into bonds out of a sense of safety, probably a safety play there, also the anticipation that perhaps the economy will slow and that that will stay the fed's hands and maybe bring sooner the date at which the fed decides to start cutting interest rates >> exactly that seems to be the push pull with investors is good news good news or is bad news good news, et cetera, et cetera. >> we'll have one eye on the courthouse, one eye on the markets for you, and the guy who's going to use those eyes is scott wapner, coming up right now is "closing bell," which will pick up where we leave off. rall right, thank you very much good afternoon, everybody, you are looking at a live shot on the right side of your screen, inside that courthouse in lower manhattan where former president trump is being arraigned he has already pled not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records we're going to continue to monitor those proceedings for you as we await the former president's departure from the courthouse, and of course we are going to show that to you live

in the meantime, let me welcome all of you to "closing bell" where we continue to watch the stock market today, from post 9 here at the new york stock exchange we do begin with fresh concerns about the economy and new reports showing job openings are increasing good news perhaps for the fed because that's what they'd like to see it is yet another sign, however, that the economy is slowing, perhaps that growth is continuing to slow i want to show you the score card with 60 minutes to go now in regulation, stocks have been in the red for much of the day, and that is currently the picture, more of the cyclical names taking us lower like energy, and materials and industrials as well. those being the biggest losers of the session oil has been on a bit of a tear lately, a bit more muted in the session today, and then of course as you see crude here barely moving, it's just sitting at just about $80 a barrel, technology a big story of late as you know, a bit weaker again as the nasdaq loses some of its recent steam, and that coming even as interest rates fall on

those fresh concerns i mentioned to you a moment ago about the outlook for the economy. it does bring us to our talk of the tape what is the state of this year's rally? is it on the rocks or soon to continue let's ask anastasia am roe sew, chief investment strategist at i capital. i'll have to beg your pardon if i have to interrupt you and show you those pictures of the president leaving the courthouse a few blocks from where we're located here in the meantime, the state of the market to you is what? >> i think it's some consolidation after a stellar rally last week. the s&p was up 3.4%, tech is up well over 20%. so we really moved a long ways in a short period of time, but we got a little bit of weak economic data. scott, you mentioned job openings we also got the manufacturing report that disappointed somewhat, and then the gdp was tracking 3.2%, now it's tracking 1.7 1.7% that is kind of the cause for consolidation. i think we can have a more positive tone to april because if you look at the broader

picture, we sort of have the recipe for a soft landing, which is inflation expectations are coming down, and broadly speaking, economic data surprising to the upside, so that actually is still supports the resilient stock market. >> i just wonder if we had the ingredients for a soft landing, whether we threw something sort of rancid in the stew, if you will, and that being what happened with the banks and now fresh concerns about what may happen with credit from here >> yeah, that's right. so it's an interesting part of the business cycle i think we are just about to be done with tightening if we think about how stocks perform, they don't perform well during the tightening stage. but what happens after tightening is sort of this relief, that is to say okay, we may be done with the rate increases. that's behind us, but the economy is not weak enough i think that's where we're sort of headed, and then eventually, scott, i think the second order effects do come to roost and that's what eventually causes a recession. i don't think we're in that scenario now, and the banking turmoil for now to me is

contained. you know, not all the issues have been fully solved there. >> i've got seasonality, april's good economic data as we learned yet again today not so much, which sort of wins the day if that sna r scenario continues, you know april is one of the best months traditionally of the year, but if the data continues to show weakness, that's going to rule the day, isn't it? >> think about the starting point for the data we were coming into the year thinking we're going to get 0% gdp growth even if it's 1.7%, guess what, that's still better than the call for recession or growth or no growth that we've had i think what's likely to happen, companies will start reporting their earnings next week, and the typical earnings downgrade is about 3%. now we've downgraded the estimate by 6% if you looked at the negative announcement, they've been much higher than in prior quarters. i think the bar has been reset pretty significantly lower, and even if wedon't get the 3% gdp

1.7 might be enough for the positive surprises to the earnings picture. >> i am wondering whether earnings are going to be a help because they don't come in as bad as feared or a hindrance because it's a reminder of just where we're heading, especially when you get the commentary from the companies, not the numbers themselves, but what all of these ceos have to say about the trajectory for the economy. >> but i think they're more encouraged today than they were in the beginning of the year and once again because economic resilience actually surprised -- >> you think encouraged. >> i mean, i think so they sort of reduced the estimates so much. if you look at semiconductors, they've cut down a lot if you look at tech companies, the average software company, for example, they significantly revised down their guidance, and now you have a scenario where inflation is easing. the fed is sort of being forced to pause and a lot of them have probably baked in the continuation of the hiking cycle, and then the economy, the consumer's stomaching this 5% rate i actually think they might be a little less pessimistic than

they were sounding at the beginning of the year. >> i'm looking at one of the most prominent ceos in america, jamie dimon, as i write this letter, the current crisis is not over even when it is behind us, there will be repercussions from it for years to come. any crisis that damages americans' trust in their banks damages all banks. he goes on and on about thinking we're not out of the woods quite yet, even though he'd be the first to say it's not 2008 all over again, but nonetheless, it doesn't have to be to be potentially bad. >> he's right to highlight the ongoing concerns for the banking sector the reality is if you're a bank and you're competing with 5% fed funds rate you have to pay up those deposits the cost of funds for regional bank ss going to have to go up if they are to keep the fozs th deposits there i think he highlights in the letter the health and maturity issues if all of a sudden the deposits go out and you have to move those to available for sale, you'd take a mark down on those

assets that issue has not been solved yet. scott, the next test for the banking sector is going to be commercial real estate he's right to kind of highlight that as one of the issues that's not been solved. >> let's add nicole to the conversation she's sitting right next to you, nicole webb of wealth enhancement group. the other issue i wanted to get into is the offsides nature of how the market has caught people this year. technology has been the big winner until the last couple of days, energy has been the big loser, certainly far from what people expected might be the case as we came into the year. what do we think about that? >> absolute bifurcation here we're seeing a lot of the returns from q1 coming from 20 names. you talk about the technology rally, where that's coming from specifically from our perspective, the technology rally, a lot of these names were unjustly beat up last year we're not shocked by the run back up, but also, we don't think that these valuations are sustainable if the fed doesn't give what is expected, which is

cuts in the second half of this year and our expectation is not for that we think that as long as there's wiggle room available for the fed, because of the job market, because of the structural deficiencies of labor, that they're going to continue to take on that. >> you don't think the fed's going to cut this year at all? >> we really don't we are out of the higher than expected, longer than expected and unless there's some structural changes to the labor market, that this is going to be a holding pattern that we sit in for some time. >> you do like tech, amazon, netflix, for example, if you think we're in an environment that's going to continue to bring rates higher, i can't imagine that the nasdaq, even if there's not necessarily a direct correlation to that is going to perform well in that scenario. >> and from our perspective, where we sit, advising clients, we have to barbell both to the value and the growth scenario. so looking at some of these names, two of which you mentioned, we are positive on the outlook for 2024, and we

think the price entry point right now is positive. look, what we are fighting through today is we are still absorbing the 40% increase to the money supply yes, we have this sharp downturn in m 2, but those two have to even out the fed does take us higher as long as the jobs market allows us too the strength and the resilience of the consumer leaves wiggle room for profits to come down, and we do believe that we are going to be in this wide trading range through the end of this year. >> anastasia, how would you address the issue of technology, whether it still has steam to go, whether this week is a reminder that energy is not dead just yet, and that those stocks are going to be able to do well? >> well, i think the barbell approach makes sense in terms of technology and energy and also dividend stocks. what i want to say on technology, i think people are going to find themselves in chasing mode when it comes to technology tech has outperformed a lot. but guess what, hedge funds are still underweight.

they've been adding. mutual funds have gone underweight, especially some of the big tech names you've got a huge reset in valuations and at the same time this big tech companies are benefitting from ai. you know, the semiconductors are benefitting from all the sickular tailwinds i think you're still going to find growth in technology at much webetter valuations. that chase is what keeps the sector moving higher. >> let's just take nicole today as an example, if you have fresh concerns about the economy that more cyclical areas of the market are the ones that not surprisingly are having trouble today, industrials, energy as we were just talking about, but materials and things lake ike t do you want to stay away from those or go into those at this particular time? >> at this particular time that's the million dollar question i would say, though, that our firm's perspective is this is an entry point on both ends of the

barbell, to your point exactly, which is we have to remain agnostic to the direction that we go, and up to this point, we are believing in the transparency that the fed is giving us, that they are managing to a 2% target that we should beex expectant of additional rate hikes in the future, that they're not done yet. and with that we couple it with the strength and resilience we're seeing in other data pockets and we believe this is an opportunity for us. again, more opportunity in 2024. >> so anastasia, are we in an environment where bad news is now bad news right? because you know kpexactly wher i'm going with that. it was flipped for a whale all based on what everything would mean as the fed does today as i said, a reminder that, look, the economy appears to be slowing. today is a reminder of that. is it a one-day blip is bad naews bad news again >> i think it is a one-day story for now. the economy is already slowing

i mean, if you look at manufacturing numbers, for example, we have already been well below 50 for a period of time, so you know, as we kind of tread water around here, that's not all that bad and again, the economy has slowed it was expecting to go into a recession, and it's not. so it just means that gdp is growing below potential. that's not bad news for the fed. i guess i wouldn't kind of misinterpret and read into one data point. >> fed perspective if you go deeper into the march immediatingimme, simply if you look a little beyond where they expected gdp numbers to be for the year, given wa we expect for q1, starts to lead to a narrative for negative gdp in the second half which plays into this plot line for we believe this take us a bit further yet. >> you know what i'm wondering, what's priced in what do you think is priced into the market whi

which, you know, went from recession to okay, maybe it's going to be a soft to no landing. you heard that narrative being put forward. now after the bank issue, it's back to are we going into a recession, and maybe now that's pulled forward, stock market not necessarily reflecting that from the beginning of the year, so what is priced in? >> conversationally with clients what we continue to tell them about q1 being priced in is a lot of concentration so again, focused on the growth in technology run up, and at this point, you know, the expectation, what is being priced in is cuts on the back half of this year. and the expectation that the worst of it is behind us meaning that the october lows we hit we likely won't retest again, and when we get anywhere close to that, we see a buy back up in the market and so what's priced in is that the worst of it is a bit behind us and that this expectation that the fed has to pivot near the end of this year >> i think what's priced in

depends on where you look in the market, and if i look to rates, then what's priced in is a significant economic slowdown that the fed is going to have to react to that's not our base case, and one place that i would look to sort of capitalize on this location is energy energy has suffered, but it's not now going to be moving, the oil market is going to be moving from a surplus into a deficit, especially with a recent cut i actually think what's priced in is energy because mobility around the world has just gone into pick up. >> ladies, thank you so much joining us here at post 9. we still as you can see on the right-hand side of your screen here are awaiting former president trump to emerge from the courtroom where he is currently being arraigned. 34 counts we now know related to the falsifying of business records. he has pled not guilty we saw a still photo from inside the courtroom as live cameras are not allowed in we just have this one in the

hallway. in the meantime, i'd like to go to eamon javers down in washington, d.c., for us, thinking about all of this, how it might be playing in the nation's capital and what may happen now. >> we do have a little bit of dental i additional information to bring you. all 34 counts here are felony counts it was a little unclear in the initial reporting whether all of these were felony counts we are now told from an nbc producer on site in the courtroom that that is the case. all are felony counts. we'll wait and see as we're looking at these live images now from inside the courthouse when the former president is removed from that hearing room and makes his way back out to his motorcade to head back down to florida. he's been in there for just over 45 minutes now we were told initially this process could be relatively quick, just a matter of minutes. so we would expect this to maybe not go even a full hour. we'll wait and see all of this is unprecedented there's security concerns.

there's a robust legal team on both sides here. you can imagine everybody will want to have the opportunity to say their piece inside the courtroom. we'll find out about all of it when they emerge from there. we can tell you that as of right now, all 34 counts are felony counts, scott, back over to you. >> back to you certainly as necessary, it's been a bit of a spectacle, a couple handfuls of blocks from the new york stock exchange today outside that courthouse where our contessa brewer has been since early this morning. now, contessa, you await former president trump's departure. just give us an idea of what the scene is like now. >> you're talking about reporters and photographers from all around the world who crammed into, as you said, just a couple city blocks, so you're dealing with that, and then hundreds, maybe thousands of protesters, it's hard for me to judge from my vantage point how many people are actually out here. they have filled the entire --

about a city square block across from the courthouse. some trump supporters, some who insist that the former president needs to be held accountable for the accusations that have been leveled against him, and then outside here you're seeing an immense police presence. we have choppers overhead, barricades that are lining the sidewalks and blocking crosswalks and blocks off streets all around this courthouse so what we anticipate is when the hearing is all said and done and the former president leaves the courthouse, he will come out a side entrance, get back into his convoy again, and his ultimate destination is, even though new york city has been his home for so many decades, he now considers his point of re reference florida. he'll head back to mar-a-lago and has scheduled a news conference there reportedly with friends by his side, one of them marjorie taylor greene who we saw show up at this park earlier

today. it was such a crush that she came, she spoke a few words, and then she left, even though she had been promoting that on social media we also saw the long island congressman george santos here as well. for him to escape, he was actually scurrying through the shrubbery to get out of here you have a lot of people who have been here for hours, waiting for any potential glimpse of the former president, though they didn't get it. and then now, again, waiting to see whether he'll come out, whether he'll address reporters as well in that hallway that we saw a little bit earlier as eamon laid out, we're still waiting on news of the indictment itself. we know that there were 34 felonies for falsifying business records and for conspiracy as well we'll continue to skwait and wah the scene down just blocks from where you are sfwr i. >> i'm going to come back to you at some point. stand by for me. con contessa brewer outside the

courthouse in lower manhattan where she's been all day long, covering this proceeding involving the former president of the united states as we continue to watch the markets, we do have about 40 minutes to go before we do close trading out today. don't fight the fed, which probably isn't finished raising rates. that is the word from our next guest, gary coe min ski is the chairman of magnify plus, the former morgan stanley wealth management vice chairman as well he is back with me at post 9 >> what a day to be downtown. >> i'll tell you what. you describe yourself as cautious broadly but not bearish. what does that mean? >> i think what the first quarter showed you, scott, if you are an investor, you have to be invested. and i was surprised with the averages, averages obviously were skewed by a couple of big stocks, but this is a time where don't fight the fed is not some cliche that is not known by almost all investors but we're raising rates. the fed is going to continue to raise rates and now is a time not to speculate in equities but to make sure you know what you

own. the markets have always operated in cycles. i've seen it for close to 40 years now. that's where we are. >> you know as well as anybody, in the markets that you've watched over those four decades, you don't fight the fed forever, and the fed is certainly closer to the end than the beginning, so at what point do we start to think over the rainbow so to speak when they're done? >> well, again, i've listened to many people talk about it over the last six months and the real simple answer is nobody knows. my personal opinion is i think the fed is going to overshoot this time. they got it wrong with inflation. it wasn't transitory i think that their belief now is to joefovershoot. is it six months before the end of the tightening cycle? >> you think it's that long? >> i don't know when the market starts to go forward when i listen to people about a pause, and now you've got to be fully invested on that basis, i don't think anyone knows the real answer.

you have to have an opinion on interest rates that's probably the most single important factor as it is with equity investing. >> have haythey peaked? >> i don't think they've peaked. i think the fed is determined to overshoot the cycle. and i would not be surprised to see a 6% terminal rate. >> you think they would go that high even after what we witnessed with svb and what is still expected to be credit tightening >> well, that's what they want >> they don't want the whole system to blow up. >> but that's why there was a backstop put in place to sort of mitigate what happened with svb. i do not think that this is the end of -- i don't call it a banking crisis i don't believe it is the end of what we saw a couple of weeks back i think you've got this duration mismatch at a number of banks given what has happened in terms of funding and in terms of assets, so that is something that the fed is not upset that this will have an impact in credit tightening. at the end of the day, raising interest rates, that's what

that's about. >> you agree with dimon, then, jamie dimon in his annual shareholder letter as i write this letter, the current crisis is not yet over and even when it is behind us, there will be repercussions from it for years to come. >> i would agree i think that the way assets are moving to the big banks will have ramifications in terms of the about for small businesses to get credit. i think that's what jamie's talking about in that letter i don't think it's a crisis. i think this is the type of movement that happens when interest rates are going up. interest rates go up for a reason, and this is exactly what the federal reserve is trying to do in terms of slowing down the economy because inflation is what the target market is. >> would you own the banks here? >> well, the kind of stocks that i would own in this part of the cycle are companies that paid dividends and distributions and reinvest those dividends and distributions in their own businesses when they're no paying it out to shareholders. because we are in the time of the cycle, you know, i've never

lost the fact that depending on when your starting point is, 40 to 60% of the return of equities oaf the long-term, the 10% number that's thrown out there all the time, half of that is dividends and distributions reinvested it's not capital appreciation. it's not talked about that much, but you are in the part of the cycle now with the equity markets where companies that pay you dividends and distributions is much more important than capital appreciation >> i'm listening to you as i continue to watch these pictures, which is wheyy i'm looking away as we wait for the former president to emerge from the courtroom after the arraignment. we're going to deal with that as it sees fit certainly. magnify, i mentioned in the introduction what you're doing now. this is like a financial search engine for investors when you talk about different parts of the market, this is a way that they, as i understand it search to be able to invest in different securities and/or

asset classes? >> magnify has been called the google of finance. if you go to google and you type in something about an investment product, it's not going to direct you mag magnify language, i was a divester, i joined the board a few years ago and now i'm helping run one of the businesses mark fisher talked about natural gas and why you would want to get long natural gas at this point in the investment cycle. you didn't know how to do it you could go to magnify, type in using natural language search, i want to invest in natural gas long, what magnify does it will give you etfs, mutual funds, sort it by performance. >> so it does it by performance, by fees. so it's not just giving you random ideas, hay, go buy x, y,

z. >> what it does comparing it to deck ades ago, this information was not readily available to individual investors if a wealth manager had a client who wanted to invest in a certain sector, etf space in the marketplace, they'd have to deal with a product specialist, a wholesaler this information is now readily available at just basically going into your laptop and typing it in and so what we've tried to do is democratize this information for the general public. >> i'm going to stop you from speaking, gary, because former president trump has just emerged from the courtroom where he was arraigned. he is now on his way towards exiting that courthouse in lower manhattan, just to recap exactly what's taken place here. 34 counts related to the falsifying of business records the former president trump p pleading not guilty in that courtroom in what really is an historic moment for this country we think that the former president is going to head back to palm beach where he will hold an event a little bit later on

this evening the manhattan district attorney who brought these charges in the first place with the grand jury is holding a news event at some point as well. so we may hear from d.a. bragg at some point. i want to go right now, eamon ja javers, we've been waiting for this moment. we have more details, and you may even have more than what you had just a few moments ago as we waited for former president trump to emerge. >> we've now seen him leave, skod he was in the hearing room for just under an hour by my clock that's a little bit longer than we were told to expect these proceedings can sometimes move quicker than that even, but obviously given the security concerns, the need to coordinate transportation and all the rest, this is a more cumbersome process than we've seen maybe ever in that hearing room. we're watching the exterior now as we wait for the former president to leave i can siboee boris epstein stann by waiting for donald trump to

leave. we still do not have the actual indictment here, scott, so we're looking for the actual details of these 34 counts to figure out the allegations and the evidence behind what the d.a. says are 34 felonies committed by donald j. trump. we don't have that information yet as we see the president now emerging from the courthouse we expect that we will see it soon we also expect that we'll hear from the former president today once he gets back to florida, we expect he's going to go more or less straight to laguardia, fly back down to mar-a-lago, and we'll hear from him later this afternoon or this evening, scott. back over to you. >> i'm going to go to contessa brewer who's on the ground just set the stage here, the scene, what it looks like now as the former president has officially exited the building, and he is in one of those vehicles in that caravan that's going to head, as eamon thinks, to the airport >> the real question that we had, scott, is whether the former president would take a

moment and try to speak with reporters in that hallway outside of court it may have been that the barriers that were set up inside that corridor kept reporters and photographers separated from the path the former president was taking again, when he walked outside, we did not see him doing any sort of big triumphant wave to anyone outside of there. this is all happening just around the corner. i'll have my photographer pan off of me and show you, i'm standing at the main entrance of the courthouse, and you can see here where the barricades are set up and the offices lined up on hogan place the former president would have come out of that door and now getting in the motorcade as you can see and taking off from these lower manhattan streets, this is very near that main thoroughfare on the east side of manhattan called the fdr, which would be a straight shot to the airport if that's where he goes. i also want to mention, it used to be when he was in new york city, a lot more than now, we

would see him going down to the helicopter port just off of the east river and often executives would use that helicopter port to fly local airports. not really a problem if you're getting a police escort and you've got a convoy clearing the path for you here outside this has remained a sub dued crowd ever since the former president went into the courtroom today to face those charges, to enter the plea of not guilty we've had almost no noise, a very calm crowd since that moment, it was a rowdy morning, but it looks like the -- really the somber nature of what's at stake here has settled in across the group that's gathered. >> as you allude to, contessa, forgive me, a historic day no doubt i heard you describe earlier this morning in some of your shots as you were waiting for the former president to arrive by continue to watch his motorcade leave the area, that there were a few scuffles between pro and anti-trump factions down there.

the new york city mayor eric adams warning all who expect to show up to be on your best behavior it appears from at least your descriptions of what we've witnessed today that people took heed to that. >> reporter: yeah, you know, for the most part it has been very calm down here early this morning when tensions may have been running high in anticipation of trump's arrival down here at the courthouse, we did see the anti-trump demonstrators spreading out this massive banner in the park that said trump always lies, and then we saw a young woman wearing a maga hat sort of run out onto this massive flag, reach down to try and snatch it up and run with it and, then she slipped and fell and there was a physical scuffle it looked like to me that there may have been at least one -- and now we're hearing the noise starting again now that they know that he has left the courthouse again. but for the most part, what we've seen is even though initially they were trying to keep the factions separated,

once they were mixed, they seemed to be fairly calm >> contessa, i'm going to take it back. i guess i spoke a little too soon for some of the protesters anyway who are outside that's our contessa brewer outside the criminal courthouse in lower manhattan i'll go back to eamon javers in washington as we continue to watch the former president's motorcade there just around the brooklyn bridge area of the fdr it looks like as it makes its way a little bit more north and to what eamon, you had told us was likely laguardia airport where former president trump is going to head back to mar-a-lago where he is expected to hold that event this evening. it should be noted as well, unless you have something that i don't know that the indictment has still not been made public >> that's right, scott, we don't have the indictment yet. i did just see on the camera monitoring the courtroom itself that members of the media have

now been rowed toallowed to exi courtroom. they were hustling out quickly to filing location so presumably they will be f filing details of these count thes very soon as well we might be just minutes away from learning quite a bit more about what's in this case at this point at some point we will get the actual charging document, the indictment itself, and see what evidence the district attorney is putting forth here in the court papers we'll also be hearing from the district attorney we're told about 3:45 this afternoon. alvin bragg expected to make a statement at a press conference there in manhattan. we will see that as well and get more detail as well. it's unclear whether we'll see the indictment document before we hear from the d.a. or after we hear from the d.a you can imagine just enormous interest on what exactly the president's been charged with here. >> we'll come back to you if we

learn that within 25 minutes or so left before the close i have the luxury of having a live picture it leooks like he's going to hae his news event as well they continue to get set up there, multiple events surrounding this case throughout the rest of the afternoon. thank, back to you as needed as well let's touch the market too a bit more than 25 minutes to go as we've just turned the hour past 3:30. dow is still down about 240 points it has been that way for much of the session on concerns that the economy is continuing to slow putting pressure on stocks our next guest sees opportunity in the group at the center of the turmoil. let's bring in bruce richards now, the ceo of marathon asset management, overseeing upwards of some $20 billion, a bit of a left turn literally to you as we continue to watch the former president make his way out of manhattan. bruce richards here. when we talk about opportunity you see in the banks, we're not really talking on the equity side we're talking to your wheel

house, which is on the debt side. >> for the equity side, these regional banks, there's a lot of regional banks, literally thousands of small and regional banks, you're going to have a real problem with earnings coming up. net interest margin is really getting squeezed as the cost of funding is going up and their loan book is yesteryear's levels of 4% rate on fixed rates and so you're seeing them really getting squeezed which means they're going to have to probably look to cut the dividend, and the equities haven't really focused on that yet. i understand that kb is down 35%, the index of equities from the highs in february. you're going to start to see an earnings problem coming next there's a liquidity problem and an earnings problem here. >> so whether jamie dimon says as i write this letter, the current crisis is not over yet, you're nodding your head in agreement? >> it's not even close to being

over it's just starting you've seen a trillion dollars of deposits leave the small banks and regional bank system, and it's gone into the money market funds that's number one. and number two is you also have a trillion dollars of debt coming due in the commercial real estate arena between now and the end of next year as well as the c & i loans which are starting to go sideways. the banks also in addition to having a liquidity problem and a capital raising problem, they're also going to have a problem with loan performance as the year progresses and we move closer to that recession. >> you're looking for defaults >> there's a few things here, first of all, in terms of the opportunity with the banks, we've been able to buy certain banks, regional banks just before coming here, looked at about a tdozen on the report we're focused on, in the last week where the bond praises have fallen to $0.50, $0.60 on the dollar, meanwhile, the book value is in excess of the equity

capitalization so we're doing our screens and we're looking for opportunities to buy into a falling market and buy some of the debt itself. we're buying assets out of banks as well, and we have a calling effort into banks to buy more assets they have to shrink their balance sheet, that's for sure, and i think the final point of that whole arrangement is the banks are unable to really lend, middle market lenders and private credit lenders is going to step up in a very big way to fill this void, really important for corporate america and for real estate, which is moving towards a train wreck right now. >> the other -- you know, somebody you know i'm sure in that side of the business, marc lasry, who when he is here i talk to about the same issue the direct lending and the idea of a yield that you can get -- what yield are you getting right now on the money you're lending out? >> 12 to 14%. >> double-digits >> yes. >> and you anticipate that continuing >> absolutely. the bank rate has moved up from 0 to 5%, the base rate being the

sofa rate and spreads are then spread off of that 5%. so it's the best lending environment that we've seen in a generation, which is why it's a particularly interesting time for lenders like marathon and marc lasry's firm avenue to be in the marketplace to lend to companies because the banking system won't be there to make those loans like they have in the past and it's super important we provide this capital solution. >> you made a quick buck or 30 million of them in credit suisse debt, correct? how does that factor into how you think of the european bank troubles versus the troubles you perceived to be here arguably at a smaller level because it's more at the regional level whereas in europe, it's the big national banks >> right well, in europe, i think, europe's in a pretty good place. there are a couple of banks that we have -- we're focused on, and i'd say that there's more to

come there, but what sergio will be doing at ubs we think is, you know, to absorb credit suisse and to run that bank brilliantly. we think the ecb will stand there to be lender when there's any cakind of cracks but here in the united states, the cracks are here in a very meaningful way in the regional banking system where there are literally about 300 banks that we think need to raise capital, aren't potentially going to be able to raise that capital and are going to have to be selling down assets the whole time we think the deposit outflow will continue, and it will come in waves, and so i think that the fed will stand up and provide all the liquidity they need to provide, and they have a huge toolbox that they learned from '08 that they can deploy. i think the liquidity will be okay it will be a slow bleed. it will be the banking

shrinking. that's not very good if the banking system in general. really what it means is weaker equity prices for regional banks. >> how do you think about the risk and if zhaoyou just bring back to svb, even on the bond side depositors were saved. equity holders, band-aondholder sorry. how does that factor into the way you think about this whole sce scenario >> depositors should be saved, first of all, because the bonders can't do the work that the regulators can do, and the regulators didn't do the work that perhaps they should have done, and so deposits shouldn't lose money, and i think janet yellen and jay powell don't have the tools right now to make depositors whole, so they have to go slowly to protect the deposits and seize those banks and have an orderly liquidation of a bank. i think that there is risk for the creditors. there is risk for those aq 1 bonds over in europe but i think generally speaking

we're looking for the banks that trade above the book value in terms of where the equity capitolization is, and that's where we're going to want to buy bonds. when we see the big crack, which is the depositor outflow, it's time to maybe pull in your risk there. >> i appreciate you coming in on what has been an extraordinarily busy day for us, bruce richard, thank you. bruce with marathon asset management we are now getting details of the indictment eamon javers back to you. >> we have the statement of facts which just came out and was released by the d.a.'s office moments ago this case is pretty much as advertised these 34 counts of falsifying business records in new york state. the essence of the case is laid out by the d.a. here it's more than just stormy daniels, though. there's more to this case than just that. the d.a. here is saying that after the election the defendant reimbursed lawyer a, that's michael cohen for the illegal payment through a series of monthly checks from the donald

j. trump revocable trust, a trust that was created under the laws of new york which held trump organization entity assets after the defendant was elected president. each check was processed by the trump organization each check was disguised as a payment for liam services rendered in the given month of 2017 the payment records kept and maintained by the trump organization were false new york business records, in truth there was no retainer agreement and lawyer a was not being paid for legal services rendered in 2017. the defendant caused his entities business railecords toe falsified to disguise his and others criminal conduct. there's additional detail in this statement of facts which runs about 13 pages. one of them which is related to suppressing a story by a doorman about the former president of the united states. they're saying the d.a. is saying here that in or about october or november of 2015 the ami ceo, that is the media company's ceo, learned that a

former trump tower doorman was trying to sell information regarding a child that the defendant had allegedly father's day out of wedlock at the ami ceo's direction, ami negotiated and signed an agreement to pay the doorman $30,000 to acquire exclusive rights to that story ami falsely characterized this payment in ami's books and records including its general ledger that is an allegation that has been floating around out there, now making its way into this statement of facts here by the d.a. we're going to hear from him in just a couple of moments' time we'll get additional detail and go through the rest of this document and bring you any more information that's in the closing page of it >> do we know when a trial would take place and i can't even begin to imagine the process of trying to seat a jury in this case, just considering how polarizing the former president is. >> sure. i mean, there's almost nobody in this country who doesn't have an opinion about donald trump,

right? and in manhattan, trump has made the case that he can't get a fair trial because it's a very liberal city it's a very blue city and a blue state. he did float the idea on social media of maybe moving it to staten island, the manhattan borough where he got the most support might be more favorable venue for him. we don't have any idea what the time line of this is going to be, scott. it will be certainly months before we see any trial in this case, and i would imagine we're going to see a whole bunch of motions. we're going to get discovery here will be the next step the defense side will get access to a whwhole lot of informatione didn't have access to that the manhattan d.a. has had in terms of what's in this case they'll be able to go through the evidence carefully and find additional evidence of their own. that will take a long period of time i don't think we're going to see a trial -- maybe we'll see that trial in 2023, not betting on it. >> yeah, be interesting to follow eamon javers, thanks so much for your coverage today.

that's eamon in washington, d.c. we had been watching the former president still on his way north up to fdr here on the east side of manhattan as he makes his way to what we think will be a trip down to mar-a-lago where he holds an event in palm beach about 15 minutes to go before the closing bell kristina partsinevelos has a look at the key stocks to watch as we approach the end. >> seririus xm is the biggest lag laggard, down about 3% after the ceo announced he's stepping down to pursue other opportunity thes he will be replaced by senior vp and controller, thomas barry c 3 ai shares are plummeting down about 26% right now after a company -- sorry after short seller did say that this company c3 ai is engaged in accounting malpractice.

c3 ai's shares have soared 200% up until april 3rd all the chatgpt and ai hype. the stock is having its worst drop on record they will have that short seller in overtime in less than an hour >> thank you that's kristina partsinevelos. we're now in the "closing bell" market zone. cnbc senior markets commentator, mike santoli here to break down these crucial moments of the trading day. option plays, jessica inscif on why the technicals are flashing a bullish signal, seema mody as well on caterpillar's latest drop we've been down throughout the day. even the pullbacks aren't of great magnitude. >> the damage is being somewhat mitigated by modest declines in the big growth stocks as well as just traditional defensives are doing okay so you know, you look at things

like the russell 2000, it's ugly, it's 2.2% drop the s&p 500 is having this little bit of chop at a very logical spot, high end of the range that's been in place since last spring. you did get a little bit joef bought in the short-term you did have extreme outperformance by a small segment of stocks. so far again pretty orderly in the process. the other part of it is nothing has changed about april being positive, about the fact that sentiment and positioning are relatively defensive and cautious right here, which is something the market could theoretically feed off of. i just wonder how much erosion you could see below the sufficient sur faface, the smal caps suffering without pulling back we're trading within friday's range just for framing purposes in the s&p. >> a lot depends too on just how the market wants to take the news and how it perceives various news items to be i bring up jolts, for example, which if you're watching that and you're the fed, you're saying, okay, finally, right

it moves in the right direction, although then it gets spun into, well, see, the economy is starting to slow >> the reaction today definitely had a tint of harder landing, and we have days like this ask then we have days where it looks fine i to think there's an oddity about this week too. which is as we've said, the jobs report coming on friday where the market's closed. investors can't react to it. we're reacting to whatever we know about the labor market now. maybe that's going to be adp tomorrow the real number you're not going to be able to basically pull the trigger either way on. >> still have a unique relationship between the bond market and the fed, if you want to put it that way bond yields are down that market just doesn't believe that the fed is going to be able to continue to raise rates. >> no, it's going to try and look through the next move, try and look through the next month or two of data, and try and essentially say not just where are we headed in terms of the

economy, but what's the direction of surprise from here, and so the market does not believe there's a very high chance of reacceleration in the economy. there's a much higher chance of a further financial accident or a sharp slowdown, and that's why if you're putting on the what might happen trade, it takes the form of projecting potential rate cuts, even when no person sits here and says i fully expect there to be two or three rate cuts by the end of this year, unless you feel like disaster is coming. >> what's so interesting is that you still think the technicals have a pretty decent story to tell >> i certainly do. so i believe it's stuck in the mi middle, so the s&p 500 has been range bound and we're struggling to find direction, and the lower part of the range is really a base forming i look at three things one is the big picture, which is the 200 weekly moving average. i look at the slope of the line and where the index is above and below, and then i also look at the 26 and 40 weekly average to

give me the trading cycle. if it's bullish or bearish, and that's really important because that's 2 3/4 worth of data as investors we look at the market from a quarterly basis. if we see consistent closes above the 26 and 40 weekly moving averages, that's indicative from quarter-to-quarter, earnings cycle to earnings cycle, we are actually seeing price increases. so that is consistently happening within the s&p 500 it's early stages, but to continue seeing this bottom, i want to see the continuous closes above the 26 and 40 weekly moving average. that's around 3950, and then as long as we have those continuous closes, our next milestone, which is where we're having a very hard time closing right now is that november lower high of 4,100, and then followed by that, i need to see the january 30th high of 4195. so it's important to form a base so see those levels consistently closed above, but even more so,

i need see that november lower high to be overcome because of course the way we define a trend is lower lows and then higher lows, higher highs which have a bullish trend. i need to see those levels overcome. >> and just like the gentleman to my left who i'm going to bring back into the conversation in a second, you're looking at the equal weight index too tell us in what way does that stand out to you >> yeah, it's extremely important. even states that a broad-based rally holds more strength. the equal weight is showing early signs. we've only closed last week above the 26 and 40 weekly moving averages, and we actually fell below it today. so hoi'm looking at 6320 as our target that we need to overcome. right now it's 5840, the equal weight index needs to jovercome to have those consistent 2 3/4 closes above to indicate a base,

which is a positive trading cycle. and it's so important to take note of that because even if you look at the equal weight or the broader s&p 500 or the s&p 500 from early 2000, you can see that we consistently closed above these weekly levels at the end of fair markets. and the inverse is also true, notably the dot com bubble, the financial crisis, all of the above. >> i feel like she's speaking your language, mr. santoli. >> it always makes sense to keep an eye on it the fourth quarter vastly outperformed and through january the equal weight vastly outperformed you're giving back some of that built up credit if you want to say it like that, that the rally had earned based on how broad it was and based on those momentum signals. a lot of the calls in january of this type of thrust only happens at the beginning of a bull market some of that has rolled over, but not in a critical way. i still do think you want to call it just a trading range

until proven otherwise or an uptrend. we actually have still maintained the stair step pattern since october, i think right now the market has registered properly the idea that we have a flattening out of earnings i don't think the overall market has priced in something more precipitous than that. we still have unusual cycle of pricing power in parts of the economy and earnings estimates down this quarter as much as they were in the prior two, and yet, once we got the reports in, the market was okay with them. >> jessica, i'm looking at crude oil, which has obviously had a great week it's still sitting above 80. there are technicians out there who suggest that this trend is being confirmed by the action this week, and i'm wondering how you see that. >> that's absolutely true. there was bullish divergence within crude oil specifically at 80 that yesterday in the production cuts was the catalyst that was needed to support that support system for crude oil, causing a

reason for it to be sent higher. and that of course could trickle down into inflation and the other concerns that affect the broader market something to pay attention to. >> yeah, and we will thank you, jessica, and seema mody, you flagged this earlier we did it on halftime as we talked about what was happening in caterpillar today i remember, you know, there were some other names too uri, deere, deaton >> and u.s. manufacturing report really did raise some real concerns with new orders tumbling, every sub sector coming in below 50 we haven't seen that since 2009. listen, when we started the year, there was this long-standing thesis that the industrials will be able to outperform in a slowdown, and that's because there are these secular tailwinds like the infrastructure act, the surge in global commodities that's one of the reasons john deere has been able to outperform over the past year. clearly some concerns about a slowdown in construction lending. there's been a new note from citi passed around looking at

how 61% of banks are tightening their lending standards. which we know the commercial real estate sector, the effect that's going to have on construction and land development. we're talking about companies like caterpillar that make tractors and excavators. if you see construction drying up, that's going to affect demand we'll get the full story in two to three weeks when these companies report earnings. >> i would imagine, boy, their outlooks are going to be cloudy at best. manufacturing as you know, seema, has already been in recession. now if we get into a point of more significant concerns about the economy, you're going to see it show up first and foremost in not only this name but the other ones you mentioned. >> the conversation from the ceo at caterpillar, from john may at deere has been it's the supply chain that's stopping us from reaching our utmost capacity so the question now is whether those challenges are starting to mitigate a little bit, and if so, if that helps their demand

story going into the second half of this year >> all right, seema, thank you for that turn back to mike santoli. we're still a minute or two away from the two-minute warning. i'm looking at the nasdaq today. it's been, what, two or three days in a row. yet, apple even earlier today, though it was lower and it is now, not by much. >> not much. the reflex is still in place, when you do have yields crack, the tech stocks aren't going down that much because it's sort of growth is going to be scarce. we know the reaction s semis have three rolled a little bit off of hot levels i'd say. you've seen obviously tesla has been a drag on the index too it's all within a pretty contained range. it's not doing a whole lot the industrial side of things is kind of fascinating. that whole kind of capital goods story was very much in vogue coming into this year. you also see the really bad ism

number, ism manufacturing, which was unequivocally weak if you look at what happens to the stock market six months after ism is in that zone, it's w actually one of the more poz we can talk about why that is and whether that sakecycle is gg to apply this time for something like cat, i noticed the street is very lukewarm on it does not have an over preponderance of buy ratings on it earnings estimates have been going up it's very difficult to say had is an -- construction employment has been stubbornly high everyone's expecting that to come down. in the jolts report today, more construction job openings than the prior month. it's a noisy environment maybe it's because of the government program, maybe it's because of pent up projects. it is interesting to see the market digest it all. >> on the index level, we knew 4,100 was going to be another line in the sand

here we go. >> there's no doubt about it, 41 to 42. it's wild how we're making so much of these levels it reminds me of prior prolonged sideways periods, relatively recently in 2015, where you felt like it's not going to give you another chance to sell the same level, is it and it gave you another chance, at least in the short-term i'm also in that camp. if you pull that just below 4,000, you're still just giving up like three days worth of upside it all still looks like it's in decent shape, and again, i'll go back to the seasonal and sentiment stuff. it's definitely not working against you in a big way you can't take a lot of bad economic data. you can't take a lot more bank stress and keep it held together for now, i think a lot of these things are kindof offsetting a opposed to just all working in a direction of much lower prices. >> want to hit the russell for me, it is by far the biggest loser today. it is down more than 2% as we approach that two-minute warning. regional banks, first republic is down 5 1/3 percent.

>> yeah, and the relationship between the nasdaq 100 and the russell 2000 looked extremely stretched coming into the week so the expectation would be, you know, qqq down and russell 2000 at least outperforming that really hasn't held up we'll see. credit has been in decent shape, but softening a bit this weak. all that stuff moves in the direction of i guess we're going to have to worry a little more about the russell. they don't look expensive. the s&p, small cap 600, as a matter of fact looks like it has priced in a pretty dire earnings scenario the russell 2000 is lower quality. it's tough it to find sponsorsh for those types of stocks in this environment it feels like nobody feels like there's a hurry to add risk, to add tampbeta, leverage. >> nobody looking to sort of take away risk necessarily yet either

i'm looking as you were talking and you were now at the vix. 19. >> it was down seven days in a row. 19 as an absolute level is unremarkable the index itself has been really placid, and when that happens, when you go these long stretches of time when the index is in a range, that's going to happen. you're up half a point on the vix. it is not nothing. you can look at that, and it's been the area where you've had these turns higher and they usually mean that the s&p has stalled out or chopping lower. we'll see if that does play out this time. you're right, it's not been a big rush to get very hedged. part of the reason is people have raised cash you can see the flows in the money market funds you can see the fact that people, the inflows into the t bill etf have been huge and consistent for weeks on end. it doesn't feel as if people want to pay up for a 30-day downside put on the s&p when they have like they have the cash. >> gold 2,000 above that level, again, this week was the first

time in a year that gold cost $3,000. >> by the way, i look at the ten-year return, it's 2% annualized for twgold there are periods when it's going to work, otherwise you're paying to hold it. >> the bell is ringing the former president arriving at the airport. we'll send you into overtime with morgan. she's going to cover both stories for you. stocks ending the day lower. that is the score card on wall street welcome to "closing bell" overtime i'm morgan brennan, jon fortt is off today. coming up this hour, we'll keep you up to speed on all of the developments surrounding donald trump and the just unsealed indictment as the former president makes his way to laguardia airport following hi