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Quest Means Business
Christine Lagarde is in it for the Long Run on Stimulus; Congress Holds First Hearing on Retail Trading Frenzy; 861K Americans filed First- Time Jobless Claims Last Week; Live: Moments To Touchdown Of Perseverance On Mars; Airbus Confident Travel Will Take Off; Facebook In Face Off With Australia; Will Other Countries Follow?. Aired 3-4p ET.
Aired February 18, 2021 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[15:00:45]
JULIA CHATTERLEY, CNN BUSINESS ANCHOR: It's the worst day of the month so far for U.S. stocks. I can give you a look at the price action. We are off
the worst levels of the session, still down some three-tenths of one percent for the Dow. Weaker than expected jobless claims from the United
States and weak forecasts from retailer Walmart weighing on sentiment here.
Lots to come in the show, and we'll discuss it. But for now, those are the markets and these are the main events.
Christine Lagarde says we're in it for the long run when it comes to economic health.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRISTINE LAGARDE, PRESIDENT, EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK: The world is in this unbelievable exceptional situation and the stimulus is needed now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHATTERLEY: Richard's exclusive interview with the E.C.B. President coming up on the program tonight.
Robinhood, Reddit and retail traders, all of them face the wrath of lawmakers in a virtual hearing on Capitol Hill.
And NASA's mission to Mars is almost over. We're expecting the Perseverance rover to land any moment now.
Live from New York, it is Thursday, the 18th of February, I'm Julia Chatterley, in for Richard Quest, and this is QUEST MEANS BUSINESS.
Good evening once again. Tonight, 2021 will be the year of recovery. So says the President of the European Central Bank in an exclusive interview
with CNN.
Christine Lagarde promising the E.C.B. is in it for the long run, quote, "ready to support European economies and allow that recovery to take hold
while health officials try to get more shots in the arms after Europe's sluggish vaccine rollout. She says her focus is to help deliver the massive
financial support approved by E.U. members.
Lagarde also says she is not worried about the amount of borrowing, but now the money needs to roll. Christine Lagarde was speaking exclusively to
Richard Quest and he joins us now from home in New York.
Richard, great to have you with us. Amazing to have this level of access to a European Central Bank President. I'll say it once and I'll say it again,
but I think the message also echoes the time that the I.M.F. government here needs to step up here and it's on their execution that the recovery
lies.
RICHARD QUEST, CNN BUSINESS ANCHOR, QUEST MEANS BUSINESS: You've said this many times, Julia, that the time is now. The time is now to get something
done, and the nuance shifts over what that means at any given point, and what Christine Lagarde was telling me is that with monetary policy at full
throttle and now fiscal policy also playing a major role bearing in mind that the European Union has agreed and has borrowed nearly a trillion
through some form of mutuality of borrowings, that now is the time for recovery.
And I started by asking the President of the E.C.B. how she saw 2021.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LAGARDE: The good news is that 2021 in our view will be the year of recovery, but I will say that the first thing that needs to happen over and
over and over again is vaccination, vaccination, vaccination.
Because while you say that vaccination is there, well we have vaccines more by the week, which is good. They're being manufactured. They're being
distributed, but people are not yet vaccinated.
So it's going to take a while before we have this herd immunity, which will not be in and of itself self-satisfactory because we know that we have the
variants and so on and so forth, but I would say that that is priority number one.
For us, priority number two is implementation, implementation, implementation. It won't surprise you. But we have this extraordinary move
from the Europeans all together deciding to borrow together, deciding to give grants to each other, deciding to have loans at very cheap rates in
order to help those most affected by the pandemic.
But it's now a question of delivering. So it was agreed in July, voted by European Parliament last week. Now, it needs to be ratified. It needs to be
supported by the recovery plans that the member states are preparing and money needs to roll in the course of '21.
[15:05:12]
LAGARDE: So vaccination, implementation, and from our perspective, we want to make sure that there will be favorable financing conditions all along so
that the recovery can really take root solidly and take us into a 2022 whereby then we catch up with the pre-COVID-19 situation in terms of level
of GDP.
QUEST: Already, some people are saying it might not be enough calling for more. You've changed hats from, you know, a Finance Minister, now you are
the other side. Do you worry that the E.U. will borrow too much? That having now got this new power it will -- it's a scintilla's move to
actually simply suddenly say, oh, let's go back for some more.
LAGARDE: No, I don't worry that they will borrow too much. I tell you what I worry about. I worry about the necessary transition between supporting
entirely the economies with moratorium, with guarantees, with furlough schemes and income substitution which is needed, which will continue to be
needed into 2021, and how as the recovery takes hold and as the economy picks up, how those schemes will gradually not brutally, but will gradually
be removed.
That's the moment which I think is the most difficult, the most subtle and where judgment will have to be applied. But are they going to borrow too
much? I don't worry particularly about that, and if I look at our own policy in terms of monetary policy, we have embarked on this pandemic
emergency purchase program that you mentioned, which is earmarked with one political item, flexibility.
If we need more, it will be recalibrated. If we don't use it all because we don't have to, we will not use it all. So I think that we really operate
with flexibility as one of the guiding principles.
QUEST: When Janet Yellen, who of course is a good friend of yours and you know well, when she says she wants to go big with a $1.9 trillion stimulus
package and you're saying no limits, of course, in relation to -- I mean, is her go big your no limits?
And I wonder whether the people are now saying -- I know this sounds weird when we are in the middle of it, but people are saying there's too much
stimulus about to be launched around the world.
LAGARDE: There is the stimulus that is needed around the world because the world is in this unbelievable exceptional situation, and the stimulus is
needed now.
Janet speaks from a position where she is now Secretary of Treasury, and she goes big with fiscal. When I said no limits and we have to go fast and
we have to go big, that back in March. I was speaking from a position of Central Bank Governor.
What is characteristic of this particular crisis is that we go hand in hand. Fiscal and monetary did not work so well together back in 2008 or in
2011 in Europe, and very often you heard the Central Bank governors saying, you know, it cannot just be about monetary policy. We are not the only game
in town.
You don't hear that anymore because both on the fiscal front and on the monetary front, policies are working hand in hand and are really laying the
ground for recovery to take hold after we are done with that period where economies have switched off.
QUEST: Let's talk about the mandate, the price stability mandate. Again, it sounds weird when we're at the -- you know, inflation. I see inflation,
but with this much stimulus, the Fed has changed its inflation target. It's tweaked it. Quite nuanced, but significant.
You're reviewing your inflation target. Are you moving towards a less rigid two percent?
LAGARDE: We shall see, Richard. We are still currently operating under the previous close to but below two percent, but clearly, we are reviewing
that. We're reviewing the inflation measurements. We are reviewing the instruments. We are reviewing the alliance between fiscal and monetary.
We're reviewing each and every item that actually composes the monetary policy that we will deploy in the months to come. And that will be
disclosed in its entirety in September.
QUEST: You're not going to give me an insight into where your thinking is?
LAGARDE: No, my friend. I won't.
[15:10:04]
QUEST: If that's the case the worry is -- the worry here fundamentally is that Europe, it came out of the great recession sclerotically, the Central
Bank, you're right, did most of the heavy lifting. Now, you've got better lifting.
But has a new era evolved in structural reform do you think? Are governments prepared to make it -- and in this I'm thinking your
predecessor. I mean now the Prime Minister, not Finance Minister, Prime Minister of Italy, you would hope he will make the structural reforms that
you and he have been calling for.
LAGARDE: I'll tell you the two things that I found striking when I came back from Washington to take the job as Governor of the Central Bank here
at E.C.B. It is the willingness of the Europeans to work together. We had never seen something like that.
They went together with various programs. I will spare them for you, but sure is one, the Special European guarantees, the ESM additional programs,
they all went out with a package which is 540 billion euros to support employees, to support companies and to sovereigns if need be That was one
step.
Step two, they agreed all-together, 27 member states, they agreed to go together and borrow over 750 billion euros for a recovery and resilience
plan that will then be distributed throughout the member states. Either as grants, no repayment or as loans, low interest in order for them to fuel
their recovery.
That I had never seen and nobody had ever seen that. That's at the regional European level. What is happening at the national level, Italy is a good
case in point, is the determination of the people with support from Parliaments to actually go for practical, effective results.
At least that's what my predecessor, Mario Draghi has announced in his speech yesterday at the Senate. Vaccination, reforms, proper recovery and
resilience plans to restore the capacity of Italy and improve its current economic situation.
This is also a significant change.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
QUEST: There you see it, Julia. The way in which the President of the E.C.B. manages to sort of put the willingness of Europeans to work
together, but at the same time recognizing the extraordinary difficulties that remain.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, absolutely. I mean it's a whole host of things and what a great interview with the E.C.B. President, Richard.
QUEST: Thank you.
CHATTERLEY: Comprehensive interview. It takes monetary policy. It takes fiscal policy, and of course it takes tackling the virus. There's so much
that's got to come together here over the next six to 12 months in order to facilitate this recovery.
QUEST: What it comes down to is what you've talked about which is certainty. This morning, and I know you can hear more of it, this morning,
I spoke to the CEO of Airbus who had results that were dreadful, but then surprisingly, what is interesting, he told me --and Julia, you'll hear
later, the airlines weren't canceling, they were merely changing their orders.
But fundamentally what they need is some feeling of certainty what's happening. This is the Airbus CEO.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GUILLAUME FAURY, CEO, AIRBUS: On the short-term, we need passengers to be able to fly because they want to fly, so that's really about the decisions
made by governments to reopen borders and give certainty.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUEST: How do you do it, though, Julia? How do you do it? Reopen borders, taking the risks. Look at the fiasco in the U.K. at the moment with hotels,
the problems in Australia, in Melbourne, how do you do it? And that is why I look at what people like Lagarde and Yellen and Jay Powell are doing and
you realize the phenomenal difficulties when basically in many European countries, they are supporting the entire national payroll.
CHATTERLEY: A wing and a prayer. Sorry for that joke but I think it works, yes.
QUEST: It did. Thank you.
CHATTERLEY: Looking forward to that full interview. Thank you, Richard.
All right, coming up on the show, a Capitol grilling. CEOs under the spotlight after last month's retail trading frenzy that sent GameStop in
Reddit parlance, to the moon.
And from the moon to Mars, finding life on Mars takes, well, perseverance.
After months of traveling through space NASA's rover lands this hour. Wowsers. I'm very excited. That's coming up this hour. Stay with QUEST
MEANS BUSINESS.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:17:43]
CHATTERLEY: As we speak, U.S. lawmakers are hearing from some of the key players in the retail trading frenzy that shook Wall Street late last
month. Stocks like GameStop soared to staggering heights, thanks in part to free trading platforms like Robinhood and word of mouth on sites like
Reddit.
The sheer scope of today's hearing is right there in the title: "GameStop- ped: Who wins and loses when short sellers, social media and retail investors collide?" And collide they did. Each side has its own take on
what happened and what should come next.
Hedge funds like Ken Griffin's Citadel Securities says they're not the bad guy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KEN GRIFFIN, CEO, CITADEL SECURITIES: We simply play by the rules of the road. Payment for order flow has been expressly approved by the S.E.C. It
is a customary practice within the industry. If they choose to change the rules of the road, we need to drive on the left side versus the right side,
that's fine with us.
I do believe that payment for order flow has been an important source of innovation in the industry. As the CEO of Robinhood has testified, they
drove the industry towards zero-dollar commissions. This has been a big win for American investors.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHATTERLEY: And just to be clear, the CEO of Citadel, Ken Griffin speaking there. The hedge fund of Citadel and the market maker of course is Citadel
Securities.
Now, Robinhood's CEO was asked why his platform suddenly restricted buying stocks like GameStop, but not selling them. He says heavy trading volume
forced his hand.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VLAD TENEV, CEO, ROBINHOOD: The decision to restrict GameStop and other securities was driven purely by depositing collateral requirements imposed
by our clearinghouses. So buying --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But why --
TENEV: Buying securities in pieces are corporate requirements, selling does not.
Even though I recognize customers were very upset and disappointed that we had to do this, I imagine it would have been significantly worse if we
prevented customers from selling.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHATTERLEY: And there were lots of those kind of interruptions. Finally, Reddit CEO told lawmakers his platform is doing all it can to keep its
users honest.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
[15:20:12]
REP. DAVID SCOTT (D-GA): How many steps does your company take in to guard against this? Anything at all?
STEVE HUFFMAN, CEO, REDDIT: Congressman, we spend a lot of time at Reddit ensuring the authenticity of our platform. So we've got a large team
dedicated to this exact task.
Everything on Reddit, all of the content is created by users, voted on by users and ranked by users, and we make sure that that is authentic and as
un-manipulated as possible.
And in this specific case, we did not see any signs of manipulation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHATTERLEY: CNN business lead writer, Matt Egan has been watching these lively hearings all afternoon. Matt, talk us through what were the key
lines for you?
MATT EGAN, CNN BUSINESS LEAD WRITER: Well, Julia, I think coming into this, we didn't really know who the bad guy is, as you put it, was in the
view of Congress. But I think at this point, it's pretty clear, they see the bad guy as Robinhood.
I've been taken aback by how, Vlad Tenev, the CEO of Robinhood has really received the lion's share of questions and criticism and the most intense
lines of questioning from lawmakers that quizzed him over, yes, the controversial trading restrictions that they imposed at the end of January,
but also their communications issues and even their business model.
At one point, Vlad Tenev, he did acknowledge under some questioning from lawmakers that, listen, they made mistakes. He did apologize for the
communications issues. But if you're Robinhood, I think the biggest concern is how often payment for order flow came up in this hearing.
That, of course, is the controversial practice that Robinhood and other brokers use where they send retail trades to market makers like Citadel
Securities and they get paid to send those orders there. Now, not surprisingly and as you heard, Ken Griffin of Citadel Securities, he
defended that practice and so did Robinhood.
They said that, listen, this is a good thing for customers because trading is now basically free, if not actually free, but lawmakers did raise some
concerns about conflict of interest, whether or not high-speed traders are actually going ahead of retail traders.
And so, I think the question, Julia, is whether or not this leads to any new regulation, any new legislation. And if it does, that of course would
be a concern for some of the key players involved.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, it's a great point. And I think, the Robinhood CEO was also grilled on the point he made, the $35 billion in unrealized and
realized gains on top of it, investments that participants using the Robinhood platform have used.
And a gain isn't a gain if it's unrealized, but it was an interesting point to make, and you raise it, Matt, is there going to be concrete action after
this? Because both the Robinhood CEO and Citadel CEO, Ken Griffin said in their opening statements, there are ways that we can make the system more
efficient and actually very quickly and there's very little attention that have been paid to that and that is transparency in some of the
clearinghouses and reducing the time it takes to do a trade and then settle a trade which requires a lot of cash.
And actually that was one of the big challenges that took place during this frenzy.
EGAN: That's right, Julia. There has been some talk including in the remarks today where, you know, there's this push to sort of try to
modernize the system and try to speed up what is known as T plus two, and that's where there's a trade and it takes two days to settle that trade.
And because of that system, Robinhood has said that they had to put up vast amounts of capital, and that is why they say they had to impose these
trading restrictions.
And so, Vlad Tenev, the CEO of Robinhood has said that listen, there's no reason why we can't move to a real time settlement system where there would
be less friction, less need to put up that money and perhaps less restrictions during times of volatility.
But Julia, what's interesting is, there really hasn't been all that much in-depth conversation about this idea of real-time settlement. There's been
more focus on Robinhood's communications, payment for order flow and issues like that rather than real-time settlement.
CHATTERLEY: Yes. And actually that would, to your point, reduce some of the frictions and actually very little heard from "Roaring Kitty" as well
who I was really looking forward to, but he did say he would be buying GameStop still today even at these prices. So, yes, we'll see if we get
action or if any action is required.
Matt Egan, thank you so much for that.
All right, turning now to the labor market and new U.S. jobless claims are at their highest level in a month; 861,000 people filed for unemployment
benefits last week, about 100,000 more people than expected. The rise comes amid signs of slow, but steady economic growth and declining cases of
COVID-19.
[15:25:09]
CHATTERLEY: But since the pandemic began last year, women have been dropping out of the U.S. workforce in droves; 2.5 million women have left
their jobs and CNN's Vanessa Yurkevich has more on why and what's being done to help.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
VANESSA YURKEVICH, CNN BUSINESS AND POLITICS REPORTER (voice over): It was supposed to be one of the happiest times of her life. But when Brooke
Gasaway was five months pregnant with her son, Luciano, she says she was laid off from her job.
BROOKE GASAWAY, UNEMPLOYED MOTHER: It was a lot of anxiety because I didn't know what was the best thing to do?
YURKEVICH (voice over): Now that her son is six months old, she is looking for work again, but the economy she is facing is still down nearly 10
million jobs since the pandemic began, 5.3 million held by women.
GASAWAY: At this moment, sometimes I am scared to say I'm a mom when I'm applying. There's something about telling an employer that I am going to be
one of those people that's going to have to balance those two things.
YURKEVICH (voice over): Two point five million women have left the work force all together, many who are mothers.
ALLISON ROBINSON, CEO AND CO-FOUNDER, THE MOM PROJECT: It's been on so many fronts such a challenging year for women. We've suffered more layoffs
than men, and we've seen our already fragile child care and education infrastructure unravel.
YURKEVICH (voice over): That very issue may have cost single mother Nicole Conner her job. She says she was fired because she could only work
virtually.
Her seven-year-old son, Atticus, is at home remote learning. She says they are surviving off food stamps and her student loans.
NICOLE CONNER, UNEMPLOYED MOTHER: I mean, I am lucky that my bills are paid during this time, but it is a sad concept that I have to consider
myself lucky to be able to go into debt and make sure my bills are paid.
YURKEVICH (voice over): Mother of four, Michelle Mitchom is also looking for new work after she says she was laid off in July from a career in
sales. The search has led her to apply for jobs she never consider before.
MICHELLE MITCHOM, UNEMPLOYED MOTHER: I've been applying for any type of jobs. It doesn't matter if it's entry level, if it is you know,
internships, if it is janitorial, if it's anything I've been applying.
YURKEVICH (voice over): President Joe Biden is proposing giving $15 billion in grants to working families to pay for child care as part of his
stimulus plan.
JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: ... enable parents particularly women to get back to work.
YURKEVICH (voice over): And some companies like Spotify, Google and Facebook are offering perks like additional paid family leave or remote
work from anywhere. Accenture is committing to hire 150 moms as a start.
GASAWAY: This is where I apply to jobs while my son takes naps.
YURKEVICH (voice over): The pandemic giving new meaning to work life balance for mothers.
YURKEVICH (on camera): How are you feeling about your future?
GASAWAY: I want to be something that makes my son proud, and I think he would want me to continue pushing and continue trying to help other people
and just be back in the work force.
YURKEVICH (voice over): Vanessa Yurkevich, CNN, Brooklyn, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHATTERLEY: All right, coming up here on QUEST MEANS BUSINESS, international outrage follows Facebook's ban to ban users in Australia from
sharing news on its platforms. Why the Prime Minister says the decision is arrogant as it is disappointing.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:30:00]
CHATTERLEY: Hello, I'm Julia Chatterley. There's more QUEST MEANS BUSINESS in a moment when we'll hear from the CEO of airbus who tells
Richard he's expecting a big rebound in plane production this year.
And 25 minutes and counting, NASA's search for life on Mars continues with a risky attempt to land a rover on the planet's surface. We will bring you
that live.
Before that, though, the headlines this hour.
In Texas, a humanitarian crisis is growing as hundreds of thousands are struggling to survive the coldest weather in decades. Nearly half a
million people remain in the dark, many burning their belongings just to try and stay warm.
Officials say earlier this week the power grid was seconds or minutes away from a catastrophic failure.
Republican Texas senator, Ted Cruz, is coming under heavy criticism after he flew to Cancun for a family vacation during the crisis. Cruz
acknowledged the trip and said he went because his daughters asked him to and he wanted to be a good father.
Walmart is raising wages to at least $13 an hour for more than 400,000 employees. That's a more than a quarter of the company's work force. That
said, Walmart's minimum wage will stay at $11 an hour, well under the $15 proposed by the White House.
The Vatican says its employees must receive a COVID vaccine or they could risk losing their jobs. They say refusing the vaccine constitutes a risk
to others. Pope Francis has been a vocal proponent of vaccinations throughout the pandemic.
"They may be changing the world but that doesn't mean they run it," quote. Those are the words of the Australian prime minister lashing out at
Facebook for their decision to block users from seeing or sharing news.
The social media giant is reacting to a proposed law that would force it to pay media companies for their content.
CNN's chief media correspondent Brian Stelter joins us now. Brian, great to have you with us.
I saw a recent survey that said that 75 percent of people in Australia got their news from social media. This is a bold decision from Facebook. What
do we make of it?
BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: Yes, and there is increasing backlash to the decision. Every hour, more and more criticism of Facebook
for cutting off the news spigot.
Many people all around the world soak up news like sponges through services like Facebook. And when it suddenly goes missing, it means you're just not
going to know as much about the world around you.
We've noticed according to services that provide traffic data that traffic to news websites in Australia has dropped markedly in the past 24 hours
because of this action by Facebook.
And, as you said, the prime minister saying Australia will not be intimidated, he said he is in touch with leaders of other countries about
this issue. That is significant, because what's happening in Australia is not going to end in Australia.
Other countries are looking at Australia's proposed regulation. They're trying to charge big tech companies a significant -- sizable amount of
money to pay for news, to pay for news publishers, to help finance news gathering.
And this kind of law may spread to other countries in Europe, North America and beyond.
[15:35:00]
Google is striking deals with some news publishers trying to stop this from getting out of control from their perspective. Facebook also open to doing
some deals but it does not agree with the Australian regulation. That's why it took this drastic action.
We've never seen this happen before. But we might start to see it again and again if Facebook believes it has to try to stop other countries from
enacting similar litigation.
CHATTERLEY: Facebook said, look, the way news is shared and the way that these news or publishers come to our website is very different from the way
that people search on Google, that news actually comes to Google and people actually access it.
And whether they click through to these web pages or not, these are two very separate cases. And the business reason for Facebook to be paying
these news publishers is simply not there.
Do we buy Facebook's reason for pushing back on just giving some money to these smaller news companies that have been going out of business now for
years?
STELTER: Yes. You can imagine these technology company CEOs feel like they're being shaken down by the likes of Rupert Murdoch, the head of
NewsCorp who has pushing for this kind of law for many years.
Of course, News Corporation has a lot of weight to throw around, Rupert Murdoch has a lot to weight (ph) to throw it around. I think the bigger
concern should be, as you said, about smaller publishers, smaller newspapers and websites that have gone out of business or have struggled in
recent years because of -- and oftentimes they blame the big tech giants.
But these cases are very different, between Google and Facebook. For Google the link is everything, it's all about helping you find information.
Facebook is much more of a world where you live inside of it, reading information from your friends, looking at photos.
Facebook basically says news is incidental to the platform, that most people barely see a lot of news in their news feed. Even though, at the
same time, if you were to say to the average person do you use Facebook, do you get the news on Facebook, they would say yes. Because that is true at
the same time.
Facebook, though, they're trying to take bold action right now, some would say anti-competitive action right now, in order to make a statement. They
don't want to see this happen in other countries.
And I think it's remarkable to see the opposition, the vocal opposition -- even human rights group today saying this is unacceptable, this is hurting
Facebook users by cutting them off from important information, including health information about COVID-19.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, during a pandemic. Wow. We'll see what happens in other countries now and how this plays out. Brian, great to have you with us.
Thank you.
STELTER: Thanks.
CHATTERLEY: A lose-lose situation. That's how the CEO of Airbus describes the subsidy spat between the U.S. and the E.U. More from the CEO of airbus
after the break.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[15:40:00]
CHATTERLEY: You heard it from ECB President Christine Lagarde earlier this hour, 2021 is the year of recovery.
Well, that's also the message from the Airbus CEO who spoke to our Richard Quest.
He says he's ready to ramp up production as soon as this summer. Earlier on Thursday airbus revealed it lost more than $1.3 billion last year.
Still its CEO says he's ready for the month ahead.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GUILLAUME FAURY, CEO, AIRBUS: For us, there are two important points in time. The first one is when we start to ramp up again the production and
we think this could be in the second half of 2021 for the single aisle, much later for the wide bodies -- we see the long-haul market is impacted
for a long time.
And when we look at when will we deliver again for the first time the same number of planes we delivered in 2019 -- it was 863 at that time -- we are
thinking of around '24, between 2023 to 2025.
And again with a faster recovery on the single aisle compared to the wide body Airbus.
RICHARD QUEST, ANCHOR, QUEST MEANS BUSINESS: How many customers -- how many orders have actually just been canceled, forget about? What would you
say, percentage wise, you've just had airlines say to you we're not going to need those planes.
And then, of course, you've got those who say we're not going to need that plane but we will take this one instead?
FAURY: Indeed, we had very few cancellations in 2020. It came a bit as a surprise, we thought initially we would see more. We have had a lot of
demands for deferrals -- basically, it's all been about replanning production and deliveries and postponing credit payments accordingly.
So that's been the bulk of the work we've done last year but we've not seen that many cancellations. The vast majority of airlines want to still
retain their ability to take delivery of planes at a later stage.
QUEST: If we look at the economies of Europe -- well, first of all, you've managed to weather Brexit. Do you still believe that production in the
U.K. is viable for Airbus?
FAURY: Well, it's not only viable, it's competitive. We really enjoy the footprint, the work force, the support we have in the U.K.
And we're very happy that Brexit being behind us with an agreement, the relationship between the E.U. and the U.K. can move forward positively and
we try to contribute to it.
So, yes, indeed we are in the U.K., we like the U.K., we will continue to prosper in the U.K. And we expect the U.K. to contribute to the
competitiveness of Airbus moving forward.
QUEST: Life's too short for the litigation between Boeing and Airbus over subsidies. You and I will have retired before that finally is put to rest
in some shape or form.
But the protectionism that came from 2020 and all that happened under the Trump Administration, do you now believe that is behind and that you can
look forward to a more fruitful relationship with the U.S. Administration?
FAURY: The main area of conflict has really been the tariffs and the Boeing Airbus E.U-U.S. conflict on subsidies. We're now in a lose-lose
situation where Airbus planes going from the Europe to the U.S. or Boeing planes going from the U.S. to the E.U. are impacted by 15 percent of
tariffs.
I believe it's lose-lose. It's lose-lose for everybody in the industry including our airline customers. So we have the conditions in place for
what I call a cease-fire or a suspension of tariffs and then a negotiation.
So I think we could see the end of the trade conflict between the E.U. and the U.S. on commercial planes, and we want to play a role in finding this
agreement.
QUEST: Final question. What's the one thing you need now? The one thing that -- as obviously vaccination comes along, travel comes along -- but as
a plane manufacturer, what is the one thing you now need?
FAURY: On the short term, we need passengers to be able to fly because they want to fly -- so that's really about the decisions made by
governments to reopen borders and give certainty.
And on the mid-term to long-term, we need to manage successfully the challenge of decarbonization. If we manage to have CO2 freer planes, this
will be the best mode of transport --
[15:45:00]
-- without impact on the ground for fauna, for flora -- the earth, the water beneath the earth. So that's clearly what we want.
Short term, moving away from COVID-19; long term, decarbonizing our industry.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHATTERLEY: It's a rare occasion when NASA lands a rover on Mars. Now the next chance is just moments away.
More on the space agency's search for ancient life on the Red Planet. Next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHATTERLEY: It's traveled nearly 300 million miles from earth and just minutes from now NASA's Rover will attempt a nail-biting touchdown on the
surface of Mars.
Now, we won't actually see the landing -- NASA's technology is not quite there yet -- but we will be able to hear it, listening in to mission
control.
You're actually looking at live pictures from Pasadena, California.
Now once on Mars the Rover will search for signs of ancient life and collect sound recordings, it'll even launch a helicopter, a first actually
for another planet.
It's just about to enter Mars' atmosphere -- and I just want to listen into mission control for a moment just to get a sense of what they're saying.
DR. SWATI MOHAN, OPERATIONS LEAD, NASA: -- on the surface of Mars.
(Inaudible) is now waiting until it begins feeling the atmosphere of Mars to go down. Once there's enough atmosphere it will start controlling its
path to the landing target.
Navigation is also confirming that we can see a little bit of that slow down of the atmosphere on the Perseverance entry capsule.
Our current velocity is about 5.36 kilometers per second and an altitude of about 67 kilometers from the surface.
UNKNOWN: We are probably seeing MRL plasma blackout at this point.
UNKNOWN: The vehicle should be doing its turns right now.
UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) lock.
MOHAN: We have indications that Perseverance is now performing bank reversals in the atmosphere. These are the steps in order to control its
distance to the landing target.
Perseverance has just passed through the point of maximum deceleration and has indicated that it felt approximately 10 earth Gs of deceleration.
UNKNOWN: MRL (ph) has lock again.
UNKNOWN: Yes, yes. Yes.
MOHAN: We saw a small outage of the UHF (ph) telemetry from Mars reconnaissance orbiter during that peak heating phase likely caused by the
plasma black out.
Perseverance is still continuing to perform bank reversals in the atmosphere to control its distance to the landing target.
Perseverance is going about one kilometer per second at an altitude of about 16 kilometers from the surface of Mars.
We have entered heading alignment which means Perseverance is no longer trying to control the distance to Mars -- to the target on Mars but instead
is flying straight to the target.
CHATTERLEY: OK. We are listening in to NASA's mission control. As you were just hearing there we have entered the atmosphere of Mars.
And that precipitates what begins -- what's known as the seven minutes of terror where it's simply impossible to communicate given the time it takes
for signals to get between earth and Mars. It takes around 11 minutes and 22 seconds for radio signals to travel between earth and Mars.
So it's simply impossible for NASA Control to operate this Mars Perseverance Rover. And the technology behind this is so important. It
has to be able to control its own landing.
Let's get the wisdom and experience of CNN's aviation analyst, Miles O'Brien. He's in Vera Beach, Florida for us. Miles, great to have you
with us.
Just explain what we're in now. What's known as the seven minutes of terror where communication is impossible.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: There are so many things that have to go perfectly right right now, Julia. All automatically, all without any
human input except for the preprogrammed algorithms onboard the craft.
That is frightening. No less since 79 explosive bolts have to fire in a certain succession and each one of them has to fire or it's game over and
there'll be a crater on Mars.
The complexity of this is hard to comprehend. And what makes it so difficult for the engineers who are the mothers and fathers of Perseverance
is they just can only stand by and watch.
And I should point out to you, Julia, that whatever has happened has already happened because we are going to be finding out 11 minutes after
the event.
Because as you pointed out radio signals from Mars, about 124 million miles, about 200 million kilometers away, take about 11 minutes to get to
us.
And so whatever has happened has happened. We're just waiting now for that radio signal to come back to us. We do know this.
CHATTERLEY: I just want to listen in to what --
O'BRIEN: Based on that, the heat shield has jettisoned --
CHATTERLEY: -- mission control is saying now. Because we are seeing clapping and the parachute's deployed so there's definite optimism about
progress here.
Let's listen in.
MOHAN: Perseverance is continuing to descend on the parachute. We're coming up on the initialization of terrain-relative navigation and
subsequently, the timing of the landing engines.
Our current velocity is about 90 meters per second at an altitude of 4.2 kilometers.
UNKNOWN: Almost there.
MOHAN: We have confirmation that the lander vision (ph) system has produced a valid solution in part of terrain-relative navigation.
We have timing of the landing engines. Current velocity is 83 meters per second --
UNKNOWN: Yes.
MOHAN: -- at about 2.6 kilometers from the surface of Mars.
We have confirmation that the back shell has separated.
We're currently performing the divert maneuver. Current velocity is about 75 meters per second at an altitude of about a kilometer off the surface of
Mars.
UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) 50 bravo.
[15:55:00]
MOHAN: We have completed our terrain-relative navigation. Current speed is about 30 meters per second, altitude of about 300 meters off the surface
of Mars.
We have started our constant velocity accordion (ph) which means we are conducting the sky crane -- about to conduct the flight (ph) crane
maneuver.
UNKNOWN: We've lost direct to earth two tones.
UNKNOWN: As expected. As expected.
MOHAN: Sky cam (ph) maneuver has started. About 20 meters off the surface.
UNKNOWN: We're getting signals from MRL.
UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) is good.
MOHAN: Touchdown confirmed.
UNKNOWN: Yes.
MULTIPLE SPEAKERS: Yes, yes.
MOHAN: Perseverance safely on the surface of Mars.
MULTIPLE SPEAKERS: (Cheer)
MOHAN: Ready to begin seeking the signs of past life.
MULTIPLE SPEAKERS: (Cheer)
MOHAN: At this point, the descent stage has (inaudible) to (inaudible). Perseverance is continuing to transmit direct through (inaudible) orbiter
to earth.
CHATTERLEY: Jubilation. Jubilation, as you can see there as -- seven months in the making. We've touched down on Mars.
MULTIPLE SPEAKERS: (Cheers)
UNKNOWN: Oh, my God.
UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) reports we're still getting telemetry from the lander.
UNKNOWN: All right. All stations.
UNKNOWN: We got it. We're there.
UNKNOWN: Touchdown confirmed. We're going to wait for the images.
UNKNOWN: Wow.
UNKNOWN: This is so exciting. The team is beside themselves. It's so surreal. Stay tuned, we might get some pictures.
UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) great.
MULTIPLE PERSONS: (Cheer)
UNKNOWN: So much has been riding on this.
PBS NEWS PRESENTER: We just heard the news that Perseverance is alive on the surface of Mars.
UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) we have seen the completion of EDL 3000.
UNKNOWN: Copy activity. That is as expected.
CHATTERLEY: If you've just joined us what you have been watching in the last few moments is the completion of a seven-month mission to land the
Rover Perseverance on the surface of Mars.
And we have just seen the jubilation and the success of that.
Miles, it still gives me goose bumps, it doesn't matter what we watch. Just seeing the joy of a success like this. Just explain how momentous
this is and what now we're going to achieve, we hope, with this landing.
O'BRIEN: Yes. This is -- it's a turning point for the mission, it's just been that long point of just getting to the surface.
And this moment we just experienced together is such a big deal. It's so difficult to do what they do. The folks at the jet propulsion lab at
NASA's facility in Pasadena, California.
They do make it look easy, Julia. They are five for five when it comes to landing rovers on the surface of Mars. And it's an extraordinary
accomplishment when you think of it.
And this begins a mission which will go on for quite some time to search for the ancient signs of possible life in what was a very warm and wet sea
three-and-a-half billion years ago.
And I think we're getting some initial pictures from the surface which is going to be interesting to see -- but that's just for starters. This will
just be basic low resolution, relatively speaking, images.
We're about to go an amazing adventure on the surface of Mars which may possibly lead us to an answer to one of the biggest questions we've ever
asked ourselves as human beings. Are we alone in the universe?
If we look in the planet next door and we find a second genesis there, what are the odds that the universe is filled with life? I'd say the odds are
pretty good, wouldn't you, Julia?
CHATTERLEY: Yes. I just wanted to say we are actually seeing the first images now. I don't know whether you can see this too on a screen near
you. But we are now getting the first images from the perseverance rover on the surface of Mars.
So Miles, as you were saying, we wickedly await those and now we're getting them.
O'BRIEN: Yes. It's -- you know it's -- welcome back to Mars.
[16:00:00]
Mars is a, you know, to quote Elton John, it's not the kind of place you want to raise your kids, right. But it's -- it's -- it's a very interesting
place for science.
I -- it -- there's all kinds of interesting questions that we can ask ourselves about our own climate here and what happened to the climate in
Mars. Why was this warm wet place now so bone dry and seemingly inhospitable?
Ultimately it would be nice to get a human being on the planet there someday to have a pickaxe and go around and check out the rocks in person.
But in the meantime we've sent these extraordinary robots and this one is the -- the most exquisite manifestation of that technology that we've ever
attempted here.
I say we collectively. Not me, but we humanity. And Perseverance is now humankind's ambassador on the surface of Mars poking around, doing some
drilling and we'll be looking for any clues in the rocks that there might have been life there. And if you know how to read the rocks, they tell
quite a story.
CHATTERLEY: We are just looking at some of the second images now coming through, Miles, as you were talking about the story that we hope some of
these rocks will tell us years in the future. It's going to take us a while to get these samples once they've collected them back.
But even just this moment, just seeing imagines of Mars, once again, gives me goose bumps.
Miles, go back to what you were saying there as we continue to see these images come in. I just want to make sure our viewers know what we're seeing
here. But the samples are going to be collected and then a separate rover is going to be sent to Mars to collect them and bring them back.
And it's going to take years, 2030 -- the beginning of 2030, maybe ever '31 before we get these samples back and can test and find what's in this
crater and the hope is that, of course as you were saying, micro bio life we hope and sense of water 3.5 billion years ago.
O'BRIEN: And wouldn't that be an amazing day. But let's not underestimate the -- the laboratory capability on Perseverance is not too bad when you
consider it's got to be miniaturized and packed up in a -- in a spacecraft that's operating now 200 million kilometers away from us.
So there will be a lot of data that will come down sort of Insitu from Perseverance itself. But ultimately what they're looking for, these organic
signs of -- of potential past life. It's not an easy, obvious smoking gun slam dunk kind of thing.
It takes a lot of laboratory horsepower to tease out the answer to these questions and that's where the sample return idea came into being. It's
been around -- NASA's been talking about this thing for decades, Julia.
And this is the first step. Many of the samples they'll be analyzed on the planet and we'll look at them remotely and we'll get pictures and we'll get
all kinds of data. But ultimately a couple of dozen samples will be dropped on the surface and a future mission, in partnership with the European Space
Agency, will come and retrieve a rover.
Maybe we'll call it Labrador, who know, it will come and it will -- it will sniff around and -- and find those samples left on the surface and then
ultimately a rocket will send it back into the -- the atmosphere or the edge of the atmosphere to in orbit of Mars and then another craft will
bring it to -- back to Earth where it will be captured and those samples, ultimately once they're in an Earth located lab, scientist will go to town.
And they'll be able to really tease out the nuances that would be very difficult to do Perseverance capable as it is.
CHATTERLEY: The jewel in the crown here of the science and as you mentioned, this is the fifth time in this science and the technology
improves every time is a helicopter that is -- and has also landed on the surface of Mars. What can you tell us about the helicopter and how is that
going to be used.
O'BRIEN: I -- you know that's -- I think ultimately people are going to remember this mission as much as anything for ingenuity, the helicopter,
assuming all goes well. It's -- it just weighs a couple of kilos. Mars has about a little more than a third of the gravity we have on Earth.
So that -- that works in its favor. But it -- there's only about one -- less than 1 percent of our atmosphere. It's a carbon dioxide atmosphere. So
as you can imagine a rotor or a winged blade would have a hard time getting aerodynamic lift. And so the attempt here is to prove it can be done.
That's the key.
They've got five test flights on the mission calendar and they're going to fly short hops just to see what is the possibilities.
[16:05:01]
And then for future missions, Julia, this could be a reconnaissance tool either for robotic missions to help them determine where to go for the next
rock to look at.
It's kind of in-between what's on the surface and what you can get from the satellites, right. And give them some guidance on that. And then maybe one
day might be used by human explorers as a tool to see what's over the horizon on Mars.
So it'll be an exciting thing. It's going to be a little while before ingenuity starts its attempts at flight. But it -- it will be a picture, I
think, that will rival the shot of Orville Wright, 1903 in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina; first flight there. This will be another first flight.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, it's completely breath taking, just watching these images as these images are coming through with what's been achieved just in the
last few moments we will certainly remember, Miles.
You began by saying this is not a place where you want to bring up your children but there are people who have ambitions to journey to Mars,
perhaps see Mars inhabited by humans one day. Where are we and what is this step along that path perhaps to one day seeing Elon Musk's ambitious of a
population living on Mars? Are we talking decades and -- and is this just a first step in perhaps achieving that one day?
O'BRIEN: Yes, I think -- you know it's a parallel effort. There's a -- there's a separate scientific pursuit, which you know, stands alone from
the human presence on Mars.
But I will tell you this, the amount of distance that Perseverance will travel and the amount of rocks it will sample over the course of time could
be accomplished in a tiny fraction of the time if a human being was there with the pickaxe and the magnifying glass and the laboratory in an
inflatable structure Allah (ph) Matt Damon, not too far away.
So there is -- hopefully it won't go that way either. But it is -- it is a -- a place that is -- it has great scientific interest to us and of course
for big thinkers, Elon Musk among them, this idea that humanity is -- is trapped on a single planet and that humanity can extend beyond Earth
overtime, it's -- it's -- we're getting close to being ready to take that jump.
Understanding the science better on Mars, understanding the surface, all these mission help us better define how we're going to go, where we're
going to go, what we're going to look at, what that -- what the weather's like, what the atmosphere is like.
But ultimately it also tells us a little bit of how to get things safely on the surface. And one day we hope to have humans inside a vehicle and
celebrating that moment at this -- like we just saw.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, what a momentous moment and time we live in. For now, until we get to that point, Miles, we'll try and fix the problems on Earth.
But it's still great to see the science and the progress that we're making in other planets too. Great to have you have with us. Thank you so much for
giving us your wisdom on this.
And that wraps up "Quest Means Business." I'm Julia Chatterley in New York. It's been great to be with you this evening. Let's now join the lead with
Jake Tapper for coverage of the deadly winter storm in Texas, already of course, in progress.
END
