jerseys and nike has the contract. this is a big deal. >> kentucky beat kansas earlier this year. >> a new ball game. one shining moment. >> and you didn't even do the bracket sheet. >> have a good weekend, every. time for "squawk on the street." >> if i had half a billion dollars. welcome to "squawk on the street." your home for all things mega millions. with a jackpot like no other, everyone's head is in the clouds. >> buy some racecars maybe. >> travel. >> be a lifetime supply of oreos. >> you have a better chance of being hit by lightning. >> even if you don't win, you shouldn't give up your dreams. our market experts don't pick lucky numbers. they choose top performing stocks. mega "squawk on the street" starts now. >> good luck to everyone out there who gets a ticket, including cramer. welcome to "squawk on the street" on this final trading day of q1.

as we said, last day of the quarter, stocks looking to close it out with some green. and as we look into europe, as well, asia was up for the first time at least in china for the first time in a few days. best headline i saw was the comedian defeated greece buys mega millions ticket. take a quick look at the road map, how do you solve a prop like r.i.m.? earnings miss. executives fleeing. an analyst saying the august quarter will be dire. who would buy them and how much more bad news to come? fox con promise it is reform working conditions while google will begin selling tablets online. today is howard stringer's last day as the head of sony. is it a cautionary tale for apple. and an upgrade at the gap, outlines a turn around at the well-known retailer. but we'll begin with r.i.m.

company's q4 results missing estimates as it reported the first slump in blackberry shipments for a holiday quarter since 2006. new ceo thorsten heins also nunsinun announcing a review extra teest opportunities. a handful of executives including jim balsillie will depart. is it a kitchen sink kind of quarter? >> just for quote the cfo, revenue pot fourth quarter fiscal 2012 was 4.2 billion, 19% decrease from the third quarter. very rare to see that kind of just incredible fall joef. frankly, i can't recall another one quarter to quarter. >> that's a big number, but does foretell that they are in a tail spin where you'll see those kind of percentage declines in revenue. >> one of the things that is so brutal, they're talking about we

plan to refocus on the enterprise business. enterprise business is what apple has decided to focus on. so they're talking about new products. >> haven't they always been focused on the enterprise business? >> that's one of the things. it's alice in one kerr land. we plan to be in our business that we've been in our business. no. this is one of those situations, i go -- i signed up for omg pop. draw something. okay? so i'm at home, i sign up with my iphone. suddenly my ipad springs to life snycing at the same i'm. >> why is the stock not lower today? >> i think someone must think that is -- you can mine those sub skrirers for a 7 million

price tag. maybe someone just says i can do a better job with those 77 million people. >> and there's intellectual problem there, as well. and we see what google is willing to pay for motorola mobility. but takes company in decline. always a tough sell for any other company to stay we're coming in to step in. think about the ceo who has to come on and defend why they're buying r.i.m. and what would happen to their stock price. that figures very promise meantly meant prominently in anybody's thinking. not impossible, but it makes for a difficult decision. >> you've cover m and a for years. you can think of a case where you have 19% revenue decline and someone comes in and says i'm going to take that shot. >> countrywide. >> touche. >> cautionary tale perhaps.

>> two months ago, hieins says there's no need for seismic change. is this exactly the opposite? >> i didn't like what meg whitmaned told david either. when you have a declining situation, i think what you do is you say i have to study, i i have to study. i think you come in with guns blazing and you get your head blown off. i don't think he understood the depths of the problems. this conference call is one of thoefs conference calls where you just basically want to say, mom, i'm sorry i took this job, you know, like it's one of these -- i use that example just because emotionally this is just a catastrophe. >> somebody pointed out it's almost the inverse of apple in that every quarter for apple gets incredibly better and every quarter here gets incredibly worse. >> and again, you go through the call and you you keep thinking do they have any idea about how

bad it really is? they're hoping for the blackberry 10. by that time, there's going to be the iphone 5 and even will be chatting up with siri about the full schedule that she reminds you of what you want. and what does the blackberry 10, how is that going to turn things? >> or to quote hunger games, the night lock 10. >> you've been going to the movies. >> it's night lock. right. >> what would your active stance on the stock be at this point? >> there's always someone like yahoo! that says i'll buy calls and always some guy that says, look, becky was talking. fabulous interview talking about the notion of what microsoft should do and how wrong it would be to buy r.i.m. you got to find an acquirer or someone who is willing to just -- we'll talk about sony in

a second. this is eastman kodak to me. it was a brand that had to be worth something. >> but these companies pay lip service to the idea of embracing change. and in every book you'll read about corporate management, it's always a question. but so incredibly difficult when things are going well to focus on change and to focus on where your business is going and really say, well, water not going to focus quarter to quarter, we'll start spending a lot of money on something we see coming. it rarely happens. >> they pay lip service to the idea that there will be a ecosystem coming. i buy the omg pop game. you go by the apple story aunt it's riveting and in the meantime radio shack is suffering because they're not the apple store.

you have all these secular decline stories and you always think who are the winners. just one winner. s's apple. >> am he will and its main manufacturing partner in china agreeing to set new standards for work conditions there. fox con will hire tens of thousands of new worker, eliminate illegal overtime, upgrade worker's housing and other amenities. it comes in response to one of the largest investigations ever conducted of the u.s. company's operations outside of america. big picture in the journal of tim cook in clean suits walking his way through one of the biggest employers in the world. >> and of course so important for apple. but what this also says to me is costs are going up in china broadly speaking. fox con is also an important employer there. broadly speaking. and it's hard to imagine it won't have an impact on other employers. we've already talked often about the cost of manufacturing in mexico, now equalling about not perhaps being less than china.

i've talked anecdotally the number of ceos who talk about bringing jobs back to this country. not a surge, not an enormous amount, but it's happening. ed a one wonders whether when you see thighs kind of move which is are necessary and part of a developing economy, it will cost more. when does it reach that equ equilibri equilibrium. >> we know in the apparel business costs have gotten too great. i know when i had mark franklin, from jardin, they brought a lot of business back to mexico. >> and back to the u.s. >> baseball bats. and you had like to think they would always be made in the united states. >> made in china? hey, what is this thing. >> but, hey, they're making them again in louisville. >> it wasn't like fox con was

like shawshank, was it? >> i don't know. but the conditions there were -- "new york times" did a very good series of pieces. >> it does feel like in the 1800s in our country where you had to have the government get involved, child labor laws, unionization and i just think when you think about this, i think the first thing you think of is i got to find a country, i got to find next fox con that maybe is a little bit more g echlgentile. >> when apple raises price, verizon has to eat it. >> and it's not as though at&t and verizon aren't fairly you powerful companies. >> hence some of the down grades yesterday. >> one thing i know we'll get to, will google's decision to go

in on the the ipad, who is going to -- does anyone subsidize google ipad like when you go in, you're really conscious of when you go to verizon store, it's kind of like buy one get one. you buy the phone and you get the bill. but it's from verizon. i don't know whether google has that kind of clout. >> and you're referring to the story today in the journal that they will open and online store to start selling code branded tablet, possibly samsung. >> and i think google is one of those companies they do have social. we had an upgrade the other day. they do have mobile, they do have the important strategies. at the same time, this is to me a rear guard action begins apple. apple got ahead of them and now they're playing catch up. everyone plays catch up. there's 57 varieties of trying to catch up to apple.

a metaphor. >> what is heinz? >> thorsten heins? >> yeah, coming back. speaking of sony, today is the last day for sir howard stringer. steps is been outlined to turn around the giant. sony is projecting a fourth year of losses. now at this point sh,ony five t the money they have in the bank. >>ky say quickly, there is something that people at home want to know. everyone who has ever met howard stringer lovers him.

>> nobody can ever tell a better story. >> you almost don't want to say anything bad about sony because you don't want to hurt howard's feelings. he's that great a guy. but as soon as i had two nickels, first i bought the walk man. then you bottom the trinitron was at one point was kleenex. >> that is true. they dominated the consumer electronic space in this country for quite some time. to be fair to stringer, of course, they were not dominating when he came in years ago to try to turn things around. but it doesn't appear that that turnaround has really taken hold. >> is it a function of too much m&a? they added a bunch of different parts on to the giant. is it a function of how consumers' tastes change, is it about the rise and fall of japan? function of jobs. steve jobs.

he's not howard stringer in terms of personality. but let's destroy sony. larry ellison feels that way, oracle. it's not enough for will him to win, it's more important for you to lose. and think sony was in the cross hairs of the greatest manufacturing and thought pl gene just of our time. he could have destroyed ford. >> a friend of mine this morning asked me what sony product i had in my house and i had a hard time thinking. >> a walk man if not a number of them. beta max was one of the early losses there. >> what do i have of sony? i had their game player are for a while and then i got xbox. >> anyway, fascinating. >> making them sad over there. >> the seasony tooth brush?

>> how about a sony movie. right? >> finally, before we take a break, last day of the quarter. bulls obviously snorting with delight. dow having its best start to the year since 1998, up almost 7.5%. s&p up almost 12. broader index has only seen double digit gains in this quarter 11 times and of those times, the s&p delivers an average digit full year return of 16%. nasdaq, 19% quarter to date. whenever the s&p is up 8 plus in the first quarter, percentage of the the time it's up for the full year, 100% since 1950. >> wow. that's pretty amazing. interesting divergence between the dow and s&p. s&p tracked by all the money managers. >> and it has apple. >> jpmorgan does the eye on the market. has an interesting fact. he said if you go back to be the

fourth quarter of last year in the rise, only one time after the germans were defeate defeat. incredible. >> here's some of the top performers for the quarter. >> sears. >> yeah, bank of america. tech and financials really leading the charge. >> i talked about the lock-in factor, that there were so many people who own financials and they had to lock that gain in and i think that was some of the selloff that we've had in the last few days. by the way, goldman has interesting piece talking about the consumer. and they don't like whirlpool. it's difficult to hate whirlpool if you think housing is coming back. >> whirlpool did suffer towards the end of last year when we got the concern about sears and then has benefited in part in that rise in sears. >> and i think there would be positive trade news trying to keep out the other guys, the lucky gs, and i think ocf, they

said good things about -- these are all part of the ground work for the 2012 rebirth of housing that would be so important if it does come true. >> you've been talking about the mohawks and usgs of the world. innovation is the story. >> gold man didn't like usg. and i got to tell you, there's two things going on with until sg. i mentioned on this show that i felt that usg making a comeback, don't forget the chinese made wood that was depeck difference and i think builders are saying i can't skimp on wall board. so i own this inn in summit and i was on -- let me say what it was for a second. and i was on morning joe and i said one of the things you can't do, you can't skimp on fire. and you can't skimp on -- you can't say i'm going to cut back on fire. i'm going to cut back on fire alarms, we'll have fewer fire

extinguishers. now you can't skimp on wall board. >> before we go, here are cramer's mega millions -- >> you got only two? >> 20 bucks. two tens. >> if you win, that's really going to be great, going really work out well for everybody. >> remember what lenin said. if the rich are unhappy, it's their own fault. i intend to be happy when i win. and i know in a carl, i said on twitter -- >> if you win you'll give away half? >> i already did that with carl on twitter, i said will you split your winnings. i will split with melissa lee who is the not here today, i promise to split my winnings, okay? >> you don't have to give them to me. >> no, i'm splitting 25% to everybody here. >> really? >> yeah, i'm going to do that. >> that means nothing. >> actually i've bought a house based on these. i went into jpmorgan and said, look, i need -- i couldn't get a decent mortgage for a house and i banked there for 25 years and

i have a huge balance, 1% of america balance and they were like -- i ended up with astoria. i don't even know whereas tore i can't is. that's not true. >> a lot of good greek restaurants in astoria. >> we'll talk more mega millions in a moment. meet a lottery jackpot winner who will offer some dos and don'ts based on her experience of what you will do when you win. before that, one more look at futures on this friday. a lot more "squawk on the street" live from post 9 in just a couple minutes. ♪

welcome to the world leader in derivatives. welcome to superderivatives.

oths of winning tonight's jackpot are about one in 176 million. that brings us to this morning's squawk on the tweet. quote, i'm more likely to, blank, than win the lottery. tweet us and we'll air your responses throughout the morning. one in 176 million. divide that and you get one in -- there you go. ? i've already given away over 2030% of my winnings.

>> in the "journal" today, economists who run lottery regression analysis and they say at some point it doesn't pay to play because you're going to -- number of multiple winners goes up, you're going to split it. but that level appears to be $420 million. so highest payout all yours. >> i love it. it's exciting. >> a good time. when we come back, mega vice from cramer ahead of the opening spell. ready for his mad dash. as a chef we are always committed to our suppliers... you know, those farmers, those foragers, those fishermen... for me, it's really about building this extraordinary community. american express is passionate about the same thing. they're one of those partners that i would really rely on whether it's finding new customers, or, a new location for my next restaurant. when we all come together, my restaurants, my partners,

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waiting for 11:00 oon is when the mega millions drawing is. a fewew minutes before the bell. a lot of talk on intel. >> look at this nice move. and only now, critics say the story is under appreciated. they are a storage play, not just a pc play. it's one to watch just because if you're underinvested and you're looking for something that has good yield where the dividend can be raised, intel, it's kind of like a forgotten story like microsoft, but it's working. it's working. >> unlike microsoft, it has managed to crack through some historically difficult levels. and one thing that i like about intel, i think the mcafee security which a lot of people

felt wasn't going to be that good, i think it works. also a big data play. i like it. a good stock to own. >> a lot more "squawk on the street" in just two minutes. [ male announcer ] lately, there's been a seismic shift

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wrapping up a big week of ipos. naigs st nation star morning holdings. and company making micro inverters that harness electricity. >> nsn, the old national semiconductor symbol. geez. >> jim having to take stock of the action. we saw innew issues this week. >> the excitement is back. and what this says is it no retail money coming out of the

mo market, but an interesting upgrade. upgrade td a maymeritradameritr schwab, do you know retail investors got in this? 100 shares here, 100 shares there. but that's a lot of money for people to make. >> and you think that translates to the broader market in the second quarter? >> i think people are coming back. i know it's individuals and i understand the problems that overall the stock market's been a terrible place. they've really beaten you up. at the same time, this has been some quarter, this 2012. and it's einspired some people o say i want to take a shot here. >> how many times have we heard that? it's not as though we haven't had an incredible rally off the

bottom in '09. i don't think the s&p has given you much of any return. >> but maybe i'm dreaming, when i see behind me the excitement of an annie's, when i see the exact target, the money is being made. bright cove is up 100% and that's an hcht d internet play. look, if the public can get in with 100 shares, come on. this is more money -- aim going to win mega -- i've already had to split it 13,000 ways. but i think the odds of being an annie are much better than being mega millions. >> let's hope that's true. do you need the bond market to confirm what you're saying before you really believe it? >> i would say so. but when you see things like this, university of pennsylvania bond, i don't know if you caught this, they're raising 100 year bond, 4.674% to buy a bond.

why can't the u.s. government do that? they would avoid the greece situation. 100 year bond. they have a long tradition. ben franklin was involved will. it's not like you're a new guy on the block. >> that's true. >> before we get to mary on the floor, jcpenney and gap, a couple good commentses. retailers looking for comps pav favorable in march. >> citigroup says people like the new jcpenney strategy. maybe people are coming back to the idea that you've got these -- david, you know this apparel injury. >> doing a crash course. >> that brings me to gap. mickey dresser has not been a fan of gap. >> of course, after you get fired from the place that you helped to create in a sense, you're not going to have the

best of feelings. >> but the xap gap is closing stores. this analyst upgrade is centered on they're finally starting to it right in terms of consume are choice. lots more color, things of that nature. very competitive industry. >> but i saw a khaki suit at banana republic that i said, you know what, i -- yeah, i'm shopping again. this khaki suit, you're going to see it, it's so gorgeous. i feel good about this. and i own a j crew suit. >> if i was mickey, and i can play him, what's the quality quality? really? what is the scamata? >> first sign of spring when cramer shows up in his khaki suit. >> you already gave us one. >> let's not do it on the same day. >> this will might be the first yooch the word schmata on "squawk on the street."

>> mattery thompsri mary thompsr with more. >> we're seeing modest gains on the opening bell of what is turning out of course to be a strong quarter for the markets. this would be the dow's best first quarter since 1998. we have the nasdaq up 13 and s&p up just about 5. take a look what we're seeing is early strength in banks and miners today. u.s. banks benefiting from the gains we've seen in european banks overnight. also of course as we are closing out the first quarter, bank of america, jpmorgan both very strong are performance. these two were among the worst performers within the dow for all of last year, so a strong you were it around there. take a look at the miners, too, they are stronger. we're seeing gains in the metals in early trade, as well, today. quek check of a couple of stocks that we'll be talking about today. finish line, this is a retailer of athletic apparel. earnings in line with expectations. but it issued a disappointing forecast for its first quarter and so the stock is under pressure in early trade. this after hitting an all-time

high earlier this week on monday. also we want to talk about a couple of ipos that priced overnight. strong week for ipos. nine out of the f of the ten pr. two pricing at or below the range. and right behind me you can see the crowd for gas log. priced at $14. right now the indication is between $12 and $13. dow has come off its best levels, up about 37 points right now. jim, back to you. >> mary mentioned this. it's very out of sync to finish line. finish line a lot of positives going into the quarter. and on the deal that looks like it's a fail, this is the greek shipping magnet deal, this gas log. and those deals have been horrendous. so i understand the public being

discerning. let's shift the bonds and dollar. rick santelli, what you got? >> i'll tell you, of course the income and spending numbers were interesting especially spending. but the numbers ahead of us may be some of the most important numbers of the week if you believe that confidence is going to give you an indication of the future. and especially how some of these confidence numbers like michigan or the pml will move through some of the energy issues we've had of late and how that will affect their outlook on the marketplace. interest rates aren't very much changed from yesterday, but if you look over the last two weeks, they continue to cascade lower. prices higher. not aggressively, but maybe the most important information is for the week with 99 billion in supply, really doesn't seem to have flinched much. whether europe has an affect over the weekend will be very important to monitor. let's go to david faber. >> actually i know we also want to get a look at that offering,

gas log, which not doing what many we've seen lately have been doing. namely this is going down. and you were referring to it a moment ago. >> yeah, i don't like the shipping stocks. they've been a big disappointed even when affiliated with natural gas. and one of the things that i like about this, frankly, is that will is not the kind of deal -- people are saying i want to be in some deals and not others. so it's not all froth. or this wouldn't be down. >> it is that time of year where ar magazine, it's its swimsuit issue, if you will, pornography for the hedge fund world. who made the most money in that world. interesting list that we always look at this year as opposed to last year. what is that sound track? you can't get anything by him. he knows every song. >> so great that they know this

stuff. >> ray dalio came in number one. carl icahn gave back all the outside money. didn't want to renlg ser with the sec. that's what i said. he had other things to say about it, but that was the reason. he made $2.5 million. one of his best years ever. el paso, genzyme, huge year for mr. icahn. james simons and a look at mr. dalio who also made an enormous amount of money the year prior. probably the number one earning overall, although paulson is close, as well. steven cohen came in at $585 million. ken griffin showing up again. but when you look at these numbers, the enormous compensation, i always make the point that a hedge fund that has revenues of $500 million or a billion dollars has a very good

year. it employs as few as 30 people. whereas a company started by an entrepreneur that has that number might the employ 1,000 or 2,000. >> taxation very favorable. so if i were president obama, i would look at this and say look at these guys. they pay almost nothing and the people at that 1,000 person plant, they're paying at a much higher rate. >> and yet money continues to move into hedge funds. the market is the market. if institutions and pension funds feel that they can get a better return with hedge fundses, that's where the money is going. but we've had so few hedge funds in 2011 that really outperform the broader in-d indices. and if they have one really lousy year, the alignment of interests. manager might have made hundreds of millions of dollars during that point, but if you stayed with them and they had one bad year, you might be flat.

>> a lot came in at the top and they really are down. not these guys. you've been a dalio fan for a while. what is he saying? >> he keeps talking about the massive deleveraging that's going on. that's his broad stream. and of course they run their business in a very different way. complete trust. and also telling people exactly what you think about them at all times. interesting way to run a business. but it is certainly working very well. real quickly, before we end, we should take a look at who was not on the list before number one was john paulson, earned $4.9 billion in 2010. but had a very poor 2011 as we well know. tepper, lambert, mr. soros also gave back his outside money. >> when we come back this morning, squawk on the tweet is

about mega millions. the fever around the country. i'm more likely to blank than win the lottery. tweet us and we'll get your responses coming up. let's get a look at this morning's early movers. there there's wnydam. the most spectacular experiences are happening here. imax now showing on the big board.

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welcome back. 62 about 62.2 is current chicago purchasing survey. you look at prices paid, they leapfrogged up to 70.1, up 4 1/2. new orders down almost 6 at 63.3. and employment really hit hard, down almost 8 at 56.3. we're going to come back in a bit and do university of michigan and postmortem at the top of the hour for all the data. back to you. >> thanks very much, rick. busy week for data. team for squawk on the tweet.

$540 million edition of squawk on the tweet. odds of winning tonight's lotly about 1 in 176 million, so we're asking you to complete the following sentence. i'm more likely to blank than win. leonora writes making money shorting apple. benjamin says i'm more likely to have my name drawn to compete in the hunger games. that's a tribute. greg writes i'm more likely to see bernanke stop printing money. always going to be a bernanke tweet in there shr. and lloyds commodities writes i'm more likely to seat bankrupt dodgers sold for $2 billion than win the mega millions jackpot. >> one of the highlights of this week. very few can justify in anyway what kind of an economic return these guys can get from this thing unless they stack to frack

under the stadium. that's literally what people believe is the only way they can see these guys making any kind of return. >> don't you want to say you own the dodgers? and that's of course what i will do. i will go buy the yankees. now, just so -- the reason why it's so hard for all these people, the odds that they were talking about, is because i've already won it, so very unlikely that they'll win. >> yeah, and there's all the different things you're more likely to have done to you. you're more likely to die having a television pafall on your hea. all different calamities that can be fall you. >> struck by lightning numerous times. not just once. >> you're holding on to these tickets, though. you're not letting anyone else touch them. >> this is very similar to what -- will the u.s. attorney, i hope he does investigate me when i do whip, because i do not have any inside information.

>> by the way, you brought to our attention a picture of a gas price tower. >> yeah, it's somewhat annoying to me that the president continues to say that we cannot bring down quickly the price of what it takes to fill your tank. here we go. will is clean energy fuels using liquified natural gas instead of diesel. you're paying $2.65. you're paying almost half. why is it so impossible to say it can't be done? we can bring it down right now right here. so i think the president has to start going to -- that's a chicago gas station. e's one in camden that i'm going to visit not long from now. so i think the idea that you can't bring it down is just wrong. >> any difference at all in performance. >> some people feel there's a 15% decline in the ability to be able to ramp up your speed. i know some of the natural gas companies would contest that. but you want it brought down,

will it is. so let's open our eyes to this fuel which we can't give away and so cheap an recognize that, yes, question smash opec with nat gas. we can smash them. >> incredible. >> we're doing it. >> people are saying it's more likely that we see some sort of waiver of epa summer blend requirements or some other political move to try to bring gas prices down in the summ summerti summertime. >> we only have about a couple hundred of these nat gas stations. >> but they won't and they haven't. >> and that is a huge obstacle. if the president were for say that all -- can you imagine if exxon decided some they are the largest distributor of natural gas in our country. if they were to say, you know what, we're going to put one everywhere, i think that the 25% imported oil -- they don't think it's worth it, and some people say that they don't want to -- will literally why screw it up, they make a lot of money.

>> have to start from scratch in some cases. >> but the president should recognize that not all fossil fuels are cleaner. okay. it's he made here. it would free us from the middle east or buying it from venezuela. so what is the objection so? the objection is it's still fossil and the president doesn't want fossil. >> we heard that yesterday in the rose garden. the trading day is young. still a lot more "squawk on the street" still ahead. coming up, proceed with caution. cramer's crane yum is in overdrive. it's not about mega millions, but the focus is on six stocks in 60 seconds. and it all comes to a head next.

hard to believe it's the last 6 in 60 of the quarter. wyndham. >> a little counter intuitive. also time share.

incredible buy back, incredible dividend. this is a real buy. >> negative comment taker on u.s. bancorp. >> would guys say no. i had not sell that. they have terrific revenue growth. >> dell. >> wouldn't it be something if dell made a comeback? >> dunkin. >> it is working out. anytime they go to immediate premium, a lot of demand. >> lululemon. >> people feel it's hate innings. ubs says it's early innings 37. >> and american electric. >> this is the anti-coal. epa has decided bad for them. >> on mad money? >> i have them and timko.

>> a lot more on those stocks. about ten seconds until university of michigan. we'll toss it over to rick santelli at the cme group. >> of course this is a very keenum for many. if you look at the reads, holy cow, 76.2, and that is a powerful mum especially when you consider that february's number was 75.3. last month it deteriorated a bit. so 76.2 now is the best number going back to february of 2011. so let's call it a little bit over a year. and the response in the marketplace we should be very watchful of because interest rates are at a key level, two week lows after coming off a big increase. equities moving a bit higher on the data. so we'll digest this, but very good number on university of

michigan sentiment survey. >> by the way, want to remind you, it's viewer's choice on "squawk on the street." pick a stock that you want to know more about and tell us why it interests you. you can tweet us using #post 9 twitter and one of our equity experts will give you you the customized analysis live on our air. send your requests. yesterday we had -- >> i love that, you can rip right lou. it's a lightning round. really exciting. >> going into the weekend, we haven't discussed europe a whole lot. spain presenting their national budget. it's been a rough week in madrid and barcelona. discussions in the times take about moody's and what banks they'll downgrade. >> i think spain, they don't have a lot of growth. people don't like -- smpain is not good. we need growth it will. they have to be doing better.

>> 30 seconds to put q1 in perspective. did you think would turn out quite this good? >> no. 998, people have to remember that was the beginning of a major move. a lot of people felt 1998 was average. 1999 was fantastic. the nasdaq up, up, up. so i think we have a better feel in this market and people have to come back, stop abandoning it. we've got something going here. >> you've still got them in your hand. >> faber's there. am i going to leave it there? this is a sly guy. but so am i. >> good luck tonight. we'll see you monday regardless of what happens. >> oh, i don't know. i may take off the morning after i win. >> when we come back, winning a multimillion-dollar lottery is a life changer, not always for the better. jackpot winner will offer words of wisdom. [ male announcer ] how do you trade? with scottrader streaming quotes, any way you want. fully customize it for your trading process --

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welcome back to "squawk on the street." blackberry maker in turmoil. research in motion reporting a dismal fourth quarter and announcing several management

changes. r.i.m. also saying it will no longer give guidance, so it a turnaround out of the question. we have your r.i.m. trade next. and after the market's stellar performance, how should you position headed into q2? we'll a talk to jim paulson. plus the mega millions jackpot, what would you do with all that cash? we'll talk to a pasttery winner on how she spent her money. doesn't always turn out like roses. >> no, i know. >> high percentage of bankruptcies among owners. >> i have seen that. which is kind of depressing. but people change their lifestyle and they don't think about the future. >> you would if you won. of course you would. we would. >> i would just sock it all around of away, you know that. >> would you take the lump sum? >> i think i would take the lump sum. they tell you the lump sum is the right way to go.

carl has it all figured out. >> and i don't have the ticket yet. >> petro china already the world's largest publicly traded crude producer. the company intends to invest at least $600 billion over the next ten years with local oil and natural gas assets, very aggressive buyers around the world of those assets trying to secure energy supply for their ever expanding economies. >> this is very good news this morning. consumer spending in the united states rose in february by the most in seven months. largest gain since july. incomes climbed 0.2% for second month after january's gain was revised down. >> and richmond fed president jeffrey lacker sitting down with seef liesman earlier today on "squawk box." take a listen to what mr. lacker had to say about economic growth. >> it could get to 3%. a lot of uncertainty around that

p. i think growth will gradually pick up. i think consumers will move ahead more rapidly some quarter, less rapidly other quarters. but job market seems to be gradually healing. business investment still seems to have a lot of momentum to it. >> it's funny, we did get personal income and outlays from pen to january. the savings rate was down rather sharply to 3.7%, i believe. from what had been 4.3% the month prior. perhaps people dipping in to their savings to try to maintain at least where they stand right now. given still choppy economic -- >> for the economy that's quite good. that's what we need to engender to -- >> we want people to save more, but at the same time, we want them to spend money. >> paradox of thrift. >> i know you've also been focused on what's going on in

spain. >> they've had a news conference in spain and they've come out, the figures look quite light. they're trying to save $27 billion. they have to half the deficit from last year from over 8% to just over 4%. but the scale, understand the scale of what they're announcing here. if proceed porti proportionately the cuts are the equivalent of president obama getting up and saying we will cut $775 billion now, not over ten years, now, throughout the u.s. system. it's a huge endeavor. they've just comefigures. they go to parliament on tuesday. for the moment, yields are relatively stable. i don't know if the ecb has been in buying today, but very critical situation in spain. >> short ends, but relatively well behaved considering all the things we were worried about. >> short end of the bond market

is where the banks basically park the cash. it's the ten year, 30 year that you've really got the issue on, will that remain supported. absolutely critical. because the firewall that they've announceded today is not enough for spain. >> of course all this austerity is another thing that's taking its toll on the population at large and raises the question as to whether you can ever get sxh economic growth. >> did you see the front page of the "journal" today some says a huge amount, this woman just looking through the shattered window of her shop in horror. real stories there. >> i keep thinking back to the banker with the ten foot pole holding off the protester. so pictures are dramatic. back in this country, research in motion ceo has started spring cleaning. several executives announced their resignation. what does it mean if you're in the stock.

will, good morning. i asked cramer earlier this morning whether or not will was a kitchen sink kind of quarter. do you think it is and where do we go from here? >> well, i think there's still more down side. operationally, you may have more success with the mega millions at this point. i think the next couple of quarters will be rough for the company and really for the first time the company's acknowledging much more intense competition in international markets which has been a source of their growth. so our expectation is results will deteriorate much further over the next couple of quarters. >> so is this not a play on operational efficiencies or market focus. is it strictly a buy back or an m&a arbitrage story? >> i think it is at this point. that's what has the stock up last time i checked. speculation that the new ceo really dismissed that with an option i think they are open to that. the big question is who might

that be and what's the likelihood of that. it's not clear to me who the natural buyer is. so i would not be buying shares on that speculation. >> having covered m&a for many year, one can imagine that any company that did announce an acquisition of r.i.m. might be if for its share of significant criticism. but from your perspective, what are the valuable assets that one could argue would be something that a buyer would be looking at and perhaps could make the case that will is worth doing? >> as a starting point, the company today has about $4 a share in cash and you could argue that the it's worth several more dollars a share. and then the question is where what is the rest of the core business worth? it's service revenue of a billion dollars a quarter. so clearly something there, but how rapidly might the subscriber base decline. and that's what a potential buyer has to be aware of. >> how does for example the operating system when it gets

here, blackberry 10, how does that stack up against for example apple's operating system or microsoft windows or android some this is a crowded space. >> i think the real question here is do they have the ecosystem when they get to the back half of the year in terms of app developers to really compete with apple, google and resurgent microsoft. and i think the answer to that is perhaps no. i think it will be a tough uphill battle. that ecosystem will be a major barrier for them to try to overcome. >> so if there is no buyer within a reasonable amount of time, cramer this morning called the potential kodak story. does this have a chapter 11 logo on it? >> the good news is you'll have cash on the books. they' are not burning cash. it's possible they could start to eat into the cash balance, but i don't see a chapter any

i'm in the near future here. i think they'll get blackberry 10 a try and we'll see if it can resonate with consumers and enterprises. >> we'll keep an eye on it. thanks for your insight, will. sticking with tech, today marking sony ceo howard stringer's last day on the job. so what does the future look like as sony looks to reinvent itself yet yesterday? jon fortt has more. when you look back at this last number of years, what have been his most significant accomplishments? >> well, it was a maverick move nearly acce acceply seven yearsy appointed stringer and the stock price really tells the story. stock is down a third. and while there are several factors beyond his immediate control, there are two products that have defined the tech space

during the period sony didn't make that make clear why sony is struggling. the ipod and the iphone. so the stock down by a third seven year, apple trading at more than 16 times its 2005 level. 2005 was the year of the ipad in an nano. truly pushed them into the global mainstream of music. meanwhile sony's fortunes have continued to deteriorate. sony lacked a hit digital music player and download service. but still tried to load up its devices with features. its phone partnership with erickson prevented it leaving room for apple to do that. the flatten he will market has gone through a period of suppressed supply and samsung has been grabbing share. hirari told me that stabilizing and simply fizing the money losing tv business will be a top

priority, but as he hurries to do that, more challenges on the horizon. is am he wi is. >> jon, that wasn't a very uplifting idea of the future. what realistically do you see in terms of what he can do that investors perhaps can get behind and that the company can really start to gain some ground back in? >> sony really has a glut of from products from alarm clocks and baby monitors to tvs. the tv business should be a priority because they are losing money there, but they really need to also make strides in the phone business which they've now taken back as no longer sony erickson. they need to beef up in software so they can differentiate with their android phone. >> thanks, jon. chicago pme numbers are out today. rick santelli has a special guest to take us inside that set of figures.

rick, over to you. >> absolutely. this is a first. we have alice frantz. is 60 the new 50 for chicago pmi? >> i think you can say that. the number is 62.2 and the number has been above 60 for five months in a row now. so i think that's our new norm. we also have been seeing this number in expansion for about the last 2 1/2 years. >> when i look at the number, you know what i see, i see a big downward move in the employment index, big upward move in prices paid over 70. what do you think about those numbers? >> i think that employment index, the big decline there was a little alarming, but you have to take that with a little bit of context because this came on the heels of a big 9.5 gain last month, like a one sigma move. even i knew we had to have a retracement on that. >> will let's really dig in.

what do the resporespondents sa? what's the direct of some of the comments of late? >> what they're telling me is that we have this lethal combination of lower new orders this month, higher prices paid, and we have higher inventory levels. so what that's telling me is that procurement managers got left holding the bag when new orders started to contract a little bit, they got left holding the bag with high are inventory levels that were purchased at higher prices. these guys are telling me we have a little part in our survey where we have the respondents, survey respondents can write a little comment about what they're seeing in their business. this is coming right from the responses mere. they're telling me that higher oil prices are having a negative impact on most chemical and freight costs. also telling me that oil is the tipping point and is starting to impact raw material prices. so what i think is happening is they have held back for so long

in raising prices that they can't do it anymore. >> now, this is really key and we'll cut this out, but in my opinion, what you're telling me is they haven't raised price that while, but they can't hold back anymore. they have to pass it on at a time where there's questions about global growth. sgr that's rig . >> that's right. and the prices paid number was the largest in 15 months and also highest level since august. >> thanks, alice. back to you. it is the end of the quarter as we know it. and despite the fact that i feel fine, the rally does seem ob getting perhaps a bit tired pup up next we'll talk to jim paulsen to find out how he's positioning heading into the next quarter. stim around. do you have lottery fever?

usu and you are not alone. we'll have a former winner with quite a story. what wisdom can she share with the rest of us? "squawk on the street" will return.

let's take one quick check of mastercard shares.

investigating a potential data breach of what it call as u.s. based entity. it says its open systems haven't been compromised, but it has alerted some of its card issuerses as well as law enforcement that some accounts may be at arriving. the stock down almost three bucks. >> we're up 39 points on the dow. stocks to watch. linkedin upgraded to positive from neutral. firm also raising it points target from $85 to $125. united natural foods initiated sell. price target $33. and u.s. steel have a $40 price target. >> as the record q1 comes to a close, what can we expect for the second quarter? jim paulsen joining us. we made back a lot of the losses

of course we saw in the fourth quarter of last year. europe receded as a concern at least for now and the averages were very, very strong. but what does that mean from here? >> well, i think we just sort of reversed a couple fears last year that proved unfounded. and in some ways at 1400 we're basically 2% above the 1365 level we reached last year. so i don't know if we've done a lot. we've kind of been flat, but earnings have continued it to go up, interest rates have come down. in many respects stocks are still cheaper than they were when we were 1360 last year. i think we'll get a correction at some point. who knows. i just think it's going to be hard to call. what i would look to do is maybe change your allocations a little bit from stocks that have really done well in the first quarter and move a little capital down to stocks that have trailed a bit. but i would prefer on stay long in the market because i still

think the environment surrounding the stock market as a whole remains very good. >> how much of your view for the rest of the year pivots around better retail participation? we've seen an up grade of some of the online brokers. flow numbers continue to fly in the pace of what the market's done. >> yeah, i think that we'll get some better participation if the market continues to go higher. my target is still 1500. i think we'll get up to that level. i do sense not only in the numbers of participation but i sense a feel has gone people are starting to think am i missing out a bit. >> you're hearing that from clients? >> a little bit. they're starting to wonder. and i think what's doing that is the idea of getting closer to all-time record highs in some of these markets. so i do think we'll see maybe a little bit of voice of that now, but maybe later in the year people actually making allocations back towards the market. i think there's a couple

catalysts this year left. people still think we're going to grow to 2.25%. i think it's more like #3% and people will have to revise up their growth estimates. and then the other thing is i think that you have emerging policy officials working hard to restart their economies. it they succeed in the second half and the emerging world shows it's picking up, i think people could get bullish on the global recovery. >> cnbc provided a fascinating data point this week with our america's survey across the population, the most popular asset to own is gold. not just people in the stock market, but generally they believe gold is a better investment than real he is say the real estate and stocks. where are you? >> i'm not. i think it's okay to own a little gold. it has some defensive properties. but i would be underweight. i just hate three things.

the popularity of gold as you just mentioned which i see everywhere, too. its valuation i think is horrible. to give you some examples in 1990, it took 20 hours of labor to buy an ounce of gold. today it takes 90 hours of labor. in 2000, you could buy the stock market, it took 5 1/2 ounces of gold to buy it. today it takes less than an ounce. the price of gold against stocks, bonds, other commodities, houses, darn near everything is close to record highs. and i think you ought to take heed on that and reduce your exposure if people like it so much, i would give to them, but it's pretty inflated. >> rising gas prices certainly going to occupy us and political candidates. will it have a significant impact if continues on the consumer? >> certainly if we continue it go up, it will eventually cut into spending. right now, though, i think it's

palatable only because the last two times we had spikes in energy prices, they also came about when mortgage rates were spiking and when the money supply was slowing. today we just have gas prices up. mortgage rates haven't moved. money supply still growing at 10% and we have a much healthier household with job creation over 200,000 a month the last six months. so i think about it doesn't go a lot higher, we'll be okay. but certainly if it continues to surge, it would be a problem. >> thanks, jim. >> everyone talking about the mega millions. so as we go break, take a look he compilation of the five things with better odds than winning the lottery. first up, becoming president. next up, winning an academy award. >> what's the sample size there, everybody or do you have to be an actor? >> writing a best seller, 1 in

220. >> being struck by lightning, one in one million. and having identical quadruplets, one in 15 million. if you have identical quadruplets, you better win the lottery. >> or play. >> after the break, we'll talk to a real live past lottery winner. [ donovan ] i hit a wall.

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appointment gain. let's head to the chicago cme. last day of the quarter. morning, alan. >> good morning. >> heck of a quarter. and these days typically see at least some participants painting the tape. is that going to happen? >> not so sure. we've had such a unique quarter that it will be interesting to see how it finishes up. obviously the trends are strong. look for to ten. we've been talking about 1475 in the s&p for a while. now we're getting close it that, so the next question is with a happ what happens after that. a big issue that might give it another catalyst is the dollar. and i think the dollar can make another push to the down side. we could see unwinding like we saw in bonds that made big news. >> i know you're watching commodities, too. for the second day in a row, the leaders on the loser board are the extra layer rows and peabodys. oil is holding on to 103.

>> commodities are also at the low ets possible. there's usually inversion relationship. so i think there's value there. and i think there's good opportunities that a lot of commodities, we need to get gold above 1700, crude oil back above 105, a lot of up side potential in this weakness of commodities has been overdone. the unwinding could be really significant from all that safety value that we saw going to the dollar last fall that we're about 10% above the loans that we saw in 2011 in the dollar. so i'm looking for a lot of down side potential there and that could be supported for a lot of assets and give us another leg to the up side. >> just to be clear, you're very bullish here. you're looking at 1475 on the s&p which is 5%, 6% above where we are now. so looking to extend even further. that sounds -- a lot of people have spoken about a correction of probably 5%, 6%, you don't

think that's about to happen? >> no, i think we've entrenched this strong up trend. the fundamentals haven't changed. and with what's happening in the world, where's money going to go interest our stock market is still a good value and i think that we have more up side in the came mod is markets than we have in the stock market that the point. that's what i'm looking for, that level. if you look at the crb, about with you get back to 320, we could see a big run. >> alan, thanks. talk to you later. >> spain unveiling its budget with 27 billion euros worth of cuts. up next, we're portugal, eitherly and more. [ male announcer ] any technology not moving forward is moving backward. [ engine turns over, tires squeal ] introducing the lexus enform app suite --

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one hour into trading, some of the stories we're squawking about. university of michigan's consumer sentiment index jumping to 13 month highs in the final march reading of 76.2, nearly to points among mid life levels. shares of ibm moving to all-time

highs. and millennial media down 8% in second day of trading after debuting with a surge of 92%. >> up side volume has been improving. 23 points higher, 22 points higher on the dow. let's have a look at the breadth of the move. nasdaq, almost exactly one to one. let's switch gears here and head over to spain. the country of course anxious issu anxiously awaiting the budget proposal from the government. can they cut the deficit as this they go back into recession with as we learn 50% unemployment against the youth. a very, very difficult situation for all concerned. potentially for confidence in global markets. julia chatterdy joining us live. we have figures from the government and going to

parliament on tuesday. >> that's right, simon. we do have a number of details, but we don't yet have a presentation from the government to be able to really drill down into those. it looks like just under 18 billion euros worth of fresh cuts from the central government. the deputy prime minister said they're anticipating about 27 billion euros of savings to be made this year and that's going to get them hopefully to that 5.3% deficit is that we're targeting. as i say, we're still waiting for that key presentation in order to be able to drill down into those details. the bulk of the cuts look to be coming from the central government rather than the regions. that's where they really struggled, blew through the deficits last year and gave us the 8.5% deficit last year. they do seem to be buying consumption led tax increases which is what they promised. and obviously it will be key for supporting growth here going forward for the population. and we have to remember these budgets based on the growth rate of minus 1.7%.

and a number of analysts far more parish than that, citi saying minus 2.7% in 2012, that will be key going forward. this is a key issue ongoing. the budget will be discussed on tuesday as you mentioned in parliament, we're awaiting further details at that point. it has to be done quickly. we don't want any further delays. i also want to point out wednesday we're expecting the spanish government to auction an amend of medium term debt. that will be a key test given the spread widen that we've seen. but now the bond spreads relatively unchanged, two to three basis points. a lot of information i still feel to come and a lot of information to digest. so it's ongoing. back to you. >> you're standing in the stock exchange where they used to have floor trades in madrid. they don't have floor trade

anymore. what is the atmosphere outside? we've seen frightening images of the national strike yesterday. several businesses clearly being destroyed. what did you see and how does it feel? >> a lot of that violence that we saw was in barcelona. in madrid, it feels very much business as usual. although the sentiment here is that these cuts are going to take place. will is a belief that the government wasn't going to back down and it looks like that's come true. so will this is a sense that we are going to continue to see protests against these measures. the situation here is pretty dire in terms of unemployment. 23% unploiemployment here. 50% among the youth population. it will create further problems as these cuts get implemented. it's only going to get worse. >> julia, thank you very much

for that. let's bring in now larry mcdonald. he trades european sovereign debt. do you feel -- good morning to you. do you feel the honeymoon period if europe is over or can we continue to rally as we've done through the first quarter? >> i must say, we have a nice team at new edge and i owe a big thanks to my trading team in london. but i would say essentially investors are looking at us trying to figure out is this going to leak over to the equity market globally especially in the u.s. and i would say that if you look at interbank lending rates, the high bor libor, new york funding rate, tent spread, i look at realized volatility on those measurements and so par we're not seeing things leak over. so last summer when we did selloff 18% in august, you saw

interbank lending really tighten up. >> the situation as you know better than i, it's different this time around because the ecb has injected a trillion euros into the banks. therefore they can fund themselves over the nektsz two or three years. that isn't our pressure point. our potential pressure point is whether we lose confidence in the bond markets of italy and spain. fundamentally, do you think that is going to happen or do you think spain can get through this? because it looks frankly a bit iffy. >> 6% right now we're below 5.5% on the spanish ten year. 6% is the key. i think if you look at what's really happening in spain is the economy is deteriorating at a very fast rate. imf expected this year gdp to be negative 1.1, then they said negative 1.7. citigroup says negative 2.6. and i think what i'm really hearing behind the scenes is that you have the bank recapitalization, the government

of spain has said it's 50 billion and you have street estimates around 100, 120. the banks might have to recapitalize and where they get that money from the espspespesf expansion is the key. >> when sthey say they expect spain to take part in a troica program, is that a line of worry for you or is there something else you're looking for? >> how they address the efssfs, they definitely need more funding. real estate prices have fallen sharply the last two quarters. and i think you really have to look at real estate prices in spain. so how they access that money in the short term if they do access it, that would definitely i think affect the equity markets. but once again, you want to look at that interbank lending globally because one of the things i talk about in my book is you really don't have a

problem in the markets for a serious selloff until the interbank lending tightens up. >> larry, thank you very much. have a great weekend. one quick update on the mastercard story. mastercard now says it has notified law enforcement about the possible account data compromise said to have taken place at one of its u.s. based processor and emphasizes its own systems have not been compromised, but some accounts are potentially at risk. also one additional angle, visa is also said to be part of that same security breach. site says as many as 10 million cards could be involved. keep a close eye on that stock later today. citi adding ford to its top picks yesterday as 2012 crocking in as a record year for u.s. auto sales. what's the reead lieu fothrough auto dleerps?

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it's mega million jock pot is now the largest in world history surpassing the previous railroaded record of $390 million and the odds of winning 1 in 760 million. winning might feel a little bit like this. >> i always knew it was going to happen, to go to the stores that i want to, to travel first class, whatever i want to do is just an amazing feeling. >> that is cynthia stafford, the star of tlc's reality show the lottery changed my life. and she joins me here. good morning. >> good morning. >> five years ago you won. how much did you you win is this. >> i won $112 million. >> and you still remember what it felt like? >> oh, yeah. it feels like it was the most euphoric feeling in the world. >> and tonight's prize is five times. >> it is five times that much.

yeah. >> what advice would you give whoever wins tonight? >> deep breathing and definitely do a little celebration because i think that was the person's dream coming true and definitely live your life. have fun. >> walk us through the first 24 hours. once you know that you've won, talk about how you responded and how one should respond. do you get your lawyer first, do you get security? do you know to an office -- >> i did all that, yes. >> and you know the media will be after you. some winners have gone to lottery offices that may be in a different area. do you try to get it listed some in someone else's name? >> actually depends on where you play. some states allow you to be anonymous so you don't have to let people know that you're the winner.

but some states you do have to make people aware of who you are. and if you do, just take your time with it. and they will search you out. take your time and get a really good financial team around you and a legal team around you. and just protect yourself. >> winners went on to be bankrupt not that many years after winning. what have you done to avoid that fate? >> stop spending so much on gucci. i think it's really, really important to have a financial planner, someone who is good with working with large sums of money. because they will make sure they protect you. and do your research. i did my research first. i looked up financial advisers i wanted for to deal with. but take your time. don't go in a rush. and don't ever say i'm going to

win money and they lose it. that's been the problem with most people. i'm going to win all this money and then they think i'm going to spend it all and they do. so they fulfilled their prove pes city by stating they were going to lose that money. >> i heard a rumor you were looking to buy an airplane. >> i was looking around at a fuel jets. >> where have you invested? >> beyond gucci. >> i've invested in a few online companies. hitch radio one of them. >> started your own production company. >> i've started my own production company. >> i have to ask, though, are you playing tonight? >> yeah, do you still buy? >> my husband bought a couple of tickets. i do still play occasionally. i play no more than a dollar or two at the most. >> quick pick? >> quick pick, yeah. >> with >> one last thing.

everybody wapts wants a piece o. how do you get through that process in. >> again, having a good financial person who can help to you say no if you're not good at telling people no. have someone that can be your buffer and help you with that. and just use good common accese. >> you're probably one of the most wealthiest people who have sat in that chair. >> oh, i feel good. if you win, come back on monday. >> thank you. now to investing in america and the auto industry. of course its renaissance, it's been well documented over these last couple of years, but it is still amazing that the big through are making a lot more money with far fewer dealerships than before the financial crisis. wri brian shactman has the story. >> david, the entire dealership culture has changed. i'm at a bmw dealership in ramsey. and you can sit up at will bar,

you can get fresh fruit, a snack, a cup of coffee, a good one. see myself on cnbc. or sit down in a comfortable booth and use their free wi-fi. this is the nature of the is th business now because they want the customer experience to be as luxurious as they buy and the big three do not want to get left behind. companies like gm are no longer interested so much in profitability. they lost more than 2,000 dealerships in bankruptcy and there's no effort or desire to get back to those levels. now it's all about profitability. there's more geography. in 2008, the average dealership profited $279,000. last year, more than double that. 785,000. less than half dealers made money for chrysler. you fast forward that number and the number is 86%. ford says that they are in line with the competition. for gm, they went from 57% to

90. that's where it gets to be investing in america. their whole -- the whole m.o. right now is to compete with the bmw, to have the wi-fi, to have a decent cup much coffee and gm is spending $300,000 to upgrade dealerships. they don't want to open new ones right now. >> brian, thank you. as we go to break this morning, the top five ceos as rated by employees. this is all according to glass door, some numbers that came out last night. number five, larry page at google. number four, ken shen nault. we'll reveal number one on this list after a chort break. omnip. you know how to mix business... with business. and you...rent from national.

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the most popular ceo according to glass door, apple's beloved tim cook. 97% approval rating. >> shocking. just shocking. >> any president of anything would be happy to have. it feels everyone is loving apple. before apple, sony used to be a

staple. what does that mean for sony's legacy and could apple become the next sony one day? a business professor at the university of virginia garden school of business, good morning to both of you. >> good morning. >> we talked this morning about stringer and how he wasn't dealt a good hand to begin with. >> as jim cramer said earlier, howard stringer is an awfully nice person. if they needed somebody to play the cowardly line, he would have done a great job and he's the most trusted man in america and went on to the tv fiasco, disappeared and wound up the content ceo of sony where they

lost their base. sony's founder bashed the u.s., the 25 years ago and really tough book talking about the japan saying how we don't make anything here, we're all into frivolous content and this culture doesn't have a work ethic and, of all things, put a u.s. guy this charge who did everything he said that we do wrong. it's destroyed the engineering might of sony. they've lost their way badly to the koreans. >> ed, are you seeing -- it's almost silly to ask this at this point. do you see any signals that apple could one day be a victim of that similar situation? >> well, any company can become so impressed with itself that it can go a similar way but you also have to remember that 1997, apple stock was at $4, i believe, and people were writing it off. so i think it's a little early to write sony off and i don't

see any evidence at apple that they are ready to throw and edge gained and i wouldn't write sony. >> as a professor, with very public base. >> we have to be careful not to look at more complicated that than. all these companies, however, and as the key creating a big loss for good. the 19th century it's man versus

these five companies that are very well managed, they see employees that need to be engaged. >> jeff, i've never heard you be so tough on a guy. wow. >> i have. >> i know. we know. he has. >> jeff, embracing change, especially when things are good, is probably the most difficult thing for a company to do. weren't the seeds planted many, many years ago? >> yes. actually, the immediate predecessor is the one who took them into the arena, the device business. they had an opportunity to partner with apple. they missed that chance. they are the creators of these new organic light-emitting

gyodes. they created them. they missed all of these opportunities. back-lit l.e.d. screens. they created it and lost it. what you have is strategic arrogance where you can have a fear of either ritualizing the founder and then you have the succession issue of following the corporate legend. in the case of disney, this is a good parallel here. people can be too quick on sony or apple. yes, disney almost died but it was brought back by michael eisner. they were afraid to do anything, though, after walt died that might not be what walt wanted. still to come, we're talking the r.i.m.m. debacle and if there's any chance for survival for torston hines at blackberry. we're back in two. ey remind a nn

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demand across the world. >> my estimate is that economic conditions are likely to warrant low rates until sometime in the middle of next year. >> now we are closer to how big and what kind of problems from the competition point of view. >> i set up with my iphone. suddenly my ipad springs to life. syncing it at the same time. sink, that's r.i.m.m. >> they were not dominating when he came in years ago to try to turn things around but it doesn't appear that that turn around has taken hold. >> the price of gold against stocks, bonds, other commodities, houses, darn near everything is close to record

highs and i think you out to take heed on that and reduce your exposure. >> what advice would you give to anyone who wins tonight? >> deep breathing and definitely doing a little celebration because i think that was the person's dream coming true and definitely live your life. >> you got that right. good friday morning. welcome to the last trading day of the quarter. get a check on the markets. dow holding on to a 30 or so point gain as s&p holds on to 1404. nasdaq down five points to 3090.67. the broader market as the supreme court hears arguments about the health care law. aetna all outperforming. reports that mastercard and visa are part of a major security

breach. on that note, let's get to mary thompson who has details on that. carol? >> mastercard says importantly that its own systems have not been breached. rather, reportedly, this came from a third party payment processor so the breach has been able to access information on the mastercard accounts. another report says that visas customer accounts may be compromised as well. i made calls to mastercard and visa, haven't heard back from them. also put out calls to major banks, jp more gun and city bank as well. it could affect up to ten million cards. again, mastercard saying that their own cards haven't been compromised, that the breach came from a third-party payment processor. as americans catch mega

millions fever, gary kominski has experience advising people. >> you want to know why i have no experience winning the lottery? because i never played tu but i did buy tickets today. >> these are mine, my four. >> carl, i have to tell you this. i had a whole segment planned. we were going to talk about business and every single person in this building is talking about this, as i'm sure everybody across the country is. how much money do you have to put away if you don't want p to touch the principle? if i could just put away $8 million, that will give me enough money. i said to him, it's a him, i said, how much do you think you need to generate to do everything thaw simply want? and the number was $50,000 a

month. it just shows you the disconnect between interest rates, managing a portfolio, those that have been successful in not having to touch principal. the answer is, this is based on where interest rates are. if you want to generate $50,000 a month triple tax-free and have a somewhat conservative bond portfolio, i say you need about $20 million to generate that type of money triple tax free and not having to touch the principal. the biggest success for people who have won the lottery and not bankrupt themselves, they never touch the principal. what happens is you get your long lost cousin who calls you up, hey, i need you to help me out and then you have one friend, help a second friend, a third person. don't touch the principal. only live off the income that's generated and you will not be in a position to have to therefore not be able to enjoy it.

herb, what are you going to do? >> after i win and quit this job? >> yes. >> living off the principal: no. the principal stays. the principal -- i'll be living off the interest, trust me. >> i don't know. i think the living off the principal was feurodian. >> no. i could live easily off the principal if i wanted to. >> yeah. >> 50k a month, i don't know. if you're winning half a billion dollars. >> 50k a month -- the point is that individual said to me, if there are 30 winners and i could just net in a lump sum $8 million, company then basically call it a day. i said, okay, on that $8 million, what do you think you're going to generate and $50,000, and need to at least get 20 million.

>> whoever wins, by the way, a the lo of people faked call that i trade stocks. i'm not allowed to trade stocks anymore. but, yes, i will give you, herb, anyone else unofficial advice because i have been involved with those that have won and i've got to tell you, some of the people who we've met, there are crazy stories about lottery winners and you can sort of tell right away those that are going to make it and those that are going to spend it all. >> expect a phone call after 11:00 tonight from whomever. >> good luck to you. >> talk to you in a while. >> yep. meanwhile, research in motion is seeing a pop. several senior executives were resigning. we covered the earnings earlier in the program i want to talk about what could happen with the company moving forward. dennis berman is joining us. one of the great m and a reporters. >> very kind of you.

>> let's open the firm of berman and quintanilla. who would you go to? >> absent the u.s. government mucking about and killing a deal, r.i.m.m. belongs with a manufacturer. it just makes sense that companies in asia, they are on the rise, they want intellectual property assets and brand names. however, there is one problem. there is no way, neither the canadian government nor the u.s. government will allow r.i.m.m. to get into the hands of those sorts of companies. so that limits your options. perhaps amazon is an interesting scenario. perhaps microsoft is an interesting scenario. i would look at a couple of those and perhaps a badly formed jv they might do to stop the bleeding. but the most logical buyers are really from asia. >> yeah. what kind of premium, if any,

dennis? >> well, look, r.i.m.m. is only worth $7 billion. motorola, which has not had a great run to itself, sold for $12 billion. look, you've got to get aboard, over the hump, and even if you put a 20% premium on where it is today, that's $8.4 billion. that's a very, very digestible church for microsoft, for amazon, say for dell, hp. blackberry has a good name. it's just lost its way in terms of product development. >> yeah. you mentioned microsoft. of course, the journal today talks about the partnership that it has in place. >> yep. >> and in the journal's words, could be waiting for r.i.m.m. stock to get cheaper before it decides to pursue a deal. do you like that? >> look, at these deals i don't think it matters, whether you spend 2.6 billion or $7 billion. the opportunity is clearly there. the ceo signaled in his language that the opportunity is there. what's odd to me, carl, is that

they basically clean house. the coo is gone, the cto is gone. so here you have them trying to maintain the quality of their products with very little leadership to do it. from my perspective, reading the m. and a tea leaves, that says, please, someone come and relieve us from our misery. i think someone could look at the patent portfolio for r.i.m.m. and probably come up with a higher valuation. and once sentiment changes in a situation like this, you can really see companies start to get excited. you know, the other opportunity, of course, is private equity. i think that there is probably less likely for private equity to get involved. the capital you need to invest in this type of business is so great. you can't just run it for earnings as you would in a typical private equity situation. >> not like retail, that's for sure. >> no, not at all.

>> dennis, good stuff. we'll see what happens down the road. let's hop over to rick santelli over at the cme and get a friday edition of the cme exchange. rick? >> carl, fridays are always fantastic. they try to look at where the hot or cold spots are in the marketplace to dictate the kind of positions they may want to hold or not holdover the weekend where you are unable to adjust. without a doubt, physical i were to tell to you guess a country that's going to have to roll over 40% of its gdp in the form of securities that are maturing, you would probably pick a european country. the rollover, that 40%, is close to six trillion. you've narrowed it down a little bit. we're talking about the united states. at a time when traders will bend over backwards to sell treasuries, they really think that rates have to go up. i contend, whether it's a qe

hook that might come down the road or it's the notion that we have to roll over close to $6 trillion over the next five years, that's a big incentive for the fed to try to keep rates down for the treasury. now, another issue we want to bring up when we talk about the economy and debt, it's how all of this, of course, is going to affect manufacturers in the global marketplace and demand. in the chicago pmi, from that organization she said that the written part of the response by many of the surveyed participants are very nervous that they are going to have to start passing along some of these costs. remember, we had a huge jump in prices paid. at a time where maybe china and japan, all of these export companies may be slowing, it's going to be very difficult to pass on. so the trader's favorite word of the day is, how do you spell stagflation. carl, back to you. >> rick, congratulations. your santelli exchange leading the top of drudge. always great to see.

rick santelli from chicago. >> thank you very much. up next, whether sony's stock is worth a second look. >> announcer: coming up, a new when squawk on the street rereturns. and then let me know what the baby thinks of it. four million drivers switched to this car insurance last year. oh, she likes it babies' palates are very sensitive so she's probably tasting the low rates. this is car insurance y, they've been losing customers pretty quickly. oh my gosh, that's horrible!, which would you choose? geico. over their competitor. do you want to finish it? no. does the baby want to finish it? no. ♪ when your chain of supply goes from here to shanghai, that's logistics. ♪

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sony is looking to re-establish itself as a top-tier electronics company. daniel earnst joins us on the phone and has a buy rating. good to talk to you, dan. thanks for coming on the program. >> thanks for having me. >> people point out apple has four products. sony has thousands of products. and that maybe this is still a cost-cutting story first. do you agree? >> well, i mean, they have gone through quite a number of cost restructurings over the last couple of years and when howard took over as ceo, they were operating at a 1% operating margin before the massive rise of the yen and fall off the economy in '08. they've gotten to 5% operating margin which is where most asian electronic companies like to be. but i think your first comment

on the hip products, end of the day, they need to have hip products. so you can only cut costs so much. there's probably more to do but they have to have it. >> where is the buy rating? where is that centered? where is the story behind that? >> right. i think there's a couple of things. i think within the world of asia electronics, sony is fairly alone in their asset base, what they can bring to the table. if there's anyone who can do in japan, you know, china, and korea in there as well, what apple has done, i believe that it's sony. they own the largest set of music, second or third biggest movie studio set. some of the most successful tv shows around the world. i think that bringing that content together with hardware, they also own, you know, what is now the second or third greatest gaming company. they are able to provide a portfolio of digital technology

and services and that was sort of the bull case. that was what howard had wanted to do and what execution against that plan, however, has been pretty poor. so it certainly makes it difficult to make the case but that's the thesis. >> really quickly, we know they no longer make money on televisions. great surprise. does that strike any fear in you. >> not as much fear as and bodes interestingly what apple may be doing. that would be another significant hurdle for sony's profit opportunity in televisions. >> we'll keep a close eye on it. that's going to be interesting to watch. thanks for your time today. >> thank you for having me.

>> daniel ernst talking sony. why malls could mean big bucks for your portfolio. back in a minute. and on small business saturday they remind a nation of the benefits of shopping small. on just one day, 100 million of us joined a movement... and main street found its might again. and main street found its fight again. and we, the locals, found delight again. that's the power of all of us. that's the power of all of us. that's the membership effect of american express.

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as the economy slowly improves, reets may be a good investment this year. diana olick is in washington with that. >> reporter: carl, you can really see what is going on in retail real estate right on this one block here on north d.c. you have a couple stores down the block from what used to be a linens and things and across the street behind the camera is the empty shell of the filings basement. all of them out of business. but now after a long time with temporary renters, the linens and things finally became a nord stop rack. the border is getting a

permanent tenant and it's really indicative of what is going on overall in retail real estate. neighborhood and community center vacancies fell by ten basis points in the first two months of this year. now we're at 10.9%. it's the first drop in over a year they will have their full release next week. topping out at 1.36 million square feet in december, 1.87 million square feet in january. the sector has not occupied this much on a monthly basis since 2007. asking and effective rents posted an increase for the first time since '08. you have equity one up around 20% and kimco realty up 19% and

we're going to talk about that coming up later on power lunch. carl? >> thank you so much, diana olick joining us from washington. just a few minutes left in europe's trading week. we'll get to that right after this. ♪ i'm making my money do more. i'm consolidating my assets. i'm not paying hidden fees or high commissions. i'm making the most of my money. and seven-dollar trades are just the start. i'm with scottrade. i'm with scottrade. i'm with scottrade. and i'm loving every minute of it. [ rodger riney ] at scottrade, we give you commission-free etfs, no-fee iras and more. come see why more investors are saying... with scottrade. come see why more investors are saying... at liberty mutual, we know how much you count on your car, and how much the people in your life count on you.

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something for everyone out of europe today. a budget in spain, euro zone inflation, german retail sales and the firewalls. >> yeah, a very busy day. of course, 24 hours ago we were talking about the hard selling. we had exactly the opposite today. people buying back into the stocks that have done well during the quarter. the cement makers doing reasonably well. the fact that we haven't been able to get greater traction here in the united states has taken these guys off their mantel, if you'd like. taking off their mantel very slightly. of course, we've actually had quite a bad month of march and the technical breakdown of the indices is in contrast to europe. that could be a real concern moving forward. for spain, clearly the budget has moved through.

$36 billion in immediate cuts. 17% of some of those federal departments. the market itself has done reasonably well. there's also a clawback of companies to expand around the world. spain is hiring. you can see that most of europe is higher into the end of the quarter, as i say, their quarter has not been as good as we've had here in the united states. just on the subject of that budget, we wait for the detail to go to the parliament on tuesday. massive cuts, painful cuts, controversial cuts. will they go through? that's the big question. the bond market today, if we can look at where we are today is actually doing reasonably well and you can see after yesterday's scare, yields have actually come back down. i'm not sure if that's ecb buying or not. very quickly, i want to mention what has come out of copenhagen.

carl has mentioned it with great fan fair. the finance ministers of the euro zone have announced now that they are combining 700 billion euros. it's helpful if we have to bail out greece again, more in ireland, portugal, or arguably with the spanish banks. but it's not enough if you have to go in and help italy or spain in a major way. it's not capable of doing that. but at least it exists and of course they will draw down over the next three years to create that ability. >> fair to say it creates second banana? >> how many times have they talked about 1 trillion, 2 trillion euros? the ecb put its money where the mouth is. and there is concern that there is wide spreads between those that took the ltr money and those that are not. there is still major concern. we are flying without trouble

here. >> see you later this week. gary kominski is up next. what have you got? >> well, take a look at six banks. hopefully we have that full screen back there. do we, guys? all right. let's bring it up. take a look. banner corp, first financial holdings, main source financial group, and seacoast. do you know what they have in common? >> no. >> the treasury sold out stakes in those four banks as well as wfss financial. there was another one. the point is these banks -- for the treasuries to get out of these banks, it was a $15 million loss. not meaningful in the overall

scope of t.a.r.p., constant arguments whether it was about making an invest manyment to get a return. but this was something that was buried and i have to bring in rick santelli on this. we're speaking about the t.a.r.p. many a time. this is a $50 million loss again. not teeshl but not everything that the government invested in here was a good return on investor capital, was it? >> no. we're not even talking about things like $500 million shares of gm or what aig still owes us. gary, you and i have talked off camera. the issue for me with t.a.r.p. isn't whether they showed a profit. it's that in many of the financial assets they hold, they are the market so they could market it the way they want. but in the end it's the fact that they co-signed, in essence, for all taxpayers. it doesn't matter how much money they made. it's the risk they took that bothers me and will continue to bother me.

>> yep. thanks very much, rick. carl, we were the last day in the quarter and we talked about the difference between window dressing which didn't happen in the great part of this week and the difference between painting the tape. i see that we sort of have a turn here on the s&p. don't be surprised, i told you, paint the tape the last hour of the day. won't be surprised to see a lot of that later tonight. >> could be an active afternoon. >> yes. let's go to mary thompson and talk about what is happening on the floor. a couple reweightings on the floor as well? >> that's what we're watching. before i get to that and the rest of the markets, i want to update you on a story that i brought you at the top of the hour, a concern about a possible data breach of mastercard and possibly visa account holders. what i want to -- this came to a third party processor. mastercard said its own systems were not breached but as many as 10 million accounts may have been compromised.

someone close to that situation says that the number is very inflated. that's something to keep in mind today. dow is off the highs of the day. a 47-point gain. the markets gained a bit of a boost and personal spending was higher and what we are seeing it broad based very modest gains today lead by consumers with health care stocks and the s&p index at a historic high today held by gains that we're seeing in altria and health care stocks at 11-year highs. the index has been one of the better performing groups throughout the week as the supreme court mulled over on the legality of the health care law. lastly, we're seeing weakness in tech stocks, a supplier altering working conditions in china.

apple stock and issue that oracle had of trying to set some prices there. these are some of the stocks. tech is the only underperformer of the major groups that we followed today in what was a fairly decent session on the last day of the quarter. back to you, carl. >> of course, for the quarter. >> rick santelli, good morning once again. >> hi, carl. we're going to switch gears to the usda report today. listen, when you think of farmers, you might not think of my guest, ashley here, her father jerry's a farmer. but there's more. she's a lawyer, she's a trader. she does everything. ashley, welcome for the program. i think we're showing you a picture of when you were 10

years old riding a combine. what did you think of the usda report today? >> we were not surprised at all by the acres for corn and wheat. we were a little surprised by the soybeans acres. >> in terms of corn, for 75 years to the 1930s, isn't that correct? >> it's a big number and it will bring a lot of corn into the next marketing year. >> now, the other issue is stockpiles. yesterday we had john macintosh on. he's upset because he thinks there's a lot less corn out there than they were saying. it's getting closer. it's getting in line. what is happening? >> we were shocked by the stocks as well. from what we know, from people we work with, we work with a lot of end users and farmers and they were seeing a lot of efficiency. this year it took only six pounds due to the warm weather. we thought we would see the stocks different than what they were. we were a little surprised by that. yeah, that was a surprise for us

from the efficiency 1257bd point. >> we have a chart. you brought up soybeans and corn. it's important from not only the soybeans side but subs institution as corn gets expensive with regard to what we feed animals. >> since the last report in january, we've seen the price of soybeans go up and more or less what we say and my dad likes to say this a the lot. price is a great fertilizer. with the increase in beans were seeing that people may start switching from corn to beans and we're hearing that from our clients as well, that it's becoming more cost-efficient to plant corn in some sectors, in some areas. >> what do you think is going to happen to the demand side? is it going to affect demand in the corn arena? >> of course, that's the place for the marketplace. we look for rationing and we look for rations over the old crop.

new crop, i don't think that will be a problem. we are planting record acres and that shouldn't be a problem. but with the old crop we'll probably see feeding of wheat, probably 150 more bushels of wheat and we planted corn because of the warm weather. what we'll be seeing is an early crop. it will be harvested earlier this year and that will bring 150 to 200 million bushels in earlier to help kind of ease the tension with the stocks. >> thanks, ashley. i want you could tomorrow for next month's report so we can catch up on the data. >> we need some video of when you were a kid, too. don't forget. >> when i was 10, i was driving a '64 chevy. >> thanks, guys. meantime, our richman fed president fred talking about inflation earlier this morning on "squawk". >> that's our new now official

inflation goal, objective. i think that energy prices are going to push that a little bit away from that and corn inflation numbers have and i think we've seen over the last couple of years. >> joining us to weigh in on that outlook, good morning. >> there is a risk of deflation and higher for the risk of inflation. >> driven by the core components with regard to equivalent rent and i think that's going to come in at 1% to 2%. there's the possibility of commodity price deflation coming through in particular as it

slows, demand for the raw materials and one of the more hawkish members on the committee tends to show through. the inflation numbers that came out were very benign and to a great extent favorable. >> you talk a lot about the see questions sister, end of tax cuts and so forth n your view, you say the economy would fall back into a recession if all of that fiscal tightening were to come to past. echoing the concern that the fed chairman have said lately. >> i think that's 100% the case. the counsnsumer balance sheet wd not come with the force reduction in subsidies coming from the federal government, whether it be the bush tax cuts, obama payroll tax cut or reduction in federal support programs that come out of the

see questions siste see questions sister. either the incoming administration or old administration are not going to want to sit through the pain of what is going to happen in the first half of 2013. >> and there's a lot more on the line than just our economy. if that happens in this country, you would think obviously china, the hard landing scenario there a lot more likely. >> well, you're already seeing china have difficulties with the export economy with the difficulties taking place in europe and there are presumptions that we're going to start to see positive growth in europe in 2013 and i'm not 100% sure that's the case. i think we're going to continue to see negative growth in europe as austerity continues to be a major problem and as you wind up with a situation where the u.s. were to dip down, there is a harder problem for china to get attention going again.

they've already cut the numbers from 8% to 7.5. it could easily cut back to below 7% if you get a recession unfolding here. finding on top of what is going on in europe. >> that would be tough to stomach. >> steven, thanks so much. talk to you later. the kudlow caucus is in question. we'll see what larry kudlow is looking at. winners and losing from the trading day in europe. we'll be right back. how do you know which ones to follow? the equity summary score consolidates the ratings of up to 10 independent research providers into a single score that's weighted based on how accurate they've been in the past. i'm howard spielberg of fidelity investments. the equity summary score is one more innovative reason serious investors are choosing fidelity. get 200 free trades today

and explore your next investing idea.

we're hitting up everyone for their best ideas for q2. plus, r.i.m.m. and going global with the top emerging markets money manager. you might be surprised where he's finding value right now. that's coming up in a few at noon. carl? >> scott, we'll see you in about 15 minutes. big oil to health care. let's bring in sir larry. larry kudlow is joining us. good friday to you. >> you too. >> from france to the uk. >> there may be a coordinated emergency release. and today the president is supposed to decide on the

iranian oil sanctions. now, europe has signed on to it but you get the uk and some other country. question, will he sign on to the iranian snkss and say sanctions and at the same time he talks about injecting strategic petroleum reserves. there's reuters saying that it's going to happen. i don't know anything. these are the rrps. and that would be coupled with the final nail on the iranian oil sanctions. >> yes, there are other theories out there that would target retail gasoline, waving the blentding requirements and the joan acts. >> yes, those are things that would take 40, 80, 60 cents off the epa. all of the mandates, ethanol mandates, 18 different kinds of gasoline, winter and summer, that could help. you know what could also help? a 10 or 12% increase in the

value of king dollar which would bring down all of these prices. and you know what is really cool, if we could somehow get our arms around these gas prices, you have a huge collapse around the electricity source. that would really help the economy. >> would you say yesterday was the beginning of a general election from an optics standpoint? we're going to hear this for the next six months. >> it started weeks ago. i'm totally opposed to depreciate it and that's much more than every other industry in america. the other point is, what is the point of attacking them when we

need them. fossil fuel is going to be around for decades. it really is a base. and that's what you're hinting at. >> i see you're looking at interesting open picks on the consumer today, specifically on income spending, confidence, savings rate? >> not bad. not fabulous. consumer spending good. consumer income not that good. inflation eroding income a little bit. i don't know if the real jobs are high paying. a lot of people are speculating that they are lower paying jobs. on the whole, consumers are spending. confidence number is excellent. that includes the gasoline spike so it hasn't taken the air out of the economic tires yet. chicago manufacturing was a little light but still a decent number. i still think we're close to a 3% economy. i'm still optimistic on stocks. i really am. i just feel that this wave is not over yet. we'll deal with the election and down the road and the tax hikes

and all of that when it comes. >> there have been cautionary calls on nonfarm, right? and that's got possible paid back at some point. is this number going to surprise for march? >> 250 would keep that trend going. 350? >> 350. if this economy were growing at 4 or 5%, you would have 300, 350,000 new jobs a month. way back when when i worked for reagan and we were coming out of a bad recession, those are the kinds of numbers we had. look, 250 is fine. it will produce income, keep consumers going. it's a decent outcome. profits are the most important thing and i just want to come

back to a theme. my friend jim cramer has emphasized this. lower natural gas prices cuts price are for all industries. it's that tax cut and profit boost and that's just good for stocks in the economy. if you can get your arms around gasoline, okay, we'll be in better shape maybe than people think. >> exactly. >> and this is a profound change and that tax cut effect could make that economy better and let's get on with free market capitalism as far as washington is going. i still hope that's in the cards. >> i love reading your feed on twitter. we'll see you tonight, larry. >> thank you very much. straight ahead, the biggest story of the first quarter. both in stark controversy. we'll be right back.

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