over the years, and the capital you've made for your shareholders. >> yeah, absolutely amazing. millions of dollars in a single week. thank you for watching "power lunch." >> and i'll say the same, and i will remind you that "closing bell" starts in about six seconds. thanks so much. welcome to "closing bell," i'm scott wapner live from post 9. this make or break hour begins with suddenly surging tech, and raising the question once again if this is the safest place to be in stocks. your score card now with 60 minutes to go in regulation. take a look at the nasdaq first because it is outperforming once again. 2/3 of 1%, how about apple, back above its 50-day moving average. nvidia back towards a new high, tesla, well, it's negative now, still up almost 10% in a week. more broadly, energy and consumer discretionary sectors

also among the day's top performers today, yields, they are lower, and that is a big part of this story. rates dropping after a new read on the economy suggests the pace of job growth finally slowing. that's good news for what the fed wants as it seeks to cool off the economy. we also have key earnings coming in over time to remind you about tonight, salesforce and crowd strike reporting their quarterly results in ot. we're going to hear from star analyst dan ives in just a bit. it takes us to our talk of the tape where the stocks are back in an uptrend. even as those early month losses continue to evaporate, let's ask dan greenhouse chief strategist with me here at post 9, it's nice to see you again. >> thank you, sir. >> what a difference a couple of weeks makes. middle of the month, how deep is this correction going to be. at the low, we're down 5.5%. here we are, we're only down 1.5%. what's happened? >> you teased at the outset that rates is a big part of this.

within the context that rates have gone up and stocks have gone up alongside it, in the last couple of days, the pullback in longer term rates, 4.25 down closer to 4 is probably the main input right now. you see the best performing sectors over that time are -- is both tech and com services. it's tesla. it's the semiconductors more specifically. i think it's hard to argue otherwise that rates cincinnati big part of this. >> are we back where we were before where, you know, lower rates and then tech just carries the ball? and that's enough to get us through this, you know, historically seasonally tough period? >> yeah, i don't know that we were ever out of whatever it is that we've been in since march. >> the uptrend was over, and we were going to have this correction that was, you know, likely going to be a bit steeper than we witnessed at just 5.5%, and that narrative has changed once again, i think. >> i'm not sure that the narrative was the uptrend is over. i think what a lot of us were saying, a lot of the people on

the halftime show and speaking for myself was that just you're entering a seasonally weak period, you have a terrific run up, and some digestion of that was likely to come. you saw that after the nvidia report. i know obviously some of the more bearish prognosticators saying the market's inability to rally on what was a good nvidia report was a sign of something was wrong, but i think it played into that narrative prior. some period of digestion was to be expected and that's what we have. >> i'd glad you brought up nvidia as we show it on the screen. new closing high. it's not at its intraday high but not that far away either. so as that stock has come back, i mentioned in the open, apple has come back, tesla started running again. then i guess it's no secret why we're able to be where we are today versus where we were a couple of weeks prior. >> let me add on top of that, it's not just tech, if we've got the charts you can throw out

bristol-myers, a bunch of their retailers. take a look at tjx, to a less tree walmart. >> i'm going quickly here. >> keep going, discretionary, if you look at the sectors that are actually doing quite well, as i pull up stdiscretionary today t give you a look, it's having just a fine session now. and it's up more than 2% in a week. >> when you look at stre discretionary, you have to remember. >> amazon 2. >> but even when you take a step back from those, tjx is basically back to a high, walmart's basically back to a high. i keep mentioning a bunch of the industrial names that have to deal with reshoring and electrification like eaton, eddie tom nancy, a couple of these stocks are absolutely on fire. that's not to say that the entire market is doing super well because it's not necessarily the case, but as we power back to record highs, it's not just nvidia, it's not just tesla. a bunch of other names are playing along as well. >> the ear piece, we're having

repeat problem ears. >> we'll get you some glue. >> the data has been softer, which is not such a bad thing either for what the fed want and what investors need. you need good data, but you can't have data that suggests we're off to the races again in some sort of resurgent economic, you know, robustness, if you look at that atlanta gdp now thing which was at 5.8%, you're like, wow, the economy is reaccelerating. even if that wasn't real, you still can't have a scenario in which the economy continues to get away from the fed. >> no, that's right. i'm glad you brought that up. i like to think sometimes i come on at narrative turning points. i think we might be at one now. there's clearly a lot of celebration about the jolts report, pulling back particularly because, again, the soft landing narrative put forth by people like yan at goldman sachs was predicated on the bulk of the work being done through

jolts rather than through let's say the unemployment rate. there's a lot of celebration of that. at the same time, i call back to a point that i was making a year and a half or even two years ago, which is this idea that the fed cannot fine tune the economy, and as you decelerate here, it's not like i'm driving in a car on the west side highway and i can go from 80 2to 60 with some level of precision. the challenge for the federal reserve, of course, is to decelerate just the right amount, and are they able to do that or not. the answer to that question is largely going to be determinative of what happens with risk assets. >> the risk is that they smash it, that they do too much. >> you don't even have to smash it. you just have to slow things down more than you intended. >> well, i mean, they've obviously, you know, succeeded to some degree to slow things down. when you go 500 basis points in the last -- what is it, 13, 14 months, that's ultimately going to happen. >> that's right, and you have seen that in working conjunction

on let's say the inflation side of things with the -- what is now clearly the transitory part of the post-covid environment having been sucked out as well. i think this is really important. as we decelerate, and we have this jobs report on friday, there will be some screwiness with it if you will related to some of the strikes that are going on. >> pce tomorrow, let's not forget about that. >> but the jobs report is crucially important because we have decelerated. we've got two months in a row now sub 200,000, which is still a healthy level, but slower than it has been. if something happens where over the next few months you go from call it 200,000 down to 125, down to 100, down into the dpu dp double-digits over the next few months, there's going to be a lot of questions about the fed's ability to stabilize things rather than overshoot from the downside and from a risk asset standpoint, we're going to have to revisit some of those conversations from earlier this year that were pushed out. >> stephanie link, cnbc contributor also of high tower advisers joins us as we branch

out the conversation. steph, have we gotten this momentum back? is it too soon to suggest that? or what do you think? >> i think it's for now an joef s oversold bounce, and i think it's tied to what you guys were just talking about. we had a softer jobs report yesterday in jolts, today in adp. you had a lower revision in gdp, the second revision. i think that's more backward looking. within the gdp you had a lower price deflator. if we think about the fed, they're looking at growth. they're looking at jobs and inflation, and if all three are going in their direction meaning in their favor, then you can make a case that the fed is probably done with tightening. that doesn't mean that they're going to all of a sudden reverse course in my opinion, but if you think the fed is done and rates do drift lower, as you said, rates lower, then higher growth, and higher technology by default, and that's what i think

you're seeing. i'm still underweight tech, but i have been looking for opportunities. you know, i took advantage of the 7% drop in lam research, for example, and also put a new position on in cdw. and i would look at other names if they continued to fall, and i think we are going to see a choppy environment in september, we may get an opportunity, but what i'm impressed with is what you guys were also talking about is the market breadth. in the past month energy has outperformed technology by 7730 basis points. in the past three months, energy has outperformed technology by 680 basis points. same thing with industrials. industrials have outperformed the past month by 200 basis points, and 690 basis points in the past three months. so you are seeing a broadening. that's where i see more value as you know, and i'm pleased to see us broadening out. i think there's other opportunities, not discounting tech, but i just think there are other opportunities as well. >> let's play off of what steph

said, tdan, and take a look at positioning. thinking about what are the catalysts to propel this market higher between now and the end of the year. there are people like steph who are underweight tech who didn't, you know, position themselves to take advantage necessarily of this incredible gain that we've seen in these mega cap names. now, if the names continue to run, it's going to be har d to reverse the positioning if you're not already there. you're not going to want to pay up perhaps. if you have an opportunity to get in, do you think you get a flow of money from those who are not positioned? we still see there's a lot of under ownership in these mega cap names, that that's that catalyst, that chase for performance, the fear of missing out. >> sure, to repeat, we're a hedge fund, and take specific positions. we're not bench marked to the index in that sense, but that said, for having had a career on

wall street, it's going to be very difficult, if the year progresses. let's use nvidia for a second, a name we're not involved in and i have no particular expertise with, but like they're going to earn 20 bucks or something in two years. you're going to get to 6 or 700 bucks in that name from a street forecast in pretty short order. if the name keeps trading up. if apple gets back close to its highs or back to 200 bucks, google continues to make new highs. i don't know how managers aren't sucked in, and stephanie can better answer this question than me. even if you don't catch up to market leading, you've got to get more overweight than you are or else you're going to get further left behind. >> that's my point too, steph. we've said this, the train has l left the station. we've got people who not only come on this program, but the halftime report are just buying nvidia now, right? it's like i can't afford to be on the sidelines from where the action is or the train's going to get to the next destination

without me. >> yeah, but i think you can own other stocks other than the big magnificent 7 and you know i own a pretty big chunk of meta even though i've been trimming it. i think you can own other technology stocks and make them bigger bets, bigger overweights relative to your benchmark. i've got a 5% overweight position in broadcom, which they report tomorrow, so my fingers are crossed there. i've got a 500 basis point overweight in ibm, and i've been building cdw, and that's now a 300 basis point overweight, these are not small positions by any means. if tech continues to run, and i think the fundamentals of the company i just mentioned continue to do well in addition to lam research, i think i will be okay. i just don't want to be where everybody is at. i certainly understand the total addressable markets. we talk about it all the time, but i can make bigger bets in names that are smaller in the

s&p, but my overweight is so much greater and it does give me the alpha. >> the risks, sure, and you can be anywhere you want, the risk and not necessarily you specifically, but for those who are also underweight tech, the risk is if this is where the money's going to flow yet again for a variety of reasons, if rates remain low enough, if these stocks are deemed as safety plays in some sense within this market too, you're just not going to be able to perform as well trying to pick these other stocks, if these are the ones that are really going to run the most. it's just the way it's going to be. >> well, i disagree because i think fundamentals do matter. earnings revisions dwivisions a going up, the broadiening of th market. nobody is in energy. it's only 5% of the s&p 500. i'm 10% in my portfolio, and i just added to chevron.

industrials, i'm 1,100 basis points overweight industrials as a whole, and that has been a home run call from boeing to ge to ingersoll-rand, i'm looking at john deere to add as well. i think that's also where i'm going to create alpha. to me they're not getting talked about as much, scott, maybe they're not as popular, but i can find values there and i can actually make money and create alpha in those sectors as well. >> fair enough. >> stephanie, google had their event yesterday, and one of the things i heard coming out of the event that may be from the participants that may be ai spend wasn't going as rapidly as people thought, and i know obviously nvidia has been obviously the poster child for spend, spend, spend, spend, spend, but we heard on the microsoft call that there's some slowness, ai spend, meta alluded to the takeup of their ai products being a bit of a question, do you have a feeling that maybe the market -- i mentioned earlier about nvidia trading at 30, 35 times, do you

have a feeling that some of this enthusiasm around ai as we talk about the second half of the year is getting ahead of itself? >> i think it is. but at the same time you know that the total addressable market at the end of this decade is a trillion dollars with a plus sign next to it. every day i see it's a trillion, 2 trillion, 3 trillion, whatever it is, it's a trillion with a t. you want to have exposure. it will be interesting to hear broadcom tomorrow. they have customized chips that they said last quarter, that business was going -- was 10% of total revenues last year going to 25 by next year. let's see what they have to say, if that's changed at all. but i do think, yeah, you know what, a lot of good news is priced into the ai theme. it's a theme you want to have exposure to. it's certainly not something that you have to chase. if any of these stocks were to pull back substantially, then you take la look. i to think you want to have exposure for sure one way or the other. >> i guess part of my point is that, you know, it's more difficult to look -- i'm looking at sector performance year-to-date beyond where the bulk of the conversation has been, whether it's tech com

services or to some tdegree discretionary, but that's also skewed by tesla and amazon. for example, financials next to nothing year-to-date, 2/3 of 1% in the green. energy, 3/4 of 1% in the green. that's it. industrials, 10% positive. so you're talking about three key areas of the market that have dramatically, dramatically underperformed where the leadership has been. what is the point for me to think that you're going to get some kind of catchup trade between now and the end of the year? >> why wouldn't you, the mean reversion for sure, right? energy might be just, you know, barely up year-to-date, but it's actually up almost 20% from the lows, right? and i think you can say the same thing for stdiscretionary. i don't know about financials. they're so caught up in regulation and the yield curve confusion. of course they're cheap for a reason. maybe that sector doesn't participate. i think there's a lot of other sectors that will participate.

oh, by the way, the industrials i just mentioned before, they're up more than the xli and energy, i mean, the same thing with the names that i own, maybe not chevron, that's been a downer for sure, but diamondback energy, schlumberger, they've done well, not to the extent that i want them to do, but i do think you will -- you could see a catchup trade trying to buy low and sell high, scott. that's all i'm tryinged to. >> -- trying to do. >> you just made a really important point, i don't think it gets said enough. the whole debate about the market weighted index, whether one tells a story better than the other. to your point about the other sectors, for money managers who pick specific stocks, that equal weighted index is way more relevant because of how much work is being done by the magnificent 7 or whatever we want to call them. that's not to say that they're the only ones going up because they're not. the market cap weighted index is up in the double-digits. the equal weighted index is up

call it 5%, and that tells a much truer story for the average money manager out there that's trying to pick specifics t stoc >> that's also where the conversation went before the august pullback when you had this huge run in the magnificent 7. the people who try to throw cold water on the market overall or at least that narrative were like, wyeah, but if you strip those out, the s&p 493 because you're looking at the weight index we're suggesting that the market's not nearly as good as you think or say it is because outside of the magnificent 7, nothing else has done that much. >> that was 100% true. at the end of may, the equal weighted index was down on the year. it was true for a big chunk of this year, the average stock was doing nothing, and all of the work was being done by the large cap. what you've seen obviously since is a broadening out, but it doesn't dismiss the fact that a lot of the names that we're talking about are doing the bulk of the work.

it's not all of the work. it's the bulk of the work. >> one name that you're thinking about, i do have to go, d.r. horton, you say you're considering adding to it, is that correct? >> yeah, down 10%, trades at nine times earnings. we're still 5 million homes short in the country, 5 million millennials are entering into the home buying for the first time, best in class, great returns so, yeah, it's down 10%. i'm looking to buy. >> good stuff. stephanie, thank you. we'll see you soon. let's get to our question of the day. we want to know what sector will lead the month of september, tech, energy, consumer st discretionary, or will it be something else. head to @cnbcclosingbell. a check on some top stocks to watch. kristina partsinevelos is back with that. >> this is the calvin klein parent company. they raised their earnings outlook for the year and said

they're seeing strong performance, especially internationally and in asia, and that's why shares are up about 3%. it's not the case, though, for chip maker ambarella having its worst day in a year as weak revenue outlooks overshadowed a lighter than expected loss. td td cowen downgrading. they're used in video processing versus all of that ai hype. they say the downgrade is painful as they still see long-term promise for this company, it's still a ways off, and that's why shares are down 18.5%. scott. >> wow. christina, thank you. we'll see you in just a bit. we are just getting started. up next, counting on a comeback, salesforce results they're out after the bell. the stock's already up like 60% year-to-date, nonetheless, he makes his case after this break. we're live from the new york stock exchange. you're watching "closing bell" on cnbc.

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wn shares of salesforce higher. the my next guest is expecting a beat he calls salesforce one of his favorite software names right now, he's dan ives wedbush right here at post 9 welcome, good to see you pretty good year for the stock, what is it up 60% year-to-date in. >> it's been back against the wall earlier this year, activists swirling and benioff, it's been a flex to muscles moment for salesforce because of the margin story and because of what i view as a renaissance of

growth that i think will continue in terms of what we see tonight. >> how high is the bar, though, given the stock move into the number >> yeah, i actually think -- look, the bar has definitely been set higher. when i look at our checks and what's over the coming quarter, i think they could accelerate the double-digit type growth with markets expanding i view this as risk reward that i view as more of a table pounder into the next six to nine months given where salesforce fits. i think this is also going to be a big barometer for thee rest of tech. >> they had the slowest rate of revenue growth in ten years last quarter. are you taking that into account enough is that reversing? what's the story >> i think it's starting to reverse. i think the big thing from tableau and if you look at what's happening on the core sof software side of things. slack is a headwind, that starts to become a tail windy wind bears are thinking their best days are in the rearview mirror. i actually disagree. this is a company that's really

on the doorstep of a renaissance of growth. >> swo we mentioned 60% of year-to-date, i think i saw 20% over the last three months or so what are the concerns about cloud spending overall because this is going to play right into this stock and the kinds of things that the ceo says on the call >> yeah, and look, benioff, when benioff talks, even listens because this is just another piece of the puzzle. we heard from paulo, but salesforce is a huge barometer, and i believe in terms of cloud spend similar to what we saw with microsoft, what i believe we saw with google, oracle as well, we're seeing an uptick in terms of over the last two, three months, and i think we're going to hear more of that from salesforce and i view this as bullish for overall tech. >> i misread the chart, it's only down about 2% over the last three months excuse me. the other thing is they recently raised prices by about 9% almost across the board when tdoes that start to show up >> it's too soon now when we look out the next two,

three quarters, i think right now street is underestimating growth from a cash flow perspective as well as are from a growth also, this is all the drum roll to ai. i believe from an ai in terms of that sweet rollout, i think that's going to be a big focus on the call. we think that could be potentially 4 billion annually by 2025, and i think this is actually an under the radar ai play in terms of what's coming out of salesforce and benioff. >> 238 is the 52-week hay. how good does this have to be to get back towards if not exceed n those levels >> scale 1, 10, if we have an 8 to a 9, this is a stock that i think breaks through that. >> you think we'll really get an 8 to a 9 just kind of given the environment that we're in, whereas i said revenue growth was in the most recent quarter that sounds to me like they better pull an nvidia. they better hit the ball so far out of the park it lands on the street. >> yeah, now to that point, i do think that many on the street in terms of expectations have bee

of a company that has a massive install base you've got the golden install base of salesforce now it's further monetizing it you go back to that slack deal that was the headwind, activists came in swirling i think it was really a moment where i think benioff and salesforce just proved the value of the franchise. >> start talking about installed bases, i go right to apple for obvious reasons, obviously the most powerful install base in consumer technology. that stock is on the move. it's back above its 50-day moving average they got the invitation sent out yesterday. is the momentum back >> i viewed it as this was a no-brainer opportunity because of what i view over the last call it month or two the street has significantly

underestimated bhaswhat's going be a min ki super cycle. all of our checks out of asia even as of this week show positive the street continues to underestimate cupertino where they play chess and others are playing checkers. >> quickly on tesla, it's one of the reasons we're talking about this resurgence in tech, what is that, up 10% in a month? >> it's about china. i mean -- >> i mean in a week. a week >> go back to the last few months i think there was a view that price cuts, you're going to have this price war that's going to continue to play out, yet, for tesla, you've actually seen what i view as an uptick in demand. we believe 95% of those price cuts are in the rearview mirror, and i do think, scott, you're starting to see that some of the parts story in tesla in terms of that valuation, super charger, next battery and fsd play out, which is why we believe this is a stock that is just on the early stage of its next layer growth. >> all right, dan ives, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> we'll see you soon.

up next, the nasdaq's end of summer rally still in full swing, but vantage rocks avery sheffield is raising a red flag on that growth train she explains why after this break. it's not just salesforce, crowd strike among the many names hitting after the bell we'll tell you what to look out for when those numbers cross don't forget to join us for delivering alpha, it's our investor summit september 28th, new york city. it brings together investors and leaders to provide insights, ideas, and analysis to help you balance risk with maximized returns. scan the qr code or sivit cnbcevents.com cnbcevents.com/deliveringalpha for more information (vo) now you can with once-weekly mounjaro. mounjaro helps your body... ...regulate blood sugar... ...and mounjaro... ...can help decrease how much food you eat. 3 out of 4 people reached an a1c of less than 7%.

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e*trade from morgan stanley tech continues to rally back from august lows with the nasdaq having its sixth update in the past seven our next guest warnings growth stocks are still too expensive joining me, avery.

>> great to be here. >> valuations have come down a little bit >> a little bit. i don't know, it looks like a little blip. it was looking like maybe it was going to be more significant. >> so you don't want to touch these stocks >> it's a consistent theme whenever we've spoken. we're very valuation sensitive the market is not so valuation sensitive. look, there continue to be mega cap tech stocks that we do like because they trade at very reasonable multiples relative to treasuries, relative to the short end of the curve, right? but there are a lot of other growth stocks including some very popular ones that are pricing in an enormous amount of growth, and that might materialize over time. the more growth you're pricing in, the more any slowdown ca ri >> stephanie link was on earlier. you referenced her talking about other areas of the market that you can to just fine in if you're willing to take a hard look, rather than just jumping on this proverbial train that

everybody is already crowded onto. >> yes, exactly. >> like what because you agree. >> i absolutely agree. i agree that you don't have to own the most popular names maybe they will work, right, but if you go to things that are unpopular, the nice thing is if things work you get meaningful valuation expansion as well as earnings growth. so a few areas that we have interest in, one in retail, there were a lot of weak earnings reports. >> yeah, i'll say. >> in august and you can get to a point where a stock has sold off enough that there is interesting upside in its potential turn around scenario i'm not saying the macro is great, but if you look at what fran, the ceo of horowitz, the ceo of abercrombie has done with that company, right, and turned it around to like 8 to 10% operating margins ask other companies trading at 2 to 3% operating margins and they're

selling reasonably priced goods, they have new ceos in an apparel sector who have experience with turn arounds in the past, say, huh, you know, there might be some opportunity here on normalized earnings. they're just cheap enough that the upside is 100% or more to these names over time. >> this one specifically talking about a and f, that was one like right in that wheel house of those other reports that were dreadful. >> yes >> right, and those stocks got crushed and then this one was the real winner of that week >> absolutely. and i think the lesson to be learned is retail is detail, and if you have the right product at the right price. >> we're stealing that. >> merchandise well over time you can succeed, even against a tough backdrop. >> okay. >> and by the way, years ago, not even that long ago, a year ago people might have wondered is abercrombie going to turn around it didn't take that long for fran to really put in place merchandising that made a real

te difference a year from now we could be seeing signs of that i think you are seeing the stock movement of some of the names that were beaten up the most showing that maybe they're just too cheap on a potential normalized earnings scenario. >> what btabout the market as a whole? it's a tale of two months. first half terrible. we're like, oh, my gosh, this is going to be a steeper correction where are we going to go back to and then lo and behold, we've had this rally back, so where does it leave us >> right, so i think it leaves us at a pretty fragile point, and the reason it's fragile is because there are -- valuations are still very high, around 30 times, s&p just shy of 20 times, with interest rates where they are, with an economy that's slowing, it's not a weak economy. if it were a terrible economy, we'd be talking about interest rate cuts. it's a weakened economy, but still strong enough that the fed has to keep rates high enough for longer and against that weakening backdrop, i think that what we're going to see over time in the future earnings

reports, which we're now at the end of earnings season, come october if some of these stocks are considered to be like secular growers actually continue to see some weakness, people might get a little nervous and want to take profits. that's another reason why we are liking to go to, you know, where are things already pricing in a l lot of weakness. another area that's interesting in industrials steph was mentioning that sector in materials. steel is an area where you have secular growth drivers auto production can be weak, and give you some buying opportunity. from an infrastructure standpoint, from building out new plants and such and needing green steel, we are likely to have tariffs for a long time those stocks are trading at single-digit to low double-digit multiples. >> got some m&a. >> m&a stores, consolidation that's happened actually since before covid, so i think areas

like that could really end up surprising to the upside, and i would just be much more cautious on these more expensive stops. now that said, because of we have a narrative now, the interest rates have peaked and they're coming down. they might hold up i'm not making a call that they're definitely going to fall off, but i think it's tricky and risky because when stocks are being driven by, you know, did they beat on this metric and that metric. when you actually look at the fundamentals and don't see real free cash flow outside of stock options, when you see a slowing growth narrative, but they beat that slowing growth narrative, at some point investors might start to get concerned, is there real value here. that just feels scary to us. >> you just mentioned peaks in certain things, peaks and troughs, the narrative right now is that we've seen a trough in earnings, right, in that this quarter, third quarter is going to finally see that growth again, and that's going to further accelerate into the fourth quarter and then into next year. are you a believer. >> i think it depends on the sector >> i think it depends on the

sector there's some consumer names with a low income consumer, real wages are looking positive now if dynamic continues some of those names could do better, like in software, though, i would say, you know, we were talking six months ago everyone was talking about second half 3 q, we're going to see a reacceleration in spending it could be tough and i would si&a say in ai, major consumers of these gcus have spoken to the speculative nature in which all these purchases are happening. if there is a lot of forward buying and the business models don't materialize, companies that are levered to that could be vulnerable. maybe it's too far out, but we're not seeing -- i am not seeing in tech companies a sign that like 3q, 4q is going to be

really strong and that makes me a little cautious. >> all right, we will talk to you soon >> looking forward to it. >> avery sheffield joining us once again we're tracking the biggest movers into the close, and kristina partsinevelos is back with that. >> premium whiskey sales slumping and that has investors' spirits on the low down. that's hurting one name, i'll explain after this break i'm kareem abdul jabbar. i was diagnosed with afib. the first inkling that something was wrong was i started to notice that i couldn't do things without losing my breath. i couldn't make it through the airport, and every like 20 or 30 yards

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> > "the wall street journal" out with a new report saying manhattan federal prosecutors are investigating tesla and its use of company funds for a project described as a house for ceo elon musk. the project reportedly called for a suspicious glass structure to be built in austin, texas shares of tesla not moving much on this particular story we have told you about this run recently in the stock. it's up near 10% in just the past week. we'll continue to bring you any updates there if we do have them let's get back to kristina for a look at the stocks she's watching sunrun is rebounding after citi upgraded the solar stock to buy saying its headwinds are priced in and investors aren't appreciating their ability to raise capital. shares are up about 2.2% today, still tracking for sharp monthly declines down 18%. investors spirits lower

after brown foreman's earnings and revenue miss three main factors, lagging whiskey sales from woodford reserve and gentleman jack, secondly supply challenges including higher coasts for grains, wood and agave, and a sizable inventory build. i wanted to say i like my whiskey like i like my jokes, aged to perfection, but i think that line is more appropriate for you, scott, shares are down 4%. >> thank you so much, kristina i think. thank you. >> bye bye. >> we asked what sector will lead the month of september, tech, energy, consumer discretionary or something else? head to @cnbcclosingbell, we'll bring you the results after this break.

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the results of our question of the day, we asked what sector will lead in the month of september. tech energy, discretionary, or something else i guess i should be surprised. half of you voting that tech will be the winner energy number two. all right, it's the only sector that's positive for the month of august, which is interesting, and it's just by a couple percentage points. after the break, your salesforce setup, the software company reporting results in just a few minutes. we'll bring you a rundown of what to look for when those numbers hit the tapen iot that and much more when we take you inside the market zone to truly appreciate the beauty, the wildlife, the sheer majesty. experience it with state-of-the-art expedition equipment and hands-on scientific research activities, all in exceptional viking comfort. we invite you to discover the world's seventh continent: antarctica.

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we're in the "closing bell" market zone now, cnbc markets commentator mike santoli is here to break down the crucial moments of this trading day. ch we are monitoring two tech earnings, what to expect from salesforce, kristina partsinevelos with what to look for on crowd strike. michael, what stands out to you today as the s&p gets back above 4,500? and there's some other things we can talk about too. >> yeah, back to levels the s&p first got to in about let's say mid-july so really, we haven't traveled too far above this so far in this rally, but i do think it's most of it going to script in terms of routine seasonal pullback as everybody's been talking about. nothing really got thrown off the rails. oil never got out of hand, yields went right up to the line of being very uncomfortable, didn't really stay there for long, and even the dollar has

pulled back. so i get we're in this mode where the economy seems resilient but not overheating. that pce number tomorrow, even is sort of bracing for the fact that it's not going to look in the surface to be that great i wonder if that matters that much at this point i don't think the fed has been the decisive factor in this market all year except in the sense that a patient and relatively data dependent fed is not making sudden moves is not getting in the way of what the market is doing. >> the stronger than expected economy has, though, been a key part of the story, and at least you -- you may have gotten a bit of a relief on that front today with the adp coming in below expectations, some of the other data was a little softer too ahead of the jobs report, let's not forget on friday. >> yes we have to stay in that middle zone of, you know, still growing, earnings still remaining supported because the economy is in decent shape, but not really getting back to the sort of late cycle, when's the

recession coming, what are the lag effects? the leading indicators don't look great i don't think we're that far from getting back in that mode for now i think the market pretty much has it right that it's a pretty good in between spot for the data. >> still get some key earnings reports, we are going to in overtime today as well, steve kovach first to you on what to expect from salesforce as we were discussing with dan ives a little earlier, just had a really nice run into this number that's a big one this afternoon. the story this year with salesforce, it's all about cutting costs and increasing those profits. we know there's activist investors like starboard, we're concerned the company is focused too much on top line revenue growth instead of profits and boy, they got what they wanted mass layoffs at the beginning of the year, plus getting rid of unneeded office space, and more recently price increases for its products now, for this report coming out in about ten minutes' time, street expecting revenue to grow about 10% year-over-year to more

than $8.5 billion. that would be a slowdown, though, in top-line growth from the 22% reported in the same quarter last year. and they're still grappling with a slowdown in enterprise software espending, unclear what that will improve. it's going to be really important to pay attention to the guidance. >> we will steve kovach, thanks very much to you kristina partsinevelos what should we look out for with crowd strike >> really it comes down to how much upside we see with its annual reoccurring revenue, especially net new reoccurring revenue, which happens over any growth that we're seeing quarter-over-quarter both those are key metrics for cyber security software names. and mizzou even suggesting buy side expectations for q2, arr just explain that is about 198 million bucks. there's been pressure on cyber names since mid-june the industry benefitted from the migration of the data center into the cloud, especially during the work from home period, there are concerns that the ai revolution will shift

capex spend to anything ai related and away tr cyber security competitor fort net lowered its outlook, so the mixed tone is why morgan stanley downgraded the stock earlier this week citing a spending slowdown from larger customers like meta and finds that crowd strikes current investments will put a hamper on its operating leverage those analysts are betting on a cut to annual reoccurring revenue, which is an important factor to this name. >> good stuff, kristina, thanks so much for that we've got the two-minute warning there. glad she set that up perfectly fortnet was kind of like oh, no, palo alto was okay it got you back now. let's see when crowd strike does. >> yes, i do think it all reinforces the idea that the total pie isn't growing particularly fast. if you go back two years ago, it seemed like there was no limit now it is a little bit of everybody's add to a budget comes from somebody else's to some degree, and also, the sales job so to speak of saying we are an ai beneficiary, not an ai

victim, that's universal at this point. and when it comes to salesforce, it's fascinating how quickly it has turned to, hey, we just took the costs down we're now a free cash flow story. forward free cash flow yield for salesforce is now higher than microsoft and oracle for the first time ever, and so what that means is that they're, i don't know, kind of telling you that shareholders are going to get share at this point, at least if it continues. i mean, obviously that can change, especially if the stock goes up a lot. but they're also going to say not only that, we're not only cutting costs but of course we are kind of right in place to be an ai beneficiary as well. >> you want to hit apple real quick back above the 50-day, this stock has been on a run as much as anything has lately. >> it's only about 5% from the highs. it's one of those deals where until it proves otherwise, when it has a 10% correction, when it looks like it's breaking down, you probably want to give it the benefit of the doubt as opposed to run the other direction it has had an outsized effect on

the s&p today. it's the biggest upside contributor, of course, so you know, people are betting somewhat excited, i guess, about the new product cycle. >> apple or nvidia or tesla as we've learned over the last couple of weeks, mike santoli, thank you very much. i'll see all of you tomorrow, have a great evening morgan and john pick it up at ot. stocks extending the rally, risk on amid a rate reprieve that is the score card on wall street welcome to "closing bell" overtime, i'm morgan brennan with jon fortt, we have got another busy hour of earnings coming your way including the dow's top performer this year, salesforce as well as chewy, pure storage, crowdstrike, five below and more >> we will bring you all the numbers, plus interviews warm front ceos of chewy and pure storage. as we await those earnings, let's talk markets, jo