oasis, take a look at williams. these are stocks down 60% and 70% that are seeing 10% pops today or 17% pops for the week. watch them. >> we'll have to be, again, once you start to get towards the beginning of the year, you'll talk about the fed. that does it for us. have a great christmas, "power lunch" begins now. and, gentlemen, you value a great christmas, too. welcome to "power lunch." along with mandy drury, i'm tie they are mathieson. chipotle making some big changes in the kitchen hoping to stop the e. coli outbreak before it gets even worse. >> stock is really tanking on the back of that, ty, losing almost a thirty of its call in three months. plus, are the dogs of the dow really dogs of opportunity for 2016? we're going to take a closer look at some of the positive signals and signs. and sunshine over the housing market. with warmer weather in many parts of the country, will that lead to more building and a

better performing housing sector? we well, it really feels like a santa claus rally is getting under way. stocks are up for a third day. as we stand, let's take a look at the numbers. the dow is currently sitting at 17,559. it is not break even get for the year but it is up. the s&p 500 is one point in the green for the year. it's crossed over that break even line so many times. >> we're rich, we're rich, we're rich. i never thought santa was going to come, and i still believe in santa. oil soaring. new data showing a big drop in inventories. crude up more than 4%, about 3.9% for west texas. highest levels in more than a week. gasoline up 5% tracking for its biggest one-day gain since last november. >> well, as for chipotle, those shares are edging higher this hour by 0.2%, but the embattled mexican fast food chain has been taking drastic steps as the

restaurants try to contain the e. coli crisis. morgan brennan has more details on this. what are they doing? >> on the heels of the outbreak that sickened at least 50 people in october and november. they are trying to reduce the risk of contamination to a level near zero where its food preparation is concerned. among the new measures, tomatoes, cilantro, will be chopped in centralized locations rather than in the restaurants as before. onions will be dipped in boiling water to kill germs before they're chopped at storms. raw chicken will be marinaded in resealable plastic bags instead of bowles. cilantro will be added to freshly cooked rice so the heat kills my kroicrobmicrobes. and 60 samples of every 2,000 pounds of steak will be tested before it heads to location with similar plans for chicken as well. the cdc hasn't identified what trig tgered the outbreak and its

investigating five more cases tied to the company but chipotle is sampiramping you have safety recover from the headlines that have triggered analyst down grades including one from jpmorgan just yesterday. shares are up slightly today, almost half a percent, but they are down about 22% since early november, november 2nd, when the first cases of e. coli came to light. guys, back to you. >> all right. thank you very much. michelle caruso-cabrera is with us now. she found someone who has been through something similar to what chipotle is going through. michelle? >> yeah, that's right. thanks so much. jim thornton ran a private label natural products company botanical laboratories which did a voluntary recall of some of its products due to salmonella and e. coli back in 2012. good to have you here, mr. thornton. >> thank you, michelle. merry christmas. >> merry christmas to you. were you able to track down the cause of it? if yes, how hard was it and how did you do it? >> it was very difficult. you have to have a very solid

recall plan and that's run by a qaqc operation and you look at all the microbial testing, look at all the batches, determine where the ingredients came from, whether it's a farm or other place, and really run through the entire process right back to the shelf, and it's a very tedious process. it's painstaking, but if you have a plan as we did, you can really get at it and try to get it down to a few areas where the vulnerability might be. >> and where did it finally come from? >> no one really knows. and in our case it was a complaint out of minneapolis, and, you know, we tested all the batches, and you do 100% testing at this point of all your bottles and all your ingredients. we really couldn't find any incidents of crypto support rid yum or salmonella. the cases dwindle. the case gets large.

you end up with a finite amount of infections but it's very, very difficult because people do other things during the course of their day whether they live in a rural town and maybe their water system in a rural area is compromised or maybe they're changing diapers and they don't wash properly. it could be from dozens of exposure -- >> so when we look at chipotle and they haven't figured it out yet, you're not -- i can't imagine you're surprised that they're having difficulty nailing this down. >> i'm not surprised at all. it's a needle in a haystack, and it really could come from someone handling it at the distribution center. maybe just didn't wash his hands or some table wasn't cleaned properly where the fruits and vegetables are handled. >> is the ceo handling it correctly? >> 100% testing. i think it's an all-out effort. even going down to the small organic farms and asking them whether or not they're using procedures and looking at the water systems and purification

systems in compliance with the food safety modernization act, for example, which has just come into existence. >> chipotle is so focused on organics. organics are meant to be healthier, better for you, safer, but yet is there a trade-off there. is chipotle more vulnerable because they're mostly organic? >> well, there haven't been any definitive studies comparing conventional farming to organic farming and which is higher risk. university of minnesota tried to do it in 2004, but the fact is you're using manure and feces in your composting and in your soil, and, you know, you're using a higher element of it although there are waiting periods before you can pick it, pick the fruits and vegetables, but from what i've observed there might be a slightly higher risk in my opinion, but no one has really done a study on which

is potentially more dangerous. >> let me jump in on the conversation. do you think this is potentially a setback for the organic movement, we might see fewer mainstream food chains around the country going the organic route as a result of this? >> hi, mandy. i think what's going on in my opinion once again is that we've had an enormous growth in the number of farms, organic farms in the country. it's almost 20,000 today and it's a burgeoning business, it's a $45 billion market, $20 billion of which is fruits and vegetables, and i think the fda particularly with respect to produce and the food safety modernization act is trying to catch up. and i think it's really great chipotle is using small farms and locales and supporting them, the farm-to-table concept, but i think what's happening is regulation once again has to really catch up particularly with water systems and soil

systems and verification and oversight and compliance. keep in mind, the usda has certified 80 agencies to go out and do field testing and oversight of all these farms in the country of the 19,000, 20,000 farms, so is it really being done? just some questions but i have always had that -- it's always lingered in my mind. >> mr. thornton, thanks so much for joining us. really appreciate it. live from seattle. >> you bet. thank you. happy holidays, everyone. >> you, too. back to tyler. >> michelle, thank you. dominic chu now, news alert. >> so due to the christmas eve and christmas day holiday s, the baker hughes weekly rig count is released today at 1:00 p.m. we have u.s. oil rigs down three to a total of 538. again, u.s. oil rigs, a three-rig decline to a total of 538. oil rigs are now down 961 rigs on the oil side for the u.s. from the same time last year. so, again, we're watching reaction in the oil markets here.

a lot of things going on with what's happening in the oil trade. also of note, mandy, next week because of the new year's holiday, baker hughes weekly rig counts will be released on thursday, new year's eve at the typical 1:00 p.m. eastern time. >> crude is moving to the upside again today, and, of course, it's flowing through to the energy sector which is one of the leading sectors in trade. nike also delivering with its latest earnings. profits soaring 20% and future orders surging as well. they're down by 2.5% today, but it is the best performing stock in the dow this year. sara eisen has more on what's been fueling nike. >> mandy, nike just did it again. a strong quarter and outlook. most impressive to wall street, futures orders, an indication of growth six months out, up 20% globally driven in part by 34% growth in china. on the outlook a few key events, the rio olympics in august and a big european soccer championship in june.

jay sole, an analyst at morgan stanley, said they're key and do tend to be drivers of sales growth and catalyst for stock moves higher. one concern, nike forecasting gross margins to be down a bit next quarter as it deals with extra inventory issues in north america. still, the company has a tendency to forecast conservatively. credit suisse, deutsche bank, tellse, goldman sachs all raising their target. the average target $146. it's trading just under $130 right now. interesting to note the turnaround. you mentioned nike shares under pressure after surging at the open, but keep in mind it is the end of the year and it is the dow's best stock of 2015 up more than 30%. also keep in mind that stock price will change tonight when nike splits. shareholders will get two shares for every one they hold after the bell today, and then the new nike, half the price, looks like in the 60s will begin trading tomorrow. mandy? >> good thing to note down. thank you for that, sara eisen. stocks higher again today.

is this our santa claus rally finally? is it under way. today gains fueling the s&p 500 to break even for the year but where are the opportunities for next year. that's the question. the four stocks that should be in your portfolio. that is next. you're watching cnbc, first in business worldwide. zapped it right to our house.ws and that's how they got it here. cool. the magic of the season is here at the lexus december to remember sales event. this is the pursuit of perfection.

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lunch." the dow transportation index coming off the best levels of the day, up 1%. leading the transportation stocks higher names like kirby, ryder systems, kansas city southern, union pacific, up 2% to 4%. aside from today's gains there's a good amount of negative momentum behind the transportation stocks as a whole. the index is down 16%, a laggard so far this year. back over to you. >> thank you very much, dom. church and dwight moving higher. they will be replaced in the s&p midcap 400 by synnex. those shares also moving higher and up about 20% so far this year. amazon reportedly trying to cut back on ties with u.p.s. "the wall street journal" is reporting that amazon is looking for alternatives to deal with increasing package volumes and higher costs. amazon is down just marginally.

u.p.s. is down 0.8%. >> our next guest expects the market to climb even higher over the next few months. joining us with his 2016 playbook is hank moldehill live from dallas. good to have you here. you see the market going up 5% to 8% between now and early march. what drives it? >> i think the fundamental thing is going to be the fact that global capital can come to the united states and be extremely well treated. if you had 100 billion euro to invest at a negative interest rate at a declining currency, wouldn't you invest it in the u.s.? i think there's an incredible support of equities and all asset classes from global capital seeking better returns in a safe environment. >> you like big cap tech. it is an extraordinary sector. those are your words and you like two in particular. amazon and alphabet. two that begin with "a" supplanting in your view another

that begins with "a," apple, as the place for money. why? >> oh, i think that those two companies are growing faster than apple. apple is going to be around for a long time. nothing is going to happen to it. it's going to remain a very large dominant cash flowing company, but the other two are gaining market share. 80% android, 20% ios. i think that puts that conversation to rest. amazon dominates everything it touches and will continue to grow, and i think amazon ends up being the world's largest company. >> bigger even than apple is today in market value? >> i think it's number four or five now. >> absolutely. what are the risks that you four see in 2016 and do you think -- you chose your words carefully. 5% to 8% between now and early march, and then what happens? >> well, you have seasonality. i made up a term and trademarked it called jason, a period of the calendar, july, august, september, october, november, we've just come out of that. these are the three or four

seasonally strongest months of the year. all the new pension money has to come in. it's about 82%, 383% of the tim you will get a rise in u.s. equities during those three months. there's so much history there since 1950. it's a tremendous seasonality situation there. >> so the gains then are front loaded. the gains in any one year are front loaded, that's what -- >> typically. you will get some january exceptions, but i think that you do get a lot of push into the markets particularly this time of year. but the fed has opened up the playbook here where now more money is flowing in because it cannot get those rates of return anywhere else. >> all right, hank. thank you very much. have a great holiday. >> thank you. great program. >> ha the biggest dividend payers in the group also happen to be the losers. should be looking at buying

these dogs of the dow in 2016. up next, a power pitch startup that gives crowd sourced love advice. >> how are you prioritizing your road map? >> how do you establish trust between your customers and the advisers. >> or dump it? stay tuned to find out.

welcome back to "power lunch." rick santelli live on the floor of the cme group. holiday week, how are the markets doing?

interest rates are moving up, stock market is still up nicely but it's not on its highs. neither are yields. month to date chart shows kind of the upper end of the recent range considering the dynamic for december has been the federal reserve. remember hyg, high yield junk etf and all the issues related to the fed? here is a month to date. it's turned up a bit but when you look at it in the context of the last time we were in this neighborhood, summer of '09, the little bounce gets lost. maybe we should revisit as we get into 2016 and we looked at a lot of currencies from emerging markets. how about a year-to-date of the dollar to indian rupee. the dollar has given up some ground as all the issues for now have melted in a light volume holiday trade. mandy, back to you. >> thank you very much, ricky. happy holidays to you. time for the power pitch where one entrepreneur has only 60 seconds to try to convince a panel of experts her business or

his business has what it takes to be the next big thing. let's have a listen. >> i'm lisa, the founder of hetexted. we're pioneering a situation advice business. we believe that personalized advice is the future of web, mobile, and media. now more than ever wee all look for answers that is specific to us individually. the millennials, hetexted answers questions they care about deeply. first has been relationships before expanding out into health and wellness, lifestyle, and beauty. our content is highly viral. we have had over 3.5 million young women using our products. so along with this rapidly scaling technology platform, we're building out a global multimedia business, and we know we're well on the way as we have books stocked in amazon, itunes, barnes & noble, and target. we have a web presence, an ios

app, and soon a film. hetexted is the first vertical of this realtime advice revolution. >> welcome to today's power pitch. i'm mandy drury. you just saw hetexted's pitch. on self we have angel investor kelly hoey. also with us venture capitalist jessica peltz and in the bay area fran hauser, angel investor and partner at roth. lisa, you're in the hot seat. kelly, would you like to throw out the first question. >> tell me about your mission in creating hetexted and what you're seeing with how millennials are communicating. >> we really wanted to build a platform that was supportive of young women and that gave them a voice to ask the questions they care about deeply and get answers that are personalized to them and their situation, so

hetexted is a realtime advice platform that gives you personalized answers and gives you the ability to talk one-on-one with our advisers. >> jessica. >> so you have done a great job in terms of building a brand and a household name along with etexted but knfocus is be so important. how are you prioritizing your road map? >> our road map has been largely based around the web feature where young women when the ages of 18 and 30 are going on. our ios app is in the app store and it's also been our real focus and priority along with the book deals we've done and the upcoming film. >> fran? >> lisa, it feels like trust is such an important part of the value proposition. how do you establish trust between your customers and the advisers? >> as we're screening our advisers, we're looking for people who are kind, obviously, empathetic, who have a good knowledge. they probably dated a few people

before themselves and they have some ideas around what everyone is going through. >> kelly, another question to you. >> with all those fragmentation of social networks, what do you have planned next to keep your product sticky? >> we really believe that delivering quality content, which is curated and which demonstrates sort of the breadth of questions and issue that is millennials are going through right now is the key to keeping everyone coming back and it's why we've had 75,000 young women return to our product more than 201 times each. >> wow. >> what percentage of your total user base is actively asking questions versus also answering questions? >> we have around 10% of our users which is quite high actively creating that very sticky, very viral content and also answering questions and really getting involved in the community and wanting to be helpful to other young women who are going through issues quite often similar to themselves. >> fran, last question to you. >> beyond relationships and dating, which vertical do you think is the most promise? >> health, wellness, and beauty.

i mean, it's really replicating the way we all speak to each other as women and we share information and we share insight and we offer our opinions, and there's a great deal of value in that. >> fantastic. we all heard what lisa has to say. now we need to know if the panel is in or out. kelly, you first. >> this is an interesting market. everyone is focused on millennials and i don't know if we figured out their behavior yet and the fragmentation of social networks and whether or not those will actually be viable business generators sort of has me kind of on the edge, but you have a determined founder and you have a sticky product so i'm in. >> what about you, jessica? >> i love the hustle that the founders have. they have executed on contracts that normally it would take companies years to execute on. however, i am still unclear on both the defensibility of the technology and the business impact that some of these offline channels are going to have on a mobile first millennial female so, unfortunately, i'm out. >> what about you, fran? you're the deciding vote. >> you know, so i'm not sure

about the revenue potential in the dating and relationships space. i think that it's a really tough environment for advertisers to be in. i don't think it's a service that the customers will pay for, but i do think there is some really interesting commercial applications for the platform in other areas like beauty, wellness, and even parenting. so for that reason i'm in. >> fantastic. okay. we've got two ins, one out. lisa, what's your reaction? >> thank you so much. we're just excited to build a big multimedia business and a platform for young women to answer the questions they care about deeply. >> thanks very much to lisa of hetexted and our panel, kelly, jessica, and fran and that is today's "power pitch." so are you in or out on hetexted? tweet us using #powerpitch. tweet me as well @mandycnbc. and for more you can visit

"power lunchpowerlunch.cnbc.com powerlunch.cnbc.com. >> check out merck, proctor aer gamble and walmart. these stocks has been to be among the worst performers in the group so far this year. should you buy these out of favor names headed into 2016? dom chu looking at the old and often reliable stock picking thing called the dogs of the dow, but maybe not so reliable this year. >> four out of the last five years the dogs of the dow approach has outperformed the dow -- >> and the dogs are -- >> the dogs of the dow is an investment strategy where you look at the ten highest yielding stocks in the dow, buy them at the end of the year, beginning of the next, hold them for a year, and rebalance, do the same thing over and over and over again. let's take a look at this year's, at the end of 2014 the ten highest yielding stocks in the dow. >> theory here is that the

yields are high because the share values are low. >> sometimes. or that they are at least value driven. you get paid to wait, that sort of thing. >> take us through this year's dog dow. >> here is what we have. >> the dow dogs right now, caterpillar, chevron, and exxon. caterpillar one of the big dogs on the performance side, down 23%. chevron down 17%. here procter & gamble and merck as well. you can see these hefty dividend yields north of 3% or thereabouts. the other five that we have so far, at least in this year's list, verizon, coca-cola, pfizer, mcdonald's, and ge. now, i want you to kind of pay attention to what's happening here overall with some of the shares because overall with general electric and mcdonald's, we've seen some real share price appreciation. as a result those names go out of the dow -- dogs of the dow. the yelields are no longer high enough. >> this is where they began the

year of 2015. >> now, let's take a look at the new ones. the ins and the outs. if we can see what they are. who has gone out? coca-cola, mcdonald's, and general electric all around 3% yields. if things were to end today, they would no longer be part of the dogs of the dow. instead they will be replaced by cisco, walmart, and ibm. all of those guys go into the overall dogs of the dow. so the idea here is if you rebalance, everything else pretty much stays the same except for these three stocks, they go out, walmart, cisco, and ibm go in. >> do you have to put an equal amount of capital in each? >> you buy them in equal amounts. >> so my return would have been -- >> on average right now you're down marginally probably -- maybe 3% or 4%. >> and that reflects in part the bad year that energy had, the bad year -- >> chevron, caterpillar, walmart, exactly. they've had some pretty bad times but on average you're marginally negative. >> let's bring in mike santoli

who has been looking at this theory and is well familiar with it. your thesis here in part is that maybe it doesn't explode the dogs of the dow theory so much as speak to the idea that value had a bad year. >> exactly. to the extent that it works or has worked in the paths, it was, as you said before, one way of identifying beaten down stocks, neglected stocks, laggards that might come back. so i think that value strategies in general have lag. now, the growth index, russell 1,000 growth index, large cap growth stocks, outperform russell 1,000 value this year-to-date by 10 percentage points. huge, wide margin. that's been the case more than not in the last couple years. so value stocks in general, especially when you're talking about the industrials, the financials to a certain degree as well. so i feel like it still does t make a lot of sense but the fact that only three of the ten are being replaced also tells you there's a bifurcation within the dow of the old traditional companies that do pay out dividends generously and the new generation of stocks that are in

there. the visas, the nikes, the apples, that have much lower payout ratios. they're not really dividend stocks. they're growth stocks. >> interesting two of the new dogs are technology companies. >> exactly. >> a cisco and ibm though you would certainly say ibm of those two is the old school company. >> but more mature. >> what's interesting about ibm is it truly did get there by virtue of the stock going down. ibm has emphasized buybacks over dividends. it does not have a terribly high payout ratio. cisco, like microsoft, has become -- old tech companies have become cash cow businesses that are sharing their cash with investors through dividends. >> value can become deeper value sometimes. >> that's what we've seen this year. >> thank you very much. mandy, over to you. >> we have a triple digit, 130-point gain for the dow as we speak. it's currently sitting 17,548. it's still down for the year but why it could hit 19,000 by the end of the first quarter of 2016. that is all coming up.

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i'm sharon epperson and here is your cnbc news update. afghan forces battling taliban fighters. reinforcement and nato military advisers were rushed in to stop another district from falling into insurgent hands. hk responded to donald trump's use of vulgar language earlier this week during an interview with "the des moines register." she said nothing from the trump campaign surprises her anymore saying trump has no boundaries. a new zealand judge resulting that kim.com and three of his colleagues can be extradited to the u.s. dotcom's lawyers say they will appeal. the ruling comes nearly four years after the u.s. shutdown his popular file sharing website. and a middle school food service worker in idaho was placed on leave after she gave a hot lunch to a 12-year-old she said was hungry and had no money. she says she was informed by the

school district she had been fired even though she offered to pay for the $1.70 meal. that's the cnbc news update at this hour. back to you, mandy. >> what's the world coming to. >> i know. >> thank you very much, sharon epperson. stocks are rallying for the third straight day. this week's gain for the dow, the s&p 500 and the nasdaq are the best in five weeks. joining us now, gene pironi and darren rachichardson. gene, you think we can see dow 19,000 at the end of the first quarter but this was your target for this year after you cut it down from 20,000? >> we had to revise our target several times this year and that is unfortunate near term, but we still feel quite confident we are going to see 19,000 and even 20,000 before the end of the

cycle. we're in the seasonal sweet spot for this market typically between november and may, and the market has faced off with a lot of head wind challenges, terrorism, china, the list goes on and on. and yet it has come back nicely to being little changed on the year. i think we're really establishing a platform for the market to move higher. >> are you just counting on favorable seasonalities? are there more fundamental reasons why you think we could keep on rallying from there? >> well, i think the surprise will be for some that the economy is really doing better than has been suggested and maybe even reflected in the very flat line market this year but the individual sectors are doing well, aerospace, consumer discretionary, other manufacturing areas, certainly technology, so is health care. it's a broad-based market still. it's just taking a pause here. >> what about you, darren? >> do you see a better year for stocks in 2016? what's behind that? >> i think the fact that oil

prices are probably not going to drop another 20%, 30% next year is very positive and the dollar i think, going to see some strength in the dollar but nothing like the last couple years. between a stronger dollar and lower energy prices it's been a headwind for the market and then the chinese market sell-off in the summer and it was a hard market to navigate. we did see some sectors hold up well mostly growth, but energy, materials, other areas were dramatically impacted negatively, and i think some of the headwinds will dissipate this next year and we should see more modest returns, somewhere in the high single digits is what we're expecting for 2016. >> if you think darin, energy prices might be in the process of bottoming out, what would you be doing in regard to the seconder, the energy stocks themselves? >> they have still scheide away from energy stocks because as much as energy prices have fallen, valuations are still in the mid-20s. if we don't see oil prices, you know, above $50, getting close

to $60 in the next year or so, i think energy company stocks, you probably continue to see them move lower. i think there's a lot of opportunity elsewhere when you look at the growth stocks. consumer discretionary, great consumer market right now, health care, technology. there's areas of the market holding up well and we'd rather stay there than go bottom fishing right now. >> gene and darin, thank you very much for joining us and happy holidays to you both as well. >> happy holidays. >> happy holidays to you. thank you very much. go to powerlunch.cnbc.com to see why darin is betting on emerging markets in 2016. that is powerlunch.cnbc.com. ty? >> mandy, drones big story in 2015 for people and for defense companies, so what will be big in defense next year and how can you make money off it? your 2016 playbook -- '15, what am i thinking about? 2016 playbook is next on "power lunch." group, they work all the t

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welcome back to "power lunch." i'm mandy drury. as 2015 draws to a close, cnbc is breaking out the 2016 playbook and we're looking at

ways you can make money next year. jane wells lays out her predictions for the defense sector in the coming year in a minute, but first let's see how she fared with her picks for this year. okay. so jane predicted we would see increased cyber attacks and hacks on the united states in 2015. she was right there, wasn't she? with everyone from iran to russia and china and even isis accused of trying to hack into u.s. infrastructure. she also said sales of commercial drones would take off in 2015. right again, jane. the faa has approved over 2,000 commercial drone permits this year. jane also predicted that the pentagon would need to look outside of the navy's budget to replace its fleet of ohio class submarines. jane, you're right again. going three for three on your 2015 predictions. so what is jane predicting for defense sector in 2016? well, let's take a look. >> 2016 looks like more war, less peace. terrorists are striking closer

to home, russia is in syria, china is building up in the south china sea, and we have an election. here are three predictions. first, nukes rule. the pentagon has less money than it planned for, so it will focus funding on the so-called nuclear triad, upgrading ohio class submarines, funding new missile designs, and the expensive new bomber, a contract won by northrup but which boeing and lockheed protested. second, minimal mergers. the pentagon is frowning on large mergers in the defense industry because it decreases competition. companies have so much cash and can only do so many buybacks. expect smaller acquisitions to pick up companies specializing in cyber security, surveillance, and drones. third, rocketmen. elon musk's spacex is recovering from a rocket explosion and will bid for its first military launch next year, but look out below. amazon's jeff bezos will be the for tortoise to musk's hare.

and we saw more in that space race just this week, but keep watching also cyber security. the pentagon has set up shop in silicon valley where it is trying to court perhaps skeptical engineers in tech to help america fight back cyber attacks. guys? >> jane, thank you very much. so what are some good ways to make some money in defense in 2016? howard rubell is an aerospace analyst with jeffrey. let's move quickly to the three picks you have guven us. you cover a lot from lockheed martin, northrup, boeing, but one of your picks is harris. what do they do and why do you like it? >> harris corp plays to part of your themes. they have great capability in radio frequency spectrum and that spans from building

tactical radios to the army with encryption devices in them to satellite antennas that help satellites communicate with cellular phones or for that matter pickup signals from stray phones that in fact, may belong to terrorists or other people like that. >> so it's a way to communicate in a protected way and also to eavesdrop on others, right? >> that's correct. they also are involved with helping the military monitor their satellites and they also are involved with a number of projects with the national geospatial agency. >> general dynamics. >> two things there. one is they are going to be the prime on the ohio class submarine. that's going to be a large and important project. there's increasing demand for armor. that's a rebound for two reasons, one is the u.s. has

bo worn it out in afghanistan and iraq, and we need to replace those systems, and countries that border europe today feel uneasy, and so general dynamics with their european business has an opportunity to sell systems there as well. >> and orbital atk is not a company i know much about. >> well, they were actually one of our top picks last year. it was a merger that occurred in february of this past year. they build rocket motors. they build defense rockets for the missile defense system. they are a leading provider of small satellites, and one of the beauties of this combination is that you have been able to get one plus one and get maybe a little bit more than that through a combination of cost savings and an ability to take some of the systems that atk builds and now sell them in a

more systems oriented way. >> howard, thank you. >> thank you. >> howard rubell of jeffries. robotic reindeer pulling santa's sleigh. first, over to brian sullivan for a look at what's coming up on the second hour of "power." >> i can't compete with that. i like this song. why this could be the start of an epic holiday stock rally and where you can find some big students before year end. also, the winners and even some of the losers in this record warm christmas forecast. and can you name today's mystery chart? this is the best performing nondeal stock in the s&p 500 over the past month. i guess i'll give you a hint of square pizza and granola. does that help? i don't know. we'll give it to you. a lot more to do. robotic reindeer, drones crashing on skiers, "power lunch" coming up.

hi watson. annabelle, your birthday is tomorrow. i'm turning seven. what did you ask for? a princess. and a pony. you like things that begin with p. i like pink frosting too. will you have a cake? yeah. i was too sick to have one last year. the data your doctor shared shows you are healthy. are you a doctor? no. i help doctors identify cancer treatments. i want to be a doctor someday. i can help with that too. watson, i like you.

this is the future of christmas. the future creepy christmas. robotic reindeer pulling santa's sleigh. this is from boston die nam irks. this is a robotics company owned by google. they're spreading holiday cheer.

i don't know what i'd feel if i saw that coming down the street. welcome back to "power lunch." i'm mandy drury. here are this hour's power points. stocks rallying for a third day. the dow is up by triple digits. the sectors leading the way, energy, materials, utilities, and telecom. chevron leading the dow. freeport-mcmoran leading the s&p 500, and celgene is leading the nasdaq 100. so a white christmas may be a little harder to come by this year, at least here on the east coast where temperatures are expected to set new records. but coming up we'll be talking to a man who runs ski resorts in vermont, new hampshire, and massachusetts, and we're going to ask him just how his company is coping with all this warm weather and lack of snow. that's coming up.

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president obama getting in a round of golf during his christmas vacation in hawaii. look at this chip shot, chipped in from 40 feet. look at that. the crowd, such as it is, goes wild, and that was the 18th hole, sow got to walk off the course on that high note.

watch it again. there it is. there it is. it's tracking towards the hole. >> yeah. the president playing in hawaii but mainlanders including here in the united states east will be able to hit the lyinks this week with temperatures near 70 on christmas eve. high temperatures have a downside for the ski season. as you can imagine. that's an understatement. joining us now by phone is tyler fairbanks, ceo of the fairbank group which operates ski resorts in vaermont, new hampshire, and massachusetts. tyler, i understand that you are still preparing for a full winter season albeit delayed, sort of back end loaded, is that right? >> yes, mandy, that's right. we're getting ready for what we're told is going to be a full winter, just a little late in getter here. that's all we can do it prepare, prepare, prepare. >> you haven't had to layoff staff or down size the amount of staff you were planning on hiring for this season? >> absolutely not. we're fully prepared that it's going to be here. in fact, the weather for the next week and a half, two weeks

is looking like it's going to step down into the patterns we need to make the snow we need for operations and then continue full swing with all of our resorts. at this point, no, we haven't laid anybody off. >> this is tyler, and i love your first name. >> you got a great name, my man. >> we're old school, you were tiler before tile e er -- tyler a cool name. how cold does it have to be to make snow and conversely when the temperature warms up, you pick the number to 50 or 55. how much snow do you lose per hour or per day? >> complicated question -- or answers to what would seemingly be simple questions. when it gets below freezing that's when we start making snow. the humidity has a lot to do with the productivity of our snowmaking. when we hit what's called wet bulb, which is the ambient temperature which takes into account humidity we can be at 26, 27 degrees wet bulb which is

a good number to get going snow making and we can be very productive. conversely, in terms of what we lose and the temperatures we lose, there's a lot of factors that contribute to that and that has to do with the wind, the duration, the time of year. the sun sits way higher in the spring than it does in the winter. so not easy answers but, you know, the reality is and probably the answer to your question right now we need some cold temps and these warm temps are not helping. >> not helping. during these weeks of warm temps, to what degree can you use other activities like mountain climbing or hiking or kids' paraphernalia, tubing, that kind of thing, to what degree can that make up for the lack of skiing during the warm weeks? >> the reality right now is when people come skiing, certainly the skiing experience is a big part of what they're after but there's so much else they want to do while they're here. we've really amped up all the other activities we have at our resorts, including some of our summer operations. we've got mountain coasters and aerial adventure parks and

soaring eagles zip lines and so forth we've reactivated for the winter including a bunch of activities on top of that music series and kids' activities. we want to deliver the full experience to our guest that is come here expecting snow and getting less than they might have thought. >> tyler fairbank, thank you so much. going to be zip lining, i'm heading to the snow. >> we don't have a "power lunch" tomorrow so merry christmas. >> merry christmas. >> and merry christmas to all of you out there. >> and happy holidays. that's it for the first hour. >> brian, take it away. >> i'm off tomorrow, too, so mandy and tyler, have a merry christmas as well. it's now just about 2:00 on wall street, 1:00 in a very warm houston, texas. look at that. the dow working to claw its way back to positive for the year as oil jumps more than 4%. all right, everybody. welcome. i'm brian. melissa is at the nasdaq. let's pick it up right there, on the weather. i'm not a weather man but i'm going to do this, look at the

insane temperatures in the forecast for the next two days. call your attention to this. 71 degrees in new york christmas eve. hey, los angeles, we're going to be 8 degrees warmer than you on christmas eve. how about that? 73 in atlanta, 74 in dallas. unbelievable. not much different on christmas day. expected to be 64 degrees in new york on friday. that's about five degrees warmer than los angeles. melissa, i understand that it's bad for the ski industry which, by the way, had a record year out east last year. i understand there's all these concerns, but it's kind of nice to drive home with the window down in late december. >> it's a nice change especially from last year when we were dealing with vortex cold temperatures, polar vortex here in new york city, and it will be great for the after christmas shopping because all those muffs and shearling whatever you want to buy, all those things will be on sale. >> and you know what's interesting about that is love your point, last three years we've had record cold, record snow, record darkness.

we deserve this back east, but i cannot wait to hear the earnings calls on probably "fast money" -- >> too warm, too warm, too warm. >> it's like my porridge is too hot, my porridge -- there's never a just right for the retailers, right? >> exactly. >> all right. so let's move on from there. the warm weather, look, it is nice, but what if any impact does it have on the american economy? got steve "superstorm" liesman joining us. you know what we're talking about. >> it is so interesting. here is the thing, last year for sure in the first quarter and the year before that in the first quarter, the economy ground to a frozen halt. this year the warmth, a lot of different weather winter winners and losers. >> say that three times fast. >> weather winter winners and losers. i want to you take a look at this map and what we're looking at is what you care about from an economics point of view. this is the week of december 13th through the 19th. what's the hottest part of the

map, brian? >> central pennsylvania -- >> no, look up. where is that red, red, red part. >> oh, that, up into new york state. >> and where is that? >> manufacturing belt? >> how about the ski resorts in the northeast. >> that's true, too. i was thinking of syracuse and albany. >> here is the thing. east of the mississippi every bit of the country in that week and by the way it's gotten a little worse is from two degrees to 20 degrees above normal. 60% of the population, folks, lives east of the mississippi. now we look out here and there are winter winners out here because of all the snow. the guys at vail resorts say their season passes in early december were up 13% compared to a year ago. some places have record snow they've never seen in a while. >> california is getting some, it needs it, by the way. >> losses here could be gains over here. let's take a look at what's hot and what's not in this white hot christmas. you could do a little extra home building because you can pour concrete when it's not that cold in the northeast. more people may go out. you could find yourself in the

car dealership because it's easier to kick tires when the winter is warmer. now, the oil thing is interesting. you can do some more mining. happen to be from russia when i was there, i know that some places require areas to freeze over so they can get the transportation going. places like alaska -- >> ice road truckers. j >> you have to have some of that. retail is the big question. >> that is the big question. >> what is that? pick that up because you love to fish. self-serving graphic. >> my friend john mcmurray says he had ten extra days booked this year. that's also a placeholder for golf. many, many more days of golfing. let's look at what's not. >> john mcmurray sounds like a made-up name. >> he's a good guy. some of the ski guys not doing so great. retailers, you know the story. the hats, the gloves. we're going to get a below average january and february is the forecast for now. they'll have to hold onto this. some of the warmer resorts you

may say, you know, let's not go on that thing because things are okay around here. the cold could motivate you to go to the bahamas. >> and listen, i guarantee you when i go back to the computer, v i will have a couple e-mails from my retail friends, sullivan, it's really different this time. nobody is buying a parka, a canada down goose jacket, i understand that but there has to be an uptick also because you can go out. last year it was icy and disgusting and dangerous and cold. >> i think that's right. >> and you didn't even want to park to run into the mall. now you kind of want to go out. >> that's 100% right. you're more willing to go out and spend. here is the thing, what i think people need to be aware of is before when you had the winter -- the frozen blizzard and everything like that, things were weaker than normal and it was a good play to bet on a rebound in the second quarter. all i can tell you when the december data come out, be very wary of some things that look like they're better than they should be and beware of things that are worse than they should

be because some of it could be weather-related. it's very hard to make a broad macro call on the warmth. it's easier on the cold. >> melissa, she made a great point there, will be other stuff that's discounted. here is the reality, melissa, you know this because you dig into the nps right after they come out. my only point on retail is not that the weather doesn't matter, it matters a lot, it's just that every quarter if we wanted to, we could probably find if you're a national retailer, something around america that could have had some impact or at least you can say that to mask other issue approximates. >> fair enough. >> oh, absolutely. and we're certainly going to see that come fourth quarter reporting season. the retailers report a little later so we won't see it until, you know, well into the year, but at the same time, brian, it's interesting because the retailers will feel even deeper pain and you make the point of going out. you know, the casual dining restaurants, they have been doing okay. they're not the one that is need the help but they will see the boost. it will be deeper have and have nots. >> i did some work that shows the big beneficiaries of lower

gas prices is casual dining. people are using that extra money. it's the best inverse -- >> driving. melissa, i will make you a bet at one of these casual diners, are you willing to accept it? . > >> depends what the bet is. >> i'll bet you the comps -- >> and the bet is a dinner at appleby's. >> the comps will be better than last year because when it's freezing, cold, disgusting rain, you know what you don't do? you don't go to dinner. you stay home. it sounds like you would agree. >> i would agree with you. i can't take the other side of that bet. >> and melissa is a much better date than applebee's. >> thank you, steve liesman. up your game, dude. >> your imaginary friend, john mcmurray. >> thank you, steve. while all of this unseasonable weather has been impacting a number of industries, there's one market that has not really been impacted at all.

jack masenko at susquehanna financial will be joining us. i've not been in the eggnog early, i'm just in a good mood. steve made the point how warmer weather may help home builders because they can pour concrete. is there any sign the weather good or bad impacts the trends of the companies you cover? >> i think on the delivery side it's probably going to be swla of a help. earlier this year we had really tough weather, particularly in the texas market. that combined with labor shortages pushed a lot of delivers into the back half of the year. a number of companies when they reported third quarter said we'll have to push some delivers into the end of the year. this weather is certainly going to help on that front. i'm not sure how much it will help new home buyers looking to go under contract. people busy with christmas and the holidays. the home buyer is most active in the spring after the super bowl into may. i don't know how much we will see incremental buyers coming out but i think getting the

homes completed that might have gotten pushed back, the weather should be helping that. >> you probably heard part of our previous conversation. so to that, jack, if a ceo of a home builder comes out and says it's the weather's fault we missed, would you buy it? >> no, no. i would not. in fact, toll braers that repot fiscal fourth quarter, they saw their orders up 21% for the month of november year to year. >> if we're going to see continued building on the part of the home builders, will we see a pull forward when it comes to the suppliers of the materials required to build homes? >> you may. i think the one thing that keeps me from getting more constructive on that front is a lot of the public builders have limited their specs. they're focused on price, not focused on discounting and so when you build a spec home which is what you'd be putting up, you know, starting construction on now, that comes with more discounting. i think most of the builders i cover are focused on price first

and so they're doing more build to order. i'm not sure you will get a ton of pull forward on the materials because the builder's strategy has shifted a bit in the new paradigm of housing. >> lennar, kb home, and nvr are your best ideas? >> we like toll brothers and horton. >> so i was exactly wrong. i made up names and you corrected me. thank you very much, jack. haemd happy holidays. >> toll brothers and horton. much more ahead here on "street signs," just going to get everything else wrong for the rest of the day. plus why burritos and bath mats are having a bad day. and we've conjured up a mystery chart. it's the best performs nonbuyout stock in the s&p 500 this month. there's your chart.

take your guesses, america. we're back when "power lunch" returns. did we just, start looking for a house? oh did you see that listing on zillow i sent you. you see that bathroom?

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latest take overoffer. and it's a tough day if you're in bath mats and burritos. bed, bath & beyond and chipotle are touching 52-week lows. >> you combine bath mats with burritos you have deli deliciou in the bathroom. >> ick. >> let's talk about the chevy cruze and the gm projects because you say general motors is a fantastic stos pick. >> i like it a lot. one of the things since they restructured the business, if you take a look at their labor costs alone, they have gone from $16 billion in 2007 down to about $5 billion today which means they're really able to focus on products that people like. that's things like their suvs, their new gmc denali, the chevy

tah tahoe. if you see gas prices where they're at today, i think they will continue to be low through 2016 and they're going to continue to increase sales like they have been doing this year. now, interest rates at 2.1% on a 10-year, if you look at this stock it's dealing a little over 4%. this is trading at eight times forward earnings, great dividend yield. >> i think it's poised to break out. >> i don't get it because gm has had every catalyst, every single wind at its back for 2015 and the stock hasn't really done much. gas prices were low, we had peak autos here. what are we waiting for? why are you sticking with this stock? what else can happen that will make the environment even better than what it's been in 2015? >> it's a good point, melissa. the stock has underperformed but it's rallied significantly in the last quarter. i think one of the big components, the people who are really looking for growth out of asia and as we know through the commodity story, asia has been a headwind for anybody producing there. i think we will start to see that co-rfer going into 2016 and that's not built into estimates. if there's any kind of upside

surprise overseas, that could really boost the stock. >> you know, i guess doing into new year's is a good time to talk about champagne and other fine items. you like louis vuitton. we can buy it here under the adr, lvmuh, so just so our viewers know, most of these adrs are more thinly traded than a regular equity. what makes lvmuh such an attractive name to you? >> this is the best in breed company. like you said, it's dom pair pairenon. one of the biggest retailers right now. this is playing that asia story. i think the asian consumer will be coming back. that's largest area of growth right now, and if you look at what's happened to the stock in the last month on that adr, it's down 20%. it's a good opportunity to buy a best in freed company trading at

13 times earnings. i think the stock could easily see 20% to 25%. >> and your final name mckesson. >> we just bought this name this morning for our clients at our firm, brian, and this is the largest pharma drkt erdistribut the nation. they're the supply chain behind companies like cvs, maurmewalma they acquired the largest distributor for pharmaceuticals for europe this year. it will double their purchasing power for pharmaceuticals, generic pharmaceuticals. something analysts aren't looking at, a fast growing part of their business is their i.t. services where they have high margins. that's something that's not built into estimates at 13.5 times next year's earnings. i think the stock will see 15% to 20% upside. >> gm, mckesson, and lvmh, robert luna, great to see you.

have happy holidays and we'll see new the new year. >> merry christmas, brian. >> merry christmas as well. up next, one sneaker stock getting a big-time upgrade today and it is not named nike. that name plus four other big analyst calls coming up in "street talk" and the skiryest craziest video you will see all day. a skier nearly killed by a drone. we'll show you the rest of that video coming up.

welcome back to "power lunch." check out what's happening with the overall market right now because we are near the best levels so far today. the dow jones industrial average up by 155 points, about a percent gain. the s&p 500 up by 22 points, and the nasdaq up by three-quarters of a percent as well. green across the board and one stock in particular, shares of freeport-mcmoran, stocks surging close to session highs. it's the best performing stock in the entire s&p 500. freeport boosting the materials sector overall. currently the second best performing sector in the s&p. on a year-to-date basis, the sentor is down 9%. freeport has been down more than 65% so far this year, so

perhaps, brian, a little bit of fundamental value buying, perhaps a little short covering, a lot of stuff going into that freeport trade. it's lost a lot of its value. >> yeah, it is. some scary moments in the mountains of italy for one olympic medal-winning skier. a broadcast drone comes crashing to the ground and, folks, if you're listening to the radio this is not some little kid's toy. this is a big, heavy drone. misses the skier by, i don't know, maybe a couple feet right behind him. he was not aware of the crash, found out about it at the end of his run. you know, melissa, we sort of say thank god now, i'm telling you, when you look at the size of that drone and his speed, he could have been killed. >> and you have to take into consideration the momentum the drone has with its weight but this is why there's so many concerns about drones and their uses and increased regulation. you have to think an accident like this or a near miss like

this will cause even more regulations to come about. still a very new industry. >> he's the best in the world at the slalom, too, so you can also say thank god he's fast. he got lucky. it will be a happy new year for him. let's move from the slope to the football field. the nfl looking for some help to make its players safer, so it is crowd sourcing to help solve the concussion problem. kate rogers joining us to explain more. kate? >> that's right. the nfl is trying to solve the issue of concussions calling on innovators for their best ideas and helping to fund them. seattle based bee yo miometrics designed a smart mouth guard. meanwhile, the u.s. army is working on a solution that could have implications beyond just the football field. they've created a tether system that lessens violent head moch

a motion. it's currently being tested in the military. >> we place these tethers between the helmet and the body. we've shown a reduction in the accelerations for the forces experienced inside the head during the back fall event. reduced those forces and accelerations by half. >> nfl realizes the important of innovation. the league has teamed up with ge and under armour investing more than $65 million in its head health challenge. >> by investing in companies like the ones we were able to find through dynamics like crowd sourcing and these innovation challenges and working through partners that are innovative like ge and under armour we have a collaborative effect and hopefully have created a dynamic where we can find the companies that have these new ideas and help them mature and help them get to the playing fields fa faster. >> they're hoping it will make the game safer for every after more than 150 concussions this

year already. it's clearly an issue not going away anytime soon. >> kate rogers, thank you very much. let's move on to "street talk." that's our daily deep dive into wall street research and stock calls that we think you need to hear about. stock one, celgene. big move today after settling patent litigation. a lot of positive analyst comments out there. cowan saying very favorable outcome. it remains one of their top large cap biocap picks. their target is $150. that's still about 20% upside and j & p adding this quote, it removed a big investment overhang. >> a bigger investment overhang is 2016, an election year, and drug pricing will be a key issue and that's been dogging the entire sector since august. we'll see how this resolves itself, if at all, going into next year. second stock we're watching micron technology. earnings miss on q1 sales and

guided lower. raymond joins downgrading it. near-term conditions seem more broadly weaker meaning it's not just weakness in the pc segment pment memosegment. stock sort of in the middle there. >> and the cash burn here also a big concern for micron tech. it's been a disappointing couple months. i guess i have to remind people this was an under $2 stock back in 2008. what a volatile name this has been. let's move to stock number three and that is finish line. the retailer, green capital upgrading it to a buy from a hold. they boost the target to $23 from $22. they like a couple things. more nike and under armour shoes, two, all that nike brings them. number three, summer olympics. they think that should help. they also like the stock valuation. big call on finl. >> and it tracks nike pretty

well. this is a secondary way to play it. you look at nike's forward pe that's around 30, 29. finish line is trading at 11 times forward. a lot cheaper there. fourth stock, amberella. a buy rating, $80 price target. it has up to 30% of the video processor market and the biggest near term driver is it's not gopro. it is the adoption ofh d security cameras and particularly in china. >> finally your under the radar smaller cap name today is adap immune therapeutics. it's up 2%. oxford, england, based biotech focused on t-cell therapy. the analyst says this company is one of the more compelling stories in the t-cell space in part because of the way the treatment genetically modifies the t-cell receptor. basically it's better at killing

tumors. they've got a $16 target on the stock. it's a whopping 60% upside from here. and the stock is moving right now. that's your last "street talk" of the week but we're back next week. right now let's leave you with another look at the mystery chart. the best performing stock in the s&p 500 this month. the answer is coming up. but first, the final oil trades are crossing for the session. that crude close is on deck when a christmas-music-filled "power lunch" continues right after this.

they come into this iworld ugly and messy. ideas are frightening because they threaten what is known. they are the natural born enemy of the way things are. yes, ideas are scary, and messy and fragile. but under the proper care, they become something beautiful.

i'm sharon epperson. a story that's very important to teachers and public sector workers, the holdings of the largest 100 u.s. public pension systems drops 4.9% to $3.2 trillion in the third quarter from the previous quarter. this is because of negative earnings according to the u.s. census bureau ka d.a. that. republican presidential hopeful ted cruz says a "washington post" cartoon depicting his daughters as monkeys is inappropriate and children of candidates should be off limits in campaigns. the newspaper pulled the cartoon from the website. five ohio teenagers

reportedly slammed a stolen van in noo a department store and got away with thousands of dollars worth of merchandise. a witness captured the incident on a cell phone and the men can be seen fleeing the store with $19,000 worth of handbags. new york giants wide receiver odell beckham leaving nfl headquarters in new york after his appeal of a one-game suspension for unsportsmanlike conduct last sunday. a final ruling is expected later today. and that's the cnbc news update at this hour. back to you. >> all right. sharon epperson, thank you very much. a big day for oil, final trades are crossing for the session. let's get to bertha coombs at the -- see, bertha, you go downtown and we gain 4%. this is what happens. >> certainly a much larger than expected drawdown when it came to the eia inventories of nearly 6 million barrels. a number of analysts think that part of this is just the refiners down on the gulf coast squaring away their inventories

and drawing down to try to reduce their tax obligations on the state level. nonetheless, we have seen pretty much throughout the oil complex today things moving higher and we're seein ing wti nymex crude few pennies above brent. that premium seems to be shifting back to the way it used to be when wti was higher. tomorrow we will get nat gas inventories. with warm weather continuing to be forecast well into the new year here in the east coast, we're not expecting to see much demand and we're expecting to see an injection tomorrow. normally we see a withdrawal of about 125 billion cubic feet for this week. >> i heard if you're bad this year, santa is putting natural gas in your stocking instead just because it's cheaper. can you confirm that? is that true? terrible joke. merry christmas, bertha. thank you. let's bring in john cusack, oil trader at money block. john, to bertha's point we have a draw down in inventories a

couple weeks ago it was a 6 million gain in inventories. what's going on with oil storage? >> well, let's take a look at what's going on in cushing. what wasn't really looking at today was the fact that there was actually a 2.8 billion barrel surplus. with that being said, you're basically looking at the fact that while there was that draw and i think bertha is right, the tax implications they're trying to wipe out, i think i'm a little mixed right now. the relative strength right now is to the upside, but with that build in cushing, i still think there's a lot of inventory there and also as she mentioned, the brent markets, let's wait and see how much brent is going to be released to the market. that could be positive for west texas, but that spread is going to get wider and i think she's really hitting on something going into the new year, that that spread is going to get wider between west texas and brent and traders will be looking at that closely. >> let me ask you something else.

i talk to people in the bakken, they don't want to go on the record, but you can buy a barrel of oil for less than $30 in the bakken right now if you wanted to because there are four sellers up there. it doesn't go into the nymex contract. if and when cushing, you talk about oklahoma and where all the storage is, if and when that gets full, what happens to the price of oil? >> i think you're going to see a challenge of getting down into that low 30s level right away. i mean, we saw it blow through the pivot but today what we saw was basically -- that was just a short covering kind of move. i'm not seeing the new buyers coming in. as you said, if we start seeing inventories continue to build at cushing, you will see a rechallenge of the lows at $33.30 and we could get into the mid-20s and it could happen quickly. >> we'll leave it there. joe, thank you very much for joining us. really interesting story you ran, oil inventories. appreciate it. see you soon. >> thank you. apple stock on track to have

its first down year since 2008. of course, so is the dow. but let's stick to the apple story right now. max wolf is with manhattan venture partners, erin gibbs with s & p investment. erin, it's not a surprise they're both going in the same direction. is apple a leader or in some ways does it follow the market overall and what do you expect to see going forward from apple? >> so typically apple trades pretty tightly with the info tech sector. right now we've seen a big hit because there have been some news about slowing iphone sales, but we've known that even though iphone sales make up about two-thirds of the revenue, a lot of the future growth is expected to come from noniphone products like the apple watch and ipad and we've seen some good comments from the apple watch going forward. i actually really like apple here. i think when you look at both valuations it looks really attractive, and the average target price right now is above 35% above where it's trading at.

so -- >> but erin, erin, sometimes analysts get it wrong. it doesn't mean we're going to close that gap. we could see a wave of price target cuts, too. >> absolutely, but when you also look at valuations, this is trading below its average, below the sector average. i really think it's a low-risk entry point at this point. >> low-risk entry point on apple. max, do you agree with that? do you think next year will be better than this year for aple? >> i definitely think it's a good risk adjusted return here. i think apple definitely leads the market. this is a market cap behemoth. it tends to drag things around in its enormous wake just because of the market cap and anything that's a market cap weighted index overweights this because it's so large. that's good to keep in mind. the other thing is as people get cautious but want returns, they migrate back to apple because it has the largest stock buyback program ever because it has the largest cash hoard ever, and because it's the largest most sustainable high margin

electronics producer in the world. that doesn't change right away but the innovation engine has stalled a bit. i think the watch is not going to move a needle that's still 65 percent. plus iphone. so i do think there's been a little bit of a slowdown there, but it doesn't matter because apple is still vastly cheap and a cash machine compared to lots of peers trading at multiple that is they don't deserve unless this story is a lot less good than folks who watch it all the time thinks it continues to be, myself included. >> okay. cheap, cheap cash machine. erin and max both really liking the apple valuation story here. a lot of investors are hoping you guys are right for a better 2016. erin, max, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> for more "trading nation" go to our website, tradingnation.cnbc.com. all right, it is officially panic shopping time, but while you may be freaking out about finding that last minute trinket

for crazy aunt alice, imagine how the shippers feel? who is making the grade? we'll hit the road on that story ahead and we're at session highs of the dow heading to the final 90 minutes of trading. the dow is up another 1%. can the markets pull out an epic comeback and end the year positive? well, today is a big part of it. we're back with more right after this.

sanofi submitting it's new once a day insulin injection for drug approval. wireless carrier t-mobile has been accused by youtube of throttling the video services content. and mining and resources companies are trading higher following a published report in china saying steelmakers and other commodity producers are

likely to slash production in 2016. brian? i want to go back to a name we talked about in "street talk" just about 15 minutes ago. that's where we call out and find wall street research that gets buried because there's hundreds of calls a day. and that is adap immune therapeutics. the stock has gained over 9%. people say cnbc whatever, we're just relaying the research that's out there. this is suntrust research. they got a $16 price target. it's why we do "street talk," because you and i literally dig through this stuff and say, okay, that's interesting, that's interesting. >> this name is also pretty well loved on the street. it was just named a top small to midcap biotech stock for 2016. so, you know, good for highlighting this, brian. something that's gotten attention of the street but not by investors yet. >> well, a little bit today, i guess. the stock is up 13.5%. so suntrust, if you're watching, there you go. the week before christmas is xind kind of like the super bowl for shipping companies with today the busiest or one of the busiest days all season.

morgan brennan is joining us with the numbers on how busy everybody in the shipping biz is going to be. >> that's right. busy is the word. despite some service issues we saw earlier in the month, u.p.s. and fed ex are on track for their best performance in years. this is a big difference from the nearly 2.5 million packages delayed back in 2013. and it says on time delivery performances have improvinged in recent weeks. you can see that on this wall behind me. particularly u.p.s.'s ground segment. that's not so say there have not been hiccups. a message an eddie bauer's line says they have been informed by fed ex they are behind processing packages. fed ex says their network is performing as designed and operations are running around

the clock. chris weatherby says they do seem to be more assertively dictating the terms of service this time around both u.p.s. and fed ex but perhaps the holiday's biggest winner is going to be the u.s. postal service. so far this season package volumes have grown 15%. that is better than the 10.5% forecast that they came out with last month. and that sunday delivery for amazon is up 50% compared to 2014. so if you take a look at shares of u.p.s. and fed ex, u.p.s. is down 1% today. fed ex is up 1.5%. >> morgan, thanks so much. just two days until christmas. retailers' most important time of the year. e marketer predicting a 15% increase in e-commerce sales this year over brick and mortar. what does it mean for the retailers. jiri wurzer is e-commerce analyst. what sorts of retailers are

doing the best job this season. >> there are two types of retailers. amazon has a terrific business and they're between a quarter and a third of all e-commerce in the u.s. huge e-commerce business. people are ordering with the app on their mobile site, terrific business for them there. but the other retailers are really doing well who have optimized their websites, the ones who have really made it as easy as possible for the retailers, for the consumers to use the sites, use the mobile web, use the apps to buy something. >> i think that's a big difference because it's one thing to go surfing online at a pc but more and more people like to do it on their phone. i have done all my christmas shopping on the phone. so it really matters what sort of interface you have, what sort of app you have. what are the retailers that have done the best job on that end because if it's not easy to do, you're not going to do it. >> right. the ones that have done the best are the ones who have really figured out how the consumers are using the app or the website and really optimized that app to

the consumer experience. so ones i think have done really well are places like -- some of the big department stores, macy's, nordstrom's. i think walmart's app is pretty good, target. those types of companies that have really figured out the customer journey and have targeted the app to that customer journey. >> and nordstrom and macy's spent a lot of money this year investing in the online mobile transactions. in terms of walmart and target, what was surprising to me is only 2% to 3% of the total revenues come from online. is it too late -- are they too late to the game at this point? have consumer's behavioring changed so much i'm not thinking about going to target or walmart if i'm going to do online purchasing? >> they came late in the game, they invested tremendously. they've done from 1.5% to 2% to 3% this year. they're making progress but amazon is quarter to a third of e-commerce. they have a lot of catching up to do. >> thanks for stopping by.

brian over to you. >> one final look at today's mystery chart, as we said the best performer -- nondeal performer in the s&p 500 this month. there's your chart. we're not giving you clues because you're too smart and you figure everything out. this is impossible. we'll tell you who it is coming up. i'm here at the td ameritrade trader offices. ahh... steve, other than making me move stuff, what are you working on? let me show you. okay. our thinkorswim trading platform aggregates all the options data you need in one place that lets you visualize that information for any options series. okay, cool. hang on a second. you can even see the anticipated range of a stock expecting earnings. impressive... what's up, tim? for all the confidence you need. td ameritrade.

you got this.

emojis are often referred to as the and this week, the emoji tsunami continued with the launch of kim kardashian's line of brand of kimojis with one million sold each and every hour for the past three days. which is your favorite? >> i'm trying to figure out what they are. we're going back to speaking in hieroglyphics. can you go back to the store and pick me up a flaming pyramid and angry cat? these are supposed to mean something. i get a few of them. like the japanese wave down in the far left corner. or like the doughnut. like what -- when would you send that? >> a doughnut? if you're at dunkin' donuts. coffee and doughnut.

the haircut makes sense. the one on the left with the three people upside down, you're at the gym. >> what about the four gummy bears? is it you're hallucinating in the forest? like hey, just saw these guys. >> maybe we're just too hold for this, brian. emojis are for the young. >> no, they're not. i'm rolling out the sulmoji. there's an ear and a mouth. >> that's all you need. >> merry christmas, melissa. i'm going to send you a flaming pyramid. >> whatever. >> time now to reveal the mystery chart. the best performing stock in the s&p over the last month. it is whole foods market. the stock is up 17% just in december. unlike everybody else, he's got a market rating on wfm. what do you make of the recent strength? are you going to have to revisit

your rating based on some of the recent performance? >> well, it seems like the strength has been related to -- a competitor research node that talked about tracking closer to flat instead of down to 2%. flat is still pretty lousy for whole foods at this point. and i'm not sure how they would come up with that number. but the trends were still negative, too. it's worth noting, by the way, that the stock is still down 30% year to date. so even though it's bounced back a little bit in december, it's down a ton. so any kind of positive news would pop the stock. >> okay, so -- and that's a great point. we're really just focusing on this month. and it sort of stuck out to us. like wow, look at this kind of performance. i know you're not digging into the weeds of the name and how many shares are sold short. but you think some of this could be short covered? >> well, some of it could be that. i think it's more this optimism that people are trying to look for quality stocks that have been beaten up. it's a very high quality company. in terms of, you know, what they offer to the customer. people really like it.

it has strong brand loyalty and a good following. and so any kind of positive news that would come out in the next quarter or so would likely move the stock a little bit higher. i think that's really where this is coming from. if you go back to what the trends actually are, they're not that strong. they had to take numbers down a bit. next year is not looking very healthy for them. there's a lot of investment spending to come, both in technology and in the stores. there's a lot of headwind still to go. >> i don't get why -- i mean, i get why they're spending money. they've got to move into the right places where the consumers are. at the same time, they're borrowing to buy back stock. i mean, what are they doing? what's the strategy here? why are they leveraging themselves and also spending money at the same time? >> i think that's what's got a lot of investors. certainly guys like me, confused. it's like, what are we trying to do here? are we reinvesting? why borrow it to just buy back stock? is now the time to buy back stock? shouldn't they spend some of

that reinvestment more back into the business than into buying back stock and really accelerate potential investment and growth down the road. that probably makes more sense than just buying back shares. >> joe feldman. so you're sticking to your neutral? >> right now sticking to it. when we have competition like kroger out there, it's pretty tough. they're selling the same stuff. a lot of the same stuff. >> thank you very much. we'll see you soon. take care. up next, the ultimate christmas gift for some. jane wells, what? >> reporter: brian, up next, you're going to meet my man servant. you're probably going to want one yourself. mostly we're going to wonder why did we think of this? when "power lunch" returns.

victoria stilwell, you appear on tv working with canines. are you a dog lover, watson? i do not own a dog. but i work with veterinarians. how do you do that? i help them analyse over one hundred thousand pages of medical studies. that's great... 'cause they can't exactly tell us what's wrong with them. isn't that right, rusty? rusty. who is a good boy? who is a good boy? you are. yes, you are. watson, i think you need to work on your dog voice.

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take a look at shares of cable vision trading below. skepticismsurrounding this deal. we've got the top legal counsel to bill de blasio tonight on "fast money." it's not the antitrust authorities. new york city wants this deal to be stopped in its tracks. >> so what holiday gift to you get for the woman like jane wells who already has everything? apparently a man servant. jane wells. who is this man servant? i'm jealous. >> you know, we have finally answered the question what do women want.

watch. man servant is a start-up created by two advertising execs in san francisco who realized male strippers for their girlfriends' parties were kind of gross. these guys stay fully clothed. is it still creepy or demeaning? judge for yourself. meet a man servant. for $120 an hour, he will adore you. >> it's a man servant, it is a luxury service featuring chivalrous gentlemen at your service. >> will hayden is my man servant. >> i enjoy serving people. making them feel special. >> i have started a four-day juice cleanse. >> i heard. >> and i am very weak and disoriented.

have you ever done a juice cleanse? >> i have not. >> you don't need one. >> we have served over a thousand women for the past year. >> oh, yeah. right there. >> and we are growing about 3% every month. >> wow. there are some rules. >> no drinking on the job. no drugs on the job. and absolutely no sex, obviously. >> i was recently given a legolas costume with full blonde wig and everything. with the beard. so that was a good time. >> men hire man servants, and man servants must remain mysteries. >> how old are you? >> you can't ask personal questions. how old would you like me to be? >> i would like you to be my age, but you're not. the fastest growing part of the business are corporate events. they boot strap the company.

there's a longer version of the video on cnbc.com. for $125, i'd say you're in, huh? >> i'm definitely going to look at that video, jane. thank you for the great idea. >> jealous, but merry christmas. >> "closing bell" starts right now. hi, everybody. welcome to "the closing bell." i'm kelly evans at the new york stock exchange. >> i am not her man servant. i'm bill griffeth. a reversal in nike shares today. we've got a rally going. despite a seemingly strong earnings report from what has been the best performer in the dow this year, investors are looking to cash in in one of the big outperformers here. what's up with nike? or down as the case may be. >> it's only one of two down stocks in the red. crude is making a comeback. the energy rally is a big story today. oil prices showing signs of stabilization. take a look at the shares of