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Comment by leereeves | Hacker News Reader

Bloomberg sure is working hard to talk down the economy. Throughout 2019 they were talking about recession.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=bloomberg+recession+2019&t=ffab&at...

> Bloomberg sure is working hard to talk down the economy

It’s a finance publication. Its bread is buttered by people paranoid about missing the next big thing, whether that be an unexpected winner or unexpected pullback.

CNBC - which is not even a great financial & business news media outlet - does a dramatically better job of balancing their bullish versus bearish articles. Bloomberg, the media platform, went noticeably bearish after Michael Bloomberg publicly came out against Trump a few years ago. I've been reading Bloomberg daily for a very long time, it wasn't a subtle turn, it was dramatic and immediate - which perfectly fits with what we've seen since then from Michael Bloomberg's direction to his firm re what they're allowed to do and say. They're following his marching orders.

The only positive thing I can say about that sort of bias and propaganda, is at least it's formally out in the open.

> it wasn't a subtle turn, it was dramatic and immediate

I've been reading Bloomberg news since it was on my terminal. I never noticed this.

There has always a steady chatter of red flags and growth sectors. That's its job. During the recession, it was about the recession. After the recession, it was about threats to "green shoots." At each business-cycle record, it was about what could tank the economy next.

(I've actually thought that Bloomberg's coverage has been bullish over the past year. While the FT was calling out a looming recession, Bloomberg focussed on American equities outperforming.)

There is no reason to value a "balance of bullish versus bearish articles." If the prevailing sentiment is one or the other, then those would be viewpoints most represented.

I am wondering has this always been the case of CNBC? Or the balance view is something recent?

I have only been reading / watching CNBC financial for the past few years and I was surprised at their balanced view. Since CNBC is constantly bashed ( may be based on politics or whatever reason Obama used to joke about ) I completely dismissed them for a very long time.

Somewhere along the line Bloomberg turns into more like a Buzzfeed like platform for Financial news.

But the numbers are produced by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, according to the article.

A lot of economic forecasts are produced each day. Bloomberg chose to highlight these.

Choose to highlight? This article isn't even in the homepage. In fact I couldn't even see it in the Economics section. Are you sure it isn't your confirmation bias?

Bloomberg cover everything about market and economy. They churn out news round the clock.

Of course it's not on the homepage now. It's from 4 days ago.

It’s not on the front page of their website.

Bloomberg is a financial news source geared at US finance professionals anything the fed says is a story for them.

Are you insinuating that Bloomberg is being nefarious by doing so?

As long as the data backs it up I don’t see a problem with it being reported on.

A selective reading of the data can be made to support almost any conclusion, and I think Bloomberg has a rather obvious bias. As TFA says: "A faltering economic outlook in coming months would likely cast a shadow over President Donald Trump’s re-election bid."

And even if there wasn't an election going on, we should consider a source's track record when evaluating their latest predictions. Bloomberg Media is the boy who cried "recession".

That’s a fair point. I forgot Bloomberg had entered the race to be honest. That could cause a lot of Bias.

However I do think the economy isn’t well, if it was I doubt the fed would have restarted QE.

He's been doing this since atleast 2016. I wouldn't rule out he having sights on a presidential run since atleast then. He did form an exploratory committee once before and abandoned the run when it showed he didnt have enough support.[1] [2]

   Stocks keep climbing and climbing, but Michael
   Bloomberg isn't sure why.
   "I cannot for the life of me understand why the market 
    keeps going up," the former New York City mayor
    said Tuesday in an interview with CBS News' Anthony 
    Mason.

   "Our economy has some real challenges," he continued.
   "The infrastructure's falling apart. We're destroying jobs
    with technology. We are keeping the best and the 
    brightest from around the world from coming to America
    to create new jobs and create new businesses.

   "All of those things would give you pause to worry
    about the future."[3]

[1]

Former New York mayor Bloomberg mulls presidential run on heels of Trump surge

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jan/23/michael-bloo...

[2]

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg Will Not Run for President

https://time.com/4250295/michael-bloomberg-president-trump-c...

[3]

BLOOMBERG: 'I cannot for the life of me understand why the market keeps going up'

https://www.businessinsider.com/stock-market-news-michael-bl...

Why is this being downvoted?

It is a interesting contribution and gives valuable insight into the article that has been posted.

> Why is this being downvoted?

So was the other comment by the same user. They're being downvoted because they're critical of a Democratic presidential candidate.

At least in my case, I downvoted it because it cited Daily Mail as a reliable source. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daily_Mail and https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/daily-mail/ have more, but basically, it’s a tabloid. Their assessment of the decision is incomplete, probably because reporting is not how they differentiate.

Here’s a few other entities' explanations of Bloomberg’s decision: https://www.npr.org/2019/11/25/782732936/bloomberg-news-says..., https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/473542-bloomberg-report..., https://www.cjr.org/the_media_today/michael_bloomberg_news_p...

Did you downvote the wrong comment? It was a different comment by the same author, with the same unique format, that cited the Daily Mail.

(Update: I'm no longer sure whether this is correct. More on this, for the three other people who care: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21969051)

No, OP subsequently edited the comment without saying so. This whole reply thread is now useless.

I'm sorry to say but you seem to be a petulant person or someone with an axe to grind, here. I haven't seen anyone try to vociferously beat down a fully citation-ed comment with legitimate sources as if it were salvaged from some hearsay somewhere.

Some would mistake you for someone who works for the aforementioned billionaire's campaign, the way you seem to want to launder his image, here.

There's no point to continuing this here, but I'd like to restore your faith that there's someone online who doesn't have an axe to grind :-) I don't, nor do I have a strong opinion about the next president (well, other than that I'd like it to not be Trump).

If you're up for email, I just added an obfuscated version of my email address to my profile. Say hi and maybe we can get back to a good place.

Eh, nothing changed for me. People probably just got lost in the hierarchy on mobile or something.

Of the four sources posted, only the Mail did the work of getting quotes from Bloomberg reporters. That alone gives it more credibility on this story. The other sources have to editorialize, because they don’t contain original reporting. (NPR features some hot takes from uninvolved parties, which is what reporters do when they can’t get a direct quote.) The Daily Mail has the best reporting on this story.

> The Daily Mail has the best reporting on this story.

I respectfully disagree, but I think anyone who reads the stories can decide for themselves.

I agree that it's interesting that Daily Mail texted reporters (or as they wrote, "DailyMail.com's anecdotal sampling of Bloomberg reporters' opinions shows scattershot unease but no willingness to contest the company policy"). I think the 2 opinions I linked to are far more thorough, though. Daily Mail's piece is what they could put out in an hour or two, and the novelty of texting a few reporters doesn't replace thinking about the underlying problems.

Reporting is facts, quickly. Editorial is issues, thoughtfully.

Further down in the article was both a quote from a Bloomberg reporter and a statement from Bloomberg Business News. They got the scoop, as they say.

>only the Mail did the work of getting quotes from Bloomberg reporters. That alone gives it more credibility on this story.

Which in no way indicates it has more credibility. Just that it reportedly spent more resources on this story.

HN tends to take a dim view of political discussions in my experience.

There have been a number of indicators of a slowing economy for quite some time now. There was at least one run towards bonds in recent months. The Fed has been famously weighing its rate decisions sighting troubling economic outlooks. The yield curve inverted. GDP figures are trending downward. This is all just off the top of my head.

Most importantly of all, a stagnating economy is likely the only way anyone in the Democratic primary can beat Trump. And there's not an editor in the country who isn't carefully weighing this when picking what finance stories to run.

Edit: As far as I can tell, my comment below was totally incorrect. Parent comment may well be unchanged. I dug up the web archive to confirm because there was uncertainty, and as far as I can tell, it's unchanged. I have a version on my phone that renders a different comment, but since, I can't repro it or verify it now, I need to retract what I wrote below.

My original comment: OP has edited the comment above without mentioning it, rendering this entire reply thread useless.

No. This is not true. The comment is exactly the same.

Why are you doing this?

It's comical how Bloomberg wouldn't get into the race until Warren polled higher than Biden for two days. Even a tiny chance that a wealth tax could happen was enough for Bloomberg to commit to the race. Haha.

It certainly feels that way. Honestly though I'm not sure if his goal is for a moderate nominee that joining the race is the way to do it. Seems much more likely to me he'll peel some support away from Biden rather than actually decreasing support for Warren/Bernie/et al.

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