session. mixed bag. jpmorgan, chase and citi group fractionally higher, goldman sachs up more than 1%. that will do it for us. >> "street signs" begins from the intrepid right now. it is 2:00 p.m. and we are live with the chamber of commerce on a mission to put america's veterans back to work. help can't come fast enough. a special edition of "street signs," hiring our heroes, begins right now. hello everybody. welcome to a special "street signs." as we said we are live aboard the u.s.s. intrepid. we said it on the show yesterday, it is a national disgrace that there are more than one million unemployed veterans out there. in fact, the unemployment rate among veterans who have served since september 11, 2001, is 40% more than the national average,

but more than 100 companies and more than 1,000 vets are here to try to remedy that. we've got a big show with a lot of guests about hiring our heroes to find the jobs and the applicants that match up. couple of guys trying to do that will join us. lockheed martin ceo and jpmorgan ceo jamie dimon will join us. let's peel back the foil on the at a timer tots. >> this is what else we have coming up from the mother ship. the real i conmy, how many do you have? cnbc's all-america survey is going to give us an unbelievable look at just how big apple is right here in america. in the meantime, the big story of course is the markets today. the big selloff has the strong quarter really limping to the close. the dow, the s&p and nasdaq with their worst day in more than three weeks. well, despite monday's big rally

all three are barely holding onto weekly gains. the nasdaq's biggest loss in three weeks comes despite further all-time highs by apple, we just mentioned. more on apple in just a second. in the meantime look at what's going on with oil. it's touching its lowest level in about three weeks and gold extending its retreat from a two-week high not able to breech the resistance around $1,700 for one troy ounce. bob, i wasn't aware gol d di locks suddenly left the building. >> material stocks, copper's weak, australian dollar down again today. stocks in moscow, shanghai, all to the downside. these are the big commodity plays. the important thing is how real can it be when you see all the moves in ipos. did you see annie's foods? pricing at $13 and the stock's

held up terrifically all throughout the day. trading around $33. open to $24. there's annie's. $35 on annie's priced at $19.35. put up ocera, holding up around 22. the bottom line here, mandy, is so far at least concerns about the global slowdown, but i think this is probably going to be temporary. you notice every time you have these concerns you get buying opportunities later on. >> there's so many people underinvested. any dip does present a buying opportunity. let's get over to rick and see what's happening with bonds. i know rather tepid demand for the 5-year note auction, how are treasuries doing right now? >> you know, the tepid demand is a big variable today. we're up about three basis points in 5-year note since the 1:00 eastern buttoning up the auction at 1% now at 1.03. in that time period stocks have moved down 85 to down 107.

usually you see rates go down. if you take a step back, mandy, other than the 5-year auction, rates have moved markedly down over the last two weeks. today seemed to be the king dollar trade at least for now. whether it's the aussie dollar or british pound, it really seems like a risk-off day is essential. >> rick and bob, thank you very much. let's find out more about what's causing this weakness. kevin is market strategist at steefl nicholas. what do you think is happening to this market? >> i think there are three things. number one, today, you're seeing energy lower because you've got an excess supply of oil that's shown up. you've also had some threats of perhaps another intervention in the oil markets where we've released some reserves. a rumor it showed up in a french newspaper a day or so ago. that's number one. number two, a month of data relatively soft out of china now, whether it's retail sales, industrial, production, profits you name it, china looks soft

and that weighs on commodities. >> do you feel there would be the need to release some of those oil reserves for the sake of the global economy? >> no. i don't think so. i think what you've seen here in the united states has been an improvement in the real economy. you've been talking about employment. we've seen private sector employment picking up as government sector jobs have been falling off. so that's been a nice transition from government-led expansion to private. and as long as that continues, i think we have a good recovery here in the united states. outside the united states when you look at china, for example, they are struggling. but by and large around the globe we have growth. >> we're at 1399 right now. we're exactly one point below 1,400. how key is that level from a technical perspective to hold to try and work out whether or not we can push out some further gains in this rally which by the way already pushed the s&p up 12% year-to-date. >> i'm not so concerned about the technical issues. what i would point out is you're coming up against the end of the quarter here and you've had something like a 15%, 16%

divergence in the quarter between the performance of stocks and bonds. so what that means is for managers who want to rebalance as they come into the end of the quarter perhaps, you may be having some of that portfolio rebalancing coming in to it selling the appreciated asset, the stock market buying the bonds. and you could see that play out over the next few days. but other than that, we still see fundamentals moving in the right direction. we think stocks are fairly to somewhat slightly undervalued. and we focus on the fundamentals which we see improving. >> and as you say we're focusing on q-2. here we come. pretty much done with q-1. thank you, kevin. >> thank you. we are going to keep on watching the markets for you. in the meantime we want to send it back over to brian aboard the u.s.s. trepd. what do you have for us? >> we have a couple guys big part of the show today. you showed in the last interview the unemployment rate about 8.3% nationwide. sadly it's higher for veterans who have served since september 11, 2001. we need to fix that. and the guys that are here, one

of the guys, is trying to fix that. and one of the guys is trying to help solve that problem by getting a job himself. we're joined by founder and executive director of hiring our heroes as well as michael, member of the army reserves, two tours in iraq, one in afghan tan and he is here. we're going to try to help get you a job today, michael. thanks for joining us. first i want to start with you, kevin. great work by the way. about 1,500 vets expected through the door. more than 100 companies. do we have any idea what the success rate is? you talk to companies, are people getting jobs here today? >> we've seen companies about an average of 15 to 20 follow on interviews, we're expecting between 150 to 200 jobs due to today's fair. >> that's fantastic. also your one-year anniversary. a young organization. how does the corporate response been particularly around the idea of working almost exclusively with veterans? >> i think it's been overwhelming. in fact, today, with capital one bank we made a commitment to

hire 500,000 heroes by the end of 2014. so we see not just big business stepping up, but we're going to go out and gauge the small business community like never before across this country. because if they can hire one veteran and one military spouse, we're really going to move the needle on the issue of veteran unemployment. >> that's a great way to put it. one job at a time. >> exactly. >> let's talk about a job, michael. >> okay. >> first off, thank you for serving our nation. >> thank you. >> two tours in iraq and one in afghanistan. what brought you here today? >> about getting a job, but also the process of coming home. after my recent tour, i got my bachelor's degree, i got that last year and now went onto finalize by getting a job and moving onto a career. so taking the initiative i learned in the military and getting and going out to get it. >> and we talk often of comeback when it comes to military, but that's just a part, right? what skills did you get? computer skills, electrical, whatever it might be that will prepare you for a job in today's

work force? >> it would be hard work, endurance, when you're out there whether it's iraq, afghanistan and you have a pack body armor for 28 hours a day in the heat, you can't just turn on the ac and say, i don't feel like being here right now. you endur it and adapt and overcome it. it's the same thing i bring in college, classroom and the long hours of studying and getting the good grades to get the gpa. >> and if you could paint your perfect job, we're going to try fo find him a job today, what would that job be? i snuck a peek at your resume. a b.a. from john j. college. it's a good school. what duo you want to do? >> i want to be an analyst for homeland security. what is the significance direct and indirect effects of this. i know an analyst was here, i talked to him got my resume, i'm hopeful about that opportunity. >> that sounds fantastic.

we've got the lockheed martin ceo coming up. just hang out here with your resume. believe me, i'll put the squeeze on him as well. i'm just going to let you go. how big can this get? how many more companies do you need to get involved? a lot of corporate america watches cnbc. >> we did 100 the first year. we're going to be in 400 the next year. we want to get 20,000 companies involved. that's our goal for next year. >> all right. kevin, doing great work. michael, good luck today. hey, out there, by the way, corporate america, michael, great guy. looks snazzy. i saw his resume. looks good. don't blush. we're going to get you a job. or i'll jump off the side of the intrepid. or not. just ahead on "street signs," can you recognize this man? he served in the marines during vietnam and now runs one of the nation's biggest companies and hiring our heroes. we have a live interview with him. that's coming up.

>> and going to the core of apple's success. the consumer. as the company approaches the $600 market cap, we're going to have the eye opening numbers on just how big the iconomy. a look at the markets, once again to the downside by about 121 points for the dow. we're approximately at the lows of the day off by 1%. little bit plus or minus for all three indices. anything? no. ♪ how about now? nope. ♪ [ dog barking ] ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] the chevy silverado. ♪ [ male announcer ] with best-in-class 4x4 available v8 fuel economy. finally! ♪ [ male announcer ] from getting there... to getting away from there. chevy runs deep. i'm making my money do more. i'm consolidating my assets.

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welcome back to cnbc's special coverage of hiring our heroes aboard the u.s.s. intrepid. better known as the fighting one. a beauty still after 70 plus years. let's talk to a man who knows a thing or two about building big defensive equipment. that's bob stevens. we showed you a picture of you serving in the u.s. marine corp. you're also a veteran. so we thank you on two levels. we appreciate all your support for hiring our heroes as well. we just spoke with a young veteran, and we talked about what he needs and his skillset. when you employ about 23% of your work force are veterans. what skills specifically does the military bring to lockheed martin? >> the military veterans are an extraordinary group of people. they've already been tested under very high pressure situations. and they've demonstrated a commitment to mission and ability to work on a team.

very often in ways that was unexpected to them, they've risen the leadership responsibilities in some cases in an instant. there is no business in america large or small that can't benefit from individuals who know how to work on a team, who know how to be effective leaders. i think one of the challenges for veterans as they transition is their skill set and the vocabulary they use is quite different than the vocabulary that you would hear in business. and we help veterans translate their skills. i was a forward observer and a team leader. in business you're a team leader. you're not a forward observer. there's a very limited market for forward observation. but we have a lot of small teams that require great leaders. >> michael touched on a lot of the intangibles. heat and endurance. when we got here this morning, people lined up, women and men, in suits, resumes ready to go. you could see the discipline in these folks. how much does the intangible matter for lockheed martin, for corporate america? >> i think it's everything.

when you get a veteran, you get a person e mersed in a culture of excellence. they are entirely associated with values, honor, courage, commitment, discipline is part of it. working together to focus on a mission. every business in america has the same kind of imperatives if they're going to be successful. >> what are you going to do to get guys like michael back to work? >> this year we've already hired over 700 veterans. last year we hired 3,352 of the finest citizens you would ever want to meet. in the last five years we've hired 17,700 veterans. we simulate them into our company. they're part of our culture, their character is superior. and we can train them in a variety of applications. when i was in the marines, i didn't know how to read a balance sheet. somebody else taught me that. but people hired me and they took some modest risk on me and gave me a chance. and i think if we're able to do that for our veterans, businesses will be enormously surprised and pleased by the

results. >> draft the best athlete and teach him the best position. that's great you're hiring all these workers. here's the other issue. a lot of talk about budget cuts when it comes to defense. you have warned, hey, we might have to lay people off if there's budget cuts. how severe is it right now? what is your sense about what congress and capitol hill are going to do? >> brian, i think everybody in america understands and we are very much at the forefront the $15 trillion in national debt, the trillion dollar deficits have to be addressed. we intend to do our part. >> how much should the defense industry do? >> well, we've already begun to consolidate facilities and reduce our work force, as you've described as the president has released a budget and the secretary of defense is implementing $487 billion in defense cuts over ten years. we're adapting to that new reality. we're also facing a very challenging global security environment. what we have not supported as we look forward is this action called sequestration that takes

out another half a trillion dollars from defense with another $50 billion in 2013. we think there's no strategy that supports that from a national security perspective. and from an industry perspective, we're not prepared to make that serious a cut. >> more layoffs would have to come. >> we think very serious layoffs will occur. >> how likely do you think more and deeper defense cuts are going to come? >> i think there may be additional cuts. but they shouldn't come as abruptly as they would be in the form of sequestration. >> bob stevens, ceo of lockheed martin. thank you for your service to america as a young marine. we showed your picture. >> and i want to say thank you to everybody at nbc fcnbc for w you're doing. >> we have more to come from the u.s.s. intrepid including another ceo you might have heard about, jamie dimon, the head of jpmorgan chase. he's going to sit down with us and talk about how they're hiring ten veterans a day and the economy. >> very inspirational. brian, looking forward to it.

also ahead you've heard the phrase america's apple pie. why we might want to drop the word pie. and in the meantime, why don't we look at what's going on with gold and oil. both are down today. and it's not just the stronger dollar here, folks. you've got the gold at 1657 yesterday couldn't get that resistance of 1700. it is down by 26. and the nymex crude also down on the french newspaper report that several governments including the u.s. might be looking at releasing some oil reserves to try and bring down the price of oil and help the global economy. we're sitting just off session lows for the dow right now. "street signs" back after this break. ♪

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demand media expands on the big board. apple hitting another all-time high today before the market turns south. it is zeroing in on a $600 billion market cap sitting there at $614 bucks. the cnbc all-america survey highlights just how big apple has become. steve liesman is here with the incredible results. steve. >> yeah. mandy, i think incredible is a good word for it. we asked americans putting together a survey for what if we just asked them, how many apple products do you own? i think it exceeded our

expectations what these numbers were. 49% of the public does not own an apple product. 51% actually do own one. maybe it's not working today. 51% own at least one. and look here what they do own. what you find is that 28% own one to two. and then 13% own three to four. and 9%, down here, own at least five or more. one, however, is not enough. get rid of that one right there. and then what you find is that 1.6 is the average of apple devices owned by all households. but how about among those who own at least one? the average is it is going to be three. and then come over here. i want to show you on the other s set of charts we have available here. apple ownership exactly what you would think when you go up in income groups, 28% earning less

than $30,000 own one, 42%, 57% of those who earn over $100,000 own at least one apple product. what's also fascinating is when you look by income group -- sorry, by age group, what you find it's very spread out. i thought it was going to be all young people. 60% of those in the 18 to 24 m demographic own one. still, when you get into the 50 to 64 bracket, 50% of this group still owns one. it's only that you get a cliff effect when you get to 26%. so i want to just come back over here and show you, let's remember what this said here. 1.6 households own at least one. then think about the demographic here. first they have good penetration when it comes to the younger age groups. as these age groups age, i think that's going to have a profound effect on this number. it's probably going to go up, mandy. >> okay. steve liesman, thanks for the great graphics and great facts

on apple. in the meantime we have breaking news with julia boorstin with regards to facebook. julia. >> thanks, mandy. sources tell us that facebook has asked secondary markets companies like second market as well as shares post to stop trading of its shares. so they've been asked to halt trading. sources tell us facebook is doing this. they're trying to halt the trading on the secondary markets in order to ensure an orderly transition to the public markets when facebook does eventually ipo. this has nothing to do with the timing of the ipo. no commentary on where the s.e.c. is in the review process. just facebook taking steps to ensure transition from the private market trading into the public markets. neither second market nor shares post nor facebook has made an official comment on this. back to you. >> julia, thank you for breaking that news. coming up, brian has another really big interview aboard the u.s.s. intrepid. he's going to be sitting down with jamie dimon to talk about how he is hiring heroes.

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welcome back, folks. it is street talk time. which is our look at the big stories making headlines on wall street. our word of the year, eurosis, is back. it's the worst day out there in weeks for the markets with just days left in what has been a very strong first quarter. energy stocks under considerable pressure at this hour as oil prices also drop after their recent run-up. in fact, oil is currently at the lowest level in three weeks on the possibility that the u.s. and some european nations might tap the reserves. let's get to sharon epperson live at the nymex with the close. >> mandy, that's part of what's driving the lower oil prices. add to that of course a big increase in supply we got from the energy department. this is where the action's been in the last ten minutes. that's in the natural gas pit

because we have, today, a new 10-year intraday low for natural gas. and right here as wooe about seconds away from the close, it appears we're going to have a new closing low -- decade low for a closing price for natural gas as well. and we have the expiration of the april contracts. so you'll notice that there's about at least a 10-cent difference or so between the april and may contract. may will become the front month contract. but still very depressed natural gas prices likely ahead. we get those numbers from the energy department on storage levels in the next session. that will have a lot to do with where the trade is going from here. mandy, back to you. >> sharon epperson, thank you very much for that. we've just learned the megamillions lotto jackpot is now up to $500 million. brian, what would you do with half a billion dollars? >> if i had half a billion dollars, mandy, let's see, what i would do is first off i would take the entire "street signs" team out for a really nice dinner, per se, because that's the kind of guy that i am. >> you are that kind of guy. >> i'd probably just like build

a solid gold house. something simple like that. >> something simple. who else have you got there with you? >> yeah. a guy that knows something about half a billion dollars, jamie dimon, president and ceo of jpmorgan. i was just chatting with mandy at the mother ship. here's what jpm is doing, this is good work. they're hiring on average about ten veterans every day as part of their mission with about 39 companies now called the 100,000 jobs mission. we're joined now by jamie dimon. it's a real pleasure. thanks very much. >> good to be here. >> we don't necessarily think of wall street and banking as the likely venue for returning veteran, but yet you're finding plenty of spots. i know you've hired a number of veterans on the spot at some jobs fairs. what are the skills that translate from the army, navy, air force, et cetera, to jpmorgan? >> a lot of our employees are main street. we're in 2,000 communities around the world. something like 1,900 in the united states. so the jobs leadership, get

things done, work as a team, work ethic, they're used to doing that. all you got to do is train a little bit and you've got some great employees. >> you know, we keep hearing that, the ceo of lockheed martin said that. work ethic. discipline. do americans in general -- are we starting to lack that a little bit? >> i don't think so. travel around the world, i think america is still the hardest working place, most innovative. not really. but there is something about people who learn through military kind of teamwork. it's part of their blood. they know their job. they know their job is a crucial part of the bigger job. so they kind of have it bred into them. >> you've been hiring on average about ten veterans a day. do you see that pace continuing? is jpmorgan going to continue to have not only veterans but workers across all spectrum? >> we've added 3,000 veterans a total and ten a day from this program. we had a lot of veterans there before. we have a lot of veterans work for the company. we've been expanding in the

united states and around the world, not in a dramatic pace, but we're still opening branches and hiring bankers and adding customers, call centers. so, yeah, we're still. this year alone we've actually hired 8,000 people. of course we've lost about 8,000. >> do you have a net -- do you plan to have a net new add of workers? in other words, do you see the economy continuing to recover the threat of a double dip behind us that you're going to have to open more branches and hire more net new workers? >> yeah. one of the things i'm proud about at jpmorgan, we never stop expanding. through the whole crisis we opened branches and hired bankers in the united states and around the world. we're probably going to hire new this year. last year we hired almost 10,000, the year before that another 10,000. tail end of some of the expansion stuff we're doing. we look at the economy as kind of getting stronger all the time. it's broad based companies in great shape, middle market companies, consumers in better shape, consumer debt service

ratio. >> even with gasoline where it is? >> it's not going to cause a recession, i may slow it down a little bit. obviously if it goes up, it might. we can all get worried. >> do you have a point at which the national price of gasoline would cause a recession? >> i don't. you have to ask some of the economists that. most think more like $5 than $4. >> is a threat of a double dip recession now officially behind us? >> i believe it is. listen, no one can forecast the economy with certainty. most of us in business, we've got growth plans that have nothing to do with the actual state of the economy. we're always going to open new branches and try to get customers and do market. but it looks like what happened in europe that's been put to bed for a while. i think they have serious issues to come through. the united states have had 24 straight months of job increases. people with jobs get homes and buy cars and get marry and had have babies. if you see a little more, like

3,000 or 4,000 a month for a while, maybe it's too much. >> if things are, i don't want to say good, but getting better at the pace, you're talking about, jamie, why is the fed on hold until 2014? >> i think the fed -- it's hard for me to comment on exactly how they come up with what they're doing. my own read is they want to see 300,000 or 400,000 more jobs a month before they declare victory. if that actually happened, i think they might reverse course. they're trying to give people comfort that they can adjust with comfort and rates. >> looks like the bond market is already trying to tighten for the fed. do you think the bond market will tighten before bernanke has a chance to move? >> they're buying an awful lot of supply now in the 10-year bond. if it goes up for the right reason, like good growth, that's fine. if it goes up for the wrong reason, no growth or inflation, that's what you should worry about. >> we heard former ceo on gm.

>> i know jack and i think the guy's unbelievably great. >> we do too. we do too. i'm sure he thanks you. i will thank you for him. he was cautious on "squawk box" this morning about the economy. what is he maybe seeing -- you sound a little more bullish? >> i saw a little script, he said that it slowed down a little bit recent couple months, but he didn't say it wasn't recovery. he just said slowing down the recovery. >> so you're not spooked by jack welch's comments. >> i'm not spooked by that, no. >> is the nationwide -- forget local markets. i get that. nationwide housing market bottomed? >> i believe that we're very close to the inflection point. and people look at prices, which are still coming down, but all the other signs are flashing green. >> give me the green "street signs" of hopium? >> all-time affordability. we had three million americans a year, household a million three 600,000, the shadow inventory is lower today than it was 12 months ago.

it's there. so distressed inventory is coming down, not going up. >> yep. >> jobs create household formation. >> sounds like you're making the bull case for housing. >> and homes for sale are like half of what they were maybe four years ago. you could come up with a pretty bullish case if, you know, i think as the economy grows, housing will get better quicker. >> what about for you in particular? have your housing-related costs bottomed out with all the mortgage issues? >> if i remember correctly, they are about half of what they were. still very high. they're coming down, but, you know, you're talking about a big cost for us. that's part of the price you pay. >> you know, i'll get a couple e-mails and tweets after this interview's over of people saying i want to buy a house, i have a job, i can't get a loan. the banks are too tight with credit. >> call chase mortgage. i do think there's some truth to that. banks their paperwork demands are very high. gone back to old fashioned underwriting. verifying income. we do get a lot of complaints

the appraisals are too tight. the signs are that it's going to happen. >> you are those people. you can ease up -- >> we're one. i'm talking about the industry in general. >> do you think we'll secret standards ease? not back to where they were in '03 and '04 and '05 where it was insane the ninja loan. is it going to ease up? >> we don't know what a qualified mortgage is. we don't know the skin in the game rules. still a lot of lawsuits about reps and warranties. if we sit down and talk about it, it could be resolved and ease. we're urging the government and players to say let's get done to get america going again. >> i have to ask you this a story out that jpmorgan attorney saying, listen, mf told us that the transfer was from mf money, not customer money, what can you tell us about the status of mf global that corzine's under a lot of heat for. >> you have to ask them about what they can do with the rules and stuff like that. i think jpmorgan acted

appropriately the whole time. there's actually testimony, so anyone can read and go through the detail of the bank accounts. they took a lot of bank loans right before they went bankrupt. i don't know the details, but more to come. >> can you tell us -- do you know where jon corzine is? there's a couple people would like to talk to him. >> no. >> jamie dimon, i'm going to leave it there. reiterate to our readers, you hire thousands of veterans. give us -- give our viewers a national cnbc audience a reason to be more optimistic about the u.s. economy, about veterans, about the state of just america because there's still a lot of pessimism and worry out there as we go to break. >> two quick things. one for the veterans, there is no class of american we owe more to than americans. i think we should all be doing this. help their families. we're giving away homes to wounded warriors who deserve it. we should be doing everything we can. these folks have been at war now

for ten years. i think we shall pay -- do everything we can to make their re-entry back into american life better. when i wake up every morning, i remind myself, we have the best military in the world, best businesses from small to large, the best universities, the most entrepreneurial work force, the best rule of law. the american economic engine is still there and it's going toic nite one day and it's going to excite people. >> i'm so pumped up now. don't we have to worry about china? >> china will have a soft landing of some sort? >> how soft? >> america can grow regardless of whether china has a soft landing or a slightly hard landing. it's not going to stop this country. our imports from china -- exports are like $300 billion. it falls 10%, it alone won't drastically change the american economy. >> gdp per capita something like 125th in the world. still low cost society. see i kept the interview going. >> exactly. >> when you say a soft landing, are we talking about

tempur-pedic soft? or the concrete with a foam cover. >> grow at 7.5%, i'll make a bet they grow very close to 7.5%. $10,000. i think they have the will and the way -- >> 10,000 lira. >> i think they have the will and the way to accomplish what they want to accomplish in the short run. just go back -- >> 7.5% they'll grow this year. that's your bet? >> yeah. i would say within if the chinese government says 7.5%, i'll make a bet of 7.5%. >> if the chinese government says it's going to be 7.5%, do you trust all the data? >> you can look at any data and dig into it and may not feel it's exactly trustworthy. >> okay. we just talked about china. now i really can't let you go. stock market's been on a tear. your view of the u.s. stock market, overvalued, undervalued, fairly valued? jpmorgan stock? >> i never forecast. i'm about to put up my chin when i'm talking about the stock price. i'm not going to do it here. >> just you, me and the national audience.

>> american companies are enormously valuable. you can buy them at very good prices. go down or up, they are among the best companies in the world. so the rest of the world would love to have the bowings and lockheed's and proctor & gamble. you can buy a good piece of america at a very good price. >> jpmorgan ceo says u.s. stock market can be bought for a very good price. sounds like you're making a case for the u.s. equity market. >> i personally own a lot of stocks. that's where my investments are, not in fixed income. >> i can't afford the $10,000 bet on china. i probably couldn't afford a $10 bet on china. but i'll make you a gentleman's bet, if they don't grow -- i don't think they'll grow 7.5% this year. i lose every bet i make. so you're a guaranteed winner. >> i owe you dinner if you're right. >> done. >> done. >> thank you very much. jamie dimon, ceo of jpmorgan. doing a lot of great work out there. ten veterans a day on average being hired. he's been at the forefront.

they were growing during the recession. arguably the king of wall street right here on the u.s.s. intrepid. back to you on the u.s.s. cnbc englewood cliffs. >> okay, brian. he did say when he said there's no class of americans out there that deserve more than u.s. veterans. also positive noises out of jamie dimon saying most of the economic signs are flashing green. we're going to talk more about that and get the reaction from jim cramer any minute now on "street signs." but in the meantime we have some breaking news out of cuba. the pope is meeting with fidel castro. our chief international correspondent, michelle caruso-cabrera, been on the ground in havana this week and has the latest for us. >> he just appeared in public. we're going to roll video right now so you can see fidel castro, first time in weeks he's appeared in public. he's with pope benedict xvi. he appears to be quite weak we are told. both of these men are both 85 years old, the same age. pope benedict has been here for three days. we weren't sure if we were going to see video of fidel castro

with the pope. but we know the pope made it clear that if he were to be asked to meet with fidel castro, he would accept the invitation. this morning on his blog, fidel castro indicated he did ask for an audience with the pope. you see it happening here. he also appeared with his two sons and his wife attended with him. once again, appearing weak. we understand that he struggled to walk as well. fl you see, again, pope benedict xvi and fidel castro, the former leader of this country back in 2006 due to age and illness handed over power to his brother who is now in charge. >> he really does appear very frail. i'm sure there's a lot of back door goings on right now with regards to what's going to happen when that moment comes, what are you hearing in terms of those mutterings about his very poor state of health? >> reporter: about his state of health? not a lot. the question is what happens afterwards. you're right, we're hearing a lot of division about what is supposed to happen afterwards. there's divisions about just how

much change should occur in the country or can occur. outwardly we hear consistently in public statements that this is a country that's committed to socialism, that any minor changes or changes in economic policy here should not be interpreted as something like we saw in china in the early '80s. there's not going to be political reform here. we were told that explisly yesterday. we hear behind the scenes there's a lot of discussion that change should be here andin veft bl. and maybe the changes occurred in the last six months, the ability to buy homes and cars and ability to be self-employed in some areas and there might be changes coming to investment rules in the country. that all remains to be seen when that moment comes, mandy. >> it certainly looks like that moment is not too far away. thank you very much, michelle caruso-cabrera, in havana. we need to slip in a break here. but more on what jamie dimon had to say about the economy with our all-star cnbc panel when

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i'm bill griffeth. coming up at the top of the hour on "closing bell," banks have been hot recently. we've got one guest who says u.s. investors should be looking north of the border when it comes to investing in the banks.

and speaking of canadian banks, td bank, we're wondering if they're on the verge of stepping up their u.s. expansion plans. the ceo, ed clark, joins us for an exclusive interview. and we'll talk about cashing in on commercial real estate. the one outperforming mutual fund tells us how he's staying ahead of the broader market by betting on commercial real estate. maria and i will see you at the top of the hour for what will probably be another unpredictable hour of trading. >> that's a good way of putting it. thank you very much, bill. in the meantime we have breaking news out of washington as the supreme court has wrapped up its arguments over obama care. hampton joins us live. hampton. >> mandy, the last hour of the historic arguments was over about the proposed expansion to medicaid, health care for the poor under the affordable health care act. basically 26 states making the argument that it's not only unconstitutional, but it amounts to coercion on the part of the federal government towards the states. well, justice elena kagan and

others asking how is a 90% funding of that expansion in medicaid, how in fact does that amount to coercion? the argument and answer from the states, they and argument from e states, they would lose if they chose not to participate in the expansion. all of the medicaid dollars going to existing programs. the federal government arguing that the medicaid program has been a voluntary program that states can opt in and out of. right now medicaid is about a $250 billion program over the next ten years as part of the affordable health care act. you're talking about in excess of $3 trillion. the other major headline of the day, the court taking up the question this morning of severability, should the entire health care law be stricten or just the mandate? the court leaning towards taking down the entire law. >> hampton, thank you very much.

just a moment ago on street signs, brian sat down for an exclusive interview with j.p. morgan jamie dimon. i felt like he said a lot of positive things, how he feels about the housing market. we have steve liesman and jim cramer here and diana olick. what did you think about with what jamie said with regard to the economy? >> well, when people come on cnbc, people talk about their book. i thought they were talking their book. the reason why that's okay is jamie dimon has a very, very big book. you've got to ask yourself, is jamie dimon telling us what he says about himself. i think jamie dimon has a huge disincentive to say things are better than they are. they have done relatively better than the rest of the group.

he doesn't have to be that much further ahead. i hope when he's talking and i believe when he's talking that he's giving us a glimpse of what his book is showing him and i think that's a window on the economy. the only thing slightly wrong about that book is jamie might have a slice of the american economy that is richer than the average. that may be a piece of that book. overall when his book is doing well -- >> it just undermines your own credibility. what did you think about what he had to say today? >> i think he's more optimistic on the commercial side. you see these great american companies doing well. i thought he was very interesting when he said, it's not that easy to get a loan. i back at jpmorgan. it's not that easy to get a loan. >> right. and he said the demand is quite high. i've been going through a re-fi process t was way harder to get

the re-fi than the original loan because credit standards have tightened so much. diana, this is really up your alley. >> it was interesting to make no apologies that a lot of customers are complaining that it takes so long to get alone and it's harder to get a loan than before. we've gone back to, quote, old-fashion underwriting and i think that is what you'll see going forward with re-fis. you see a lot of people are not able to benefit from that and it's because a lot of tighter underwriting. people not able to get the loans like before. he makes no apology about that and he thinks it's a good thing. >> is it tight or is it normal? is the baseline the go go double odds or is the baseline the long history of 80/20? >> no, i think it's tighter right now. it's far tighter than it was historically. forget the years of the crazy credit lending. we are much tighter than historically because you're expected to have a higher credit score.

fha, jpmorgan does a lot of federal loans. not necessarily downpayments but credit. >> i'll take 80/20. i couldn't get 80/20. >> what about the news here? you were turned down by a loan at jpmorgan? >> they had a very bad rate versus what i managed to get. they would like me to put up more money even though i have a 1% -- >> you have a few dollars in the bank? >> they weren't competitive. >> mandy with her maxed out credit cards, that's a different thing. >> not even. not even. in fact, if i do max them out i'm hoping that you as a consumer have a beautiful ship so let's make use of it. it's called the uss intrepid and brian is standing there a. by the way, you have a terrible record with bets. i would never make a bet with jamie dimon. but, very candid interview, brian? >> listen, i had to buy herb

greenberg dinner last night. >> thanks for the invite. >> we had a romance. we had a lovely dinner together. tons after steel and iron together. if i repeat something that you already said, i apologize. but, jim, i want to ask you, listen, he sounded to me -- he's not going to say, buy the s&p. he sounds pretty bullish on the u.s. stock market. >> i agree with him. it seems ironic to me that i tried to get a mortgage from jpmorgan and didn't get a good rate. i made me feel like i want to be bullish. i have u.s. bancorp on tonight. i don't know if they share that level of un thes yachl for the economy. >> why wouldn't they? >> these guys have a visibility.

>> i think also the housing market has been very spotty. in some regions it's better, some regions it's worse. >> as he said, i see a bunch of green lights but he wasn't able to say that it's all recovered. >> true. >> the threat of europe being behind this, at least to jump in now. >> go ahead. >> if you talked about this, my apologies. when we talked about how he said the three and four handles that the fed may change course, what i like about that is you have arguably the most powerful man on wall street saying, just because the fed has said something and put it in print doesn't mean it's going to be the rule of fed law. he said the fed could change its

mind. so how much do we have to read into that being hard and fast? >> he said the exact same thing yesterday. i hope our bets are more optimistic in which case we will change our forecast. i hope there are no illusions. if the numbers change, the fed is going to change. >> i've got that. i guess the broader point i was trying to make is, how much do we listen to what the fed has to say about interest rates or should investors simply make their own assumptions because wall street, as jamie said, is going to do what it wants any way? >> very simple, brian. you can sleep with what the fed told you with one eye opened. >> jim? >> i don't like to sleep at all. anyone on twitter knows that. i went to sleep for a couple hours last night, i feel okay today. >> it's going to interpret how it wants to interpret.

>> we've got the stress test behind us. he's making a lot of positives. >> fixed income investors or traders are interpreting the fed differently from how being quit tea investors are. >> i fear 1937 the way the fed does. taxes go up big, you might not have such a -- >> we went up from 180 to 220 and it's still 220. we're not talking about like having 100-pound ball at the end of the economy. >> how about a 1% rate and by this point it was going belly up? >> that's huge. europe may in fact -- whether or not it is -- >> we didn't talk about it. we talked about america. isn't that great in america first. >> i want to ask the question i

tried to get to you earlier with regards to europe. jamie dimon says it's been put to bed at least for now. do you agree? >> i think it's been put to bed at least for now. what is important is we know how to put it to bed again. why jean-claude trichet would not learn that lesson, if there's a liquidity problem, flood it with liquidity and solve the problem. >> steve, thank you all for playing. >> and, ron, who has done a fabulous job, back over to you for the finale. >> thank you, mandy. i haven't done anything. the nbc family has done it. the company has done it. the veterans, men and women here all over the world, all over america, we want to thank you for your hard work and service. we are going to get people service. it's been a successful jobs fair. i've told jamie dimon i will take him for a bloomin onion if