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 to be happy we always seem to want something

to go wrong. we almost wish it would happen and even when it doesn't, the pajama traders trade like they do and then the nasdaq back slid. i make no secret about how early i get up in the morning. it is not my choice. i am incapable of sleeping in. my e-mail had a bunch of woe is me, we are going to roll back yesterday's big gains. saw the s&p futures were getting hammered and twitter feed filled with hysterical people who believe we would get obliterated. why? because the white house. specifically fears that president trump might possibly fire the special counsel robert mueller or that he might fire

missiles russia vows to shoot down any and all missiles fired at syria. get ready russia, because they will be coming nice, and new and smart. you shouldn't be partners with a gas killing animal who kills their people and enjoys it tweeting our relationship with russia is worse than it had ever been and that includes the cold where. no reason for this russia needs us to help with their economy. something that would be easy for us to do and we need all nations to work together and you know what, i found this whole decline perplexing i couldn't figure it out how could the latest dust ups be

any worse than any time since the cold war in the cold war? wait a second. the president is saying things are worse now than when the cold war was on i grew up near the willow grove naval air station. the cuba missile crisis came within an inch of destroying the world. the russias were installing nukes in cuba. if the russians hadn't backed down at the last moment, we would have had nuclear war i remember asking pop, what happened to the sun. and when he explained it was the planes i didn't think hiding in our cubies in kindergarten would help save me here is the thing, whenever we

have geopolitical purpturmoil, i fall back on my bristol myers theory the theory has it that what the heck does syria or russia, have to do with the price of earnings multiples in bristol myers sure enough, the pajama traders which is what we call the guys in their pajamas trading overnight. look, it makes sense for the market to get slammed when the president antagonizes china. numbers cut. but less trade with russia, who care as soon as russia is a gas station that happens to have a government a trade war with china is something to worry about but if you cut off russia.

now you can say wait a second, we did only end up going down, but in the end we went down for a particular reason. we might need faster rate hikes. plus a beat of oil taking up to 66 bucks a barrel. and then that hotter consumer price index this morning the fed don't include the weaker employment numbers that came out last week. i think they are a distraction and one thing that is happening which can't start fast enough. simple, the minutes matter so the markets got hammered across the board. it is always weird when you look at the nonoil standouts in days like today for the second day in a row,

mark zuckerberg's snappy outburst, made you believe he is the conscious of social media. i think the rally has more to do with shorts that went awry we are endlessly on technical deaths that are lurking. so no, we got neither of those opportunities. as i am telling club members of actualownersplus.com you don't like it less because it is in trouble in the end, these guys in washington have no idea how facebook works and they want to regulate and that is no tt good for the stock. putting a bunch of geriatrics in

charge to regulate why do we need, because if there is another situation like this, congress is going to take a dim view of the testimony. he needs to get out ahead of the next scandal and that and not the earnings is why facebook stock trades at such a low stock. yeah, come on, i love the numbers but i think the numbers could come down and this stock is risky than it was a month ago. don't blame today's decline on the president. feel free to pick up stock of amazon since trump has bigger fish to fry at the moment and is not weigh in on twitter about amazon the culprit is the month old fed minutes. that really does impact what we will pay for the stock of bristol myers and it won't be

for the better douglas in new mexico. >> caller: hi, jim a great book booyah from the land of enchantment. my question to you is square, it has pulled back 18% along with the market's volatility and it hasn't bounced back yet. do you see this related to any kind of trade war issues >> no. it ramped because of cryptocurrencies and the ceo was saying, listen we are going to take cryptocurrencies and those have cooled. and everything involved with crypto going down with it. the only thing you can blame for today's decline is the feds saying we may need faster rate hikes. on mad tonight, i am sitting down with the ceo of gap

important earning season for one big sector, i will reveal it and is it time to defang the fang stock i will tell you why all the stocks in the current group are not, not created equal stick with cramer. >> announcer: don't miss a second of "mad money." follow @jimcramer on twitter have a question? tweet cramer, #madtweets send jim an e-mail to madmoney@cnbc.com or give us a call at 1-800-743-cnbc miss something head to madmoney.cnbc.com.

. on a rough day for the averages, let's not forget that the individual companies themselves still matter here and some are doing quite well. for example, i think the resurgence of many brick and mortar retailers is one of the greatest under appreciated themes of this market. even as they shouldn't be, take the gap which also owns banana

republic, old navy and athleta this year, apparel caught fire, the gap languished down 9% since 2018 we know the gap reported a very strong quarter at the beginning of march with fabulous sa same-store sales growth. 9% bump for old navy today we got a chance to sit with the president and ceo of the gap. take a look. >> bart, i am honored because i am with the best apparel retailer in the business that perhaps no one has ever heard of when you talk about the number that you had for old navy and why it was a standout in the whole country. >> i am honored to be here as well i like most of what you said except no one has ever heard of

it which is why i am here today. >> they never heard of the number, they know the brand. >> yeah. a pleasure to be here. we have beentalking for a whil of what i call the balance growth strategy. these are amazing brands, customers know them and everybody knows gap around the whole world. ole navy which is a killer brand. and our up start brand which is growing fast which is athleta which is performance lifestyle space. we are managing the inside of these company to really move with how the consumer is moving, moving towards the athleisure or performance lifestyle. retail used to be a set piece game you build stores i have been talking about i want to soften up our asset base so

we are nimble. >> you are an up front guy and talk about being in the wrong stores and need to be able to get out of the wrong stores how much is this formed by big data? >> we have been building back end big data analytics over the last couple of years 2 billion visits a year between our online and our stores. we know a lot about our customers. we can see our lifetime value and know who our most valuable customer is. and being able to extract that data and that traffic, being able to marketing spend effectively. and knowing what the returns are. that is a huge asset and structural, because we have multiple brands and

multichannels, we have what other apparels don't have. >> when you talk about big data, in terms of what you could get a customer to spend. >> a customer who is casualty engaged and one who is deeply engaged in our brand, it is at least ten times the value. if it is a mom, she is buying for herself, her family, she is working out, so she is buying in the active space she has a career, so she is buying professional clothing herself. people call it share of wallet. and for us, it is share of life. >> well, one of the things when i listen to you, i say to myself, i don't want financial engineering, but the amount of money you have spent buying back stock, your stock prices was the same as it was five years ago.

i want you to spend on athleta, i don't care about a share buy back you are doing plus 20% in athleta and it would change the way you add value to stock. >> we upped our cap x and spending at the level of $8 million a year. we got advantage of the tax laws which we are appreciative of we are disciplined and focused i want to make sure i can return on the rate of capitals. and secondly, any company and if you hear opposite, they are not telling you the truth, any company has management capacity. so what we try to do every day is spend to an rioc number and spend to the capacity to execute. so i agree, we will always be disciplined in returning excess

cash to our shareholders but management job is to invest in profitable growth. >> one of the things i have seen you do better than most is targeting the right people which means using social media now in terms of reaching customers isn't it the best? >> our ad spend, our marketing spend, working media has pivoted massively. away from traditional media outlets. replacing media ads in your click stream is another way we are spending and the cool thing about it, many cool things, but one of the cool things about it as a business person is i can look down the pipe and see what the return is. i might say i want to spend down

to a three x return. >> i would presume, instagram, owned by facebook, natural place for you to be. >> correct. >> and it is working. >> it is working. >> i know you can track exactly how it is working. >> excellent line of sight to returns. >> let's talk about something. you beatyourself up too much you think you are not fast fashion enough can you explain where you are going? >> i would tease apart fast and passio fashion. fast to me is table stakes using data, exchanging files back and forth, that has created opportunities to speed up the product pipeline, traditional pipelines, probably 45 weeks and we are now in a place in

parts of business, athleta, bottom complex which is the core of the business, pants 8 to ten weeks from i have an idea to i have product on the shelf number one, you can derisk your buy by having better information about what the customer wants, whether it is print, pattern, silhouette, ankle treatment or whatever it is number two, in an environment where traffic is negative overall, you are not going to buy to a positive unit number pre season and that is unit growth. >> let's talk, you put all of the real estate investment trust that are involved in retail on, there are good malls, good centers that had vac cancies. >> we have 140 stores right now.

the business is 50/50 direct to consumer online and in stores. we are going to continue to build stores at a responsible rate athleta is really, it is super cool for a number of reasons most retail came from physical and went online. athleta came from online and catalog and going physical and focused that we are building the retailer of the future someday you and i will be talking years from now, and looking at this moment as the brand. values issue that our customers are super responsive to. the engagement in that brand is amazing. and that is what consumers are looking for today. she says that as a brand that she can relate to as a value platform and a powerful equation.

>> how did you do a 9% come through, what is the secret there? >> you have to start with great products i have been unfairly branded as anti creative. you need amazing creative talent and we have amazing creative talent great product that is on trend and the value equation in that business is it is known, customers love it at the end of the day. consistent and disciplined in the underlying you put it all together and you have a business that is gaining market share that is what we are all about right now. profitable market growth. >> thank you so much for sitting with us. >> thanks for having me. scha w

. in two days earning seasons begins in ernest i got to tell you, this is the most important earning season for the big banks in years the broader market just had a pullback some good performance by the financials well that could be one of the few things that gets us back on track. the bulls have been desperate for any kind of positive catalyst everyone kept focusing on big picture earnings like escalating trade war with china or the major scandals in tech or in the white house we have been counting the minutes until earning season kicks off on friday. it might have positive under

pinning for the entire stock market despite all the fears that we have this remains an excellent environment for companies doing business for those abroad. and the rest of the world is worrying thanks to what. many of the companies we have heard from, just in the last few weeks delivered good numbers len n lennar and say nike. the banks get a first bite of the apple. and you know financials become more profitable when interest rates go higher both short-term rates set by the feds and long-term rates set by the overall market short-term rates, we had one

rate hike in february. and another in march and we might have a few more in i would say from those minutes people are thinking more than two. whenever the feds tighten, the banks make more between the rates they pay you and the rates for the loans. solid backdrop for the banks as for investment banks, these guys are the big winners and in this market, we know has gotten a heck of a lot more volatile all last year, the investment bavr banks saw their trading business get hammered because equity in bonds. volatility index, or vix averaged 11 and now it is almost 20 in the first quarter, we had 61

trading days on 41 of those days, the dow jones average had a triple digit move compared to 20 days in the previous quarter now this rise in volatility is one of the big reasons we have been buying gold in the actual earners travel trust now, some might say the stock market's erratic behavior might scare ordinary investors but actually, i am not even worried about those that cater to smaller investors research firms have been raising numbers and applying better than expected earnings that are rights down in front of us meanwhile, we are seeing a pick up in investment traditional bank

hit a record high in the first quarter. led by deals here. here i am thinking about cvs buying aetna deals in the first quarter alone. with the united states accounting for 44% of these transactions the fees are huge. and by the way, the gross margin is great because not that many people i say nice what else? there is open questions that financials can help us answer. i want to know how mortgage activiti activities is holding up len n lennar says business is going to get better may also help us settle the

puzzling state of the consumer we know consumer sentiment is at its highest levels in decades. what is it we also get a look at defaults which of the big banks do i like the most going into earning season my top picks are bank of america, citigroup bank of america, has a gigantic deposit base in the country. and fantastic job in cutting cost and advancing their technology platform. citigroup, an under appreciated investment banking business. citi do not get anywhere near the credit they deserve.

jpmorgan, come on, classic blue chip bank. may be the best position globally if you are a multinational company, we got to go to jpmorgan it is the most expensive stock in the group even as it has come down nine from its highs when you look at it as a price to earnings basis, the darn thing settle for just 12 times that is a steal versus the rest of the stock market which sells meyer. how about goldman sachs? an extremely well-run company. based on the resurgence of volatility as well as stronger climate. soon be retiring ceo and he is a competitive fellow who is going to want to leave at a high note. the only big bank i have to tell

you i would avoid is wells fargo. especially with the latest reports that it could get hit with fine. i think investors will keep selling wells and use it as a source of funds that they can pour into other bank stocks. we will have major individual earnings to fall back on with the large banks leading the way. citigroup, jpmorgan, and bank of america. listen to what these bankers have to say. they are incredibly important. i meant to start with john in illinois john >> caller: hey, jim, booyah to you. i want to start out by saying thanks for being a fantastic guiding light in the market. >> i sure try.

>> and thanks guys on twitter. who are saying thank you for getting us through the earning season important moment we are going to leave that big vacuum that has made it possible to own stock. >> caller: i saw recent news that the fcc levied a fine on them pnc is not admitting any wrongdoing you probably know they are reporting on friday q1 financials. >> i am a buyer of pnc i think they will have a terrific number. i think pnc is ripe to own you know what, i am getting pretty bullish is it time for the fang stocks

to consciously uncouple? i will tell you why it might be time for these well-known tech names to separate. and then there is no place like home even for your next investment checking out a home builder that puts and then tonight's edition of the "lightning round." stick with cramer.

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if you want to understand why so many investors have so many trouble accepting the --

when dozens of lawmakers can't seem to get their heads around how facebook makes its money, you better believe a lot of investors in the same age bracket have the same problem. fighting these stocks tooth and nail every second they come up you have five companies that count for one third of the whole nasdaq netflix, the baby to apple we hear possibly can't keep climbing unsubstantially blah-blah-blah all of this is made worse by the etf-ization of the market. so they could market it to

people who want big cap growth stocks right now ten of them, that's right, ten similar fang indices. they have different business models alphabet too most people over the age of 40 don't even know what these companies do watch the testimony and listen to the questions you find yourself wondering if he is addressing congress or some people who think facebook is a group of faces. that's only part of the problem. the truth is fang is hard to understand because these companies are constantly evolving how this company makes their money. spoiler alert, advertising we thought amazon was a simple retailer ten years ago, netflix was a dvd

rental service no one has a clue anymore of what alphabet does and to make it easy, it is a search company -- i don't know as for apple, is it an ecosystem for selling software on those devices. if these companies made cars, homes, televisions or homes, we would get it we aren't angry about walmart. our fear deep down is that many people think these companies with the exception of apple aren't worth anything. no one understands them. they don't understand how they make their money in the end, these are some of the greatest secular growth stories around even if you can't appreciate what they actually do, at least recognize that they have visionary leadership and amazing earnings per share or revenue

growth bottom line, i am not telling you to love fang, i am not urging you to embrace their seemingly sky high marketing acquisitions i am saying they have these valuation for reasons. just because the story seems alien to you, it doesn't mean it is not real. being too skeptical about fang, has been a mistake, people so feel free to bet against them, but please, before you do, try to understand exactly what it is that makes these companies so special in the first place. "mad money" is back after the break. - i love my grandma. - anncr: as you grow older, your brain naturally begins to change which may cause trouble with recall. - learning from him is great... when i can keep up!

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>> announcer: lightning round is sponsored by td ameritrade it is time it is time for the lightning round on cramer's "mad money." we'll play this sound -- [ buzzer ] -- and then the lightning round is over. are you ready, skee-daddy? it's time for the lightning round on cramer's "mad money." john in new york >> caller: jimmy, booyah.

>> what's up >> caller: i picked up some gtt. >> i say buy shane in nebraska. >> caller: what do you think of health equity? hqy? >> don't know it to be able to comment on it. have to come back and do homework andrew in pennsylvania. >> caller: hello, jim, big booyah from pennsylvania >> wrong side of the state, but i will take it how can i help >> caller: what is your opinion on steel diynamics.

>> daniel in florida. >> caller: i am calling about ticker symbol s. sprint. >> i will tell you, when i see these stories about a take-over and i don't have anymore insight, i think you have to ring the register. joel in pennsylvania. >> caller: how are you i would like to hear your thoughts on marriott. >> i think marriott is great gerry in utah. >> caller: what do you think of my buying shares of las vegas sands? >> i prefer mgs. and a lot of my friends like

wynn. >> caller: i took a position, they nicely beat, over 50% and it is trading at five times earnings, i am in the house of pain what should i do >> what stock? micron believe they will not make the earnings next year i see weakness in flash. i am worried about possible weakness in d ram coming i am not a buyer elsie in florida. >> caller: can we talk about ge? stock plummeting. >> there was a report that i read that was significant. they said don't buy in the quarter. if you don't earn it, don't buy it dan in illinois. >> caller: dan from the blue state of illinois. how are you doing?

a message in twitter. >> twitter is doing phenomenally well if it came down 10%, i would buy more i think it is going to be a win. and that, ladies and gentleman, concludes the "lightning round"" >> announcer: lightning round is sponsored by td ameritrade g? >>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. we're finally back out in our yard, but so are they. the triple threat of dandelions, lurking crabgrass and weak, thin grass! introducing the all new scotts turf builder triple action. this single-step breakthrough changes everything.

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would be telling you to steer clear of the home builders interest rates are heading higher last week lennar painted a different picture. as they start to get jobs again, they are much more likely to buy new homes and that is why they told us to watch the labor participation rate they argue it will be more than enough to off set the higher rates. i think it is credible even as payroll number was underwhelming. we could use expert judgment which is why i feel it is important to hear from taylor morrison so yesterday, i got a chance to speak with the chairman ceo. we couldn't talk about the

quarter but that left us a lot of ground to cover so take a look what i need to know, is there is a perception, feds raising rates. aren't there other factors that work this time given how low rates are and how every time in the economy is different. >> so true, jim, i subscribe to everything you said about unemployment rate and labor participation. but that is only a couple of areas. i think we should be focused on some of the demographic tail winds we have. think about the baby boomers and the millennials. we are only 1.2 million houses think about the confidence of consumers today. they are feeling good about their job. they are starting to see income growth we have such a tight supply. and the list keeps going. >> i want to drill down on these different demographic cohorts. still a lot of people living

with their parents and still a lot of people turning 55. >> 25 million plus of millennials still living at home the average age of the millennial buying today is somewhere around 30, 31. the largest group is turning 29, 30 and then you think about the financial security of the boomers. so i am bullish about where we are going. >> we were building 2 million homes. it never came back why? >> i think there is a number of reasons. it took, i think if you took back, four, five, six, seven years ago, one set of reasons around people, you know, unfortunately lost their homes during the downturn. i think employment is a different place. so i think, as time has progressed seeing different factors. today it comes down to the labor

infrastructure and a lot of availability. and that is good news/bad news we are continuing to build on the deficit of the supply. so we are building 1.1 million, 1.2 million a year >> 55 plus active lifestyle, urban infield, and you can switch you can pivot where the demand is where is the demand the most in these cohorts and where is it geographically. >> that is one of the things that gives us great confidence about the longevity of the cycle. we are seeing it in the first-timers and that is about a third, a third, and a third for us that first timer, the affordable even that has multiple subgroups. the first second time move up is

moving up. and luxury line up that could be first time buyer at 800,000 in the bay that might consider a luxury. so we are seeing strength. >> one of the reasons i like your stock today is equal payday. you are female executive, and fill us in on what you think about the subject? >> certainly getting a lot of air time and my views might surprise you i think i have a practical approach to how i feel i think it is misunderstood about how we talk about the generic titles and i think we have a long way to go. we have a long way to go but the way i think about it is people make different amounts of money for different reasons. and you know, we can look at titles and say, simply speaking somebody with the same responsibility doing the same job with the same education,

managing the same book of business, they should make the same am ount of money. but finding those that match is next to impossible and this morning, our division president, about a third of our management is female. >> wow that is different from what i would have expected. >> different in the industry and i am proud of it women that make in the same roles more than the women. and the same men make more than the women. you have to look at more than the role, you have to look at responsibility the real question we have to ask is do we have enough women, and do we have diversity, not just in our business but across that is the challenge. and then we can talk about the equal bay. >> thoughtful answer for a question across the country.

sheryl palmer. stick with cramer.

another bad quarter from bed, bath and beyond i like to say there's always a bull market somewhere. i promise to try to find it just for you right here on "mad money. i'm jim cramer, and i will see you tomorrow

when everything's connected, it's simple. easy. awesome. welcome to the stanley cup playoffs score! >> game seven! the pittsburgh penguins again stanley cup champions. here comes laine >> pass for staal.