00:00With the new set of tariff measures that the president has introduced, Mike, do you think that inflation becomes a bigger risk as we head into the end of the year while the president tries to get the Federal Reserve chair to lower interest rates?
00:16Absolutely. I mean, listen, the first thing I'll say is that I know this can be somewhat controversial, but the Fed is pretty apolitical.
00:22They just want to do what's right around inflation and employment. And I don't think they're going to be pressured by any administration, which is the right thing to do.
00:30And I do think inflation could be cause for concern as you look out towards the second half of this year.
00:39You know, I think we saw in the data there was a huge amount of front loading of inventory in Q1.
00:45That was to get ahead of higher input costs. And we've seen the input cost data go up quite a bit since then.
00:51And so, you know, whether it's, you know, manufacturers or whatever, you know, whoever's selling anything.
01:02I mean, I have two coffee shops and we sell coffee, obviously. And, you know, costs are going up and you got to either take that on your margins or pass it through to consumers.
01:10And the reality is you're probably going to get a little bit of both and that's going to hurt both corporate margins.
01:15It's also going to hurt inflation. And so I think the Fed is doing the right thing by being data dependent and waiting.
01:20And I do think that, you know, you likely are going to see inflationary pressures later in the fall.
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