freeport, international paper, westrock and the mosaic are the leaders. we'll see if that continues. back over to you, carl it is 11:00 a.m. at trump tower in manhattan and 11:00 a.m. on wall street. and "squawk alley" is live ♪ good wednesday morning welcome to "squawk alley." i'm carl quintanilla along with

sara eisen the dow is up 81 the best day for retail since late july as the markets go green for august absolutely we are also following a big business story president trump making waves doubling down on a previous statement that, quote, both sides were responsible for the violence over the weekend. multiple executives stepping down from the white house business councils, some vowing to stay and work with the president. listen to the restaurant ceo andy plesner who is a big trump supporter. listen to what he had to say >> i was really happy with jaime diamond who came out and made his statement. this was very positive because i think two years ago jaime dimon never would have said anything american executives speaking up is incredibly important. don't walk away from the table, stay in the game, let's see what we can get done. >> now listen to former secretary treasury larry summers

disagreeing and saying wishes to speak to anyone in the senate, anyone in the president's cabinet or key officials in the white house, he will be unable to, if he is not a member of the president's council. he is not fit to be the ceo of walmart if his judgment is so bad as to suppose that being a member of this council is giving him some kind ofy be, what he m and what a number of ceos are, is scared. scared that if they leave the president, the tools of power will retaliate and president trump has brought our country to the point where ceos cower, to the point where ceos cower, that is a particularly damming indictment,

far beyond anything in charlottesville, his presidency. >> larry summers coming out swinging on this issue more so than any economics issue i have heard him talk about lately. >> we asked him to put it in historical context, and he said this was a more dramatic episode. his point about being scared the president would retaliate is unfair because walmart might argue, we have a customer base, we have an investor base to whom we are responsible, has nothing to do with whether we think the president will slap us around. but whether our customers believe we are representing them, serving them, doing our duty >> or possibly boycotting them. >> you could potentially argue they would want to resign they are scared what their customers would do almost the opposite argument and i would come back to the point maybe you can claim that's what ceos felt, what mr. summers felt, in the immediate aftermath of the president's election, where his tweets had negative share price effect

but clearly ken frazier's resignation marked the shares up that day so it's a bold claim from the treasury secretary there, but we understand his point in the background. >> but still, ken frazier was the target of two presidential tweets and they were fiery saying that he has more time now to lower rip-off drug prices that might make another ceo a little bit, i don't know, hesitant to actually speak out and leave this council we're going to discuss it. sarah hagan is here and former aid to president bush. and the former press secretary, ben, what about this idea that some ceos could be too scared for retaliation from the white house, should they be? is that appropriate for a chief executive to be? >> well, i think at this point there might be greater reputational risk staying on one of these advisory councils with president trump.

i don't blame them they thought he was going to be irrational actor they wanted to have a say over policy and advise certainly when it came to regulation, but the problem is these advisory councils haven't really done anything there's no infrastructure bill tax reform isn't going anywhere. they have become a photo op to support president trump. and so ultimately when you watch the events in charlottesville. and i encourage you to watch the unedited footage on vice news and watch the anti-semimigtes a racists in our country something terrible is happening under this president this is a time for moral clarity. and a number of business leaders have stepped up where the president has failed to act. i commend them for that. >> do you think, sarah, the fact that so many ceos, and we're counting five on this particular issue, have left a prestigious white house council as a sign that the councils aren't that effective and the ceos don't

really get listened to or could it actually imply that the ceos don't feel that some of these high agenda business items are going to get done? >> well, i don't think that it's because they don't think these agenda items are going to get done i think we're all hoping they do, particularly business leaders, but i do think that they have a customer base that they have to take care of. and if, you know, someone like walmart or any of these large companies, well-known companies with big broad customer bases, you know, see that these leaders are standing by a president who seems to equate neo-nazis and counter protesters, that's a real big business problem for them in addition to having concerns about the statements as individual, they've got a business to run. and i think they're making a business decision. >> sarah, how much political pressure is the president under? will he be feeling it? and if it did spread and include a member of his cabinet or white

house staff speaking out, would that be a really significant negative step for the presidency >> it would be very significant if somebody resigned over this it doesn't appear that anyone is, but i suppose that is still possible that would be a turning point. and i think you would see other people in the administration resign i do think, though, if that doesn't happen, this is a turning point for the president. republicans in congress are no longer going to stand with him if tax reform gets done, which we all hope it does, it's going to be out of mutual need and survival it's not going to be out of a desire for shared success for trump that these republicans are feeling and desiring this is going to be about their own survival >> well, how is that different from any other topic, sara >> well, i think, look, republicans wanted president bush to succeed because they liked him and worked with him well i think that was true for the previous president, obama and clinton, too, on the democratic

side i think many republicans this morning are waking up and saying, i thought trump was, you know, unorthodox, i thought his tweeting was inappropriate, his style was certainly not something we have seen in the past, but i could live with all that because he was the leader of the party today they are scratching their head and saying, what does he really think about these issues? and can he provide moral clarity and what does that mean for me will they get together on tax reform possibly it's not going to be out of hoping and trying to help the president get re-elected in a few years. >> ben, do you believe that a ceo has a rational fear of reprisal, even if it is a tweet? and as an add-on to that, does it really matter once again today, the president tweets about amazon. is it hard to argue thatamazon is suffering as a result this morning? >> i think president trump has

squandered the power of the bully pulpit his approval rating is nothing like we have seen in decades at this stage of the presidency and so that's not the only metric that these companies track. for example, they track what their customer base cares about. my firm runs a sentiment tracker for many companies to look at the fundamental values of the consumer and diversity and inclusion is very high on that list it's very high on the list of their employees. and associating themselves with president trump instead of their consumers and employees on that is not a great calculus to make. >> i don't think there is a fear go ahead, sara, i'm sorry. >> on the amazon tweet today, who knows what prompted it, maybe "the washington post" editorial, but can the president do anything about it he complains about amazon not paying enough taxes and hurting retailers, which may be valid points, but is there anything this president is going to and

can do besides just bully these companies on twitter >> well, i mean, certainly there are actions that the federal government could take that could be very harmful to companies now, if that started happening as a retaliation for an editorial, that would be a real problem for the trump administration you can see people in court. but i think increasingly the president's words over twitter are just meaningless i don't think the ceos are afraid of them i don't think they should be we haven't seen any long-term damaging impacts by things he said about multiple players. and increasingly, that will be less the case. and what he did yesterday, he got one do-over on his comments in charlottesville on monday what he did yesterday, i think, probably makes it so that nobody takes anything he says too seriously, particularly when he's criticizing others, other companies, other actors in the

political space. >> well, we'll see about that. guys, we'll leave it there thank you for joining us on this debate sara fagan and ben lebolt. we are seeing demonstrations across the country sparking unsolicited donations to the alt-right economy. our contessa brewer has more on that story contessa >> reporter: wilfred, paypal, godaddy, those are just some of the companies who grabbed headlines for ending service to alt-right groups daily stormer is well-known in alt-right circles. it participated in the charlottesville rally setting up the hate ban as the alternative to uber. its web host godaddy prompted and ended the service. google did the same thing. today daily stormer moved to a russian domain when youtube changed the compensation structure, many went to patreon in order to get

paid this summer patreon kicked off lauren sumner. enter patreon who specializes in controversial offerings and then get paid for it. counter.fund will provide an intermediary to paypal credit cards and turn bit coins into cash for a fee to help fund the alt-right movement gab launched their social media service as an alternative to facebook and twitter cracking down on hate speech. though gab has been rejected by the app store nine times, it's raised more than half a million in just the last 36 days it has more than 200,000 users worldwide. but don't call gab alt-right or white supremacist. >> gab rejects all assertions that we are solicited or affiliated to such organizations or groups. for us, it's about giving people

an authoritarian dictatorship the freedom to speak, the freedom to did send. >> it's one of the many anti-establishment groups not following ideological principle but they will put paypal out of business and create a crypto currency, an alternative to bitcoin. >> contessa brewer, thank you very much for that when we come back, we'll go to markets we'll break it down, next. and the ceo exit parade continues from the manufacturing council. the fallout and the state of the relationship between the white house and american business. later on, details on apple's massive war chest and the t be it's making on original content, when" squawk alley" continues.

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across our entire network, to more companies, in more locations, than centurylink. we do business where you do business. ♪ ♪ markets are in green today ahead of the fed minutes we'll get at 2:00 p.m. eastern time. the dow is going for four straight wins. the tech sector is up more than 20% for the year for more on this, we'll bring in david rosenberg and ken allen, portfolio manager at tu price. david, the nation is having the blistering political conversations and yet the market is up. why is that happening and how long can it last >> well, i don't think it's up for any other reason than this time last week the stock market got dramatically oversold on all these geopolitical tensions

surrounding north korea. so i just think that there's some reversion trade going on helping out the market here. so we are basically taking out a lot of the jitters from a week ago. i don't really advise anybody to look at the market on a day-by-day basis i think that the mantra as you discussed is how great the market is doing, but it's really a handful of stocks. i mean, you've had three dow stocks account for over half of the increase the median dow stock for the year is only up 2% and the median s&p 500 stock has basically done nothing since mid-june so that is basically two months of nothing so it is a wide market and, in fact, it's not worthwhile talking about the market at large. it's become, in my opinion, very idiosyncratic and special situation oriented but the market itself when you look at the mediate stock in any of the major averages is moving

sideways for the past couple months. >> it's a good thing about price waiting, which we try to pay attention to, ken. and you also take note of the strong performance of a small group of big tech stocks, which again today over at some trust initiation with the buy. what do you make of that >> well, i will dovetail what david said in terms of the size of some of these companies that has become enormous with in-tech. and one of the big stories over the last year is the largest market caps in the world are tech companies, apple, google, microsoft, facebook and amazon, and these companies are riding the ultimate plat fortune that the internet has become to become stronger as every day goes by. and so i think all of those have good growth ahead as they continue to the penetrate enormous markets and i especially look to amazon for its still really low share in the retail market and in the technology market. so i think that there is good runway ahead for many of these stocks, especially amazon as i

mentioned. >> so david, you have been bearish sort of on the idea that the economy is in a healthy place for a while. and waiting for some sign of it to turn. i'm wondering how you recognize numbers like yesterday's retail sales, global numbers like what we saw out of japan with 4% growth, even german gdp is the best it has been in over a year. a rising market that continues to find footing in small pieces of good news, whether it is in the u.s. or abroad or corporate earnings, it's not like whooer turning in the economy >> right well, i've actually began my writings on cnbc shows that have been advocating a situation all year long towards the overseas markets, whether that's been the emerge markets, i've singled out japan. of course, they have struggled a little bit lately, not just because of the economy, but because of abe's political problems but japan is a nice value turn-around play

and i've been quite bullish, actually, on old europe all year long so everything you said, completely agree with, is there any evidence of any acceleration in the u.s. economic growth? this year the answer is no the retail sales number yesterday, and i wrote about it in my daily, very spurious that you would have had a 0.6% increase in seasonally adjusted retail sales, yet the raw data was the worst july for the raw da data they are either posting weak financial results or cutting their guidance for the rest of the year so the answer is that i am quite down beat on the u.s. economy. i'm not calling for a recession, but i don't see anything going on in terms of domestic growth that has me excited. and actually, i think when you look at the domestic-oriented stocks in the market, they have not done a whole lot look at the small caps relative

to performance this year they are oriented to the local economy. if you're talking about the source of the stimulus for the economy this year, it's been up until recently a 10% unexpected appreciation of the u.s. dollar that's really goosed the currency translation to earnings and sails for the large multinationals that's the big story when you think about it >> ken, i just want to come back to some of to your major tech investments. you're talking very positively about the structural tail winds behind some of those companies and despite that attraction for the broader sector, when we talk about computing or online retail, it seems like it is so heavily dominated by just a few player are there any small players out there that can make some market share gains that perhaps aren't on such deep evaluations or is this going to be dominated for decades to come by one or two players? >> i think that's a really good point in terms of power players. if you look at computing, the

two biggest players are going to take a strong share of industry profits for years to come. those being amazon and microsoft. but within the overall market, which is so huge, i think there's room for smaller companies even a larger companies that aren't the mega caps to do quite as well that point in that regard, salesforce.com, the third biggest and most successful in the xloud cocloud computing trei mentioned red hot that is smaller that has a lot of platforms. it is still a relatively small company compared to the size of the ecosystem and the power it's going to have going forward as it gets more and more important to the customers >> ken, david, thank you so much, guys a lot to watch today appreciate it very much. >> thank you still to come, a top congressional republican, house ways and means chairman kevin brady will be here

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we are just getting a statement right now from former president bush issuing a statement on charleston. it reads, america must always reject racial bigotry, anti-semitism and hatred in all forms. as we pray for charlottesville, we are reminded of the fundamental truths recorded by that city's most prominent citizen in the declaration of independence, we are all created equal. we know these truths to be everlasting because we have seen the decency and greatness of our country. this comes after the president's remarks and business members leaving the white house council. earlier on "squawk on the street," we talked to the former ceo of ck restaurants who urged ceos to stay on the councils take a listen. >> i was really happy with jaime dimon when he came out, it was a week or two ago, and said, this was very positive. because i think two years ago jaime dimon never would have made that statement and afraid to say anything. so american executives being willing to speak up is

incredibly important don't walk away from the table, stay in the game, let's see what we can get done. >> joining us this morning is fred hoffberg, exec under president obama and a small business administrator thank you for coming. >> good to be here. >> this is a division of companies and executive that is will be pressured to take sides. so what do you do? >> well, most companies don't like to take sides let's be clear, because they don't want to alienate customers. they don't have democratic customers or republican customers. so i think customers trade carefully when they decide to join a presidential council or any council in the united states government because it can have an impact. >> but the thinking in january was, at the very least, give him a chance, right? and more directly, the policies that they put forward in the transition were pro-business let's make this happen this looks like it could go pretty well. market reacted to all of that. >> i think there was -- certainly, any new president coming in, and when the white house calls someone, they say,

we would like you to serve on the council, the natural act if you're a patriotic american who believes in our country, you want to serve. so that's a natural tendency, whether it is an appointed position or a council. >> so the president went after the ceos for leaving the council on twitter he said, every ceo that drops out of the manufacturing council, i have many to take their place. grandstanders should not have gone on. ken frazier, kevin plain and others, are they grand standing here >> no, they are not grandstanding here if they were grandstanding, the president wouldn't have put them on the could sincil to begin wih he wanted to seek their advice and create bigger policy that's why gary cohn is there and steve mnuchin. he should change policy to make the economy grow and put people back to work that's why he put them on the council. >> what do you say to the individuals, whatever way they are linked to the president or not, whether they are ceos or not, that outright criticized issues of racism, but not

resigned should they be going further or have they done enough because they have spoken out and now it is not their role to call out the president? >> i watched larry summers who believes they all should resign. each one has to make their own decision when their head hits the pillow at night, can they sleep well at night knowing what path they're making and what they are aligning themselves with and not aligning themselves with that's an individual decision they have to make. >> they are ceos, is it a personal decision? are they making it on behalf of shareholders or consumers? >> they've got a lot of stake holders. they have employees and a diverse workforce. they have to be able to face the employees, face the shareholders, face the customers, it's a complex decision each one of them has to make >> what is their incentive to do it to resign, what is their incentive to do so to cause more problems for the president to try to put pressure

on him given some statement that they may or may not have disagreed with because we can argue if it helps or hinders the customer base or the sales or the share price, but what does it achieve if they do resign? >> i think basically when you -- i worked for president obama as eight years, and i believe in president obama and the policies he put forward if there were things that president obama had done that were so ultimately against my belief system, that i could not actually serve in good conscious, then i would have to leave. that's why people resign larry summers said people resigned over the clinton welfare. they did not believe in it and left people do have to make a stand for what they believe in it's a complicated system and it's the employees and if the communities are within, those are all factors you have to make. >> finally, does it remind you, not to age any of us, but does it remind you of prior periods where there was big divisions, economically or socially in this

country and companies had to make choices that they're not used to? >> well, i think the companies do have to make choices and they'll have to live with them and some decisions were made by companies in the past, whether it be anti-semitism, racism, and those legacies last for a long time they have an impact on the kind of talent you bring in and the customers that want to be associated with you. so companies have to make the decisions and think carefully about the long-term, not simply about a short-term gain or a tax reduction or regulatory -- >> but these companies are clearly not imposing these views within their own staff and companies by still remaining on a board and conversing with the president who hasn't even imposed them himself necessarily. >> but let's remember, this president won't even allow people to stay on a commission and be critical. so he's actually leaving no room he actually does not want anybody who is not 100% four

square in. if you take a position contrary to him, he will blast you and say, either you're with me or against me so the president is actually drawing that line. he's making that decision, not actually the ceos. >> these councils are a little opaque so it's hard to know the dynamics we're trying to find out as best we can thank you for coming in. >> the reason i brought that up is because in my view, jaime dimon a week or so ago, we did talk about racial equality, the work he was doing within his own company, and i think that is different from perhaps maintaining on a board but on the debate of whether people should be speaking out or resigning or not, it's different from the actions within their own company. moving toward, let's go to michelle caruso-cabrera back with the european close. >> european stocks are up for a third consecutive session. the second quarter gdp rose by 0.6% in the area that uses the euro and the entire 28 countries

in the europeandoo union the euro fell because of a different story, reuters cites two sources, the european central bank mario draghi will not deliver a new message related to policy at the u.s. federal reserves jackson hole conference many had thought he would use the annual conference to chart a course out of stimulus, but instead the ecb spokesman said they will focus on the theme of the symposium fostering a global dynamic economy. his august 25th remarks, while the sources added he was keen to hold off on the policy did cushion until the autumn as they agreed at the last rate setting meeting in july. now for a specific stock story, f fiat chrysler was up 2.6% after developing self-driving cars technology fiat had a second day of gains out of the report from automotive news earlier in the week saying chinese automakers are considering a bid for the

italian vehicle maker. and balfour beatty swung to a half-year pre-tax profit and carlsberg was down after a tougher second half of the year from the danish brewer as well as a lack of revenue growth. back to you. >> michelle, thank you very much for that the ftse 100 had a nice return there. elsewhere in the uk, we had comments just recently from the uk prime minister theresa may in relation to the race debate here in the united states over the last couple of days. >> i absolutely abhor the racism, hatred and violence we have seen portrayed by these groups the united kingdom has taken action to ban far-right groups here we have banned far-right groups here in the united kingdom i see no equivalence between those who have fascist views and

those who impose them. and it is important for all those in positions of responsibility to condemn far-right views wherever we hear them >> guys, we talked about the difference between implicit and explicit criticisms. that was a pretty implicit strong criticism there and from someone who so far has been one of his allies in a relative sense for major world leaders. >> she didn't use his name. >> exactly but said leaders have a responsibility and also criticized the idea of equating those that have racist views and those who oppose them. so clearly a reference to the comments there >> and also a reminder that everything that happens in this country, his tweets, his responses, his remarks, the outrage, it's on a global -- it gets watched on a global platform and you wonder, our allies and adversaries are tackling everything, no questions on north korea and yesterday's news conference. meantime, let's get back to hq with sue herrera with an

update. >> here's what is happening at this hour, everyone. we continue to focus on charlottesville. in an exclusive interview with nbc news, attorney general jeff sessions says federal authorities are in no rush to file charges than the charlottesville car attack >> we will be working with the state to see how they would proceed with their charges once -- and we can bring charges whenever the investigation justifies them but i don't think we should just feel like we've got to do it in a matter of hours or days. two administration officials confirming to nbc that hope hicks will be named intercommunications director until a permanent person is named. hicks has been by president trump's side since the day that he launched his campaign brio soft hammer rattles have been recalled due to the wooden rings on the rattle that can crack posing a choking hazard to children about 1500 items were sold at specialty stores, such as home

goods and in ordnordstroms and . that's our news update at this hour. "squawk alley" is back after a quick break.

our collaboration with pg&e is centered around public safety. without pg&e's assistance, without their training we could not do our mission to keep our community safe. anytime we are responding to a structure fire, one of the first calls you make is for pg&e for gas and electric safety. it's my job to make sure that they have the training that they need to make the scene safe for themselves and for the public. it's hands-on training actually turning valves, turning systems off, looking at different wire systems all that training is crucial to keeping our community safe and our firefighters safe. together, we're building a better california. welcome back to "squawk alley. gary cohn says a plan could be implemented as early as thanksgiving for more, let's send it out to our elan mori with a special guest. >> hi, wilfred thanks for having us and thank

you, chairman kevin brady, for being here today >> thanks. >> i want to start by asking you about the speech you're going to be giving later on today you were here at the reagan center in california to talk about tax reform and you're going to be emphasizing the fact that the white house and republicans are on the same page on tax reform you guys are unified, but i have to ask you also about the tension that has arisen between republicans and the administration over the past few days, particularly over the president's comments around the violence in charlottesville. where do you see this and how does it affect tax reform? >> it's a fair question. we are here at the reagan ranch on a historic day. it was 31 years ago on this day the house and senate reached agreement to deliver to president reagan far-reaching tax reform cuts. in fact, we're in front of the tax cut table where he signed that legislation that really laid the foundation for the overall game-changing 86 tax reform so our message, we want to speak

directly to the american people today to tell them we are working toward that same type of bold game-changing tax reform. but they are going to need to be engaged in this process. it was the american people that made that work for president reagan and will require their engagement and advise and work as we deliver this year. look, i think it's important for the president and me and every leader to strongly condemn the kkk, white supremacists, neo-nazis who bring this violence to america. you know, i know president trump said it was repugnant to this country, he's exactly right. since we're here in california, president reagan, i think, also hit it right in a major way when he said that the politics of racial hatred and religious bigotry has no place in america. because it undermines the very values of our country. that's the right tone we need to

hit going forward. >> you see several ceos leaving the president's advisory council because they feel like they can no longer work with him. can you still work with this administration on an issue like tax reform given the statements? >> yes, i can. and i think, in fact, there's room for all of america to work with this white house and congress to do this. because while there are divisions in the country, this is about delivering tax relief to all americans you know, every business, large or small, every family up and down economic ladders, this is an area where president reagan found union and i'm convinced we can do it again. >> we have seen a lot of principles and framework from you all and the administration, but we haven't seen a lot of details yet. here's what gary cohn has said about when we could get more meat on the bones. >> we hope we can get taxes done between now and thanksgiving we would like to get infrastructure going as soon as, as soon as tax comes out of the house and goes to the senate we'll put infrastructure into

the house. >> thanksgiving, is that going to happen? is that realistic? >> so i have learned not to pick certain days 2017 is our year to deliver to make history on tax reform we're on that timetable. in fact, while we may not be in washington, we're working our tax teams and are meeting sometimes twice daily. the principals are having discussions and soon we'll be visiting by phone together with the white house and the senate and tax writers as well on the progress we're making. so we're working throughout august preparing tax reform for when we return, but we're on the timetable for delivery this year. >> you mentioned that we're sitting by this table where president reagan signed the 1981 tax bill into law. you and i both know, that was a big tax cut. and that reform didn't happen for five more years. is history going to repeat itself this time >> you know, it did take -- the '81 cut was important because it showed the american people finally they can keep more of

their hard earnings in paychecks. and it led to confidence of tax reform we're trying to do the same thing in one tax bill now, which lowers taxes for every american, every local business, and moves up into the lead pack just as president reagan did so the model we get from the reagan tax reforms are critical, especially because the american people are so engaged. >> representative kevin brady, chairman of the house and ways committee, thank you so much for joining us today back over to you guys. >> thank you very much for that. when we come back, we'll get details on apple's massive hollywood award chest and how that is changing the conversation and rick santelli, what are you watching today >> i'm watching the your roeuro not so much against the dollar and the yen. we'll talk all that is euro after the brk.ea

i'm scott walker here's what is coming up at the top of the hour. we'll talk about apple's next move and the company's new content play plus, the tech rally reboot. we'll debate the stocks. one firm just initiated it all in the lofty price targets that come along with it and josh brown is making big moves in his portfolio today we'll tell you what he's buying

and selling. see you in just a bit. >> who doesn't love josh brown see you soon thank you very much, scott let's go to rick santelli and the santelli exchange. >> thank you, sara baseball season, if you have a good baseball team playing good during the regular season, many fans get their hopes up there's going to be some october play, some playoff games, right? the same could kind of be said about central banks and their economies. if you look at the eurozone and forget the issues of negative rates and whatnot, they've had 17 quarters of positive growth in the eurozone. not bad in over four years, pretty good. and if you consider that at the end of june of this year, mario draghi kind of hinted about the playoff games because they're having such a good season in terms of growth. and everybody jumped to a conclusion that maybe defining the exit, painting it, at least sort of in the model of rfed as they started to tighten and

tackle the balance sheet, the markets specifically the euro currency had a really nice run now, i want you to look at a chart. that chart you're looking at is one-year chart of euro versus the yen. may consolidation runs up, we're kind of doing a consolidation, but the pattern could still be kind of a sloppy staircase higher if you look at the one-year chart of the euro versus the pound, a little bit different issue. it hasn't even established very much of a sideways trade so it still looks pretty bullish so those two don't argue for picking top. you have to be careful, picking tops and bottoms is a treacherous activity, but let's go to the white board on the euro versus the dollar the first chart is a 12-year chart starting in '05. the reason i picked this is everybody including myself is focused on 1.20. there's been key spots along 1.20 falling short over the last 12 years the point of this is, just

because it's falling short, a, doesn't mean it's going to reverse and go lower and that's it, but let's go to another chart to get it tighter. we'll go to the beginning chart of 2016. we are hovering right at 117 if you go back to may of last tt significant top. think about it this way. with jackson hole coming and all the odds that are going on, we could easily test this and still work higher. but all depends. we have a lot of congestion down here operating under the consumption that 115 handle is possible. it might not be the top, and i've said this before, but with regard to the euro versus a variety of currencies, it could be a top wilf, back to you? >> but rick, doesn't the euro dollar react much, much more to the differential in treasury bund spreads than any of the other fundamentals and any even slight sign of tightening with, the bund yield has shulurely got way more potential to move up than the treasury -- >> i don't dispute that. that's logical

it's actually textbook but i auger everybody to go look at three years at tens minus bunds and try to correlate that to the run in euros, it just doesn't fit. >> rick, thank you, as always. when we come back, first it was disney now apple making new bets on streaming original content. details when squawk al lea returns. fidelity's active trader pro can help you find smarter entry and exit points and can help protect your potential profits. fidelity -- where smarter investors will always be. finding the best hotel price is whoooo. now a safe bet. because tripadvisor searches... ...over 200 booking sites - so you save up to 30% on the... ...hotelock it in. tripadvisor.

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tonight, and visa. we'll get more on this when quk le ctiesn a moment

apple is the reportedly setting aside $1 billion for original programming that's according to the journal today. and it comes after disney's

announcement it will pull some movies from netflix and start its own streaming service. one start-up stepping on to the battlefield is iris.tv, using ai to give content creators an edge on the competition for more, we're joined by the company's ceo, field garthwithhere on the program so ai, to extend watch periods is there a way to describe this to the layperson >> so what we do, we're in the business of taking audiences away from facebook and google and bringing them back to broadcasters and media companies. and we do that by licensing our ai software companies like time inc., fox. if you're watching a clip on sports illustrated, you were talking about nfl earlier this week, about dell beckham jr., you might be watching for a fantasy reason or because you love the giants, we'll help you dive deep into that archive and continue watching, just like you would experience on netflix or youtube. >> but get people back on to the

broadcast platform how would you make the switch? how would the consumer decide to make the switch? >> millions of viewers come to your site on cnbc.com every day. if you have 20 different videos about what's happening right now in charlottesville it's what's driving the most kind of ad completions and the view time. so our system will learn that. and when someone watches a clip, we'll recommend in breaking news and recommending in the content that's performing best >> so it's all keened into behavioral patterns? >> yep we'll index the content and create sbleblintelligence on th videos, and anonymously look at what device you're on, to create a personalized play list for every user >> and what can your software achieve? we are ultimately in a sort of zero sum gain moment, where you can perhaps drive stuff, as you say, from facebook back to the broadcasters or can you actually make viewers want to just watch more videos, wherever they're watching it >> it's a really good point. we basically are seeing

personalization disrupt all of media. so facebook, youtube, these companies have kept that tech, as like the best-kept secret in the industry so what we've done is we've built technology and license it to these companies like cnbc, fox, cbs, so that on your owned and operated platforms, you can build audience because media ultimately is a pretty simple thing, right we need to have great content, own a distribution platform and monetize it. and if you can imagine that window well and have great programming, you can build large audiences. >> is this sophisticated coding on the spectrum of all coding? >> correct part of our business is really on the deep learning side. and what we like to think of in terms of ai is that it's augmented intelligence we have systems that are constantly learning what videos are performing best and rising them up. but we also provide a programming tools engine to our customers. it's easy for them to manage and have control over our ai >> what's the biggest challenge that some of these traditional media companies have in competing with facebook and google >> so there's been this trend that we've heard, which is go

where the audience is, which is effectively a fallacy. these guys have gotten tons of free content on to their platforms. they've been able to learn from their audiences and use that to create great user experiences. media companies can do this themselves and when they do, they'll turn into huge profit centers online. >> iris.tv, thank you, field >> thanks for having me. >> that does it for us here. we'll send it over to the half fed minutes on the way at 2:00 we'll see you soon welcome to the "halftime report." i'm scott wapner our top trade this hour, apple's record high. the stock has been on another tear, pushing past more milestones how high can it keep flying? with u.s., josh browne, steve leventhal, jon najarian. let's start with the most-loved stock up 10% this is restarted the apple run. here we go 162 and counting >>