money" faithful have spoken. the winner is, very tight match -- guy! >> unbelievable! >> unbelievable! >> congratulations, guy. >> guy wins again. my mission is simple, to make you money. i'm here to level the playing field for all investors. there's always a bull market somewhere and i promise to help you find it. "mad money" starts now. hey, i'm cramer, welcome to "mad money," welcome to cramerica. other people want to make friends, i just want to make you money. reality. reality keeps confounding the bears.

reality keeps going things that aren't supposed to happen and don't shy to a supposedly negative scenario. today's stunningly good news flow finally put an end to the dow's losing streak, s&p climbing.34%. nasdaq climbing 0.43%. bears love to growl. give them some honey, meaning bad news, and they are in heaven. but this market's real short of honey. instead it's filled with swarming killer bees. good news for the bulls, and as soon as they get enough collective stings, what do they do? they head for the hills. what were today's bee stings that took our minds off washington where the yogis and bullies keep struggle to repeal obamacare? for starters there's today's

consumer confidence level, which rocketed to the best reading since 2000. this is a tough number for the bears to believe, because is bears decided the reason why things were going north was because of the swamp. i've said over and over again that while trump's responsible for a part of the advance, there's so much other good stuff that's happening away from the president, away from washington, and the most important thing that trump has accomplished so far, is to deregulate and overregulate an economy. i'm not trying to be political here. it's simply that all movements go too far, when obama took over from bush, i believe we were massively under regulated and many of those regulators were

asleep at the wheel. eight years later, we have corrected too far in the other direction. in this sense, trump's giving investors exactly what flay want and that's ambrosia for the stock market. remember, the bears are saying speaker ryan, is going to confound tax cuts so badly that nothing happens, which now seems to be the man's m.o. ryan's plan will be as uneffective will taxes as it was with health care. what matters much more is that trump's rolling back regulations, in a way that emboldens businesses, which is exactly what that blast off number is measuring. another thing that's confounding the bears here, some stocks refuse to roll over and play dead. take tesla, the big wrap against

tesla is that it makes great cars, but it didn't make any money. that's why tesla keeps losing. but something happened this morning that basically ended the bear thesis, done, 10 cent, the gigantic paying 1.7 billion for -- tencents has enough catch to make enough money until it produces its goal of making 500,000 cars a year. i don't see how the sho tencent determines whether tesla make it or not. the automaker who is compete with tesla, ford just missed it's quarter, it's stock it was

down, as well as the stock gainer gm, but this morning, david iborn has taken a take in gm. einhorn has a point there, general motors estimates are lower than the s&p 500. it's been a bad thing for the bears, autonomous driving, people not getting cars like they used to, all that stuff. but now that einhorn is in, i think the easy short may be over. i know that lots of people are thinking tesla's about to roll over, but that got stung by wasps all over the place, first r red hat comes online, putting up the best numbers everybody, one investor says it's breathtaking, it could end up another 200

billion worth of revenue. read throughs, amazon's web service business must be booming, credit to microsoft's cloud. you have to be bullish if you think there's more technology spending out there than anyone, even the most uber bulls expected, red hat which at times has been inconsistent, i think it can still go higher. how about apple? i know a bunch of wise guys that were laying down shorts when the stock was took at $150, it's got to roll over, isn't that what's got to happen? a piece that talked be the new iphone supercycle, the possibility of new service revenue streams and this embeddedness that could send the

stock up 20% to 30% in the next two to three years. even though this is the largest capitalization stock, the shorts got squeezed. me? i say own apple, don't trade it. apple's got all it's own coat tails. they've got all this like a charged tire rolling over the bears. and the newly public company behind snapchat, talking about how successful it is. today facebook released statement -- competitives are doomed to a lifetime of disappointment and sadness. suddenly snap doesn't seem like as much of a snap as it was yesterday. remember, by the way the principle reasons why so many kids use snap, because the parents can't see the images. there's been a big brouhaha of

late, facebook adding ads next to psychological programs. does snap -- something that you and i are allowed to see, is that better than google? so facebook jumped on snap. the consumers tapped out. you hear that one lately? that had lots of people pairing against darden, but it made a $780 million acquisition of stock's chairman. who are we to be short. aberration? no, not when you review the quarter that carnal cruise just posted, the company is not wallowing in disappointment even though paul ryan let down on a seven year promise. and also buying furniture, restore ration harbor with big numbers, something we thought

could happen when we did a piece last week that said there was massive buying there. finally there's bonds, oil and energy. this morning we saw an actual bond auction in germany, there was only demand for 3 billion euros, and that's what's driving our rates down royal? some rumors about cuts, commoditi commodities, a key measure of -- believe me, after eight straight down days from the dow, the bears should are realized something might be afoot. maybe they're too busy reading trump's tweets to draw the conclusion that washington is out of control. perhaps it's time to unfollow the president, stay focused on the facts, unless that is, you

don't want them getting away with the negative story that's endlessly driven into our heads by every single pundit in business media today. michael in my home state of new jersey, michael? >> boo-yah. >> boo-yah, what's going on, michael? >> the stuff that the president put out where he's getting rid of regulations on methane. i think justin is totally a victim of the weather, remember, who thought we would have the warmest winter every, other than people who actually believe in climate change. >> troy in new jersey. >> quick question about american airlines, with low fuel costs, they just actually recently took a $200 million stake in china

airlines, and warren buffett also supports it at 2.1 billion. that travel trust, i told club members, i like southwest air better, but i think american is absolutely terrific. but our symbol of love is a stock that i love, and love, is not for sale. there's just not enough honey for the bears in this market. if they just stick to the facts, they'll realize it. and tonight, i'm diving deep into the trends that are impa impacting your dollars, it's a consumer stock showcase night. i'll see if this wall street stunner can keep heading higher. and the company behind timeless treats like ho-hos, and twinkies. and general mills is giving us everything from cheerios to the

pills bury dough boy, so stick with krarmer. cramer.

let me change it up a little here. going to spend some time talking tonight about the new habits of the consumer, and this is the snap, selfie, instagram health and wellness era. let's kick it off about este lauder, the huge global beauty company that has makeup and fragrance brands caught a bullish report from jpmorgan. with an overweight and a $100

price target. so is el really a $100 stock simply masquerading for a $80 stock in how do we figure out if this stock deserves to go higher? on the one hand we know that the beauty segment is riding a powerful long-term theme here, the rise of social media and the selfie that nobody wants to go outside without their makeup on les they be caught in a bad picture that all their friends can see onliner are? este lauder has not been a big performer. so of course the stock price is lagging, up just 30% over the last five years, the larger markets up 58% over the last five years. maybe the analysts are on to something.

let me summarize jpmorgan's argument. then i'll give you my own take on the story. first of all, like i just mentioned, jpmorgan, like este lauder is a giant of the beauty industry. snap, instagram, which of course is parent facebook and also go pro, they all come to mind. este lauder creates more demand for all sorts of cosmetics, which matters, since 40% of este lauder's saems sales come from the -- este lauder has a vast scale, giving the company plug and play acquisitions. this company is by far the largest premium player in the whole category.

and premium players are growing faster than their market competition. isn't that interesting? people really want the best when it comes to this category. remember the company snapped up the popular two faced makeup line for $1.4 million, it's largest acquisition ever, esti lauder knows how to buy a brand with a large following, which in turn helps to bolster the company's growth going forward, they have fabulous salespeople. fabulous, and third, kind of on the fence, jpmorgan says the -- mall traffic seems to be on a death spiral, and retail stores are aggressively closing all across the country. este lauder gets business from macy's, a chain -- kind of intellectual here. they say that the macy's store

rationalization plan could only turn out to be a positive for t etse lauder, the stores seem to be closinga carried high costs, including selling space and trained beauty salespeople. and este lauder covered some of those costs themselves. by closing stores you're getting rid of meager sales. jpmorgan says that the weakness in department stores can be offset by the specialty department stores. like ultra beauty, who made a gigantic deal with este lauder to launch the mac brand on its website, suddenly you can give the u.s. brand a real boost, because i think it's going to go

national. right now este lauder gets 30% of its sales from emerging markets and analysts believe that these new market will grow faster than the rise in the global middle class. this is happening faster than most people realize, that's why people are buying fancy makeup in places they weren't. the company does have some of the highest sales, general and administrative expenses in this space, not to mention a gigantic marketing budget. while the next closest competitor spends only 8% on marketing. and este lauder eats some of the costs for department store giants. and we know este lauder has more -- there are some real

risks here today, this is a company that gets 86% of its sales overseas. you can read my mind, strong dollar, bad for the bottom line. if the rest of the world starts to improve, then the rest of the world is going to continue using the green back. as the european sales would translate back into more dollars and their goods would become relatively cheaper than those made across the atlantic. i think it's important to look at este lauder's results. when it reported in november, este lauder recorded a quarter that businesses liked, posted a small revenue mist. the next quarter and the full year was weaker than the analysts had been hoping for. but despite these set backs,

investors willing to look mast the -- sales and earnings growth to accelerate in the second half of its 2017 fiscal year, which has already begun. tested against organic growth, price increases, which are fine and the strength of its recent acquisitions. okay so not organic, but we'll take it. we're worried about store traffic, the fact is that two of este lauder's store brands are picking up speed, especially overseas. the skin care business, this is the one that's really crushing me, it's still weak, although it returned to positive growth this pea quarter. you know hong kong has been in tough shape. chinese gambling, if that's taking off, maybe este lauder

can be a good read through, meanwhile the company's economy is accelerating, este lauder continues to innovate with their products and they're aggressively trying to expand its products into fast growing retail space. i think management told the first really good story in years. here at $85, the stock is not particularly expensive versus history, trades 23 times next year's estimates. it wouldn't be cheap up there, but at premium multiple makes sense given how fast it's growing. so here's the bottom line, i could easily see este lauder going to $100, thanks to the terrific leadership of a true inspirational ceo, fabrizio schrader, and the way he's

trying to help the company benefit from this boom. plus more "mad money," it's a special edition, can it offer cream filling for your portfo o portfolio? i'll reveal my next consumer stock showcase. then does your portfolio need some wheaties or cheerios or some lucky charms? and turn off netflix and get out of the house, online companies that are worth getting off the couch for and could help you make some money. so stick with cramer.

my business was built with passion... but i keep it growing by making every dollar count. that's why i have the spark cash card from capital one. with it, i earn unlimited 2% cash back on all of my purchasing. and that unlimited 2% cash back from spark means

thousands of dollars each year going back into my business... which adds fuel to my bottom line. what's in your wallet? this isn't your average food fight. which stock will generate the

most heat. and when the big goods rise, who will have to get out of the kitchen? >> tonight we're focused on the ways and the fis sis tuds of the american consumer. there are always recidivists, people who didn't get the memo and still eat real bad food, at least, well, if you take a look, this pyramid is very popular. and it's made of unnatural and inorganic food and it shows you that people at times will deviate from kale smoothies and will go into the food group if you want to stress the -- america's packaged food company went bankrupt over five years ago, it garnered a ton of attention. people thinking twinkieings might vanish from shelves never to be seen again.

hostess is back, let's get reacquainted with the company that -- when i say timeless, i mean these things are stuffed with so many preservatives that they would make perfect fallout shelter food. first of all the new hostess has been red hot, this thing became public in a weird way, this was bought -- changed it's name to hostess brands, since the stock started trading on november 7 at $12, rising to $15 as it is today. 23% gain just for 2017, so is this pyramid of food worth owning? i got to tell you, this is one tough call. before we get into details, let me give you some history. we know what hostess of hold was often a troubled business.

the hostess brands were following in the tradition of the old continental bakeries. they filed bankruptcy in 2004, when the company came back it changed it's name to hostess brands, but after streamlining its business, it wasn't long until the company went bankrupt again in january of 2012. breaking the darn company apart, liquidate all of it. flour has approved most of the -- much of the rest going to a pair of other bakeries. the key asset, though, the hostess brand snacks that everybody loves was bought by a joint venture group that was created by apollo global

management. almost immediately after this purchase, the new owners got to work bringing hostess operations back online, by june of 2013, they were making twinkies again. the new owner cut back the now nonunionized workforce. in may of 2014, the investors brought in william taller, he's an industry veteran who served advanced pierre foods and was the ceo of pinnacle foods which became hostess. the company is focusing on innovati innovati innovations, then in june of 2016, hostess announced it was acquiring superior cake products as part of a move to expand beyond its traditional offerings into more premium, more freshly baked foods? as hostess bided its time as a private business, it's private equity owners engaged in let's call it some financial engine

engineering, they took out $1.5 milli million. the interest on some of this paper was as high as 7.7%. this is what happens quite often in the world of private equity. the next step for these guys is to cash out by running the company in question into the public markets. and all of this is fine. sure enough, last july, we learned that apollo and d metropolis was selling a special acquisition, gores group for $2.3 billion. the transaction itself was complicated, but you need to know that the deal required hostess to take on more debt, also giving gores almost $30 million more to buy shares, that means the share count is -- following the transaction,

apollo metropolis was still part of the majority. finally they also set up a tax receivable agreement, i told you it's very complicated, which basically allows early investors, to monetize some of the tax benefits held by hostess after it's years of losing money. great for the private equity investors, the deal was approved on november 4, by the 7th, hostess brands was trading under twnk. in late november, the company uses it's newly public status to refinance much of the high interest debt at higher levels. the company posted yet another strong quarter, although management said that the growth could slow down to single digits later this year. it's not that expensive, trading 21 times it's earnings

estimates. meanwhile hostess products is accelerating, and they have all those in the hands of a private equity firm, perhaps instantly creating 30 million shares of stocks. the private equity holders can unload part of their position, that's never good for a newly acquired stock. i'll admit that hostess, the company seems to be doing pretty well here, but there's so many ways that the private equity guys who brought this business back from the dead, could enrich themselves at the harm of the company's shareholders. i don't mean that as a criticism of the firms. they have to do what they have to do. they have to make money for their investors, they are doing the right thing, but this is pretty much standard operating procedure in their industry. but this private equity factor can cause all kinds of problems

down the road. that's why my take away is simple, if you really like hostess, i think you'll love flowers foods, flo. most of the bread brands that hostess sold back in 2013, flo has a much cleaner balance sheet, even though it's a $4 billion company, and flowers has been reporting strong results and coming from a couple of weaker than expected reports earlier this year. flowers is also cheaper, 18 times earnings, paying a dividend of a 3.3% yield. as much as i like what hostess brand has been doing, i would sigh car rosing, this story has still got a ton of private equity baggage, makes me leery

of investing here. and let me just tell you, it's much less risky and mostly certainly better for you. but you just forget how good they are. i've got a big dinner tonight. miles in missouri, miles? >> what's up? boo-yah, jim. >> boo-yah, miles, how are you doing? >> i'm doing fantastic, how are you? >> i don't know, i just had a twinkie, i feel terrific. >> nothing better than a twinkie, they're hard to find. >> they're coming back, same with the donette, it's all coming back, better than for you than ever. >> i'll keep my eye out. >> what's up? >> i got a question, are beer stocks soaring or what's up with all the out of the country people buying up all the american beer manufacturers? like budweiser and coors? is there something i'm missing?

>> bud got bought because there were some better operators who took care of it and made a lot of money. i like bud stocks, i saw a consolation brand down graded today, i would like to buy that stock under $160. when it comes to hostess, they got a lot of products but they're not as investors as flowers food, which is regarded as much less risksy. general mills has been unloved in thor market as of late, but could it still be crisp or is it too soggy, and could unlimited br bread sticks be the next big thing in consumer marketing?

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we're plumbing the depths of the consumers appetite tonight and to do that we have to examine the other side of the trade. many investors think there's a

slowdown in store because of the recent rise in interest rates. the banks are leading the market higher after we learned that there's going to be two more hike this is year. but i'm not clairvoyant, hey, it happened to ibm. how do we as investors deal with the fact that nobody's perfect and protect ourselves? one word, diversification, even if you have tremendous conviction that the economy is soaring, you should have one stock in your portfolio that will thrive in times of slowdown. we're talking about good space, especially the high yields will keep chugging along, regardless of the agenda. that's why we're taking a closer look at a really unloved stock, general mills, gis, with the help of larry williams, the almost mythical technician who's been trading futures,

commodities and stocks for more than 50 years, williams is a legend. he's written nearly a dozen books, created a dozen technical indicators and he's got his own website where he teaches people to become better traders. i really trade.com. when williams tells us he likes something as he did with cosco in october, when it traded at 150, now it's at 166 after touching 178 not too long ago, when no one liked it, that always makes me want to do some digging and williams likes general mills here. he likes it so much that he even owns some for his retirement account, that's a statement. his reasoning, first of all, take a look at the long chart of general mills going back to 2015, williams started with an assumption that a major food conglomerate like this one will have both seasonal and cyclical

patterns, so he went looking for patterns here and he found two major ones, a 125-day cycle and a 425-day cycle. and he consolidated these two charts and this chart predicts where this stock is going to go in the future. this chart has been a good indicator of where general mills has been. and it's going to have a general bounce, and a major pull back and off to a major rally sometime this summer. in short, williams sees the stock headed higher in the foreseeable future. let's bring a little fundamental analysis into the chart picture. we know that general mills has a gigantic international business, which means that these brands are somewhat hostile to the u.s. dollar.

rising interest rate also hurt it's share prices. i mention this because the dollar strength or weakness is generally coordinated with our interest rates. and remember, interest rates have come down. that's why williams decided it would be a good idea to look at general mills in the light of dollar index. take a look at this chart of general mills with the dollar index in blue underneath it. the dollar index does have some influence on general mills stock price, right? more specifically, the dollar index seems to predict general mills' action. the dollar is pushed forward 160 days, both when that's when williams found the relationship and it makers for a better forecasting tool. you can see the dollar, with the selloff in general mills that began in july.

while a weak dollar is actually good news for this company, that 160 day-lag shows what happens to the stock. what's that allows the dollar index to anticipate the move of the stock. actually if general mills continues to lag 160 days behind the action of the green ballpark, williams believes this stock could make a historical low. these brands are challenged, i know it's been a really tough time. i like the ceo very much. he's been pushing the company towards much more natural, healthy, organic, but at the same time, the company reported a not so hot quarter last week, including it's seventh straight revenue decline, that should make me more cautious, as some have, like clorox and it's 2.5%

yield makes for a pretty compelling stock. that's a big if, though. or maybe what all this is showing is that kraft-hines, after being rebuffed by unilever, maybe they're trying to go after general mills, taking into account there have been multiple press releases saying that pal is going to step down this year, that could be just the opening that general mills needs and they could pay a heck of a lot more for this stock than it currently trades for and still make a fortune for sharehold shareholders. the chart suggested by larry williams suggests that the beaten down general mills could be ready to roar, a brilliant guy with a fabulous track record. if you want to own a food stock, or you're going for fundamentals, you go for

pepsico, you can follow along with us, that said, if you're patient and you want to go with williams, you've got my permission to bier the general

. it is time, it's time for the lightning round. you hear this sound, [ buzzer ] then the lightning round is over, skee-daddy, it's time for the lightning round in florida, raymond? >> hello. >> hi, raymond, you're up, it's jim. >> i'm sorry? >> go ahead, you're up, it's jim. >> i have it? okay, jim? >> yeah. >> i just wanted to know what is going on with pfizer pharmaceutica pharmaceuticals. >> pfizer's sitting there, their need to make a deal and that would make everything work out. >> boo-yah, jim, from northern

california. >> in regards to irk cconic, i received one from the elliott group which wants to replace the whole board. and so i would like to know your opinion. >> we're telling club members at action alerts.com that as we get close to it we will make a decision. we do like the fact that kleinfeld split the company up and created a lot of value, though. let's go to adam in texas. >> intrexon. >> when you biuy the tech stock, it's either going to go 50 or it's going to go 9. if you're in it, stick with it.

let's to roy in california. >> boo-yah, jim. >> boo-yah, roy. >> i own raytheon stock. and that's it for the lightning round.

these daysive we're going to go out to dinner, if we're going to leave our precious restoration houses, we're -- it better be for a bargain or a great experience. nothing else will get us out the door. darden, the parent of olive garden is a bargain. how is the stock gained more than #%? first because very few of the snobs on wall street would anniversary go never go to olive garden. but i have loved darden stocks forever. these i take my vegetarian salad loving daughter and we play beat the halves, we order so much salad we kill them. they're making money on us, but their new family style technology makes them foolproof. i think that makes darden one of

the greatest under valued storyings out there. my only reservation with olive garden is there are no reservations. and while it's true that at one time, i did wear cargo pants to olive garden to take home some of those fabulous rolls, okay, many times. my daughter is now old enough to be embarrassed, so it's no longer part of the game plan. darden gave you a two-fer, deal management sees as adding 20% to 25% per share. some of the worst concepts are starting to vanish. cheddar's got a $13 price point, so it's pretty much in line with olive garden no matter what you order. to me the decision comes on top of the decision by popeye's to

sell the added brands. and panera bread is a bargain. they're frugal and they want good taste, but they'll leave the house to chase experiences too. which bring mess to carnival cruise, here we go with ceo arnold donald, the ceo who may be the best turn around artist of our time. and closed up more than half a percent. he remains the steward of what i call one of the most experiential vacations you can get at a very low price, a cruise, again, i rely on my cruise taking daughter to understand what the attraction is here, a cruise represents an inexpensive and fabulous backdrop. carnival is a bargain at a time

when the consumer is still obsessed with frugality, this is one of the isolated incidents where the consumer wants to get off their couch and spend. i come back with once again, if you can get a bargain, and no one would ever say that olive garden is expensive. i would go somewhere that's purely experiential on your hands, which is exactly what carnival is, i think that those will produce 52 weeks a year all over the globe profits for your account. stick with krarg. cramer. that's 10 times faster than slow internet from the phone company. say hello to internet speeds up to 150 mbps. and add phone and tv for only $34.90 more a month. call today. comcast business. built for business.

remember here at ally, nothing stops us from doing right by our customers. who's with me? we're like a basketball team here at ally. if a basketball team had over 7... i'm in. 7,000 players. our plays are a little unorthodox. but to beat the big boys, you need smarter ways to save people money. we know what you want from a financial company and we'll stop at... nothing to make sure you get it. one, two... and we mean nothing. ♪ ♪

talking a lot about darden, don't minimize red hat, when you see a quarter like that, that means there's commuter spending, it spending all over the map. it's incredibly bullish for tech. there's always a bull market somewhere. i promise to find it just for you. i'm jim cramer. see you tomorrow.

>> welcome to the shark tank, where entrepreneurs seeking an investment will face these sharks. if they hear a great idea, they'll invest their own money or fight each other for a deal. this is "shark tank." ♪ linois, with a product to make kids feel more safe and secure. ♪ hello, sharks. my name is debbie glickman, and my company is fairytale wishes.