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First Move with Julia Chatterley
Futures Softer after Tuesday's Rally, Europe Pulls Back; China Suffers from Both Floods and Extreme Heat; How Drones can Reseed Forests after Wildfire; UK Consumer Inflation hits new 40-Year Highs; Fires Rage in Italy, France and Greece; Sri Lanka Lawmakers Pick Wickremesinghe as new President. Aired 9-10a ET
Aired July 20, 2022 - 09:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[09:00:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
JULIA CHATTERLEY, CNNI HOST: Welcome to "First Move", fantastic to have you with us. We will have all the latest on the blistering Heat wave,
blanketing much of Europe as well as the United States and part of Asia in just a moment's time.
In the meantime, a bit of relief of Britain is following the hottest day on record Tuesday. We don't often talk about wildfires in the UK but fire did
destroy dozens of homes and buildings around London.
It was the busiest day for the emergency responders there since the Second World War. Wildfires are also scorching the European mainland. We'll have
live reports from Europe, the UK, Beijing in just a moment's time.
A heat wave settling in around New York City to and while it might be a bit of a scorching day outside the New York Stock Exchange, the field I can
tell you is a little cooler inside as you can see, and that has nothing to do with the aircon.
Investors I think taking a breather after what can only be called a fiery day of trading on Tuesday, the NASDAQ rising more than 3 percent with the
DOW and the S&P 500 not far behind.
Europe softer two on the eve of that crucial European Central Bank meeting with a half a point rate hike in play. A bucking a stronger handover to
from Asia where the Chinese central bank kept interest rates steady.
China's premier also ruling out "excessive stimulus to help boost growth", Netflix shares a bright spot to set to rally more than 4 percent in trade
today after the home of Stranger Things reported another quarter of slowing things, a loss of around 1 million subscribers, forget squid games more
like skip games perhaps but much better.
And this is the key numbers then the 2 million customers lost that were feared. I call that a triumph over extremely lowered expectations. As we
discussed on the show yesterday Netflix shares go down more than 65 percent year to date.
Investors were truly pricing the worst it seems the worst, however, clearly in play in Europe as it battles against the heat wave emergency. And that's
where we begin today's show.
At least 20 European countries are currently under heat warnings. Its fueling wildfires in several nations in southwest France, fires have burned
in an area twice the size of Paris.
The French President is planning to visit the region today. Firefighters are also battling raging wildfires in Italy. Nine cities are under the
country's highest heat alert. In Greece houses are engulfed in flames near Athens.
At least 600 people have been evacuated. Elinda Labropoulou joins us now and Elinda, great to have you on the show. Have the firefighters managed to
get those wildfires under some kind of control?
Oh, I believe we've lost her. OK, we'll continue and we'll see if we can get her back shortly for now. The UK finally cooling down a day after
seeing temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius for the first time, the record breaking heat set off red, rare wildfires in London, the London area
destroying dozens of homes and buildings.
Nina dos Santos joins us on this. Nina and London Mayor said it was the worst day for the firefighters in that region since the Second World War
incredibly busy for them.
NINA DOS SANTOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, that's right, 2600 calls they had to deal with yesterday is Breton roasted under those record breaking
temperatures that just a reminder for our viewers top the mercury at 40.3 degrees Celsius in Fahrenheit that's 104.5 and rising.
Well, there were blazes that burned right throughout the course of the evening in London around London, particularly around the perimeter from
north to West to south and also east where I am here.
Just a half a mile away from the village of Wennington, which are only few miles outside of the perimeter of London? We saw 90 acres of farmland
backyards back 20 buildings being destroyed by fire leaving 90 residents tonight not knowing where they're going to sleep.
I in fact spoke to one of them who are a grave digger, a second generation winning --. And he and his son first noticed the fires that broke out that
caused all this damage in his neighbor's backyard.
They try desperately to put out the flames with a hose pipe, but very quickly realized that with the winds rising and the earth as dry as it is
it was a tinderbox and there was very little that they could do. Here's what Tim Stock had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TIM STOCK, WENNINGTON, ENGLAND RESIDENT: But once the wind picked up yesterday obviously, obviously the flood the flames are sucking the oxygen.
It's gotten out of control, it's so quickly. So - a training so deeply thinking about but laying in I didn't sleep last losing hotel room and
thinking I barely could have gone I just thank God that everyone got out alive everywhere --.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[09:05:00]
SANTOS: Well two rows of terraced houses were damaged in this place a number of other different semidetached and detached buildings. 12 stables
were burnt down as well with horses now having to try and find some shelter for the next few nights.
And Tom Stock there managed to escape with his wife, members of this family, two dogs in the pet tortoise multi, he said, but across the
Capitol, there was other damage by other fires.
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan said that 40 buildings in total had been destroyed by these wildfires. The specter of the type of flames that we see
burning around this time of year in southern Europe has become a reality even in Northern Europe.
And we spoke to the leader of the local council just earlier today who said that they become increasingly aware that climate change is a reality for
these parts of the United Kingdom.
In fact, they've actually recently been voted back in and actually nominated a specific representative to deal with climate change in this
part of the suburbs of London.
So this has been a wakeup call, yes, the Mercury has come back down. It's a balmy sort of 27 degrees Celsius at the moment. But there is a reality that
fires like this, and potentially other extreme weather events like flooding, are going to become an increased reality, Julia.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, that's fascinating, isn't it hiring people to take risk mitigation efforts and to perhaps assess what infrastructure needs to
change. But to your exact point in our viewers, and I was going to ask if you hadn't mentioned it, your hair's blowing, I can see a breeze.
And the sky looks considerably less bright and blue than it has for the last couple of days. As even as we see increasing frequency and ferocity of
temperatures in the UK, and in other countries, it is only a few days a year, at least for now.
And that's the challenge in understanding how to react and how to adapt infrastructure in particular.
SANTOS: Yes, that's right. And this is true, particularly in big agglomerations, like London, where yes, public transport inside the city
continued to work a bit yesterday, but only 50 percent of it was air conditioned, meaning that it wasn't a forgiving environment for the elderly
or the young.
And when it comes to rail services across the United Kingdom, yes, they have somewhat resumed today after a number of services were taken out of
action, because the tracks got so hot.
They started to bend yesterday, Julia, there's big delays for commuters, still lots of cancellations and a big backlog. This is worrying times, of
course, for an economy that today published inflation figures that topped 9.4 percent.
So really, it's another dent to the economy that the government and the people of Britain can scarcely afford these days.
CHATTERLEY: The last thing the country needs Nina dos Santos, thank you for that. China also enduring the effects of extreme weather ranging from
floods and landslides to scorching heat wave conditions which are weathering crops and putting lives at risk. Selina Wang reports.
SELINA WANG, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The heat wave continues across China, but rain showers through the south are expected to slightly
cool the weather. But only briefly, more than 30 cities have issued an orange alert meaning temperatures are expected to reach 98 degrees
Fahrenheit, only one city in Xinjiang issued a red alert meaning temperatures are expected to reach 104 degrees.
Now compare that to last week when more than 80 cities issued red alerts with some logging temperatures of more than 110 degrees Fahrenheit. But
China's Meteorological Administration says this relief will be short lived and they expect the heat to crank up again in southern China tomorrow and
then later in the north.
Now this heat wave has been ferocious. According to state media by mid- July, the heat wave in Gulf to half the country and impacted more than 900 million people, that is more than 60 percent of China's population.
This is all part of the global trend of more extreme weather driven by climate change. It is not just heat but also flooding in China. Flooding in
recent months have displaced more than a million people and destroyed crops in central and southwest China.
That crop damage threatens to push up inflation. And it is bad news for an economy already battered by the pandemic. The heat wave has also pushed up
electricity demand to extreme levels as people turn up the air conditioning.
For instance, Zhejiang province a major manufacturing powerhouse, urged it 65 million residents and businesses to save power. And all of this is
coming as COVID cases are raising in China.
The snap lock downs and mass testing continues across the country even in the scorching weather. There have also been growing reports of COVID
workers collapsing in the heat.
And residents across the country are still required to wait in long lines for the regular COVID tests, even under the brutal temperatures. Selina
Wang, CNN, Beijing.
CHATTERLEY: Scorching temperatures sweeping across the globe are proving to be more evidence of the climate crisis more in the United States. More than
100 million Americans are under heat warnings and advisories.
John Harwood has more on the White House's plans for climate action, John, great to have you with us. We're expecting President Biden to announce some
measures. Is he going to announce a climate emergency? And if he does, what does that mean?
[09:10:00]
JOHN HARWOOD, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: No, he's not going to announce a climate emergency today, he's going to announce some more limited steps,
for example, using federal emergency management money to assist people affected by extreme heat.
He's going to talk about some regulatory steps to encourage the transition to win to renewable energy, including wind power. He's going to be speaking
in Massachusetts, at a defunct coal power plant that is now being used to facilitate wind energy.
But we have to step back and remember the challenge here. The United States is a closely divided political system controlled by two parties, one of the
parties, the Republican Party has no interest in dealing with this issue, doesn't even acknowledge that it's an issue, that puts the entire burden on
Democrats.
The Democrats have a very narrow majority, including a member from a cold state that's very Republican. And that has prevented legislative action.
There are some administrative steps that the president can take.
But the Republican Party, which opposes action, also controls the nation's highest court. So that severely constrains the ability in the current
environment for the United States to act.
CHATTERLEY: He's fascinating, and this was a president that came into power saying he wanted to put the planet foil first. And this was one of the key
differences, I think, between this administration and the Power Administration.
I spoke to John Kerry, who is of course, the United States climate envoy, back in May, at Davos, and I talked to him about coming up with some kind
of comprehensive climate plan. Just listen to this, John.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHATTERLEY (on camera): Final question, can you promise me a comprehensive climate bill, in this administration, please?
JOHN KERRY, U.S. SPECIAL PRESIDENTIAL ENVOY FOR CLIMATE: I wish I had the power to grant that promise. But I have confidence that members of Congress
are still fixated on it. They're serious about it. People want to get something can they come together? That's up to them. But I still believe
there's a chance of getting some times.
CHATTERLEY (on camera): Planets before politics, please.
KERRY: Well said.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHATTERLEY: Planet before politics, John, but what you're telling me is that whether we're focused on it or not, Congress just won't be able to
come together to agree anything comprehensive or concrete on this, despite what was seen.
HARWOOD: At this moment, they can't, you put it exactly right, Julia, John Kerry has been working on this issue for a very long time in the Senate, in
the Obama Administration, and now in the Biden Administration.
But again, when power is so closely divided, and one party is an obstacle, that means the other party has to be completely united to do anything. And
the Democratic Party is overwhelmingly in favor of acting on climate, they've got a substantial agenda, that but for the one vote of a cold state
senator, they can't move on right now.
And that's simply the political reality. It could change. You've got several months to go in this Congress. So either before the election or in
a lame duck session, after the election, it's possible that people like Joe Manchin, if inflation, for example, is coming down, might view the equation
differently.
But at this moment, there is not the ability in the United States Congress to act. And Joe Biden can do a few things, but not all that much on his
own.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, I guess that's politics. But all the while the planet burns and people suffer. But to your point, I guess they are more fixated
on inflation and the cost of living crisis. But this has to be an emergency priority, too, John, great to have you with us, thank you, John Harwood
there. Straight ahead, on "First Move", sowing seeds of recovery how drones fighting global deforestation from wildfires faster than humans ever could.
And subscribers slide what Netflix needs to show to bring back the darling of Wall Street. Stay with us, that's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[09:15:00]
CHATTERLEY: Welcome back and return to our top story. It could be the middle of next week before Europe gets any serious relief from its searing
current temperatures.
Heat records have been shattered across the region and over the past 10 days wildfires have torn through more than 40,000 hectares in France, Spain
and Portugal. CNN's Melissa Bell reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MELISSA BELL, CNN PARIS CORRESPONDENT (voice over): A fire rages through a field in Spain as homes burned. In Greater London, a house is swallowed by
Wildfire. These are just some of the many sweeping across Europe, where temperatures have soared in a heat emergency that stretches across the
globe.
China's heat wave began last week with 51 cities including Beijing, now under the second highest heat alert level. European cities sweltered under
new highs in what is the continents second heat wave of the summer now entering its second week, Ireland seeing its hottest day in a century.
In the United Kingdom temperatures reached 104 degrees. At first with London's fire brigade declaring a major incident on Tuesday because of a
"huge surge and fires across the Capitol".
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think we just have to adapt. Our homes have to change our way of life has changed really, doesn't it.
BELL (on camera): Here in France, the temperatures reached 105 degrees difficult enough for Paris, which is not accustomed to such extreme
temperatures. But down in the southwest of France, the impact has been far more devastating.
The French president is do down by those wildfires that have been spreading for several days under pressure from local officials who accused him of not
having done enough, soon enough.
BELL (voice over): Down near Bordeaux, wildfires have continued to spread burning through still more of the parched pine forests that run all the way
down to Spain. Already tens of thousands of people have been forced to evacuate their homes in southern Europe, the extreme heat causing fires in
Texas and causing the plains to swelter all the way up to the Dakotas.
Temperatures are as high as 110, feeling as high as 115. Experts say that climate change can no longer be ignored.
DAVID WALLACE-WELLS, AUTHOR, "THE UNINHABITABLE EARTH": We're talking about weather events that we probably would have expected to see a decade or two
down the line. But what's more striking than that, I think is how poorly we're preparing and adapting because we knew these temperatures were
coming.
BELL (voice over): For many people across the northern hemisphere this Tuesday brought those temperatures and those weather events into far
sharper focus, Melissa Bell, CNN Paris.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHATTERLEY: Now as you watch wildfires like this one in France destroy thousands of acres of forest and vegetation. The next question should be
how can it be restored as efficiently as possible, especially when traditional methods of receding means time consuming manual labor.
In Chile, for example, specially trained dogs were used to scatter seeds from bags on their backs. Well, thankfully now, tech is transforming that
process. The good news is that drones can be used to reseed burned lands six times faster than a planter carrying a shovel, who can only cover
around two acres a day.
Now firstly, they use to identify optimal receding locations. Then swarms of heavy lift drones follow flight paths to spread seeds in the most
efficient way. Seattle based startup DroneSeed offers a one stop shop to replenish land using ceilings they specially produce.
[09:20:00]
CHATTERLEY: And Grant Canary is Founder and CEO of DroneSeed. And he joins us now. Grant, great to chat, you set up this company because I think you
believe that the wildfires that we're seeing are going to become more prevalent and there needs to be a scalable way to reforest. Talk us through
how it all works.
GRANT CANARY, FOUNDER AND CEO, DRONESEED: Yes, so as you mentioned, it's a one stop shop. And so what we've done is taken a five year old tech
company, which is DroneSeed, and combine it with Silvaseed, which is a 130 year old seed and seedling powerhouse.
And so by doing that we're vertically integrated. And that's really important for the size and scale of what we're trying to accomplish.
Because with the severity and the size of wildfires that we're seeing, what's occurring is that we are completely overwhelmed on the supply chain
side.
And so by being able to combine all those aspects, we're able to vertically integrate. So start with the land manager, they need seed, they need
capital, we're able to walk them through that process when they're affected by fire and supply the seed that's from Silvaseed come out with the drones.
They're heavy lift drone swarms deploy with the seed vessels you mentioned, and then follow up with seedlings, small baby trees grown in the
greenhouses associated were growing millions and pay for it all with carbon offsets.
CHATTERLEY: OK, so there's a lot in there. So we're going to break it down. I think the first thing for our viewers to understand is that 30 days after
the fire stop burning, you can start planting the seeds and seedlings, and that's an incredibly swift turnaround.
And it helps, as you pointed out that you've got the whole supply chain covered. So you've, you're already establishing that you have the seeds and
the seedlings in hand to be able to drop.
CANARY: That's absolutely correct. And that's really important because what we're seeing with that natural regeneration, the size and disparity, the
wildfires, it used to be forest burns, forest regrowth, nine times out of 10 with temperate conifers in the in the U.S. West, that's dropping
significantly, because the seed sources in the soil and the tops of trees are being burned up and consumed.
When we see these high severity fires, which are historically not, been what occurring, coming through due to climate change is. And so there needs
to be a bigger solution as a result from humans to be able to step in and get that seed source back on the landscape.
CHATTERLEY: And you can cover three quarters of an acre per flight with one of these drones, but actually, it's quite fascinating. So we're now showing
images of an area of land.
And it's your video that's clearly been burned by Wildfire, what kind of soil quality and nutrients are left? I just wonder when you're dropping
these seeds and seedlings, how much of these actually, ultimately are able to grow and become trees, because surely they're not all going to survive?
CANARY: Yes, a lot of you see that big black clouds, that's a lot of the organic topsoil being burned off and consumed in the high severity of the
fires. And so what we do is we take the seed that we've acquired from Silvaseed, we've expanded to become the largest private seed bank.
We manufacture that into a seed vessel, which is kind of about the size of a hockey puck. So it's like a little tiny patch of soil, the seed is in it.
And then we drop that seed vessel down into an area that we've really identified in a first pass with Lidar and multispectral imaging, which are
just sensors to say, great, where's a seed going to grow well?
Where's their gravel patch, where's their competitive vegetation or rock faces, want to eliminate those areas, drop the seed vessels in places they
will grow. And then we follow up with seedlings.
So we get the best of both worlds, we'd get the seed, and then we follow up with seedlings, which is the historical method of doing it. And by that
we're seeing the highest establishment rates.
CHATTERLEY: And because we do have a drone following on this show, so I would never be forgiven. If I didn't ask you about the drones specifically,
they carry a 57 pound payload and you operate them in groups of three to five.
CANARY: That's correct. We were the first and only FAA approved to fly swarms, this two to five aircraft, and to be able to do so beyond visual
line of sight and with heavy payloads at 57 pounds.
So the first step, that survey flight, then the second step, we create the flight paths, we pre-program them, deploying them to areas where the seed
vessels will grow well, and then its show time.
That's when the crew goes out to say, we've got the two to five aircraft flying at a time. And then they land and we swap out the seed vessels and
we swap out the batteries like a NASCAR pit crew.
So that's really how the operations work. Then we follow up with the seed vessels that are the sea seedlings the baby trees grown at Silvaseed.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, I can see how passionate you are, show time when you get to go out there and try and help restore the London and fix these things.
Have more questions, but we have to talk about the money.
[09:25:00]
CHATTERLEY: Because one of the ways part of the way that you finance this is that companies can come to you. And I know Shopify already as a client
and say hey we want to take part in this because it helps offset their carbon footprint, so in a similar way to going out and planting trees, this
works in a very similar way.
CANARY: Absolutely, we're seeing a number of use cases in which not only is that the right thing to do, but it's a competitive advantage. So for
Shopify, what they're doing is they're able to utilize their planet app on their app stores.
For their merchants, it's difficult to source carbon offsets, understand all the methodologies, et cetera. And so they're able to source for those
merchants and then help them offset the shipping. And that's available on their store.
Others, they're utilizing carbon offsets as a competitive advantage. You see a lot of tech companies, they're competing for internal talent, and
they've got a pitch that vision of the future.
And if that vision is not talking about climate change, it's not a real vision that they're pitching that for internal talent, as well as to their
customers. We're seeing the same in real estate, there's better rates available for green interest lend, or green lending with interest.
And so they've got to be able to first decarbonizes and then second, which means eliminating the sources of emissions to begin with. And then second,
translate some of those things as sticky things that are difficult to remove the source of the emissions, transport and other bits.
And then that's where the offsets come in. And that translates into better interest rates and story for tenants and higher rent rates.
CHATTERLEY: OK, so you are just one company, as brilliant as this is, this needs to be scaled up in a dramatic way. And I like it. When you say to me,
look, you've got FAA approval now to swarm fly drones, which is a huge step. But who are you talking to?
How do we scale this up beyond one company as important as you are? Because this not only is required in the United States, as we've been talking about
in the show already, Europe requires it parts of Asia, we need to do this in scale and size, particularly, it's far more efficient than then current
methods.
CANARY: That's really where the tech side comes in. Tech enabled companies are really focused on that scale, and doing so in a very short time period.
So we've started out and started off in the Pacific Northwest, expanded California.
We're adding Montana, Wyoming, New Mexico hit by fires; we're working up in Canada with First Nations, Saito, Dell, and all those communities impacted
by fire in a really significant way.
And we've added New Zealand and Australia. And then we'll be looking to expand elsewhere, as well.
CHATTERLEY: I get your point is about private companies, but what about governments too?
CANARY: Governments are absolutely part of the solution. And that's, that's, we work with land managers. That includes state and federal
agencies affected by fire that need better tools, they need software resources.
We work with tribal nations; we work with timber companies, nonprofits like the Nature Conservancy and small family forests.
CHATTERLEY: Good, so it is a team effort. That's why I was getting down to because we all have to take part in this and reforesting regenerating our
environment. Grant, great to chat to you, thank you.
CANARY: Grant Canary, Founder and CEO of DroneSeed there. Thank you for your time. OK, up next Stranger Things. Netflix calls the loss of nearly a
million subscribers a win as streaming stalls. We'll discuss.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[09:30:00]
CHATTERLEY: Welcome back to "First Move", stock market traders toiling as summer temperatures remain boiling inflation. The market outlook is boiling
but for now.
Investors not truly recoiling take a look at this. U.S. stocks are consolidating a bit after the best day of gains for stocks in almost a
month yesterday markets upbeat on second quarter U.S. earnings picture so far but still plenty of investor pessimism out there.
Bank of America saying fund managers are unloading risky assets as a speed that has not been seen since the global financial crisis. And Sanford C.
Bernstein is warning today that the markets still may have not seen full capitulation on reason a quickening pace of central bank rate hikes that
will be needed to contain inflation. And on that note, the UK is reporting today that consumer prices have hit a fresh 40 year high of almost nine and
a half percent. The Bank of England now considering a half point interest rate rise at its upcoming meeting.
And in other European headlines we could know tomorrow where the gas is flowing to Europe once again through the Nord Stream pipeline from Russia
after "maintenance work".
President Putin is suggesting that Russia will honor its customer commitments even as Europe announces new emergency plans to conserve energy
in the face of an uncertain Russian energy supply.
And in earnings news, let us not beat around the bush Netflix shares are running up that hill after the streaming home of Stranger Things reported a
less bad set of subscription losses only and I say only around 1 million customers last.
I have to say instead of calling Saul, it's time for Netflix to bring up - over at Microsoft and get its cheapest streaming service up and running as
soon as possible.
Joining us now is Tim Nollen, Director and Senior Analyst at Macquarie. Tim, great to have you with us, it's sort of a stranger thing. But there
are Stranger Things to be celebrating the what, largest subscriber loss in the company's history, but it could have been worse. And I think that was
the message from that the co2 and the investor reaction reflected that.
TIM NOLLEN, DIRECTOR & SENIOR ANALYST, MEDIA & TECH, MACQUARIE: Yes, I mean, it is still a loss of a million subscribers, and that's the second
straight quarter. And I mean less bad than they had guided to. And you know, from the outside, we never have a good way of understanding really
what subscriber numbers are going to look like.
So we have to go by what they say. What they're saying for Q3, though, is lower than Investors had been expecting only about a million subscriber ads
in Q3 total. So turning back positive again, but that gets them through the first nine months of the year to flat to zero subscriber ads on that
number.
Typically, Q4 is a better number. And so there's still hope that they will grow this year in terms of subscribers. But they really still are still
struggling to add subscribers at a time when competition from a lot of other streaming players has really heated up.
CHATTERLEY: Subscription growth in the United States and Canada. Can we just assume that that's done that market saturated? So when we're talking
about trying to find those locations of potential growth, it's got to come from the international arena, Asia Pacific.
And while there's both opportunity and brand recognition, clearly in that region to your point, competition continues to heat up too. So it's never
really going to recapture what they've had over the last five to 10 years.
NOLLEN: Absolutely. Well, you know, U.S. and Canada, obviously the most mature and the oldest markets for Netflix basically have maxed out. And
actually Europe or EMIA region and Latin America have also maxed out those numbers were all negative in Q2.
[09:35:00]
NOLLEN: Asia Pacific is the one growth region for Netflix, and that probably will remain the case. The reason though, that Netflix has come out
with a new strategy as of last quarter's call, which is to launch an ad supported tier is to try to regain some subscriber growth.
Now, internationally, you know, that is has been the case for some time that that is where the growth for Netflix will come from. But as you said,
there's a lot of competition. I mean, Disney Plus still has a number of markets to enter into Discovery Plus, HBO, Max, Paramount Plus, lots of
other U.S. based services, launching an international market, some with very strong brand recognition to begin with.
So that's an ongoing challenge. But for Netflix, the ad supported tier really is an effort, in my opinion, to reduce the churn to sort of
stabilize the losses in the U.S. and Canada, the more mature markets, hopefully add some new subscribers over time, given that a lower price
point may be appealing to them.
But we'll see if they actually can add subscribers in some of these more mature markets.
CHATTERLEY: I guess the hope with this ad supported tier 2 is that you can tackle one of the other big problems they've got, which is password
sharing, and obviously they're testing that now in Latin America.
Look, guys, you no longer get to share a password, but you only have to pay a small fee relative to the broader subscription price. What do you think
the likelihood is of being able to convert those sorts of secret password shares into people that are on that lower ad supported tier? What's the
conversion rate we're looking at here if we want to try and monetize this better?
NOLLEN: Yes, it's a difficult question to answer in terms of the numbers. And actually the password sharing, it kind of goes hand in hand with the ad
supported tier.
CHATTERLEY: Absolutely.
NOLLEN: If the problem is losing subscribers, or maybe more optimistically, not adding to subscriber growth so much anymore, then the answer is how,
you know, how do you fix that?
One answer, I think is a lower priced ad supported tier. We should probably talk a bit more about what that really means, because we think it could be
quite positive for their actual ARPU and revenue growth over time.
The other is to reduce the password sharing, they have estimated 100 million users are simply sharing passwords, you know, kids on their parents
passwords, or parents on their kids passwords and so forth.
What may happen, I think over time, as Netflix is testing a way to try not to alienate their customers who have been kind of accustomed to doing this
for so long. But to just encourage them to pay, you know, one to $3 more per month to be able to share that account.
It's walking a fine line, because it risks upsetting users who are just accustomed to doing this for so long. And it risks turning them off
completely and say, well forget it. I don't need Netflix; I'll watch HBO or something instead.
So can they encourage customers to actually pay up a little bit more to have other users on the platform? That's a big important question. As you
said, they're testing it now in a few smaller countries in Latin America.
And we'll see how that goes. But I look at this as you know, an element of an effort to really introduce some lower priced plans, along with an ad
supported tier that ultimately the hope is to, to increase revenues as well as subscriber numbers.
CHATTERLEY: Yes. And have 10 seconds. You don't touch this stock. It's not a buy here. Even how beaten up it's been.
NOLLEN: Right, we are still staying away from Netflix. A little bit of a relief in the stock today on the news, a bit of less bad report. But we
think it's--
CHATTERLEY: But don't get excited.
NOLLEN: Whether you had.
CHATTERLEY: You got it too, great to chat. Thank you, Tim Nollen, Director and Senior Analyst at Macquarie there, thank you. OK, up next, wildfires
raging across Europe. We speak to a French firefighter about the blazes devastating southwest France. That's next.
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[09:40:00]
CHATTERLEY: Welcome back. Europe's record breaking heat wave is bringing with it raging wildfires. Blazes are ravaging swathes of land in Italy,
Greece and France, in France is southwest wildfires seared an area twice the size of Paris.
The French president is expected to survey the devastation later today. Tens of thousands of people were forced to flee their homes over the eight
days the fire raged, officials say its spread has now been contained.
Joining us now is Yael Lecras; he's Vice President of the French National Fire Brigade Union, sir, great to have you with us. Can you explain the
current situation? I know the weather has cooled slightly is that helping?
YAEL LECRAS, VICE PRESIDENT, FRENCH NATIONAL FIRE BRIGADE UNION: Yes, of course this is very good news and that the temperature are going down. What
we have to face it's a huge fire. And not only one fire but many fires in the whole country.
Because there is too big fires in the southwest but we have four so fires everywhere in the north in the south, southwest, southeast. And what we are
doing is to stop those fires very quickly at the very beginning to stop them not - coming from the east and people are on duty since a long time
since too long time. But we have enough people to fight the blazes. And we have also some help coming from the European mechanism of civil protection
which is a good thing and we have two - plain that are coming from Greece to help us to fight these blazes.
CHATTERLEY: (Inaudible)
LECRAS: (Inaudible). The forest and that is a real problem. That's why the authorities decided to evacuate the people and at this time even if we have
the 20,000 hectares burned there is nobody who is hurt seriously.
No, no people is injured. So it is a success. But it's very difficult to fight a forest fire with all those houses in camping and population inside.
That's why we decided to evacuate and it facilitated the operation of course.
[09:45:00]
CHATTERLEY: Yael, have you ever dealt with anything like this before? And the belief is that we're going to see more fires like this. How do we
prepare better? What, what do people need to know and to understand?
LECRAS: This kind of fire is very special. But in the future, I think that it will be more currants - because of the climate change. With so many huge
fires, like in your country in America, yes, like in Australia and with bushfires.
And we have, we will have to face more often this kind of fire. So what the population have to know is that we will always have some small fires, but
also huge fire light just like this one.
And we can have means to fight the fire. But the real solution is in the how to fight the wave of change in the climate change. And this is not a
job for the only firemen it is a job for the whole population.
And what we can do is to preserve what we can to the forest and the economic aspect of the country. But the real key is the climate change.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, I think many people would agree with you, sir. Are your firefighters trained for this? These are not normal fires. These are not
home fires. These are wildfires.
And they're called that for a reason. It is more training, more support required for your people to from the government.
LECRAS: Yes. All firefighters are really trained for this kind of fire. We have a national school for this kind of fire. We have special simulation
tools. And we have a real expertise in this kind of fire.
We train hardly and we have solid experience of this kind of fire. So the people on the ground, people on the air that the firemen are really
prepared for this fire. And when we went from some other firemen come to help if they can't fight because they are trained, the forest fire, the
wildfires, they go on this wildfires.
But if they are not trained, they come in the European city to do the currant operation. Because it is one operation every seven seconds in
France for the firemen.
So organization is really to prepare for this kind of fire. What we are not prepared for is the multiple starting of fire in the whole country. One
fire, two fires OK, but 2030, it's more difficult for us, of course.
CHATTERLEY: Of course. And we're seeing that all over the world. Sir, thank you for your bravery and I'm actually showing pictures of President Macron
meeting some of your firefighting colleagues in the Gironde region.
I know he'll be thanking them for their bravery and we thank you too. Sir, thank you so much for what you're doing and great to have you on the show
today. Yael Lecras, the Vice President of the French National Fire Brigade Union.
Once again, there the President of France, Emmanuel Macron meeting with firefighters hearing, I'm sure some of the stories of what they've been
facing over the past week and a half fighting those wildfires in the Xian region.
OK, let me bring you up to speed now with some of the other stories making headlines around the world. Sri Lanka's parliament has picked Prime
Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe to be the country's next president.
He will replace the former leader who was ousted after mass protests over his handling of the economy. But the appointment of the premier threatens
to anger some protesters who are demanding a full government overhaul.
CNN's Will Ripley joins us now from Colombo with war. Well, you and I were discussing the fact that the former, he's now the president, the former
Prime Minister's residence was set fire to in those protests that we saw over the weekend. Congress may be happy other people are going to be happy
with this choice.
WILL RIPLEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You know, I think it's just - Julia because obviously those who are out protesting are the loudest
and the most vocal and we didn't saw that today. I think we have some pictures we can show you of very, very loud and angry protesters chanting
pretty strongly worded derogatory statements about the sixth time Prime Minister, acting President and now President Elect Ranil Wickremesinghe.
[09:50:00]
RIPLEY: But I'm also talking to people, by the way, their numbers Julia and the dozens at the Secretariat, which is the last government building that
they continue to occupy.
And there's been actually an order to police to clear out that area at some point; we don't know when that's going to happen. There is a small number
of people who say they're going to dig in their heels there.
So we obviously have to watch that situation. But we're not talking about 100,000 plus people or even 10,000, or even 1000. We're talking about
dozens of people largely protest organizers that came out expressing their displeasure.
Talking to regular folks, which is what I you know, I was walking around Colombo, and just kind of randomly - people because sometimes I think
that's a great way to get a sense of what people think.
And I asked this one truck - driver, why aren't people out? Why aren't they protesting? And he said, look, we're tired. The election is over. Let's see
what happens.
And I think that there are others who think that look, yes, he was closely allied with the Rajapaksa dynasty. He's been prime minister six times. So
he's worked with obviously lots of different administrations.
He was the prime minister under the exile, former president Gotabaya Rajapaksa for two months. But he does have a lot of economic --. He is the
guy that was called in, in the early 2000s to turn around the economy in Sri Lanka, pull it out of the doldrums.
And he said to me earlier this week that he could do it again. So maybe people are waiting to see what's going to happen. They are promising Julia,
fuel deliveries starting tomorrow, hopefully get those fuel queues down from six to eight days to you know, maybe hours, maybe two days, three
days, God that'd be an improvement. Isn't that a scary thought?
CHATTERLEY: Wow. To point they need a government now that can take action and provide fuel and food supplies and try and stabilize the economy in the
country and the living standards for people which is the key now, so fingers crossed. Will Ripley in Sri Lanka there, thank you, more on "First
Move" after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHATTERLEY: Welcome back to "First Move". And today's connecting Africa. The International Energy Agency reports that almost half of Africa's
population has no access to electricity.
Madagascar's Axion Group wants to change that by scaling up solar. Eleni Giokos spoke to their CEO.
ELENI GIOKOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hassanein, great to meet you, give me a sense of what Axion does.
HASSANEIN HIRIDJEE, CEO, AXION GROUP: Axion basically is doing infrastructure and services on the African continent where investing and
operating on the long run in those fields that is to say energy, telecom and financial services.
GIOKOS: Why have you picked some of the biggest growth sectors to be plugged into?
HIRIDJEE: Because it's where you can make fastest disruption. 1.1 billion Africans and today, barely we've got 30 percent that are connected to a
grid, which is very low. In my home country, Madagascar, we are talking about 12 to 14 percent, which is very low.
We're building a small production unit, and we're distributing it straight with decentralized electricity grid to the final customer in small
villages. Today we're covering 50 villages in Madagascar, we started 50 villages, we're connecting 10,000 households.
That is to say 70,000 people are using our electricity grid, which is decentralized, de carbonated and fully, fully digitalized, thereby with the
coupon with their mobile money form, and they just plug-in in their prepaid metering.
GIOKOS: You're establishing Madagascar but you've also got your eyes set on other countries to help for some of the energy needs.
HIRIDJEE: In Madagascar we've developed the biggest solar farm of Indian Ocean called --. We've developed 40 megawatts of green energy. It was the
first solar farm in the country. Now we're developing a new solar farm of 20 megawatts in Senegal on the new port of mineral port of Dhaka.
[09:55:00]
HIRIDJEE: We're also working on two projects on the continent, focusing right now in Gabon, the project. And in Mozambique, we're discussing on the
project as well.
GIOKOS: Has your life and world as a business changed since the continental free trade area came into effect?
HIRIDJEE: Today, we're not seeing immediately the effect of this agreement yet is starting to be implemented. But a basic thing when I want to travel
in Africa from point A to point B, I mean, you know, how is it?
GIOKOS: I know.
HIRIDJEE: How complicated is it to get a visa here and there. So too will is there, I think it's going to be very, very effective is going to unlock
a lot of things for the continent, but it's still to be happened, a lot of important decision. A lot of policy change needs to happen.
CHATTERLEY: And that just about wraps up the show. "Connect the World" with Becky Anderson is up next and I'll be back with "One World" in a couple of
hours' time, stay with CNN.
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[10:00:00]
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