good morning. investors are liking facebook today. the social media giant's quarterly profit tops $1 billion for the first time ever, blowing past wall street expectations. it's your money, your vote. gop presidential hopefuls set to square off tonight in their final debate for the iowa caucuses. we know donald trump says he won't be there, but now tud cedz is raising the stakes. and the happiest, healthiest state in the united states unveiled. the new report this morning may have you planning a vacation to a warmer climate. it's thursday, january 28th, 2016. "worldwide exchange" begins

right now. good morning and welcome to "worldwide exchange" on cnbc. i'm sara eisen. >> and i'm wilfred frost. check out shares offa faceboof . advertising revenue soaring 57% year over year. we'll break down all the key metrics and talk with an analyst in just a minute. as you can see, premarket trade up 12%. >> not usual that we see a move like that in the premarket. let's check on global markets this morning. sort of a mixed picture overnight. let's show you what's happening with u.s. futures after they closed lower yesterday. the dow was up about 68 points and gave back all of the gains and then some to close sharply lower after the fed. boeing and apple a real toll on the dow yesterday. looks like we're pointing to a higher start in the early session with dow futures up about 83. s&p futures up 32 points at this early hour in nasdaq futures up

57. europe is seeing slight gains in the early trading this morning. a mixed picture. dax, negative. france and ftse 100 positive. in asia, also a mixed picture with china falling again, closing at the lowest level since december 2014. the nikkei off 0.7%. though, we did see green in hong kong, china closed lower almost 3%. oil still taking our cues off oil. we did get a reprieve from that yesterday with oil higher and the stock market closing lower. first time those two have moved in the opposite direction in ten days. perhaps that was a relief to some who are sick of watching the trade of oil. though, they didn't get what they wanted from the federal reserve. >> decoupling of oil in the stock markets. i wonder if it can continue. we'll hope it doesn't, given that oil is up. the global markets also digested yesterday's fed decision.

the fomc keeping rates unchanged, as expected, and saying it's closely monitoring financial developments. >> it's not obvious the hawks need to force the fight right now. if i was janet yellen and i was selling this to the hawks, i would have said, suppose things firm up, stabilize, we can give the nod in the march press conference that things are moving back on track and we can hike in april. so we've lost, what, six weeks. it's not material in the grand scheme of things. whereas, if they allow a tail spin, we're in real trouble. >> the fed says the economy is still on track for moderate growth and a stronger labor market, even with gradual rate increases. sara, i'm surprised that the negativity in markets yesterday after this. i thought there were straws for the doves to clutch on top yesterday. clearly it wasn't an outright dovish statement, nor were we expecting that from janet yellen given the previous message of hiking four times this year.

overall, i think the statement said if market volatility spilled over into the fundamental economy, then we'll reassess. if it doesn't, we won't. that, i think, was actually quite a good way -- >> comforting. not the bulls. they were looking for more affirmation that the federal reserve is going to be flexible. they kept march on the table. importantly, that was seen as a sign that they're not as concerned with international developments and financial volatility as they have been in the past. but a 200-point decline in the dow was after pretty clear message they weren't impressed. the big story of the morning, facebook shares surging. strong performance in mobile and a big jump in ad sales. facebook now has more than a billion daily active users. here's what sheryl sandberg told our own julia boorstin yesterday just after the release. >> we're really pleased with the growth in the advertiser adoption on instagram.

98 of our top 100 marketers on facebook are now also marketing on instagram and that's great. it's also the case that facebook is really strong. i think what really matters is with facebook and instagram, we have the two most important mobile ad platforms out there. we have this common ads infrastructure that enables us to serve the right ad to the right person. >> facebook is also spending on artificial intelligence, virtual reality, and drones to bring the internet to the most remote places in the world. that's important to ceo mark zuckerberg. here's what he said on the call. >> now 100 million hours of video are watched daily on facebook. we've been testing new experiences like suggested video. we're also exploring waiting to give people a dedicated place on facebook for when they just want to watch videos. >> joining us now on the cnbc news line to break down the

quarter, victor anthony, managing director at axium capital management. thanks for joining us. what are they doing so right that differentiates themselves from the likes of twitter? this online appetizing, they seem to be absolutely destroying. >> well, number one, you have a massive scale. the number of users on the platform is enormous. those users go on the platform for a daily basis and remain engaged. i think advertisers are finding that should be an exceptional place to advertise on. so it was an exceptional quarter, beating estimates across all metrics. the advertising growth was solid. you had help from instagram. that's what you're seeing playing out with the stock right now, up about 12% premarket. but i expect it to be up sharply higher than that. >> clearly in the short term,

this is positive for the stock. what about the long term, victor? are they planting the seeds for growth with oculus and artificial intelligence and these long-shot ideas that aren't translating into revenue growth just yet, but is it a reason to own in the long term? >> that's probably the reason. in addition to the strength of the core platform, which i see continuing for several more years, another reason why i'm advising investors to buy the stock is you have a lot of optionalty on the platform. there's whatsapp, oculus with virtual reality, which i think will be a home run. there's potential for facebook to capture a meaningful slice of video ads. they're thinking of allocating a separate facebook. there's optionalty on e-commerce. there's also search. so there's a lot more runway left on the platform.

i think none of these things i talked about are reflected in current estimates. >> you talked about the dedicated video platform. clearly they're also pushing hard into news. are they going to try and create a total unique one-stop online platform where people can get absolutely everything they need? and is that a realistic target for them to be chasing? >> well, you know, i think a one-stop platform, that's an ambitious goal. i think there are multiple other platforms out there, google, which i think could turn out to be very, very strong in terms of search. i think that'll continue. i don't see facebook supplanting that any time soon. but i do think it's becoming a place where you can consume news, where you can consume content from your friends, from just about everyone else. so it is moving in that direction, but it will take time for them to become that one-stop shop you just talked about. >> victor, thanks for joining

us. >> just raises price target on the stock to 145 on facebook. so it's bullish. another major tech giant set to post quarterly results today, and that would be amazon. landon dowdy joins us with the inside line on what we can expect. morning. >> hi there, sara. good morning. amazon reports fourth quarter earnings after the closing bell. analysts expect results to be fueled by amazon web services, a record-setting holiday performance, and a boost in prime memberships. wall street forecasting earnings of $1.58 a share on revenue of $36 billion. that's up 251% from earnings reported a year ago. the main moneymaker, amazon web services. the booming cloud computing business expected to grow 50% or more this year, but don't discount google as a potential pricing threat. amazon may have also racked up a strong holiday sales thanks to its annual membership service, amazon prime. they recently added 3 million

new members in the week before cli christmas alone. despite a tough retail environment this winter, amazon should reap the benefits in its nonapparel categories. amazon was one of the biggest stock market winners last year, rallying 114%. although, shares are down 13% this year. back over to you. >> landon, we just talked about facebook pushing into new areas. amazon doing the same, trying to get in on the music game. >> that's exactly right. "the post" reporting amazon is set to launch a full-blown music subscription service to take on spotify. said to be competitive pricing at $9.99 a month and set to launch in the fall. yet another way for amazon to dominate in entertainment. >> okay. landon, thank you very much for that. now of course amazon is getting into the big game. the company will advertise during the super bowl for the first time with a 30-second spot featuring alec baldwin and former nfl quarterback dan marino. take a look. >> all right. let's hear it. >> cheerleaders.

>> cheerleaders, m marino? i thought you were the expert. >> what about a snack stadium? >> what's a snack stadium? >> a stadium built entirely of snacks. >> brilliant. marino, new list. i'm going to need an architect, a five-star chef. >> snacks? that's smart. cheerleaders? >> cheerleaders. >> i didn't really get that. >> sounds like they're advertising the siri-like -- i don't know. >> it's not the best. when we teased that and it had marino and alec baldwin, i was excited. a little lackluster. >> and they're paying up. >> they cost a lot. >> some stocks to watch today. qualcomm had better than expected revenue and profit forecast for the first quarter. shares falling in the after

hours on the news. major johnson & johnson shareholder artisan partners reportedly urging several activists to pressure the company to consider major changes. that includes a potential split into three divisions. takata reportedly preparing for the exit of its chief executive. this amid the company's crisis. it's been under pressure for almost two years now over its defective air bags, which can explode. those issues have been linked to at least ten deaths. >> ebay failing to grow sales in the critical holiday quarter. guiding lower for the current quarter and the full year as a strong green back has taken a toll on its business. shares plunging in after hours session 12%. shares of paypal going the other direction. strong earnings growth and better than expected sales as new customer additions surged. also announcing a $2 billion stock buyback. alibaba reaching a $900 million deal to sell its stake in online

ticket selling. this comes as they build their own competing platform. shares off in after hours trading. oh, now it's up about 3.5%. when we come back, can a rebound in the faum stocks save the market? the answer in today's trade of the day. certainly facebook, shares are surging in the premarket. >> and we want to hear from you this morning on this topic. our twitter question, is now the time to go back to the fang stocks? vote with us. do keep watching here on "worldwide exchange." we're back in a couple minutes. t seizing opportunity. so i'm going to take this opportunity to go off script. so if i wanna go to jersey and check out shotsy tuccerelli's portfolio, what's it to you? or i'm a scottish mason whose assets are made of stone like me heart.

papa! you're no son of mine! or perhaps it's time to seize the day. don't just see opportunity, seize it! (applause)

welcome back to "worldwide exchange." if you're just waking up this morning, let's get you up to speed with the markets. yesterday oil and stocks decoupled. we saw oil move higher, but due to certain earnings like apple and boeing, stocks moved lower. today they're united once again. thankfully to the upside. we've got wti up another 1.5%. 32.7, pretty strong given the last couple weeks where we've been as low as 27. u.s. futures pointing higher. nasdaq to the tune of 1%, leading the charge. u.s. dollar mixed this morning depending which currency you're looking at. >> now to today's trade of the day. facebook's strong results and amazon's upcoming results may

turn arnold the so-called fang stocks and the overall market. fang, as you may know, is an acronym coined by jim kramcramer the big-name tech stocks. besides the macro headlines weighing on the markets, profit taking in these names is one of the reasons for the major in indices declines. they did have down days, and it's clear those four names dictated the direction of trading for the overall market. same goes for trading so far in 2016. as go f.a.n.g., so goes the market. for more, go to cnbc.com and check out cnbc pro. one reason they're so big, that they have such strong weights in the major indices. a lo the of people say the s&p was flat for the year last year because the f.a.n.g.s outperformed. >> made a big, big difference.

another big tech stock yesterday was one of the reasons the dow is falling. >> apple. >> also, microsoft is up 25% over the last 12 months. they report as well today. lots of earnings to focus on. let's also get an update on what's been happening in europe so far today. nancy hulgrave join s us with te latest. >> a big earnings day here in europe as well. at the moment, some earnings disappointment a s leis leadinge to the downside, but just off modestly. still getting near the session lows at the moment. let's take a look at the key sectors. that gives you a better idea of the earnings play. health care off some 1.7%. this after disappointing earnings coming from roche in switzerland is also weighing on pharma companies, especially in germany. telecoms off about 1%. retail, disappointing results from h&m.

banks a big focus once again, off by 0.8%. the big focus here is on deutsche bank. shares are trading lower after germany's largest lender reported that fourth quarter loss of 2.1 billion euros, hurt by weaker trading. a lot of this was expected after the preliminary guidance. we're listening to comments from the co-ceos as we speak. that's not doing much to reassure investors. back to you. >> all right, nancy. thank you very much for the update. in other headlines this morning, u.s. health inspectors have found the practices at a theranos lab, quote, at immediate jeopardy. a statement says an inspection back in november uncovered five major violations of federal laws governing clinical labs. they could be fined $10,000 a day in the issues are not

fiktsed. it is one of silicon valley's most highest profile startups. the company says the inspection results don't currently reflect the state of the lab. it has been so -- i mean, it's a private company, but so interesting to see these setbacks. >> still to come here on "worldwide exchange," it's debate day in iowa. at least for some of the republican presidential hopefuls. but it's the showdown off stage getting all the attention today. the big fight between donald trump and ted cruz after the break. >> but first, as we head to break, here's today's forecast from the weather channel's jen carfagno. >> so we continue the melting today in the northeast. down to 9 inches at central park as of last evening. this morning, more sunshine and temperatures above freezing will continue to help. a little system coming through the great lakes. a couple of snowflakes out there. maybe a light sugar coating of snow in michigan. florida, big storms yesterday, even a storm in broward county. watching the risk for severe weather again today. then the northwest stays wet

with more rain coming in. we'll see that from seattle all the way down to eureka, california. see those temperatures in l.a.? going up into the 70s. down sloping winds here going to cause that, so santa ana winds going to be a concern. we take you out to the southeast. temperatures back to average. the trend for the weekend is spring fever and warming temperatures coming. more on that forecast for tomorrow. for the weather channel, i'm jen carfagno. a nsweet-treat-goodness hold-onto-your-tiara, kind-of-day. live 24/7 with 24/7 digestive support. try align, the undisputed #1 ge recommended probiotic.

today is a somber anniversary in american history. 30 years ago the space shuttle challenger exploded less than two minutes after takeoff from cape canaveral. all seven crew members were killed. it was later determined that the o-rings inside the rocket boosters failed. nasa will pay tribute to all its fallen crew members during a wreath laying ceremony later today. we're now just four days away from it the iowa caucuses. tonight the republican hopefuls were scheduled to square off on the debate stage, but how quickly things are changing. nbc's tracie potts joins us live from washington with the latest. >> reporter: good morning. donald trump the leading candidate says he's out. he's not even going to show up for this debate. now, his numbers right now in iowa are strong. analysts are debating whether or not his decision to be a no show, to skip this debate, is a risk or whether it could turn out to be a smart move. donald trump's feud with fox news and anchor megyn kelly has led to one less candidate on stage tonight.

>> i don't like being taken advantage of. >> reporter: fox confirms there will be no empty podium. trump tells south carolina voters it's what we should have been done with the iran nuclear deal. >> you leave. >> reporter: ted cruz challenged trump to a one on one saturday. trump has a competing event. >> he doesn't want to answer questions from the men and women of iowa about how his record doesn't match what he's selling. >> reporter: drawing attention to where cruz was born, trump tweets, can we do it in canada? other candidates are ready to move on. >> interesting side show. greatest show on earth. this is not a show. this is serious. >> reporter: chris christie recalls being bumped from the main stage. >> did i whine and moan? did i refuse to show up? did i hold my breath and stamp my feet? no. i said, you know what, give me a podium and a microphone. you don't walk away. you stand up and fight.

>> reporter: well, donald trump has decide e ed not to stand up fight. he's going to sit it out. still to be discovered this morning is whether or not iowa voters will be offended by that or whether they might be impressed. >> and meantime, tracie, donald trump has been tweeting about this, as you can imagine, pretty much all day yesterday and all night long. fox debate advertising rates, he says, falling like a rock. tune into my special event for the veterans at 9:00 p.m. eastern time. he's just playing by his own rules completely. the question is, does it hurt fox, does it hurt the debate, does it hurt the entire process? >> reporter: he certainly hopes it will. his argument all along has been he's the star of the show and without him they won't have as many people tuning in, therefore they won't get the ratings, therefore they won't get the advertising revenue. so he's definitely trying to hit fox in the wallet on this one. >> tracie, thank you very much for that. it's going to be a fascinating 24 hours. all right. in sports, just another night at the office for steph curry and the golden stay warriors. the best team in the nba looking

to extend their home winning streak to 40 games against the mavericks. fancy ball handling by curry in the second half as he hits the three to push the lead to double digits. the wha warriors win easily. >> your favorite. >> he's everyone's favorite. >> jpmorgan has bought the names rights to the san francisco arena. it's a business surprising the arena will be named after a new york based bank given the warriors' ties to silicon valley. the owner is partner at venture capital firm cliner perkins. >> and in other news, the tennis channel getting a new u.s. owner. sinclair buying the cable channel for $350 million. tennis channel, which had been owned by a slew of private

equity firms, currently available in about 30 million homes. >> there we go. australian open as well is in process. >> you're monitoring that? >> a little bit. roger federer fighting back against novak djokovic. good luck. >> keep the updates coming. when we come back, this morning's top stories on this very busy day of earnings season. plus, the surge in facebook shares premarket. we'll bring you a kplooet sport card of the winners and losers so far next. >> but first, we want to hear from you this morning. our twitter question of the day, it's the busiest day of earnings season. we've seen the likes of netflix and facebook bounce back. is it time to buy f.a.n.g. once again? of course, today we have earnings from amazon. we're back in a couple minutes.

good morning. facebook on fire. more than a billion daily users and a billion-dollar quarterly report. >> earnings in full swing. if you thought things were already crazy, you haven't seen anything yet. today marks the busiest day of earnings season. >> and behind the wheel, the unique way uber is planning to stop driver speeding. it's thursday, january 28th, 2016. you're watching "worldwide exchange" on cnbc. >> if you're just getting up, a very good morning to you and a warm welcome to "worldwide exchange." let's get straight to global markets this morning. u.s. futures pointing to a positive open. the nasdaq expected to open up

by about 1%. it's leading the charge, and we are seeing performance so far mirrored across the board for the u.s. equity futures. about half a percent for the other two indices. we've also seen a mixed performance, but some gains, in europe and asia. let's have a quick look at european trade, where we're looking at mixed performance, as i said. in asia earlier today, we saw declines for the nikkei and china but gains for the likes of hong kong. oil prices important yesterday. we had decoupling, oil rallying. >> wasn't that a nice little reprieve? >> but we don't want it to happen today. we they want to join forces once again. >> the dow did close lower by more than 200 points yesterday. some disappointment on the part of bulls from the federal reserve, that they weren't more dovish or more easy or more flexible. they kept march on the table for an interest rate hike. they did say they're monitoring markets and the international economy, but didn't go much

farther than that in terms of saying how that would impact the policy decision. >> i was surprised that we had quite such a negative performance in markets. there were straws for the doves to hold on to. we weren't expecting an outright dovish statement from janet yellen. nonetheless, as you say, perhaps not quite dovish enough. >> data dependent. it's going to be all about those data releases and earnings. big story of the morning, big beat by facebook. a big jump in sales. the stock is soaring right now in the premarket. you don't often see a move like 11% in the premarket. that's what facebook is doing right now. the site now has more than a billion daily active users. it's also spending right now on virtual reality, artificial intelligence, and drones, trying to bring the internet to the most remote places in the world. here's ceo mark zuckerberg on the conference call. >> now 100 million hours of video are watched daily on facebook. we've been testing new experiences like suggested videos, which enables people to

discover more videos they might be interested in. we're also exploring ways to give people a dedicated place on facebook for when they just want to watch videos. >> now, it could be the busiest day of the week for earnings and economic data. weekly jobless claims are out at 8:30 a.m. eastern, expected to pullback after last week's spike of 290,000. december durable goods also released at 8:30. demand for big-ticket items expected to slip last month after being unchanged in november. at 10:00 a.m., we get december pending home sales. now, of course, as we know today is the heaviest day of earnings for s&p 500 companies. among those reporting, alibaba, caterpillar, and ford. befo amazon and microsoft are the big names after the bell. >> since january 1st, s&p growth has declined, drin in part by lower expectations for energy and financials.

joining us to give us an earnings roundup. good morning, lindsay. >> good morning. >> facebook delivered. did it help the tech sector overall? >> it did. we're seeing numbers for the tech sector up over 100 basis points since the start of january. now gret is still negative for that sector, but we're going to hear from amazon and microsoft, as you mentioned, tonight. netflix was the biggest surprise so far in the s&p 500. so that certainly bodes well. i think analysts have had a little bit of a hard time modeling this sector for the past several quarters. it is the most exposed sector of the s&p 500 to a strong dollar. >> you hinted there at apple beating. the market performance yesterday very much negative. did that surprise you? >> that was all related to the guidance. that is what we are seeing unfortunately. 60% of the companies that do provide guidance, and there are less andless of them every quarter, they're providing

downside guidance compared to our consensus estimates. >> i was just going to ask about guidance because the whole thing is we knew this was going to be a tough quarter with energy and the dollar. but is the outlook any better? >> no, the outlook -- you know, management teams have no reason to be super bullish here. they're being conservative. it's a game of beating numbers at the end of the day. it's interesting though because energy prices on a year of year basis peaked in the third quarter. i know they're down since the start of this year. but energy numbers chekeep comi down further and further. i think that's another area where analysts are having a hard time. in the last three quarters, estimates have come up almost for the energy sector 8%. that's not a lot when you're down 55%, but something. >> and energy names we haven't really heard from yet. could that be a big negative weight on earnings season? >> it could, unless they report to the upside.

again, i think analysts are kitchen sinking the numbers. >> what about revenue growth? >> it's not good. this is going to be the fourth quarter in a row for revenue decline. we haven't seen that since 2009 when we were in the depth of the great recession. top line sales numbers are expected to come down 2.5% for this quarter. that number keeps coming down. misses on top line are 60% of companies are missing their top line. industrials have been the biggest culprit of this. that's a high number compared to historical standards. we need to see that improve. >> strong dollar a big theme for earnings last year, weighing on many international corporates. is that a factor we can ease off on this year, do you think? the dollar still strong but not strengthening so fast. >> it seemingly has stabilized so far this year. fingers crossed that continues. the second half of the year, we're going to lapse those numbers. hopefully that will be a reprieve for corporate america. >> given what you're seeing so far, how does the s&p valuation

look overall? is it still looking historically expensive? >> no, you know what, it's trading at a little bit of a discount as things currently stand last night. earnings for 2016 are expected to be $122, which is down from $125 earlier this year. right now the market is trading at 15.4 times. that's a discount to the 16 times historical average over the last ten years. but we've seen it get worse than that when we get into dire situations. >> s&p down about 7% or so this year. thank you, lindsey. now, it is time for today's top trending stories. we'll start with this. a huge win for google. its artificial intelligence system beating a top human player at go. the complex 2500-year-old board game that supposedly no computer could beat.

facebook ceo mark zuckerberg also posted saying his team was close to achieving the same thing. i guess this is one of those things people are trying to do in silicon valley that normal people do not know about. >> i've never even heard of go until this morning. >> now a computer can beat it. a huge step. a leap forward for artificial intelligence. >> board games just don't really get much air time these days. monopoly was a great one. >> me too. i was the shoe. >> i was always the dog. there we go. don't know why. uber has started monitoring drivers to see if they're speeding or braking too hard. the pilot program is designed to respond to customer complaints, which the company plans to review using smartphone data. if drivers are speeding regularly, uber will ask them to curb their enthusiasm as they say in a press release. this is interesting. this would annoy me if i was a driver and they literally monitored every step of the way. i wonder if it will cause grief with their drivers.

>> they have these legal complaints when it comes to independent contractors, the way they pay them. so how much control over them can they really have? >> something to watch, definitely. >> the limited edition air jordans going on sale this saturday, but people have already started lining up in chicago. some as early as monday. they're called the just don sneakers. >> do you think they'd suit me? >> i do. i think you'll have to pay up unless you want to go to chicago and wait on line in the air jordan store. this is what nike does so well. >> i don't think they would suit me. i won't have to cough up. final trending story. after 34 years, the delorean motor company subpoena resurrecting the iconic car from the 1980s film "back to the future." starting in 2017, the company plans to crank out as many as 325 over five years, costing at least $100,000. that's an interesting one.

i'm not sure -- >> people go nuts for this stuff. the "back to the future" memorabilia. >> that was fun that day, "back to the future" day. >> yes, speaking of, the nike air max. still one of the most coveted sneakers. >> the hoverboard. >> we're in the future. we're in 2015. >> 2016. >> 206. well, 2015 was the "back to the future". >> it was. let's move on. a new report today hails hawaii as the state with the highest overall well being. gallup grades states on community and financial well being. hawaii ranked among the top ten. alaska came in second in the overall rankings. west virginia had the lowest rankings overall. i'm going to get a copy of that report. there's lots of states i want to go and visit. >> have you ever been to hawaii? >> never been. a bit of a trek from here. >> it is. but worth it. >> okay. done. >> if you are a big sports better, hawaii might not be the

place for you right now. the state's attorney general issuing a formal advisory opinion arguing daily fantasy sports contests constitute illegal gambling under existing state laws. new york, illinois, texas, and nevada also challenging their legality of sites like fan duel and draft kings. this is a big fight that has just taken off this year. >> keeps going. >> when we come back, this morning's must reads. why a global tax war could be brewing. first, happy birthday to the mexican billionaire carlos slim. let's hope this year is a better year for the telecom magnet. he was 2015's biggest billionaire loser with his wealth dropping about $15 billion. still worth about $50 billion. stay tuned. you're watching "worldwide exchange." born with a hunger toy and a passion to build something better. and what an amazing time it's been, decade after decade of innovation,

inspiration and wonder. so, we say thank you america for a century of trust, for the privilege of flying higher and higher, together. ♪

it is time for today's must reads. stories catching our attention. my pick is in the "new york times." it's titled "for bloomberg, ambition vies with caution." the author has covered bloomberg. she was a met ro section editor. she writes how many republicans and democrats would defect to support this willful child of wall street, how many independents could mr. bloomberg, ardent defender, of his administration's stop and frisk policy, can he count on significant support from black supporters. would his maneuvering to win a third mayoral term undercut his claim to be above back room politi politics. it's a series of questions. it's really a good look at what

you might think might be going on inside mayor bloomberg's own mind as he considers whether the time is right for him to enter the race. this is a woman who wrote a book about him and about his three terms as mayor. and the conclusion is, it's not easy to see whether he'll actually do it. he would have to defy history. he would have to defy his own biographical, political career to do so. but it is a good look at what he might be thinking as he goes on this journey. >> an interesting take as well. yes, he's an ambitious person, in a good way, but also he's relatively risk averse. thus, weighing up whether this will be something that would add to his legacy or not. >> he's going to talk to consultants, look at history, and look at the opening. we'll see what happens. >> we'll probably have to wait until march or so, see what happens in the democratic race. right. my must-read is in the "financial times." not often a must read is about tax. i've picked it. very sexy pick. the title is "alphabet and apple spell global tax war." of course, we talked about this

earlier in the week already. john gapper writing, apple could soon be instructed to pay billions, triggering a showdown and a breakdown of the international tax system. this sounds apocalyptic, but it's a decent bet this war could happen. this is really fascinating. we've been talking about it in terms of the presidential race from the u.s. spective is just as high on the agenda. if we get a reform on the u.s. side and it starts to try and claim back more of that european tax, you'll get a big, big pushback from the other side. saying there could be a global tax war is, i think, quite an applicable term. just in the u.k. this week, google has been instructed to pay $130 million of extra tax. cameron and osborn are getting slammed because it's being seen as way too little. the debate going on for quite some time. the ruling came out this weekend. this annoys voters everywhere when it's seen big, profitable corporates aren't paying enough tax.

>> there you go. you managed to make it sexy. we're approaching the top of the hour. andrew joins us from new york. >> good morning. a lot of stuff on tap. we're going to be talking to a couple of pretty interesting people that might indicate where the economy is going. mike jackson later from auto nation. of course, auto, the big question, whether this gravy train will continue or not. a lot of questions about that. he's already speculated it might not. doug oberhelman is going to be with us from caterpillar. >> quite a quarter they delivered. we talked to an analyst earlier. hard to find anything wrong with the kind of double-digit growth they posted. andrew, thank you. see you at the top of the hour. >> still to come on "worldwide exchange," the markets fed obsessed or fed up? joe lavorgna joins us with his take after the break. stay with us.

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our next guest says there's a problem with the way the fed is communicating with the markets. the fed can't hike until the markets find footing, but the markets may not find footing until the central bank's intentions are clear. joe lavorgna lavorgjoins us now. let's get your latest take from yesterday's statement. is your view still one that the fed is confusing things a little? >> oh, absolutely. the fed, in fact, in december said the balance -- the risks were balanced around the economic outlook. that had been a change from nearly balanced in the meetings before. so they were nearly balanced then became balanced in december. now, of course,ing this word smithing may not seem like a lot to people, but it really is. yesterday they said that they couldn't tell you what the balance of risks to the outlook was or is because we're not sure where markets are going. the last time the fed did

something like this was march 2003 as we were on the cusp of re-entering iraq from a military perspective. so here we are roughly 13 years later, and yet the fed doesn't know exactly where the risks are. unfortunately, that causes a lot of uncertainty in financial markets and causes extra risk aversion, which causes more volatility. it's really gotten messy in my mind. >> but don't you think they should just wait to see what the data shows in terms of the impact of financial markets and international weakness, joe? >> sure, sara. absolutely. but the problem is that the fed needs to treat the financial markets as if it's an intelligent 13-year-old, one that doesn't have a lot of patience and can only grasp little certain specific things at one point in time. unfortunately, this data dependency itself is not very clear. the fed itself isn't programmed to set itself up to be clear with things. in other words, the yellen-led

fed has really focused on labor markets and output gaps and things that really drive their thought process. therefore, they can't pivot when market conditions change. i'm worried because marks tend to be very good forward-looking indicators of growth. if the fed waits for the data to be clear, the economy at that point may have tipped into a recession. >> joe, central banks around the world need the ability to be able to make a change in their policy. now, whether that's an outright cut or hike is one thing. but rhetoric is part of their policy. surely there's some sense in what janet yellen is doing. she's giving herself more space to become more dovish in a few months' time if necessary. bank of japan has their meeting this february. they have such little room. maybe janet yellen is giving herself more room to be dovish. >> that sounds logical, but the problem is that central banks

are where they are in part because of policies that had proceeded what they're currently doing. they left rates too low too long back in the 2000s and should have been raising rates much earlier. i don't believe you should raise rates, at least as much as they say they're going to, so late in the business cycle. also, keep this in mind. central banks, specifically had the fed, when they reverse, they reverse course quickly. yes, we need to see what's going to happen with the economy. the thing is, you look back before the 2000 recession, they went from a tightening bias to outright easing within eight weeks. if you look at the last financial crisis, the fed went even faster in terms of its switch from everything is okay to we need to reverse course. so i would argue, yes, what you say makes sense, but history shows that markets lead the fed, not the other way around. >> march seems to be the decision in question.

is it as simple as if the market calms down, then they'll raise interest rates in march? if it doesn't, then they won't? >> sad but true, yes. tell me where the s&p 500 level is, and that'll dictate what the fed does. assuming, of course, the fixed income market is not pricing or is pricing a hike. the fed is going to look at two things. i know this sounds crazy, but this is how they behave. where is the stock market, and what are the fixed income markets discounting? the problem is with the fed reintroducing their language from december we know it took them a meeting in october before they could hike it out in december. it seems they've made it very hard for them to go in march, even if markets improve, because people are going to be looking for them to take the language out before they can hike again. the situation has become very messy. this is the dark side of transparency and trying to communicate to markets, when in

reality, you're not really sure what you want to do. >> okay, joe. thank you very much for joining us this morning. much appreciated. chief u.s. economist at deutsche bank. sara, what's the main thing you're watching today? >> i'm going to be watching facebook shares. you have to be watching after that blowout quarter. more than 50% revenue growth. shares are up 12%. so many interesting statistics here in this report. number one, 500 million people watch 100 million hours of video every day according to the company. that's a huge source of growth in terms of mobile ad revenue. >> absolutely right. premarket, it's up 11.5%. there's lots of other companies reporting today. >> which did you choose? >> we talked about amazon and microsoft. i'm going to focus on two others, caterpillar and alibaba. they'll give us a great indication of what's going on in china. a crucial market so far this year. alibaba reporting in just an hour's time. keep an eye on that. it's up 3.6% in premarket. i asked you on twitter, since netflix beat, facebook beat, and

amazon is up to date, is it time to go back to f.a.n.g.? 63% say yes. "squawk box" is next. with creative new business incentives, and the lowest taxes in decades, attracting the talent and companies of tomorrow. like in the hudson valley, with world class biotech. and on long island, where great universities are creating next generation technologies. let us help grow your company's tomorrow, today at business.ny.gov

good morning. the final gop debate before the iowa caucus will go on tonight without donald trump. and senator ted cruz smells blood in the water, accusing the front runner of ducking the debate and challenging him to a one-on-one showdown. facebook smashing wall street's highest estimates. the stock sharply higher late yesterday and this morning. reaction from street analysts straight ahead. and a flood of earnings are due this morning. reports from alibaba, caterpillar, eli lily, ford, under armour, and jetblue all on tap before the opening bell. it's thursday, january 28th.

we may be set up for a little rebound at the open. we'll see. "squawk box" begins right now. live from new york, where business never sleeps, this is "squawk box." >> good morning, everybody. welcome to "squawk box" here on cnbc. i'm becky quick along with joe kernen and andrew ross sorkin. let's start with the markets this morning after yesterday's losses of over 1% for the u.s. equities. you can see this morning that things are picking up a bit. the dow futures up by about 52 points above fair value. s&p up by over eight points. the nasdaq up by 43. of course, after the fed, it was dovish talk, but maybe not as dovish as the markets had been hoping. that's why you accelerate after the fed statement was released. take a look at the energy markets right now. wti up another