2014. and "squawk box" begins right now. >> good morning, everybody. welcome to "squawk box" here on cnbc. i'm becky quick along with joe kernen and andrew ross sorkin. the bulls are battling back. stocks now higher for three straight sessions, although the gains yesterday were very muted. the s&p and the nasdaq logging their biggest three-day gains since mid october. of course, there is still room to go from the recent highs. the dow is now down 4.7%. the s&p is off by 2.8% and the nasdaq is down by 2.3%. this morning, if you check out those equity futures, you are going to see green arrows once again. the dow futures indicated higher by about 58 points above fair value, the s&p up by more than 7 points and the nasdaq up by more than 15. in asia, volumes were light with japan closed for a public holiday today. but for the most part, there were green arrows across the

board. the hang seng was a very strong performer, up by 1.78%. the shanghai and the kospi in korea posting gains. in early trading this morning, in europe you'll see at this point the same story there. the dax in germany is up by 1.25%. the ftse in london is up close to 1%. and the cac in france is higher by 0.75%. the key for the global markets today is going to be janet yell.. she is on her way to capitol hill for her first congressional testimony and public comments as chair of the federal reserve. yellen is going to be appearing before the house financial services committee starting at 10:00 eastern time. investors will be paying close attention to her comments on the health of the economy and plans for the extraordinary measures. this is a careful line she'll have to walk here, talking about her concerns about the economy but at the same time explaining why she believes the taper has been the appropriate policy to this point. andrew, back over to you.

>> thank you, becky. we have a lot of corporate news, a lot of tech news to talk about. apple lost its latest bid to put ebooks anti-trust monitor on hold. the federal appeals court rejecting the argument that it caused ir repu ed irreputable h. nobody likes a monitor hanging out in your office. also, google signing a major advertising deal with comscore. they will be integrating comscore's technology into its business. this is a big deal. it will allow to change things on the fly if campaigns are not working. google hopes the deal will help it attack bigger brands. check out rack space. the company is forecasting lower than expected full year revenue. and announcing its ceo of seven years is retiring. looking to transition into a cloud software developer.

joe, over to you. >> andrew, in washington, the obama administration is again delaying a contentious health care requirement. this time it's similar to the last time we pushed back on pan date. in this case, it's for medium sized businesses, some of the same ones that were affected the last time when they don't have to do it in 2015, either. this is to provide coverage for full time workers. the so-called employer mandate was originally supposed to take effect in january. now a medium sized business with 50 to 99 full time workers will be able to avoid a tax penalty, all the way to 2016 for failing to offer health insurance. in addition, larger employees will be able to phase in coverage as long as they cover about 70% of their full time workforce by next year and that rises to 95% in 2016 and, you know, depending on which side of the aisle you're sitting on, this is either the administration responding to concerns from business that it

couldn't do this quickly enough or it's a transparent attempt to hold on to congressional incentives in the election in 2014. i just liked it literally, you know, on drudge. the first -- you know, there's the main drudge and then one, two, three, four, five, six things on this. huffington post, i counted this morning, number 15. it's right below all republicans deserve the death penalty and keystone -- three biggest lies about keystone. just way down here. it's so funny. no, about six olympics stories up here. >> god pleas them. right? >> right. walking dead beats the olympics, unfortunately, for -- the olympics still did very well, but just in demos. but you don't get a premier -- >> you don't need to point that out. >> it's in a lot of different places. what happens to bob costas? >> he had an eye infection. it hasn't cleared up.

>> he has two now. >> i saw that. i went from this side to this side. >> what do you to? >> he wears his eyeglasses and he kind of on talks about it at the top of the broadcast. i wonder if he's washing his face with the water. >> that's the first thing you think of is the water in russia. >> guys, i was -- >> i feel for him. i do feel for him. >> because i have contacts and i -- >> well, no, i do with, you know, when we're doing a lot of drn anything that happens. what if you don't drive a car, but i always worry with road rage what if you get into an altercation or something, you would have to take off work for three weeks if you got a black eye or something. >> no, i've had it before. >> what would you do? >> i was gone for three days. no, not -- i had that face break out. >> you saw my bruise from getting hit by a golf ball. >> yeah. >> if i was working at

chippendales, i will not be able to go to -- and i'm constantly getting recruited for -- actually, not. >> the white house says people hoping to enroll in health coverage for march 1st, they have trouble applying by saturday's deadline. because of a planned 62-hours maintenance shutdown of a social security administration computer system. the shutdown will prevent applicants from verifying their social security numbers and other data through the healthcare.gov website. if they have problems, they can request a special enrollment assistance. i saw an advertisement yesterday for obamacare. >> did you? >> yeah. please call, please call, please call. you know, do it. >> new law, you have to try and get the word out. i don't know why they don't just move the social security administration's station for shutting down this thing. just move it by three days. >> should they do the individual mandate? you can't do the individual mandate. you see, the other thing i think is when you're putting in a new

intiet entitlement, and you know you never take back an entitlement. so even if the corporate mandate -- they don't even care the way it looks because it looks like corporations get a break, individuals don't. they want as many individuals signed up as we go along here because once it's like -- well, the jeanie is out of the bottle. you can't take it back. so no matter what happens in the election, this is here to stay. it may be piecemeal, it may be more expensive, you may be bailing out insurance companies. it may be the biggest cluster mess -- cluster flog -- >> if you had fewer individuals who sign up, it's going to meal all the premiums have to be repriced. >> i know. they concede that insurance companies might need to get bailed out. in our washington news, we are tracking the fight over the debt limit. the house vote is set for tomorrow to extend the treasury's authority through march 2015.

house speaker john boehner is expected to make a 13-month extension of the federal debt limit conditional on the repeal of this plan cut and military pension benefits. that's all the republicans -- and who is going to say that's a bad thing to ask for. so a far cry from demanding that -- >> it's an easy one. >> it's a far cry from -- >> it's not easy yet. >> it's different than saying, all right, we'll raise the debt limit as long as you repeal obamacare. they didn't quite get that, so they've lowered -- >> the bar. >> yeah. lowered it a little bit. some republican lawmakers have expressed skepticism about the cost of the proposal, so passage of the plan will likely need some democratic support, but i wouldn't want to be a democrat. wasn't raising the debt ceiling because they didn't want to extend military pensions. >> that's why it's very clever. >> democrats want to raise the debt ceiling. >> they're down.

>> also people throw other things into this, i'm sure, at the last minute. >> that's a cynical view and you are not normally cynical. you're more of a worrier. >> professional skeptic. >> you are not that skeptical about things. well, about capitalism, i guess. what's going on in the markets, bec becky? >> why don't we take a look. the futures this morning are indicated higher. you'll see right now that dow futures are up by about 60 points above fair value. s&p futures are up for 7 points. stocks were up for three days in a row. the s&p 500 and the nasdaq logged their biggest three-day gains since mid october. and the nasdaq and s&p 500 closed at their highest level in over two weeks. if you take a look at what's been happening with oil prices, yesterday it settled above $100 for the first time since december 27th. it's up lt 30 cenanother 30 cens morning to 100.36. the yield is still below 2.7% on the ten-year note.

the dhorl morning looks like it is up by $9.80. $1,284.50 an ounce. gold, by the way, yesterday was up at the fourth straight session. if you take a look again at that dollar board, you're going to see that this morning, the dollar is down against through, at 1.3671. it's up against the yen, 102.36. right now, it's time for the global markets report. julia chatterley is standing by in london. good morning. >> good morning, becky. 9 to 1 here, green to red. a bit of cautious optimism ahead of yellen's testimony in a few hours time. we're just coming off the highs here of the stocks. the outperformer here, the

german markets up around 1.3%. portugal, managing to raise yet more continue-year paper this morning. a positive sign for the periphery of europe. it really is the cyclicals that are outperforming. the autos, chemicals and the likes. featuring higher by 0.6%. and the real focus this morning, as with yesterday, barclay's bank finally giving us the full breakdown of their 2013 earnings. down just shy of 5% here. profit is declining 37% last year. it's the signal that we've had from the u.s. and other european banks of the likes. they're doing further measures to support the capital position, including up to 12,000 job cuts this year. a bit of bad news in the fixed income division, not stopping them from raising their bonus

pool by 10% this year. investors not impressed here. on that note, i'll happened back to you. >> thank you for that report. we have another report for a crazy story, guys. a little bit of an update to the story we talked about yesterday. remember dumb starbucks? the starbucks parity store was opened. the local nbc station in southern california reports the store was hit by a notice of closure for operating without a valid public health permit. the story served free coffee over the weekend, had a menu listing starbucks items with the word dumb in front of them. i don't know how dumb this is starting to look. if they were going to make money on it, then they get shut down before they can get to it? >> there's a real liberal quandary here for you. and i want to see how you come down on this. the two positions are anathetical. >> go for it.

>> all right. gm's new ceo, barra, $14.4 million. ex object tant exorbitant pay. >> who says that? >> liberals. but she's a woman and she's, therefore, being paid less than a man would have been paid. so you've got both of your cases there. you don't know which one to -- you're going to say she should be making 20 because that's what men make. but then you say no, nobody should be making 20. >> why do you think it's -- >> because it's your mother, your sister, you don't know which way to go. >> why do you think she's getting paid too little? >> i thought the 14 million put her on par with the men. >> does it? >> yeah. and more than -- >> why do you think -- >> because earlier there was a story that she was going to be paid less than the male ceos. >> but she isn't. >> 10 million of that is in long-term compensation. she will only do well if the shareholders do well. >> but there will be a time where it vests and the media,

the mainstream media -- >> put it down. >> now you're changing your story on -- >> no, no, no. if she does a killer job with gm -- >> and hopefully she will. >> i want her to make as much money as she is worth and -- if sandra -- did you see the guy that signed with the the tech -- maybe it was with the braves. so he signed for four years, $120 million or $140 million or something. now, i admit she can't hit a fastball, you know what i mean? so she doesn't have real skills that are important. all she can do is manage hundreds of thousands of employees and take care of shareholders and -- >> but you're making out that people are being dismissive of her capabilities. >> no, i'm not. don't put me in your position of saying female employees can't -- i'm saying immediately people say she's not going to make as much as men. i'm saying the liberal quandary

is -- no, but you can't pay a ceo that much. so you're stuck. you don't know which way to go on this, right? >> one other question for you. >> yeah, go ahead 37. >> do you think there's another company that would hire her for more money right now? that to me is actually the most interesting question. >> because you mean i don't know if it's a real marketplace? >> but she's been there to -- >> she's very valuable to gm. and i'm not making comments about her, but i'm making up -- cos which goes to ceo pay. oftentimes, a lot of people in that position, it's not career that there's a true competitive market for those people because it's not clear that -- >> if it's not a hand picked board, than why would the board decide to pay that which? >> the system, so on -- >> it might be a weird system, but for the people that can't stand this -- >> but i'm happy for herr. >> you know what i suggest to the liberals that hate ceo

compensation? isn't it great in a country that you can do this? go back to school, liberal, get your mba. go start at the mail room at goldman sachs and work your way up and kick blankfine if you're better than he is. what a great country instead of >> i'm not on trying to, but i think you simplified it in a way that maybe -- >> i wouldn't do that. >> the good news is that we have about two hours and 45 minutes left in the show, so we can continue this conversation. >> i want to get clearer about how -- does she deserve as much as a man? >> absolutely. >> even if it's 40 million? >> even if it's $40 million. the question is whether the man deserves $40 million. coming up, it's not the end of the show for the new york

city area snow. not the show. cheryl sandberg is speaking with cnbc in an exclusive interview. she tells our julia boorstin about what's next for social media and cnbc is the home of olympic curling, of course, and hot stuff. we've been airing a lot of it. we'll have the highlights and the medal count from sochi when we come back. the works. because when it comes to feeling safe behind the wheel, going the distance and saving at the pump you want it all. get our multi-point inspection with a a synthetic blend oil change, tire rotation, brake inspection and more for $29.95 or less. get a complete vehicle checkup. only at your ford dealer. you stand behind what you say. there's a saying around here, around here you don't make excuses. you make commitments.

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hi will. we've got winter weather alerts extending all across the northeast. winter storm watch across d.c. atlanta, we'll be watching for significant icing into the day tomorrow. right now, atlanta is dealing with the rain. further off to the south of birmingham, we have freezing rain and purple, sleet and pink. snow into sections of north alabama. today, the wintry mix and the iciness extends across parts of the south and east up towards the north of birmingham. tomorrow, the big issue for places like atlanta, as we watch for that wintry mix, that iciness could see a significant rain event into the metro area. that could lead to huge power outages. treacherous road conditions. we have snow for places like asheville. towards the end of the week,

this will move up into d.c., new york city. here is the snowfall across the southeast. through thursday morning, asheville, roanoke, up to a foot of snow. snowfall for the northeast, 8 to 12 inches in d.c. and new york. 5 to 8 inches in the area in the light purple and that will include the new york city metro area. further up to the west, lower totals. looks like this will be a significant snow event for the northeast as we head into the end part of the week. and significant icing, again, for places like columbia, south carolina, and atlanta, georgia, and one of those big risks with the ice storms is that potential for power outage.s. we'll keep an eye on it. >> alex, thank you, i think. this is the winter of the gift that just keeps on giving. in the meantime, kraft is removing artificial preservatives.

sorbic acid is being repleased by something that is a natural mold inhibiter. this is the latest sign that companies are tweaking recipes as americans try to stick to foods they feel are natural. a number of footmaker foodmaker change their recipes. >> is that how you pronounce it? >> we talked about it beforehand. tamicin, that was our best guess. >> really? >> yeah. >> arithromycin. >> it's natural something mycin. i'm not even going to try. >> can i see the front page for andrew? >> while you guys are doing that, what are you got there? >> just, you know, you act like you didn't have any idea what i was talking about. >> go ahead. >> i've got a good story that -- the huffington post, mary barra,

gets paid had a of her female predecessor. >> but as you know, i wouldn't -- i don't read the local press. i only -- >> you are being pushed and pulled on both sides of the "wall street journal." >> the hill if possible. i try to avoid -- >> i read the -- >> i'm not talking about you. i'm not talking about you. i'm talking about huff post immediately says she's making half what the male makes, but had he they hate when anyone makes anything. how do they feel about this, good or bad? >> they start with the premise that everybody is paid too much. >> okay. >> but the male is being paid too much and they start there. >> everybody is paid too much. >> and then they feel bad for the woman who is getting paid less opinion. >> even though it's $14 million. >> natamycin, not in the dictionary. >> no, it wouldn't be in the dictionary. >> we have a facebook story to get to. on the heels of facebook -- on the on heels? >> on the heels of, their best quarterly results ever,

facebook's best quarterly results ever, the company's coo cheryl sandberg do you know sat down with julia boorstin for an interview. the big question, what's next for facebook's business? >> on your recent earnings column, mark zuckerberg laid out a vision for having a portfolio of apps. how does this strategy change your strategy? >> i think for the foreseeable future, the great majority will come from our main app. as we roll out some of these main apps, we'll see what works, we'll see what takes off. and then there are things that will grow like instagram has grown. but our focus when we first roll out these products is on the experience of the people who use them. >> what do you have to do to avoid confusing or overwhelming advertisers and consumers? >> i think advertisers right now know that they can buy ads on facebook and get great returns and we'll continue to work with

them to prove that case and enable them to launch graed gre great experiences. so if they want to share in the main facebook app or they want to send a one to one message, we want to offer both of those. >> it seems like there's a shift away from being social ads to really personal ads. how big of a shift is that going forward? >> what's exciting for us is we're both. we're personalized marketing on an unprecedented scale. every day, the 750 million people come to facebook. that's massive reach. and a lot of our clients take advantage of that reach. what's more interesting than that are the targeted segments we can do. the 20 million u.s. consumers who are in the market for a mid to small sized suv right now, the 35 million u.s. households who buy premium grocery products, we're able to offer both that massive reach and very targeted but still at scale opportunities to give messages

that are really personal. >> whenever we talk about personal messages, you have to ask about privacy concerns. how much do you think about that creep out factor of really personalized ads? >> we care about privacy a lot. it's a cornerstone of our business. we conserve very targeted ads to people based on the information wv without ever giving that information and giving that information to people they haven't given it to. that is really important for us. >> there is still that x factor. you might want to be useful without being too personal. >> i think ads that are personal to you are much more fruitful. i think as long as people understand that their privacy is protected, that it is their data and it is their data to share, which we really believe, getting a targeted ad experience is just a better experience. coming up in the next hour of "squawk box," we're going to

bring you sandburg's thoughts on facebook's biggest challenges and its relationships with teens. there's more of all this on cnbc.com. you should check it out. sandburg, we should mention, is one of the cnbc first 25 contenders. if you want, you can vote right now on cnbc.com/25. and fyi, sandburg nominated flo gloria steinam. >> that's back too far. >> before? >> there's a lot of people that -- >> she had a lot of influence. >> this is the milk in problem. >> he should be in, but he's ntl eligible. >> he's on the list. 88 region 89. but you could argue that his flew -- >> yeah, yeah, well, you could argue darwin did, too. >> by the way, i have one for you.

>> one what? >> person who should be on that list. >> you'll go crazy. >> who? >> al gore. he's had more impact on the conversation in terms of things you don't like. but in terms of the global warming stuff, it's changed the whole conversation. >> if we put charlottans and villains on there, as long as we put ken lay and some of the others -- >> i'm just putting it out there. >> you're right. >> just from an influence perspective. >> madoff has to be on there, too. >> no. he has not had nearly the -- i would argue the al gore changed the world and -- >> you're equating him to -- >> no, i'm not equating him to that. look, data will tell. at this point, the data is not going to model's way. if it comes back and it does, then you'll be right. but if it doesn't, and you all collapse -- >> but it doesn't matter because companies are changing their behavior as a result. >> did you see the world right lane -- you saw the eu just punted on stuff?

>> i can't debate the stein part. >> i'm not talking about that. when you ask people the most important concerns that they have, there's 15 of them. are you sure that it's paramount in everyone else's mind? >> in the business world, you hung out in davos. anyway -- >> when we come back, what the markets want to hear from janet yell yellen's first testimony. the ceo of ehealth's gary lauer will tell us why he's not supporting obamacare any longer. and as we head back to sochi, the medal count and more on curling. first, as we head to break, take a look at yesterday's winners & losers in the market. [ male an] the new new york is open. open to innovation. open to ambition. open to bold ideas.

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good morning. and welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc. i'm joe kernen along with becky quick and andrew ross sorkin. you have to put larry david's wife as a co-25er for -- because she was a producer of "the inconvenient truth." >> if we had to put every team member behind every person -- >> well, the hockey stick or hansson, those guys -- >> you mean the band? >> no, hansson, the -- that's

what you know about this whole -- >> it's a cultural -- you need to investigate yourself. >> i will do that. >> joining you right now is marianne bartle, from merrill lynch wealth management. also michelle gerard, chief economist at ubs. after the last jobs numbers we've gotten, have you changed your mind at all about where we stand? >> no. you know what? i don't think the fed is going to slow the pace of tapering. i'm sure they're disappointed that job growth has kind of slowed a bit, but i don't think that they're worried about the economy. the biggest thing, though, is we've talked about this before. with janet yellen, the kind of support that the economy is going to get from the fed is going to be different. i think the fed in general is done with qe.

so even if the economy slows, it's not going to slow the pace. what she's going to do is provide support by reassuring everybody that rates are going to stay low. that's how the accommodation is going to come. >> does she have another tool beyond that, saying they're going to stay low for an extended period of time? >> it gets very tricky. there's only things on the margi marg margin. being able to tighten the forward guidance is what it is at first. after that, what do you do? you have to cut interest on excess reserves. even the fed know that that doesn't add a lot. if the economy really weakened up, they would have to go back to the drawing board and think about other things. something that we haven't seen before. but i don't think they're going to go back to, you know, quantitative purchases if the economy ends up needing more help down the road. >> marianne, where does that leave us in terms of the market? if the economy or the jobs picture looks like it's slowing, there have been signs of economic weakness, the fed is

not necessarily going to step back in and prop things up. what do you do with the market? >> we're basically seeing what's happening is transitory. a lot of weather is impacting the recent economic data. we're forecasting 3% gdp growth primarily coming from cap expend and consumer spend. so we really like the markets here. they're not overvalued. in fact, this pullback is actually put them a little bit undervalued. and then when we're looking for investment themes, we're talking about team usa. team being technology, energy, autos and manufacturing. so not only are we rooting for our usa team -- >> wow. there we go. >> but we're rooting for team usa in terms of the markets. >> get tlo those up here. come on. >> we're still about 4.7% below where we were for the highs of the dow. do you think we regain that and push beyond that? >> we still have year-end push of 4000 on the s&p. really entered 2014 with too

much optimism coming into the markets. everybody was really bullish. if you look at the sentiment indicators. and what we're starting to see is some of the sentiment pulled back, especially if you look at the aaii, they're not as bullish. i think we chop around a little bit, but the markets are fairley oversold, overvalued. but we think we see new highs. >> you could be talking about very slight gains from where we ended last year? >> single digit type of returns. >> 2% or 9%? >> we're probably up around closer to the 8% kind of. >> that's what 2000 on the s&p would be. so the dow is down a little more than the s&p. the s&p is only down 2.7%. >> they're hitting because of what's happening in the emerging markets. they're really hitting the multi nationals, the big international ones. so we're telling our clients, because we really don't like emerging markets. we still think that there's risk there. but if you want exposure to that market, we're recommending to buy the multi nationals because they're actually the cheapest that we've seen in the past decade on some of our val

valuation matrix. >> so 150 divided by 1850 is what you're talking about on the s&p. >> yes. >> that is 8%. >> we had great gains. nobody was forecasting the markets would be up 30% or 40%. >> well -- >> very few people, let's put it that way, joe. so we still see modest gains, still above the long-term averages. normally the long-term basis is around 6%. so we're a little bit above that. our forecast of 2000 is a little above consensus. >> and i have to agree, i think certainly with mary in terms of, you know, there is a lot of noise in this data and i think just like people were too optimistic perhaps in the economy at the end of the year, extrapolating some of that strength too far forward, the risk is that once again, we're getting some numbers that people are getting too pessimistic on the economy. you have to save the extremes. and the economy is doing better, it's gradually improving. but understand what it can do. i don't think it can grow 3.5% sustainablely at this point, but

i don't think it's so weak that we'll have to worry about an economic performance of subtwo. you want to sit back when there's optimism and perhaps stay more centered. now i think we're at the point where the risk is people get too pessimistic. >> thank you both for coming in today. appreciate it. coming up, cnbc is the king of curling. let's check in with carl in sochi. it's a good time for him over there. to find out what is coming up. you probably are heading out to vo vodka right after this, right, q.? >> you've got that right, joe. when we come back, we'll wrap up all of last night's action and we'll talk about why all the athletes are complaining about the snowboard half pike when "squawk box" continues live from sochi.

welcome back, everybody. on the agenda today, the nfib will be releasing its small business sentiment index. later this morning, the department of transportation is scheduled to release its monthly travel record card. that would include flight delays, tarmac times and mishandled baguetts. tonight in washington, president obama is going be hosting an official state dinner honoring french president francois hollande. that is your "squawk box" planner. joe, i'll send it back over to you. >> it's like a bad video at a -- like a medium sized company that

they put together to explain -- >> this is the price is right. >> no, it's worse. it's like a medium sized company and they're sending it out to all these sales force about how to approach a new -- >> have you ever seen the video like when you're in the elevator? >> we really do need to -- >> we've complained about this repeatedly on air and they play it now to -- >> no, because now we have to play it. but the person that originally picked it out, we have to find that person. >> i'd like to know who it is. >> and we have to give them an award or fire them. >> i'm going to give them an award. wow. >> if they still work here. >> contina says move on. it was probably him because he's telling me to move on. >> i know it didn't come from anybody in our control room. >> it didn't? >> no. they use it just to torture us now. >> it's awful. >> day six of competition is under way in sochi.

and carl quintanilla has been listening to all this. he joins us -- >> oh, yes, i have. i blame contino. >> yeah, you know contino. that sounds like him, doesn't it? that wouldn't last on "squawk on the street" in -- >> no, we're all business all the time. you know that. >> that is true. >> joe, so much to talk about from sochi. victories from women's hockey. we've got a medalist in women's alpine skiing. the big news is that team usa in curling is getting off to a rough start. we take you to the ice cube curling center where the crowds were so loud that a russian player said, quote, we couldn't hear each other. we could only see our teammates mouth moving. u.s. women lose to switzerland, 7-4. u.s. men lose to norway. the coach todd hunt said we knew we weren't going to be undefeated. so we have some catching up to

do here. part of the story is what the athlete res wearing. norway got this started back in vancouver when they started out with some loud paints. this year, russia has joined in with some red and white pants. by the way, russia faces norway today. coverage on cnbc starts at 5:00 p.m. eastern time. tonight, you'll see men's half pipe snowboarding, speed skating and ski jumping. the halfpipe is turning into a real problem. the athletes are complaining that the sides are too vertical, meaning it's too hard to transition to the next jump. practice was delayed on monday to try to correct some of that. and shaun white, the two-time defending gold champ trying to become the first american man to win in the same event in three consecutive winter games. a lot of athletes basically wiping out today as we've watched some of the competition here.

medalboard goes like this. canada in first place with nine and four gold medals. norway and netherlands with seven. united states and russia with six. it was 61 degrees here yesterday. that's warmer than it was in atlanta, warmer than it was in birmingham, alabama and austin, texas. so the snow making machines on the mountains have their work cut out for them, too. we're on track for our warmest winter games ever and that's creating a whole new set of challenges. >> amazing. we can send you some snow, carl. we still have it. it's 10 degrees this morning and the drifts are so high. you figure they would get that half pipe right. that's -- i don't know. >> yeah. because when you crash, it's dangerous, absolutely. >> oh, god, so scary. never, never would i try that. anyway, thanks, q. >> okay, man. >> he can't see the dancing. coming up, another delay in the health care. this time for medium sized

businesses with 50 to 99 workers. our next guest is fed up with the white house and is withdrawing his support. e health's ceo gary lauer will tell us what's the last straw for him when we come back. we'll have the this music, of course, to keep it all rolling. d people a simple question: in retirement, will you outlive your money? uhhh. no, that can't happen. that's the thing, you don't know how long it has to last. everyone has retirement questions. so ameriprise created the exclusive.. confident retirement approach. now you and your ameripise advisor can get the real answers you need. well, knowing gives you confidence. start building your confident retirement today.

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welcome back to "squawk box." you saidbacker was a good thing. what changed? >> tissues i heard a week or so ago. for obamacare and the affordable care act, ever thought about using the internet to connect people, and i just really believe at this point that we're stuck in this where it's all

being left to government to do this. and it just isn't going to work that way. >> explain this thought, though. if you listen to folks in the administration, it sounds like obamacare, at least, the welcome back has been fixed. publicly, it >> i think the website seems to be working okay but there's not enough people enrolled. remember, the federal government website healthcare.gov is for the 36 states. you have 14 other states, new york, where i'm sitting right now are operating their own exchanges. some seem to be working okay like california and new york on a relative basis and some are just a disaster. there's no way to describe it than that. the loser in all this are the consumers who want to get, you know, quality health care and get enrolled. additionally you look at the enrollment numbers through the first 90 days you have an

imbalance. you have a number of older people, not enough younger people. this thing is not going to work unless you get a lot of younger people who don't utilize a lot. >> you talked about wanting the private sector to do this. >> interesting issue. you can come to us to get your obama health care. if you're lower income you can only go to a government exchange. we're working with the federal government to change that, trying to get a few of the states to come around. the issue is that a lot of these people are eligible and they can only go one place in the government. it's much like saying if you're low income you can only ship the package through the postal service. if you're higher income you can use fedex or u.p.s. >> is there a path for this to end well or is does this only end badly? the reason i ask, what you're

suggesting is the administration and others, give us six months, give us a year. these things get worked out. >> whatever we know, what is a fair -- >> i think we're going to know over the next six months. these health insurance companies will soon start pricing products for the next year. to just give you a flavor for that, e-help, we have more product than any place you're going to find. what we find is the 2014 health insurance products are on average 65% more expensive than similar products a year ago. if you get more of an imbalance, those prices aren't going down. they're going up. that's where this thing really unravels. >> we listened to it the first time around. how come we couldn't count on you to be more discriminating on whether this is going to work out or not? now we should listen to you. in the first place --

>> i've been hoping for a long time that the president and government would embrace the private sector so we could have a public sector/private sector partnership. we haven't gotten there yet. >> i believe in my heart. i want this to succeed by the way. >> if five years, we haven't seen the embrace of the private sector. you think that's coming? >> i'm doing everything i can. i think it's only good for people. >> thank you for being on the program this morning. >> within we return, the one-time -- cnbc first 25 face-off between banking legend sandy weill and jamie dimon. that's coming up at 7:30 eastern time. plus, a market face-off. two are ready to bring their strategies to the table. that's next on "squawk."

big questions ahead for janet yellen. market watcher david and jim paulsen will take us what investors will take away from the day's testimony. >> a cnbc exclusive. an interview with facebook sheryl sandberg. her thoughts on the biggest challenges facing the social media giant. >> a cnbc first 25 face-off, the legend versus the prodigy. we'll be matching up sandy weill and jamie dimon in the battle for your votes. cnbc begins right now. ♪

>> good morning, everybody. welcome back to "squawk box" on cnbc. i'm becky quick along with joe kernen and andrew ross sorkin. following the first two-day win streak for the dow and the s&p 500, the futures this morning are indicated higher once again. the dow futures up by 44 points above fair value. it's off the highest levels of the morning. the s&p futures are up by 4.8 points above, they were up by as much as 7 points earlier. take a look at the ten-year note. at this point it is still yielding just below 2.7% at 2.689%. we have a lot going on this morning. janet yellen is at the lead of those. she'll be testifying before congress today for the first time since becoming the fed chair. she'll be giving her semiannual testimony on monetary policy before the house finance committee. she'll be doing the same before a senate panel on thursday. there will be a few economic reports on the agenda as well. at 7:30, we get the latest reading on small business

sentiment from the national federation of independent business. at 10:00 eastern time, the government issues december reports on wholesale, inventories and job opportunities. that's the jolts report. the debt limit also back in focus on capitol hill, republican house leaders planning a vote tomorrow to raise the nation's debt limit. but they want to attach a repeal of a planned cut in military pension benefits. that cut was part of the recent budget deal, that the idea of repealing it has drown support from democrats and republicans. >> we have a couple things to talk about. barclays expecting to cut up to 12,000 jobs this year to reduce costs and counter falling income. we'll keep an eye on this one. then there's a fascinating story in all the papers. nonprofit group better markets has filed a lawsuit against the justice department to block the government's $13 billion settlement with jpmorgan calling it unlawful.

better market saying that it is appalled that the settlement gave the bank, quote, blanket civil immunity without conduct of official settlement review. i don't know whether to agree with dennis kjell heelliher. shining a light on how the settlement got there. i'm not sure it should necessarily be held up. >> i need to know about the barclays layoffs. >> some will be here. >> it said most in the uk. >> i need to know whether i'm -- i just need to know -- >> would you be more disturbed if it was here. >> absolutely. >> more disturbed here than the uk. >> i don't care what happens over there. i don't care about their unemployment rate that much, not like i care about the one here. if i'm going to factor into how i think about the jobs numbers -- i care about here.

multinationals are laying off somewhere else, that doesn't affect me nearly as much as if it's happening here. >> do you care about the stock markets. >> i do. >> we've been to davos 11 straight years. you're so global. if they're talking about the employment picture and yellen's on and everything else, i'd like to know where the bulk of the job cuts are. that's my point. >> give me a statistical number. >> every human you feel pain for? you should feel a lot of misery. there are things beginning on in this world that are really bad and we can't help. >> you know how miserable i feel. >> okay. >> banking analyst dick bovay saying -- >> there used to be be at least a dozen and brokerage firms that

were headquartered in new york that were a great size. they're not there no more. the ones that are left, they're taking money and jobs ouch the new york. why? one of the key reasons, you had three attorneys general in a row who can't stop suing them. >> the height and scrutiny to new york banking jobs elsewhere, among the examples, by melon shipped jobs to bangor, india. while goldman sachs chose to increase staff in new jersey and utah, instead of the big apple. that is true. >> these tech companies, a lot of new jobs in bangalore. does that make you happy? >> that's not as good. >> look at him. >> yes, it feels good. wouldn't you rather have them in this country? >> selfishly, yes. >> selfishly? >> otherwise i'm happy for them. you're a nut. >> steven darst and paulsen.

do you remember what he said. >> just the good part. >> he said we're going to go down or tread water for the first half of the year basically. we'll get back to where we ended the year. it's playing out like you said. it's scary. >> plenty early yet. >> it is. remind me of what you said. this is kind of what you expected. no? >> i think we're volatile but flat year, we started this year with a bit of an under heat fear. that's what the sell-off has been about. before the year is out, we might have an overheat fear from higher levels. we might get them both in this year. the net result might end up about where we started the year. i still think, though, larger term there's a lot more potential in the stock market. i think we'll have a rough, frustrating year. >> it's called progression of the mean, it's called a backing and filling, it's called

consolidating our gains for the last three years. >> first-year people finally got comfortable with the markets finally. as soon as everybody gets comfortable, they give you a bad year. that's what we're in store for a little bit. >> there was a consensus that built up towards december, the end of last year that the yen would continue to weaken this year. it has strengthened. that interest rates would go down. they have gone up. that gold would go down. it's gone up. u.s., japan and the european stock markets are in positive territory. they're all in negative territory. the consensus early on this year has shown to be long. that was built into expectations in the latter part of 2013. so it sort of -- the market has figured out a way to throw you a curveball. we've been wrong with the consensus so far, the widely perceived opinions that were registered right here on this

show in late 2013. >> i just want to say, it's not useless if you have a flat, volatile year in some sense. there are good things going on underneath it. the price earns multiples come down a full point from where it was at its highs last year. the interest rate, the ten-year bond yield is becoming a problem. now it's pulled back, kind of eased off. sentiment, as dave said, it's getting ahead of itself. it's been gut checked. all the while underneath all of this, earnings keep going up. i think in some sense there is a refreshing -- >> the valued market to an undervalued market by the end of the year? >> i think we will be. also, i think it will set us up, i think, for people being underallocated to equities. you know, again, once again, going into 2015. whether it could start earlier, that's always difficult timing. there's a lot of good trade plays this year perhaps. it's going to be tough to time

it. >> it looks like the unibomber is waving. i know you have a manifesto. you have three different sheets. give us five things. things are good, you have five things that show us that the u.s. is good? you have five things for something, don't you? >> five thing you want to watch this year. >> okay. that will do. one. >> five things you want to watch. you'll want to watch the fed. can they -- are they going to change the playbook or not? that's what we're watching. as you said, becky, for her testimony today and on thursday. are they going to change things? obama-nomics. >> are thee going to be able to cheaper the yen. >> cheaper than it is. >> the tax increase starts april 1st. in june, there's supposed to be a new wave of structural reforms. japan has done a fair amount on free trade agreement. individual taxes are going up. >> how are they doing in terms

of push back over there? he's ruffled a few feathers. >> that visit to the shrine did not win many friends, even in the united states, much less korea, taiwan, japan. and china. >> the long-term adversaries. number three is europe. can europe successfully transition to a unified banking legislation step one, the unified bank regulator. you have the stress test and the asset quality review that are going on now. it's interesting to me, i think this is a big positive building on what jim has said, james paulsen, which we you've got here is the mario draghi said we are ready if things get shaky to add more stimulus. i think you're getting set up for japan, u.s. and europe to figure out a way to give more stimulus. that's number three. you want to watch the european situation. >> all right. >> i am amazed at how low the

greek bond yield is. >> is this four? >> no. still on europe. >> the greek ten-year bond yields are 7.77. last time they were about 9. two years ago they were 33. >> portugal and some other places. >> there's a concern about this german court. >> becky, phenomenal point. they kicked the ball to the european court of justice in luxembourg. there has been -- the nature of the language was quite incendiary. okay? in terms of their -- they say this is out of bounds, illegal. okay? >> you can't do it now. people are going to stick around to hear four and five. we'll take a break. they're going to wait. >> people at home are thinking what's four, what's four? honey? i'm not leaving here. >> happy valentine's day to you. four and five we'll get to in a

second. coming up, we have much more from sochi. we have his number four. >> four and five! >> four and five. i don't want to be dismissive of five. >> they're all equal. on the olympics we'll give you an update on medal couldn't the. facebook's sheryl sandberg on the biggest challenge for the social media giant. we have an interview with her you don't want to miss. and then check out sandy weill and jim my dimon years ago. look at this. we'll have a big face-off between the two banking giants in the next half hour. who should win? we're back in a moment. why's that? uh, mark? go get help! i have my reasons. look, you don't have to feel trapped with our raise your rate cd. if our rate on this cd goes up, yours can too. oh that sounds nice.

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welcome back to "squawk box," everyone. we've been watching the futures. after three days of back-to-back games, green arrows once again. the dow futures are up, the s&p futures are up by just over five points. a government task force looking into cyberattacks of retailers, it has not come across evidence suggesting the attacks are coordinated campaigns. the economic impact of private business and individuals cannot be overstated. >> in news out of hollywood, iconic former child star shirley temple black has died. she found fame at the height of

the great depression starting in "heidi," "curly top" as well as others. she was ambassador to ghana, czechoslovakia. >> that picture she looked fantastic. >> you can tell. she always still looked like a little girl to me even as an adult. we have the whole collection. >> we should get grenadine syrup and ginger ale, make a shirley temple at the table. >> that's what you and this generation know her as, the inventor of the drink. >> i know she's an actress, of course. >> okay. >> i'm a delinquent but not a complete delinquent. >> she was known for -- >> a lot of great stuff. >> she was one of the first multitalented -- she could sing,

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welcome back to "squawk box." facebook stock has done a total turnaround since its ipo. it's now up 16%. jew we sat down with the ceo, sheryl sandberg. julia? >> sheryl sandberg says it's now at a new marketing strategy. but they've had their challenges along the road. >> we have to prove it and we should have to prove it. the big brand dollars on madison avenue are important to our

growth. we're doing well with them, every one of the ad 100 have advertised with us over the past year. measurement was a challenge for us. we could show you we improved brand sentiment but we couldn't link that to in-store sales. we made products in the investments to be able to say they saw facebook ads, these are the sales results they've achieved. that is how the dollar starts moving. >> if you see a huge perception change in how they use facebook. >> three years ago facebook has an experimental buy. while we're a small part of ad budgets we have lots of room to go he to get close to our share of consumer time. if you're a cmo in this country now, you have a facebook strategy. that's because you are starting at least or you do understand that we can really drive your business. >> how do you keep from hitting a ceiling of how much money --

>> we think we're way beyond what is a social ad budget. if you look at the numbers, 12% of consumer media time is on mobile and 3% of the budgets. we think we offer, by far, the best opportunity to reach consumers on mobile. facebook gets 1 in 7 minutes on the desktop. we get 1 in 5 minutes on mobile. greater percentage. when people are on facebook on their mobile phones, the thing they do the most is read the news feed and engage with their news feed. our ads and news feed offer an interesting way to reach people wherever they are. >> i have to ask the facebook team question. is all this hubbub about teams not being engaged on facebook much to do about nothing? >> we're focused on engagement across the board. teens remain incredibly active on facebook and instagram. >> the fact that this perception is out there, do you feel like you need to shoot it down? >> we just look at what's

happening, how teens are using facebook, how older people are using facebook, how people are making facebook such a big part of their lives. it was our tenth anniversary last week. we rolled out what we called our look-back videos which were one-minute videos of highlights from people's facebook. it was incredible. almost 200 million people saw those videos. importantly 50% of the people who saw them chose to share it. that's what we're focused on in facebook, building products that make people want to share and have great experience doing it. >> now, the fact that facebook had these look back videos, half of them were shared, that fac . factoid, it indicates that facebook can create an entirely product like the welcome-back video that will quickly engage a mass number of viewers.

coming up in the next hour of "squawk box," we'll have sa sandberg and what she thinks the movement needs to tackle next. >> any commentary on twitter from her? >> you know, i asked her about competitors like snapchat and twitter and how they've been making changes to try to take them on more directly. she kind of dodged the question and talked about how they're trying to improve service, give more options to their consumers. she wouldn't address them. she just said it's all about giving their users more options about how to communicate in different ways. >> okay. >> if they're giving their users more ways to communicate publicly, that's a lot like twitter. >> this is a subject on your beat and facebook to some degree. she's one of the 25 contenders. do you think she should be on the contender list?

>> she's worthy of a nomination. i actually wrote a piece for cnbc.com how i think zuckerberg should be on it. i think the interesting thing about sheryl sandberg she could be on the list of the next 25. because you know, i think unlike zuckerberg, she didn't create facebook. she's been influential in helping facebook make money. i'd put zuckerberg on the last 25 and sheryl on the list of the next 25. >> interesting. >> hard to do the next 25. >> if anyone is on this 25, zuckerberg has to be on this. people don't create $150 billion companies by the time they're 28 years old. >> i think what zuckerberg did and the fact that it was within the last 10 years and not 25. >> there's certain obvious ones. >> not mark zuckerberg but jesse

eisenberg has mark zuckerberg. i like that zuckerberg more than the actual zuckerberg. he's a better mark zuckerberg than zucker berg is. >> i was going to say, we struggled to get mark on. we should get jesse eisenberg to interview him. >> i'm with you on that. >> we might have aaron sorkin start anchoring, too. >> that's okay. >> easier for me. >> julia, thank you so much. gary busey for me. yes. up next, the state of the small business confidence plus cnbc first 25 face-off. banking legend sandy weill versus the protege, jamie dimon.

who has had the most influence in the business world? that's next. >> chelsea clinton for me maybe? >> yes! >> and later, senator marco rubio took on poverty. now he's taking on higher education. we'll get -- that's coming up at 8:40 a.m. eastern time. esesteak, cheesesteak ♪ ♪ it's the cheesesteak shuffle! huh! ♪ ♪ every day, all day, cheesesteak, cheesesteak! ♪ ♪ every night, all night cheesesteak, cheesesteak! ♪ ♪ 9 a.m. cheesesteak! ♪ 2 p.m. cheesesteak! ♪ 4 a.m. cheesesteak! ♪ any time (ruh!) >>geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance.

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welcome back to "squawk box," everybody. let's catch up on some of the earnings reports this morning. first up, cvs caremark reported $1.12 a share profit. revenue was also above consensus. >> cvs, the stock up by just over 1%. print reporting fourth quarter losses, 26 cents a share, smaller than the 33 cents loss that wall street was expecting. revenue was better than analysts had been expecting and sprint which is 80% owned by japan's -- said it added to subscribers during the quarter.

ingersoll-rand matched ikes a w variety of heating, air conditioning and fluid systems. they say inflation is affecting results. >> the latest read on small business is out. cnbc's steve liesman is here with data and a guess. who's your guest? >> if you could guess. >> dunkleburg. >> yes! >> is it every month? >> every month. this is our dedication among the things to dedicate to small business in the economy. >> 0.2 to 94.1. that's the small business index from the national federation of independent businesses. it remains below the 100 average of the prerecession. your typical downbeat report this morning, i slightly disagree.

i saw a few golden snug thes that made me a little bit more optimistic. overall, the index up three points. it's the creating the new jobs. capital spending was down but up quite a bit last month. expecting higher sales up 7 and earnings, mean us in 5. tell me why i should be more downbeat like you. >> we're treading water. we haven't seen the index move up into any kind of expansion level. one nice piece of the index, one of the components, up 7 points. that was expected real sales over the next three months. that may explain why we have the nice jump in hiring plans. the best numbers we've seen in the hiring plans components since 2007. so if this all follows through and if the sales turn out to be as strong as the owners think they'll be, maybe we'll finally get going. i don't know if we're going to

do better this year than we did last year. >> if i could pick two parts of the index to rise, it would be the job creation plans and the expected sales plans along with the capital outlays which did not rise. bill, quick thing on inventories. you have an issue here. big inventory buildup in the third and fourth quarter, concerned that the first quarter is one that inventories were worked up. >> we noticed in the fourth quarter a dramatic decline in satisfaction with stocks. of course that went hand in hand to the gdp report. we had huge increases and inventory building in the third and fourth quarter that contributed 40% of the gdp growth i think we saw in the second and certainly in the fourth quarter. the inventories are too heavy. more plan to reduce inventories than plan to add to them. >> i want to give you a quick chance to weigh in on the janet yellen debate.

your survey continues to show there's a lack of skilled workers out there. one of the big questions for janet today will be the issue of structural unemployment out there. you have 30 seconds. what would you say on the issue? >> i'd say there are indeed problems with the shortage -- skill shortage matchups that we have other problems that are structural problems. people aren't qualified, meaning just showing up on time. so a lot of the problem is qualified labor. not necessarily skilled. >> bill, thank you so much for joining us today. >> thanks, steve. >> see if you can get a smile on your face for next time. >> i'll work on it. >> you want to come in with a 100 here. it's been how many years running now. >> it's so much warmer there. >> we have a fun face-off this morning. beginning today we're pairing up some of cnbc's top 25 contenders it's a contender verse contender face-off. two reporters will present one

contender's stats and story. we have the lowdown on contender number one, jamie dimon. before we do that, we begin with kayla tauche at the new york stock exchange. >> sandy weill, before getting the boot from american express in the late 1980s -- or after rather he started over at a little known commercial lender called commercial credit in baltimore. he got together about ten businesses, brokerages like smith barney, investment banks like solomon brothers and insurers like lehman and prime america and travelers. to keep growing he had to overgrow glass steagall. a law was repealed in 1999.

it len to the weill's career-making coup. it was a $70 billion deal that created citigroup. that's one third of the size that jpmorgan is now but at the time, both were staggering records. a travelers director one told fortune magazine, he's a genius at running crappy businesses. wall street by that time rushed to emulate weill's model of empire building. the irony, jpmorgan, wells fargo, bank of america are still vying to be all things to all customers. citigroup has -- smith barney, america, travelers, all of those are separate. there's even some talk of reinstating glass-steagall. the law he was instrumental in repealing.

an interesting turn of events but no doubt on wall street, regardless of what his legacy is. kate was talking about jpmorgan, one of the things that's emulating this model. >> of course ironic given the lineage behind jim my dimon. when it comes to influential players, dimon is a natural, of course. you know him for his successes in jpmorgan, record profits, stock close to its all-time high and personality, of course. he rose quickly from being sandy weill's assistant to run citigroup and then turning around bank one before selling it to jpmorgan. as ceo he achieved a dom nan position in the industry. along the way, he worked on literally hundreds of deals with his own acquisitions and advising on ones of the bank, including the infamous purchases of bear stearns and washington

mutual in 2008. he's dealt with several bee bachles, a $13 billion mortgage settlement, now the subject of litigation as of yesterday. critics saw him undermining weill. along the way, he's become the model of banking ceo guy, successful, shrewd but rough around the edges as well. >> wait, wait, wait. when left citigroup it had more to do with wrangling people. >> there were issues. his daughter, had been passed over for a promotion. that upset sandy. >> >> there was a dinner. petty things. >> sandy was jealous of how good he was. >> mon and black were sworn

enemies. as a goodwill gesture, black danced with mon's wife. but mon didn't reciprocate. >> the end of glass steagall, apologies to jamie, wins the game. >> whether you think it's a good thing or bad thing that happened. i'm not going to wait for this conversation. it changed the way bank iing -- >> i think we glossed over sandy weill in the early '80s when i was a stockbroker. he rolled up about six things before he did that. >> if you have extra room i would put jamie on that list because of what he did in a post sort of 2007, '08, '09 period

and what that means. if you're looking at the full 25 years -- >> i think sandy wins. if we're picking the top 25 -- >> jamie's on the list. >> right. >> you have to view it in the prism of a financial crisis. one guy contributed to it and another guy kind of contributed getting out of it. >> that's why this is not about -- that's the interesting part about this whole game. it's not about who is the good guy or bad guy. >> the thing is trying to break this down to 25 people, this is an impossibly difficult task. i look at the 200 list, i think there are people missing. >> i'm financially bias. that's my beat. you want to have people from all sorts of industries and all parts of the world. we have a good showing, i think. >> yes. >> we'd certainly like to hear more from the viewers. weigh in on this. get involved on the twitter action. >> number four and five are coming.

>> david darst is here, jim paulsen is here. >> we know tv. >> watch the movie receipts every single night. sandy weill knew where every penny was in citigroup. that's an important criteria. which of those two got surprised the most? >> my lap lips are sealed. i'll leave that for you and the viewers. >> your lips are never sealed. >> someone got surprised a lot more than the other one did. the state of the economy, seen through the es of janet yellen. her first testimony before congress is today. investors will be watching. we'll tell you what you need to know and how markets will react. carl is in sochi with an update on what's happening there. carl? within we come back, we'll walk through the medal count,

talk about what we're going to see tonight and how some of the team usa superstars are already setting some records. "squawk box" continues live from the winter olympic games in just a moment. open to ambition. open to bold ideas. that's why new york has a new plan -- dozens of tax free zones all across the state. move here, expand here, or start a new business here and pay no taxes for ten years... we're new york. if there's something that creates more jobs, and grows more businesses... we're open to it. start a tax-free business at startup-ny.com.

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welcome back to "squawk box." there's a live shot of the torch in sochi. let's get back to carl quintanilla, who is there. he has a lot more on the olympics. he's looking, if i say so myself, michaela said you were looking very gq. >> it kind of reminds me to where in the back to the future where michael j. fox wears the vest and they ask him if he just got off the boat and he didn't know what they were talking about. i think one of the sweetest victories is julia mancuso, taking the bronze in the supercombined alpine. she's the most decorated female

u.s. skier in olympic history with four medals. this is her second straight medal in this event, taking silver in vancouver. she's the first alpine skier to win a medal in three straight olympics. aside from all of that, she tweeted this one's for you grandpa denny. her grandfather died a year ago at the age of 83. she was not expected to win this event but a big-time event skier and congratulations to her. the other big superstar from last night, speed skater shani davis finished 24th in the men's 500 meter. but this was really considered a warmup for him. three more events to go for davis. you'll hear a lot more about him over the next few days. tonight we'll get women's swede skating, the 500 meter. some ski jumping, cross-country skiing which as you may know is a brutal, exhausting sport. the medal board looks like this. canada is making a strong showing with nine medals, four

of them gold. netherlands and norway with seven and u.s. and russia, of course, are tied with six. and finally, guys, vladimir putin is basically everywhere. he was at opening ceremonies. he was at figure skating on sunday night. today he visited china house. i did not realize this. beijing is bidding for the winter games in 2022. so they are beginning to promote that bid here in sochi. putin doing a favor, obviously for one of his strong allies in trying to promote that bid as well. we'll see if they get it down the road. all those security concerns aside, he's made his presence widely felt at the games. that's probably a statement as to how these games have come off so far. >> have you seen him in the flesh walking around? >> we have not, no. i've talked to some people, mcdonald's's ceo don thompson was here. he spoke with putin a couple of nights ago. i haven't seen him.

as far as the security goes, you don't see like guns or ak-47s out. everybody is in these purple plain clothes outfits, trying to make them seem less intimidating. you don't feel a sense that there's security going on although you definitely know there is. >> there's been a few suspects rounded up before the games, i would imagine. they endon't feel bad about that. you've been to some of the events. how cool is it? >> we saw a little bit of hockey practice. we saw some women's hockey last night. women's hockey, by the way, those girls are tough. you can tell they're not tall because they're women. unbelievable game between canada and finland last night. that was fun. we're trying to get to some curling later on today and maybe some speed skating. it's kind of tough because we're doing live television a lot.

>> within we come back, when we see them in the next hour, i want to talk to you. >> carl, your liver, man. >> in a row, man. boom, boom, boom, boom. >> vodka is not your drink. what is your poison, joe? i forgot. >> chardonnay. >> joe? no. >> it's true. >> it was beer, joe, any time you're ready. >> with beer i get bloated. i can't drink enough. i'm drinking chardonnay. it's true. >> was that four shots you really did or were some of those water? >> i did a disclaimer that it may have been vodka, it might have been russian tap water, i really can't say. people really thought it was vodka. >> was it? really?

when i saw you do that -- the. >> bartender gave me water. that was my second or third take. >> we know how that goes. >> i think a pinot noir. pinot grigio, margarita. >> zima. >> if it comes in a coconut and has a straw and umbrella, that's where i stand. >> you're pretempting me. >> carl, we'll see you in the next hour. thank you. >> say hi to darst and paulsen for me. >> they're right here. we will. coming up at the top of the hour, janet yellen ready for her first appearance before congress as fed chair. we asked the man who's running the hearing what he's expecting. congressman jeb hensarling will

jen us. "squawk box" will be right back. ♪

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it looks like the future! we must have encountered a temporal vortex. further analytics are necessary. beam us up. ♪ that's my phone. hey. [ female announcer ] the x1 entertainment operating system, only from xfinity. tv and internet together like never before. stocks moving higher yesterday, ahead of federal reserve's chair's janet yellen's testimony. let's find out what investor should be listening for. david dars it is still here as well. jim, you'll be leaving in just a minute. i want to get your thoughts on this. you told us before we may see a pullback. you weren't expecting a massive pullback? >> no. >> do you think we're done with the downdraft at this point? >> i think so, for now.

we may have another one later in the year but from higher levels, becky. if the fed does make comments about maybe slowing down the pace of tapering, that could be influential in the short term. i think the fed will be largely less relevant than people think this year until we get to a point maybe -- if we do get to the point where people start thinking about overheated growth, possibly. if we get rise in commodities -- >> you think that could happen this year? >> i do. i don't think we have an overheated problem. i think we're stirring a cocktail, we put in the new fed chair, widelier y perceived as dove, we give her a weak dollar. maybe velocity turns up. commodities are rising. check out the crv move this year. if you take wage inflation and raise it a couple, three percentage points up towards 2.5, i think it's a lot of

attention and otherwise. that's where in the interim if we get good enough growth to generate that, it will be a higher market first. ultimately that may bring the fed back into the picture in a big way. >> all the stuff that we used to think about it, it will be a different world, starting next week. earnings were out of the way. the fed will not be that much, they're tapering. europe is okay. congress will raise the debt ceiling. we won't be talking about congress. we'll still be watching obamacare. what's going to take over. >> last year, the catalyst was we gave up the armageddon theory in this category. i think this year will be the start of exiting stall speed. i really think it is. we're going to go with 3% and get away from the 2% stall speed number and that might be more than anything what brings out corporate spirits and cap spending. that could be the next big thing. >> very quickly, give us a tease

about number four. we don't have time to talk about it. >> watch china. their influence on the other emerging markets, china's trust problems. >> you know what a tease is. >> that's it. wow. >> david will be with us for the next hour. we have four and five to get to. we'll do that in next block. jim, thank you so much for coming out. >> always a pleasure. >> great to see you. >> what's five? >> there are people at home waiting with bated breath. >> five? >> we'll wait. >> you can't leave. >> you'll have to stay to watch this. congressman jeb hensarling, janet yellen on the hill in front of the committee that he chairs. and marco rubio to talk about the economy, jobs and how to match education with jobs. "squawk box" will be right back. tdd# 1-888-628-2419 searching for trade ideas that spark your curiosity

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a kloser look at how curling is sweeping america off its feet. >> plus, education, jobs and the economy. we're joined by senator marco rubio of florida where it will be 80 degrees in miami today. the northeast bracing for another winter storm as the final hour of "squawk box" begins right now. weather trivia. >> welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc's first in business worldwide. >> i'm joe kernen along with becky quick along with andrew ross sorkin. let's get a check of the markets this morning. it's been up all premarket session, up 50 now.

after yesterday, there was a lot of grinding. overseas in asia, a quick look, nice numbers there, especially on the hang seng. and then in europe, not bad. in germany, we'll take the ftse. we're being inspired a little bit by the sun. the sun is really not moving. >> we're moving around, i'm told. even though i do get called up. >> i do have people tell me i think the sun revolves around the earth because of the whole global warming thing. flat earth. don't believe in evolution. >> it revolves around us. >> around me. >> we'll take that, too. google signing a major advertising deal. the agreement attracts some bigger brands. the search giant will integrate management technology into its double click ad business. the setup will let advertisers

track ads in nearly real time. and small business owner's optimism continues to edge higher at the start of the year. pricing power is straining profitability. also in washington news, the obama administration has, again, delaying a contentious health care law requirement. this time it's pushing back the mandate for medium size businesses. those are businesses that are 50 to 99 people. it's push back the mandate for them to provide coverage to full-time workers. the so-called employer mandate was supposed to take effect in january. >> back to david here. i think we know four. i want you to flush out china and then for five, we're going to say five now. this is working so well. only just like -- if you can think of a way not even to mention what it is, mention some related thing that people will be thinking about. >> okay. >> four is china and maybe more importantly its affect on all the other important emerging

markets that matter to us. >> the baltic dry shipping index, an index, shipping for iron ore, grain and coal is down 62% this year. our old friend byron bates used to watch this for us. >> since the turn of the year. it's volatile, isn't it? what does that mean. >> i believe the new leader there, xi jinping, is basically using this like the new ceo of a company that comes in and cleans house. >> right. >> you'll have a swapping first half. but we do believe that china is on top of this situation, number one, the shadow banking system. >> how many do you have here? is this is an outline. >> three. >> you have three. good. >> four. >> it's like a powerpoint, indentation now. >> it's a new one. this is getting good. >> shadow. >> baing system number two is the purchasing manager's index which came in below 50 last week. that was what set everybody off.

january 23rd is when things started to hit the fan because of that number. the market number that was 49.5, below 50. >> i remember that. that hurt the market. >> and the third thing with china is the inner bank lending. those rates have shot up. their rates are 9%. they should be 3%, 4% with all the money that's sloshing around there. in my mind this will be a sloppy first half in china. they'll keep pressure on emerging markets and we could see as we get towards the end of the year coming out as this new ceo, xi jinping, clears the decks of china. that's number four. number five, the greek letter pi relates to number five. >> okay, good.

>> you're an mit guy. you know all about pi. >> we're going to segue from pi to janet yellen. >> i bet she knows how far out on pi. she probably knows all the numbers. >> nobody knows all the numbers. >> she may have been kloser to it than i would be at least. how about that? >> okay. >> janet yellen will be on the hill for her first congressional testimony. as fed chair we're joined by congressman jeb hensarling, chairman of the house finance senate committee. are you going to give her a hard time. >> who, me? >> you're in charge of this. >> i'm not in the hard time business. this will be the chair's first appearance. we're looking forward to hearing what exactly she's going to do that will be different from her predecessor, i have no doubt that the capital markets will be analyzing and parsing every word. she'll be there a long time so there will be lots of words to

parse. >> we have david darst here who likes to do everything in lists. one, two, three, tell us what your list is. >> what are the limits of monetary policy, particularly in the face of this unprecedented regulatory burden that's come out from the administration and from congress. we just recently heard from the cbo, 2.5 million net jobs will be lost out of obamacare, dodd frank and the rest. >> somebody will want that bite for tonight's news cast, right? >> well, i don't know. but it's a legitimate question. that is we have the excess reserves. i think about 1.7 trillion sitting at the fed. what benefit are we getting from quantitative easing versus the huge risk? we know this unprecedented balance sheet will have to be around at some point. you're on a tight rope here.

on the one side it's significant inflation. on the other side, you can throw us back into recession. understanding whether or not what some called the evans rule, which "the wall street journal" primed the day before yesterday, may be the evans suggestion. then, this isn't your feather's fed. we have forets into credit allocation policy. is that a smart thing? there's mortgage backed securities markets. there's winners and losers. seniors on fixed income are losers. i'm not sure that's a good thing, as we continue to erode the boundaries between monetary policy and fiscal policy. those are a couple matters we need to explore. >> totally baseline sort of -- as honest as you can get on this, each hearing, do you think they're aimed at influencing the fed in terms of how they actually do what they do?

>> reporter: do you think it's an exploration in understanding what they do? >> well, i guess a combination of the two. i don't want the president and secretary of treasury to conduct monetary policy. i don't want 535 members of congress to conduct monetary policy. on the other hand, i don't want fed conducting fiscal policy. i don't think independence and accountability are mutually exclusive concepts. the fed is 100 years old, our economy will undertake a federal reserve centennial oversight project. if you're 100 years old, you're probably in need of a checkup anyway. this agency, in particular, is very powerful. this is about accountability and learning what are the factors, the criteria, by which they make their decisions? and how can pruentrepreneurs, sl business people plan accordingly? i think it's one of the great

uncertainties that keeping all this capital on the sideline while our countrymen are remaining unemployed and underemployed. >> congressmanhensarling, i'm a big fan of yours. the markets are worried about the fed's possible deviation from this old idea of former guidance, i.e., the not going to start tightening until the unemployment rate get tos 6.5. it's 6.6. would you be able to explore this in the testimony today how rigid and how dogmatic and how flexible versus inflexible the market will be? the markets want to see if the fed is going to stick to the playbook or call an audible. that's the question. >> that well could be the first question i ask. that's on everybody's mind. unemployment is at 6.6 now,

quite easily, notwithstanding a weak labor market, notwithstanding still a fairly historically low labor force participation rate, unemployment could slip down to 6.4%. that begs the question, again, where's the fed going with this forward guidance? is it a rule or is "the wall street journal" opined, the day before yesterday? is this federal reserve and provization. what good is forward guidance once you reach a mile post, you jettison it. i think all of that argues in favor of at least a more predictable rules-based policy. at least at one point in her career, chairman yellen seemed to show a certain amount of respect and affinity for the taylor rule, which is probably the most famous of the rules based approach to monetary poli policy.

at some point you have no rule, you are making it up as you go along. i think that reads greater fear and uncertainty in the capital market. >> if you're looking at forward guidance, you'd expect for them to tell you what should happen. >> we'd like to know what is the data that's going to merit the correction. at least in the formula, the decision-making formula that the fed will follow. it is neither an appearance nor reality making it up as you go along. we understand there are variables and factors. but what is it that will cause you to make your decision again, so that foreign guidance is foreign and guidance. >> that will be helpful. >> before we go, quick question on the news of the morning, better markets, an advocacy group for the public has now sued jpmorgan and more important importantly, the justice

department over its settlement with jpmorgan, saying it is unconstitutional and wanting more light on what happened during that sentiment. where do you stand on that? >> i haven't studied the basis. i don't know. i'd be happy to take a look at it. without studying the basis, i don't have an opinion. >> congressman, we appreciate your time this morning and being on the program. good luck with the hearing today. >> thank you. coming up, the push to revamp higher education. senator marco rubio will tell us about his new plan to get america back to work. that's at 8:30 eastern. carl quintanilla will be live in sochi with answers. i'm still confused. we did bavarian curling. >> yes, that's very sophisticated of you, joe. it willing on cnbc all week long, 5:00 eastern time. if you're still confused about the rule, the only guide you'll ever need is coming up after the break.

tough night for the u.s.

men's and women's curling team. carl quintanilla joins us with a kloser look at curling. you're going like that. we didn't have that. it was almost like shuffleboard. >> shuffleboard, yes. >> that's bavarian curling. i need to know how this one works and why they don't knock other people off. i need this. >> okay. i know you've tried it, joe. it is an amazing game. we actually have footage of team usa's loss last night for both the men and the women. we're not a favorite for gold in this event but we're doing our best. this was introduced in the '98 winter games. it's been called chess on ice. it's a combination of strategy, timing, luck and precision that became a breakout event in vancouver in 2010. if you're not familiar with the rules, two four-man teams throw these eight stones on this ice

to the bullseye. the object is to get the most stones kloser to the bullseye as you can. you sweep the ice to get the stones to curl in a specific direction. as for the terminology, that's a whole other ball game. the leaders are the skip and the vice-skip. the player whose turn it is to push the stone down the sheath is the delivery. the bullseye is known as the button. the stones weigh about 42 pounds each and they're made of polished granite. this was invented in medieval scotland in the 16th century, brought to candy by scottish immigrants. the first curling club in the united states was in 1830 in michigan. one of the reasons it's a cult,

a phenomenon, unlike the half pipe or alpine skiing where these athletes look like olympic gods, one of the few sports you can actually imagine sitting down and playing with one of these players, right? you don't have to be in amazing shape. there's very little concussion risk. in fact, in the past there have been athletes that have been turned away from games because they were too fat and just spent their time drinking beer and smoking as they played. >> we have the little things to push off. that's something you need to be careful with, because you're not on skates. it's slippery. you try to get a good pushoff but you have to sort of practice at that. andrew, did you hear what the bulis eye is called? the button. >> the button. >> here's what i don't understand. is it like scoring with shuffleboard, if you knock the other guys you get multiple

points? >> i'm not sure about the multiple points. obviously that's the most amazing part to me, one thing to get it near the button but to actually hit it, to knock someone else's stone off of the button withio know how they do it, the way they line it up that far in advance. did you play a full end? that's like the word for inning. >> did you play an actual structured game. >> no. >> i couldn't even get it all the way down the ice. >> it was classic. our coaches, we had two coaches and they spoke no english. they spoke german. they were talking the entire time looking at us speaking german. >> we'd nod. >> we were looking at each other like -- it was come cal. >> you can imagine like back in the 16th century when there were no skis, right? they had ice and rocks. this was one of the easiest games to invent. i'll throw the rock down the ice and we'll see how close we can

get it to the bullseye. >> tell us about the vodka. it was vodka or you were faking it? >> watch him. here's a video. >> you really want to see this again? >> yes. >> there's shot number one. which was actually really good. 4 this is all in an attempt to -- americans don't drink as much vodka as russians. we were trying to show national pride. >> i threw up a little bit watching that video. >> yes, yes. >> you remind me of a famous movie. did you see "the lost weekend"? >> no. >> that's how he would power. he was an alcoholic. you look very similar. he could power. >> when we went to china, remember how i ate the grasshopper on a stick? that was all about china. that was all about russia.

>> i feel pretty good today. >> wow. don't try that at home. >> the control room will get out the slow motion. curling tonight, 5:00 p.m. eastern. >> on cnbc. >> right here. >> i can't wait to see what you'll eat on "squawk on the street" today. when we come back, more of our exclusive interview with ceo sheryl sandberg. system around. "squawk box" will be right back. ugh! ♪ you told me he was good, dude. yeah he stinks at golf. but he was great at getting my claim paid fast. how fast? mine got paid in 4 days. wow. that's awesome. is that legal? big fat no. [ male announcer ] find out how fast aflac can pay you at aflac.com. [ male announcer ] find out how fast aflac can pay you sometimes they just drop in. always obvious. cme group can help you navigate risks and capture opportunities.

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this week, sheryl sandberg is at aol's inaugural makers conference talking about what "lean in" has accomplished and what else there is to do. we have this exclusive conversation. >> are you seeing enough action from the companies that can make a difference? >> we have a long way to go to get to real equality. companies understanding the barriers is important. i have stood on a stage with john chambers, the ceo of cisco, looking at his top management saying we have not understood bias and how you've treated all the women in this room. i think what we're seeing, ceos, most of them are many hen, some are women, are recognizing this isn't about equality for women.

this is about their bottom line. if they can embrace and use the full talents of the population, their companies can outperform. that's the change we need to see. >> sandburg is a cnbc first 25 contender. she says her nomination for our list is also at the maker's conference. she'd be nominating gloria steinem. when we come back, education, jobs and the economy. senator marco rubio will be joining us. first as we head to a break, the u.s. equity futures have been higher all morning long. the dow looks like it would be indicate indicated up by 52 points. the s&p 500 up by 5.5. where they almost never fight about money. [ dog barks ] because right after they get married, they'll find some financial folks who will talk to them about preparing early for retirement and be able to focus on other things, like each other,

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china. number five -- >> these people need to go to the bathroom. >> is profits. profits are estimated to grow 8% in the reporting season that we're in now. >> right. >> that's the fourth quarter. the first quarter is expected to be only 5%. you could see a dip in the market as this unfolds. second quarter, 10% year-over-year. third quarter 10% and the fourth quarter 14%. so that ties in to the scenario that i believe will unfold this year where you have a sloppy first half and a better second half, which is consistent with what jim said. that's the fifth thing to watch. >> how is that related to pi, 3.14. >> the greek symbol for pi is often used to mean profit in economics terms. >> what would that equate to for

gdp? if companies did 14%. >> a full year of 3%. the key thing to watch, overarching all of these. >> 48, at 8:30 we're going to hampton. >> seven seconds. >> i cut you off. don't say anything. federal reserve chairman janet yellen in her first report to congress on the economy. i expect a great deal of continuity in the fomc's approach to monetary policy, specifically on asset purchases, quoting now, incoming information broadly supports committee expectations of ongoing improvement in the labor market conditions and inflation, the committee will likely reduce the pace of asset purchases in future measured steps at future meetings, however, chairman yellen says, purchases are not

on a preset course. decisions about the pace will remain contingent on the outlook for the labor market and inflation. as far as the fed funds rate policy and the targets, the targets are for 6.5% unemployment and 2% inflation, remains. however, again, chairman yellen saying crossing one of these thresho thresholds. turning to the broader economy, the economy recovery gained traction in the second half of last year. nevertheless, the labor market is far from complete as far as the recovery there. the housing sector recovery slowed in the wake of mortgage rate hikes last year. overall, economic activity and employment will expand at a moderate pace this year and next says the fomc.

they also say they've been closely watching the volatility in global markets. the fomc and miss yellen in her statement saying these developments do not pose a substantial risk to the u.s. economic outlook. she concludes by talking about steps as far as regulatory reform, pointing out among other things that right now the current round of stress test are under way with the result expected in march. back to you guys. >> hampton, thank you. hampton pierson. joining us right now with more on fed chair yellen's testimony is al broadis. those comments probably don't come as much of a surprise. if there are surprises i would expect they'd be in response to questions that come later today. if you had the chance to ask the first question of chair yellen, what would your question be? >> good morning, becky. i think i would ask her to what

extent these two relatively weak labor market reports have possibly changed her view and maybe the committee's view about the outlook for the economy going forward. you know, if you go back to the minutes of the december meeting and the statement at that meeting, it was clear that the committee and probably the chairman yellen as well were more optimistic about the outlook than they had been earlier, because labor market information in the second half of the year up until december at least was looking pretty good. so i think i would want to get some sense of how this most recent data, of course there have been other weak numbers, too, purchasing marriages number was weaker than anticipated. i would want to get a sense of how that's affected their outlook. the stronger profile of the economy has taken a move to level out.

still i'd want a pressure on that. >> you may be right. the two bad jobs numbers in a row is a trend. three would have the number looking as a trend. we've not seen great weather. you could very well be on track to a third disappointing number. >> three strikes and you're out as they say. i think that even a third number doesn't mean that you're going to have really weak outlook going forward. but it would raise the probability that the performance of the economy is going to be weaker than had been anticipated earlier. of course that raises the question of whether the fed might react to that by delaying or slowing or pushing the pause button on the tapering. i don't think they want to do that. i don't think the chairman wants to do that. but you know, in addition to the payroll numbers themselves, there are other sides, tend

slack in the labor market, wages have been weak. loss of unemployment is still quite high. so all of those things would weigh in. we'll just have to wait and see how they twist it all out. >> you've had a moment to work through the testimony as well. >> i appreciate that moment. >> when hampton leads with continuity, that's not by accident. that's policy. she wants the world to know she's continuing seamlessly as possible. and she's looked at these two weak employment reports and she's saying you know what, we still expect a taper. that's the first bit of news for the market. i thought i saw gold maybe come off its highs earlier. was that something -- >> i have to take a look. >> let me know if that happened. that's one thing i thought i saw early. >> it's still up over $7. >> it was up by 9. not much. here's the thing. she's beginning to grope for this language of what to do when

you reach 6.5%. there's a thing here, crossing the policy threshold. that's getting to 6.5% unemployment rate, would not prompt an automatic rate hike but would indicate, this is a little bit confused here, it would be appropriate to consider whether the broader economic outlook justified a hike. so it's a threshold for beginning a consideration. the fed has a problem here. 6.5% was the threshold trigger point. they're trying to get away from that. big question i think most fed observers, i'm talking to becky. >> we were talking to congressman jeb hensarling earlier. he'll be running the hearing today. that was his point. forward guidance, he thinks is kind of a weak way of looking at things, that you can't say this is forward guidance and you throw it out the window. what he'd be interested in hearing, what are the data points you are watching? if it's not unemployment rate,

how would we be able to play along at home. >> the fed would say forward guidance is a strong tool and it's worked she well. one of the things i've been watching the entire time is the december 15 -- 2015 fed futures. where does the market think the market will be two years from now? it remains at, i'll call it 48 basis points or 58 basis points. what janet yellen should do is call in sick today. that's where she wants the fed funds to be. >> there's no upside today. >> the fed on a forward guidance basis has the market right where they want it. the idea that they will remain lower. there's a problem in a number that in general my take, through other language that it's used and has convinced the market

will remain low. >> thank you for joining us. >> nice to be here. >> we'll talk to florida senator marco rubio. about something in terms of overhauling higher education. we'll talk more about that. it is a key issue for equal opportunity in this country. we'll talk to him when we return. of up to 10 independent research providers into a single score that's weighted based on how accurate they've been in the past. i'm howard spielberg of fidelity investments. the equity summary score is one more innovative reason serious investors are choosing fidelity. call or click to open your fidelity account today.

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welcome back to "squawk box." ahead of janet yellen's big heari hearing, the dow jones look like it would open up about 40 points higher, the nasdaq 13 points higher. the company reported a better than expected profit, the market research firm naming a new ceo as part of an executive reshuff reshuffling, comscore. this deal with google and what that means for the advertising world. >> let's get down to the new york stock exchange. jim kramer joins us now. something i've been kicking around in my own mind as we went down 5.8 on the s&p, now we're

down 2.7. i don't think a lot of people that were waiting for a pull back wave would pull the trigger at 5.8. do they get another shot? is it over? i know it's fine tuning things more than you like to do probably, jim. is it possible that action yesterday and late last week was pretty constructive? and we might finally go above last year's quote? >> i don't know, joe. i think yesterday's action was not that constructive. most of the rally was contained to some of the soft good companies, drug companies. this morning we have a couple high profile blowups, conagra, just terrible. over in tech, infoblocks. technology has been holding in there. so i think you're going to get your chance. >> okay. so it could total -- it will get back to 5.8, maybe get down close to 10? >> well, we're not oversold

anymore. i don't know if we'll take out that low of 5.8. the earnings this week have not been that good. cvs is the bright spot. cvs lacks like they could handle a tobacco bump okay. a lot of what happened last friday seemed like short covering to me. a lot of stocks, i think particularly the industrials, they're beginning to come back, you give up some of those games. >> jim, i'm crazy about your shirt. good morning. how are you? number one, apple at 529, can that make it to 650, jim? mr. icahn has pulled back. it's a cheap stock. r & d is ramping up. we have to expect new products soon. how should we be playing apple here? >> i like apple so much, david. i know you do, too. icahn goes away, what does the stock do? it leads technology yesterday. what does that tell you? this is a company that was opportunistic and buying its stock when it got hit. you wouldn't do that be, you wouldn't spend $14 billion,

unless you had something in the pipe that could dazzle. i think this is tim cook's chance to say we have growth again. one of my favorite stocks in the market. >> great to see you guys. >> yellen, a couple bad employment reports and then the stuff that you're saying right now. you probably won't see just rip roaring optimism but stay the course, though, which means will we ever be at 100 billion a month qe, jim? >> i think we're okay in qe. honestly, i'd like to see some weather numbers. there's a lot of dispute about weather. but when you look at a company like ethan allen, in february, in january, what you're seeing is that california and florida, which have good weather, you know from senator rubio, we get a situation where the sales are quite good. in the parts of the country where it is just too cold, the

business is down. and i can't asterisk it from employment but i can asterisk it from a weather situation. >> cold this morning. >> yes, another cold morning. >> 10 degrees this morning. anyway, there is another one coming though we're running out of snow, i'm told. thank you, jim. >> thank you. up next, senator marco rubio, plus don't forget, four hours of dealmaking on cnbc, starting at 8:00 p.m. eastern time. right now, take a look at the ten-year note. it is yielding at 10.7%, just moved there. "squawk box" will be right back. d people a simple question: can you keep your lifestyle in retirement? i don't want to think about the alternative. i don't even know how to answer that. i mean, no one knows how long their money is going to last. i try not to worry, but you worry. what happens when your paychecks stop? because everyone has retirement questions.

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[ man #2 ] and it looks like we could have another one of those photos! [ female announcer ] every minute. every medal. every screen. the nbc sports live extra app gives you unprecedented access to every moment of nbc universal's coverage of the sochi olympics, now on your tv. the x1 entertainment operating system, only from xfinity. welcome back, everybody. right now we are getting kloser to the opening bell and as we do, the futures continue to have some gains. off the highest leaves of the morning but the dow futures up by 33 points, s&p up by 3.5. our next guest is senator marco rubio, coming to us with maybe some solutions to the big questions that we have. on how to approach what's happening in this country. senator, it's great to see you. thank you. >> great to see you.

thank you. >> forgive me for engaging in deductive reasoning. there's two ways to run a society. you can either redistribute assets to effect an equal outcome or you can guarantee equal opportunity. i think you've seized on it here. for republicans to win back the hearts and minds of voters, we ned to fix this, because opportunity is not equal. it depends on where you're born and what kind of family you're born into and until we fix it, the other side is going to make headway by trying to guarantee outcome. you've got some answers here. >> yes. >> i applaud you for it. >> mobility, that ability to rise above the circumstances of your birth is something i experienced, perhaps many of you have experienced as well, most americans have. the data now shows we're no longer perhaps the most mobile country in the world. i won't accept that. that's one of the things i think makes us truly exceptional. what is it that's holding people back, increasingly in the 21 cst

century, the post-industrial revolution, it's the lack of access to higher education. we have a 20th century higher education model that says everyone has to get a four-year degree, a bachelor and a bachelor's and graduate degree but that's not the only way. there are a bunch of professions that have more than high school and less than college and we need to provide access to that learning as well. and technology has brought knowledge and learning to more people than ever before but we don't reward it with a degree or federal student aid and that's why you have a trillion dollars in student loan debt out there across the country. i propose more information for students. i filed a bill called the right to know before you go that students will be told before they take out a loan this is how much you can expect to make when you grad watt with this degree. we should open up lending to private lending groups that can

invest directly into an individual student. and finally we need to open up the accreditation process and be able to allow people to get credit and degrees based not just on classroom work but life experience, work experience, areas that you can show aptitude in through testing and online learning. >> what are we going to use all those liberal arts schools for those facilities? what are we going to use them for when you see what people can expect to make with the degrees. >> some people will choose that route. i teach a political science course at florida international university and many are taking the course because they want to be journalists or politicians or they want to go to law school. i tell them to go design software. but my point is that it will still have utility and many people will choose that but we've got the rapidly growing areas of our economy that we've got a growing skills gap and

we've got to fill it by allowing people to access the information. not just young 18-year-old students, 35-year-old single mothers, too. >> sometimes i wonder why do some republicans even go into government because they don't like anything that government can do and they want small government. that can't be your only role is to try to hold back the growth of government and this is a place you can play. i don't know if it is just higher education, i don't know where to start, it is not just throwing money but an overhaul to guarantee opportunity with freedom and with economic freedom and personal freedom they can choose their own path and succeed in this country that's a really noble thing for a politician to try to do. >> it is my personal experience, i went to college on pell grants and federal student loans so i think this is a role for government. it is not the solution for everything but it is not to mean

it can't play a role. government should be limited and effective but in that role there are things the government can to allow people to access the skills they need to take advantage of the opportunities created by a free enterprise system. >> the christie coronation took a wrong turn at albuquerque -- or actually it was a wrong turn at ft. lee. are you suddenly much more marketable, you and jeb bush and others like you would you say? >> first of all, this is not part of anything like that. like i said already at some point next year i'll have to make political decisions simply because my first year in the senate is ending its first term -- >> if it is not you, who would you like? >> we've got a deep bench of qualified candidates and you mentioned governor bush and there are others governor walk in wisconsin. there are others who have expressed interest as well.

i'm sure i'll leave someone out. my point is i don't think we'll have a shortage of quality candidates that would love to serve in that position. senator, thank you. >> thank you. >> we appreciate it. >> is not that far off. we appreciate it, thanks. >> we got to get down to david faber who has news on charter communications and that long i guess saga at this point. >> it is going to get longer because this morning charter has sent 13 names that it would like to nominate to the board of directors to time warner cable. essentially setting up what will be a large proxy fight here over the control of the board as it tries to seek control of the company itself. it did not raise its offer this morning i am told, but it did submit 13 different names. i won't go through all of them right now. that would, of course, to be replace the entire board at time warner. this is a somewhat unusual move given charter, of course, has also partnered with liberty

media. john malone, greg maffy, malone would prefer things to be more affable, but it does not seem to be taking that turn, when and if charter will raise the offer and what the response will be from time warner cable. we'll have more on this on "squawk on the street" and talk about this and sprint and other things. but the saga getting started. >> thank you for that and we look forward to more "squawk on the street." we'll get final reactions to janet yellen's testimony coming up later today from david darst. [ male announcer ] the new new york is open. open to innovation. open to ambition. open to bold ideas.

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let's get back to david darstment. you add all the things up what does it mean for the markets? >> you want to expect the central banks of the world the european central bank, the bank of japan and the fed if things get sloppier they will add stimulus. we are expecting they will add in japan regardless. they've got to cheapen the yen. also european central bank. if these bank loan quality problems surface, becky, so you're going to expect

sloppiness and then they're going to hit the accelerator again. >> what is the accelerator when it comes to the u.s.? does that mean expanding qe, again? do you think there's a different tool they can use? >> might be using some language that says they're data dependent. the market are the feds and the market is not proactive, janet yellen will say we'll let the economic data tell us what to the do. that means they are reactive. >> do you get in a situation where jim paulson pointed out before where you could see inflation really kicking into overdrive? >> well, it's so low right now, it's low globally, i don't see it on the horizon. wage growth you've seen the horrendous numbers so many people are suffering. so, i don't see -- we have asset price inflation no question about it. >> you say add stimulus. will they either stop the taper or go back up? >> i think, joe, it's basically maybe delay taper. delay taper. they say, okay, give it another month. give it a couple of months.

>> you wouldn't be surprised. >> but you want to be -- >> 13 seconds. >> 13 seconds, floating rate notes. the treasury has just issued this no security. everybody here should learn about them and own a few floating rate notes. >> thank you for being here this morning. make sure you join us tomorrow. "squawk on the street" begins right now. good morning and welcome to "squawk on the street." i'm david faber with jim cramer. we are live from the new york stock exchange. carl is in sochi, we'll hear from him a little later on. janet yellen set to deliver her first testimony to congress as fed chair about an hour from now in her prepared remarks yellen says she expects a great deal of continuity with her predecessor ben bernanke when it comes to monetary policy adding that the fed will likely cut bond purchases in measured steps if economic data indicates improvement. take a look, of course, where we're going to start the day. looks like we will have slightly up open at this point. as you look at futures.