anyway, the market in general, i don't think the tax and tariff stuff is make or break but it will be the headline maker >> that means it's clear path to do it. >> maybe. >> maybe we'll see. >> you think that's the one thing keeping it from happening? >> it might be we have to go. michael, thank you that does it for closing bell. a big "fast money" from san francisco begins right now welcome to a special edition of "fast money" tonight. tonight "fast" is going crypto we're live at the st. regis hotel in san francisco it's a gathering of who's who and top investors and executives from the world of investing and crypto we've got three of the biggest names joining us tonight, tim draper, a billion laaire lacqueo tesla, plus the president of coinbase, asiff hirji, is going to make a major announcement

here on the show that will rock the crip poe world forever you won't want to miss that. and brad garlinghouse, the ceo of wall street's most beloved crypto, ripple, will join us to talk the next bing thing for that coin xrp. i'm melissa lee. you arrived in crypto heaven the original bitcoin baller himself and dan nathan, a consultant for credit sweeuisse. a volatile day started in d.c. and much talked about here at the conference and, of course, the big driver of the volatility, talk about a possibility trade war. >> right part of this conference we're talking about is what do you use for a hedge. we talked about the hedge last week is that potentially cryptocurrencies can serve as that but the theme was we are in a period of time with all asset classes, stocks and bonds, where volatility is going to increase and obviously that's what we saw today. >> it's interesting when you think about the last few years when equity volatility was so low. we saw a lot of volatility in other risk asset classes, we saw

it in currencies and commodities. that's where the hedges got you killed it was a drag on performance against equities what quietly happened in '16 and '17, the hedge that is blown out has outperformed every other hedge almost every other period which are crypto assets from all intents and purposes that is one theme from the investors here as they search for new ways to kind of hedge traditional risk assets. >> over time crypto has been a great hedge but over the most recent period it's not a relationship that's been changed. >> it's a relationship that's getting stronger so we've been effectively uncorrelated boy bitcoin has been uncorrelated against every asset class. i would expect as more institutional investors come into the space and this becomes more of an asset class, you would pick up that correlation it's natural what's happening now, there's too much friction, very few people have a stock-bond commodity account and then bitcoin in the same thing. futures are changing that and so

over time we'll see a moderate correlation but i would expect it to be an uncorrelated hedge type asset. >> when investors in general think about a trade war and tariffs specifically, that's an inflationary impact on the market so you look at crypto and think is this the hedge. >> so bk has been saying for years on "fast money" that his view -- let's call it bitcoin. it's not a currency, people are not transacting on it, it's a store of value for all intents and purposes it's digital gold. so when you think about that in that context, take the currency part out of it let's call it an asset so at the end of the day if we'll be manufacturing inflation through a trade war, that e-z are the risk assets that make sense. >> and even last week, they were talking about in a trade war you get inflation and what do you want to own? hard assets. and one part of that was you want to own crypto assets because the opportunity cost of not owning them is so low. let's say you put 1% of your portfolio into this, if you're wrong, you lost 1%, it's not

life changing but if you're right and your hedge your portfolio correctly, you can change what your portfolio structure looks like. >> i know you're busy with the conference so far but in terms of what you have done in relationship to the volatility we've seen in the markets, whether crypto or stock. >> let's talk about the stock market for instance. i have a short position on the qqq. i think we are in a down trend from those late january highs. i think there's a lot of uncertainty, not only just the political stuff but some geopolitical stuff heating up, obviously, that came out of nowhere in the last couple weeks so to me i think the highs for probably the first half of the year are in in the market and i'm not shorting the market because i think we'll crash, we had 11% peak to trough decline from this parabolic high in january. i think we're going to retest that over the next couple months. >> yeah i think this is a traders market we're not trending, we're in this choppiness, volatility is picking up so you don't want to get too over your skis

you want to buy low but when it rips higher, you want to take those profits quickly. it's a different trading mechanism than we have in the last three to five years, you need to be more nimble here. >> let's bring in silicon valley legend tim draper, founder of dfj and draper associates, an early investor in tesla, skype, one of the biggest bitcoin investors. welcome to "fast money," we appreciate your time. >> fun to be here. >> you with your bitcoin tie. >> absolutely. promoting as i go. >> you were an early investor in bitcoin, you bought bitcoin assets auctioned off by the u.s. marshals with the shutdown of silk road but you're also a big investor in the company. tell me how about you look at the opportunities out there and view the ecosystem. >> well, i think crypto in general and bitcoin specifically is transformative. suddenly you have a distributed currency that is not subject to the whims of some political force or another, it can go across border, it's global

i think the word "international" is going to fade away and the word global is going to come forward. and i think we've got the beginning of a major movement and i think it's bigger than the ice -- the iron age and the bronze age and the internet age. this is the biggest thing that's ever happened in the -- to the world today. i think we've got one of the great opportunities as investors, we've got a great opportunity for-to-participate through bitcoin, through other crypto, through coinbase, through other -- all these groups doing incredible things and as a human i think we've now got a world where there's going to be governance that's local but then there's going to be a virtual governance that we'll all be a part of and all the various governments are going to be virtual and competing for us

so they have to provide good service and a low cast and that's something governments haven't had to do before. >> so tim you have massive hits. web 1.0, web 2.0 how convicted -- how is the similarity and conviction to blockchain technology and crypto assets relative to those past two periods for you. >> so web 1.0 or 2.0 -- well, i guess 1.0 transformed communications and information and saw in gaming and entertainment and all those interesting industries they were big industries and they got transformed, your industry, media transformed in a big way by the internet. now there are these industries that are even bigger and they're generally highly regulated and those industries are the ones that are transformed by the blockchain -- real estate,

insurance, banking, venture capital, investment banking. and health care. and government itself i think is an industry. a lot of people think of it as a foregone conclusion but it's an industry and we'll be able to choose the government that's right for us and i think that's a whole new way of looking at the world. the world will open up and they're going to have to provide service just like every other business provides good service for their customers. >> so you mention a number of industries that could adopt the use of blockchain to help them to save money, et cetera in the long run, though, do these same industries -- are they at risk of being displaced entirely long-term, is blockchain different or foe >> it's never one or a zero. it's not like hey, it's going to disappear and everything's going to go away which is what the media was saying about itself for a while and now the media is, like, thriving and things

are going well there is always like a reboot and a refreshing that happens when there's a new technology that comes through in a wave and it starts affecting different industries and i've seen that so many times that i'm sort of yeah, this is what's going to happen and i'm so sure of it that i'll make stupid commitments like, hey, when boy bitcoin was 300, say in three years it's going to be 10,000 and people are looking at me like he's totally crazy. then it was like three years to the day. that was weird. >> there's something cool there. >> so you mentioned multiple cycles, right? multiple tech cycles as investors we get excited about what the promise is here but when i talk to developers they're telling me we're not in 1995 internet, we're in 1980s internet where do you see it? is there a disconnect between investors and developers >> are you talking about real estate developers?

>> no, blockchain developers. >> they're just getting started. this is going to be enormous and at draper associates we're making investments in companies that are just getting -- this is just the early piece of the iceberg. we haven't even found the tip of the iceberg because there's so much more than can be done wherever there's this kind of a new technology, all this creativity is formed, if you're running one type of business and then you see that you could do an ico and create a coin that has a new marketplace you say, oh, hey, i've got a new way of operating and it makes both the coin and business better because you get that extra creative boost from all of that and it's really kind of -- this is the most excited i've ever been as an investor and i was there at the beginning of the

intern internet. >> so make another prediction. you called bitcoin 10,000 to the day practically. what's your next call? >> i'm holding off on that because april 12 we're having a big party and i'm going to make the announcement there. >> april 12. >> and you are all invited i'm going to make an announcement then of what my prediction is. one of my predictions is that in five years you're going to walk in and try to pay fiat for a starbucks coffee and they're going to laugh at you because they're going say what is this are you counting out pennies giving me shells >> so no more u.s. dollars and cash >> we won't use fiat five years from now none of us will because all the engineering effort, all that excitement is focused on bitcoin and all of the cryptos around it and i think that's what we're going to

be using and we are doing -- at dripper university we're doing crypto boot camp, bitcoin boot camp and that is -- that's leading up to the party and so it's all going to kind of come to that one moment april 12 when i give you exactly what you're asking. >> wow, let me ask you this one last question -- a fresh dollar to put to work, yes fiat for now. but a fresh dollar to work, would you put it into an exi existing cryptocurrency or an ico? >> a fresh dollar -- here's the funny thick. here's how i look at a fresh dollar you talked about volatility. i think bitcoin is very stable it's all these other currencies that are volatile. they're falling away as bitcoin becomes the standard for all of us to use so i think of the

dollar and i think let me get rid of it. i want to move into something that will be used in the future. >> what would that be? >> it would be bitcoin. >> it would still be bitcoin even though these other coins have come out and gained market cap? >> well, entrepreneurs that are doing something with bitcoin or some of these other currencies, they're all very interesting because i think bitcoin will be the standard that will be like the microsoft when the internet came, be sort of the standard and then there will be all these others that could become amazon or apple or facebook but some will also be just like small little boutiques. like they'll have -- like they'll only use a marketplace that's kind of a -- just for rings or just for people who are green or people who are -- or

women. i keep looking for the women coin i think that's going to be huge. >> when you find them, let me know. >> it's huge movement. >> let me know, tim. >> and the coins have this ability to do a movement to monetize a movement it's different from a corporation. it's different from a nonprofit. it's something new it's like the prediction of something that is going to happen, that you wantto happen it's like kickstarter for societal change. >> tim, great to speak to you. i'll speak to you on the stage at the conference. tim draper, draper associates. is bitcoin going to be the standard >> i think bitcoin is going to be the standard digital currency out there and we'll have an ecosystem built around it. coming up, the moment we've been waiting for, coin base president asiff hirji will be here to make a big announcement on this show that will have a major impact on how you trade

crypto you won't want to miss it. plus, wall street's love for ripple make it the most valuable kro cryptocurrency in the world. brad garlinghouse will be here to talk about that you're watching a special "fast money" live at the st. riseg hotel in san francisco don't go away, much more "fast money" still ahead index investing for that low? that's three times less than fidelity... ...and four times less than vanguard. what's next, no minimums? ...no minimums. schwab has lowered the cost of investing again. introducing the lowest cost index funds in the industry with no minimums. i bet they're calling about the schwab news. schwab. a modern approach to wealth management. whilnothing comparesnary modeto the real thing.d... experience the command performance sales event for yourself, now through april 2. experience amazing at your lexus dealer.

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welcome back to our special edition of "fast money" at the credit suisse west blockchain symposium in san francisco now anybody who buys crypto knows what this app on my phone is you know it, coinbase. millions of crypto investors opened up their own account. coinbase exceeding the number of brokerage accounts of charles schwab joining me is the president of coinbase, asiff hirji, he has a big announcement to make but we want to start off with the base of the business. the fourth quarter of last year in particular, the month of december was a blockbuster one. >> what has happened the price of bitcoin was much higher the last time we talked now there's volatility, what have people been doing >> our trading volumes, if you

want to have a view of what they are, they're basically related to where the asset price is and what overall volatility is so the higher asset price, you'd expect more trading behavior this is the same as inequities given that volatility is down, our volumes are not where they were in december. >> with that growth that you saw last month of the year, there were a lot of customer complaints and i want to talk about that a lot of the exchanges across the board experienced that what is the state now? has the consumer and customer experience improved in your view >> yeah. that's a great question. let's put in the perspective if 2017 the trade volumes increased 30 times it's tough to grow 30x without having bumps in the road we had our fair share of bumps the platform grew more than 40x.

our support capability grew 600x that's still not enough. we had a lot of customers that didn't get the service they needed you might have seen we hired tina from twitter, she's an amazing hire, she's done a fantastic job. we're, in fact, hiring 500 additional reps this quarter of which the first 90 started yesterd yesterday. it takes time to hire reps, we're dealing with people's money so the time we find somebody and put them through security checks, it does take us time but the queues are down, service levels are back where we need to be and as long as we don't have a massive spike like december we should be fine and by the end of this quarter we'll be in great shape. >> this is the asset class for millennials. from your user base, can you back that up with data that you have more me belieillennial use? >> i think the early adopters were all millennials and many of them were that i think the asset class has

matured and now you see the people that have the money, which tend to be the more 50ish, 55ish and those people are coming on board trading as well so we have a diverse range of traders and we're trying to help accelerate the maturation of the asset class. >> we'll get to that in just a minute but in trying to figure out where the next leg of growth is coming from, is it by adding new coins to increase volume in where are you seeing it coming from >> we get this question all the time, why are you not adding more coins we have said publicly we are committed to adding more coins to the platform and we will. having said that, we have published a digital asset framework that lays out how we evaluate coins there's rubbish out there we need to avoid but more fundamentally than that there has been a lot of discomfort by the s.e.c. around a lot of these ico-based tokens and it would have been irresponsible for us to have added these assets in

the face of that uncertainty we are trying to legitimize this is a set class, we won't be the ones operating in the black. there's plenty of exchanges that want to do that, that's not us we're the leader in the space, we take it serious lift as there is more regulatory certainty, we will add more assets >> it's interesting you mentioned icos because even with xrp, the coin of ripple, in the past couple days we saw it spike because we simply advertised the fact that you and the ripple ceo were going to appear on "fast money," you weren't going to appear together. >> right. >> these are separate interviews but there were rumors going around that xrp would be added and that would be the big announcement to be made today, which it's not. >> that is not the big announcement. >> is there a concern that there's not enough liquidity where people can push around the price so much? >> you're right. when we're thinking about listing a token we look very hard at how open is it to market manipulation and all theize in

out there about whatever token, pick your favorite, the more it drives volatility and looks like it's being manipulative, the less likely we'll list it because that's not healthy for the ecosystem so i met brad coming in, he's about to come on the show and i was joking about it, should we take a picture of ourselves and post it on twitter? >> you would not believe what that would do if you did that. >> exactly. >> one of the things i think -- the adoption of your platform is -- the simplicity has helped that for all intents and purposes do you guys think -- people tune into the show, they want to hear what we have to say about relative valuation do you think about an educational process for the coins that you have listed and adding analytics to the platform in simple fashion so people can kind of do a little more than check the message boards about why what to buy and sell >> that's a great question in equities you have these share sheets on the assets, you would have this data you would look at

that needs to be created and i would say you need easier vehicles to get exposure and that's -- that needs to be created as well, i think fundamentally, though, our positioning is we are the safest and most trusted and everything we do has to follow those two rules. the most trusted is about things like market manipulation and is it the right data. the safest is this is not like equities i ran a big equity trader. that's recordkeeping this is not recordkeeping. we're dealing with digital bearer bonds so if you don't know what you're doing bad things will happen on the custody side so we look at that very hard. as this is a set class matures, market data will show up. >> asiff, stick around, you have a major announcement you'll make on this show in regards to coinbase app twitter is losing its mind in anticipation of what that announcement is. i'm melissa lee, you're watching "fast money," we're live in san

francisco. here's what else is coming up. >> announcer: had you bought $1,000 worth of bitcoin three years ago you'd be sitting on $40,000. but had you bought $1,000 worth of ripple on the same day, you'd have $90,000 and after you hear what the ceo has to say, you'll understand why when "fast goes crypto" returns.

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♪ california soul welcome back to a very "fast goes west" special crypto edition. we're live at the st. regis hotel in san francisco and we are back with the coinbase

president and coo, asiff hirji, and we hope you're pumped. just as we promised, all of you tuning in will be the first to hear about the next big thing for coinbase tell us about it. >> thank you for inviting us here and letting us do this. we've talked about the maturation of the asset class and what needs to happen in crypto it's mostly active traders, we're getting institutional demand but we haven't done much for the individual investor so i'm delighted to say that today coinbase is announcing the launch of the coinbase index fund it's basically a very simple-to-use easy way to get exposure to the crypto assets we offer on our exchange. it's a market cap weighted index fund it's underpinned by the coinbase index, which is effectively the benchmark data for crypto, which we're also announcing today and both have been available very, very smartly and people will be able to sign up, invest and we'll give them exposure

now, unfortunately day one it will only be available through accredited investors again, back to the regulatory uncertainty. those are the investors who are allowed to do it now over time we would hope very much to expand to all investors and we're working with regulators on what it will take to make that happen. >> what are the mechanics of this will you hold the actual cryptocurrencies that are on the exchange in order to reflect what's in the fund >> absolutely. so there's a separate legal entity which is completely separate from coinbase to protect the investors, coinbase asset management that's the entity you will be a customer of. it will buy the assets in the fund, it will market weight those assets, it will rebalance those assets as the index goes up and down and just like any other fund, you can investor redeem over time. >> so it's interesting people get nervous about the whole idea of a cryptocurrency i think at a conference like this you hear digital assets and crypto assets.

so you are creating an asset class for all intents and purposes and you see this as something that will expand users? >> ilds argue cry i would argue asset class. it went from active traders to institutions to individual investors. individual investors tend to trade in funds and they tend to trade in index funds, passive investing. >> is coinbase picking winners and losers you also decide what goes on to the coinbase platform which will then go into that fund. >> there is some argument to that i would go back to we are committed to adding more assets to the exchange. if we add an asset, it will show up in the fund it will be market cap weighted we have a framework for how that works and we look very hard and that's what will drive what shows up on the exchange and in the index. >> so back a little bit to the mechanics of it. this will be open to accredited

investors. is there a holding period that you have to be in? is there a one year lockup or anything like that >> we're trying to make this super simple today if you want access to a fund you're buying a hedge fund, paying performance fees, you have lookups we're not doing any of that. this is a vehicle to be as simple as possible, to be as friendly as possible, it gives you easy in, easy out, low fee and it's transparent and based on the index it's just like an etf in many ways but it's not since this is a crypto fund. >> i'm sure you've looked at the competition. is one competitor at the grade skill bitcoin investment trust granted, that's only bitcoin but this is -- it's sort of -- it feels like the same product for all intents and purposes. >> that's a good question. i think the investors are not going to want to pick specific winners or losers. i don't know that they want to do that. >> i'm sorry, asiff, we have to interrupt you.

we're hearing word cohn ha resigned. >> we're learning gary cohn plans to resign, this is coming from the "new york times" citing white house officials. the officials according to this story saying there's no single factor behind his departure but his decision to leave comes after the struggle over the plans to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum so we are learning gary cohn plans to resign. we'll bring you more headlines and details as we get them back to you. >> thank you very much, meg tirrell, i would imagine the markets would be very volatile, trade lower on this news >> gary cohn was looked at as the last person that was in the way of trade tariffs, right? so maybe the last adult in the room in some cases if you believe that i happen to believe that tariffs are horrible so you want to have somebody like gary cohn in there. this is not going to be good for the market.

>> when we were hearing gary cohn was going to be added to the administration the markets loved it. >> they thought it was a continuation of easy money policies that had been in place for much of the bull market. hat t at the end of the day he was the captain of the committee to save america, that sort of thing. this is not great for financial markets, for risk assets, we saw what happened, how that tariff announcement came about. don't forget, back in august you remember after charlottesville remember how many corporations came out and denounced the president's language and stance there? so gary cohn was front and center as opposing the president's view this is something that corporations are going to have to take a stand on, especially this tariff thing. we've seen companies come out and talk about it. he was a stabilizing force against something that was an immoveable object. >> we're showing you ispy etf, they are trading lower you mentioned he was seen as the last barrier between the administration and actual enactment of trade tariffs

let's connect the dots then. trade tariffs are inflationary how do you think the market reacts tomorrow? what trades are you looking at >> i think the entire market will be affected because now you'll have earnings compression so your pe ratio is going to be rerated? >> interest rates go up. >> interest rates go up. >> dollar goes up. >> dollars go up, stocks go down. >> i think over the lastweek we've heard a lot of prominent economists say how stupid this is when you think about how many jobs trying to buffet in america versus how many jobs impacted by companies that actually consume these materials that have the tariffs on them. to me i think it's packing on to the uncertainty we've had since late january the way the markets have reacted is they don't like this volatility in the white house. >> asiff hirji is still here one last question to you. >> of course. >> when does this product launch >> it launches very soon you'll be able to get to the web site today, sign up for it, it will be available very soon.

>> asiff, thank you for your time asiff hirji of coinbase. we just got news gary cohn has resigned we'll continue to track the market reaction. still ahead, the ripple effect ripple soaring 400% capturing the attention of the crypto universe ceo brad darling house will be here to tell us what the next big thing for the coin is. you won't want to miss it. ♪ plenty of room at the hotel california ♪ - learning from him is great... when i can keep up! - anncr: thankfully, prevagen helps your brain and improves memory. - dad's got all the answers. - anncr: prevagen is now the number-one-selling brain health supplement in drug stores nationwide. - she outsmarts me every single time. - checkmate! you wanna play again? - anncr: prevagen. healthier brain. better life.

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welcome back to "fast money. we have breaking news out of washington, d.c., a story that will impact the markets. gary cohn has resigned hampton pierson has a statement from the white house ham? >> we have three statements, first from president trump, quoting now. gary has been my chief economic advise, did a superb job in driving our agenda, helping to deliver historic tax cuts and reforms and unleashing the american economy once again, he is a rare talent and i thank him for his dedicated service to the american people. from white house chief of staff john kelly gary has served his country with great distinction, dedicating his skill and leadership to grow the u.s. economy and pass historic tax reform. i will miss having him as a partner in the white house but he departs having made a real impact on the lives of the american people. and from gary cohn himself it has been an honor to serve my

country and enact pro-growth economic policies to benefit the american people, in particular the passage of historic tax reform i am grateful to the president for giving me this opportunity and wish him and the administration great success in the future all past tense gary cohn has resigned as national economic director of note, he was not at the news conference today with the president. gary cohn out as national economic director. back to you. >> all right, hampton pierson out of washington for us thank you. for more on this, let's bring in eamon javers and the resignation comes as we seem to be on precipice of a brewing trade war. >> yeah, that's right. there were a couple of things that hampton says today that this was likely to happen. one was that gary cohn who had been a relatively religious attendee of the news conferences did not show up. there's an empty chair in front of where i was sitting for

someone on the white house staff, we're not clear if it was gary or not. he's usually in the room for those things, he was not i was told repeatedly today by white house officials that if gary resigned, it's not going to be because of tariffs, it's going to be because of an accumulation of things that is that gary, they suggested to me, is too mature to simply not get his way on tariffs and resign on principle on that issue alone but it would be because of a number of things, white house officials were not pushing back throughout the day today on the idea that gary cohn might resign from his position here, also, interestingly, gary told his interns on his staff as recently as yesterday to make sure they got the full experience out of being at the white house and sounded wistful and hoping to make sure his internals got the most out of their experience, it sounded to people who heard that like he was considering leaving as well so this is not

necessarily a surprise cohn has been talked about as somebody who might resign from this white house ever since the charlottesville incident over the summer in which he was pressured by his family to consider resignation given the president's equivocation on those racial incidents in charlottesville, virginia, last year it didn't happen then, it does happen now and now it leave the nationalist economic contingent inside the white house, peter navarro, wilbur ross who was at the press availability today in the ascendancy within the trump orbit. gary cohn was said to have been working on an event for thursday in which he would bring a number of ceos who stood to lose from tariffs into the white house to make their argument to the president. that it would seem will not happen now and peter navarro and wilbur ross, who have been bringing in ceos who will benefit from those tariffs will

be in the ascendancy, melissa. >> eamon, thanks so much eamon javers joining us on the phone. and eamon mentioned, according to his sources, it wasn't simply because of the tariff issue that gary cohn resigned but regardless of why, wall street just lost their top deputy in the white house and as you pointed out, probably one of the last barriers standing in the way of the trump administration and tariffs in terms of somebody objecting to them in the white house. he's gone now. >> right. >> what does this mean for the markets? >> again, i don't think this is good for the markets because the markets are going to say okay, what else? are we going to have more debt all the other nationalist agendas out there that could be harmful to the market, i think the market will shoot first and ask questions later so this -- again, we're in a period of extreme political volatility that are affecting asset prices and the market isn't reacting well. >> we'll show you the etfs, it

looks like they're down 1% apiece. >> it's interesting to think about before january how few 1% days we had. we had a rip in the market back on monday when it looked like the trade war wasn't as likely so this back-and-forth is not particularly great especially when you think about what led the market back from february 9 it was a concentration of prior leaders. we are still in a down trend and i think it's a market now where you want to sell rifts for all intenses and purposes and re-evaluate what 2018 from a return environment will look like given the uncertainty as we head into the midterms think about that over the course of the spring and summer >> we should mention the dollar is showing weakness on this news we want to bring in larry kudlow larry, what does this mean in terms of trade >> well, it's not great, i can say that i mean in recent days i've talked to gary i personally urged him to stay

he didn't commit and i've done it on the air, you've heard me do it. i think he did a great job i think he has a good staff. i think he's been a powerful force so i'm sorry that this is true i'm reading the "new york times" web site and the president issues a statement so i guess we know it's true you know, some of your colleagues are saying about the trade story, you're asking -- i think it's a turn for the worse. the peting -- he was trying to set up a very good -- great idea to have the manufacturers who use steel come in and talk to the president and give him the other side of the story but i was told today and i reported this on "closing bell" that that meeting was not on the calendar and was never put on the calendar now what role that might play in gary's decision i cannot say but i think he did a great job, i'm sorry he's leaving we'll see who the president appoints

the president tends to have balance where there are these disagreements. he tends to have balance and the national economic council has a broad reach in terms of policy everywhere, infrastructure, for example, taxes, regulations, energy, so forth, including health care so i wouldn't necessarily say that the cause for freer trade, freer, mind you, is over but we'll see we'll see who is appointed and someone can take over. he's got very good people around him so we'll see i don't know i personally regret this very much. >> well larry do you think the president would actually appoint another top economic adviser who would advise him against tariffs at this point? when you say that the case for freer trade is not over by any means because of gary cohn's resignation, who carries the torch for freer trade at this point? >> well, you're left basically with steve mnuchin and you're

also left with kevin hasset and you're also left with a number of people on the national economic council who very much supported gary's effort to tamp this down. i mean, look, melissa, i -- my view has been blanket tariffs are very bad that's what i oppose however where there's unfair trading practices -- and you don't have to look far on the map -- it's china so to me targeted tariffs that might lead to negotiations -- and i would have gone after china. i would haven't gone after canada i think that is still an error it's going to happen, i guess. i wouldn't go after the eu, i wouldn't let nafta hang in the balance. if china is the problem -- and they are in intellectual property rights, that's for sure -- then go after them targeted tariffs, but don't have a blanket tariff now, there are other people in the white house who share this view that trade actions would be

okay as long as they're targeted and presumably temporary in lieu of negotiations. there are plenty of people who hold that view, there's no pewism here but i think cohn did a good job, served his country well and we'll miss him. we'll miss him but on the other hand the president said this at his news conference today with the swedish premier. lots of people come to the white house, lots of people would like these jobs and life will go on life will go on and the president cut taxes, he rolled back regulations, he's promoting energy, the economy is doing very well so i don't want to push the panic button. i might also add if anyone talks about it, the economic fundamentals, particularly profits from the bottom up are looking better and better so don't panic, don't panic over this. >> well, i mean, already the markets are showing a little bit of panic we are looking at the dow etf, the s&p etf about a percent down

in after hours trade you mentioned mnuchin and hasset as being for freer trade, the markets are looking at this as if freer trade is in jeopardy. what's your take on how the market is reacting >> don't jump to hasty conclusions. that's the bested a vice i can give you, don't jump to hasty conclusions. i've seen this before, even when i worked in there with reagan years ago we had staff changes at the highest levels. life went on so i really would suggest to investors wait and see. don't make hasty judgments and by the by, the economy is in very good shape so gee wiz, hang on for a bit, let's see what happens, let's see what the president says, let's see who's a candidate for this position and other positions. don't tear the wall down, don't jump off the cliff, please, no one jump off the cliff, melissa.

>> the very calm words as the markets are down by 1.5% at this time larry, if the president called and asked you, would you serve >> i don't have any comment on that i'm not even thinking about that. >> all right, larry, thank you very much for phoning in. >> i've been -- thank you, melissa, appreciate it, good-bye. >> thanks, larry larry kudlow what's your -- we're seeing the loss. >> let's take the opposite side and take larry's advice and not panic and say this is part of a bigger negotiatingtactic and a the end of this we come out with a freer system, because that is the white house position thatedly they're going to impose these blanket tariffs and other people will react in a positive way for the u.s. that's the positive spin that you can put on. >> it do you buy that? >> not one bid but but i want to

present both sides i'm a trader at some point this negativity turns into something i want to buy. that's not today to be clear but you'll look and say o.k., maybe it's not as bad as we think. not today, though. >> and there is no reason to panic but at the end of the day when you think about it, there's no one opposing these protectionist policies, when you think about the market, larry mentioned how well the economy is doing, these are the things that will turn a cycle if it goes on too long so this is an important input, no reason to panic right now in the aftermarket. >> let's bring in john for more on this. what's your take, john, on the developments here? >> well, melissa i think larry is right to say nobody should jump to too many hasty conclusions about what it means, however i think it is safe to say we are not headed for a freer trading system certainly the fact that gary cohn is leaving now is a strong indication that the president will in fact follow through on

the tariffs he's announced there are outstanding questions, though there's a much bigger case, a much more economically important case involving china and intellectual property that the administration has to rule on later this year. if gary's departure proves a sign of where that is headed along with the tariffs then we're headed for a very rough ride because a strong push against china on intellectual property and the economic report of the president, the administration will claim damages of hundreds of billions of dollars from chinese practices. if they act mike pence rat with that we'll get a big response from china and markets are not going to be happy at all, it will make what their reaction is right now look like a tea party. >> larry had mentioned, john, that kevin hasset, steve mnuchin are going to be the new champions of freer trade and we

know that that that is relative freer trade. do they have strong enough voices at this point >> i agree those are the voices, i don't know how strong those voices are i would think that mnuchin is the one who has the shot at being most influential but, look, this is where donald trump is different -- a different kind of republican president. the republican party as it's evolved over the last generation or so has increasingly relied on working class voters, blue-collar voters to go with some of the traditional pro-business republicans past republican presidents have pretty much always sided with the pro-business wing of the party. donald trump is different. he feels that his base is with those blue-collar voters he did side with the pro-business wing on tax policy and he may return to that on other issues, he's unpredictable. but the fact that he is going forward now is a sign of how

different this situation is and how markets need to prepare themselves for the possibility of further disappointment although, again, as larry said you can't draw universal conclusions from one departure. >> another way president trump is different, though, john, is that he calls himself the stock market president when he sees the market sell off -- i mean, you have to wonder if that causes him to rethink the stance particularly when we're looking at more than 1% losses on the back of just cohn resigning. >> that's right. look, i don't think it will change where he's headed on these particular tariffs that he's announcing but i think it will inform his pick of a successor to gary cohn and that's where larry was right if the president sees that market reaction is so sharply negative and if it's sustained tomorrow and after that then

you're going to see the president because of his regard for the stock market as an indicator of how he's doing, you're going to see him take that into account. gary cohn is not the only market oriented adviser he could get. as the trump presidency has encountered more and more turbulence, it's increasingly ha hard i suspect it will be able to get somebody who will pick up that torch and he will look for somebody to do that if he thinks the markets are going to punish him badly. >> we were talking to eamon on the back of this news and eamon, according to his sources, he believes that gary cohn resigned for a myriad of reasons, not just because of his possible impending trade war. what's your take or what are your sources telling you about the stability within the white house, particularly when it

comes to steve mnuchin and kevin hasset. >> i agr agree the trump white house is in chaos. we have h.r. mcmaster, theize in so a lot of factors go into this decision but i think the stakes were raised on this decision but i think it was a factor. >> john, thanks so much for phoning in, we appreciate your analysis on this breaking news if you are just tuning into to "fast money," here's the news gary cohn has resigned from his position at the white house. we are taking a look at right now at the etfs that track the market the futures market opens at 6:00 p.m. but in terms of the etfs, the spdrs, the dow, the qqq,

more than 1% decline 'lha mh ren at straight ahead so lionel, what does being able to trade 24/5 mean to you? well, it means i can trade after the market closes. it's true. so all... evening long. ooh, so close. yes, but also all... night through its entirety. come on, all... the time from sunset to sunrise. right. but you can trade... from, from... from darkness to light. ♪ you're not gonna say it are you?

welcome back it's the story of the afterhours session, it will be the story of the day tomorrow, gary kocohn hs resigned let's get to eamon javers. eamon? >> the story during the course of the day tomorrow will shift

to who replaces gary cohn. remember the president today said everybody wants to work at the white house, they all want to get a piece of the oval office the question for the trump administration is going to be what type of person do they pick from among the vast number the president suggested he had ready to apply for senior white house positions? will it be somebody who is more in the global free trade camp or will it be somebody more in the protectionist camp that seems to be in the ascendancy inside the trump white house. that will be a big question for tomorrow and overnight tonight. >> all right, thank you very much, eamon javers if it's somebody in the mold of gary cohn, the market should stabilize. >> the market should stabilize if that's the case, that's the uncertainty. you want somebody in there that lch a different view than protectionist because go back to the civil war, protectionism is bad. >> what do you look at tomorrow first thing? >> i think if you saw things get overly done, you probably looked to add to things you like but at

the end of the day, like i said ten minutes ago, we're in a down trend, you look to take profits on rallies. >> i'm melissa lee tune in tomorrow for more on this breaking news story look at the etf