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>> companies, and trends shaping today's

complex economy. Plus, global business,

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The Bloomberg Business Week Daily

podcast with Carol Massar and Tim

[music] Stenovec on Bloomberg Radio.

>> Hi everyone, welcome to the Bloomberg

Business Week Weekend podcast. A lot

came at investors in a shortened trading

week because of Friday's Juneteenth

market holiday. We had the first FOMC

meeting presided over by new Fed chair

Kevin Warsh, the latest actions between

the US and Iran in ending that war which

brought enthusiasm back into the

markets. And speaking of that, SpaceX

continued to capture a lot of attention

on Wall Street and in the overall

narrative. For the latest, head on over

to bloomberg.com or to the Bloomberg

terminal.

>> Speaking of SpaceX, the historic

milestone on Wall Street that just might

reshape the entire late-stage private

ecosystem. We dive into the massive

SpaceX public debut, the largest IPO on

record, which is still sending

shockwaves through tech and capital

markets and has us all eyeing the next

big AI IPO. Could it be Anthropic? Could

it be OpenAI?

>> Could be.

>> That's the question. It's also one of

the macro themes, new companies, AI, and

IPOs that we're focusing on this hour.

>> Yeah, and another major macro theme, the

race to secure critical minerals and

build up their supply chains. It's all

in keeping with countries protecting

their national interests. Those critical

minerals, by the way, also important to

AI and SpaceX overall. For more on

silver, antimony, and kind of the whole

industry and what's going on, we checked

in with the CEOs of two publicly held

mining companies.

>> And our third theme this hour that's on

our radar, the push to build,

manufacture, and physically rebuild

America's industrial base from the

ground up. With the CEO over at Thompson

Research Group, she shares why we are in

what she calls, quote, the golden age of

commercial construction.

>> All of that to come, we begin with the

company that's captured our imagination

for a long time, first as a private

company, and now as one that just went

public in the largest IPO ever 1 week

ago. It's one for the history books and

one that launched SpaceX into the ranks

of the world's most valuable publicly

held companies, and this week overtook

some of its Mag 7 colleagues when it

came to market cap.

>> The offering syndicate for the IPO

included several lead underwriters,

including JPMorgan Chase. The list, to

be fair, reads like a who's who of Wall

Street's biggest and best-known banks.

For an inside look at how this all

played out, we caught up with David

Bauer, head of equity capital markets

Americas over at JPMorgan Chase. Also,

Bailey Lipschultz, Bloomberg News IPO

reporter.

>> SpaceX, of course, the largest IPO ever.

I'm just curious from from your view,

how you think market participants right

now, Dave, should be looking at this in

the context not just of other potential

IPOs in the future, but really in the

context of everything we're seeing out

there right now, the talk of people

taking money from other assets, selling

that, getting into SpaceX, just your

view.

>> I mean, first of all, for somebody in

the ECM world, what a time to be alive.

Like, these are these are great times

for the markets, and I think, unlike

other cycles we've seen where IPO

issuance has been extremely active, you

have a real catalyst forming the

investment thesis behind this. This is

the reindustrialization of America.

We're creating new ecosystems, new

economies. I mean, you think about what

space could become, what AI could

become. These are these are investment

theses [clears throat] that many people

haven't been able to invest behind

before, and so I think seeing that that

this euphoria in the IPO market is

warranted and appropriate.

>> What's the signal to the market and

market participants specifically?

>> I I I think right now you're you're

seeing that the IPO worked, and so I

think it's all it's all systems go to

make a you know, pun intended for

SpaceX, but I think if there was any

hesitancy of you know, should I continue

to buy up 20%? I think the answer is

yes. And if you look long enough,

there's a you know, this is a business

that could be generationally

transformational.

>> But thinking about the generational

transformation, Dave, when I look at the

pipeline or the kind of group of

companies that could be coming public,

they don't look like SpaceX. When you're

meeting with people maybe at your former

employer KKR talking about something in

their portfolio, number of other private

equity firms, what are they looking at?

Obviously, this is a big one for IPO

buyers, but does that translate to

someone who owns say software companies

or other companies in other industries?

>> Well, the the mega IPOs are getting the

headlines right now, but there's been a

very active and very accommodative

equity market in general throughout this

year. And putting SpaceX aside,

new issuance volumes are up almost 2X

this time from last year. And the best

preponderance of that has been other

sectors. And we've seen healthcare

coming back, we've seen biotech issuance

coming, we're seeing industrial energy.

Also, the markets are working at large.

>> those

themes still off of AI in some capacity?

If the bottleneck is power and I'm a

power company, then I at least have an

AI pitch because when I look at or talk

to folks, it's kind of like your TAM is

either infinite because you have AI

behind it or it's zero because your

software and the worry is that your kind

of total market could be at risk. How do

you think about kind of other industries

and how that fits into that?

>> Yeah, I look I don't think the market is

shut out for certain issuers.

I think it does come down to price and

having the right starting point in the

public markets. And I think there is a

bid for those other businesses.

You know, you mentioned sponsor-backed

businesses.

It's a good time to you know, what I

would say get the puck on the ice, start

it, and you know, we always say we're

advising our clients and our issuers

proof points in the public market are

worth even more than in the private

market. And so getting out there,

starting it, and you can see how, you

know, your valuation can expand as you

perform. You can get your share price to

a level that you might be more

interested in selling at, but getting,

you know, getting started can be

helpful.

>> What is it about this moment right now,

Dave, that is compelling so many of

these companies not just to go public,

but also to look into going public? And

I'm I am going back to sort of the the

companies that when they do go public

will become mega-cap companies.

>> And just to tag onto what you're saying,

opportunistic or fundamentally based?

>> I I think I think this is a more

fundamental based market. And you look

back to 2021, which felt a little bit

more technical cuz like rates were zero,

and so therefore equities were

attractive. And you had a very different

dynamic that drove that. I I think this

is much more of a fundamental. I think

the market is looking at what the next

three to five years could be. And you

know, potentially looking past some of

the near-term volatility. And it's not

saying they're ignoring downside risk,

but I think saying

there's certain positions right now that

are very much worth investing in.

There's a whole slate of new issuance

that is different than the portfolio

I've I've had in the past, and I'm going

to take that opportunity to invest in

it.

>> I am thinking though about those mega

IPOs, be it Anthropic or OpenAI. Should

we make any assumptions about their

market reception just because of what

happened with SpaceX?

>> I think

I mean [clears throat] SpaceX is is is

an end of one of itself from the fact

that no one else is doing space at this

scale at that this this velocity.

>> But it's an AI play.

>> But it is an AI play. But where I was

going with that is I do think I mean

this bodes well. If you're Anthropic and

OpenAI, you're you're applauding that

this type of market reception happened.

And you know, the the size of the deal

getting done, having it trade as well as

it did,

to me that that gives you more

confidence that the next wave could get

done in a very positive way.

>> Well, when we look at what the next few

months can look like, back to the

broadening out, is AI still the flavor

of the day if we look at some of the

reports that are out there in SK Hynix

or other large companies in the AI space

looking to tap the market like Carol was

men- mentioning because of these

tailwinds and kind of what does that

mean for this July, this August class?

>> Yeah, I look I I think we're going to

have a very active summer. Um even even

the SpaceX period of time, you know, a

lot of people thought coming in we'd

have a dearth of issuance and you'd have

a real quiet period. We did $10 billion

of equity capital outside of SpaceX last

week. And so, you know, the market was

still working. There were still a ton of

deals getting done.

Um I think this capex cycle to your

point of of AI, people still want to

invest on it and that's across equity

debt, um you know, all those facets of

capital here. And so, the public markets

are are helping that, but it's also the

private capital markets as well. You

you're we're seeing capital formation in

almost every corner of of the capital

markets.

>> You oversee ECM. I come back to the

point that Google, Alphabet, however you

want to call them, raised close to $90

billion across a suite of products. Is

that something we should expect from all

these hyperscalers who need capital to

attack the equity market and is there

any risk that that gets oversaturated?

>> I think the the the speed at which

Google was able to raise in the public

markets shows the depth um and the

capacity for you know, for for the

capital markets. And I think as long as

companies are showing an ROI and a good

use of proceeds to raise that equity

capital, the markets will be there for

them.

>> How do we know when it becomes

uncomfortable, crazy,

exuberant?

>> Frothy?

>> Frothy.

>> back to '20 and '21. At what It's easy

now to say that these were companies

that were advantageous, but in the

moment did it feel that way?

>> I go back to when you look at

fundamentals and you look at valuations,

we're not terribly stretched and we're

not at a you know, a a new point in

time. And you go back and you look at,

you know, for example, software

valuations in 2021, those were hitting

new highs and they were hitting kind of

new records of where the market was

trading at. We're not seeing that writ

large in the public markets.

>> SpaceX isn't profitable.

>> No, it's not. But it's and it's being

valued on a sales multiple for 2025

sales. And and that and I think that

some people have come and sat here and

said, you know, it's starting to feel

like you know, when we're valuing IPOs

on sales multiples, it's starting to

feel a little bit like the dot com boom.

Why is this time different?

>> Uh

well, one, I think I I think that's

unique. One, SpaceX I think is its own

animal. And I think when you're thinking

about the space economy, you're you have

to look at that in a very different way.

I don't think you're seeing the rest of

the market being valued aggressively on

a sales multiple or other metrics where

people are trying to extend and get

comfortable with it. I think these are

based more on fundamentals. It's based

on growth right now, and people are

seeing where the capital being laid

today has a return in the future. And I

think you can pull that forward, and

that's what's going on.

>> But the circular financing doesn't worry

you guys, or what are the what what's

the We have this conversation a lot. Are

we stupid to have that conversation

about a company that seems to buy from

another part of its properties or

invests in a chip maker because they

need to Like, you know what I'm saying?

What's the conversation you guys have

about that circular financing?

>> Uh the the what keeps me sleeping well

at night about this is the fact that

we're having the conversation. And I

think if if people are acknowledging it,

we're talking about it, you're

dissecting it, you're diligencing it, I

think this cycle has room to continue

and it and and to grow. I think it's the

unknown risks, not less the the known

risks that um I think, you know, could

could derail the cycle.

>> And when we look at this market,

is there a risk in in kind of just

thinking about the difference between a

hyperscaler who is historically been the

best cash flow cows in the history of

mankind, they can at least turn off

spending.

How do you think about companies that

are spending and need to spend, but

don't have hundreds of billions of

dollars annually or bi-annually in terms

of free cash flow?

>> Yeah. I I Look, I think you um

you have to look at the the the the

fundamentals of the contracts. What what

is what is a contract, you know, what is

contracted from the demand bill that

they have today, and get comfortable

that what they're investing in right now

has the right economics to yield a

return in three or five years.

And I think you're right. Like you know,

they might not have the

free cash flow spigot today, but you

look at

what is contracted and what could be put

you know,

come to fruition in a high quality way

in the next two to three years.

You can bridge to that free cash flow.

>> We got 30 seconds left here. You've been

covering this market. What do you want

to ask Dave?

>> [laughter]

>> Do we see more private equity IPOs in

the second half or is that still an area

broadly speaking that such and go?

>> I I think definitively yes.

I think the market would be

accommodative for that and in our

backlog suggests that we will have a

number of those in the second half.

>> 10 seconds, how much does debt leverage

how much does leverage ratios matter for

those companies?

>> It matters. I think I think you want to

get it to a

comfortable starting point, but I think

for good free cash flow stories with

solid predictable revenue and growth,

the market can get comfortable.

>> All right, thanks to David Bauer, head

of equity capital markets Americas at JP

Morgan Chase. And to Bailey Lipshultz,

Bloomberg News IPO reporter.

>> The IPO market is evolving. We know that

thanks to those mega cap tech and AI

connected companies. It's a major

narrative and theme this year. So too is

what all those AI and high-tech

companies and their supply chains

overall need. And that takes us to

critical minerals.

>> And to two CEOs and one strategic

alliance to strengthen America's

critical mineral supply chain. The CEOs

of United States Antimony and America's

Gold and Silver Corporation join us

next. You're listening to Bloomberg

Business Week. This is Bloomberg.

>> You're listening to the Bloomberg

Business Week Daily podcast. Catch us

live weekday afternoons from 2 to 5 p.m.

Eastern. Listen on Apple CarPlay and

Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business

app or watch us live on YouTube.

>> One major theme over the past year or

so, the high-stakes race to secure the

world's critical mineral supply chains.

A macro theme that just got a massive

jolt with the Pentagon's latest

multi-million dollar defense grants and

the rollout of the government's $12

billion Project Vault Stockpile

initiative.

>> It highlights a crucial vulnerability as

Western nations scramble to decouple

from dominant suppliers like China. For

more, we caught up with two executives

at the center of this resource rush,

Paul Andre Huet, CEO of America's Gold

and Silver, and Gary Evans, CEO of US

Antimony.

>> We spoke to Gary and Paul back in

February, the day they announced a plan

to construct and operate a hydromet

processing facility in Idaho, and we

began with an update on their project.

>> Since then, we've done a lot of work.

We're doing a lot of the engineering

work. Gary and I actually traveled to

Bolivia together to go look at one

completely operational plant, which was

extremely useful for our team, his team

as well. We're able to look at the best

practices they're doing, and we're going

to be deploying a lot of those best

practices in the engineering work we're

we're submitting for our own plan. So,

the our intent is still follow through

with this JV, have a fully domesticated

line of antimony production here in the

very near future that will last decades

to come. Not And this isn't a flash in a

pan where you go

>> Yeah.

>> Uh you know, this is going to be around

for a couple quarters. Our intent is to

have this new facility, state-of-the-art

facility that it will be there for four

or five decades at least minimum. So,

this is a big change here for the US,

and we absolutely need this antimony.

It's so desperately needed and required.

>> Gary, you know about this, right? You

guys have the only

um North America antimony processing

facilities, right? It's out in Montana.

Tell us about what's going on here. And

I am curious that since we've had

President Trump really focus on critical

minerals, rare earths, and so on and so

forth. I mean,

is the momentum continuing? Is the

demand like tell us what's happening?

Because it feels like we talked

[clears throat] about this nonstop for a

long time. And now it feels like we

moved on to AI and some different

things. Where are we?

>> Well, uh obviously uh with watching the

Iranian situation, we're using up our

military goods quite quickly.

>> [laughter]

>> Is that tapping supplies?

>> So,

as the only antimony supplier to the US

government, um we're a sole source

contract, a $240 million contract.

We see the the the purchase orders and

we're delivering now to the government.

Uh just started in May. And um

you know, our year end our year revenues

will be a hockey stick because we are we

just announced 2 days ago our new

smelter in Thompson Falls, which the

government helped fund.

>> Right.

>> $27 million worth is a about a $40

million facility.

Um

that we started firing up furnaces in

May. We have five running now. We'll go

to have full capacity by the end of the

month.

>> Which will be nine furnaces?

>> Nine furnaces, correct. And so, we have

an existing plant already. And now we

have the new plant. We decided to not

refurbish the old plant cuz we want to

get as much production as possible. So,

we know we see the demand from the

government and we're trying to ramp up

as quickly as

>> Have you gotten that $27 million fully?

>> Of that 27, we've received 12. There's

milestones. Like every time these

furnaces, that's a milestone. So, we'll

get the rest of it by the end of the

year.

>> Why is it so hard to to get a furnace

fired up?

>> Um these are not off-the-shelf furnaces.

We had to custom make them. And so,

there's parts, you know, everything

there's a little this didn't work, this

valve didn't work. So, you're testing

them over about a 3-day period.

>> Okay.

>> I guess what I'm wondering though in

general, Paul, I want you to come back

in here. I mean, like I said, there has

been so much focus. We had we were often

taking um going to the White House, the

Oval Office for the president to talk

about how important it was.

He went to China, talked to President

Xi. Like is there anything that has come

out and changed since we last talked

that has showed, yep, still a priority.

There's a lot going on behind the scenes

that maybe we're not daily reporting on

like we used to, but it's happening.

>> Yeah, there's certainly even I can see

the difference in reporting, no doubt

about it. However, behind the scenes

it's it's kind of it feels like a duck

on water, right? The duck is real

[clears throat] calm, but the the feet

are going 100 miles underneath the

water. Think about our own JV, we we

have been working non-stop since the day

we announced it. We announced that that

was that week we announced it, the day

we were here on live.

>> Right.

>> So, since that day we've had a crew of

around eight people working non-stop

making sure we get this engineering. So,

there's certainly no lack of

aggressiveness on our part, without

doubt. There's there's like you hear

Gary, the purchase orders are coming in

like I hear them and I speak to them

every week. It's like, "Oh, Paul, we're

we got to get this thing up and going,

you know, we need we need the supply. We

got to be able to feed into this thing."

There's a lot and and it's it's the

antimony's obviously critical, but you

think about the silver. You you you talk

about these we were talking earlier

about these IPOs that are coming out.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah.

>> My god, some of the biggest

trillion-dollar IPOs we've ever seen in

our lifetime since the railroads began

at the turn of the century here. These

are massive IPOs. What do you think's

going to power these things? Um the

steel was the industrial revolution,

silver is going to be this new power

revolution. There's no doubt silver is

going to be required for the

transformation we're going to need for

all these AIs.

>> Well, Paul, then why is silver down 45%

from January?

>> question. I If I knew that one, man, I'd

be a lot richer than than I am today, no

doubt. I can't add to that, but I can

say this, silver has in my opinion,

there's no doubt, everybody I've spoken

to, every expert, every technical

analyst, silver's found its bottom for

sure, right? Um we've seen some silver

price above 100. I I I

Silver's in its first innings here.

Silver's still at a massive price, Tim.

You know, you think about it, we're

still very very short on demand year

after year after year, 5 years in a row,

short on demand.

>> Would you say the same for gold? Down

25% from this highs at the end of

January?

>> different. When you were on with us in

February, we Gold was a different

>> Right.

>> It was it was 20% higher than it is now.

>> It was. It was. Yeah, look, um I've been

a gold miner my whole life. I'm

currently a silver I know we're called

America's Gold and Silver, but we're

predominantly

>> talking about all the gold that you were

sitting on.

>> Yeah, when we we don't for America's

Gold and Silver doesn't have a lot of

gold just to just to refresh you. It's

more silver.

>> Right.

>> We have silver, copper, antimony, um and

lead. All critical elements and critical

metals that we need in the industry. Uh

gold it's look

gold's far from done shining. People are

trying to reposition to everybody is

trying to get into these new IPOs. You

hear of funds. I've got funds that have

been uh long-term shareholders for more

than 10 years into us that are saying,

"We're repositioning. We're trying to

get into these new AI into this stuff."

Um so, it's not uncommon to see people

having redemptions, going in, and then

buying something into this

AI world.

>> Carol, you brought a a great point about

the government and where the government

kind of stands on funding.

Um our company has today $245 million of

government grant requests in from

antimony to hydromet to tungsten.

>> Mhm.

>> And our joint venture has a $75 million

government grant request in.

>> Request.

>> These are requests and these are grant

requests where they basically just like

we got the $27 million their grant

requests.

We're still dealing with a bureaucracy.

It moves slow.

Uh deadlines were given to us in January

by the Department of Energy were missed

in April, in May, in June.

>> Why is that happening?

>> Good question.

>> If it's such a priority. I Can you can

you pick up the phone and talk to the

president or his team?

>> Well,

we have on our board General Jack Keane

who you know and he has definitely

helped us in the past. I tried to not

use that a lot. It's it's to me it's

kind of the last resort, but um we're

getting ready to have to shake the

trees. And what he does, he goes and

sees the Secretary of of the war, he

goes and sees the head of the Pentagon,

and they go, "Well, why hasn't this been

approved?" And then trees get shaken.

So, it's it's the government has a lot

of third-party contractors that are

slow.

>> Well, I guess what I would just to

follow is it's still a national

priority. We've We've heard from the

administration that it was about

national security, right? You know,

we've been talking a lot about energy

security, and the US is in a much better

place than it was decades ago, but we

see other countries struggling with

that. But again, going back to national

security, whatever you need, whether

it's oil, whether it's critical

minerals, um supply chains, drugs,

whatever it is, is it still though when

it comes to rare earths or critical

minerals

>> I have no doubt it's still a high

priority. It's just we're dealing with

government bureaucracy. That's the only

thing that I can see. It's absolutely

slows us down. Absolutely. I mean, the

whole purpose of this grants are to

speed things up. And so, we're waiting 6

months to a year for grant grant that

we've applied for that makes perfect

sense, and still it it's going through

the wheels of motion.

>> The biggest one is that

you think about Project Vault we were

both so excited about when you hear this

reserve for critical metals. Your

Project Vault's a $12 billion. Um that's

got to get deployed similar to we have

oil and gas reserves. We're going to

have this new Project Vault. That seems

to be moving at a pace that's a little

different than when it first came out.

>> Right.

Your food is different. You can feel it

a little bit.

>> Well, I mean, the the the government

federal government side of things is is

is one part of this, but when you're

actually in these communities and in

different different areas, there's also

local challenges when it comes to uh the

way people think environmentally about

mining, the way they think about

extraction.

>> We've run into the in Alaska we've had

environmental groups with opposition.

We've had we've done a media campaign

and we do meetings, we do we've hired

lobbyists, we've hired PR firms, we do

television commercials to try to educate

because the problem is the the people

that are negative on mining are looking

at the old school, the old miners from

20, 30 years ago.

>> are they getting wrong?

>> What they're getting wrong is we're

completely a new animal today. We take

environment very, very seriously. We do

things that we other miners never would

do. And we we we reclaim land sometimes

the same month that we dig it up. I

mean, it's not like 5 years from now, we

do it in the same month. So,

>> what? That you reclaim the land?

>> that we leave that footprint where you

can't tell we were there.

>> reclaim things many times today they're

even better than what we started with.

>> That's right.

>> But but I do want to talk about Stibnite

because you're not wrong. But it's not

the same in every state. You go to

Nevada, you go to Idaho. I'm in Idaho.

Um

we're welcomed in Idaho. [clears throat]

It's very, very different. There's NGOs

and that, but we have such a community.

We've got I've got 300 miners who work

in day and out. I've got another 100

since we burned on this show. I hired

another 100 miners at Crescent. That's

that's another 100 from the time I was

here. Um and there is such an

overwhelming amount of support from that

industry. I I've got hotel owners. I've

got people who run car rentals business

go, "Thank God the mine is back on. This

mine has been dead for 20 years. Thank

God you guys are spending money. My

hotels fill, my restaurants fill." I I

had somebody walk up to me because I'm

CEO was so happy to buy me dinner. I

said, "Look, um I I don't want you to

buy me dinner. I want to buy it actually

and and we're glad we're here and thank

you for supporting the mine." So, there

it's Alaska is is different. Idaho I can

say, "Look, you're not going to find a

better state. It's it's a good place to

be mining and

we're fully permitted at USA S. At

America's gold and silver, that was one

of the big advantages me and Gary had.

When we him and I met, we had one

tremendous advantage. We can move fast,

we're both aggressive, we can get this

thing done in a in this term limit of

time frame. Um and I'm fully permitted.

We're fully fully permitted.

>> And let me say something. When we're

done with this facility and with what we

produce today, our combined companies

will represent 50% of the US demand for

antimony.

>> That's big.

>> And this country was only getting it

from China 2 years ago, only.

>> And that's for a long time here.

Remember, not a flash in the pan. This

isn't a 100-m dash.

>> Every time you guys say something,

there's a million questions that come to

mind. Well, and what's China doing right

now? They're still moving

>> China is now an importer. China used to

be an exporter. They had the largest

mine in the world called the Twinkle

Star, been around 120 years, depleted in

June of '24. This when they put their

embargo in in September '24. We compete

with them every day when we buy antimony

from the countries like Chad and Bolivia

and Australia and Peru, and they're out

there paying more money than we're

willing to pay, and they import it to

China and nothing comes back. They're

using it themselves.

>> Look, we're in a unique position to

actually really take advantage of that

American-made brand. We really are.

We're from anything, your your cell

phones,

solar stuff, electric vehicles, we could

be domestically producing silver,

copper, antimony right in Idaho together

as a group and and providing it to

Americans. That that's a big change.

That hasn't happened in that area for a

very, very long time.

>> So, I don't know if you guys have

noticed, but we have some midterms

coming up in November. [laughter] So, is

the clock ticking to some extent to if

you say that you're not getting you've

got these requests out there, but it's

not happening, is there a little bit of

a clock ticking for you guys, Garrett?

>> Well, I mean, there's no question we saw

a change within the administration from

the Biden to the Trump, but I'll tell

you uh Uh,

during the presidential Biden era, he

implemented some things that help our

industry. So, I truly think it's more of

a bipartisan situation.

Um, no question though that Trump has

led a far Trump has gone overboard in

trying to get as much capital as

possible to rejuvenate this industry. I

think that will continue. I don't think

it'll just all of a sudden when you have

a if you have a Democratic president

it's going to change things.

>> Gary, I would imagine that the

reporting around the US magazine depths

has also gotten people on board with the

idea of making sure that, you know,

weapons here in the US are back to

levels that they were before the war at

least sometime soon.

>> Well, in the

U Department of War has represented to

me that they have the lowest amount of

inventory of antimony since World War

II. And you can see what we've been

doing with Venezuela and now Iran and we

got Ukraine, we got Israel. I mean, it's

a big deal and it's not just United

States, it's the NATO countries, it's

Australia. I mean, it's it's a worldwide

problem.

>> Look, yeah.

>> It's fixable. We can fix it. That's what

we're trying to do.

>> Right. There's no doubt we can't rely on

everyone else to meet our needs. We have

to be self-sufficient in US and we're in

the right process of getting that done.

Um, even when the moment I went in the

White House and Gary's got a lot more

experience in the White House than I do.

I am a a true blue miner. But the one

thing I heard very resonating was not

only do we need 53 million pounds of

antimony per year as a country, the US

alone, but we have to think about our

allies. We can't ignore our allies. So,

when you think about munitions,

ammunition, fire retardant, you know,

one of the biggest things for antimony

is fire retardant. Do you think the

fires in in some of the states like

let's use California are going to reduce

next year? How often do we report those

fires? Do we report them getting smaller

or we report them getting bigger? Well,

by God, we need antimony for that. You

don't have antimony for it. It's the

biggest use, it's fire retardant. I'm

producing it with him right now today.

So, get off our ass and get to work. We

took you guys and what's, you know,

possibly coming our way in terms of

extreme flooding and

also dry patches like in a big way and

fires.

>> Well, antimony is so critical to this

stuff. We talk about the war stuff and

everything and it's real. It's real

depleting that. But when I think about

fires, I'm in Nevada and and they come

so close every year, year after year.

I'm like, my God, we need to make sure

we have the supply of antimony on hand.

>> Our thanks to Gary Evans, chairman and

CEO of United States Antimony

Corporation and Paul Andre Huet,

chairman and CEO of Americas Gold and

Silver.

>> Still ahead on Bloomberg Business Week

from building out critical mineral

supply chains to the golden age of US

construction.

>> That's our next macro theme. More when

we come back. This is Bloomberg.

>> You're listening [music] to the

Bloomberg Business Week daily podcast.

Catch us live weekday afternoons from

2:00 to 5:00 p.m. Eastern. Listen on

Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the

Bloomberg Business app. Or watch us live

on YouTube.

>> So far [music] we've tracked the boom in

the AI IPO market and the geopolitical

race to secure the silver, antimony and

critical minerals needed to sustain

Western industry.

>> All of that capital and all of those raw

materials ultimately converging on one

final massive macro destination. The

physical reindustrialization of America.

While the digital landscape pulls the

major headlines and unprecedented

capital expenditure cycle is playing out

in the physical world.

>> Data centers, airports, stadiums,

petrochemicals, pipelines and LNG,

utility work. All of this is something

our next guest has called the golden age

of commercial construction.

>> She's Katherine Thompson, founding

partner and CEO at Thompson Research

Group. It's an equity research and

advisory firm that focuses on companies

in the industrial and construction

spaces.

>> Um great to have you here. We actually

had a fun conversation before we even

got going. Um, first of all, when it

comes to construction and you look at

the industrial spaces in a big way, what

is going on that's interesting and

especially to an investing audience?

>> Yeah, you know, here's I think the

simplest way to to look at this.

The US hasn't built

in 40 years. We haven't built things

within the US. And so that whole

globalization trade is the pendulum is

swinging. So essentially what this is,

we are in the golden era of US

construction. Now, I think there's a lot

of focus on data centers, rightly so,

but it's it's not just data centers.

>> But what else are we building? I mean,

we talked to the CFO of of Levi's, our

former CFO at this point, maybe he's

left. Um, but uh he says we're not

building we're not going to make jeans

here in the US. We're not ever making

Levi's in the US. That's what he said.

Just doesn't make sense.

>> But we are building we were just talking

about airports. So many airports across

the US. When you actually are building

the data centers, you have to address

power.

So with that power, you're addressing

the power grid, you're addressing the

roads that lead to power grids. Just

putting this in perspective for the meta

data center site in North Louisiana. The

prep site alone is 1 mile by 5 mile.

And it is the largest town is Monroe,

Louisiana. You should just check out how

big it is. It's not very big at all. And

so it's bringing jobs, you have to have

electrical, plumbing, power, and that

just doesn't is this before? This is one

of dozens upon dozens of communities

where you're essentially creating cities

that didn't even happen before.

>> How temporary are those jobs?

>> Mhm.

>> Once that data center is constructed,

how many human beings are needed to

actually

>> It's a great question. So today we we

just wrapped up a global industrial

forum over at Nasdaq and we were asking

these very questions. Um, and the great

thing is like we were talking to Turner

Construction and they're the ones

building it and let's use that Monroe

that North Louisiana site. That's going

to take almost 10 years to really build

out soup to nuts.

On average, a consistent feedback that

I'm getting from those that are building

out, it's 5 years, 7 years.

Then you have the tail upon that where

yeah, not all of those workers will be

there, but they're going to be shifting

to another site that's going to take

just as long.

This could be decades long.

>> What does it mean in terms of the

economy? Like I think about the energy

rush like in North Dakota and the Bakken

and they all just kind of laughed with

all the fracking cuz they're like we've

seen these boom and bust cycles. And so

workers come in from around the nation

and their family stay stay where they

kind of originally lived

and people are afraid to build housing

and everything is so slow to support

those people because they're like,

"Okay, they're not going to be here

forever. It's not like you're building

industries that will be here for

decades, not just one decade." So I'm

just wondering like how do folks kind of

manage that infrastructure industrial

build around maybe the data center that

ultimately isn't going to need all those

people?

>> That's a That's a great point, but

here's here's another way to think about

it. You had that really big site that we

were talking about in Louisiana, but you

also have smaller data centers that are

going to be and that's the other big

trend that's happening. So I just toured

a data center construction site just

outside of Minneapolis but city. It was

maybe 40 minutes away. What that does is

it really supports you're going to be

able to have jobs not just in the small

communities, but in in

bigger tertiary cities. It will support

those jobs. So it doesn't feel the same

way as it did to through the like the

frac boom in the mid you know, 2014,

2015.

>> Are we just going to become a nation of

data centers?

Are we going to become a world of data

centers? Not if local

politics puts an end to some of them or

or stops them from even

>> Well, what's going to

what's going to end up happening ends up

getting regionalized. So, there will be

certain states that are fine and open to

it. It also, you know, essentially, if

you think about

uh

for for every one text

that you use, it there's going to be

three data centers backing up that in

some way, shape, or form. So, these are

going to be in the US or it's going to

be abroad.

And so, from a national security

standpoint, there is a lot of talk with

the companies that we talked to about

like we really need to have as much of

it in the US as possible.

>> It's easier said than done though. I

mean, our our producer Talia sending us

a

like five articles, uh research notes

about local pushback to data centers.

Here's one for example from Bloomberg

Government. Lawmakers are trying to get

data centers to pay for their own power

as they gear up to face voters squeezed

by high energy bills in the November

midterm elections. It's not a simple or

a fast fix. Power-hungry data centers

are springing up nationwide to support

expanded AI capabilities. Wholesale

electricity costs have increased up to

267%

in some areas located near significant

data center activity from 2020 to 2025.

We're we're paying the bill for some of

these.

>> So, the you're spot on. There will be a

policy push to create power

and uh in mini stations at data centers.

I mean, that is coming. It's not a

matter of if, it's it's more like when.

>> So, so what it essentially does is it it

it makes it so the data center has is

generating the power or paying for the

power generation itself and it's

separate from the grid that customers

are using. That's the idea.

>> Yeah, and taking a step further,

if the grid even outside of the data

center is stretched, it will provide uh

energy to the community. So, there will

it's no matter if, but it is

>> kind of the data center to do that.

>> But it I mean this this is on the this

is on the come because and it's coming

in a in a lot of different angles and

and way and I know you know you were

just talking about SMRs. I mean that is

going to be, you know, part of the

solution. Uh you know, for us we're

we're trying to understand the what and

the why. And and you have, you know,

really great questions with that, but

with power

there will be generated at data plants.

I mean that is that is the focus.

>> a way to do it without SMRs? Is there

because those don't here in the US don't

exist. Now, from a regulatory

perspective, they're still stuck in

development. Um China has a couple, the

US doesn't.

How else could they power these locally?

>> It's a variety of different sources. Uh

areas that have prevalent natural gas.

So, that is why you are seeing more data

centers in Louisiana and Texas.

Um but it's just really access to

energy. It's I mean really kind of

bottom line that

>> could put one by a a

um

Niagara Falls, basically.

>> I don't know if New York is going to

allow that to happen though.

>> but that's [laughter] the idea that it

would be close to a place that generates

a lot of electricity.

>> Correct. Correct.

>> So, from an investor's perspective, um

it's interesting how I feel like yes, we

talk a lot of high-tech and AI and

everything that's involved in that, but

there's also kind of old investing

strategies that are back in fashion and

it's whether it's steel or building

materials. Like walk us through that in

terms of maybe what investors need to be

thinking a little bit more about.

>> Yeah, I I I go back to the original

theme that I said, there're just going

to be more things built in the US.

And the most basic material that is used

in any construction

could be a nuclear power plant, a data

center, or that highway we talked about.

>> steel or concrete?

>> Oh, it's crushed rock.

>> Oh, crushed rock.

>> Just rock.

>> That was not my

>> Making big [laughter] Just seriously

Think think think Flintstones. So,

um a some great players in that would be

Martin Marietta Materials.

Uh Vulcan Materials is another one. Um

CRH

They'll do both rock and cement and

concrete. Um but then you have some

smaller cap names, too.

Uh Construction Partners. The ticker

symbol is aptly named ROAD.

And uh there's a new IPO out um called

Suncrete uh RMIX and they do concrete.

So, it's You've got a lot of different

options for basic materials that are all

part of the backbone of the

infrastructure.

>> How much of um is this of this is

potentially being handled by like huge

private companies and not necessarily

ones that are publicly traded?

>> For for the basic materials?

>> just basic materials. I'm talking like

all this type of construction. Like, you

know, Bechtel has a history in nuclear,

for example.

>> Correct.

>> that I think they worked on Vogal. I'm

not quite positive.

>> Well, as far um

in the US, if you want to look at

private companies, if they've been

around for a long time, it's a pretty

good business. There are You would be

shocked by the number of

100-plus-year-old

crushed rock companies that are in the

US. So, there will be a lot of private

companies. Inevitably, there are a lot

>> we're talking to like

engineering and construction companies

that are private family-owned companies

that have been around for generations.

Sometimes employee-owned companies.

>> absolutely. And and in the construction

side, too, and on the specialty side, a

great example with that would be

Mortenson.

>> Mhm.

>> Uh family-owned, based out of Minnesota,

and they are one of the top three

builders of data centers in the US.

>> Catherine, why are these names up? I'm

looking at CRH.

It's down almost 19% year-to-date. Um

Martin Marietta Materials down about 11%

year-to-date. Um I'm just curious.

>> Like, what what's happening?

>> Yeah, if if this is all going on and

demand, let me just pull up road cuz I

>> So, I I can give you I

road is down about 2% year-to-date. So,

uh

the federal highway bill called IIJA is

up for reauthorization in September.

There is always a messy stocks put trade

very poorly going into this multi-year

highway bill reauthorization. So,

there's just a lot of negative head or

not negative headlines, uncertainty

around the funding. Um ironically,

infrastructure funding right now has

more visibility than I've had in my

entire career. And it's really two

two-pronged approach. One, there is this

is one of the few things that is uh not

divisive from a political standpoint.

Democrats want it, Republicans want it.

So, it's just a matter of like getting

the dollars out, so you can get the

dollars going. And then states are very

um have very strong DOT budgets, and

it's as strong as it's been in

25, 30 years.

>> Yeah, it's interesting.

>> So, but it it's optics.

>> That was Katharine Thompson, Johnny

partner and CEO at Thompson Research

Group.

>> And that wraps up this long holiday

weekend edition of Bloomberg

Businessweek from Bloomberg Radio. Thank

you so much for joining us.

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