nope. get ready, because we're helping leading companies lead with digital. good morning it's 8:00 a.m. at apple headquarters in cupertino, california, 11:00 a.m. on wall street, and "squawk alley" is live

good wednesday morning, welcome to "squawk alley." interesting morning as the dow is up 145, close to session highs after a record open earlier inside of 27k, although we're keeping our eye on the russell as well. let's get to bob pisani on the floor. hi, bob. >> nice day, carl, with a number of two breakouts i say breakouts, i mean big cap tech stocks at new highs pharma is doing well in some cases historic highs apple is there, cisco is at a new high, united health, disney, merck is also there, microsoft is there, so we've got a broad swath of stocks hitting 52-week highs. another factor that's really helping? financials remember the complaining we've been doing that the banks keep lagging. not today. most of the big regional banks

are all leading. the big money center banks also up but not as much it's really led by the regional banks. the trade war and it's cessation is the key to what's going on in the markets. so industrial stocks are trading on the upside. russell 2000 is underperforming. china stocks are outperforming today. and india is underperforming now, what does all of this mean? it means that the trade war trade that has been very prevalent for the last four months is starting to unwind and you're starting to see it right there. the characteristics have been number one, go long u.s. small cap stocks that's number one and that's unwinding now. go short u.s. global industrials. that's also unwinding. short china. that's unwinding china has been outperforming recently finally, go long india on the trade war because it's relatively isolated and doesn't

have the supply chain issues the rest of the world has. i just show you bombay has been dropping for several weeks compared to the united states. what's it all mean it means that there's less concern amongst traders right now that trade wars are going to be significantly disruptive to the global economy now, if the trade war with china blows up again, this will be an issue. nothing has been resolved there, obviously, but right now it's very obvious the market is thinking that there's going to be less tension over trade and not more guys, back to you. >> thank you, bob pisani and tech once again in the lead this morning. intel helping to drive the dow to another record high for the second day in a row. it's been quite the week for intel. the stock is up better than 6.5% over the past five trading days. joining us now, stacy rascon and christopher roland good morning to both of you.

>> good morning. >> stacy, intel said that they're going to be able to hit their full year guidance despite these concerns about chip shortages. >> yes. >> i'm hearing from oems that there are still shortages, despite the fact that intel is saying they're going to hit their target. >> yes. >> so how much of this rally is justified? kind of what are its limits and how much of this damage is intel going to have to continue to deal with? >> sure. so you have to remember on their last earnings call intel said they were going to have supply constraints. so they had supply constraints built into their guidance. if you also look at the letter they put out, there's nothing they haven't already said. it was dead on with what they have said before so it wasn't a surprise i do think it assuaged some of the concerns of a potential q4

guidedown because they already had it built in. but there was nothing -- nothing new to it. i think the other reason that it's been up, especially yesterday, is there were these views that they may be able to hit the 10 nanometer ramp a little earlier april instead of june. this is a process that's been delayed for four years four weeks i don't think matters. but it's helping sentiment. >> i get you christopher, when you look across the chip sector not just at intel and amd and the interplay between those, but things like storage, solid state drives and memory, we just had micron on a few days ago and they took a hit on some tariff concerns where do you see the most opportunity or maybe the most disconnect between where the valuations are and where the potential lies >> yeah, it's a little tough right now because semis have been on an absolute tear for years. there have been supply

shortages, not just of intel but across the board here and a lot of consumers of chips have built a ton of inventory, particularly as lead times for these products have stretched and these shortages have really just grown. so there is some risk for at least two quarters of this inventory workdown across the board. so some of the broad-based guys i think are a little bit more at risk right now but some of the really niche specific guys, guys playing into the data center might be a little bit better than the broad-based guys. >> christopher, in terms of your outlook on intel, how is that shaped by the fact they sell this interim ceo with no sense of when that will be resolved. >> part of that is in the valuation for intel we think but in addition to that, we think you have to look forward to perhaps a ceo that could be

better than b.k., and leadership intel hasn't had before as they move into new markets, deeper into the data center, all these new areas and addressable markets. >> stacy, right now there's certainly a crypto effect on some semis, not a positive one, as that has cooled off with bitcoin's price cooling off as well i wonder about the cloud effect. we've had some reports from big cloud players that perhaps their growth targets aren't quite what people were hoping, but it's not clear how much of that reaches into infrastructure and cloud demand and will perhaps eventually have an effect on semis. what's your read >> you bet if you look at hyperscale cap ex, cloud spending, over the last four to six quarters, it's been making my head spin you can look at intel's data center numbers, the numbers have

been fantastic i think it has to come back down to earth at some point if nothing else, the comparisons will get very tough next year and i don't think you can stay on this sustained level of spending on a permanent basis. there's not enough dollars to go that way i think we're starting to see some incremental noise that that may be starting or people are starting to get worried about it >> all right christopher, stacy, thanks we'll see where the chips fall coming up on "squawk alley" the ceo of sonos sits down with us exclusively to share some news following the company's recent ipo. and next, why apple ceo tim cook is calling other companies' data practices, quote, a bunch of bunk. more "squawk alley" after the break. alerts -- wouldn't you like one from the market

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xfinity xfi, simple, easy, awesome. shares of gm higher this morning as the company announces a partnership with honda to build an autonomous vehicle. phil lebeau spoke with the president and has more. >> general motors like so many of the automakers is realizing, as is honda, you can't do it all

by yourself. if there's a chance to partner up or get another investor, then it makes sense so for general motors and honda, here is the partnership. honda will invest $2.75 billion in gm's cruise holdings over the next dozen years, including $750 million right off the bat so it takes a 5.7% stake in gm's subsidiary the goal, developing and building an autonomous vehicle what might that vehicle look like well, gm and honda put out a teaser image this morning. you might look at this and say what is that is it a truck, is it a delivery van? it's a little unclear at this point, as is the release date for when we might see this on the road but they say this week when it's ultimately built, will be sold worldwide. >> what we're doing is getting a purpose-built vehicle that's fully autonomous that can be deployed in a shared network for the transportation of passengers, transportation of other things

and so we see a huge amount of opportunity and flexibility coming out of this. >> now, separately from this investment by honda and this new vehicle that they're developing with cruise, general motors is working with cruise to build self-driving vehicles like this one. this is a prototype that we had a chance to ride in in san francisco. they are working and testing these vehicles out in san francisco. it's still expected, according to general motors, to roll out and be available to the public next year. let's see if that actually happens. by the way, as you take a look at shares of general motors and honda, all of the automakers have had a rough year. we'll see more of these partnerships, whether it was gm and honda, toyota and uber, daimler working with bosh. increasingly everybody is partnering up. >> it seems so unusual, phil, to have such rivals partner with each other but you say there are going to be morning partnerships

coming who is going to be first to market now with one of these autonomous vehicles? >> wamo says it will begin testing and basically putting out for public use a self-driving vehicle for ride-share purposes in the phoenix area by the end of this year now, it's going to be limited use so geofenced into an area of phoenix or suburb of phoenix so it's not widespread use. then the race is on. gm says next year, but you really have to look at 2021, 2022 before you see widespread adoption and use of these self-driving vehicles. >> interesting, though, that bob lutz yesterday, phil, talked about competition to tesla and the next day we get an announcement like this it's going to be interesting to watch this space over the next year meanwhile apple's tim cook sat down with vice news for a conversation about data and privacy while calling out other tech companies on their own data practices. take a listen. >> any brand out there cares

deeply about the continued -- >> joining us this morning here, eric capoe, as we got that sound cut short. i think you're familiar with the sound bite, talked about human curation at apple news, and said that collecting data doesn't lead to better products. how much of all of that do you agree with >> apple is making this a marquee issue for the moment and clearly aligning themselves on the good side which is to say we're not going to take your data unnecessarily if we do take your data, it's just to improve the product. we're not going to sell it to anybody. this is in sharp contrast to facebook and google and others who basically use your data to sell to the advertisers and we use it to target yourself, as well as for other ways

so tim cook is saying people will continue to realize how important their data is and they're not going to want to give it away freely. we shall see the public -- the consumers haven't really reacted that sharply. they haven't really said i don't want my data to be utilized. we'll see if that happens in the future. >> now, apple is one of the many companies that had to send representatives to capitol hill last week about this issue of privacy. it was apple along with google, twitter, at&t charter, and apple had to make the point because they were about the hardware, they are not as much at risk as google or facebook but there's still going to be regulation it seems regulation will be inevitable how much do you think it will change the game for companies like apple do you think this is how they will separate themselves from facebook and google. >> i do, because regulations is not going to hurt them in ways that are appreciable it is going to hurt google and

facebook because they are basically surveillance organizations whose business model depends on capturing all your data. >> and here we've got tim cook, that sound bite is ready, talking about devices. take a look. >> the narrative that some companies will try to get you to believe is i've got to take all of your data to make my service better well, don't believe them whoever is telling you that, it's a bunch of bong. >> apple is mainly focused on devices. there's a big ecosystem, marketing ecosystem built around targeting and data right now, small businesses in particular, but big businesses too are using it to find the people online who they want to reach how much does that change and how much does it disrupt if we really do get a shift in either consumer behavior about data or government regulation on how it can be used? >> i think you'll see government

regulation being pushed by tim cook he was saying i'm open to it, but i wouldn't trust this congress, who doesn't know much about technology as we've seen, to craft laws or regulations that will help either the big businesses or the small ones >> is there any congress that you have seen that you would trust to do that >> probably not, but certainly not this one what tim cook is saying is privacy is a fundamental human right. if you keep pushing that, that's certainly where the other companies cannot go. >> it's so interesting because apple just doesn't have the experience with advertising that these other companies do and advertising is all about data. it's impossible to talk about advertising without data apple could increasing be moving in that direction as they do apple news and create a bundle of tv content. if they move more in that direction, could they put themselves more at risk?

>> they would if they move in that direction but if you watch tim cook, i thought he was very direct about not doing the things -- maybe using google's old slogan of don't be evil for himself and for apple. >> eric, if you're facebook, what's your answer to that other than to say we're working on it? >> if i were facebook, i would be way more proactive than they have been. this is really a major issue you've seen it in europe with the new regulations, gdpr, which is just the beginning. i think if i were facebook, i would make it very, very clear, up front on your home page as to which data is being captured, which data i can opt out. >> they would argue they have centralized all those things, all those levers, all those tools. not enough. >> have you tried to find it >> yes, i have. >> you have to go through pages and pages. you can't find it. there should be a big button saying go here, find out what we're capturing. tell me which data you don't want me to capture

make the data your own and allow people -- i would think at the end of the day most people would opt in because of the convenience of being targeted in the right way. >> do you think people will opt in or will this result in a facebook that is less profitable because it doesn't have the same degree of profitable. >> it's very possible that facebook will be less profitable using your data in ways that you don't realize to then make money is not going to be a sustainable business model in the future. >> to what degree do you think that apple and tim cook are in this privileged position because by the way they define their market, they're already targeted you've got a secertain amount o money and mindset if you are an apple customer one of the things that you can pick in facebook or probably in google is iphone users and that does a particular thing. so in a way has apple already targeted before it even hits the starting block >> yeah, you know who your customers are and they're very

different from the audience that's out there but this discussion we're having is very interesting, but for facebook to go down this path means it's not the facebook we know today and i think that people will lose interest and move on and facebook will survive this particular moment, though you never know what's coming next, right? >> certainly we await the results of their current investigation. amazon is the other big story raising minimum wage as you now know to $15 for all u.s. employees. jeff bezos spoke in washington last night about the decision and how it might affect his competition. >> the thinking about this, trying to decide do we want to change, we realized, we just made a decision, well, you can offer competitive compensation or you can decide to lead. and as soon as we framed it that way, we're like let's decide to lead i think people will follow >> a lot of discussion of just how savvy this was, ahead of hq2, given the fact that they have these enormous revenue

engines outside of retail and we talked about shares of other retailers after the worst day for retail since february. >> and we're going to see i think this is a great idea, the $15. it helps them separate in yet another way from all the other retailers because they're doing it now, not in the future, not incrementally, one stroke. >> eric, minimum wage, or at least wages are one clear way to draw a line in the sand, i suppose, but what about working conditions, which are a little softer and harder to define. amazon has come under a lot of criticism for those, particularly in warehouses do you expect additional messaging or maybe changes from amazon or pressures from others on that or does this get them off the hook >> no, i do, i do. what jeff was saying is we decided to lead in this area i would assume the $15 hourly wage is only the beginning he is being stung by some of this criticism of the conditions

in the warehouses. and i think he intends to make amazon kind of an example of great working conditions he needs that. in an economy where it's hard to fire workers, he needs to hire 100,000 temporary workers for the holidays this is going to help him tremendously he also has a high turnover. when he pay people $7, $8, they're going to look f other jobs if you pay them $15 and give them great conditions to, would, maybe they'll hang on further. ultimately it's a very smart business decision. >> when you look at starbucks and some of the perks that howard schultz has made a point of offering, such as access to education, what do you think the next big thing is going to be for amazon or for some of these other companies as they try to show that they're a good place to draw these employees? >> i think education -- first of all, great working conditions like we discussed. family leave when you have a baby in the family, all these things but i think education, what is the best thing to -- particularly in the world of

automation and robotics, educating workers on how to better work with machines, better work with robots, and then make better money is really going to be key. advancement of workers is going to be a key right that people are going to want to have. >> other companies that haven't made the investments in tech, right, or productivity or who are still relying on human capital, this will be expensive. >> it will be expensive and hard to follow. >> guys, thanks. two really interesting stories today on apple and amazon. thank you for being with us. when we come back, silicon valley well represented in the forbes 100 richest american lists. a look at some of the tech ceos that made it when we come back. first, the dow is up 124, just off the highs 'rba ia nute

welcome back let's get to seema mody. >> some news out of italy.

italy's economic minister says his government will reduce the country's budget deficit after 2020 that's a move that will likely reduce tensions with the european union in response italian banks staging a modest recovery on hopes that this budget deal will be given the green light from brussels in turkey, after the latest data on inflation showing a rise in consumer prices by 25%, the highest we've seen in years, putting its central bank in a very difficult position. it's next policy meeting on october 25th. shares of tesco sinking after they reported weakness in overseas markets astin martin, the first car maker to go public in decades saw a tepid debut on the london stock exchange on the foreign policy front, russia and india expected to sign a $5 billion missile deal

during president putin's visit to new delhi the move will likely not go down well in washington they did sanction china recently for acquiring a similar missile system from russia that will be something to watch this week. carl, back to you. let's get a news update this morning. we'll go over to sue herera at hq. >> good morning, everyone. here's what's happening at this hour it's a busy news day a high-level meeting is under way at the state department between secretary of state mike pompeo and german foreign minist minister they are discussing syria, the iran nuclear deal and relations with russia. fireeye reporting north korean hackers are stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from banks all over the world. fire eye says they originate from a state-linked group that poses an active global threat. north korea denies that it's involved in the cyber attacks. and a new study suggests a daily glass of wine could

shorten your life. sorry to be the bearer of bad news the washington university school of medicine finding people who drank four or more times a week were 20% more likely to die prematuree ly prematurely. cancer risks outweigh the benefits that drinking can provide for heart health. and toys "r" us may return to a shopping center near you. a group of secured lenders has scrapped an auction for the assets the group believes it could make more money by reviving parts of the toy chain instead of selling off its parts. you're up to date. back downtown to you guys. jon. >> thank you, sue. up next, shares of sonos on the rise this morning, up about 5% it's been two months since the speaker company went public. the ceo, patrick spence, joins aerhere ay with usak (guard) what i've witnessed... controlled fury. freakish intelligence.

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the dow hitting another record high this morning, now up triple digits as it looks for its fifth straight positive session. so why are weaknesses in several segments of the markets getting so much attention? mike santoli is the man to ask for more on the hot and cold market, mike. >> jon, those areas in particular that are getting so much attention for running cold, small cap stocks, lagging badly in the last month, underperforming the s&p by four or five percentage points. banks have been bad all year,

has not held back the s&p and the dow. people are asking what does it mean for a market? also the equal weighted version of the s&p 500 is lagging on a year-to-date basis by 4 percentage points. yes, it's been a lopsided market and very selective the big question is does the relative narrowness of the market, are so many stocks not participating mean anything about the future honestly the answer is unclear there are some markets that are very broad and rallies are very inclusive. this is not one of them. but small caps underperforming for phases of time happens a lot. i think all else being equal, a lot of investors would like the banks to participate a little bit more but here's an interesting little wrinkle just tactically one, so many people are pointing to these divergences in the market also small caps and banks in particular look like they're oversold ready to bounce, so

maybe we're going to lose this talking point at least on a short-term basis pretty soon, guys. >> mike, a lot seems to be riding on energy today the biggest weekly build since march of last year and then pompeo comes out with these relatively hawkish comments about iran, so it's been all over the place. >> it has. it's interesting because as we've talked this week, carl, energy being to the plus side has been one of the opportunities for people to rotate into a group that has not gotten overextended and helped the overall index. although in general having oil prices go up for reasons of geopolitical instability isn't the most positive thing for the stocks long term so it's not clear how that's all going to play out but it's very much i think characteristic of this rotational market that finds another group to hold things together while other stuff pulls back. >> a lot of cross currents here as we're off about 60 points from session highs mike, thanks we'll check in with you in a

bit. this ever-growing battle for the smart home continues microsoft's latest device launch includes their first-ever smart voice assistant enabled surface headlines. meantime sonos competes in the space, a mix of hardware, software and partnerships. joining me is the ceo of sonos, patrick spence it's great to have you back. good morning. >> good morning. >> news of the day might be your arrival in japan, which you say is the second largest music market tell us about it >> yeah. so japan is the second largest music market in the world, and it's been a little bit late to the streaming game, something that we really ride. obviously sonos has benefited from the rise of streaming services like spotify, pandora, et cetera. so japan we've seen picking up streaming the last year or so so we're glad to bring sonos into that market. it's an exciting day for us. global expansion is a big part

of our growth story for the future. >> patrick, considering how much competition there is here in the u.s. with so many different home devices now, some of which you're partnered with but still competition, how important is this global expansion to drive your growth going forward? >> you know, there is a lot of opportunity remaining in the markets that we're in today. there's about five countries that make up 80% of our revenue today. and so those are important markets. we think it's really early in those markets. markets like the u.s., as you mentioned, but also global expansion, there's a ton of opportunity. what we try to do, china is a great example where i'm sure you're aware of tencent filing for their ipo. china is another great market for global expansion japan has been a little bit later, but it's something that's going to be a big contributor to our growth over the next decade. >> patrick, it's jon fortt the challenge for you as i see it or one of them is proving out the quality story. there's so many coming into the

market with smart speakers that are less expensive than yours and you've got to make an argument that yours just sound better and are worth the premium. aside from placement inside, say, big box stores, what can you do to not just tell that story but prove it out >> yeah, it's a great -- that's a great point, jon i think that's been something that as we're doing the road show, for instance, and talking to investors, we've been trying to help people understand that our approach is very different than the approach other companies are taking we're so used to consumer electronics companies bringing out dozens of new devices and trying to get you to upgrade to the latest and greatest. sonos builds quality devices but last for many years. we make them better over time with software and then people buy more of them we've been working with the startup enjoy to bring that experience into your home and allow you to test it in your home so i think we're working with japan with beams, a high-end retailer that's focused on the design of your home an giving

you that experience in a different type of way. you know, i think all of you might have the sonos experience and it's something you need to experience in your home to feel the power of it from a design perspective, from a sound quality perspective, but also the openness to services so we support all the services around the world we're not focused on pushing one particular voice service or one particular music streaming service the way others are. >> can you give us a sense of how the sonos beam has done since you launched it in july? there's so many competitors of streaming content to your television but this is a really crowded space. >> the beam is the first smart speaker for the living room. there's roku, amazon fire, but really beam is the first smart speaker focused on the living room we've seen lots of products focused on bedroom and kitchen but this gives you music, tv and the voice features and

functionality. so we've been very pleased with its performance so far in all the markets. it's going to be a big onefor the holiday season in our estimation because it really does have a unique spot in the home and is an area that really nobody to this point has addressed. >> patrick, as you know we're in an increasingly difficult environment in terms of global supply chains. what would have to happen for you to really recalculate production in asia or move some of those chains, depending on what tariffs do? >> you know, it's been a -- it's been decades in the making of the supply chain across china. that's not something, you know, end-to-end that you can move overnight. so a lot of the noise around tariffs has been concerning in terms of thinking about that whole supply chain we've been working hard and a lot of people in the industry have been working hard to look at how do you do that and what are you going to move. but there are so many parts that are so interdependent and been built over decades that it's not something that can happen very quickly.

but it's something that i think everybody now is being more mindful of and trying to really look at. we're fortunate about half of our business is in the u.s. and we have half outside the u.s. and we've been spared from the tariffs that have been implemented so far but it's certainly something we think about and are trying to do in a responsible way and with the long term in mind think about where else can you be manufacturing but that is not something that you can really do overnight. >> you listen to jack mah and he's like, well, if this got really serious and lasted 20 years like he says it possibly could, you would see at least original production move to countries outside of china but within asia, vietnam and others. does that make sense to you? >> you could definitely start to see some of that happening as a result, but remember i think people end up thinking it's just the manufacturing. you know, there are hundreds of components that go into one of our products, and you have to have all of those component suppliers in the same location you have to be able to do just in time delivery so you're

talking about moving potentially hundreds of companies, not just a manufacturing plant here or there. this is a very complicated and very interdependent supply chain now for anything that's being built in technology. so that's something that's not going to happen in a short time. >> patrick, voice control in a way, you've got amazon, google, microsoft, apple, others out there with that feature. most of them are broadly making it available across devices. so what is particularly this q4 the premium feature that differentiates, the thing that you think people are going to want and be willing to either make a brand choice or a premium choice based on? >> you know, i think the good news is google and amazon really seeding the market with a lot of inexpensive voice speakers is it's given people a taste of certain services but in a narrow range. so you can access the google services or the amazon services from those products. but what you can't do is what

you can do on sonos, which is access all the services. so we have alexa today, google assistant is coming on our platform we're the only ones putting multiple voice assistants on one product through software we have over 80 music services on the sonos platform so we create -- our proposition is you can invest in sonos and it gets better over time and you'll get all those services for the next five to ten years and you can add different rooms and play across multiple rooms. so it's very much thinking about how you expand, how you put it in your home in a long-term quality way and do it in a simple way, but you get that security that you're going to have access to all services. you don't have to figure out how to navigate the battles of big tech. >> patrick, good stuff really interesting information drop by post 9 sometime and see us in person thanks for your time. >> thanks, jon, appreciate it. thanks, carl coming up, a look at the tech-heavy list of the 400

wealthiest americans first, rick santelli, what are you watching today >> this pit going wild why is it going wild we're going to tear up what we were going to talk about it's going wild because interest rates have crossed important thresholds, equity markets have crossed important thresholds where does it go next? we'll talk about that after the break.

i'm scott wapner here's what's coming up. as the dow closes in on 27,000

and hits another new record today, is it confirmation that one of the best trades of the year is ending we'll explain coming up. plus jim cramer is seeing a change in leadership in the chips. we'll tell you what stocks are likely to pop and drop if that's the case. and our call of the day is from a space that's gotten hammered lately. we'll tell you the one retailer one analyst thinks is about to surge. it's on the "half" and it's less than 15 away. >> scott, thank you very much. i imagine you'll watch yields as well we've got the 30 at 3.27 now let's get over to rick santelli. >> good morning, carl. listen, we're going to do part new and part what i anticipated on doing but as i look at the board, i can't help but notice some things that you need to be aware of, you being the viewer or radio listener the data this morning seemed to have lit a fire in the market. not that the equity markets weren't already pretty red hot, but we did have good adp jobs

and we had a tremendously strong service sector reading from the ism group, second highest reading ever and the highest reading was the second month it was in existence back in 1997. but as i look up at the board, the first thing i see is that the long end is really starting to hit its stride. we've taken out the 3.11 high-year close of the year for 10s. doesn't mean that we're going to replace it yet, we haven't closed, but it is an important first step not only that, as carl mentioned, we shot through that 3.26 level in 30s. for all you technicians out there, there was a variety of patterns and formations that have been violated, especially on the 30-year i won't address them all the important thing is when signals are important, you should get a validation in a number of different systems that you monitor technically, and that does seem to be the case. the 10s to 2s and hopefully we

have a one-week chart has moved much closer to 30. it's trading 27.28 this is hugely important for investors because not only in mid-september do tax benefits run out for purchasing treasuries, what we really need to acknowledge is that the recipient of much of that institutional buying was on the very long end in 30s so the notion that jay powell and company could be looking at a steeper yield curve is really good news. now, the dollar index, you notice, didn't contribute in a dramatic way, but that's good because as it sits at almost a six-week high while this is going on, all the pieces fit quite well now, for what i was going to talk about, can the rest of the globe catch up with us that's hugely important. the data today shows we continue to outjog all the competition, but jay powell and company, as "the journal" aptly put today is with this new notion that less

is more, i couldn't agree more you don't need to be the transformer of the universe anymore, federal reserve, and that actually is a good thing. less guidance is a good thing. investors should look to the markets, not a group of federa reserve members for guidance on the future and, finally, important date, october 14th, one of the big issues the rest of the world competing better with us is all about germany and the ecb and merkel is getting weeker and the bavarian elections will give you lots more information on exactly how much weaker her coalition is wow, what a day. jon fortt, back to you >> indeed, rick crutiny of the p family's tax paying. a lot more still to come

"the new york times" out with a special investigation reporting the president engaged in what it calls suspect tax schemes. robert frank has done more digging on this story and joins us now from headquarters robert >> reporter: jon, the new york state tax department and the president both responding to that report of "the new york times" how donald trump received hundreds of millions from his father without paying proper taxes. now the president tweeting,

quote, the failing "new york times" used the concept of time value of money in a very old, boring, and often told hit piece on me. now he's referring to the article stating donald trump received over $400 million during his lifetime from his father fred, that's far more than the $1 million loan he has often claimed. the article said if his inheritance had been invested in the s&p it would be worth nearly $2 billion his current net worth is around $3 billion the new york state tax department saying it is reviewing the allegations and vigorously pursuing all appropriate avenues of investigation. but there is little legal risk to the president since some of what "the times" describes is beyond the six-year statute of limitations for tax crimes they rarely reopen cases after they've closed them from an audit. and finally it's unclear whether the irs can actually investigate a sitting president for tax fraud. many tax experts say they can't.

but from an image perspective the president has always been sensitive to claims that part of his success was inherited from his dad and he's often said, quote, i built what i built myself carl, back to you. >> the piece is getting talked about a lot today in "the tim times. a quick check on yields. the bond markets reached some important thresholds there's the ten year at almost 3.13 at the highs. that has to go back to july 2011 and then back to october 2014. when you're looking for answers, it's good to have help. because the right information, at the right time, may make all the

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welcome back to "squawk alley. the fda seizing thousands of documents during an inspection of e-cigarette maker juul lapse. aditty roy has more on the story. >> reporter: hi there, julia the fda says it got more than 1,000 pages of documents here from juul headquarters as lawmakers are urging the government to restrict e-cigarette sales. all of this happening because the fda is looking into juul's sales and marketing practices and specifically teenage use of

e-cigarettes which scott gottlieb calls an epidemic the number of high school students who have used e-cigarettes in the past 30 days has skyrocketed about 75% according to people familiar with preliminary data from the cdc. juul ceo kevin burns says it provided information about the company's online age verification protocols and calls meetings with the fda a constructive and transparent dialogue adding that it's released more than 50,000 pages of documents to the fda. meantime senators dick durbin and lisa murkowski sent a letter to the fda urging the agency to immediately ban kid-friendly e-cigarette flavorings and restrict online sales of nicotine products. juul is one of five they are looking into they are made by british american tobacco, altria and imperial brands. they did see shares rise upon

the news back to you. >> aditty, thank you very much for that i'm glad we started the hour with chips because amd is now 10% for the week we'll keep our eye on that along with the bond market thank you. always good seeing you let's get over to the judge and "the half. i'm scott wapner the index now closing in on 27,000 stocks surging today as one of the best trades for your money appears to be ending it is noon and this is "the halftime report. blue chip boom boeing, apple, microsoft all hit new highs. did the winning trade war trade just die and holding our traders' feet to the fire in the quarterly report "the halftime report" starts right now. it is very good to have you with us on this wednesday. here to debate joe terranova, steve weiss, jon