german business morale has risen in the month of february. the climate index has risen to 111 in february versus consensus forecast for a lower number,

109.6. it has also seen the current conditions index at 118.4 in february. reuters consensus was also for a lower number, at 116.7. so well and truly beating on a number of different lines today. in terms of the expectations index, 104 seen in february versus 103 in a reuters poll. so it is showing us conditions are coming through strong according to sentiment in the economy of germany. euro this morning has been trading weaker. we are down about a third of a percent. let's take you through some of the european market action. the ftse climbing 0.2%. above 12,000 on the german stock market. the dax has been trading higher, the highest point since april 2015. so very firm start for german stocks. italian stocks are fading.

this morning, shares have hit a 14 month high, earnings driving some big reactions in europe. shares in lloyds banking group getting a boost after profit hit a ten-year high in 2016. lloyds reported pretax profit of 4.2 billion pounds, about three times what it reported the same period last year. the bank's cfo said the uk government is likely to fully exit its stake in the bank in may. joining me no is mcshill mcgrade from cio direct investing. welcome. the market seems to like the lloyds numbers, it's at the top of the ftse. what did you make of the record card today? >> the record that came out today was as expected. so, i'm quite surprised that the share price has risen. what's been happening in the past with lloyds shares is that investors have been looking at it through the rearview mirror and worried about their compensation payments, et cetera, rather than thinking about what are the prospects

going forward. >> what are the prospects? the bank has been talking today about bank asset quality remaining strong with no deterioration into the underlying portfolio. will there be a sound book going on with the brexit, the interest rate potential? does the outlook look as firm? >> i think the outlook does look firm. the compensation is booked in now, so anything more, it's sort of coming to an ent for thd for. they're the largest mortgage provider in the uk and have a 25% share of banking overall. they're in a good place. now, people talk about brexit and the economy may be slowing down. but really we're not seeing that yet. and so it's conjecture as to whether it really will slow down. but where lloyds may be affected

is the retail public, because if we do see a bit of inflation, if we do see interest rates rise a bit, they may slow down the house purchases. so mortgage applications may fall a bit. you know, they're in a strong position. >> the dividend has been raised. is this enough for shareholders? what do you think the trajectory will look like on payouts from here. >> the trajectory is looking good. the payout equates to over 5% yield for the shares. that's attractive in today's interest rate environment. so, i think that's very positive. i think that's one of the buying points of the shares, is that there's a strong dividend in pre-financial crisis they paid a dividend and were consistent at doing that. we think they're going back to that scenario again. >> a couple points from the cfo.

they say may is the month that the government will fully exit their stake in the bank. do you agree with that time frame? and how big to the psychology will it make to get rid of the government ownership in the bank? >> psychology is an interesting thing. i think it will have a big difference on the psychology of the market, and also this drip of the market of shares, when that ends that will be positive. may, i see no reason why not. they have about 2 million shares to sell. they've been doing that quite effectively over the past months. >> acquisitions. the company bought an online credit card business, in the personal space of finance. the cfo ruled out further acquisitions saying they're not looking to make more. should the bank be more active in the world? we have a lot of big cap companies merging together. should it be more active at this point? is it true dent to sit on the sidelines from here? >> i think it's prudent to sit

on the sidelines. they've been through one hell of a cry signals. they're trying to come through this and come out the other side. so a period of stability seems sensible to me. >> thank you for staying with us. we' we'll talk about markets more broadly in a bit. shares in bayer are trading lower, dragged by by litigation and restructuring costs. this despite fourth quarter ebitda that beat estimates. they were expecting stagnant numbers for single digit growth for their agriculture unit in 2017. brian mcgee joins us from novasector. brian, let me ask you about the numbers today. after the third quarter with decent numbers coming through from pharmaceuticals, expectations had started to lift into the quarter. you are disappointeded by toe's

result? >> i wouldn't say disappointed. strong performance from pharma continued through. that's the core of the business. it hasn't been enough to cope with the dying pressure on earnings from crop sciences. and it was kind of a moderate or lackluster performance in the consumer business. i think bayer is being careful with the language they're using, to manage expectations. their focus remains heavily on the monsanto acquisition. >> if you look at the numbers today, pharmaceuticals such a strong growth area, but pouring a lot of energy into this sta takeover of monsantmonsanto. is it taking its eye off the ball of pharmaceutical? >> i don't think so they raised their expectations behind the

core five pharmaceutical brands already on the market. they had some good news earlier in the year with respect to the xeralta drug. that added 700 million in sales this year. they also increased and continued to increase investment in pharmaceutical r & d, that's where the long-term value will come from. it just won't happen in 2017. >> when you look more closely at crop science, the tone from the company today was that it's a difficult environment, in particular you saw they had a lot of development expenses, higher payment losses on receivables and higher research cost. are any of these challenges conquered by having a much larger footprint with the acquisition of monsanto? >> that's part of the thesis. some of it is addressed by scaling that business, getting it to category leadership position in crop science. the longer term play is

diversification, higher value aspects away from sees into what i suppose is becoming digital farming. there's a huge piece on that. if the transaction goes through, then bayer has access to pieces of technology that they really don't have in their own crop sciences business. >> i thought the market reaction was curious. the stock was about 2%. some analysts saying there's no big trigger for the price action today. what do you think will be the catalyst for the stock price if we look over the next year? >> i think news drives the stocks. they're so big that companies of bayer's scale, they tend to trade within a fairly narrow band. any positive news or negative news pushes it within that band, you see these moves. i don't think there's much that will trigger it. i suppose it feels to me like a bit of an overreaction. this is a long-term stock, not a

short-term one. >> noted, thank you very much for the commentary. brian mcgee from novasecta. we will speak with the ceo of bayer, werner baumann at 12:20. coming up, britain's biggest home builder strikes a profit but builds fewer properties. we'll talk property after the break.

market moving news, bae systems ian king has announced he will retire on the 30th of june with charles wood buburn t take over. thyssenkrupp agreed to sell its

brazilian mill. it marks five years of unsuccessful attempts the german conglomerate has made to exit the south american economy. thyssenkrupp said it plans to reduce itself to the steelmaking business. pre-tax profit of barratt rose nearly 9% as completions outside of london hit the highest level for nine years. it was an interesting response. the market took this as a positive sign if you look at forward sales up 7%, completions, special dividends, but the rate of completions was an issue for some. why? >> this is a volume rather than a margin oriented builder. so volumes are extremely important. one of the reasons why you think barratt shares have reacted negatively to this is because we

have the special dividend coming through which is attractive to share holders. this company has always been above the sector average, it's pushed now to the top of the sector. but also the completions were flagged earlier. in january, on january 12th when they had the trade update, it was exactly the same number of completions as reported today. no surprises there. >> so, i do think that the outlook for them is interesting in the fact that if interest rates go up, there may be less mortgage applications. we were talking about lloyds earlier. and thwill that be more difficu for barratt going forward? >> they do a lot of work around people who don't have that much money to spend. outside of london, we need to remember london accounts for less than 12% of the overall uk sales. we need to look outside there. a lot is being done with first

time home buyers. so, yes, they could be more punished there. mortgage applications in general have been coming down for a while. the results that came through in december about mortgage applications still show a decline, but that pace is slowing. looks like there's a bit more encouragement back in the market if interest rates are to rise, and that's quickly fed through to banks and mortgage rates which we expect to happen because banks have been good about rises, so it could weigh on that. >> how much pressure is there on margins? operating margin up to 17.8%, that's above guidance. if you have an environment where property prices may be challenged around brexit, you don't have free movement of people impacting the skill set, do you think operating margins provide clarity? >> you brought up the two negatives. the big positive here is land. land is the biggest expense and prices are looking to come down.

the government is focused on releasing land which will, on the whole, benefit the small and medium house builders more. but it will also help the large house builders as well. >> i don't know what we said, but the stock price just came off. gemma, thank you for fleshing out the story for us. airbus has reported a fresh 1.2 billion euro charge for its a-400m military group dragging down profits. airbus still raised its dividend 4% to 1.3 euros per share. we'll speak to the ceo of airbus about those challenges. tom enders will be on at 11:50 cet. and accorhotels topped expectations. revenue rose 3% boosted by strong demand in the core french market. they are cautiously optimistic about france in the year ahead. i will speak with the ceo,

sebastian bazin at 11:30 cet. stay tuned for that. i want to ask all sorts of questions about ownership. that is later on in the show today. federal reserve policymaker patrick harker indicated he could support an interest rate rise at the mid-march policy meeting. speaking to reporters, harker said he didn't think march should be taken off the table. san francisco fed president john williams said the u.s. economy is essentially at full strength and cautioning the bank needed to find maneuvering room on rates before shrinking its balance sheet. cleveland fed president, loretta mester also cautioned that donald trump's administration brought a new degree of uncertainty to the central bank's outlook. >> there is some uncertainty about was kind of policy changes the new administration will enact.

we don't have details of the tax changes. there is uncertainty around that. i wouldn't say that's the driving force of the policy path. that's one factor we have to take into account, fiscal policy changes and their impact. but the devil is in the details on that. what the policy package looks like, you know, we have to look at that and see those details before we're able to assess the impact, potential impact and the timing of those impacts. >> joining us around the studio, casper rock from casino capital, and mick shell mcgrade is staying with us. i want to ask about the environment. three interest rate hikes is spelled out about the fed, about a 20% chance for a rate hike next month. do you think we might have liftoff again for the raising of rates? >> there's a balancing act between raising of rates and the

tapering of quantitative measures. so we may see two this year, more likely three next year. so the impact of measures from donald trump could be backloaded this year. i see it in the current year having two rate rises this year. >> i have issues with that assessment. i do think march is a live meeting. the only wildcard for me is that james bullard, a central speaker at the fed doesn't want three rate hikes, he sees one. perhaps that is impacting psychology. but i think march is a live meeting, what do you think, michelle? >> i think it has to do with what trump says. he has promised to set out his measures and this infrastructure spending. janet yellen is concerned about the market getting too hot. so march could be a live meeting. >> that from a dove. >> sorry? >> that from a dove. someone who is traditionally

dovish. >> yes. in fact, it depends on how those two announcements, that announcement from trump synchronizes with the march meeting. it looks as though interest rates are on the rise definitely. >> let's talk about that scenario. caspar, you see the global growth back drop improving, and global inflation coming through. when we talk about inflation, it's not just the headline story of oil. there could be other effects coming through the system. >> there clearly is a cyclical effect from the oil. the secondary effect into food stuffs, seeing how much the secondary effect comes through is important for the longer term level of interest rates. if you look at inflation expectations, they are not moving up much at all. >> why is that? are the markets not used to dealing with inflation? >> i think so. >> we saw second round effects

taking deflation rates more south than an anticipated. it was a constant thorn in the side for mario draghi. if you have inflation, secondary effects do come through and move the needle for the environment? >> people are looking at the core rate of inflation, if you look in certain economies in europe, look at germany, the core rate has just been nudging up. it's not really a problem yet. the headline rate is bumping up against the levels you worry about. >> neutral equity, but you are also looking at overweight in the u.s. in that portfolio. explain that case for us. >> to me, you have stronger growth, a pick up in inflation, much clearer pick up in inflation and stronger dollar. reluctantly stronger dollar. that leaves you with a back drop of having an overweight in the u.s. equity. perhaps the more important thing is the complexion of your portfolio.

historically you've seen performance from more defensive growth type things. there's a clear rotation and there will be over the year towards more cyclical value type exposure. rather than going overweight equity, we are adjusting the beater through the pofl portfo through the more cyclical part of it. >> the cyclical part will be the leader going forward, particularly if trump does spend money on infrastructure and those industrial type stocks will benefit from that. also what you're seeing around the world is an uptick in manufacturing, services, so it's not just the u.s., everything is looking pretty good right now. indications for a lot of markets to tick up nicely, it looks pretty strong to me. >> what happened to credit markets as the hot area to

invest in for a number of years, many have been calling the end of the bond markets. you are underweight fixed income. you don't want any protection in credit markets? >> we're underweight conventional government bonds. we have a reasonable exposure towards index linked securities in the u.s. we did have a decent rating in the uk, we've been switching towards the u.s. within the credit markets, we have reduced our recommendation towards high yield because spreads have narrowed so far. despite strong economic growth, normally is a good environment for high yield. we just think spreads are too narrow. what is interesting you're seeing one or two investment grade names that the total yield you're getting out of them is good for the client base. >> the corporate bonds look attractive and they look attractive here because if you think equities are attractive, bonds should be attractive as

well. if you're looking for yield, definitely. government bonds, i don't see the need to go there. >> there must be a ton of paper out there at the moment. so many deals in the works, mega cap deals taking place. >> huge huge issuance in januar. it will continue on, i think. >> thank you to you both. we will squeeze in a quick break here. check out world markets live, our blog which runs throughout the european trading day. we'll be right back with "street signs" after this. anyone wittype 2 diabetes knows how it feels to see yourumbers go , despite your best efforts. but what if you could rn thin? wh if you could love your numbers?

discover once-daily invokana®. it's the #1 prescribed sglt2 inhibitor that works to lor a1c. a pill taken just once in the morning, invokana® is used along wi diet and exercise significantly lower blood sugar in adults with type 2 diates. atowering a1c than januvia.to be more effective invokana® works around the clock by reducing the amount of sugar allowed back into the body, and sending someugar out through the process of urination. and whit's nor lowering systolic bod pressure or weight loss, it may help you with bot invokana® can cause importt side effects, inuding dehydration, which may cause you to feel dizzy, fainlightheadeor weak, upon standing. otheside effects may inude kidney problems, genital yeast infections,cnges in urition, high potassium, creain cholesterol, riskof bo, ororrinary tract infections, possibly serious. seris de effectsay include ketoacidosis,

whiccan be life threatening. r doctor rht away if you experience symptoms or if you experience symptom of allergic reaction such as rash, swelling, or difficulty breathing or swallowing. doot takinvokana® if you have severe liver or kidney oblems or are on d. tell your doctor about any medical conditions and medications you take. using invokana® with a sulfonylurea or insulin macause low blood sugar. it's time to turn . imagine loving your numbers. invokana®. there's only one invokana®. ask your doctor about it by name.

welcome back to "street signs." i'm karen tso. the stock 6stoxx 600 moves higher. >> the devil is in the details, we have to see what those details are before we can assess the impact, potential impact, and timing of those impacts. the highest profits in a decade send lloyd shares higher, as the bank says the government should fully exit its stake by

may. abb uncovers criminal activity in it's south korea subsidiary, resulting a $100 million charge on its 2016 results. the head of the eurozone's bailout funds says greece will be able to borrow in markets by next year. welcome back to "street signs" this morning. we're looking at some news just crossing this morning from the uk. the latest is on gdp for the fourth quarter. it's been revised to 0.7% quarter on quarter from a preliminary estimate of 0.6%. so going in the right direction, also beating expectations in a reuters poll for it to stay steady. in terms of the level on an annual basis, year on year 2%

this is from a preliminary estimate of 2.2%. that's going the worse direction. so sliding by more than anticipated because expectations were for that estimate to remain around 2.2%. that's a bit underwhelming on that metric. in terms of what we're seeing on 2016 gdp for the course of the year, that's been revised to 1.8% versus preliminary estimates of 2%. in terms of services output, that's confirmed at 0.8% quarter on quarter. household spending up 0.7% quarter on quarter versus 0.9%. so household spending coming down a bit. government spending 0.2% versus being flat. government spending going up, household spending going down. this is key as we talk about brexit and the triggering of article 50. minus 1% quarter on quarter versus what you had reported

previously of an increase. the biggest fall since the first quarter of 2016. if you're looking for an ill pact on brexit, it's flashing up in business investment mostly an seeing signals of it at the margins around household spending. you've seen reaction in sterling this morning. u.s. futures, we wrapped up the week last week on a high for markets. you can see it continued in session yesterday. the early picture this morning is for a slightly improved market this morning. investors inclined to push stocks again forward. is it still trump? is it still around tax and hopes for changes? earnings moving the needle a bit yesterday. but the market has been calling it almost a seller strike taking place as investors keep pushing the averaging north into record territory. in terms of european markets, there's an element of that here this morning. the european stocks actually pushing higher to their firmest point in about 14 months.

german stocks the highest since about april 2015. the stock market early on this morning t hsh morning, it has given up the 12,000 handle, but still firmer. the italian markets sliding 0.5%. on fx markets, efo numbers from germany moving the needle. trimming some losses. 1.0515 on the markets. japanese yen, 113.123. the australian dollar up about a quarter of a percent and trading just shy of the 77 cent mark. emanuel macron met theresa may on downing street yesterday. the former economy minister reasserted his view that an exit is an exit. and that britain shouldn't have any undue advantages when

leaving the eu. as well as seeking reassurances over the status of french expats living in the uk, macron attempted to woo fellow nationals back to france saying it would make it a more attractive place to work. president trump directed his administration to enforce u.s. immigration laws more aggressively. the president wants illegal immigrants arrested and deported regardless on whether they committed a crime. documents detailed the president's plan to discourage asylum seekers, publicize crimes and strip such immigrants of privacy protections. president trump denounced a wave of racist and ant smemitic crimes in the u.s. in an exclusive interview with nbc, president trump called recent attacks "terrible."

hallie jackson has more. >> reporter: in st. louis, rows of vandalized headstones at a jewish cemetery. in san diego, the 12th bomb threat against a jewish community center just this week. 70 incidents across the country this year alone. in washington, a president watching. >> i think he needs to take a leadership role and speak out more strongly against all of this hate. >> reporter: today, president trump's response in an exclusive interview. with nbc's craig melvin. >> i think it's terrible. i think it's horrible. whether it's anti-semitism or racism or anything you want to think about having to do with a divide, anti-semitism is likewise just terrible. >> reporter: so you're denouncing it now once and for all? >> of course. i do it whereever i get a chance, i do it. >> reporter: he had the chance, twice, last week. >> as far as people, jewish people, so many friends, a daughter who happens to be here

right now. number one, i am the least anti-semitic person that you've ever seen in your entire life. number two, racism, the least racist person. >> no, we know that. >> quiet, quiet, quiet. >> reporter: the president's message today, to some, too little, too late. >> we have a series of anti-semitic attacks on jewish communities and cemeteries and this president said nothing over the weekend. his silence is poison. nothing the president, today, mitigated the cancer growing in the white house that starts with him. >> i'm asking is he comfortable with his role as the person who needs to be delivering a broader message? >> he is very comfortable and understands as the leader of the free world that he has an awesome responsibility to make it very clear where we're going as a country and what our values are. >> coming up on the show, more headaches for samsung. we'll bring you the latest on

the continuing south korean scandal after the break. ♪(music pys)

♪ hgh ho heigh ho 's offworke go what's up man? anshould-be sleepers. because the es who uly change the world, arthe ones who can't it to get out int.

welcome back to "street signs." abb said it uncovered trcrimina activity in its south korean business. it is suspected of embezzlement and misappropriation of funds. abb says the problem will have an impact of about $100 million on previously reported results. and samsung's chief jay y. lee is continuing to be questioned amid a probe into a corruption scandal. let's get out to sherry for more in seoul. i read its not uncommon for

directors of family-run companies to be facing criminal charges, but often they are pardoned and don't do time. this time it could be different according to market watchers. what is different about the samsung story? >> exactly you're right. because of this corruption scandal involving the president of the country, and the weeks-long street protests calling for her impeach m as me well as reforming these corrupt practices in the political circle and the business side, especially talking about the family-owned large conglomerates. it's been a chronic issue in the korean economy. but just because of the scale of these outcry and cries among the korean public, things could be different this time around.

the samsung chief has been called in for yet another questioning. the third one since friday's arrest. my source tells me that it won't be much change when it comes to -- there won't be much change when it comes to his stance and his defense. basically saying we were the ones who had to give in to the presidential office's pressure and there was no favor in return. now, at this point these are allegations. and he has not been found guilty, but certainly this corruption scandal and the arrest of the de facto leader of the samsung group in south carolina put the problems of these conglomerates into the spotlight. south korea is in flux. it is witnessed to what could be a transition like never seen before. the president is being investigated in a web of conspiracy that's threatened the country's major corporations as well. as investigators dig deeper into the complex connections between the country's biggest names and

those in the highest levels of government, calls for change are growing louder. protesters gather each weekend in downtown seoul, fuming at perceived injustices in the upper echelons of society. >> translator: south koreans are rejects rather than accepting the idea of the country's economy being run by the overuse of power. >> this man is considered one of the country's most foremost experts. >> we're in the transition period of going into the third generati generation. those in the third generation are not seen to have contribute d largely to samsung's growth. >> but as the conglomerates face

unraveling, this may be a good opportunity for some. >> this is a good opportunity for managers to run the corporations and show the market they are capable of running this huge entity. >> reporter: even if jay y. lee is found guilty of bribery, embezzlement and perjury, it may not spell an end for him. korean courts have been lenient with some tycoons, releasing them despite guilty verdicts or imposing short sentences. but the scrutiny has already been ignited under chaebols. >> do you think the story will impact other chaebols? >> definitely. >> how? >> they know the legal consequences of getting too close to the political sector of this country. in the future, other chaebol groups will indeed and must change their attitude with regards to the corporate governance. this is a scandal that's rocked south korea with a trail leading

to the president's door. and many say a real change has to start at the very top. >> and many seem to agree this is a baby step, at least in the direction of bringing more transparency to these chaebols and their business practices. i would like to end on this note. the prosecution that is on the case of the president as well as samsung did ask for more time to investigate to go through more names of chaebols, including sk. we will be watching this story unfold. back to you. >> thank you very much for that. former hong kong leader donald sang has been sentenced to 20 months in prison for misconduct in public office. he was found guilty of failing to disclose private rental negotiations with a property

tycoon. japan's e-commerce giant rakuten rose today. there's mostly green splashed up across the region, pauline. >> yeah, it was a choppy session, but by the end most markets pushed higher. so rakuten ended up 9.4%. the e-commerce giant which also owns viber said it will buy.4 shares outstanding at half the price of the 2015 share issue. that's a 46% discount. we asked the cfo of rakuten earlier today what the reason was behind the share buyback. >> we just thought the underlying value of our businesses were not, you know, appreciated enough by the market. we thought that our share price

was undervalued. and we're very confident about the growth of our company. so we just let that lead into our decision. >> rakuten ended higher, but the nikkei just below the flat line there. let's look at the kospi. the kospi ended up 0.2%. samsung electronics also ended up despite the ongoing turmoil surrounding the head of samsung group. the hang seng ended up more than 1% as a new budget was unveiled. property developers rallied because in that new budget growth was forecast to be 2% to 3% this year. no new property curbs were announced. so we saw developers happy about that, rallying into the end of the session. karen, back to you. >> pauline, thank you very much. greece needs less money than previously thought and will be able to tap markets on its own

by the middle of next year. that's following comments by claus regl ishing. he did warn that the imf would have to be involved to assure further payments. joining me this morn sergeant former greek finance minister. he's been penning an interest read on the crisis called "game over: the inside story on the greek crisis." good morning. >> good morning. >> these comments that greece will be able to tap the market by the middle of next year, is that an overestimate? >> after greece concludes the review in the next month or so the ecb includes greece in the quantitative easing program. this should allow them to come out of the market in the second half of 2016, issue a bond, and return back to market since the last such bond in 2014. >> sounds easy when you put it that way.

>> i think there's a number of hurdles to pass until we get there. we will probably get there. the question is is that enough to ensure that by the end of the program 2018 greece will be able to fully finance its markets. there i'm less optimistic. i think >> reporter: also today, the there will be a need for a follow up agreement. a follow up program, if you will. possibly with some sort of credit line. and some money on the side. it's hard to see at this point how even president's new national in that best-case scenario greece will be able to fully finance itself in the markets from mid 2018 on. the critics would say here we are again with a great crisis. we thought we got past it. we had so much work done in brussels, but it feels like if you dive below the surface nothing much was really done, which is why we're back at square one again. how do you see it? are we facing a new greek crisis? not the way we did in 2015. we're not about to see again a repeat of the horrendous summer, with the referendum and going to

the brink. what you have this time around is this agreement is within the imf and the europeans, particularly the germans, on whether additional debt relief should be released now or not. so there's, again, intense negotiations. i think that the government can actually pass the additional measures that the europeans have asked. some of these measures are excessive, but they are priced to get into qe, which is the path to hope at least to be able to exit into the market. >> the price keeps cropping , around what more the greeks can sacrifice. eu ministers claim to have made progress. front and center has been around pensions. a lot of work was done around the reforms of pensions, lifting the actual age, but still it was from a bad starting point compared to the rest of the eurozone. do you think the greeks have to give more on pensions? >> there's been progress, but

there's been tremendous pain. it's time to give greece a bit of a break in terms of the fiscal target. we're now running a primary surplus, do we need to keep a high primary surplus for a long time? everyone pretty much agrees there's space for additional debt relief. so you need to give the economy some breathing room to be able to turn the corner and to give greeks hope that indeed after this long period, seven years now, there's some hope for the future. >> i understand that, but does it have to be pensions? do you need breathing room on pensions? >> the pension system that been reformed. however there are cohorts which are now the current pensioners where a number of pensions are not commensurate to the kind of years that people have worked and the final salary. perhaps some correction to be made there. however these are people that are already on low pension. one has to be careful with any reduction. >> is there a mention in your

book about the drakma, the greek government has made noise about returning to the drakma. do you think these options are just noise to create momentum around this debt relief that's been happening in brussels? or is it something the government wants? >> i would like to think it's simply noise which gets amplified because we're a brand-new global environment with the new u.s. administration, brexit. there's a lot of discussion of where the eurozone is going. i think we crossed that bridge. we didn't take that path. so i do not think there is a brexit. it's a risk that's not there. however, it is true if the continuing difficult situation goes on for much longer, the voices that say, well, what do we have to lose by leaving, they will amplify. >> thank you very much for joining us today. just a quick tease for your book, it's described as highly readable by the financial times.

you can check out "game over: then side story of the greek crisis." the "wall street journal" calling it a brisk and illusive account of the crisis. other stories we're tracking, the top ten hedge funs saw net buying over $1 billion in three sectors for the first time since 2015. financials led the way followed by info, tech and industrials. pablo savi joins us. nice to see you. probably no surprise that financials are leading the charge as everybody gets on board this reflation story around donald trump. hedge funs were front and center around the story. tell us why and how active they. were. >> the interesting thing with the financials, as you pointed out last time, they were the top buy sector two years ago. that was the magnitude of $4 billion. it's not the same level as it was back then. what's leading the charge, it's

actually bank of america. and really it's the two hedge funds moving into bank of america. there's some talk of jpmorgan as well, and schwab as well. >> goldman sachs? that's been a stock that moved to a record high in recent times. is goldman picking up hedge fund activity? >> not this time around. it's jpmorgan and charles schwab more so. >> what's the rational? >> in terms of bank of america, they beat their earnings forecast the last couple of times. growth is good. if you look at the stock performance, it's been on the rise for a number of months and years as well. when you look at the top three buy sectors, you saw financials, information technology and industrials, you could make an assessment that first of all you have the glass-steagall act that will be particularly dismantled and not be there anymore that could help the financial sector.

followed by slowly rising interest rates, and then technology, so you could have the repatriation tax that could benefit. specifically when we look at information technology, the semicsem semicon ducter activity. >> so it's not apple. there could be money coming back to shareholders in a special payout. is apple attracting much fire power? >> it is. in terms of the percentage of foreign revenue they have, it's about 60%. it's not near the semic semiconductors. the magnitude is different, the overall revenue that apple has and that takes the limelight. >> consumer discretion, there are a lot of question marks about the probability of the sector but the numbers came through a number of them that were decent, walmart leading

that bet. amazon pulled out of there. viking pulled out. i'm not sure what their intricacies are with amazon, but it could do with the fact that recently they have come under some flack when they come to selling chinese products, increasing the competitiveness for the u.s. market. >> those long energy oil also dumped that. pablo savi, thank you for joining us today. that's it for today's show. i'm karen cho. "worldwide exchange" is coming your way next.

good morning. the street awaits the minutes from the fed's latest policy meeting and any potential clues about a rate hike. icahn takes aim. the activist investor takes a stake in bristol-myers squib. could the drugmaker be a possible takeover target? and faceball. could baseball be coming to a new speed near you? it's wednesday, february 22, 2017, and "worldwide exchange" begins right now.