00:00How do you think of oil, and how do you think about what's happening in the Middle East?
00:04If this lasts three weeks, four weeks, even like two months, are we going to be in trouble?
00:09It's a big deal, and every day it gets a little bit worse.
00:12I don't know how it's going to be resolved.
00:13I hope it gets resolved in the interest of the United States and against the Iranian regime, not the Iranian
00:19people.
00:20But I don't know.
00:21But I read something today that was very interesting, that China reduced their demand by 5 million barrels a day.
00:28Today, America increases exports by 3 million barrels a day.
00:32That 8 million has made up for a lot of what was lost, which is maybe why it hasn't been
00:35as severe as people think.
00:37On the other hand, inventories are coming down.
00:41Gas wells may have to be closed and stuff like that.
00:43So it gets a little more serious every day.
00:46That day that it becomes a disaster has been pushed out quite further than we thought at the beginning.
00:51Do you worry about the U.S. consumer?
00:53Are you seeing signs of stress anywhere?
00:56I think the upper end, the top 50%, lots of money, jobs, wages going up, home prices going up, dock
01:03prices going up.
01:04They're spending like they should.
01:06They're buying, they're traveling.
01:07The bottom 30% is, I'm going to say, struggling a little bit.
01:11It's not a massive downturn.
01:13And, of course, we'd like to help them.
01:14But their wages have not gone up.
01:16But more important than that, they still have jobs.
01:18And they don't have too much debt.
01:20They still have jobs.
01:21And at the end of the day, what's going to drive consumer spending, consumer sentiment, that part of corporate profits
01:27will be jobs.
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