store. >> every now and then you can get a decent item. >> you can because they're always on sale. >> i love that fact. 40 or 60% off, what have you. >> my card has been used to buy things at atleta. >> yes, i'm sure with the women in your family we'll see you family, 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. traders on the panel today -- pete ja nair jan, guy adami. tonight on fast did mark zuckerberg pass the d.c. test? traders tell us whether they liked the testimony and if the stock is in the clear. plus bank of america says the bitcoin bubble is bursting as we speak and they have a fancy chart to back up that claim. but danny masters, a former jpmorgan trader who has gone full crypto says it's not bursting, it's bottoming he's got a fancy chart of his own that might have you getting bullish on bitcoin again

we start not with missiles or trade wars but instead with something that is really scary the fed and what looks like the end of easy money, yes, the trade war and the escalations taking a back seat to the fed, the first fed minutes of the jerome powell era was a bit more hawkish than many had thought with the moving to a neutral policy that sent stocks back to the lows we talk about the threats to this rally is perhaps the fed the biggest one? pete >> it is today the reason i say that is every single day there's a new headline that actually is moving everything around. it started off the day with syria, it started off with donald trump, then moves to the fed and back towards facebook and go towards technology, oil, the commodities themselves i think it's just literally that's where we are and i think the most important thing is we're all looking forward to friday because friday we finally get to look back and say, all right, how are the earnings, what are the real results and then we actually have some facts in front of us but the fed is going to give people a little bit of scare but

at the same time they have been very transimportant. i think powell will be just as transparent as the previous group. because of that i'm not as nervous as i think the market's reaction today against the fed. >> what do you think >> you said easy money was a rodney dangerfield movie. >> lousy movie. >> not that great. >> pete's right. three months ago we thought there was nothing that could derail this market now every day there's a new issue. and i won't run through a long list of the fresh, you know, kind of issue of the day there will be another one tomorrow probably. i don't necessarily think this will be the holy grail and be the catalyst that will have us forget these things. eye would argue at the end of the first quarter when we priced in the numbers we priced that in before we got a tax bill pete's probably going to say great numbers we're going to have in the first quarter. the question is is the market cheaper? i'm really talking a lot for you. >> i appreciate. >> the things that help me a little bit is on positioning

full bear indices and bulls are at their lowest level since preelection which means this market is getting a little more pessimist pessimistic. that's what it needs. >> that's the lens that it needs to be perceived. everybody needs to get more bearish. >> when you went to the negative side, you went right to pat. >> i had no idea that was just a natural reaction. >> i think it's really important here especially when you consider the fact that the s&p is down 8, 9% from its all time highs in january we have to be really clear here, expectations for strong q-1 earnings are baked in the cake just that simple all those other things, the fed, geopolitical, washington, we're just starting to see hit business confidence. we're starting to see hit consumer confidence. we've seen weak retail sales numbers. and that's the thing i think that we go back and look, if january, that january 26th high was the high for 2018, we're going to look back and say that's pretty obvious because we really hold forward a lot of

demand for a whole host of things after that tax bill to me i'm optimistic that we'll have a decent economy and the fed will be transparent and not make a huge mistake but all those other things we can't quantify right now a good reason why the vix is -- >> if it's priced in, what if it's extended past what is priced in? what if the earnings are that much over what we already think they're going to be in terms of being -- >> listen, if we saw cautious dpid ens for q-2 and the stock market doesn't get hit hard then you go and buy it because at that point it's starting to discount some of this growth that we can see in the second, third quarter, that so sort of thing. to me you have to take a very measured approach. i don't think the fed should be the big issue at this moment i think it's the geo political stuff and the markets are sleep walking through what's going on in d.c. >> i agree there's things to be worried about on top of the fed. you make this point all the time i'm in your head

you're in my head. two months ago with that jobs report that set off this bout of volatility that we're still in. >> february 2nd, thursday was a february 1th, tim said that i think there's a good chance that good news will be bad news tomorrow and you got a good wage growth number that friday and the market went down 670 dow points, the biggest move we've seen in years in terms of the dow. the market was chugging along up to that. to answer your question, i do think there are concerns about the fed. i don't think they're going to take a misstep either, but that doesn't mean the market won't react in a negative way. ipg it's been the fed all along. everything else is sort of noise, facebook, tariffs, everything else going on the fed is what's really -- >> this isn't even about a fed mistake. again, let's not just this fed, no one's doing that. but rates have to move higher because we shouldn't be at certain accommodative policy whatever it's growing at it is not a time for rates to b

this low if you look at the headline kind of a relief. if you look at the core, it's actually kind of hot we got ppi yesterday that was the high since 2011. inflation is there if you listen to steve leaseman who does a good job with this stuff, you have some of the numbers that are starting to run off so your numbers will look a lot hotter we had deflationary forces that are baked into these numbers keeping them low the fed is very focused and these minutes today tell you the fed has to move. >> i agree, speaking with steve liesman. we had a little bit of back and forth there, i said that i think the minutes were a little bit hawkish. when you hear statements the appropriate path for federal funds rates over the next years would likely be slightly steeper than they previously expected, i read that as hawkish he said, i don't think it's hawkish. all our context, in i context was more hawkish than they sounded like before. >> and it's all been about -- >> it's relative. >> -- have a slightly different

tint than the lens they're looking at yes, i think the markets are looking at the fed you brought that up, guy, about the fact that it really is, all the other stuff is just noise. but the fed is certainly something everyone will focus on and they'll continue to, but the earnings will trump that. >> why do the financials go down the most >> you know, it just seems -- >> with the prospect of rising rates. >> yeah. which seems interesting, right, that the financials got hammered as hard as they did today. i was very surprised they got hit that hard. but he this a huge day the other day. >> real quick, i don't think it st about a mistake they might not do everything exactly right. >> what they have to do. >> the mistake has been thinking the fed always has the market's back they have for the past years. >> i'm getting dizzy looking a t that shirt right now sorry. >> you're picking on his shirt look in the mirror like the pot calling the kettle black here. >> oh, sorry. >> i didn't even say that. >> i'm worried about the folks at home getting hypnotized.

>> this shirt is a yankee pinstripe. >> nice comeback for guy, mel. you can't fight your own battles. >> i didn't ask her to stick up for me. >> whatever. >> that's my normal reaction to your shirt. >> whatever. >> thanks. >> move on >> thanks, mel >> the markets may be shrugging off the attention and the markets are going wild crude and gold goad hi crude hits a three-year high our next guest says there's more room to run. hi, todd. >> hey, melissa. crude oil is looking amazing here we'll start off on the monthly this is very important to remember that we have all the prices set based on percent gains. what you see here is the life of this down trend in crude it looks like the market wants to come up and test about this $85 level. that's the decision in this down trend that began since the credit crisis. so with that in mind, let's head off the monthly down to the

weekly here's that same line. the graphics department did a great job of drawing this in crude oil geopolitical tensions weakness in the dollar et cetera inflation coming down the pike that looks to be the next up side target. if we get through 85 then we can be going significantly higher. another commodity here is gold and again just really not much to add to this chart just to put the gold market in perspective on the monthly, look how far gold has come and look how insignificant this decline appears to be up on the monthly chart. that's really nothing. gold's been incredibly quiet as we see as we go to the next chart on the weekly. kind of a similar setup to crude oil. we've got obviously a basing pattern here what i'll draw your attention to is it looks like an inverse head and shoors here. you got the left shoulder, the head, the right shoulder it looks like it could be blast off. i put on option positions that don't pay off until we get to 1500 in the next three months. i think gold is finally ready to

go all that volatility we saw in the last couple of months, that we thought cold would be higher it feels like now is the time it wants to go. with all that being said here's the s&p, from my point of view we're in a boring range. with all the news going on here look at the price action over the last few weeks, chop and mess and noise don't get caught up in it. since that january 28 high, we have been in a big old triangle. we'll come up and challenge the upper end here i don't think we're ready to break through just quite yet looking at all the sectors i think it lot be a little bit more consolidation heading into earnings season. >> does the chart of your dollar play into your view of gold. >> i was talking to tim about that he's bullish i see a dollar that continues to free fall. that dollar will be key. if we break through 88 there's long-term like the whole lull in the dollar is in jeopardy, this up trend about the 84, if you break through 84 on the dollar index from a technical point of

view, this whole move off the dollar is an abc correction and there's a longer term down trend in the dollar that will exacerbate that commodity rally. >> thanks, todd. >> you know, you sort of glossed over the -- you buried the -- what do you people call that burying the lead. >> i haven't said anything yet. >> what do you think about todd's energy call, tim? but the real question is what were you and flash gordon doing in agreement >> they're chatting charts obviously. >> i know as much about elliott ways as elliott gould. we keep our best stuff for the real show, not in the green room but todd is right, we were talking about the dollar some reality about the trade and possibility the economy are things that keep the dollar not from necessarily breaking out but i will say this. the dollar's put in a lot of bad news i think 13% down over the last 18 months, you've seen around 88 there's been a bottoming range it's been fighting above the 50s so technically i think it's not

in that bad a place. i don't like gold. gold had the perfect storm to rally for two years and i think it's range bound and if anything do we suddenly not think interest rates are going higher because if they are gold is meandering or going lower. >> what do you think about gold? >> every time i believed in gold it ends in tears i think that gold will be up 100, it will discount and happen the next day gold is not a story until it is one. it's not a story right now i will say this about energy how does earnings get into april 23rd to me is pretty interesting especially if you compare it to slum bourg et. halliburton will get. >> i have to say this about the commodity call he's making here. you talk about interest rates going higher, higher input costs. i don't know how this is a bigger headwind because we do have global tightening going on. if you talk about what hits the skids for this market, a

combination of all those things after such a long period of accommodative monetary policy. >> don't you think we're in a still inflationary environment which is great for commodities if anything oil is going higher. if i grab oil against the dollar -- >> i think the combination of those things, you know, could be a real problem that's what i'm saying. >> i tend to think oil's going higher as well i've actually been adding in the energy space to a number of names. i already have four, i won't tell you all but psxi today option activity was huge i like that name anyway so it give me an excuse to buy in. i always go back to the old chips, i always find something in the chips i know this is not in the commodities realm. but if you look at ips which there are names we don't bring up as much as others marvel i saw this paper in there. i think it's going higher. >> looks like mark zuckerberg has won over both washington and wall street. the stock is up 7% this week but did he win over the traders

here they'll grade his performance next plus a former jpmorgan trader twos full-on crypto. he'll tell us why he thinks the bitcoin boom is getting higher and pete here one of the beaten down oil stocks that is about to break out. at&t provides edge-to-edge intelligence, covering virtually every part of your manufacturing business. & so this won't happen. because you've made sure this sensor and this machine are integrated. & she can talk to him, & yes... atta, boy. some people assign genders to machines. and you can be sure you won't have any problems. except for the daily theft of your danish. not cool! at&t provides edge to edge intelligence. it can do so much for your business, the list goes on and on. that's the power of &. & this shipment will be delivered...

welcome back to "fast money. facebook under fire as zuckerberg got grilled on washington but maybe he should do it more often because the stock has rallied for the second day in a row. julia boorstin. >> mark zuckerberg wrapped up his second consecutive day of five hours of testimony. he fielded questions on everything from election interference to whether facebook violated the consent decree to the all important question of how facebook manages data. that was the source of the most and the most testy exchanges >> is it possible for facebook to exist without collecting and selling our data is it possible to exist?

>> congressman, we don't sell people's data. so i think that's an important thing to clarify up front. and then in terms of collecting data, the whole purpose of the service is that you can share the things that you want with the people around you and your friends. >> investors seem satisfied with zuckerberg's responses, the stock moved up by nearly 1% today after facebook shares gained 4.5% yesterday. he reiterated that he's expecting regulation of facebook and the rest of the industry and if it's done well, it's not a bad thing. >> i think that it is inevitable that there will need to be some regulation my position is not that there should be no regulation, but you have to be careful about what regulation you put in place. >> of course, over the past two days the ten hours of testimony did raise a number of big questions for facebook going forward including does facebook have a monopoly on social media? zuckerberg says no and is facebook a media company

or a tech company? zuckerberg says a tech company these topics are sure to be of great interest moving forward. melissa, back over to you. >> julia boorstin in washington for us let's play a little game. >> i like games. >> the question is do you like or dislike zuckerberg's testimony? >> i understand. because on facebook -- >> if you like. >> if you like it or you ds like it play the game correctly. i disliked it. i say that he's extraordinarily well prepared. but every other answer was, senator my people will get back to you on that his people have to get back to a lot of people on a lot of things there weren't hardball questions. i heard maybe three or four. the stock did rally, but to me the test will be earnings coming up jim kramer said last night what if there's another cambridge analytica. then karen chimed in that they haven't dismissed the fact that there could be another one that could be catastrophic for

the shares. >> dan, like or ds like? >> i'll use a math emoji. >> no, dan. >> that's your choice. >> i thought it was fun. >> he liked it >> don't dislike it, all right. >> it could have been a disaster there was a very low probability of that by all intents and purposes and i think he did well. so the fact that the stock held yesterday's gains, my thought right after that was it was a good old fashioned short squeeze maybe continued, this stock is ranged it's not making a new high in 2018 because i just think that these guys have to play with kid gloves on so many different areas on which they're going to play into the midterm elections, they have to be really careful, that would be one, man, if there's anything in that regard. so to me the range is probably in, you probably see a stock between, i don't know, 175 and to the down side maybe make a new low at some point. >> i don't understand how they can be bullish on their earnings there's no way they can say

we'll knock the cover off the ball. >> can i play the game, please >> yeah, geez. >> i like it more if he was wearing my shirt he'd looked better but what he said today was not the issue at hand other than the fact that if you listen to the closing bell and the jersey senator that came on and talked about the browser buzzer legislation that he wants to push through and destroy the internet, that's the stuff that worries me wherever these guys fall in love, i hear dan saying range bound, i think absolutely range bound. this wasn't the moment that allowed the stock which has been underperforming two years to rise i think people are struggling with the centralized platform concept see facebook maybe as the parasite that's feeding off of them. i'm not saying that's what's going on and they didn't just wake up and find out they're using their data, but that's what i think might be happening. >> i'm giving it a double like. >> a double like. >> like like, i hit it as many times as i could here's why they just created something, with all the regulation that's going to come through, right, think about this for a moment. they are building a moat because

think about those competitors that want to come in to compete with facebook. they won't be able to afford it. >> moat. >> facebook can. stocks can actually be in another range, but it will be a higher range. >> except who is the real competitor -- there aren't all that many competitors out there. >> they dominate right now so nobody. >> so ne dominate right now. i understand all the points. i think your point about there's no way they're going to be able to say great things into this quarter, i agree with that the optics would be bad which is why i think you might fail. >> just the flip side of what you're saying, 75% of all online ads are served by google and facebook there's a way to do legislation that encourakourcourage innovatn it is not easy to say this moat will be created by legislation they help craft. >> i disagree. i completely disagree. >> what's a peak lifestyle fr a company. history tells you you only get four or five years for in the

center of the roadway. facebook has had a lot of that time i agree with dan, to say there's not gooding to be competition -- >> but big regulation always favors bigger companies who have deeper pockets who can afford to deal with new regulation as opposed to the smaller companies -- >> this is a economy that's a pretty small argument. if you want to think about it in terms of telecon in the '60s, '70s, or rail, all this other stuff. >> i'm double liking what dan says double like for me. >> that's not a double -- >> applicable to other people's -- >> just did it. >> anyway, moving on. >> please. >> still talking facebook, but for more on what this means for the future of facebook and how to value the company, let's bring in the dean evaluation finance at nyu great to see you again. >> good to see you, too. >> you actually bought facebook yourself back on the 3rd of april. so i guess you say that it's valued at what >> i mean, my value was about 180, but i really think that this is going to have

consequences for facebook. it would be unrealistic to expect it not to but i think the consequences are being overstated i don't think you're going to destroy this company's business model. i think ultimately this is a company that trades a free social media site for information about it it's hypocritical to claim that your data is being invaded when you give that data to the company for free you're getting something in return so i think the business model will endure with restrictions because thosery strikzs will cost facebook in terms of higher expenses every year. >> when you think about evaluation and what facebook has tradedate before versus what it should trade in the future, how do you discount that prior evaluation to reflect the new restrictions on its business model? >> first, is i dropped its margin by 15%. that's a pretty hefty drop in margin i assume some advertisers will leave. $1.5 billion will leave next

year because there are people gunshy and want to leave i did assume there would be a fine of at least a billion dollars. the ftc will make facebook an example. with those costs built in, i still think it has a fundamentally good business model and my value reflects that. >> that's a pretty big discount on the margin from 85% down to 70 wouldn't you assume that during this transitionary period that they're also going to see a decrease in users. they're already seeing it in north america. and we know that globally users are monetized in a much lower rate couldn't this be a big inflection point for this company if you were to see revenue growth slow down and costs go up dramatically >> there's a scaling problem they already face with or without this data scandal. they have 75% of north americans on their user roles. you can't grow much faster here. there is this leveling off and some of this predates the data

scandal where facebook charged a fee. the market punished it when that happened you'll see more restrictions that will reduce their advertising revenues that's partly why i brought the growth rates down and reduced revenues at least for the next couple of years because i do think there's going to be a period where they have to pull back and recalibrate their model. i don't think they want to abandon the model. i don't sew a subscription based model as the answer to that. but it will cost them in terms of higher operating costs. they'll get that movement. people will be dispointed when they see the numbers come in because they're so used to seeing 40 to 50% growth. >> 180 you expect in 12 months or so? what's your timeframe on that number >> when you value a company, you actually value it as of today. >> so today it should be valued at 182. >> 180 the expected price a year from now would be 195 or 200.

>> oh, okay. we asked the traders what they thought of mark zuckerberg's testimony, if they liked it or disliked it. professor, same question to you, like or dislike how mark zuckerberg did >> i liked it because it's capital. it's a lot of posturing and he postured just the right amount the reality is nothing good ever comes out of capitol hill testimony but bad things can happen nothing bad happened over the two days to me, that's good news. >> professor, thanks for your time >> you're welcome. >> what color do you call that shirt there? >> coral. >> coral. >> right away. >> you just blurted that out coral. >> you like the shirt? >> i have eyes i can see the shirt. >> hard to match a tie with that shirt. >> or that shirt. >> can we have -- >> can i say something everything he just said sounded like lower multiples everyone who said 17 times earnings for facebook is too cheap, what's the multiple on this company that has lower margins and is possibly losing

their top line somewhat? >> i have to add one thing there's other levers for these guys to pull they never charged for it. maybe get into payments. a lot of stuff that will be good that comes out of this for the future of this company if you can hang around in an area trading at the high teens even if you have growth rates coming in, you'll probably get paid back in the not so distant future. >> you're liking it. >> this company will come out a better company with a better prospect for their brand than they had let's say a year ago. >> coming up, pete najarian stepping up to the plate to one beaten down oil stock but he says the pain is over. i'm melissa lee. you're i'm melissa lee, you are watching cnbc, first in business worldwide. in the meantime, here's what is coming up on fast. ♪ ge, we bring good things to living ♪ ♪ we bring good things to life >> a new report says it's about

to get worse plus bank of america said the bitcoin bubble is popping. but the former head of jpmorgan's commodities desk says it ain't no bubble it's a bottom. d he'll explain why when fast money returns. from some unexpected friends. these zebra and antelope. they're wearing iot sensors, connected to the ibm cloud. when poachers enter the area, the animals run for it. which alerts rangers, who can track their motions and help stop them before any harm is done. it's a smart way to help increase the rhino population. and turn the poachers into the endangered species. ♪ ♪

welcome back to fast money back in november stepped up to the plate to pitch target. >> i like target i think it's too cheap you can see where it's kind of been holding down in here. it almost tipped those levels before when it pulled back we didn't have to hit those levels but you're starting to see a little bit of a perk right now. i like what we're seeing i think this stock will get up towards 70 once again. >> and that was a great call target is back up around 70 bucks and up 18% since that pitch. what do you do now, pete >> hold on to it the stock's going higher still in the mid-teens and great growth prospects when you go on the e-commerce side of things 20% plus there their margins are

strong this is a company versus the discount on the s&p there's plenty of up side. i think this goes through 80 now. >> since you have the hot hand why don't you pitch us another fast pitch. >> all right ready to do it all right. so we're going to the energy space. i talked about how i've been adding to the energy space this is one of the names that i grabbed a couple of months ago stock has not performed well yet for me but it is hanging around the 77 level it's exxonmobil. as i always start off with management new ceo, tillerson gone, woods is in. this guy is a doing a great job been at the company since 1992 knows all the ins and outs, they passed the batten to another great $25 billion annually these guys are going to be spending. so this is a company that's willing to put the money in and move along and move this company to the up side now, catching up with the oil rally. the disconnect has been there for a really long time this is part of the fundamental story here this stock was trading near these same levels.

i don't know if we've got the other one, but near these same levels when this was trading lower to 30, $28 actually, stock was still trading down the same level. this disconnect is going to start to close you will see the stock move to the up side. the fundamental story is all intact they've been buying back shares. over ten years they've shrunk their share count 20%. look at the p/e level, that looks great. the cash flows look phenomenal this is a company that has $30 billion right no cash flows. that's going to double by 2025 so that's the goals that exxon has set out there. i think they're going to be able to execute on this this stock is way too cheap at $77. >> quick question would be the lack of earnings growth. the valuation is reasonable but haven't seen the eps growth that you see out of conoco phillips. >> that part is disappointing. if you go back several years revenues are much higher than they are now but this is a company that i

think still can grow they've really put the money out there. and actually if you look at the cash flows, if that's right, if that doubles by 2025, this company's going to continue to make acquisitions and there's all kinds of different other types of things they can do with that cap ex that they're spending right now. >> you have chosen exxon but there's other big integrators in this space so i assume you have to like this more than an exxon or royal dutch shell. >> i think this is an extremely efficient company. a lot of people don't think so, but i do i think the efficiency of a they're doing is unbelievable. i like other names but exxon is the name that has the most up side from here. >> what other names do you like? conoco. >> i own conoco, i own exxon, i own different pieces that i mentioned earlier, but i bought phillips today psx. i've also got the ohih. >> are you buying pete's pitch on exxonmobil? >> i like the space and i think pete's right, this company could higher but i'm a seller. relative to the peer group, i'm

sorry, pete. that is pete i'm sorry. really sorry but bottom line is i think exxon is not very efficient. i think ultimately the good news for them is the whole sector's focused on capital giveback and they're doing that. >> i don't know, jack, about oil stocks but i'm buying it pete has just been repeatedly bullish on this name and as it's been bottoming over the last couple of weeks and he made good points and he seemed convicted. >> you don't know what about, jack so merrill lynch bank of america merrill lynch yesterday added them to their u.s. one list. >> buy or sell >> it doesn't say anything >> i said i'm a buy. well then i'll say it -- >> you have no sign. >> i wrote other things on the sign. >> you wonder why -- >> you have 74, 75 a number of times to dan's point so i'm on the buy camp even though i don't know this jack guy either. >> two buys and one sell on

exxon. but we want to hear from you head to twitter and vote in our poll @cnn fast money crypto getting crushed one former jpmorgan trader says the bottom is in what has him so bullish. [phone ringing]

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bitcoin still struggling to get back to 7,000. the word on the street is that the bitcoin bubble is actually

bursting bob pisani has the details j. >> bank of america chief financial strategist michael hartnett, you all know him he's implying bitcoin should join some of the greatest asset price bubbles in history including the mississippi company and south sea company in the 18th century, gold in the 1970s, the stock market rally in 2009 bitcoin appears to be the biggest bubble of them all that's the high one. at its highest level it was nearly 60 times the value of three years ago. the dutch that was at its height in the 1630s, that was only 40 times higher than three years before the mississippi company formed as a monopoly when the french controlled louisiana and the southern united states in the 1720s was 30 times higher than its early years. so nothing else comes close to bitcoin. now we all know these kinds of charts are a staple of wall street and the implications that you're supposed to draw this mental line and assume bitcoin

will fall dramatically as well the problem is it may not go to nothing or like the stock market in 1929 it may fall big and then just come back again here's my thoughts it's still too early in this cycle for this to definitely be called a bubble. call it what we experience perhaps a bubble-let, i don't know this is like in the 1980s that people tell me there might be a lot more room to go. i think it's too early to say the bubble has completely burst. >> thank you very much, bob pisani for more bring in a jpmorgan trader who went all in on crypto danny masters launched the first traded bitcoin and fund. so you've been an early believer in bitcoin and when you take a look at a chart like that that bank of america merrill lynch have put out, what do you think >> i wonder where bank of

america were on the very left side of the chart because i don't remember the bullish call to start with. crypto is a difficult marketplace to analyze, there are metrics that don't exist in the markets that we traditionally know and love. and so i look at people like chris pinnenski who is a guest here and spencer bogart, co-lat ta ochoa and people who have been around crypto for five years will give you a very, very different feel than this chart looks like kind of approach. so it's a tough one to call. >> how do you actually trade crypto and i ask you that because people want to make parallels or try to think of the way in which you trade crypto like another commodity perhaps a commodities trader, can you make that parallel or is it a completely different animal in terms of what drives the trade on a day-to-day basis >> my first ever thoughts in crypto were sort of parallel to my first thoughts in oil we started my company way back in the commodities focused and i

thought that the depletion that's pervasive and the emerging with china in the early 2000s would lead to a scenario that would rally -- and i didn't think that we'd find the answer and the proof for many years to come and i think that's a parallel with cryptocurrency, i think the sell-off is there and i think that the story is convincing, the technology is convincing we may not know the proof for another tenor use. >> is it concerning, though, that in that parallel back then for oil there was a use case for oil. people were using it for various applications, but right now the use case for cryptocurrency even as a currency is questionable and even as a store value if you take a look at the volatility may be questionable as well. >> yeah, i think if you look back to the commodity parallel, i remember the outbreak of the gulf war in what was it '91 the land war we saw moves in oil that we've never seen before, overnight moves. and that changed the whole dynamic and opened up a whole new area for oil prices to go.

i don't think you can necessarily look back at those things and draw those exact parallelsp the use cases for crypto are bitcoin is disrupting money in gold. ethereum is disrupting the capital. there are other protocols that are disrupting identity, identity provenance and so on. these things are really unproven yet but quite promising. >> danny, let's talk about that use case for bitcoin because it is the largest crypto. it seems like some of the smartest minds have really just hunkered down here and saying we know what the knocks are, it's slow and this and whatever when you think about something like the lightning network that's to speed up transactions, we've seen transactions fall dramatically since the crypto. is it the sail wagging the dog what's going on here how do we get these use cases to go and are these brilliant minds focused on the right stuff >> one of the things that struck me about the whole crypto

universe when i first got involved an one more of your guests dan moorehead were in amsterdam in 2014 and we were the only financial guys in a conference of 2,000 developers and crypto geeks one thing i'll say for smur is this a an ideological group of intelligent young people that are driving it, i think. >> on that, i agree with that and i totally agree in the use case of crypto and why the decentralized ledger is good for a lot of business, but is bitcoin going to be the horse to ride so that's my only issue. because a lot of people are just grabbing on to that which is there. but do you see this as the commodity for the crypto space that will live out >> i think bitcoin has a very special and unique position in crypto obviously satoshi's original white paper, its rrl emergent, when we started bitcoin was the

only cryptocurrency in existence. it will have that special space. what we've always thought -- and proving the point with lightning, actually, in as much as you see all the tweaks and developments that happen perhaps in alternative currencies like we saw segregated witness and other capacity expanding event happening in litecoin before it happened in bitcoin, i think all these things actually do add to the use cases of bitcoin to make it better. >> so walk us through your fine a little bit it's been a rough year for you mentioned pantera any fund to invest in cryptocurrency do you hold fiat in times like this is that the way you offset some of the risk >> i can't get into the specific metrics of our funds for reasons. >> sure. >> but i'll tell you we had a very strong year last year and a strong year this year as well. so yeah, we certainly are very flexible in what we do, we can be all cash. even short. >> are you in all cash >> we were in one of our funds, yeah. >> you were.

>> since a little bit early. but yeah. >> and since this point where are some of the cryptocurrencies that you think have the biggest up side for this year? >> you know at the moment there's been a lot of compression for all of the coins. they kind of suffered expo naen shly that's because what drives litecoin is really the overflow from bitcoin when bitcoin transaction fees get really high like they did when there's so much traffic that puts more fee pressure into litecoin and ethereum classic would be the same parallel for ethereum. >> that's a trickerdown. >> so those are all quite depressed. for me there's really two main plays, that i like bitcoin, i think we've seen a lot of liquidation, and leverage come out of the market which is probably a little too risky for some people to hold on to and that's come out. i sort of like bitcoin iffy with can call it the reserve currency

for crypto, a fancy term, but let's use that for the moment. then i think there's select projects in the alt coin space, the ic 20 space for example, i think when you look at good products, good developers, good idea, blockchain specific idea, you can select tokens that have been beaten down and are quite attractive at these prices but more of a stock picker's kind of market. >> you won't give us any of the icos you are in. >> i like aventis point. we're owners of that company we also like homers block which is 175 and a slightchain protocol, we're invested in that company heavily. both of those companies under the hood like all the good companies will develop usable technology in the next 9 to 18 months that's what the market needs to get some confidence back. >> danny, great to have you with us we hope you'll come back. >> you're welcome. >> danny masters. >> so we have a melt up

november, december and a crash back in january. now let's just talk bitcoin for a second now it's been a slow bleed it will reverse that entire move back to 5,000, this is my just guess. keep an eye on all these projects danny said it four times remember that announcement that coin base made last week they're starting a venture fund to invest in prongjects. >> yeah, i think danny's right, have a dynamic here where you have to let some of these platforms go to work and let that technology play out i'm a big believer, but the question is bitcoin is horse to ride all the way through is obviously the bigger challenge for people playing in that space. >> coming up, make or break time for the big banks as they gear up to report earnings this week. how the traders are playing the space.

welcome back to fast money bank earnings kicking off with jpmorgan citi to report. and interesting moves for the group. mike is here at the plaza. >> take a look at what's going on in the sector generally first. xls saw above average activity this week. we saw 1.5 times, that's a wrong thing right there. put a circle on that yesterday actually was about 2 times the average daily volume not surprising when we have these kinds of moves these were taking a look at the big money center banks, these are the moves we're expecting.

i think wells fargo right here is probably the one that we want the take a look at and the reason is, of course, because this is the one that also has a little bit of idiosyncratic risk going on so what's going on with wells fargo? constantly we have these controversies coming out and the stock basically sells off on the bad news but then actually it recovers a little bit and recently we obviously along with the rest of financials have seen some terrible performances and then news this week about a potential billion dollar fine come ougt of europe. also interesting is this is where all the activity and options seem to be concentrated right around this 50 strike today. the april 50s were the ones that were so active a lot of bad news in this speak but i think we might catch a little bit of a bounce here. >> you know, mike, we were going to invite you over i wasn't even going to ask the traders. come on over, mike but we're out of time. sorry, mike. pete, bank earnings. you excited for them

>> yeah, i am. and the flows are there. we talked about it at the top of the show this will be the distraction, if these numbers are as good as i anticipate them to be, and i expect to see some up side. >> more checks of the show on friday, ge going from bad to worse in the last year has the company sheds more than 150 billion in market cap. it could run into bigger trouble next week when it reports earnings 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.

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welcome back to fast money cowan putting out an alert on ge still say the company's dividends are not safe they also say they'll report eight cents a share and the word on the street is 12 cents a share. >> first of all, that's a fair call the big issue with ge right now is having any vision on what kind of write-offs they're going to have to have for their insurance business and for ge capital i should say that's what's dogging the dividend because if they get a basis without that you can make the call that they can still pay. y'rstl in it. >> still in it. >> up next, final trade. e'd be n seconds, what used to take... minutes. that guests would compliment our wifi. that we could video conference... and do it like that. (snaps) if you'd have told me that i could afford... a gig-speed. a gig-speed network. it's like 20 times faster than what most people have. i'd of said...

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♪ dropping sick beats, they call me dj nana ♪ ♪ 85 and i wanna go don't get mad. get e*trade, kiddo. you like toni braxton, right? >> oh, buddy. >> right, right, right, right? >> go with it. >> the bets are that you're a big loser. >> that's okay. >> 67% of you say no, they're not with you on your pitch for exxonmobil >> hurts a little. >> when is she coming on >> final trade time, pete. >> i'm going to go with marvel chips, baby, chips. >> singing the blues is nandex on the whole russian move but i think this is your time. >> said to the dulcet tones of toni braxton. >> that entire snap from

february >> pedro got me thinking about that energy space. and dan said he knew jack. i know jack as well. but -- >> i bet you do halliburton, s yn.io >>eeou bac my mission is simple, to make you money i'm here to level the playing field for all investors. there's always a bull market somewhere, and i promise to help you find it. "mad money" starts now hey, i'm cramer. welcome to "mad money. welcome to cramerica other people want to make friends. i'm just trying to save you some money. my job is not just to entertain but to educate and teach you so call me at 1-800-743-cnbc or tweet me @jimcramer. do you have ever get the sense that this market just does not want t