make and john kasich's strategist make, if they can make it to march 15th and win their home states, that will give them a chunk of delegates and tability to allow him to extend the context. >> "closing bell" starts right now. >> hi, everybody, welcome to "closing bell." what a rally we have on our hands today. >> i'm bill griffeth, investors welcome march with open hands, highest level since mid january. this by the way, the right now if these hold, this rally, these would be the best first trading day of the month in over three years. >> that's a roar, march coming in like a lion.

nasdaq adding 121 points and s&p, 44. >> after better than expected economic date that we had on manufacturing and construction, some of the housing data looked good as well. auto sales. >> we'll get more on that in a moment and biggest gains coming today from the financials in tech sectors, utilities are the only sector in the red. financials up more than 3%. tech up about 3%. coming up we'll discuss whether it's time to buy into financials which remember they are the worst performing sector this year. >> that's all you need to see right there, that picture. we love that but financials at the top and utilities at the bottom in the red. the safety trade is definitely off today. also, we're going to hear from one market watcher who predicts that stocks will head even higher if hillary clinton and donald trump win decisive super tuesday election victories, we'll talk more about that coming up here. >> we'll head live to capitol hill for the update on privacy versus security against the fbi.

>> which is ongoing there in the house at the moment. >> we begin with this rally for first day of march. joining our exchange, ron weiner and peter costa, feeling pretty good about himself and rick sante santelli from chicago. peter you got in as you said you would. continues higher, does this continue -- what do you make the first time in a while we had a pretty good rally to begin a month. >> i hate to put a little bit of wet blanket on things, i'm looking at the up and down volume and with the market up 340 points you would think the spread would be larger. you would think it would be more 7 or 8 to one but only 5 to 1. i'm not sold 100% on this particular rally. we're probably going to see as you go on with the jobless and

jobless volatility, that will be key. >> if the data gets good enough, it does bring the fed back into the picture. for now, what names are you buying? >> i have to tell you, we took a little off the table a little while ago. we put about half of that back on. i don't expect that much. the fed could cause a little bit of weakness but you know, on the whole, i see this market in a trading range, don't see a whole lot of catalysts that will drive it forward another 10 or 15%. i think at the end of the year i'll be happy with 5 or 7% gain overall from here in the markets but i don't see a catalyst and i don't think the fed will move that much. i think they are kind of painted themselves in a corner and it's going to be a slow grind side ways up and down a little and just no time to market time, won't being the space for it. >> ron, you've been understandably skeptical with the market volatility here. you're waiting for more evidence from the economy that things are picking up, a catalyst.

once you get that, isn't it too late to get in the market, doesn't the market anticipate that well before the evidence? >> when i say xep cal, it's the kind of stocks we own. more diversified. 90% u.s. we just decided not to play in the european and foreign markets, which turn out to be the smart thing to do but it was really the safe thing to do. there's enough ways to make money here in the u.s., mostly being in large cap. we're maybe 5% cash now but we've made a few bets here and there in our more aggressive portfolios, they are working the last several days but we don't expect that much at the end of the day. >> all right, meanwhile, mr. santelli, quite a nice pop in yields in the 10-year as well. what's going on here. >> 10-year wasn't even the highest, it's up 9 basis points, highest close since the 5th of february five-year the highest

since the 1st of february. my thought it's like whack a mole but whack a fed policy or any central bank policy. it looks to me like mario draghi will have to widen the net on the securities available for qe which means he goes more negative. we have had dofish speak and whopping improvement in ism that warrants the rally in stocks, 49.5, fifth number below 50 but it was sequentially higher and of course with jobs coming. it makes perfect sense to me. i think the market still hasn't defined what the fed path is ahead of it. for the moment, it's operating as though it's going to be less than many of the dots of last year demonstrated or portrayed for the future. i think there in lies the room. >> which numbers are you watching right now? one trader was telling me for him, 1971 on the s&p has become something of a pivot point. he wants to see it above it to

confirm today's rally. what are you watching? >> 1971 sounds about right. it could be give or take a few points. but i think that the next resistance level is going to be around the 1995 level. i would like to see the market get to that at some point this week. i think blowing through 1971, 75 is key through a continued rally. 1995 would be great to end the week but you know, who knows what will happen with the jobs report. >> are you sitting on your hands happy with the positions you have. >> no, i'm ready to dip in a little more once we have a pull back, maybe not to the 1865 level but below 1900. you know, it's going to happen, the longer we wait and further out it goes, you're going to hear my opinion change. but if it happens in the next couple of weeks, i'm going to be ready. >> i've got it tell you, bill --

>> ron, for me, it's the earnings of the companies. these levels and peter knows what he's doing in his business. but for me, i'm seeing pretty good numbers not stellar but pretty good numbers. the dollar comes down a little and numbers will get a little better. the market came down about 10% from the summer because the imf and everybody else said china is slowing down so the global estimates came down. the market should have corrected. now that the market is where it is, if earnings get better, i don't know about levels, what i do know is that if home depot does better, home depot stock will do better. that's what i'm counting on. >> what about financials leading the way and technology names to participate, would you buy in those sectors or no? >> we decided a while ago we were going to actually go to an etf. we bought the xlf. we bought a couple, own some individual names but it's scary out there.

they are supposed to make spreads and the spreads aren't happening. we have maybe a market way position in financials but we chicken the way out, we bought the etf and we'll dig amongst the bones if something bad happens. >> you're not alone. that's awfully popular these days. >> let's get to apple's top legal executive testifying on capitol hill. eamon, what's the latest? we're still hearing from james comy on capitol hill. very much trying to be the reasonable man here in this debate today. he says this is a very tough question. toughest he's faced in government and says he can see a lot of arguments around the table on the other side of where he is and he's gone out of his way to praise apple for its initial help early on. i want to bring a snippet of what he said, it goes to one of the questions out there this in debate. why doesn't the fbi turn to the

nsa for help. comey seems to have answered that question when he said earlier today, that they've actually reached out to all parts of the u.s. government by implication here anyway, he seems to be talking about the nsa here. >> here's what he said. >> we have engaged all parts of the u.s. government rkts does anybody have a way short of asking apple to do it with a 5 c running ios 9 to do that and we do not. >> i came out of the security business and you haven't looked at the source code and don't really understand the disk drive, at least to answer my rather dumb questions. >> i have high confidence that all elements of the u.s. government focused on this problem and great conversations with apple. apple has never suggested there's another way to do it ear than what they've been asked to do. >> we're expecting to hear from apple's general counsel later this afternoon as soon as they finish up with mr. comey, sewell

is in the room there. comey get ag heated reaction from members of congress pretsing him for answers, we'll see what treatment apple gets when sewell comes up to testify later. >> they hold the hearing. then what? do we expect congress to come up with some legislation or. >> reporter: not this year. >> where is this going to go? >> reporter: may have noticed an eye leelection year, we don't expect anything will happen this year. clearly people on capitol hill are starting to think about this encryption problem as something they need to address. you saw this interesting power grab at the beginning of the hearing by the members of the judiciary committee who said this is the place where we ought to be considering these issues. they think there might be something happening here and want to be on board early on. we could be talking years from now. >> time is of the essence, there are many open cases across the country where investigators are holding on to iphones they can't crack. >> that's right. just yesterday apple got a big

win in court with eastern district ruling yesterday saying apple was in fact right for the request to open an alleged iphone of a dealer. >> thanks very much. following the capitol hill hearing on apple. >> by the way, coming up, we'll have ben brafman to give us his take and how it could affect the fbi's case in california. and ash carter tomorrow, he will weigh in on the apple case after delivering an address in a major security conference in san francisco. look forward to all of that coming up. speaking of apple, dominic has a quick market flash. >> we're watching what's happening with apple. they are getting a break today and stock is inching back above the $100 level a share for first time in weeks. so apple is actually done this

eight times as a public company and according to data partners, about a week after breaking up above $100 a share, apple actually loses a lot of its gains. on average, apple falls about 1.5% and trades negativively 62% of the time, nearly two-thirds. while investors might be breathing a little sigh of relief. it might be too early to say if apple's pain is over. apple's shares not exactly due for a bit of a rally once it breaks above the $100 if bill kelly history has anything to say about it. >> all is well with the world if vix is below 20 and apple is above 100. >> transports are up. skies are clear. the sun is out today. >> skies are clear. >> thank you, domestic. >> see you later. we have breaking news on auto sale, phil le beau, was the story. >> according to auto data, the sales pace for the month of february 17.54 million, that was

roughly in line with what most were expecting, 17.6 or 17.7. to have a point of reference, the first two months, the sales pace has both of them have been above 17.5 million, keep in mind those are two slowest months of the year when it comes to auto sales. the real question, what happens when we get into the spring months when sales pick up. back to you. >> i thought it was fascinating just how much the average car price is up over, 20%, right, over the last couple of years? >> over the last five years, it's up 20%. you've got an average transaction price basically 33 grand right now, something like that. the question is whether or not we're pushing the limit on that pricing because a lot of people are looking at there has been increase in incentives not to the point where we were back 15, 13, 15 years ago, nonetheless, as incentives move higher that makes people pause a bit and say, are we hitting a limit

here, especially with the average vehicle selling for well over $30,000. >> i'm thinking why does the industry move to a dollar ago agree gat monthly sales figure instead of unit one. look 20% better or whatever the case may be. >> kind of like hollywood, right. >> true. >> just throwing it out there. thanks. >> 20%. price increase? >> but there's no inflation. >> no, that's the report yesterday on prescription drug prices, aarp saying that the average of 600 most prescribed drugs out there, they've gained -- they've doubled in price in the last seven year, annual increase of 10%. >> the inflation is a little bit out there. that's been the story the last couple of weeks. you wonder why we're up today. the inflation gauges are moving in the right direction depending on your point of view on things. >> all right, here we go. we've got the last 45 minutes of

trading to go today and the dow is sitting near the highs, gain of 344 points and nasdaq is big gainer though right now. >> the s&p may be still stuck in negative territory for the year but believe it or not, stocks are still more expensive now than we were at the beginning of the year. dominic chu has a report you can't afford to miss. >> how could super tuesday's results affect your money? john harwood sizes up the high stakes for your portfolio coming up on "closing bell." you're watching cnbc, first in business worldwide. man 1: [ gasps ]

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raising interest rates and that's what the banks want to happen,er go, 5% gain for these banks across the board. >> for a sector has been the worst performer. super tuesday is here and by this time tomorrow the race for the white house could look a little different. john harwood is at cnbc headquarters. >> they call it super tuesday because the race goes national tonight. as you see from this map, 12 states on the board. largely in the south but include minnesota, massachusetts and vermont. polls suggest hillary clinton is poised for a big night against bernie sanders, so big she's focusing lesson him than on donald trump, ripping the republican front-runner's failure to condemn the kkk. >> i was very disappointed that he did not disavow what appears to be support from david duke and from the ku klux klan. that is exactly the kind of

statement that should be repudiated upon hearing it. >> the republican side, donald trump appears in his position to add to his delegate lead. ted cruz is making his home stand. his hope is that a second vickry over trump after the caucus win in iowa would stamp him as the trump alternative to win nomination and general election. >> the only campaign that is in a position to beat donald trump on super tuesday is our campaign. if you don't want to see donald trump as the nominee and don't want us to give this election to hillary clinton, i ask you to stand with us today. >> of course john kasich and marco rubio both want to make exactly the same case. their home states of ohio and florida don't vote for another two weeks. march 15th is when they find out whether they get to stay in this race. >> all right john, see you. for more on super tuesday and political clarity can send stocks even higher.

let's bring in david from cumberland advisers who wrote a note about super tuesday's impact on the markets. david, welcome back. nice to see you. >> bill, nice to see you. >> what do you think that impact will be? >> we get clarity today, markets go higher. we looked at the net davis data base since 1900, the pattern is the same. start out the year with uncertainty and it's not clear, candidate disputes, markets go down. as the fields narrow and things become clearer the markets turn and go up and end the year higher or much higher. it looks to us as if the democrats according to what john harwood just reported are going to be clear in terms of hillary having the nomination and we'll see whether trump really gets a lock or not. the clearer the contest becomes

the narrower the field and better for the stock market. that's been the case in every presidential election year. >> i understand your point there, i wonder, will it hold in this case if it's somebody like a donald trump. in this case it doesn't seem it's going to be bernie sanders but the candidate more unconventional, nomt the one that might see a little more establishment, someone that wall street will be more comfortable enough in that sense. would this year be different in donald trump comes out in the lead? >> that's a great question and we don't know because trump is almost unique in the way he has ascended into the likely nominee status. if he really does well today, but on the other hand, the minute that is established, what do you see? hillary clinton is targeting trump not sander and trump will respond and start to see their differences in positions. when trump comes out with flat taxes, lower taxes, repatriation

of funds, he will begin to distinguish himself from hillary clinton. so it then becomes a divide on economic issues. think that clarity will also add to markets rising once they can distinguish this. >> we tend to oversimplify but when you get the point. if hillary gets the nomination, maybe hospital stocks do well, thinking obama care will be a little safer but prescription companies, drug companies may be under pressure because she's going after them for the price increases. what about donald trump? who are the winners and losers you can think of based on whatever policies he's been able to enunciate at this point? >> well, it's hard to say because he's been vague, bill. >> it's not clear, there are key points, he talks about repatriation of several trillion and creating a 10% tax instead of the present structure. what is a couple of billion of

capital -- trillion, not billion, sorry, coming back to the united states do? how would it be reinvested in the united states in capital projects? would we ak sell rate the growth rate? would that stimulate more employment, get to 3, 3.5% gdp instead of 2% gdp. all of the pieces start to come together and could be a very positive picture. >> we will see. david, thank you. >> thank you, bill. >> david kotok of cumberland advisers. 35 minutes left in the trading session. so far no sign of any change in the tone of the market here. >> it's pretty clear across the board as you can see there, gains of 2% for the dow up 325 points and nasdaq leading the way today of 2.6%, adding 119, much more ahead on today's rally, we'll have dominic chu.

>> and we'll have the results of "forbes" new billionaires list, guess who's number one? get who's off the list? we'll get to that coming up.

shares of international

couldn continental exchange. they are exploring an offer for the london stock exchange group now. remember last month london said it was in merger talks with the deutschein frankfurt. two previous attempts to join the european changes failed. clearly everybody is play in the exchange business. med tronic, blaming the strong dollar for lower than expected operating margins. one analyst says that figure is being used as a measure at how well they what they acquired one year ago in 2015. >> let's look at the s&p 500, still mired in negative territory despite today's rally. you would think stocks are cheaper compared to the beginning of the year but not so much. dominic chu is here to explain how and why. >> so if someone told you that the stock market today is more expensive, you would be thinking

well, how? that's what jp morgan strategists are telling clients right now. even though the s&p 500 is around 4%, 3.5% lower than the beginning of the year, expected earnings for s&p 500 companies for the coming year are now lower as well. according to this report, earnings estimates for s&p 500 companies are down 6.2%, they've fallen more than the overall market. even though the market is down, expect that earnings are down more and that's going to be a big key, hence the more expensive the market is today even though it was higher earlier this year. this concern over corporate earnings and sales is nothing new. acou we've had two straight quarters of earnings declines and important to note, while some traders and investors look at these forward priced earnings ratios because they are forward looking, those figures are derived from analysts estimates,

no one can predict the future but they try. you have to be comfortable how accurate you think those forecasts will be but still if you told somebody, guys, that right now the market is more expensive than it was even at higher levels, it's all about those earnings expectations, guys. >> and dom, that's a little worry some, if this was based on trailing earnings, it would be one thing. we've been through a tougher period. to say looking forward they are still expecting further declines, a lot of people look at that as a leading indicator of the market. i wonder if we've gotten traction, whether it's because some of those declines have troughed that analysts are expecting. >> it's not just that. you bring up a great point. we know a lot of earnings declines have been driven by abnormally large declines in the energy sector. that's dragging a lot of things down. if you had factored out those energy expectations or factored out those real results, you would have seen modest growth over the course of the past year. the real issue becomes whether

or not you can see the sentiment turn around. we know it's a big part of what's happening in the overall market. if we do see some signs of stability in the oil pack and energy stocks and financials and technology, that may go a long way into providing real upside fuel for the markets but for right now the bears out there will point out the fact that we have seen slowing growth in erngds and corporate profits and something larry kudlow has said has been the mother's milk of the stock market and slowing sales for the better part of a year. it's a very interesting kind of debate right now whether or not the bulls or bears are correct in this kind of situation. >> larry will be on with barney frank next hour and maybe we'll have a drinking game and see if he mentions again. time for an update. >> here's what's happening this hour. the white house says president obama asked gop senate leaders for suggestions on supreme court nominees during a meeting earlier today. met with mitch mcconnell and

senate judiciary chairman chuck grassley along with vice president biden in the oval office. laf rof calling for the syrian/turkish border to be closed. he spoke to the united nation human rights council in geneva. ted cruz voting earlier today in the texas primary. polls show cruz leading in his home state but trailing donald trump in the 11 other states voting today in this super tuesday. new york mets, $75 million outfielder came to practice as you can see there on a house. along with his pitcher. cespedes has been coming to the ballpark in a different luxury vehicle. it looks like a nice horse. he bout a 270 pound champion hog for $7,000.

i guess you could say knows how to bring home the bacon. >> work with me. >> you're producer, rich fishman is very proud of that line. >> i know he is. >> well done, rick. >> i tried to deliver it. >> you could point out he's riding in on a white horse, right? >> this is true. trying to save the mets this season. >> a palomino. >> thank you, sue. >> see you in an hour. >> different one every day. i think the journal had written up he came to practice on a three-wheeled bike thing the other day. wow. i like the horse idea but that's not cheap. 30 minutes to go here. dow is up 318 points and s&p 42 and nasdaq, up 118 for a 2.6% rally to kick off the month of march and a leading trader will tell us whether he thinks it will hold to the close. an analyst says valeant's future looks far from her owic

coming up.

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a gain of 321 right now and all three major averages enjoying their best first day of the month in trading in over three years. not a bad way to start the month of march here in 2016. gaming stocks also rising on the back of new data showing that maybe, maybe the multiyear slump may be bottoming out. you have see las vegas sands up 5% and mgm reports. >> a lot of things up in this market. what's going on? >> what's not going on? everything is up today. we see gold rallying and oil rallying and utilities are rallying. you could put your money anywhere and making a decent return for the start of the new month. >> did it start internationally or something here because it's the first day of a new month? >> we're not seeing increase in money flows but not seeing

selling and weak shorts covering in the new month, maybe locking in gains they've had. but we're seeing a ton of volatility still. stocks moving around 6, 7 point swings, while the market is up and that volatility is good, it's still present in this market. >> this one has been an unusually strong one. the question becomes as we look towards dater, what point does that bring the fed back and is that going to be a worry point? >> we're getting the best of both worlds, better fundamentals but dovish comments from the fed officials. march is probably off the table. probably the back end of the year and the market is showing it, 300 point rally on first day of the month is impress everybody and builds on what's going on in europe after four days of rally over there. >> with this rally going on

valeant is a different story, shares having another rough session, wiped out 20% of their value in past week alone. meg terrell joining us with the recap of what's going on one tough headline after another for this company, right? >> that's right. of course, ceo mike pearson came back yesterday. just yesterday the company announcing its withdrawing its guidance for the year. they are postponing earnings call suppose d to be held yesterday morning saying they are not going to file their 10 k within a 15-day extension as they continue their investigation and announcing a new sec investigation, the subpoena they received at the end of last year. what moer could happen today? hillary clinton released a new campaign ad specifically targeting valeant. take a look. >> and the company is called va va valeant pharmaceuticals and we're going to make sure it's

stopped. i'm hillary clinton and approve this message. >> she was referring to a migraine drug raised from $18 a vile to $1400. they are saying there is a generic version and most patients take that and followed up in a new statement and checked in with the patient and she is covered by insurance. we have shares rebound a bit. they just popped slightly into the green early today. putting out a note saying analysts there talked with the ceo mike pearson by phone and saying that the rationale behind the guidance withdraw was related to the fact this was pearson's back day at valeant and needs:to understand the business performance. there should not be any surprises which investors are unaway. whether it's giving more confidence, we'll have to see. >> thank you for now. let's good more on this story with vickie bryant. i understand they are saying it's first day back on the job but the clock is ticking in a

number of ways, you have bond investors that have covenantses that may be triggered. how much time do they have to get the information out there? >> i think they are overdo on reporting to investor, they did a disservice yesterday by canceling the call. the interim ceo, perfectly capable of conducting the call. this is the company is definitely in crisis putting off even more information that they have available now, i think was wrong. i think that was a wrong call. and so we don't need to wait until one man comes back to run the show. that's been kind of valeant's problem and sort of restates what the wordy think trying to indicate, we're going to distribute his leadership going forward if we have to wait and can he release the fourth quarter reresults because he's not back yet. >> this may sound simplistic but the questions about valeant and

its relationship with all of the questions surrounding this company for months now, why would anybody be still holding for example high yielding debt in this company? >> that's a good question, i had an underperform and sell on this bond variously back and forth since 2014. i've been concerned about this company for some time and the escalation and in concerns in recent months, really just highlight the problems with disclosure and what do we really know and understand about valeant, even the decision about the latest sec investigation shows again we really can't judge by what the company determines is material or not because the company decided that fill la dore was not material. this is a company that the concern took away a third of the market cap already before yesterday. that's material, sec

investigation potentially surrounding the relationship, i think that is material and we should have heard about it before now. this is a company that really we should be -- we should be holding their feet to the fire this a company when critics of the company come forward, will have pages and pages and dozens of slides itemizing point by point rebuttal to everything brought up against it. but yet we can't find out the simplest thing, when are we going to hear fourth quarter numbers from a company like this? >> right. no, that's exactly the question. vickie. appreciate you joining us this afternoon. vicki bryan. about 15 minutes to go here and markets holding on to a gain over $300 points and gain nearly 3% earlier, up 2.5 right now. broadly the s&p is up 41 points. maybe today's market prally could help the housing market down the road. recent corrections in equities have impacted the sale of high end homes, diane will have more

next. conventional wisdom as today's super tuesday primary elections but larry kudlow and barney frank say be wary of conventional wisdom. we'll get their super tuesday take coming up on "closing bell." ♪

welcome back, big rallies in financials and technology today be helping to propel markets. the s&p is up 42 and nasdaq up 118. >> and the market is starting march off in good form with today's rally but the correction territory achieved in january and february certainly took a bit out of the housing market in particular the high end housing market. diana joins us from the nation's capital with that story. >> the correlation is even closer than you might think. it variousries depending on the local market as with all things real estate. the recent correction in stocks has only put an exclamation point on how stocks and high end homes track. they did diverge during the last housing boom. more leent recently, the s&p

fell 10% as of member fid febru that was matched by the sale of million dollar plus home sales. in new york city luxury home sales are down but also slowing in san francisco where the financial markets do play a role amid all of that tech. in southwest florida, where real estate is fueled by wealthy retirees from the northeast and midwest, luxury sales there we're told have stalled. here in d.c. though the luxury home market has a much morsteaddy denominator of government and the high price lawyers and lobbyists who surround it. they are still buying. >>. >> i actually think the stock market is good for my business. >> really? >> i think people are going to really think about die veinvesta little bit into something they can enjoy. >> in other words, bricks and mortar over bulls and bears but that could all be changing now. >> that's right. we'll see if we get a one day

lift in home sales at least. thank you so much. >> 12 minutes to go and the dow is up 311 points and s&p up 41 and nasdaq the outperformer paced by tech, up 116. >> you hit them with that statistic we were just talking about. only seven names in the s&p 500 are at 52-week highs which tells you just how brutal these markets have been and what were some of those names? >> time warner cable. verizon. avery denson, johnson & johnson. but as point out tech and financials are leading the rally today but our next guest says two old school stocks bear some of your attention as well. he will name names when we come back. i'm in vests and as a vested investor in vests,

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eight minutes left and dow holding up to gains, up 310 points and kelly is clearly hungry. >> there's a back story. >> talking lots of food here. >> this is snack time if it's not nap time, it's snack time. >> one leads to others though. >> and we talk about during the break, the old school stocks if you will. you want to stick to.

>> putting today's rally aside on light volume, you want to stay conservative, you want to stick with rock solid bound sheets and dividends and kellogg, for instance, a great portfolio of names in there. it's fairly recession resistant. we don't think there's going to be a recession in the u.s. but things will continue to be wishy washy at first. >> pfizer. >> pfizer pharmaceuticals. >> why that one over others? >> there's still valuation upside in terms of what's happening. they are toyidoing the inversio popular or not, is going to have a positive impact on bottom line. when you look at the pharmaceutical sector. you want to look at pfizer as a name of the core holder of the portfolio. it's a rock solid balance sheet with stuff happening in terms of internals of the company. >> you have a couple other names, center point, names that you quote warren buffett won't

mind holding on to if the market was shut for ten years. >> you think about southern company or centerpoint, 4.5, 5% dividend yield, terrific when you think about the fact that you'll probably see 5 or 6% equity returns over the next couple of years. 90% is coming from your dividend alone. you've got interest rates probably going to climb at the lower and slower pace than most anticipated last year and now the picture is already a little bit more mixed. and you've got good earnings productability and it's about the steadiness. you don't want to take a lot of risks here. >> solid advice as always, we're going to come back with the closing countdown and kelly will have m&ms right now. >> frosted flakes. >> she demands green m&ms. >> we have to do fast food earnings after the bell and domino's it's torture. today we'll have complete coverage of the big rally and look at which stocks in the

financial sector really led the charge into the green and we'll talk a little super tuesday, just hours left before we find out what happens. we're back in two.

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we have evenly seen a big rally. from the get-go, pretty good rally, gain of almost 2% today. let's back it up and show year to date after two rough months does today's rally amount to a hill of beans. we have a low achieved on february 11th when jamie dimon announced he bought shares of jp morgan chase and we've been off to the races since that time. the dow is still down, 3 1/3%. finishes with a rally of 1.75%. let's back that up. year to date how oil has done, it also bottomed on february 11th, the diamond bottom. crude is down 7 1/3%. >> a hill of beans because the dow is out of correction territory on a day where we saw

nice move up and actually you want to look at the acceleration of oil. initially we saw markets moving without any gains in oil and i think you can credit that to the financials responding well to the increase in the 10-year yield. they like that steepening yield curve. >> and the economic data this morning. >> expectations and weaker economic data and europe continues to feed this expectations. >> and if there's a fly in the ointment, what is it? >> volume. >> thank you for that. volume once again is week. you wonder if there's a lot of conviction behind this rally. we have the beige book. no one is ready to call an end to the volatility but need added evidence from the data later this week. >> we always need more. >> but march coming in like a lion. >> nmary thompson as we close ot

a good gain, the nasdaq even stronger. ringing in the closing bell here at the new york stock xhafrexch as we close out this first day of march. let's figure out the effect of what super tuesday is going to be on the closing markets. i'll see you tomorrow, kel. >> it is super tuesday on wall street. that's for sure. welcome to the closing bell. i'm kelly leaevan, the dow up 3 points the best first day of the month in about three years. 2% gain there and 2.4% gain for the s&p 500. stocks broadly up 45 points on that index to 1978. the nasdaq outperformer all day true on bell up almost 3%, 2.89%, adding 131 points and couple of other green spots,

transports up 155 points and dow up a little stronger and oil was up today. the russell 2000 was up and notably the vix. volatility gauge was out. joining today's panel, mike santoli here and welcome, guys. o'neill securities will join us shortly. what do you make of it? >> i wouldn't call it an everything is okay type of message from the market but it's wiping away what was left of that recession trade, that idea that we were really wobling close to that. the ism manufacturing number and construction spending number continued on this narrative that domestically things look okay. when interest rates lifted a little bit. you had treasuries lifted, we're rebuilding the prospect this year. that helps the banks. also, all of that nudge, everyone was wondering if that was going to be the easy place to short the market again. it seemed like the paying trade

was higher. that all played out that way. up and we sat there most of the day. i don't want to quibble with it too much but it wasn't the broadest rally or really led by the riskiest stuff. >> we did have financials really kind of taking the charge here. we have seen this trade placed on time and again, every time it looks like skies are clearing and rate hikes might happen. as soon as that goes away and any negativity like we saw for the rest of this year we are also the first ones to be taken to the wood shed. >> this is maga rally, the make america great again rally. everyone has decided that donald trump will sweep through super tuesday and america will be great. back to your question, there was a problem where people started to think again, is this a systemic bank problem? financials suffer from that exist ent shal question mark, which happened for first six weeks of the year. think what you're seeing, actually it's yet another one of

these things may slow down but the banks when they go down, 20% below their book value are probably a buy. >> you know, you might have been joking about the maga rally but kenny, is it possible there's some tie-in to super tuesday he here. >> i think it's possible but i think this is much more of a technical rally. every index, the dow and s&p and oil and russell and nasdaq have all broken through their down trending 50-day moving averages which has been a level of resistance, we've been fighting with it for a while now. we've broken through on every one of those. almost like this sense we did it and now boom. as we hit this vacuum, there's no real resistance. 1970 we hit some resistance but we've now broken through. we're going right to 2000. then i think it's going to hit resistance in 2000 until we catch up again on the macro

data. >> that brings us to friday morning jobs report number. how important is it? >> it's always important because they make it important they are expecting 190,000 jobs, anywhere north of 150 will be positive. i think we'll get right where we expect. it will be right where they want it to be. >> if we go up 2% between here and now, who knows how the market will take it. i do think we're in a zone where good news friday should be good news for the market and supportive, because it seems too close to the march meeting for it to say they've been back on the table -- >> given what we heard dudley say, more reflective of the environment until today then of today's trading session. >> going back, there's going to be a problem at some point where people are going to look at earnings. you've seen earnings estimates down, 6%, 7 to 10%, whatever you

look at. and the market is now trading at something like 17 times earnings. you're at a point where it's hard to see on the fundamentals you can argue we should be going up that much more. >> i do wonder, i know this is not how people trade when they are doing it knee jerk but it's that 17 times multiple on a gap basis going back to the article in the journal the other day, it's 21 times, there's a 25% gap between the pro forma results and what the gap numbers are. >> i put that stat in my note talking about as prices go down but profits go down. the valuation of the market actually goes up. >> we're just keeping steady. >> the market appears to still be kind of overvalued, right? >> one question i have, with the early earnings pressure all energy related as that sector and transports was the brunt of this move lower? is it different? does that tell us anything? >> it is widening out a little

bit. i do think that the fundamental challenge is out there but i don't think that's standing in the way of the next five percent move one way or the other. the credit markets were screaming in a stronger direction. that's been your big head wind and that's now -- if it continues that way, that's supportive and helps you hold the price earnings multiple on stocks. that's been the big problem with the stock market multiple. >> one of the leading gauges too. hang on, we have a news alert on zi zinga to get to. >> zinga appointing a new ceo as mark pinket becomes executive chairman. he joins the board of directors this past august and spent more two decades at electronic arts and zynga says he's been involved as the company works to focus more on mobile gains.

pincus took on the role last april and replacing the ceo to turn around the struggling company. pincus will focus on vision and working with product teams. >> julia, thank you. what do you make of it? >> this stock has really been left off to the side obviously. less than $2 stock right now. you were talking for a while about fact toring the value of the real estate to where it was worth, any fresh face there, somebody who actually -- knows his way around the gaming business is a positive thing. a type of gain -- >> those shares are under pressure a little bit on the news. >> stock rallying after the strong economic data this morning but the real test will be the february jobs report come friday. let's get to steve liesman. >> what happened?

i wrote the whole script based on the idea that the market would sell off in last hour but now it's no good. it did appear while the nation is focusing on the presidential case, markets are acting to economic data. first data out of the box today was pretty positive. car sales and construction spending were reasonably strong. and the downturn in manufacturing didn't get worse. it's now barely contracting a little below the 50 line. big data though yet to come despite fears in the u.s. economy is softening. wall street economists are still banking on a strong february jobs report. the consensus for tomorrow's adp, the private sector up 185,000. jobless claims are still seen being relatively low. that gives confidence for the friday report. you're looking for another 200,000 number up from 151,000

in january. recent market gyrations and growth concerns led bill dudley to suggest he's not in a rate hiking mood. he said the balance of risk to my growth and inflation outlooks may be starting to tilt slightly to the downside just in time for the data to slide to the upside. today's market rally began with dudley's comments but accelerated about the better economic news. that says that maybe the market is more interested in better growth or more growth rather than more fed stimulus, kelly. >> you're right. that's what makes moving interest rates so interesting so to see the 10-year jump up. >> and stocks went up. >> exactly. >> usually that is a sign of kind of the reflation trade being put on. >> i think that makes -- dudley makes a very interesting point. came from that as well as the news overnight about china and ecb and more stimulus coming from there. as the day wore on and got that

better data and market continued to move higher. steve is exactly right. people are tiled to the negativity and want to see real growth. it's almost a vote for america. >> funny, you mention that. i also want to state the obvious here and if you look at the last two months of data and at the time include, the overseas data can be weak and if we're weak that drags down the market. if we're doing okay, that's all the market needs to hear. >> you know, kelly, i've been interested -- i wonder if mike would maybe engage on this. it looks like the market looks for every reason why it's falling except for most important which is earnings. they have been really housy. you blame the fed and china and blame europe but when i look at the earnings numbers, i have nothing to write home about. all you can say about the economic data is it gives the hope and the prospect for earnings to turn around. but i don't think the rally is

real until we start getting better guidance to the upside for this year. >> that's very true. one year ago we were base he canally operating at the same annualized level of s&p earnings and the market was more looking on the bright side -- >> that's the level, they buy growth not the level though, right? >> right. in reality, the growth wasn't going to be there. the market was no smarter in figuring out that in fact we were looking at a little bit of a short-term peak in profits. i agree with you but do think that talk of negative interest rates around the world earn whether our fed will have to do that, that is the conversation as recently as a week or so ago and now we're talking about could they do march? >> right, by the way, steve, what is the latest on that? especially in light of those remarks but even with today's improvement in the data or even if friday is a blowout, does that in any way put march back on the table for a rate hike. >> i have to side with what was said earlier, it's too late to

guide the market to a hike. i've long maintained it was too aggressive in pricing out june. and that's because i thought the economy was going to bounce back from the fourth quarter. i think what could happen is that the fed would take a pass or pause in march with a signal that something could be coming at the next meeting or there after. i think it's still possible to get 50 basis points this year and i think the market has been a little off sides on that because it really comes down to the economy. if you think the economy is going into the tank you're right to bank on zero. but if you think we're going to muddle along at 2% with decent job growth and a forehand on unemployment, you have to bank on the fed to do some hiking this year. >> just as important as friday's number is that thursday morning jobless claims series too. we have that to look forward to as well. steve liesman, back at headquarters. >> financials leading the rally after underperforming the broader market.

we'll look at whether now is the time to bank on the banks. >> heading to the polls to select a gop and democratic nominees, donald trump express is roaring to the republican nod and hillary clinton does seem poised to take the democratic banner. we'll see if these two can be stopped later on "the closing bell." we got another one. i have an orc-o-gram for an "owen." that's me. ♪ you should hire stacy drew. ♪ ♪ she wants to change the world with you. ♪ ♪ she can program jet engines to talk and such. ♪

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we have a market flash to starts things off. >> we've looking at shares of ruj are ford international. a secondary offering of 80 million shares, net proceeds from the offering to be used towards general corporate purposes, including the repayment of existing indebt indebtedne indebtedness, jp morgan and morgan stanley will acts the joint book running managers and if you look at the stock it is down 5% on this news. even year to date down about 30%. back to you. >> the theme continues, these companies keep doing secondaries in this case sending those shares down another 5%. >> the individual shares go down but the sector was up nicely. i think people look at this

activity, maybe the better position companies can recap talize without having this messy wave of defaults. we see more but over time it's positive to see them be able to raise capital. >> reequityizing the sector, you're doing it at 30 something oil prices, it's not much fun if you've been owning the stock all the way down. but this is a good sign. as you say the banks were a great example, able to raise money after tarp and all that stuff and stress test. maybe this is a stress test type moment. >> speaking of the financials, worst performing sector so far. today they were having a party. can it last? charles joins us now, vice chairman and head of investment group at aerial investments. great to see you again, were you shaking your head again today? >> it was finally a good day. i think you have me on here to remind me that i've been predicting the banks were going to have a good year and they haven't year to date. today was a great day. all of the things that have been

head winds turned into tail winds, the economy looked better today and interest rates went up instead of going down. and energy went up instead of going down and these things all reinforce each other and all became tail winds today. >> i guess it also shows us how dependent we are on quite simply the mac co-daro data. if it gets better the calls will be great, if not, well -- >> the one thing that will be a constant, these stocks are very cheap. i keep talking about this but morgan stanley at 81% of tangible book. to trade at 81 of book means you have a lot of margin of safety here. at some point all of these macro fact tors will not be in the face and we'll have value and these stocks are very cheap xbl how much more value -- >> you take a goldman sacks at 88% or something like that of book value, i mean, you're

talking about a 15% rally in the stock to book value or go beyond that. these guys are barely making. some of them are making their cost to capital and return on equity is 7 to 10%. i'm not sure how you go beyond that. >> in a world of 180 on the 10-year, the equity required return is not the old 9 or 10%. it's like 7 or 8%. if you are earning your cost of capital, they sure trading above book. the old rule was buy is the one times book and sell at two times book. and this period of below book is really historically unprecedented. >> i think obviously the market has decided that these -- stocks used to trade with oil for a stretch of time and now switched back to trading with interest rates and go back to what rob just said. ultimately it's kind of an earnings problem, not necessarily a credit or systemic

contagion problem. what might be a catalyst beyond cheapness that might help them to work a little bit. >> higher interest rates have huge impacts. if we get a positively sleeped yield curve, you talk to the cfo, he will tell you one factor has a huge impact on earnings, somebody like morgan stanley is deferring fees on cash balances of all of their customers. that's probably around a 25 basis point forgiveness. that will go right to the bottom line. a place like goldman sacks that is borrowing short and ending long will do very well when interest rates eventually return to their normal structure. >> and then that means again we go back to this case fl how do we steepen the yield curve and get brighter growth and reflation prospects. thanks for watching us. >> thankds for having me. >> on a day when the banks are seeing the glass half full. >> the battle with the fbi is back. the company's top lawyer is

giving testimony right now. up next we'll hear from famed defense attorney ben brafman. plus donald trump says he's worth $10 billion, but the later forbes billionaires list says he's worth far less. we'll hear from the person behind that list later on "the closing bell t q

. privacy versus security threat has been center stage most of today on capitol hill.

eamon has the latest. sewell is testifying right now. he began by saying that apple has no sympathy for terrorists and apple has enormous respect for law enforcement but said they simply have to stand on principle when it comes to encryption. here's what he had to say. >> some of you may have an iphone in your pocket right now if you think about it there's probably more information stored on that device than a thief could steal by breaking into your house. the only way we know to protect that data is through strong encryption. >> we also heard from the fbi's head james comey who made the case that the fbi really is responding to the court case that we saw yesterday in new york. that was a case in which the federal judge in new york ruled against the fbi, comey said the fbi has to accept all of these different legal verdicts. here's what he say. >> the government lost the case yesterday in brooklyn. we could lose the case in san

bernardino and it will be used as precedent against the government. is that the way the law works, which i happen to think is a good thing? >> this is not one of those political issues that slices democrats versus republicans, we're see a lot of these questions, not the typical idealogical divide. fascinating to see how witnesses here are handling those inbound questions. >> we're going to examine the legal aspects now. while congress is considering policy matters. the case is playing out in court. a federal judge in new york said apple does not need to help the government crack open an iphone. what impact this might have on the california terrorism, his clients include michael jackson, martin shkreli. this is by all accounts hugely difficult and complex issue. where do you lean in terms of what is the right thing to do here? >> well, i don't want to lose my defense lawyer stripes which took me 40 years to earn, but i

think ultimately, this is going to require congressional action that's going to benefit the government and the government will end up having access to these devices, we got an acquittal in a murder case because we gained access to the victim's phone before it was encrypted and found information which led to a suspect who had greater motive to kill the person than did the client we were representing. >> it also seems if these phones can't be penetrated that effectively creates lawless spaces in cyber space, doesn't it? >> it does, but the interesting question that i don't think is really being addressed. this is a form of involuntary serve tud. telling apple you need to do this and apple says we have a business interest in protecting our clients, people who trust us with data. the government forces apple to invent something that doesn't

exist is virtually unprecedented. >> that's what happapple is maka case on. they are making their case right now that this would be compelled speech and violate the constitution. the flip side of that being of course, the constitution has a right to search and seizure. so i'm sure that while they claim what's new and different about this they would have to create a new program, you could also point to the same document and say, they still have to abide by the same laws as everybody else. >> except there are no laws that cover this. the all rits act that the government cites was written in 1789, when it was updated in 1948, they changed it gra mattically but not substantively. nobody contemplated this type of difficulty when these laws were written. it's up to congress to give guidance. you're right, the government has enormous power but have to go tlo channels to use that panel, search warrant and go before district court. here it's just lawlessness and government wants it and in

brooklyn yesterday they lost that fight. that is not a binding decision on california. it may have no effect in california because the defendant in the brooklyn case already pled guilty. the whole issue was moot in his case. >> as you suggest in talking about the updating of the law, haven't we run into this before, when telephones became u bik tuesday, these statutes had to be updated, what can the government do, where does privacy lie relative to both sides of a legal matter, as an ability to get to that information, whether it be phone records or something else? is it going to be updating of these principles? >> i think you're 100% right. you couldn't listen to someone's conversation unless you were in the room. they've been allowed to listen in on your conversations and allowed to look at your text and search your computer as long as they have a search warrant. difficulty here is that the technology has jumped to a point where apple has invented, with

the encouragement of the government. because the government funds these encryption studies because it's a national security issue. i think ultimately congress is going to have to decide is this a national security issue that's enough of a pressure point for us to make new legislations for this century? >> we can wait for congress to act? this will be fine when congress gets together and in harmony and comes up -- i'm just -- it reminds me a little bit how fiscal policy, which congress has done nothing and we've depended on monetary policy completely and we're left for the judicial system to figure out a problem that you're saying arguably should be in the -- >> i think the concern you raise is a real one. i don't think if congress undertakes this in my lifetime we're going to see a solution. but that's the way the world works. and if there's no statute that governs a particular issue, you look to congress to create a statute or look to a courageous set of judges to create an

exception. i would think what you might be able to do in a san bernardino case, create an exception that is fact specific to a case where it involves an act of terrorism. we do it in other areas of the law. we passed very, very -- i think offensive statutes that allows the government to use certain powers in a terrorism case that would be unheard of in a regular case. i think that maybe what has to happen. >> let me ask you, if they -- if judges following the new york example were to rule in apple's favor, what impact would that have on your practice going forward? >> well, my practice, we don't do any real terrorism cases. i think we're okay there. on my practice going forward, it's it's apple fighting the government. tomorrow it's going to be apple fighting a defense lawyer who wants access to an encrypted code. in san bernardino, if there had been another shooter not compromised or killed, his defense lawyer would want access to the phones to be able to cast

blame on the people who he might claim took primary responsibility. so eventually they are going to have to deal with this issue, either as an issue the defense bring or issue the government brings. i think jim comey is a very good person. he's a smart guy and legitimate man caught in a very difficult bind. they have hundreds of phones, sigh vance, who testified, they have hundreds of phones they can't gain access to. as a civil libertarian, i'm okay with that. but if my client's freedom depended on me gaining access to it, i could switch sides in a hartd beat. >> i have a feeling you would gain access. thanks for joining us. time for a news update with sue herrera. >> here's what's happening. series of artillery shells exploded on the main street of a syrian village sending a group of international reporters running for cover. the journalist were on a tour organized by russia's defense and foreign ministries, the

shelling came from al nusra positions. north korea's foreign minister says his country will never be bounds of those critical of human rights issue and would not take part in sessions that singled it out. california's statewide snow pack is only 83% of its march 1st average, the result of only moderate precipitation since last october. this may not be the drought busting year california was hoping for because of el nino. erin andrews took the stand for the second time, an emotion alan drews told jurors about the lasting damage the videos have done to her. back to you. >> chilling, so chilling and difficult for her. going on for years now. >> absolutely. >> thanks so much, sue herrera.

>> voters are heading to the polls for super primary caucuses and polls. could this be a make or break day? barney frank and larry kudlow will weigh in. bill gates tops the forbes billionaires list which may not shock you but what is surprising is who fell off the list. that's later on "closing bell." they are. do i look smarter? yeah, a little. you're making money now, are you investing? well, i've been doing some research. let me introduce you to our broker. how much does he charge? i don't know. okay. uh, do you get your fees back if you're not happy? (dad laughs) wow, you're laughing. that's not the way the world works. well, the world's changing. are you asking enough questions about the way your wealth is managed? wealth management, at charles schwab.

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here's a look how we finished on wall street, the dow up nearly 350 points, better than the 2% gain across all averages, nasdaq up 131 points and gained almost 3%. we did mention too a couple of other factors here. transport stocks much higher today. oil was hanging in there. the vix was lower and russ selling small cap, everybody really pretty much participating. we're a little more than three hours from polls closing in the super tuesday texas primary and there's 155 delegates up for grabs and that's where ted cruz's candidacy could hang in the balance. hampton pearson has the latest.

>> reporter: we're at the river oaks section of the city of houston. quite a few cars backing up ats what has been a very busy polling place. democrats and republicans actually vote at the same voting precinct. part of the reason for that backup. this is also where earlier today senator ted cruz got to have the super tuesday luxury of casting his primary vote in his hometown precinct. there was quite a stir when i was here at the time. i voted and came out and talked to a media swarm. no surprise. he expects to win and if in fact he wins, he thinks he's the guy who's going to be ready to take on donald trump, one on one. >> it is all about delegates. tomorrow morning what is likely to happen is donald trump is likely to have a whole bunch of delegates, we're likely to have a whole bunch of bell gats and there will be a big dropoff for

the rest of the field. >> reporter: those 155 delegates, to get all of them, cruz would have to get 50% or more of the vote. otherwise they'll be proportioned. his rival, donald trump and other will come out of here with delegates. the main thing for cruz to get a win. overall the texas primary expecting a record turnout on the gop side in part because they have early voting and even before folks went to the polls today, over 1 million votes had already been cast. cruz leading in most of the poll and this is really make or break. back to you. >> i was surprised at the numbers, thank you so much. and for more on super tuesday, hets bring in former massachusetts congressman and cnbc contributor barney frank and larry kudlow. great to have you both along.

barney, you got a nice shout-out from warren buffett in his shareholder letter. >> i'll have to go get it. >> recommended reading. >> obviously i'm not a shareholder although i did. >> i did represent in congress the original berkshire hathaway building it's in the city of new bedford, great city. >> there you go. massachusetts, your state looks like it could be going for trump today. >> i gather that. i've seen this. when i was in the legislator and a lot of liberal moderate republicans, ed brook, former governor frank sergeant, but the massachusetts republican party followed the rest of the party to the right with some time lag. we have a story in the boston herald, the kind of ar dentally republican paper, that the governor of massachusetts is in somewhat of a quan dri because he doesn't want to be a trump

delegate but that may be all of the delegates you get. >> these are proportional today. after this it gets to be winner take all. you've been saying you think this is a trump/cruz race. at this point wall street as we've heard from other analysts, they just want to know who the candidates are going to be. it seems like they would be rallying behind trump here even if he's the somewhat unexpected front-runner out of the pack. >> it's going to take a while. this is not the end. this is really the beginning. but i think the big questions today is ted cruz winning in texas, maybe oklahoma, maybe arkansas, that's a possibility. that will be a good night for mr. cruz. mr. trump is probably going to take every other state that's up for grabs. and i think one of the issues today is marco rubio. the rubio people are lowering their expectations and i've talked to some of their insiders and it's heart to get a straight answer. all i'm saying is at some point

marco rubio needs some ws, he's got to have some ws. and really, he's not going to get them tonight. his last chance will be march 15th in florida. trump has a big lead. in some sense maybe it is going to be a cruz/trump race but we'll see. let's sigh what happens tonight. >> let's bring in mr. mike. >> i was going to ask barney if he thinks tactically speaking there's a lot of talk they want to see trump as a nom thee and feel he's beatable and have this drama play out on the republican side, now that we hear this movements to potentially get in the way of whatever the primary voting goes. how do you view it from the democratic perspective? >> we have no role in this, either trump or cruz would be a great gift. i don't think either one would do -- each party you look back

at gold water, mcgovern, whatever, there tends to be a 40% floor for one of the two parties. i think with either trump or cruz, you've got to be escaping i scraping it. i had thought rubio would be better. lowering expectations what rubio just lowered was standard of performance. i've never seen a clown act equivalent to his. i understand his feeling he has to go after trump in a way that breaks through but i took himself down more than he hurt trump in that process. but from a democratic standpoint, either trump or cruz loses to hillary clinton. >> i'll say to my friend barney frank, don't count your chickens before they are hatched. she's blowing out sanders, that's what everyone expects today. mrs. clinton wants to raise taxes across the board. payroll taxes, capital gains

taxes and income taxes. that is no way to solve a stagnant economy. she also has very significant spending programs, not as much as bernie sanders but she's really qualified. and she's reaching out to the african-american community. i understand that in political terms. i will say this, barney, more government welfare assistance is not going to be the answer. >> unemployment rates are very high. i think we've got to have more incentives to get them back to work. she has a very old fashioned really tax and spend proposal, barney. >> quick last word. >> first of all, larry, con descending to tell black people what's in their new interest. don't interrupt, you're preaching to black people and voting against your own interest. with all of the free trade, pro immigration et cetera, he's going to be stuck with trump or cruz and trying to put a good face on it by making hillary

clinton into a caricature. she's not for raising taxes on everybody. she has a responsible potential. >> have you endorsed hillary. >> yes, early on. >> just to set the record straight, barney. the evidence shows we've had a 50-year war on poverty. it has not worked. >> that's nonsense. >> that's not what i said. >> you distorted mine. >> that's not what i said. >> my point was with respect to minority groups is this, we have very high black unemployment and teenage black unemployment -- we have. >> larry, we don't want to -- >> what larry is saying preaching to black people that they don't know their own interest and he does and they are right, they don't believe him. >> larry kudlow, barney frank. gentlemen, good to hear from you both. tomorrow john kasich and two of his billionaire bankers will join "squawk box" at 7:00 a.m.

we're all going to try to be up as late as possible watching these results come in tonight. buffett and gates and musk and zuk, some of the familiar faces topping the forbes billionaire list. one name on americans' minds is missing from the cream of the crop. where the donald lands in this year's ranks up next.

welcome back, we have a market alert on oil inventories. >> check this out. u.s. crude inventories rose by

9.9 million barrels in the week to 517.1 million, which is much more than expected. analysts were expecting for an increase of 3.6 million barrels and that's why you're looking at oil dropping by around 60 cents or so on this api report. wti crude at 38. -- >> seema, thank you for more. "forbes" is out with its 30th annual ranking of the world's richest people. this includes 1,810 billionaires which is a lot but it's down from last year's 1826. topping the list once again is bill gates for the 17th time by the way in the past 22 years. his net worth in 2016, an estimated $75 billion. for more we're joined by lou ois sa kroul. >> has donald trump tweeted at you yet? >> not yet.

>> people wondering about his actual net worth. he slammed you guys for not representing it accurately. where does he fall? >> he falls at number 325, he's at 4.5 billion and he's actually moved up the ranks. >> really? why so? >> he's got almost all of his wealth in real estate holdings and that is one asset class that is actually outperformed so many other billionaires have their money in oil or stock markets and really dragged it down. >> wait, doesn't he say he's worth 10 billion. >> he does. >> i'm confused here. who's correct? >> we think we're correct. we go back and forth. >> calling donald trump a liar? >> in a story we did earlier in 2015, he actually admitted at one point to exaggerating what he told us. we take everything -- especially since it's the donald, we spend a lot of time going through every single thing we can find on him. >> a lot of people if oil or stock related holdings weaken.

here's what trump had to say last july. talking about real estate values new york city, san francisco, miami, many other places have gone up considerably so his net worth in excess of $10 billion. >> that's what he thinks and it's always net worth is in $10 billion. >> that's what he thinks. it's always what someone is willing to buy. >> oil obviously, commodities. >> the other big thing is the strong dollar since this is an international list. carlos slim is the year's biggest loser. he used to be the richest person in the world. his america mobile, his telecom stock fell, but the peso dropped 20% so that did not hold on to his wealth. >> mike and rob, what jumps out at you? >> you know what jumps out to me, you look at the top five. it seems to me one of the -- kind of the factors that seems to feed into this is guys who say they just couldn't care less about money.

gates, buffer, bezos for that matter. when you get to a certain level, obviously, it's just about -- you've built an empire. >> i like the idea that you have these people who made their open money. at the top. but then i get balanced a little bit when i see a lot of monopolists at the top. it may be the yin and the yang, how do you look -- do you look at that? >> i think it's interesting to look at. for me this year two of the big stories were the fact that jeff bezos and mark zuckerberg moved into the top ten. i'm a huge fan of his now. here he is making so much money from the social network and he's embracing it to the fullest. he became a father, you know, he's giving away money. he is kind of owning the fact that he has this positiopositio >> on the flip side, michael pearson, tori burch falling out of the billionaire rankings. louisa, thank you for joining us.

the sharing economy is growing and not just rides on demand. companies like task rabbit will get your chores down. but with the recent shooting rampage, we'll weigh in next. and with the fbi fight, the secretary of defense ash carter will join us in a first interview tomorrow at 4:00 p.m. don't miss it.

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do you need someone to stand in line at the passport office for you? by the way i did not so long ago. no time to paint your apartment? well, taskrabbit has you covered and they have a new on demand feature. kate rogers has more. >> that's right. the company updating the ios app to allow you to have tasker confirmed in five minutes and most tasks completed in under 90 minutes. they mobile usage tripled in 2015 and most are mobile only today. >> when i founded the company back in 2008, on demand was definitely not something anyone even talked about. mobile had just come out.

and so i think we have seen the trend of mobile technology really push the consumer expectation to be more realtime. >> the ceo said they're set to be profitable in 2016 and they have 15 applications coming in from those who want to become taskers on the platform. there's a lot of focus on the background check, which we spoke about last week in the wake of the six murders committed in kalamazoo, the uber driver was charged in the crime. they outsource to sterling to check social security numbers and they have a human layer to the process. >> 100% of the community meets someone in person. so we hold orientation sessions with someone from headquarters or a tasker ambassador in the smaller markets. >> the employees have the ability to raise red flags. back to you. >> that's good to hear. thank you so much. kate rogers.

more "closing bell" in two. cme group can help you navigate risks and capture opportunities. we enable you to reach global markets and drive forward with broader possibilities. cme group: how the world advances.

aaron levy his point of view on the apple ruling and what it means for the tech injury. "squawk alley" tomorrow morning. a killer rally to kick off the month of march. coming in like a lion just like they always say. mike, your thoughts here? >> i think we want to see how

the crude market kind of absorbs the big inventory number. and stocks have delinked. >> i'm sticking with the make america great rally. you scratch below the surface but it's good for moment. >> you can catch rob's selected breaking view content if you're a subscriber to cnbc. go to cnbc.com. that does it for "closing bell." "fast money" begins right now. >> thank you, kelly. live from the nasdaq market sites, times square, i'm melissa lee. we have the strategist who cut his target on the s&p just before the stocks saved the his -- staged the historic comeback. something happened in the market and it can signal the all clear to buy the stocks and why some technicians are down right giddy. later, the man who called the demise in valiant is taking aim at tesla. you will not