Not all electric vehicles can go the distance

Lucid is going backwards, while BYD is poised to pass Tesla. [Bloomberg]( This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a master thesis on how humanity can adopt and safeguard against Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. [Sign up here](. Today’s Agenda - Lucid is a [money pit](. - Biden’s [AI czar]( is full of wit. - [China]( is [scaring]( me a bit. - [Insurers]( can’t throw a fit. Saudi Arabia’s Lucid [Dreams]( I want someone to look at me the way this guy looks at this car from Lucid Motors: An attendee inspects the interior of a Lucid Air Dream Edition electric vehicle on the opening day of the Geneva International Motor Show. Photographer: Bloomberg Look at him! Seriously, have you ever seen anyone so in love, so invested, so enthralled?! Here, let me zoom in for you: Too bad the luxury sedan he’s obsessed with is made by a company that’s a bottomless money pit: Lucid “is miles away from becoming cash-flow positive,” Chris Bryant [writes]( (free read). Ever since the US luxury electric vehicle manufacturer went public via a SPAC in 2021, Saudi Arabia — Lucid’s biggest investor — has watched its money burn in a bonfire of [misguided]( business decisions. How, exactly, did this happen? Well, it’s no secret that the Saudis have been trying to rid themselves of their rep as the Country that [Shotguns]( a Barrel of Oil at Parties. As part of its big ‘ol rebrand (also known as the Saudi Vision 2030), the crown prince has pivoted to more wholesome ventures like [golf](, [live entertainment](, [luxury beach resorts]( and … you guessed it, electric vehicles. Two years ago, “the Public Investment Fund’s 60% Lucid stake was valued at more than $55 billion,” Chris writes. Today, that investment is now worth just $5.4 billion. Now, let’s take a gander: Who do you think Lucid’s most loyal customer is? Haha it’s the government of Saudi Arabia, of course! The Saudis have committed to buying 100,000 Lucid vehicles over the next decade. That is, if Lucid can make them all. The EV company only expects to build about 8,500 cars this year. Perhaps the opposite of Lucid is BYD, which Tim Culpan [says]( is on the cusp of overtaking Tesla as the world’s biggest EV maker. In 2008, Berkshire Hathaway bought about 10% of the company for $230 million. It is now worth more than $9 billion. BYD founder Wang Chuan-fu, like Elon Musk, is very focused on batteries. “Development of a new, thinner product called blade batteries, coupled with rising production of low-cost lithium iron phosphate alternatives, means BYD is likely to be a global EV leader in cars, and the batteries inside,” Tim predicts. Whether Lucid will still be around to see that happen is another story. This Old-Ass Guy Has a Point About AI Imagine playing Words With Friends with the 44th president of the United States. Would you let him win? I mean, that’d be the nice thing to do, considering he sacrificed eight years of his life to leading his country. But maybe you wouldn’t even realize that he was the former president. Maybe he’s got some random username like B33NLuViNThiSC0UntRYS!NCE1961. We’ll never know for sure. But thanks to [this interview]( by Nilay Patel, the editor-in-chief of [the Verge](, we do know what Barack Obama’s iPhone home screen looks like: It’s very important to me: What are the four apps in your iPhone dock? Four apps at the bottom, I’ve got Safari. Key. I’ve got my texts, the green box. You’re a blue bubble. Do you give people any crap for being a green bubble? No, no. I’m okay. All right. I’ve got my email, and I have my music. That’s it. The stock set. Pretty good. If you asked the ones that I probably go to more than I should, I might have to put Words With Friends on there, where I think I waste a lot of time, and maybe my NBA League Pass. Earlier on in the interview, the former president — a true master in self-deprecation — admitted: “Look, I’m obviously not 12 years old. I’m an old-ass 62-year-old guy who sometimes can’t really work all the apps on my phone, but I do have two daughters who are in their 20s. It’s interesting the degree to which, at a certain point, they have found almost every social media app getting kind of boring after a while.” But here’s the thing about this old-ass guy (hey, if he can say it, so can I): He’s shaping the future of AI regulation and policy, and doing a damn good job at it, too, [according]( to Dave Lee. Over the past half a year or so, Obama has quietly helped the White House put together its sweeping executive order on artificial intelligence, culminating in a [20,000-word master thesis]( on how humanity can adopt and safeguard against the technology. Not surprisingly, he did his homework, speaking with tech leaders, advocacy groups and policy think tanks to inform his assessment. Even in his [reading list](, which he released after the Verge Q&A, Obama struck a delicate balance: Sure, he includes materials that ring the alarm bells about AI, but he also provides content that speaks generously about its potential. “You won’t find a more capable figure who can harness the best of Silicon Valley while understanding how vital it is to keep such advancements under sensible control,” Dave argues. Watch his [TikTok]( for more. The Third Nuclear Superpower Normally when you hear someone say, “We want to reach quantitative parity,” you give ‘em a round of applause because they’re closing the [gender pay gap]( or improving [on-screen representation]( for people of color. But parity isn’t always a good thing — in nuclear ambitions, for instance. At the moment, the US and Russia together [own]( about 90% of the world’s atom bombs. But Chinese President Xi Jinping wants in on that percentage: By the mid-2030s, China says its stockpile of deployed warheads will reach “quantitative parity” with the US. What does that mean, exactly? Well, Beijing is “pursuing a nuclear force build-up on a scale unseen,” Bloomberg’s editorial board [writes](. Needless to say, I’m *not* interested in parity if it increases the odds of nuclear Armageddon: If Beijing’s efforts to become the third nuclear superpower succeed, America could be in serious trouble, Andreas Kluth [writes](. Consider what might happen if America’s enemies decided to combine their warheads as leverage. Then what? “If the US tried to match the sum of Russia’s and China’s stockpiles, each of them would feel more threatened and build even more nukes to keep up,” he writes. This could potentially lead to an endless cyclone of carnage that culminates in the near-erasure of human civilization as we know it. Oh, and it’ll drain the economy, too. But who’s going to be counting cash while the world burns? Not I! I’ll be cozied up with [a good book]( and a [can of beans]( in my [DIY underground bunker](. Bonus Wartime Reading: Xi Jinping is still playing coy about [next week’s meeting]( with Biden. He’d be wise to make it a success. — Minxin Pei Telltale Charts Yesterday, the FDA [approved]( Eli Lilly’s new weight-loss drug Zepbound, which will arrive at your local CVS sometime after Thanksgiving. The drugmaker will charge about 20% less for its shot than Novo Nordisk does for its obesity drug Wegovy. So far insurance companies have been reluctant to cover Wegovy for weight-loss, partly because of its [high price](. Lilly’s drug could change that, even though it’s still more expensive than its diabetes equivalent, Mounjaro. Evidence is mounting that these shots not only help patients lose weight but also help prevent heart attacks and strokes, Lisa Jarvis [writes](. Those kinds of health benefits mean that insurers won’t be able to avoid covering obesity drugs forever. The two words that probably haunt economists the most are “soft” and “landing.” That is their temple. That is their entire universe. If the economy does not cool and inflation does not fall further, their souls may be haunted by the ghost of William P.G. Harding. OK, OK, that’s an exaggeration. But I’m sure a lot of economists are relieved to see that the soft landing is, indeed, manifesting itself. Fed Chair Jerome Powell “has hinted strongly that the most influential central bank in the world is done with its aggressive hiking cycle, and that its next policy move will be a downward one,” Mohamed A. El-Erian [writes](. Even so, “the path from here may not be as straightforward as the consensus suggests, particularly in confidently predicting rate cuts alongside ever lower inflation and robust economic growth,” he warns. Further Reading Free read: Trump could learn [a thing or two]( from Charlie Chaplin if he truly wanted to cause a scene. — Stephen L. Carter The S&P 500’s [eight-day winning streak]( obscures an utterly uninspiring performance. — Jonathan Levin Adam Neumann still gets to be [a billionaire]( after WeWork’s bankruptcy?! He’s [so good at this](. — Matt Levine Efforts to tackle climate change can easily [run off the rails]( without the right safeguards. — Lara Williams Biden, please call Erdogan. The sooner the US gets [Turkey involved]( in Gaza, the better. — Bobby Ghosh Moody’s is wrong to punish colleges for [betting]( on private companies. — Aaron Brown Ukraine needs [a new strategy]( that combines diplomacy with fighting. — Marc Champion ICYMI Joe Manchin [isn’t running]( for reelection. A robot in South Korea [crushed a worker]( to death. Peter Thiel is [taking a break]( from democracy. All the Kickers The rare KitKats that [went missing](. The world’s first [chimaera monkey](. The algorithms [deciding]( brain transplants. The drone that [delivers beer](. The [new flavor]( of brandy you couldn’t pay me to try. The “Tesco Cat” that got [banned](. (h/t Andrea Felsted) The ex-Goldman employee who pivoted to [cabaret](. The celebrity [scaling]( the Empire State Building. [The boys]( who will eat you alive. Notes: Please send beer via drone and feedback to Jessica Karl at jkarl9@bloomberg.net. [Sign up here]( and follow us on [Threads](, [TikTok](, [Twitter](, [Instagram]( and [Facebook](. Follow Us Like getting this newsletter? [Subscribe to Bloomberg.com]( for unlimited access to trusted, data-driven journalism and subscriber-only insights. Before it’s here, it’s on the Bloomberg Terminal. Find out more about how the Terminal delivers information and analysis that financial professionals can’t find anywhere else. [Learn more](. Want to sponsor this newsletter? [Get in touch here](. You received this message because you are subscribed to Bloomberg's Opinion Today newsletter. If a friend forwarded you this message, [sign up here]( to get it in your inbox. [Unsubscribe]( [Bloomberg.com]( [Contact Us]( Bloomberg L.P. 731 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10022 [Ads Powered By Liveintent]( [Ad Choices](