years, extra day. leap day. "squawk box" begins right now. good morning. welcome to "squawk box" here on cnbc. we are live from the nasdaq market site in times square. i'm becky quick along with joe kernen and andrew ross sorkin. here we go. look at the u.s. equities at this hour. you will see red arrows. dow futures off 140 points. s&p futures down 14. nasdaq off 40. that comes after all of the major averages were down yesterday. check out things in the treasury market. you will look and see the treasury yields are higher. ten-year yielding at 4.31%. we are keeping an eye on the price of bitcoin this morning. that is up by 4%.

$62,690 is the last tick. time for the planner. let's tell you what is about to happen. we have a lot going on. the fed inflation data is due out later today. we get the latest on the core pce at 8:30 eastern time. we get the weekly jobless claims as well. on the earnings front, we hear from best buy reporting before the opening bell. we will hear from hp enterprise and dell after the closing bell. in the meantime, the congress leaders have reached a tentative deal to avert a shutdown. we have emily wilkins with more from d.c. >> good morning, andrew. fourth time is not yet the charm. the house plans to vote on the temporary funding measure to prevent a government shutdown from happening at midnight on

saturday. the stop-gap measure was agreed to to negotiate a spending deal. both chambers are racing to pass the bill by friday night. congress would have until march 8th under the new plan. that includes the department of energy and commerce and others. the rest of the funding, defense department and financial regulators needs to be completed by march 22nd. lawmakers working to appropriate funding said they are confident the first group of bills can be done in time for next week. they acknowledge it is the second group that will be more difficult to do. republicans are continuing to push for at least some of their conservative priorities to be included in the bills, although it is not clear what if any can

get the bipartisan support to be passed. extending the deadlines delays other issues congress is working on. this includes funding for ukraine and israel and the tax package that offers benefits to companies and parents that you saw the house pass several weeks ago. andrew. >> thank you for that. we should tell you that speaker johnson promising there would not be another stopgap. what is he facing from his conference at this point? >> reporter: andrew, members are not happy about this, especially the hardline conservatives who gave kevin mccarthy so many problems. you know, members are not happy and they don't want another stop

gs stopgap. this doesn't seem like there is any appetite to oust speaker johnson. there is a sense that is not something republicans want to do right now. they don't see it as being productive in the election year. they are not happy about the course the things are taking, but the way johnson moves the bill through the house, there is not much to do to block it. >> emily wilkins, thank you for walking us through where things stand as we speak. we will talk more about this. thanks. shares of dow's salesforce are weaker, but we should point out the stock is on a roll near an all-time high. down a little bit this morning. the company reported $2.29 which is 3 cents above estimate. revenue is above and the current guidance was roughly in line with expectations. the earnings guidance was higher than previously expected.

full-year guidance was above, but it is right near the new high. the company announced a $10 billion increase in its share buyback program. it initiated a quarterly dividend of 40 cents a share. here is ceo marc benioff on "mad money" last night. >> we have to be able to make sure we don't suffer any delusion which is why we are buying back and also giving back with our dividend. this speaks to the size and scale and quality of the company we built with salesforce. >> as i said, shares at $4. snowflake shares plunging after the ceo announces his retirement effective immediately. he joined the cloud software company in 2019 and took it public the following year.

he will remain chairman of the board. the company named former ad chief sridhar ramaswamy as the new ceo. snowflake's fourth quarter sales increased year over year, but operating losses rose to $275 million. the current quarter guidance came in lower than expected. that stock right now is off 22%. you have shares of ww international. the company formerly known as weight watchers. they have been tumbling 23% in extended trading after oprah winfrey said late yesterday she plans to leave the board and she is donating her stake in the company to the national museum of african american history and culture. that company has been struggling to stay relevant in the ozempic

era. she said she is taking the drug as a maintenance tool. amazing to see how she kept the weight off. last year, the company acquired a startup to help give members access to the weight lost drugs. ww reported subscriber numbers at the light end of the guidance range and full-year revenue guidance which was lower than expected. we should note that the market cap has fallen to $232 million. it is not a company we fonormal cover. >> when the board member and effective spokesperson is now taking those medications upended. >> that is why it is at $2. >> right. i'm not saying the business wasn't complicated before hand. >> it's over because of ozempic. >> people thought it was irrelevant and then she joined

it. >> that was before the world has changed. >> now the world has fully changed. >> just like salesforce down $5 which is 1%. this is 89 cents and 23%. that is a long, sickening decline. i would still rather -- what do they do? sell low-calorie food? >> no. they are selling you on one or two or three -- they have the rules. >> you don't have to stick needle the needles? >> it is a lot easier to follow. >> i would not feel it. so fat. let's talk about news that is raising eyebrows. >> what was that? >> on wall street, joe. your stomach. >> did i feel something? >> the s.e.c. looking at internal communications by openai ceo sam altman. a lot of people in the valley looking at this and questioning

what is happening. the investigation into the investors being misled. the sources telling "the wall street journal" saying this was predict i believe after altman hadn't been candid in the communications. the board used that to fire altman and returned two weeks later. the s.e.c. closes investigations without making formal accusations of wrongdoing. unclear where this will go. we may learn more. there is an internal investigation which openai's law firm is doing. i don't know what we will learn from that. >> this is the first of several washington usuaissues. ro khanna would like to learn more. >> about what happened. >> right. you're back? >> i am. >> i can ask you this. needles.

would you prefer forehead, lips or stomach? i could never been a drug addict. >> i have given myself shots in the stomach. >> you have? >> yeah. my face? >> people get them in the forehead all the time and lips. you would choose stomach? >> yeah. >> i can't believe you would give it to yourself. it comes pre-ready to go. >> i haven't done ozempic or anything. i don't know. >> i'm not saying that. you naturally look like this. >> this is the result of not eating for three days. >> you weren't eating for three days? andrew? she hasn't been eating for three days. >> i have eaten the last day. not saturday. coming up, frank luntz. we talk politics as president

biden and former president trump visit the u.s. and mexico border. frank will join us next. biden is going to a place where they get one person per day. it looks good here. i don't know what people are complaining about. as we head to break, shchec out okta. guidance came in stronger than expected. "squawk box" is comingig ck. rht at ameriprise financial our advice is personalized based on your goals, >> announcer: squawk planner is sponsored by ameriprise financial. we can make this wor. and the feeling of confidence that comes from our advice... i can make this work. that seems to be universal. i can make this work. i can make this work. no wonder more than 9 out of 10 clients are likely to recommend us. because advice worth listening to is advice worth talking about. ameriprise financial.

(vo) sail through the heart of historic cities is advice worth talking about. and unforgettable scenery with viking. unpack once and get closer to iconic landmarks, local life and cultural treasures. because when you experience europe on a viking longship, you'll spend less time getting there and more time being there. viking. exploring the world in comfort.

president biden and former president trump head to the u.s. and mexico border today for the closer look at the hemessage to voters. we have frank luntz here with more. let's start with something, frank, a black swan. what are the chances neither one of these individuals are the nominees? i can make a case on both sides. if this supreme court goes against, i know it is delayed for trump, but if he were in a court, although it is new york or wherever it is, of trying to overturn elections, i don't know what would happen there. and biden, any given day, i think something could sway public opinion where democrats said you got to throw in the towel. >> let's look at the election

right now. biden has been dropping over of the last three months. every month he drops another point. 1.5. donald trump has been accused of 91 felonies and he has beaten biden by average of five points. he lost the last election by 4.5. that is a significant swing. people forget if biden and trump are the same in the popular vote, it is likely trump beats him in the electorate college. people like someone else other than biden. unless he is willing to step as as aside, they will not push him out. it gets 100,000 votes which is a warning sign to the campaign, he is not going anywhere. on the trump side, he owns the republican party. >> after mcconnell. >> there is no support to get rid of him.

nikki haley stays in the race and her percentage gets smaller and smaller nationwide. there is just no anti-trump vote enough to push him out. unless someone gets sick, i don't see either of them pushed out. >> do you agree the column today? the highlight for republicans could be when trump secures the nomination. it could be downhill from there. he even makes the point what is the end game if donald trump were to be reelected? what will he do at that point? it points out how biden has showered the united states billions of dollars. student loans have been forgiven. subsidies for this. still at 37%. that hasn't worked for him. what does america need? what does it want?

this is why trump would have a chance. he wants to close the border. >> take a look. immigration is about to pass inflation as the number one issue. not just immigration states or border states, but across the country. we are becoming less and less concerned about inflation and more and more concerned about the impact and consequences of an open border. number two, you are losing union voters. biden is losing african american males and he is losing segments that used to vote democrat consistently. the latino vote. we have the argument over immigration. the latino vote is moving closer to the republican party. in fact, at this point, donald trump is getting 45% of the latino vote. that is unheard of among republicans. immigration right now and the vice president did not go to the border. she wanted no part of it. that is a mistake for the

democrats. the republicans oppose the legislation that they screamed about for months now and they don't have clean hands either. donald trump has a 20-point advantage over biden on immigration. the republicans have a similar advantage over democrats. as this issue climbs, the republicans do better. >> frank, what is this issue for the democrats? losing swing voters or middle of the road voters or the far left progress sichives unhappy and n showing up to vote? >> it is age. you can't fix that. you can't message that. that is impacting all voters. 18 to 29 year olds. i have been on the show talking about them being biden's strength. it is not his strength. they have been moving away. it is not necessarily an endorsement of trump. it is a rejection of biden. >> it is who we dislike less as

a nation. >> they are concerned about donald trump's behavior and frightened about biden's age. we have two candidates inherently weak and having issues with people who give them the 50% vote. the base is strong, but the edge is weak. >> the supreme court will make a ruling or take up the case in april about, the federal case, against trump. i don't know when we will hear the answer, maybe in june. does this mean the case is in september which is primetime of the entire election cycle. how does that play in your mind? >> it plays for trump. trump may not have to face any of the cases before election day. the american people are watching this and they can't believe these are the two candidates who have been nominated. >> it plays for trump. are you arguing it is better for

trump to have the case happen prior? >> it isbetter for trump to push all this out and say he is a victim. that's the key component we never had before. >> if the case is allowed to go forward and somebody brings the case in september, what does that do the vote in america? >> he won't have the case. there's no judge who will say the candidate for president who has been nominated, has to go through a court case in the last 60 days of the election. andrew, it will not happen. >> flip it around. is there an argument to be made if, in fact, the supreme court says the case can't go forward and actually that brings out democrats or republicans who have been anti-trump or say, you know, they feel like this system is rigged on the other side? that's why the case, we're not talking about the case at all. the case is irrelevant? >> andrew, everyone is voting.

every human being will line up. vote early or often. every state. every human being who cares about polipolitics. particularly chicago. >> if you are right about that, what happened in south carolina or i'm sorry, in michigan, this idea that they will repudiate biden. they are unhappy with biden and do you think those people don't go to the polls? >> no -- >> they do go to the polls and do they say to themselves i'll vote for trump? those people who voted in michigan to say we don't like what biden is doing in terms of policy in the middle east and israel. you think those people vote for trump? >> i think those people ultimately vote for biden. >> i don't know what we talk about with that group. >> i was going to ask that question. i think haley voters will vote

for trump. >> i agree. you have the shift. trump is losing suburban voters at a greater pace than in 2020. suburban women and 18 to 45. >> who is he picking up to be five points up? >> if everybody is voting. >> hispanic and latino. union voters, which is why pennsylvania and michigan and wisconsin, state after state of the nine key swing states and trump is winning. arizona, nevada, georgia. >> the picket line? >> no impact in the end. just think we need to focus on the tone and the content that will go back and forth. in the end, we are down to 1% or 2% in the states. we will have the most hostile election in modern history. donald trump should focus on

this. we will have this clash. >> you think it will happen? >> you think there will be a debate? >> no. i'm not convinced it is those two candidates. 99%? >> if you want to bet on it, it is legal now, you have to give me 9 to 1 odds. >> either one? >> either one. let's make a bet. >> it's a black swan. i wonder if we are underestimates neither one of them. >> if either steps aside, it creates chaos in the party. if they step aside, that party wins the election. >> that's what i mean. >> biden is not going to step aside. trump is not going to step aside. it's a conversation that isn't actually real. >> okay. frank luntz, thank you. coming up, special report from phil lebeau on chinese electric vehicles. later, a new survey on the

rise of anti-semitism in america. we will speak with jonathan greenblatt in the next hour. "squawk box" will be right back.

your brain is an amazing thing. but as you get older, it naturally begins to change, causing a lack of sharpness, or even trouble with recall. thankfully, the breakthrough in prevagen helps your brain and actually improves memory. the secret is an ingredient originally discovered... in jellyfish. in clinical trials, prevagen has been shown to improve memory. prevagen. at stores everywhere without a prescription. you always got your mind on the green. not you. you! your business bank account with quickbooks money now earns 5% apy.

(♪♪) that's how you business differently. intuit quickbooks. chinese brand vehicles are seeing stronger demand around the world. our phil lebeau has more on china's auto revolution from one country buying in. chile. >> reporter: buenos dias in santiago, chile. this is the primary market, separate from the major market, where you see the boom of the chinese built vehicles exported and sold in this country. how many vehicles exported from china? number one in the world. a 62% increase in auto exports last year. let's be clear here, the vast majority of the vehicles exported are gas powered,

internal combustion. we wanted to find out the appeal. are people embracing chinese vehicles? clearly they are because sales are strong. we went to an auto mall, literally, a mall which has all of the major automakers, including automakersmotors. we asked people what is making this attractive to buy an auto here in chile and built in china. one dealer said something interesting. he said there is an ability for the people here to get past the idea of the car being built in china. that hesitancy has faded away. >> they know and understand that for them it is a challenge to enter because a lot of prejudice in terms of the perception of the chinese has in the u.s. it is a matter of time. the quality they have with the pricing they have is going to start convincing people.

>> reporter: so what are the primary markets where the chinese are exporting vehicles? first is russia. one the europeans pulled out after the war in ukraine, and then china stepped in supplying the vehicles sold in russia. mexico is a close number two. in mexico, chinese built vehicles are now 10% of the market. when you talk with the experts, they say it is a matter of time the until they build in mexico and start exporting to the united states. >> elon musk is absolutely right. he knows just how cost competitive the chinese can be. tesla makes half their vehicles in china as we speak. he knows the chinese cost basis and he understands without tariffs, chinese will dominate. many will not be with us if the

chinese pour in without tariffs. >> reporter: michael dunne spends a lot of time in china. he was referencing the warning from elon musk from the last earnings call. if something is not done about trade, the chinese automakers will dominate around the world as they continue to export. tesla and byd and xpeng trading in tandem. xpeng coming off the inflated prices six months ago. guys, what we are seeing in chile, we are seeing in australia and in israel. you go around the world and if there is not a manufacturer in that country, and even if there is a manufacturer in the country, the wave of exported vehicles from china quickly resonates with buyers due to the cost and they are better made and more reliable than they used to be. that is why they are successful

in countries like chile. >> for the u.s. automakers, can they compete or will they look to washington for higher tariffs and try to make sure -- >> reporter: they will look to washington. there is a 25% tariff for anything built in china and exported to the united states. regardless of a chinese out a maker or tesla. that is why tesla builds in china. others don't export from china into the united states any more. they did initially. they don't do that right now. what you are seeing, becky, for the u.s. automakers, they will increasingly turn to washington and say if you don't doing something in terms of trade policy when the chinese automakers are building in mexico, which is the plan within the next five-to-seven years, something will happen with the chinese coming in and undercut price and gain market share.

that's the concern for u.s. automakers. >> this worthole report is amaz. i have a real quick question for you. is that car going 0 to 60 in one second? the roadster we have been waiting for forever? is that safe? can you see? >> reporter: are you talking about the tesla roadster? >> elon says it goes 0 to 60 in one second. i don't want that. that scares me. it seems you would fishtail or come up on things so quickly. is that hyperbole from elon or is it true in. >> reporter: i think it is hyperbole. they cracked the 3 second barrier. they keep pushing the time down. you see they will be able to go

0 to 60 faster and faster. >> why? >> reporter: the roadster is a niche vehicle. there are people who want that roadster. they look to the original roadster and say bring us back the roadster. that is what he is working on. >> all right. >> phil, thank you. coming up on the other side of the break, the biden administration looking into whether chinese components in eahicles pose a security thrt to americans. this is the live shot of the white house this morning. when we come back, we are talking china and more. easy-to-use tools and paper trading to help sharpen your skills, you can stay on top of the market from wherever you are. e*trade from morgan stanley power e*trade's easy-to-use tools make complex trading less complicated. custom scans help you find new trading opportunities, while an earnings tool helps you plan your trades and stay on top of the market. e*trade from morgan stanley ♪ (upbeat music) ♪ ( ♪♪ )

with the push of a button, constant contact's ai tools help you know what to say, even when you don't. hi! constant contact. helping the small stand tall.

good morning. welcome back to "squawk box." we're live from the nasdaq market site in times area. the futures are under pressure after the majors closed yesterday. dow futures off 130. the nasdaq indicated down by 33. new this morning, the commerce department investigating national security risks from connected autos with parts from china and other countries of concern. the personal data risk if your phone connects to your car as well as the risk the vehicle could be disabled by bad actors. the department wants to take the action now before chinese

manufactured vehicles are more widespread in the u.s. here to talk about it is michael f froman. >> good morning. >> i plug my phone into the car. you don't need to plug it in. if you want the power, my battery is always low, so i need to do so. you need to do this in so many places. that's the better way to start. do you plug in your phone? >> i do the same. it underscores how connected we are and vulnerable we are to cyber attacks from china or elsewhere. bad actors elsewhere. >> do you think we are particularly vulnerable to china? that is the fundamental question. we have a different headline of chinese security risk or tiktok or this or that. are the risks coming from china severely more dangerous than

anywhere else? >> i think this week, we said a couple of things. one is the kexecutive order regulating the sale of data brokers to china and five other countries. we see movement on the hill with the bill to put 100% tariffs on the imports of cars from china there is a particular focus on china. i'm not sure the cyber risk is specific on china. there are plenty of bad actors out there engaging in cybersecurity intrusions. there is a concern that china is building up overcapacity in the auto sector, particularly the electric vehicle sector. unlike steel and aluminum and solar panels, there is an effort to get ahead of it to figure out what they are doing to make sure they are not undermining our security. >> how much of this is a security concern and economic concern? we just heard from phil. >> very little imparts from china in autos.

mostly from gm and ford who produce in china. it is not the big chinese ev companies. >> we heard from phil with the report and how they building in mexico. nafta across the border. >> that is capacity. that is what people are focused on. trying to get ahead of it and saying this is the key sector for the economy. we don't want to find ourselves in the same situation with the overcapacity being built. >> here is the other conundrum. if you see the comments from mo elon musk, he would say the byd vehicles are better than the vehicles manufactured by every u.s. manufacturer except tesla. you can say that is a -- he has motivations for different reasons to say that. i don't disbelief him. a lot of people who have driven the byd vehicles who say that.

>> there are several companies producing several kinds of electric vehicles that are very good. i think it is putting a challenge on our industry to continue to innovate and continue to try to come up with new models peoplewant. these actions are about giving them the space to do that. no now, is that the best thing for consumers in the paradigm has shifted where it is not all about consumers or efficiency. there's an effort with redundancy and security and our own industry in key sectors, even if it means a cost on consumer goods. >> you are describing a bad scenario for me. not only do the big three have to compete against tesla, now china has great evs. we just signed these labor agreements that make it very difficult to foresee how the big three can be competitive already

withes tesla. non-union. the government will have to support the big three. somehow again. >> i would under estimate the capacity of the big three to continue to innovate. >> what evidence? where have we seen them innovate in the last ten years? you can't park the volt? if you have a wooden house, you can't park it there because the house is going to go up. >> a new sector. a lot of change and infrastructure being built. the big three are trying hard to play a significant role. >> who wants a big three ev? they haven't found a person yet. >> i don't think that is true, joe. they are trying to create space for it. it comes at a cost. politicians need to say this is a tradeoff. do we want a u.s. ev industry and what cost are we paying for it? >> it is called tesla. >> that's it. do we want more than that? >> if you build it, they will

come. they haven't built it yet. >> the question is if we let the cars in, maybe they would. that's the flip side. i could argue to you that the ev takeup has not been as high because the actual cars are not good enough. it is a product problem. >> tesla is a model of what you like to be and nowhere near that? >> you are happy to have a monopoly? >> i'm not saying i'm happy. if it is a monopoly based on how good your product is, we see that with big tech. close down a big tech company because they are so good at what they do? peter thiel has a book out called that. >> winner takes all. >> no. >> that's the theory. >> that is the theory. >> if you are really that good, you have a natural monopoly. it is not illegal. >> all of these things and all of the industriyies subsidized

the u.s. government. >> come out to my neighborhood. every car is a tesla. >> michael, thank you. "zero to one" is the book. wendy's facing backlash and now clarifying. it never intended to bring on surge pricing. that is next. i'll pay more for that. >> announcer: currency check is sponsored by interactive brokers. the best informed investors choose interactive brokers.

(ella) fashion moves fast. setting trends is our business. we need to scale with customer demand... in real time. (jen) so we partner with verizon. their solution for us? a private 5g network. (ella) we now get more control of production, efficiencies, and greater agility. (marquis) with a custom private 5g network. our customers get what they want, when they want it. (jen) now we're even smarter and ready for what's next. (vo) achieve enterprise intelligence. it's your vision, it's your verizon. fresh, warm hot dogs! when i'm not selling hot dogs, i invest in a fund that advances innovations like robotics. fresh, warm hot dogs, straight out of my torso! one for you, one for you. oh, you're a messy one. cool, right? so cool. anyone can become an agent of innovation with invesco qqq, a fund that gives you access to nasdaq-100 innovations. hot dogs! fresh, warm hot dogs!

before investing carefully read and consider fund investment objectives, risks, charges, expenses and more in prospectus at invesco.com. - i got the cabin for three days. it's gonna be sweet! fund investment objectives, what? i'm 12 hours short. - have a fun weekend. - ♪ unnecessary action hero! unnecessary. ♪ - was that necessary? - no. neither is a blown weekend. with paycom, employees do their own payroll so you can fix problems before they become problems. - hmm! get paycom and make the unnecessary, unnecessary. - see you down the line. you know doug, ever since switching to workday you've been a real rock star. rock star? what do you know about rock stars? billy idol? i mean where's the skin-tight leather? my shoes are leather. where's the unnecessary zippers? that thing! billy, rock star is just how doug feels when he uses workday. thanks, rory. i'll show you rock star! be a finance and hr rock star.

workday. for a changing world. billy idol just stole your golf cart! now a followup to a story we told you this week. wendy's is clar phiing for plans of dynamic pricing after backlash online and price gouging from politicians. wendy's posted a statement on the web site saying dynamic price planning has been misconstrued. it doesn't plan to raise prices at the busiest time, but use the new digital menu boards to change menu offerings during the day and offer discounts. >> i said this the other day. >> the carrot, not the stick.

>> at slower times. that's not so bad. >> i said this on "morning joe" on another network. at a busy time, it doesn't work. at the slow time, it could work. if you were driving past the wendy's and there is a digital board up and it is 10:30 in the morning or 3:00 in the afternoon and there is a sale on and you could get a burger or chicken nuggets for 99 cents, you would say i'll do that. that is different. if it is lunchtime or dinner time and raising prices and you see mcdonald's across the street because most of the places have five of these things lined up next to each other, you will go to the other one. >> we got it wrong. we got the story wrong by saying they will do it at busy times and raise prices. if the prices are staying where they are or lower, that is different. >> i disagree. they didn't explain that.

>> over time, the question is do you raise or base level prices go up to offer the discount at other times? >> do you eat at wendy's? >> sometimes. >> the competitive industry. >> they are all next to each other. if there is a wendy's, there is a kfc and mcdonald's whiitn spitting distance. >> a decent street. yes. >> announcer: executive edge is sponsored by at&t business. next level moments need the next level network. ds incre e. let's check it out. says here it gets plenty of light. and this must be the ocean view? of aruba? huh. this listing is misleading. well, when at&t says we give businesses get our best deal, on the iphone 15 pro made with titanium. we mean it. amazing. all my agents want it. says here...“inviting pool”. come on over! too inviting. only at&t gives businesses our best deals on any iphone.

get iphone 15 pro on us. (♪♪) your shipping manager left to “find themself.” leaving you lost. you need to hire. i need indeed. indeed you do. indeed instant match instantly delivers quality candidates matching your job description. visit indeed.com/hire

welcome back, everybody. boeing shares are slightly lower this morning after reports that

the justice department is looking into the door plug blowout incident on an alaska airlines flight last month. joining us right now with more on this is ron epstein, bank of america securities senior aerospace analyst. this is fairly serious because it goes back to an agreement they had from years ago, several years ago that this could raise some new problems and potentially criminal charges. can you explain? >> yeah, so if you go back to late -- actually early 2021 there was a deferred prosecution agreement that the doj agreed to with boeing on the two previous max crashes and part of that agreement was that it was a $2.5 billion payment, if you will. part of that went to airlines, part of that went to the families of the folks that lost their lives and part of that went to the government. i think about $250 million to the government, $500 million to the families and the balancecus.

that was a three-year agreement with the department of justice. the blowout happened a couple of days -- i think two days before that agreement ended. so, the doj is now looking and saying, hey, did boeing violate that agreement, and if they did, they can tear up the agreement and they could potentially file charges. >> so, the agreement being that they were going to make sure that they were safe and safety standards were followed and this door blowout would suggest that didn't happen? >> couple of things. the agreement was, one, a little bit mind numbing when you think about it, part of the agreement was they wouldn't deceive government regulators. that's part of it. and then, two, that they would work on the safety and quality culture of the company. so, the two things i think they're probably going to look at, i don't know for sure, one, did they look on the culture, and, two, was there anything in the data set that was shared with the faa and ntsb that -- was there anything missing that could be considered fraud.

the current investigation is being led by the fraud department, that's what you call it, of the doj. and the u.s. attorney in seattle. >> we can dig a little deeper into the safety and culture issues in a second. what does this mean for investors right now? >> yeah, i think a couple of things. if you're a boeing bull, you're waiting for $10 billion of free cash flow. the company said their guide for that is 2025 or 2026. it is going to take longer. number one for the company is quality, you know, compliance, culture, that stuff comes first and the financial targets will have to come later. anybody that is waiting for that free cash flow target or whatever financial target you're looking for -- >> justice department inquiry is pushing that off. >> that, plus the ntsb investigation, plus the faa, right? you had boeing ceo met with the faa administrator whitaker just two days ago, i think it was, and then the faa chartered a report, i think with 25, 50

experts on the culture at boeing. so you got all this going on. so the financial -- the financial targets are clearly going to have to take a back seat to everything else. >> what is your rating on the stock? >> we're neutral on the stock. and the neutral rating is because the stock -- my sense is it is going to be range bound until these clouds clear. something kind of has to happen. we're in the midst of probably the strongest commercial upturn, i don't know, potentially in history because of the covid downturn. however, you know, boeing has been held back by all of this. >> ron, we're out of time today. thank you very much for coming in. >> you bet. >> thank you. coming up, two big hours ahead. google's recent a.i. blunder leading toe en an apology from the company's ceo. the head of the adl, jonathan greenblatt, will be with us, talk about new data on

the rise in antisemitism across the country. "squawk box" returns after ts.hi

wall street forecasts over 100 billion in sales for anti-obesity drugs known as glp -1. but these treatments are largely administrated through cumbersome injections. enter lexaria bioscience with their patented oral delivery technology. early studies were glp-1 suggest reduced side effects and better blood sugar control with reduced spikes. lexaria bioscience.

transforming the future of glp-1 drug delivery. investment opportunities are everywhere you turn. do you charge forward? freeze in your tracks? or, let curiosity light the way. at t. rowe price, we ask smart questions about opportunities like advances in healthcare and how these innovations will create

a healthier world tomorrow. better questions. better outcomes. good morning. futures pointing to a lower open as investors look ahead to the fed's favored inflation gauge. salesforce beating on earnings, but forecasting single digit growth for the year. we'll show you where shares are trading and talk other stocks to watch ahead of the open. and antisemitism on the rise in the united states. we'll bring you a new survey with some startling numbers from the anti-defamation league. the second hour of "squawk box" begins right now. good morning and welcome back to "squawk box" right here on cnbc. we're live at the nasdaq market

site in times square. i'm andrew ross sorkin with becky quick and joe kernen. look at the futures. we have two and a half hours before the market is set to open. right now, we would open down 108 points, off on the dow, nasdaq down about 20, the s&p 500 down about 8.5 points. treasury yields as well, you're looking right now at the ten-year note, sitting just about 4.303%. the two-year, 4.683%. and crypto, on the move, bitcoin, $62,985. ether at $3,550. >> say the 62 again. >> 62k. >> so easily. >> 63, keep watching. >> it was just 27. and before that it was 17. >> and before that it was 60, yeah. >> still hang your hat on that. >> you would say it moves around. >> you're right. you're right.

>> dom chu with a look at this morning's market movers, dom. >> we just need 6,000 more dollars and we get back to the records for bitcoin. on the stock side of things, let's talk about the stocks to watch. we start with a tech giant and dow component, salesforce. the enterprise software company is just down maybe 1% or so on around 35,000 shares of trading volume, well off the extended hour lows yesterday. it was at that point down around 7% just after 4:00 p.m. eastern time. salesforce beat estimates for quarterly profits and revenues, but full year guidance for revenues came in lighter than some estimates, enough to trigger weakness in the stock. as you can see here, that has run up 82% over the last year. salesforce did also boost its stock buyback program by an added $10 billion, and initiated a new 40-cent per share dividend on a quarterly basis. on balance, down 1%.

shares of snowflake, i guess you could say they're melting. the data management and cloud computing company reporting better than expected quarterly profits and revenues, but current quarter revenue guidance was below forecast and this is maybe the more important one. snowflake also announced the retirement of the ceo frank slootman, he'll be replaced by former google ad chief ramaswamy. so maybe a lot of drivers there for a 23% downside move. and a couple auto-related stocks, group one automotive and auto autonation, both up premarket. they have upgraded both auto dealership stocks, each one goes up toequal weight from a prior underweight. they cited things like incremental optimism due to relatively stronger new car pricing and slower electric vehicle adoption trends on balance. group one, autonation, each up .5%. back over to you.

>> dom, very good, thanks. a check on the markets with paul hickey, co-founder er of bespoke investment group. you like the focus on tech, that was smart. luckily you were focusing on steel or something like that. that was smart from the beginning. i'm fascinated by what you're seeing in terms of the backdrop which includes the fed and inflation and interest rates, all these different things, wars, but the one thing that takes precedence over all this stuff has been a.i. and its effect on the market. >> yeah, exactly. if you look -- there is several different a.i.-related etfs, stocks from all over the world. >> i'm sorry to interrupt. you said something very interesting. how many of the s&p 500 are a.i. dependent or a.i. related? >> within the etfs, there is 67 stocks. you tend to focus, it is only on the mag six or four or whatever

it is at this point. but other companies are going to benefit as with any technological improvement. but the key is, since the launch of chatgpt, the a.i. -- those 67 related a.i. related stocks are up an average of 40%. rest of the s&p, 8%. if you just look year to date, over 4% for the a.i.-related stocks, 2% for the non-a.i. related stocks. we look at the economic data, how it is going to push out the fed rate cuts. what people are missing, it is not -- that's not what's driving the market. it is these a.i.-related stocks and the perceived benefit of them down the line. >> when nvidia reported most recently, the headline on all the major paper work, global stock markets hit new highs on nvidia. and it was, like, that was so mind boggling, and i understand animal spirits and i understand

1999, i can understand all that, but you've got actual evidence of why that would make sense, not just one stock, but it has been important for a whole universe. >> right. people say 1999, let's -- >> 1997 and a half, how's that? >> jensen huang, he's biased, but he talks about a.i. being bigger than the internet. let's go back to the internet. you had aol, 1991 and netscape in 1994, right? if you compare how the nasdaq performed following the launch of both of those, netscape made the internet navigable and aol brought it into our houses. in those two other periods if you go a comparable amount of time, over a year, you saw similar rallies in the nasdaq on that. so, there was plenty of volatility in the nasdaq going forward in those periods, but the path was higher.

i think, you know, to say that we're necessarily in the late stages of this rally, i would, you know, just look back at the '90s and say, maybe we're not. >> '91 or -- >> '94. december '94 was netscape. >> party like it is 1999. besides nvidia, are you putting these into your portfolio as well? what are you putting in? >> the two sectors, technology is one sector that is going to benefit, you also have to focus on the consumer discretionary sector, the companies with the most contact with consumers, you saw service now and their last earnings report talking about how their chatbots are increasing customer service, you saw klarna say that their chat a.i. related chatbot replaced the need for 700 workers. it is going to create a lot of efficiency in not having to have these customer service

representatives answer questions and have the a.i. do that. right now in the early stages of any technology revolution type thing, you're going to see the benefit accrue to the tech sector. but then eventually it broadens out to other areas of the economy. >> just get back -- give me your favorite a.i. stocks then. if i was allowed to buy them, what should i be buying? >> i think within the shopify is a company just -- >> that's an a.i. stock? >> and amazon, those companies, they are taking -- they can take all the consumer data and, look, what are people -- what do you want to buy? they're going to predict what do you want to buy? even in the fast food sector, companies like mcdonalds, you have restaurant brands qsr, which is the chairman is patrick doyle from dominos who basically turned dominos into a tech company. you know, you have -- you're going to be able to take customer behavior, predict customer behavior and benefit from that. it is not just a tech story for the long-term, though that's

what we're seeing right now in the short-term. >> okay. thanks, paul. is it booze or barbecue sauce? >> it is thursday, the best day of the week. it is rum, two types of rum. >> two types of rum. >> mount gay and mayers. >> i don't know which one is -- >> everything in moderation. >> meantime, let's show you shares of best buy, rising right now, after quarterly results coming out, adjusted earnings of $2.72 a share, that's 20 cents better than estimates. revenue of $14.65 billion, that's also a beat. same store sales, though, fell 4.8% during the quarter. that was better than the 5.4% decline the street had been expecting. full year best buy seeing ajust

e adjusted earnings compared to estimates of 616. see things move around here. the revenue in range in terms of what they're expecting. 41.3 billion to 42.6 billion with estimates of 42.33 billion. the stock up close to 3% on the back of that news. coming up on the other side of this, the ceo of energy drink celsius will join us. we're going to talk consumer demand, the energy drink market and the company's latest results. this has been a high flyer. and then later, 24% of americans foster antisemitic prejudice. that's according to a new survey from the anti-defamation league. we're going to talk about it with the adl ceo and national director jonathan greenblatt will be at the table to talk about this study and what it means. "squawk box" coming rit ck ghba. >> announcer: stocks to watch brought you to by voya. like ys and retirement savings.

voya helps you choose the right amounts without over or under investing across all your benefits and savings options. so you can feel confident in your financial choices. ♪♪ they really know how to put two and two together. voya, well planned, well invested, well protected. you know doug, ever since switching to workday you've been a real rock star. rock star? what do you know about rock stars?

billy idol? i mean where's the skin-tight leather? my shoes are leather. where's the unnecessary zippers? that thing! billy, rock star is just how doug feels when he uses workday. thanks, rory. i'll show you rock star! be a finance and hr rock star. workday. for a changing world. billy idol just stole your golf cart! po, destiny calls for you. what is it you're holding? a cookie. ah! you can make money the hard way as a bullfighter

or a human cannonball... or save money the easy way, with xfinity mobile. existing customers can get a free line of our most popular unlimited plan for a year! not only will you save hundreds but you'll also be joining millions who have connected to america's most reliable 5g network. sure is a lot safer than becoming a stuntman for money. get a free line of unlimited intro for a year when you buy one unlimited line. visit xfinitymobile.com today to learn more.

welcome back to "squawk box." energy drinkmaker el r celsius with fourth quarter earnings, beating estimates, up 95% year over year. and this thing has been on fire. john fieldly is here, celsius' ceo. good morning, john. nice to see you. as i said this is a beverage company that is just -- you have been -- it has been a wild thing to see. how quickly can you continue to grow this base? >> yeah, it is exciting, exciting. how quickly we can go there is huge opportunity for us in the category. we're celebrating today the first time in company history we broke a billion dollars of revenue for a year, $1.3 billion in revenue. we're abillion dollar company and over a billion dollar brand. it is exciting. there is a ton of runway. the energy category is one of the fastest growing categories in food and beverage and we're

positioned for today's health-minded consumer. 11.5 share in the category now. one of the fastest growing drivers in both dollars and units. so we see a huge runway ahead. >> so, when you think about the brand of celsius, do you see it as an energy drink only brand? you tried to carve it out in this space of being fit and for fitness folks, if you will. how far can you extend it beyond drinks, if you would? >> that's the unlock and the opportunity here. we started off in the gyms and health clubs. really we marketed the product in the early days as a preworkout. we gained more awareness, especially with the growth in fitness. we became a fitness lifestyle brand and with our partnership with pepsi, which we just celebrated the one-year anniversary, it expanded us into broader distribution. so, we see a huge opportunity, we just went into jersey mike's as well, and our great flavors and i'm drinking an oasis five, we have kiwi guava, some great refreshing flavors.

we just launched a cosmic vibe this year, a refreshing fruit punch. we're seeing celsius paired with meals, like at jersey mike's, just went into dunkin' donuts as well, over 3,000. we see the big category for celsius even bigger than the energy category. and we also have a fizz free line we expanded in 2024, we're excited about that. >> you have a -- you have the partnership with pepsi. i think there was a question for a long time, i don't know if it has been put to bed, whether this is a company that remains independent, meaning yours, independent long-term or gets swallowed up and owned by a larger drinkmaker. how do you think about that? >> yeah, we have a great team here. our team is working hard, one of the best in the business. we just won supplier of the year at 7/eleven. the foreseeable future is to be number one in the energy cat dpoi category and that's what we're working on.

>> the other question i have, which is more of a consumer news you can use question, which is, you know, i think a lot of people, some people have sort of fallen in love with energy drinks. a lot of other people i think are still scared of energy drinks because they think, oh, my goodness, is my heart going to go faster, there are questions about if you drink too much of the stuff what it does to your kidneys or your liver, and you tried to address some of these things publicly. how do you confront those issues? >> well, that's what's unique about celsius. you look at our formula and ingredients, we have over 2.8 grams of vitamins, of green tea, ginger, biotin. you look at some of the formula ingredients compared to some of the competitors that are out there, we're much better positioned. we actually -- one thing that is interesting, we're contributing to the growth of the category. new consumers coming into the category are trying celsius and enjoying it. one thing we hear is no crash, no jitters on the product from a lot of our customers versus some

of the other products that are out there, you get jittery and other complaints and negativity on it. we hear that han hands down on product. we're a better for you energy drink, looking to live a better, active lifestyle and accomplish their goals. >> when you sit around on a monday morning, in front of a white board and draw out who you think your competitor set is, who are you looking at? is coffee on the list? i assume red bull is on the list and monster and, i don't know, we can go down the list. how do you think about that? >> yeah, yeah, we're prepared, thinking about the list. our monday morning ritual is very intense as a group here, leadership team, within the organization. our competitors, we're actually -- we just came into the number three energy drink and growing rapidly, so it is going to be red bull monster and celsius. so we're looking at a three-team race here as we enter into '24

and beyond. we're number one in the energy category on amazon. we do extremely well on other platforms and other regions of the country. it is an exciting time. we do see coffee as a competitor as well, especially some of the cold offerings. we have a non-card line, a peach mango green tea which is phenomenal, and differentiated in the energy category. we see this going beyond energy. >> john, nice to see you. you got a lot of energy. in the morning show business, some days ineed more energy than others. i drink too much coffee, maybe i need to rethink -- >> we can send some celsius to start the day, so you have it in the studio. >> years ago, this is pre-celsius, i don't know if you remember, when i first started on the show, i actually drank -- >> rum? >> no, i used to drink diet red bull or sugarless red bull. remember that? the sugarless red bull because you didn't want to crash, but these hours are so crazy. >> this is you on red bull.

>> part of the reason to get rid of caffeine is you can't get too amped up either. >> yeah. >> i think it is good to be amped up on a morning show. he said he sent some. did he send it to the wrong place? out in englewood cliffs. >> we'll get you some celsius. coming up -- >> get you amped up. >> rum, yeah. >> coming up, are the mistakes by google, by that gemini a cause for concern in the world of a.i.? jon fortt joins us to weigh in. probably see both sides of that argument. futures right now continue. >> good guess. >> yeah, it is. continue to be in the red, down 130 on the dow. we'll be right back. >> announcer: time now for today's aflac trivia question. who was first african american actress to win an oscar? the answer when "squawk bo rern tus.xoh, charades! - okay! - love it! umm... first word. - tonsillitis! - nostril! uh-uh... bill! uh-huh... - hip-hop! - limping!

mmhmm! medical bills! uh-huh! - pancakes! - cash! who pays you cash when you have medical bills? grrr! no idea. [tapping] gap! the gap left by health insurance? who pays cash to help close that gap? aflac! oh, aflac! get help with expenses health insurance doesn't cover at aflac.com pictionary?!

sometimes, the lows of bipolar depression feel darkest before dawn. with caplyta, there's a chance to let in the lyte™. caplyta is proven to deliver significant relief across bipolar depression. unlike some medicines that only treat bipolar i, caplyta treats both bipolar i and ii depression. and in clinical trials, movement disorders and weight gain were not common. call your doctor about sudden mood changes,

behaviors, or suicidal thoughts. antidepressants may increase these risks in young adults. elderly dementia patients have increased risk of death or stroke. report fever, confusion, stiff or uncontrollable muscle movements which may be life threatening or permanent. these aren't all the serious side effects. caplyta can help you let in the lyte™. ask your doctor about caplyta. find savings and support at caplyta.com >> announcer: and now the answer to today's aflac trivia question. who was the first african american actress to win an oscar? the answer, hattie mcdaniel. mcdaniel won the academy award for best supporting actress for her role in "gone with the wind."

google's ceo sender pichai saying the a.i. chatbot's inaccurate depictions of people were unacceptable. so are gemny'ini's mistakes a ce for concern? jon fortt is here to weigh in. >> yeah, gemini's inaccuracies are an enormous problem. we're talking about the new artificial intelligence systems revolutioning literature, the way our society accesses information. if it is built in biases, it is poisoning us all. how did this start? last year users began to notice the image generator inserting people of color into scenarios that didn't make sense. like responding to a prompt for an image of a german world war ii soldier with a picture of an asian woman or a black man. naturally, this week people started ed piling on with more questions when they asked, gemini couldn't say which was worse for society, elon musk tweeting memes or hitler. critics are calling this out

because it is dangerous. the ideas these left wing tech overlords are serving out might shape our reality. if they're based on political bias and historical inaccuracies, the tools stop being productivity tools and start becoming propaganda machines. >> so can we expect artificial intelligence to ever really tell us the truth? let's be honest here. >> well, andrew, on the other hand, the problem isn't so much gemini itself, the problem is the assumption that we should trust a.i. to draw us a picture of a nazi instead of researching historical photos of actual nazis, the idea we should believe a.i. has the capacity to make judgments at all about good and evil. we're ducking on ourselves for not bothering to do actual research and expecting google or amazon or openai to deliver us accuracy and nuance by default. i'm sure it is a total consequence this is blowing up in an election year when affirmative action is raging in the national zeitgeist. is it a problem that gemini is

returning nonsensical images? sure. it is a problem that we expect software that still can't accurately render human fingers and toes to figure out global race and culture. why are we already holding a.i. to a higher standard than we hold our human leaders? >> there is a long history of this, though. >> there is. >> tay from microsoft got corrupted, years ago. >> that was one of the early chatbots. >> yeah. somewhat important for humans to corrupt the -- >> some of the early google efforts were corrupted too on the other side of the bias. >> right. for those of us who are afraid this a.i. is going to take over our jobs, and do -- between the fingers and toes and not knowing what a nazi looks like, we're still a little ways off. >> a.i. is supposedly crossed the rubicon, something really amazing and powerful, and you're

saying it is just still early and that eventually get the bugs out of it and this kind of stuff won't happen. i thought that's why it has been such a major force for the last year and a half or whatever. i thought we had gotten to the point where -- if we get to this point, it is still -- that looked like garbage in, garbage out. >> to we ever get past that? i thought a.i. was supposed to get to the point where it could think and reason and do these things. >> should be able -- >> is it always going to be gigo? >> all of us had amazing 7 or 8-year-old kids at one point and then they do something and you're, like, actually -- >> is that to sell off the euphoria built into this? if it is not as good as we have been told? >> i certainly think, until the fingers and toes get figured out, we can guess a ton of other finger and toe type issues. >> i remember the old twitter

was and flack for that and elon and it all changed. it makes me think that you let a bunch of these silicon valley type lives make the a.i., it is just a reflection of them. i thought a.i. was supposed to be its own thing. it is not supposed to be a reflection of the people that program it. it is no better than anything else. >> no. it is just whose garbage, the liberals' garbage or the libertarians' garbage? and take it out on the on the other hand. get the full text of both arguments to share or you can argue with yourself. that's what i do. >> we do too. jon, thank you. when we come back, we're going to talk about the problems facing the housing sector with taylor morrison, ceo cheryl palmer. as we head to break, check out

shares of okta this morning. the cybersecurity giant beating earnings and revenue estimates, citing strong win rates. shares look to open at a high this morning. bank of america upgrading that stock. it looks like it is up by almost 25%. "squawk x"ilbeig bk.bo wl rhtac

rylee! from rylee's realty! hi! this listing sounds incredible. let's check it out. says here it gets plenty of light. and this must be the ocean view? of aruba? huh. this listing is misleading. well, when at&t says we give businesses get our best deal, on the iphone 15 pro made with titanium. we mean it. amazing. all my agents want it. says here...“inviting pool”. come on over! too inviting. only at&t gives businesses our best deals on any iphone. get iphone 15 pro on us. (♪♪)

welcome back, everybody. higher mortgage rates continue to impact demand from potential home buyers. the ceo of one of the nation's largest home builders joins us right now. cheryl palmer is taylor morrison's chairman and ceo. and thank you for coming in today. >> great to see you. thank you for having me. >> let's talk about how things are going. we saw interest rates start to come down and then rise back up. what is that mortgage rate mean for the buyers, what does it mean for the builders? >> you're right. it has been a little bumpy over the last, you know, 12, 18 months. and in the fourth quarter we saw rates drop back into the 6s. what was so nice about that, becky, is the consumers actually is in a different place than they were 18 months ago where they thought rates were going to be back into the 3s or maybe low 4s. the consumer kind of met us halfway. when they dropped into the 6s,

we had the ability with all of our tools to get them comfortably into 5% interest rates. and i think the consumer recognizes by any long-term historic standard that's a really good thing. today, they moved back up. the ten-year is at 4.3, rates moved into the low 7s. you know, interesting, we just reported our earnings and last quarter the average coupon of all of our closings rate was, like, 6.7%. it tells you how far customer and the consumers come. once again, we have the tools to get them into the low 5s, mid-5s, personalize the rate based on what their needs are. >> what tools do you use and what does that mean for your profitability? >> it's a number of different tools. i think not painting all customers with one brush is probably most important part of that. some customers need a little bit of help with cash at closing. some want the confidence of a 30-year fixed rate. we'll do forward commitments.

some need a temporary support, so we -- they might do a 2-1 or 3-2-1 buydown. that 6.7 would be the final coupon rate. it tells you what they expect to have happen. you know, the cost of when we first started doing this, a couple of years ago, was actually much more significant. we were trying to go from the 7s down to, like, 3.99 or 4.25. today, when we're looking at 5.5, 5.75, it is just not as bad. >> meaning, customers are thinking, okay, 5.5 sounds pretty great to me right now. >> that's right. >> versus two years ago that was sticker shock. >> as silly as it was, it went to 8 so quick, i think it reset the customers' mind so they don't expect that they're going back to 3.99. >> every time diana olick is on and says it is not a demarnd pro demand problem. >> it is not a demand problem. >> why aren't home builders matching in? if you can sell, why don't you

match the demand? why can't inventory match the demand? it takes time or -- >> we have -- if you look at the new home inventory across the country today, i would tell you it is a healthy probably seven months of supply. the real important detail there, joe, is what is the finished inventory and that's relatively low. so i think that is actually a really nice balance because i think we're like 1.4, 1.5 months of finished inventory. i want to have inventory at all stages of the production cycle and we do. the resale inventory is also pretty tight and that's the lockup effect you keep hearing about. i think we just moved to about three months, but the devil is always in the details. >> do you buy big plots of land? i can remember in years past, lennar, somebody got in trouble, they spent so much money and then the land prices dropped and they were stuck with it and had to write down. how do you do that? do you buy a huge swath of land to put up a development?

>> we do. we're a developer first. >> is it based on mortgage rates too? >> when you underwrite the land, recognizeding land on buying today is not coming to market for two to three years, so it is the land that i bought, you know, back in '21 and '22. when i look at taylor morrison, we have just under 50% of our land that is purchased pre-covid. it is in a -- from what is sitting on our balance sheet, it is in a really good place. but we buy parcels. our average is probably 150 lots, joe. but we'll do, you know, we build for all segments. when i think about our active lifestyle communities, those could be 500, 1,000 units, golf courses, lakes, big amenities. >> but to put all of those loans, i mean, interest rates have gone up, so it means you have to pay more for every one of these purchases you make for every one of the builds you do. what is the limiting factor right now? it is too expensive to build the

homes? too hard to find people to build them? what would be the limiting factor when you look at this? >> a couple things. one, all consumers aren't created equally. when i think about the support that we need to give to that first time buyer, they may not have the equity in the house that a move up or a 50 plus, you know, lifestyle buyer has. so most of our incentives are going to really support that first time buyer. look at the average equity that is out there today. and i think i just read something that said, you know if you owned your home about four years, and you bought a medium priced home about four years ago, you have over $200,000 in equity. they have -- if you bought it in 2000, you might have over 400,000 on average. so they have other levers to pull. as far as the labor environment, we -- i'm not going to say we're back to pre-covid. but we are much better placed than we were these last 18 months, where the entire supply chain was really challenged and

labor. today, i think honestly, it is very predictable, dependable. there is always going to be something, but it is not everything any longer. >> that's great. sheryl, thank you for coming in. you did just have earnings that came out and we appreciate the timeliness for why you're with us. >> thank you g. good to see you. jonathan greenblatt on the rise of antisemitism in the u.s. he has a new survey and the numbers are staggering. in the next hour, the chief investment officer of bit-wise will join us on the thoughts on the rise of bitcoin and the impact of the spot etf on digital currencies and ethereums next. check out prices this morning. that's not a misprint. 62,500 for bitcoin. we'll be right back. isn't always equal. but at the massmutual foundation, we believe tha— you know, it doesn't really matter what we believe.

what matters is what ruth, marcus and michelle believe. that kendall believes he has a say in his future. that these neighbors believe there's opportunity in their neighborhood. at the massmutual foundation, we don't believe. we know things get better when we invest in each other. (♪♪) to build the electric vehicle of the future, you need partners. mining partners. technology partners. education. supply chain. energy. what if one partner could do it all? that partner is ontario, canada. with all the critical minerals to make electric vehicle batteries. 65,000 stem graduates per year. one of north america's largest i.t. clusters. a fully integrated supply chain. all powered by one of the cleanest grids in north america. ontario. your innovation partner. ( ♪♪ )

shares of paramount global are higher, fourth quarter sales fell 6% as ad revenue on traditional tv channels s shran. but earning did beat estimates for break even quarter and the company is predicting that ad sales will climb in the current quarter, driven in part by record revenue from the super

bowl. subscriber numbers for the paramount plus streaming service rose by 4 million from the prior quarter to 67.5 million. that beat estimates. on the call, executives said the streaming service should be profitable in the u.s. next year. >> we are watching the shares of ab inbev. fourth quarter sales came in slightly ahead of estimates at 6.2% growth. but revenue in the u.s. fell 17.3% in the quarter and sales to retailers dropped by more than 12%. the company primarily attributed that drop to declines in the sales of bud light, which, as you know, lost its spot last year as the best-selling beer in the u.s. the company's profit and revenue grew last year thanks in part to price hikes. separately the brewer reached a tentative collective bargaining agreement with the teamsters union that averts a strike at 12 major breweries in the united states. coming up, some startling numbers on antisemitism in the

u.s. adl national director and ceo jonathan greenblatt will be with us right after the break. take a look at the futures. also jobless claims numbers that could move all this around in a little bit. right now, the dow looks like it would open down 132 points. nasdaq off 45 points. the s&p 500 looking to open off about 14 points. we're coming right back after this. according to just capital, only 11% of russell 1,000 companies disclose 2024 race and ethnicity diversity targets for their management team. but that's up 9% compared to 2023. celebrating black heritage, i'm ar eern.shonppso this thing, it's making me get an ice bath again. what do you mean? these straps are mind-blowing! they collect hundreds of data points like hrv and rem sleep, so you know all you need for recovery. and you are? i'm an investor...in invesco qqq, a fund that gives me access to... nasdaq 100 innovations like... wearable training optimization tech. uh, how long are you...

i'm done. i'm okay. every day, more dog people are deciding it's time for a fresh approach to pet food. developed with vets. made from real meat and veggies. portioned for your dog. and delivered right to your door. it's smarter, healthier pet food.

welcome back to "squawk box." a new survey by the

anti-defamation league shows antisemitism is still on the rise and results show one in four americans are prone to believe in antijewish conspiracy theories, the highest level in more than three decades and up from 20% two years ago. the survey showed that more than 42% of americans either have friends or family who dislike jews or find it socially unacceptable for close family member to support hamas. for more on the findings, i want to bring in jonathan greenblatt of the anti-defamation league. surprised by the results? >> unfortunately i'm not. we have watched this trend line move in the wrong direction for the last five plus years. and to think in 2019 it was just 11% of americans, so to see that more than double in just five years is shocking. but, look, this is playing out on our college campuses, this is playing out in public spaces.ot >> these polls were taken when?

>> in the first half of january. this is -- adl has been studying antisemitic attitudes since the 1960s, and we run the sentiment analyses every two to three years to gauge and baseline where attitudes are. >> how connected do you believe these results are to what has happened in israel and to the response that israel has had to the attacks? >> look, it is a good question. i think in 2016, things started to change. when extremists started to feel like they had permission to express antisemitic attitudes and since the october 7th massacre, the lids have been blown off the sewers by the antizionists. >> i don't want to conflate antizionism with antisemitism. >> they're two hues of the same color. but here's what i -- >> okay. continue on. >> here's what i would tell you, in 2022, right, whether israel had a coalition government with arabs and jews in the

government, muslims and jews working together, we had the most number of antisemitic incidents we ever tracked in america. this idea that israel causes antisemitism is wrong. >> i mentioned the piece in the journal, interesting, last two sentences, progressives claim that being anti-israel or antizionist isn't the same thing as being antisemitic. tuesdays at berkeley shows how dishonest that claim is. and if you don't know what happened -- my point is, okay, we learned nothing from harvard, we learned nothing from what we have seen at all these ivy league campuses. what does berkeley know, the most progressive campus in the country, nothing is -- they don't suspend these students that show up and spit on these kids and make these kids think they may not walk out of there alive. they don't even suspend them. nothing has changed. >> the lack of leadership at these college campuses is a catastrophe. >> nothing has changed. youmade no progress, have you?

>> i would like -- look, we are pressing title 6 cases, we have been working with the education committee in the house to put them in front, we saw what happened at harvard and at penn. they're being held accountable. and i'm told that applications are dramaticallyin-of-at harvard. you saw the jeff sonden fsonden story in the "journal." >> sunday night. for viewers who don't know, two jewish women were assaulted by a throng of hamas protesters. >> hurns. >> something is profoundly wrong where the university think it's it's "normal" for people to converge on the campus, faces totally covered by scarves. >> said they're -- administrators say -- nothing they can do about it. >> here's what you can do. number one -- number one -- enforce the law. you break windows, assault people you should be arrested.

number two, ban masks on college campuses. not a covid protection. i'm talking about someone's whose there and screaming out intefadeh and assaulting people. how is that normal? three, the thing to talk about, we need to overhaul -- talked about it on this show before, overhaul dei. diversity of education is important but got to be done differently. >> how would you do it better? >> how do we do diversity education differently? most programs stdied them. >> inside universities. dei programs inside businesses. >> corporations, et cetera. why we launched our workforce pledge at adl. if you have a dei program that doesn't include jews motor targeted minority you're doing it wrong. that's opposite of diversity. got to change. we think companies need to

either adapt and rethink the way they're doing this altogether. that's overdue to happen. >> what's the -- at this point -- >> what should we do -- >> yeah. and biden, already under pressure. hamas is -- hamas is not -- it's not, nowhere close to taken care of at this point. >> number one, hostages need to come home yesterday. right? that's the thing i know i'm focused on. why i wear the ribbon, my dog tag. they've got to come home. beyond that, i'm not a military strategist. i'm focused fighting hate here in america. >> i don't think the political will is going to be there for them to do what they need to do because of exactly what you are talking about. >> i mean it is alarming to see how the sand seems to be shifting, and -- >> you predicted it. ed you said no way public opinion will eradicate -- >> hamas is a genocidal organization that prioritizes

killing jews. should be unacceptable yesterday, today and tomorrow. so whatever -- future government in gaza might be -- it can't have hamas. >> what do you think about the -- >> people voting? i'm old enough to remember, upset about policies that the government was doing or political party was doing, actually got involved. didn't pull back. i want a seat at the table, earn it and demand. what's happened is ridiculous. how's that going to help, like, economic opportunity for the people of michigan? how's that going to help make that state better? how's that going to help the democratic party win? >> people who just voted. >> people voting uncommitted is pathetic. really want to make a difference roll up their sleeves, get involved. you know what, andrew? i hope they like what the other guy will do. sure he'll listen to them. you know? it's absurd. >> the institutional -- you said it's taken years for this to

happen. the academic makeup of these colleges is not -- hasn't changed one iota. >> what do you mean "academic makeup". >> people hired and tenure has are, where a lot of these ideas are being sewn and put forth. i don't think these students -- coming up with all of this on their own? this is not being taught? and how do you -- slowly -- weed out -- how do you weed out what we're searing on all of our best -- >> tiktok, any of these. >> social media is, talked about it. super spreader of hate. cultural rot at these institutions. go in and remediate them. >> and how do you do that? >> and you just said, what's the other guy going to do? >> yeah. >> a view the other guy, former president trump, is more -- look, some people say more pro-israel, and then other people say that he has said things that are anti-semitic himself. what do you think?

>> look, president trump has a close relationship to the jewish people that any president in history, jewish grandchildren in the west wing. he clearly has a set of views -- i don't agree with everything he's done or did, look at the abraham accords. unquestionable. >> for your purposes, when you said, what the other -- what's the other guy doing to do? for your purposes where do you land on that? interesting question. >> we're a tax exempt apolitical organization but doing big conference next week and we're hosting jared kushner. at the adl conference, julie sweet and mark rowling. and hosting him? abraham accords whether or not you like what the trump administration did unquestionly good. we need to be bipartisan. what i would say, more than ever our jewish community, really, the country, needs to find ways to come together. if you only see the world tinged through your lens of red or blue, you're seeing things wrong. and like, joe, i mean, got to tell you. i know you have a lot of strong

feelings about this, but if th country doesn't come together, divided we fall. i don't understand why this is so hard. >> the side i'm representing isn't responsible for the division. and to hear hunter trashing jared, did you hear that yesterday? what about -- his defense for -- his -- escapades. >> i can't speak -- i don't want to talk about hunter biden but i will tell you this. there is good and bad on both sides, and you've got to listen to both. >> and grandchildren, living in the white house. so you know, you said it a bunch of times. whatever. let's be, live in the real world. his daughter -- i mean, jewish kids. jewish grandkids. >> nice to see you, jonathan greenblatt. and when we come back, leaders of the china select committee join us to talk u.s.-china challenges. just back from a trip to taiwan.

then the chief investment officer the bitwise on the rise of crypto prices, spotty etfs and whether an ethereum etf is on the way. we'll be right back.

wealth-changing question -- are you keeping as much of your investment gains as possible? high taxes can erode returns quickly, so you need a tax-optimized portfolio. at creative planning, our money managers and specialists work together to make sure your portfolio and wealth are managed in a tax-efficient manner. it's what you keep that really matters. why not give your wealth a second look? book your free meeting today at creativeplanning.com. creative planning -- a richer way to wealth. wall street forecasts over 100 billion in sales for anti-obesity drugs known as glp -1. but these treatments are largely administrated through cumbersome injections. enter lexaria bioscience with their patented oral delivery technology. early studies were glp-1 suggest reduced side effects

and better blood sugar control with reduced spikes. lexaria bioscience. transforming the future of glp-1 drug delivery. the future is not just going to happen. you have to make it. and if you want a successful business, all it takes is an idea, and now becomes the future. a future where you grew a dream into a reality. it's waiting for you. mere minutes away. the future is nothing but power and it's all yours. the all new godaddy airo. get your business online in minutes with the power of ai.

good morning. happy leap day. it's bonus day for the markets and the final day of february. major averages on pace for their fourth straight positive month. this hour we get pce inflation data. the fed's preferred measure. bringing to you. before that, can anything stop the latest bitcoin surge? crypto prices on the rise again this morning. we're going to speak with the chief investment officer of one of the new spot etfs. the final hour of "squawk box" begins right now. good morning and welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc live from the nasdaq market site in times square. i'm joe kernen along with becky quick and andrew ross sorkin. and not a pretty picture. that is.

a beautiful -- that's a beautiful picture. a beautiful -- this is not so pretty. down 127 points. aww -- are we consolidating here? haven't had any bugig up days seems like a week now. at least not in the averages, but maintaining, these are pretty lofty levels. >> sounds like you are spoiled now. a little bit of the -- >> every day i want it up. green day. i like the, let the good times roll. treasury yields you see our taylor morrison guest, the basis point where the ten year was. >> yep. >> hole builders, closely. see where mortgage rates are headed. right to our first guests of the hour. they're just back from a trip to taiwan where they met with senior leaders on security, trade and investment as tensions with china bubble. bring in congressman mike gallagher of wisconsin. chairman of the house select committee.

on the chinese communist party and democratic congressman raja krishnamoorthi of illinois. ranking member on the committee. you guys seem like you're okay together. that's good. that's a start. a start in today's environment. congressman gallagher, begin with you. what did you learn? >> well, we just spent two 15-hour flights together and really bonded on that, but i think the most important, the important thing from the trip is that taiwan just had a very successful election. it's the first of roughly 40 democracies that are going to be going to the polls this year, and despite the relentless attempts by the chinese communist party to interfere with that election and to influence the outcome, taiwan's democracy prevailed. remarkably free society and we have great partner there's. very impressed with the meeting we had with the president-elect. william lai. i expect him to build off the president's legacy and we need to learn from them making sure

nothing interferes with our upcoming election. why it's sensible for us to ban sites like tiktok before they dominate our news ecosystem. beyond that, speed delivery of weapons taiwan purchased but remain backlogged right now. >> similar thoughts on this? agree with everything that congressman gallagher just said, congressman? >> yeah. i echo his sentiments. two other takeaways, joe. one is that in every conversation we had, whether with the president-elect or the current president or others, they asked, are we going to fund aid to ukraine? are we going to help ukraine prevail, because they see ukraine as a link, important in their own defense against ccp or chinese communist party aggression towards them. the second takeaway is that there economy is doing really well's in contrast to the mainland, chinese economy. and as the number two and number

three, soy and corn, from illinois, and huge exporter of semiconductors, it's very important to the economy of illinois and america. >> congressman krishnamoorthi, we had our own phil lebeau down in chile today. apparently auto industry, serious designs on the rest of the world. what should we do there? do tariffs make sense in that case? >> yes, possibly. actually mike and i actually wrote a joint letter to the administration talking about the issue of the oncoming onslaught of cheap imports from china in terms of potential electric vehicles, and other cars that go far beyond the demand for those vehicles in china. so this is going to be kind of a repeat of their other export

model that they've used in the part, which is they export cheap stuff abroad, often under the cost of producing them. dumping them on economies and driving businesses out of entire industries. and we can't let that happen in the u.s. with chinese car imports. >> agree with that, too, mike? >> yeah. i think what byd in particular is doing in you're now should be instructive for us in america. if allow these vehicles to flood the american market it could be the death of major auto manufacturers. i also have concerns that our auto manufacturers might be forging partnerships with chinese battery companies. thereby making us more dependent on critical components for our electric vehicles going forward. i don't think it was the intent of the inflation reduction act and i want us to be careful in term what's we're doing to foster our domestic industry.

certainly they have investments in global and very careful for policy we explore here in america. >> a total aside. i can't help myself, congressman. very depressing op-ed piece from dan in the "journal" today talking about the current state of politics. did you see it already, mike? you're smiling? guess you probably. read part i believe the public refers to washington as a shapeless blur, people don't know what's going on, frustration including wisconsin rep mike gallagher. yeah? >> i'm one of the most talented that is surely a sign how far congress has -- >> we're in trouble. >> like being best player on the chicago bears. >> hold on a second. i thought this was bipartisan. hold on. i'm a little concerned. >> no question dysfunction is frustrating in particular the broken budget process and the

way it seems to moor ss to we c outsource. my work on armed services committee profoundly bipartisan. very productive. we made meaningful progress. doesn't get headlines because we're not bomb throwers out there trying to get clicks on social media. that stuff still happens and that next generation of leaders in congress does give me hope. >> if you try to talk him out of it, congressman, krishnamoorthi, not that he's confided in you what was really behind the -- he was -- i mean, you heard people talking about him as a president some day. you don't want to do that, congressman gallagher? >> i -- i try to talk about it. he said the only way he would stay is if i became a green bay packers fan. kind of a red line for me, joe. i'm sorry. but in all seriousness, mike's retirement's a huge loss for congress. he's exactly the type of

republican that we democrats can do business with and we do every single day, and under his leadership on this committee, we've really kind of charted a bipartisan and serious and thoughtful course with regard to the competition with the chinese communist party. so he's done a tremendous -- done yeoman's work in that regard. >> in all seriousness, congressman gallagher, united we stand, divided we fall. this is -- this is a difficult position domestically. just -- writ large our political situation right now with the election, and we've got china waiting in the wings to -- i mean i don't know what their designs are, five, ten, 15 years from now but we've got to do better, wouldn't you say that? >> yeah. i would say, go further saying chinese communist party clear to me after a year working on this with raja is actively trying to

divide us. their strategy pit americans against americans and destroy ourselves and don't ask to contest our privacy in the indo pacific because we'll be too internally divided. so all the more reason why serious sober members of congress and executive branch need to come together, cut out all the b.s. and do the work that needs to be done right now to prevent a war in the near term and win this competition over the long term. we're not attacking it requisite sense of urgency. as for the president, i'm not old enough to run by modern standards. delay that to in my 80s seems like. leaders from the executive branch are going forward. but, again, here in congress there is a lot of bipartisan work done. just doesn't get the headlines a lot of nonsense does. >> raja, when you were there, did any of the leaders in taiwan intimate to you how long they thought things -- how many years

do we have? do we have years before china decides to do the, bring it back into the -- however you want to characterize it, however they do it, but that's their design on taiwan. how much time do you feel -- do they feel we have? >> i think there's a real sense of urgency there, joe. as you know, xi jinping said by 2027 he has commanded people's liberation army to be prepared to successfully invade taiwan. by that timeline, the taiwanese want to make sure that they have what it takes to deter any aggression, at least by that time if not earlier, and that's why our trip really revealed that although they've made a lot of progress, we still have a long ways to go, and we in the united states need to do our part. end of the day i think republicans and democrats, independents, look at the polling, they say, we want to win the competition. we got to avert war. we have to avert aggression by the ccp.

>> all right, gentlemen. thanks. did you sit -- 15 hours. were you -- like, sitting next -- do republicans fly front of the plane, mike and do the democrats -- how does that work? >> we fly in coach and democrats are in first class. given the -- >> that's what i, exactly what i said. >> this is disinformation. >> these are alternate facts. yeah. fake news. okay, gentlemen. i want to thank you both. good luck. all right. when we come back this morning, we've got breaking pce inflation data. that comes at 8:30 eastern time. very key number for the fed. why the markets will watch closely. but next -- chief investment officer of bitwise joins us on the record interest that he's seeing in his etf as crypto prices surge. crypto-related stock seem to be sizable moves in the last few days. how they're trading this

morning. stay tuned. you're watching "squawk box," and this is cnbc. you always got your mind on the green. not you. you! your business bank account with quickbooks money now earns 5% apy. (♪♪) that's how you business differently. intuit quickbooks.

you know doug, ever since switching to workday you've been a real rock star. rock star? what do you know about rock stars? billy idol? i mean where's the skin-tight leather? my shoes are leather. where's the unnecessary zippers? that thing! billy, rock star is just how doug feels when he uses workday. thanks, rory. i'll show you rock star! be a finance and hr rock star. workday. for a changing world. billy idol just stole your golf cart!

box." bitcoin trading about 62,000, 73,000, now jumped -- 63,000. much of that action driven by

heavy interest in no spot etf. next guest helps run one of them. bring in matt hougan. good morning to. when you look what's drives this how much is retail investors investing directly in bitcoin. how much is the etf? how much of it is institutions in the etf? >> absolutely. a great question. we're seeing enormous demand for the bitwise bitcoin etf and across all etfs. the answer all of those categories. retail investors come into the etfs. hedge funds, seeing raas or independent financial advisers. i think there's an even bigger wave coming in a few months as we start to see the major wire houses turn on. but this has been bitcoin's ipo moment. it's in a new era of price discovery and i think prices could go substantially highe er from here. >> i want to go back to this idea of who you think is buying these etfs?

meaning, how much of this is retail versus institutions? >> yeah. absolutely. with the etfs, when they first launched not turned on at major wire houses, major institutions. the initial demand out of the gate for any etf including these is primarily retail and independent financial advisers and hedge funds. so i think that's the primary driver. what we're seeing. i'll tell you, after this meeting getting on a plane to talk to one of the largest institutional consultants about this. heed that next wave of institutional capital. >> you mentioned hedge funds, i put in an institutional professional category. in terms of this big move, do you think it's that money that's pushed this or do you think it's straight retail? >> i think it's both. i think it's both. it's just new demand. think about bitcoin prethe etfs,

only a small could buy it. now everyone can buy it. it's off the hook. 30,000 bitcoin purchased by etfs this week alone. bitcoin miners created less than 3,000. what's driving the price. it's both hedge funds and retail and that advisor community. >> obviously you have one. say it's going to go up, people say you got the book. say it's going up, where do you think it's going to go? and describe exactly why. >> yeah, sure. at the start of this year in december we actually published our 2024 predictions and we said that bitcoin would trade new all-time highs above $80,000 a coin. based on what we're seeing in our etf and other etfs we have to revise upwards. could be 100,000 or 200,000, could be higher. there's a simply supply-demand dynamic going on. net new demand and a fixed supply and actually a reduction

in new supply coming up in april with the happening. sometimes investing is complex. sometimes it's easy. with bitcoin right now it's just about supply-demand and there's too much demand and not enough supply. >> think about the various etfs, spot etfs out there, talking about a dozen now. there's been a big question mark about whether that turns into three or four? i mean massive consolidation, remain independent, or new play, emerge in the field. how do you see it? >> i think they'll be six or seven or eight of these that survive long term. there are five over a billion. proud that bitb is among that. about 1.5 billion. t they'll be consolidation. no mistake the most successful etf launches of all-time by a large factor. ours, 1.5 billion, maybe six,

serve been, maybe eight of these and then variations. you'll see the etf ingenuity machine come up with covered call options and other variations on the theme, but this is a big market. i think $100 billion-plus category. enough room for multiple high-quality firms to play in it. >> quick, do you expect to be offering the bitwise, you know, ethereum etf anytime soon? >> we think the door is opening to more crypto etfs. bitcoin etfs have proven it's a low-cost, secure way to access the market. we're getting enormous positive feedback about bitb and want to be a player in every crypto category for etfs. looking aggressively at the ethereum space. i think a good chance we'll see one by end of this year. >> okay. matt, nice to see you. appreciate it. thanks for coming on this morning. >> thanks for having me. >> good. coming up, a new look at the fed's preferred inflation gauge and later hedge fund manager kyle bass sounds off on the biden administration new bid to keep americans data away from

foreign rivals like china. a handsome young man. quk x"ilbeig bk."sawbo wl rhtac [music up and under] ♪♪ crowd: get in! [crowd cheers] american announcer: justin rose has done it. british announcer: he's a 17—year old phenom. nobody's born with grit. british announcer: this is hard to watch. it's something you build over time. american announcer: that's 21 missed cuts in a row. [car trunk slammed shut] ♪♪ but creating a future only you can see, demands relentless pursuit. for 88 years, morgan stanley has offered clients the same determination and forward thinking that define justin rose's career. because the only way to reach your full potential... american announcer: rose, back in the winners circle. ...is to pair the vision of what's possible ♪♪

with the grit it takes to make it happen. [crowd cheers] american announcer: he's done it! [music out]

our new documentary big shot. the ozempic revolution. dune in at 10:00 p.m. eastern and pacific. in this sneak peek melissa lee looks how easy it is to get access to alternative versions of popular weight-loss drugs cheaper but are not fda approved. >> reporter: our team wanted to see how easy it would be to get

compounded acsemaglutide. put it at sites that didn't require blood work used real names and body stats. by this metrics none of us should have qualified for glp1 medications. one site all i had do input basic info, like my height, weight and set up a call way doctor. no. never tried this before. after a seven-minute consult, i'm qualified. >> okay. five questions, that's it rrntd i was approved. of eight sites reached out to two approved us to take this none of us saw a doctor in-person. compounded semaglutide is currently allied by the fda but not approved. an important difference. there are dozens of pharmacies across the country mixing their own versions. sometimes adding other ingredients, like b12, and while some facilities are inspected by the fda, the drugs they make are not.

>> wow. melissa lee joins us right now for more with this, and melissa, this is the worst-case scenario that a lot of doctors and drug companies have told us isn't happening? >> this is absolutely happening. the shortages across the country with the actual brand name drugs plus the high cost of the drug, plus limgted insurance coverage driving people to find other ways of getting it and telehealth is the easiest way. go online and literally it took -- five questions, seven minutes, and one week to get that compounded semi mild glue to accept g semaglutide in the mail. >> how much did it cost? >> $700. >> a doctor? >> a real doctor. i don't know what kind. doctor's never seen me. i didn't see the doctor either. i didn't see the doctor. a zoomed video call and the person had a, you know, like the

generic sort of head where you can't -- you don't see the face. >> generic. no pun intended. right? >> exactly. the problem is, when i asked the doctor, is it the same? he said, yes, it's the same. it is not. these drugs are not the same. >> and you're injecting it. >> injecting it into your body. these drugs are manufactured exclusively by eli lilly and novo. no way to get the molecules. >> this is basically the equivalent of the pill mill where is you saw the opioid pills being prescribed by doctors, too. you'll find the same scenario? >> the tsame in that a lot of people are specifically looking for one kind of medication. in that sense, it is the same. >> did you fill up with big shot? >> i did. >> did you? >> she's a big shot herself. >> she is. a good name for this. a really good name. you came up with it. you swear? all by yourself. >> i did. inspired by various -- things --

>> excellent. melissa, thank you. folks tune in tonight. this documentary premieres tonight on cnbc, 10:00 p.m. eastern time and pacific. make sure you check it out. coming up, breaking inflation data. the te plastce numbers next, when "squawk box" returns after this. rude. who are you? i'm an investor in a fund that helps advance innovative sports tech like this smart fitness mirror. i'm also mr. leg day...1989! anyone can become an agent of innovation with invesco qqq, a fund that gives you access to nasdaq-100 innovations. i go through a lot of pants. before investing carefully read and consider fund investment objectives, risks, charges, expenses and more in prospectus at invesco.com.

all right. the moment we've been waiting for all morning. just a few seconds away from

some new pce inflation data. personal income and spending numbers and initial jobless claims. pce number is the biggy. the one the market's waiting for because it's the one the fed watches closely. ahead of that watching futures. dow in the red all morning along with other major averages. dow now down by 140. nasdaq off by 44. s&p off by 14. rick santelli standing by at cme in chicago. take it away, rick. >> yes. jobless claims 215,000. higher than expected. 215,000. it's the loftiest level going back to the beginning of february. on continuing claims, 1 million 905,000 and finally crossed over 1.9 million. that's highest read since the third week in november. now, the money numbers. personal income for january up 1%. up 1%. you know what's fascinating here? last january, guess what?

we started out up 1%. and last january that was the highest level going all the way back to july of '21. we're equal in january. this number, once again, could take you back to july of '21. that is is a whopper of a spending jump or income jump, excuse me, on spending, up 0.2 exactly as expected. real spending negative when ajufrtded for inflation. down 0.1%. and down 0.1% equal what's we had in august of last year to find the lower number you have to go to march of 2023. now, let's get into it. the deflator, personal consumption deplayter month over month up 0.3%. exactly as expected, rearview mirror, 0.2 becomes 0.1. on the 0.3 side highest level since september of last year. something to pay attention to. now, let's go back to the deflator, but this time the

core, okay, and let's go -- excuse me. go year over year on the deflator, and that's going to be up 2.4%. exactly as expected. 2.6 in the rearview mirror. so making very good progress. this is the lowest level since february of '21. now, month over month core deflator, up 0.4% exactly as expected. and 0.4%, though, follows up 0.1%. so up 0.4% is warmest number going all the way back to january of last year, if you round it to half. round it to 0.36 up to 0.4% february of last year. we take these things out a couple digits. finally year over year core deflator, in my opinion, one of the more important numbers, 2.8, last -- what we expected. 2.9 last time. so made progress. here's something interesting. this is my favorite calculation.

now the 12th consecutive month that this has moved lower than the previous month, and that is indeed a very good thing. of course. now, 2.8% is good, but consider this -- pre-covid in march of 2020 this was 1.5%. just to give some context. now, what have yields done? dropped precipitously from basically 430 down to 427. dropped three basis points, but something to consider why we've dropped three basis points. i think the real spending numbers being on the weak side might have contributed to that. we see that the pre-opening equities, dow jones, has indeed moved up, and that's something to pay attention to here as well. getting close to at least on the futures side positive territory. i know that was a lot, becky, but we want to take it step by step. because these numbers are that important. back to you.

>> that chart looks unbelievable. look at that chart! a precipitous drop there, santelli. isn't it? it's off a cliff! >> and -- >> two basis points. >> yeah. three. >> but on stock charts -- >> depends how you're looking. we did see, though, rick, the other thing, futures under significant pressure. equity futures. actually you showed quite a bit of improvement quickly. right before this number looking at dow down by 140. yeah. there you see the improvement for it. maybe show me a futures board, because, again, xy ratios on some of these things, access on some of this really changed things up a bit. rick, stay with us. for more on the new data we bring in joe la voinea, futures down, massive improvement pop more than 100 basis point. nasdaq in negative territory up by 50.

and snbc nikko security and former white house national economic council chief commit. and policy director and former assistant secretary for economic policy at the treasury department, and our very own senior economics reporter steve liesman. steve, go to you first. dig through what you think some of the most important things are here. >> quickly on the pce number. you have this still goods deflation. goods down 0.2. services up 0.6. and so this contradiction in the economy goes on. you have a surge in food prices, up 0.5%. i think we do need to give a tip to economists who seem to do at least one thing well. which is their ability to take the cpi number and ppi number translate that into a very good forecast for the pce. seem to have nailed that. i was always more interested going into this number, because i thought that the market had

probably already knew what this number was. had a good forecast for it. priced it in. the income and spending numbers. very interesting to me that income was up 1%, and spending was up only 0.2%. savings rate up just a little bit. but it was an interesting time maybe you can tell the story here that consumers seem to have decided to take a break. replenish savings a little bit. seemed to have a robust holiday spending season. so january was a pause, and i guess the question becomes for the market is it a pause that refreshes or a pause that is the leading edge of perhaps slower consumer spending? can't know that, but it is interesting. incomes very healthy. looking to the source of that income in a second here, but spending was much more muted and that went along with our cnbc nrf indicator. census retail data showing that spending did take a break in january. leave it there, guys.

>> okay. joe, here on-set. walk through. steve and rick are right pointing out it's very strong until number came up 1%. good news to you? shows things are happening but a time of concern? >> i think it's concern, because income numbers based largely on payroll data. it's strong. problems with the payroll data. one, tax receipt numbers suggest a net birth, net adjustments used to inflate the numbers are overstated. number two, feel like a small businesses are highing plans that is a major gap between the net worth adjustments assuming. accounts for almost 60% of last year's job growth. a big gap. if that's the case, becky, you will see income over time be revised down. a much different picture. on march 28th we get the revision to, or the data on the

gross domestic income for the fourth quarter. that number has been significantly weaker than gdp. and in july get annual benchmark revision. my guess is as we get to march and then into july we'll find and economy a lot weaker than people think and i argue very kivlt wconsistent with consumer sentiment. up sharply from its low still consistent with recession. >> ben, thoughts? consumer the strength, to see income rise that sharply and see spending down? that would be the concern. if the consumer gives out, that's the thing that's -- that would really push things over the edge? >> exactly. that's the key thing to watch is the strength of the u.s. consumer. u.s. consumption has driven a fairly ly robust recovery. six straight months of positive growth driven by consumption. my take driven by two things. one, red hot labor market and

rising real wages putting money immediately in people's pockets, they continue spending and have. second has been, a little underappreciated. experienced a wealth boom in this country, s&p up 20% over the last year. flip side to rising housing prices is higher housing wealth. a good news for homeowners. so i think the u.s. consumer, my take, u.s. consumer will likely continue their robust spending seen in the past couple years. >> okay. you and joe don't agree on this? you don't think that you're going to see some sort of turn when the revisions come? >> i mean, look, agree with the blue chip forecast, looking at around 2% growth for q1. it fed now is slightly higher. around 3%. until you show me consistent patterns of u.s. consumer slowing down, i'm just going to look to the recent historical trends. >> steve, what do you think about strength of the consumer right now? >> i kind of agree that i wouldn't jump off of this number and say, now is the time to sort of give up the idea that the

consumer's going to remain strong here. always listen to joe and his outlook there if indeed employment is weaker than we believe, that's a reason to be concerned. i will point out, i wonder what joe thinks of this. i have wages up very healthy 0.4% in this report here, which, to me, has been the thing that many economists have, i think, overlooked in the idea that people thought all of the spending came from that stimulus that was out there. i tended to think that at least a good chunk of it has come from the idea that wages have been decent and employment relatively strong. so long as that remains, i would be upbeat on the consumer. >> yeah. i mean, look. on the real wage side it's only been very recently that the wages have turned positive. it's been tremendous. >> right. >> government support programs that have helped basically stabilize income. the problem is, steve, with all of this, income and consumption

of measures of current activity and don't tell us where we're going. claims numbers, continuing claims, staffing plans, temple temp every employment, in a sharp downtrend. not seen a pullback in broader activity as mentioned in gdp. over time if we realize health that means longer we run tight monetary policy longer we have inverted yield curve longer that bank lending standards are tightening the more at risk we are of a pullback in spending and down ternturn in economy. we might appear healthy now never tells us where we're be in two, three, four, five, quarters. >> folks, got to leave it here. thank you for joining us and wrapping up all of this data. joe, rick, ben and steve, programming note. 8:30 a.m. eastern time, richmond president tom barkindowning us

onset for an exclusive conversation. >> pretty cool. shares plunging. conducting an internal review of accounting practices as a result, delaying its fourth quarter earnings report. know knowledge -- nothing of -- coming up, should u.s. car companies fear chinese imports? after a break, hmaayn capital's kyle bass tuning in. stay tuned you're watching "squawk box" on cnbc.

what is cirkul? cirkul is the fuel you need to take flight. cirkul is the energy that gets you to the next level. cirkul is what you hope for when life tosses lemons your way. cirkul, available at walmart and drinkcirkul.com. ♪ upbeat music ♪ upbeat music

i'm jack black. get tickets right now for kung fu panda. you don't have time for a drum solo. get tickets! [ screaming ] get tickets! skadoosh. get tickets! theirs morning president biden says he directing secretary of commerce to investigate tech enabled vehicles from countries of concern including china. biden says such connected cars, collect sensitive personal and

infrastructure-related data, send it back to china. this is one day after biden issued executive order aimed at protecting americans' personal information. the data brokers may sell to china and other countries. joining us now to talk about all of this, kyle bass, hayman capital founder and cio and -- none of this is surprising, i guess? is it? after all of your previous appearances? >> taken a long time, but, you know, even xi jinping bans teslas from the cities that he travels to in china, because he's afraid of tesla's surveilling him. whether it's a guilty conscience on the fact all of these connected cars can transmate data, it's, looks like we're going to enter into reciprocal action what i'm a huge proponent of. >> after offall of the appearan i don't think we've ever talk and dumping and just the way china approaches global trade,

and now it's going to happen, or there's no reason it's not going to happen, with these vehicles. byd vehicles. phil lebeau was down in chile. so that's another thing we have to -- they don't do anything in our interest. do they? china? >> their goal is global primacy al all costs. >> you just say that. >> yes. look back at trump tariffs. 232 tariffs on steel and aluminum, china wants to act say uneconomically or economically they can produce things and give away electricity or materials and flood our market, ruin our capacity to produce, and then we rely on them for production once they ruin our capacity. so those tariffs were defensive terrorists and they stayed on for a reason. i know in the beginning they said, trump this and trump that. the tariffs were driven by bob lighthizer and really smart people and stay in place. the 232 tariffs, 301 tariffs are

there still for a reason. cars are know iteration of they could dump in cars into our market and put our big three out of business, if they wanted to act, could sell cars at a loss if they had to a few years because we run economically and they can run a state -- a state actor can run without economics in mind. >> the way they build real estate, stadiums everything else. can do all of those things. right? it's non-economic, done for a reason. >> what do you make about the idea talking earlier about just competition in the u.s. and making the argument, about cars, bringing cars into our country. elon musk will tell you byd car's pretty great. i don't know if you think that's true or not, one of the reasons i think some have a view evs are not having as big a pick-up you might imagine is that the product itself is not that great? >> yeah. look, i own two teslas. i bought them early.

they're just, for me, they don't, they're not my -- my date-to-day driver, because if i need to go two or three cities away i don't want to worry myself about where the next charger is. when you, even in palo alto where i had one, you know, you have to sit at the shopping center in palo alto for half an hour and wait in line for a charger. like, it's not like going to the gas station for two minutes and filling up and leaving. >> right. >> there are only specific-use cases that work and if you're just driving in a short distance, plugging in athome i get it. it can't be your dailydriver. especially in places with more rural areas. >> did you think that the thing is, just a fallacy? >> say again? >> that the ev, the market for evs, call it easven the next te yearses is a fallacy? it is unlikely you'll get the battery to really extend over the next ten years in a way that may solve the problem you're talking about? >> correct. i mean, you know, in my case,

the stated mileage would say 232 on a full charge. i could get about 100 miles. >> really? >> so that was early. now, they've gotten better since then, but i won't buy another one. i won't buy another one probably long as i live. >> really? >> yeah. because i drive an hour and a half, two hours to a ranch or to a property. we have eight properties around the state in our business. no way am i going to drive an electric vehicle to do that. i just can't do it. >> i was going to -- one question would be, when's the last time china did something that seemed nice or conciliatory towards the united states? i don't think you can come up with anything, so i'm not going to ask you that. andrew, this is in "the journal" once again but the former science editor of "the new york times" who's saying that not only do documents now show that the virus, covid, came from a lab, but it was -- i don't know how this is new, but the laboratory actually developed the virus. i guess they're implying that it

wasn't just a complete fluke or accidental, but it was part of the gain of function research to test these things. now, it's still a leap to say that it was released on purpose and sent to the rest of the world on purpose, but is that -- are we ever headed there? >> look, i'll give you a theory i have. it's really simple. at the peak of hong kong's protests, at the peak of the chinese communist party's existential threat to their relationship with hong kong and protesters, they couldn't just roll tanks in there like they did in tiananmen square because hong kong was hugely connected, so we would see everything on video and audio. and at that peak, at the same time china's current account, their kind of net income account was headed towards zero, because they were traveling -- they had 450,000 students here, traveling and spending abroad and all that traveling and spending is in dollars. their hong kong protests were at a peak, at a zenith, and

magically, covid showed up and allowed them to take over hong kong without a shot fired, and their current account went up $450 billion overnight. now, maybe it was just a pure coincidence. maybe it was great luck on the communist party's part. maybe it was not. no one will ever know. but if you look at the emails between fauci and collins, look at them under foia, it's obvious that there was a cover-up that went on. where we didn't want to blame them right away, we didn't even want to entertain the thought. we didn't even want to have it as a possibility was wrong. but as we sit here across the table, no one's ever going to know. but you know, they didn't act as a responsible global actor. >> so, domestic airlines were -- >> we all know what they did. >> domestic airlines were shut down in china, but global airlines continued to fly. >> for another three weeks. right? they ceased travel domestically

from wuhan throughout china, and yet international flights took off for another three weeks. that's a fact. that's super interesting. >> this is the kind of stuff that on the old twitter, you would be -- this would have never happened, right? this would have been like a forest falling in the tree, right? >> there's so many things that are fairly obvious that are just facts and then we're never going to know if the virus was released. >> whatever would have indicated that is gone, destroyed? >> yeah. >> all right. well, so, the bottom line is they're inexorably headed for global -- but we're not doing anything. >> they're experiencing a real estate collapse. >> no way we just sell to their consumers and they sell to ours and we're all happy? i thought xi said there was room

for two superpowers. >> i don't understand how two countries with diametrically opposed value systems can engage in meaningful interaction for a long period of time. it's not going to work. >> there's a lot of s&p 500 countries to talk to, kyle. >> well, a lot of them have been acting as aggressively as they can to move supply chains, and a lot -- many of them will be caught with some assets there in china if things really go south, if china does invade taiwan. we see these daily incursions getting closer and closer and closer to the shores. and their defense zones get intruded every day. if and when that happens, joe, there will be people that lose money. it's okay. you have had ample warning. the writing's been on the great wall for many years, and it's really intensified in the last few years. >> the writing on the great wall. >> it's fairly obvious what's coming. >> kyle, thanks. coming up on the other side of this, maybe we'll try some hot sauce, but we're also going to talk markets and help get you ready for the final trading day

of the month. futures right now, take a look at where things stand now. nasdaq up about 110. the s&p 500, up about 17 points. d iss bcatching "squawk box," anth icn. so this is pickleball? it's basically tennis for babies, but for adults. it should be called wiffle tennis. pickle! yeah, aw! whoo! ♪♪ these guys are intense. we got nothing to worry about. with e*trade from morgan stanley, we're ready for whatever gets served up. dude, you gotta work on your trash talk. i'd rather work on saving for retirement. or college, since you like to get schooled. that's a pretty good burn, right? got him. good game. thanks for coming to our clinic, first one's free.

there are some things that work better together. like your workplace benefits and retirement savings. voya provides tools that help you make the right investment and benefit choices. so you can reach today's financial goals. and look forward to a more confident future. voya, well planned, well invested, well protected.

welcome back, everybody. joining us to talk markets as we make our way toward the opening bell is katherine kaminsky, chief research strategist and

portfolio manager at alpha simplex. the markets turned. the futures markets turned around based on all of that data, the pce coming in line with expectations, lot of other moving pieces there too. was there anything you heard today that made you feel better about the markets? >> well, i think the reason people are feeling better is because today it's business as usual. things were in line with consensus. i think the market was looking for either an upside on downside surprise. an upside surprise would make people more nervous, but a downside surprise would have been a positive sign for rate cuts sooner, so i think it's really sort of a little bit of a no-off today, which surprised me in some sense. >> why? what were you expecting? >> well, we were expecting a little bit -- possibly a positive surprise in pce, something that has been consistent with a little bit more sticky data that we've been seeing in january. so, i think we're going to have to keep looking at the rest of the data this week, but really, the reason the market's happy about this is there's no bad

news. it's really just, we have to wait longer, which we already knew. so, i thinkthat's sort of the take i have today on today's market and why we're seeing some relief. >> heading into this, you already had the idea that fixed income would be a place that you would be shorting over the short-term? >> yes, so, i think fixed income really got ahead of itself. the market got a little ahead of the fed, and we saw yields go down really drastically at the beginning of the year, and that has really reverted. you've seen a lot of short pressure and short signals, particularly on the short end of the curve, so short-term bonds, and that's something that's just that really we have a lot longer to wait for cuts, but what's amazing is the equity market seems unfazed by this move. so, we'll have to see -- that's why today's data was interesting. would it reconnect again? >> excellent. kat katherine, thank you for time today. before we go, you can see

the futures turned around pretty drastically. dow futures off by about 140. now they're up by about 150. s&p futures turned to positive territory too. the nasdaq, up by almost 100 points. folks, that does it for us today. make sure you join us tomorrow. we'll be right back here. right now, it's time for "squawk on the street." ♪ good thursday morning, welcome to "squawk on the street," i'm david faber with jim cramer. we're live from post nine at the new york stock exchange. carl is on assignment. let's give you a look at futures. you just heard becky say it, so you don't need to hear me say it again, so i won't. just look. all right, let's get to our road map this morning. it starts with the fed's preferred inflation gauge. january core pce in line year over year, up 2.8%. on the tech front, we got salesforce out with a beat in

terms of i