for new secretary of state rex tillerson. it's thursday, march 2, 2017, "squawk box" begins right now. ♪ live from new york where business never sleeps, this is "squawk box." good morning. welcome to "squawk box" here on cnbc. we're live from the nasdaq market site in times square. i'm becky quick along with joe kernen and andrew ross sorkin. we'll start with the market rally. stocks coming off the best day of 2017. the dow was up by 303 points, climbing above 21,000 for the first time ever. that march from 20,000 to 21,000 happened in just 24 trading sessions, that's a tie for the fastest time that's happened. last time it happened was on the march from 10,000 to 11,000. >> 1999.

>> right. >> two horrible comparison years. we have the records, 12 in a row, 1987. >> right. >> this is 1999, neither of which turned out particularly well. >> no. but it has been fun watching things climb. >> i have three newspaper takes on this. just to show the universe and how things work and the way of framing what happened yesterday. one of them is really good. you'll like it. it's not the "new york times." >> it's -- are you going to do it now? >> we can do it now. i thought the journal's take was sort of reasonable. it was stocks surge as optimism rises. >> right. >> they went in to say the trump speech, that the trump speech basically outlined a lot of his programs which still have a chance for happening which could be good for the economy and market. jim cramer said yesterday, maybe not a lot of details, but the

balls are in the air with these different things. that was good. >> okay. >> i was proud of "usa today." proud of them, this killed them to write it. "usa today" says trump actually inspired the dow to 21,000. they used his name to somehow associate this with positive things. which i don't think heretofore "usa today" has done that. then we got the financial times, which i see as a combination of the best things about the "new york times" and the best things about euro centric thinking. they put it altogether, they have jillian tet to make sure, remember brexit would be like a lehman moment. they're savvy enough to say now that the fed is definitely going to hike, that's why the market went higher. as we all know, the market loves rate hikes. they do mention the trump rally. >> maybe just being -- >> no, no, stocks charge higher

despite disappointment that trump failed in his first address. >> i thought they were going to say despite the fed -- >> no, no. they nailed it. >> that surprises me. >> don't you read this salmon-colored thing every day? i don't. you're right. i don't either. i read it to make fun of it. >> you saw what was a good story, why the markets are defying forecast of gloom and doom. >> i didn't think that was bad. >> was that okay by you? the other story, how we have gone back and forth on who might be behind the russian -- >> we will talk about jeff sessions. >> not jeff sessions but -- >> we have bypassed the other big story. >> there's no jeff session on the "new york times." what is on the new york times is the obama administration is the

one spreading the information around. >> that's true, too. >> jeff sessions, on the first meeting he was at heritage back in july. there were all kinds of bunch of other ambassadors there. as far as speaking on the phone, he talked to 25 different ambassadors in the -- was do you think he said in september? >> it's going to be -- people will look at this the same way they looked at bill clienton meeting with the former attorney general. >> he wasn't with the fbi in september. >> you can look and say i thought the question -- >> it's sticky now because the fbi is doing the investigation, and he's head of the fbi or as attorney general is head -- >> for better or worse. we have no idea what happened with the russians. we don't know if there's anything there. we don't know what's going on. >> right. >> having said that, you can't testify that you had no contact with these people and -- >> he's saying as a surrogate.

>> he's saying after the fact that as a surrogate. he didn't say then and there i did this as a surrogate, but i also talked to them in my other capacity. it's otherwise known as lying in the real world. >> and he's under oath. >> he's under oath! >> it's somewhere between no problem and nancy pelosi saying he has to resign immediately. >> it semi deserves a deeper look. >> i'm not calling for him to leave the job. i don't know enough. but it's semi indefensible to say something under oath which happens not to be true. >> say i haven't had any contact with russia as a surrogate for the campaign -- >> he didn't say that. >> they said you have had any contacts with them? his understanding is i thought that's what you men. >> you could say that -- i could say i thought, you know, i.think i was robbing the store. i didn't think so. >> i know the story. i'm not overly excited or

concerned about it. it's just -- we'll see what happens. this is another one of those -- if you find a -- at this point this whole russian thing, you have manifort, you have flynn. if there's other stuff, fine. if this is it, i know that -- you know, democrats need some way to sort of feel better about themselves. >> given the principle stand that you took relative to the hillary clinton e-mails and what you thought were things she said under oath or not, you would think an inquiry would be fair. >> there is an inquiry going on. >> it sounds like you don't think -- >> i don't know what will happen. i have no way of knowing. i know less -- >> that's the -- >> none of us have a way of knowing. i have the feeling or i would predict not a lot happens. >> that may be. i don't know. whether there's smoke or fire or not. i don't -- >> you think there should be an

inquiry? >> there is an inquiry. you mean an independent prosecutor? >> yeah. >> i don't think you need an ini prosecutor at this point. issa said that to slam obama. the last eight years we never had an independent prosecutor. this time i would like to do it right, is what he was saying. >> darrell issa. >> let's look at the u.s. equity futures. as we mentioned yesterday, best day of the year for the markets. this morning, slight pause. dow futures down by 10 1/2 points. s&p down by 4. nasdaq down by 9 points. this is the first time we've zone the dow close above 21,000, it did it by pushing well above that, well above 21,100. trump just tweeted since november 8th election day, the stock market has posted 3.2 trillion in gains and consumer confidence is alt a 15-year high. jobs. that's his take on it.

>> that's the first tweet since the speech. is that true? >> i didn't see any yesterday, but i did not check last night. >> live by the markets, die by the markets. you have to hope -- this is always the conundrum of the whole story. >> that's what all the naysayers have said on -- every day of the 14% rise. if you're going to take credit for this, be ready to take credit for the down draft. when you get the down draft, let me know. i know you won't be a cheerleader. actually you do serve a useful purpose. if you don't have people -- >> i could be the wall of worry. >> if you don't have people in the consensus, where will the consensus come from? if you don't have the attitude -- if there's no one in the crowd, how do you know what the crowd is thinking? you can't say one sheep is causing -- there's got to be a lot of sheep to follow. if one leming goes off a cliff, will anyone follow the lemming?

you provide a useful purpose. >> he had one tweet yesterday, 21 hours ago. all caps, thank you. >> for the -- for saying the speech was good. >> is it that or that that was about the time we crossed 21,000, wasn't it? >> that could be it. >> i thought it was in the morning. >> 22 hours ago. >> 22 hours would have been -- around 9:00. maybe that wasn't. >> i don't know. let's get you some other big headlines. fed speak and rate hike speculation are key market themes this week. yesterday lael brainard said it would be appropriate soon for the central bank to raise rates. >> with full employment within reach, signs of progress on inflation and a favorable shift in the balance of risks at home and abroad, it will likely be appropriate soon to remove additional accommodation continuing on a gradual path, as

the federal funds rate continues to move higher for the expected longer run level, a transition in balance policy will also be warranted. >> the odds of a quarter point rate hike at march fed meeting rising overnight. above 70%. >> good for them. >> in corporate news, lyft reportedly seeking to raise $500 million in a new round of funding that would value the start up between 6 billion and 7 billion, a fraction of rival's uber's value. reports say lyft hired catalyst partners, the investment bank run by frank cattrone to help. yesterday announcing a 2017 capital spending plan of $22 billion from the exxon ceo. in an exclusive conversation, we asked him about that spending plan and how it's impacted a

movement in oil prices. >> our view on the oil prices, there's still uncertainty in the marketplace. while prices have gone up in the short-term, we are not building an investment campaign based on the assumption that prices will be there forever. >> we do have much more of that interview coming up. >> snap's long-awaited ipo is officially here. shares priced yesterday afternoon, set to start trading today. julia is outside the snap headquarters in venice, california with all the details. julia? >> good morning. snap inc. set to raise $3.4 billions in its ipo today in a valuation of $26.6 billion. it is set to begin trading today on the new york stock exchange under the ticker snap. evan siegel hoping to avoid

volatility today. the company says about a quarter of shares in the offering will go to existing investors who agreed to a one-year lock up period. snap wants to avoid the technical difficulties and delays that marked facebook's ipo at the nasdaq and the huge spike that twitter saw on its ipo day. snap has not confirmed whether evan spiegel will be at the nyse today for the start of trading. he has shied away from the spotlight and hasn't been doing interviews. guys? >> julia, i know that house -- it's almost like a house in venice, isn't it? right down from -- isn't it looking out on the boardwalk there or whatever it is called? >> i think you're thinking of their original snap offices here in venice, the first building that snap moved into and they moved out of evan spiegel's d dad's house.

this is on a side street b a block and a half from the main venice boardwalk and the beach area. it's very spread out, very unusual, which is company cited as a risk factor. >> it's a great neighborhood. it's eclecteclectic, you have everything you want. it's crazy. that other building i'm thinking of, i swear, julia, before it was snap, i think that was a pot dispensary where if you went in and said i have anxiety, they would write you a prescription for pot. do you know if that was -- do you know which one i'm talking about? >> i don't know if that's what was in those snap headquarters offices before they moved in. >> i don't have anxiety. i do now, when i lived there, i didn't. you're right, it's very bohemian, artsy. the neighborhood is not that thrilled about the ipo.

we expect some protesters here today, people not happy with the gentrifying of snap, raising property rates around here. >> it took about a month for the dow to rise from 20,000 to 21,000, thanks to a handful of stocks like goldman sachs, apple, boeing. joining us now is hans olsen covering the economic angle is bruce kasman from jpmorgan. mike santoli is also here. we need an update from mike. last time you were on, three

weeks ago. don't chase that rally. famous last words. i think we got 14 out of 15 new highs, a 3% move, because i -- i decided to remember where you were saying that. 2316, so now we're 2389. basically 80 points, 3%. how about now, do you buy into this rally now in your view or not? >> basically the trend is up. basically the market has defied all these little tactical clues i was focused on two weeks ago, that a lot of people are focused on saying this market is in good shape. s this an underlying urgency which you saw in these odd streaks, and it shows you it's still there. now it's running hotter -- the market is running hotter, in terms of sentiment and how stretched the trend is, that short stuff than then. you will get a pull back. it will more likely happen when it's running hot, but i don't

think that's something for an investor to focus much on now. >> if it goes back 3% to where you said don't buy it in the first place, this time if it pulls back 3%, is that enough now for you to say buy it? >> you have to see what's going on at the time. i don't want to make too much of basically trying to trade every little wiggle of the market. >> that was bad advice to people three weeks -- >> what does it mean to chase the rally? the lead of the story that that was based on don't chase the rally but don't leave the market. >> i think you should have chased the rally. buying with both hands that day. >> we talked about these unusual -- >> that wasn't a helpful -- >> i said i'm wrong. >> okay. all right. >> i'm wrong. >> so the question is if it does pull back, do you buy this time when you said not to buy last time? >> yes, you're in a tape where you want to buy substantial dips when the overall story remains the same. >> mike did tweet yesterday for lent he's giving up shorting. >> it hasn't been -- >> i think it's been

significant. we talk about these streaks. first time in 30 years you had all these record highs. only a few times it's been this calm. that shows you the market defied the odds of going up further. >> it's been defying the odds since november 8th because everybody said it would go down 5,000. where are you now -- >> the measure is not people for day trading. the measure is six months a year, three years from now. >> i always hear that from people that -- >> that's the -- >> people like doug, they're short for years, they say i'm just early. but it doesn't come back down to the point where you were -- you've not helped investors. >> i happen to have been focusing on people who have been correctly bullish up to that point and saying let's take a break. >> let's hear hans. at this point, what do you do? i've been riding the rally for sure. but i'm at the point now where i'm increasingly nervous because, you know, to your point, if you look at the rsis, if you look at earnings expectations, they're coming

down for 2017. >> you only got nervous this morning? a month ago? november 8th? when did you start getting nervous? >> coming into the year, i thought the returns for this year would be modest. you know, the animal spirits are let it rip. market likes what the president has put out there. it likes the economics story. and the least resistance is higher right now. you have to start wondering when are the fundamentals going to start to pull the day. they haven't so far. >> the economic back drop, do you think it warrants the moves that we're seeing in stocks and bonds now? as of yesterday the bond market finally started -- >> i will leave the stock market valuation to these guys. >> all the papers say optimism is increasing, will that translate to a higher rate of growth? >> i want to make it clear there are two things going on right now the one story we're spending time talking about is u.s. exceptionalism with a new

president, with a new agendagen and a lot of uncertainty as to how that will be delivered. we're skeptical about the stimulus side and how much tax reform we'll get, we're clear we'll see big regulatory changes. the second point is we have a global economy doing a lot better. we have a reflation story playing out here. yesterday our global pmi survey for february hit a level that is about the high for the last six years. we've raised our forecast on china and western europe over the last week. there's a story here playing out more broadly and playing out as the u.s. first quarter is looking like it's softening. i think the global economy story is an important one. not the only one, but i don't think we want to lose sight of that. >> can people say i'm confident and optimistic, but then just talking and then not acting on -- is it possible that this

doesn't translate into actual numbers you can measure? >> sure, every time you have a big political event there's a knee jerk reaction in sentiment, which is sometimes validated and sometimes not. after the u.s. election we have to be careful. however we're sitting three months after the event and sentiment readings have held up. importantly, i want to hit this point, if you look at the sentiment readings in europe which has nothing to do with donald trump and u.s. policy in asia, they're also moving up in a material way. >> you don't think the gains in europe yesterday have to do with -- the u.s. -- people say, you know, europe was weak for eight years, too. sometimes the u.s. is such a big part of the global economy, if we had done better the last eight years, maybe europe would have done better. not true? >> no doubt about that. what we're seeing in the global economy is the natural possess whereby as things get better you get mutually reinforcing dynamics. bruce, hans, mike, thank you all. coming up, when we return,

much more of the first business tv interview with the new exxonmobil ceo, darren woods, his outlook on handling price volatility. ♪ say carl, weave a question about your brokege fees. fees? what did you have in mind? i don't know. $6.95 per trade? uhhh. and i was wonderin if your okerag offersome of guarantee? guarantee? where wean g our fee and commons back so can you offer me what schwab is offering? what's walthe questions? ask your broker if they're ofng $6.95nline equity tradnd a tisfaction guarantee. if you don't like their answer, ask agn at schwa

after woods spoke to investors, exxonmobil shares were up 2%. >> it's an exciting day for me, it's the first chance i had to talk to the investment community, talk about our mrapl what we see as the advantages of the company, glad to be here when the dow was responding as it was. >> i was watching exxon shares, as you were talking, i saw them up as high as 2.4%. apparently the street likes what you were saying on some of these points. a huge part is the capital extee expenditures. is this an inflection point where you have gone from pared down to looking at oil prices picking back up and that's why

more additional capital expenditures are coming through? >> our view on oil prices, still uncertainty in the marketplace. while prices have gone up in the short-term, we're not building investment campaign based on the assumption those prices will be there forever. one of the advantages we had with this recent acquisition in the permian, we have a much bigger portfolio for short cycle investments. that gives us flexibility to move as the market moves and to raise our investment levels up to match what we see as opportunities in the marketplace. a large part of that growth in our capex is taking advantage of this short cycle investment in permian. >> i think it's 550 wells you have in permian -- >> 5,500 wells. >> that make a 10% return. >> we have a great portfolio and many make more than 10%.

it was a minimum threshold we use. but it was a prolific play, excited about the opportunity in the permian. it fits in our wheelhouse as a company to bring the discipline, technology, rigger to drive value, increase production, increase resource recovery of that. >> based on those numbers, is it safe to assume anything over $0 you will continue to pump on those wells or is there a point, you would shut down on some of them? >> a lot of the pacing is based on the ability to efficiently rom out the technology, ramp that technology up, so price will play a role, but also we want to be sustainable long-term. we want to be thoughtful about how we grow that invest mtd and volume. >> people talk about this renaissance of american drilling, wondered if that means opec is irrelevant at this point. what do you think? >> opec has made a difference in

the market in the short-term. the permian brings a new dimension to the marketplace. it's a question of how opec responds to that. you saw earlier on their response was to continue to keep production up. market got oversupplied. prices came down. they backed off with that. you see it coming back up again. i think the market is still in discovery to understand how that unconventional play fits in with more traditional dynamics. >> what do you think -- who do you think is calling the shots at this point? the american producers or opec? >> i would say the american producers are responding to market prices. opec has low production costs, so they have a lever they can pull, the choices they can make there. what you're seeing in the u.s. is just a response to whatever that market price is. >> in the next hour, we'll hear more from darren woods, get his comments on taking over for rex tillerson, the new secretary of state. >> coming up, jeff sessions and fire over meetings with the russian ambassador, the full story straight ahead.

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welcome back. you're watching "squawk box" live from the nasdaq market site in times square. good morning. welcome back to "squawk box" on cnbc. look at u.s. equity futures.

looking at some red arrows. dow opening off about 18 points. nasdaq off by 10 points. s&p 500 looking like it would open off by 5 points. news this morning, the trump administration says it will take aggressive action to fight what it views as unfair trade practices by other countries, that action may include defining rules, the u.s. trade representatives office says it won't tolerate practices that distorted markets including kufrn currency manipulation. it's a signal that the trump administration may trying to push what's acceptable under wto rules in trying to slash trade deficits a deficits between china and mexico. attorney jeff sessions under fire for meetings he did not disclose during his confirmation hearing. eamon javers joins us from

washington. how big deal is this? >> it's a pretty big deal. these are dramatic developments involving the attorney general of the united states. let me walk you through what the "washington post" reported last night and some fallout overnight and into today. starting with this "washington post" story that broke late last night. the post reporting that jeff sessions met twice with the russian ambassador to the united states, sergei kislyak. one meeting took place september 8th in sessions' senate office, this despite the fact that sessions said during his confirmation hearing that he wasn't aware of any contact between the trump campaign and the russian government. this is the moment that will come under scrutiny back in january in which sessions said this to the united states senate. >> if there is any evidence that any one affiliated with the trump campaign communicated with

the russian government in the course of this campaign, what will you do? >> senator franken, i'm not aware of any of those activities. i have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign, and i did not have communications with the russians. >> sessions there saying i did not have communication with the russians. despite the two meetings that the "washington post" is reporting last night. now we have a new statement from senator sessions, now the attorney general saying i never met with any russian officials to discuss issues of the campaign. i have no idea what this allegation is about. it is false. a sessions spokeswoman goes on to put additional context to this saying he was asked during the hearing about communications between russia and the trump campaign, not about meetings he took as a senator and a member of the armed services committee. that is not good enough for nancy pelosi, the democratic leader in the house of representatives. she says in a statement last night now, after lying under

oath to congress about his own communications with the russians, the attorney general must resign. so that's where we stand politically today heading into what will be a very busy day today in washington, d.c. >> okay, eamon, thank you very much. we'll continue to watch this. when we return, reddit is the self-described front page of the internet. one of the most top ten visited sites. co-founder alexis ohanian will join us at 7:30. and kevin mccarthy will join us on the gop's agenda. and later, the world's biggest grocery store chain is set to report earnings, we'll have an interview with the cfo. stay tuned, you're watching "squawk box" on cnbc.

time now for the executive edge. the price gap between new and used cars is now hitting an

all-time high. phil lebeau has the details of a new report on auto loans. i am not even familiar with a used car what that is. i know what a pre-owned -- i don't mean that, because i always buy new. aren't they called pre-owned now? >> do you have a glass of chardonnay when you go to the used car lot as well, joe? let me show you the numbers that came out from experion. this is looking at auto loans in the fourth quarter of last year. this is the average auto loan, the amount borrowed by people in the fourth quarter for a new vehicle, just over $30,000. for a used vehicle, just under $19,000. we did the math, this is a record gap between a new auto loan and a used auto loan of $11,292. now, the average new vehicle price continues to rise. that's one reason why people are

taking out more in terms of borrowing for a new vehicle. the average new vehicle price according to kelly blue book, $34,352. 32% of the auto loans now stretch beyond six years. people are saying, look, i want this vehicle, but i have to get the lower monthly payment. as a result i will stretch it out and yet the average new vehicle monthly loan payment is $506, it's now moved above the $500 mark. we talk about this all the time. the difference between demand for suvs and trucks versus cars, it continues to move towards trucks and suvs. almost two-thirds of the vehicles bought last month were trucks, suvs and crossovers, which cost more money. as you look at the annual auto sales rate, remember we hit a record high last year of 17.55 million. we should tell you the february sales rate came in at 17.58 million. what you want to focus on,

march, april, may. that will let us know if demand is truly as strong as we've seen for january and february. incentives were up last month. that's one reason people were saying, yeah, i'll buy. with regard to your comment about used vehicles, don't tell me you didn't have a chevy chevette that you went out and got at the used lot. i know you did. >> i did worse than that. i bought a ford taurus from hertz after they finished -- it had 80,000 miles. i did. >> i'm sure those people drove it with care. >> they really took care of it, phil. what a beater. i brought it back here. it's legendary. it's legendary. i didn't change the plates for a while. >> nice. >> i had a few dents. had a few dents on it. one headlight. once i came into the city, the other head light went out. what do i do? i had to stay. couldn't drive home.

thank you. we've all bought -- pre-owned cars. that's my point. >> it had 3,000 miles on it, it was a dealer's car, during the financial crisis it was a year old it had 3,000 miles on it. they didn't have financing, so i paid cash for it. >> i lease, so i get a new one every two years. you -- you know, it's a zip car or there's a new way of doing it. what do you do now snfrnlt y? >> you call the driver. >> where are you, dammit? where the hell are you? >> bring it to the front. >> exactly. >> not true. among the other stories -- >> kind of true. >> only slightly. marissa mayer will forgo any stock bonus she might have earned this year because of that massive data breach the company suffered back in 2014. the board withholding her 2016 annual bonus of $2 million for the same reason. under her contract, her stock award is not to be less than $12 million per year. the breach affected data belonging to 500 million users including our own becky quick.

>> i think. i don't know. i've never been told. >> but you have an account there. >> yahoo!'s general council is resigning and will get no payout. >> so there are heads rolling. >> yeah. something's happening. except there's still 12 million. >> yes. >> her contract calls for that. stocks to watch today. shares of juno therapeutics falling on news that the company will not be moving forward with a key cancer drug because of patient deaths. the drug was to treat a rare form of leukemia. roche reporting success of a key cancer trial. that could help cushion it against its key selling cancer drug her-ciptin. and broadcom forecasting higher revenue for this quarter. carl icahn is telling the former trump taj mahal casino to

a group led by hard rock and two investors. this after it was closed amid a strike by casino workers. hard rock says the buyers plan to invest 300 million to renovate and reopen. president trump opened the damage taj mahal in 1990 and lost ownership in a bankruptcy filing. and now to sports. for the first time in history, the northwestern men's basketball team may experience a little march madness after a stunning win against michigan last night. with less than two seconds to go, a tie game. the wildcats threw a pass all the way down the court that led to a game-winning shot at the buzzer. fans, as they should -- >> my gosh. >> -- stormed the court. the victory gives northwestern its first winning record in the big ten conference in nearly 50 years, and a fighting chance to get into the ncaa tournament for the first time ever. >> my gosh.

>> big ten -- >> did you see that? >> no number one seeds for a lot. they have the great ohio state, indiana, michigan. rutgers. >> how did i know that was coming. >> you know what? you know laura ingraham, love laura ingraham. timing of this bogus story about sessions meant to blunt the national optimism surge following the speech. i did read between the lines there. this happened in september, and it says this -- people -- they fail to say whether people have known this for a while. again, someone gave it to the "washington post," very conveniently the day after the speech. so it's just the timing that's really interesting. she called it a bogus story. that was her words, not mine, andrew. i don't want to -- >> quoted her yesterday on something, too. >> no, i didn't. >> there was something you said i read on her twitter feed. >> i quoted her but didn't mention her by name. >> are you troubled by any of

this at all? >> i -- at this point i'm not. >> do you have any questions at all about this? >> about russia? >> yeah. >> i don't think -- no. you can look into it. >> i would like to see -- >> don't you think for our democracy we should look into this? >> sure, at this point, you have manifort which we knew about, and flynn, who knows what he said, and now sessions talked to him as a member of the armed services committee. i don't know. >> i don't know either. >> the most interesting thing is the leaks that are coming and who is generating the leaks. >> that's more interesting? >> yeah. i don't think there's a russian connection. when we come up, snap inc. begins trading on the new york stock exchange this morning. priced at $17 a share. as we head to break, a quick check of the european markets now. mixed picture there. cac up, everything else in the red margin.

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oh, snap! oh, snap! oh, snap! oh, snap! >> welcome back to "squawk box." snap about to make its public

debut today. the parent of snapchat, the disappearing messaging app -- i think that's an old way to describe snap these days. that's separate, anyway. pricing its ipo above the project projected range at $17 per share. joining us now is michael wolf, ceo and cofounder of activate. i brought my glasses, my spectacles. i can snap this interview. >> well, it's appropriate because what they're describing themselves is as not a social network, not a messaging app, but a photography company. >> would you buy this on the open? >> yes, because i think that -- >> yes, you would? >> because i think there's a lot of growth ahead. yes, there are a lot of skeptics. >> right. >> but there are few web scale properties. it's got 150, almost 160 million users today. it's going to continue to grow. >> but the story is an advertising story. that's where the money is going to be made or not. >> yes, and it's a compelling way of advertising.

there's about $20 billion in advertising that's going to be there that doesn't go to facebook and google. they're going to suck up a lot of it. >> but the big question is, you know, just from a valuation perspective, for this to be successful, it has to grow even bigger than facebook. does that make sense to you? >> it doesn't. it's not going to grow bigger than facebook. >> it's not? >> but there are a lot of people that are going to want to participate in this because there isn't a lot else in the internet that's going to continue to grow. >> and how much of this is a broadcasting business? the reason i ask is a lot of people really use snapchat as a messaging platform, just back and forth to each other and to a couple of people. it doesn't seem to, at this point, have the sort of one to many that facebook does. facebook h >> facebook has lots of video on it. snapchat has video, its discover feature. then it also has the stories people create themselves. that's where they've been able to put a lot of advertising. yes, money is going to move from

tv into snapchat, but they don't need a lot more money for this to be very viable. >> for kids -- i know for our kids, it's the only way they communicate. they don't e-mail ever. they rarely text back and forth. they're on snapchat constantly with all of their friends. they're there, i think, because the parents are there. as more and more parents come into this, is it going to chase the kids off? >> the accepted wisdom about facebook was once your parents and your grandparents are there, you're not going to want to be there. some of it comes down to communication. i know for my 18-year-old, if it doesn't go on snapchat, it didn't happen. >> that's how our kids are too. >> one of their challenges is going to be growing beyond that 18 to 34-year-old audience. it's not clear. it the other challenge is going to be capturing people outside the united states. >> what's this thing worth? what's a fair value for this, and what kind of math do you do to get there? >> the math doesn't work. what works is people believing

it's going to continue to grow and they want a piece of that. >> i lived through 1999 where you were supposed to believe things were going to groo to th moon. >> the internet continued to grow. yes, there are companies that went away, but there are companies that are still here. >> why is this not twitter then? >> when twitter went public, they didn't have a viable way of advertising. they didn't have an advertising product that really showed it worked or that advertisers want to buy into. snap does. also, snap has an entirely different way of selling advertising. jeff lucas, who they hired from my old place, mtv networks, is a brilliant advertising leader. >> when you think about the growth prospect and the idea of getting older people on this thing, right now, and maybe we're just the wrong generation. do you use snapchat?

>> yes, i do. >> you do. you don't find this interface relatively impossible to figure out? >> remember, a lot of people thought facebook was hard to use in the beginning. a lot of people didn't understand. things like getting poked on facebook or how they were going to use facebook messenger. they've got to make it a lot easier for other people to use. to becky's point, right now it's about 18 to 34-year-olds. they will. >> what's the honeymoon period? when will you be able to properly measure what this company is worth? >> i think two years from now. they're expecting they're going to double advertising sales from this year. they're expecting they're going to continue to double. if we don't see that happening, then it's not going to be worth it. >> okay. michael wolf, great to see you. >> great to be here. >> thank you. coming up, riding the trump rally. the dow climbing 303 points. that's the best performance so far this year. we'll talk strategy after the break. and later, house majority leader kevin mccarthy joins us on the gop agenda.

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stocks march higher. wall street kicks off the new month by hitting yet another milestone. dow 21k. this morning futures are mixed after the record-breaking session. the latest on the trump rally and putting your money to work now, straight ahead. and nothing but the truth, so help you god. >> attorney general jeff sessions is in the hot seat over accusations that he lied under oath. house leader kevin mccarthy joins us to talk about the latest cabinet conundrum for president trump and the gop agenda. and snapping up shares of snap. tech investor tells us what he thinks of the company's

valuation and whether or not he's buying at the open, as the second hour of "squawk box" begins right now. live from the beating heart of business, new york city, this is "squawk box." good morning. welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc, live from the nasdaq market site in times square. i'm andrew ross sorkin along with becky quick and joe kernen. a record close on wall street yesterday. futures this morning marginally down. the nasdaq would open down close to eight points down right about now. european markets, a little more mixed, virtually unchanged. here's what's making headlines. snapchat parent snap beginning trading today after its ipo priced above expectation at $17 a share. it's the largest technology ipo since alibaba went public in 2014. we'll have more on snap's wall

street debut in a few minutes. after yesterday's data flood, just one report on the calendar for today. that is the labor department, which will be releasing its weekly jobless claims at 8:30 eastern time. it is expected to be a virtually unchanged number from last week. and the fed governor is the latest to hint that rate hikes could come sooner rather than later. she told a harvard audience last night that it will soon be appropriate to remove additional accommodation. those are her words. with sentiment increasing that a march rate hike is in the works, the two-year note has hit its highest yield in serve years, trading at 1.296%. we'll hear from another fed governor later this morning when steve liesman has an exclusive interview with jerome powell on "squawk alley" at 11:00 a.m. eastern time. fwiereuters just reporting kremlin weighing in saying it's unaware of the details of the meeting between russian ambassador and u.s. attorney general jeff sessions. says such meetings are routine.

top democrats are demanding attorney general jeff sessions resign immediately following news he met with the russian ambassador to the united states during the 2016 presidential campaign. he didn't disclose that during meetings during his confirmation proceedings. a spokeswoman for sessions said he never discussed campaign details. some lawmakers are calling for a special prosecutor to lead an investigation into russia's ties, if there were any, with president trump's campaign. house majority leader kevin mccarthy joins us later in the program to discuss this and much more. exxonmobil, the world's largest publicly traded oil and gas company, has a new leader, and this is a place where ceos have a long tenure. just two months into the job, we spoke to darren woods at the company's annual analyst day. woods addressed former exx

exxon ceo, rex tillerson, and the chances he would be involved in renegotiating the russian sanctions. >> having worked with rex for many years, rex is going to make the decision which is best for our country. his personal circumstances for where he was in the past, i have no doubt that's not going to play in on his decision making. >> we will have much more from exxon chairman and ceo darren woods later in the program. march coming in like a bull for the markets. the dow, the s&p 500, and the nasdaq all posting their best session of 2017 yesterday. the dow surging more than 300 points, crossing to close above the 21,000 point level for the first time ever, and it did not do that tentatively. it closed at 21,115. joining us for more is the chief u.s. investment strategist at rbc capital markets. also, scott clements, chief investment strategy at brown brothers. jonathan, what do you think of this? this is momentum. it's momentum that's continued.

it's started to shake out some of the doubters. where do you stand? >> this really is all about the fundamentals. i don't think this is about donald trump. you had an ism report which showed that manufacturing is ripping. you're seeing similar manufacturing data in virtually every major country around the world is picking up as well. that's really what's fueling this. >> let's talk about yesterday's activity. when we saw the futures up 150 points in the morning, i mean, it seemed hard to find another reason beyond donald trump's speech the night before. >> yeah, and this is probably -- not probably, this was definitely the most presidential we've seen him. for some folks who may have been concerned about his rhetoric. i'm not sure whether that one little blip is the real story here as much as a really powerful run driven by better economics. >> the markets are up 13%, and it started on the day of the election. it's hard not to tie a lot of that back to what's happening. >> but the market was up 8% from the middle of the year through

election day. the market was up 1% on election day, before we thought trump was going to win, when people thought this was a move up because hillary was going to win. so i think there's something bigger. is he contributing? yes. do i i think these pro growth policies are a big positive? yes, i think they can be. but i think there's something bigger than just donald trump in this market. >> scott? >> i think you've got a combination of both a secular underpinning of improved economic activity and the rebound in corporate earnings. that's more fuel in the tank. when you layer on top of that the cyclical, the policy potential of stimulative things in the form of tax reform, deregulation, infrastructure, et cetera, that's what's fueled the market. i think what happened on tuesday night was some of the risk surrounding the uncertainty of this white house evaporated a little bit over the course of a speech that was the most presidential he'd given. i think that was the rally yesterday. bit of a relief rally. >> what's the fair value of the market without the policy stuff? >> it's hard to say, andrew, because the market is rather pricey. 22 times trailing earnings in an environment in which interest

rates are more likely to rise than fall. i think the market is priced for protection, maybe a little ahead of itself here. >> interest rates may be rising, but you're still talking about inkr incredibly low rates. maybe a quarter point hike as early as this month. when you compare that to the value that you'll get in stocks, it's still hard to say that switching the case for stocks. >> it doesn't switch yet. that's exactly the underpinning for the market. but the directionality of interest rates is more likely up than down. march's hike won't be the last this year. >> are you expecting two or three this year? >> three, including march. >> so let's talk a little bit about interest rates. again, we just had warren buffett on monday. he thinks stocks are cheap relative to what you're going to get in bonds at this point because of interest rates. >> i think that's the case. i think that we're going to end up seeing a lot more from the fed because, you know, wages are going up. the cycle is maturing.

you know, it looks like march is a done deal. if they walk back away from march, they're really going to shock the markets since they've pushed this thing hard. more important, rates should never have been at 62.5 basis points. it should be much higher now ginn the health of the economy. their playing catch up. >> jonathan, would you tell people not to invest here or jump in? >> i think the prisurprise is t this thing is going to continue to melt up on us. the earnings numbers are really coming in strong. this year, for example, revenues are supposed to grow 6%. last year they grew only at 2%. i think that there's upside from that. so i would absolutely be jumping in. >> scott, again, going back to this, it seems to me that so much of this rally is sparked by the idea that there's a new administration in town. for the first time in a very long time, the markets are -- investors are starting to look at this and say, okay, this is a different paradigm. this is going to be a new

environment, and there are going to be things unleashed. is that something that you think is a strong part of it? i get the earnings are up. that supports it. but i think what the spark was, was seeing a change in washington. >> i think that's right, but it's connected to the earnings. we're in the eighth year, ninth year -- >> it wouldn't be happening if earnings were horrific. you're seeing this improving economy at the same time. >> which feeds to earnings. in the eighth or ninth year of a bull market, it becomes difficult for companies to increase their earnings. operating margins are high. cost cutting has taken place. deregulation would be welcome, more efficient tax rates. those sort of things feed through earnings. that's what keeps this market going, even at valuations that by historical standards are relatively high, although in an interest rate environment like this are well supported. >> all right. thank you both for your time. when we come back, snapping up shares of snap. the parent company of snapchat debuting this morning on wall street. will tech investor paul meeks be

a buyer? we'll find out after the break. then, house majority leader kevin mccarthy will join us. stay tuned. you're watching "squawk box" here on cnbc. brokerage fees. fees? what did you have in mind? i don't know. $6.95 per trade? uhhh. and i was wondering if your brokerage offers some sort of guarantee? guarantee? where we can get our fees and commissions back if we're not happy. so can you offer me what schwab is offering? what's with all the questions? ask your broker if they're offering $6.95 online equity trades and a satisfaction guarantee. if you don't like their answer, ask again at schwab.

stocks to watch today. shares of june therapeutics f l falling on news the company won't be moving forward with its cancer treatment drug. roche reporting positive results, on the other hand, that could help cushion it against looming competition for its best-selling cancer drug. also boosts sales for newer drugs pup up -- up 5% on that. snap will make its wall street debut in just a few hours. the parent company of the disappearing messaging app pricing its ipo above the projected range of $17 per share. joining us now is paul meeks. good morning to you. i've been trying to use these glasses as much as i can. i don't know if you can see them. we're going to be snapping while we're doing the interview.

tell me whether you're going to buy at the open. >> i am not. >> we just had michael wolf on arguing that this thing was cheap, based on his studies of the media market. he thinks this could be the next facebook. you don't. >> i don't. you know, it could be over time, but the problem is here's a company that over the last two years has burned through almost 1.1 billion in cash. when you take a look at facebook, when they went public back in the spring of 2012, the company was quite profitable and showing an increase in usage, where of course as we know from snapchat, they're actually showing at least a temporary e slodo -- slowdown in daily active users. >> what do you think the fair value is of snap today? >> that's the toughest question. when you have a company that has

no profits in sight, i think even the most aggressive investment banker's estimates have this company not breaking even for several years. i don't know if you can even take a look at a stock valuation. >> what did you think of twitter before it went public? >> oh, i actually was negative on twitter. i actually was even on your air back in the spring of 2012 and was negative on facebook. i only turned positive several quarters in when they finally showed that they could monetize mobile traffic. so there will be a tipping point for snapchat at some point. it's just i can't see it yet. >> tipping point, meaning up or down. >> there might be a tipping point fundamentally that would justify the valuation, but i don't see it yet. >> in terms of whatever -- and we asked michael wolf this question too. in terms of the honeymoon period, how long do you give them in terms of trying to figure out whether this model works or not? is it six months, a year, three years? >> oh, i think in the internet

time scale, that's way too long. next couple of quarters, they're going to have to show a couple things. one is a reacceleration of daily active users. two is an increase in the average revenue per user, particularly abroad, where the aprus are always less than they are in the united states. >> what are we supposed to make of the fact that so many media companies, including nbc universal, spending a lot of time and money building and creating lots of content for snap. >> that's true, but the problem is, at least at this point, it's a one-product company. also, they do dominate in a traffic demographic. the younger folks. at some point, at least in the united states, they're going to have to come up with another gig. >> you said at the top this might be something to short. is that something you're going to do? >> no, i'll probably take a look at how it proceeds over time. but right now i'm quite skeptical. and i don't see that there's any urgency to participate in the

deal. this will play out over a couple of quarters and also just like it did with facebook, the company at some point will reach a crisis where it's really going to be a make or break for the business, and if they handle it well, it becomes a star. if they don't, unfortunately, it becomes twittered. >> okay. paul, we'll save the tape. we'll look forward to seeing what happens at the open today and what happens over the next couple months and talk to you about it soon. >> thanks again. >> thank you. coming up, best-selling author, internet activist, and co-founder of reddit joins us to discuss the power of tech and a free and open internet, and of course his fiance, tennis star serena williams. plus, more with becky's interview with darren woods. check out the futures at this hour. all in the red slightly. we'll be right back.

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nearly 20% of its staff in 2016. the job cuts come as part of an effort to save money amid slowing growth in the rooftop solar industry. box warning its current quarter will not live up to analyst expectations. the cloud software company did beat earnings forecast for the final quarter of its fiscal year. you can see the stock is up by 4%. >> i don't understand that. fed speak and rate hike speculation a key market theme this week. late yesterday, the fed governor joined the conversation. she said it would be appropriate soon for the central bank to raise rates. >> with full employment within reach, signs of progress on inflation, and a favorable shift in the balance of risks at home and abroad, it will likely be appropriate soon to remove additional accommodation continuing on a gradual path as the federal funds rate continuincontinue to move higher towards its expected longer run level, a

transition in balance sheet will also be warranted. >> the odds of a quarter-point rate hike at the march fed meeting rising overnight, now above 70%. this whole thing, i don't know how liquid this is. >> i don't either, but look, we have had fed speaker after fed speaker in the last week say, yes, a march hike is on the table. if something happens that we don't see a march hike now, i think the fed has built up this credibility, it's going to get yanked away again. this is not long-term credibility that people say, okay, we'll see what happens next month. >> we had conversations with liesman as to why it was at 20%. it stayed at 20%. yellen said i'm much more hawkish, it stayed at 20%. then it finally changed. >> now it feels like an orchestrated parade of fed official after fed official. >> i don't know if it's them. i think it might have been that things actually happened to make people believe that this the fed might have enough nerve to finally do it. they tried to jawbone it.

it stuck down at 20. >> that's why they're now in a dangerous position. they've done the jawboning. >> we were saying they got to raise in march two weeks ago. they should have then. how come no one believed it back then? >> because when you bump your head into a brick wall for eight years again and again. >> now they got cover, i think. >> i think so too. let's talk about a little fundraising news this morning. lyft now reportedly seeking to raise $500 million in a new round of fundraising that would value the ride-hailing startup between $6 billion and $7 billion. just a tiny fraction of uber's valuation, which i think is at about $70 billion now. reports say lyft has hired catalyst partners, the boutique investment bank, to assist in the efforts. lyft investors include alibaba and general motors. also, yahoo! ceo marissa mayer will forego any stock bonus she might get this year

because of the massive data breach the company suffered back in 2014. the board is also withholding her 2016 annual bonus of about $2 million for the same reason. under mayer's contract, her stock award is not to be less than $12 million per year. the breach affected data belonging to at least 500 million users. yahoo!'s general counscil is alo resigning and will get no payout. carl icahn is selling the form former trump taj mahal. the price hasn't been disclosed. the buyers plan to invest $300 million to renovate and reopen the casino. president trump opened the casino in 1990 but lost control in a bankruptcy filing. icahn, who also owns the tropicana, says he only wants to operate one casino. >> here's the question. will they rename it? will they call it the trump taj mahal, which i believe they

own the license to the name, or do you make it the hard rock? >> it's going to be the hard rock, i would assume. the hard rock is looking to build this casino in north jersey. on election day, they voted down -- new jersey voters said, no, you can't put casinos anywhere but in atlantic city. >> what are the prospects for casinos in atlantic city? that's the big question. >> it's always been tough. >> very tough. i don't know if it's gotten any better, the prospects down there. there's like room for one. there's one really good one. >> the borgata. >> it's the nicest. i don't know if it makes money. what was the other one? there was a beautiful one. they spent a fortune. what is it now? >> i don't know. >> it's gone, i thought. p it's empty. >> if you could get your act together, that city. they got the boardwalk, the

ocean, gambling close to new york city, incredible history. i don't know what the problem is. it's tough. it's tough down in atlantic city. i've been there i think once. when you walk outside in las vegas, you have one feeling. when you walk outside the hotel in atlantic city, you think you're in vegas because you're in like a casino. you're definitely not in las vegas. >> the promise was always supposed to be the city would get cleaned be up i tby the cas and the revenue being there. that's never taken place. >> good place for like an hbo series, i think. a lot goes on there. >> do you know the board game based on atlantic city? >> a board game? monopoly. >> every one of the properties is a street in atlantic city. >> we do know that. >> do you know they don't sell the iron anymore? if you love being the iron to move around. thimble is gone. >> why is that?

>> because it's old-fashioned. they got rid of the iron. >> that i did not know. >> got rid of the thimble. just happened recently. >> two things you use frequently, the iron and thimble. >> and it's an iron that's not like one you plug in. >> in this digital age when we're talking about snapchat, to people play on an ipad now? >> we still have the board game. >> i don't know what's going on. >> i always liked risk. you know who i want to be now? russia. i thought that would be good for you today. >> yes, mr. sessions. when we come back, he's been dubbed the internet's own cheerleader. reddit co-founder joins us to talk about his entrepreneurial successes, his fight against anti-piracy legislation, and his love for his fiance, serena williams. that interview is next. and then, house majority leader kevin mccarthy joins us with his reaction to the president's address to congress the other night and what's going on with the gop agenda when it comes to policy changes. right now, though, as we head to a break, take a look at the u.s. equity futures.

things are flat this morning after the dow finally crossed 21,000. actually, i shouldn't say finally. it got there in 24 trading sessions. that's a record. "squawk box" will be right back.

top democrats are demanding attorney general jeff sessions resign immediately. this follows news he met with the russian ambassador to the united states during the 2016 presidential campaign. nbc caught up with sessions as he was leaving his house this morning. >> well, i have not met with any russians at any time to discuss any political campaign, and those remarks are unbelievable to me and are false. i don't have anything else to say about that. >> what about the calls to recuse yourself from your agency's probe -- >> well, i've said that whenever it's appropriate, i will recuse myself. there's no doubt about that. >> all right. we will have kevin mccarthy on i think in about ten minutes. >> we can talk about that.

>> i want to know whether there was any -- you know, people may have known there was something going along here. it's interesting. >> in terms of the timing. >> yeah. in the meantime, let's get you caught up on the other stories front and center. president trump weighing in this morning on the stock market's record run, including yesterday's surge to record highs for all the major averages. in a tweet he just put out, the president said, since november 8th, election day, the stock market has posted $3.2 trillion in gains and consumer confidence is at a 15-year high. live by the markets, die by the markets. we'll see where it all goes. hopefully he'll be right. in the meantime, american express is ramping up the battle for the high-end credit card customers. it's adding new perks to its platinum card, including access to more airport lounges. it's also raised its annual fee by $100 to $550. it's faced increasing competition in recent times by jpmorgan, chase, citi, and

others. we were talking about that reserve card a couple weeks ago. that's gained a lot of customers in the past couple months. also, the labor department is now out with its weekly initial jobless claims report in about an hour. expecting 245,000 new claims for last week. that would be unchanged from the prior week. new exxonmobil ceo darren woods introduced himself to wall street yesterday at the company's analyst meeting. here's what he told us about the impact that the sanctions against russia could have on exxon's exploration business in that region. >> when you look around the globe, another key place has been russia. i realize with the united states, with what we've done with russia, it has cut down your ability to be able to reach some of those assets. what's your prognosis? where do you think we're headed in terms of our relationship with russia and what that means for exxonmobil? >> well, i don't really have a view or a prognosis on the relationship between our countries at that level. we have a mix of businesses in russia. we have a very successful business on the east coast that

is not affected by the sanctions. we continue to invest and manage. the sanctions have affected some of the arctic and deep water work that we were doing. we're right now at a standstill. we're complying with all the sanction requirements. as and when the government decides to take action, we'll be in a position to respond and hopefully look at some of the data we've collected as part of that initial activity up there. >> your predecessor, rex tillerson, obviously is running the state department there. that has all kind of people wondering what's going to happen with his relationship with russia. he's obviously spent a lot of time with putin and with russia negotiating for some of those things. do you think it makes it more likely that sanctions are relieved because it's rex tillerson? >> my own personal view, having worked with rex for many years, is rex is going to make the decision which is best for our country. his personal circumstances for where he was in the past, i have no doubt that's not going to play in on his decision making.

>> have you spoken to him at all since he's been confirmed as secretary? >> he's been pretty busy, and i've been pretty busy. >> i should take that as a no. obviously you've been with this company for 25 years. >> i have. >> you're only 51 years old. you've had a lot of time to be here. you were still put in this job a little sooner than you might have expected because of mr. tillerson's movement with these things. who do you turn to if you have any questions on something? >> i have a great board. we have a very experienced and knowledgeable, diverse board, all very, very supportive. lots of conversation serving on the board. they've been very supportive. any questions i've got, any perspective i'm looking for, they're my first stop. >> and sir, if you're looking at your legacy for where you want the company to go under you, you come after -- you're stepping into some big shoes to fill, i guess i should say, after the last couple of ceos who have spent quite a lot of time there

and put their mark on it. is there a mark you would like to make on exxon? >> it's not my mark i'm looking to do. the way i think about it, and i've used this analogy before, it's like a relay race. i can get handed the baton. i'm starting where i'm starting based on the hard work of the people before me. my job is to take that baton and advance it as far as i can, as fast as i can. that's what i'm focused on. >> you expect you'll be here until 65, retirement age? that's a long runway. >> i haven't even thought about that. i'm just focused on how do we grow the most value for the shareholder and stay after it. >> we'll have more from darren woods coming up in the next hour. okay. let's talk about social media. the internet. they call themselves the front page of the internet media forum. reddit continues to clean up some of the site in recent years, cracking down on the offensive comments and hate speech in user forums, but also taking all sorts of positions. we want to welcome the co-founder of reddit. also the co-founder of

initialize the capital, ama, ask me anything. we're going to call this an ama session, if you will. i've got a million questions. before we start, today, as you know, i've been putting on my snap glasses. i'm curious where you stand on snap as a vehicle in the social world. >> i'm very bullish on snap. i've talked to a lot of folks over the last year and a half, reengaging with reddit, it's clear there's a lot of interest in this product because it has engagement numbers that everyone else dreams of. it's finally put together mobile and video in a way that actually has people paying attention. right now brands are trying really hard to get in front of people through silent videos that auto play while you scroll past them. they count three seconds as a view. that's hardly influencing someone. once snap develops the business side of a formidable product -- >> as an investor, is this something you would buy? >> i'd be long on snap.

>> do you own a stake in it now? >> not yet. >> did you buy into -- >> you might today? >> yeah. i did not buy into the friends and family round mostly because i'm focusing on enough things with reddit. >> did you get involved in twitter or facebook? >> no, and i was actually pretty famously bearish during facebook's ipo. you can find the footage somewhere of me poo-pooing it, obviously not related to the trauma the stock had at the onset. it feels to be similar to facebook where there's a ton of engagement. it feels like there's all this momentum because everyone is pouring in to see what's going to happen. they just need to figure out the business side of it. i think like facebook, they eventually will. >> you took some pretty outspoken positions around net neutrality a couple years back. we have a new fcc commissioner. we have a new president, new administration, which may be taking the opposite view. what do you think is going to happen here? >> you know, i'd be really -- i'd be really disappointed.

the ambitions for net neutrality, the promise of net neutrality is the free market chooses the winners and losers, not cable companies. i really hope we do, even with the new administration, have people who believe in that and want to support that. >> although, it's not necessarily about the free market. it's about saying that everybody has to be able to be given all you want to run through the network. i get it. i can understand if you're building the toll road why you might want to collect a toll on it. >> and i think we've seen options so far where we've actually been able to give consumers and these limited number of cable companies equal amounts of choice and freedom. the key goal for me, though, is to make sure that we have an open internet where some upstart sitting in a dorm room has just as good of a shot of building the next snapchat as the income it does of succeeding. that's the part i really want to maintain. the way that we stay competitive, the way that we as a country become or continue to be global leaders in tech is that a new upstart can win

because it's better, not because they've made a deal with one of a handful of cable companies. >> just take the devil's advocate position on this. let's say you're comcast, parent company of this network. you're netflix. you're pouring a lot of data over it. you might pay for that. by the way, at that point, to pour all that information through, you're probably relatively successful, meaning the startup is probably not going to be pouring that amount of information until they've reached a point of success, at which point they might have money to pay for it. >> well, i think -- >> does that make sense? >> yes. i think the chicken and egg problem is if our cable bills are any indication, a tiered internet is what we would see in the future. so your basic internet package might involve netflix and that's part of your, you know, 49.99 a month. if you wanted to use the upstart video streaming service, which doesn't have that relationship, maybe that costs you an extra $30 a month. it's part of a premium package. >> what about scaling back on net neutrality where you can't cut deals with the big guys so

you can still get paid for the amount of data going over the network? >> i think this where this comes to a common ground so we can have the flourishing new entrants and not let incumbents get sweetheart deals. >> what bothers me is you can have all the usage want for a network. when i saw how much data streams over the network, i thought, wow, they should be paying for this. i get the idea you don't want sweetheart deals, but if you're using massive amounts of the system setup, i think you should be paying for it along the way. >> well, i think there is going to be a way this nets out that doesn't punish consumers based on their choices. i don't want to have to pay more for the electricity for my tv if it's a sony versus a samsung. at the end of the darks ay, all care about is how much energy i'm using. >> different question. silicon valley culture. we had this uber story recently in terms of the discrimination going on inside. it was a bad story.

what do you think is happening here? >> well, i mean, i think this is an important time for tech. i think we have long had a lot of things to work on and frankly be better at. our company is reddit. we have an amazing people, culture, and team. our head of talent, katelyn has done an amazing job. we know, like every company in tech, that things have to be better. there's already a stigma that keeps out great people from joining our industry. we don't succeed unless we have great people. >> the reddit question, we hear these stories about people trying to buy up popular user names. you foe what iknow what i'm doi? pretending to be native people to do advertising. how do you stop that, and how big a problem is it? >> it is not nearly a very significant problem, in part because a lot of the tools these same people use are pretty

easily thwartable on our end. we have an anti-evil team. >> what's an anti-evil team? >> they do everything to help. they're smart of our smartest engineers who help curb spammers to harassers to these cheaters who want to game the system. it's always an arms race, but we do a pretty great job snuffing folks out. we're always improving that system. >> final question, because we talk about the trump administration all the time. the relationship between silicon valley and washington, is it going to get better, worse? what's going to happen? >> i even said this during president obama's administration. i think we as an industry need to do a better job talking to washington. i think historically we've done it from afar and not actually taken the time to come humbly as educators and as sort of collaborators. but again, i want to see how the rhetoric lines up with the actions. i want to see things that are going to be best for all of the american economy. >> okay. thank you for being here. we should say, you're getting

married soon. >> yeah, before the end of the year. >> to someone we know, serena williams. >> amazing woman. >> someone we love. >> and her sister is going to be here tomorrow. >> do you know serena? >> i've met her once, but i don't know her well. plus, we need to get you a new sponsorship. you're wearing adidas sneakers today. she's nike. >> that's okay though. >> i was a sneaker head before we met. it's certainly been a perk in the relationship. but you know, if we can make adidas happen, i'm down. likewise, i'd love to see you come on reddit talk about "billions." >> we'll do an ama. >> can you play? >> i've never picked up a racket. i'd never even watched a match before a few years ago.

i don't even play ping-pong. >> okay. alexis, great to see you. thank you. >> thank you. when we return, house majority leader kevin mccarthy joins us. we're going to talk taxes and policy changes next. futures at this hour have been in the red most of the morning. just barely.

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the vision for america. house majority leader kevin mccarthy saying the republican party does not distinguish between race, religion, or political status. kevin mccarthy joining us now. that's the intro i read. i don't know. i want to start -- so ryan had to sit up there with the blue

tie and the flag, and pence had a blue tie on. so it was red, white, and blue up there. that left you to be like walking around with president trump. that was a pretty good role for you. initially, i said, oh, my god, he's secret service and leader. how did you like that walking in the other night? you were front and center, my man. >> i get that role by being majority leader. we were kind of teasing paul and the vice president, both wearing blue ties, thinking that the president was going to wear a red tie. and the president did not. >> okay. let's start with -- i would love to talk about the speech. >> it was a great speech. >> but we can't because lo and behold, this story came out right the day after everybody was feeling pretty good about things and optimism. i'll be darned. suddenly this thing comes out. my question is, do you know if this was around for weeks and weeks? i've heard some people say that

maybe -- i mean, if it happened in september, people knew that sessions probably met with the russian ambassador. do you know if this was around and then just leaked yesterday or today or whenever to just put a damp per er on things? >> i don't know when it was around. it is out there that obama individuals have been pushing different articles around. the president did do a very good speech, regardless of what party you believe in. i watched what van jones said about him, that he became america's president. >> unbelievable. >> it was moving. i don't know from television, but when he talked about ryan giving his life and his widow there, i was brought to tears. it was a moving experience. >> let's get back to the news of the day. i like the way you did that though. so secretary sessions this morning said i never talked about -- he's changed it a little. i've never talked about the campaign with the russians. under oath when he said i've had no contact with them, what do

you think that meant? was that under oath, did he not remember or he was parsing it that there was no talk about the campaign? what do you think happened? they're going to make hay with this. >> they will. i think attorney general sessions needs to clarify. you've got to remember what the situation is. in the role of a senator or a congressional member, we meet with ambassadors all the time. they're saying there were these two meetings. what happens is all these ambassadors go to both conventions to understand the political process. they ask members all the time just to come in and say hi to ambassadors. i couldn't tell you which ambassadors i met at the convention. i'm not thinking that way. as his role as a u.s. senator, he's going to interact with ambassadors. so i don't know from the standpoint -- and this is what he needs to clarify. did he think the question regarded just as a role of the campaign, which he's not working

for. he has endorsed but he wasn't working for them. and that's why trs different than other situations. >> leader, are you satisfied with the answer this morning, which seemed to suggest -- i mean, he's effectively just denied it straight up and down, instead of saying, look, i misunderstood the question or i forgot that i had actually talked to this person. they've sort of parsed it in this other way. to me, i think it looks like he lied, whether he meant to or not. >> yeah, i would clarify exactly what the question was being asked and how you answered it and what these meetings were. otherwise, this will continue to bog down the role, especially of attorney general. i can see in the role of a senator interacting with an ambassador. is it because in today's age you had a meeting with an ambassador and lent your name to another campaign, there's some collusion involved? i don't believe so.

this could be an innocent situation, so don't hide from the fact. just come forward and clarify what transpired. >> do you think a special prosecutor should investigate the larger situation here? >> i don't see that evidence there yet. i'd rather have all the evidence before you make a decision like that. and that would be an independent counsel. we don't have a special prosecutor statute. right now this whole russia -- there is an investigation going on in the house and the senate through the intelligence committee. that's where it should take place. they have the documents. they have the place to have the information that could be very top secret to be able to look at and have that information. it's bipartisan, republicans and democrats, looking through that. i would wait to see from that investigation where we move forward. >> congressman, some market players that watched what the stock market did said there were not a lot of details in his speech, but it sounds like some

good things could still happen and are in the works, which comes after people are saying what's taking so long. can you give us any time frame on repeal and replace? maybe it should be called repair. i don't know. some in your party are scared. they think you need to repair this. they seem to have lost their nerve after six years of trying to repeal it. now they're losing their nerve. >> all right. don't take the democrat talking points here. i was just with the president yesterday at launch walking through where we're going. we're all on the same page here. remember, the aca is essentially two things. it is the exchanges and the expansion of medicaid. well, the exchanges have collapsed, as we all know, from the co-ops, 23 co-ops, 18 have already collapsed. one-third of the country has only one provider. there's so many problems there. this is where the president, i thought, was pretty clear. he talked about tax credits to supply to the individuals.

he talked about protecting pre-existing conditions, those under the age of 26 being protected. we have a plan. it's going to be moving next month. you'll see it, and then we'll move on to tax reform. >> after that, tax reform. okay. >> that's when you'll get excited. >> all right. maybe if you were engaged to serena we'd have more time. we don't have anymore time for you, leader mccarthy. >> i understand. >> please come back tomorrow because we got things to talk about. see you soon, leader. thanks. >> all right. thank you. coming up, stocks to watch and this morning's top business stories ahead of the opening on wall street. a programming note, tomorrow on "squawk box," commerce secretary and "squawk box" regular, wilbur ross. nice he remembers us. at pgim we help vestors see the implications of long term megatrends like the prime time of urban expansion, pinpointing opportunities to capture alpha in real estate, infrastructure and emging markets.

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coming up, we talk the trump rally and where you should be putting your money to work right now. then, the ceo of semantic will join us. plus, the cfo of kroger on the company's quarterly results. "squawk box" will be right back. what did i n't know. mind? .95 per trade?uh. and wawoeringif youbrokeragag offers some sort of guantee? and waguarantee?where we can s and coissions back if we're n happy can you offer me what swab is offering? what's wh all the questions? asyour broker there offering $6.95 online uity tres and a satiaction grantee. if you don't like their answer, k again at schwa

the markets make history again. the dow powers to 21,000 as the trump rally rolls on. a "squawk box" exclusive. exxonmobil's new ceo meets wall street. his plans for the company's global expansion straight ahead. plus, a trip down the gau e grocery aisle. kroger out with earnings. the cfo will join us as the final hour of "squawk box" begins right now. ♪ live from the most powerful city in the world, new york, this is "squawk box." good morning and welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc, live from the nasdaq

market site in times square. i'm joe kernen along with becky quick and andrew ross sorkin. after a big gain yesterday, the futures have pared. the losses today are down less than two on the dow, less than three on the s&p, less than six on the nasdaq. treasury yields, which have spiked in the last couple of sessions, are now 2.47 on the one we watch, almost 2.48 on the ten-year. okay. making headlines this morning, the biggest one, snapchat parent snap set to begin trading on the new york stock exchange today. among the stocks, shake shack under a bit of pressure. the company's earnings matching estimates. comparable store sales less than analysts were expecting. also, sales of juno therapeutics dropping. you'll hear more this half hour of our exclusive

conversation with the new exxonmobil ceo darren woods. the company's new leader is pushing ahead with new drilling, exploration, and refinery expansion. >> we're very focused on making sure we have a strong balance sheet that will allow us to take advantage of opportunities that materialize in the marketplace. >> we'll have more of this interview in just a few minutes. we'll talk the dividend at exxon, which has risen for 34 consecutive years. we'll talk to him about that later in this half hour. >> that's interesting. okay. the market surging to record highs of what are economic i indicators. steve liesman is here. >> like a great running back, this rally has proven itself to be fast and strong. it ran past 21,000 before anyone was sure if 20,000 made any sense. and yesterday's powerful rally plowed through two really tough obstacles. the chance of a fed rate hike in march has more than doubled in just the past couple days. the market has increasingly, by the way, priced in a third rate

hike this year. the fed governor joined the let's hike sooner team last night. >> with full employment within reach, signs of progress on inflation, and a favorable shift in the balance of risks at home and abroad, it will likely be appropriate soon to remove additional accommodation continuing on a gradual path. >> the stock surge yesterday also blew past concerns of weaker economic growth from the weaker consumer spending numbers and monday's bigger trade deficit. q1 gdp now tracking 1.7%, down 0.2. this number had been in the past as high as 2.3%. look at some of those big changes. the atlanta fed coming down by 0.7. march beg morgan stanley below 1% for the first quarter. right there in the middle, bank of america, moody's, and merrill lynch at 1.1%. it could be the market has become accustomed to perennial

first quarter weakness. it seems just as likely that what's driving investors is the promise of tax cuts, infrastructure spending, and deregulation from the trump administration, all of which seem more likely after tuesday night's speech by the president. but those obstacles trying to get that running back of a rally, the weaker economic growth, that may go away. still, you going to have sothe weaker dollar as well as the threat of higher interest rates. >> those are crappy numbers. do you think they're low? >> look, they're not far off -- >> soybeans? >> i don't have a soybeans excuse, joe. this is just january. this is where we're tracking. i thought 2% would have been a good number. we're now below it. some of those big revisions yesterday really got my attention. >> those numbers help explain to me why yields are still so well behaved. they got a little little well behaved. >> not if you were siltitting o

long two-year position. >> we made the point, watching all these proposals we're talking about and hearing people say the deficit is going to get blown away, it was strange watching the ten-year go back down. the other thing i wanted to talk to you about is we sat here, both of us, three weeks ago and said a march hike is absolutely called for. we were at 20%. we were looking around at everything that was happening saying, they got to do it. it's obvious they should do it and it was 20%. they tried to jawbone it. that didn't do it either. suddenly it happened. you're saying jawboning did work. the jawboning only works when it works? >> it works when it works. dudley came out with compelling -- >> what does that mean? >> it's one of them code words. >> oh, god. >> i know. it's exasperating. by the way, it was lower than 20%. it was down below 8%.

it was crazy. not only that, but the market had no belief at all in the third rate hike. if you guys could ask elizabeth to put up that december fed funds futures, i think it was running like 1.24 maybe. we're increasingly pricing in that third rate hike in december, which the market completely different believe. you have consensus in the middle, joe. it's not the hawks talking. the doves are moving toward the center when it comes to that third rate hike. do you have a theory? >> no, but with those crappy gdp numbers, maybe there is a reason not to raise. >> that's what's interesting about the rally. when you see stocks like this blow past the weaker economic growth, it tells you there's a strength to this reality. i don't think those obstacles go away, but it tells you -- not only that, but the speed is rather incredible. >> we just brought up juno therapeutics while you were

talking. anyway. >> i'm tasking the guys in the back. a little sympathy. i didn't know i was going to use this chart. there's the december pricing at 1.23. 1.37 would be a full rate hike priced in. >> you said the market had to get through some things. i love this. "financial times," wall street hits record high as they're betting on a rate hike. >> well, the one thing you do get is you get the banks. >> it's for a good reason. benefits for a good reason. i think it's a good reason. normalize things. >> exactly. >> joining us now, rich steinberg, president and chief investment officer of steinberg global asset management. admittedly, we were too conservative on our short-term estimate of the dow and the s&p move. so i figure now you're going to explain why you were not bullish enough. but then you're probably still going to be negative and think that we're overvalued right now, rich. have i got that right? we're hearing that from a lot of people like you.

>> yeah, joe, i'm not negative, but i'm just looking at this rally with a sense of healthy skepticism. >> huh. >> the gdp growth isn't there. >> you're a real outlier, rich. >> the promises in washington haven't been voted on yet. >> right. >> estimates for the s&p for this year have actually come down from 132 bucks to 130 bucks. we're trading at over 18 1/2 times estimates. i think we have a hedge on our portfolios, so we're capturing about 70% of the move and that's okay. until we get some clarity that we are going to move a lot higher, i don't think it hurts to have some risking management controls. listen, as this market has ripped, would i have preferred to have no cash and no hedge in place? absolutely. but since 1980, there have been 21 times where the market has fallen 10% intrayear and have had positive years.

so that's an important component as we look at this move up. risk can happen quickly on the way up, and it can happen quickly on the way down. >> the 10% could take you back to where you were negative when we were only up 4%. >> right, but we may have more clarity on tax issues. we may have more clarity on deregulation. >> your stock portfolio doesn't care about clarity. rich, okay, here's the other thing. out of the last 30 years, you almost never have 14 out of 15 records being set in the dow. that's a time when you would hopefully be at 150% invested, not 70% invested. it's just hard to put lipstick on that pig at this point. you might be right. maybe you're early. maybe it finally comes down. at this point, you should have been buying with both hands since november 8th. >> right, but joe, you have to also think about who we're investing for. our investors are trying to have an outcome that are either for

endowments, families. they don't want all the downside risk that could come with being overleveraged or, you know, 100% equities when a family may need cash flow and things like that to go with it. >> okay. all right. we'll check back. maybe it'll come down and everybody that comes on will get a chance. >> i don't think the market is going to have a huge crash or anything like that. i just think we need a big breather until we get clarity from washington. >> that's what we've been hearing for three months. that's exactly what we've been hearing every step of the way, rich. hopefully you don't capitulate when it is ready to go down. then that doesn't do anyone any good. anyway, we appreciate it. thank you. >> take care. when we come back, exxonmobil's new chairman and ceo meets wall street. more of our walk squawk exclusi -- "squawk box" exclusive interview with darren woods. plus, ceo call is in

session. we'll talk to semantics chief executive about cyber security. and later, the billion-dollar startup that wants to change the way you buy a home. the founder of compass will join us. stay tuned. you're watching "squawk box" here on cnbc. ♪ across new york state, from long island to buffalo, from rochester to the hudson valley, from albany to utica,

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welcome back to "squawk box." e-trade has joined its rivals in cutting commission. the firm announcing it's cut the commission to 6.95 per stock trade and that will go as low as 4.95 per trade for active investors. fidelity kicked off a new price war by cutting commissions earlier this week. that move was matched by another -- do we still call them discount houses? those three are the big ones. all morning we've been bringing you the first business television interview of exxonmobil's new ceo darren woods. woods is guiding the company on an ambitious agenda of global investment. here's what he had to say about those plans and about the exxon

dividend, which has risen for 34 consecutive years. >> one of the beauties is we have a nice balance in short-cycle investment opportunities and long cycle. we had a world-class discovery. we're looking at a phased investment where we can bring in initial early production within five years of that discovery, which is almost unheard of in our industry. as we continue to explore that block, bring on more production and continue to grow that capability. the other big opportunity that we talked about today was in papa new guinea. we had a recent acquisition, brought some additional resources to bear on that facility. we're looking at using that foundational investment we made in papa new guinea has an ability to leverage on more production and get good synergies and low-cost production out of that asset. >> you spent a lot of time in a

lot of different positions. one was as the head of ir. you were talking to the street pretty frequently, i guess. this is common ground for you. what about the cut that you saw in the credit rating from last year? it went from aaa down to aa-plus. united states is also rated aa-plus, so you're in good company. but at the time, the rating agency was looking at this saying it's partially because of continue to buyback shares. i think $54 billion at a time when debt was increasing. do you care about that? do you care about the debt, or do you care about buying back shares and keeping the dividend there? >> well, what we are very focused on is the philosophy of how we manage the business and our financial situation and position over the long-term of the business. as you know, it's a commodity business. we're going to see the ups and downs. what we're focused on making sure of is that we have a strong balance sheet that will allow us to take advantage of opportunities as they materialize in the marketplace,

whether that's through organic investments or acquisitions. our goal and the philosophy we've used to manage that have been unchanged for as long as i've been with the company, which is making sure that we have the capacity to respond as we need to, keeping a very solid financial position. of course, as you move through the market cycles, the rating agencies will take a different view, but our philosophy remains unchanged. that's what we're staying focused on. >> it's been 34 years consecutively that you've increased the dividend. is it a safe bet to think that's going to continue this year? >> we're first and foremost focused on value creation, creating shareholder value. we also recognize we've got a commitment to our shareholders and having a reliable and growing dividend. that's a commitment we take serious. >> sounds like a yes. but again, stay tuned. 34 years in a row. we'll see if this makes it 35. andrew? coming up when we return, shares of cybersecurity company

symantec up 30%. we have the ceo next. tomorrow on "squawk box," a cnbc exclusive interview. commerce secretary wilbur ross is going to join us live at 7:00 a.m. eastern time. back in just a moment. it's been over 100 years sin the first stock index wascreate, as aenchrk f average. t a lot ofeople still build portfoli with sategies at justrack the benchmarks. but investing isn't t outachiing it's about achieving goals. aninvesco liesoing that today requires translation?expertise ofhigh-co. y inst in average?

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the valuof capita to e nmorgan staey, but ingshat matt. welcome back, everybody. one in three people in the united states were victims of cyber crimes last year.

symantec says the market is a $10 billion industry and expected to grow annually. joining us now is greg clark, symantec's ceo. greg, thank you for being here today. >> thank you very much, guys. pleasure to be here. >> so we know that cybersecurity is a growing problem. it's something consumers are certainly becoming more aware of. what is happening right now and what can you do to protect people? >> so i think that, you know, a very big crisis. as you mentioned, 39% of north americans were affected by cyber crime in the past year. i think life lock is an outstanding identity protection brand. we have completed our acquisition of that and happy to report that's going well. we're really excited about bringing digital safety to our consumers with the combination of norton and life lock. we feel good about the future and driving revenue growth in our consumer business.

>> we have seen some misses when it comes to cybersecurity businesses. i wonder if there's some sort of weakness, something happening here overall to this sector. >> you know, i think that both those companies are in difficult period compares. sales execution is complicated at that period in time. we're seeing good results in our business. s -- our first quarter was a beat. last quarter was a beat. we raised the quarter we're in now. so we're having a good outlook here at symantec. i think sometimes when you're in a 30% growth cycle like some of the other companies, it's a difficult period. >> greg, you have two different components. or at least well-known brand names. one is the norton family of anti-virus things out there. one is the life lock brand you just bought. how does it work, life lock? it sounds like a really good deal.

there have been questions long in the past with life lock about how secure it was. there was a former ceo who put out his social security number and kind of challenged people, said that life lock would protect him. turns out he was hacked 12 or 13 times. how does it work now? >> yeah, so i think that was quite a long time ago. identity protection and credit fraud is something that is here and now. i think one of the great aspects of life lock is that when you talk to consumers that have been affected by identity fraud, the service is great. it has a very strong promoter score in the surveys of customers that have been affected by identity fraud love the product. we feel good about being able to take the many millions of norton subscribers and offer them identity protection through lifelock, which is the leading brand and does give a great service to people who have had, you know, identity compromise, both prevention of that and

early detection. it's very difficult to remediate identity fraud as a consumer, the hours you have to put in on the phone. lifelock is a fantastic service for people to correct those issues and clean up their identity and wipe it out on the dark web. a lot of great value there. those things you mentioned are definitely far away in the past and the company has executed extremely well. we were very pleased with fourth quarter results that we talked about in our last conference call. consumers like it. growth is good. >> all right. greg, thank you very much. part of your plans are the global expansion for lifelock. we appreciate your time and hope you'll come back. >> thank you very much. coming up, breaking economic news. minutes away from the jobless claims. we'll bring you the number. plus, kroger out with earnings. we'll talk to the cfo about this quarter and the future in a deflationary food environment. stay tuned. you're watching "squawk box" on cnbc.

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good morning. welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc. we are live at the nasdaq market site in times square. among the stories front and center aftt this hour, democrat are demanding that attorney general jeff sessions resign immediately after controversy about his dealings with russia. sessions denied meeting with russians during the course of the presidential campaign. >> well, i have not met with any russians at any time to discuss any political campaign. those remarks are unblooechelie to me and are false. i don't have anything else to say about that, so thank you. >> what about calls to recuse yourself from your agency's probe? >> well, i've said whenever it's appropriate, i will recuse myself. there's no doubt about that. in corporate news, abercrombie & fitch out with quarterly numbers. 71 cents a share for its latest

quarter, 4 cents below what the street was expecting. revenue also missing forecasts and sales declining for the 16th straight quarter. however, the company's hollister division posted its first same-store sales rise in a year. crude oil prices are falling for a third straight day. that follows a record buildup in u.s. inventories. stockpiles are at a record 520.2 million barrels. the senate is set to vote on the confirmation of ben carson as secretary of housing and urban development. that vote should happen this morning. carson is expected to win approval. and we're just seconds away from weekly jobless claims. quite a few seconds, actually. not quite a minute though. here are the futures that just now turned positive, up 16 points on the dow after gaining 300 points yesterday. the nasdaq is called down 2.5. the s&p still in the red, down a little under 2. we got up as much as about 360 points at one point yesterday and closed up about 303.

so well off the highs for the session. so the dow is actually adding to those gains again. there's the ten year. if you look at the very right-hand side, you can see there's been a move back to almost 2.5% just in the last couple of sessions. rick santelli is standing by at the cme in chicago with the numbers we're waiting for. rick, give them to us, please. >> yes, joe. last week we had 244,000. that now stands at 242. from there, drop all the way down to 223,000. so you drop 19,000. that's a pretty big drop. once again, we are flirting with levels that we haven't seen since the early '70s. the last important area we had was at 233 to 234. we have now dipped below that. on continuing claims, we're splitting hairs here. basically a bit over 2.06 million, about where it's been hovering. as i look at the landscape, you're correct to point out that

we've made a beeline from what looked like a test of 2.30 to a test close to 2.50. i think all of that needs to be put in perspective for 2017. we really have stayed in a fairly tight range, 2.30 to 2.60, at least on a closing yield basis. we settle last year at 2.44, which is about 2.5 basis points below where we're sitting right now while stocks, of course, have been on a tear. this is really the last data point today. we'll continue to watch how the digestion and equities is going. by the looks of it, by the look of the run we've had, not only is it good digestion, it looks as though investors are continuing to look forward to an equity dessert as well. joe, back to you. >> all right. one way of putting it, rick. thanks. kroger was just out with earnings, world's largest supermarket chain beating on the top and bottom lines of comparable store sales falling

more than 7%. joining us now is the cfo of kroger, also a member of the cnbc global cfo council. i bet that's not unit sales. is it again pricing was deflationary in terms of the drop? >> yeah, we certainly experienced deflation again in the quarter. it was essentially the same in the fourth quarter as the third quarter. the mix was a little bit different. deflation and grocery got a little bit less. it was still deflationary but less produce inflation ticked up almost 500 or 600 basis points. there was actually less inflation in the pharmaceutical area. so it was a mixed bag but essentially the same result. about a percent and a half deflation in the fourth quarter. >> when you talk about groceries and things, mike, when i hear deflation, usually i would think it had something to do with bumper crops or, you know, you're feeding livestock cheap stuff. who knows what goes on in live cattle and pork. that's what i would normally think. but in this case, it's really --

like walmart keeps bringing prices down more and more. you kind of have to match. is that where the deflation is coming from? >> well, we've been on a 12 or 13-year journey of continuing to offer our customers a better value. we've invested in price every one of those years. frankly, if you look at every segment of retail over any longer period of time, gross margins contract a bit as competition is always out there. so there's two types of deflation. the deflation i spoke of was our input deflation, the cost deflation. certainly pricing continues to be competitive. we build our business plan every year assuming that the succeeding year is going to be more competitive than the last. we aren't often disappointed that that's the case. it's just a fact of life in the retail industry. it's always very competitive. >> there are prospects that there's going to be some day a reflation trade and maybe commodities don't always, you know, stay weak. but you could still have deflation from what you just said, right, from -- >> you could certainly have some

product cost inflation and a situation where the retail prices don't move in tandem with that. we've had that over the course of time. the thing to think about inflation and deflation is the most difficult periods of time to manage is when product costs go from inflation to deflation and then the opposite when they start to inflate back up. those are the two most difficult periods of time for any food retailer to manage through. and we're -- it certainly feels like we're entering that period where there will be some inflation coming back, we think by the end of the year. we would be projecting some slight inflation by the end of the year. >> we see similar things happening, you know -- i've seen target mention in the same breath as what some of the supermarkets are going through in terms of just margins getting hurt from trying to compete with, you know, some of their peers that are offering even lower prices. it's been a tough environment

for kroger. things were going along swimmingly. in the last 12 to 18 months, the stock has suffered a little from this environment. what can you do? what can management do, and when is that going to change, or there it ever change with a competitor like walmart? >> well, there are several things we're doing. our corporate brand portfolio is a very strong portfolio. it had a record fourth quarter in terms of units. it was the highest share of units that we've ever had in our corporate brands portfolio. those have a slightly higher margin for us. that obviously affects the top line a little bit. one of the things we watch very closely is our tonnage. our tonnage continues to grow despite the fact that our sales and dollars were deflationary at 70 basis points negative. we had positive tonnage growth in the quarter. over time if you continue to sell more units to your best customers, it's something that you're going to be happy with over time. in fact, when with look at our customers, one of the things we focus on a lot is our loyal customers.

they, in fact, had positive i.d. sales with us in the fourth quarter. that's a huge part of the book of our business, our sales to our loyal customers. that's where we spend a lot of time and energy to continue to reward those customers on what they like to have. >> the largest in the country now. you're geographically diverse. is there more to do in terms of growing or in terms of adding stores or other chains to where you'd like to be? >> well, we get that question a lot. the way i like to answer it is we know where we have white space in the united states. there are always people coming and talking to us about joining the kroger family of companies. we typically would look at anything that's out there in our industry. one of the fundamental things we look for is a strong management team. we like them to bring something to us that's not a skill of ours. if you look at the fact that we have over 600 clickless stores today, the skill for that came from our merger from harris teether a couple years ago.

we had nonat the tie at the tim merger. they had 150 to 175 at the time. that wasn't a skill we had to learn. that came with us from that merger. those are the kind of things we look for when people come knocking on the door wanting to join the kroger family. >> i was going to ask you -- oh, do you remember -- i think if you brought back that jingle "let's go krogering." do you remember, how long was that? >> joe, i grew up in northern kentucky. i grew up going krogering just like i know you grew up in cincinnati. in fact, everybody was wondering if you were going to ask me to sing the jingle. i promised if you asked me to sing the jingle, i would do it. >> oh, i don't know if we want to do that. >> yes, we do. >> i don't want to hurt your viewership but -- ♪ let's go krogering >> the happy way to shop, was that the end? >> it was a fairly long jingle. we haven't had it for a while.

i can't do much more than the beginning. i'm getting advice to probably cut it off there anyway. >> well, your voice, that wasn't good. no. >> it was not good. i leave the singing to my wife. >> it wasn't good. >> it was not. i agree. >> any process penspects for th this year? i hear really bad things. should i even consider following them? >> well, being a native of the greater cincinnati area, i certain certainly follow them. it doesn't -- they're not having a good start to the spring. let's just put it that way. it'll be interesting to see how they do. everybody has to go through rebuilding every once in a while. i think they have some good prospects. >> all right. great seeing you today. thank you. >> thank you. coming up when we return, gary cohn's former chief of staff at goldman sachs turned ceo of a real estate unicorn. robert reffkin looking at how

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welcome back to "squawk box." treasury yields right now are -- we check the ten-year normally. 2.472. up from maybe 2.35, 2.33 a couple days ago. so now inching back towards 2.50. we're going to talk a little tech and real estate this morning. purchasing a house is one of life's toughest decisions, made even more difficult by the lack

of transparent realtime data available to buyers and sellers. joining us to talk about how technology can redirect the real estate injury, robert reffkin, founder and ceo of compass. i don't know if eldest "squawk" viewers remember this. you came on the show three years ago when you announced the company. it's now worth a billion dollars three years later. >> yeah, look, we're a technology company, and we're the only ones doing what we're doing in real estate. the real estate market is bigger than the stock market. we're building tools that allow our agents so manage and grow their business all in one place. >> did you have any idea when you started this thing that you thought this could become a unicorn? >> what we did is said what's one of the biggest segments of the economy with the least technology. that's how we identified this space. yes, our investors want to build technology in a space where there's not a lot of it and bring the promise of it to this space. >> so tell us about this new program you're trying to put

together. >> so today we're launching collections for our agents. it's a proprietary tool that nobody has. it allows an agent to work with their customers and give them a customized portfolio of listings, let them see it in a personalized feed wh. when there's a price or status change, they get notified. >> how is this different from zillow or street easy? and that brought a lot of transparency to real estate. >> we're going to focus on the end-to-end process. an aggregator is like amazon being a product where a client says i want top buy this. oh, go to that local store. we're doing everything end to end in one place so that the client can search to close all through compass. >> the reason there's not been a lot of technology there is it's a lot of small offices all over the country. is that kind of the thought behind it? >> we have 30 offices around the country. we have over 1300 agents. the average agent has increased their business 32%. so we're creating the first

national brand around real estate that brings the best of technology with the best of traditional agents. >> okay. here's the other question. there's sort of an all-star agent business, as you know. agents who have become famous, frankly, going on television and whatnot. how does the technology change that dynamic? which is to say, for compass to succeed, do you need to have these all-star agents in that way, or is it the technology unto itself which is actually going to create the value? >> so the number one agent team in the country, the person who sold the most volume last year, is leonard steinberg. he's an agent at compass. what technology allows you to do is save you time and give you, you know, a better connectivity with your clients and more insights for your clients. it helps every agent. the average agent only spends 11% of their time with clients because 89% of the time they're trying to prepare to meet with the client. we're bringing that 11% much higher by giving them tools to save them time. >> would you ever roll up other real estate agencies yourself? >> we wouldn't roll up other

real estate agencies. we're focused on a platform that'll be end to end for our own agents. ultimately in the 15 most port cities in the world, not just the united states, but london, hong kong, singapore. >> you're never going to sell this as a true program to douglas element. >> we would never sell the software in the market we're in. there is potentially a model. you don't want to have a physical footprint in a certain region, you can license it to those agents directly. >> and are the other agencies now seeing what you're doing and trying to build this themselves? >> look, it's very hard to build technology. you need an in-house team. we're the only ones that have an in-house team of technology engineers from places like google and twitter that are building this product. >> why wouldn't you sell it to other places? seems like that licensing opportunity would be huge. >> i'd rather own the transaction. you can make a lot more by owning the entire process through the transaction than just a little fee off the top. >> okay. while we have you here, just a gauge of what you think is going

on in the housing world right now. >> so one of the things that's challenging about the space is you're not able to see the realtime data. we have a market app that's a realtime data insight of what's active across all the markets we're in. what we're seeing a buyers are more interested now than they have been in the past. two reasons why. one, the stock market is at an all-time high, so people have capital that they want to invest. secondly, people believe the fed is going to increase the rates, and they want to lock in a low interest rate before the end of the year. >> meaning that there are price wars taking place, that people are willing to bid above asking price? >> in virtually every one of our markets, there's an increase of bidders coming to open houses. >> do you do a better estimate than the zillow estimate? everybody looks to find out what it is. >> you can have an estimate off public information or based off what buyers are doing with their agents. those are the kind of insights we're providing to the marketplace. >> okay. before we let you go, also, we

teased this. you used to be the chief of staff to gary cohn. did you ever think he was going to be in the white house? >> gary is an incredible businessman. he was a great boss. he was always interested in politics. so i wish him the best. i know he's going to do a great job. >> investor in compass, by the way. did he have to get rid of his stake? >> he was not an investor. >> anyway, great to see you. congratulations. really, it's great. you love those stories. >> one quick question. you said you have the top real estate guy in the country. how much did he sell? >> $600 million. >> okay. that's a good year. >> yeah, it's a good year. >> robert, thank you. when we come back this morning, jim cramer will join us live from the new york stock exchange. we'll get his take on today's top stories. check out the futures this morning. the day after the dow crosses 21,000 for the first time ever, dow futures indicated up by another 26 points this morning. s&p futures slightly lower. the nasdaq up by about one point. you're watching "squawk box" on cnbc.

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the s&p closed out february up nearly 6%. when the index gains at least 5% in the first two months, it tends to finish the year

let's get down to the new york stock exchange. jim cramer joins us now. the dow is now turned positive. jim, some people pointed out it's not that many dow stocks -- of course there were only 30 dow stocks now that i think about it. but if it's only ten dow stocks,

that somehow makes it less likely to continue, or less based on actual fundamentals or whatever. we've had like six guys on today. they've all told me it's gone too far and that until we know some details it's bound to pull back. we're getting a lot of that. i guess that's good. >> that's pretty much every day's fair. i find many people just continuing to find fault with the rally, which i will make clear is the best rally that i've had in my lifetime. so i just feel like, you know, started trading in '79, this one is the one that has the most going for it including warren buffett by the way, which people like forgot what he was talking about on monday. so, i mean, yeah, a lot of nitpicking. remember we had these people we found their investment letters and they were very, very negative, and if you fell google that went gundlach, there are many underpinnings for this market and they're not

necessarily ideological. but it's very nonconsensus to say good things. >> yeah, that's true. you know, i always blame it maybe we have a lot of sell side people, and, you know, sell side guys got to always in their back pocket have that at any given time there could be a 5% or 10% correction. they have to, or else they can't keep their job as a sell side guy, right? so they're cautiously optimistic. >> right. >> they finally stopped using that, but do you think if we had buy side guys -- mark grant has been saying buy with both hands all along. he's not considered buy side necessarily, but are those guys better, you think? or they don't need to come on and talk to us then. >> i think there are people who feel like they have to have at all times almost have to have a full position in the stock market. and they are, yes, trying to feel how much j.p. morgan to have versus how much honeywell versus how much parker hanifen

and eli lilly, but they're not going to come on tv and say things are better and we're putting a lot of money to work because that's not how it works anymore. >> we do get a lot of consensus about how great things are right before things aren't -- that's usually not a great side. >> asimilar trymmetrical, on soa you're a fool, it's tough to bet against this market. instantly i had 25 clowns saying, there it goes, that's the top. i would love to know those people what they did. because they're not going to be able to get back in very easily. >> no, it's hard. >> everybody's got immunity if they say negative things and not if they say positive things. >> what if the market continues to go up? who can still buy if it was just for argument sake say it's 22,000. who's going to step in and buy at 22,000? nobody. >> well, you have to find the stocks within 22,000. i saw becky's interview with the ceo of exxon, there's an upgrade of exxon today.

exxon is not a bad company if you think oil can go to $60. so you have to look. you have to look. yesterday there were stocks like broadcom, which frankly looked -- is not an expensive stock. i was saying to people you got to buy, got to buy and it's up ten points. and it's like, hey, i think it's got another 25 to run. but people look and say, wait a second, that was at 100 one day, we can't touch it. you can't think like that. you can't look at where it's been. you got to think about where it's going to. >> banks, wells fargo's all the way back to where it was before. this is on the prospects of a possible rate hike. we still haven't even gotten them. >> right. i mean, look, that is the biggest worry is if we only do one rate hike that would be -- these stocks are overvalued. but if you look at j.p. morgan sells at 14 times earnings a growth stock with a great balance sheet. why is it selling at 14 with a growth stock great balance sheet? because it's being mispriced. but to say something like that after it wasn't 50 a year ago is to look like, you know, you missed it. but sometimes you have to just say in 1982 you didn't miss as

much as you thought off the '81 bottom. >> do you think that the day will come -- and we got to go, but let's say this is just total conjecture and i don't think it at all, let's say the russian thing gets very serious and very interesting where you're actually starting to wonder about some existential threat because democrats have already used the i-word. they're using it a lot. do you think the market would selloff on the prospects of trump not being president? >> would i pay less for eli lilly for that -- >> no, you know but there may come a day where people think if we lost him it might be bad for the market. >> then we have a chance to get in at last, could we get a little chance? float some russian stuff and get in? from russia with love when they do that, my friend. >> get andrew to worry if he leaves -- >> is andrew worried? >> thanks, jim.

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house minority leader nancy pelosi demanding jeff sessions resign immediately. >> i would clarify exactly what the question was being asked and how you answered it and what these meetings were. otherwise this will continue to bog down especially in the role of attorney general. but i can see as a role of a senator interacting with an ambassador. but is it in today's age because you had a meeting with an ambassador and somehow you lent your name to another campaign there's some collusion involved? i don't believe so. >> i was looking around, there are headlines everywhere, democrats demanding sessions' resignation, elizabeth warren, nancy pelosi. and i was thinking, wow, that seems strong at this point. but then i realized last week it was some democrats were demanding impeachment of trump.

when you do it -- when you're yelling that much, the yelling gets less significant. >> well, there have been centeri centrist democrats arguing -- >> it's an oxymoron, i guess. >> anyway, join us tomorrow. right now it's time for "squawk on the street." ♪ big day for snap inc., the parent of snapchat making its wall street debut at the big board. biggest tech ipo on a u.s. exchange since 2014. we're going to cover all the bases including the opening trade. good thursday morning. welcome to "squawk on the street." i'm carl quintanilla with jim cramer, david faber at the new york stock exchange. stocks look to build on some more records, perhaps, after the s&p's best day of the year on explosive volume. europe is mostly green. yields around 2.46. jobless claims hit a new 44-year low. roadmap begins