sullivan and mandy. over to you guys. >> thanks very much. stocks are up. gold is down, and we are downtown in the beige book delivering alpha wednesday. looking at the wrong camera. live with news, info and top level tips from our amazing delivering alpha conference all day long. right now breaking news on the beige book with steve liesman. >> thanks very much. brian, a beige book that in my opinion is a bit at odds with the weaker economic data. you just don't see it. the beige book a bit stronger than the economic data we've h.overall the beige book saying the economy increased at a mod toast moderate pace. manufactured which has been weak in some of the other data is said to be expanding in most districts according to the beige book, consumer spending and auto sales all increasing. we had that weak consumer spending number. seven districts report modest retail gains, new york saying it's it was soft. retailers in four districts saying it hasn't met

expectations but weather conditions cited as a reason and talked about that on "street signs." weather conditions the reap. real estate construction up in all districts and growing at a moderate to strong pace. faster growth in multi-family construction. this morning we got the real estate construction number. multi-families tanking, not in the beige book. hiring held steady or increased in most districts though there were some reluctance to hire full-time workers because of the economic outlook and as we've seen in the past the affordable care act. most districts reported limited increase in wages and little price pressure reported overall. i want to focus in on the richmond area which is an important area for manufacturing. here are some of the specific comments by businesses there to the richmond fed. a lumber executive saying it was the best year since 2007. a manufacturing representative saying some firms have gone to two shifts, but confidence is,

quote, fragile, and the packaging manufacturer saying, quote, there's light at the end of the tunnel but it only flickers at times. overall, mandy, i would say this is a more upbeat beige book than we've seen in the economic data and it's a little more contemporary, ending july 8 so we'll see if the july data follows this a exdotal data in the beige book. >> thank you very much. meantime, we interrupted hedge funder john paulson to get to the beige book. let's go back to delivering alpha and right now he's talking about the housing market. let's rejoin him and listen in. >> if you bought a house in 2000, that's going to drive demand. what else is going to drive demand, there's been very little new home construction so there's a shortage of homes to purchase. the inventory of existing homes has come way down where it's now it's at a level relative to sales of where it was in the

peak of the housing market. it's only about a five-month supply, so that means in order to meet the demand you're going to need new home construction so i think that the rate of new home construction will continue to increase, and that's going to benefit the overall economy. >> can you characterize your level of conviction on this? are you as sure about this as you were sure about the short? >> well, i would say -- i would say yes, that the trends, you know, are -- once they go in a direction they have a certain force to them. obviously when they went down it was a very strong force of liquidation. banks selling no financing, prices continuing to go down and now you bottomed and you're going towards the upside, so there's a lot of forces that will continue that trend. first of all, banks that make a mortgage loan. that mortgage loan improves in quality as the underlying equity increases, so the risk of default or foreclosure on new

mortgage is almost nill. secondly, everyone that bought a home last year with 20% down is on average 50% richer today so that's going to increase the demand for new homes. and there's a shortage. there's a lot of pent-up demand for housing. >> even with what some call weak household? >> earlier on me said buying a home now is one of the best investments you can make. we'll talk more about the home builders in just a moment's time, right, brian, because we've got the disappointing data on that front today but our guest who is waiting in the wings is not at all deterred. >> isn't that amazing. john paulson made his name and fortune betting against housing and mortgages. five years later he's banging the drum on housing and mortgages in a positive way. you know, it goes to show you can't stick with a dogma. you can stick with a catma. >> you can stick with a catma, is it raining cats and dogs in here yet? please, i hope so.

bernanke's testimony not upsetting the apple cart, up for the ninth time in ten sessions and stocks are on track for their fourth straight winning week so let's get straight to bob pisani who is sitting here on the set with us at the nyse. rick santelli also out there in chicago. i'm going to mix things up a little bit. i'm going to start with you. bernanke's iteration that things are not set in stone have really put a yield to the anchors on the downside? >> we're back up at 2.50 and i would like to cling to brian's words, can't stick to a dogma which summarizes ben bernanke to a t and what was set in concrete was his defensive plans and what was set in jell-o was the management of exit and taper. i don't think that the market moves really on an intraday basis. if we settle under 2.46. i would consider that

surprising. >> okay. bob pisani, i mean, i think what he was saying this morning was pretty dovish, right? and you're surprised by the reaction we're seeing in the market. >> surprising that the written testimony is what moved the market and i agreement i think it was dovish. the ten-year yields dropped ten basis points in a matter of a few minutes, that's quite a big move and i think he accomplished what he wanted to do. the dow jones industrial average, normally you get the fireworks in the q&a and given this was likely his last testimony in house some felt he'd be more aggressive or mr. bernanke might be more aggressive with the house, criticizing them for lack of action on the fiscal front and none of that really occurred. the markets have been moving in a very, very narrow range. the banks today, bank of america, five in a row, all the big banks reporting good numbers. pnc and u.s. bank corp very good numbers on loan growth that were reassuring and minor drop downs. builders, housing starts below expectations. i hope we said all the declines in multi-family and that's why

the home builders are not down today and realgy pre-announced huge earnings. >> also up 11% year over year, let's not forget. just because they missed expectations. dad, i'm bringing home an a-plus and you bring home an "a." missed expectations but still not a bad grade. >> everything is perfectly fine. >> love when you agree with me. >> and a big day because of our exclusive delivering alpha conference where the biggest power players in wall street like john paulson gather to discuss, debate and share idea. tickets may be sold out but don't worry because we're bringing you some of the hottest headlines from that entirely for free. josh lipton is following all the ideas and big ideas coming out of conference and joins us now. josh? >> big names making big cams at our delivering alpha conference today.

everyone, of course, talking about jim chanos and his call shorting caterpillar, and he is still short hewlett-packard. we'll delve deeper too that in just a moment. here's some of the other stock-moving headlines you might have missed. leon cooperman of omega advisers gave us ten picks. let's highlight two, qualcomm, manufacturers, semiconductors from mobile phones says there's too much pessimism in this name. talked about the 31 billion of cash and the balance sheet, no debt. he's a fan. also he was talking about sand ridge energy, the independent oil and natural gas company. cooperman saying this one has the potential of doubling in his opinion. look at that chart. cooperman speaks and investors listen, and we also heard from chris hawn of the children's investment fun. his funds, eads, saying the stock could double on a two-year horizon. porsche if it merges with advocates waggen, you could double your money and aurizon a

total turnaround story and drug tueting ultra high cholesterol and he likes japanese stocks with a focus on mazda and john paulson of paulson and company sat down with cnbc for his first tv interview ever saying he's satisfied with his long-term performance. he was asked about gold, of course. he said, listen, the rationale for gold has not gone away. there will be inflation. just hard to predict when and there is more to calm. remember, carl icahn will be talking to our own scott wapner. that's later today. stay tune. mandy, back to you. >> indeed, some very big names making very big waves there. let's get back to one of those big names. john paulson is still speaking at cnbc's delivering alpha conference. let's have a listen. >> one is trying to anticipate which of the announced deals could get a competitive bid because then if you get a

competitive bid you can make, you know, a very, very high return, and secondly in trying to anticipate consolidation trends within an industry and then to acquire a stake in a likely takeover target before an announcement is made. we've had several successes. the biggest one was sprint. they unusually announced a deal to sell 70% of strength to softbank but we thought the price was undervalued perhaps because it didn't have a full takeover control so it didn't have a full takeover people why you. we thought given all the activity in the wireless base there could be another bidder. we took a substantial stake and bought 230 million shares and prior to the announcement by dish of a competitive bid, and then they got into a war. softbank ultimately had to raise the price.

as a result the sprint stock is up 25% for the first six months of the year. after the deal was announced. so if you annualize that 25% is a 50% return. and then on the other side we try to say who can be taken over next? we ranked all the players in the wireless segment. leap to us was the smallest player, could no longer exist as an individual company but there were a lot of consolidation hopefuls. we bought the stake eight months before and we haven't adjusted it. well above the transaction happened and at&t announced that they would buy leap at over 100% premium of where the stock is trading. >> reporter: looking for what's

next? >> who is next? >> you look at the industries and there's a lot of talk and chatter in the cable business. ma lone who is a very inquisitive guy took a stake. he want to use it as a vehicle to speak to other companies. he wants to buy time warner which is somewhat large. the other target is cablevision but it's a likely target but it's up to the dolan family since they control the votes of whether or not they have interested. there's been quite a bit of additional activity globally in the cable sector. you have vodafone bid for deutchland and liberty bought a cable company in europe. verizon and vodafone. >> you worry about deals closing in a post-at&t/t-mobile world. >> when you have corporate

strategic deals they are always well financed and that's an important part of the analysis. there's not much regulatory risk >> >> a couple questions to me on john paulson deand in. after subprime he could have retired as a result legend. why didn't you -- did you ever sorry carousely consider going out on top like that? >> no. first of all, we like, you know, making money obviously but we obviously like not necessarying motion. in 20 years we had two down years and 1998 and 2011 been profitable every year. mostly little gains that add up

to significant gains over time. it's hard to get wealthy. it's a long-term process. i also say if you start at t$1 t the end you have 1.20. you want to compound an above average rates return over a long period of time and if you do that then you can create wealth for jfs and investors. we're now at the next 20-year phase. i'm 57 now so i'd be 77.

so i think that's realistic. you mentioned soros. he would be one of the people i would add mire, admire buffet. both of those individuals are great investors, still doing a great job, and they are well into their 80s so i think it's realistic to assume that i can do this for another 20 years. >> finally, books have been written about your subprime trade. has it been documented to your satisfaction? and how do you think of it in your head? >> yeah. not yet, there's a lot of complexity in washing tortes. what we did and what we saw from the analytic standpoint and in terms of financial analysis it was a very interesting investment. so i think later on when we have more time we will document, you know, what exactly hpd and how we pertoys pated.

>> george, john paulson. >> thank you, john. >> all right. there you go. john paulson with carl quintanilla sharing some great ideas, amazing turnaround for housing and he's will be long gold, wrong on gold. >> he has been wrong on gold. >> more about that interview so thanks very much for joining us. down here at the new york stock exchange today in honor of delivering alpha wednesday and also the fact that you're anchor is "closing bell" today. so much ahead that even i can't believe it, including why today's bad housing data may not actually be bad at all. later on, our exclusive interview with the first quadrillion air. that's 1,000 trillions. >> tweet us at cnbc @cnbc.cnbc and guess what, lots of other ways to check us out, for

example, on facebook or good old e-mail. remember that, "street sign signs"@cnbc.com. (announcer) scottrade knows our clients trade and invest their own way. with scottrade's smart text, i can quickly understand my charts, and spend more time trading. their quick trade bar lets my account follow me online so i can react in real-time. plus, my local scottrade office is there to help. because they know i don't trade like everybody. i trade like me. i'm with scottrade. (announcer) scottrade. voted "best investment services company."

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the slowing economic activity is going to hurt goal and it already has. looking longer term. our fair market is $9p and you don't need to be a major bull to be a bull on caterpillar stocks. >> there's three main reasons. the lower mine iing cap x and i has to do with after-market parts and more services and that tends to be with production levels and we don't think the production hovels of goal are going to decline. grow at a slower rate, absolutely and on top of that cat has be a opportunity some of the oems and they have safer

operations and finally the mining industry will be down this year but that means caterpillar's other franchises will do well and be more important to the company than ming and a nice engine business tied to oil and gas that you look. >> you raise a really good point. >> a lot of competition world wide and i'm wondering to what degree will cat florida invest money worldwide to keep its market share growing. komatsu the number two player in the world. a major competitor to caterpillar. i'm not sure the share between those two will be as minimum wage and look at zoom lion. we are concerned that some of those companies as they break

into places like brazil, may put up more of a fight, but nonetheless, again, a slowing china would hurt those companies more so than komatsu or caterpillar so we think that's a net benefit for them. >> jim who started his career as a forensic accountant and known for calling and founding enron, are you comfortable with cat's accounting? >> i am comfortable with cat's accounting. i think what mr. chan close was talking about, of course, was the situation with seaway, a chinese company they had to purchase and write off the goodwill almost immediately because of accounting fraud at the corporation. 1% of the market cap and there's questions from a mining equipment a couple years ago that suffered. will they write off the goodwill there? i don't think it's an accounting issue. i think it's more valuation-based but overall the

controls that are in place are sufficient at caterpillar right now >> at am fleck, thank you very much for joining us on cat. meantime, let's take a look at what's happening in housing, a very big story with housing starts falling nearly 10% last month but home builders very interestingly, holding pretty strong against that weak housing starts number and this all comes as john paulson just moments ago, you heard him here on "street signs," and he is at cnbc's delivering alpha conference, and he's saying that owning a home is the best v.an individual investor can get into. so what gives? >> what did you make of john paulson's comments a moment ago? >> we agreed with mr. paulson. >> that's a surprise. >> well, he's a great investor, but in addition to that on a fundamental basis, extremely tight inventory levels, historically low interest rates, and we've got a tremendous pricing environment which continues to climb so we have a great setup for homeowners to

create value so it's a good time to buy a house in our opinion. >> and the data that came out does not bother you either. >> the weakness was entirely attributable to multi-family starts which is a very volatile component. it was down 27%. single family starts were flat month over month and increased by 12% year over year. the march towards housing starts continued. we're not concerned either that the recent backup in mortgage rates will derail the housing recovery. >> let's dive into that. some are saying here's the impact of higher mortgage rates. if you're a home builder, you don't plan to build a home three weeks ago when rates started to rise. these are homes in the plans for months, if not longer, correct in. >> that's absolutely correct, but we're coming off such a historically low base, afford ability is at an all-time high and that's really creating the opportunity for your average american to come and -- >> listen, i'll give you credit, bob, on "street signs" a year and a half ago, you came on and

were bullish on the home builders, called you crazy, i think, but didn't call you maybe. you were right. those stocks have doubled if not gone up more. make the case why they are still good investments. >> our long-term average starts for housing is 1.4 million. we've chronically underbuilt during the last five years. we're only at 1 million starts. demographics are going to force us to continue building. the public home builders have the resources to capitalize on the growth. that's why we think this is a great long-term investment for both individual investors and funds with a multi-year horizon >> we could talk all day, would love to and we can't and you're overweight the following home builders, putte, kb homes and lennar. >> later on, one analyst is going all in on tesla saying that stock could hit 200 a share. we'll ask her how coming up. unlike history, math and english,

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valley with an update on yahoo! stock, incredible, 64.4 million shares traded, the second highest in the past year, and it's up almost 10% on the day. it was up higher than 10% just a few minutes ago. this on the heels of yahoo!'s earnings report. earnings per share beat. the revenue a little bit light. 0.7 billion versus 1.0 will expected and ya brought down guidance. excited about the prospects of future growth and now over to earnings squad. >> welcome to the earnings squad where we talk about the earnings stories everyone is talking about. i'm melissa lee along with herb greenberg.

let's start off with the scorecard. 10% of the s&p 500 companies have reported so far. 69 the released estimates. we've got to kick it off here with ibm and intel, two reads on the tech sector. >>ine them and big blue. street is looking for 377 on revenue of 25 million, a year over year drop of around 2%. some folks are talking emerging market demand. how is that going to hold up? >> okay the positive side. >> as jim chanos said this morning on "squawk box," he talked about the servicing issue something people were concerned about and you always wand to watch with this company. the company has always said they can mike that metric.

hasn't mattered as much. >> certainly seems like the sentiment on the stock has turned. morgan stanley expected a miss. we did seine member stock react very sharply when accenture came out. that was the end of june. we sort of got an indication for a faster growing part of the business and could be under pressure. >> bill fleck on our numbers online saying he's shorting it. >> intel 20% and scram cling to get those shipped in tablets. >> getting the tanking pc market. look at the expectations. eps expects to be done year over year. >> american express is out, one we're watching starting from yesterday. an "ft" report saying there's a

cap on all credit as well as debit transactions. today saying they could cut by 11% and did see the stock down as much as 4%. on that statement, basically a non-statement. this is a draft pop sale, on extentive process and you see that it did rebound and pear its losses and this is going to be a major topic on the conference call today in the after-hours investigation. >> this is a big issue though from them. 12% of their build business volume isn't backed from europe specifically, a big impact. a couple of stocks on your radar. >> it's been the king of excuses for the past two quarters, but if you lock at the stock, people believe this company is going to

deliver this time. will they? i don't know, and then we have sherwin williams, of course, which is the other one. >> had a tough hiccup. >> all right, we'll see. that's earnings squad for today. we'll be back tomorrow with more updates and insights. meantime, "street signs" is back right after this. a fighter alri. since aflac is helping with his expenses while he can't work, he can focus on his recovery. he doesn't have to worry so much about his mortgage, groceries, or even gas bills. kick! kick... feel it! feel it! feel it! nice work! ♪ you got it! you got it! yes! aflac's gonna help take care of his expenses. and us...we're gonna get him back in fighting shape. ♪ [ male announcer ] see what's happening behind the scenes at aflac.com.

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okay. a very special edition of street talk brought to you from the new york stock exchange. why don't we start with mcdonald's and a downgrade today. >> they cite increased concern with sales trends relative to what wall street expects. >> the world's largest business aircraft maker. cessna make jets as well as prop

planes and revenues also dropped 6% to 2.8 billion. not a bad year. up 21% over the last 12 months. >> we've picked this name out from under the rock. it is amberella. >> not barberella. >> i wish it were, it would be so much fun. >> just squeaked in over the 500 million market cap requirement. the company specializes in video capture and things like high def security cameras. that stock has been hot and 66% year to date and am brela is up 205%. >> i knew there was a way to make one off of spying. >> mattel, the big toy-maker, barbie, not selling so many

barbies is the problem. >> looking like a shrimp these day days. >> mattel reported it's partly due to an impairment charge. as mandy noted barbie sales are down for the fourth consecutive quarter. >> making it look like a real person. >> nobody wants a real person. i don't want to see what i look like in doll form. >> american girl and monsters high. they don't look like real people but the descendants of frankenstein. selling real well. >> tesla tug-of-war. a goldman call came out and we have an analyst who says guess what, the stock is speeding towards $200. massive upgrade there and aggressive course and do not forget wall street's biggest power brokers at our exclusive

delivering alpha conference. another live update but first besides my co-host, what sells coming up on closing bell? >> many things coming up. earnings, all about earnings. we'll take the pulse of the banking industry and exclusive interviews and after the bell earnings extravaganza, intel, ebay, american express, all set to report after the bell tonight, instant analysis as soon as those numbers are released and we're not finished. the cfo stacy smith tells us how the slumping pc industry is affecting them bottom line. much more on delivering alpha. nelson peltz live and his intentions for pepsico. that should be very interesting. first more "street signs" coming your way.

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big headlines a short time from cnbc's delivering alpha conference. carl quintanilla sat down with john paulson. major headlines that made you raise your eyebrows. >> the man who made what some have called the greatest trade ever being short housing is now long housing. even though we have seen a lot of valuation calls on some of these names, some of the housing stocks are ahead of themselves. he still think there's a lot of room to run. take a listen. >> i'm not sure if housing prices will increase 10% every year but it's likely over the next five years.

>> very belich on housing. can't paulk to paulson without talking about gold. the gold fund is down 60 plus%, a small piece of his overall portfolio, about 2% and those in it from the beginning are doing pretty well. gold he bought in the beginning around 950 and has taken his knocks on that and here's how he responded. >> the rationale for owning gold is valid. i would say in a trend we're in a pause period but over time as you see the economy grow, credit expand and inflation or the indicator of inflation start to rise i think demand for gold will increase again. >> interesting in that it's his first television interview ever.

the street watching john paulson speak, a good session here at delivering alpha. >> made headlines and everyone glued to the screens so a great job. thank you very much and on the back of what john paulson was saying about gold, we want to know what's next for the precious metal. >> frank, i guess there's people out there saying paulson got it wrong and were watching with glee as he was trying to defend his position but what do you think will happen? do you think paulson is right over the longer term? >> ultimately i'm a very long-term bull and as he indicated from his pricing he's somewhat late to the trade and when you have a run from 1,800 to 1,900 you can be very right and still very wrong. i think we'll get back to median

cost of production and by that i mean the long-term cost of mines that were involved when the metal was at $300, $400, $500, $600 and today's action reinforces that. the market wants to find a reason to go higher, but it just isn't there. if you add on to that $110, $105 crude oil, that's becoming a tax again. you're having to demand destruction, not inflation. absent inflation, gold will have a tough time making a new rally. >> costs more to mine. use a lot of diesel fuel and smoke, whatever it is. what's the worst case scenario for gold? >> you could see a major wash outto 8.25, 8.50 if the world absolutely came to an end and everything was rosie in the u.s.gy.

i think we could test the old 1,180 lows and go sideways in the $150 range for three or tee or four months, maybe six months and then see where we are. >> a real pleasure. thanks for joining us on "street signs" today. >> always. >> still ahead. i guess we'll call this bizarro day, not because we're down here but herb greenberg will come out in defense of herbalife. hard to believe but true. >> and we'll hear from the man who just last month was $1 million times richer than the world's richest man. before their gift helped preserve the point...

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i'd like to show you what's going on with the markets here. we're actually slightly negative for the dow. only slightly. we were modestly higher this morning, because, of course, ben bernanke was reiterating -- stressing -- that their plan to scale back their extraordinary stimulus, to scale back qe, was subject to change. i guess a fairly dovish message in there, and he shied away from using the "t" word, the tapering word. as we can see, we have lost some steam in the markets. brian? >> well, speaking of the

markets, let's talk about a company that's been a hot topic for the markets, and that is tesla. shares are bouncing back today, up, in fact, just under 10%. this is a strong recovery from the big drop yesterday after goldman sachs sliced their price target on the name. joining us now from doherty company is aandrea james. you said something, andrea, that caught my eye in your note. you note that tesla to you is an easier buy at $120 a share than 30. what do you mean by that? >> what i mean is that a lot has happened in the last three months that shows tesla's potential. they've executed really well. they had their first profitable quarter. they paid off their d.o.e. loan. they got this wonderful endorsement from "consumer reports," basically says they have the best car in a $1.5 trillion auto market. and they've had the innovations in supercharging and in battery swapping. so a lot's happened in the last three months and it --

>> andrea, we agree with that. we've covered tesla extensively. however, i'll push back a little bit. they're only going to sell, like, 21,000 cars this year, and they have a more than $12 billion market cap. with your price target, if it's hit, you're looking at a $20 billion company. that's about $1 million a car valuation. >> it is today. you know, the last couple of years, tesla is a forward-looking story. and so, my price target is a forward-looking price target. the stock today is forward-looking. so, you know, back in 2010, 2011, the stock was trading on what they could do this year. now, we know they can make a really good car for $80,000. can they make a really good car cheaper? the stock will get the credit, i believe, for the answer to that, which i think is, yes. >> i mean, it really is a valuation that you're looking at, andrea. and i think what's really important, when you're talking about execution, you do note in your points that it's not that they've executed beyond expectations.

they've actually just executed to plan. it's that we have so much more visibility now, not just for the next year or the next two years, it's really going out maybe four years from now. >> absolutely. i think six months ago, a lot of americans would be hard-pressed to tell you what a tesla car was. i think most people today are aware of the company, and not must in north america. they're doing european deliveries, so awareness will grow in europe. and asia is hitting in q3, q4. >> all right. thank you. we're sitting at 118, so a little way to go to get to 200. >> and a quick note to andrea, and what's interesting, it defines tesla, she doesn't cover the other car companies, she is basically a technology analyst. and that says a lot about how people are looking at tesla. >> we have actually raised this point on "street signs" before with herb, we'll talk to in a moment, if we need to look at tesla as a technology company, a technologist disrupter or automotive disrupter. and looking at the shares of

he herbalife. earlier, a report said the ftc is looking into the company and they find that the practices at hlf are, quote, disturbing. let's bring herb in on this. do you agree, herb in. >> well, i wish i could look at that. when i saw the story, i thought, wow, that's something. but it's what i also heard from the consumer advocates who -- and there is a consumer group and hispanic group that were meeting with the ftc on monday. well, to hear that they say that the ftc says this is disturbing and we're going to look -- it's like me, saying, hey, brian, and mandy, great to meet you. i mean, it's meaningless to me until the ftc comes out and says, we're actually taking a look at this. they tell a journalist or someone else this is disturbing, we're looking into it. until then, it's back to where we were. >> mm-hmm. >> well, where is that, herb? >> where we're at is where carl

icahn is, and he'll tell scott wapner, is they're doing nothing. the bigger issue is the states attorney generals are looking at the issues and we need to get to the point on all multilevel marketing companies that the ftc in the very least sets clear guidelines so there's no gray area, there is no non-bright lines as they like to say, and no ambiguity into the rules as they apply to multilevel marketing. that's public companies and private companies. >> and i believe the ftc did decline the attendees at the meeting whether or not they've launched a probe -- >> what they declined to do is they declined to say if they said anything at the meeting. >> i love the sneaky tease to get icahn to deliver. herb, genius. >> thank you. >> wouldn't expect anything less from you, herb. >> thank you. >> thank you very much. next up, a guy made 92 quadrillion dollars and lost it in seconds. it's a true story.

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get the blood tests. change your number. turn it up. androgel 1.62%. pay attention, because this story is amazing and it's true. imagine signing in to your paypal account, seeing there was 92 quadrillion dollars in it. that's 1,000 trillion bucks, it's 92 with 15 digits behind it. clearly a mistake by paypal, but a cool story.

chris reynolds was that lucky, or maybe unlucky, paypal user. chris, a fun story. tell us what it was like for a brief moment to be the richest man in the history of the universe. >> well, it's a big number, and for a nanosecond, i guess a small number, i felt great, and then i felt terrible, because i saw the minus in front of the number. i checked and it was a zero balance, and then i felt relieved, i guess. i saw a lot of fun opportunity in it, and took it to facebook and within a few minutes, somebody -- a friend of mine -- >> chris, what did paypal tell you? that's a lot of numbers. >> i talked to paypal this morning, and it was a glitch. it's a classic glitch. and as i understand it, 92 quadrillion is a number they refer to when they just run out of numbers. so i guess i broke the bank. >> very quickly -- [ overlapping speakers ] -- if you had 92 quadrillion,

chris, what would you have done with it? one thing. >> i would retire the national debt. i'm a responsible guy. i feel, you know, a little bit of guilt over the debt. and then i'm going to buy the philadelphia phillies. you know, next time this money appear, i'm going to act more quickly. >> chris, i like it. pay down the debt and buy the phillies. they're both good for the nation. chris reynolds, thank you very much for joining us. thanks for watching "street signs," everybody. bill and mandy up next on "closing bell." and we do welcome you in to "closing bell" on a newsy say. i'm bill griffeth. >> indeed, very newsy. i'm mandy in for a change. we're mixing it up. i'm down at the new york stock exchange. maria will be back tomorrow. the day is full of heavy hitters and continues here on cnbc with ben bernanke on capitol hill to a literal who's who of wall street at cnbc delivering alpha conference. the market is reacting to both events da