a fraction of a point. thank you so much for watching "street signs" today. "closing bell" is coming up next. see you at the same time tomorrow. today, on the "closing bell." 13 k on the way? can the dow close above the key psychological level? despite mixed economic data on housing and the consumer? plus, eye on the ipad. glen hutchins talks tech, including his view on the impact apple's latest device will have on the sector. and negotiating summer travel. priceline's ceo talks earnings, and how he's going to keep his company's performance up in challenging economic times. live from post nine on the floor of the new york stock exchange, this is the final and most important hour of the trading day. >> i still get jitters, and chills, the fact that we're sitting on the floor of the historic new york stock

exchange. welcome to the "closing bell," i'm bill griffeth. >> i'm maria bartiromo. >> what are you watching today? >> i'm watching the ltr. i'm waiting to hear what the details will be of the european central bank's new lending facility. we'll probably find out the details at 5:00 a.m. tomorrow. that's obviously one of the big components of this market. if it's more than $500 billion, people are going to say, wow, the panks are really in tough shape. they need the money. another way to look at it is you're taking advantage of #% rates and this is a good time to take the money. >> wouldn't you? >> that's going to dictate tomorrow's trading session. >> that has helped our marks as well. what i'm watching, priceline. you know, for a long time, google was the stock we all wanted to own. but we missed the boat. lately it was apple. and now sudden live it's priceline. have you seen priceline lately? look at it again. up another $40, almost 7% gain.

and again, i ask the question, won't anybody split their stock anymore? >> wow, yeah. >> look at that. >> you don't see a lot of splits in technology. >> we've got the ceo on today. ask whether he will split the stock. >> i will. we'll talk with him after the bell tonight. and find out really what's driving that business. jeffrey boyd joining us on the closing bell quoilg right after the bell today. it may sound like a broken record, but we're on dow 13,000 watch. lower oil prices and pretty good increase in consumer confidence this morning helped offset disappointing home sales in durable goods data. the nasdaq leading the major averages once again. money moving into technology. news apple will reveal the long-awaited ipad 3 next week. that helped apple shares soar to a record high. you're seeing ripples in apple right now. >> they were teasing us once again. about an hour of trading to go. we were hovering around 13,000

again. there it is. we're right on 13,000. raise your hands, anybody, anybody tired of waiting for 13,000 on the dow? we're sitting on it, right up 19 points. nasdaq quietly heading back to 3,000. up another 12 points. and s&p 500 also with a little move today, a gain of two-plus points at 1370. we've talked about the low volume as the dow flirts with this magic number once again. we turn our attention to volatility, plus jpmorgan holds investor day. where is the firm growth this year. if you just got an ipad 2 #, here we go again. it may be time to upgrade to the ipad 3, which we are told is on its way. today's "closing bell" exchange, we have all that covered and we start with our weather man, bob pisani at post 9s, and jon fortt

is out in san jose. the dow 13,000, let's get it over with, huh? >> i think the suspense has passed on that. the ltro maria was taunging about, a lot of people say if it's low, below 300 billion, it means the banks don't need the money. i think folks feel if they have a nice cushion, that would give a lot of people a little better feeling. maybe 600, $700 billion, the goldilocks number would be just right. once again, we're getting a divergence between the transports and the industrials. i don't like it when this happens. you don't want to see several days in a row, all of a sudden the transports moving down and the industrials holding on the up side. that's a bad side. of course the s&p and nasdaq are at new highs. bill was just talking about volatility, what's going on, because even though the vix is low, look at that, still sitting down there, right around 18, that's the lowest it's been in a while. we are, if you go out just a little bit further looking at a lot different situation.

let me show you the curve of the vix as you go out in the future. it's at 17 right now. remember, you can go out further on the curve. look at this, all of a sudden we're up at 28, 29, out in august, september. you get to the end of the june operation twist, the feds' operation is going to be ending, that's where they'll extend the maturity of the treasury portfolio, that's going to be ending. i'll bet mr. bernanke will get a lot of questions on that. and the election is coming up. volatility is a lot higher further out on the curve. what we need to do is watch what mr. bernanke will say tomorrow. i guarantee you he will be peppered with questions about qe-2, and ending of operation twist, to get some kind of indication of what the feds' thinking is going to be. that's what traders want to know for tomorrow. >> you çee the expectations of the higher volatility. mary thompson, what are they saying at j prkpmorgan chase?

>> bill, i want to start right now, with the head of the firm's investment bank, talking to the group assembled today. and he addressed one area of concern for all the big banks, that being regulations, that being the volcker rule. he believes a number of ambiguities in this rule are going to be worked out and that the bank is going to be just fine. keep in mind there is concern that the volcker rule is going to impact the profitability of the market-making or constrain the market-making operations of these banks. but he believes because countries, including canada and japan, and germany have expressed concerns about the liquidity pressures that could come to bear because of volcker, he believes those ambiguities have been worked out. that being said, he also provided investors probably with the most detailed look ever at a bank's trading operations, breaking out by product what jpmorgan makes by revenue trading these products every quarter. it's heavily are on the

derivatives business, that it's said it's better to be a bigd derivatives trader like jpmorgan, that puts you in a positive position, a dominant position in that area. >> so mary, now that we've got a lot more clarity in terms of the volcker rule, and how they're feeling about the volcker rule, do you think, number one, we're going to get some clarity on a dividend, and number two, are we going to get more clarity on the stresd testsd with the snrgded sgld whad dougd brond steend the krrksd frksd orksd said earlier about capital allocation is, again, you have to wait for the federal reserve. but he repeated that over the long term, the company wants to have a 30% dividend payout. and as far as the stress test, he feels the bank is in a fine position to pass it. they said even under the worst case scenario, the bank would have $35 billion in excess capital. under the stress test that they just submitted the results to. we should hear about that again,

maria, on march 15th. >> who here has an ipad? >> i do. >> mary, you got an ipad? >> no, but i'm getting the ipad 3. >> you're the smart one. >> jon fortt already has the ipad 3. >> so what's new and different and exciting about the ipad 3, jon fortt? >> sharper screen, better camera, new a-6 chip that's able to handle the grasphics. this is a big product for apple, in part because last quarter, it did 9 #$.2 billion worth of sales, selling 15.4 million units. that's about 20% of apple's holiday quarter revenue. if this continues to eat into pc market growth, and continues to drive things for apple, they're expecting a 32 #$.5 billion quarter. that's what they guided to. they usually beat that.

this could sell quite a bit. >> how nice for you, mary. >> jon, is there any indication, whether they will put sirius in the ipad? >> i expect to see sirius across all the ios devices, probably this year. that's how they tend to roll off -- roll out these kind of platform centric features. yes, i would expect to see that. >> it will brew our coffee, toast our bagels and have everything ready as well. talk to you all later. let's get a closer look at the movers and shakers so far today. courtney? >> thanks, bill. what a flirtatious market we've got here, if you look at the dow, s&p and nasdaq all at those multi-year highs. we might make it. we might not. we're going to have to wait and see. we've got less than an hour to go. volatility creeping up just a hair right now. still around the low 18 mark. very low as bob pisani was pointing out. take a look at crude oil.

falling even further right now, below $107. that's the worst two-day slide in two weeks for wti crude. the yield on the ten-year, creeping up just a bit. but again, holding below 2% today. tech leading the way. we talked about the nasdaq getting closer to the 3,000 mark, as you can see. if i get out of the way, you can see the s&p sectors here. technology at the top. all the way at the other end you've got energy and utilities down. ever so slightly. tech sector may be getting the marginal leaders, by about half a percent, the nasdaq having a bullish day. we were just talking about apple, holding that event in san francisco on march 7th. the company saying it's going to be something you really have to see. investors really looking again at shares hitting more all-time highs. look at this, above 5.33 a share. micron is up 9%. netflix, some traders love it, some hate it.

up more than 3%. bullish today. >> thanks so much. rick santelli in chicago. over to you, rick. >> we've had a lot of false starts today. we had weak day in the form of durables in housing, very strong data in the form of confidence in richmond fed. throw in the wild headline that came out arndt 10:00 eastern regarding the referendum vote in ireland, the ten-year had a lot of volatility. we were below 19 # 0, now in the low price of the day, a little above 19 # 3, up one basis point on the day. how does this stack up with our foreign ten-year notes. you can see our chart going back to the beginning of the month. one point hovering at the lowest yield since the first couple of days in february.

very similar pattern to the gilt, ten-year uk, as it hofrs around the 2% level. today it actually dipped a bit below it. remember the ltro tomorrow, try to think this way, there's a lot of talk that if it's big, it's going to hold some negatives. it's a lot like some of the programs in the u.s. maybe they work, but maybe they didn't. but it left a sour taste in a lot of people's mouths. are bill, maria, back to you. >> rick, thanks very much. you've still got us talking about technology here, waiting for the ipad 3. i'm going to wait for ipad 12. >> just do it. >> stop if you've heard this before, we're approaching dow 13,000 right now, as we head to the close. we've got about 50 minutes to go on the tuesday opening. stick around for the next couple of hours. >> money moving into nasdaq. where you can still find opportunities in technology. we'll talk to glen hutchins,

he's weighing in next. >> will rising gasoline prices take a bite out of the bottom line like priceline.com? have we mentioned, that's skyrocketing right now? we'll ask jeffery boyd in the next hour. >> how high apple shares might head once the company unveils the ipad 3 next week. >> here's how the s&p 500 heat map is shaping up. a little more red than green today. we are cnbc, glad you're with us from post 9 at the new york stock exchange, first in business worldwide.

welcome back to closing bell. here's a look at some of the business headlines we're following right now. move over ipad. unveiling it next week. the latest buzz says it will

sport a quad core processor, with the latest 4-g technology. that news has helped push stock of apple to an all-time high today as the tech behemoth closes in on a market capitalization of $500 billion. yes, half a trillion dollars. yahoo! is now threatening to sue facebook. google went public in 2004. it settled a patent with yahoo!. microsoft unveils a test version of its windows 8 operating system tomorrow. windows 8 is operate ti mized for touch computing. it will run on tablets as well as desktops and laptops. it could propel the president to microsoft ceo position when steve balmer eventually steps down.

balmer has had that position since 1999. maria? >> let's stay on tech, because silver lake is the largest technology focus private equity firm known for its big payoffs. like skype in 2009, which of course later the firm sold to microsoft last year for more than $8 billion, which landed the firm a three-fold profit. joining me in a cnbc exclusive is silver lake co-founder glenn hutchins. great to see you again. >> hello, maria. i love your new set. >> it's high-tech. >> it's as elegant and cutting edge as you are. >> thank you very much. what's going on in the world. i want to get your interest and ideas in technology. how do you see the world in terms of the markets being up as much as they are in 2012 relative to the fundamentals of the economy? >> i'm really concerned about that. i think that, you know, we are in a long-term period of low growth, about 2 #%, and high

unemployment about 7% to 8%. we're not going to break out of that in a cyclical manner, because it's the result of underlying structural problems. when you have a good quarter, like we did in the third quarter of -- the first half of the last year, people, i think, get over exuberant. when you have a bad patch like in the second half of last year, people get pessimistic. right now i think we're in an above-trend period. >> as an investor, would you be selling into some of this euphoria right here? >> i would be very careful about what i bought. and if i had something that was mature, and ready to sell, i would think this might be a time to do it. >> let me get your take what's going on in technology. obviously you sold skype to microsoft last year, you took part in the $950 million financing round for groupon. you teamed up with kkr to acquire go daddy, which is a deal you talked about quite a

bit on this program, $225 billion. nasdaq day in, and day out, is the winner, with money moving into tech. what's going on? >> as a director of nasdaq, i'm happy that you mentioned the other stock market. >> right. >> the -- we are on the cusp of some of the most important and q technology trends in my lifetime. and you mentioned skype. skype resides, for instance, at the intersection of two of those, which is mobility, or communications defined very broadly, and social networking. let me talk about the communications piece. the wireless broadband is by far the biggest technology trend i've ever seen. there are more connections to wireless devices in the united states today than there are people. >> wow. >> i've never seen a market that's bigger than the population. >> big statement. >> in the world today there are 4 billion devices, 5 billion subscriptions to devices, there are -- and that's a per capita

market three to four times the size of the pc market. it's the use of the network that's growing at 100% per year because of the devices enabling people not just voice, not just e-mail and text, but also robust applications, and with broader network capacity, even more and more robust applications going down the network. it's growing like gangbusters. there's a massive ecosystem of hardware, software and services and content suppliers around that. that's a huge trend. >> again, are valuations getting ahead of themselves? i recognize there are serious strong fundamentals behind what's going on. but are the prices keeping up or are the prices a bust? >> the first comment i made when we were talking about the broughter market, and the broader market is going to affect the broader economy. it's much above the broader economy. the technology has its own set

of dynamics, and is growing independent in a secular way, independent of underlying economic growth, just because it's part of the economy that's averaging overall growth up by a lot. >> that's where the growth is. >> that's where the growth is. the valuations reflect that. and if you buy -- my view is, if you buy the best companies, with the best long-term growth prospects and best business models, and prepare to hold for a good long time, like if you had bought google when it came out, or ebay when it came out or amazon -- >> or apple. >> -- or apple, you'll make money. if you buy the best businesses and hold for a long time, these are great companies with tremendous growth dynamics underneath. >> speaking of the beginnings of some of these companies, in terms of tech ipos, do you think that will be weird the deal flow comes from in 2012? is it tech, health care, biotech, what areas are richest for you? >> in general?

>> in general. give me both. >> one thing going on right now, of course, worth noting is the high yield in leverage markets are vibrant now. access to capital, debt capital has never been in recent years, has not been stronger than this. it's an extraordinary opportunity. there are a lot of new refinancings going on. that's a piece of the market that's very high. i think the ipos are very important for two reasons. one reason is they give, for the classic reason a successful company can benchmark its success and other people, then insiders can have access to the stock. it's also benchmarks for new investment in new companies, and creates confidence that the new companies thcan have access to e markets and be success ifful at end of the time. >> and risk averse ti there? they want this deal? are they putting their money to work here?

>> i think you're seeing very good vc deal. us in the alternatives business, whether it's private equity or im or venture or others, are in the nose bleed section of the risk/return sector to begin with. no investor should have everything in one place. so they need to diversify. >> good to see you. >> as always. my pleasure. >> appreciate it. glenn hutchins is talking to us, co-founder of silver lake. >> the dow making its best effort to close above 13,000, up 24 points right now at 13,07. donald trump and warren buffett both said housing is extremely cheap right now, but what do the charts say. as we head to the break, we'll take a look at how each member of the dow stands as the blue chip average does try to close above that 13,000 level. more back with the "closing bell" from the new york stock bell" from the new york stock exchange after this.

welcome back. i'm sharon epperson. silver soared today. precious metals across the board, getting a lift from another cash infusion from the european central bank. that's anticipated tomorrow morning. this ltro 2. keep in mind as well, we're looking at gold prices to test that $1800 an ounce level as well. but silver really has been the

outperformer. it's up 33% year-to-date. really, it's just making up for the fact it was underperforming last year. kept playing catch-up with the gold market. back to you. >> sharon, thank you very much. less than an hour of trading to go here this tuesday. investors watching the home builders this morning. still saying that the housing recovery has a ways to go at this point. and donald trump said this morning, he's a famed investor in the housing market as we all know, he said real estate is a buy. listen to this. >> housing is one of the great investments right now. i tell people all the time, go buy a house. you can make an unbelievable deal. >> warren buffett said the same thing yesterday on "squawk box" here on cnbc. let's see what the charts say. jeff is with us today, the chairman of renaissance macro research and cnbc contributor. do you like housing? and what are we going to look at

to represent here? >> you get the home building index first. housing cyclicly has come off the bottom, it's improved. my biggest concern, here's the home bultders index -- >> this goes back to 2007. >> little longer term, it's obviously down a lot. a nice base formation. you're up against this resistance level. the trends have improved. my biggest concern is when you look at the poster children for bad behavior, it's usually a long time before they become sustained leadership. i think cyclicly we're in a pretty good spot for home builders. but if you're looking for a two to three year investment for stocks, i think there will be some backfilling. >> is there a name you like right now? >> my favorite would be lennar. if you look at lennar on the charts here, you've got a stock that's broken out. this is a longer term formation. obviously a climactic low down here. same type of base formation. looking at getting it together. going to the next level. i like lennar from, again, a

cyclical perspective. i don't think you're getting back to the old highs. in the next six, nine months, there are decent -- >> so you've got to be patient as the repair work is done, to put it in those terms, right? >> remember, ten years ago, there were probably five home building analysts on the street. so it's gone through a whole cycling. i don't think it will ever get back to where it was. it's going to be a mediocre play for a long, long time, the stocks will be. but i think you could make a little money. >> jeff, good to see you. thanks for joining us. great job on the telestrator, too, by the way. >> thank you. >> up 28 # points on the dow jones industrial average. money is moving into technology yet again. the dow trying to close above 13,000. we are right on 13,000. if it closes there, it would be the first time since may of '08. better than 6% in 2012, is this rally sustainable.

bond flow funds are booming. is this love affair with bonds starting to get overblown? we'll check it out when we come right back. look at some of the standout performers in the s&p 500 today. you're watching the "closing bell" on cnbc, first in business worldwide.

welcome back. bob pisani down on the floor of the new york stock exchange. still on the up side, but i'm concerned about that divergence again between the industrials and transports. this has been going on for more than a week. and the transports would be even weaker if it was not for a rally midday in the airlines, because oil dropped. keep an eye on that. meantime, looking at what the retailers are doing well. auto zone, historic high. they had a fantastic earnings report today. auto parts are just going through the roof. sales are terrific. their competitor o'reilly is at a high. tjx, limited both at new highs as well. home builders, excellent segment just prior with bill. kay schiller numbers didn't help.

good numbers for the period ending in january for ryland. bottom line, slowly but surely, housing is improving, just not fast enough. guys, back to you. >> thank you, bob. slowly but surely the dow is rising above 13,000 yet again. they failed to close above this level for the past week as we continue to focus on it. how does this play into the investor confidence right now? we want to talk about that. >> yeah, we do. joining us now aaron, along with katy with bank of america merrill lynch global research. good to see you both. thank you so much for joining us. aaron, we kick this off with you. with ejust had glenn hutchins on the program and he said things are getting a little overdone here, that there's valuation worry, that things are getting excessive. you disagree with that? >> i don't think it's getting excessive. i've not seen complacency.

when i talk with clients and colleagues, i'm hearing the risks that are out there. i don't think it's overdone. i'm going back to the high in 2007. earnings are higher. interest rates are lower. and stocks weren't terribly expensive back then. >> you want to be # 00% invested? >> i want to be fully allocated to risk consistent with my own tolerance for risk. >> differing opinions in the market. break the tie for us. are they cheap or expensive right now in the aggregate? >> i think they're fairly valued. >> right down the middle. >> we could move up a little bit from here. we could overshoot fair value from here. frankly, we need to see a real recovery in the u.s. housing market and belief that the banks can lead the market. in a sustained way. and we need to feel like analysts are off their earnings expectations, particularly in and around europe, that we moved around that corner, i think. we're just not quite there yet for a new all-time high. >> would you be selling into some of the strength here then?

>> i would sell some of the holdings that are at all-time highs right now. and al lo cat a little bit further down the spectrum. >> where are you seeing value right now? >> i'm seeing value in low volatility, frankly. an investor who wants to get long the market or short the market, they should look at options as a way of doing it. we've got volatility running at low levels relative to this post-crisis period. >> premiums are cheap right now. >> exactly. >> let me get both your takes on what no doubt is going to be more ease by a major central bank tomorrow. we're waiting on the ltro facility details. we'll get them tomorrow about 5:00 a.m. new york time. what's going tob the impact on stocks? >> that new ltro program has had its effect. what it's done is taken the

disaster scenario off the table. what i mean by that, a situation in which a major european bank can't fund itself. goes bellyup. interbank market freezes up, we're in back in a post-lehman world, that's off the table because this program is out there. whether one auction or another is larger or smaller, matters less than the fact that it's there. >> you're the global strategist, what impact will this latest financial -- the european version of the quantitative easing? >> policy is perhaps the single driver of sent the. you keep saying on market stop panicking, that's what we saw with the ltro. the question is, is the takeup going to be as big as people's expectations tomorrow? i think there's a little bit of downside potential if we don't see the size that most people are expecting. if there isn't that additional extra cushion. but right now, if we hit the targets that we're talking

about, 350 to 450 billion euro gross issuance, you know, that would be, i think, just enough to keep the market steady. >> i just wonder if it could work in the reverse, where somebody would say, look, if the banks need another 500 billion euros, maybe they're in worse shape than we thought. >> that's a funny thing, we feel that way a little bit about china sometimes, they're damned if they cut rates or hike rates. there's argument that policy is enough or not enough. >> katy, aaron, good to have you on the program. >> in the meantime, we're heading to the close. the dow up to 13,015. we might do it today. we might get it done today. >> we'll see about that. we're also getting the outlook for commercial real estate. we have an interview with larry silverstein. >> find out when investors need to be paying close attention to the euro, right now.

>> as we take a break, here's a look at the major currencies and how they're trading on wall street. back in a moment. but first, before we go to break, the "dividend." according to net index.com, the average broadband speed in the u.s. is slower than broadband speeds in which of these countries, hungary, malta or romania? the "dividend" pays off after the "dividend" pays off after the break.

we asked, according to net index.com, the average broadband speed in the u.s. is slower than broadband speeds in which of these countries, hungary, malta, or romania? now the payoff. all of them. 20 minutes left in the trading day. i'm seema mody. the nasdaq continues to post gains, technology being one of the best performing sectors today. we've been speaking about apple as well as semiconductor stocks outperforming. chinese adrs, report earnings yesterday, they missed street estimates.

on the conference call, the ceo saying their twitter light service will contribute to the top line on the second half of 2012. that's adding momentum to all of these stocks right now. money flying into international chinese stocks. nokia, downgraded by oppenheimer. >> seema, thank you very much. about 16 # minutes left in the trading session here, with the dow above 13,000 for the moment. let's check on the nasdaq. which is pushing its way to its highest close since december of 2000. it was up about 22 points at the hive of the day, up 19 right now. we're getting ever closer to the 3,000 mark on the nasdaq composite, now at 29 # 85. we talked earlier about volatility. the see sawing near break even right now, down just a fraction at 1802. it's been trading below 20 for about two weeks now, signaling a reduction in volatility, maria. >> of course, bill, the other major focus we've been watching

is crude oil, the slide we've been watching for the past two days. our next guest has been keeping a close eye on the euro. he said tomorrow's ltro will indicate where the euro heads next. darren, talk to us about what investors are expected to see tomorrow. now, this second blending facility by the central european bank, the first one really had an impact. >> the first one had a tremendous impact and pushed risk assets higher over the past few months. i'm expecting it to come in a little bit lower than expectations. i think the market's looking between 400 and 500 billion euros. if we do get something below that range of 400 to 500, i think it will be positive for the euro. you'll likely see a negative read across the risk assets, as there would be less qe in the market. >> is that the number you're expecting then? what kind of number would the market like to see, 500 billion? >> i think if it's anywhere between 400 and 500, the market

would be happy with that. it's kind of like porridge that's just right. >> what currency gets impacted negatively if in fact the euro goes higher? do you want to sell the dollar in that environment? >> i think you want to sell the dollar and i think you want to sell the yen. i think those two would trade worse. >> all right. we'll leave it there. darren, thanks so much. good to talk to you. darren wolfberg joining us. >> i think we're going to do it. >> you think we'll get over 13,000? >> i hope i haven't jinxed it. up 33 points right now at 13,015. >> money moving into equities in 2012. did you know there's a bigger boom happening in bond funds? go figure with the rates where they are. >> where treasuries are trading so far today. back after this.

i'm back on the floor of the

new york stock exchange, standing in front of the post where they trade shares of domino's pizza. the price going higher. after the company delivered better than expected fourth-quarter earnings for the fourth consecutive quarter. analysts say domino's is reaping the benefits of new menu items, like pizza hut and papa john's is beating themselves up in a price war. they expect to grow 3% to 4% in the long term. that's stronger than forecast. but they warn they could be hurt if the dollar goes higher. he does expect a rising dollar in 2012. so a little caution there from domino's on the international sales front as they watch the currency markets very carefully. domino's stock has been the clear leader among the pizza players. it has doubled in the last 52 weeks. that's a lot of pizza, maria. >> thank you, bill. the market is on the rise, but one asset class is taking in seven times more money than stock funds are taking in, in

the last four weeks or so. it's bond funds, believe it or not. joining me, jeff cox. jeff, yesterday, we talked about this. and we had one guest who said there's absolutely no reason to be this conservative with your money right now. >> the cal tar may say 2012, but investors are acting like it's 2008. that's one of the principal reasons there is still this risk aversion. a couple other reasons, remember when bill gross said buy what the fed is buying? that's what investors are still doing. we're still in the operation of operation twist. we talked about this a couple weeks ago here, a big month for corporate bonds, both on the high-yield end and investment grade. >> i don't mind, the corporate yields are pretty competitive. i'm feeling like that might be a smart thing to do, buy corporate bonds. because you're getting some return there. but if you look at fixed income, treasuries, talking about zero

return. you don't want to lose money. actually, you are losing, because of inflation, right? >> you are. yet it's so interesting to look at these numbers when you see $30 billion in inflows over the last months, bonds only about $4 billion going into stocks. you have to turn that around when you see the returns. even in real returns, you're seeing about 10.5% return on stocks and about less than 3% on bonds. kevin ferry said he thinks this is the end of the secular 30-year bull market in bonds. >> check it out on your website, jeff. thank you so much. >> thank you. >> are jeff's full story, check out cnbc.com. you'll see his story right there on our website. we'll get the closing countdown after the short break. how does priceline.com try to follow up a quarter in which earnings soared better than 60%. we talk to jeff boyd after the

break.

four minutes to go, and let's see, it looks like we just might do it. the dow, we're all obsessing over 13,000. but when we step back a little bit, what we're looking at is the possibility of the fifth straight month of gains for the dow, which is a pretty good run at this point. the nasdaq, meanwhile, is very quietly heading toward 3,000. let's talk about this. i realize it's just a number. and we're talking about the dow, we're only talking about 30 stocks. but if we fail to close above 13,000 today, you can imagine at some point it's going to become impatient about this. and move lower. but it may be a moot point as it looks like we're going to close above 13,000 for the first time since the spring of 2008. the nasdaq is quietly moving higher, the 3,000 number is coming back into view again as we sit here at 2985. the highest level on the nasdaq

since december of 2000. the ten-year yield, moving lower. they are signaling a run to safety right now for whatever reason. 1.9 # 4 level at this point. we'll keep an eye on this one whether it can have an impact on the stock market. if the run to safety intensifies, you can imagine they would be running from the stock market at that point. the rally ran out of steam for oil. the market is getting tired on crude oil. now at $106. started the day just around $108 per barrel. even brent north sea crude which has had the iran premium forever is starting to come off those highs around $124 per barrel. golfed, that's been quiet for a while here. failing to get to that 1,800 level. we're stuck in this range here, and have been for a while, up $12 today. the s&p sectors today, technology has been leading again, the sector for all seasons as i keep calling it

here. health care hovering up there, another growth area where you'll see a lot of job growth these days. let's go over and talk to kate moore. we talked about the domestic funds, and how to invest in them. you're a global strategist. where do you see value around the world right now? >> well, you know, just last week we upgraded two parts of the international equities sector. developed europe, and emerging markets. we kind of added a little bit to our positions. our view is, everyone owns it. consensus is overweight. europe is very unloved still. we're not overweight europe, but we're less underweight than we were. >> we look at the europe 6 # 00 chart -- >> the euro stocks, yeah. >> where in europe right now? >> stay high quality. you want to look at the high quality dividend plays as well.

there are so many stocks in europe that have higher dividend yields and corporate bond yields. if you want to get a toe in the market, don't get too much risk. we're still bullish emerging markets. we think the growth story is very strong. with central banks cutting rates, and the ecb offering the 2, it will be supportive for the equities there. >> good to see you. thanks for stopping in. >> thank you. >> bob pisani, is it possible? are we really going to do this today? >> i think we'll finally make it. >> february 28th, we didn't have to wait for leap day to get the dow to 13,000. >> i'm more interested tomorrow what mr. bernanke has to say. >> we've got the ltro out of europe, mr. bernanke. a lot of things coming out of the woodwork. >> auto zone had fantastic numbers today. we know how well priceline did, o'reilly auto at a new high as