Gains. We have Big Technology shares, higher. Nasdaq is up one half of 1 at the moment. S p 500 gaining half of that, thousand like her of the day up 2 10 1 10 of 1 . Materials, various agricultural stock has led gains here. Thats notably ahead of what is be a canadian rates increase coming up later this week. Many of the fertilizer stocks are well out of that following that. O watching bond markets there is a lot of discussion about what is going to happen now. Increase inseen an yields over the last couple weeks. There is debate about whether that will continue or not, julia, with a lot of split opinions. Jennifer im sure they will julia im sure they will continue to be split. Lets move on to our top story today in washington. Congress is returning from the july 4 recess tax reform and other key agenda items before another recess in august. Joining us now from capitol hill is sahil kapur. Weeks forritical few this august recess. Only to deal with what is going cant tackle critical tax reform either. Sahil absolutely. Right now, the senate is still healthcare debate. And have an endgame towards 50 votes to pass this through the senate. Over the last week, when the energynt home was certainly on the left, more 2pac pass it. Senators have been sending this in the last few days, they are not closer to getting votes. Once they get back from the august recess, they have another set of deadlines. It will be difficult to do anything while they try to get those things done. S Health Care reform not going to happen, so tax reform will not happen . Is there anyone not participating in the progress who actually thinks theres a real chance this will happen before the end of the year . Less and less so. I dont want to say hope is lost among everybody, but its impossible to deny the fact that prospects are diminishing, by virtue of the fact that health care didnt get done by the Indigenous Health republicans had hoped. They hoped to spend this month moving legislation forward. The mere fact that time is running out is important. Republican leaders have widely a Political Climate republicans are dealing with. It is going to be difficult. There was a fullblown belief that that come in early. Paul ryan remains confident that this transformational tax reform is coming. Surprise surprise there. There calls seemingly that the Office Recess should be cant. What are you hearing on this . Unlikely. Tremely i should say first, its unusual dish ers of the party to face difficulties from within their own party to cancel the august recess. Its usually something the embarrassarty does to the majority. This is unusual, to suggest that republicans dont feel like they can go home and august. How do you tell your youreuents that overriding priority has been to replace the Affordable Care act, and you have all offices and cant get it done. Theres no it a spin that politically. I dont see any indication that Republican Leaders will go for this. Its critically important, jobs. Think you very much, sahil kapur. Talksent donald trump about the administrations ties to russia. The kremlin connected russian lawyer during his fathers president ial campaign. The lawyer had offered to provide potentially damaging information on hillary clinton. Shannon pettypiece joins us now from rdc. Spree but skull this, in nothing burger, which has become one of his favorite phrases. You have people on the left calling trajan. Wheres the truth life . What we know about this meeting and its significance . The story keeps evolving after previous put up that nothing burger comment, we learned even more about it. About been meeting this Adoption Program that the russians had stopped in response to a law human rights violators. As the New York Times found that more information on the report on saturday, we learned that the meeting was initially supposed to be for this russian lawyer to give Opposition Research to the dirt theyaign, the allegedly had on hillary clinton, and that is why donald junior took the meeting and included Jared Kushner comment paul manafort. Oppositionat information was discussed, alleging that the Clinton Campaign got money from russia, then the conversation evolved into this Adoption Program. The characterization has changed. Are learning the meeting was set up by a publicist on behalf of his client, azerbaijani and pop singer there is that new twist to it, how that connects to this russian lawyer. How i think we are still only seeing a small piece of a larger picture here. What exactly constitutes collusion . If this woman in fact offer this information, and then the meeting happened, what exactly constitutes collusion, and what is illegal here potentially . Maybe, if you could see it is shady, or you could see it as, thats what campaigns do. The issue here legally is that the Campaign Finance law that says you are not allowed to accept any contributions from a foreign national. There is that information could be considered a thing of value, so that would be inappropriate for a camp aimed to be accepting Opposition Research from a foreign national. It can be debated whether that happens here, whether this was knowingly accept the information, whether it came out of the blue, whether they even knew they were meeting with a russian national. Does a lot of things we dont know. One potential legal element here could be this violation of the campaign law, where you are not supposed to accept this. The layer involved made a point to say they never talked about the campaign. Questions than answers. Lets check Bloomberg Markets first news. Mark secretary of state rex knowledge and severe strains in u. S. Turkish relations following a meeting and istanbul with the turkish president , erdogan. Tillerson admitted the relationship has been, under some stress for some time. I hope we are beginning to put it on the end. Hours ofknow about six meetings on three different occasions with president duda one. Think each meeting, things are getting a little better in terms of tone between us. We are getting beginning to rebuild some of the trust we lost in one another. Secretary tillerson added washington they must strengthen their relationship going forward. Syrian officials arrived in geneva today for ceasefire talks, and of bringing an end to the countrys toughest things to vote civil war. This is the seventh round of indirect talks is to fund in the store shelves back and forth between syrian and other leaders. This comes for the first of a ceasefire in southern syria the u. S. , russia, and jordan. Basically broadly holding. Disagreements, there is adjustment. We are watching that very carefully. At the very beginning there were sporadic incidents, but we can still say we believe that they have chances of working out. Less than a month after brexit negotiations began, the European Unions parliament is threatening a veto over the rights of eu citizens in the u. K. The legislature says the british also would reduce the you citizens quote, secondclass status. The number of uninsured u. S. Adults has increased right 2 million this year, according to a widely considered indicator, to gallup share care wellbeing index. They found losses were concentrated on younger adults and people buying their own policies. Under currently proposed republican legislation, an estimated 22 million additional americans will, uninsured. Global news 24 hours a day powered by more than 2700 journalists and analysts in more than 120 countries. I am mark crumpton, this is bloomberg. Julia . Thank you. Coming up, earning season kicks off with a growing chorus of voices including janet yellen. Is bloomberg. This is bloomberg. John this is Bloomberg Markets. Earnings investors roll out this week. Theyre also looking to Janet Yellens semiannual testimony to congress, starting wednesday. Here to discuss this is the bloombergtegist for intelligence. Great to see you. Earnings are projected to rise. The question is, will valuations and this is expand . So far so good this year. Valuations are well above longterm averages, and s p 500 forward earnings valuation of about 17. 5 forward earnings its about 15. 5, a longterm average. Think we are looking at that are earnings ahead. Investors can get confirmation that they continue to rise in the quarters ahead, especially in the first half of 2018. Comparisons will get a lot harder. Thats in the first half of 2018 things are looking up, better. Youll feel more confident. Thats i think is enough to keep investors interested trade i love the point you make about valuations, when you talk about earnings. A looks increasingly lessso. Such an important thing. Get caughtinvestors up in these numbers, owed 17. 5 times earnings, so far above the longterm average. When you look at stocks relative to yields you can get pulled his chart up. This one shows us tenyear treasury yield, one option. On the longterm average, stocks are still paying you a lot more than bonds earnings adjusted basis. Of thee dividend yield s p 500, 2. 1 , thats close to what you can get for treasury bond without roads. Its dividend deal those will grow over time as stock prices and earnings growth. The relative argument is still in favor of bonds. Still relatively attractive to most asset classes. There are sectors that, even if you look at comparables, they look expensive. Lost summer months as well energy here is one. An eyeopening there to sectors extremely expensive. Energy is one as stock prices bounced back over the last year, and earnings have yet to justify the stock price expansion. Stable, whichs you might not think about. Over this cycle, weve seen an influx of investors into yield oriented stocks. Offer astocks highyield to the s p 500 index. Tos but up the prices offset that extremely high , theres low valuations people are trading below longterm valuations. Toes onestory, there are opportunities underlying this. Thats for the action has been. Lets talk about rates for a moment with Janet Yellens testimony coming up later this week. Do you think we will get any guidance on wednesday . I dont know that the bond prices have been driven up this year. Steady come aen easy as it goes. Heres what we have actually done. They will stay easy, continue to reinflate. Their ships and asset prices theres 25 basis points increases in yield as you mentioned. It seems like the propensity stc, it isook at the simply not there. Its a great point. An financials of price and expectation for bond yields to continue. Financials of s p 500. Thats what we usually say. We will talk goldman in a while. Thank you. Janet yellens report on congress this week, to the house wednesday, senate thursday. Catch that both based on bloomberg at 10 00 a. M. Eastern. Still ahead, primetime, amazons cargo planes getting ready to support the companys annual deals. Were putting the focus on tech next. This is bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Markets. Week, we will focus on technology by showcasing the depth of bloombergs expertise and global reach. We begin with news that chinas government has its Major Telecommunications companies blocking access to Virtual Private Network. Amazons prime air cargo planes are fueled and ready to support the companys third installment of prime day. Emily chang is in San Francisco for more on these tech stories. Us. K you for joining what exactly is the Chinese Government doing here . This is a trend we have been seeing. What is this latest step in tale . Havee appearance in china always operated in a legal gray area. This is where an individual can access the Global Internet unfiltered. The means you can get access to sites like facebook or twitter or the New York Times, that are blocked in china, thanks to a Virtual Private Network. We have learned theyre cracking down on individual access to vpns. Notified some of these Virtual Private Network providers, that they will be shutting down and suspending operations. What we have gleaned, this doesnt necessarily apply to multinational corporations, companies doing local business in china, that rely heavily on Virtual Private Networks. But it can be a big blow to individuals, anybody living in china that wants access to these services. The way it works having lived in china for several years you use a Virtual Private Network to get access to sites you want, then in a few months, the vpn stop working for some unknown reason treaty move on to another vpn. It can certainly be very crippling if youre trying to get access to these unfiltered websites. That leads me to the question i wanted to ask. Are there still ways to get around this . Youre making its its about individual censorship. What does it mean for google, facebook . Whens unclear exactly this goes into effect, however one will be affected. They say by february 1 of next year, Virtual Private Networks will be dan. As for facebook or google, these that havent been accessible and general for many many years in china area facebook was shut down there in 2008. It has been a long time. I would be more concerned about Companies Operating in china , airbnb for example, trying to start its new big surface. They are running their Global Business for a company like facebook, theyve been with us for the last eight years. Might not have such a big impact on a company like that. , a pageng to amazon that is taken from china in the form of creating a holiday around buying stuff, like singles day with prime day the company has aggressively pushed people trying to buy stuff via voice using alexa. In workout that will thus last year. How Higher Expectations this year . This is the third year in a row for prime day. The first year, everybody was very skeptical. Amazon had been fairly close about releasing data in terms of actually how much sales secondyear sales increased 60 . Last year they said they sold more on prime day last year than they did it last friday and cyber monday. We can only expect that this year it will be even bigger. Of course they are pushing amazon echo, you could big deal on a coke, deals on voice be a europe echo. If you have echo you get this its all part of amazon prime trying to push the us into their ecosystem tom to get us to use more amazon products. You can only participate in prime day if you are a prime member. You guys showed that shot of the prime air jet. They have 40 jets on standby that they have been leasing for the last several to come from and shipping that happens via ups and fedex. They want everything to get to you on time. Well see where the chips fall. It starts tonight. Tonight 00 p. M. Eastern, 6 00 a. M. Pacific. Will see what i will get. [laughter] think you very much. Will take aad, we look at metals today. This is bloomberg. From bloomberg World Headquarters, im julie hyman. Commodity markets currently closing in new york. Lets look at some of todays movers. S have been on fire. Heat wave coming to the Northern Plains sparking worries about dry air conditions for the second half of the month. And sending the higher wheat corn and store beans up by 2 . We are taking a look at oil which has been rebounding during the course of the trading day. Their lowest in 12 years, investors are also pondering the libyaility of nigeria and agreeing to production. They were not part of the original opec agreement. It wasnt helping oil earlier in the session but we saw it reverse midmorning. Gold has been bouncing around today looking to end eight weeks straight of decline. Even ifin less demand there is simmering geopolitical tension. We also have a quite high short interests in gold right now. Surging to the highest level since early 2016 and long on gold has dropped. Heres the short interest. We see it at the highest level since 2016. Will be sticking with Precious Metals. The ceo of a canadian money manager focusing on Precious Metals and mining among other areas. Thank you for joining us on the show. Lets talk a bit about businesses health. Given that we have the introduction on gold, your chairman was a renowned gold person. Are you still aggressive about gold is a company in light of his leaving . Things havent changed. Where very constructive longterm and we will shy why from shy away from price targets today. Gold is a hedge for other asset markets. It is a small market. When people start accumulating it, it can have a very good price reaction. Gold,re are you waiting say, to the beginning of the year. With the focus on higher rates, gold is in a bit of a correction. Speculative positions have been increasing, which is a positive factor. For our equities in particular, talks in the markets that we that they haveve been in a year down cycle right now. They are getting to some very good price points. Seeing higherhaps yields and some of the bond markets globally as well, does that not give you any kind of laws for concern . It will give us pause short term. Before you start getting some reactions otherwise. Gold is quite a practical hedge. Are, at some point, higher rates will force corrections and gold will start reacting better. What about other Precious Metals . Silver has not been behaving well as of late. Are there any among those that are even more tractive than gold . We like those markets. Speaking, all of them are in a very comfortable supply demand balance. Those marketsen that are kind of hybrid industrial uses are balanced, they get squeezed a lot quicker. We like silver, platinum, and palladium a lot. Talk to me about the business because weve seen a number of changes. The chairman leaving. The mutual fund and the hedge fund business. We talked about the base in particular. What is the plan to improve margins to generate the best return . Ive seen quotes from analysts saying your capital rich and earnings poor. How do you change that . It is a challenge. In canada, we had a small Asset Management business competing against the banks. The channels are very hard to get into. We have People Associated with that business. We will never be number one in canada and lets focus on what we can go after globally. That is the focus, real asset mining and metals. We do have a very strong Balance Sheet and it will get stronger after this divestiture. Over half of the market capitalizations are represented by cash and investments. The challenge will be to turn that into constructive earnings. It is a good market to invest in our sector now. Most investors out there, they are scratching their heads, worrying about the developments whether it is macro or fundamentals. In this market, valuations are pretty tough. Is as a tradet market . In demand inise is the sector we are in. Its a volatile sector and requires a lot of expertise, technically. I believe that our margins are sustainable, going forward, and that the businesses grow ball. Many investors are looking at it as a hedge for other markets. Talk about you diversification, this is a relatively minor area for you you guys something have just invested in as well. A Canadian Joint venture with canada royalty. Talk about the thinking behind that. Pun but its the seed investment only. We are looking from the perspective we do have lending operations or a bunch of Natural Resource businesses. It is a Natural Resource at the end of the day, so lending practices are suited to earn some good returns in the air. We are testing it out at this stage to see how real it is. It looks like it will be a large and growing business. We just have to see how the deals progress. Will there be any more kind of diversification . Or are you battening down the hatches . Other areasking at related to Precious Metals. Energy, timber, agriculture. You mentioned it a few minutes ago. Agricultural producers not a lot of experts in that area and its a globally oriented business. Your company ipo was 10. What is the longerterm plan to get back to that price . When the company went public, it was the era of two in 20 where we had extremely Strong Performance fees. And when youre alone, we generated 200 million in performance fees. Difficult to build that up again. The task is in front of us. We think we can do it. I dont know if we can get to of with the , iestment of the capital think we can build a significantly larger earnings base. Julia that just takes time. Julie lets tech check the headlines with mark crumpton. With congress returning from the july for recess, President Trump is pressuring republicans in the senate to act on health care. The gop effort has stalled and support is eroding for majority leader Mitch Mcconnells bill. There are calls for moderate republicans for a bipartisan approach that mcconnell admits he might be forced to do if he cant gather enough votes. Threats against congress including last months shooting are on the rise. The chief house Law Enforcement official says Capitol Police have investigated more threats against members of congress this year than in all of 2016. There have been 950 threats as opposed to 902 last year. Causing major damage, there are no reports of casualties. 28 Million People visit the markets 1000 shops, restaurants, and bars every year. The fire in 2008 nearly destroyed the market, closing it down. A British Court has given the parents of charlie guard a chance to present fresh evidence that theyre terminally ill son should receive experimental treatment. Previous Court Rulings have said the child could not receive treatment for a rare genetic disease and that he should be taken off of life support. The application came after pope francis and President TrumpBrought International attention to the case. News 24 hours a day powered by 2700 journalists and analysts in over 120 countries. Im mark crumpton. This is bloomberg. Julia making 400 return in less than a month, welcome to the world of crypto currency. How legal are they . Step in . Regulators from new york, this is bloomberg. Julia this is Bloomberg Markets. Im julia chatterley. Julie julie hyman. Lets check on markets with abigail doolittle. Abigail small gains for the dow in the s p 500 up between. 1 and. 2 . Small gains and losses, but look at the nasdaq leading the way on. 5 . Tech is a top sector today, but not the top sector. The top sector is the material space and we have lots of gainers in the material space including Mosaic Industries and fmg court. And our Bloomberg Intelligence analyst earlier told me that he believes this has to do with isengthening the green which rallying on drought concerns in warm weather out west. Richard board thinks it has to do with the weather. Striken a potential other competitors mine in chile. Les, the ceos meeting with indonesian officials to work out concerns there. Another stock popping higher on the day. Here is an intraday chart up. 75 . Despite a bloomberg report saying the f35 program is to billion, a new pentagon estimate. Weapons expensive program out there, but investors seem to be ok with this. A report earnings next week. And speaking of earnings, lets talk to the bloomberg very quickly and look. We have a really great chart happening here. Growth fromave the earnings season year over year back here in 2015 and 2016. Order, up 14 . Look down on bottom, maybe something has got to give between earnings performance and price of stock, where they are trading. Julia traders turned it into 283 million in just one months time. Using3 profit was made along with following a very long digital marker. I will not try to pronounce the number of digits. Talk us through this story. It is basically holding the currency for us. , ahave very long characters completely random collection. We spent a few days trying to work out who might be the biggest holders of this. It is pretty much impossible to identify it. A slightly mysterious instagram post. The story can go through who would be the most likely people making the big money. It is a 400 return in a month. Its just basically impossible. That is by design. One we know is a guy named mike not a gratz and he has 10 of his net worth in crypto currencies. The very young russian, 23. On reddit, not entirely reliable. Julie in terms of the secrecy surrounding it, and you have a lot of people that buy and invest, doing it just because it is secret. Is there a Tipping Point coming were one of the parties will win out . Does it look like anything will change . They are pretty much at loggerheads. You have just a different form. F currency they have this regulation here. Julie giving it credibility. Some people say i dont want to get involved. On the flipside, philosophic seat philosophically, this is where bitcoin came from. Using things like ransomware attacked they demand to be paid. Regulators have to step in and either of those two parties dont get a choice. The European Parliament has said, this currencies cant be anonymous. Digging figuring out who is behind these surges of numbers. Its time for the Bloomberg Business flash, a look at some of the biggest stories in the news right now. Abercrombie fitch take trading down 20 . Familiar to people with the matter, the retailer had begun preliminary discussions regarding a transaction. The company has opted instead to rigorous execution of the companys business plan. These outlets one congressional approval to negotiate with facebook which they blame for dominating on blaine online advertising. That is according to Research Firm he marketer. They want a bigger share of advertising. Money for a new growth fund backed by votto. Bono. The rise fund seeks to spend 2 million on ventures offering environmental and social benefits as well as financial returns. The swiss bank pledging to raise 5 million over five years. And that is your business flash update. That adds to Elevation Partners which is another financial venture. More on investing ahead, further signs that active managers are falling behind their passive counterparts. We will dig into the numbers next. This is bloomberg. Julia this is Bloomberg Markets, im julia chatterley. Julie im julie hyman. All major averages are in the green. Accra Fund Managers have returned an average of less than 1 . It joining us with a look at what is holding them back, she leads the u. S. Investing team. Easy if you stick your money in an etf for an index fund this year. What went wrong with some of the more active macro funds . Some things are tied to the trump administrations win in november. Rising in the dollar has slumped. Another is that a lot of the managers off that when trump did not get some of his policies through, markets would actually take a dive. And the markets have continued to climb. Beenef index fund has better than paying to and 20 out of the hedge fund. You pull up these numbers in the outflows we have seen in q1 from discretionary managers, its being added to a computerdriven fund. The hsr data. It continues. Were at an Inflection Point where active managers are having to show their value. For many managers, their right they are right where computers are able to come in. That is really what macro managers have done over the years. , lot of them like george soros they made their money by spotting the trends early and some of the computers are taking over and doing that faster and better. We see very low volatility. A lot of managers are saying time when will be a volatility comes back and may be at that point, they can grab does problems again. Data is showing over the past five years on average, they havent really made any money. We have talked a lot of them going under. What about the survival of the macro funds when they have not been doing well for quite some time . They charge the highest fees in the industry. They have had that cushion there for a while. And the other, really, is that it continues to make some money if youre ready to make macro isagers betting that there some volatility there. We have seen a few bright spots. Julia actually finding riskadjusted returns is incredibly hard. Will they be trading more or less, taking more or less risk. That, they seeing take on more risk. They were saying managers with bigger risk comes the potential for bigger mistakes. They go to that spot of the risk return. If im going to pay the higher fees, we need to return. As we see fit. T julia coming up, just add butter. Thats the advice from Goldman Sachs, a regular at a restaurant. It we have more ahead in new york from is bloomberg. And this is bloomberg. Julia is 3 p. M. In new york, 12 p. M. In San Francisco, 8 p. M. In london. Im julia chatterley. Julie and im julie hyman in for scarlet fu. Welcome to Bloomberg Markets. Were live in a bloomberg World Headquarters in new york. Over the next hour, these are the stories we are covering in new york and around the world. Tech shares rebound from last weeks selloff. We will navigate you through the close of trading as earnings and janet yellen come into focus. Computers on the lookout for potential chaos. And new jersey commuters on alert. And in banking, we have the earnings season. Just add butter. Lets get a check on markets. Nothing to huge but we were lower earlier. Youre probably pleased by the fact that were looking at more positive training. The nasdaq really leading the way up. 5 . Lets look at one of the bigger stories on the day. The better path for them is to focus on rigorous execution of their business plan. The stock is down 85 from the peak back in 2008. Comesst buy down 6 , this after earlier they said amazon is building its own geek squad in competition to best buy. We have maryland, and defend the shares of best buy and it doesnt seem to be helping so much right now. On pace for the worst day since may of 2016. Amazon gaining on this news. We will take a look at some of the tech strengths again, top sectors on the day. Big gains here and it appears that investors are buying the debt, sticking a toe back in after some of the recent weaknesses. Research, they told me that he really see this as the matter that investors are seeing a bit of a risk and they are going toward the triedandtrue names and technology. Were certainly seeing this. One factor or topic that is coming up quite a bit this year, we look at g btv 96. He has a great point about volatility. It is a year to in blue. Down near 11. Have one ofe, we the points that in march, it went lower than the s p 500. Point, its more than five. See some volatility ahead not just for technology but the markets overall. We could see a summer of 2015 type of event. Something to keep an eye on. Lets move on. Just add butter. That is the advice from Goldman Sachs cohead of trading from a town hall in april. He compares clients to regulars at restaurants say they give their favorite customers free addons and so should Goldman Sachs according to people who attended the event. , just add with more butter. Be nice to your clients. It has become a rallying cry in the last couple of months. It is on baseball caps. I dont know how widely the baseball caps were distributed but i know Senior Leaders have them on their desks. Julia in addition to some of the concerns we have, we see fixed income suffering in the last several earnings quarters. They can have better relationship. A think the First Quarter trading results. There has been a concern, a mood inside goldman that hasnt been entirely positive. They sort of bring some optimism and positivity back. And i think he would admit that there is something they could do better on. Things they are probably happy with. But it is true. The Goldman Trading business is having some challenges and this is one attempt to try to fix those. On the flipside, everybodys trading business is suffering. Fixed look at that income, there is a lot of weakness. Is it even more cutthroat at this point between the banks to try to gain that little bit of market share that they can through these types of measures . The First Quarter was better than goldman. They beat expectations. Certainly compared to precrisis , it is downers Something Like 40 . Each desk is having to do more with less, having to come up with revenue. They are not used to having to come up with that. Everybodyressure on and theres a lot of interest in each specific client. If Morgan Stanley can do better by that clients, they dont have a ton of money to throw around to goldman and jpmorgan. It means, in this example, you know, they are hurting a little bit. Do we have an indication yet that this has worked . If you look at the estimate for Goldman Sachs in the earnings we are about to get, are there signs of rye grass . Signs of progress . Quarterecond doesnt look good for goldman or their competitors. I spoke to some people at townhall or who watched it on tape to video after the fact. But they said to me is, its a little too soon to tell. Behind people coalescing the slogan but to see it take shape in a month or two months is too early. It is demoralizing in this environment. Gainskelihood is forming according to estimates. Stock and bond trading. I dont think they expect them to beat goldman on bond trading. We think goldman will bring in more in that business again. But Morgan Stanley and stock trading is far ahead. Julie we will be watching all the numbers. Lets get a check of the headlines with mark crumpton. Trumps eldest son said he is willing to communicate with the Senate Intelligence committee. Donald trump junior tweeted today that he is happy to work with the committee to pass on what i know. The republican on the panel said he should be interviewed. Susan collins said the committee should talk to trump about a meeting he and other Trump Associates had last year with a russian lawyer reportedly giving information about democratic president ial candidate hillary clinton. The racks Prime Minister returned to muzzle today, hoisting the iraqi flag. Following nine months of combat. Speaking from a small base where heavy fighting has been underway for days, they said iraqi forces have achieved victory by the they of our martyrs. Launched a massive operation to retake muzzle in october. In recent days, they had confined the remaining militants in an area less than a square mile. Theresa may will call on opposition lawmakers to steer britain out of the european union. In her speech tomorrow, she will restate her Political Mission to tackle injustice invested interests. Social and economic reform is needed to make a success of wrecks it but will cross partyk cooperation to deliver it. Officials are hoping this afternoons commute goes smoothly after an uneventful start to the socalled summer of hell. There were no major problems this morning as amtrak began for signals in penn station. It is expected to last for eight weeks. Mobile news 24 hours a day powered by 2700 journalists and in over 120 countries. Im mark crumpton. This is bloomberg. Julia more to come on the commute from penn station. Patients prepare for the evening rush and we are alive with what to expect. From new york, this is bloomberg. Juliajulie this is Bloomberg Markets. Julia time for the Bloomberg Business flash, a look at some of the biggest business stories in the news right now. A battle is brewing over electricity. Elliott management has promised a long takeover battle if Warren Buffett does not improve the terms. Creditor of largest encores bankrupt Parent Energy futures and wants the Texas Company to allow alternative proposals with better valuations. They have agreed on a route agreed on a revised merger to create a Holding Company to operate regulated [indiscernible] the board of both Energy Giants unanimously approved a stock to stock merger. Reportedly moving forward with a ofposal to increase control the u. S. Subprime auto loan units. Thats according to people familiar with the matter. This comes after a stress test last month. 59 of the units, looking to require a stake work around 450 million. And thats your business flash update. Dubbed theas been summer of hell for commuters using penn station after eight weeks of major upgrade work. Underway today. I look at how things are going so far. Thank you for braving penn station for us today. Off is build . How many problems did people see this morning . It has been dubbed the summer of hell but the morning commute here seems to go pretty well. There were some brief and minor delays the people seemed to be able to get into manhattan without to many problems. We spoke with commuters earlier today and they were prepared. They took earlier trains and knew they would face overcrowding. But they were happy with what happened, given the circumstances. Them were more concerned about the evening commute about to get underway because there were fewer options when it comes to getting out of manhattan. Julia what do people say about the inconvenience . Do they recognize this is essential infrastructure . , doannoying as it can be they actually understand . I think there is a fair amount of understanding from commuters and a fair amount of relief that work is actually being done. They have been a number of problems at penn station. A lack of investment for decades, three train derailment. Those of the things that really prompted this kind of emergency work. I think a lot of people want to make sure that though work does get done by september as planned. Eight weeks in the summer of hell and it continues to be hellish after that. There are still a lot of problems and a lot more that needs to be done. Problems in a lack of Infrastructure Spending in new york and across the u. S. Miss. E into what did you she will ask him about that september timeline. Interesting to hear what they have to say. Point abouta great Infrastructure Spending in new york and beyond in the United States. Earlier today, we got an investors take on infrastructure in america. It is fascinating. A poster child for the state of american infrastructure. And you see a patchwork activity this summer to keep it safe. Theres another Investment Firm decades from now that they continue to deal with on a daily basis. To deal with it requires tough political decisions, but the cost is borne of commuters. I think its only when you get this safety crisis, a really extreme consumer commuter. Tough. The challenge for President Trump in the administration is coming forward with the program that will get the capital to move in short order. They tend to say i like Energy Infrastructure and i like alternative energy. They dont, they want to rebuild the tracks. Its got to be procured in a way that makes sense. Just saying to come and put money, what the government and what the agency needs to do is to develop a project that makes it clear. A project with boundaries that one can bring contractors and Equipment Suppliers to bear. But that is tough. It takes three to five years to ppplize any substantive type program. If existing agencies cash. Ourselves. Like , people areis looking at the United States and the administration because it is an energy power market. That is what we have invested in this country. But the market is open and ready. Is that really the essential difference . There are countries with cash ready to go. Its the project. If youve deregulated markets and youve got private sector activity, utilities, the big oil. In a sense, it has geared up for the private capital. This is not about capital. Its about the project. A perception here at least that it is very different than europe or asia. Theyre infrastructure is much better than ours. Is that correct . What are we lacking that they have . General statement, it is fair to say there is more investment on a relative basis in europe and in asia. Its invested in many different ways. A lot of it is direct government expenditure. Go to somewhere like europe. Its been going on since the early to mid 90s. You have very substantial Publicprivate Partnership programs. They will be addressed by the private sector. Jim on daybreak america earlier today. It time to bank on financials ahead of earnings . Or financials overall . The options guest has that trade next. This is bloomberg. Julia and it is now time for options insight. Take it away. Jim fromining me is him cam holdings and we will talk financials here. Were coming up into earnings season. It you had a trade looking ahead to the stress test which the banks all past. So what is going to happen now with earnings . We were talking about training revenues. Were really looking at the group. Earnings really began to ramp up ,ater this week with financials 60 of the s p 500 constituents reporting by the end of the month. Week, 30d of next financial components of the s p 500 including this friday, jpmorgan, wells fargo, and city all reporting their secondquarter earnings. We told our clients to go out and buy some october calls to play upside into and through the fed stress test through the major banks. And there is really nice momentum to this group. We have similar thinking coming into the beginning of earnings season. Julie we had financials rally relatively strongly along with the steepening of the yield curve. We have janet yellen speaking this week. Theres a lot of debate about whether we are going to continue to see that steepening and there are bats it will not continue. How are you factoring that into this play when you are looking out again in an october call on the financials . The 10 yearsaid yield versus the three months and 20 basis points the last couple of weeks. That increases net interest margins accepted as positive for the banks. But there are some other factors. We do have a graph for you guys looking across sectors where we aggregate the single names. And something of note, health care as well. The best performing sectors. What is interesting about , the total open interest of individual stocks has declined 10 . Financials and health care are clustered toward the lower right. Theres not a lot of open interest. It has begun to break out and it has declined. The calls for that open interest has decreased. Theres not a lot of by and that the Financial Sector is breaking out. Technically speaking, we are up around this 25 level. Waslast time it was here 2007. We are looking at a decadelong breakout. Still in october, we showed calls weeks ago for clients. Stay in october, go out and buy 26 calls. Its about a simple and option traders you can do. You pay . 43 for those and have exposure into earnings but the long return breakout, if we are right, if this is a catalyst, theres a multiyear breakout ahead. Out. well see what works i like that. Very much, julie. It still ahead, staying on track with the summer of hell. Outrage. Nt commuter from new york, this is bloomberg. Whoooo. Youre searching for something. Like the perfect deal. On the perfect hotel. So wouldnt it be perfect if there was a single site where you could find the right hotel for you at the best price . There is. Because tripadvisor now compares prices from over 200 booking sites. To save you up to 30 . On the hotel you want. Trust this birds words. Tripadvisor. The latest reviews. The lowest prices. Mark im mark crumpton. Time for first word news. Syrian officials arrived in geneva today for ceasefire talks aimed at bringing an end to the countries civil war this is the seventh round of indirect u. N. As you and envoy envoy shuttle between leaders. A ceasefire in southern syria brokered by the United States, russia, and jordan. They are basically broadly Holding Quite well. I know in all these agreements, there is a time of adjustment. We are watching that very carefully. There have been incidents at the beginning and sporadic incidents but we can still say that we believe that there are fairly good chances of working out. Protesters walked the streets of venezuelas capital city caracas today in the latest demonstration against president nicolas maduro. Opposition leader sounded the call for supporters to stop vehicle traffic for 10 hou