tv Squawk Alley CNBC May 21, 2015 11:00am-12:01pm EDT
11:00 am
11:01 am
welcome to "squawk alley" for a thursday morning, joining us jon fortt at post 9 and bao zoom has opened for trade. we want shopifiy. >> we start out with apple. morgan stanley raising their estimates for both the iphone and the apple watch. the firm expects 53 million iphones sold in the current quarter up from a previous estimate of 50 million raising estimates on the watch by 20% to 36 million sold in the first 12 months. meantime a respected analyst at kgi securities lowing his estimates on the watch saying the demand is slowing down. cutting his annual shipment estimates in half. shares of apple this morning up a little bit finally above 130 today to 131. but we had ubs a few days ago, raising, everybody believes the
11:02 am
iphone is tracking better than the street is giving the company credit for. >> and the phone number, the phone sentiment is a lot easier to trust than the watch. i don't think you can trust anybody's positive or negative feeling about the watch right now for a couple of reasons. one, we don't know exactly what's going do happen with supply short, tim cook said earlier this week they'll in stores by june. we don't know how many and because of that we don't know what demand really is. have people kind of cooled off on trying to order the watch? because they don't know when they're going to get it? that seems likely. and also the device slykely to get a lot of new features, not only from wwdc, but also when ios 9 makes its debut later with the new phone. expect apple to build in new features there. if they're great, maybe it has an impact on watch demand. apple has all of these stores and people are walking in seeing a cool watch feature, they're more likely to buy it. >> a lot of people saying the marginal increase in demand,
11:03 am
estimates on the phone is china. they're doing better in china than anyone ever thought. >> i think that the kgi story on the watch and the story about the iphones really are apple. because apple is the iphone and that's what really matters. the watch is in my opinion really important because it brings apple pay to a much, much larger, much more valuable universe. but when i looked at the kg i-thing, when it first came out. i was reminded by something called mcnamee's third law, in a bull market cream is not the only bovine product that floats to the top. and we have an issue of people who say things in order to -- provoke attention and get stories. and you look at the gap, the guy was so far above where everybody was, the point is it doesn't matter. they could sell 100 million watches and it would barely move the needle on apple's numbers, the reason the watch matters is
11:04 am
strategic. i'm completely with jon on this. i think focus on the phone. the watch is magnificent. they went from 0% to 3% global market share on the first day. on the first day. >> i walked by a wells fargo in my neighborhood yesterday. big logo in the window, wells fargo, a big fat apple. >> apple pay. >> they're all over it. >> when you watch how this develops, who knows exactly what's going do matter. but at the end of the day, the point jon was making is the right one. apple now is in a really good position. they're starting brand new initiatives that we're all paying a tremendous amount of attention to. even though they aren't the biggest thing relative to the numbers. >> you believe i'm guessing i'm going to extrapolate here, you think they're cheap? >> i think apple is by far the cheapest stock in the s&p 500. >> no, come on. >> for value for what you're getting? it's extraordinary. you're getting 15 times earnings for a company that is basically
11:05 am
moving the u.s. economy practically by itself. schlepping the whole thing. >> that means you have a lot of faith in the next iphone cycle. >> well keep in mind, i'm not that excited about the market. so apple is by far my biggest holding. but my market exposure is a lot lower than it has been. splim because i think we're getting towards the end of the cycle. >> apple by far your biggest holding? >> and it has been for more than a year. >> although you've been cautious on the broader market. shares of best buy rallying after profit and revenue topped estimates, the ceo said results were stronger than expected thanks to good product cycles in large-screen televisions and iconic mobile fophones. shares of salesforce in the green. mark benioff talked to cramer about it. >> this quarter we served them all. the number one thing we're fighting for is helping our customers make their customers
11:06 am
successful. because we're all about helping our customers connect with their customer in a whole new way. in sales in service, in marketing in community and analytics and apps and all of those businesses performed incredibly well this quarter. >> subs, service, revenue. billings they're calling it one of the cleanest quarters mark has ever printed. >> i think that's true. and it doesn't change the story, though. which is it's now a deal stock. and until we know which way that comes down, right? we're going to have to sit there and look at the earnings and go wow, those are beautiful earnings, now let's speculate as to who if anyone is going to step up and pay $50 billion to own this thing. >> it was always hard for me to look at this as a deal stock that didn't look like a guy who was hanging out a shingle trying to sell his company, either. the multiple is huge. sure the strategic value is there. who can you imagine go to the board and say well, here's my case for why we ought to spend
11:07 am
$60 billion on salesforce right now. >> i don't know the answer to that question. i do know we're very late in the bull market. this is exactly the environment in which that kind of thing happens. and mark benioff is one of the greatest salespeople of our generation. and if i were he, i would, if somebody steps up with a number -- i think the shortest unit of time in the universe should be how long it takes them to say yes. >> are salesforce investors going to go for that if it's anything short of $70 billion after this quarter? he's got to convince them after saying he sees his way, the fastest company to $10 billion in sales, all of a sudden, i want to sell it for seven times that number. >> if i were he, that's what i would do. >> and if you believe you're late in the cycle you would probably do it as a shareholder, too. >> i think we know if the shareholders are given a chance to vote. they'll take the cash. >> speaking of cash, we're watching mcdonald's closely today. shareholder meeting in oak brook, illinois. not without it's share of drama. our kate rodgers is watching
11:08 am
that. >> we're bringing you the news. the shareholder meet something still under way we have a major victory for shareholders of mcdonald's this morning in a preliminary vote shareholders have approved a proxy access bylaw, meaning that if shareholders have owned 3% or more of mcdonald's stock for three years, they're able to list director candidates on company proxy materials, a way to make the board more accountable to shareholders. mcdonald's stock not moving much on the news. >> if that weren't enough, we're getting news on a trade bill today. amon javers in washington. >> got a key vote in the united states senate important to the president's pacific trade pact. the senate voting 6 38 to break a filibuster on the measure. that means they're going to go on and debate the amendments throughout the afternoon today. that 62-vote margin does indicate there might be enough votes here for final pa passage. although a lot of these
11:09 am
amendments will be crucial to how the bill shakes out through the day. the thing could still be derailed. a positive derailment from the president perspective. >> hp announcing major changes to its business in china. including a sale of its majority data networking business in that country. it comes after the nsa leaks hp set to report earnings after the bell. jon will be watching for china and impact on the dollar as well. >> this move with h 3 c, the data networking unit that kind of became part of hp, it's interesting because this chinese group gets control of a majority of it. hp still has some influence within the context of all this chatter we're hearing about chinese actors trying to take trade secrets from the u.s. you wonder how this plays in. how much intellectual property
11:10 am
does this chinese group get as part of this? how much are they able to pressure u.s. companies to turn over control of some intellectual property to them. i'll be interested to see where it goes from here. >> to me this is one of those great examples of why policy in washington really does matter. i don't know that snowden was really the trigger. the chinese have been grabbing our stuff. and we've been grabbing their stuff for a long time. i do believe that china is ready to assert itself in the global technology marketplace, it has the population to set standards globally and i do think that if you look at things like alternative energy for example, their commitment to move forward against our reluctance to move forward. is almost certainly going to give them a huge industrial advantage there. i do think at a national level, we need to go back and look at some of these areas of technology and begin to invest in ways we've been reluctant to do in recent years, i do think
11:11 am
clean tech is the most obvious and pressing one. i think that there's a lock going on in enterprise technology in the u.s. so it's less important for the government to do that. i do think we need to recognize that china is flexing some muscles here and not from weakness, they're doing it from strength. we've got the people, we've got the products, but i don't think we have the national policy to get there. >> some of it is happening above board. and you saw what just disthis week, right? >> we're unlikely to be the people to be the first to hear after something important happens. it's going to be interesting. >> you've got a gig in luzerne. >> luzerne p.a. and then we go off to ohio. i've been on the east coast, enjoying the fruits of manhattan. it's -- >> you know. >> i can only imagine what that means. >> it means you get a lot of late-nights, i got to tell you,
11:12 am
staying at the gramercy park hotel. you see that place at 2:00 in the morning, you come back from a gig. there are people in new york who are still living the great gatsby. i find it mind-blowing. >> roger, great having you as always. >> always a pleasure. >> roger mcnamee. trading around five points to the upside. shake shack rallying after the company filed a trademark application for chicken shack. presumably selling chicken sandwiches. cramer called shake hack the tesla of burgers, $89 today, it was $79 yesterday. >> expensive burger. >> unbelievable. when we come back one-on-one with the incoming ceo of paypal. with us in an cnbc exclusive and paypal's current parent company, ebay taking a major swing at amazon this morning. and then alibaba's backed company baozun, the ceo will join us when "squawk alley" continues. ♪
11:13 am
11:14 am
my mom works at ge. if you want to succeed in business, mistakes are a luxury you can't afford. that's why i recommend fast, reliable comcast business internet. they know what businesses need. and there's a no-mistake guarantee. if you don't like it, you have thirty days to call and get your money back. with comcast business internet, you literally can't mook a mistick. i meant to say that. switch today and get the no mistake guarantee. comcast business. built for business.
11:15 am
11:16 am
trajectory of your business and what demand is going to be for what you uniquely offer that can maybe get use of attention versus shopfy which has similar things and seems to be get morgue attention this morning. >> yeah, actually today we are in the business to bring all the brands to online business. we are actually establishing the stars and marketplace stores. today in china you can see that the e-commerce market is growing very fast because of two reasons. first one that all the brands want to do the business. the other reason is that all the consumers are getting more and more mature. so they require more authenticity of the products. so take a look into the future, we can see a very big potential for us to grow. the market is big, we are capable, all the brands have the demand. so that's why we can grow the company to next level. >> vincent, tell me what's
11:17 am
happening with the counterfeit issue in china right now. we see that as a red flag issue for alibaba. one of your investors, is the chinese consumer getting more and more attached to getting genuine stuff? or are you finding you have to battle the perception still that boy i can get something that looks a lot like this for a lot cheaper. >> yeah, actually before in the previous time most of the consumers are shopping for cheaper price. but today most of them are requiring more and more genuine and authentic products from the online market. we are here to sell the 100% authentic products to the consumer. talking about the anti-counterfeit. we think it's a trend and it's a very good thing for us. because when the we are selling the authentic products, if we have more and more anti-counterfeit promotions, we
11:18 am
benefit from this. >> tell me, what's your mobile play? how much are you able to enable e-commerce through mobile devices for brands in a way that makes a difference for chinese consumers? >> yeah, today the younger generation is more and more honest about devices to buy things and the marketplaces like mobile and jd are offering mobile versions of the marketplaces. in the meantime we're helping all the brands to offer their mobile apps and also mobile sites to consumers. for us we have our own retail form that is microphone, based on mobile 100% and we're seeing a strong demand for the consumers to buy things through this mobile platforms. >> what is being u.s.-listed get you strategically, besides the obvious capital benefits? what does this bring you for your audience back in china? >> yeah, i think it's quite important for us to be listed here, because we are serving
11:19 am
over 90 brands in china. in which most of them are national brands. so for us, all the national brands have very good presence here. so that's why we choose nasdaq on the american market for to us list this will give us a good chance to access more and more potential brands. >> vincent chu, the ceo of baozun. just moments after the stock has ipoed, it looks like perhaps a bet on chinese consumers moving towards more athentic goods. up next, before he takes the helm of paypal next quarter, incoming ceo dan shulman joinses for an exclusive interview. ♪ every auto insurance policy has a number. but not every insurance company understands the life behind it. ♪ those who have served our nation
11:20 am
11:21 am
so if you get a trade idea about, say, organic food stocks, schwab can help. with a trading specialist just a tap away. what's on your mind, lisa? i'd like to talk about a trade idea. let's hear it. [ male announcer ] see how schwab can help light a way forward. so you can make your move, wherever you are. and start working on your next big idea. ♪ e and start working on your next big idea. financial noise financial noise
11:22 am
11:23 am
process. our josh litton spoke to him in a exclusive interview and josh is live in san francisco with more. >> well jon, can you look to the last reported quarter to see the kind of growth paypal is enjoying. revenue up double digits. 165 million active users and now it's up to dan schulman to keep the momentum going as the incoming paypal ceo. he tells me after the split, paypal is going to be more nimble. it's going to be more focused. it's also going to be easier he said, for paypal to forge new partnerships. i asked him what kind of partnerships, for instance i said what about google? there's a tech giant building its own payment platform. here's what he had to say about that. >> i think there are a number of different players in the ecosystem. there are obviously financial institutions that are tech companies, there are oems, carriers, there are merchants themselves. and we'd be open to partnering
11:24 am
with them in any one of a number of ways. in fact one of the things we're going to be talking about today is how we're moving from being more than just a button on a website. and really trying to aspire to become the world's largest open digital payments platform. >> so schulman, they're not saying no to google. clearly open to any range of deals and partnerships now and down the road. this is also a really competitive space and only got more competitive when apple moved in. so what does apple pay mean for pay pam? here's what schulman had to say? >> as i mentioned you know we did four billion transactions last year. mobile grew last year tremendously. in the first quarter, 30% of our overall billion transactions we did were on mobile. that grew 40% year-over-year. so you're seeing an explosion in digital payments going forward.
11:25 am
so schulman's point to me was as he sees it apple pay benefits him. he points out a lot of merchant who is are apple pay clients are integrating paypal technology. it's not the tech giants as you know out here in san francisco and silicon valley, there are a lot of young, hungry start-ups. gunning for paypal's business, including stripe, re/code reporting that stripe will announce a new round of funding, valuing the start-up at $5 billion. but schulman, not intimidated by stripe or any other start-up. here's what he had to say about that competition. >> that data gives us a tremendous advantage over any start-up that scale. we can use that data to sort through the risk analytics, how can we prevent bad guys from coming in. allow good transactions to happen. >> so schulman does have a lot of competition here, not just from the tech giants, but from the start-ups, sounding a note
11:26 am
of real optimism and confidence, talk to analysts on the street you'll hear a lot of excitement as well. they'll point out there aren't that many high-growth highly profitable internet brands out there. guys, back to you. >> our josh lipton watching the mobile pay space. a lot of people paying attention to what the economies are doing in europe. simon is here to wrap up their trading day. >> relative tli flat on european markets, we've made some gains. the oil stocks and engineers have done well. brent surge and wci on this country. as far as the economy, as carl points out there was disappointment that the german economy appears to be slowing down axt cording to the composite pmi falling down to 52.8, for a second month falling closer to 50, closer to not growing at all. the big news is the eu leaders, all 28, are meeting in latvia in riga. to meet with their former soviet buddies just outside the european union. it's important because this is where the greek prime minister
11:27 am
tonight gets to meet angela merkel and francois hollande. it's said by the greek press that cypress is going to announce a debt return linked to growth this is attracting a lot of attention courtesy of the german press and maybe the position that actually comes through from angela merkel. it is that there will be a two-stage deal with greece potentially, that's what rbs thinks is on the cards. it comes from a german report. and it's partly because the germans are hosting a g-7 summit in two weeks and they don't want the greeks messing with that or the greek issue. the message may be do a deal with us next week, six billion euros of savings in v.a.t. changes and we'll release millions in bailout funds, let's move off the red line in the pension and labor reform to parallel talks and aim for a third big bail-out in the fall that would unleash the cash for greece near-term and get some progress. we'll see what happens and what
11:28 am
the noises are tonight and tomorrow in riga. in the meantime at corporate level, deutsche bank held its shareholders meeting and started the meeting by appealing to shareholders to be more patient. this stock over five years losing 38%. this is after the financial crisis. they've actually put now one of the theco, co-ceos in charge. so hopefully we'll see more of anshu jayne in charge. deutsche telecom there was a suggestion they need to boocht their growth and profitability and some suggestion they would partner if they needed to in order to raise the profitability there. guys, back to you. >> simon, thank you very much. simon hobbs. we just talked to baozun. another company goes public here at nyse. shares of shopifiy, valuation fears persist, is the market getting overheated.
11:31 am
i'm sue herera with your cnbc news update. president obama's trade agenda has cleared a key senate hurdle to move to a final vote. the senate has topped the 60 votes needed to begin action on the president's bid for fast-track negotiating authority. up to 105,000 gallons of oil may have leaked from a ruptured pipeline tuesday, with up to 22,000 gallons reaching the
11:32 am
ocean off the santa barbara coast. so far, no evidence of widespread harm to birds and sea life. a convoy of prison vans brought eight men to court, suspects in the easter weekend jewel heist in london that netted hundreds of millions of dollars in stolen goods. some of those arrested were senior citizens. the eight ranged in age from 48 up to 74. domest being violence charges against free agent nfl running back ray rice were dismissed today. as rice successfully completed his pretrial program. he was arrested for third-degree aggravated assault in 2014 for punching his then-fiancee unconscious in an atlantic city elevator. that's your cnbc news update this hour. back to squawk alley. the week etsy gets slammed by investors, two e-commerce-focused companies are in focus. shopify and baozun.
11:33 am
joining us this morning, jon steinberg, the ceo of the "daily mail" north america and a cnbc contributor. interesting morning, not only we talked about baozun a moment ago, baba is down to 93 a share now. >> we see it time and again, the companies get bid up in the private market, they go public, there's a huge pop and then they come crashing down in the first earnings. this etsy thing, we all saw it on ipo day. we all said the price was crazy and it was going to happen. it was so obvious, i can't even believe the market is correcting it now and it didn't happen in the first place. >> priced at 16, it's 17 now. >> was it priced efficiently? >> you always happen, you always talk about the price thing. if you look at the first day ipo pop -- >> closed at 31. >> let's look at box. where are these relative to the ipo, no, where are these things relative to the first day, they're all way down. >> baozun's case is interesting. if you believe that china really is going to push forward and
11:34 am
become a global citizen when this comes to commerce, when it comes to technology, then this is an interesting play on authentic goods within china. if jd is going to do well long-term if alibaba is going to do well long-term, doesn't baozun have to do well. >> why is shopify up 50% and baozun is flat? >> shopify doubled their revenue year over year and baozun was flat. in q 1, the revenue was up 80% in march period. investors are concerned over the flat year over year revenue number for 2014. >> not concerned about over how much money that shopify is spending? >> it's a $2 billion valuation. it's basically trading at 20 times trailing revenue. that's pretty extreme. i'm sure we'll have a revenue miss. i'm sure we'll have an earnings miss and it will correct back down to the ipo price. >> if you were taking your own start-up public, would you say now is the time?
11:35 am
>> i don't know, it seems like there's an adverse selection thing going on. the best companies are the ones that are staying private in this kind of quasi-public state. >> examples? >> how private is uber, really, right? at a $40 billion valuation with everybody able to basically trade shares as they like them. i know that uber cracks down on the share trading a little more than most, the question is there two public markets? one for the rich hedge funds and mutual funds, and all the mutual funds are in this now and the retail market is closed out. the government took all the growth away from retail investors. >> a big long piece in the new yorker about andreessen. did you read this last week? >> i did. >> is ipo, is that the exit now? does that remain the true exit for a lot ever these guys? >> he's been very anti-ipo for a number of years. as he said in the article. when you talk to most silicon valley vcs, it's viewed as unnecessary heart ache and now we have have shadow public
11:36 am
market. the entrepreneurs have solved for it the investors have solved for it and the stock market has not solved for it i talked to a mentor and a friend who told me about companies that would go public that were worth $45 million when he was doing this in the '70s and '80s. what a different world we're in now. >> you got to feel like there's some good bargains to be had with companies going public that aren't getting maybe the hype and attention that that others get. there's an argument to be make that etsy could do well from here. and it certainly isn't priced outrageously right now. based on where it is. facebook, a few years back, the ipo was a bit of a disaster, if you had held on, you'd be doing okay. >> i think that fit bit will be an interesting case, one i think we were talking about today. if you look at the revenue growth, fitbit is going to do $336 billion. triple every possible metric in q 1,have a negative sentiment because of the apple watch.
11:37 am
but fundamentally it's a profitable company with enormous growth. 4.5 million devices sold in 2013. 10.9 million devices in 2014. there may be an interesting opportunity to say apple isn't going to eat the whole market. >> doesn't fitbit remind you of blackberry before the iphone? >> it's so cheap, it could be a takeout target. could microsoft go and buy fitbit at the right price? yeah. the question does if apple watch does super well, someone else may want to have a b player. >> there's a lot of talk that drives the demand for any kind of watch or wearable. >> do you trust this, morgan stanley has a note looking at watch demand based on surveys, nothing really tangible. but they say it's up 60% since march alone. >> one number i looked at an 8% to 10% attach rate. i think it's got to be a 20% attach rate. every person i know that has one
11:38 am
either loves it or thinks it's pretty good and they're glad they have it on their wrist. so i think that it's huge there as well. and look i think that they will do something along the lines of a tv and they will do something along the lines of a car. i don't think carl icahn's thing was crazy. >> 20% to 30% attach rate? no way. >> really? you don't think so? tell my why you think no. >> between one in five and one in four people who get an iphone also get a watch? you're talking globally not just in the u.s.? >> what was the upgrade on the iphone, iphone 6 represented 20% upgrades. >> i smell a wager coming on. >> couldn't 20% upgrade to get the watch? and the watch price is going to come down dramatically. won't they come in bundles, won't the phone come with the watch? maybe you get a cheap version of the phone, with a cheap version of the watch? >> let's get it in stores first. >> i can't believe they'll have it in stores in june. i can't imagine what the lines and fights will be like in the
11:39 am
june if the watch is in stores. >> we should mention, jon, were you featured in a new cnbc.com segment called raising the bar. >> they had us go to a bar, they gave us drinks and had us talk about entrepreneurship and experiences. i didn't drink the drink because i was super nervous, i didn't want to have alcohol while i was in a live reported segment. so we faked the drinks at the bar. we talked about hiring, employee management, revenue kbroet. >> they should do one with you and caffeine. >> after buzzfeed brews. >> exactly you have to have right liquid for the segment. "squawk alley" we could do energy drinks? >> or straight shots. >> jon steinberg. up next, every day there seems to be bad news from the middle east, but jordan's king abdullah says in his country it's business as usual. he joins us for an interview in a moment. but first up, rick santelli, what are you watching today? >> there's a lot of action that
11:40 am
has resulted from steve liesman pointing a light on some of the data issues, a wonderful thing i'm getting traders from all over the country saying let's shine a light on other areas, i'm going to have another area where the data purports to say one thing, but maybe the reality is a bit different. i have to run and work on the bls website to get it ready. all after the break.
11:43 am
coming up on the halftime show, legendary investor mario gabelli, and the stocks he likes ahead of the 2016 election and it's not a generational thing, the most widely-held stock in every age bracket is the very same one -- we reveal that and other multigenerational favorites coming up. and citi put a $722 price target on netflix. it's already up more than 80% this year. how much higher can it go? we'll discuss that and much more straight ahead, jon we'll see you in about 15. now we seem to hear bad news about isis military gains every day. but jordan's king abdullah says in his country it's business as usual. cnbc's hadley gamble spoke to him in a first on cnbc interview. she's live in the dead sea in jordan with more.
11:44 am
>> i got the chance to speak with king abdullah. we've got a,000 world leaders here. one of the major topics were the gains by isis in iraq and syria. the king abdullah, i asked his majesty if it's safe in jordan and if he thinks we're going to see an end to the crises any time soon? >> i think we have a history over many decades of jordan always being stable throughout the region whatever the crises are. and you know you've got to remember with everything that's going on around us, jordan has done extremely well, we look at the region, you mentioned sort of syria and iraq. iraq has always been a very strong market for us. and i believe that the iraqi government with the coalition forces are going to open the route between baghdad this summer. >> now of course what you're
11:45 am
hearing from king abdullah is perhaps wildly optimistic. he's saying that the trade route could be open again as early as summertime. summer is already here and you can tell behind me it's quite warm. but it's interesting of course, because jordan faces enormous challenges. they have hundreds of thousands of syrian refugees on their balance sheet and they are facing an energy crisis. essentially they have to import 97% of their energy needs. to do that is quite difficult. now i asked the king about that and i asked him about alternatives as well. take a listen. >> because of the lack of gas that we get from egypt, we had to move quickly and this is i think always a sign of jordan being able to adapt to all the challenges we've had. that's why you're seeing a major investment in alternative energy. >> now it's interesting, he's talking about renewable energy. when i spoke with his majesty, he showed me the window out behind the palace and he showed me his fleet essentially of electric cars. he's really excited about his
11:46 am
own tesla and we got to take a ride in it he's pushing this country to go green. carl? >> interesting stuff. thank you so much, hadley. hadley gamble joining us with king abdullah. let's get to the cme group, rick santelli with the santelli exchan exchange. >> you know i'll tell you, we do, we really appreciate steve liesman has a lot of my sources now looking for a variety of issues that are embedded in our data because we use data to evaluate the economy. and steve shined a light on some of the shortcomings and well, there's many. now today we learned for example that we had 274,000 in terms of initial jobless claims. now that isn't the 15-year low. the actual 15-year low was several weeks back at 262,000. but it's awfully close. and of course, i do this number every thursday at 8:30 eastern. and it is good news, many times when it comes out lower than expected, we see rates move because it is significant. well, as i said, i've been
11:47 am
getting a barrage from all my sources, not only here, but around the globe. with data points in europe. but special thanks and shout-out to art nolan and porter boggus. here's the idea they gave me, bls website is something we should all spend time on. initial jobless claims may not be giving us the type of picture and making us draw the right conclusions about the economy. why? labor force participation rate is why. because it's basically at the lowest levels or hovering at the lowest levels since '77. when you go to the bls website, let's look at some history here. civilian noninstitutional population. if you want to know the true nitty-gritty and granular, you can look it up. basically it's 16 or older. what was that population size in '77? the last time the participation rate was down here? 159 million. how many at that point in time weren't in the labor force? 60 million. flash forward to today. and the most recent data at least i found was 2014, good
11:48 am
enough. civilian noninstitutional population, 248 million. those not if the labor force, an historic 92 million. think about it this way, obviously embedded in this is social security disability people. we get that. there's structural unemployment issues embedded in that number. the simple conclusion is the only way you can end up in an initial jobless claims is to have a job. and then not have a job, then file. well, the point is, we have a lot fewer people that actually have a job. so we're going to have a lot fewer people that are going to get fired from a job. so now think about that when we draw conclusions every thursday at 8:30 eastern. back to you. >> thanks, rick. coming up, a big beat by best buy has shares moving higher this morning. wasn't the company supposed to be getting killed by showrooming? what was the driving factors behind the strong quarter? coming up. with a control pad that can read your handwriting,
11:49 am
a wide-screen multimedia center, and a head-up display for enhanced driver focus. all inside a redesigned cabin of unrivaled style and comfort. the 2015 c-class. at the very touchpoint of performance and innovation. so open an account with schwab. and when a market move affects, say, a cloud computing stock you're holding, we can help you decide what to do. with tools that help you see how market activity is affecting your positions. so when the time comes to decide whether to scale in or scale out... you can make your move, wherever you are. and start working on your next big idea. ♪
11:50 am
11:51 am
even get four years interest-free financing on serta icomfort and tempur-pedic. plus, free same day delivery, set-up, and removal of your old set. when brands compete, you save! but this special financing offer ends memorial day at sleep train. ♪ sleep train ♪ your ticket to a better night's sleep ♪ shares of best buy up nearly 5% after the tech retailer beat earnings estimates largely on the back of strong smartphone and tv sales. joining us by phone is a senior retail and technology analyst at webb bush securities. went from underperform to a neutral on best buy. your price target is $37 i believe. which is just $1.50 away from here. that sounds like faint praise based on what's going on now. isn't that basically a sell?
11:52 am
>> well no, i actually, i'm pretty well known for having sell ratings, i have one on netflix and my price target is below half of where the stock trades, if i hated these guys, i'd have a sell. the truth is we had one-year price targets, one-year investment recommendations i think best buy moves sideways this year, it trades on comps and it has a tail wind from radio shack going away. from lower gas prices and from increased housing starts which help appliances so they've got three things that are going to drive their comps positive. and kind of hide the fact that they are losing share online. on consumer electronics. i think maybe a slight benefit from 4 k tvs, but prices on them are coming down so fast, it won't help them next year and next year i revisit. think the guys get the tail wind. they sail well over smooth waters this year, next year it becomeseja vu all over again.
11:53 am
>> the new app has apple pay. they're including open box inventory now online. you call their execution i believe nearly flawless, we've got werables, drones coming up towards the end of the year. they're doing price matching, doing it in a way that still allows them to make a profit. isn't there a bull case that perhaps this holiday season turns out better than you expect? >> the bull case is these guys are the cadillac of consumer electronics retail and i think the problem with that bull case is that cadillac is your dad's brand. it's not your brand. so if they don't win over new customers, young people and their old customers die, vengsly that's what's going to happen. they've got a problem and everything you heard today is about retention of their existing customer base. go ask people under 20 if they'll ever shop at a best buy as long as they live. i imagine 90% of them will tell you why. there's no point. all of these things sound cool.
11:54 am
go to woot.com owned by amazon. it's open box. why do i need to go to best buy to see stuff people have returned, when i can get it at amazon at probably lower prices. i don't think any of those things you just mentioned have sustainable benefits, i think they have benefits this year and then it becomes yesterday's news next year. >> if the strength is in categories of big heavy things like tvs, some have argued this morning, i don't know if you agree that that you're not going to want to have that delivered by amazon. >> i don't agree, the last three televisions i've purchased i had delivered by amazon. i know people get worried about it. there are no moving parts in televisions, there's not much that can break. if it doesn't break in the first week, it's no going to break. when you do return things to amazon, they take them back, no questions asked. i spent $14,000 at amazon last year, so you're talking to the wrong guy worrying about amazon. >> how much did you buy at best buy? >> i'm a silver member.
11:55 am
11:56 am
by the time police arrive on a crime scene, they could have little to go on. a vague description. a single piece of evidence. a partial plate number. with an app from ibm, officers can now access over a billion police documents to find hidden connections, and identify potential suspects. ibm analytics helps one hundred thousand officers work smarter every day.
11:58 am
wednesday night some of the biggest names in sports gathered for the sports business journal awards dinner in manhattan. among the biggest issues this year in the sports industry, the ever-changing media landscape. we asked some of the biggest names about the rise of live streaming apps like meerkat and periscope. >> it's a free market and the free market is going to work itself out in the way it does. but the more people who are able to access the content of the sports in my opinion, as an athlete, the better. >> there's a difference between fan engagement and commercial exploitation and while some people may think that's a fine line. it's one we're going to have to be prepared to draw. >> for the leagues that do it right, they'll be capitalize on that. for some leagues if that's cutting into your television profit, then you have a problem. >> for football, are you really willing do just watch it on one
11:59 am
guy's cell phone? i think that's a little bit of a reach. >> tell you one thing, the sports industry has a lot to wrestle with, think bettman's comments are interesting. where is the line? >> in the short term, swin cash had it right, come on it's about being able to capitalize on the entire experience. plus, i can't think of many sports i want to watch like that without any commentary, without all the great camera angles. football? somebody way up in the stands? can't tell what's going on. >> hard to find the ball, hard to find the puck, depending on the sport on a cell phone. that's going to be interesting. i saw a statistics today. something like 350 scripted series last year on television, on broadcasts on cable. streaming. i mean and after spotify yesterday, it's, it's getting almost too hard to keep up with. >> you already had 500 channels and nothing on. now we've got 20,000 channels,
12:00 pm
that the talent is going to have to rise to the top. seems to be doing that. some of these things do well. some of the things don't. i think it's going to be similar with the live streaming stuff. i'll watch a second-grader's soccer game. but if i can get better quality watching the nfl on a real channel with great camera angles? i'll do that. it's high noon, let's get over to headquarters, wopner and the half. ♪ ♪ well welcome to the halftime show, our starting lineup, joe terranova is here along with josh brown, pete najarian and super mario gabelli, the chairman of the gabelli funds, he is with us for the hour today. in our game plan looks like this. top stocks from generation x to y to boomers and beyond. the names you love most and the one that stands out the most. how high can it fly? with netflix shares up 80% this year, one wall street firm ups its price target to more
80 Views
IN COLLECTIONS
CNBCUploaded by TV Archive on
![](http://athena.archive.org/0.gif?kind=track_js&track_js_case=control&cache_bust=422924376)