fascinating stuff. i'm sure we'll talk about this a lot. the cost of drugs is a huge issue for a lot of people. >> regeneron stock up 2,000% in five years. >> tonight on "fast" apple doing something ahead of product launch it's never done before. tonight at 5:00. >> thank you. "closing bell" picks up our market coverage now. ♪ back to life ♪ back to reality >> welcome to "closing bell." i'm kelly evans at the new york stock exchange. welcome back. >> i'm bill griffeth in for simon hobbs. >> back to school, back to business. >> you see all the pictures on facebook of the kids going back to school. i thought about putting a picture of mine on there. i'm going back to school as well today. let me point out, when i left here to go on vacation august 21, look this up, the dow closed at 16,459. >> where are we right now?

>> 16,464. a moment ago we were at 459. we are above that now. >> if you didn't know any better, you would think bill didn't miss anything. everybody tuned in the last two weeks know bill missed the plunge of more than 1,000 points that monday morning, august 24th. >> i had no idea. >> that was my mom's birthday actually the dow traveled 10,000 points more than that in just that week. oil was bouncing all over the place. you missed its one-day biggest gain since 2009. there was volatility that started to happen before we left. that index did double in the month of august on a percentage basis. >> today it's back at 25 right now which in and of itself puts us in yellow flag territory. what did we learn? what does this mean, kids? >> this is the overarching question we'll ask as we watch the dow now having another big move. it's up 367 points on the session today.

>> as for today's market move, financials and technology have been leading this way higher. we've got financial analysts to tell us which stocks investors should be watching right now. they've been upgraded today in anticipation of a fed rate hike. >> i know you were seaside. did it filter all the way to where you were the market moves? >> it was very quiet. it was very quiet. it was actually too quiet. yes, it was. >> the tale of two tablets. amazon set to release a 6 inch device as apple is preparing to unveil ipad pro tomorrow. which stock is a better bet on the news. >> does today's rally mean concerns over china are over? john busy is back with usey is .

>> and the chinese market. we've been hearing from big voices lately, warren buffett. lee cooperman. here is what they had to say about what's going on. >> important thing is where they are going to be in five or ten years. i'm confident they'll be considerably higher in ten years. i really have no idea where they'll be in ten days or ten months. >> i think the u.s. market is reasonably fairly valued. i think the markets in europe are several years behind the united states. we've seen europe being more interesting than the united states. we expect europe to outperform the u.s. and japan to outperform the u.s. probably. i don't think the u.s. is poised for decline. >> down days i like because we buy them cheaper. we don't try to figure out what's going on in markets. i've never been good at it. >> two smart guys with high net worth. >> i love that. >> let's get to our "closing bell" exchange.

kevin kelly is with us here. >> what does it say about the market where we are right back where we started middle of august? >> it has more to say we are rangebound right now. we see asset classes with mutual funds at record lows. margin debt jumped higher. bad combination. what you just said about china, china come back online now. they were down that marked place and whipsawed it back up. you probably sell in china and take in a breather with u.s. equities, as well. there are some things that are doing well. some things that aren't.

as a whole, the market is probably rangebound. i tend to sell at these levels. >> jim, what about you? did people miss an opportunity to get involved here h if they didn't catch the lows of a couple of weeks ago? >> i don't think so. this market hasn't resolved anything. we haven't retested the lows from a couple of weeks ago. we are still under the 200 day moving average. right now we are just bouncing around quite a bit. the major peers in the market have been china, the fed and some high yield contagion that could spring out of the energy industry. i think the fears of the fed are a little overblown because it's just a quarter of a point, hopefully they'll raise it and get the uncertainty out of the way. that it's big issue. in terms of china, i think those fears are overblown, too because what's lost in all the news is that the consumer part of their economy is really doing pretty well. it's just industrial production that has come down and their exports. consumerwise, they are doing a much better inside that economy

than people think. i'm not inclined to be aggressively buying here. it's possible we'll retest first. i agree with steve, we are bouncing around, rangebound, but i think by the end of the year, we'll resolve to the upside. >> if you're buying anything it's high dividend pairs now? >> or dividend pairs expected to grow. you had warren buffett talking about ibm. one of the reasons ibm may work in the future because it inked a deal with armh. they are the internet of things. over a billion shifts license their technology. they power qualcomm's snap dragon processor. they are doing very well in this tough market. you can smart to find names that will work.

they are trading below their historical pe five-year average. >> the interesting thing is how much retailers are playing leveraged oil etfs. some have bigger trading volume than the blue chip names we talk about here every day. on that note talk about looking around for value here, on the low end of the dow today, to see glencore after everything it's been through, suspending the dividend saying it's got to raise, sell assets, what are people to do with the energy space? >> i think it's too early to get too aggressive. if you look what kevin and steve and i are all saying, there are certain areas that will do better than others. health care is doing extremely well from an earnings standpoint. up 14.8% year over year last quarter with revenue growth 8%.

good news is i do think energy is starting to base in here. if that it's case, some of these fears about high yield defaults may abate for a while in the energy space. if you look how bearish individuals are, it's hard to believe this market could go substantially lower. you've seen a lot of capitulation in this market. >> steve, what levels are you watching right now? >> i always look at the s&p cash. i don't look at the dow. professional traders look at the s&p. we are rangebound there. your support is the 1867 level which that's been the recent low. i do think we are going to test that level sooner than later.

>> both the dow and s&p are up the same amount today. >> no, no, i hear you. it just doesn't calculate when you look at 30 stocks compared to 500 names. i'm not saying one is better than the other, just what professionals trade at. >> understood. >> thanks, guys. >> let's look at financials. they are one of the top performing sectors today after wells fargo got an upgrade from evercore and deutsche. marty, why are people in love with the financials when interest rates during bill's absence have gone nowhere? maybe slightly lower? >> what we saw this correction opened up the window again. we have 5% in valuations related to the certainty.

>> if i'm an investor anticipating the fed will raise rates, whether it's this month or december or march of next year, whatever it is, i'm going to buy the financials anyway. you don't think that movement is already in these stocks at this point? >> it's not priced at these levels. in other words, when you look at the earnings adjustments you make if rates were flat, you still would have 12, 12.5 pes. you start adding the extra 5% to 10% earn us give when rates start to go higher as they lagged positive rates and sensitivity positions begins to pay dividends, that's where you start to see the traction that we would believe the rates would be able to play for the banks next year. >> i guess if there is an argument against it is that the fed as they've warned or promised, whichever way you want to put it, they are going to do this slowly. even after the first rate increase -- >> one and done, every other.

>> they are taking their sweet time which will not be that great for financials in the scheme of things. >> that is exactly right. what we talked about, you want banks that have much more neutral positions, not ones which are asset sensitive. we do think the fed will go very slow. we think 75 basis points over the next year and a half to 2016, only at 1%. you need to have banks like wells fargo that can lag their deposits significantly as you start to get that off the floor, off the 0% rate and have other ways they can grow their earnings, as well. >> why do you like goldman as strong buy as opposed to wells and m&ts? >> wells will have a strong buy as well as goldman sachs. goldman sachs is more investment banking, their ability to continue to capture what we think is going to be the next paradigm shift, a lot less

competition than what they had p pre the financial crisis. slow growth will create more demand for their services on that front which they will benefit nicely. >> so true. just had a conversation about the insurance space. slow revenue growth, building through acquisitions. that should benefit these guys. thank you. >> thanks, marty. >> nice talking to you. >> financials which are helping lead the way in this rally. dow up 359 points today. same for the s&p, nasdaq up 2.4%. >> i think it's hilarious, almost precisely where it was when i left two weeks ago. >> up next, tablet wars heating up. apple going big with this new ipad pro. even as amazon gears up or gears down to release this $50 tablet just in time for the holidays. we'll look at both sides of

that. which tech giant could come out on top? >> disney, verizon, nfl, all making moves today to attract core cutters. i'm watson. and today hundreds of companies are putting me to work. i'm teaching watson to help your vet speak dog. you're a dog, right? i'm teaching watson to help you make healthy choices. i'm teaching watson to help design a vacation around your personality. don't judge. i'm teaching watson to answer endless questions. how big is infinity? where do babies come from? why can't i have chocolate for breakfast?

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welcome back. a strong day here to kick off the week back after a long weekend there for labor day here in the u.s. the dow up almost 350 points. 2.1% gains to the dow and that brought s&p 500, the nasdaq getting 110 points today. on that dow, general electric is one of the biggest gainers. it's getting the green light here as we look at it up 3.6%. that deal valued at about $9.5 billion. >> they have waiting a long time

for that deal to go through. this is considered to be jeff immelt's crowning achievement he's been waiting to finish off. >> certainly wasn't the energy ones. >> it was not. a couple of mergers and acquisitions otherwise headlining our movers today. media general buying meredith corporation, a cash and stock deal valued bat $2.4 billion. the combined company will reach roughly 30% of u.s. television households. meredith's magazine stable includes "martha stewart living" and "better homes and gardens." i'm told in that press release, nowhere was the word "magazine" used, interestingly. blackstone is buying real estate investment trust strategic hotels and resorts for $14.25 a share. chicago-based strategic hotels specializes in high-end properties. that deal is valued at about $6 billion and that includes debt. apple and amazon reportedly

planning to unveil devices. apple unveiling a pro with 12.9 inch display. amazon doing a new fire tabt with only a 6 inch screen and going to cost $50. >> how do they do? one product category, two different strategies. gentlemen, good to see you both. first of all, let's start with the amazon story there. that's yours, michael. $50, what am i getting for $50 with this tablet here? >> you're getting the ability to read books, clearly, watch movies on occasion, and a handful of apps. this is clearly not as well developed an app store as the apple. >> who will buy this thing? >> i'd say anybody with $50 that doesn't have $400 or $500. this is like asking me if

mcdonald's can compete with ruth's chris steakhouse. amazon is going after the low end of the market. those are the people not yet amazon customers. i think they are trying to hook them in getting them used to using amazon services. once we have a small fire tablet maybe you want to join amazon prime for streaming video. i think it's strategy to get people to use amazon and i think it's going to work. >> will this work where other consumer device strategies haven't gained traction? >> yeah. at least from apple's perspective, the ipad pro -- >> sorry. i meant with regard to amazon. let's put that aside and go ahead with what you were going to say about apple. >> both these guys are trying to go after very different ends of the bar of the tablet market. apple is trying to go after almost the enterprise out of the

market with the ipad pro, 12.9 inch screen. it will be targeted for enterprises. with ibm and cisco partnerships announced, which we think have less than 10% penetration of tablets today. >> we know there is a slump in the tablet market, which i don't understand. people know i love my blackberry, but i love my tablet more than my blackberry. i could not work without it. why are we in a slump? is the pro meant to be something of, not a solution, obviously because it's a specialized product here. what is the solution to this slump we are seeing in sales for tablets? >> yeah. i think like you, everyone loves their tablets. the trouble is you haven't had a whole lot of innovation if you think about it over the last two or three years in the tablet market. the incremental utility from

these new tablets is minimal to upgrade to a new tablet. that is a challenge they have. they need to figure out ways to increase the number of use cases what could happen as a way to potentially drive demand. we think ios 9 with the multitasking, productivity improvements could be a level not just for the high ipad but ipad mini and air across the board. >> we'll have more on ios 9 in the next hour. going back to amazon. their phone didn't do all that great. the kindle has been a success. what about their history with launching new consumer products like these? >> remember that these guys are not a device company. they are not a device many manufacture. i think bezos thinks he can dominate every category. looks like they've given up on

the phone. kindle has been a success. i think the fire tv stick will be a success because you can retrofit any television and turn it into a smart tv with one of those. i doubt any other of their devices will work well. kindle for books makes sense. i'm going to carry the 6 inch $50 on an airplane because if i leave it behind, i don't care. i will not carry my $500 ipad because i do care. i think these guys are coming at this market from opposite ends. perversely, i think a $50 fire hd will help apple because it will get a lot of kids to get tablets as gifts from middle class households. those kids are going to grow up and be apple's core consumers. i think it's really a good thing. the more people you introduce to this, the more likely apple benefits in the long run. these guys are going to divide the market. apple will take the high end. >> will be very interesting. you take a chain and chain your

ipad to your wrist when you go on the plane. >> there you go. >> thank you both for joining us. >> it's like the disposable camera. >> very interesting price point they've got going there. guess this is me. we've got 37 minutes left in the trading session with a rally under way. dow up 339 points. we are trading at 16,446, which is the number i was saying about two weeks ago before i went on vacation. >> we are glad you're back. disney, nfl and verizon changing things up to attract core cutters. will viewers tap in? julia boorstin will have the details. >> john bussey is in the house with his take on china and whether its resources are deep enough to fix its economy and markets.

at ally bank no branches equals great rates. it's a fact. kind of like shopping hungry equals overshopping.

welcome back. keeping an eye on markets with a half hour to go in the session. another strong day. dow up 338. industrials leading the way. those utilities which were the leaders or biggest decliners during a lot of that volatility, telling you it did have to do with rates today in the middle of the pack. nicely we moved on from that theme. >> transports have come back, as

well. that's one green shoot he is looking at right now. >> sitting out today's rally is netflix. losing ground for the seventh consecutive session, the streaming giant shares wiping out 20% of their value in that time. today down 4.4%. >> wow. disney shares trading higher. the entertainment giant expanding the reach of its digital movie service by teaming up with amazon and microsoft. julia boorstin is in los angeles with this story. now it will be disney everywhere, right? >> that's right. it's really disney everywhere. you can buy "frozen" and with cloud-based app called disney movies everywhere, you can watch "frozen" everywhere on any device. beginning today, disney movies anywhere will be available on amazon video and tv. next week the cloud apple launched for roku as well as android tv. any disney, pixar or marvell

movies you purchase through any of these services will be stored to the disney account you have in the cloud. even purchases you might have made in the past. you can redeem digital copies of many dvds and blu-rays. what disney is trying to do here is tap onto kids' desire to watch movies over and over to sell more movies in an ij of video on demand which is rental and streaming through services like netflix. disney is uniquely positioned to offer 0 this kind of branded movie app. not only does it have the kid-oriented content and big-name brands but also has a library to the available on streaming services. the student does have a deal with netflix which starts next year, but that's for new films the studio releases starting in 2016. with the app's expansion, disney is trying to make cloud access so easy it makes sense to buy a movie rather than rent it.

>> can i pick up with the sports piece of this? over the weekend i know you were watching tennis, as well. trying to find just a u.s. open match on espn or espn2 then telling you to go to espn3 which is a streaming app. i'm thinking, how are people following something they used to take for granted would be shown to them, the most compelling match on their own tv without having to search everywhere for it? the nfl deal has that feel to it, doesn't it? >> what the nfl is doing here, it's taking the digital rights it has and trying to sell more content to consumers. the app they announced today is nfl game pass. for $99 a year, if you're a big nfl fan you can watch any game soon as it's over. listen to games live. they say they are not trying to replace the live tv experience. listening is not going to replace watching it. the fact they are trying to make

more money speaks to where things are going. they are hedging against the future. they see people are streaming content more than ever and want to make sure they are offering that content. >> i'm trying to think of a reason not to cut the cord right now? my kids are in their mid 20s. my daughter wouldn't know a cord if she saw it. she is totally into streaming at this point. i'm trying to think with this introduction, with what at&t and directv are doing with a similar programming model, is there a reason to even have a cord any more? >> absolutely. kelly was talking about how hard it is to figure out where to find different content. if you want to watch a live football game, you are going to watch it on traditional tv.

you can put together a series of things, but if you are interested in live sports, it takes an effort to put together that portfolio. what a lot of folks like bob iger said, traditional bundle as a package looks good once consumers try to start piecing together their own version of the bundle without that traditional tv piece. >> that's it. here is your 5,000 option 0s. >> how did i watch tennis last night? on my ipad. >> no, you didn't? >> i did. >> because you had to? >> it was the marie anderson match and something else was coming on television i wasn't going to watch so i went to my ipad and streamed it at that point. >> brave new world. julia boorstin, thank you very much. let's stream our cnbc news update with sue herera. >> here is what's happening at this hour. kentucky county clerk kim davis

has been released from jail. the judge who sentenced her for refusing to issue marriage licensees to gay couples ordered her not to interfere with future marriage licensees. her lawyer though refused to say whether she will comply with the judge's order. >> secretary of state john kerry discussed iran with israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu. >> republican presidential candidate marco rubio campaigning in new hampshire holding two town hall meetings. he vowed to void any nuclear deal with iran if elected president. in the latest marist poll, rubio has only 3% support in the state. >> the 2015 college basketball champions, the duke blue devils meeting with president obama at the white house. they presented the president with a jersey and signed ball. and a fantasy camp scholarship that he can redeem after he leaves the white house. that's your cnbc news update. back to you guys. >> let me remind everybody, they

won that in april. what took so long? some of those kids graduated. >> they probably have. the white house is a busy place. it's got a lot on the agenda. >> thanks, sue. >> thanks very much. 30 minutes to go. dow is up 360. we are continuing to edge higher here. s&p is now up 2.3%. nasdaq up 2.5%. >> a top trader will tell us what he's watching as we roll through what will be a very critical final half hour of today's trading session. >> we'll speak with the veteran china watcher who calls the country's stock market a casino where the dealer can change the rules at any moment. ♪ no student's ever been the king of the campus on day one. but you're armed with a roomy new jansport backpack, a powerful new dell 2-in-1 laptop, and durable new stellar notebooks, so you're walking the halls with varsity level swagger. that's what we call that new gear feeling.

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welcome back if want positive signs, the market is giving them to us today. industrials leading the way with the dow up 65 points. investors betting the chinese government will still do more to stimulate the world's second largest economy. >> we are into the final and critical half hour of the trading day here. i'm with my friend cnbc market

analyst. steve grasso told us at the top of the hour we've been rangebound. he is thinking about selling this market. what are you going to do here? >> welcome back, bill. i think the market's strength might be representative of your returning here. >> you want something, what is it? >> i'm not so sure steve's got this one. we've been rangebound and beaten up badly. the market has been run by hedge fund guys looking to outperform. when you've got assets under management, i've got a reason to keep those assets under management. guys were selling into some of the weakness, hoping it might break down further. it could buy back their stock cheaper and outside returns. >> we had the second worst week of the year last week. is this a bounce or do you find this rally encouraging? >> right now as we go into the close today, the imbalance to the buy side is unremarkable. we are not starting to see ourselves firing into the bell.

with that being said we are bouncing off the bottom. we'll start trades back up to some of the levels we saw. i don't know if we get back to where we started the year. certainly we have more up side here. >> thank you, gordon. always good to see you. >> thank you, both. chinese markets did a turn around after regulators announced new measures including a circuit breaker in extreme trading. joining us is john bussey, senior business editor and columnist at the "wall street journal" with more how the regulators are handling this market. are all these measures to put markets back to normal or up? >> there should be a sign over the top that says "under construction." there is a minimal regulation. there is opaque transactions.

witness the fact for all of this meltdown, all the sell-off, this market is still down just 0.5%, the shanghai composite from the beginning of the year. if you looked back 12 months, it's up almost 40% which describes some of the tulip mania that went into the run-up over the last year and half. >> are the communists who run china and trying to create this capitalist environment at the same time, this experiment we've been watching for a while, are they losing now? are they winning? are they panicking? how would you characterize what's going on now? >> i think they are walking right into the turban fan blade of economics. >> which they are discovering? >> yes. if you look at some of the economic data which in and of

itself is opaque and not entirely to be trusted because it's coming from centralized government, the economic indicators are probably better than the market indicators. they show this isn't over. exports were down in august. imports were down in august. this is a slowing economy. they had to use $94 billion worth of their reserves to prop up the yuan. there's capital flight. they are trying to put crimps on that. that will affect markets around the world. the government was trying to get its arms around reflective of the economy going through transition. >> interesting you were trying to push to combine and go public to make steps in that direction. is that because they have enough confidence in this market continuing to function? is that because they want to

give off the appearance again of continuing to liberalize these companies whether they are or aren't? >> it's all those things. then you have to ask yourself, well the fastest way to liberalize, the fastest way to stimulate are to require some of those state-owned enterprises to privatize, to be sold off. what's happening, they are combining them. it's going to be more in control of the economy than before. they are still facing the huge problem of aging society that's just simply not as productive as it has been over the last 30 years. >> guys also had a great feature on one of the towns hit hard on the closure of their big steel mill. so many people in this country can relate to that, of course. >> that's right. in a funny way they are going through the rust belt phenomenon that happened here in the united states.

>> all in a rapid succession. >> right. >> good to see you as always. >> with about 20 minutes to go, the market holding on to its gains. the dow now up 373 points. that is session highs. >> when we come back, why equity analysts seem to be embracing this buy the dip mentality after all. big day? ah, the usual. moved some new cars. hauled a bunch of steel. kept the supermarket shelves stocked. made sure everyone got their latest gadgets. what's up for the next shift? ah, nothing much. just keeping the lights on. (laugh) nice. doing the big things that move an economy.

see you tomorrow, mac. see you tomorrow, sam. just another day at norfolk southern.

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and we've got your back. legalzoom. legal help is here. gordon was mentioning we didn't have a tremendous imbalance to the buy side going into the close. we are holding near the highs of the session with a gain of 374 points on the dow. s&p is up 45. the nasdaq, the strongest of the three up 2.6% right now. 122-point gain. we look at the s&p, all 500 components and there are a handful that are minus right now. many of them high profile technology stocks. netflix earlier that's been continuing to move lower despite

this rally today. >> china discussion you were just having, yahoo is one of those names. alibaba, yahoo has that stake in, said its second quarter gross merchandise volume will be lower than initial estimates due to weaker consumer spending in china. you can imagine that taking a bite out of baba and yahoo today. adding fuel to the rally. dominick chu to round them up. >> shares of wayfair higher on an upgrade of b of a. the analyst there says short reports overlooked several important factors in a sell-off in wayfair shares creates an attractive entry point. there is suntrust boosting procter and gamble to a buy citing valuation among other reasons. p&g is the third worst performing stock in the dow. still down about 23% in 2015. shares of fitbit up about 10% as

morg morgan stanley raised from overweight to equal weight. there's been some resilience in demand post apple watch launch. rbc capital markets boosting aetna to outperform from sector perform rating. the firm is comfortable with the likelihood of the humana deal closing. summit research cut its price target on baba to $81 from a prior $91. shares reverse course midday on those cautious comments about its china activities at citi's global technology conference. what is one analyst making a bearish call on the stock. that is part of the story. for morehead to cnbc.com/pro where subscribers can get more on that story. >> that is one thing we were discussing. it's conference season. a lot of companies use these

conferences to preannounce. 13 minutes to go. stocks generally are doing quite well today. dow up 377. all the major indexes up 2.3% to 2.6%. our next guest says s&p will rally. this just in: 50 million customers' data was not compromised this morning in a security breach that didn't happen. wall street. not rattled. at all. no. not at all. not at all. i mean, look at the day. sir. sir. what went right? what went right? everything. thank you. with threat intelligence, behavioral analytics, and 6000 experts, ibm security will help keep you out of the news. my dad's company wasn't hacked today. cool.

welcome back. the rally continues. joining us, paul dietrich and bruno delama. who says 9.7% higher? >> me. >> how is that going to work? >> me. the market's gone up 6% in the last week or so. the u.s., underlying u.s. economy is doing really well. i think actually will be helped by some of the troubles in china. this is also the year before an election year. if you look at every time we've had that, we had a really good year. if you look at the pullbacks over the last five years, we had the pullbacks in the fall then we had in many cases double-digit gains by the end of the year. that's going to happen this year, too.

>> you convinced, bruno? >> yeah. the u.s. was a few weeks ago the most expensive market across global markets. this has been a good healthy, natural pullback. 9% seems a little bit of a stretch for us. we like the markets as they are today. >> hang on one second. we have breaking news from the world bank. sue herera has details. >> it were tans to the discussion you are having right now. "financial times" interviewed the world bank chief economist who was warning federal reserve to delay any rate rise saying it risks triggering panic and turmoil in emerging markets in it opts to raise rates at its september meeting and should hold fire until the global economy is on surer footing. in addition to that, he highlights the mounting concern outside the u.s. over the fed's potential lift-off and with what happened over the last two weeks in china. he's addressing the market

turmoil. if you put that all together, it leads one to believe the scenario was looking worse than it did even in june. he is urging the fed to stand pat for september. back to you. >> thank you very much. bruno, i saw you nodding your head. do you agree with him? >> actually, i don't. i don't think it's a big deal. >> you don't think a rate hike next week would be a big deal? >> september, december, it needs to happen. the economy is in good footing. sure, there's not a lot of inflation going through the system. the general data is not bad. i think we should just do it. not a big deal. >> do you agree, still for the world bank to come out and say it, what do you make of that? >> the imf is on record saying they don't want to see it this year either. >> i think this is orchestrated. you don't get the head of the imf and world bank saying these things without speaking with janet yellen. i believe this is a signal to

the market we may not see a rate hike. >> doesn't this make it, if the fed wants to show it's not bowing to international pressure, wouldn't this make it more likely or necessary for them to do something to say we are still going to do it? >> they could. it doesn't make sense. with the chinese lowering rates, it means everything people buy at costco three months from now will be cheaper than it is today. what we have is deflationary pressures coming in everywhere in the world. there is no reason to raise rates. and with the dollar as strong as it is that, is a de facto raise anyway. >> that's true. good to see you both. thanks for joining us. >> thank you, gentlemen. we are coming back with the closing countdown in just a moment. >> after the bell, tomorrow it's that big apple event. we will preview what the tech giant is unveiling in this latest product announcement. keep it here. you're watching cnbc, first in business worldwide. care of my heart.

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moved higher. that began this whole process. when i left the dow was at 16,459, and now we are above that. after all that volatility and over that two-week period, we are up 0.22%. volatility also went through the roof. what is higher? financial stocks. i'm going to bring in mary thompson on that. you see all up about 2%, 3% in anticipation of a fed rate hike here. >> wells fargo was upgraded. then upgraded bank of america, as well. there was a decent amount of deal flow. that supported the markets. what was interesting is when you

came into a number of the strategists' notes were negative. september when you have a tough start like we did in september, historically it suggests the rest of the month will be bad, too. they were warning we'll retest these lows of 1867. today was a different story. >> so many historical benchmarks have been thrown out this year. >> we have data coming out of china. investors will watch that. they want to watch what comes out from apple tomorrow. >> its ipad pro they'll unveil? >> yes. and the new iphone. and we'll be in a holding pattern till the fed makes its decision about interest rates next week. we've got a lot to look out for. >> pulling back just a little bit right now. as steve grasso pointed out, we've been rangebound. we are still in a trading range here. >> it's true. this has been the story for all of 2015 for the markets.

as we await that fed rate hike. >> thanks, mary. we go out a strong start to this week after labor day. good to be back. let's get to the second hour of the "closing bell" and think about what apple will introduce tomorrow. stay tuned to the second hour of "closing bell" with kelly evans. see you tomorrow. thank you to "closing bell." it is a strong one. dow up about 388 points here. responding to some strong overseas gains. it's 2.5% on the dot, that gain for the s&p 500 adding 48 points. the nasdaq up 2.7% and change. up 128 points. back above 4800 now.

welcome to all of you. mike, people want to know is this rally based on suddenly fundamentals look okay again or because china intervened and quelled concerns for the time being? >> fundamentals being okay helps. i think it's much more about relief we got through five days when the u.s. and china were not open on the same day. i think friday was a lot of just get out of the way. nothing broke overt long weekend in china. you have the expectations of stimulus there. dovish noises about what the fed might or might not do here. all that working together. i don't think today would have swayed bulls or bears from their position. we are not in the range. now warning the fed to raise rates. >> we heard concerns globally and the pain being felt already in emerging markets, in china where some of these currencies are under strong pressure.

there is concern about what that will do to their economies. why that matters is you have art cashin telling us every day the fed is warned by global organizations around the world. now there is only a 30% chance it makes this move toward higher interest rates in september. a lot of people increasingly talking about december. >> from a posturing point of view, it's not that the imf and world bank are here to tell us what to do. they can weigh in on anyone's economy, but does this make it harder for the fed to raise rates or easier in september? >> i think it makes it on the margin harder. because it underscores the degree to which the fed is the outlier here in terms of policy. what the markets don't want to

hear is the fed is on its own calendar. i don't think a september bump up 25 basis points says they are going it alone and it's against all evidence. i do think it does create that picture. >> i wonder if the issue here comes down to an issue of the chinese economy, why should it be up to the fed to be looking over its shoulder? why isn't the world bank and imf being more strident about what china should do? >> who cares about 25 basis points? it will have no impact on the global economy. the fed is worried about liquidity factors around the world. china's economy over the weekend on imports was terribly weak. the export numbers gave you a bit of a relief. if you think about the mosaic of global central banks and what they are supposed to be doing, we've known the fed was at a divergence with other global central banks for probably the last year. therefore, get on with it if you're the fed. global data over the weekend and this morning in europe, german

imports and exports are at record highs. europe was supposed to be suffering under the weight of china. you don't have an argument global growth is as bad as people make it out to be. >> i would say within this market today it wasn't about the macro factors. there were pockets of strength. technology, semiconductors led a rally. microchip technology raising its second quarter revenue outlook. that was positive. you saw some areas like that that came back, health care, banks another strong. >> and industrials. when is the last time we saw industrials leading what it? some people were pointing to ge, but that doesn't seem like enough to lift the entire sector. some of these names 3% to 4%. was the more cyclically-cleared sectors working. it makes sense if you're thinking you are going to have maintained liquidity by the fed or china, and these are the

cheap assets that got the brunt of the sell-off. it makes much more sense to me than going back to netflix near its all-time high. going back to the old organic growth stories. it makes more sense as a healing process to go to the cyclical growth. doesn't mean you'll have this sustained. it makes sense. >> as we heard from one of goldman's top bankers, industrials could be the next place we see more deal makings still. let's get out those stocks are rallying today. history suggests september could be on the horizon still. >> brian put it well earlier today. one thing about stocks in september, you never know what's going to happen to stocks in september. that's been the case so far in the first four days of trade this month the s&p lost 2.5%. but today a massive rally that cut those losses big time. leaving out the day-to-day noise and looking back, we know that

september is historically the worse month for stocks. we use analysis to look at what happened in the past. there have only been eight instances that happened since 1990. the worse income 2001 when the s&p fell 3.6%. after that kind of start, the s&p continued to fall and end the month in negative territory 7 out of 8 instances. all but once and losing nearly 5% on average. if the s&p finishes the first week of september flat as it looks like it will, it is a coin toss. we are right back to not knowing. the september swoon could be

just starting. >> we know september traditionally a weak month. we had a poor start to it. people will say volume wasn't all that great. are we just masking or papering over some of the problems here? >> take advantage of volatility. we got below 25 today. last week we were elevated above 30. if you have short-term trading you dance near the door. make sure nothing fundamental has changed in companies you hold. to say we are out of the soup because things feel better and we have relief, i don't think anybody is saying that. you have a lot of reasons to stay light and nimble and dancing near the door. >> probably the biggest news

yesterday, was unfortunate we weren't open. for glencore to do what it did, put it in context for us. >> they capitulated to reality on some point. they said no more dividend, raise capital. take the pain is the idea. a lot of people are going to look at that combined with other negative sentiment and commodity and trades and say this might be the kind of thing that shows people throwing in the towel. >> david rosenberg said it's the blood of the street you want to see signaling a bottom. that would be constructive for the overall markets. >> it's more aggressive than anything we've seen from the oil majors here. he said himself to the "wall street journal" this better put an end to it. if this doesn't shore up confidence, i don't know what investors want. have we really right-sized for the new normal of the commodity space? >> no you are not reducing

existing capacity that much. i don't think it will bring back the super cycle type trachltd could it give investors confidence glencore is better positioned to survive this, but not the whole tide is shifting. >> thinking about exxon, chevron lagging the market today and investors wanting to know with the oil price bouncing around here, what are we looking for to see if a bottom has been put in? >> i think volatility in the oil market tells me we are finding a bottom. absolutely. if you listen to u.s. majors on the e&p side, the eia data is right saying we peaked in april. 13 straight weeks in baker hughes rig count. they talked to people they say on the capex side. it's been stubborn on the way down but starting to happen. miners tend to be selling assets at the bottom.

copper may be the most imbalanced of the major commodities right now. you are getting back to a place where there is sanity. >> labor day passed, the peak driving season passed. any time they had a summer like they just had, the fall's been difficult for them. >> without a doubt. i do think, to be honest, there is too much focus on has crude bottomed, is crude the tale to tell us where other risk assets are going? i think you can have some comfort that it's somewhere in the zone of trying to find the low and it's probably a net positive until we get there on the consumption side. >> the dow transports. this is an area of the market that peaked last december. true to form, it became a bit of a tell. we went through that sharp correction a couple of weeks over the last couple of weeks. it starts to get a bid now.

does that also -- how much more does that rally have to extend before there is confidence that is a true green shoot? >> a little more. the bigger story is the overall headline index is caught down to all that stuff flashing the warning signals, small caps, junk bonds, transports. now you have to see them show convincingly they are leading us out of it. >> tim, what is your best way to play the market? >> find the places where i think you can make a strong valuation argument. financials are the place to do that. the yield curve and net interest margins. this is an interesting place. i think if you make a 12-month call you'll be in a great place. >> the bottom call. brave, tim. i like it. thank you so much for joining us. appreciate it. >> stick around to catch more of tim seymour and the crew on "fast money" at 5:00 today.

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welcome back. here is a look at the dow standouts today. general electric up 4% leading the way. walmart up 3.9%. pfizer, intel strong up more than 3%, as well. after hours, we have an earnings alert on david and buster's. >> popping by about 7% and volume shares. they just reported earnings coming in 40 cents per share that beats the average analyst estimate 23 cents. revenues $217 million. analysts looking for $204. more of that bullishness coming as they raise their full year outlo outlook. their q 2 comparable store sales up 11%. their total 215 store sales up between 6.5% to 7.5%.

again, a very bullish report, if you want to look at analyst expectations. we'll see what happens when the company conference call starts. shares up just about 7%. again 114,000 shares. the shares up 37% year-to-date. back to you. >> thank you. 11% comp sales growth. that just caught my eye. check out the dow, s&p and nasdaq in august. sell-off followed by a rally. more how retail investors responded to moves, let's bring in chief strategist at td ameritrade. you have a window into retail behavior. what happened during those swings? >> you read so much about mutual fund clients, et cetera, selling out. we have an index imx that measures what clients who invest once a month do. what it showed, they did cut back on their exposure. they cut back on exposure in terms of beta and volatility. there were net buyers last month. what we saw is they sold some of

the higher volatility type stocks and bought stocks taking advantage of the fact that there was a sell-off that wouldn't get hurt as much had the sell-off continued. >> what about customer whose couldn't do it because the td platform was down here and there? >> there was a day we were slow, no doubt about it. that was a very small amount of clients. overall, i 1-2-3 inning we made all our clients right any way they should have been. >> we are flashing names of net sells and buys. any surprising ones on this list? >> the fact twitter was a bit of a surprise to me. not that it's not a fan favorite. we know retail tends to like facebook and twitter. when it got down to its ipo was on when people would bail out on a stock. we saw the exact opposite as people came in to buy twitter. it's kind of interesting if you tie a thread you see twitter, netflix, disney. at the end of august, the conversations was about is this the end of media? what's going on with media?

the retail client used this to say this is overdone. media is a big part of our life. we'll continue to have it on a daily basis. >> whose clients were panicking last month? what can you infer from this index? it doesn't show it's purely a contrary indicator. doesn't always flow with the market. what is your interpretation? >> my interpretation of it is i think the clients have done fairly well if you overlay it with the s&p 500. that being said, when you do say whose clients we're selling, those folks who spend more time planning their vacation than planning their investments probably didn't do well during this. one of the good things of 2008 was so many people started to take things in their own hands and understand what their investments are. those are the folks benefitting from the movements that

happened. >> i love what you were saying about how people were trying to be prudent buying names at a discount last month, not panicking too much. do you think the retail investor is getting weiser? some suggested it's the new dumb money? >> i can't speak to the algos. the retail investor is getting much wiser, much more -- again, education became a big part of everything they do. we see it how we interact with our clients. in fairness to our competitors, many do it also. we do a the love education. more importantly, we are not just doing the education. what you are seeing is the retail investor has a completely different face than it did 20 years ago. people are engaged much more. the growth of derivatives through options. most importantly they understand

the risk side. >> are we seeing the fact there is a relatively small core of very engaged investors and others saying i'll hand it off to etfs? >> you see some combination thereof. we have a great retail investor advisor business. over 5,500 investment advisors. those folks tend to have a trading account. some of their money they want managed. others want to be involved with it more directly. >> we've got to go, but how much was mobile traffic? anybody on the beach kind of vaguely aware what was happening with the market? >> our mobile traffic picked up considerably. fred thompson gets more than 15% of our daily trade on mobile. >> big-ticket items there. thank you so much. >> always a pleasure. we have a news alert on continental resources. >> so no movement here on the shares after hours. shares were up almost a percent. continental resources saying

they are now going to cut their capital expenditures plans by about $300 million to $350 million from the previous budgeted amount. they also plan to reduce the number of operating rigs they have in the balkan shale region to eight rigs from ten by the end of the month. the chairman and ceo of the company saying we do not believe today's low commodity prices are sustainable long term but committed to living within our cash flow until they recover. we are going to reduce this capital expenditure to preserve the value of our world class assets until commodity prices improve. an oil company cutting its capital expenditures outlook from its previously budgeted amount. another casualty of what's happening with the slide in oil prices. we should point out shares for continental down 19% year-to-date and down about 60% over the last 12 months. back to you.

>> dom, thank you very much. >> up next, tech stocks look too attractive to pass up after the recent market sell-off. will the ios be a big hit for apple or disappointment investors? good. very good. you see something moving off the shelves and your first thought is to investigate the company. you are type e*. yes, investment opportunities can be anywhere...

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tech stocks among the big winners in that rally. here to tell us where opportunities to buy are. tim lesco and mark kessler. welcome to you both. we are talking about a missed opportunity maybe to get in on some of the real bargains, but where do you think people can get straight value? >> i think it's fair to say there's still a lot of opportunities out there. i think it's fair to say if you look at the move today in semiconductors, people were obviously leaning the wrong way when you see microchip saying the quarter is tracking as expected. and all the stocks surge, that suggests that the sentiment was negative going into that news. >> you like the semis. tim, where do you see opportunity? >> we are starting to see opportunity build within the enterprise sector. the big news of the day is what is apple going to announce tomorrow?

people are talking about an enterprise tablet. you've seen strong franchises growing at high single digit numbers trade down like oracle and microsoft. we are constructive on the group as a whole. >> one of the issues an investor has is what is a tech stock? netflix not in the tech sector for s&p. it seems like you have to make that call. did the big enterprise companies look cheap? is it more devices or component? where would you see some of the value being created? >> i think the notion of buying all tech is frankly an anachronism. three names we wanted to highlight today are different names, but all 13 are $30 billion in market cap. symantec. people know that franchise, not a lot of growth but in the process of selling their storage business. going to make growth

investments, buy back stock, low multiple. another name is avago. that has exposure to wireless and storage. we think they will be positively impacted by cycles with respect to the new iphone. then ads. marketing, data, those types of solutions. not a very well known company but undervalued. >> give us your picks? >> we like oracle, microsoft and apple. all trading at significant discounts to the market. we are a valuation shop. any time you see big dislocations in the market, it often makes things more palatable to us. companies we typically traded pes we don't like come down into our range. oracle is a great example of that. 7%, 8% growth. a good dividend and changing their business model. >> tim, you're not worried

they'll be underwhelmed by apple's announcements tomorrow? >> if we can predict apple's announcements better than anybody else, we would be special. long-term apple is cheap, 11 1/2 times earnings. whether this next iphone is a hit, they've got a great install base and only 250% people upgraded to the latest new phone. a lot of room for apple. >> thank you both. >> thanks. >> time for a cnbc news update with sue herera. >> a jury is recommending the death sentence for the white extre supremacist. ruling out three men as suspects in the death of a police officer in fox lake, illinois, last week. they are now looking for a person who left dna evidence found at that scene.

>> lockheed martin filing a protest with the government. it concern as $6.75 billion contract the army awarded oshkosh last month for humvee trucks. >> a first look at president obama's visit with survival expert bear gryllis. the two will appear on a special edition later this fall. there you see the president eating a partially eaten salomon carcass left behind by a bear. it was cooked just a little bit over a small flame. yum. comcast is the parent of nbc and cnbc. better him than me, back to you. >> i was going to wince, but i eat salomon sushi. >> luckily a bear hasn't eaten it before you. yes. >> that would be a new restaurant experience. >> yes, it would.

>> thank you for now. sue herera. >> could apple have surprise up its sleeve tomorrow? that's next. don't hate the rich. coming up, find out why somebody here says we would be much worse off without the 1%.

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welcome back. it was a strong day on wall street. dow up 390 points to settle there that's good for 2.4% puts shy of 16,5000. the s&p adding 2.5%, as well. 1969 the closing level of the nasdaq up 2.7%. 128 points. it's above 4,800 again. crude oil was moving around today. it looks weaker now. down about 0.3% below $46 a barrel. collateral damage of that continues. >> news alert on macy's to get to. let's get to courtney reagan. >> macy's coming out to say it will be closing 35 to 40 of its underperforming stores. macy's saying this only represents about 1% of their sales. the company, as many retailers do, prune their store portfolio on an annual basis. they make their decisions based on the stores underperforming. we know macy's is opening new

stores. among those is that offprice concept. those stores are opening right now. macy's is closing 35 to 40 underperforming stores representing about 1% of total sales. they have 770 total. >> what do you make of this announcement here from macy?" >> macy's has been struggling lately. investors want to see -- they've been proactive on their struggle looking at real estate holdings. they are under activist pressure to spin off their real estate and right size the number of stores to fit the business, focusing on the offprice outlets. closing others as they've been dealing with. apparel has been a weak category. they are getting hit by that. >> getting ahead of what everyone is viewing a make or break holiday season for brick and mortar. >> i thought i saw best buy

trying out pilot placement programs in macy's. trying to get where the consumers are. >> shares of apple higher today. the stock has been lower on the weak. joining us with what to expect is cnbc contributor natalie morris with our panel. welcome to you. >> thanks for having me. >> you had a sneak peek? >> i had a sneak peek at ios 9. that is exciting. that's not what will be new tomorrow. it will be about new iphones to put this new software on. sometimes we see the street poop on apple when they don't have new hardware. this is an under the hood upgrade year. we will see the street maybe shake a little because we don't have new gadgets. >> what about ios 9? what is interesting about it? >> it's a new form factor. people are not going to be deterred by it. a lot of times when you change the user interface people freak a little. it's familiar enough but faster

and snappier and predictive. it knows what you are going to do next. gets you to that next place faster. >> when it comes to this mid cycle upgrade of the iphone, sometimes these are good for apple. can we handicap how that will be? >> it's so different this year we have two models to go on. usually we get the 5 and 5s or 4 and 4s. usually in the "s" years people don't need it. there is significant hardware here. maybe 4k video shooting. the competitors do that. we'll see if the two different versions of this model really catapult more sales. usually the s-years, the market shakes on it but sales do gangbusters. >> people are interested to hear what apple will show in terms of the tv. >> me, as well. >> hasn't been that exciting yet. analysts are still hopeful.

>> right. i'm hopeful, as well. i wanted a new apple tv in the summer www-d.c. event. we didn't get it. i'm clinching this will be the time. since 2012 we haven't had an update to this hardware which is crazy. gadgets are like dogs, seven years to one, right? >> i keep focusing on the software. software is eating the world. when it comes to the predictive stuff, will this change the way we interact with our phones? this is the one they are going to push out. everyone has to do it right away. >> force touch may be something we will be using. maybe in the new apple tv remote. they want to put the same force touch we have on watch on to ios. the new apple tv software will be more of a better extension of ios 9 on the tv now. we'll see those -- it's more of a fluid spectrum. >> natalie, thank you.

>> yes. big day tomorrow. >> rest up. breaking news on united airlines. phil lebeau, what can you tell us? >> not every day you have the chairman and ceo step down effective immediately that. happened at united airlines. jeff smisek resigned as chairman and ceo he's been replaced as president and ceo by oscar munoz who serves on the united board of directors. there is little indication as to what precipitated this or why he is stepping down. not long ago the cfo stepped down and left to take another job. they just replaced their cfo. united, more turnover in the executive ranks. jeff smisek who has come under criticism for the slow integration of united and continental after orchestrating the merger of those two airlines. stepped down as chairman and ceo replaced as ceo by oscar munoz.

back to you. >> phil, all i can say is wow. i'm thinking back on issues united had telling pilots to be careful about safety, be engaged. they've done a lot on the cost side. would any of that be percolating enough to cause a turnover move like this? >> there have been a number of people within that company who have not been happy with jeff smisek as ceo. that's been going on for a number of years. when you look at the integration of united and continental, when they were brought together, everybody said we know there are a number of problems with united. perhaps the continental side of the business which is what jeff smisek was running will be able to be integrated with united and make up for the deficiencies at united. that hasn't happened. united had a number of operational issues. numerous computer glitches as they were integrating these

systems. it's not the smoothest system in the world. at the same time, there have been a lot of employees who have been discontent within that company. it is not uncommon, and i'm sure some of your guests might have had this experience to be on a flight and hear the crew say from your continental based united crew, thanks for flying with us. that's one way crew was say we are not crazy about this merger. those are judge just a few of the things that have been, if you will, nipping at the heels of jeff smisek. a lot of people within that company and people on wall street said he has not done enough or did not do enough to integrate these two companies quicker. >> united looks like a market cap of $22 billion, smaller than american. delta is the big at $37 billion. quite a gulf opening between the big three. >> there's been massive underperformance. it's just about the five-year

anniversary of the closing of that merger. it seems as if if you haven't straightened it out, perhaps this decision was made try for somebody else to try. >> would continental feel as strongly as smisek or the new ceo oscar as jeff did about competition against emirates, norwegian, qantas? >> that's not changing. that is a domestic carrier versus gulf carrier issues. that is not changing. >> you have hawaiian and jetblue and fedex piece of this all saying they are not necessarily agreeing at all with these three big carriers. >> they do not have exposure to the middle east routes united, american and delta had. hawaiian doesn't compete with emirates.

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welcome back. is there a look at shares of united continental which had a big move. its ceo jeff smisek out. phil lebeau, any detail how this went down? >> a few more details. remember, there was an ongoing internal investigation at united airlines. there is also a federal investigation into what kind of an agreement jeff smisek and other executives may have made in the past with the former head of the new york port authority regarding flights from new york down to, and i believe it was north carolina or south carolina. i can't remember the exact small market. it was one of those flights if you added service there, it would stand out. at the time when this investigation was announced, everybody said well, did you do this in exchange for the port

authority giving united special treatment in the future? at the time united airlines said we are investigating this. we do not believe this was the case. clearly, that's all tied in with this. not only has jeff smisek no longer running united airlines or chairman of the board, also announced today is the executive vice president communications and government affairs, he is out as is -- he or she is out as the senior vp of corporate government affairs, both stepped down. those are tied in relationship to the internal investigation into the port authority and that service that began from new york down to that smaller market down in the north carolina, south carolina -- i'm summarizing this. if i'm not mistaken, the reason that came under scrutiny because the port authority person in charge, the executive there had some type of summer home or cottage in that market.

people said, wait a second, why are you adding service to this small market here? there is a conference call coming up in about 45 minutes no doubt there will be a number of questions, not only about jeff smisek, but this internal investigation and whether or not this was one of those quid pro quos that should not have taken place. as a result, i've got an executive shake-up. >> i wonder if we'll hear from oscar munoz who will be ceo? president of cfx. he was executive at at&t, coca-cola and pepsico. >> we've got more on this breaking news with the former continental airline ceo gordon bethune who joins us by phone. what do you think of the new ceo whose background is largely consumer products? >> i've known oscar since -- actually, invited him on the board many years ago. he is a very capable man. he was cfo of cfx.

now chief operating officer. i think he will be a real strong executive. >> did you know jeff well? what did you think of his leadership at this company? >> i hired jeff in '95. i don't know a better, more upstanding person and strong leader than jeff. i think jeff got with the sleazeballs in albany and new jersey. that it's politics that are up there that can color you. it's unfortunate. the ten years i was ceo, i must have been approached by 100 u.s. senators and congressmen to add service to their city as a special favor. >> what was your philosophy? you can cloak business in all sorts of different ways. >> yes. my philosophy is we did what was good for continental and its shareholders, period. >> what about this move? i'm sure you're still a big shareholder, right? >> the problem with this move is

it's very politically colored. the port authority has warfare going on. government christi is a presidential candidate and albany has its own ambition. this is politics as usual in that part of the country. you always have to wash your hands when you leave a meeting with those people. >> let's bring in phil lebeau. >> i'm curious, jordan, from your perspective. you're no stranger to some of the complaints. i'm sure you heard them regarding the integration of united and why it took so long. employees not happy. executives not happy. how much of that do you blame on jeff smisek and how much do you say it was just not an integration that went well and there is a number of people who are to blame there? >> you know as much as i do. jeff wasn't dealt the same hands as delta. they were forced to take half of

united and half of continental executives. that mix didn't work well. you only have one good chance to make a good first impression. they screwed that up the first two years were abysmal. i saw in the last 12 months a lot of progress there. i thought jeff had got the thing back directionally correct. so i don't believe that this is operationally a jeff smisek leadership issue. i think this is some color politics in an election year with that kind of smear campaign and the board got elected just to stay clear of it. >> in terms of colored politics i wonder, phil, anything on this antitrust probe that a lot of consumers and shareholders in airlines are interested in working on, the price collusion. i know we don't know a lot about that but i just wonder as these political sort of accusations swirl if this has any implications for that.

>> well, with regard to this particular situation with jeff smisek, i don't think so. separately from that, kelly, and i think gordon will agree here, i don't believe there's any evidence of any type of collusion there. i think that that was a politically motivated complaint against the airlines. and if you look at the data, it's pretty clear that that collusion charge just doesn't hold up. >> we've got to go but i would love a last word to you. >> if you asked four smart people, kelly, what the answer of 2 plus 2 is, they'll all come up with 4. that wouldn't be collusion. that would be all of them coming up with the right answer. so that's what the airlines are guilty of, of coming up with the right answer of capacity and pricing. i'm sure there has nothing to do with that at all. >> thank you so much, gordon be bethune, for sharing your thoughts this hour. phil lebeau, thank you for now. we will have much more on this break united airlines shake-up when we come right back here on "the closing bell."

welcome back. just having a close look here at what is happening with yahoo! shares after hours. a key part of yahoo!'s

divestiture of alibaba is that it would get some tax advantages for shareholders. now, the irs has to rule on that. it looks as though there has been a decision in which the irs is determining not to grant a requested ruling. here's a look at shares of yahoo!. they're down after hours. if i'm reading this right, it's by about 4 1/2%. if this is interpreted as not being in favor of giving yahoo! this actual spinoff tax break, obviously that's a big potential negative for the shares. and even for the deal itself. but, mike, it's not so clear whether we can go so far as to say this has been determined yet. >> no, we can't. and of course it's my company. so i don't want it get too deep in speculating about what's going on here but that's my interpretation. >> sara? >> i was just going to say a lot of people saw the spinoff as a key catalyst for the stock and that it has done well. marissa mayer, what she has managed to do with the tax shares. i remember when this was

announced certainly the stock rallied pretty sharply. we'll see. it's not definitive. >> looks like the company wanted the irs to say definitively one way or another this can proceed. their plans is r. to spin off alibaba in the fourth quarter. today this was already in focus simply because al babas gross merchandise volumes weren't there. it had to issue a business update on that at a technology conference that hurt alibaba shares. it hurt yahoo! shares as well. both the macro factors and in this case potentially some tax-specific factors are really coloring the outlook for investors who had assumed that this spinoff would happen and happen in the most shareholder-friendly way. again, without needing you to comment as somebody working at yahoo! finance are down about 4% after hours. we'll get you more update from our josh lipton potentially soon as we get that. of course we're still also keeping a close eye on shares of united which had a major c suite shake-up. the ceo jeff smisek is out. following that story for you as well. we're going to take a quick break and come right back.

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welcome back. a couple of quick late-breaking stories to recap quickly here for you. first, united doing a big c suite change. its ceo jeff smisek is out. shares responding negatively to that. then yahoo! asking for the irs

to rule i guess pre-emptively on giving it some tax approval status for its alibaba spinoff. not apparently given that ruling granted. let's up on "closing bell." thank you, sara and mike. we'll hand it over to you, at "fast money" to sort through all this right now. >> "fast money" starts right now. live from the nasdaq marketsite overlooking new york city's times square -- i'm melissa lee. our traders on the desk are tim seymour, brian kelly, karen finerman, and dan nathan. coming up apple shares are doing something they haven't done before heading into an apple event and it's got some am fans very nervous. plus one big bank taking it on the chin but warren buffett sees value in it. normally stocks would be our lead. we did have ni