officer, and the stock is getting cleaned. i think this could be a harbinger for the broader economy. i keep talking about that great line from the sun also rises. question: how did you go bankrupt? answer: two ways, gradually then suddenly. of course, ernest hemingway. studying the declining economy will not come out of left field. look at delinquencies, right? they are piling up. and if you look at the credit card curve, that's parabollingic. it's going straight up. and when they start adding up student loans, forget about it. as an investor though, here's the problem. you've got to have exposure to the stock market. it is the greatest money-making 345 chien in history, so you've got to be in it to win it. just don't be flat-footed. maybe have more cash than normal so when something happens, you're there to scoop up the bargains with both hands. that's the way we like to do it on "making money." right, liz claman? liz: s&p is about two-thirds of

a percent cheaper than yesterday, so again, don't buy stocks when they're moving hire, right, charles? charles: they always gone sale. liz: buffett says -- well, we find him buying on days when the markets are down. that would be today. the dow looking at a 22-day cumulative loss are of about 60000 points -- 2-day, 600 points. s&p down 34 points, and no fresh record for the nasdaq, the tech-heavy index's 3-session win streak snapped. one name in the semiconductor space and one of the major u.s. airlines moving in opposite directions. we're going to get to that and the selloff in just a moment. but first, we do need to tell you that the jury in the donald trump hush money trial is now in its fourth hour of deliberations. the former president is inside that courthouse and must stay there until there's either a verdict or the jury is dismissed at the end of the day. now, the former president seen here arriving at new york supreme court this morning is

charged with 34 felony counts related to secret alleged payments made to porn actress stormy daniels, an act a prosecutors allege a was part of a on conspiracy to influence the 2016 presidential election by unlawful means. the verdict could come at a any times we need to stress that, hence the order that both the defense and prosecution cannot leave the building. so we're going to take you live downtown. in the meantime, except for the nasdaq which notched a new record high yesterday, we are looking at a continuation of tuesday's losses. russell getting slammed the hardest, down 1.55%, but the dow is following close behind losing%, struggling -- 11% -- 1%. led by unitedhealth group. led lower here, the insurer dragging all the a names in the space underwater after warning at an a investor conference that it sees near term, quote,

disturbance around medicaid reimbursement rates. let me translate that the for you. they won't go -- be getting as much reimbursement for medicaid claims. if unh is the dow the's problem, american airlines is the s&p's headache, the worst decline since june of 2020. four years ago when the pandemic lockdowns slayed travel. at this hour the carrier is reeling after a ceo with robertize sum said a believes strategy to win know down business travel options alienated corporate customers. yes, the people who pay the most. doesn't that help in well, that did not help that yesterday's american cut its second quarter profit forecast citing slowing revenues. so right now you're look at an $111.48 stock -- 11.48. we are keeping an eye on a big splash in the oil patch, marathon oil higher by 7.75% on conocophillips' announcement

it has agreed to buy the shale driller in a $17.11 billion all-stock deal that represents a 15% premium to marathon's tuesday closing price. as is often a the case, a the aa quirer is falling, this time by about a 4%. a good part of the reason stocks may be down right now is that bond yields are popping. the bench mark 10-year is up 7 plus basis points to 4.622, and look at the 00-year, just -- the 10-year, just a ke9 cannen's whisker away from 5% at 4.993. what does this all mean in to investments, the markets and your stocks, j jpmorgan chief global strategist david kelly is here. what does it all mean? we do have fond bond yields moving higher. often stocks move lower in that case. but is there the somethingmit ow

rates will go. so i think what we're seeing this week is rates backing up because the government's having some trouble unloading that debt. those higher rates, of course, are hurting the stock market. that's what's going on. liz: and you figure people want to clip this coupon, look at the 3-month, 5.if 389% yield. >> it is tempting, but, you know, history suggests that a long-term investor should be a long-term investor -- liz: in stocks. yes, absolutely in stocks. but, i mean, there are other alternatives too. for example, a lot of alternatives that i think people are look at these days, things like infrastructure and housing and real estate. so there are some other ways of investing. but but in long-term assets because what'll happen is at some to my knowledge those short rates will be cut, and last year it turned outta that stocks beat cash more than three times over, so it was a good idea to be in stocks even though cash yields were pretty atrack thetive.

liz: a -- can attractive. there's no wall of worry at least at the moment for say, for example, a mega-cap name like nvidia which is bearing down on apple. invid woo, listen to this stat that charlie brady, our managing editor, gave us. since last wednesday when nvidia reported their incredible earnings, every single day since then nvidia has closed at a fresh record. what does that look like to you? >> well, i don't want to talk about individual stock stocks -- liz: of course. >> but if you look at the magnificent seven that people have been looking at for a while, there's clear there are the two groups of investors, those hiding out in cash and those who are doubling down on whatever has done well recently. and tech stocks in the u.s. have done very well for a long time. they are generating an awful lot of cash but also on top of that, on top of the earnings growth we're seeing this rise and rise and rise in valuations, and that's really what's going on. it's almost like there's not

that much fundamental analysis going on here, it's just this train the's leaving the station, and i want to be on it. liz: yeah, i get that, but then you're doing the fomo trade, fear of missing out. is it better to go into, perhaps, large cap names versus mega-cap names? >> i think so, yes. overall, if you look at the top ten stocks in the s&p 500, they're selling at 29 times earns. you can -- liz: can you put that into context historically? should be 20, right? or something like that. >> yeah, overall, over the last 25 years, actually, over the last 25 the years the average price to earnings ratio for the s&p 500 is about 16 times. so it's very high by historical standards. it's basically almost twice its normal level. but the rest of the market is selling at about a 17 times which is fine. so, you know, i think, you know, if you just buy the index, of course, a third of the intex is now these top ten stocks, but if you invest more actively and try to invest in the rest of the large cap universe, you can get better deals, think.

liz: we always have to turn to the fed because we expect that the federal reserve maybe will see one rate cut. i mean, this is -- some people say two, some people say none. give me your sense of where jpmorgan stands on this and when. i mean, this morning we were looking at fed funds futures for september. this morning. there was a 60 something percent chance, i believe, where did i put this down? we had, yeah, about that, about -- and now we're at 358%? >> well -- 58%? i'm sorry, that's november. why aren't we looking at september? can we look at september? okay. just wait a second, because september in this morning was at 53%. and suddenly it's dropped to 46. is that because bond yields are rising and there's lackluster interest in these bond floats? >> i think it's partly that, but also the bond market itself is reflecting the fact that the economy is growing by about a 3%

year-over-year. we thought the trend growth rate in the economy was 3%, it's actually doing 50% more, so the economy's growing faster, inflation does look stickier, so you've got a hotter, stronger economy. and that's just telling the federal reserve we don't need to move now. and so right now, you know, i'm thinking that, you know, v very close call in september. i think we might easily just get one rate cut in december, and then the federal reserve will gradually bring rates down next year. but for as a long as the economy is strong, the federal a rereceiver's going to to take its sweet time. rez liz the market is pricing in just a 45% odds for september. last week that was at a 67%, so it's falling, okay. which is something that that this show had warned people for a long time, do not expect six, five, four, three, even two rate cuts. that's where we have stood for quite some time. if when you talk about the consumer and when you talk about a very strong economy,

abercrombie & fitch hitting an all-time report. -- record. this is pretty stunning. dick's sporting goods, another all-time record. tjx in the past couple of weeks looked very good. gap stores over the past year, that stock is up 1400 put -- 140 plus percent. should that be an indicator of every consumer? out there spending? >> no. i think, i mean, there are two groups. there's a lot of americans who, frankly, people, particularly households who rent who are really struggling still because rents are high, and there are a lot of consumers who have barely seen wage gains keep up with inflation, and they feel pretty crummy. liz: let's keep that clear, rents are still sucking up much of people's disposable income. >> absolutely. and there are a lot of people living paycheck to paycheck. the economy doesn't count by heads, it counts by dollars, and the spending of the most affluent 10, 20% of american consumers is powering this economy forward. that's really why we didn't have

a a recession, because americans stop at the limits of credit and people being willing to continue to lend to these more aaffluent consumers, that has kept consumer spending -- liz: that's where we worry, when something bends until it breaks. we haven't seen it break yet. thank you thank you so much, david. >> thank you for having me. liz we are getting a clear view of what the fomc voting members, these are the important ones, are thinking. we're going to get this tomorrow on "a the claman pa countdown" when we are joined by atlanta federal reserve president rafael bostick, tomorrow at 3 p.m. eastern, that's an interjewish you -- interview you cannot miss. the jury apparently has just put out a innovate -- note, we're going to to let you know what it is as soon as we get more information. we'll take you there the live. up next, we'ral talking about the ipo market. boy,s has it been stuck in a

2-year lull. high interest rates have cause canned several companies to rethink listings on major stock exchanges. so what, you say? well, silicon valley venture capitalist eric hippeau isignala drought. he says he's got a remedy. eric is next. for the investor, the renaissance ipo etf is made up of the largest newly-public u.s.-listed companies, a nice portfolio remedy for those who invested, up more than 37% over the last year. 9 with the dow jones industrials down 400 points at the moment, "the claman countdown" returns in just a second. please stay with us. ♪

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liz: fox business alert, we do have breaking news, the jury suggestion sent out a note which contained four requests, three on david pecker's testimony. he, of course, of american media, testimony regarding a phone conversation with former president trump and one on michael cohen's testimony on a trump tower meeting. as soon as we get more information, we're going to take you live to the courthouse. in just a few minutes. lydia hu, our reporter, is inside, she's getting more information. we will get her to you momentarily. here's a question, are public companies becoming as rare as unicorn sightings? jpmorgan ceo jamie dimon pointing out in his new annual shareholder letter that the number of u.s.-listed public companies has has not just slunk, it's shriveled. at its peak in 1996, there were 7,300 publicly-traded

corporations. that today that number's been reduced to nearly 4300. over the last two decades can, the total numb of private companies in the -- numb of private companies has ballooned from 1900 to 11,32000. eric hippeau who made his fortune investing in early stage start-ups says the fast declining number of companies choosing to go public is, quote, a or worrying trend that needs versing if -- reversing if we are to maintain u.s. dominance and continue enjoying the benefits of our economy. let's bring in eric hippeau. he joins us now the talk about this. the stagnant ipo market, eric, isn't helping. according to u.s. bancorp 20211, record breaking year. ipos reached a 22-date -- 2-date high of more than 1,000. that was following a drop can in 2022 of about a 83% to 175 and and then you can see what happened, it got a little bit worse in 2023.

finish why is this such a bad thing when public companies are blossoming? private, rather, private companies are place blossoming? >> yes, well, the entire economy is based on public companies. they're the ones who said the -- who set the trends, who set the comparables, are able to raise billions of dollars, who are employing the most people. so it's great that we are able to to keep private companies private longer. at some point they have to go public. and at the moment, it's not possible. if they, as you pointed out, there's fewer and fewer ipos. and this has been going on, you know, for decades now. we're down to about 4,000 companies at this trend in about a 20 years we'll be down to 2,000 companies. and so that's just unsustainable. we cannot be the envy, economy being the envy of the world without the most public

companies and the richest stock market in the world. liz: let me push back a little bit, eric. why do they have to go public? koch industries never went public. some of the biggest american companies chose to stay private. cargill, hobby lobby, chick filet, publix, fidelity investments, they all stay private. petsmart, staples, mars, the candy giant. why must, do you believe, they go public? >> the companies that you mention are very great companies, but their family- they're family-owned businesses, and they tend to be also family-run businesses. most companies are not that. the pane companies that i fund -- the companies that i fund have multiple shareholders, and they certainly have multiple stakeholder, and if you don't go public, you are not rewarding those shareholders, rewarding the employees who believed in the company early and have stock options. it's impossible to reward them.

and then the other part of it is we are depriving the public investors from the benefits of participating in high growth companies. in the previous segment, you mentioned nvidia. liz: yes. >> nvidia went public in 1999 at a sal -- valuation of $20 million. the company's worth almost $3 trillion. who are the beneficiary of os all this? their public shareholders who were able to buy the shares all along the way. they're the ones who really made a ton of money, and it's a democratic process. anybody can buy shares. liz: you point out in the fortune article several reasons you believe this is happening. first of all, companies get choked up in regulatory red tape, right? you also talk about how mergers and acquisitions have ramped up where the big fish swallow the little fish before they can go public. those are the solutions. i'm talking about the problems at the moment. so if we could take that down, that would be helpful.

compliance costs, you say, availability of capital has become more so, right, eric? i mean, there are a lot of venture capitalists like yourself who have put so much capital out there. so can i just ask why you feel that this is so worrisome? >> my job is to finance and the job of ore venture capitalists -- other venture capitalists is to finance finance most innovative, the most creative, the most job-creative companies in the world. if there is no outcome, if our founders, the people who are starting those businesses, don't believe that they can have an outlet that will allow them to be richly rewarded for these efforts, it's difficult to build those companies. and the fewer and fewer people are going to want to start companies. and if fewer and fewer people start companies -- liz: right. we don't want to lose the leadership in this country, and we certainly have it. your solutions. now we put that up on the

screen. you say that the government should provide some sort of tax incentives to help these companies go public along with loosening regulatory hurdles, shorten lock-up periods, incentivize innovation. why should we give people tax benefits to go public? >> well, it's just part of the solution. i think more importantly we need, we need to be, we need to realize that we are a capitalist country, and we need to foment capitalism. i probably have the last, one of the last job tighten the untiles this a says capitalist without being canceled. [laughter] we need -- liz: us too, it's okay, eric. we're capitalists here at "the claman countdown." >> we need to, we need to reassemble around capitalism. we need to promote capitalism. and then when it comes to regulations, regulations is the most important part here. i am not against regulations. of course we all a want to be a part of regulations, but we need to have a cost benefit analysis. when we set up a new rule, and

since sarbanes-oxley, the act was launched in 2002 we have seen a slew of other regulations. so the cost of maintaining the compliance is way too much for company. liz: okay. i hope everybody reads the op it that eric wrote, it's in fortune magazine. thank you very much. and, yes, the anticapitalists, when they're protesting, who do they order from when they want food? instacart can, you know? publicly-traded companies. with we depend if on them. all right, one of the most important court cases in u.s. history is now in the jury's hands, and they have questions at this hour. the jury in the criminal trial of former president donald trump is districting right now -- deliberates right now and just sent a note for a request on some testimony. we're going to head out to new york state supreme court to get more granularity on exactly what they would like to hear. the dow 30 still in the red, but there is some green at the very top. we are looking at the heat map,

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president trump's defense team are back in the courtroom. they are waiting for the jury to be seated. the presumptive republican presidential nominee is facing 34 if felony charges -- 34 felony charges of falsifying business records connected to hush money paid to former adult film star the stormy daniels. lydia hu is outside the courthouse. the judge gave stern instructions to the jury, they've got to be unanimous in their decision, 34 counts, and now they have some questions? >> reporter: that's exactly right. and we know these questions were communicated to justice juan her if chan just before 3:00. and we have some details about what those questions specifically were. the jurors wanted to have testimony read back to them on four particular issues. one is david pecker, that's the former ceo of american media incorporated that owns the "national enquirer", david pecker's testimony regarding a phone call he had with the former president.

david pecker testified that president trump all called him -- excuse me, david pecker testified that trump called david pecker to discuss buying the life rights to karen mcdougal's story. she's the playboy model that allegedly had an affair with the former president. and trump was concerned she was about to sell her story rights to another media outlet. and the conversation was whether or not he thought, whether or not pecker thought trump should actually buy those media rights. that's one piece. the second piece is the decision not to have funded mcdougal's life rights. ark mi initially purchased mcdougal's life rights to the storying and the plan, as a we've heard, is trump was going to pay david pecker back. that never came to i fruition, and the jury wants to hear more about why did trump never actually pay the $150,000 for karen mcdougal's story. and finally, more testimony read back from david pecker talking about the 20215 trump tower -- 2015 trump tower meeting with

the former president and michael cohen in which pecker offered to be, quote, eyes and ears for the trump campaign. and lastly, michael cohen's testimony about also a trump tower meeting, unclear whether that's the 2015meeting or perhaps a subsequent meeting in which alan wise wising -- weisselberg was present in which they were discussing how they were going to a pay michael cohen back. the gist of all of these questions says to me, liz, that the jury is really trying to understand what this alleged catch is and kill scheme that the prosecution is alleging to have taken place. we're not seeing any questions about the actual documents in this case or where they've been falsified. and i will caution it's difficult to read a hot into what the questions are, who's actually asking the questions. are these questions on behalf of all 12 jurors or just 1 juror, but that's where wert at this juncture. they've been districting now since just around a little after a 11:30. the judge has said they'll go

until 4:30, check in again and perhaps until 6 p.m. tonight and have a check-in again and this continue tomorrow. and this coming on the heels of that marathon day yesterday of closing arguments. so you can imagine the jurors might be a little tired and also hoping to get in some sleep from the midst of all of this. that is the latest from here, liz, back to you. liz: difficult for everybody involved, i'm sure. lydia, thank you very much, lydia hu. we'll go back to her if there's more breaking news. in the meantime, fox business alert, the company that's been around since 18932 is acting like a hot young name. abercrombie & fitch soaring 25 to the a new all-time high in the wake of its strongest quarter in history. the retailer beaten on both the top and bottom line in the first quarter and sales surged 22 year-over-year. the retailer sees full-year revenue growth climbing 10 from the previous 4-6% estimate. and then you've got fellow retailer the dick's sporting goods also hurtling to a record

close after a it reported a first quarter beat and raised its full-year outlook saying comparable sales were up 5.3% year-over-year as a more customers shopped in store and ramped up their average a transactions once they got this. dick's sporting goods up 15.6%. if chewy chewing up the scenery. the stock of the pet food and supplies e-commerce company roaring higher by nearly 26 thanks to a top and bottom line first quarter beat. and here's what was at the heart of that beat, automatic a deliver thely sales. delivery sales. like every month just send is me the kitty litter, the canned food. those sales led the way with a 6.4% year-over-year increase, chewy announced a share repurchase program of up to $500 million with no expiration date. cab baa shares are rebounding, up 8.25%. that's a big turn around. they fell earlier in the session on guest traffic declines during

the first quarter. the fast-casual mediterranean chain which is hugely popular lately beat on the top is and bottom line, but some customers responded to the 3.5% increase on menu prices by staying away. cava did lift its sales outlook expecting to add 50-54 locations this year. well, forget about flipping homes, how about flipping an entire town? one midwestern city has done it, transforming itself from the underwater mortgage capital of the nation to the hottest real estate market in the country. the mayor of that town is here to tell us how they did it. you've to got to hear this. and speaking of transformations, anna hard a man was -- harman was set on being a lawyer, but after graduating from law school she decided to transform her less than thrilling legal career into something let's call it

more blingy. she launched studs, a hip and stylish piercing studio that's all the rage now especially near college campuses. how did she do that? anna's my guest on my newest everyone talks to liz podcast episode. she shares how she turned her own experience getting her ears pierced at tattoo parlor into a trendy new and fast-growing business. shones and is running. she owns and is running. listen wherever you get your podcasts. "the claman countdown" returns in a minute. the dow is off a its lows, now down 343 points. ♪ ♪ some things should stand the test of time. long lasting eylea hd could significantly improve your vision and can help you go up to 4 months between treatments. if you have an eye infection, eye pain or redness,

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coventry direct today at the number on your screen, or visit coventrydirect.com. liz: mortgage rates resuming their march hire after a 4-week rebrief. new numbers from the mortgage bankers' association show the average rate for a 30-year fixed mortgage increased to 7.005% from 7.0 0 11%. that's the first increase in a

month and in response, total mortgage application volume fell 5.7% last week to a 3-month low. but when it come to mortgages -- comes to mortgages, higher rates respect always the problem. take rockford, illinois, a city 90 miles from chicago and milwaukee. back in 2013 it was the underwater mortgage capital of america, the whole country. that year nearly one-third of the metro area's home mortgages were worth less than the money owed on them. well, a decade later the picture has totally flipped with "the wall street journal" and realtor.com just now crowning rockford the top real estate market in america. so how did a city drowning in near-dead mortgages emerge as one of america's real estate hot spots? let's ask the man who sat in the mayor's chair since 2017 and shepherded much of this, mayor tom mcnamara a here in a fox business exclusive. let me rewind the clock here.

2017, you became mayor, and this is a horrible situation. what was your first thought of how to wrap your arms around this problem? >> well, liz, thanks so much for having me on and really highlighting the success of the community. so this really took a team effort. so we pulled together expertses throughout our city, and we listened to what they had to say, we then listened to our residents, and we just put action into focus, ask and we invested really in hard work. we invested in partnerships throughout our community, we invested in physical infrastructure as well as human capital to get us where we're at. liz: a lot of cities do that and and the it doesn't pull them out of the abyss, the likes of what you guys are seeing in rockford back in 2014. -- 2013. let's narrow down exactly what it was that you did. they say if you want to stilling late something, cut taxes on it. you cut property taxes by 37%.

weren't you worried that the city's coffers would then suffer because of that? explain to others who are listening right now how you pulled that off. >> yeah. so we lived within our means. we have, our work force is i one-third the size of all of our comparable communities. we invest if heavily into our employees, but we also have a very lean work force. we allowed our employees to to tell us what they thought we should cut, where can we increase revenue and cut expenses. we then went to the business community and said what do you think we should cut and where can we increase revenue. and then we went to to municipal finance experts ask and most importantly listened to them and made difficult decisions. so we're here through a lot of hard work, a9 lot of help from a lot of community members. liz: well, you got some good ideas from everybody around you. i think it's smart to go to experts instead of just saying let's do this, let's do that. you built a program, you paired this tax cut with a program for the unhoused. talk about that and explain if

how it worked and why it also had the salubrious effect on the situation in rockford who? we've done a number of programs and a couple ohed like to talk to you about is one we have a critical home repair program. we know that it provides an individual a lot of dignity to stay in their home. we also know if we're not -- an individual can't reinvest in their home and it's getting key lap dated, the next step for us if they a lose that home is we would have to take it over, demolish it and spend a lot of money. so we did a critical home repair program, we partnered with habitat for humanity and said if you promise to live in that home for years, we'll help repair that home. we created a community development financial institution where we went out and partnered with our local banks and financial institutions and said to any local contractors that we were putting people to work, if you want to buy one of these dilapidated homes, you fix it up and sell toyota single family occupy resident, we'll give you a low interest loan to do that. if you want to build a new

property in rockford or, we'll aa bait your taxes for three years, waive all of your water connection and plan review fees if you build a new residential unit in the city of rockford. liz: well, for every action there's an equal and opposite reaction. people are flooding into rockford, and the average price on a house, i believe, stands at a $235,000. mayor mc, that mare rah, thank you. -- mcnamara, thank you for being the kind of leader of a community your size and fixing a problem that almost seems insurmountable. good luck to you. >> thank you. thanks for having me on. liz: all right. first quarter earnings season wrapping up but not before a slew of big retail names report this week with. our countdown closer says one of them has been left behind, and you need to grab it because it is on sale. we'll tell you which stock it is when "the claman countdown" returns. ♪

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liz: "fox business alert." this the 17 billion-dollar marathon, conocophillips deal we've been telling you about today. this is not just a one-off merger. lately the u.s. oil patch has been a hotbed of consolidation. last year was the most active

with 250 billion in deals struck. chevron buying hess. purchasing pioneer resources. charlie gasparino says harbinger with a political component to it. >> not just me. i'm asking my banking sources every day seems like oil patch deal. not by the way small companies. these are multimillion-dollar massive conglomerates. there are economic reasons for doing it. why do they think the biden administration, who we have had people representing lina khan, the ftc chief here much. liz: she has been very tough. by the way that is a live picture of president biden speaking in pennsylvania. i believe philadelphia. >> right. liz: maryland governor. with him. >> i mean, whether joe biden has any clue what i'm talking about is a whole other story but the people -- liz: he has to know people, corporate leaders don't like

lina khan. >> he doesn't know. i don't know if he knows or cares. he is that much into the weeds. but his regulatory apparatus is very anti-merger. not just lina khan. justice department antitrust division, go down the line, fcc. you have to ask yourself why is this happening? bankers are saying there is somewhat of a bet here on the political ramifications of what might happen if the trump administration if there is a trump administration. now are they guarantying, there is a lot of reasons why people go do mergers, right? never only one reason. obviously the economics are number one but, you know, with trump ahead in the polls and a lot of people thinking he might pull this out, there is a little bit of an arbitrage going on no what i understand among deal-makers that you know, we could see a loosening up of the merger restrictions that biden has put on. and some of this is, listen,

face it, you've seen the deals that biden has said no to. simon & schuster. who bought them, i can't remember or tried to buy them but they stopped it. that is a small book publisher. liz: amazon the parent of roomba. that never even announced. >> how about amazon-mgm. that got through but it took years and years and years. >> true. >> there is something else going on here and there's a bet. the question how far, let's just gameplan this out. why aren't we seeing any media mergers which would definitely be the one place where there needs to be mergers like big tech buying whatever, paramount, warner brothers/discovery, given where the stock is. liz: if you want those companies to survive and those employees to have jobs you have got to merge. >> the one place where i think the regulatory environment probably won't change according to bankers is in the media space

because trump is so anti-tech himself. you know, has not had nice things to say about zuckerberg and -- liz: all these mergers in the, in the oil space have come during the biden administration. >> they're now. why are they coming now? these are -- liz: by the way you need regulatory approval. that takes awhile. they announce the merger but just doesn't happen. >> i think what you're seeing here, takes a year, right? what you're seeing here is some bet. now the question is, the most logical place to bet would be media, media being bought by big tech. if there is ever a truly free market did. oj and you might get that under trump, who knows who they put in there, maybe jay clayton becomes the head of the justice department's, justice department and he put as very free market person in as antitrust chief, i mean you could see big tech buying, buying up warner brothers/discovery, and

by the way david zaslav will sell like that. so that is where we are right now. people are looking at mergers. i think this is a tell -- liz: warner brothers/discovery, right now, charlie, is down 2.7%. >> to where? liz: $7.66. i don't get this i know media is screwed up. we're in the middle of it. cord-cutting, we all know what it is doing to the business but i don't really get why, like zaslav not agreeing to sort of extortion nary terms on the nba deal. he is theoretically saving money. liz: something to bring up with the consumer financial protection chief. we have them tomorrow. >> you don't have them now? liz: tomorrow, sorry. >> by the way -- liz: we're good. not that good. >> consumer protection bureau chief, those guys, listen, would

they have any say on this? i mean do they rule on these sort of mergers? liz: well they do have power, they do have power. charlie, thank you very much. we're coming up on the closing bell. four minutes away. markets are lower off the bottom here though ahead of the big economic data that -- well tomorrow we get gdp for the first quarter but friday the big one, core pce, the fed's favorite inflation gauge. the dow is on its way to its second down day in a row. s&p and nasdaq on the pace to snap their two-day win streak. maybe jitters related coming ahead of those two numbers. meantime major retail earnings on deck. tomorrow, costco, ulta, report quarterly results after the bell. our "countdown closer" says markets, investors have completely forgotten about one of those companies. now is the perfect opportunity to buy it because it is on sale.

gradient president, mike binger, tells us his favorite in the space. mike, you say it. >> you said it, ulta beauty coming tomorrow. i like the setup coming into the report tomorrow. the bottom line i consider beauty to be a sticky business. ulta is the 800-pound gorilla in the retail space selling cosmetics. just recently inflation and a little competition have slowed growth but i think that's temporary. put it like this, earnings per share estimates have come down 3% since march but the stock is down 30%. this leaves this stock at 15-year low on a valuation basis. the stock trades 13 times. after this year they will be back on 10% plus earnings growth. ulta continues to have strong customer loyalty, stable margins and they're buying back two billion in stock. we'll know a lot more tomorrow after they report their earnings but i think at these levels it is really worth a shot taking. >> mike, at the top of the show

we had jpmorgan's chief strategist david kelly and he talked about p-e ratios and whether stocks are cheap or expensive. this one, ulta, has a forward p-e of 17. that's right around the 20 year average but you know, all of the other fancy names are way higher than that. so, people would be buying this at a discount if you're judging by the p-e ratio. give me a sense what you expect on the inflationary picture? because ulta and all the other companies have to deal with their input costs, their prices that they charge consumers and that of course all plays into the big picture. >> yeah so the big question where's inflation? you will know a lot more on friday after the pce is reported but you know in our opinion we think this next move, we brought down inflation a lot from 9% to close to three but that last move down to where the fed wants to get it is going to be tough to achieve in my opinion. it is probably going to take at least throughout the whole year of 2024. so in our opinion, we don't

think that, you know, the fed is really going to cut-rates in two scenarios. the first is inflation is well under control. we any that's going to take at least six months to see or else the economy starts to deteriorate and they have to support it with a rate cut. in our opinion neither one of those situations is in place. so we think no rate cuts will be in effect this year. maybe one next year. liz: none. david kelly said one possibly. here we go, mike, thank you very much the closing bell is about to ring. the major averages do close near, not at the lows of the session but near with the dow down 408, the s&p down 39, the nasdaq down 105. [closing bell rings] suddenly the vix, volatility spike about 10%. tomorrow atlanta federal reserve president rafael bostic is here in a fox business exclusive. don't miss it. ♪