his best. >> it really was. >> business environment smiling, upbeat, cheering the crowd on. >> no media. >> no media. that was crucial. >> friendly crowd. >> thanks for watching "power lunch." >> "closing bell" starts right now. have a great day. hi, and welcome to a very busy friday here on the "closing bell." i'm kelly evans at the new york stock exchange. >> and i'm mike santoli in for bill griffeth. a bit of a pull back. dow and s&p with mild losses. the dow component united health is dragging on that index after accusations it defrauded medicare. >> down 4%. president trump wrapping up a visit to boeing taughting job creation. we will bring you highlights of his speech there. >> plus, a look at how trump's win has hurt gun sales and could put a $5.5 billion deal at bay.

righters is reporting that softbank is preparing to approach t-mobile. david faber has been covering this story. he joins us at this late hour at post 9. david, what is your take? >> interesting. excuse me while i get rid of that phone call. i really wanted that phone call, too. that was the key one. why right now? why right now? but, you know, kelly, i can't confirm what is being reported by reuters specific to whether or not they are preparing to approach t-mobile. that thing, softbank which controls sprint. i think many people speculated on that potential outcome ever since we saw the man who controls softbank visit then president-elect trump promising to create jobs. >> one of the very first visitors we should add. >> there are some pictures. one of the early visitors, exactly. holding up that piece of paper with the amount of jobs on it. and so a lot of people have been speculating on that possibility, certainly, that once this

auction for the -- the incentive auction for the broadcast spectrum concluded, which t-mobile was a part, sprint wasn't, that perhaps you would start to see conversations take place. it has been something i've reported that t-mobile would be interested potentially in a deal if, in fact, its gee, john legere, could run the combined company. still key question whether they wanted to consolidate, deconsolidate. the biggest question, guys, is on the antitrust front. despite that visit to trump tower and that the president could get involved in terms of antitrust law, i think there is still a very large question to be asked here as to whether or not you could ever see the doj, which is well studied in these matters and which already had indicated it would not allow t-mobile/sprint merger a number of years back change their tact, particularly on a week, consider this, where verizon decided to

go to an unlimited data plan. at&t followed through today with that same thing not just if you're a directv customer all of which points to the competition that is taking place in the wireless market that antitrust enforcers will tell you in part, michael, is because of the very decision they made not to go from four to three. >> cre consumer friendly right now. you have the industry makeup. we also don't have any real sense of an antitrust approach from this white house, right? it's so early on that we tonight have a sense of how they would treat deals, who the appointees of the relevant players might be. >> we don't. it's hard to say. the fact is the doj has a team that has always been on this. staff members have been a part of this for a long period of time. that's where the review would take place. if you are t-mobile, do you want to go through that again? now you -- once you agree to be acquired by at&t, that got turned down but you got an enormous amount of spectrum and a huge booby prize in billions

of dollars of money, too. then you didn't move ahead with sprint, what would sprint have to give them to make them at least say, okay, we'll consider it. maybe it's john legere running the combined company. maybe it's a willingness of sprint to step back entirely but it's not clear that's enough. >> the one thing that seems like it could change the landscape are the kinds of talks that are out there. comcast will launch a service. you sometimes hear verizon and comcast talking. if you start to see that kind of cross pollination, does that all of a sudden make it easier to describe the companies not just going from four to three, but this whole industry kind of reshaping itself? >> that's an interesting point. that's one we could see. the mvno that comcast has with verizon. some questions as to whether our parent company comcast would have interest in buying a wireless outright. >> t-mobile. >> also for consolidation within the cable industry. we know that verizon has thought

about the idea of trying to buy charter communications. >> right. >> so there's a lot of things moving around here, but sprint and t-mobile, certainly not a surprise if in fact t-mo is approached by softbank. will they sit down and hammer out a deal with the antitrust overhang. would they consider doing something else even along the lines of buying a dish which is another name to throw in there in this consolidation. >> of course they started with an even bigger potential deal. talk about kraft/heinz, approach of unilever. animating stocks across the sector. sara eisen has been over that all day. >> david has some news on this. >> yeah. yeah. we're going to stay on this. sara and i are going to talk about this. joining us at 9:00. this has been the big story of the day. this is a real potential deal, not one where the company is preparing. the offer was made in the last few weeks from kraft/heinz to buy unilever.

it was then outlined by unilever when they confirmed the deal, $150 share purchase price made up of both stock and cash amounting to $143 billion but it was rejected by unilever. and what we can tell you at this point after a day here of sort of reporting is the high likelihood that under u.k. takeover law, by the way, they have 28 days at kraft/heinz to actually come to an agreement or make a formal proposal, but what is likely to happen here is not that kraft/heinz is going to go what we would call hostile. in other words, if, in fact, they are not able to get the board of unilever to agree to a deal in the next 28 days, expectations are they will simply step out as opposed to take it to shareholders as is, you're right, under u.k. takeover law. and that is for any number of reasons. certainly unilever made it clear in their press release today that the price was not adequate

for them. they didn't see any real reason to continue to negotiate, but it is certainly the hope i think on the part of kraft/heinz that they can change their mind. one certainly expects that they have a higher potential bid there to make, but there are a number of impediments. you don't have any idea where the government could stand on that in either the u.k. or the netherlands. as importantly, there is another, and this came up a lot when mylan was fighting off schticting. it controls a lot of parts of the company. you have a netherlands part and anglo part. if you want to buy the nv part you have to go through the trust. now they will vote their shares according to the way their depository shareholders want them to, but they have an important role here. again, it is another potential impediment to making a deal more

difficult were kraft/heinz to want to go directly to shareholders over objections of the board. >> sara, you know about these companies. do they raise the price to something more appealing to unilever here? >> that's one possibility. schticting and booby prizes aside. the context is interesting. as someone who covers these companies, everyone expected heinz, craft hindes and 3g, the private equity firm run by brazilians, to make the deal. everyone expected that in the food base. unilever is only half food business. it's more than half consumer products, shampoos, axe deodorants, dove soaps. this would be the first foray into that area. it's peeked a lot of interest. it potentially makes it a little more difficult.

this is a company that is both british and dutch. it has headquarters in both places so, first of all, kraft heinz could be taking advantage of a big currency move. the british pound has devalued 20% over the dollar in the last two years. it's made it certainly cheaper, but the 3g playbook as david knows well is to slash costs, boost margins, boost profitability. all could have potential here with unilever, which has been growing slowly and struggling in emerging markets but it could mean job cuts. in this political environment with such a major international deal, it would be the second biggest cross border deal, that could be a high burden. >> when you put together the set of potential political ramifications from it coupled with the actual existence of this foundation that owns a lot of -- controls a lot of the stock and may have a say in how it's voted and the board's rejection pretty soundly of the initial offer, we'll have to wait and see. in the next 28 days will be key

not to say that craft heinz and their 3g -- part of the 3g family aren't very good at figuring out a way to get to an end on a deal. >> of course, they're aware of all of these potential complications, structural complexity of the deal. maybe they felt like this was the highest quality, most attractive asset in their space in the world, let's go for that first and then go to plan b afterwards. >> it may be. to sara's point though, somewhat curious they are going after a company that is more dominant in household products or consumer package goods than it is in food. by the way, on the hostile takeover again, they have used warren buffet. he wouldn't want to be part of this. highly unbe likely to go down this route if they can't get unilever to recommend it to shareholders. >> the common thread between the packaged food business and the household products business right now is that both of these industries have been struggling with top line growth.

they cannot grow since the recession this has been the problem. consumers are going healthier, going online. >> look at nestle yesterday. >> that's a common theme you have seen. that means two things, ripe for acquisitions and ripe for cost cuts. that's been the playbook with food companies with the 3g heinz kraft speculation brewing, and now that's going to be a bigger theme at the household products makers. it's interesting to see the two groups of stocks moving in completely different directions today. mondolese is a loser on the day, so is general mills, so is campbe campbell's soup. those are the ripe targets. colgate, for instance, gets 75% of its sales overseas shooting right up to the top of the s&p. >> we'll see if there's a white knight that comes in here if they raise the price. david and sara, thank you so much. exciting friday here. be sure to tune in to "squawk on

the street." sarah will have an exclusive interview with irene rosenfeld. mark ibel is here, keith bliss joins us over there on the floor and our own rick santelli is here as well. keith, let me just ask you, what does it say to you that we're starting to see a bit of a deal making boon if you want to call it that? >> we fully expected it in 2017, not only on the ipo front but the m&a front. you have blockbuster deals. softbank is coming in making big moves. i don't know if everybody rel e realizes this. they're potentially making a play for t-mobile to consolidate that industry. that's healthy for the stock market. that's one of the reasons why you see the stock market stay up, stay healthy, stay pretty resilient. if you think of all the political ak krim money, in

years past that would have sunk the stock market pretty well. if you take a look at the fundamental and technical setup, it doesn't seem like the market cares a whole heck of a lot about what's going on in washington. people are anxious to be in the market, anxious to do deals. >> mark, you know, a lot of this merger talk is one other way that it's almost as if it's a bull market acting like a bull market again. you're adding on to these all-time highs. there's been a reluctance for the market to stay down. where do you feel it's gotten to and what the potential is for the next several months? >> yeah, the more expensive markets continue to get more expensive. we can see the u.s. moving up whether it's based on earnings or the takeover talk that you've been talking about. we think from a valuation standpoint at some point valuations matter. within our multi--asset framework we think it's

important. others are seeing that there's values outside the u.s., whether they're in europe or whether they're in emerging markets. >> expand a little bit on that, mark. is it because of the currency plays or just the fact that those markets are less over valued, if you want to call it that? >> yeah. i think you start with valuation. i think you can look at earnings. while it's been a good earnings season for us in the states up 5%, european earnings will be up double digits before it's all said and done. valuations are a little bit cheaper. you have currency in there. look at central banks. we'll raise rates two times, maybe three times this year. i think it's the right time to do that. other central banks are playing our playbook. we think when you add valuation, cycle, sentiment into the marketplace there's just better opportunities across the board outside than inside the u.s. >> rick, doesn't seem as if any of these potential big corporate buyers are doing any kind of a market timing thing, but certainly the context is very accommodating financial markets, not just that we have low

interest rates still even with the rise that we've had, but the credit markets have remained so strong and basically enabling a lot of this risk taking that we've seen out there. >> yes. i think, mike, that is very telling. i think if people could just clear the political bias zone, meaning all the things going on with politics, make their investing decisions, quote, unquote, more uncertain, let's look at the landscape we have. ppi headline up .6. biggest month over month change. you had cpi headline up .6. the biggest increase since february of 2013. you had year over year cpi up 2.5%. biggest since march of 2012. while all that's going on this week tens are unchanged, twos, thirtys, fives, unchanged. the dow down 35 is up over 300 on the week. so in my opinion, you continue to check to the highest market and that's equities.

still calling the shots. interest rates aren't only cooperating, they're basically comatose sitting on the year after the week we've had with inflation data. >> certainly are, rick. thanks very much. appreciate it, guys. we have to run from here. thank you, rick, mark, and keith bliss as well. we have some news on petroleum demand. let's send it over to dom chu forthat. >> guys, mike kelley, the american petroleum institute is out. the latest numbers show that total petroleum deliveries rose by 1.2% over the same time last year to 19.3 barrels per day. that count is the highest for a january in the last nine years. but if you drill down into motor gasoline deliveries, which is more linked to consumer demand, that total amount dropped by 2.6% to an average 8.4 million barrels per day which is the lowest demand in three years. earlier today baker hughs announced the latest oil recount

went higher by six rigs. that would make it the fifth straight week to added oil rigs. >> dom, thank you. keep an eye on oil prices. 45 minutes to go. dow's down 35. the transports are higher by four or five points. the nasdaq is also higher. you can see the dow is pretty evenly split. >> united health care dragging down the dow today after the justice department joined a lawsuit over medicare advantage. that's a billing issue. up next, we'll look at the potential fallout for united health. president trump touting job creation at boeing's plant in south carolina. we'll bring you the highlights. that's still to come on the "closing bell." uh, yeah. it's over, larry. what is? the whole wheelie thing. what do you mean? i just got this baby to get around the plant floor. right, but now ge technology monitors every machine. yeah, it brings massive amounts of information right to you. so you don't need that. well, it makes me look young and uh..."with it." time to move on.

oh i'll move on... right into the future. ...backwards. you're going backwards. the future's all around us! not just on your little tablet, my friend.

capital street and our own

bertha combert bertha coombs. what do you think the prospects are for a big fine settlement against them? >> medicare advantage is an insanely popular program. so these are the plans that run the medicare benefit. as far as the fallout for united, look, if justice is getting involved in a whistle-blower suit, that could mean there's some there there. there could be a period of overhang and investigation. so this will take some time to play out but, sure, there could be other plans involved. i think the program is pretty viable. the issue of up coding is not a new one. seven years ago there were some upcoding provisions inserted into medicare advantage rates and that was a whole seven years ago. >> bertha, you know, the other stocks besides unitedhealth care have been hurt, down 2% or so.

what's the sense out there that there might be added legal or regulatory risk or people pulling apart this entire food chain of health care services? >> to look at what the case is, there's a whistle-blower case. they said that the insight group that looks at data for coding basically sort of rigged the way they looked at it. they looked back at a lot of these different cases where they billed the government. they only looked at the ones where they under billed, sort of did a heads we win, tails you lose kind of audit. not just for united but for other companies that they service for according to the overall lawsuit. back in 2009 united settled a similar sort of suit involving this same unit that had to do with only looking at the lowest rates for reimbursement. in that case they settled for

$350 million. the company says it is going to vigorously defend itself in this case. this is one of the issues that is bipartisan. we may not agree on how to shape the overall health reform, but they all agree that we shouldn't have the health system getting over billed. >> any sense of how big these fines and damages could be? >> i probably couldn't hazard a guess, but i just wanted to echo what bertha said, that combatting fraud and abuse is really a bipartisan initiative. it's like motherhood and apple pie, whether it's plans, whether it's hospitals, whether it's other government contractors, it's something that the congress takes seriously and will continue to take seriously. >> and, bertha, of course, you know, this news comes as we've seen two plan mergers dissolve, not going to happen at this stage. you saw aetna come out and raise its dividend. it's a big buy back when a

merger breaks up. is there any sense that the industry is more generally back on its heels especially not knowing what's going to come out of obamacare reform? >> that is the issue. we did get some coming out of cms trying to sort of stabilize and tighten up the rules that allowed people to kind of come into the system, incur a lot of charges and then leave and not pay for insurance. a lot of actuaries said that should help, however, there are some fundamental sort of issues. humana said it's still a risk pool that is too difficult to manage. they're not going to go in for 2018. molina health which is one of the insurers that really understands this group well, part of the reason that they had a big loss that they reported was some of the mechanisms to share the losses haven't been working. they're not getting reimbursed enough for some of the losses that they did incur on the

really expensive patients and that is the key issue that insurers really want to see resolved. >> some of the best performing stocks after obamacare was implemented. now the air coming out of this balloon. thank you both. more context on that this afternoon. all right. we have 35 minutes left before the bell. we have the dow, s&p sitting on very slim losses. in fact, there's another afternoon buying attempt coming in here. the nasdaq has traded slightly positive up almost 1/4 of a percent. gun sales also surged under president obama. they have slowed precipitously under president trump. that could put a $6 billion deal in jeopardy. those details still to come on the "closing bell."

>> you have the s&p 500 just turned green for the day. basically once again in the afternoon recovered losses from earlier. the dow down 40 or less than that, actually 45 points to the down side is just the loss on united health. >> the s&p almost positive. nasdaq up 13. at 3:33:33 we do get the whoop whoop going ahead into a long weekend. >> facebook may be hoping to reinvent itself. founder mark zuckerberg released a letter, manifesto, whatever you want to call it yesterday speaking against the recent push of antiglobalization and whether it's possible to make a global community. he writes now across the world there are people left behind by

globalization and movements and drawings. there are questions about whether we can make a global community that works for everyone and whether the path ahead is to collect more or reverse the course. he goes on about fake news. our approach will focus less on banning misinformation. >> no real surprise that zuckerberg, i mean, the whole premise of facebook is kind of connecting everybody in the world so that he's going to come out and say that we need to reinforce these forces of globalization. of course, he also comes down to the point that somehow software can do it for us. >> my thing is facebook i think is fundamentally clicky. it came out of college networks which were networks of friends posting pictures of being out and that's still what it is. >> that's right. >> whether that click is defined by who's cool or who believes in what ideology, sure, there are people of all stripes on the platform, but you're largely interacting and reinforcing those kind of self-defined characteristics. >> and the algorithms

essentially do that. that's the first line of their function is to find where you have things in common with people, not otherwise. he also does talk about these super affinity groups. clearly they have these metrics inside when you join some kind of a facebook group, that some people just basically make it, you know, their whole social world, which may be good, may be bad, but it's not necessarily a formula for drawing connections across distance. >> one of the great things facebook can do is be a platform for business. the ease and ability to follow a business, follow a new product that you like, interact, that brings people together nkts . >> it does. it's not the front mind. they have a high minded approach. >> they should look at that. >> that's all social media, too. twitter. transparent eyeball for the world. i'm not sure that's what investors want. >> there's more of his 6,000 word on this. >> we'll talk about snap. time for a cnbc news update with sue herera. >> hi, guys. here's what's happening at this

hour. southern california officials are urging residents to leave areas northwest of los angeles because of a powerful storm. wind driven rains and they are expected to spread throughout the day. numerous flights have been delayed or canceled. at the munich security conference gop senator john mccain says the resignation of president trump's security adviser, michael flynn, shows that the trump administration is in, quote, disarray. >> i think that the flynn issue obviously is something that is -- shows that in many respects this administration is in disarray and they've got a lot of work to do. free meals in coach returning to some delta airlines flights. beginning this spring the meals will be offered on 12 transcontinental flights. passengers will be offered breakfast in the morning and lunch a little later in the day. that's the news update.

guys, back downtown to you. >> when you get it, the airplane food is pretty good. it's really not bad. >> they've narrowed it. now that they don't have to feed everybody all the time. >> i don't know. >> you don't agree, sue? >> some of the meals are good but i've had a few kind of iffy experiences, shall we say? >> i don't know about the salads. they should do away with those. nobody wants a sad looking thing of greens in a sealed container. >> a snack box of package branded stuff. >> there you go. there you go. >> we'll see you next hour. thank you. we're heading into the close. less than 30 minutes to go. dow is down 29 but the s&p has turned positive following the nasdaq. president trump visiting boeing's plant in south carolina today. how his focus on made in the u.s.a. could impact the dream liner's bottom line. snap kicking off the secret weapon. details later on the "closing bell." so we can share our amazing trading knowledge.

that's a great idea, but why don't you just go to thinkorswim's chat rooms where you can share strategies, ideas, even actual trades with market professionals and thousands of other traders? i know. your brain told my brain before you told my face. mmm, blueberry? tap into the knowledge of other traders on thinkorswim. only at td ameritrade.

president trump taking his push to create more american jobs on the road today by visiting boeing's plant in south carolina. phil lebeau is in charleston with the highlights. hey, phil. >> hey, mike. president trump's been a little over two hours here at the

boeing plant. a little longer than the folks at boeing were expecting and he hammered some very familiar themes. tops on that list, jobs, jobs, and jobs. in fact, he said once again reiterating his promise that he will not disappoint america when it comes to creating jobs. he did hint about the possibility of a big defense order coming. with boeing and the f-18, he also stressed that he wants america to rely less on imports and to buy american. >> we want products made by our workers in our factories stamped with those four magnificent words, made in the u.s.a. >> it's a little hard to hear there, but they started chanting u.s.a. in fact, we heard that several times. big day for boeing, stock hit a new all-time high. it's up 21% since donald trump was elected. ceo dennis mullenberg is on good

terms with the trump administration. he reiterated that the company is going to be investing in jobs here in the u.s. >> mr. president, our commitment to you and to our country is that we're going to continue to build dreams. we're going to continue to grow and sustain jobs here in the u.s. and we're going to continue to bring innovation, bring new innovation to our customers that allows them to connect, protect, explore and inspire the world. >> by the way, it's been a real change over the last eight weeks for boeing ceo dennis mullenburg. today the president of the united states ended a speech by saying, god bless boeing. you couldn't write a script better than that if you're in the pr business. just eight weeks ago they were freaking out when the president sent out a tweet saying maybe we should cancel the air force one order. my, how things have changed in the last eight weeks for boeing. >> phil, stay with us.

let's bring in elan moy. it's almost significant what we didn't hear. what about the export/import bank. >> i was surprised that one didn't come up because we had heard that donald trump was going to talk about that, but instead he talked about the importance of leveling the playing field for american workers. again, bringing back the idea of made in the u.s.a. the only way that he's going to be able to do that is if he has specific policies addressing those issues and the specific policy that's ready to go right now is the one from house republicans which is the border adjustment tax. that's been facing a real uphill battle here on capitol hill over the past few days. you saw retailers come out against it. you saw several senators raise questions about the feasibility of that tax going forward. and it's really going to take the white house to make a sustained and concerted push to get that border adjustment tax through congress and through the senate. >> phil, you know, it's interesting. you mentioned the pr boost that

this must have given boeing. >> right. >> if you made a list of the big american companies that were likely to move production elsewhere, boeing might be on the bottom. they're going to make the planes here regardless of what happened. in a way kind of easy for boeing to seem like the good corporate citizen in this context. >> reporter: absolutely, but they've got a couple of projects coming up that it will be interesting to see what the reaction is from the white house. one example, they are building a finishing center in china where they will have some of the aircraft that are sold to chinese airlines. that's a substantial part of the order book for boeing. they're not going to be final assembled there but they will be finished there. the idea being that this will ingratiate themselves with chinese customers, the chinese government which is a big part of doing business in that country. will the trump administration say anything when the finishing center opens. for all we know, they may not. they might sit there and say, how many people are you

employing there? keep finishing in the united states. it's not as if boeing is strictly in the u.s. they have a global presence. being in china is important for boeing. >> ylan, i'm thinking about the extent be to which this president keeps emphasizing buy american. i want american made products. he doesn't seem like the type who would mind if the u.s. did favor its own industries over those of other countries. >> yeah, the argument that retailers had been making in this is that it's going to be much more expensive to buy goods here in america if this border adjustment tax does get through. that's the argument you're hearing from the retailers but expecting the exporters such as boeing to be making a big push over the next week or so to say, look, this is something that can help increase the number of factory jobs that we had in america. this is something that can promote a stronger dollar which would help americans afford more goods so the exporters here have to really weigh in and make their case to the american

people after retailers and other big businesses have been so strong in pushing back against this border tax. >> you know, ylan, that's why retailers perhaps are in such a tough spot. maybe they made the case to the president this week when they were in the oval office about this. it's not about holes in the gap make things elsewhere and they bring them here. they purchase them. >> reporter: that's right. what you're starting to hear from some lawmakers in the house in particular is this possibility of exemptions. can you carve out certain products, can you carve out certain industries from what they're calling essentially an import tax to make it more palatable. i talked to one strategist who said as soon as you start getting one exemption here, getting another exemption there, soon enough you have all the special interests lining up and then you essentially have no way to raise the revenue that's required in order to find a reduction in the corporate tax rate. that is the real thing that republicans are going after because they believe that reducing the corporate tax rate

will spur investment throughout the economy. >> we are looking at the president arriving in west palm beach, florida. that's where air force one just landed saluting and shaking hands there. it doesn't appear like he's making any comments but we never know. we're keeping an eye on it. holding up a t-shirt there. he just came from that meeting with boeing that we were talking about, phil. in fact, saying how much he made nice with boeing and told them exactly what they wanted to hear. i'm not under the impression he couldn't change tomorrow if he feels like their cost programs weren't coming down. >> reporter: i agree. i don't think any boeing executives are fooled into believing, well, look, we're buddies with donald trump and the president isn't going to come down on us. if he feels it's advantageous to hammer them on the price of air force one, which they haven't finalized yet or on a military contract in the future, he will do it. and if they were to at some point decide that they were going to move some type of assembly over seas, he would likely hammer them on that. so i don't believe that they

think that they are best friends with the white house. >> yeah. >> reporter: but they certainly enjoy better footing than they had late december/early january. >> and the president continues to work the crowd in west palm beach florida. phil lebeau, ylan mui, thank you both. head into the close, 17 minutes to go. dow down 17 points. s&p and nasdaq positive. russell down a point. since president trump's election gun sales are down. small outdoor retailers are collateral damage. we'll talk about the sales drop that could hurt a megaretail merger right after this.

♪ we're drowning in information. where, in all of this, is the stuff that matters? the stakes are so high, your finances, your future. how do you solve this? you don't. you partner with a firm that advises governments and the fortune 500, and, can deliver insight person to person, on what matters to you. morgan stanley.

welcome back. guns, president trump and hedge funds seem like an unlikely troika, but each are connected in a way that could have an impact on a pending merger. leslie picker is back on this troika. >> that's right, leslie. gun demand has fallen off sharply. consumers aren't rushing out to buy guns because they don't think they're at risk of new gun regulation. that has caused the major gun retailers to struggle. two of the biggest ones, cabellas and bass pro shops are tied up in a $5.5 billion deal and with other gun retailers

crumbling, their deal could be in jeopardy of an antitrust shoot down. now hedge funds that bet on the probability of deals closing are giving this one a less than 40% chance. cabela's is trading around $45 a share, about 30% below the $65.50 that bass pro shops agreed to pay. interestingly, elliott management, the active vest investor that pushed for the sale showed in a filing that it dumped its stake at a profit. elliott and bass pro shops declined to respond. >> leslie, i notice that cabela's is trading even below the price it was at before this was announced. clearly the market says, perhaps game over on this. also that the fundamental business doesn't look great even though they sell so much more

than the guns. >> reporter: it was interesting, october was a month with a flurry of deal activity which you wouldn't normally expect. but at the time so much of the market and all of the activity in the business community planned on a clinton victory. if you were a gun retailer, especially during this time, you are stocking up your shelves with guns because a lot of times when democrats are in the office gun activity surges. gun purchasing activity surges because they expect their guns to be taken away. so that's kind of what really contributed to all of this mess, both on the financial side and on the likelihood of the sale. >> all right. that has been the pa terch. thank you very much, leslie. appreciate it. got about 12 minutes left in the trading day. markets are fighting to stay above the flat line. the dow is up 30. almost all of that is unitedhealth. >> largely absent from president trump's celebrated news conference yesterday was the subject of china. coming up a bull and a bear weigh in on how investors should

be looking at that country. stay with us.

♪

just minutes to the close. let's take a quick look at the top stories moving markets. one that's weighing on them. reports of tax reform plans getting more complicated in washington. senators oppose the border

adjustment tax. we'll see what further impact that has on the ability of tax reform to happen. unitedhealth having the biggest drag after the doj joined a suit and energy is the biggest laggard of the s&p 500 sectors. joining us is michael jones and christian ma goon, amplify etfs. thank you for being here. michael, let's start with you. coming into the week a lot of people say, yeah, this rally has been strong. maybe due for a breather. it's been very resilient today. do you think we have a little pay back to come? >> i do think we might have a little bit of pay back into our future. the market has been rising on two sources of rocket fuel. one is very sustainable. earnings have been better than people expected, particularly in the forward looking technology and financial sectors. i think with all of the economic data coming in, really strong, earnings are looking good coming into the second quarter

throughout 2017 but the other source of rocket fuel is the expected stimulus coming out of the trump administration, tax reform, infrastructure spending. that's where i think the market may be set up for a little bit of disappointment having to wait a little longer for the goodies to come out of washington. that's why i think we could see a pull back the next few weeks. >> christian, joining us from amplify etf. the market is having no trouble pushing itself higher here. seems like that would be good for your business? >> kelly, it is good. we have equity etfs out there. growth and value are performing well. i agree with michael, i think there are some risks to the market. on the eve of president's day weekend the biggest mover has been president trump. i think we could be set up for some disappointment in the coming week or so with this tax plan specifically. >> yeah. it's interesting. well, christian, i'll stay with you on that because in some ways a market that kind of refuses to go down even when we can kind of gather up a lot of these reasons

why perhaps it's overlooking some risk, that does give some kind of encouragement. whether it lasts or not, it's clear there's been some investor demand to get more exposed to stocks in here. >> yeah, absolutely, mike. the animal spirits are certainly bullish. they're resilient. the contrarian in me makes me wonder a little bit if it's over done if make america great again is maybe had i don't want to say a bubble effect but maybe too much of a push on valuations here in the short term. >> michael, where would you look for fourth year placement in the market that you think could do well even if we do have a pull back? >> well, i think obviously pull backs, particularly if they're driven by macro factor like, oh, gosh, it is more complicated to reform the tax code than we thought, it's going to take longer, those kind of pull backs tend to take everybody down with them. if i were looking for where the long-term opportunity is, people are not focused on what's happening over seas with respect to earnings.

we think japan looks extremely attractive both as they've turned around their earnings story and you've also got really concerted stimulus happening that we don't have to wait for a consensus between the senate and the house like you do in the u.s. that stimulus they've already implemented their corporate tax reform. they've got infrastructure spending online and you've got a super accommodative bank of japan. so we see japan as one of the most attractive markets and one of the cheapest. >> all right. michael jones, appreciate it. thank you very much. christian magoon as well. up next, we're going to have the closing couldne iing countd. >> we'll tell you about snap's secret weapon that may lure investors. d capture opportuniti. we enable you to reach global markets

and drive forward with broader possibilities. cme group: how the world advances. this car is traveling over 200 miles per hour. to win, every millisecond matters. both on the track and thousands of miles away. with the help of at&t, red bull racing can share critical information about every inch of the car from virtually anywhere. brakes are getting warm. confirmed, daniel you need to cool your brakes. understood, brake bias back 2 clicks. giving them the agility to have speed & precision. because no one knows & like at&t.

this is my retirement. retiring retired tires. and i never get tired of it. are you entirely prepared to retire? plan your never tiring retiring retired tires retirement with e*trade. i'm in vests and as a vested investor in vests

i invest with e*trade, where investors can investigate and invest in vests... or not in vests. sign up at etrade.com and get up to six hundred dollars. final two minutes of the trading day and the week. we actually have another late day buying spree here. the dow is close to the flat line down 13 points right now. the s&p 500 very slightly positive for the day. for the week the s&p has managed a little more than a 1% gain. 1.2% over where we closed the prior week. it came into the week the rally had gotten ahead of itself. it seemed it could tack on. every single day there's a little bit of a buying or little bit of a lift. the health care sector, this

isn't one that gets talked about. everyone is talking about the reflation trade or financials. on the down side, maybe the retailers. health care has been a stealth source of the retail market. it's in the health care. technology, tools, supplies, things like that. also the pharma stocks not so much the services which are getting hit today on the united health care down side. bob? >> so the trump rally still intact. leadership, bank stocks even though we topped out. usually mashing and what i wili. technology stocks, new highs in apple. other big technology names happening. banks and technologies still under pinning the market. energy is down again today. this week big names down 4 or 5%. exxon down 10%. chevron has at a new low. the market is not believing that oil is going to move. >> bearish fundamental news. >> not believing the 60 dollar gas even though the opec story is intact. there's one fundamental. >> february usually you have

some choppiness. we haven't gotten it. only a week left in the month. we'll see if that comes. bob, thank you very much. ringing the bell today at the new york stock exchange apex for youth. up at the nasdaq international coco roper. second hour of "closing bell" is here. kelly? hi, everybody. welcome to the "closing bell." i am kelly evans, and really interesting reaction here on the close. in fact, it looks like the dow just turned positive. it was down 30 points but now it looks like it's higher by a point or two, evan, to close at a new record high of 20,621.5 points. big comeback on the bell there. the nasdaq, that was an easier bar to clear. it was higher throughout the later part of the session. up nearly half of a percent. .4. 5838. that's 20 points higher than the previous record close.

the s&p 500 managed to gain about almost 4 points today to 2350. that is a new record close. the russell 2000, 1399, i believe it's still a little bit shy. so three new records on this friday for the major averages despite them being in the red for much of the session until 4:00 p.m. we'll get to more on that in just one moment. donald trump also visiting boeing's south carolina plant today. during his speech he focused on his campaign theme of america first. coming up, larry kudlow will weigh in on that and corporate tax reform and obamacare changes passed at the same time. joining me on the panel today we welcome back cnbc senior market's commentator michael santoli along with cnbc contributor evan newmark and david kelly checks in with us as well. mike, i mean, it's -- is it maybe expiration? all of a sudden we turned positive? >> on the close it could have been expiration. a little bit of movement there. i don't know that it was out of character for this market. i think one of the more

impressive things about the week is not really the strength but just the persistence of the rally and its refusal to back off. we have more stocks going down than up. the indexes have been able to keep afloat. a lot of divergence between the things that are working and stuff that's not. maybe it will keep the overall market from coming too dangerously ahead of itself. a lot of people, i'm still receptive to the idea that there won't be set back. >> evan, there are a ton of potential deals announced today. it reflects decent financing conditions, optimism about -- it's funny. you would think that as stock prices climb the deals get guess attractive. >> for some reason having presented the boards quite a few times, it's the craziest thing. it's like when everybody's share prices are rising, somehow all of a sudden it makes them want to be super stars. >> when else could you get a deal like kraft, heinz, unilever done. >> the good thing about the deals that we've seen recently, this is true over the last

several years, they're strategic deals. cost-cutting deals. that's why i don't think the unilever deal, kraft deal happens because it's a pure cost cutting deal. i don't see how theresa may who's the prime minister of the u.k., great, we're going to be on our own and there will be no more independent british companies. >> already you're seeing the press. >> but it's a strategic deal that makes sense. it's not a stupid deal. it's not a softbank buying fortress. >> that was earlier this week. you have a problem paying 40% over their trading price? >> yeah. >> you don't think there's a lot of value? >> probably not. you can hire people a lot more cheaply. >> let me get to david kelly on these markets, david. so we close out the week with some record highs even though as we mentioned it was not exactly the kind of moves that had the impetus behind them we saw earlier. and at the same time there were doubts cast on the prospects for this border adjustment piece of the corporate tax plan happening.

it sounds like there are senators who aren't that pleased with it and so forth. that's not yet dimmed the optimism of these markets. >> i think we will eventually get a corporate tax cut. frankly, the cash flow tax border adjustments is very complicated. it does have a nasty sort of tariff aspect to it. i think for the markets overall a simple cut in the corporate income tax as it is right now would actually probably be preferable. i do think we'll get some corporate tax cut this year, but i'm also getting a little nervous about the height of the market. we're now running about 14% above the 25 year average of ford pe ratios. if you eliminated the u.s. corporate income tax rate that would push up earnings by about 14%. so, you know, i think the market is pricing in a big corporate tax cut. even looking at that that's pricey and that does reduce future returns. people need to look at what they're going to make in the next few years. >> i was surprised. jpmorgan is a basket of the

companies that are unusually high corporate taxpayers. t. roe, schwab, symphony. there's five or six names in there. there are plenty in the category of paying much lower than the effective tax rate. >> you see a lot of financials, retailers, media companies like our parent company which are fully domestic and telecom are the ones which is why it's interesting that you have the likes of, you know, ge and other big multi-national capital goods companies pushing the idea of this border tax when who's a better tax minimizer than ge, right? they're not heavily taxed if they want to get this done. the ones with the high tax rate they say, sure, lower our rates but it will kill us on the border adjustment. >> if you're a bear, this is your nightmare market because there's low volatility. it's just grinding higher. you know, half a percent every couple of days. i mean, that is just the worst for you. >> never short a dull market.

>> no, exactly. and i think it is pulling some marginal money in, but i think to go much higher you need something fundamental to change. i think it can grind, you know, maybe 3 or 4% higher in this kind of environment, but to really be a step function market you need something to happen with the global economy. you need the u.s. economy to grow over 3%. rit now it feels like the u.s. economy is growing at 2%. >> i think back to -- i'm not predicting this will be like a 2013 market. that was the best single year for this bull market. >> that was -- >> up 30%. >> wow. >> you can't say this is really why because the economy was wonderful. there was a perception that the down side, there was a floor placed in it by the fed, qe, that the economy wasn't going to fall back into crisis mode. >> tougher trade. >> we don't know what's going to come out of washington, but the global economy has momentum to it. we don't really think we're on deflation recession watch. we're comfortable paying higher

valuations. >> david, there's a real argument you could make for the federal reserve to raise interest rates much more. you could look obviously at the unemployment data, maybe the inflation data. if they do that, could that kind of push us back on our heels? >> it could do it. i mean, this week we have a cpi report. i think that means we're going to hit 2% year over year for either january or february. feds finally at 2%. i think that could push the fed to tighten. i think they'll tighten maybe three or four times this year, maybe four times. the other point is, look, if we're relying on the global economy that's going to do better, that's what i agree with. i don't think the u.s. will get 3%. the global economy can do better. the better valuations are actually overseas right now. long-term investors should think about how long we really want to -- i would be over weight u.s. stocks relative to u.s. bonds. they need to make sure they're not under weight. long term is better than here at

home. >> all right. thank you, david, for joining us this afternoon. david kelly. >> sure. let's send it over to dominic chu for a quick market flash. dom? >> kelly, the tech sector hit a fresh high today going all the way back to september of 2000 closing positive every day in february so far for a 13 day winning streak. that's the first time ever the s&p 500 tech sector going back through history through 1990 the tech sector, spied are, ets closing at session highs. an etf has gone up 3.5 to 4% year to date, kelly. it's tracking the biggest sector in the s&p 500. perhaps some of the bulls out there like the fact that the gains this year have been led by technology and financials, guys. back over to you. >> yeah. i was just going to mention amazon being at an all-time high. >> it's not. amazon and netflix are in the consumer discretionary. >> consumer discretionary. >> staples. >> shares of t-mobile and sprint

popping after softbank is talking about approaching t-mobile. let's bring in btig on the phone with a buy rating on t-mobile and a sell on sprint. walter, a deal many have been expecting happen, but how likely is it in your view? >> definitely expected that the chairman of the company and ceo wants to buy t-mobile. the only question remains whether they're willing to sell the currency that massa wants to give them. sprint stock is very highly valued at the moment. deutsch telecom doesn't have great prospects in europe so it would take a very high price for them to sell because what are they going to do with a bunch of cash and having to stick with their own asset? so if they wanted to remain in the u.s. and massa was willing to spend a 10 to 1 ratio of sprint share, that still might not be enough because i think

deutsch telecom management team realizes that sprint stock at $9 is over valued. it would take a ratio much higher than that in order to entice deutsch telecom to say yes. the only thing that's expected is that massa wants to buy it. the only thing we're waiting on is to see if deutsch telecom can find a deal that's acceptable to them and their shareholders. >> right. deutsch telecom being t-mobile parent. you're arguing against this from a valuation point of view. what about the anti-competitive aspect of it as well? >> that's hurdle number two and certainly something that deutsch telecom has to consider even if softbank can come up with some type of currency that d.t. wants to accept. they have to say, okay, are we willing to go through a lengthy process for approval where maybe the fcc is on board but you still have to go through doj where there are some mathematical evaluations that are done in a market after the

fcc stopped them t-mobile hats clearly changed the market. you have some companies offering -- companies like verizon you thought would never offer unlimited are offering unlimited. hhi tests that would make it, i think, difficult. i'm not even sure, you know, you get to that point in the first place if they can't come up with the economics to entice the telecom to do the deal. it's another hurdle. >> hhi is just a market share. >> concentration. >> yeah. >> so assuming, walter, then we stay with four players in this realm for a while, if that's what your assumption is, what does it mean for the economics of this business? you're obviously seeing at&t and verizon going with these unlimited plans. it seems like a dog fight. >> many people, i think, talk about the wireless industry being very competitive and yet the churn rate, which is a reflection of how many people disconnect, is at the lowest

it's been for pretty much every one of these companies and the margins that a dominant player are generating are the highest they've been. higher than even what -- like even more dominant companies. china mobile have been able to get in their markets. so it's been a robust market. there's been talk of the cable companies coming in to disrupt. that's going to be very hard for them to do just based on the structure of the market and unlimited and what role that plays. so with four players in the market, i mean, yeah, it's more competitive today than it was six months ago, but i'm not sure the wheels are flying off for any of these companies at the moment. >> walter, thank you for joining us. walter piecyk of -- >> any thoughts on the space? >> the wireless space? the profit margins should go

down because they're value added pretty low. they're pipes, distribution channels but, you know, they're tenacious. >> what are they doing, right? something besides a commodity pipe, right? buying time warner. >> but it's super hard. it's super hard to keep that value added in there. i'm kind of surprised the churn rates aren't higher. >> i keep saying it's like long distance in the '90s. used to be a really competitive thing. >> i remember the tv commercials, actually. >> at the time they said, world com can't merge with mci. that would be this ridiculous, dominant player. >> that was an asset throw back. >> it went from a company to a feature of another company. president trump paying a visit to boeing featuring on products made in the u.s.a. and despite the flurry of headlines surrounding the president, tax reform seemingly remains the priority over on capitol hill. larry kudlow has a plan to get it done. kathy ireland has conquered

home furnishings, beauty, fashion. for her next product line she promises to get close to men. she explains next. you're watching cnbc, first in business worldwide. roach your wealth management strategy the same way to create a financial plan built to last from generation to generation. we'll listen. we'll talk. we'll plan. baird. ♪ it's not just a car, it's your daily treat. ♪ go ahead, spoil yourself. the es and es hybrid. experience amazing.

ways wins. especially in my business. with slow internet from the phone company, you can't keep up. you're stuck, watching spinning wheels and progress bars until someone else scoops your story. switch to comcast business. with high-speed internet up to 10 gigabits per second. you wouldn't pick a slow race car. then why settle for slow internet? comcast business. built for speed. built for business.

welcome back. the president traveled to boeing's charleston, south carolina, plant today. phil lebeau was there and he joins us with the highlights. phil? >> reporter: kelly, this was president trump talking to his base. blue collar workers in a conservative southern state. so when he met with the workers and talked with the workers here at boeing, he knew he would get a friendly reception and he did. the reason he was here, the rollout of the latest dreamliner. the 787-10, the biggest dreamliner. he sat in the cockpit. he hit some key themes we've heard before. lower taxes, less regulation. that will lead to job creation. he hinted about the possibility of an f-18 jet order from boeing. >> we are looking seriously at a big order and we'll see how that -- you know, the problem is that dennis is a very, very tough negotiator, but i think we may get there. we're also working on the air force one project, which was a

difficult project for previous administrations, but it looks like we're getting closer and closer. >> reporter: the dennis he was referring to is dennis mullenburg, ceo of boeing, who also took the president on a four of the plant down here. by the way, boeing has not finalized the price cut, if you will, on the air force one project. we're still waiting to see when that finally gets announced. this is the third meeting between trump and the boeing ceo, and by now dennis mullenburg has the message down in terms of what the president wants to hear. >> this is about manufacturing in the u.s., going forward boeing's going to be spending another $6 billion of r&d and capital in the united states this year investing in innovation. >> reporter: pretty good day for boeing. good day if you're a boeing shareholder as well. the stock hitting a new record high. take a look at what it's done over the last ten years. kelly, i said it earlier today. if you were a boeing pr

executive, you could not have written a better script complete with the president ending his speech to wild applause saying, god bless boeing. that's a pretty good day if you're boeing. >> phil, we're still split on whether it's mullenburg, mule len -- >> reporter: it is mullenburg. it is mullenburg. >> all right. phil lebeau for us in south carolina. thank you. joining us on set is cnbc senior contributor, larry kudlow. tax reform and obamacare and do it right away? >> yes, as a matter of fact. i mean, i -- i think -- i'm not 100%, but i think this border adjustable thing is dead in the water, okay? i don't even want to go there. i think it's not got the political support. so, nonetheless, they've got to get stuff done, and my key point here is president trump needs ws. he needs ws. he needs legislative ws to show, okay? he needs wins. now they're going to go for the

roll back of obamacare, and that will be in the first reconciliation bill which will pop up sometime this spring, budget year 2017. my point is take the business tax cut, separate it out from the rest of the tax cut. we can do individual tax reform next year. the big priority, as he just said again today in boeing, keep these companies home. give them low tax rates. give them expensing. give them a one-time repatriati repatriation. now, put that in the reconciliation bill. i know a little bit about this. we did this many years ago. we did it for ronald regan. we got all the legislation done, by the way, by august of 1981 through reconciliation. the whole tax cut -- >> where are you there? >> oh, my god. there it is. there we are. heavy in conversation. yes. i love that picture. my point is he needs ws. he needs ws about work and jobs and wages. getting rid of obamacare is a

big plus because they have a lot of regulations and taxes. i think he's got to get the business tax cut into the first reconciliation package, otherwise, as i think evan was hinting at, the stock market may be over valued because it's discounting higher profits and so forth. >> and we're all on board. we spoke with congressman kevin brady and here's what he said about the border tax adjustment and tax reform. >> is this border adjustment tax, congressman, definitely going to happen as part of tax reform? >> it is. look, if you don't have that in there, tax rates on our local businesses, small and large, will go up. our tax code will continue to favor foreign products over american made products and we'll continue to have major incentives to drive jobs and headquarters over seas. >> is there a plan b? >> i'll tell you, there is no real tax reform that keeps in place tax breaks for foreign

products over american products. so this is a critical part of tax reform. i predict it's going to be part of that overall tax reform. >> and he said it over and over and over again. and we hear though that the senate is not necessarily on board? >> no, not on board. chairman kevin brady is a dear friend. he's a wonderful man. there is nobody in this country who has done more for economic growth, tax reform and sound money than kevin brady in the last half dozen years, but i don't think this is the moment to go through an overhaul of consumption taxes and income taxes and all the rest of it. i think this is a moment to score a w. >> do you have to because of the deficit? >> no. no. >> you have to because they've cornered themselves with their own budget rule. they need this to be scored as deficit neutral. >> no. no, they don't. >> they say they do. they believe they do. >> i understand. i am explaining this to many of them. i'm going one by one. >> by the way, obamacare, getting rid of it is deficit harmful because you're getting rid of the taxes initially.

>> the reconciliation process is whatever you want it to be. >> exactly. >> i want to make this point. i know about it. we used it years ago. i know the legislation. i know the history. the so-called byrd rule, which is emerging in the middle '80s or something that says you have to be deficit neutral has been violated several times. the key point here is not mr. brady or mr. ryan or even mr. trump. the key point on doing reconciliation to your best advantage is the senate parliamentarian and the law says if you don't like the ruling of the senate parliamentarian, you go out and get yourself another senate parliamentarian. >> do they have to do obamacare first? that's what the president said earlier this week? >> they can do it at the same time. that's what i'm asking for. right now i'm in the minority. they can do it at the same time this spring and reconciliation does not block it. and by the way, this business tax cuts, this darn thing's

going to pay for itself in four or five years anyway so i wouldn't even worry about that. but the key point for president trump, who's tougher, he was fabulous today in boeing, jobs, lower taxes and all of it. he's terrific. he needs ws. >> okay. >> larry, larry -- >> he needs ws and i'm giving himself a way to get a great w. >> you're saying all the right things, but you also have a president, whether you like it or not, who's very easily distracted, very easily distracted. he's got attention span issues, larry, and unless -- and policy, it is the devil's in the details. it is the devil is in the legislative process. and he is not a man who you really see sitting in meetings kind of going through it. he likes press conferences. >> he would just like the win. he wants to be able to get up there and say i made it happen. you'd think the other details are going to hold him up? >> when you're president, especially a president like him, he's -- he's in the news cycle. to him, that's how he finds --

>> no. no. >> and budget issues are not news cycle issues. >> no, that's called messaging. very important. messaging. his messaging is growth and jobs and wages. his messaging is the rust belt states. his messaging was boeing and south carolina. by the way, he came out -- >> why the border adjustment? >> we don't need it. we don't need it. he didn't say anything about the exit bank. >> he's for the exit bank. >> i don't know. we're giving him low tax rates. >> you know he is. >> the point is, evan, you have a million lawyers, tax lawyers, you know, detail people. that's not the job of the chief executive of the united states. he's got a vision. >> i agree. >> he's putting that vision out. alls i'm saying is some key decisions will be made about legislative strategy and the republican party has got to get on board, in my view, and get this reconciliation story right because the backbone of economic growth that trump is running on

comes from the business tax reform. >> yeah. >> it's also the back bone of the stock market rally. if you wait a year, the economy will under perform, people will postpone decisions, the stock market will be very disappointed. we don't have to wait another year. >> yeah. >> it could be done through reconciliation. that has to be trump's message. his people in the front office, all of them, must know about getting him ws. >> all right. >> when i was a kid james baker was the secretary -- chief of staff. the whole group wanted ws for reagan early. that tax bill was signed in august of 1981. i want this tax bill -- >> your guy thinks -- >> i want this business tax reform signed by august of this year. 2017. >> donald trump thinks his press conference was a big w. he thinks everything he does is a w. >> that's another subject. but i'll tell you this, he had a lot of strong messaging in that press conference yesterday. he is crafty as a fox. it may not be what the mainstream media wanted to hear,

but he's talking to the folks and the folks like that. so i wouldn't put that down. >> we'll see if he's listening to what you're laying out here, larry. >> thanks for having me. president trump did sign a new law yesterday rolling back regulation aimed at coal mining. up next we will go to coal country for reaction and the ipo for snap chat's parent company. we'll tell buyers about a secret weapon that could fuel investor interest in the company. stay tuned. what's going on here? you know how ge technology allows us to fix problems before they... they slow production, yeah. well, no more catchy business acronyms. wait, we don't need to smooch? i'm sure we can smooch a solution! we just need to "hover" over the candice, problem until... just let it go... hey, sorry i'm late for team building. smoooooooch! that felt right. what's wrong with you!? he's so trusting... what's critical thinking like?

a basketball costs $14. what's team spirit worth? (cheers) what's it worth to talk to your mom? what's the value of a walk in the woods? the value of capital is to create, not just wealth, but things that matter. morgan stanley

what?pony neighing] hey gary. oh. what's with the dog-sized horse? i'm crazy stressed trying to figure out this complex trade so i brought in my comfort pony, warren, to help me deal. isn't that right warren? well, you could get support from thinkorswim's in-app chat. it lets you chat and share your screen directly with a live person right from the app, so you don't need a comfort pony. oh, so what about my motivational meerkat? in-app chat on thinkorswim. only at td ameritrade.

welcome back. president trump signing a bill yesterday to strip back an environmental rule and fulfill a campaign promise to help the coal industry. >> eliminating this rule i am continuing to keep my promise to the american people to get rid of wasteful regulations that do nothing, absolutely nothing but slow down the economy, hamstring companies, push jobs to other countries, which is happening all over, although i must tell you we've stopped it. >> well, so how does the industry feel about the action. contessa brewer is in the heart of coal country with the reaction there. hi, contessa. >> reporter: hi, kelly. they feel good about t. coal miners are hoping it's a harbinger around here. that stream protection rule that trump over turned was intended to protect the groundwater. it's a series of regulations or framework to protect the

environment from mining-related pollution. the coal industry called it too broad, redundant and a job killer. in a tiny town on the ohio river where i am now, they need every job that they can get. the industry has lost 30,000 positions in just the last five years. >> this town is nothing compared to what it used to be. i mean, this used to be all stores, grocery stores, clothing stores, everything. but and this is what it's turned out to be. >> reporter: remember, trump made a big campaign promise to bring back coal. coal workers see the new law as a step in the right direction. the next bank, scott pruitt? >> maybe it will mean somebody that's a little more on our side. i understand that we need the epa in some form, you know, but over regulation. when you're using an agency, you know, as a way to drive an industry out of business or an

industry that's over regulating, you know, it's not good. >> reporter: the folks i spoke with here on the ground say they are not antienvironment. they want clean air and clean water for their families and their neighbors, but they really see these rules as the obama era government's intention to crush coal, kelly. >> and they want those jobs most of all. contessa, thank you so much. it's time for a cnbc news update. hi, sue herera. >> hello, kelly. here's what's happening at this hour. the kremlin says it's not disappointed by how u.s./russia ties are developing under president trump. telling reporters that moscow never harbored any illusions about the relationship so there's nothing to be disappointed in. a florida man is accused of plotting to bomb target scores along the east coast in an attempt to drive down the

company's stock. 48-year-old mark barnett built at least ten explosive devices and then paid another man to place those bombs on store shelves. he faces up to ten years in prison. cases of the flu continue to rise across the country. the cdc saying flu activity is widespread in 46 states. the other four states, colorado, hawaii, oregon, and utah are designated as a step below widespread. and you can now shop from home from a google home device. google home now has the ability to order and purchase items through google express with just your voice from stores including costco, target, whole food and pet smart. that's the news update this hour. kelly, back to you. just make sure what you say. watch what you say because if you say -- and there was actually an incident of this with some other home device. i really want that, you know, quilt, the quilt arrives. got to be careful. >> i did not realize that. >> yes. >> i was going to ask evan if he had planted that story.

>> no. no. i do use google home at home. >> you have to. >> i do. and it's actually used more by my wife and my son who annoy me. they like to go up to the room that i'm sitting quietly reading and going, you know, okay, google. my son asks some obscure nfl statistics and i'm like, much faster on your phone. he's like, i don't care. i like making you angry. >> we all agree. thank you, sue. >> you've got it, guys. remember china barely mentioned by trump in his whirlwind news conference. up next, a bull and a bear take on investing in the far east.

this is my retirement. retiring retired tires. and i never get tired of it. are you entirely prepared to retire? plan your never tiring retiring retired tires retirement with e*trade. i'm in vests and as a vested investor in vests i invest with e*trade, where investors can investigate and invest in vests... or not in vests.

sign up at etrade.com and get up to six hundred dollars. won't replace the full value of your totaled new car. the guy says you picked the wrong insurance plan. no, i picked the wrong insurance company. with liberty mutual new car replacement™,

you won't have to worry about replacing your car because you'll get the full value back including depreciation. and if you have more than one liberty mutual policy, you qualify for a multi-policy discount, saving you money on your car and home coverage. call for a free quote today. liberty stands with you™. liberty mutual insurance.

jk kjvx zkjl;kjl; xz well. . ? . ? . . ? . ? . ? . ? . . ? . ? . ? . ? . . ? . ? . ? >> process of getting along very well. >> investors looking at china. so first this is all sparked because morgan stanley issued this bullish piece on china.

is now the time to invest there. china you can tell us that. >> buying u.s. dollars which are at a pretty high point. for all of those things i'm pretty excited. >> leland? >> you have to differentiate between the a share. if the money ball comes in, it's a good time to invest. if it's not, it's not. independent of anything happening objectively. and that's separate from the investment environment. the fact that trump has laid off some of his harsher rhetoric means there's an improvement. they're going to have a difficult year. >> you called this a long, dreamy think piece. this is like a sale -- piece of salesmanship. doesn't china merit some consideration as a genuine place

to invest. look, the inflation data has turned positive. if you're doing a piece on how china is going to look, then you're going to be making a lot of assumptions. there will be rebalancing from manufacturing to service. there's going to be cutting all over the place. they're taking government pledges as if they're being done or they've already been done. they are not doing most of this. if you look at china base book data you're not seeing sustainable rebalancing. you're not seeing this capacity being cut across the commodities. people think it's happening because they're listening to the headlines and promises. it's not really happening. >> how can you believe anything? >> i think that's always been the history of china. you can't really believe everything. in a way that's priced into the market because do we ever have clarity on china? i don't remember a time. i just think when you talk about demographics, population,

there's 25 million people every year moving into the cities. i have to think at some point they're going to be forced to move to more service-based economy like the way the u.s. has in past decades. so i think that capitalism kind of repeats itself. history doesn't necessarily repeat but it rhymes. >> there seem to be these two polar views where one is that magic magical, it can do nothing but grow. the other being it's a structural tinder box. they can't manage debt and it's the game they're playing. is there middle ground? >> yeah. i think both those views are usually wrong. what we're looking at, if you look at what's happened over the past year, you've seen an on year rally and that's optimistic and reason for some confidence. on the other hand, you see deteriorating cash flow. when you're looking at positive dynamics on the growth side but you're seeing cash flow deteriorate, you're seeing borrowing pick up to cover cash flow shortages, this is not a

good thing. it's not about china is about to fall off a cliff. we're not in danger territory. cash flow is going one way, profits are going another. one will win 2017. >> quick last word, ryan. why you still think it's a good place to put your money? >> i go back to the u.s. dollar. any weakening of the u.s. dollar will be a surprise to the positive. not to mention you will have solid growth over the next couple of years. in terms of short term valuations and dollar, you have to have money in china now. you're foolish not to. >> ryan payne, leland miller. opposite at sides here for a reason. polar opposite. snap, inc., releasing a video. up next we'll get a look at the company's keyack which sigss. and kathy ireland's brands has been recognized as one of the most powerful in the world. she'll join us to talk about her latest projects. wait until you hear them. you're watching cnbc first in business world wide.

i love the smell of napalm in the morning. no, this is double espresso. hodor! hodor! ehhh, hodor. you guys watch game of thrones, right? inconceivable! surely, you can't be serious. i am serious. and don't call me shirley? that's the unlimited effect. stream your entertainment and more with unlimited data when you switch to at&t wireless and have directv. plus, get the amazing new iphone 7 on us. know you have a dedicated advisor and team

who understand where you come from know you can craft an investment plan as strong as your values ♪ know that together, you can establish a meaningful legacy with the guidance and support of your dedicated pnc wealth management® team.

welcome back. snap, inc., releasing a video featuring ceo kevin spiegel. spiegel is selling snap in a very specific way. >> snap is a camera company. we feel like we're really at the beginning of what cameras can do. cameras have evolved from being a piece of hardware like a chip to software that's connected to the internet. before cameras were the best way to perfectly save or record something that you saw.

and they sort of helped augment memory, but now, you know, cameras augment the way that we talk. >> and snap has made a key acquisition to enrich conversations. josh lipton has more. hi, josh. >> well, kelly, it's called bitmogi. here are three of you guys, kelly, mike, evan. this is a free app that lets you create and send these kind of cartoon images to friends and family in a snap. our own jim cramer sent me the following bitmoji last night. as everyone in the newsroom knows, good luck keeping up with jim. they bought bitmoji. it is the number one free app on the app store. these are the kinds of features that can make snap more fun and familiar which can boost engagement, a plus for advertisers. bit strips is one of several acquisitions. it bought mobile scanning app

scan for 54 million in 2014 in cash and equity. mobile video communications company looks to be 79, plus stock in 2015. 64 million for bit strips in 2016 in that same year 115 million for mobile search company verbify. bitmoji is more important for snap as growth slowed. daily active users in q4 grew 3% quarter over quarter. >> josh, did you create those bitmojis? >> for you three? no, that was your very talented producer. i was amazed by how ripped mike looks, by the way, right there. that is an amazing, amazing bitmoji. been to the gym, mike. >> santoli. >> obviously that's got to be part of the function, right? i want that waist a little bit narrower. >> i'm not more likely to buy snap at the ipo.

>> i look 20 years younger. >> that is the good thing. you missed my eyelids. you know, i got news for evan spiegel though, i'm not sure he should go with that whole camera thing. i don't think -- i'm not sure that worked too well for gopro. gopro -- a lot of people look at snap like me. my son uses it, i do not use it. the prospect of me using it is close to zero, as terrific as those bitmojis might be. i think there is -- you know, how much there is there. if you talk to my son, there's a lot there, but if it involves someone who's over the age of 22, maybe not so much. but i don't know. >> i mean, obviously it's a very expansive definition of what camera is. it's basically any kind of visual record of communication in the form of some kind of visual image, which is what it is. i think -- i think we can get a little bit too caught up in what these guys decide is their grand mission. >> what does that have to do with the business? i'm lost as to how sort of

having all the images that you might create and share and send. i'm not saying it's not one of the best ecosystems out there that's ever been created but is it sustainable? >> addictive things tend to be sustainable for a while. by all accounts it's addictive. >> this is the problem that i have with all of this stuff. remember years ago, i think we were working together at the wall street when farmville came out. i was like, farmville. i do not under -- i was like, i walked around the newsroom. i asked everybody, are you playing this farmville? apparently, you know, hundreds of millions of people are playing farmville. >> right. >> somebody showed it to me. >> what you didn't ever have is coca-cola saying i'm throwing money. >> did you play farmville? >> no. but i like the snuggy picture. that's another story. coming up on "fast money", tom lee is going from a bear to a bull. he'll explain why at 5:00 p.m. eastern. up next, kathy ireland joins us here on set at post 9 to

discuss her latest business venture and how she's built her global brand. we'll see what she's got in the box there when we come right back. okay, let's call his agent. i'm coming over right now. the newly advanced gle can see in your blind spot. onboard cameras and radar detect danger all around you. driver assist systems pull you back into your lane if drifting. hi chief. hi bobby. and will even help you brake, if necessary. it makes driving less of a production. lease the gle350 for $579 a month

at your local mercedes-benz dealer. mercedes-benz. the best or nothing.

welcome back. we have a news alert on viacom. >> that's right. paramount pictures ceo and chairman brad gray is expected to announce his departure within the next week. this according to a report by reuters saying that his departure from the studio would come after being at the studio for 12 years. and the studio has definitely underperformed over the past several years. this should not be a huge surprise, if it is indeed announced next week as reported.

because continue coming viacom has been making a number of changes. and at one point it was considered up for sale so now we'll see if we get that departure. >> thank you. kathy ireland has come a long way since her super model days. you may want to pay attention.

welcome back. from super model to super mogul. kathy ireland has had lent her nail to over 17,000 products with $2.6 billion in annual sales. joining us once again, welcome. >> thank you. great to be here. >> i can't wait to hear what you have in store. >> are we doing the diamonds or the underwear first? >> all of it. men's from head to toe. swim warts, "sports illustrated" celebrates the women. how about the guys? and our partners at ppi from women to men.

it is under our company. so we work withed wonderful businesses. it is our experiential component of our business. wonderful people. marty kress is on our board. out of north carolina, incredible people. >> so let's take men's line as an example. do people come to you with a need? do they come to you with an idea? or are you looking at the market and seeing an opportunity? >> primarily hearing from our customers. hearing what the demands are. that's how we started our brand. and it has been wonderful and powerful to work in ways that are different and to have partnership that's are truly different and allow us -- >> is it under your name? >> no. not everything. that's something that is exciting, too. to work with companies.

some that we own, some we have partnerships with that don't necessarily bear my name. so what is the opening you would have seen in the men's had wear area? >> improvements upon it with. quality. with price to value ratio. great looks fashion. >> you want fashion. >> we have a vast channel of distribution. so anyone where from nieman marcus to macy's to online components. >> i was going to ask you, is the department store dead? you've watched them flourish and now be challenged. no. it's not dead. it is, yes. the way people are shopping is changing. we have to be innovative. and with our jewelry, beer being disruptive. so our partnership, kathy ireland diamonds in new york. this is disruptive. the retail diamond industry is

hurting. shoppers go into the jewelry stores, looking at other jewelry. they purchase it online and that's impossible with our patented program. our retail partners, they have a strong roi. an online program also protects them. and millennials are shopping in a very different way. you talk about the department store. in every way that they shop, it is different. my generation, it was, it's cut, color, clarity, karat. and millennials want more. they want the value. a bigger look and they demand to know how these products come to market. what is going on? so the disruption, if you think, dollar shave a club. noble gets cut. no cut diamonds. and the $2,000 to $10,000 price range. >> there's a border adjustment tax that might happen. is it a concern trying on source

more? >> we're looking at all of that. especially in times of economic uncertainty. this is where brands are extremely helpful. because people shop where they have that trusted relationship. we've got to get it right for them. >> thank you so much for joining us. we'll believe on the lookout. you guys can pick them up. >> the diamonds and the und underwear. >> "fast" moi money" starts rig now. your traders on the desk. tonight infamous wall street the tom lee is throwing in the towel saying it is time to buy fang stocks. we'll tell what you he said that had all of wall street talking and a number buying.