Kelly Evans: For more let's get out to Morgan Stanley’s tech, media and telecom conference with a special guest
Deirdre Bosa: Hey Kelly, thank you so much. That’s right, I’m joined by Dan Simkowitz. He is the co-president at Morgan Stanley. I appreciate you making the time.
Dan Simkowitz: It's great to be here.
Deirdre Bosa: Over the next few days, you guys really have a who's who in the tech world. You've got Dario Amodei of Anthropic tonight, Elon Musk dropping in virtually tomorrow, Sam Altman on Thursday, CFO's of mega caps, what is sort of the high level take away so far?
Dan Simkowitz: Yeah I think though what most importantly in the power of innovation how important it is to the markets and to the broader economy I think that is on display. You've got tariffs dominating some discussions but the tech sector today – I’m not sure we can take full credit for it – outperforming pretty significantly so that's number one. The second is a bit of a Morgan Stanley element, which is this, the purest expression of our strategy, we you know it's pretty simple and straightforward. What we do, we help clients allocate capital, manage their capital, and so we have 1800 investors here at the conference at all-time record. They're engaging with 360 companies. It's the 30th year we've been doing it. I've been coming to the conference for 25 years and what you're just seeing is that, again, the power of innovation and how that can create resiliency for example in the US economy but especially growth. And I think you're hearing what we're sensing in a little survey action, 90% of the companies are pretty upbeat in their prospects the technology market and the demand for their services. So it's a pretty exciting time despite all the market volatility that we're we're working through certainly in the backdrop.
Deirdre Bosa: When you're at the Palace Hotel surrounded by all these tech leaders it can feel like you're in a bubble. But I noticed that some walk by, they've been taking note of the sell off today all the tariffs. How much is that factoring into some of the discussions today and yesterday?
Dan Simkowitz: I think to a degree you’ve got, we're in those early days and I think we still have a way to go around trade policy being implemented by the administration that's creating volatility. That volatility impacts traders, it impacts investors and I think on the trading side whether you're FX or interest rate trader or now some an equity trader especially globally you gotta deal with that day-to-day. Some of the people have to do that themselves here at the conference, some have trading desks that they have to engage in but on the investing side, I think they're trying to think long term which is what is going to be the impact to their companies. But especially their supply chain right and then finally for a company you got to think about, you know, do I have to redo my income statement and my forecasting around tariffs and then do I also have to think about longer term supply chain.
I think equilibrium, you know we may not reverse, but hit equilibrium around some of the the policies and then some of the bullishness that I think was out there I think represented for example by Stan Druckenmiller and in December, which is this is going to be the most pro growth pro action D Reg and environment, that that's still sitting out there. But right now I think it's on pause sort of adjust to a new trade regime.
Deirdre Bosa: Right and I wonder sort of what is the Morgan Stanley view on the economy. We're less than just a few months into the new administration. I heard Jamie Dimon speak at Stanford last Friday he was starting to get worried about inflation. What's your view and some of the uncertainties potentially around these new economic policies?
Dan Simkowitz: I think if our concern is more on growth than it would be on inflation. I think what you've seen for example in the market is attuned to that you know. The 10-year treasury has gone from 460 down to four one just in the last week or two, the probability of rate cuts has emerged back and so I think what you're seeing in the marketplace in the last few days there's some concern around 25/26 growth and so I think that is on investors minds and corporates minds as well.
Brian Novak, Head of U.S. Internet Research: 2025 TMT Conference, San Francisco | Morgan Stanley
