welcome to the program. headlines today from around the globe, mixed news out of the banks. barclays beats thanks to improvements in investment banking. q1 better than expected, but deutsche hit by a one off charge. also shares in alcatel-lucent plunged after margins fall. >> people are very cautious, very reluctant, and the model that we have in europe simply doesn't work to allow people to make risky investments as they

perceive it or do more than is absolutely necessary. >> and in japan, minute endo promises to regain its shine after poeing it first annual loss in more than 30 years. >> and fed chairman ben bernanke down plays the expectation of any further easing in the mere future but doesn't completely close the door. >> i remain prepared to use balance sheetle tools to support the recovery and to help make sure unemployment continues its downward path. >> and u.s. trade representative ron kirk says china has room to free up its markets further. ambassador kirk joins us live for a first on cnbc interview. and coming up in today's program, u.s. treasury secretary tell oth any geithner says europe is doing a better job of managing its crisis. find out what else he told cnbc

in an exclusive interview. and the exclusives don't stop there. i spoke to the chairman of icbc. tune in for that at 10:40 cet, plus ways to make money in latin america. we hear from an expert who is overweight brazil. find out why at 11:20 cet. >> bank earnings are in focus again dominating the session here in europe. barclays ended the first quarter with an increase in adjusted pretax profit of enue reboundin. performance has been encouraging, all hoe it declined to provide an outlook because it says market conditions are just too challenging. the stock up 1.6%. elsewhere,more mixed. profits below estimates after it booked belle legal and impairment charges. patricia has more in frank

further. >> market reaction is clearly negative. also what the bank had to say about the investment banking part saying the economic concerns will impact investment banking in 2012 as well as 2013. plus as well the entire environment, of course. numbers definitely below expectations, but also the asset and wealth management side actually lost 8 billion euros. litigation charges were about 230 million and the entire environment remains challenging. cfo comments and we'll actually have him on closing bell around about 17:50 cet. he said there will be no need for a capital increase at deutsche bank this order to reach the regulatory requirements. i think this is something very important for analysts to have heard and they also said that

they only took a very small amount of the ltro money provided by the ecb. so all in all i think what is very important to see is what's going to happen strategy wise, where they'll be more and more emphasis. still looking at margin pressure, however, it seems that there's a bit more momentum at that part of the business, but we need to hear clear management change and clear management vision once the co-ceos come in at the end of may. >> absolutely. thanks for that. also if n. spain, santander posted a 24% drop in its profit after provisions against nonperforming loans climbed in the first quarter, but those numbers did it beat forecasts. karen has more for us in madrid. >> yes, the stock pretty volatile in trade, outpacing what we've seen on the ibex, but the actual numbers, 1.6 beating was the profit and i investigation profit because this is just showing you the

amount of money still flashing in the spanish banking system despite all the negative headlines out there. sure the provisions are double that at 3.13 billion euros, but if you strip out this effect and take a look at the numbers pre-provision, in fact santander said a new quarterly record of 6.3 billion euros, up 9.2%. so this is telling you about some of the strength playing out in the banking system. and don't forget these are banks with very diversified earnings, as well, and u.s. and continental europe all contributing to the profits. bad loan side made the market nervous. 3.98% was the bad loan ratio. but in spain, 5.75%. so it is higher than expected, but still below the industry average of 8%. in terms of the actual figure bad debts 32.6 billion euros. so you can start as to see there

is some negativity, but santander certainly in a position to be able to cope with that. i asked the bbva, cfo and present ceo yesterday on their thoughts about theough banking sector here versus the broader sector and they were keen to dress this is not what we're seeing in 2008 all over again. >> translator: i think that we are not facing a 2008 situation. the perspective has changed in terms of the economic cycle, we have had five years of economic deterioration in spain. simultaneously, there has been a consolidation process. there were 45 local banks in 2008. today we have only nine local banks. >> and the xhnts there from the bbva cfo confirming what the imf said, saying we are seeing strength in the system, just about ten vul per be banks out there.

there's been a huge a consolidation. these banks are profitable. where some of the concerns still lie is this terms of the bad debts and the leveraging on the loan side. spain and portugal, we did see a fall in lending for this will quarter. down 4% in spain. down 6% in portugal. no surprise, who wants to borrow in this environment. we know the banks have been tapping ltro, but they've been using those funds to reprice their loan book and get a better terms there. so this is helping their profits when it comes to net interest income. back to you. >> all right. thanks for that. we'll talk to you later. joining us for more, assist aan editor at reuters. peter, good to see you. you've had time to digest those numbers. what's the key thing, the key takeaway for you you? >> it's a difficult one, i have to say, this first quarter because you're sort of to a certain extent, we're still stuck in a bit of limbo on some

of these banks. doifrp for example waiting for a new management team to arrive. santander obviously problems in spain. but i think probably what's interesting is that for the first time in several years really, we're seeing a bit of differentiation coming in in some of these banks and people are beginning to drill down and look at performances in particular, businesses, and say how did you do compared to the competition. so for example if you look at deutsche bank, people are looking today at their trading businesses, particularly fixed income, and say that was down in the first quarter compared to first quarter 2012, but not by as much as rivals like credit suisse. so does that mean deutsche is taking market share or does it mean it's being more clever about hinges? doifrp's message was we're aing market share. barclays fixed income trading was you willy up year on year, which was quite unusual compared to some of the rivals.

so i think people will be trying to piece together really who is winning and who is losing in these market battles at the moment. >> we heard joseph ackerman say it might get harder for peripheral banks. a difficult environment overall. when you look at santander and bbva together, they both said we met the capital requirements laid down by the eba, bba says we haven't loaded up on more spanish debt. whan investors really need to know is how exposed are they still to what happens with the spanish economy? >> that's absolutely right. they're can definitely the tallest, strongest banks in spain. but the question is that really a claim worth making. and i think it's interesting thatbviously can continue to stress hair diversification and are looking at an ipo of their max can business which would trade on a much higher multiple and presumably release capital which would help them strengthen

theirs. so even though santander can say we've met all the requirements, we've made all the provisions we have to make, even then, investors aren't totally convinced that they're totally immune from what happens in spain. >> and you make the point about different -- we're starting to differentiate between banks. barclays stock is up today and deutsche and santander is down. is that going to become do you think a meaningful differentiation? >> i think the investors for the time being are still lumping tell all together. you look at the valuations on which these banks trade. they're really not that different. people are still looking at book value multiples. and if there is a differentiation, it's really by country. kind of the spanish banks trade to the german banks or something like that. but i think as the sort of

capital picture becomes clearer, and as it becomes clearer -- the other thing you're seeing, for a while we're all doing the same kind of things. dearly for some banks have been in the investment banking business is just pot going to be an option anymore given the capital requirements. they'll have to be much more clear about what their strategy actually is rather than saying we'll do a bet of everything just like everyone else. >> all right, peter, we'll come back to you a little later. plenty more from peter to come. chris even. >> taking a look at asian markets, mostly higher. we have assurance from the fed it will keep an accommodative stance to support growth. that's helping sentiment a little bit. strong earnings also helping to

boost investor sentiment. nikkei 225 over in japan in and out of negative territory, but managing on close to the up side, but pretty much flat today. we have the bank of japan meeting coming up tomorrow, so a cautious stance is being adopted by investors will. traders cautious in shanghai. we have bank earnings in focus. industrial bank reporting strong earnings. tomorrow we have icbc, bank of china later on today. so a lot of people waiting to see what kind of profits that will continue to show. not to mention there was rumors circulating we could see some policy easing from the pboc. so this particular market trading a little bit to the down side. the hang seng pretty much up 0.8%, china unicom, mixed bag of earnings, posting strong earnings giving a lift to the market, but byb being assumed by warren buffett, that traded to the down side. that seems to be weighing, all that mixing in to the basket of the hong kong market. elsewhere south korea up 0.1%.

not a strong finish despite data showing a faster than expected growth in the first quarter. guess what? data showing maybe the outlook will look uncertain from here given the global uncertainty surrounding the export picture. australian market up 0.3%. new zealand pretty interesting. flat. why some we had the central bank keeping rates steady, but signaling a strong dollar as a concern. india down three points. so overall, it looks mostly higher, but a very cautious trade today. ross, what does your meet map say? >> we just weighted to the up side. around 3:2 after slim gain the ftse yesterday. much better gains in sort of core europe. xetra dax up 1.7, just mildly higher. cac 40 up 1.about 7.

ibex just down. you've seen the weight of santander weighing on the ibex. keep your sigh eyeyes on periph. they upped their economic forecasts, still kept in place the potential for more qe. but we did see per about per yields come down yesterday. we have seen lch coming in with a marginal hike. and what they're saying for 10 to 15 year o.a.t. its, 30 basis point increase in margins. going to get a 50 basis point increase in margins. hasn't had a notable impact on trading today. as far as xwilt oigs concerned, pretty steady yields after disappointing gdp numbers yesterday, but sterling still up at 7 1/2 month highs against the dollar. in fact, the dollar has weakened

post that because they kept the door open for more qe. canadian dollar doing fairly well, as well, today. up to a seven month peak at 98.16. the out that canadian central bank will not follow through with more stimulus. dollar-yen is weaker, 81.08. and the euro up against the dollar, as well, 1.3250. so the dollar index down at three week lows. christine. >> well, it's all about the fed tweaking its forecasts, marginally higher for the u.s. economy for this year, but ben bernanke insists that qe-3 is not off the table. he said the fed was prepared to use any tools available if the economy needed it. he expected the fedded to move on rates, but more official thes now saw a rate hike in 2014 as appropriate. bernanke also highlighted continuing concerns over europe. >> progress has been made, but

obviously judging by market conditions, there's still more work to be done. and we are counting on our european colleagues to continue to follow through their commitments and to put very strong effort into addressing what remain significant problems and concerns in europe. >> at the same time, the u.s. treasury secretary timothy git p geithner has warned severe austerity drive would push back into recession. he said that while europe was doing much better job of handling it crisis, risks do remain. >> they're putting a lot of financial force behind these reform efforts. so again, i think hat most likely you'll see is that europe contains the risk of a major cataclysm. they let the reforms take some time to work and our economy should continue to gradually strengthen lieu that. >> geithner also spoke about the

trade relations ahead of next week's strategic dial up in beijing. he'll be co-chairing with the top chinese officials in beijing. >> exports to china over the last three years have been growing very, very rapidly. chinas has let the exchange rate appreciate by roughly 13% against the dollar in real terms over that period of time. competitive playing field is shifting if our direct. >> but is there room for the world's second largest economy to open up further? ron kirk thinks so. he says china can help global prosperity by committing to free market sense abilities with the same dedication shown when pushing into other are markets. joining us now on a first on cnbc interview, u.s. trade representative ron kirk. ambassador, thank you so much for being with us today. tell us more how you feel china should do more to open up it markets. >> well, as secretary geithner noted, our trade with china has been on a very nice trajectory.

it's important to note that it's been roughly ten years since the u.s. and other members of the world trade organizations invited china to join. it would be hard to argue against a proposition that no country's benefited more from global trade liberalization than china. we think that's a good thing. they've made a great contribution to global stability. but there's no question that china still has some ways to go to fulfill all the commitments that it made when it joined the wto. we well can their growth. but we simply want help to continue on their path of liberalizing opening up their economy across a number of sectors. and that would not only be good for china, but it would also be good for the rest of the world. >> one gripe the u.s. has is the way china is appreciatingis currency. are you happy with the appreciation you're seeing from the chinese? >> secretary geithner has spoken to that.

and i'll let his comments stand on their own.currency has moved. what we look at at the trade perspective are all the other ways that china can advantage its own domestic industries over other suppliers, whether it's in indigenous innovation, intellectual property the rights, any number of other things. exporter strengths. they all have the met effect of giving china an advantage to the disadvantage we think of u.s. suppliers and manufacturers and others around the world. all we're basically asking china to do, christine, is just get government's hand off the scale. chinese companies are growing marvelously well. they're more than capable of going out and competing in a global market pace and that's what we want is fair competition. >> in what areas would the u.s. want more access to in china, can you be more specific? >> for example, economies like the u.s., so he would say here in singapore, have learned and

understand that when we put restraints in place, all we do is make it more expensive for our businesses. so in the area of services investment, for the most part, the u.s. has a completely open services and investment regime. china still works from a cat take log. we'd like to see them not have a catalog at all. but clearly we would love for them to open up for u.s. and other businesses to come in, buy companies and compete and compete on the same level as domestic companies. in terms of provision of raw materials, we recently challenged china's export restraints on that and won that case in the wto because we want to make sure china doesn't manage these critical materials that are so relevant. we don't want china to manage those in a way that it advantages their own domestic have is a industries and harms the rest of the world. but there are a number of areas across innovation, services and

investment, we i thithink it woe in china's interests to continue toward liberalization. >> we have a political transition going on in china right now. what would you say to the new leaders in place that would enhance trade between both countries? >> what we are say to the presumed leadership as we've been saying, and we don't know what that will be, but we recently had the opportunity to host vice president che earlier this year and we'll say what our president has said. we absolutely welcome and support china's rise as a world global economic power. it's the reason that we made a very difficult but wise vote to endorse china's joining the world raid organization. but we think that we have complimentary skills that can help china meet its long term growth objectives and the best way for china to meet the needs to move people out of poverty,

continue their upward trajectory, is to have strong healthy competitive industries that aren't advantaged because of governmental preferences. open up, compete, and let us help you grow. >> ambassador, there are quite a few protectionist voices in congress. do you think you can do enough, chief enough to keep those calls of protectionism in the u.s. at bay? >> well, ross, i do believe that we can and i think it was most clearly demonstrated by a very strong coalition that supported president obama's move last fall to approve our raid agreements with colombia, panama and korea and renew very important assistance program for workers. but i would also push back on you a little bit. most americans also find it amusing that we continue to hear these claims of protectionism towards the u.s. when by any

definition, we have the largest trade imbalance in the world. and i suggested to many of our colleagues if we're protectionists, we're flunking that test in a magnificent way. >> okay. i hear plenty of congressmen, there are certain congressmen who come out and make these calls and they get publicity. so you have to be careful about the image that that projects, right? >> i learned early in my political career that very little i can do to manage what you choose to cover. and we understand our members of congress and our constitutional democracy operate independently from the administration. different members of congress will raise different concerns. but we believe under president obama's leadership the strength of our trade policy is evidenced in the fact that we have been -- we have shown an ability to work with those who both support and strongly favor moving forward

with trade aggressively and those that have had legitimate concerns. and we found the common ground and built a new tell pltemplate allowed us on move forward in a legitimate wide. and that's what's allowing us to now move forward very aggressively in trying to build the transpacific partnership. so i know there are some that will be critical of trade, but we think the more appropriate approach is the one the president has outlined. >> when we come back, we want to get your thoughts on beef and argenti argentina, as well.

let's get reaction to the move in beef. ambassador, how do you respond and what is the u.s. doing to contain the problem? >> the first thing we've done, and i know our secretary of agriculture tom vilsack has spoken to this. usda and others havest this had particular animal, they did confirm it had a very rare

strain of this bse. but i think the most important hinge that they have termdeterm this was more of a genetic mutation, that he did not contract it by animal feed. and that's where we have the concern for consumers. if it was contracted by feed, it's more likely it would have impacted the whole herd. nothing to imply that. i think us did ta has confirmed this animal was not put into -- slaughters and put in to production. so based on all the scientific evidence we have today, there's no reason to believe there is any health concern to u.s. consumers or any of our global partners. >> so the ban should be lifted? >> i don't believer the ban should have ever been imposed. the reality is that first and foremost, the government won't quarrel if any actions to protect the health and safety of our citizens. but if you're going to on do take relative to food safety, all of us make a covenant to do

so based on sound sanitary standards. we don't believe there is any reason at all for indonesia to impose the ban. >> and what's your reaction -- argentine senate voted to approve of nationalization of ypf, a yununit part of repsol. what is the u.s. reaction on con if i indication of assets? >> first of all, i think you know as a general proposition,d of assets? >> first of all, i think you know as a general proposition,cn if i indication of assets? >> first of all, i think you know as a general proposition,c? >> first of all, i think you know as a general proposition, as tempting as it can be in the short it erm to protect domestic growth, its not a path for sustainable economic progression and led by mexico and a number of other country, the united states signed the resolution in geneva a couple weeks ago condemning will type of activity.

i think you know the spanish government has spoken out strongly against this. and we don't qualify at all with argentina's efforts and objectives to try to strengthen their economy. we still believe mftiin opening hair markets for more investment is the way to do will. the actions that argentina has taken i don't believe will do anything to incentivize other investors to come into the market. >> ambassador, thank you so much for your i'm. >> thank you for having me. that was ron kirk, u.s. trade representative in an exclusive cnbc interview. ross. stories we're following today, barclays improve investment banks, but q1 better. deutsche bank being hit by one off charges. and shares of al came teka teca

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an hour and a half into the european trading day, european stocks mild gains on very heavy earnings day around 2:1. good numbers from barclays this morning. xetra dax good numbers, deutsche bank fairly disappointing. gains of 1.7% yesterday. cac 40 up around 0.2%. santander is weaker. as far as bond markets are

concerned, no big reaction to the hiking of margin requirements from the beginning of may. around 3% level on the ten year yield at the moment. and spanish bonds, 50 basis points comes in on may the 3rd. bund yields higher than where we have been. as far as the currency markets are concerned, the reaction to ben bernanke for the dollar has been to see the dollar index slip to three week lows. yesterday did upgrade their economic forecast slightly. slightly better turn on the economy. but they still kept the door open for more qe and there are some who position themselves in thoughts that would close. so euro-dollar up to 1.3254. dollar down against the yen. canadian dollar after seven month highs thoughts the central bank won't add to its monetary policy, so doing fairly well. and sterling actually here up at 7 1/2 month highs against the dollar despite the pact that we

saw with the flash estimate uk officially in recession from yesterday. christine, how have we looked in asia today? >> well, it was all about ben bernanke today. his stance that he will support growth. that is helping sentiment across the region. earnings clearly if focus. front, center, everywhere else. nikkei 225 pretty much flat. market players in the japanese market are staying very cautious ahead of the bank of japan meeting scheduled for tomorrow. the shanghai composite a bit of a cautious day there. bank earnings in focus. we have industrial bank of course and some of the other banks posting strong earnings. tomorrow we having a gri cae ai agricultural bank reporting. hang seng up 0.8%. gains late session. we had some mixed earnings coming from the like of china.

byd, which is a chinese carmaker backed by warren butch at the time reporting a 90% slide in quarterly profit late yesterday. so that took a hit. elsewhere, strong gdp numbers in south korea, but the outlook pretty uncertain, so that kind of took away any gains coming from ben bernanke comments. new zealand central bank keeping rates on hold citing the strong currency as something to look out for in terms of future monetary policy. and the sensex pretty much flat, so a little bit of a cautious start to the day. >> we heard more comments out from wen. he'll set up branches in central and eastern europe and wants to raise 500 million in a dedicated china emerging eu fund. china wants to set up 10 billion credit line for central and eastern europe. also got munumbers out from the

bank of china, says its q1 net profit 36.76 billion yuan. much lower than the forecast of 48.91 billion yuan. net profit figure lower than we might have thought. and that sort of ties in with the move at deutsche bank. profit slightly below estimates after it booked around 300 million euros worth of legal and impairment charges. net income came in at 1.4 billion euros. profit down around 26%. better news at barclays. it had an increase in adjusted pretax profit of 22%. revenues rebounded. british lend her says performance for the start of the year has been encouraging, but it's been declined to provide an

outlook. and santander had a 24% drop in profit after bigger provisionses against nonperforming loans, net income, came in at 1.6 billion, which is below estimates. loan losses jumping 51% because of the economic conditions in the eye berrien peninsula. following a visit to spain, the agency saw significant differences between the country's big banks and small in how they would cope with worsening economic conditions. the imf says the large groups appear to sufficiently capitalize, savings banks immediate to build bigger buffers. and on that neote, we'll bring peter back this. we were talking earlier about were the big banks really sufficiently sort of divorced from the spanish economy.

how much more of a bad bank do we immediate in spain fmeed neet savings banks? >> it's difficult for any one bank in spain to divorce itself from the problems of the overall banking system. and as you saw from that imf report, even though they've taken significant write down pri provisions on the property exposures and balance sheets, some invest thinks think they might need to do a bit more to persuade people that they've dealt with the problem. the question then really is sort of how you you do that. and we've argued quite strongly that what they really need is not necessarily a straight forward recapitalization or provisioning, could you do that, but it would be complicated. but actually what could you do is you could do an insurance type scheme a bit like the uk did for world bank of scotland in 2009 where you basically -- the government, although in this case it would have to be with the help of the european authorities in some he ways,

basically says, okay, if the losses get worse, we will basically cover them and that way you sort of take the tail risk of a real disaster scenario off the table for investors and for the market. and you allow these banks to hopefully get back on their feet. >> could you use european eu funding for that purpose of insurance? because the whole point of insurance is you don't need to ever tap it, i suppose. >> yes, that is the point of insurance. or at least by providing it, you make it less likely that it's needed. but obviously it has to be credible, which is why the spanish government can't do it because the spanish government is not a sufficient guarantor at the moment. it's not really clear whether you could do it by the eu. obviously there's a provision in the bailout fund that it can lend to countries for the purpose of recapitalizing their banks. w i don't see why it wouldn't be possible to provide insurance for the companies providing

insurance to their banks, but there may be all kinds of legal objections to to. but given the sort of the creativity that's been shown by some of these institutions in handling some of these bailouts, doing something like that wouldn't be beyond them. what is clear, though, is is that spanish banks need some kind of solution. and actually what they've done so far, whether or not it's enough in the long run, it's pailed in the sense that it hasn't restored confidence at the moment. >> yeah, i was struck by draghi yesterday saying it would take it a month or two to work out what happened in the ltro money. santander said most is still on deposit at the ecb. very little of that will get into the real economy. >> varies bank by bank. santander will have drawn on the ltro as an insurance policy if it they can't roll over their funding. in the meantime, you're right, they just park it at the ecb. deutsche bank said this morning, although they didn't put any

mums on it, they've taken a little bit of ltro money. and i think the argument there seems to be some of the uk banks have done this, as well, the art there seems to be you take ltro funding about order to fund your positions in some of the peripheral countries and then if the eurozone does really collapse, that at least is not a problem for your head office. >> i want to get your views as well now on goldman sachs. there was an interview on c mbs in the u.s. yesterday with lloyd blankfein, he old us they had no plans to step aside as ceo of goldman sachs after an op-ed accused bank executives of losing control of the firm. described his initial reaction to the claims that goldman referred to their own clients as mupp muppets. >> we've gotten used to surprises, but we read it

closely. of course our first reaction is to take it very seriously and say what is really going on here and to try to get at the work. >> change in tact from a pr marketing perspective. they've suddenly decided maybe we do need to come out and speak to people. what do you make of the challenge facing gold man? >> it's very significant because they're in the spotlight and they're not used to be in the spotlight in this this way particularly in the u.s. they're used to operating behind wills scenes and being very well-known to sort of big companies and to governments and to institutions. but not being sort of public name and what's happened over the last few years is that they've become a public name. and so everything they do is subject to more scrutiny than they used to. whether you come out and talk about it in public or not, you debate the merits. the question really is what you say and who says it. and lloyd blankfein, i don't really necessarily see lloyd blankfein stepping aside in

favor of someone else would change much at goldman sachs. the question is there a broader shift that needs to take place and what we've argued is that what they should really do is split the chairman and chief executive's role and appoint a strong chairman would who could then will also do some of this talking and provide some air cover it for blank pine who is now having to take it on by himself. but they've resisted that. >> he said you've got chairman and ceo the same person, it means you've got the same message. but i'm not sure that washes. >> that's right. one way of arguing it. >> peter, good to see you. thanks very much indeed for that. we'll get you back and talk about holland, as well. but for now, we'll let you go. christine. focusing on chinese bank earning, but we have comments coming out from wen who is in poland. he's encouraging chinese banks to set up branches apparently in central eastern europe. he also says he wants to set up a $10 billion credit line for

infrastructure, tech projects and central eastern europe as well. so those are some of the things coming out. we know of course he is in latin america traveling. a slew of bank earnings out. tracey chang has the details for us. >> this week is all about earnings. we have several very big chinese financials reporting q1 results including bank of china, hong kong, which we just broke out for you, net profit will of $5.8 billion which was sdwrus below forecasts. the nonperforming loan ratio there just under 1%. let's look at some others. 43% rise in first quarter profit over last year thanks to strong growth in goss. meanwhile industrial bank earnings also surnged merely 60% over qe 1 last year. and despite robust earnings growth, there seems to be growing public discontent over a lack of competition in china's

banking sector. china's 16 listed banks total 2011 profits are higher than the announced annual gdp. and we will hear from several china banking heavy weights tomorrow. earnings numbers are due from several. >> and of course all those earnings coming at a time when china of course is slowing down. tracy, thank you very much for that. >> i spoke exclusively with the bank's chairman in beijing and asked him about icbc's profit outlook. take a listen. >> translator: just as it is impossible for the chinese economy to continue a growth rate of over 9% for the next 30 years, chinese banks will witness their profit growth gradually coming down to a reasonable level starting from

this year. >> as china shows clear signs of closing down, how will this impact your loan growth this year, where do you see demand coming from? railroad i think the chinese economy is growing at a normal pace. in the first quarter, we made more than 232.9 billion yuan in new loans and that is actually 24 billion yuan more than the same period lasts year. >> when you hear wen say the monopoly needs to be broken, are you worried about the shakeup? >> translator: i totally agree with premiere wen that we should break the monopoly. i think the essence of premiere wen's comments is that he wants to see a healthier more diversified and more multiownership financial system so as to enhance the efficiency of the financial services. this is exactly what i wish could happen. in a healthy economy, you have

to have sufficient competitiveness and anti-monopoly enforcement. i believe china will promote legislation in this aspect in the future to better define what a monopoly is and what it is not. we have full confidence to face the challenge. >> you can catch the full exclusive interview this weekend. nintendo posting its first annual operating lorks but insists it's not game over. let's go to the nikkei live in tokyo. >> continue ten dough posted its first ever operating loss of $456 million for the fiscal year ended march. sluggish gain console sales in the u.s. and the strong yen dragged down sales by 36% year 00 year to $8 billion. nintendo slashed prices

worldwide for its 3 dd s hand hd wi helds last august. nintendo hopes to get back into the black this year. it will be releasing a string of game titles including one of its all-time favorites, super mario brothers. that's all from the nikkei. back to you. >> thank you very much for that. well, earnings parade also in south korea. the big surprise came from hyundai motor. >> yeah, christine, hyundai beat in all financial categories despite sluggish domestic sales. but the biggest upward drive no hyundai came from overseas. sales in fact jumped 17% despite the comeback of japanese rivals.

going forward, hyundai thinks the japanese yen will stay relatively strong. and they also plan to launch five new models in the u.s. will this year. meanwhile, sk hynix saw a third quarterly loss among weak pc demand but shares closed higher by about half a percent. demand is growing at an exponential rate as more chinese customers buy smart phones. hynix is still deciding whether to bid in further round, but insured investors that it will not overspend. back over to you, christine. >> thank you very much for that. earnings continue, ross. >> yeah, super thursday here in europe. shares plunge after margins full. the actual story right after this. this.

big earnings today in europe. broadly speaking, we have shell up 2.79% this morning coming up

with company beating broadcasts, 11% rise in fourth quarter profit as high oil prices outway the impact of lower u.s. gas prices. unilever saw its sales price thanks to price hikes as well as growth but warned challenging conditions. stock up 3.2%. and bayer has also beat forecasts thanks to a pick up about will demand for pesticides. we'll talk to the ceo later in extended programming. but the real downdraftcatel-luct alcatel-lucent, stock off nearly 14%. stefane has more details in paris. >> yes, the qe 1 net profit was stronger than expected but doesn't reflect the real business conditions which are difficult in europe and north america and these two regions, they are facing weaker demand from telecom operators.

the ceo of the company is very cautious about the situation in europe. >> the problem is that in europe, people are very cautious, very reluctant respect and the model that we have in europe simply doesn't work to allow people to make risky investments as they perceive it or do more than is absolutely fess. >> he also explained that the margin was not at the level that he would have liked. the profitability has been impacted by the shift to new generation of telecom gear where the profitability, margin lower as a result, the company reported an operating loss of 221 million euros. the company says it will have a better visibility at the end of the quarter. >> stefane, thanks for that.

swiss maker of computers announced better than expected earnings and says it's cutting costs by over 10%. we'll have more from carolyn in the second half, and also still to come, timothy geithner says europe is doing a better job of managing its crisis. we'll have more market reaction to the fed, as well. remember, the dollar index currently down at three week lows. and we'll dig in to the earnings state side, as well.

in the united states, ben bernanke down plays the expectations of any further easing in the near future. but doesn't close the door. >> we remain prepared to use balance sheet tools to support the recovery and to help make sure that unemployment continues its downward path. >> mixed results from european banks. barclays beats. santander q1 better than expected. but deutsche bank has been hit by a one off charge. >> and in japan nintendo promises to regain its shine

this year after posting its first annual loss in more than 30 years. >> welcome back. you're watching "worldwide exchange." great to have you with us. let's go ahead and take a look at the u.s. futures and see how we're poised to open on wall street. we've pulled back a little sense i first checked the numbers, but the dow looking higher by 14, the nasdaq slightly under the flat line and s&p 500 higher by just about 2 points. this after we saw solid gains for stocks yesterday on some good earnings and a muted reaction to the fed comments that came out. of course we had the apple numbers and the reaction to that, the nasdaq snapping a five day losing streak, the best day since december 20th. and we saw the s&p tech 500 logging the best day in five months, as well. so positive day for stocks yesterday. we'll see if we can continue that momentum today. ross, over to you. >> just had the eurozone april business climate indicator slipped again.

minus 5.2. saying risks are still to the down side for the european economy and we turned negative on the european stocks. cac down third of a percent. deutsche bank is weaker in germany. santander as well. big increase in loan loss provisions for the spanish bank. and al cacatel-lucent down heav in france. >> the big news yesterdays of course was the fed meeting and ben bernanke saying the ted's monetary policy is in the right place, although the central bank will act if the u.s. economy were to take a turn for the worst. as expected, the fed reiterated its pledge to keep rates low until at least late 2014 and upped its economic forecasts to reflect the improving labor market and slightly higher inflation. bernanke says the fed's next move depends on data.

>> forward guidance on the federal funds rate is conditional on the data. and if the data were to come in much stronger than expected, we would adjust the guidance appropriately. so it's not unconditional. it does depend on how the outlook evolves. and, again, should the outlook strengthen notably, then we would have to respond to that. >> fed punds futures are now pricing in a 74% chance of a rate hike in march 2014. raiders also putting chances of further easing at just 28% at this point. meantime, treasury secretary tim geithner says the u.s. economy is looking more resilient and that strength is wrood based. in an interview, he says in order to maintain that yoet, congress needs to pass measures to boost intra structure, exports and help troubled homeowners refinance. >> it would be a terrible mistake for us to lurch prematurely to extreme

austerity. that would undo some progress we've made. it would push unemployment up, back into recession. >> xw >> geithner says you're of that doing a better job and china presents a mix of opportunities and challenges although the competitive playing field is shifting towards the u.s. joining us is tony fratto. great to have you with us this morning. you've heard the comment from the the fed and tim geithner. your outlook right how. >> i think we'll -- we want to be optimistic in to the rest of the year. i think the fed wants to be optimistic. the fed actually do a really remarkable job but they're not good at predicting slowdowns. because they expect that their policy will have a positive impact on the economy. i'm looking at a slowdown, i don't see how the u.s. -- what's the catalyst for growth in the united states. there's no great cat the take list outside the united states with china slowing. europe in's session.

uk in recession. japan in recession. so there aren't a wll lot of reasons to be optimistic for the rest of the year especially with the uncertainty that john got into with secretary geithner there. the end of the year uncertain i with the elections, with the likely withdrawal of stimulus or runoff of stimulus and questions over what we're going to do on tax policy and fiscal policy will be drags on the economy. so i think that's the big risk for the second half of the year. >> that's interesting because a lot of the folks that i'm speaking to are bullish on the markets and of course they are pointing to the u.s. as a place for growth. so if you you think the u.s. is in trouble or not growing as fast as some might think, certainly that's a problem given what we're seeing in europe and china. >> and i'm not talking about falling off a cliff or recession. but we won't get the rapid levels of growth that we want for see to have a big material impact on the unemployment rate and job creation. and i think that the likelihood of getting that rapid growth is

just lower at the end of the rear. we've seen this before where sentiment from market participants, uncertainty, has an impact on the economy. and absent any other great traction in the economy, some big rebound in housing, major technology catalysts out there, we didn't see those thing, we won't see it from energy i don't think in the near term this year. so i think that's where we are. much more optimistic about the future coming out of 2012 into 201 2013 and 2014, but i think 012 will be tough. >> you mentioned energy. could high oil prices change that picture and to what september? >> they can and i think we'll learn a little bit today with exxonmobile and chevron -- i'm sorry, shell and some of the others reporting this week. and try to get their outlook on energy. i think expectations from a lot of people are that oil is going

to -- oil prices will come off their highs. but still remain fairly eleva d elevated. natural gas of course is the great promise. we want to see what we can do with really unbelievably cheap natural gas prices here. less than $2. it's cheaper than water and what happens in situations like that are really innovative people find ways to page use of it because it's cheap and so important to the economy. we do know long term what we're looking at, if you're the big energy producers, we have long term increased demand for energy that's going to continue out for decades. and especially emerging markets become much more needy in terms of energy to supply hair economies and power their homes. demand will be there for a very, very long time.

>> i just noticed exxon had a big jump in quarterly dividends ahead of today's results. it probably suggests numbers won't be too shabby. >> yeah, i would think so. i think they surprised a lot of people with a 21% increase in dividend. and i think that's exactly the kind of signal that i think i'm talking about is that they certainly expect that prices will remain high enough that they can meet their capital expenditures and still pay what is for them a really substantial dividend and gets them back into play with some of their competitors in the market. >> okay. tony, thanks for that. plenty more to come from you. we'll dig into the oil sector results, as well.

and i think my. is slower than everybody else's. here we go. italy has sold just a t-bill auction, a more important one coming up tomorrow, 8.5 billion six month chlt bills. average yield 1.772%. those t-bill yields are up from the previous auction. the bid to cover okay, 1.7. meanwhile rupert murdoch is beginning his second day in court in london. he's standing by his comments from yesterday that gordon brown threatened. and also banking earnings dominating the session in europe. deutsche with disappointing figures. figures.

let's start in the united states where we're looking at an up picture for the markets right now in terms of the u.s. futures. looking like the dow will open by 14, the nasdaq coming back a little over the flat line now and the s&p 500 could be up by about 2. this after solid gains for stocks yesterday. good momentum from apple's report. the nasdaq had a good day snapping a five day losing

streak, its best day since december 20th. so interesting to see if we can keep that momentum up today here in the united states. how does it look in europe? >> momentum swung to the down side. we've just hit the session lows. 3:2. it was the other way around earlier on. corporate numbers from the likes of shell, unilever and barclays all barely good. but just down about a third of a percent after gains yesterday. cac down a third. ibex has turned down 1.8%. if you've just woken up, there has been a margin hike but hasn't had a major impact yet. these margin hikes for both french debt and spanish debt this morning. o.a.t. its, 30 basis point increase on issues between 10 to 15 year duration and spain, 50 basis point hike on may the 3rd.

sparse currently are markets concerned, dollar index at fresh three week lows during the session. it's just clawed back some of those losses, but weaker across the board. this follows of course the fed statement yesterday, keeping the door open for still potentially it may happen some more qe. i know an expectation maybe that door would be closed. sterling up near 7 1/2 month highs against the greenback. now hitting 1.62. despite of course that gdp number yesterday. christine. >> asian markets higher, but pot by much after ben bernanke of course gave the assurance the fed will keep policy accommodative to support growth. earnings continue to be the big focus here in asia. nikkei 225 manage to go close to the up side. we have the bank of japan meeting tomorrow, so a lot of caution ahead of that. the boj expected to increase size of its asset purchase

program. over in shanghai, earnings clearly in focus, but caution there because of earnings coming up from banks, we had boc out after the bell. also tomorrow we have icbc as well as agriculture banks. so that i'ms to be keeping investors minds uncertain right new. hang seng up 0.8%, mixed bag of earnings. chinese car maker that buffett is supporting posting a slide in earnings. and of course we had earnings from china unicom. strong gdp numbers, south korea help to go lift the particular market, but the outlook uncertain, but set gains coming from bernanke's comments. australian market up 0.3%. big story the central bank keeping rates unchanged, but citing the strong kiwi as a concern of focus going forward.

the sensex trading to the down side. still trading in and out of negative territory. so overall a mixed picture. most markets trading to the up side. i'll be back tomorrow with the news moving markets here in asia. >> meant plenty of earnings tod. barclays revenue banking unit rebounds. nearly doubled to around 3.5 be billion pounds. performance has been encouraging, although still declined to provide an outlook because of challenging market conditions. in spain, santander posted a 24% drop in profit after provisions against nonconforming loans climbed. net income at 1.6 billion euros just below estimates. loan loss provisions up 51% because of the economic conditions in the iberian

peninsula which offset growth. and disappointing figures from deutsche bank. profit below estimates. booked around 300 million euros of legal and impairment charges. patricia ma trish patricia has the reaction. >> down 3.5%. and, yeah, it seems that the anybody didn't like what they say to say in terms of the number, but also in will terms of the outlook. investment banking supposed to have an impact about in terms of the economic environment this year as well as next year. also money is blowing out of the asset management side of the business, about 8 billion have left. on the other hand, comments from the cfo earlier on say has gone they will not be the need it for a capital hike at the moment. that kind statement does not do the trick for investors. so they only took a very small amount of ltro.

by the way, we'll have him on later on closing bell at about 17:00 cet. should be very interesting. remember, this is the last set of results. i don't think he will say anything in terms of the strategy or more detail on the strategy going forward. that will be left to the new co-ceos due to come in at the last day of may. and that will be very important indeed where is investment banking going, where is also all the other types of businesses going like fx raidintrading. the strategy is entirely important and perhaps left to the new management in terms of guidance. >> absolutely. thanks for that, patricia. meantime here in the states, lloyd blankfein has told cnbc that he has no plans to step aside as ceo of goldman sachs in his first interview in two year, blankfine reacted to last year's

bombshell "new york times" op-ed in which a former employee accused the senior executives of losing roll of the firm. blankfine admitted we haven't gotten everything right, but said that investors continue to support the firm. he described to cnbc his initial reaction to the claims that goldman referred to their own clients as muppets. >> we've gotten used to surprises. so we have to grapple with this. but we read closely. of course our first reaction is to take it very seriously and say what is really going on here and to try to get at the work. >> tony, i want to get your reaction to this this. blankfine coming on for the first time in two years. nice that he's reacting to some of this, but your take on what he said. >> first of all, a lot of the banks, jamie dimon has been the best about getting out and talking. i think we all would like more of the bank chiefs talking about hair businesses and what they're seeing in the economy and how they're going to move on from

the financial crisis and going forward. it's really helpful to everyone and it's helpful to understand how their institutions will work. go goldman probably has the rockiest period coming out of the pnks cfinancial crisis. blankfine made the most important kind that clients are sticking with they will. so that they he can go forward in a positive way. it's really the public who most of the public who are not even customers of goldman who are the critics. but it's still important to them. it's important to have a positive public face and that they're helping the u.s. economy grow and american businesses grow and compete in the world. so that's blankfine's challenge. i think it's a multiyear challenge. it's nothing that will be changed overnight. >> but step in the right

direction. >> no question. >> we'll get more insight from you later on in the show. coming up next, as brazilian bank btg packed up for its debut on the stock exchange, we talk to a guest who says the only way for brazilian equities is up. stick with us. stick with us.

mexico gerl comp federal comp controlling saying it will investigate allegations at walmart. comptroller's office will ask u.s. authorities for information on the case separately shareholder has filed a lawsuit against walmart's board and executives seeking to recover the costs of investigating the bribery claims as well as damage to the company's reputation. taking a look at shares of walmart, in europe they are down about half a percent at 43.33. >> and we have an ipo in brazil after the brazilian bank managed to raise just under $2 billion. a highly anticipated ipo. the market in brazil, though, is all but ground to a halt in the middle of last year in the wake

of the eurozone crisis and three smaller brazilian companies all pulled float plans citing a lack of plans. joining us is julian thompson. seems to be good demand. we saw the first company to float in brazil this year. and they had to have quite a big discount. investors nervous about investing in brazilian companies or do they have to price things just to get them away? >> i don't think they're nervous about invest manage brazil per se. i think the price that is being demanded in a lot of these ipos is fairly cheap, a lot coming in below the range. btg is priced within the range, but one would expect that from

btg. it's quite a unique asset. it has a very good reputation and, therefore, it's really an international layer. the other companies that we're looking at are small domestic operators. so i think there's a unique situation, but i'm not sure the brazilian ipo market is really fully open for business as we speak. because ipos typically you don't make a huge amount of money in brazil on an ipo. the average increase on the first day is 2%, 3%. it's really not like china where effectively you're being given free money and there's huge demand for it. >> brazilian economy has seen quite a big showdown. what's the outlook now? >> i think the outlook is very positive, but it's very polarized. it depends which sectors you you are investing in. we've seen very good performance out of consumer discretionary

infrastructure, utilities, interest rates. that's because the economy has slowed down quite significantly. interest rates have been cut from 12.57% to 9%. they'll probably be cut further 50 basis points on 8.5%. so interest rate doing very well. commodity related sectors and financials doing badly because they're either suffering from the china slowdown or cutting interest rates putting pressure on bank mar begins. and we saw that yesterday with the largest private sector bank in brazil suggesting it will be under pressure second quarter and stock down 6% yesterday. so banks not doing particularly well, but consumer related sectors doing extremely well. >> julian, let's talk about mexico poo second. you're overweight mexico. saying that it's linked to the u.s. manufacturing cycle, we're seeing things pick up there. what else is it you like about

mexico right now? >> what i like particularly about mexico is that it's really in a very different cycle from the rest of the emerging markets. it had a crisis in 1994 which is when i started my investment career and it really put the mexican banking system under pressure for a long period of time. credit is extremely low. less than 20% consumer credit. one of the lowest ratios about emerging markets. and what we're seeing now is a gradual recovery in the banking sector, recovery in consumer lending. and that's on the bank of good employment and a strong manufacturing sector. which is largely linked in to the u.s. cycle. so mexico to us looks extremely well positioned at the moment. >> all right. thank you so much, julian thompson. certainly a great conversation and who are to tamore on talk ad the time. coming up, our next guest says the s&p 500 will like sli be

sustaining in a range the rest of the year. of the year. > dddddddddddddddd

welcome to the show. headlines from around the globe today, here in the united states, ben bernanke down plays the expectations of any further

easing in the near future. but doesn't completely close the door. >> we remain prepared to use balance sheet tools to support the recovery and help make sure that unemployment continues its downward path. >> mixed results from european banks. barclays beats. but deutsche bank hit by a big one off charge. >> and in japan, nintendo promises to regain its shine this year after posting its first annual loss in more than 30 years. nice to have you here. let's take a look at the u.s. futures to see how we're setting up for trade on wall street. we were positive before, now looking in negative territory. dow lower by 3, and the nasdaq as well, and s&p 500 just under the flat line. this after we had a solid day of gains in the u.s. yesterday.

good reaction to the apple numbers. muted reaction to the comments from the fed. the nasdaq snapping a five day losing streak having its best day since december 20. >> european stocks weaker ahead of the u.s. open at the moment. we've come under just a little bit of pressure. european banks very much in focus as you can see. deutsche bank currently down 4.2%. they came out with numbers that were weaker than we might have expected. big junk in loan loss provisions. barclays down s. flat. was up. they've done quite well, better than expected out of the investment banking unit. ftse just up marginally. jackie. >> joining us now is partner and

chief market strategist at bell curve trading and tony fratto is also still with us. bill, looking at the markets and where we stand, we've had a lot of people still expecting great things to come for the rest of the year, but you're taking a bearish view. >> yeah, really our view hasn't changed. we think 2012 will be a range year. around 1420 in the s&p and down 13,500, 13,600. s&p's topped out right around 1420. but the bottom line is we've had a great rally since early october. we're telling our clients take advantage of that. book some profits, get a little bit are more defensive. because we still have a number of issues to deal with. in europe, we still have

sovereign debt issues. we've got governments that are trying to implement budget cuts. you have a slowdown in china. and i think even here in the u.s. if you look at the data, we're definitely taking our foot off the gas pedal, as well. i'm not sure if it will be as dramatic as last year when the market sold off over 20% from the early may highs to the october lows, but we're telling our clients that the market is vulnerable and so we want to be a little bit more defensive. >> i wanted to ask you about the second half. i'm curious as to whether your clients are concerned about how the fiscal situation is going to work out here in the united states. and how you see them reacting to what is going to be a really uncertain outcome. not just from the election

itself, but also miss cal policy. will they pull their head wills back in their shells or will they try to move forward? >> i don't think that's an immediate concern. i think that's spg that's definitely in the back of people's minds. i think kind of the way the politics and the election play into will is how hampers the fed. if we do have the kind of slowdown that we had last year, market sells off, i think once you get into the summer, it's going to be difficult for the fed to really do anything because i don't think they want to be perceived as being through shal influential in the election. so kind of the way i look at the politics entering into this at least in the short term is more h that the fed will be in a blackout period once you get into the summer. so in we do have a swoon like we

did last year, it will be interesting how they react. in terms of the tax issues and budget deficit and things like that, those are major, major issues. but that's not really on the forefront of our clients' minds right now. >> all right, bill, we'll have to leave it there. bill will stick around. rupert murdoch is testifying for a second day. yesterday he was detailing his relationships with the british government down the years. while he said he had a warm friendship with tony blair, he said gordon brown had personally called him to declare war on his media business. kay wh kayla tausche is outside the courts. look, it's sunny. i hear mr. murdoch's reiterated

his statement that gordon brown had indeed declared war on him this morning. >> indeed he is. and the questioning is taking a political line yet again on day three of the inquiry where rupert murdoch and james murdoch were the guests highly anticipated to be appearing here. now, one of the first things he said was that jeremy hunt, remember, he was the culture secretary whose aide resigned yesterday amid allegations that he was leaking information to news corporation during the take overof bskyb, jeremy hunt apparently rupert said he maybe not once or twice, but he doesn't remember and that was one of the key issues brought up, not only for questioning of rue period, but also questioning of james. now, remember, rupert murdoch as been an executive here in the uk for over 60 years, has been hobnobbing with the political scene for over 60 years. so a lot of material to cover and we'red told it's only a half day of questioning today.

so interesting to see what will come out as far as the two hours maybe that we have today, but we'll bring you the headlines as they happen. but again a political day of questioning. >> okay. kayla, we'll follow your tweets, as well, to find out what's going on. thanks for now. >> coming up next, we've already heard from royal dutch shell which reported strong first quarter profits, but still waiting for results from exxonmobile. we'll drill down on exxon, shell and the energy market straight ahead.

we've had corporate earnings out kicking off with oil. shell stock up 2.8%. increase in first quarter profit. unilever up 2.8%. price hikes and growth in emerging markets, although it still warns of challenging conditions. bay bayer forecasts up. pick up in demand for pesticides. we talk to ceo for european viewers in around about 20 minutes or so.

andle ca alcatel-lucent down 14% because of slowing demand from telecom operators. on the flip side, shares in logitech. it continues on cut costs by 10%. hi, carolyn. >> pretty strong set of numbers. fourth quarter net profits jumped nine fold. ebs came in at 17 cents a share, more than double the forecast. and as you said, we saw a big spike in the share price this morning, logitech up by over 12%. but last 12 months, down 42%. three profit warnings last year. a shake up in management and of course this is all pretty much because the company didn't adjust its product proper port i

don't portfolio. >> we think we have the strongest portfolio we've had in a long time. >> and they announced a new restructuring program. it wants to save up to $80 million in costs annually, but the problem is didn't really say what the costs associated to that will be. that's why a couple of analysts out there are still a little cautious about the stock. back over to you. >> thanks, carolyn. jackie. well, royal dutch shell's first quarter are profits rose 11% beating forecasts as higher oil prices and ramp up of new projects offset lower gasoline prices in the u.s. exxonmobile reporting numbers at 8:00 a.m. analysts expecting flat earnings growth following the flung in natural gas prices. exxon is raising its quarterly dividend making it the top

corporate dividend payer. richard, thanks so much for coming in. let's talk about exxon for a moment. we are seeing lower natural gas prices eating in to potential growth there and seeing oil prices at high levels. do you anticipate those prices to stay where they are in terms of what we're seeing for crude? >> i think crude prices will stay where they are. i think the fundamentals really don't support this level, but the bottom line is geopolitical risk is very high right now. the issues with iran will put a floor beneath prices today. >> so do you expect that to impact not just exxon, but some other companies in the space and p what do you think for the next quarter? >> i think prices will stay at this level until i'm guessing the summer. the summer ultimately is going to be when we see resolution of this issue. and as a result, oil will benefit from a higher price a of crude than normally the market would dictate. the saudis are pumping an awful lot of oil. stockpiles around the world are

growing. so if we were to come to a situation where this iranian situation was resolved in a diplomatic way, we could easily see crude prices crop drop by $ so dollars. i think it will be very unusual in the situation between the p 5 plus 1 in iran to find a solution where both sides seem so unwilling to make a first gesture. so i don't hold great hopes. my hope is that it will happen, but at the end of the day, i think that as time marches on, it will become more and more unlikely. and with the israelis sitting on the sideline with a stop watch running, this this is a lot of pressure to come to it a deal. and morally you don't strike a deal with a lot of time pressure especially one as complex as will one. >> and what about slowing global growth? we've taken our forecasts down for china. issues in europe lead to us believe growth there will be muted, as well. how can that bring the price down, as well, if demand starts to quinn dell? >> i think really that's why

you're starting to see stockpiles grow so much. on the one side on the fundamentals analysis, supplies are growing. saudis are pumping as much as they can trying to calm the markets. on the other side, the u.s. is consuming a lot less. we came down from about 21 million barrels down to about 18. and we're seeing the eu strength, as well. with china starting to see its growth starting to slow, global demand is really static. i think it will be steady unlike what other people are really saying. i think the best we can hope for is steady. it may be coming down. so we say fundamentals don't justify this price. so really we have to get through this issue of geopolitical risk and try to get to that resolution so we can once again come back to the actual supply and demand. >> and it will impact the election coming up. >> no question about it. if you have some kind of resolution, i think it's actually unlikely in an election environment, if you were the iranians, what incentive do you have to make a deal with an

american president who might be in the last five or since months of office. so i discount that a little bit. there it's no question if gasoline prices stay elevated, it's going on play a big role in in election. voters care about it even if it doesn't have a real material impact on their weekly expenditures iks psychologically it's an issue and they usually blame a president when those prices stay elevated. >> all right, gentlemen, we'll leave it there for now. thank you so much to richard for joining us on the program and tony will stick around. meantime mitt romney is last man standing in the race for the republican presidential candidate. let's get a view on the elections from tony, as well. tony, we were just talking about those elections. let's shift the conversation over to mitt romney and look at the republicans. how do you think his chances ares as he comes up against obama? >> he's right where he wanted to be, a two-man race, he cleared the republican field. we know gingrich has now finally suspending his campaign.

this is the great opportunity for him. he just went through a bruising republican primary season. there are a lot of questions about him, whether he's strong enough to represent the conservatives in a party. i think he's doing a good job of consolidating that support among all republicans. now he needs to reintroduce himself to more loosely attached voters. independents, swing voters, some democrats. and especially in the 10 to 12 state has we know are the real battleground states where these are voters who they haven't made up their mind yet. they could swing for the president, they could swing for a mitt romney. he needs to allow them to give him a chance to make his case, make this a two-man race and a choice between him and the president. i think he'll be financed enough to do it. we'll head in to the fall with a great race, i think. >> of course a lot more that we could talk about when comes to that topic, but we have to leave it there. thank you both. meantime coming up next, a slew of earnings due out today including big names like

pepsico, ma'am samazon and star. we have the details next. ♪ ( whirring and crackling sounds ) man: assembly lines that fix themselves. the most innovative companies are doing things they never could before, by building on the cisco intelligent network.

futures. see how we stand before the open. looking to be lower. dow by 6, nasdaq by 4 and the s&p 500 just under the flat line right now. meantime futures trading up a bit before, so interesting to see that we've taken a negative turn here. let's also get you up on date on what's on the calendar for the u.s. we've got a lot of things approachesing. weekly jobless claims out at 8:30 a.m. forecast to drop by 10,000 to a total of 376,000.

at 10:00, we'll get march pending home sales expected to rise 1.3%. meantime exxonmobile reports results before the opening bell. we'll also get numbers from pepsico, bristol-myers, u.p.s., goal gate. >> caller: kellogg, lockheed martin, the list goes on. after the close, amazon, starbucks and zynga. earnings picture seems to be indicating that the corporate side of things is picking up. do you expect that momentum to continue? >> it's definitely been a strong earnings season surprise. i talked earlier about the concerns we had, china slowing down, europe if recession, our own economic data getting weaker. so then you have to ask yourself the question why is the s&p still trading around 1400.

i think there's two reasons for that. number one, the fed still has that carrot out there about potential quantitative easing if the economy slows, but i think the other major plus has been corporate earnings and i think earnings season will continue to surprise on the up side. the real question going forward is with the recession in europe, with the slow down in china, with our own economy seeming to decelerate, can that momentum in earnings continue. i think it will be more difficult second, third quarter. but clearly this has been the bright spot so far. >> bill, would you have thought those factors would have played into earnings in the quarter, and they haven't, so i'm not sure why they come in to more play in the second or third. >> i don't think you've seen the full effect of the slowdown in china. you've seen it in some of the commodities. i don't think you'll see show up in earnings until later this

year. clearly the recession in europe has been an issue. but again, the longer that persists, then the greater the drag will be on earnings. and when enwe look at our own macro data in the u.s., that's just starting to turn down. so i think you will see the impact of major sectors of the global economy slowing down. i think it's going to be very hard to avoid the impact of take going forward. i just don't think at this point it's really made its way into earnings, but it will be difficult to avoid that second, third, fourth quarter. >> that's a good point. and tony, we have the jobless claims coming out for the week. any sense of what we'll see there today? >> they've been stubbornly high and they keep surprising us with how high they are, the 370,000 range. so we really need to see that trending much lower. i think everyone six months ago would have expected to see job

last claims trending much closer to 300,000, not menear 400,000. so i was curious what are some of the data points you might look to change his outlook on the s&p and we have gdp coming out soon and then another payroll day in a couple weeks. >> unfortunately that is a whole other conversation and we are running out of i'm. so i'll thank both of our guests. thank you guys for joining us. that wraps it up for "worldwide exchange." >> european viewers will stay with us. i've got an interview with the c ceo of bayer. but for those of you in the u.s. -- >> that's it for today's show. great to be with you guys.

this is going well. good morning, a bullish view on the world. the fed is talking about and an improving labor market and treasury secretary tim geithner says the u.s. economy is gradually getting stronger. european stocks getting an earnings boost this morning. overnight, asia edged higher on fed talk and upbeat results. now u.s. equity futures are pointing to a positive start here at home p about it's thursday, april 26th. take your child to workday. and, big finish -- >> "squawk box" begins right now!