Who Wins in the U.S.-EU “Deal”? Wall Street Turns Bullish on Nike & Anthropic’s $150B Valuation

0:00:07 it’s on the minds of everyone from you to your congressperson to your barista
0:00:15 when they flip that little pos tablet towards you asking for the tip i always feel like i’m in a
0:00:22 moral crisis of whether or not i tip and how much i should tip because how much are they being paid
0:00:28 tipping the question on everyone’s minds we’ll bring you the answers this week on explain it to
0:00:38 mean get new episodes every sunday wherever you get your podcasts today’s number 75 that’s the
0:00:44 percentage of men in japan who give all of their money to their wife the system is called kozukai
0:00:51 the wife manages the finances and the man receives a monthly allowance meanwhile japan enjoys some of
0:00:57 the highest household savings rates and lowest personal bankruptcy rates in the world put another
0:01:02 way japan has discovered the ultimate money hack give everything to your wife
0:01:09 money markets matter if money is evil then that building is hell
0:01:22 welcome to prof g markets i’m ed elson it is july 29th let’s check in on yesterday’s market vitals
0:01:28 the major indices were mixed as investors digested the trade deal with the eu we’ll talk more about
0:01:34 that in a second the s&p 500 and the nasdaq both hit new records the dow fell slightly the dollar
0:01:40 climbed the most since may as the euro fell sharply and finally oil prices rose after president trump
0:01:48 shortened the timeline for russia to end the war with ukraine okay what else is happening trump has
0:01:54 reportedly struck a deal with america’s largest trading partner the eu while the details aren’t
0:02:00 yet confirmed it is reported that the eu has agreed to pay a 15 tariff rate on most goods europe also
0:02:06 agreed to increase their investment level in the u.s by more than 600 billion dollars this framework
0:02:13 follows the july 11th letter from trump which threatened a 30 tariff rate on eu goods unless a deal
0:02:19 could be struck by august 1st on the news the markets were mostly unaffected the s&p finished
0:02:26 the day about 0.2 percent higher the nasdaq closed up more than 0.3 percent the euro stock 600 and index
0:02:33 of leading european blue chip companies that ended the day down a little over 0.2 percent so trump has
0:02:40 completed a deal with the eu this one according to the president is quote the biggest deal ever reached
0:02:47 in any capacity this comes less than a week after trump made a deal with japan which was in his words
0:02:53 quote the largest deal ever made so both of them record-breaking deals this deal is even bigger than
0:03:00 the last one truly historic i say that sarcastically but i should add that actually a lot of people do
0:03:06 believe it many people online and in the media are viewing this deal as a crucial victory as evidence
0:03:13 that the trump strategy is working that he’s getting deals done that he is winning and it’s not just
0:03:18 jesse waters or people on fox it’s more than that here’s a bloomberg opinion headline from yesterday
0:03:25 quote europeans not trump ended up chickening out here’s another one quote trump wins the hulkamania
0:03:31 tariff brawl he started here’s a tweet from a mainstream financial journalist quote trump is
0:03:39 winning on trade so many people are calling this deal a win for trump and you can kind of see why
0:03:45 he threatened these tariffs and in return he got this commitment from the eu to invest 600 billion
0:03:53 into the u.s sounds pretty good but it also sounds very similar to the deal we saw with japan last week
0:04:00 which was a reduction in tariffs and in return a commitment to invest 550 billion dollars into the
0:04:06 u.s and so considering this is essentially the same thing i will ask essentially the same questions i asked
0:04:13 last week which are what are they investing in what are the terms of the investment what is the timeline
0:04:20 and has anything been signed and as with last week the answers this week are the same for the first
0:04:27 three questions the answer is we don’t know and for the final question the answer is no nothing has
0:04:34 been signed this is once again a framework of a deal meaning that everything trump is saying literally all
0:04:41 is subject to change and as we discussed last week this is a recurring theme in trump land that by the way
0:04:48 has consistently never worked whether it was the 200 billion dollar commitment from china which never actually
0:04:55 materialized or the 600 billion dollar investment plan that was a trillion and then 300 billion and then 600 billion
0:05:03 from saudi arabia hasn’t materialized or the 500 billion from apple or the 500 billion from open ai and soft
0:05:10 bank over and over again we see an announcement of a deal a big headline and then six months later we look
0:05:17 back and we realize actually no nothing ever happened nothing was signed nothing changed and thus no deal got done
0:05:26 this is the reality of trump’s deal making and what is most ironic about this is the fact that in the same week
0:05:33 that we learn of this historic trade deal with the eu we also learn some new information about the historic trade deal with japan
0:05:39 the trade deal that was supposed to have japan invest more than 500 billion dollars into america
0:05:45 and that america was supposed to receive 90 of the profits on that was the deal which by the way we said would
0:05:52 never materialize well we now have some clarification on that deal from the japanese government this came out
0:06:01 over the weekend according to japan’s chief negotiator of that 550 billion dollars only one percent of it will
0:06:09 actually be invested in america the remaining 99 are going to take place in the form of a loan
0:06:16 which the japanese government is going to collect interest on so put another way no japan isn’t
0:06:22 investing 550 billion dollars they’re investing five billion dollars and by the way the timeline has also
0:06:28 been clarified to three and a half years which means that japan’s annual investment into the us is going
0:06:34 to come out to one and a half billion dollars that is 26 times less than the amount of money open ai just
0:06:42 raised in a private venture round so as predicted the japan deal was not a deal the only thing we got
0:06:48 wrong about that one was that the truth came out way quicker than we anticipated and here we are all over
0:06:56 again with europe a 600 billion dollar commitment with no deal terms no timeline and no signatures now
0:07:01 people might say what about the 750 billion they say they’re going to spend on energy to which i would
0:07:08 say once again not a deal nothing’s been signed and in addition europe was already going to buy that energy
0:07:15 because of this very widely understood concept called the ukraine war so as has been proven with japan this
0:07:22 is once again not a deal this is a press release this is europe saying something to make donald trump
0:07:29 appear victorious and therefore make him happy we know that’s basically all he cares about so let’s go back
0:07:36 to our deal tracker and just to remind you of what our definition of what a deal is our definition is a
0:07:43 contract or a treaty that is signed and ratified into law that’s what we think a deal is this doesn’t meet
0:07:52 that definition so today is july 29th we’re about 190 days and probably 50 tariff announcements into this
0:07:59 presidential administration and we are currently sitting on a grand total of zero ds that’s where
0:08:04 we’re at let’s give scott a call i’m sure he has many reactions of his own
0:08:14 scott how’s it going it’s going really well how about you i’m doing well i see you’re in new york i am in
0:08:19 new york that’s right you recognize my apartment don’t you i recognize your background i recognize your
0:08:25 grayson perry on the wall that’s right that’s right my only my only piece of art one piece of art it’s
0:08:33 a good one well we want to get your take on this eu trade deal uh a historic deal apparently the biggest
0:08:39 deal ever reached in any capacity those are the president’s words um your reaction scott well first
0:08:46 off i’m curious what your thoughts are based on what i’ve read this is a good deal for the us and a bad
0:08:52 deal for the eu and that is it looks like a lot of our it looks like it’s asymmetrically advantage to
0:08:58 us in terms of tariffs they’re mostly opening their markets keeping their markets the same we’re opening
0:09:04 them further and i was trying to figure out how we ended up in a place with a better deal than them
0:09:11 other than obviously the genius deal making of the president uh and i think it’s a couple
0:09:16 things one i think this is where it really hurts to have 27 member countries that europe is not really
0:09:24 a union and two i think the elephant in the room and mia pointed this out is the u.s military umbrella
0:09:31 that the real existential threat of getting into a trade war with the united states is it it diminishes
0:09:38 their ability to push back on the russian army and ukraine and that also i think that for the first time
0:09:45 america potentially leaving nato and and folding or collapsing the military umbrella that the eu has
0:09:52 enjoyed is is a real possibility so i think for just market stability to get their businesses back to
0:09:57 planning again to try and i would imagine part of this was a wink and a nod that america will continue
0:10:05 to support the ukrainian army and also be a productive member or the base anchor of nato that they needed to
0:10:10 get this deal done the net net as far as i can tell if this framework becomes an actual tariff deal is
0:10:15 it’ll raise prices on u.s households about twenty four hundred dollars it’s interesting i guess their
0:10:23 primary our primary import from uh europe is you know i assumed it was air mess scarves it’s not it’s
0:10:33 pharmaceuticals uh so our prices do go up uh but this is uh just calling balls and strikes the way i see it and
0:10:39 i i do want your opinion here i feel like this is a win for trump that he got the better end of this
0:10:43 deal as far as i read it what are your thoughts that well i think a lot of people are saying that
0:10:50 and i gotta be honest i can’t see any reason why i mean this is the same thing we’ve seen before we’re
0:10:56 putting up a tariff and as we all know that tariff is a tax on us yes it’s going to lower demand
0:11:02 um on on europe’s side of things but ultimately who are we taxing we’re taxing the people who
0:11:08 import those products to america we’re taxing american companies so that’s america losing on
0:11:14 that side there’s also the america losing in terms of prices going up and then again we got to get to
0:11:21 the quid pro quo here what did we get in return well europe’s supposedly investing 600 billion
0:11:27 dollars in america but if history is any guide we’ve seen it with japan and with china and saudi arabia
0:11:32 means absolutely nothing nothing’s actually been signed here and so i don’t fully understand why
0:11:39 people have decided to wake up this morning and say oh this one’s legit this one makes sense this one’s a
0:11:44 win it’s a victory even the markets i mean perhaps they’re gleaning that information from the market’s
0:11:51 reaction but the market’s reaction was very very small s&p closed maybe 0.2 percent higher that’s
0:11:58 basically flat these days european market down 0.2 percent i mean in my view that’s not much of a
0:12:06 reaction so the way i see it again nothing’s nothing’s changed and you know we’ve gone over that but i i
0:12:14 guess i would i would be interested in why you your thoughts on why people might be seeing this as
0:12:22 something more substantial than anything we’ve seen before perhaps because it’s with the european union
0:12:29 and the tensions have been higher i mean what what is it you think about this deal that people decided to
0:12:36 say okay this one this one’s a win japan was kind of a a tie but this one’s a win for
0:12:42 trump this does feel a little bit ed and that one of two things happened either the eu said
0:12:47 we’re just going to play slow ball agree to a framework we need to get back to business
0:12:53 the the chill here the indecision is bad for everybody and we’ll work out the details and
0:12:57 maybe throw up arms in frustration and never get to a deal waiting for a democratic congress
0:13:03 or we got to placate this guy because we need arms to continue to flow into ukraine otherwise is
0:13:10 poland next so it feels to me like the us based on the framework i’ve saw has got the better end of
0:13:16 this deal i would have thought the eu would have responded with equivalent reciprocal tariffs and it
0:13:22 doesn’t look like that it looks like our tariffs that we’re managed and getting them at least in terms
0:13:27 of a framework to agree to are greater than the tariffs that are going to be imposed on us well perhaps
0:13:31 europe has realized that tariffs are attacks on themselves i mean this is a this is another big
0:13:36 piece of it you sound like that literally the physical embodiment of the economist magazine the
0:13:41 economist is saying the economist magazine has been saying for 40 years the reason for abusing the
0:13:48 reason to try that the the the kind of center of gravity for the economist is that free trade and free
0:13:53 markets are the way to go and i think you make a really solid argument as a matter of fact when i first saw
0:13:58 this i thought oh we’re lowering tariffs on everyone this is actually a free trade agreement and i agree
0:14:05 with you but this is where we are we’re on the we’re on it felt like we’re on the precipice of a trade war
0:14:11 where we were going to implement 50 he was you know he was threatening 30 and 50 taxes i thought they
0:14:16 would have reciprocated with those taxes and then we see economic growth just come to a standstill and then
0:14:24 the largest democracies in the world figure out a way to create openings for autocracies so this is
0:14:29 this whole framework all of this bullshit this nonsense probably should have never happened
0:14:34 right and the really interesting analysis to your point will be okay how does this who are the winners
0:14:40 and losers versus a year ago and i’m not sure you know we’re going to come out with much different other
0:14:47 than a huge erosion and goodwill towards us exactly having said that it’s back to business it does feel
0:14:53 like the tariffs are a bit asymmetrically favored towards us and uh i’d like to think and i don’t
0:14:58 know if this was the case i’d like to think that trump said give me a win here give me a great press
0:15:05 release and i’ll continue to ship arms into ukraine and and uh bear hug and talk about how much i love
0:15:13 nato i don’t know if that happened but that is a big playing card but the other thing the first thing
0:15:19 i thought of is that europe is a union in name only that when you have the prime minister of france
0:15:26 coming out saying this is a terrible day they can’t even speak with one voice and so it’s it’s not easy
0:15:32 to have 27 member nations all with veto power trying to negotiate a deal like this so net net given where
0:15:40 we are given a trade war that made no sense to begin with i i call this a lowercase win for the
0:15:47 trump administration um even if it’s a perceptual win here ed i do think when you read this press release
0:15:52 and 27 you know eu member nations or whatever it is have signed up to this framework i think the trump
0:15:58 administration can can legitimately say this was a win for them this let me put it this way i think
0:16:04 you know the perception is the reality right now and the perception is is that our largest trading partner
0:16:10 in the world has come to an agreement for a framework that on the face of it looks like
0:16:17 it’s asymmetrically tilted towards the u.s uh we’ll see what happens here yeah we’ll see i don’t think it is
0:16:25 but but but but we will see um thank you that’s our little economist our little a little economist
0:16:32 subscriber he just he’s not having any of it it’s it’s those geniuses in brussels with their fondue
0:16:36 i’ll believe it when i see a deal i’ll believe it when i see a deal that is signed and sealed that’s
0:16:42 ratified that’s when i’ll start to believe any of this but i i’m not i’m not buying into these press
0:16:47 releases we’ve seen them too many times that’s a fair point all right thank you scott i’ll see you
0:16:54 tomorrow take care brother after the break wall street changes its tune on nike stay with us
0:17:04 support for the show comes from public.com you might already use ai tools to refine your emails
0:17:09 and streamline your workflow so why not see if you can optimize your investing as well for that you can
0:17:14 check out public.com public.com is the investing platform that takes your money as seriously as you
0:17:20 do with public you can build a multi-asset portfolio of stocks bonds options and more you can also access
0:17:26 industry-leading yields including the 4.1 apy you can earn on your cash with no fees or minimums
0:17:32 but what sets public apart ai isn’t just a feature it’s woven into the entire experience from portfolio
0:17:37 insights to earnings call recaps public gives you smarter context at every touch point and the best
0:17:43 part you can earn up to ten thousand dollars when you transfer your existing portfolio over to public
0:17:49 go to public.com slash prob g to fund your account in five minutes that’s public.com slash prob g paid
0:17:54 for by public investing all investing involves the risk of loss including loss of principal
0:17:59 brokered services for us listed registered securities options and bonds and a self-directed account are
0:18:05 offered by public investing inc member finra and sipc complete disclosures available at public.com
0:18:06 slash disclosures
0:18:14 hunter biden’s three hour interview with andrew callahan started out normally enough
0:18:19 lore so you’re born here in delaware or born here in pennsylvania in delaware okay in delaware
0:18:26 yeah wilmington small talk what are your thoughts on wilmington delaware nice place oh yeah work family
0:18:33 addiction anyway i don’t want to tell people how to make crack cocaine he did then came the crash out i
0:18:39 hear rom emmanuel is gonna run for president like oh boy there’s the answer there’s the answer you
0:18:43 have the pod save america they’re saying you know i don’t think south carolina that’s only
0:18:50 what the i mean are they out of the minds i don’t have to be nice number one i agree with quentin
0:18:56 tarantino george clooney is not i don’t know what he is he he he’s a brand and by the way and god bless
0:19:02 him we’re not picking on him keep coming back hunter no in fact everybody has been crashing out lately and
0:19:11 today on today explained from vox we’re gonna ask what’s up hey this is peter kofka the host of
0:19:17 channels a show about media and tech and what happens when they collide and this may be hard to remember
0:19:23 but not very long ago magazines were a really big deal and the most important magazines were owned by
0:19:28 condé nast the glitzy publishing empire that’s the focus of a new book by new york times reporter
0:19:34 michael grinbaum the way condé nast elevated its editors the way they paid for their mortgages so
0:19:40 they could live in beautiful homes there was a logic to it which was that condé nast itself
0:19:46 became seen as this kind of enchanted land you can hear the rest of our chat on channels
0:19:49 wherever you listen to your favorite media podcast
0:20:01 we’re back with prof g markets wall street has officially turned bullish on nike a note from jp
0:20:07 morgan analysts upgraded the stock to a buy telling investors to quote just buy it jp morgan boosted
0:20:14 nike’s price target predicting a share price of 93 dollars by december of 2026 the bank also
0:20:21 increased the outlook for the company’s earnings per share in both fiscal years 2026 and 2027 and jp morgan
0:20:26 isn’t alone goldman sachs jeffries and august have also upgraded the stock in recent weeks
0:20:32 nike shares rose three percent on yesterday’s news and the stock is now trading at its highest level
0:20:39 in five months so this has been a pretty great week for nike a pretty great month for nike and it’s
0:20:44 coming at a time when things have been generally speaking quite bad for the company the stock fell
0:20:52 30 percent last year revenue fell nearly 10 percent net profit fell nearly 50 percent we also had this
0:20:57 tariff drama which is a big problem for a company that builds most of its products in china they also had
0:21:02 this management shakeup recently which forced them to withdraw their guidance in a recent earnings
0:21:09 report that was a problem they’ve had too much inventory they’ve had weak demand bad forecasting
0:21:16 we could go on forever things have not looked good for nike but it appears that something is
0:21:23 beginning to change perhaps it’s the new ceo elliot hill perhaps it’s market conditions we’re not
0:21:29 exactly sure but analysts on wall street are starting to take notice so to understand what exactly is going
0:21:35 on at nike our producer claire spoke with lorraine hutchinson a retail analyst at bank of america
0:21:41 i think the biggest thing that’s changed with nike is we have a line of sight that the worst is behind
0:21:48 us so they’ve had a lot of struggles with putting out products that’s way too lifestyle focused and they
0:21:55 oversold a lot of these key franchises rather than innovating and launching new franchises um
0:22:00 they had to clean that up under a new management team and that’s been really harmful to the sales and
0:22:06 the earnings of the company so now we’ve started to see some green shoots and signs that the worst
0:22:12 of that is behind us and i think that’s caused investors to focus more on what could earnings
0:22:18 look like as they come out of this really tough time would you say the stock has bottomed in that case
0:22:24 i think it has um we have a buy on the stock we think the stock goes higher from here based on continued
0:22:30 sequential trajectory in the sales and the margins what would you say elliot hill the ceo is doing
0:22:37 right so elliot hill joined um and diagnosed the problem very quickly he looked and saw these three
0:22:45 lifestyle styles as you being much too high a percentage of total sales and so he realized as
0:22:51 the sell through began to slow that nike needed to exit a lot of that volume very quickly they had
0:22:58 started this before he took over as ceo but they accelerated it dramatically so what does that mean
0:23:03 it means clearing through some of the liable product that’s already on the shelves it means buying back
0:23:10 some product from wholesale it means really trying to clean up the inventory out of the wholesale channel
0:23:16 and out of nike’s retail stores uh that was really the first thing he did he also reorganized the company
0:23:25 back to focusing on sport instead of gender or product it’s it’s now sport so they’re really very laser focused
0:23:31 on their heritage of being a performance company and that’s been a big cultural change for nike
0:23:39 that was lorraine hutchinson retail analyst at bank of america well it’ll be very interesting to see how this nike story
0:23:44 unfolds as we’ve said the past few years have been incredibly rough back in 2021 the stock was at an
0:23:50 all-time high the company was worth nearly 300 billion dollars since then the stock’s been more
0:23:56 than cut in half we’re looking at a market cap right now of less than 120 billion dollars and a lot of that
0:24:03 failure was blamed on the former ceo john donahoe who tried to lead this digital transformation of nike
0:24:09 investing in tech and e-commerce and even crypto even nfts which kind of seemed exciting at the time
0:24:17 but ultimately it came at the expense of the things that make nike nike things like brand product quality
0:24:23 wholesale partnerships etc so when john donahoe stepped down as ceo and elliot hill the former
0:24:30 nike exec took over the idea was that elliot would bring the company back to its roots that he would focus on
0:24:36 the things that made nike great and that was a big piece of why scott became bullish on nike
0:24:42 back in october of last year this was part of scott’s fallen angel thesis this idea that
0:24:48 these once iconic companies not just nike but also intel disney estee lauder that those companies
0:24:55 whose stocks had gotten battered in recent years would rediscover their roots and return to evaluation that
0:25:00 more accurately reflected their iconic status in american culture which as of the beginning of this
0:25:07 year they certainly didn’t that was the thesis at least well it would appear that it might be
0:25:13 beginning to materialize nike as lorraine pointed out is starting to turn things around
0:25:19 major banks are now upgrading the stock and despite this massive tariff exposure nike shares are up eight
0:25:25 percent year to date as for the other fallen angels intel has underperformed it’s up around two and a half
0:25:31 percent year to date disney’s done better up nine percent but the biggest winner to scott’s credit
0:25:38 has been estee lauder which has risen 25 percent in 2025 that is roughly the same return as nvidia
0:25:47 so is 2025 the year that the fallen angels rise up again well if sentiment towards nike our original
0:25:51 angel is any indication it would seem that a comeback is underway
0:26:02 anthropic is chasing a blockbuster valuation the ai startup is reportedly in talks to raise funding at
0:26:09 a valuation north of 150 billion dollars that is more than double its 61 and a half billion dollar
0:26:15 valuation from earlier this year and it would make it the third most valuable startup in the world this
0:26:20 comes as the company’s annual recurring revenue has quadrupled to four billion dollars since the
0:26:27 beginning of the year fueled by enterprise subscriptions and its coding assistant claude code now the startup
0:26:33 world is understandably very excited about this valuation about what it says about anthropic and
0:26:40 also what it says about the future of ai in general and that is totally fair and we agree however the more
0:26:46 interesting story here isn’t the jump in valuation the more interesting story here is who’s investing
0:26:53 according to the financial times anthropic has been holding talks with mgx which is the government owned
0:26:59 investment fund of the united arab emirates which on its face isn’t that interesting everyone’s raising
0:27:05 money in the gulf these days but it is more interesting when you realize that as of last year
0:27:12 anthropic made it a point that they would never raise money from the middle east according to the ceo
0:27:18 quote democracies need to be able to set the terms by which powerful ai is brought into the world both
0:27:24 to avoid being overpowered by authoritarians and to prevent human rights abuses within authoritarian
0:27:31 countries which is why last year anthropic specifically told its bankers that it would never raise money from
0:27:39 saudi arabia it’s also why dario amadei the ceo was the one notably absent ai leader during trump’s trip to
0:27:45 the middle east in the spring and it is also why he wrote a memo to employees explaining why it is dangerous
0:27:52 for ai companies to quote get in bed with the middle east in that same memo he wrote quote the basis of our
0:27:58 opposition to large training clusters in the middle east is that the supply chain of ai is dangerous to
0:28:07 hand to authoritarian governments fair enough i’m sure many would agree with him however here we are in
0:28:14 july and anthropic is in talks to raise money from the government of the uae a total reversal of what
0:28:23 was supposedly an ethical principle of the company in an attempt to justify this about face dario the ceo
0:28:29 wrote quote it’s perfectly consistent to advocate for a policy of no one is allowed to do x but then
0:28:36 if that policy fails and everyone else does x to reluctantly do x ourselves in other words he’s
0:28:42 basically saying we commit to not taking money from dictators unless of course the dictator shows up with
0:28:48 a ton of money and other people start taking his money too then we’ll reevaluate our commitment
0:28:55 so this is becoming a recurring theme on this show as we discussed a couple weeks ago silicon valley
0:29:00 has this tendency to make these bold ethical declarations and then to abandon them as soon
0:29:06 as it gets in the way of making money we saw it with open ai which was supposed to be a non-profit
0:29:12 to benefit humanity and then they reversed course on that we saw it with google which said it would never
0:29:17 work on weapons and then it just took up a 200 million dollar contract with the department of
0:29:22 defense we saw it with meta which made the same promises and then it started working on military
0:29:29 products with anduril over and over and over again these tech companies create mission statements and
0:29:37 ethical guidelines and humanitarian promises and to a near certainty they never follow through and this is
0:29:43 just another example of that principle it’s not really a tradable thesis it’s just you know something
0:29:50 to remember you can never trust a mission statement they are almost always empty especially the ones
0:29:57 from silicon valley the real mission of silicon valley and of corporate america at large is the same
0:30:05 as it’s always been it’s to make money and as we’ve said before there is nothing wrong with that so you
0:30:13 might as well just admit to it okay that’s it for today thanks for listening to prof g markets from
0:30:25 the vox media podcast network i’m ed elson i’ll see you tomorrow
0:30:41 you help me in kind reunion as the world’s heart