becky quick is with us and is live from a target store. what is going on today >> it is a big week for retail out with numbers today. it is target reporting i'm at a target store on 34th street you usually think miracle on 34th street and macy's this year, big box retailers target cape out with better than expected numbers but stock still down target today, the street is

looking for $2.83 and revenue of $27.7 billion. we'll get numbers soon and bring you those as soon as they hit and bring you the instant reaction we'll have an interview with brian cornell, target chairman and ceo just after those numbers hit at 6:30 about a half hour from you no. >> target. >> lowes is out. andrew, do you want to check on that >> let's go straight to the news >> let me tell you where things stand. u.s. equity futures at this hour what a day it was yesterday. let me show you where things stand this morning as we get to these reports. the dow is down. nasdaq looking to open higher.

call it about nine points. the s&p is flat. off marginally there treasury yield as we speak the 10-year note now given everythings that going on. 1.634. >> andrew, the big story in the journal. shoppers still spending despite inflation. numbers are good for lowes adjusted 2.73. adjusted $2.36 was the estimate. the metric, $22.9 billion versus

expectations of $22.0. same-store sales and another for u.s. comp store sales. yesterday, that was the big shocker. how much better the same-store sales were these are above expectations not to a better extent to the beat >> yesterday, lowe's shares were up >> based on home depot >> a lot of people anticipating these numbers. >> the comps are not as strong as we saw at home depot. before home depot came out said, maybe you keep having dejavu, that the pace of growth is slowing. >> they said people are coming out and now doing all the things they didn't do during the pandemic during the pandemic, they were

doing things before. >> i thought everyone was supposed to do their at home project when they were locked at home >> instruction projects were put off. >> and you couldn't get people to do the jobs there has been a real back up. don't for get significant number prices too between those factors. some of it may have gotten spread out. >> lowes was able to get higher growth margins the operating margin companies also raising its annual revenue forecast. expecting sales of $95 billion compared to an estimate of $92

billion. the street was above a little bit. i don't know whether we are seeing the trades settle in. those weren't trades yet that is indicated to be up lowe's ceo marvin ellison will be with us next hour >> home depot gets a lot of professionals and lowes is a little more do it yourself

a little softer and kinder >> the joke used to be lowes is home depot with lights >> it is darker in there i go in and have to ask someone. can you go in and do it on your own. i can't even get the stuff to buy myself light bulbs. it is sad. i think lowes has been a little friendlier or easier >> marvin ellison has been given a lot of credit. they've seen a lot of turn under his leadership in the meantime, fda is planning to authorize the pfizer booster for all adults starting

tomorrow expanding the shots available by tens of millions any adult that meets the timing criteria at least six months out from the last shot would be able to get a booster shot. citing the case counts and eagerness ahead of holiday gatherings they've said any adult can get it right now pfizer has submitted emergency use for covid treatment pill and saying the company would submit that before thanksgiving >> new overnight >> the antibody treatment made by glaxosmithkline to have these pills that can

offer significant help to anybody that does get ichb fekted let's talk about the trouble at act vision the report saying he didn't inform the board about rape and one rape accusation settled outside of court employees walked out of court demanding the company replace the ceo

t activision making a statement that they've already made significant changes and the board remains confident that he appropriately dealt with the issues saying it wasn't an accurate view of him and the company would move forward with zero tolerance policy clearly an issue and story we've known bobby for quite some time the report sufgts that they were

informed and the board saying they were properly informed. it is hard to know what the right answer is here the view is inaccurate so i don't know. >> i'd like to hear more i'd like to hear from bobby. i think the allegation is the board didn't it is a third party a lot of employees seem upset with him and also how empowered employees have become and how you are

starting to see walk outs and things a couple of years ago you probably wouldn't have seen over issues that are serious. >> employees are looking to be unionized as well. >> 50id like to hear from bobby. would love to hear his take on it >> we'll try to endeavor that. when we come back, a huge lineup still to come including the target ceo who will be speaking with becky in just a bit investor mario and new bombshell books from chris christie and more more after this.

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news out of china. a report in china's security times launching a new china fund the fund reportedly aims to raise more than $468 million the world's largest hedge fund

with $223 billion. bridgewater didn't respond on a comment on that report markets now. join us with that. managing partner good morning to both of you. boy do these retail numbers move all that would show is can it continue >> we are looking at a pretty healthy market going forward the key is looking at the consumer spending. looking at how we finish out the end of the year. consumer confidence numbers were low. that is contradicted by the

data i think consumers are closing out with a strong year inflation. we don't care anymore about that in the past two years. what happened? >> i think we cared a little less at the end of the day, this is going to abate maybe the back of this quarter and as we enter the winter heating months in the northern hemisphere we'll drive the byproduct prices, fertilizer and things like that. i look for wage inflation to continue we created five times as many jobs as workers entering the

workforce we've hit that 6% i was expecting short of that early battle of the debt ceiling in early september >> people talk about things like the pandemic stocks. where do you put your money? >> right now, there is i big benefit to remaining diversified. the sectors i like with financials and tech. good to have exposure there. looking at consumer and tech

it is a good opportunity for stock selection. as you try to play different factors in the market or look at broad trends, those can reverse quickly. leading in especially in sectors where there are winners and losers with the big calls of company fundamentals you can't even believe what is happening. by the way, you saw elon musk with more tesla stock. what does that say about where we are there are things in the market right now that show the traditional techniques rivion is one of those showing

800,000 vehicles where i am looking i believe i was right. now is the time for stock picking. looking at things with pricing power, growth and price protection they showed us they are putting up the price target. specifically leverage of the year even the more interesting ones where chips are able to price through. even if amazon doubles in capacity only growing by 8% and look at some of the payment

processors are able to come back to 70% and benefitting midshift from cash to credit. >> thank you good to see you this morning >> coming up more big gains. referencing them taking a closer look at another vehicle startup market cap that just passed ford and gm. a bit away frotaetm rg earnings. live from the nasdaq market site from time square ♪♪ we see companies protecting the bottom line by putting people first. we see a bright future, still hungry for the ingenuity of those ready for the next challenge. today, we are translating decades of experience

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>> lucid shares company shares are still on track eclipsed ford and gm and the company to do so this month. not to be confused with lucent which was one of the casualties of the by gone era >> a question for you is this 1996 or 1999 i think it is one of those >> i think it is 2021. correct me if i'm wrong. >> i know. just you will of the money and

valuations when you see that and we are sort of on the precipice. how many did we talk about today and that total for all the players. >> i just don't know >> yeah. there's money. a lot of money sloshing around we know that there's that one i might buy

fury before he killed someone. i might by that script page. i wrote that whole quote out once and tried to memorize it. the biblical quote that jewels would say before someone's time was up they are going to say i don't own it >> we have to run. we are awaiting quarterly results. the numbers coming up. flus

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. welcome back earnings now from target the numbers are significantly

better than anticipated. adjusted $3.03 compared to the $2.83. sos that a beat by 20 cents. revenue up by four cents comparable store sales up 12.7%. better than expected the street had been looking for 8.2% increase. that comes on seam-store sales growth or comparable growth on 20% a year ago if you are looking at same-store sales. that growth is up and digital sales up 29% let me tell you about a few other metrics here compared to 8.5% a year and a half ago looking at the pressure on that. looks like the company's

guidance and now the company is saying they are anticipating before they've been saying high quarter digit. seeing strength at the beginning of the fourth quarter so far the company paying dividends compared to what they are saying compared to last year. 2 billion shares we'll keep an eye on that. that stock down 2.5% by the end of the day yesterday target shares up better than 1.1% strong numbers across the board. operating margin 7.8% as people were watching these retailers as

costs go up across the board passing on to the consumer and how much you eat yourself after this break, we'll be sitting down with target ceo brian cornell to talk more about these numbers in anticipated holiday sales and more this is cnbc this is the new world of work. each day looks different than the last. but whatever work becomes... the servicenow platform will make it just, flow. whether it's finding ways to help you serve your customers, orchestrating a safe return to the office...

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welcome back, everybody. target out with numbers. earnings per share a beat by 20 cents. comparables up versus 21% a year ago. digital up 29% you can see the reaction in the stock. that stock up. joining us now to think about it is target's ceo. what happened in the quarter

the team just continues to deliver growth on top of growth. thinking about our comps up. stores continue to grow as well. growing and all driven by traffic. up 13% we continue to see our guest and feel good about our performance and the holiday season >> raising your guidance and what you anticipate for the fourth quarter, is that because of what you've seen in the err will i days? >> the continued momentum continued for seven quarters

trusting our target and the safety and team. we are anticipating a really strong holiday season. >> for a long time when will traffic disappear. now the question is, when does inflation really hit the retailers the question for the margin of the third quarter compared to 7.8% what are you doing to manage inflation right now? >> investments and supply chain to make sure we have the inventory for the holiday season our business model going all the way back to expect

more, pay less value is an important part of what we bring to the consumer each and every day he want to make sure the consumer comes in knowing the value. >> is there a shift towards the holidays >> charting our own shifts and inventory. we've been working closely in the ports to make sure we unload during off peak hours. inventory was up $2 billion almost 20% we want to make sure we have the inventory to see the incredible demand we are seeing >> the inventory being up and the demand being up. people saying the supply chain

has been an issue and has been such a strong demand across the country. >> just from our business and comps to be up on top of 20% the last year. there is continued demand. so it is a consumer feeling confident right now. they are shopping in stores and across categories. we expect to see that in the holiday season we'll see that staffing in place to meet the demand and continue to show market share continuing throughout the pandemic we continue to put share on top of last year we expect during the holiday season, it will be a consumer and guest. we'll be a big part of that. >> yesterday, talking about the

hiring picture where it got easier for the hiring before the government stimulus rolled off have you seen the same thing >> we have had really strong retention. we made investments in 2020. we invested $20 billion in health and welfare of our teams. we feel realle good offering additional hours see 1g 00,000 additional team members. expanding that into 22 and beyond. >> what are your retention numbers? >> some of the strongest in our history. some of the investments we've made in safety and numbers are vee high

>> so you are losing fewer >> much fewer. >> in terms of hiring, it hit all of the 100,000 employees >> we are right on track we are going to invest to invest in quarter after quarter a place where people want to work in a supply where you've noted we'll add another 30,000 to flow the inventory into the channels. >> yesterday goldman sachs raised its forecast because they think profit margins will expand

another 40 basis points next year for the s&p 500 in general. that's a tricky thing and counter intuitive when you look at these higher inflation costs. does that sound like something to you >> we'll look at how we manage the entire p&l we have leverage in our sg and a. really shows how well we are managing the entire p&l. some staffing challenges and higher costs delivering for our share holders. >> i think joe has a question. >> we've heard about how much stimulus is in the system.

both fiscal it seems like things are going well taking the baton so all those numbers and gains will continue for more necessary to keep that going will you see that at a time when same-store sales are flat or can all of that pick up the extra slack? >> we are trying to evaluate that >> in the future, we'll be a company that continues to invest

in growth. we think we are positioned to win. the investments we've made in digital stores and assets. using or stores in full fillment hubs we are going to continue to be a growth company and will continue to invest in its team and continue to grow market share for years to come. trying to get a better sense of what the future looks like sitting here today, we see a healthy consumer and one spending time in our stores and digital channels i think we'll build on that for years to come. >> if we do keep tloeing stimulus if we get another $4 trillion. whatever it is you mention your margins the higher compensation and supply chain issues. freight costs. raw materials go up.

is that okay that the increase in sales comes with some of the down side from things being too tight from too much money in the system is it a good tradeoff for you? >> that is sort of the things we do ever day. we'll continue to maneuver through that we think we are really well positioned if there is another round of stimulus we'll see healthy consumer shop in our stores and use digital channels we are in a good position to maneuver through the challenges. we've shown ability through the pandemic of comps on top of last year's comps how we've maneuvered through these challenges we have inventory growth making

sure we can meet the demand. what our search ants and supply teams do and we have to adjust to the ever changing circumstances. >> is there any read or anything we can define from the shift in terms of the mix of what people are buying right now and how are you thinking about your competitor set today versus two or three years ago now >> yeah. andrew, as i just talked about we are seeing growth in all of our categories all five of our key categories are in double digits that says consumers are spending across our store behind us now is all of the holiday decor. consumers are getting ready to

celebrate the season we are seeing strength and decor. toys and gifting consumers are investing in decore and gifting they are buying apparel and still investing in their home. some of the strongest categories are food and beverage and household essentials we are seeing spending across all categories right now we are seeing a really healthy consumer >> the white house called you and some other big box retailers in to talk about the supply chain issues what happened there? what did you thern >> i learned a lot and actually spoke to the president last week i've learned a lot we are all committed to making sure we are doing a better job in the ports we are a leader some in that

space. we unload over 60% of items off-peak hours and are utilizing other ports. we are going to make sure america can celebrate the holidays we'll have the inventory, the gifting you are seeing we are looking at discussions of how to make sure america can celebrate the holidays the stores are full and we are investing on inventory and ensuring america can come to the store to celebrate the holidays. >> you've done some big things chartering your own ships. going to the east coast. are you anticipating after the holidays is this a first quarter or second quarter or when do you see an improvement in the supply chain? >> there has been challenges in

the supply chain going all the way back to the start of the pandemic this is not going to get resolved overnight we need to do a better job of leveraging technology and sharing data it will take some time i expect some of those challenges will roll into 2022 over normalize and some of the investments and infrastructure investment is going to make a huge difference as we invest in ports, roads, and bridges across the country. >> starting next year, will the bridges be normalize for the supply chain >> i think it will take some time we will see challenges through 2022 >> when you look across all businesses, strengthen all five of these businesses, where do you spend the most time kind of worrying about getting the inventory, finding this stuff? what has been the biggest challenges >> becky, i worry about all those things we worry about making sure the factories are running so we can get the inventory, whether you worry about flowing it through our system

we worry about whether each of our stores are staffed each and every day. i worry about the health and safety of our team i worry that the consumer, you know, continues to stay healthy and celebrates the holiday season so we worry about all those factors. but i have confidence that we have a great plan and fortunately we got a talented team in place and we're showing the agility and flexibility to adjust each and every day to changing circumstance. but i have lots of worries, but i also have the confidence that i got a great team in place, a strategy that's connecting with the consumer and a consumer that continues to shop both our stores and takes advantage of our digital channels. >> last question, your dividends and share buybacks have both increased over the course of the year you anticipate that continuing, what are your plans on that front? >> we have a 50-year history paying a dividend. you will see that going forward. we generate a lot of pre-cash flow we will start by investing in our business and remodels and

new stores next year, continueing in technology and supply chain we will make sure we take care of our shareholders as we go forward. so we feel great about our position today we feel we have built tremendous momentum i think in the third quarter, we print some of the best numbers in retail. >> great to see you. the chairman and ceo of target joe. coming up, more of this morning's movers, including home improvement retailer lowes we will bring you marvin ellisson, ceo, that's straight ahead. we'll be right back. we'll be right back.

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welcome back to "squawk

box. i'm dom chu. we have a mixed picture this morning with two of america's biggest, most well-known retailers coming out with results. both of them, by the the way, that eat analyst's expectations. first of all, an upside move for lowes about two-and-a-half percent, two and a quarter percent. the second home retailer seeing home improvement trends continuing it beats on earnings, ups its forecast target coming out with results there were some concerns about some of the margin pressures facing a company like target you just heard from the ceo brian cornell, those shares, better than expected earnings, margin concerns, those shares are down 3% in the pre-market trade, also watching what's happening with ferrari those shares are getting a nice

little boost here, they're up 14% year-to-date analysts at morgan stanley, an early tesla bull, by the way, back in the day, comes out with an overweight rating, maintains the overweight and puts the target price at a $50 mark here. watch those shares of fer roar, that's coming up here, i'm send things back over to you. >> mccolllock. thank you, mr. domino. appreciate it. we have former new jersey governor chris christie, he's talking inflation. the infrastructure bill, how the mid-terms are shaping up later, lowe's ceo marvin ellisson, the stock is moving higher you are watching "squawk box" on cnbc

so, you want evs, you have come to the right place. is that tom brady? yeah. he comes in to recharge, get software updates. you know. let's go!

former new jersey governor chris christie live. we're going to get his take on the president's infrastructure and social spending plans, taxes and talk about his new book and lowes on the move in a pre-market after quarterly results. ceo marvin ellisson is here to talk the strength of the consumer and inflation fears and pfizer booster shots for all

adults as soon as tomorrow get the details as the second hour of "squawk box" begins right now. ♪. >> good morning, welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc, live from the nasdaq market site in time's square. we don't have a transporter like star trek, so becky makes the physical move back here from 34th street from that target store. andrew is here becky is on her way back after that brian cornell interview she'll be joining us shortly we also have highlights of that interview that will run, in case you missed it. at this point we're having an mccolllock week as far as the markets go down a little bit today on the dow the nasdaq is indicated up a little of a bounce back yesterday in the averages after

the first down week we had in five it happened last week. then next week, time is flying, andrew you know -- >> flying. >> turkey day is coming. >> yeah, it is you get tired. >> from the triptofan in the turkey that would be enough how could you not? you eat the turkey, you get tired, that's what it is. >> i have actually, i get made fun of by my family. i have been in a food coma have you ever been in a food coma where you are so tired, if in the middle of a meal you almost have to go lie down. it's probably my fault >> i have gone and lied down >> it's not the way. it's a food. >> go ahead. let's bring everybody up to it >> the big diright now is this the fda promising a quick action on pfizer's request to have the

vaccine booster approved for all adults the "new york times" saying a final decision could come as soon as tomorrow president biden hinting a final decision regarding the federal reserve position could come also at the end of this week if jerome powell isn't widely expected, brainard could get that job we are watching shares this morning of target. the retailer reporting a adjusted quarterly profit of $3 per share. sales top forecasts and we just talked to brian cornell. as prices continue to soar, democrats in washington are changing their messaging surrounding their economic agenda with that story, we go toy lto ylan mui >> now it's costing you a concern over the price tag of soy. democrats have new talking points for their $1.75 trillion

social spending package. >> more importantly, the build back better act, what we can do from the standpoint of fiscal policy is going to cut costs. >> want to fight inflation support build back better. >> 14 nobel laureats in economics said, it will actually bring down the costs it will reduce the deficit and it is totally paid for and it's going to reduce inflation. >> democrats argue the bill saves families $3500 a year in reduced electricity costs, lowering the price of insulin and cap child care costs at 7% of income for most families. democrats also cite an analysis by moody's that shows it would boost gdp and create jobs. that same report projects inflation will be higher in 2022 and 2023 if this bill is passed by as much as a half a percent

annual point in the middle of next year. moody's calls run away inflation overdone and it's a side effect over a stronger economy. but budget experts say the spendsing in this bill is front loaded while the improvements to productivity could take years to play out that means the inflationary pressure is greatest next year just when the political risk is highest heading into the mid-terms. joe. >> mccolllock. ylan, thanks now for a look at all these things, inflation, social spending, chris christie, let's welcome the former governor of new jersey his new book "republican rescue" it's available now thanks for joining us. hey, governor, it's been a while. good to see you. >> hey, good morning, joe. >> a lot happened in the past. ahead, it hasn't even been a year and things have flipped i'm wondering, you know, we are making projections, thinking

about a year from now in the mid-terms. and at this point you know we hear there have been a historic dropoff in generic support for dems and dem policies, are you confident a year from now that the american public will be in the same place given that stockmarket's at a new high. we're seeing good jobs growth. we saw those retail sales numbers yesterday. will it last the republicans are very fickle. >> well, joe, look i am pretty confident for a few reasons. first are historic am norms. over the last 60 years, the laughing loss of seats for the party of power in the white house is 27 seats. the margin right now only five seats for the democrats. so historic norms are moving in the republican's favor but it has been absolutely hyper fuelled by a couple of things. first, the incompetency the president showed in afghanistan

and the withdrawal there the american people will not forget that. because it labels the administration, which sold itself in the campaign on competency to be incompetent now these inflationary times are something that, you know, look, my children, the older ones in the working world, they have never experienced inflation like this in their lifetime, they don't understand why the price of everything is going up. my wife came home from a trip to the supermarket, bought a really big package of toilet paper, it cost her $29 that's what real people are feeling out there. there is no hope for inflation abating. as long as that's the case, i think democrats are in very, very big trouble i heard them talking about capping the language on their plan gosh, everything they say that plan will do it's also going to make coffee for you and brush your teeth it's just a ridiculous set of

claims that they're putting out there. >> the political landscape is interesting. it's very divided, very divided. i'm not talking about the plea between republicans and democrats. i'm talking about in the republican porte e party, there is two parties, it's very divide the democratic party, there are definitely i think there is two parties, although, one seems to be a little bit i don't know being bullied by the other to some extent. i think the progressives sort of have the upper hand. at least it seems that way but the republican party has its own issues in terms of what it wants to be. is it a glen youngkin sort of a chris christie party and can you afford to completely alienate the maga trump types from this next election tike him? how do you walk that line, chris from >> there is no reason to do that, joe.

look that's why i wrote the book. it lays out plans from here. one, we have to stop looking backwards, 2020 is over. the ven detta is not productive for the country and our party. the democrats are giving us an opportunity to layout a hopeful optimistic conservative agenda for the country that contrasts with high inflation, failure abroad we can do that but we got to consciously do it. we have to stop looking through the rear view mirror and start looking at the windshield. elections two weeks ago showed us the power of that, glen youngkin winning in virginia and in new jersey, jack ciarrelli came close but short phil murphy is the first governor incumbent to lose multiple seats in both houses of the legislature. so voters are sending a message. if you givethem a reason to

want to vote for you about the future when i ran for election in 2013, i was running on the boardwalk if asbury park which we just rebuilt. voters said, why should i work for you? i said, we rebuilt this in five months, the guy said that's what i got for voting for you last time what do i get for voting foryo next time? voters want to hear about your vision for the future and our party's got to get away from the grievances an vendettas in the past the policies that we put in when trump was president and the grievances as governors. >> i wonderer who the standard bearer will be you intimated you might throw your hat in the ring for 2024. do you have? you do that whether former president trump is nominated, runs again either way you think that you'd go for it

>> yeah, if i decide to run, i won't defer to any candidate i don't believe anybody that believes they are qualified to be president and have a chance to win, something important for the country should defer to any candidate. if you believe are you good enough to be president of the united states, i think it's disqualifying if you say, but i'll defer if so-and-so wins dwight eisen hower is not out there. so we won't be deferring to anybody if i decide to run i won't make that decision until the end of next year >> do you think -- i don't want to use the term wolf -- but the perspective that we see positive so frequently by one side of the democratic party s. that a part of the reason for poll numbers, for congress, the administration what is really behind that i hear how popular the build back better agenda is whenever the president's people are, you know, making the rounds, that it's, i hear numbers like 60% of the american public want this.

but then i see other numbers that say 70% of the american public think we're headed in the wrong direct in terms of a lot of these policies. who do you believe >> well, look, i believe it's the american people are not stupid and they know that these things cost enormous amounts of money. the other thing business men and women have learned is that when the government is giving away barrel loads of money for free, people don't want to work and there is a significant labor shortage in this country we saw 4.4 million quit their jobs last month. this is absurd at the jersey shore, to hire a dishwasher, you had to pay north of $25 an hour this is something the american people know is not sustainable as to the woke culture, all you need to do is look at one simple issue which should be a foundational piece for republicans in 2022 and beyond

that's education they do not want a week ago gen da taught to their children and parents want to be involved in mack those choice of where their children go to school and what they will learn. i will tell you this, joe, if the republican party has a choice between parents decide or the teacher's union learning what they will learn, i am telling you, it's not even a close call, people will want parents to make those decisions, that's what i think is behind those numbers is this discontent, kids are taught in public schools race is a determining factor for how you should feel about the person sitting next to you and they're being taught america is not the american dream anymore i don't think any of us wants that >> governor christie, in terms of the shortage of workers, obviously, our policies have been a factor in that, too that has been a significant issue a lot of wall street firms have pointed to. what should we be doing about that how big of a problem do you think it is?

>> well, becky, i don't think it's nearly as big a problem as the government dumping, you know, billions and hundreds of becomes of dollars into people's bank accounts. i talked to a guy yesterday who said he started to get money directly deposited into his account from the federal government he didn't know what it was for so when people are given money for free, you slightly bring down the incentive to work especially for people who, you know, are saying if i don't have to pay payroll taxes on this money net-net, i'm making more than if i work i think that's a much bigger push than immigration has been on the labor shortage. when you have 4.4 million quitting in a month, what's that got to do with immigration to me i think we have to fix our internal problems first. let's get the stop joe biden kamala harris and nancy pelosi from dumping money on to people's couches where they're having them sit rather than off those couches and getting back to work.

i don't want to exclude chuck schumer, because he's dumping just as much money as the rest of them. >> governor, it's andrew here. i read the book. it's fascinating, so many anext dietz i thought were so telling. i have been watching you make the rounds in this book tour joe asked, obviously, whether you would run if president trump ran. but you are also often asked if president trump were to run, would you vote for him and for reasons that i want to get into with you, you don't seem to be willing to answer that question. i am so surprised, actually, when you read this book, you would think there would be no ways in a million years you would be prepared to vote for him. you can explain that >> sure, i can explain it to you very simply, andrew, by telling a story from 2016 when i was supporting donald trump slated hillary clinton debate prep and

shair chairing his tan situation. the ambassador of the united states said to me, i don't understand your political system, why people are supporting the people they are i said, look, in the american political system you don't get to vote for often who you want to vote for you vote for who is left i won't talk about 2024 who i might not vote for when i have no idea who is left and the alternatives will be believe me, if the democratic party moves in the direction of socialism from an economic perspective, a non-capitalistic system perspective, i find it very hard to vote for any candidate who represents that point of view. that's why i'm not going to put myself in a box in november of 2021 so i'm a little surprised when i asked the question and i give the answer that people are shocked i won't commit to who i will vote for or wouldn't vote for in 2024. if you got a crystal ball and can tell me what my choices will

be, i will be much more likely to give an answer. since don't have a crystal ball you can't. >> governor, it's a reflection of the real times we're in, that's my point, if both parties have their own issues, own internal issues. you have bernie sanders, the party looked at the possibility of him being the candidate and i think that they looked into the abyss and realized the possibility of that. you saw they ran into joe biden. then bernie sanders is now sort of the geographic center of the party and they're doing a lot of the stuff that he runs then you think about president trump on the other side. i they glen youngkin might be better i guess for suburban women. but president trump, probably, through a lot of republicans is still the leader of the current republican party and the people that don't go along with him get prime oaried. liz cheney is not getting

recognize by the republican party at this point. mitch mcconnell would probably like to distance himself from president trump but is unable to because it might be political suicide. it's a weird dynamic that we're having here. i don't know how you thread that needle >> well, the way you do it, joe, is to be authentic and be yourself that's why i keep saying to folks, stop looking backwards, start looking forward and be yourself whatever that is, the voters want to see who you are. >> is it positive or negative for the republican party in 2022 and 2024 >> if he continues to talk about 2020 and grievance and vendetta politics if he looks forward, he can be helpful. >> governor christie, thank you. it's kind of a bipartisan. i don't know which party is more f'd up, i really don't i probably shouldn't say that. >> it's too late. >> it's too late coming up, ceo for le'oes marvin

ellisson on the latest quarter "squawk box" will be right back. this is ashley. she's a posh virtual receptionist. she'll make sure you never miss a call or an opportunity to grow your business. you can't be in two places at once, let posh answer. posh virtual receptionists.

. what publicly traded company was founded in 1921 and originally known as north wilkesboro hardware? the answer when cnbc "squawk

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wilkesboro hardware? lowe's the company was founded in north carolina by lucous smith lowe's. >> lowe's beating on the top and bottom line. racing with annual forecast. joining us to talk about much more is marvin ellison the chairman and ceo marvin, welcome, thank you for being with us this morning it's great to see you. >> good morning. great to be here >> better than anticipated numbers, the top line, bottom line, a lot is because of the strength in home improvement trends, what have you seen with demand trends remain strong as you said, we raise our guidance both on revenue and profit. let me take you to the macroenvironment this is illustrative to what we see. when you think about home

improvement in the backdrop of what's driving it, you are looking at things why a true shortage of available homes. you are looking at home price appreciation, historically know mortgage rates, an increase in disposable income and really interesting statistic. over 50% of u.s. housing stock is over 40-years-old and we estimate we have about 1.5 million in the supply of homes to meet demand all of those create a positive backdrop for home improvement. so we're a great beneficiary. >> wheat e wall street is looking for the time when consumers move on, saying we improved our home. we did that in the pandemic. we're ready to spend elsewhere you don't see that happening this is a return to opening that you think makes the sales go

away >> well, exactly, what we continue to see is demand continues to stay strong we did a survey of our professional customers what they said to sus their backlog of projects and their business is as robust as they've seen it in many years and they can see that robust pipeline of projects going all the way through 2022 you know, so for us, it's really about executing really well to meet that demand and ensure we are looking around the corner, so-to-speak, to ask the question, what other demands will be out there. you know, today we're going to be announcing something that we call a lowe's livable home this is our attempt to take a $32 billion market that is simply helping baby boomers and individuals who have mobility challenges redesign their homes, so they that i can age in place. if you've ever tried like i have

for my father to go to one location, to get a walk-in bathtub or stair lift or pull-down cabinets, it's almost impossible so we are creating one-shop shop at lowe's where we want to have goods and service if partnership with aarp, which is going to be a collaborator with us to ensure we can educate commerce and that we can give them the ability to learn how they can modify their homes in a way they can allow them to live with mobility challenges, to stay in the same place that they love >> you know, i can attest to both of those things, having older people i know want to stay in their homes, also looking to try to find a project. good luck with that. it will be a long contract to get people to come in and do it. let's talk about things like lumber, essentials we saw prices skyrocket through the course of the year, in some cases doubling the cost of what it might be doing in the cost of

a project, if someone was putting in a back deck what have you seen in terms of inflation? how do you handle it how is it that you think you will increase your gross margins in the full year, even with these higher costs >> well, becky, lumber inflation was more pronounced earlier in the year we saw historic deflation and prices fall in the third quarter. that was offset by dramatic inflation in categories like copper so net-net for us in the third quarter, it really balanced out. the thing that i'm really proud of is in the face of you know true global supply chain challenges that you all talk about on a daily basis real issues with inflation, we're able to beat our margin rates for the quarter, beat our operating income improve earnings per share as you mentioned earlier, we raised outlook for southern revenues the thing we understand we have to do is manage the business

well because we want to be a examiner centric business if you feed goods and services for your home, you want to come to lowe's and get a competitive price. that means we have to manage through all these challenges on a day-to-day fortunate i'm great leaders have dealt with this before we're managing through it. i'm proud we have been able to deal with all of these headwind, yet, still outperform all expectations in every financial lives. >> how do you hand tell supply chain? inflation? where does the cost go if it's not eating into your bottom line, who sit impacting >> let's talk about a supply chain for a moment i had a lot of competitors and leaders that i respect in retail that went out and secured and leased additional ships. we never took that shep step instead we create coastal holding facilities, big storage facilities on each ports around

the country. we simply ordered them inventory early. we got it in country we were able to make sure we were able lean into those seasonal categories without having extreme shortages when i say extreme shortages, that's a relative statement. because as one of the largest importer products in the country, we have scaled. so we leverage the scale to manage the global supply chain challenges effectively it doesn't mean we're immune to them we've managed them and been able to not push a lot of those costs to our commerce. in addition to that, when you think about how you manage all the inputs of inflation, despeculation cost increases, is comes down to vendor supply relationships. we have a win-win philosophy we want to make sure we are not pushing unnecessary costs to our commerce by finding ways to mitigate it through pricing strategists, make, sure we are managing all elements of the business well and looking at

other expenses, we're able to reduce it for the quarter, by doing that, it allowed me to absorb the cost increases, we're a big company. we have a lot of agility we proved it in the third quarter and all year >> one of the questions we have ceos is we hear complaints so much how difficult it is to find help, labor. what are you doing on that front right now? how tough is it to find people to fill the jobs that you need >> so let's talk about our -- for a second it is a challenge. but it is what i would call a difficult and certain parts of the country more so than others. we're very pleased that we have a great operation an an hr team that has done us an incredible job of keeping us staffed. over the last two years, we've invested over $1.4 billion in wage inequithe i to support our front line associates. in this past quarter, in the

third quarter, we paid out $138 million in profit sharing, specifically for hourly employees. we called this profit sharing winning toke when the company wins, we want our hourly associates to win that was $70 million over the according to payout. that's on top of one of the most competitive wages in retail and on top of all the other benefits we provide when you have a healthy environment, you are paying out almost $120 million in ponouss noer the quarter, just for hourly associates, you become an attractive you know employment opportunity. that's the seventhconsecutive quarter that wave had 100% payout for our quarterly bonus that's something we're very proud of >> you said some places in the country, it's more fiflt i difficult to find workers than the others where are the most difficult places >> there are pockets like the pacific northwest historically will always be challenging. you will find pockets throughout the west coast have you pockets in the northeast.

but the net effect of it is we hit all of our hiring targets that we had estimated and forecast for the quarter we're a little different although the holiday season is important for us, we sell a lot of trim and tree, our peak season is the spring when other retailers are ramping up hiring, we will be ramping up hiring at the very beginning of the year going into the spring season it doesn't mean holiday is not important. we're looking for a very robust and exceptional holiday and the early results point to that again, we will see our peak hiring period start in january and february >> that is an impressive stock chart 23 are looking at, especially in the last couple years you have been there, stock up about 3% this morning after a better-than-expected numbers on the bottom line, the top line and the company raising its forecast for the full year marvin, we want to thank you very much for being with us today. we really appreciate your time. >> thank you have a great upcoming holiday season >> marvin ellison is the

chairman and ceo of lowe's still to come, jeff bewkes, and james andrew military talk the history of hbo and the merger between time warner and at&t and later, mario gabelli gives us his te akon markets, inflation and much more. stay tuned you are watching "squawk box" on cnbc thanks for coming. now when it comes to a financial plan this broker is your man. let's open your binders to page 188... uh carl, are there different planning options in here? options? plans we can build on our own, or with help from a financial consultant? like schwab does. uhhh... could we adjust our plan... ...yeah, like if we buy a new house? mmmm... and our son just started working. oh! do you offer a complimentary

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box. i'm dom my chu target shares are a focus for a lot of traders and investors those shares down 3% after target beats about every metric you can have but there are concerns that some of the cost pressures facing target will have an impact going forward. some of those margin pressures taking down the stock. now walmart, target ceo brian cornell was just on in this past hour of "squawk box" talking a little about target's quarter and what it sees int coming holiday shopping season. >> i think this quarter we printed some of the best numbers in retail. you think about our comps up almost 13% stores continue to perform well. up 10% our googlewas 30% on top of 155% last year all driven by traffic. traffic was up 13% so we feel really good about the momentum in our business >> speaking of momentum.

on internet retailer, amazon.com also getting a slight bid in the pre-market trade after analysts at goldman sachs have called amazon their top internet pick for 2022, citing some of the secular demand trends around things like online advertising, ecommerce and cloud computering among other things so amazon shares taking a bit of a bid this morning also watching what's happening elsewhere with roku, that stock is down. analysts have downgradeed that stock to a sell rating they think the slowing momentum is causing concerns. roku down roughly 2.5% in the pre-market trade some of the most popular ticker searches on our website cnbc.com over yesterday's full trading session may be no surprise that electric vehicles continue to dominate the discussion three of the top four searches have been ev-related lucid group up 10% again this morning after a huge move

yesterday on good demand from the company. rivian up 12%. tesla up 2%. elon musk sold stock again for the seventh straight day peloton and walmart up 1%. with these gains, we're talking close to 1200 billion making it more than general motors in market value, guys >> how many times have we used that comparison in the last couple of weeks? rivian, now with lucid it is something to see great to see you. when we come back, the fda could approve pfizer boosters for all adults tomorrow. details after the break. former chairman and ceo jeff bewkes and james andrew miller will talk to us about his tuneder box. the ruthless pursuit of new frontiers. quk x"ilbe right back. quk x"ilbe right back. >> so, you want evs, you have come to the right place.

> is that tom brady? yeah. he comes in to recharge, get software updates. you know. let's go!

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people meg tirrell joins us right now meg, this is something people have been eagerly awaiting >> yes, becky, it's interesting how this got narrowed a couple months ago for moderna and now pfizer has come back with a large study and plus data from israel supporting this so the fda according to reports is potentially going to clear this for everybody 18 plus this followed suit after what state have in new york city. there is news, smith klein announcing a billion dollars in purchase agreements of their covid anti-body drugs of the u.s. government. glaxo smith-kline will deliver them with the option to purchase more through march this thriving shares and particularly the smaller company, this morning, jfk there not moving too much on the news

and this follows a lot of purchases in the past few weeks of covid drugs they appear to be beefing up the arsenal of covid, cases head to rise into winter in the last months, the number of deals they struck they're yellow, the anti-viral pills in white pfizer is expecting to have a deal announced this week up to $5 billion for the u.s. government it's a trend it's interesting to see the government buying up these medicines as they are trying to get these vaccinated >> mccolllock. meg tirrell. thank you. appreciate it. when we come back, a lot more on "squawk," former time warner chairman ceo jeff bewkes and james andrew miller will join us the future, let's show you where things stand nasdaq looking to open higher

about 22 points higher "squawk" returns after this. so, you want evs, you have come to the right place. is that tom brady? yeah. he comes in to recharge, get software updates. you know. let's go!

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or go online today. welcome back to "squawk box" this morning a. new book titled tinderbox goes between the merger of time warner and at&t and the troubled spin-off of that we will create a new media giant with discovery that deal expected to close in the first quarter of next year we are joined by two special

guests, former time warner chairman jeff bewkes and the author of the book james andrew miller good morning to both of you. it's great to see you. i have so many questions jeff, i want to start with you what's fascinating is the number of recriminations on both sides about this transaction you described what at&t ultimately did with the deal to be malpractice so i'd ask whether ultimately you regret selling them the company? >> we had to make a merger with somebody basically we needed to get, hbo was already like netflix it already had you could thin the sopranos, but couldn't watch friends on nbc. you couldn't watch the office on nbc or usa we needed to get addressability so you can watch your favorite shows on the networks that you are used to seeing them on and

it was moving over to these digital companies. so we needed a platform, whether it was amazon or an alliance with disney or something with apple, where all the networks on the table dial could come alive in your living room and when we saw that wasn't happening, we looked for some company that could give us direct consumer capabilities like netflix had, like amazon had. we ended up with at&t. we thought that what they would do is take their $125 million customer relationships and their big consumer data platform and help us use it to enlive the advertising on cnn and tbs and give us some subscriber information for hbo subscription but that didn't happen there was a fairly revealing quote from the at&t chief in the

book that said if you pay a premium for a mortgageer, you need to disrupt the company that you bought we thought the reason for the merger was to activate this add platform and consumer platform for hbo and turner we didn't think it was for at&t to try to manage the time warner networks better, in fact, because they didn't have networks or studios, we thought they'd leave our people to help guide them in that process instead they basically went ahead with trying to replace our management with theirs i don't think it turned out as well as the street and we had hoped. >> you described it, though, as malpractice, what they did to the company. >> well, i mean, you read the book because you can't, you know, you take these words out of context and they become kind of provocative. it's a little more complicated than that. they did have a challenging path

but i think the market is the best judge of it if you look at it and the decision on wasn't working i think that's the best way to judge what has happened. >> james it's a remarkable book you spoke to so many different people and really go through the history of hbo, which unto itself is fascinating. full disclosure they made to fail many years ago. i'm developing something with it now. the question i asked you is john stankey and randall stephenson have said repeatedly that this has still been a successful deal do you think that stand out? >> well, look, i mean, one of the things that is important to mention is that hbo, there has never been a stock called hbo. right? so throughout its entire 49-year-old history, there has always ban parent company. it has been a series of mergers

and acquisitions that have taken place. the at&t deal, look, if it's very, very successful, i'm not sure if they answer the phone then when they calm. i think that vertical integration turn out to be much heard than they thought and i think john stankey admits that in the book. i think the market didn't value, give them the premium that they thought they would have after this acquisition >> jeff,you have been watching the sland scape play out we seen what happened with disney's numbers last week are you of the view that in the end there will be five players, two players, how does this play out? >> you know, i'm here because i'm so excited about the book. i couldn't put it down and it's a heavy book it's a big book. i do want everyone to read about how did hbo do what it did

there is all this, there is so much humor and if you don't take my word for it, jim interviewed 750 people people of hbo. competitor's at hbo, actors, directors. the guy was invented the favorite shows if you want to see how this happens, it is just a funny, lively, audacious group of people all, you know, not everybody agrees with each other. that's the virtue of the method of this book you've got everybody's opinion, nobody agrees. so you can see how the sausage was made it was fun, it was funny you know if you go into, i know you are worried about the current market i think it's always been true of these subscription network businesses, whoever is first has an advantage over who is second. i don't think you get more than,

well, here's the number for you. i think netflix just last year made $2 billion of earnings. hbo made more than that five years ago. and netflix is worth many times what hbo is worth. what everybody forgets is the turner network make 4 or $5 billion twice what netflix makes now. and nobody is talking about that so, it's a very interesting industry trying to move across the river from the old cable distribution up to the new broadband and i really hope everybody reads the book to find out how it's going to work. >> i read every word. >> what did you think? >> i was pass the -- as i said i was fascinated by every page of it i'm curious since talked to everybody. what was the moment as a writer listening to somebody say something and you thought, wow, they're in totally different

places >> look, the whole point is to isolate how hbo, which fundamentally changed television became an outlier. there were one moment for me, there were many moments, one in particular, david simon who created the wire was told that the show was going to be cancelled and he pled with carolyn straus, a program executive, to get a day in court with chris albrecht. he talked for an hour and talked about the future of the wire, why it was so important. this is not a show getting big numbers or award and albrecht listened to him and said, you know what, we will do it we will do two more seasons. i think the pilot of the sopranos tested poorly if that had been a network show, it would have never made it on air. one of the things i tried no do is trace the ped free of those moments where you have a

ubiquitous fork in the road, hbo has taken the path less traveled, they're doing something different. that spells the last 40 years. >> jeff, we got to go, real quick, you famously said netflix is the at banian harmony going to take over the world i don't think so, in regard to netflix. in retrospect, is there anything you wish you had done differently? >> i'm glad we're still talking about that there was the hint there, the albanian army did take over the world when alexander the great was running it we weren't able to say in 20 so we're screwed. we didn't know what was going to happen that's why we were trying to get tnt an these network things. when that did not work, it was the call to arms we got to get -- there is no reason we put all the tv shows and put them in one place where you don't want to watch them on cbs or abc anymore you want to watch them on

netflix. there was no reason that had to happen >> the book is called tinderbox, go out, get it, appreciate you both joining us this morning. >> thanks for having us. when we come back, senator rob portman talks esenpridt biden's spending bill and what to expect this week. stay tuned you are watching "squawk box" and this is cnbc destination spot injected. let's start tripping. follow route left, left, left, left, left. recalcumalating. left, left, left, left, destination place now more far away. stop. wait. go into your behind. translation is complex. transperfect makes it simple. our experts help your business succeed. in any market, any language, any industry. simplify global business with transperfect.

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good morning, another biging morning for the retail earnings. we have new results from amazon and lowes. we tell you what the ceo said about the supply chain and bring you new data more covid vaccine booster shots for more u.s. adults widest approval, reportedly comes before the week is out we have the details straight ahead. one of the most respected investors tells us where he sees opportunity and damageer ahead we will talk media, inflation and much more with mario gabelli. the final hour of "squawk box" begins right now [ music playing good morning, welcome to "squawk

box" right here on cnbc. we are live this morning and i'm andrew ross sorkin along with becky quick and joe kernon let's show you the futures, where things stand at this hour, habit an hour-and-a-half before the market is set to open. the nasdaq is opening, nasdaq off about a point. we will show you treasury yields we have a bunch of earnings reports to tell you about, the ten-year note sitting at 1.644 >> that yield really picking up. retail earnings in focus as andrew mentioned. you have analysts beating both the top and bottom line. comp store sales jumped close to 13%. well above the 8% it was forecast however, you see the shares are down by about 3.5% this morning. part of this operating margins were squeezed from a year earlier. i think there may be questions about that every other metric looked very strong in those numbers. meantime, lowes beating estimates for revenue and profit and they raised the annual

revenue forecast comp store sales came in by an increase of 2.2%, much better than the 1.7 decline analysts were looking for all of them exceeded expectations in that stock after gaining 4.1% yesterday based on the strength of home depot's news is up about 3.8% this morning. we'll be talking more about target, lowes and retailers focusing on the state of the u.s. supply chain. keep an eye on pfizer, a quick review on covid vaccine booster shots approval for all adults in the united states. the "new york times" reports a decision could come as soon as tomorrow that stock right now up by about .7 of a percent. its vaccine partner biotech seeing hire shares up 1.7% let's get back to the broader markets. mike santoli, senior commentator. what are you watching this morning? >> we're watching a quiet

market i think we fell a fraction of the point on the s&p 500 from a new closing high yesterday kind of hugging this round number 4700 this is an options expiration. it's one reason it exerts a gravitational pull it's fair to see the overall market regrouping from being a little overbroad coming into last week really nothing much changing about the trend. it shows you, there wasn't a tremendous amount of broad energy in terms of thrusting into a new high just yet so probably just needs maybe a little bit of time yesterday actually more stocks down than up even though you had huge growth stocks leading the way take a look at the etf, compared to that same index on an equal weight basis you will see, it's been a little top heavy the qqq driven higher. still you know a decent trend in terms of the equal weighted nasdaq 100 marginally above that all time-time high it's a selected take i would look at the travel and leisure-related companies.

take a look at pbj in etf that tracks this area kind of failed again if you sigh obviously this very excited kind of vaccine peak right there. another one in july. kind of had us a lower peak there recently hand has fallen away, obviously, uptick in covid cases, mostly overseas, also here the absolute epicenter group that's most affected by a big market crisis as the travel stocks were. they have this huge comeback very frequently through history. there aren't leadership florida you monitor it for the sentiment of the strength in the reopening in terms of pure travel. those stocks have come back a long way, even though business hasn't, joe. >> we are going through some interesting times, mike. and i know you remember so many conflicting tide winds i can't believe the retail numbers, given that everybody is paying more. i don't know if it's stimulus.

i don't know if it's, there is no elastticity anymore in what people pay for things? can you explain it are we flush because we didn't spend anything during the pandemic >> a lot of money noticed into everybody's bank act early this year i was very front loaded. there was except-up savings and you can't really talk about the good retail sales numbers, which are measured in nominal dollars and say people are ignoring the higher prices, because they're paying the higher prices, that's a part of the reason why the retail sales do better right? >> yes. >> so a lot of stuff you have to buy. people have the capacity to buy right now. wage growth is actually pretty good, more or less keeping pa is so far this year in terms of where consumer prices are going. >> that was a question that finally occurred to me can we ever see in a retailer negative comps, not negative growth, negative same store sales year over year

do you think you could ever see that, the stimulus dries up, the economy is already reopened, so there is no more reopening bounce >> right >> could that ever happen? >> of course, it could happen. obviously, in specialty it will happen all the time. broadly for retail sales probably not you have nominal gdp growing 10% this year. it will be tough not to participate in that in a retail sector >> all right thanks, mike meantime, president biden hitting the road to sell the infrastructure bit a bridge in new hampshire needed repairs for years and the new law will allow leaders to make significant investment in 70 years. this is only half the story. now than infrastructure is done, democrats will turn their attention to the rest of the biden's build back better agenda, specifically talking about his nearly $2 trillion social and climate spending bill joining us with more is the ohio senator negotiator during the

talks over infrastructure. we will talk about what's next but are you -- is there any element of this that you are satisfied by this, senator >> in terms of the next bill, build back better? no, i think we have such a big deficit. i don't think we should be raising taxes on the economy i don't think we should be doing the stimulus spending and you guys just talked about the fact that inflation is hitting everybody. annualized it's over 11% we'll be back to double digits for the first time in 30 years so i think it's exactly the wrong thing to do. infrastructure is very different. that legislation as you know, is going to be long-term spending, very little of it will be spent in the next couple years when it is spent, it will be on long-term exam assets like that bridge in new hampshire. that makes the economy more efficient and productive and lead to higher growth and more

jobs they're very different pieces of legislation, which is why we wanted to separate them. we have now. we passed the infrastructure bill, which will be good for the country. i don't think we should move forward with the gdp at all. i think it's exactly the wrong remedy for an economy that's already hurting in terms of inflation. >> egather you disagree with the president in terms of what he thinks it will do with the inflapgs one of the great curiosities we talk about inflation over the past two months now, if not longer, is just how much consumer confidence there still seems to be? how do you square those two issues >> well, i think there is still a lot of pent-up demand. i heard joe's conversation with regard to retail sales, why those numbers are still up there is pent-up demand out there and a lot of money in the economy that stimulus package in march. the $1.29 million has nothing to do with covid, a lot to do with stimulus is still out there. that's still generating a lot of

economic activity. it overheated the economy, which is what larry somers, former secretary treasury and the obama administration suggested would happen he was right i think that explains a lot of except-up demand i don't think it goes on forever. that's another points made earlier, if we do have this continued inflation and wages not keeping up wages are not keeping up overall. you look at the wage growth over the fast several months, it's there. it's not keeping up with these high levels of inflapgs. i think we're in a situation where we need to pull back and stop spending so much on city i st stimulus and focus on economic growth >> senator, we're expected to hear by president biden perhaps this week or next week about who he is going to pick to run the federal reserve going forward. would you be in favor of j. powell would you be in favor of

brainard, if those are the two choices, what itself your pick >> well, i this they from what i know about where miss brainard will be on the monetary side of things, i would prefer to stay with j. powell i think he is less dovish and more likely to deal with the -- the fed has unemployment and the other is inflation i would hate to see us negotiation and if balance sheet even further at the fed and hate to see us put even less pleasure -- pressure on interest rates. i would stick with j. powell >> then i wanted to ask you about the administration's plans for boosters as you know, there will be an expansion of boosters across the country. a big question whether there should be a mandate, not just for the original vaccine but for boosters and how do you think business leaders should think about that going forward? >> well, boosters are incredibly

fortunate. unfortunately, we know the vaccine wears off. we've seen a lot of situations in ohio and elsewhere, where we got higher levels of infection now because of this new wave so, yeah, i think boosters are incredibly important the business commune ought to be providing incentsives. that's the way to go not for mandate. i think vaccinations are incredibly important we should have many more incentives in the private sector and people step up and get their booster. i think you will see more and more of that flu is said incentives i am curious how you think incentives, monetary incentives as you get money to do something or disincentives one of the fascinating things in singapore happening is you won't get insurance if you are not vaccinated what would you think of insurance insurance companies or businesses say if are you vaccinated you are insured, if not, we're not doing that

>> andrew, i think the private sectors and the non-profits and the hospitals should be allowed to make their own decisions. that is the position i've taken from the start back when people were saying they shouldn't be able to do that i don't think it should be government mandated or up to the private sector incentive systems are providing monetary rewards, are you right. that hems. so i think the incentive system is probably more effective and probably going to be something regardless of what happens with these court cases, i think you will see more and more companies turn to that. >> just to bring this conversation full circle, in terms of inside -- i know where the republican party stands. where do you think the democratic party stands in terms of this build back better plan and with you think some portion of it ultimately gets approved >> well, that's up to them, isn't it because they've chosen to go on a strictly partisan way, which is sad i think president biden is

trying to govern as though he's fdr. as if he has a 50-50 senate, fdr had a 50-55 senate and a massive majority in the house of representatives. look, we're equally divide in the house there is a four-seat majority we should work together. one good thing about the infrastructure bill we did work together it became more partisan towards the end, because the house leadership tried to combine the two, the bbb bill with the infrastructure bill, the pledge from the president was not to do that finally it was voted on separately we saw it was able to pass it had 19 republican votes in the united states senate because it was negotiated by republicans and democrats alike. i think that's a much better way for us to proceed. you have to ask democrats what they will do in reconciliation, it has taken much longer than they expected it would, because there are more moderate democrats in particular who have serious concerns about raising taxes on the economy as we're coming out of this pandemic, about increasing inflation even

more with more stimulus spending as we face increasing precious and middle class families all over america have higher prices for gas and food i think it's the wrong way to go they're going to have to make that decision. because they've chosen not to engage with republicans on it. >> senator portman, always good to see you >> thanks. >> okay, guys. >> thank you when we come back, two more interviews you don't want to miss legendary investor maria gabelli will join us we'll hear exclusively from general motors stay tuned you are watcngsqwkoxhi "ua b" and this is cnbc and this is cnbc so, you want evs, you have come to the right place.

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. welcome back to "squawk box" this morning let's show you the futures as we got in a number of big earnings report the dow off 53 points. nasdaq off 4 points and the s&p 500 looking to open down 5 points take a share of tjx, the parents of tj maxx and marshals, the stock rallying in pre-market trading. becks. >> thanks, andrew. also check out crypt to currencies, pointing to the growing adoption of critical

tokens the staples center in los angeles reason renamed the crypto.com arena and a 20-year naming rights and the arena owner aeg in what is one of the largest-ever deal of its kind. the official home of the lakers and clippers will be officially renamed christmas day. crypto.com ceo will be on to talk about the deal. we were talking earlier, what does this remind you of? maybe 1999 >> that's the question, '99, '96? >> which stadium was renamed with the dot-com >> enron >> late '90s. >> enron field >> minute made, but it's not in florida. there is a lot of them that -- i'm used to them now you get used to saying it pav a while him some of them fit in good like the big insurance company in cincinnati, my dad worked for was great american.

so great american ballpark >> that sounds antastic. >> crypto keeper.com, i don't know the staples center, i really liked that sound i don't think of the staples superstore >> do we believe it's like the cover of sports illustrated, it's the kiss of death >> no. >> none of them. >> let me know when they finally like it, then i'll let you know. >> the death of equity you know, it's so big now it scares me. because there are still people it's so big of an industry on the world series, it was behind home plate, the entire time was the biggest crypto. >> i saw matt damon. did you see that

>> will all these people have egg on their face when it comes to zero? >> matt damon, it was a good one, he was portraying his role from the martian, bringing all that back. it's cool. >> now we're talking trillions now of market cap and coin, what is coin based? sorkin, this at this point it's almost too big to fame, is it not? another reference to -- what's your new book about? are you going to let any of us know >> we may be getting there no new books yet always working on more. >> you have a project, it's not too good to fail, in no >> it's the gamestop >> you don't tell me anything and i'm still waiting for that deal book invitation i wasn't getting my e-mail thing was messed up. is that? >> instead you got to unblock everybody. >> snail mail. >> snail mail.

coming up, what key u.s. retailers really think about the state of the supply chain. we got brand-new data you need to hear. stay tuned you are watching "squawk box" on cnbc as an independent financial advisor, i stand by these promises: i promise to be a careful steward of the things that matter to you most. i promise to bring you advice that fits your values. i promise our relationship will be one of trust and transparency. as a fiduciary, i promise to put your interests first, always.

charles schwab is proud to support the independent financial advisors who are passionately dedicated to helping people achieve their financial goals. visit findyourindependentadvisor.com so, you want evs, you have come to the right place. is that tom brady? yeah. he comes in to recharge, get software updates. you know. let's go! (rhythmic electro rock music) (crowd cheering) - bito, bito, bito, bito! - [announcer] bito, the first u.s. bitcoin-linked etf.

i'm one of the largest importers in the company, we have scaled.

so we leveraged the scale for the mobile supply chain channels effectively. it doesn't mean we're immune to them we managed them and have not been able to put a lot of costs to our customers >> there has been a challenge of the supply point back to the pandemic as we saw demand surge. so this will not get resolved overnight, ultimately, we need to do a better job of technology and sharing data it will take some time i expect some challenges will roll into 2022, overtime, we'll see things will normalize. >> the ceos of lowes and target come to us about the state of the supply chain and managing through the pandemic strains we have new data how retailers are feeling. fred collins joins us with more on that hi, frank. >> good morning, becky 91% of retailers see their supply chain impacted into 22 of 2022, this is agent new research

from the supply chain soft ware provider they show 55% are concerned suppliers could shut down because of covid disruption. this led many to buy earlier while at the same time reducing black friday sales 71% saying there will be fewer 43% say they will be negatively impacted by container shipping delays cost, of course, continues to be a factor container shipping is 600% higher year over year, trucking more than 20% higher rail shipping to cities 29% higher the krupa says suppliers are calling looking for two things, resilience and optionality >> having option of more transportation, having options of sources of supply, having options in terms of how you flow the product into the market. >> mackenziehas research estimated the company should continue to plan for supply

chain shocks forecast ac disruption lasting one-to-two weeks will come every two years, a two h four-week every three years, a longer disruption every five years, if you count the trade war and covid, we've had two major disruptions in the past five years that lasted over five months. >> and the suez canal if you count these things when we were speaking to frank cornell, he was saying a year from now, we will be back to normal, this would be a better situation. he wasn't able go out on a limb and say that he said there is a lot of issue and demand has been so strong, too, lowes is in a slightly different position. their peak time is not the same as the other retailers they need to gear up for spring. so they have been able to dodge around it. every company is taking extreme measures to accommodate. >> i think one thing that's a big difference for target is their omni channel strategy.

they've reworked the company, where stores and warehouses, that cuts down on costs and supply chain delays. it's hard to find trucking nowadays, sometimes there is a delay going from the warehouse to the store >> target hired 30,000 full-time supply chain employees to try to be a little better prepared for all this stuff it is an interesting puzzle. wecontinue to watch it thank you so much. >> coming up, veteran investor mario gabelli will join us with more to come you don't want to miss this, stay tuned you arwahie tcng "squawk box" on cnbc . that's the nature of being the economy. observing investors choose assets to balance risk and reward. with one element securing portfolios, time after time. gold. agile and liquid. a proven protector. an ever-evolving enabler of bold decisions. an asset more relevant than ever before.

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welcome back to "squawk box" on cnbc. let's get right to our next biggest this hour. investing legend mario gabelli, trying to figure things out here, mario. you figure there will be more split-ups, more divorces you have made your name as dr. love and that's what we always called you. >> joe, thank you. >> corporate getting together.

sometimes marriages don't work out. stuff still keeps happening, right, mario >> corporate love-making would be a private equity spacs and strategic, for example, this week you had a couple big deals, kkr got involved in buying, cypress cyrus won. you had someone buying core logic. there will be a lot more going on, on a global basis. but the thing that i'm talking about is that the deals that you thought about in the past, honeywell splitting up, p itt splitting up you had an avalanche with ibm, j&j and dell and bm ware and then you had united technologies doing their thing. which worked extremely well. then have you the non-u.s., toshiba's three-way split. you had several others like volkswagon spinning off a trust.

the point is when the board rooms of america look at this, when they look at what's going on, you have contagion they're starting to think if we've got a business growing at 2%, one growing at 10. the market is paying only 4 or 5% of a growth rate, why not reexamine how we do it from a tax point of view and what's fair to the shareholders so that's what's going on. there is a whole bunch of companies i like i think the stock at universal music. that is interesting. group hotel interesting, holland, these are the companies going through this financial engineering. some like the ibm-kb splitoff. have you to be patient, joe. the mechanics of an etf owning ibm where they want it in a certain size portfolio, they're going to basically sell the stock and so you got to figure out when are they finished selling it and then do you want to own it?

>> well, not every conglomerate in the past that you were talking about, there weren't synergies. a lot of times there were a collection of assets is that the point you are making, that there needs to be some type of symbiotic relationship between the different entities that are in an integrating company >> no, the perception of wall street changes, joe. i started my career as an anal anal cyst in the 1960s you wanted to have businesses that smoothed out those cycles for having leading lagging indicators things change and today in a free market system, with all the mistakes at&t that's a spinoff of warner media, i'm not going to get in with jeff bewkes said, independent of that you know, that obviously, discovery is going to do extremely well

but at the moment the stockmarket is not and so you have the good and the bad. but you got to allow this to happen the companies make a lot of mistakes but they also do extremely well. the market's changed >> well, investment bankers, they seem to do well either way and we've seen the pbms. they need to be owned. they need to be spun off is there anything to that, that you know ceos are suckers when these guys come in from the big wall street firms and make a case for something and two years later they do a divestiture? >> i am more cynical than you are, i have a coin in god, everybody we trust, everybody else we verify tonight john malone, i'm sure they're investment bankers these guys come to work every day to make money for the shareholders when i have a pension or endowment plan to buy an asset you know a pe, i take two and

20 i had the ten-year lockup. i am buying stocks companies don't know what to pay today you could buy malone and all of their companies and you can get them at a discount for what they're worth you don't pay two and 20 you pay something. on the other side of the coin, you don't have to have a lockup. there are many companies in america with fantastic ceos that come to work every day and they're better than pe firms carl icahn is putting his arms around you know, companies like that, that have very good parts that i have been following 50 years >> hey, mario. you talk about john malone he's somebody who has been so smart about making sure he's looking at tax minimization strategies there are so many talks about what may happen with tax strategy in washington right now. i am sure investors like yourself are kind of looking

through all of this trying to figure out where the next step may be coming in terms of tax changes. are you doing anything at all in your portfolio to plan or prepare for that in. >> a great question, becky from that point of view, half of our clients have a corporate tax breaks, their 401 ks and endowment and so on. we have to follow a man travel it's not what we earned percentage wise, which is great. we're well above, i don't want to get into percentages, they're public it's what you keep from a corporate point of view the congressional budget office put out a number a week ago that said we as a country took into the fiscal year $372 billion against like 220 with a constant nom nam tax rate in the u.s. for depreciation running off 2018, and earnings, nominal earnings it's going to be $500 billion. on top of that, you have a tax

rate of a minimum 15%. so, those are a lot of moving parts. then unfortunately you have sad cases. lobbyists, 1031 is not changing. carried interest, which is absurd is being extended all you have to do is hold it five years real estate lobby is paying the politicianles. it is what it is from our point of view as clients, we look at do not take all your gains this year, because next year if have you losses, you can only have 3,000. you have to be practical we do that every day with a microscope and telescope and from the stockmarket's point of view, becky, it's you know inventories are ballooning they are ballooning because instead of just in time, they say, i just will pay you any price to get it now. that working capital and also we're seeing significant increases in capex but the big question mark for us on the stocks is the multiple.

that's a function of the ten-year bond. we don't think it will stay. it may have jumped up last night. >> what i'm trying to understand, mario, is in the environment you are describing right now, are you beating the bushes for companies that are likely to combine with other companies? or are you beating the bushes for companies that are going to not get to uncombined with other companies? or are you just looking for businesses that have, for whatever reason, have a bright future and great management? or all three >> joe, i think the answer to that is all of the above from the point of view after what we call private market value from the 1970s when a company is public, what's it worth if it's no longer public, private, who wants to buy companies that have strategic interests and where is that money so we want to be the pilot fish for a whale, for the shark, being in front and identifying the targets. yes, we'll do that, we have an

investment, carl icahn is saying, i want to own "x"% we look at companies, for example, the society of civil engineers says anything. you read the report card, which you will look at, your own children, your family members. this is the american report card, conventional infrastructure plus broadband, alone today we're talk about broadband or tomorrow. independent of what company makes the pipes or service lines to get lead out? we have the epa says there's five to 10 million homes that have to get lead out as a result of that, there is a company in minnesota they have a pvc pipe manufacture we have companies that built copper those will benefit we're identifying those. the other part, joe, is dell,

microdell comes along. you like to figure out how to do that there's tax issues you are looking at a meeting i have tomorrow with their analysts spinning off. when you look at rivian selling at $180 billion mark cap, i have these companies selling at 20 million. they're going to give me electric trucks in the future. you know, i got to be focused on them so i'm looking at both >> have you bought an nft yet? have you bought the only bitcoin? >> there is an interesting story in "variety" this week on how the movie companies are going after nfts and the baseball companies are going after. for christmas and for thanksgiving, i would, instead of buying an nft that your family member, your child, even your sweetheart, boy or girl, whatever they are, basically, you can get them a baseball team by buying the atlanta braves the stock is selling at 31 with 60 million shares. we think it's worth low 40s. malone is going to do something

in the next two years. we got a little speed bump with major league baseball contracts coming up. the second thing is with basketball and hockey, somebody talked about mario lemieux and the penguins, you can get the rangers for free buying madison square garden sports the stock is 180 they did win the other night but then on top of that you can buy a soccer teach so you know do i need to own something intangible or buy something that has economic value and a scarcity how many more basketball teams will i create? how many more basketball teams will i create and so on. >> mario, it's coming from john skipper, he used to run espn recently he effectively said he thought the regional sports networks were actually going to come under some real pressure and challenging with an unbundling in a way they have not before. that would impact valuations when it comes to teams

do you agree with na >> i think there is a lot of moving parts in our regional sports networks. i don't disagree on the other side of the coin, there is an offset that has a huge tail wind that's a headwinds of uncertainty, the amount of money that's coming up for the owners of these leak sinclair broadcasting, selling around 26. it's political advertising next year secondly, the fanduels and the plotters are spend ac lot of money. they are replacing car dealers car dealers will come back in a big way in terms of spending so the local tv stations will do well andrew, you got a good point that is how do we offset the challenges on colleges, college sports, major league baseball and football and nfl and how do you offset that with the brand coming from from their ability to attract eyeballs and get more advertising so there is some companies that

have, will have a challenge. but that's a part of the american system. you make mistakes. and you make opportunities and you -- and that's why it works with all the flaws >> we got to go, i guess, mario. you think -- how many streaming companies will there be in five years that everybody has >> joe, that's work in progress. look, how much can they pay for it how much can they be paying for it we have music, spotify, all the vendors, whether it's sony, it's the logical next step. then i would guess via com is a morsel, they're doing a great job. are you talking about a stock with 640 million shares, $28 billion of market cap with some debt of 10 billion but that's nothing i don't understand why it's still around >> all right mario. you told me about pets like 20

years ago. i've had a dog that's had under water treadmills and ac y accu-puncture for a spine injury you were right, the explosion of what we do for our animals is something you called early you are probably out by now. >> companion pets, joe, you got to love them >> you got a choice, people or pets >> the amount of money individuals are spendsing in tokyo for companion pets is worthwhile >> unbelievable. i'm telling you, accu-mumpunctui gone thank you, mario gabelli we want to see you soon. >> great to be with you all. see you in person at some point. >> thanks, joy, thanks, m mario coming up, the trading day ahead and gm cuts the ribbon on a new electric vehicle plant today

we will hear from the auto maker's esento mpridt ake the rush to get a foothold on evs. stay tuned you are watching "squawk" on cnbc offers investors a broader view. ♪♪ we see companies protecting the bottom line by putting people first. we see a bright future, still hungry for the ingenuity of those ready for the next challenge. today, we are translating decades of experience into strategies for the road ahead. we are morgan stanley. so, you want evs, you have come to the right place. is that tom brady? yeah. he comes in to recharge, get software updates. you know. let's go!

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become an owner. >> we spoke this morning with marvin ellison from lowes. you look at the numbers the big

bucks are doing. not always getting credit from the stockmarket. >> let's say home depot worked all three stocks up. wal-mart's most interesting. this was up in pre-market. then when we started realizing walmart is committed to not putting through prices, that was the end of walmart's stock it's not going to cover. home depots passed things along. i think marvin ellison, he's done a great job that stock will stay up. it has to do with execution issues it is a conundrum to see target down 12. that was a fantastic interview perhaps they didn't guide up enough target has been up, up, up you can say the same about lowes, mr. littlellison. in your interview, there was no plots on target.

target is a better buy than walmart, which my travel trust owns we sold some higher. i think target said nothing so it merits being down this much >> one of the things we have all been trying to figure out is sploi chain, how long this will last up you heard from jamie dimon and chain. you heard from -- i was a little surprised that brian cornell wasn't even issue he would be back to normal a year from now there's so many unknowns and demand is so strong, it's hard to see how this gets fixed and when >> bloom betterberg came out wia story yesterday, that containers were doing nothing at ports. the more i listen and the more i dig deeper, the more i realize it is a challenge by labor, and it's not necessarily unfixable, but it's intractable, in the

sense that different sides that keep blaming everybody, are not in sync that if you go on the weekends, there's not much going on >> i've heard from independence truck drivers who say, look, the regulation trying to get through there is really pretty difficult, in terms of what you have to do you have to take directions from the port they cut 15% off of what you're getting there. it sounds like there's more streamlining to even take advantage of the resources that are there. >> we have a president who could say, here's how it's going to go i'm not saying it has to be during the train strike a long time ago when truman took over the trains but i think there's a palpable sense that things are just not working right. not that things are overwhelmed, they're just not working right if we saw 24/7 cranes working and saw a bit more create activity on the part of, like a

costco, which has its own fleet, i think we would feel better, but supply chain to me means you don't have the right merchandise. when i see those numbers, i question whether that's a real issue. by the way, costco doesn't have much of a supply chain problem why is that? creative is the cfo more creative yes. it has to do with management. >> jim, great to see you we'll be watching for the great stuff you've been doing. >> i'm saying down 15 by target. >> i listened to the entire interview yesterday, took notes. you learn so much about the economy, about the supply chain, about inflation from these things >> and the ethos of a company backed by a family that wants to cut prices it's an incredible company i think the american public is a little fickle, but maybe they'll remember the lowest prices are with walmart >> jim, we'll see you in a few minutes. stay tuned

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i'm not a coach, but i invested in invesco qqq. which gives me access to next-gen statistical analysis software. become an agent of innovation with invesco qqq. welcome back to "squawk box. it is a very big stay for the ev ambitions of general motors. they have a brand-new factory ready to go, and phil lebeau joins us right now with a special guest. >> mark royce, president of general motors joining us from factory zero in sterling heights, michigan. i know you'll have the first electric hummers rolling out of

there before the end of the year how quickly can you ramp up product? and how effective do you thing the opening of this plant will be in changing the narrative that says general motors is not moving fast enough when it comes to evs >> i can tell you, i'm so proud of the employee base, this is in detroit, just to be clear. >> there you go. >> this is all the employees you can hear the buzz in the plant, but also you can see some of the vehicles we're getting ready to produce on a production base you know, we have close to half a million people who have raised their hands for hummers and lyrics, as they come out of the chute. this is just the beginning, we're very excited we went right to electric vehicles we didn't make any investments in the hybridization as a small step we went right to it. in the time that other people have said, you know, that they have made electric vehicles, we

have done a whole new platform from the ground up we've converted a factory that i used to work in a long time ago to an all-electric future. i can tell you, we're going to be the hummer sut, and suv, we'll do the silverado-e, which in 45 days we'll open the reservations for that. following that we do the sierra electrified pickup truck we have a whole slew of vehicles including the autonomous vehicle in this plant. we're very excited for today >> but, mark, you're not operating in a vacuum. you see the valuations lucid is close to surpassing the market cap when it comes to the ev companies and the enthusiasm,

and gm is not getting the same love from investors, what do you think? >> i think we're going to do 30 evs by 2025. no oems, no spacs, no startups can make that claim. we're in it for the long haul. now we're bringing production here in a very short time period our whole slew of electric vehicles we're in for a long haul i think mary barra said it it shows how much general motors is undervalued we'll see this play out over the next few years this is the most exciting time in my career, and i've been in this business for a while. as an jerp and as a marketer, a salesperson, you know, this is the time for general mothers we're playing the long game. for that i feel deeply excited i'm excited for all the people over the last 18 months who have made this happen. >> sure.

>> this goes way back, 4 million vehicles coming out of it and we're ready to launch our whole future on it >> any discussion by gm management about splitting off the ev assets, if you will, from the rest of the company? >> well, you know, phil, we have looked at this in detail over the last few years you know, we just announced a new head of digital, so we vertically integrated a lot of these things we have take propulsion and interesting grated it into our electrification, so this is a very integrated approach i don't think splitting that off -- and we don't think splitting that off can deliver the speed we have seen over the last 18 months to produce the world areas first super-truck and do it in a way that's validated, and the engineering in this factory is -- we don't

see that as a great thing to do to be the best in the world at electric vehicles. that's what we're going to be. >> mark, i know we have a lot more to talk about i know we'll catch up again at some point mark reuss, thank you for joining us from the plan back to you. i have one second. make sure you join us tomorrow "squawk on the street" is next ♪ . good wednesday morning, i'm carl quintanilla with david faber. cramer is out west at one market in san francisco futures on the cool side as the market keeps a wary eye on the new uptick in covid cases. retail top lines are strong, but