google, tess thtesla, ford, amog others they're all vying to become the king of the self-driving car that does it for "closing bell." thank you for joining us today we'll see you tomorrow "fast money" begins right now. "fast money" starts right now. live from the nasdaq market site overlooking new york city's times square i'm melissa lee. tonight, on a very special "fast money," wall street's crypto crazy. we're heading to credit suisse's and blockchain's conference and we'll talk to mike novogratz about why he's going all in on crypto coins pfizer is considering a big split. general electric bouncing back the names you know in your portfolio are having big days today. walmart gone wild, having its

best day in more than a year, the stock surging to levels not seen since february of 2015, helping the dow to close at a record high, after the retail giant announced a $20 billion buyback. online sales, according to analysts, will explode in the next year. with walmart trading about 20 times earnings, amazon trades at 250. the question here is, should investors start valuing it like a growing tech company in other words, what is walmart really worth guy? >> i can't speak to what the valuation should be. that's what the street is struggling with. they did say online sales will increase by 40% next year. you think about that, i mean, that's for like a startup type company. that's not for a mature company like walmart that's a significant number. you mentioned $20 billion stock buyback. i think that's roughly 7.5% of their market cap not insignificant. i think that's what people are struggling with. what is the right valuation?

i don't know the answer. what i do know and our good friend carter worth who is at the zenith >> the top three >> he'll probably chart this it appears as though if we just look at the stock, it's headed towards those levels that you mention, the beginning of 2015, which was either side of 90 bucks. >> i feel as if when you try to value it, you're never going to come up with the right valuation. you'll always feel like this is the peak of the forward pe for walmart. if you want to look at it like a tech company, you can, i don't know if it's a rush to judgment as a tech company, if you look at gross margins, if you evaluate it as a tech company, they're going to shrink, they'll be compressed going forward because online sales, lower margin in-store sales, that's a problem. labor costs, investment in the business costs year to date, it's still

underperformed amazon. it might be the beta trade lately >> i agree with where you're going with this. i totally disagree with the tech assessment at best 5% of their sales are now e-commerce, even though it's growing 40% as a tech company. this is a company, you're rightly pointing out, i think this is where you're going, they have massive headwinds, okay how can suddenly a company that was in trouble before this move from amazon against their own turf is suddenly now better positioned, when labor costs are going through the roof target has raised minimum wage to 11 bucks. in arkansas they're going to possibly 15. to me this is a multiple that is way too expensive. >> if you also think about it in terms of if walmart goes to highs, it would go to highs not seen since 2015. aren't we at the point where walmart today is in a better position versus 2015 >> no.

you're looking at a u.s. business, $18 billion in e-commerce, going to $24 billion. that's sales when you compare it to an amazon, they're going to do, what, $209 billion next year in u.s. sales, right? so you look at it, you question to yourself, the expense it's going to take walmart to catch up if you ask mark lurie, he'll tell you he wants this company to be viewed as a technology company. the reality is they're not even close. >> they're already saying they'll keep as a percentage of sales spending at 21%. >> why do they have to catch up? >> there's a couple of things going on >> wait one second if we talk about the latest conversation, it's been groceries. walmart owns groceries they have a 50% market share in groceries. >> the worst place to be the worst place to be. >> amazon is less than 1%. that was the latest craze when

amazon took on whole foods >> they couldn't compete with that >> they own that spot. >> exactly >> more competitive than this. >> aldi -- >> you've got amazon -- >> here's a thought. maybe we're making the wrong comparison maybe it's not walmart necessarily versus amazon. maybe it's walmart versus the other retailers. >> there are sales to win over >> that's the question i asked yesterday. >> you ultimately have a cacase - >> people are anticipating the role of other people's business on walmart >> if you look at it on a forward basis, we should look at it -- >> to melissa's point, the only one who could compete with amazon is walmart. walmart could take amazon's clientele. amazon cannot take walmart's >> they can compete on killing their margins.

>> correct >> you can't have it both ways you can't invest and you can't basically try to grow their top line, which they're doing, you just said that the bottom line is going to be terrible we persecuted amazon for years for not showing any -- >> 2009 -- >> i get it. but the point is are we worried about valuation. if we're worried about valuation, then forget about it. but amazon, no one's worried about valuation. let's back up. >> 92,000 in '14 look at the stock price. 2009 to '14, they built a tremendous amount of fulfillment centers. this year they're claiming that they're going to start another spend. that's why amazon could be a sideways stock for a little while. >> can we play would you rather? >> mainly because they're going to build out international >> i have two layers of would you rather

>> two layers. >> walmart trades at a discount to costco, home depot, as well as lowe's. would you rather walmart or any one of those other three -- >> home depot for sure >> why should we pay that multiple for home depot and not for walmart? >> because i think when you've learned over the summer, i think what you've learned is, although a lot of people thought home depot was amazon-able in the summer, you're learning now it's not nearly as amazon-able as we thought a few months ago let me say one thing quick the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago >> holy johnny appleseed >> the next best time is today would you rather walmart sat back and allowed the competition -- or would you rather them at least try and get into the game, which is i think what they're -- >> i get that. >> of the cost, right? >> you mean people are overvaluing what walmart is doing? >> walmart is responding to a secular threat

and because they're responding with a very coherent strategy, we're overrewarding that strategy, which is coming from a company that was facing major headwinds to begin with. >> walmart versus amazon let's go to the charts to see who wins that one. chart master carter worth is at the plasma >> it's really about what happened the last two days in walmart. so here, as of friday's close, is a trailing 12-month chart of these two stocks we know it's a dead heat obviously with today's strength, if you were to add this week, walmart is now just slightly ahead of amazon. basically, the same thing over the past 12 months i would to look at what happened the last two days. the stock jumped 6.5% in the two-day period this is that breakout, right you see it here.

you see the well-defined tops. you see this ascending wedge or triangle you see the breakout 6.5% in the two-day period the following tables are interesting, one is absolute, one is relative. 1970 to present, the stock ipo'd october 1st, 1970. 300 instances where it's moved more than 5% in a two-day period, for instance tomorrow. these are the stats. one week later, will mart is up on average half a percent. one month later, 2.7 three months later, six months later. the odds of being up are much better than 50%, as you can see in this column after what's just happened, it's happened 300 times the data, the history shows, 1970 to present, that walmart continues higher you can say, maybe this doesn't beat the market, this is absolute let's do that. this next table is relative performance. how does walmart do relative to

the s&p. what you see here is it not only is up absolute, the prior daily, it is up more than the s&p, one week later, one month later, six month later. independent of amazon, we'll get to that next, the presumption is this strength, as big as it is, there's more to go here is the chart again, and the breakout i like breakouts, that's what charting is all about, yes versus, for fun, amazon, which is struggling to maintain enough trend. so at this point here and now, i think walmart is a good bet. i think people are probably offsides we're talking about managers who have been forced to embrace this i bet the statistics that history reveals will break out >> that's pretty compelling, you said it, guy, he's at the zenith of guests. >> today >> today

>> but i'm sitting next to the person who likes it the least. >> i love you this >> not that. walmart. >> walmart, yeah >> i asked for the seymour did you see my haircut >> you're like twins, this is crazy, i can't tell you apart. >> do you dye your hair too? >> you wish. >> does it matter the context in which walmart makes that greater than 5% move >> to the study of price action, no whether they announce a buyback or they say alliance sales that's a lot of data it's not just a rare instance. it's 300 plus instances over a 47-year period the stats are reliable, up further, absolute, and beating the market the amazon question is a different question but here and now, for the general investor, the thought would be, ah, i can't chase it it should be the initial move

that likely carries through. >> you know you said the amazon is a different question, when i look at the charts and go back here, i see an inverse correlation between walmart and amazon if you go back to 2015 i don't see that i see them both moving in the same direction so in my opinion, walmart did the watchup trade. does amazon take the baton from here >> that's certainly possible it will be some news-related thing that does it, as is often the case what revolves tsolves the patte something fundamental. is amazon in trouble here? probably not but its relative strength to the market is poor >> carter, i brought this up, i mentioned you at the top of the show, you may have heard, you were standing there. i look at this and say there's a very good chance walmart put to the double top sometime during the next month do you think that could, a, be the case, and b, could that correlate to potentially the top in the broader market? >> i don't think the stats argue

for that the stats argue that it follows through. >> carter, thank you carter worth coming up, hedge fund legend mike novogratz is making a comeback and betting big on bitcoin. he'll explain how he's cashing in on the crypto craze and how high he sees bitcoin going and next, is this the beginning of the end for the activist on wall street? later, the airlines taking off once again the group of stocks up 7% in the last month and there is one name tim see mey seymour says is about to go supersonic more "fast money" after this witness katy perry.

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witness katy perry... aaaaaaw look at that dog! katy perry: with music videos and behind the scenes footage, xfinity lets you witness all things me. welcome back to "fast money. someone else has been jumping in on the crypto currency train, wall street. >> reporter: hot, hot, hot the crypto currency boom is still going strong remember when jamie dimon said bitcoin was a fraud and will eventually blow up maybe. maybe not. there's been a huge sea change in wall street's interest in blockchain and crypto currencies in the last year as evidenced by the conference you all are at. there's an increasing sense of regulatory certainty as different countries are speaking out about what is and isn't

acceptable, even if some regulators are coming down harder than others the other reason is dollars and cents. there's more money at stake because crypto currencies in particular and blockchain in general have proven far more resilient than anyone thought four years ago in the case of crypto currencies, wall street is treading cautiously. no bank has yet said they would start publicly holding crypto currencies or lending it out that would be a big move but goldman sachs is weighing having a new trading operation dedicated to bitcoin and other currencies that's getting closer. dimon said bitcoin was a fraud but notice he didn't say blockchain was a fraud blockchain may be the ultimate answer banks are definitely getting into the blockchain business credit suisse and other banks

have been eyeing the launch of a commercial platform for blockchain-based syndicated loans. all sorts of interest in that blockchain >> thanks a lot, bob pisani at the new york stock exchange. one of those who has been bitten by the bitcoin bug, mike novogratz joins us for the credit suisse and bitcoin conference, mike, thanks for joining us, we appreciate it >> thank you >> people know you from goldman sachs, people know you from investment what are you doing with bitcoin, are you recognizing a fund >> you know, i started investing in bitcoin and the whole ecosystem when i was at fortress as a private investor i've been very active in the space i never thought i would come out of retirement, but the space is so exciting right now. i decided to build a business. i've hired a whole bunch of smart guys we're going to raise a fund,

we're going to build a business, and hopefully take advantage of what i see as a revolution, actually, a decentralized revolution >> you're pouring a lot of money of your own into this fund, reports say it's $150 million in what you hope to be a $500 million fund, mike where are you investing right now? is it strictly in the crypto currencies or are you also investing in the underlying blockchain technology? >> you know, i've been investing in bitcoin ande etherium. way back, i wasn't smart enough to know what was going to win so play the whole ecosystem that's still our approach. >> where do you see bitcoin going? a lot of people have crazy predictions out there. what's yours >> listen, the one thing i've realized is, i can hear the herd coming i was in san francisco and met

with a few big institutional investors. they're still a ways away, but they're coming lots of funds are being raised i'm pretty confident to say it's going higher the hard part about manias, i think this will be a real mania, is you have to have a lot of imagination to think where things could go. often we set our own limitations by putting a price level on it it would not surprise me if in the next six to ten months we're over 1,00,000. >> would you call this a bubble, mike if this were any other asset class, we would say a move like that constitutes a bubble. >> bubbles are funny historically manias or bubbles happen around changes to the ways we fundamentally live, whether it's the railroad bubble, they really did change the way we live. this decentralized revolution is going to change the way we live. we've gone to an experiment to now we're implementing

just like in '97 when you thought about the internet, we could have never understood the ubiquity of the internet in 2017, even at the height of the bubble ten, 15 years from now, blockchain and decentralized systems will be everywhere and so yes, it's a bubble. it's going to be one of the great manias of all time bitcoin happens to be the bellwether of this entire decentralized revolution it's the easiest way people can get exposure to it bitcoin probably runs the hardest. but things like etherium will be the public utility of this space. we've split our bets we're betting on a lot of the other icos as well >> the internet bubble imploded, famously, mike does that imply that bitcoin, that that bubble in bitcoin will also have a similar sort of implosion? and how does that happen what triggers that >> right now, total market cap

of the whole blockchain, bitcoin, etherium ecosystem, is roughly $200 billion in 1999, the internet got up to around $6.5 trillion we are a long, long way from what a mania looks like. and so, yeah, listen, prices will always get ahead of themselves, and new technologies just like, you know, you had gold up and down, there will be big volatility in this stuff at one point there will be a major correction why i think having a macro skill set and a macro hat to wear in investing this stuff is that you hope you understand when things run out of gas and try to get out before then. i do think just like on the internet, there are going to be companies that exist 20 years from now that really do change the way we do business >> sure.

bitcoin is a whole other asset class. i'm wondering, using that macro hat, what sorts of indicators are you looking at to tell you that bitcoin is not in a bubble right now and what sort of indicators are you going to look at to say they're flashing warning signs to me, what out there are you looking at >> so i see bitcoin really as a digital gold it's become a store of value people say, how can that be a store of value why was gold a store of value? there are 20 other metals you could have picked, somebody picked gold, maybe because it was shiny, there's a limited supply my kids walk around, i have four kids, 60% of the waking day, their head is in a phone they're growing up in a digital world. one day their boyfriend is going to give them digital flowers and they'll really enjoy the flowers. my mom would say, i want real flowers. but as we move into a digital world, having a digital store of value makes more and more sense.

where could the price of gold and silver go? who knows? there are a limited amount of bit coins. very few people own them at this point. there are less than 5 million people in the whole -- that have crypto wallets and it's a world that all has access you've got people in taiwan, korea, japan, united states, all over europe, that can participate. you've got to let your imagination run. things can go a lot longer and higher >> so there's a lot of money to be made before that bitcoin bubble bursts? >> no doubt. >> no doubt, you say with a smile. i've got to ask you this question as well, because bitcoin has a reputation for being used for nefarious purposes, laundering money, drug money. that may or may not be true. the reputation is there. are you concerned about regulators cracking down

that's sort of the external force that could pop this bubble as well. how much of a reality is that to you? >> you know, what's been interesting is how positive certainly the u.s. regulators have been from the fed to the sec to the sfdc. everybody has been supportive of first the experiment and now the actual ecosystem i think regulation is coming it's going to come in the ico market the sec has already put out a few guidelines and i think it's probably healthy. in a lot of way it prudentializes this whole ecosystem. china shut down bitcoin exchanges and banned icos. i think that's not great for the system we're monitoring and i think trading around those events. but i broadly think the cat is out of the bag this is not going away le gard at the imf broadly said

to her central bankers, guys, this is the new reality, get with the program, and really endorsed crypto currencies and blockchain as a real financial revolution and innovation. >> last question, mike and i've got to ask you to put your overall investor hat on and draw from your vast expertise. if you had to look at anywhere in the world right now, either long or short any asset class out there or bitcoin, what's the best place to put your money right now? >> you know, it's a little unfair, just because i think the risk/reward and the volatility is so much more promising in the crypto space i could be wrong, bitcoin could be -- regulators could be tougher and we could go into kind of a slump in bitcoin the kind of down/up scenario, bitcoin is not going back to zero this is not an experiment that just ends. so the risk/reward, i still

think bitcoin and etherium are my two favorite bets i have a ton of my own money bet that way at this point the rest of them worries me a little bit we've got a president that seems to be a bit of a maniac, to say it nicely, and having a lot of political risk in the system we've got debt to gdp at an all-time high when the fed is raising rates and will start sucking liquidity out of the system at ending qe. stocks at an all-time high, stock market as a percentage of gdp at an all-time high or close to it. i'm overall cautious in the rest of the world i think the political risk is higher than is being priced in it makes me more comfortable to be in this completely uncorrelated set >> jamie dimon called bitcoin a fraud at our delivering alpha conference a few weeks ago he's a smart guy, you're a smart

guy. do you think he knows what he's talking about? >> jamie has a really big franchise to predict so he's doing exactly what he should be doing as the ceo of a giant rent-taking franchise, right? the decentralized revolution goes after institutions that are rent takers. banks are rent takers. i think jamie's shareholders should be happy he's doing what he's doing on the same hand, jpmorgan i know certainly has a bitcoin -- blockchain unit. they had a conference the day he said that in san francisco where they were discussing blockchain. and so, you know, listen, he's a bright guy he's probably been the best banker of his generation i'll leave it at that. i think he's going to be wrong with bitcoin >> all right, mike, thanks so much for joining us. i hope you'll come back to "fast money" soon. >> thanks a lot. >> mike novogratz. all right. what do we think >> the takeaway i get from that, obviously great interview, but

when somebody like mike novogratz comes out of retirement, he's not coming out just to do some desk job he clearly sees something. i think he was pretty clear in his explanation as to what he sees bitcoin is here to stay, or some form of it brian kelly has done extraordinarily thoughtful work on this. my concern would be, what does this decentralized system do to development market currencies? i don't know the answer to that. i've got to believe it has some impact >> i thought the most interesting thing, at this place, he said risk/reward favors crypto, which is extraordinary. it speaks to maybe where we think we are right now with pricing in the world's public markets, et cetera but that the genie is out of the bottle and there's no going back to me, the way you play this is how you play a lot of these things you don't bet on minors in the

bitcoin space. bet on the people selling the picks and the shovels. the ecosystem is on some level more interesting than the bit coins themselves >> the institutional investor base isn't in the story yet. when they get in the story, it's another leg higher i would absolutely be buying bitcoin here >> for me, i think the regulation is the key. there's going to be more, not less ultimately that's a bearish headwind ahead, more from credit suisse's bitcoin conference. we'll hear from blockchain about how the technology could change wall street forever. i'm melissa lee. you're watching "fast money" on cnbc, first in business worldwide. meantime, here's what's coming up on "fast. >> he did not want me. why? ego. >> legendary investor nelson peltz lost his battle with p&g what's next? we've got a special report

f esplus which one othe banks do traders see breaking out on earnings? the answer when "fast money" returns. the classes, the friends, the independence. and since we planned for it, that student debt is the one experience, i'm glad she'll miss when you have the right financial advisor, life can be brilliant. ameriprise

welcome back to "fast money. in the biggest proxy battle in history, pg&e shareholders voted to deny nelson peltz a seat on the board. leslie picker has more >> reporter: p&g declared a slate of 11 directors had been elected. those are preliminary results. peltz isn't exactly buying those results. he said he's waiting for the certified election results by independent inspector of election he spoke with our sara eisen in cincinnati and he said he's not throwing in the towel just yet >> our numbers say it is as close to a dead heat as possible i think our numbers show we were in the lead this morning

we don't know what they came in, we don't know what they brought in if anything, it's plus or minus 1% we need to really count it andened it >> reporter: peltz said regardless of the outcome, p&g should put him on the board. the ceo said no, but he did acknowledge the vote in some ways is a reflection of shareholder impatience with their current strategy >> certainly there's a desire to see us move faster i take the feedback from all investors, however the final vote ends up i think, and frankly i know from many investors, they support the strategy do they want to see us move faster i'm sure and we're moving faster. as many ask me about the past, i've said we can't change the past, we learn from the past >> reporter: p&g is the largest company by market cap to ever be targeted by an activist. activists lately have been

targeting bigger companies which have the firepower and resources. so they have been much more fou forceful in their rebukes. today, honeywell announced it planned to do the opposite and keep aerospace spinning off what they contend to be noncore sets. that vote is set to take place next month in determining whether or not they should put ackman and two of his nominees on the board, melissa. >> thank you, leslie picker from headquarters interesting what activists are doing these days i'm not sure exactly what the scorecard is but it doesn't seem to be extremely good when it comes to proxy votes and exact change >> a friend of mine runs a mutual fund, they invest in all of them across the board they've picked some of the sweeter ones

their performance up 13.5% year to date. there's opportunity out there. these mega cap deals very difficult to get the buy-in to move the ship, if you will as the assets raise of these headline funds, they have to go after bigger deals they don't do three more deals, they do one big deal very difficult to move the needle p&g, they have a year to ship it around >> in terms of winning and losing, nelson peltz lost a proxy vote on dupont and then eventually the ceo was out >> and there was major change there. to be clear about nelson peltz and his guys, they're generally nonaggressive activists. they typically endorse change that's positive for investors. it's not as opportunistic as it is for other activists they had a big victory with ge, a $200 billion company they got somebody on the board you have to make a core

assessment of what they're trying to do >> back in the old days the activist was the only one to benefit from these deals where they would sort of extort, i'm talking about back in the '80s, corporate raiders would go in and extort money from the corporation. right now it's the investors that make the money. you can still follow them into these names. >> do you like p&g here? >> no. we talked about walmart potentially. if you put up a chart of walmart and a chart of procter & gamble, they topped out at the same time, pretty much the exact same price. 2015, they were mirror images of one another. now what's happened to proctor, it's probably a month ahead of where walmart is big valuation of 21 times forward earnings when i was in college, remember we had to read "moby dick," that's what peltz is trying to do now

coming up, moment of truth for the banks. jp morgan, bank of america, wells fargo, all gearing up for earnings later, our deep dive into the crypto craze on wall street. we're talking to the head of blockchain credit at credit suisse i'm explain why the technology could change wl re as alstetwe know it. much more "fast money" straight ahead. atile markets." something we all think about as we head into retirement. it's why brighthouse financial is committed to help protect what you've earned and ensure it lasts. introducing shield annuities, a line of products that allow you to take advantage of growth opportunities. while maintaining a level of protection in down markets. so you can head into retirement with confidence. talk with your advisor about shield annuities from brighthouse financial established by metlife. you myour joints...thing for your heart... or your digestion...

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money. earnings season under way, banks are gearing up to face their moment of truth. jpmorgan, citigroup, wells fargo, bank of america, all four have posted impressive catch-up rallies in the past month. which one are you banking on, get it >> ooh >> going into earnings grosso >> jpmorgan is the favorite. if you look at the xlf on a relative strength index, they are overbought if you go back a year to date, not year to date, a year from now, 12 months from now, you look at the xlf has outperformed 35%, it outperformed large cap tech i would be careful of jumping into banks i'm not gung-ho. >> what are expectations i don't think expectations for q3 are extremely high. i look at it and say setup is muted going in, the best case scenario, or worst case scenario, if you will. there could be an opportunity here downside risk is minimal i would be buying jpmorgan for the potential of a good quarter

and ride the stock higher. >> i like citi and bank of america. i think the bar is lower for these guys in a global economy, these guys have the lowest exposure i'm not sure that unless we had a major pickup in fixed income, you would have a chance to see goldman outperform for all this talk about banks destroying it as in outperforming, they've underperformed other sectors >> still up. >> what's your point what period? >> you just said it underperformed >> the wrong term. where's your reference point >> before the elections. >> i'm talking about this last market spurt, financials have lagged >> what do you say about goldman? >> i think in terms of fixed income, if you've been reading the newspapers lately, the higher ups, the fixed income commodities at goldman sachs are

stepping down, leads me to believe the quarter won't be great. jpmorgan is the most expensed when you look at price to book you're probably long in the tooth. i agree with tim, citi probably has the most runway ahead of it and it's probably the cheapest on that metric of valuation. >> earnings aside, many of these big banks have something else in common they're hot on blockchain, the technology that facilities bitcoin trade and can be used for a host of other transactions we're headed back to the bitcoin and blockchain conference to speak with james disney, leading the charge on blockchain's ambitions. thanks so much for joining us. >> thanks, melissa >> what are the goals for credit suisse in terms of blockchain? >> it's a very important technology for us at credit suisse we have a lot of innovation going on across the bank, in all divisions, in all regions. i think it has the potential to streamline our operations and that ofall financial services.

a good example is some of our lbo clients. when we do a private equity transaction and buy a company, a leveraged buyout or lbo, we finance that with debt when we raise that debt, it can take 20 or 30 days to close and settle that transaction. we've had an experiment when using the blockchain we're able to close and settle that in a matter of minutes. if you add up the transaction volume that we do over a quarter there, that's hundreds of billions of dollars we're able to free up and take out of the system to use for other purposes that gives you an example of the opportunity that we see with blockchain >> so that's the immediate use walk us down five years from now, probably the technology will change exponentially, improve, and be deployed for other purposes what are some of the purposes we're not imagining right now in the present for banking? >> it's a good question. you think about it this way. blockchain technology is what underlies all of this. you think about bitcoin, it's the first killer app for blockchain technology.

and the analogy i think is really the internet. e-mail was the first killer app on the internet. and look what's happened over the next 20 years. i think there's a lot of innovation we're going to see here we've done other experiments in other parts of the bank. transferring art and other asset classes amongst our private banking clients. i think the sky is the limit, really we're in the very, very early stages here. >> you've talked about a system that takes the process from 30 days to a few days, to your point. what does that do to middle office jobs all throughout wall street over the next six months? >> yeah, i think it's much like what you see across technology with automation and ai it's probably going to reduce the need for some of those middle and back office people. now, i think it's an opportunity to redeploy some of those resources. it helps us from a regulatory standpoint it helps us with capital efficiency it helps us with speed it takes out cost. i think that's good thing for everybody. i think that's actually an opportunity rather than risk for most of those people

>> this is probably one of the first conferences, james, that i've heard of happening on wall street focused on crypto currencies as well as blockchain what was credit suisse's gold with this in terms of -- i mean, you are heading up how to use the technology within the bank what was the purpose of this conference because this is not really happening on wall street too much, from a major bank to have a conference like this focused on crypto currencies >> yeah, it's an innovation that we thought was necessary, when you think about what's happening out there in the crypto currency space. we've brought together investors and clients as well as our internal i.t. and operations people i think there's a huge opportunity here we see that innovation is called to what we do. we need to be innovative otherwise we're out of business. it's crypto currencies and the blockchain technology, which as you've discussed, it's the next gen database

this will be the first of things we're doing internally and external, this is one of the first external things we've done i think you'll see more for us it's important for us from an investment banking standpoint, with our investment banking clients, as we're trying to do a lot of transaction with those startups a s are startup, and internally for us >> james, thanks for your time, i appreciate it. james disney at the credit suisse and bitcoin crypto currencies and blockchain conference >> extraordinarily deflationary. you think about the amount of middle office and back office jobs on wall street that are going to go -- i don't want to say it, it gives me no joy, but blockchain makes those jobs obsolete >> you extract that across other transactions like property transactions, real estate. >> not just in the financial sector

>> exactly >> any place where there's a payment going on >> exchanging assets >> it will make guys a lot more profitable if anyone benefits, it's the banks. these guys have a lot of roic to grow on. >> you know what goes away for the individual investor, title insurance. when you have that clearance on the black chain, it makes it very visible you save 3500 bucks when you buy a house. s > ahead, the one name trader are betting on to soar even higher much more "fast money" after this es to investing, looking from a fresh perspective can make all the difference. it can provide what we call an unlock: a realization that often reveals a better path forward. at wells fargo, it's our expertise in finding this kind of insight that has lead us to become one of the largest investment and wealth management firms in the country. discover how we can help find your unlock.

welcome back options traders are betting on more gains to come for one name. mike khouw joins us. hi, mike >> reporter: had i there november 75 calls a lot of activity 14,000 of those traded for an average price of $1.12 those are bullish bets that ual could be above that strike price by the $1.12 they were paying or expiration this stock basically is well below its yearly highs >> thanks, mike. for more "options action," check out the full show on friday at 5:30 eastern time. ahead, our pros are at the credit suisse conference in new york city and they're getting ready to answer ururngyo bni questions right after the break. stay tuned well, it's earnings season once again. >>yeah.

lot of tech companies are reporting today. and, how's it looking? >>i don't know. there's so many opinions out there, it's hard to make sense of it all. well, victor, do you have something for him? >>check this out. td ameritrade aggregates thousands of earnings estimates into a single data point. that way you can keep your eyes on the big picture. >>huh. feel better? >>much better. yeah, me too. wow, you really did a number on this thing. >>sorry about that. that's alright. i got a box of 'em. thousands of opinions. one estimate. the earnings tool from td ameritrade. ♪ it's not just a car, it's your daily treat. ♪ go ahead, spoil yourself. the es and es hybrid. experience amazing. [he has a new business teaching lessons. rodney wanted to know how his business was doing... ...so he got quickbooks. it organizes all his accounts, so he can see his bottom line. ahhh...that's a profit. know where you stand instantly. visit quickbooks-dot-com.

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goods? b.k. >> alex, it's not reported, but you do need to pay taxes on it there's not a statement that goes to the irs. but the irs has ruled it is property just like a stock so if you sell it, you do have to pay taxes on it and you should pay taxes on it i know i do. >> the next one, you guys spent the whole day at this conference, what were your thoughts here on the event overall, karen >> well, you know,i've been intrigued with the payment space for a long time. clearly now it's evolving in sort of hyperspeed i don't know which of these are going to work. there's going to be many that will be very important to the revolution in the payment space. i don't know which ones will be. i want to be invested in many of them i don't have the expertise to do it, despite my reading b.k.'s book and many other things b.k. is doing it for me. but i want exposure to the space. >> dan, mike novogratz was a speaker at the conference. he was comparing this bitcoin

craze and this potential bubble to what happened with the internet and with railroads. do you think that this is a bubble the point that he was making is there is money still to be made and the bubble is long from popping. >> i think there's a lot of money to be made i heard mike's interview with you, he had a great keynote at the conference i came into this business in 1997 as the internet bubble was inflating. it kept on going for years, billions and billions of dollars were made. looking back, was the value using the internet to disrupt businesses blockchain, that's the key takeaway, the blockchain technology is here to stay if you want to bet on that, you look at other ways than buying crypto currency, technology that's going to be impactful for days and days to come.

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15%. >> target traded well today. >> that's it i'm melissa lee. thanks for watching. "mad money" with jim cramer starts right now. right now. 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. i promise to help you find it. "mad money" starts now hey, i'm cramer! welcome to "mad money. welcome to cramerica it's my job to not just entertain you but to educate and teach you. call me or tweet me. on a day, a magnificent day where the dow gained 7 0 points, s&