perhaps to see what alphabet may deliver next week. is a -- sarat? >> morgan stanley, and very good in the capital markets and not dependent on the interest rates and a ways to go with a great management team. >> thank you, everybody. and thank you for watching us. "the exchange" begins next. >> thank you very much, scott. i'm wilfred frost, and from lilly to every sector. a frothy market or levels are justifying what we are seeing? and plus, parting, alaska air seeing a loss, but signs of a brighter day ahead. and consumer confidence is sending a stronger message to the housing market and what is t there ahead, and we will look at that. and dom chu has that.

>> wilfred, we have lost some momentum, because at the highs, the industrials are flat right now, but earlier in the day, we were up about 161 point, and that is the idea of how far we have come back, and not crazy, but a little bit of the slowing momentum, and backed off some of the record highs that we have seen earlier today, and certainly from the close of business yesterday as well. one place that has backed off of the highs, but it did set a record one today which is why i will put the yellow or the gold star here is the 27% gain over the ishares of the home construction etf and the earnings reports today in the housing sector helping to propel that particular move higher in the housing stocks, and remember, since the pandemic lows a year ago, we were up roughly 165% in this particular home construction etf, and trend to watch and even though it was on the low today, but it did set a record high after the opening bell, and the stock story of the day, and focusing on gamestop

and the highly shorted ones and look at the shares of beyond meat, and we were up to 30% today, and there is a fundamental news catalyst to this, wilfred, in that they are teaming up with a joint venture with pepsico, the consumer products to develop plant-based snacks and drinks to help to carry those shares higher with a breakout of the trends for beyond meat. and wilfred, some fundamental stories driving up beyond meat today. >> and fundamental factor for deals there, and some also fundamental factors, dom, into the reportings today, and what are what is out there? >> yes, reportings of this early earnings season, and more small companies are getting the forward guidance in regard to the guidance and it is not the near term or this coming quarter, but it is in focus

here, and number of the companies are saying, hey, we will give you the adjusted profit guy didance, because they are seeing a little coming this year, and a little color comm commentary, and we are getting the quantifiable guidance, because there is adjustable profits, and by the way, check out these stock, because the five are important. apple, tesla, boeing, facebook and at&t and are among the stocks left to report at some point in week, and the reason why i want to highlight these aside from the fact that facebook, tesla and apple are all within the top five or six stops in the s&p and altogether, these particular stocks overall make up roughly 12% of the market gap of the s&p 500, and you throw in microsoft after the bell today and wilfred, you are watching that one, but it is 17% of the s&p 500, and in just those six names, and that is why they are key. back over to you. >> dom, thank you for that, and

we will certainly be watching microsoft tonight, but with all of the companies reporting, does it give the investors a slightly clearer picture of what 2021 is going to look like and the rally is going to keep going or the numbers are not good enough for valuations we will welcome in neil hennessey at hennessey fund, and neil, thank you for joining me. let's start on that broad point. and clearly, there are some signs of frothy innocence the markets and a great run, but are the earnings coming through and justifying the rallies that we have seen? >> well, wilfred, the market is not long in the tooth, and selling 20 times the earnings this year, and 18 times the earnings next year on the dow jones, but if you are looking to last year when the pandemic hit, companies had no idea of what was going to happen, and how severe it would be and what the turndown would be on profit, revenue, employees. and they weathered the storm as normal, because businesses

weather all kinds of storms. so when you are starting to look at maybe a little forward guidance which i never liked personally, but essentially, it is giving the consumer or giving the investor some confidence that the company is a little bit more confidence that the pandemic is starting to get behind us, and that the economy is going to start to open up which is going to mean that more business is going to be coming, too. >> and neil, the obvious point the note is that it is not like markets fell last year in line withearnings declining, and they have already rallied ahead of the expectation of the bounceback in the fundamentals this year, and there is some of the signs of the frothiness and do those signs worry you when you see them soaring on the single-day moves >> i don't look at the market as frothy here. there is sectors and individual names that are frothy, but you have to look at the nasdaq, wilfred from last year up 45%, but if you took out the six

stocks of amazon, apple, google, facebook, tesla, it was only the market up 21%, but the frothy stocks, and a lot of investors or small investors that are in chat rooms that are chatting up companies, and there is no fundamental analysis in there. the bottom line is that there is a lot of value in market, and frothiness in some of those sectors in names. >> what about the protection, and how are you getting that for your clients in the moment, and do you own bonds or gold or bitcoin? >> no, i don't own any bonds, and i'm not a fan of the bonds simply because i have thought that bonds were certificate of confiscation, and it is a no-lose gain in there long-term, but essentially looking at the market and buy quality, that is how you protect yourself. if you are looking at over the last 40 years, 33 of the years are up on the average of 18% a

year, and the seven years it was down over the last 40 years, they were down on average 9% a year. and the worst of it was 2001 and '02 and three years of a bear market, and other than that, we have not seen a bear market and we have seen volatility, and we have seen corrections, but we are not headed into the bear market, but we will continue to see some volatility in here. >> so let's finish fooe, neil, h one of the stock picks kb homes. >> well, it is a first-time buyer home, and mortgage rates of 30 years in the 3% range, and come on. years ago when i bought the first home i was 14.5% with pmi insurance and most kids with two income families can afford a kb home out in the future. so i mean, i like it. they earn around $5 a share, and selling at less than one on the

price to sales earnings ratio and pay a 60 cent dividend and plenty of room on the not only stock, but the dividend at the same time. >> neil hennessey, thank you for joining us. >> thank you. >> good to see you. all three of the major averages at the moment fractionally low on the day. shares of lock hooedheed martin lower. morgan brennan has spoken to the ceo, and joining with us the key takeaways. >> that is right. i got off with the ceo, and the coo frank st. john, and on the heels of the air earnings miss this morning and i should note that the profits are still up 20%, and raised guidance, and i did ask taiclet that they do

support a stable outlook going forward. he discussed the 21st century war fighter vision to double-down on the emerging technologies amid a flat lining budget taking in the approach that he similarly wielded at the americon and thinking of unmanned drones, et cetera, by partnering with tech and teleco companies and he would not disclose those names and focusing on ai and machine learning and linking the space systems and capability of the bigger and emerging portfolio picture that speaks to the $5 billion rocket merger, and he said they were positive but quiztive. and so they were halted for

volatility trading today, and that spoke for the investor appetite for investor space and i asked him how he was entering the burgeoning space, and he said that they were diving into the intel where small and medium-sized satellites are concerned and that commercial infrastructure are going to include the low-earth satellites over the coming decades and noting the partnerships and that space continues to be a key area of growth over the longer term. >> morgan, thank you so much for the detailed perspective on the numbers. lockheed is down 2.8% today. still to come on the exchange, looking to take off alaskan air, and growing optimism about the return of travel we will speak to the coo about the latest quarter and if he can see clearer skies ahead. and plus, he is warning of a potential crisis, and it took a pandemic for congress to hear him out.

>> forgive me for being angry. i'm angry, because i have done this for so, so long. and i have been ignored for so long. >> we will speak to prestige ameritech about their equipment and why it could be a security issue. more of "the exchange" right after this. >> this is "the exchange" on cnbc. and in an emergency, they need a network that puts them first. that connects them to technology, to each other, and to other agencies. that's why at&t built firstnet with and for first responders the emergency response network authorized by congress. firstnet. because putting them first is our job.

welcome back. shares is of alaska airlines are low today and down nearly 50% over the last six months missing on revenue, but the company is optimistic as the vaccine rollout continues. phil lebeau joining with us the details. hey, phil. >> hey, wilf. in part of coming off of the conference call with optimism of the q1 quarter and they anticipated losses for the fourth quarter, but like all airlines, it is not about the fourth, but it is capacity down for the first, and the q1 revenue down between 60 to 65%, and roughly in line with the analyst expectation, and the january cash will come in 100 and $125 million and let's bring in brad tillden, ceo of alaskan

airlines, and brad, when you are looking at the first quarter, and ai mentioned the conference call, because there was optimism looking at the advanced bookings, and you are looking at bringing down the cash burn to cash positive. >> yes, good morning, phil. we are happy to be here, and what alaskan airlines is seeing, and others as well, the bookings for the first couple of months with the third wave of the coronavirus, and not bookings, but the airplanes are flat, and coronavirus has kept people from coming to the airplanes, but people are looking ahead, and the rollout of the vaccine, and feeling and seeing more optimism. our bookings for the future travel are in the neighborhood of 60 to 70,000 bookings a day, and versus the current of 40 to 50,000 people per day, and so

there are signs of brighter skies ahead. >> i have heard of friends and family members saying i am thinking of booking a trip in the springtime, and what is going to happen to the airfares and how much do you expect them to rise, because there is expectation of hopper and others that we will see the increase of the airfares over the next couple of months >> yeah, i think that a different airlines might respond to this differently, but at alaska, our mentality has been that the first thing that you need to do is to stimulate the demand and get the demand, and what you are saying, phil, it is right, and they are cooped up, and held in the communities for 12 months now, and they do want to get out and see other parts of the country or visit friends and family, and so, we, what we will be doing is to try to stimulate the demand. our mentality is to keep the low

f fares out there to fill the plane, and this is latter part of 2021, and maybe you will see the pricing returning to normal, but i don't think that, nobody is thinking of sort of a different pricing environment than that right now. but i think that you will be seeing some fares and promotional activity in the lower fares in the next few month, and we will see when it happens as airplanes are more full, maybe the fares will return to more normal levels. >> brad, where do you stand on requiring people on the planes to prove that they have been vaccinated whether that is employees or passengers? >> you know, we will, what alaska will do with that, wilf, is to follow the industry trend and industry regulations, and at some point in time, there is going to be some sort of indication that we are all carrying with us, but alaska is not going to lead that effort. we are very supportive of the industry practices and

government practices like wearing a mask, and we are behind, that and support whatever protocol we come up with for the industry overall. >> and brad one last question, you took delivery of the 737 mack, and you took control of those, and how much of a game changer for alaska as you bring those into the fleet >> it is going to be huge, phil. as you know, we were all 737 fleet for many, many years when we bought virgin america, that brought the airbus into the fleet, and the reserve pilots on both fleets and reserve inventory and all of that stuff, and so moving back to basically, this is going to have us back to largely all boeing fleet by summer of 2023 and bringing efficiencies so that with every airplane that we bring, the fuel is going down, and the cost is going down and the maintenance cost is going down, and the revenue opportunity will increase, so this is going to be

a real profit driver for us. >> brad tillden, ceo of alaskan airline, and congratulation, the last earnings after 84 earnings reports. you get to sleep in. >> thank you very much. it is a great honor to lead the people of alaska which is a blessing that i never thought would happen in my life. it is fantastic, and we have enjoyed getting to know you and all of that over the years as well. >> we will be in touch i am sure at some point in the future. wilf, i will send it back to you. >> brad, our thanks and congratulations to you, also. >> speaking of the travel and starting today, all international travelers arriving to u.s. need to present a negative covid test leaving the cash-strapped tourist countries scrambling for more tests. seema mody with more on that story. >> yes, that is right. americans planning trips overseas have to ensure they can get access to the covid test to avoid delays on the return. united airlines said that the

cdc ruling has resulted in the increase in cancellations to mexico and the caribbean, and two destinations that have seen a nice jump in bookings since last fall, and the hotels and the resorts are trying to work out a solution with a number of marriott and hilton properties offering on-site ant igen and pr testing and hyatt is covering the cost of all of the tests to keep americans covering down south, and one is hiring professionals to give the test out, and st. lucia is providing training to ensure that more hotels have more resources. >> we have testing now available at our hotels. we are the medical staff at the hotel have been trained to take the swabs. and in private villas, and smaller properties, we do have physicians that are going to be going to the properties to take the swabs. and we are able to respond within the 72 hours.

>> now, for st. lucia and the caribbean broadly, tourism is the main driver of the economy, and 65% of the gdp, and wilfred, that is critical to their livelihood, and of course, that vaccine is going to be a game-changer to get back to prepandemic levels. >> and seema, those requirements are only for the places that you are allowed to return from the you not a u.s. citizen, and not the caribbean items, but not the u.k. or europe, and does that also play out to people's exposure, and the business-travel-type hotels that have more exposure to the european destinations that you are not required to return from even if you are tested and are they suffering more accordingly? >> yes, that is a great point. if you are planning a trip overseas, you have to check the restrictions in place. currently, the countries from the u.k., and major parts across brazil, there are travel

restrictions in play, and the protocols were put in place by the biden administration, and that is something that you have to take into account. but if any traveler is returning to the united states, this new ruling does apply to them. you have to present a negative covid test prior to departure, and take that test 72 hours before the flight. >> seema, thank you for that. still to come, prestige ameritech is one of the only u.s. manufacturers of protective equipment, and we will talk about what the made in america executive order means for the ppe maker next. and from the changing face of pension funds to bubble potential in esg, and we will talk to the ceo of prestige when we return.

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so dare to care, to be hope-sided. we're never divided, when we live to give, we always live united. welcome back to "the exchange." markets right now essentially flat and a little byit of gains for all three majors, but nothing too much. and so you can see the tops, and the energies and mixed, but in the bottom, a little of industrials and financials, and a lot of earnings coming in. and so, industrials at this hour showing some strength, and 3m

showing some strength, and g.e. is reporting mixed results and weak guidance, and the company said that they will have positive industrial cash flow giving the stocks a boost here. and i don't know which way to look. and now, the bank benefitted from the bumper volume and trading to the ultra rich client, and the stocks are up 3% or so today, and having a look at gamestop, and it won't stop double digits with the trading halted today, and hovering about 6% below the all-time high since the retail investors of reddit started the squeeze some 400% so far this year. time for the cnbc news update, and sue herera has it for us. >> good to see you, wilf. the senate has confirmed antony blinken as the next secretary of

state with a bipartisan vote of 78-22. he is a long-time confidant of president biden. internet outages reported by users across the northeast. verizon has reported a fiber cut in brooklyn, new york, but it is not clear if that is the issue for all of the outages they have not given an estimated repair time either. and tsa confiscated twice as many firearms at checkpoints in 2020 than in 2019, and that is despite the huge decline in air travel because of the pandemic. atlanta hartsfield-jackson had the most with 220. a judge has approved a weinstein company bankruptcy plan to provide for victims the of harvey weinstein, and $10 million for the former company officials. to receive the full value of the claim, the victims must agree to forego all legal claims against

weinstein. you are up to date, wilf, and back to you. >> thank you, sue. president biden is issuing federal mask mandates and the defense production act in his efforts to fight covid-19. and meg tirrell with those updates. hey, meg. >> wilf, we are hearing throughout the pandemic of the shortagie s of the protective equipment, and shortage in the united states, and president biden signing an executive order focused on made in america, and that is really for everything especially across the government contracts. as part of the executive order, the president is creating a director of made in america for the white house office of management and budget which would make waivers for buying outside of america more difficult, public. and so the replenish of the

stockpiles and for america to make its own personal protective equipment. one of the players in that space who has been sounding the alarm on this is prestige ameritech, and the executive vice president mike bowen joining us now. mike testified in front of congress in may about how long you have been warning about this problem that we don't make enough of the ppe here in the u.s. what has changed between may and now in that situation for you? >> well, having -- sorry. having a new president is very exciting. the previous administration didn't take a scientific approach, and seeing mr. biden and his team take a scientific approach to devastating issue is a very exciting thing to us. >> so you are one of the things that you laid out is that, you know, during previous emergencies in order to ramp up the supply, it takes time, and

investment, and if there not the follow-through in the purchasing, you are left, you know, having all of this ramp-up, and all of the investment, and it is financially damaging to you, and what kinds of contracts have you been striking now in the past few months, and do you confidence in the long-term manufacturing for this important equipment? >> yeah, the thing that we did differently this time is that we asked the people to stay with us, and we had them sign a contract. so, many of the hospitals across america had signed contracts with us for two years, and this is going to allow us to know when the ramp-down is going to happen, and keep frus getting hurt like we did after the h1n1 pandemic in 2009/2010. >> well, you know, there is still a demand for n95s and it seems that it cannot be met. tell us, what, what needs to happen in order to increase the supply of the n95s

is there a material that isn't gettable -- what would help with this situation to really expand that with the variants being more contagious, and the public needing better masks as well as health care workers? >> we have never historically sold to the public, so we don't understand that market. the hospital market however is at least from our vantage point seems to be okay. at this point, we have 5 million more masks that we are making than we are selling. so we are actively looking for customers at this point. so the n95 shortage in the hospitals, i don't see. >> so 5 million more n95 masks that you are making than selling, and is there a way to pivot to supply it to the public or a disconnect to getting it tout the hospitals >> i am not sure if there is a disconnect or if the shortage is

ending. because, you know, until a couple of months ago, the phones were ringing off of the wall, and emails were filling up, and that is not happening now. and we are known to all of the hospitals, and distributors the, and we are seeing the need taper off, and again, we are not in the retail market. if president biden wants us to help that, that market, we'd love to try. >> all right. mike bowen, we will leave it there, and appreciate you being with us. >> my pleasure. >> and we will send it back to you. >> thank you, both. >> the san francisco 49ers are hoping to strike it gold in england by increasing their investment in leagues united. and that story is coming up. and consumer confidence

clipinclip i -- climbing slightly as some americans are receiving their second round of stimulus, and what a third round would mean.

>> welcome back to "the exchange." consumer confidence rising after falling for two straight months. a new confidence board says that consumers are worried about current market conditions, but more optimistic in the future, and that the confidence of buying a home in the next few months is rising, and will be robust. joining me is steve from the consumer confidence board. and so sum this up for us, and nicely ahead of december as well. >> no, look, it is two-point increase up versus down which is what we have had the last couple of months. this is better, but the conference board's measure has two components. one, how the consumers are feeling about the present

situation and the second is the future. the present situation went down a little bit in january. so people are nervous about their jobs, and nervous about their own financial condition, and worried that the business conditions are worsening right now, but as they are looking out over the next six months, they are thinking that it is going to be better and part of that is driven by the views of the stimulus, and part of it is the views of the vaccinations and the ability to get back to normal. >> clearly, the discussions are on going in washington about the stimulus, and how much are the numbers dropped if we didn't get the full 1.9 trillion, and the full stimulus checks >> it is hard to say that we want to get the number back over to 100 where people are buying again, but they need to have certainty in their own income, and with the stimulus check in hand, theyn't doe no fit is the last one they will see, and how much, or how fast things are going to go back to normal, and the main important thing for us to worry about is jobs. and so, you know, people want to

work. it is basically how they can afford the maintain the households and the level of spending. so that is where the focus needs to be, and in order to get people back to work, we need to get people vaccinate and get the herd immunity back, and it is coming back to covid, covid, covid, and how fast can we get the vaccination through the society. >> and the housing market has been strong despite a relatively weak economy over the past year, and did you think that the numbers this morning suggested that over the short term >> the housing market is strong, and part of that is the falling mortgage rates and they are as low as they have ever been, and at some point that going to peel off demand, and then you run up against the fundamentally people being able to afford it. so that is one of the instances, and the other thing is the rotation out of rental housing, and urban centers and more into the suburban situation, and that is covid driven as well.

so it is a turn of events if we can get back to some assemblance of order and office routine, then people will stabilize and not be counting so much on the remote work. >> and steve, what is the latest take on the consumers' incentive to spend instead of saving, and what is the change of the mentality or the stimulus change from the economy or even into the stock market >> the stock market has a lot of cash on the sidelines and so the pension monies coming in, and so forth, and whether or not this is a bubble or not is a good one, but there is a lot of cash out there, and where do you put it the bonds are not returning here so at some point, you know, it becomes problematic. but then it comes right back to jobs again. and if the people can find the certainty of their job, and people are getting back to normal, they will go back to

start spending again. and you to deal with consumer debt levels and student debt levels which are quite high. and now, consumers are worried so they have been paying down the debt a little bit, but more certain, they can go back to borrow again, so there are puts and taking here, and it comes back to confidence. so if you are looking at the administration plan, certainly the stimulus is important, but it is not about distribution of the vaccine, but it is about production and at 1 million a day, and we have 330 million a day, and they need two doses a day, and we need 660 million shots and a million a day, it is good, but it is going to take too long, and the government has to focus on the production and helping the companies produce rather than worrying about the production. >> steve oldman, thank you for joining us. >> thank you, wilf. and now, it is flat about

seven basis points, and down briefly at 3,858 as we speak on the s&p 500. and now, he is one of the most influential investors in the market, and blackrock's larry fink is out with his letter of scrutiny and deciding the next investments. we will ar fherom him on that. and whether they are approaching a bubble in investing. we are back after this.

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i just don't have the bandwidth for more business. seriously, i don't have the bandwidth. glitchy video calls with regional offices? yeah, that's my thing. with at&t business, you do the things you love. our people and network will help do the things you don't. let's take care of business. at&t. welcome back. blackrock's ceo larry fink releasing the annual letter to ceos promising tougher scrutiny to companies before making investments. as the world's largest asset management, the size gives it major influence in this area. andrew sorkin spoke to larry earlier and joins with us the highlights. andrew, good afternoon. >> good afternoon, and great to see you, wilf. this afternoon, he was calling on companies to disclose a net

zero carbon footprint. in the interview, i asked him about the investment products that blackrock is building based on sustainability, and the data over time that the indexes on the s&p 500 will have less significance. >> to me, this is part of the tectonic shift, and i believe that actually more of the public pension funds who have been pretty loud related to sustainability are going to move large pools of their money away from, you know, the traditional index to a more customized index that meet their, their participants' desires and needs. and we will have that technology and ability to do that. >> i also asked larry fink if he thinks that there are too many public companies that actually fit the sustainability model and whether as a result there might be a bubble in esg companies right now. >> well, a bubble means that it

is going to burst any time soon, and the amount of money that we are seeing that is moving into the space is going to continue. so for those who think that we may have a bubble, and maybe one or two stocks that we may have bubbles, but what i see is more and more companies and management teams are trying to move towards this space faster and not slower. and so, we'll know in the next five years, and you know, there is going to be some failures. i am not here to suggest that everything is going to be rising perfectly, and like in everything else when we have a huge trend, we have huge winners and then we have some losers, and we will have that in this space, too, but when you are thinking about some of the great technology companies, when i think of some of the technology companies over the last 20 years, some of them were trading at 100-plus pes and the earnings grew into the pes and now trading at whatever today, 2735

type pes. >> unclear if he was alluding to tesla there, but that is one company that may be the exemplar of the company that fits under this sustainability umbrella that has gotten a lot of attention and of course, a lot of people believe is in bubble territory, wilf. >> and clearly a lot of the energy companies are not, and so there is a nice dichotomy there. and to play the devil's advocate, the cynic would say, why have they continued to hold companies like, for example, exxon over the last decade is it so they can engage with the company and try to make them change their behavior or was the driving factor that we will own the company, because we believe that we will make money doing so, and each year doing the bare minimum required to sort of justify why it is okay to hold that company, and still say that you are pro climate change, and to add one final point on it, i guess if this is the first letter on the topic saying if they don't change, we will vote

with our feet, fine, but this is going on for quite a long time, and they have not voted with their feet, and they do still own these companies. >> right. i don't want to speak for larry fink, but i think that there is a couple of things going on here. one is that the company has $9 trillion under management, and only about four of that is actively managed, and so a huge portion of that means that it is in a passive category from what i understand. as a result, you can't divest those shares so easily. if someone owns the s&p 500, you own the s&p 500. so the big issue is how do they handle it in the context of active management. so the issue that you raise is important one. which is, that if you own something, it is better to own it, and work behind the scenes to make it better or better to get rid of it? there a real ongoing debate about that. the company blackrock, that is, they did vote against about 69 different companies last year,

and 64 different directors and has 161 companies on what they call the watch list. so we have to see how this plays out over time, and i also think that larry fink started to talk about climate in earnest last year in a meaningful way. one of the first in the context of big investors, and so we are just at the early innings if you will of this game. i know that is not fast enough for a lot of folks out there, and a lot of the environmentalists and others who have been critical of blackrock and other investors for a long time, but it is a journey, and i think that it is the beginning of one. >> so i totally get that point, andrew, and clearly, you are not here to speak for them. i think that the debate comes from how long the journey has been going on for. back in my days as a firm manager, we launched a specific fund, and back then, the argument was that if you want to invest in the esg if you can,

and that means that we won't own any of these types of stocks in that fund, and whereas now the argument is now, all of the investment is under the lenses of the esg, but no longer it does not mean that you can't own the stocks, but you have to engage with the companies. >> maybe here is the distinction, wilf, maybe really over the last call it 24 months, green investing has become profitable investing, but for a long time, it was not clear that there was genuine performance related to it, and it is also clear that there is a shift in the mindset of so many investors around the world around this issue, and so you can see the capital going to companies who do have sustainability programs and pulling away from companies who don't, and that a sea change, so maybe you could say that larry fink is ahead of the game or maybe he is following the trend, but he is clearly a voice for it. >> totally agree with that, andrew. and we are coming up on the clock, but if the motivation is because it is becoming

profitable, it kind of speaks to my point as to why these big companies have started to change the position in the way they invest. is it because they are doing it for human good for because it has become the way that to make money and that is what is forcing them to change, and this morning and the book last night that preceded well worth the read check it out andrew sorkin, thank you very much. the san francisco 49ers upping their stake in the english premier league by buying a bigger stake in leads unedit the incoming vice chair about that move coming up.

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but thanks for joining us. >> thanks for having me. perfect timing just at halftime. >> so i'm really interested you're upping the stake and i wanted to start by asking, why valuations are different i could just google manchester united listed on the new york stock exchange, worth $2.4 billion at the moment. half of what an nfl team tends to trade for and you know, of course, both valuations very well why do you have such a big gap because there's not such a big gap in the revenues. >> yeah, obviously in the uk with the promotion relegation system comes with it a little bit of risk. the more you can stay competitive within the premier league, the better your valuation and more you can matriculate off the table. i feel like there is, more leeds, for example, as long as we can continue to show promise and competitiveness in the premier league, the valuation will continue to rise.

as for the difference between the nfl and premier league, i can't necessarily speak to that specifically but certainly, premier league valuations are right up there with some of the other top american sports leagues. >> and as you said, leeds, of course, recently promoted so they've got work to do to be established long-term, not being a relegation threat. what is the valuation you've paid today and where do you think it could get in the next five years >> you know, we don't go into the specifics of where we are today but the sky is the limit clearly, this is a club with a remarkable history, great bones, a global fan base. 20 years ago and leeds was one of the most popular clubs in all of the world and the fan base, there's a dormant amount of kinetic energy there ready to explode and we've already shown that we belong and we justcompe and the sky is the limit for that. >> the premier league has seen remarkable price inflation for tv rights, both for the domestic uk rights and the global rights

over the last decade on the sort of three year rotation when they auction them off parent company comcast with nbc sports near. can that inflation continue or has the rise been too severe and do you see the stream with the likes of amazon who started to get a taste of premier league action recently stepping up in a big way? >> yeah, you know what i don't even like, i think it's a misnomer to say it's inflation. it's more passion growing it this is just an increase in passion and you had a previous guest just a few minutes ago talk about how consumer confidence is going to come back months after a vaccine and i think professional sports are going to come roaring back and frankly, i believe they're going to come back to pre-covid, exceed that of pre-covid levels and i feel like whatever formats people want to consume their premier league football, whether it be streaming or linear programming, i think you'll see more and more and i think it's going to come back even bigger. >> who's going to win next the 49ers super bowl or leeds

united, the premier league title. >> the name of the game is being in the position to have a chance to win so as long as you're competing at the top level, anything can happen and we have a good chance. >> i'll let you get back to watching the second half thank you so much for joining me. >> thank you for the time! >> much appreciated. >> that almost does it for "the exchange," on closing bell we'll have the imf managing director joining us, also, the novartis ceo and microsoft's numbers will come out live during the show. but first, on "power lunch," houston rockets own er tilman. his most recent deal "power lunch" ar aersttsft this short break. thanks for watching "the exchange."

welcome to "power lunch. i'm john stephanie will join me for an hour