welcome to "on the money", are the markets heading for a record high? what will the new year bring. keeping safe from your mortgage to credit card, the man in charge of making sure you don't get ripped off. whose better at investing, women or men? and from bold and brauny to small and sporty, the best world's automakers have to offer, cars that will make your heart race and wallet a little lighter. "on the money" starts right now. here's a look at what is

making news. two important indicator concerning the strength of the american consumer and the news is mixed. retail sales rose by 2/10th of a percent. a major retail trade group says holiday sales rose by 3.8%. that is slightly below the forecast but higher than 3.5%. all of this matter because it tells us about the strength of the consumer and consumers make up two-thirds of the u.s. economy. the markets couldn't make up their minds as earning seasons began. the s&p 500 closed at a record high on wednesday and the nasdaq posted the best two day gain since september. wells fargo and bank of america, all beat analysts expectations and citi fell short. ge met estimates while chip

maker intel missed. don't look now, google may know how warm you like your house. they are buying thermostat and alarm maker ness labs for $2.1 million. earnings season is under way and the markets can't decide which way to go. what should you do with your money? joining us is liz ann sonders. this is a very different year, i'm anticipating from last year. we're into earning season and things look like. are you worried about what's happened so far? >> not unless we get a big movement in one direction or another out of the overall economy. obviously top line growth tends to be tied fairly closely to nominal gdp growth thanks to the increase in the economy in the third quarter and fourth quarter better trade numbers and estimates starting to trend up for 2015. if that ends up being a miss and we lose the basis for top line

growth, then the question is, can companies squeeze anynor out. can profit margins expand anymore. that could be the potential risk. i don't think it's a rye risk. >> they've been doing that for a lot of years. cutting costs and trying to squeeze out more with less. is there a point you run into, forget it, there's no more that can be squeezed out? >> i think we were not at the end of the line for profit margins. we could see profit margins expand a little more. the market can continue to do well even if they are leveling out. >> when you say do well, you're not looking at necessarily a repeat of last year? >> not necessarily -- >> but potentially? >> one of the risks for the market is a melt-up. we could get that this year. and the reason why i say risk -- >> that's a good risk to. >> as good as they feel while happening they don't tend to end well and the corrections that follow are nastier than if we had a grind-up type of market which would be a healthier environment. >> what growth are you looking

for? 3%. >> i think the 4% that we saw in the third quarter and estimates in some cases going to 3.5 and 4 for the fourth quarter, that's a stretch for 2014 but we can hang around the 3% level than we have certainly been in the last year or two. >> one of the things that you've been looking at is what's been happening because of this energy boom we're having in the united states. what does that mean? what does that translate into in terms of jobs and stocks? >> the energy boom obviously is helping to improve the competitiveness. it's a game changer in terms of economic risks and geopolitical risks and filtering into broad manufacturing too. the other plus for manufacturing competitiveness, not only the labor cost gap narrowed between us and china, but other costs have narrowed as well. there's something called the total landed gap. it's wage cost and real estate

cost and logistics and transport and energy and all of those things, that's nar rowed to a degree if you are a u.s. based company with u.s. based customers it is no longer economical to necessarily ship your business over there. >> at charles sh wab, have they caught on to what's happening? are they coming late to the game, putting their money in the right places? >> it's interesting we found with our client base is that the investors that have a disciplined approach, whether they have an adviser that they work with or have an asset allocation structure and adopting discipline around that. they have fared better and have state participants. we find the ones that are not so much do it yourself but winging it and trying to time the market in short term, they've been more fearful and on the sideline. last year was definitely a turn,

increased interest. i would not suggest that the individual investor has a frothy amount of optimism. i think they are starting to realize things have improved, '08 came out of the 5-year number the end of 2013. you went from flat performance up to 125%. that's an eye opener but i don't view it as an extreme you need to worry about. >> what would you tell the people sitting at home thinking i need to make sure i'm putting money aside for retirement. i may have missed out a little bit in the last few years. what would you tell them now? >> every investor is different, no one cookie cutter answer that's appropriate for all investors. if your goal is to make a decent return and beat inflation you have to have equity exposure. will define how that fits in an otherwise diversified portfolio. first have a plan then work around that. but i think again, if your goal is to beat inflation in the long term, you have to have equity exposure.

thanks for coming in. great talking to you. >> we're "on the money." a massive target breach exposed 110 million americans credit and debit cards to cyber thieves and now it looks like other retailers were compromised as well. are companies doing enough to save safeguard your information? could the new wolves of wall street come in skirts and lipstick, why women may be taking over the world of finance. let's look how the stock market ended the week.

using old technology, there's a better way called emv

technology. >> that was target ceo telling me what could be done to prevent security breaches like the one his company experienced last month. up to 40 million customers are reeling after discovering their credit and debit cards are compromised. is the problem we're using outdated technology? joining us now to talk about what you can do is consumer financial protection bureau director richard cordray. thanks for being here. >> my pleasure. >> as america's first consumer watchdog was your reaction to what's happening with target and other retailers with the security breaches? >> i think we're immediately concerned any time you have consumers whose information may be compromised and it exposes them to fraud. we need to be making sure that the best technologies are being used in america as is happening more and more frequently around the world. both retailers and credit card issuers have responsibilities and we're concerned to see consumers are being treated fairly. >> the cfpb only has been out there for two years.

do they realize they should be contacting you with complaints about this? >> i don't know that many consumers yet understand how the consumer financial protection bureau is on their side and looking out for them. they can bring complaints to us at consumerfinance.gov, 270,000 people have done that on a range of products, but if they have concerns, something is not right with their account or think they are not being treated correctly by the credit card issuer or provider, they should let us know. >> what do you think is going to happen with this case in particular, with target and the other retailers admitting that they were breached and compromised and this information changed. do you think we should switch to european technology? >> i don't want to judge exactly which technology is the right answer, but i think it's a wake-up call for the entire industry. it clearly has been both on the bank side and retailer side more can be done right now with existing technologies and to

protect people and see to it consumers can use payment mechanisms with confidence it's not going to somehow undermine their financial liflz. >> your agency has been busy, there are new mortgage rules that went into effect. what are those rules and how will they help homeowners? >> we saw the financial crisis earn meltdown of our economy five years ago caused by the mortgage market. everybody agrees on that. these are new rules on the road that will improve the function of mortgage market for consumers and you go to buy a house. you can have more confidence you won't be set up to fail. these rules require a back to basics approach. if they offer you a loan, they have a responsibility to make sure it's a loan that can succeed over time. >> they seem like common sense rules. how do you enforce these rules? what has the pushback been? >> i completely agree. these are common sense rules. had these been in place before the crisis they would have prevents much if not all of the

crisis. it's taking us back to the type of lending that community banks and credit unions have been doing for years. the key point is they'll not only have these rules in place, but they have examination teams to make sure institutions are handling them correctly and people are violating the law and it's hurting consumers will be able to fix those problems. >> is it going to be tougher to get a mortgage as a result? that's been -- the critics have said it's going to be tougher for people to qualify? >> i don't agree that's correct. if we're going back to basics here, we're making sure that the lender checks out you can afford to repay it. that's what good lenders have always done. you can't have a lending model that succeed over time if you don't do that. in the go-go market of the last decade when they started laying off these loans a day or week after they made them, they didn't have an interest in the long-term success of the loan. we actually now need surprisingly rules like this to

make sure that lending is done properly. >> i can understand why mortgage areas are one of the top priorities for your agency. what are the area agencies that you want to focus on over the next year or so? >> mortgage is the biggest single consumer finance market it was and should have been our first priority. credit card markets are important to us. there's a lot of change that's occurred with the card act. we're making sure that's being handled properly and also have other areas of concern. student loans and auto loans are areas we want to make sure that consumers are being treated fairly. we're looking now for first time really at the national level credit reporting industry and debt collection where we're going to be potentially writing new rules to update and improve the laws that protect consumers. >> sounds like you have a full agenda and going to be a very busy man. thank you very much for joining us today. >> thank you. >> richard cordray. up next we're "on the money"

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are women better investor than men? women hedge fund managers outperformed male counterparts for a second year in a row.

what can you learn to improve your rate of return? joining us now is author of a separate study of women and investing, michael liersch and jackie, thank you both for being here today. >> thank you. >> jackie, this latest study that the female hedge fund managers outperform male counterparts, are women better investors than men? >> this is a great question. we do see this is part of a broad trend we call womenomics, how the increasing economic power is fundamentally changing our planet. you can hear people talking about this from warren buffett to joe biden but how is it with this economic power we can invest differently or use a gender lens in investments. if you look at thee enstudy andy this is part of one of those lenses, access to capital,

women, whether they are hedge fund managers or microentrepreneurs have less access to capital. >> michael, your study really interested me as well, 55% of women say they no less than the average investor and 78% don't want to be actively involved in the investment process and half are concerned they are going to outlive their investment and 6 in 10 feel they have to financially support someone else on their family. that adds up to some really interesting dynamics. what is it about women? are they more risk adverse than men? >> the idea that women are risk adverse than men is something you hear a lot of in the media. the key piece of all of the data that you just relaid is that women also feel like they know less than the average investor but men feel they know more than the average investor. >> is it just they are dumb er

investor as a result? >> what happens is men lean into the conversation and women may tend to lean out of the conversation because it's lower. your perceptions of your own investment confidence that's driving certain behaviors. >> is confidence in your investing ability, is that a good thing or bad thing? >> it can actually work for and it can work against you. that's why we see women and men collaborating together. could be a huge win. >> if you're at home, you should be involved because it helps to have two people balancing off each other? >> that's exactly right. >> one of the things that jumped out at me, the idea that when men and women know the same amount and feel they are really involved, there tends to be not be as much of a difference in that investing behavior. >> when you think about the culture and context and idea here is that you're right, innate differences between men and women aren't as existent as we think they are.

really it's -- the context, the wealth level and education level and knowledge about investing that's driving a lot of differences we see, especially the difference in confidence. and once you equalize the playing field, men and women are quite similar because we're all human beings with unique goals. >> do you agree with how there's not necessarily a difference between men and women if they have the same knowledge and same amount of confidence? >> absolutely. it's one of the reasons i joined u.s. trust. we have a program for financial empowerment for women. this is about how do you give women the confidence to successfully manage their wealth. that's essential because as michael said, we know that when women and men come to the table together and are both leaning into the conversation, the end investments are more appropriate for that family. so we're really looking for both to come to the table. there are differences.

for instance, our research shows that women are 30% more likely to say they want their investments to reflect their beliefs and their values and social political environmental views. >> they don't want to be investing in companies they think are doing harm? >> exactly. when they bring that into the equation, they start talking and men say, this is what we're talking about and they break down the chinese wall that's traditionally existed where you can bring values into your philanthropy but stop and don't take your values in your investments. now we're saying, let's have a holistic conversation here. >> michael and jackie, thank you both for coming in today. >> up next, a look at the news this week. what will you be driving next year? a look at the hottest cars from the detroit auto show.

for more on our show and our guests, go to otn.cnbc.com. or follow us at twitter. here are stories that may move the markets and impact your money. johnson & johnson, microsoft and verizon and ibm will be reporting quarterly earnings. on monday, the markets will be closed in observance of martin luther king jr. day. on wednesday business and political leaders descend on davos on the three day economic

forum. on thursday, we'll get existing home sales numbers for the month of december. finally today, with vehicle sales in the u.s. hitting their highest point since 2007, automakers are ramping up with a truckload of new models. horse power is roaring again. so are the big three. phil lebeau has a look at the auto show. >> the bold and brawney are back, to the corvette to the ford f-150 that got a complete makeover with a body made out of aluminum alloy. >> a real proposition is the aluminum cab and aluminum box. >> the gmc canyon. >> new trucks are getting plenty of attention. it's the sports cars that have people buzzing, starting just over 100 grand is a convertible

with a retractible roof described as mechanical magic in motion the japanese can build cars that make the heart race. >> we went to our designers passionate about sports cars and clean sheet of paper, give us what you think the ultimate sports car is. >> bentley's continental is far from a sports car but with 521 horsepower, you'll go zero to 60 in 4.3 seconds. price tag, $196,000. mercedes is rolling out a new slightly larger and more refined c class. >> our baby is all grown up. this is probably our most accomplished and beautiful execution of the c class. >> the chrysler 200 has been redesigned featuring a more aggressive and curve ashs look. the vibe at this year's show is one of optimism. the auto industry is once again

on a roll. >> the feeling is good. knows who have jobs are in good shape. everybody has money to spend and selling more units. it looks like a good next five years. >> all together automakers are launching 63 new models in the united states this year. a record for the industry and that slew of new models is one reason executives here at the show are optimistic that 2014 will be a fifth straight year for higher sales and profits for the auto industry. phil lebeau, on the money. >> thank you for joining me. each week keep it here, we're "on the money." we'll see you next weekend. i would not say i'm into it. but let's see where this goes. [ buzzer ] do you like to travel? i'm all about "free" travel, babe. that's what i do. [ buzzer ] balance transfers -- you up for that? well -- unh. too soon? [ female announcer ] fortunately, there's an easier way, with creditcards.com.

compare hundreds of cards from every major bank and find the one that's right for you. creditcards.com. it's simple. search, compare, and apply.

[ticking] >> i make money. nothing wrong with it. that's what i want to do. that's what i'm here to do. that's what i enjoy. >> you tell me you're a shareholder activist. >> i don't say--the name is the same. an activist is the same as a raider, you know. they call it whatever you want. rose by any other name. >> so you haven't changed? >> i haven't changed at all. not one iota. [ticking] >> eli and your lovely wife right here please. >> eli broad may be very rich, but he says he wants to die poor. to achieve that, he gives money away by the bucket load. half a billion dollars so far to los angeles, to disney hall, the l.a. opera, the museum of contemporary art, three