Putting the magic in Magic: The Gathering

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
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**Kimberly Adams** (0:31)
Inflation holds steady, the global oil supply does not.
From Marketplace in Los Angeles, I'm Novasafo. I'm from Kimberly-Adams. Consumer inflation was 3.4% in July. That's about the same as June, according to the report out this morning from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Prices rose for things like shelter, food and medical care, but they fell at gas stations. Remember, this was July. Things have changed. The gas prices are now up above $4 per gallon on average amid renewed attacks on cargo ships in the Middle East. And the International Energy Agency is now predicting a bigger hit to global oil supplies for the rest of the year. Joining me now is Susan Schmidt, Portfolio Manager at Exchange Capital Resources. Susan, good morning.

**Susan Schmidt** (1:14)
Good morning.

**Kimberly Adams** (1:15)
All right, so the fighting in the Middle East is now expected to disrupt oil supplies even more, 4.3 million barrels a day versus a forecast a month ago of 3.7 million barrels. Does this mean anything for consumer prices, say, a month from now, three months from now?

**Susan Schmidt** (1:30)
Well, it does imply that the conflict will continue and we're going to see this elevated price of fuel continue impacting the economy as we move forward. We don't have a great sense of where the price of oil is going to go because none of our predictions were accurate when the conflict first started. We've seen the lower demand from slowing economies globally, which has put less pressure on the price of oil. We know there's going to be pressure on the consumer. We know the price of oil will stay elevated to some point, but we don't know exactly when it's going to end or how much impact that's going to have on the consumer's wallet.

**Kimberly Adams** (2:11)
Usually, Wall Street does not like uncertainty, and yet it's been booming. If you need any evidence of that, we know that Norway's Sovereign Wealth Fund, the globe's largest single investor, saw record profits in the first half of the year.
How do we reconcile these two things, both happening at once?

**Susan Schmidt** (2:29)
We have that emotional roller coaster, is AI good or bad? Is it going to be able to deliver the kind of returns that investors expect and that these expenditures seem to warrant? We don't know, but we did have another data point last night. We're CoreWeb, providing that compute power necessary for AI turned in better than expected earnings. The stock's responding very well, up almost 20 percent pre-market.
So another positive point to give AI investors confidence going forward, but that has been fluctuating back and forth. Let's see how they feel next week.

**Kimberly Adams** (3:04)
Susan Schmidt of Exchange Capital Resources. Thank you very much.

**Susan Schmidt** (3:07)
Thank you.

**SPEAKER_4** (3:24)
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**Kimberly Adams** (4:17)
Magic the Gathering is considered the first modern trading card game. Such games are big business. They're also art. People can create fantastical worlds or just draw a cute animal.
For our series, What's That Like? We're meeting some of the people who bring the world of magic to life.

**Elena Danner** (4:35)
My name is Elena Danner and I'm a freelance fantasy illustrator. I primarily these days work for Wizards of the Coast on Magic the Gathering.
Getting into art was always pretty scary. When I told my guidance counselor and other teachers that I was going to art school, they're like, what are you doing? I'm like, but I'm compelled. You don't understand. I must draw. And my mom was always like, yeah, sure. You should do that. Do what you love. Just having that support always meant the world to me. Even like other members of my family were very not supportive.