good morning. welcome to "squawk box" here on cnbc. we are live from the nasdaq market site in times square. i'm becky quick along with joe kernen and andrew ross sorkin. the u.s. equity futures right now are a little bit weaker. the dow futures are off 60 points. nasdaq futures down 70. s&p futures down 15. it comes after a mixed day for the markets yesterday. the nasdaq a little lower. s&p and dow a little higher. you did see 6 of the 11 sectors higher. a mix across the board. treasury yields are down coming under pressure. it is back below 4.4% for the ten-year treasury at 4.39. the two-year sitting at 4.30. oil prices ticking up slightly

on the geopolitical concerns continuing to ratchet higher between russia and ukraine. right now, it looks like wti is up 1.75%. below $70 a barrel. the same tensions driving gold prices higher the last several sessions. you can see this morning, gold is up 4%. 2 $2,762 an ounce. and joe said we are close to $100,000. topping $97,000. it was in the $98,000 category a little bit before. there $97,803. bitcoin now up 40% since donald trump won office and elected a couple of weeks ago and has gained 160% in the past year alone. we have two big guests coming up to talk about that and so much more. galaxy ceo mike novogratz in the

7:30 half hour and the crypto component senator cynthia lummis of wyoming will join us at 8:10 a.m. >> lummis? >> it rhymes with hummus. >> i got it right. >> no. you said lume. it is not like the guy that dr. lumis. >> i think of carol. >> i think of dr. lumis. shares of nvidia losing ground this morning. it's definitely -- who is the lady we have on that we messed up for years and years? >> bartells. >> yes. profits and revenue beat estimates. sales nearly double in the quarter. the company had positive guidance and expects sales, big number, $75 billion in the

current quarter over 37.1. the company sales projections did not meet the highest expectations and we see stock under pressure. this is most valuable company on the planet. ceo jensen huang on the company's call last night. >> we'll ship more blackwells next quarter than this and we'll ship more blackwells the quarter after that than our first quarter. and, so, that kind of puts it in perspective. we are really at the beginnings of -- of two fundamental shifts in computing that is really, really quite significant. >> other chipmakers are under pressure this morning. we'll talk to an analyst about the stock coming up in a couple of moments. >> if you look at what happened last quarter to the stock, it was a similar situation where they beat expectations, but did not beat the highest expectations.

the stock was down on that, but up 17%. if you are looking at it year to date, it is up 95%. the pullback is not a big deal. i wouldn't read into this. i heard people say they haven't been able to keep up with demand. that's the problem i would like to have. we'll see. in the meantime, one of the richest people facing bribery charges. indian billionaire, gautam adani and others indicted by the justice department in the heme to pay officials $250 million to seek $250 billion in contracts. the claims against the company's chair are baseless. shares of adani green energy fell by 20% in india overnight. back in january of 2023, short

seller hindenberg called it the largest con in corporate history. adani also denying those allegations. meantime, let's get to the latest on the trump team building sessions. we had a few more names out there, but still no treasury pick just yet. megan cassella is now joining us from west palm beach for the latest. we are waiting for the white smoke to go up. >> reporter: we are sure are, andrew. good morning from west palm. like you said, no big names this time. a quiet day overall yesterday. we know the president-elect was hunkering down at mar-a-lago meeting with two top treasury candidates. kevin warsh meeting with trump about the position. we think that pick is imminent coming today or as early as this week, i heard the team soft circled by thursday to get this pick done. it looks like that timeline may still be on track.

what i can tell you is take a look, i think we can pull this up for you guys. the cabinet is really coming together here. we see how much work has been done in the just over two weeks since the election. of those formal cabinet senate approved positions, four left unfilled. treasury, agriculture, labor and housing and urban development. still moving at a rapid pace down here. much faster than the first trump term. the other thing that is moving forward down here, guys, the doge effort. the department of government efficiency led by vivek ramaswamy and elon musk. the pair laying out the op-ed putting together the clearest argument over what they plan to do and how they plan to do it. they laid out three main goals. cutting regulation and reducing costs and planning reductions in head counts across the board. what this amounted to, guys, is a shot across the bow ugh to ge

the authority. they believe the law is on their side and they believe that, if necessary, the supreme court would also be on their side. really setting the stage here, guys, for really potentially massive political and legal battle over the effort to streamline the government. something to watch as we wait on the treasury names. back to you. >> you are down there, megan, but in washington, can you speak to the jd/gaetz meetings and what that was like? i believe jd vance is doing more meetings today with the proposed defesecretary trying to get senators on board. >> reporter: absolutely. up there on capitol hill, jd vance returning back to the senate for the first time since the election to meet with the senators to try to get them on board with both of the picks.

i do think it is interesting to see that matt gaetz has taken most of the attention and taken the air out of the room. we are starting to hear from trump allies saying they wish he wasn't spending so much political capital on this pick right here. other allies of the president say this is moving forward at pace and this is really who he wants. that maybe we'll see how far it goes. so, we will see hegseth up there, too. what is interesting with both of these is reading the tea leaves from the commentary. most of the republican caucus willing to meet with them and hear them out, but not all willing to get on board saying there are a lot of questions. still a long road to go, but vance is making that argument for them. >> megan, fascinating seeing the vice president walking around and holding the meetings on his behalf. >> it -- >> typically for these type of candidates, it is a lower level person that shepherds them

around. >> everyone pulls one. everybody does recess appointments, too. not necessarily of high profile positions. the really weird thing is that i didn't realize is the different chambers can force the other chamber into recess. the senate can say, no, we're not doing that. the house can force the senate to do it. the house is so -- they still don't know. we've got so many seats left to be decided. it's going to be maybe more narrow than it already is. it's very complicated on who can call a recess appointment and who you need on board even to do that. >> definitely need the speaker of the house. >> yeah. i guess the senate majority leader, my daughter explained this, it not as important as the

speaker of the house because of the vice president. >> third in line, the speaker of the house. >> and the vice president. >> is the senate in charge. coming up, these guys were like amazing when they figured it out. coming up, more reaction on the nvidia results and demand outlook for the a.i. chips and what it could mean for the stock. we'll tell you about another tech name that is soaring this morning. i'm not going to tell you yet though. quk box" will be right back. >> announcer: this cnbc program is sponsored by baird. visit bairddifference.com.

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dad: you can talk to me. son: it's been really, really hard for me. welcome back. we told you another tech stock soaring this morning. that would be snowflake. it jumped 21% this morning. that is after the report of the stronger results on the top and bottom line. jon fortt spoke with the snow there snowflake ceo about the quarter. >> up 21% on the year and $5.7 billion. up 55% year on year. we upped our guidance for product guidance for the year to 29% which is pretty impressive

given our scale. our products in a.i. and data engineering and go to market notion are all humming. >> you can see the rest of the interview on "closing time" today. and surging demand for the a.i. chips, but as we mentioned, also issuing an upbeat forecast for the current quarter despite signs of slowing growth. that is what has people looking at the stock differently. vivek is the senior analyst at bank of america securities. what do you think of last night's numbers? >> good morning. i think before we look at last night's numbers, et's look at what they reported and the track record. it is not a small company. this is one of the largest, if not the largest company. they just put up a quarter where

sales grew 94% and earnings grew over 100%. they are guiding to where sales are slowing down, but over 70%. when i look at what they are able to accomplish next year, we think they can grow over 50%. i was just looking at the other so-called mag seven. nvidia will probably grow four or five times that growth rate next year and trading at less than one times earnings and the rest is over two times earnings growth. we think the numbers are exceptionally strong, but you are right, they were not able to come close to the so-called risk expectations. i think the risk is they are just at the start of ramping the blackwell supplies and it is just starting to get going. if i look at the usually range of beats versus guidance, i think that will get us pretty close to where we are expecting. i'm not worried. this is quarterly noise and the growing pains of the new product. >> what do you think the

disappointment is here then? >> sorry. can you say that again? >> what do you think the disappointment is here? >> the disappointment is the supply chain is ategized closely. it is followed by a lot of people. anytime of company reports, the expectations are there over what the stock has done. there are constraints in getting the supply and building the products and getting them to customers. what we have seen from nvidia over the two last year is they are able to beat their own guidance by $2 billion to $2.5 billion consistently. last time, they reported $35 billion. that's why i'm not surprised to see them not factly exactly come high end of he of expectations. when you look at the beats, they will come in line with the quarter. this is expectations in a

transition quarter. it is nothing to do with the long-term fundamentals of the company. >> your sense of the blackwell chip is it is going to knock it out of the park? is there anybody even in the vicinity competitively at this point? >> no. i think they lead the pack for a reason that delivering this product is more than a chip, right? you have to first of all be able to put 72 of them in a single rack and connect it with high speed and copper inter connects. you have to have a systems and software approach and millions of developers who know how to do something with it and have a range of relationships and relationships not only the supply chain, but with relationships with the enterprises with the cloud companies and i think that is an issue. the other thing to keep in mind is they are an industry with the large language models where the

language is changing self times a year and the ability to deliver the product ing from two years is exciting. there is not enough build out to support the industry. >> vivek, this is maybe a longer term challenge if you believe there is a challenge. there is a debate taking place inside the large language model whether the models themselves, the scaling of the models is happening at the pace it used to. this sort of hockey stick angle is slowing down. you saw sam altman take to twitter last week saying there is no wall saying there is no slowdown. what is your take on what is happening here? >> i think, you know, when we look at the technology industry, right, we used to have this industry fog r a while and everyone has been looking at the

death of the industry and here we are 50 years later. one version or another just keeps on going. when we look at the large language models, it started last year. we are just in the first one or two years. i think it's expected that the industry is going to take a step back. in fact, we saw microsoft ceo address the issue two ays ago. he is not seeing any slowdown in scaling. it's not just one company driving it. this is a global industry. you have many companies driving it in the direction of trading and inference. we do think that, you know, it's expected for the industry to, you know, pause and reflect from time to time. instead of changing the nature of the models three or four times a year, maybe they change it one or two times a year. the amount of computing infrastructure is required just to address what is already take >> what do you think -- for

those folks throughout who own the stock or wanting to own the stock, what is the fair value of the stock is? >> technology stocks tend to trade between one to two times their earnings growth rate. we have growing over 50% this year and the stock is trading over 30 times next ar. we still think it is competitive valuation. it depends. as i mentioned, when i look at the other so-called mag even, it is trading two times. >> vivek, thank you for joining us early this morning. we appreciate your perspective. look forward to talking to you soon. thanks. coming up, boeing ceo slamming the company culre yi the aerospace giant can't afford another mistake. we'll discuss that next. "squawk box" is coming right back.

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welcome back, everybody. boeing ceo kelly ortberg says the giant satisfy is facing ser problems and can't afford another mistake. a recording of the all-hands meeting where he called out wasteful spending and in- infighting. ortberg said we spend more time arguing over thinking about how we beat airbus. huge concern. we'll see what they do about it. coming up, when we return, the justice department, this is big. they want google to get rid of chrome officially. we will bring you more on big

government versus big tech. as we head to break, a look at yesterday's s&p 500 winners and losers. >> announcer: executive edge is sponsored by at&t business. next level moments need the next level network. it all started with a small business idea. it's a pillow with a speaker in it! that's right craig. pulling in the perfect team to get the job done. i'm just here for the internets. at&t, it's super-fast! you locked us out?! and when thrown a curveball... arrggghh! ahhhh! [crashing sounds] we had everything we needed. is the internet out? don't worry, we have at&t internet back-up. the next level network for small business. ♪♪ i sold a pillow!

good morning. welcome back to "squawk box." live from the nasdaq market site in times square. checking the futures this morning, mixed and not big moves either way. yesterday, dow finally eked out a gain. nasdaq was flat. check out bitcoin. big gains both on the percentage basis and number. almost $4,000 gain. let's talk about big tech. talk about google and other things. united kingdom competition regulator will soon announce behavior remedy over the anti-competitive practices. the regulator is expected to

announce a remedy to solve the issues in the sector including amazon and microsoft. including one of the sources, there's a chance that google may be excluded from the competition given its smaller size compared to those leaders aws and microsoft azure. meantime, that's in the uk. back home, the justice department calling for google to divest the chrome browser to a more equal playing field for search competitors. the federal judge called that google holds a monopoly in the search market and now all of this will go to court and appeals and go on for many years and the question of taking chrome out of the game changes the business materially or not. >> solves the problems that the government has with that. would that do it? >> i don't know. look, as i said, i'm now using -- i use google.

i've used perplexity. i was using chatgpt just yesterday. it's a different game. >> i think the bigger issue for investors in this is what it forces management to do in terms of fighting and dealing with it. that was the question with microsoft. bill gates blamed the government's deep investigation into the company and all the dealings back and forth with why microsoft dropped the ball along the way. that's why. >> a mine share stoirg.ry. how much time do you have to spend with your lawyers and think about these issues and what kinds of things you go off and do ambitiously. if there is a white board of things you want to try to do. >> this narrows that scope dramatically. microsoft's reaction is to have brad smith, who is in washington all the time, say let us help you however we can which is what they did with the last activision blizzard situation.

they changed their dealings with washington. it's a major focus of how that company operates and jor of how they dealt with it. >> we will see how matt gaetz deals with all of these issues soon enough. >> even google chrome? >> even saying. that i don't know his feelings on that. i did see elon musk say something. >> the google case started under trump. >> it did. elon says the real test of how good a.i. is is that it would be able to predict the future. you would think that which you don't think -- >> i thought we wanted them to be smarter than people. who could predict the future? >> that's how smart it could be. the other thing is he's not a libertarian. he says the government, when it

does things, is not great at them because it has no incentive to satisfy customers. i guess that's what we always said. if you don't have a profit incentive which makes you watch everything and mind your ps and qs. >> the doge op-ed in the journal and vivek and usk wrote it and they are doing it include executive action. they will be doing that across the board. >> it is also who is coming around to where maybe -- i saw ray dalio, the last person i would think who -- >> nobody likes to see waste. the problem with bureaucracy is the focus on processes, not the focus on outcomes. it could require a better way. >> increase innovation for the whole country at large. it could be -- i read something. i don't know. you see crazy stuff in social

media. i might put it down for a while. >> it would be good for your mental health. when we come back, president-elect trump putting his team together. will we hear about a treasury secretary pick today or tomorrow? we'll have more on that story next. "squawk box" will be right back. >> announcer: currency check is sponsored by interactive brokers. the best informed investors choose interactive brokers.

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president-elect trump putting his team together and the markets are focused on a potential treasury secretary pick.

joining us now with more is jake sherman from punch bowl news. if lutnick is in at commerce to take care of the tariffs stuff, can they now get a treasury guy or gal who is not definitely sort of a good cop-bad cop? it is harder to get the markets go gher if you are totally on board with trifrs ariffs across board. can they get warsh on board or do they need someone on board with more controversial policies? >> joe, i have conversations with the trump transition every day with the selections. i wish i could chart a graph with who is up and down in the treasury secretary realm. it's stunning how much this has shifted on a day-to-day basis between lutnick, who is out, and scott bessent and mark rowan of

apollo. i have a tough time keeping up who is up and who is down. there are knocks on all of these people internally. what i would say is that very quickly trump needs to make this decision because he is all -- this is just from the 30,000 point of view, he needs to find somebody that is easily confirm able. he stacked up several people and wasting political capital and energy in the senate on nominations that are going to be ex-tremely difficult or impossible to get through. it needs to happen quickly and needs to be someone who has a good chance of getting through. >> it could be more than one? in other words, some people think you have one that you have to pull and that takes some of the pressure off some of the less controversial, but still controversial figures. >> here's what i would say, joe, on the tariff front. i don't understand why people

think this person, whoever he puts in at treasury, will have any leeway to make decisions out of trump's mouth. this is someone executing trump's agenda. i don't know why the narrative is one is better than the other on tariffs or on protectionist policy. it's just not reality. this person is going to have to work within the constraints of congress and constraints of the president-elect and then president trump enacting the agenda. >> then he's not going to pick someone independent. he is already thinking about jeff sessions. kevin warsh -- he would tell trump. others would tell trump, no, i'll disagree with you. you think he wants a lap dog. someone who is a lap dog is someone he'll pick? >> i don't think being in the president's cabinet in any administration is following his

policy. i heard yesterday out of the trump transition world that people were souring on mark rowan because he has given over the course of his long time in finance a lot of money to democrats. including $50,000 to hillary clinton in 2016. >> oh. >> i don't know that -- i don't know that -- >> trump gave money to hillary clinton. >> of course. >> they were at his wedding. i saw him there. >> by the way, guys, it is not unusual as you know in finance, who gives money across the board. in fact, i think that would be welcome in many quarters of capitol hill. i don't quite understand that. scott bessent is somebody who worked for george soros where the republican party has been saying is the devil. >> what is the line? >> my betting line is i don't listen to polymarket or any of

the betting sites at all. >> maybe you should have for the election, jake. >> i didn't have a prediction on the election because, joe, i say the only way to make a wrong prediction is to make a prediction. >> jake, for those of us who read the wall street journal op-ed. i don't know if you had an opportunity to look at it. >> i did. >> elon musk and vivek ramaswamy laying out the aims with doge to make the government more efficient. talked a lot about the efforts to do this mostly through executive action and sort of internal operations as opposed to anything that would require congress' help. i was struck by one sentence and maybe you can explain it to me. they say they plan to quote take aim at the $500 billion plus in annualex-penditures that are unauthorized by congress or not used in the way intended. specifically, they mention the

corporation for public broadcasting and planned parenthood. i can be wrong and you know more than do. the corporation for public broadcasting and fair debate whether ople want to fund it or not fund it. that was created by congress in the '60s and approved by the congress every two years. i'm trying to understand how you cut that without congress. >> you can't. let me defend my honor, joe. i did not hope anyone won the election. >> i know. no, i know. i can always tell when you're on. you have no presentedpredelecti. >> they will not be successful, andrew, let's start with this. the drivers of federal debt and deficit are entitlements and

military spending. you can cut around the edges. by the way, they will be able to cut around the edges without congress a whole host of ways. there are some expenditures that are at agencies and various facets of the government that are not directly impacted and directly directed by congress. i don't quite -- i think if they look for money that is going to -- the corporation for public broadcasting and planned parenthood, they are wasting time and not finding much money. listen, the big picture here is musk and ramaswamy have the ability to suggestion to congress. they have not asked to make their efforts statutory. there are ways this thing could be successful. he could go to congress and ask for anything that musk or ramaswamy finds should be subject to -- not be subject to

the filibuster and should get an immediate vote in the house of representatives. they have not done this. this seems to me a blue ribbon commissioner or vanity project. >> they say all employees should come back to the office. there are some people who should resign. there is an interesting piece in the journal today about people working by tele-working, if you will, and so much started after 9/11 during the bush administration and that is made -- these people arguing, made the country safer because in some cases, you had things spread out and, therefore, you had double and triple backups, if you will. i just don't know how much -- i hear you saying you don't think much is going to happen. if you told all of the employees have to come back to work, i assume you have a lot of rest

you resignation and if you cut $50 billion or $150 billion out of the budget. that's not $2 trillion. nobody wants money to be misspent or wasted. >> there's a lot of money that is so. listen, the president does have the authority to order people back into the office. he doesn't need congress to do that. he can force regulations in doing that. i think that would be something that would trim around the edges, but not trim in a major way. >> still better to see it operate the same way businesses do. a reflection of people who work in the private sector. >> that would help the economy here in washington where entire chunks of downtown washington are uninhabited because the government is not back in and corporations are not back in. i will say this, they say they will put a doge official in every single office and department in the government. listen, maybe this is good. at the end of the day, to make

any real change, you need congress. by the way, government funding is going to be up in the next couple months. every, you know, 12 or so months, this happens. they better get to work because it's not going to be something they can do on an ad hoc basis. >> okay. jake, great to see you this morning. thank you for bringing us the news as you always do. when we come back, banana inflation. yup. unique and expensive piece of art. not the banana you can buy at the store, but you could buy at the store as duct tape you can buy at the store. sotheby's auction with details. the most expensive banana in the world. "squawk box" is coming right back. >> announcer: this cnbc program is sponsored by truist securities. experience, expertise, execution.

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welcome back, everybody. this may be the most expensive banana and single piece of duct tape of all time. the duct-tape banana sold at sotheby's for $6.2 million. 6.2. it last sold in 2019 for $120,000. robert frank said the return on the banana is more than 25 times and twice the return on nvidia stock. that's a real banana and it's going to ripen and get gooshy and gooey. you have the right to create the art with your own banana and prove you did this. that's what went for $6.2

million. good pay day if you can get it. when we come back, the tale of two rivals. walmart and target going in opposite directions after reporting earnings this week. what this is telling us about the consumer. long time executive is going to join us. later, the great one. hockey legend wayne gretzky is going to join us at 8:20 a.m. eastern time. we get his take on the state of sport and one of his records that could fall this yr. quk box" will be right back. elps of the biggest challenges in financial markets. if we focus on the mortgage market and follow the life of a loan from origination right through its pricing in the capital markets, our data science capabilities can provide a deep level of insight. at ice we have extensive data sets, especially around three pillars. the property, the mortgage and mortgage performance. this trifecta of data and its history is a bit of a data scientist's holy grail. ♪♪

come back, everybody. walmart is taking the lead in retail sector after strong

earnings for the week and target plunging. now with us on the state of the consumer is manny tirico. he is the former chairman and ceo of pvh. manny, thank you for being with us this week. this is something a lot of people are trying to figure out. is walmart the outlier here or is target? what do you think? >> becky, that's a great question. i think you also have to look at what's going on in the two companies. walmart is clearly signaling to the consumer that they're delivering value, particularly in the food and household goods categories. the other thing walmart has done really well over the last three years is they brought in the assortment of merchandise mix. it is much stronger today than three years ago. it has become a place where consumers are comfortable going shopping. target, over the last three years, has had some challenges.

inventory is overly elevated and clearing new goods. target's strength has been the brand assortment. today, in this environment, that just doesn't carry enough weight and their value message is nearly not as strong as what you're seeing at walmart. on top of that, when you just look at the numbers, the execution, inventory looks elevated going into the holiday season and there is a real concern there is continued margin pressure going through the fourth quarter which, obviously, has put profits at risk. i think the signal on the consumer, i mean, if you listen to the tjx call, they talked about 40 quarter off to a really strong start and i think you are hearing that message at a number of other retailers. so, i think it's going to be a mixed message and i think there are real winners and losers out there. >> in terms of having inventory and not having consumers show up

for the discretionary areas like apparel. brian cornell said they expected consumers would show up in more force in the fall. that didn't happen. they're hoping it happens around the holiday season, but that will impact profits. >> becky, that's a great point. if you look at the back to school season, it started off relatively strong. august, early september and then the second half, the unseasonably warm weather put a tremendous amount of pressure. apparel, sweaters, cold weather apparel. boots. those categories really struggled. there's been a resurgence in those categories starting the second week of november. business has really improved, but i think what you'll see as these retailers start to report in the next week or two is a real indicator will be what

inventory positions look like going into the holiday season and will they need to be much more promotional to move through goods as now the consumer is coming back. and another point, this holiday season, we're losing a week of selling between thanksgiving and christmas. this happens every ive or six years. it just intensifies the year and inventory levels just become critical. >> a big part of it is the discretionary spending. i think target has 60% of the mix discretionary and walmart is 20%. how do you feel about that because the apparel retailers suffered base on what target had to say yesterday. are there some in particular getting tarnished unfairly? >> if you look at the overall retail environment, one category is strong which is the discount

retailers, tjx, ross stores and burlington. they are clearly sending a signal on value and availability of excess inventory in the market that they're really going to have strong assortments going into the holiday season. i think they will continue to perform. i think department stores and specialty apparel retailers, specialty footwear retailers i think as a group are going to continue to have challenges as they move forward. if you look at what happened in the markets, you know, walmart went up, the discounters all hung in there and just about every other general retailer over the last week has really seen their stock move down with this concern that's overhanging the market. look, i think there's some real strong exceptions to that, and no surprises, it is just the players are going to continue to

be strong. i think abercrombie and fitch, the ceo there has just done an amazing job of repositioning that company. the merchandise looks terrific, and i would be shocked if their sales didn't trend to outperform just based on my visit and what i'm seeing at the store. you know, dick's sporting goods, the last two years, performance has been outstanding. i think both of those retailers have just done an amazing job leading those companies and the execution companies have just been off the charts. >> yeah. >> i would anticipate those two companies will continue to perform, but i think the overall category of specialty retail apparel will be under pressure. >> manny, thanks a lot. >> great to see you. take care. >> you too. take care. it is just about 7:00 a.m., 7:01 on the east coast.

you are watching "squawk box." the justice officially calling for google to devest its chrome web browser in a filing. the doj arguing forcing the company to do so would create a more equal playing field for competitors. google said it will appeal. bitcoin watch this morning. getting close to $100,000. it is now over $98,000 this morning and we will speak to the galaxy ceo about that move in a bit. starbucks reportedly weighing options for its business in china. it could include selling a stake in the operations or potential strategic partnerships. china is the second biggest market globally for starbucks but it is facing competition from local brands. we talked to brian nichols, the company's ceo, recently about that prospect and he said it was on the table.

sounds like here we are. this morning a lot happening with the dow as manning seeing a 71-point upward presser so far in the premarket. nasdaq is down. not too bad for nvidia, which is off a little. let's get to dom chu, probably will be touching on some of the names with the morning market premovers. hey, dom. >> joe, becky, andrew, yes, we will start with nvidia shares because as joe points out they're falling but only down by about just 1% despite a beat on profits and revenues for the quarter. revenue growth slowed slightly from the second quarter but still up 94% on a year-over-year basis. the ceo signaling optimism for the blackwell ai chip, saying, quote, we will deliver more blackwells this quarter than we previously estimated. nonetheless, after a 190% run year-to-date pulling back 1%. palo alto falling as well, breaking down to 2.5%. a similar story here, posting

better-than-expected revenues and profits in its quarter as well. the cybersecurity company is looking for raising its guidance into year-end. it is also announcing a two-for-one stock split by the way that will take place after the close on friday, december 13th. palo alto netanyahu down roughly 2.. snowflake shares are soaring, up 21% right now after a major beat for its quarter, issuing better-than-expected fourth quarter guidance as well. management is forecasting momentum will snowball into year-end. they're raising the gross margins guidance. the ceo spoke with jon fortt after the results last night. listen. >> the revenue off 29% year on year, obligations at $5.7 billion, up 55% year on year. the guidance for product guidance for the year to 29%, which is pretty impressive given our scale and our product in ai,

data, engineering, also go-to-market motion all are humming. >> for more call on the quarter, tune in to jon fortt's first on cnbc interview with ramaswamy. it happens today. back over to you. >> very good, dom. thanks. see you later. still to come this morning, the dow breaking a four-day losing streak yesterday. we will talk about the latest market move and what investors should be focused on. late, bitcoin topping $97,000, inches ever closer to $100,000. galaxy ceo michael novogratz will be here to talk about it. "squawk box" will be right back.

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(gentle breeze) - [announcer] eyes forward. don't drive distracted. let's talk overall markets. joining us is alexandra watson. goldman sachs asset management. good to see you. >> good to see you, too. >> there's kind of a feeling there are some animal spirits from the election that are sort of rippling across a lot of different markets. is that true? are there specific stocks just a buyer -- will they all be, you know, at 22 times, i wonder, you know, how much is left, even if there are animal spirits. >> i think it is a great question. there are many reasons to recalibrate portfolios going into next year. >> now you sound like jay

powell. >> yeah. >> are we recalibrating. >> it is a great person to sound like. >> oh, yes. >> i think that in the short term we see a lot of reasons for the macro to continue to pass through into markets and that there's a lot of momentum when you look at surprise indices and the breadth within them and, you know, the valuations, yes, they are high, but you know what? they've been high all year. so we continue to see some opportunity and momentum. you know, that said, i think next year is going to be more of a show-me-don't-tell-me story. it will give an opportunity for the belly of the index since bases like mid caps and more in the financial sector where we can see some of the business models get unhandcuffed. >> how many variables are there in this new political environment? i mean we've got possible cost cutting from elon and ramaswamy,

obviously. we've got possible extensions of tax cuts and a widening theoretically of the deficit. you've got tariffs. are these all conflicting, they're pulling different ways some of these things? what is bullish? >> well, when you take a step back, one of the things that we've been focused on is the market looking to price trump 1.0 and 2.0 the same and we don't think that's going to be the case, in particular when it looks at the prioritization and the speed at which things start to come out. now, wholistically there's what washington can do versus what congress can do, so we're more focused on what would be imminent, which is on the tariff side. you know, when we do our baseline outlook, we still have the base case, you know, pretty strong, resilient growth within the u.s., albeit some stickier inflation. one of the things that could be a tail event is the level and degree at which protectionism ends up, you know, being the dominant force in the market.

but wholistically we are still focused on those macro variables in particular in the united states, and most of it on average continues to be pro-growth and cyclically pro-growth. >> is deregulation pro-growth, and i guess interest rate cuts are good for the market, but could those be curtailed if inflation from the tariffs comes back? >> yeah, they very well could be. but when you look at the way the market is priced right now, in particular u.s. rates, i mean it is pretty hawkish. we've only got two cuts before may. not only is it pricing in inflation as sticky but pricing in acceleration there. >> you are thinking we are tight, given the bitcoin, the stock market, everything else, it doesn't really look like we're slowing things down. it doesn't look like there's any reason to cut at all. >> if you look at some of the outright variables which is the labor market which has driven a

lot of the tightness and levels of inflation that we've seen. >> that's easing? >> it is easing, yeah, and we will see more data today. but on average the rate of growth in jobs, the quits rate, the wage, inflation, all is getting to a better place. >> you are multi-asset, would you be buying any duration at all. >> we are really focused on where in the kev. >> where are you? >> we're in the front end of the curve. we think there's opportunity for fiscal slippage with some of the announcements that come out. on the other side of the coin is deregulation or changing ratios for banks could open up a new buyer for the belly of the curve. >> almost for everything that's positive, i can find something negative, and for everything that's negative i can find something positive. >> is it glass half full or half empty, which do you take? >> i think it is always both. >> yeah. if you look at what is happening in the market, risk premium at 20-year lows, and people could

have taken the other side of the trade all year around. >> liquidity off the charts now. >> yeah. >> money market. >> i guess glass half full or glass half empty is where you think it is headed. >> exactly. in our view, we're still bullish on the u.s. it is very different outside of the u.s. we see a lot of room for risk, but now that's in the price too because you are seeing one of the most extreme bases in european equity prices verse the united states at 25%. so it is really going to be a picker's market over there. >> what should we pick then? >> we are looking a lot at dividends, dividend-paying stock. income is going to be important. it is a huge diverse fire and there's a lot of room for it to increase overtime. >> the new comcast is going to have-- >> put that on the buy list for next christmas. >> we are in an interesting position, where we are.

>> yeah. >> not everybody else, not all of the other assets talk about stocks and stuff all day long. >> this is true. >> i think jon fortt might be coming up with something fairly interesting. >> oh, it is in the tease! that's where we're going next. great segue. when we come back, comcast mentioned the spin-off, including the one you are watching at this mount. jon fortt is here to way in. he will tell you whether it is a good idea or bad idea. yeah, management is watching. "squawk box" comes right back after this. time for today's trivia question. who was the first u.s. astronaut to travel to space? the answer when "squawk box" returns. aflac! like how aflac pays people money for the expenses health insurance doesn't cover. aflac! health insurance does leave a gap. but aflac gives people money to help close that gap. aflac! oh! coach prime got one on the line too baby! uh huh! see that's how you hold up a trophy.

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and now the answer today's aflac trivia question. who was the first u.s. astronaut to travel to space. the answer, alan b. shepard jr. in may of 1961, shepard made a 15-minute sub orbital flight in the freedom 7 spacecraft which reached an altitude of 115 miles. welcome back, everybody. cnbc parent comcast announcing this week it intends to spin-off its cable networks into a

separate company. jon fortt is here to weigh in. good morning, jon. >> good morning, becky. this is awkward since cnbc is one of the cable kids being sent away. how come bravo gets to stay home with mom and dad? i always knew bravo was the favorite kid. no. the internet promised to bust a bundle and let us practice a la cart but it never happened. we swapped the cable bundle for broadband wireless instead of paying $12 to buy a cd we pay $12 for spotify or apple music. etflix is the new hbo. while the business model for premium content has changed the demand for it hasn't. in the case of the cable properties comcast is spinning out, this will give them an opportunity to rethink themselves as more than channel numbers on a schedule. they can become experts and specialists in areas their audience are passionate about

and become conveners of communities through events and special membership, not justicing vehicles. for the ones who truly know their audience there's as much money to be made, becky. >> okay. the arguments against it include things like these are being spun out because they're cash cows, they aren't growing, and in the past when we have seen it play out with private equity, private equity came in and maybe in the case of magazines and newspapers kind of bled it dry. >> well, becky, as a veteran of magazines and newspapers, on the other hand this comcast spin is the death knell for cable networks. we have seen this movie before. some channels are struggling to recover from lost carriage fees. cable companies used to pay them to lure subscribers, some miss the revenue now going to tiktok and instagram. crucially, most are riding out the sinking ship rather than making radical choices to build new business approaches. the private equity sharks are circling with a new media

executive riding shotgun, they'll swim in and get them to work, throwing in a digital property every now and then, borrow heavily and cut staff to milk cash while calling it innovation while not so secretly hoping a big tech company will buy them out, which they won't. they will be replaced when the new ted turner will create the powerhouse channels from scratch because he isn't burdened with legacy headaches, becky. >> the argument is content is king and content needs to find new di triggs. >> i absolutely believe it. got good content here. >> that's the question. content may be king, but the math of that content, the economics of the consent shifted so materially and what that ultimately looks like, i don't know. there was a fascinating piece that puck put together, i don't know if you were reading it, both -- the cohan piece and the byers piece looking at tpg and

the acquisition of directv as a model which has been quite successful. it has been for the most part riding it for cash, not necessarily growing the business. >> right. and i was part of night ritter, the number two newspaper chain in the '90s but it was taken out by private equity and sort of moved around to media news group and other places and it didn't work out so well. but there's opportunities to build here if the companies get on the ball. >> we do need to keep a sense of humor i guess. >> i strongly believe that. >> all of the parental stuff, i talked about that too. when i found out it was like one of my parents was telling me they were getting divorced. then it was almost like, so, you know, mom's kid with the new husband is bravo and they get to stay but i'm going to boarding school or something, are we problem children? >> cnbc would be going to boarding school. >> we're heading to boarding school. >> some of the others are going to military school.

>> did i misbehave? i need some super glue. what were you going to say? >> i was going to ask a different question. we were talking about actually that puck piece, which is, you know, if you spin the company off, you don't have a tax liability, but two years later technically you can sell the company. so you can sell the company at the stepped up basis, right. that's the interesting part. so that could actually -- there would be an almost automatic premium maybe on the stock for at least the first two years. >> brian loves this and i'm sticking with it. >> exactly, exactly. >> but i'm curious how you see it all playing itself out. >> they're not going to change anything in our bedroom, i hope, because we're coming back from boarding school and our stuff will still be there. >> really? >> i don't know. >> sometimes you do need to leave the nest too, you know, otherwise you will be one of the 25 year olds, you know, that are still in their parents insurance. >> the best way to figure this out is to read about it in the

"on the other hand newsletter" where you are scrutinize each argument. or you can type in cnbc.com and get the full text to share. >> thank you, sir. >> i had some other funny things i was thinking of. >> let's go to commercial. coming up, mcdonald's is loving -- you know, i heard the mcrib might be coming back. >> da-da-da-bum-ba. >> slurpee. >> they do it the same way they do the chicken nuggets, slurry. then mike november ogratz o sharp-moving bitcoin and where prices might be headed. we are coming right back. better questions can lead to better solutions. t. rowe price. invest with confidence.

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all right. mcdonald's is working on a new mcvalue approach for 2025. cnbc has learned it includes keeping a $5 value meal offer in first half of the year and introducing a buy-one-add-one option for a dollar more. franchisees are voting on the value offerings but it looks like the initiative will pass. it includes a double

cheeseburger, mcchicken sandwich, mcnugget and small fries. look at their stock since they introduced the $5 meal in june, up 12%. you have seen the pull back that came with the issues around the -- was the quarter pounder that had the issues? i've forgotten already. >> yeah. >> so the quarter pounder. >> it was onions. >> onions that were on it, those issues have been resolved. they're back in the sails. you can see the pickup with the $5 meal, it was a huge boom for the company and the stock. pulled back a little bit year-to-date, you see the bigger numbers over six months, up about 8%. on the other side, bitcoin's run, can it continue. galaxy ceo mike novogratz will be here. and then later, quesne gretzky will be our special gut thesis morning. you do not want to go anywhere. we're coming right back.

this cnbc program is sponsored by --

welcome back to "squawk box." take a look at the futures right now. we've got green on the screen, dow up 162 points, nasdaq looking to open 48 points

higher, s&p 500 up about 18 points. look at shares of nvidia, now down a little over a dollar. this after being much lower earlier this morning after missing some of the -- well, i should say some of the expectations but they hit the expectations but i think people had even higher expectations. then look at this one because bitcoin closing in on $100,000. it was actually up at $98,000 briefly before, now at $97,826. joining us to talk about that galaxy founder and ceo mike novogratz. we are closing in as we said, 100. when does it happen, sir? >> you know, today, tomorrow, it feels almost inevitable at this point. you know, when markets get close to targets they hit them. listen, what i think listeners have to understand is when donald trump got elected there was a paradigm change, and we have a hard time trading paradigm changes. what i mean by that is four

years with a really harsh regulatory and political climate for people in this industry, and now open wide open. the entire cabinet almost owns bitcoin and is proponents of digital assets. kennedy said his whole net worth is in bitcoin. the people around that table are very pro this space, they're pro innovation, they're pro digital assets, they pro bitcoin. i think the rest of the world has to take notice and we are seeing it. we are seeing it with buying from the mid east. right now there seems to be almost an inexhaustible demand from the public equity markets. you look at microstrategy, what michael saylor is doing. that's the big buyer of crypto right now, people funding in the equities, using those monies to buy bitcoin. but, you know, normally you hit 100, you bounce off of it. i would not be surprised if, you know, we go much higher. we are in price discovery. there's not a lot of supply. there had been a giant seller

for the last week between 92, 93, 94, probably $14 billion, $15 billion in bitcoin sold there. i know because we saw the buying, not us but the u.s. market. >> as a trader though, if you are just trying to trade this, as you know so well, it is -- there are times when it blows through whatever you think the target is, and 100 you are saying now, maybe it blows through that. there's also been remarkable retrenchments where, you know, it retraces 50%. >> yes. listen, there's a lot of lift. i don't think it will redigitize 50%. i'm confident we don't go back below 80, very confident. that's where we took off for, 76, 77, you know, preelection, that election move. it would be shocking to me if we went back. but, listen, there's a ton of leverage in the system right now. you look at the three-times dlefrd microstrategys, etfs. you look at the under funding ro

do crypto. so the crypto community is leveraged to the gills so there will be a correction. >> speak to that because every time you say the word leverage, i think those who are risk managers, it is like a red flag. they hear that and it is like a bell goes off, leverage in the system. we are talking about two, three times leverage, and i don't know if you think that's too much leverage. but if that were to, quote, unquote, break, who wow it manifest itself? >> listen, biotechnology coin is a 50, 60 pole asset and why do you need leverage on it, but people have leverage on it. microstrategys 100-plus evolved stock and to double leverage that, you know, seems like you are asking for trouble at one point. so there will be some sharp corrections certainly in the stocks that are more levered than, you know, the underlying commodity itself.

>> right. >> by definition there has to be. >> michael has been hugely successful. his strategy has -- it is not a microstrategy, it is a macro strategy at this point for him. >> he is as the crypto community will call him a chad. he is one of the most eloquent crypto spokesman out there. he had a strategy people believed in, it's worked. listen, does it feel very, you know, very energetic right now, and there are a lot of people as they say creeping in, yes, so it is a lot more dangerous than it was $150 ago. every time he issues stock he is buying bitcoin and right now the public equity markets are giving it to him. >> and you think that they should be? >> i personally would tell my investors to buy straight bitcoin. it is a little less risky or a lot less risky, and i don't think in an environment like

this you need as much risk. i mean bitcoin is giving you 50vol and it already has moved a lot. >> let me ask you this question. so a lot of -- you know, everyone here is saying, okay, it is going up, it is -- you know, when trump gets into office there's going to be a regulatory scheme that's going to make sense, that's going to help make it even more popular. the question that i would ask you is what are the things that you think this administration are going to do in terms of regulations or lack of regulations or whatever that's going to make it more popular, either day to day, hopefully not just as a speculative asset but as something that has a bigger and better use case? >> so, listen, if you think of bitcoin as anything other than digital gold, i think you are missing the point. why is it going higher? the trump administration is going to allow the rest of

traditional finance into this space, and so citibank and bank of new york and state street and goldman sachs will have a chance soon enough to buy and sell, to lend, to do options, to innovate. that unlocks a huge amount of capital to come into this space, so that's the biggest thing, right. right now banks can't hold crypto on their balance sheets, for goodness sakes. that will change relatively quick. >> if that were to happen, woo what are we talking about? call it 100,000 now, once that happens is it baked into the prices or would you say 200,000? >> we're moving in that direction, right. like if you think about gold at -- what is gold? $16 trillion now. i haven't looked recently. probably close to $16 trillion, right? that's 18,000 bitcoin.

young people don't like gold, bitcoin is their gold. they live in a digital world. as the money goes from baby boomers to younger people there's a natural progression to bitcoin. it should catch fire in the next five to ten years. >> depending on the size of the market. >> yes. so that would be 800,000 bitcoin. it is not going to get there overnight, but one of the things holding back on bitcoin, innovation in the whole crypto sector, was an aggressive sec and u.s. government. that's all going to change. i think don't underestimate. you have to give a shout-out to the crypto community who persevered in small meet-ups. hitting $100,000 will be a big deal for that giant group of people that have spent a long time. and, remember, this whole experiment got life because of fiscal instability, right, because governments just kept

running larger deficits. >> to that point, if elon musk and vivek ramaswamy do their job, one would think -- >> and i watch this very closely. i mean, you know, the same president picking linda mcmahon who run education and matt gaetz to run attorney general might have four of the best i can think of with any combination of those guys that are the a team. those guys plus elon and vivek, if they actually bend the curve of debt, gdp, if they cut our deficit, if they increase efficiency the story of bitcoin is less appealing. to do that they're going to have to tackle social security and medicare. then they have to get through a very close congress, right? the senate is three seats, four seats. the house is four or five seats.

>> wait a second. donald trump himself says he doesn't want to tackle social security and medicare and cut people's benefits. >> you can't cut the deficit unless you attack those. >> i can't imagine him doing that just because it is something he has always been opposed to. he is not going to want to tableau back from take blow back from the people who put him in the office. >> and if that's the case, which is the case people are betting on with great intentions, bitcoin goes higher, bitcoin goes higher, we have to keep printing dollars. >> final question because you have been good sort of talking about both sides of the debate here, one being that, you know, bitcoin is going higher given so many folks in the administration own it, that the regulations are going to be set up so that banks can participate, all of that. that would be on the good end. but on the other end you are saying, you know what? this president might be so successful at creating more efficiency, at getting our

fiscal house in order, if you believe all of that, that it actually bad for bitcoin. so which side are you betting on? >> i'm long a lot of bitcoin right now. it has a ton of momentum. remember, the u.s. is one part of the global economy, right. the rest of the world also has to wake up. the only country that really has taken the ax to cost and inflation is argentina. so we'll see if the rest of the world becomes, you know, argentina. they put themselves in a really tough recession. those are politically difficult things to do. but when i look at globally and in so many places, i mean look at gdp of nigeria over the last five years and what has happened to it because the currency keeps depreciating. it just doesn't grow. >> right. >> right. and so bitcoin is a global currency or a global asset. it is the only asset in my lifetime that people in every country participate in, and so that's a lot of where the power comes from. now you have the leader of the

free world saying this is important. i just think it is a paradigm shift. >> mike novogratz, always great to see you. thank you, sir. >> thanks, guys. >> you bet. all right. when we come back a breakdown of the trump tax and tariff plans. robert frank takes a look at who will benefit and who may get hurt. that's next. also, take a look at shares of nvidia this morning. this comes after last night's earnings report that beat expectations on every count. did not beat the highest of estimates on wall street though. as a result it was down a little earlier, but it is making some moves on this. at this point it is down by less than .7 of a percent. we will break down the quarter and more importantly talk about e chip maker's outlook. "squawk box" will be right back. in the after hours, bro. dad, is mommy a “finance bro?” she switched careers to make money for your weddings. ooh! penny stocks are blowing up. sweetie, grab your piggy bank, we're going all in. let me ask you. for your wedding, do you want a gazebo and a river?

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look at the president-elect's tax and tariff plan. >> good morning, joe. president-elect trump has two big plans that would impact the after-tax income of taxpayers. first, of course, is extension of 2017 tax cuts. extending those helps about three-quarters of americans with those at the top benefitting the most. the top 1% would get an effective tax cut of about 6% while middle income tax holds get a cult t of 2%. just about everyone benefits. on the other side, they're more aggressive since the lower class spend a good share of their income on goods. so those at the bottom see a decline in income of about 2% due to tariffs, those at the topple see a drop of about half a percent. if you add the two plans together, which is important, tariffs and taxes, here is what you get by 2035. lower earners would see a tax increase of about .6%. the middle class would basically

be flat, and those at the top would see the biggest tax cut of about 4%. so the slightly regressive tax cuts combined with the highly regressive tariffs would shift the tax burden from those at the top to those at the bottom. now, the big swing factor here, joe, would be growth and to what extent that offsets if you get wage growth at the bottom, that could help offset what the two plans combined would otherwise do. >> we don't know anything though, do we? >> here is what we do know. we do know that the republicans who say we can't extend these tax cuts and add to the budget are saying tariffs will help offset it, right. they're saying the tariffs will be -- >> what about removing the salt cap? we don't know whether they will do that. >> that will add to it. >> we don't know if they're going to do it. >> they need some offset. >> yeah, to do that? >> to do all of this. >> or raising the cap above where it is. they couldn't remove it completely. wouldn't it be a deficit buster?

>> correct. i don't see them changing salt in a way that makes it more deficit friendly. >> did you ever see a republican taking the social security taxes, just having no cap on those? they proposed that on the left. >> yeah. >> on the left. >> yeah. >> but it would never happen on the -- >> no, and despite all of the cost cutting, you were talking earlier, that will be very hard, assuming the richest man in the world is telling people to cut social security and food stamps, that will be a tough sell. but, you know, it is important to recognize that you can't say tariffs are going to offset the tax cuts and say, well, tariffs are a negotiating employ. if you are using them on the balance sheet there will be some form of tariffs. >> the point is we won't know any of this until we are going on along down the road, right? >> right. >> i'm not sure anybody knows. i'm not convinced donald trump knows what he wants to do with these things. we will see how it plays out. >> whoever came up with voodoo economics, both sides engage in mostly voodoo. >> that's right. we don't know until it happens,

and then we don't know the impacts of these things until years later. >> right. >> everyone said the trump tax cuts would generate huge declines in revenue. in fact, we've seen record revenue. a lot of that is economic growth, but we've seen record revenue on the corporate tax as well as the individual tax. >> yesterday i saw senator elizabeth warren say that the $2 trillion that elon and vivek are going to try to cut, that's just the $2 trillion that trump gave rich people in the 2017 tax cuts. that's what she would say. >> i don't think you should be allowed to say things like that because actually the corporate -- we have new highs in corporate taxes being raised. >> you know, both sides say a lot of things that aren't mathematically true, but -- >> that's a whopper though. >> yeah. i mean we -- look, everyone likes the trump tax cuts because just about everyone, except for high earnings in high tax states got a tax cut.

>> you pointed at me. >> all of us. >> i resemble that remark. >> thank you, robert. >> thank you, guys. when we return, more bananas. no, not more banana. we are going to talk nvidia and senator cynthia lummis will share her thoughts when we calm back. >> we didn't show your banana picture.

all right. welcome back, everybody. nvidia reported third quarter results that beat expectations for sales and earnings, and the ai chip maker delivered a better-than-expected forecast. earlier the stock had been down a little bit, down by about 2.5%. now down about .8%. joining us is ray wang, final analyst. hi, ray. how are you? >> good morning. >> did the decline in the stock price make sense to you? is it a case where nvidia can beat expectations but it is almost impossible to beat the highest whisper numbers on the street ever? there are such high expectations built into the stock every time. it is down by less than 1%. >> you're right. i think people were taking money

off the table. it was a spike-the-ball-in-the-end zone performance but everyone was saying, should we take money off the table and come back and i think that's what happened. these are big numbers, 19.83 net income, 47 billion and something in guidance. that's huge. >> yeah, it is hard to find many flaws or faults at all with the numbers that came through. it does remind me of last quarter when they beat expectations again. the stock was down immediately after the earnings but it went on to grow something like 17% over the course of the last three months since then. you have still got a buy on this. you are looking at i think $180 price target, the stock is at $144 today. >> i am, and here is why. when you look at the mag seven, they're basically growing exponentially versus the rest of the fortune 500. seven stocks are basically growing very quickly and nvidia is selling to six of the seven of the mag seven and it is a huge number. it is about 50 billion a quarter

these mag seven are spending in terms of data center growth. that's what is driving the majority of nvidia's revenue on the data center side. that growth to 30.8 billion in two years is huge. gaming doesn't come close. gaming was up at 3 billion. what we are seeing right now is still a massive build-out on data center, happening in the next 12 to 18 months and that is driving it. after that we will see something different which is in sovereign ai. countries will say, hey, our companies can't catch up and we have to invest at a country level. >> yeah, i've heard people knock nvidia because it is really just these big companies like the metas and the amazons that are buying all of the chips right now, but that's because they're first in line, nobody else can get through to them. when you hear about the demand nvidia will invest on the conference call, it is hard to look at supply versus demand as a problem. it means far more people want the chips than they can possibly

produce at this point. if you were looking for a hole to poke, because most of the holes i've heard people try to poke in the argument don't make sense to me, what's the best argument you can think of for why you might be concerned about the stock? >> the only reason i would be concerned about the stock is living in the valley what we're seeing is a ton of people at nvidia retire. they've put in their five years, they put in their ten years, they're leaving, they're cashing out. they're doing something with their lives, and it is really the talent that will be hard to beat given that stock run-up. the other piece is really blackwell to ruben when it happens in 2026. the question is, you know, same questions people will ask, are the chips going to be hot, are they going to work. i think that's what people are worried about, but right now the chips are 2.5 times faster and cost 2x as much and people are willing to make the bit. >> they're worried the concerns in the last week or so about the chips overheating, the blackwell chips overheating when put in some of the server arrays. i've read other reports people

are speculating it has already been corrected. what do you think? >> from our conversations with people over there it has been corrected. i think the other piece that's happening is this is really complicated. not a lot of companies have ever done this before, and i think they've tried all different possibilities and combinations. i think they've figured out a couple of solutions. that's what we heard. and this shift is actually important because if you think about what is next, right, it is going to get even smaller and it is going to get even hotter. as you know, the consumption and the power consumption on these chips hopefully come down, but people keep stacking more chips in one place which is why they get really hot in data centers. >> ray, i had not heard the argument before about people retiring at nvidia. obviously if you have been there five or ten years and you have stock options or restricted shares, you're sitting pretty. you've made a whole lot of money and it is pretty easy to walk out the door. where does nvidia get new talent? >> oh, they're not having trouble finding new talent. i have a son that's com sci

major today and every one of them are looking for a job. nvidia is getting a lot of great talent from different companies with young startups actually folding in to experts in the enterprise that have been around for a while. they don't have a hard time finding talent, but the existing talent pool, some are starting to take a break. >> even if there were problems around the blackwell chips, my first thought is where do they go. my thought is nowhere. but who is in pole position, even if they're far behind, who is in second place? who might be able to come in with a different offering at some point down the road? >> we all hope that amd has something to offer but the challenge is the gap is so huge, right. they put so much money into the development of this set of chip, and the capital required to get to the next set of chips. if you continue to go down that path, very few companies will be able to pull that off. i think that's really the challenge. but when people say, hey, what do you do after nvidia, the

question is we'll take a code from the wayne gretzky playbook, let's skate to where the puck will be next. the question is what are we going to do when we go from semis to hardware scalers to software, where does it move to the next space? one against nvidia has an answer. they're in the space. on top of the chips and create that access point for the next point of ecosystems. so the layering going on in nvidia makes it a very tough company to beat, because they've been thinking through all the possibilities and jensen has more to offer. >> ray, thank you. ray wong. >> take care. >> you too. it is 8:00 a.m. on the east coast. you're watching "squawkbox" on cnbc. bitcoin nearing the $100,000 level. gains now stand at 40% since donald trump's election. we'll dig into the future of crypto in a few minutes with a

senator from wyoming. the justice department is calling for google divest from chrome. the push comes after a judge ruled in august that google has an illegal monopoly. the trial is scheduled for next year. india's adani group is slamming allegations of fraud and bribery after the chair was indicted in a new york federal court. they are accused of paying indian government officials more than $250 million in bribes to obtain solar energy supply contracts. tens of billions in market value were wiped from the value of the group's company after that news. saying claims against it are in its words, baseless. the futures right now are mixed this morning, although we have seen some upticks here. we're in triple digit gains for the dow, and the nasdaq is

actually moved into positive territory. we'll take a look at treasuries, where we have seen the long end right around 4.4. it's below that this morning. let's get to dom chu with a look at the premarket movers. >> good morning. we'll start off with shares of bj's. shares up 6% right now after reporting mixed results in the quarter and raising the low end of its full-year earnings guidance. the major driver is increasing its membership fee. the club mus membership will increase from $110 to $120 and will abow the company to purchase up to $1 billion of stock through january of 2029. moving on to shares of deere and company, up 1.5% after another major bottom line beat in the quarter. net income guidance coming in

below expectations. deere and the ceo citing market headwinds as a factor, so shares up 1.5%, only up 3% on a year-to-date basis. and we'll round it out with snowflake, up 23% after its beat. it's also issuing better than expected fourth quarter guidance. manage is forecasting that momentum will snowball into year end. now, the ceo spoke to cnbc's john fort after last night's results. >> the product revenue is up 29% year on year, performance obligations at $5.7 billion, up 55% year on year. we upped our guidance for the year to 29%, which is pretty impressive given our scale. and our products in ai and data engineering also go to market motion are all humming. >> tune in to john's first on

cnbc interview with ramaswamy later on today. andrew, back over to you guys. >> thanks for that. boeing's ceo saying the aerospace giant facing serious culture problems and can't afford another mistake. "the wall street journal" citing an all hands meeting where he called out bloated management ranks, wasteful spending and a culture of in fighting and shirking responsibility, saying in part, we spend more time arguing amongst ourselves than thinking about how we're going to beat airbus. coming up, wyoming republican and bitcoin supporter senator cynthia lummis will join us as bitcoin itself, crypto currency nears $100,000. and wayne gretzky closes in on the all-time goal record.

i think gretzky has like 55 other records. stay tuned. you're ing "squawkbox" on cnbc.

♪ ♪ the international criminal court has issued arrest warrants for israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu. his former defense minister and hamas leader, the icc said there were reasonable grounds to believe that netanyahu and former israeli defense chief were criminally responsible for starvation in gaza and the perse -- persecution of palestinian.

so they've got -- those are -- those are the same? netanyahu and -- bitcoin nearing $100,000 this morning. they've seen a big boost since the election, as crypto supporters cheer donald trump's white house win. the president-elect's team now looking into whether to create a white house role focused on crypto policy. trump himself reportedly spoke with coinbase ceo earlier this week. joining us what she sees ahead for crypto policy under trump, wyoming republican senator lummis. good morning to you. we've been looking at this price, trying to understand why it's move thing way. it clearly has to do with this new administration and what comes next. my question to you is what comes next in terms of policy that would manifest in a way that would justify the move in these prices.

>> i think the answer is twofold. one is, we -- there's an appetite now to do a statutory framework for digital assets. senator gillibrand and i have been working on that for years. we'll now move to that in early 2025 as opposed to later in 2025. the other thing is the proposal that i have and that president trump has discussed about a strategic bitcoin reserve or strategic bitcoin stockpile where the united states would acquire and hold bitcoin for 20 years because of the way that bitcoin has been appreciating since inception, this would be an asset that could help shore up the u.s. dollar as the world reserve currency and serve as a

reserve that could be used to reduce the national debt significantly. but you know the american people are still hurting from inflation from high prices. and they want the national debt reduced. these are ways to do it with an asset that is immutable, can easily be held by the federal government in a variety of vaults, and that states can participate in, as well. so this is the gold standard digital asset, and a strategic -- >> but senator, we got off the gold standard a long time ago. my question is how much you would spend tax dollars at a time when we're talking about trying to reduce costs, how much would you spend on bitcoin as part of this reserve? >> we wouldn't have to spend any new dollars. we have reserves at our 12

federal reserve banks, including gold certificates, that could be converted to current fair market value, they're held at their 1970s values on the books, and then sell them into bitcoin. that way, we wouldn't have to use any new dollars in order to establish this reserve. the united states already holds over 200,000 bitcoin in the asset forfeiture funds. so that would be the initial source. so no new money spent on this. >> senator, do you own bitcoin yourself? >> well, i might. i have five bitcoin and put them along with other stocks i owned into a blind trust. i hope they're still there in my blind trust, but it's blind, so i don't know. >> what do you think about other members of either this

administration or congress that may own bitcoin? i ask because one of the questions invariably that will come up is, we were just talking and look, the whole administration, they're bitcoin owners. therefore, this is going to be positive for bitcoin because they want bitcoin to go up. the other side of some brains in the world hear that and say, well, that's a conflict. >> well, i get it, bitcoin is a commodity. so it's a lot like cattle. i own cattle, and nobody wants me to divest, thank god, of my cattle. so we have to remember a few things about bitcoin that are unique. bitcoin is legal tender in another country, and we need to recognize that as americans. bitcoin is a store value and means of exchange that has characteristics of a commodity.

so it's very different from other assets. quite frankly, i believe it should be okay for people to own bitcoin without doing what i did and putting it in a blind trust. but to be inordinately careful, since i was the earliest and biggest advocate for bitcoin, it seemed to just help me credibly sell it to my fellow policymakers, if i put it in a blind trust. >> senator, totally switching gears, we just heard a story about the international criminal court has issued the arrest warrants for prime minister netanyahu, along with the hamas leader of the october 7th attacks. i know that senator thune a couple days ago said that there should be a bipartisan bill to put sanctions on the icc, which has done similar things historically, you know, about

american troops in afghanistan and some of the detention facilities. but it pointed out that leader schumer isn't doing anything at this point, and if he's not going to do, then senator thune threatening. do you think -- i just read it. i wasn't familiar with it. but in just reading it cold, it was like, really? the hamas leader and the head of israel. >> they're in a war. this is a very different scenario. so i agree with senator thune that this criminal court is out of bounds. it's behaving in a rogue manner. we all know what happened on october 7th. and i support the right of israel to defend itself from these horrific attacks, barbaric behavior by their neighbors, funded by iran.

>> while we have you here real quick, did you have any meetings yesterday? i know that vice president-elect jd vance taking matt gaetz around to meet with members of the senate. >> i haven't had any meetings yet. i expect that the appointees will be focused early on, on the committees of jurisdiction over their nomination. so i definitely want to have those meetings. i want to explore many issues with them from how they would choose to run the department. in the case of mr. gaetz, i want to now how he would go about ferreting out the lawfare and corrupt behavior of the u.s. department of justice. in addition to exploring some of

the behaviors that are alleged against him and how he would respond to those kind of questions. >> could those things be disqualifying for you? >> i want him to tell me in his own words who he is today, who he is used to be, and what he would do to run the department. all of those issues should be on the table when we get around to having our conversation. >> okay. senator, great to talk to you this morning. really appreciate it. >> nice to see you all. have a great day. >> thanks. when we come back, a can't-miss interview with nhl legend wayne greatski. don't go anywhere. "squawk box" will be right back.

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alex ovechkin of the nhl's washington capitals closing in on the league's all-time career goals record. that stands at 894. it was set back this the 1990s but our next guest. joining us now is four-time stanley cup champion wayne gretzky, the great one. wayne, it's good to see you. i know you've watched for a long time. you know us. i know you from michael jordan's tournament. your daughter was like 10 years old. we're getting old. have you noticed that? >> that's the first thing i though 'tis every morning. it's been a great run, and like you said, she was a young girl, now she has two kids of her own and life is great. >> it's just shocking to me that

i remember that down in atlanta and seeing you all. when efficient i've talked to people that have incredible records, it usually is something like this does happen. i think a lot of the things, i don't know how many on the record you have, some 50 plus. this is a big one, but you probably, for the sport, are not that disappointed at this point that it could be exceeded. >> no, no, not at all. people ask me about it all the time. you know, i'm good friends with alex. you know, the thing about the national hockey league is, while we were retired, we kind of wondered what's going to happen. and then mario lemieux retired, we were like, what's going to happen to our game? and then along came sidney crosby and alex ovechkin. now as they get older, we wonder what's going to happen, now we get other guys coming in.

so the game is in a great spot. it's in a really good area. our fans across north america quite frankly worldwide are getting bigger and stronger all the time because more and more kids are starting not only to watch hockey but play hockey. but the players themselves, the guys, the superstars, they're really not only are they great players, but they're really good, special people, great for their communities and great for the game. and alex is a special young man. listen, i'm very proud of what i accomplished with the 894. nothing can take anything away from that. but, you know, alex has been exceptional for a game and for the washington capitals. i hope i'm the first guy to shake his hand when he does break the record, because people ask me all the time, is alex going to break your record? i would say yeah, eventually, that's what happens. that's progression in our sport. i can remember the day i broke

gordie howe's record. i remember seeing my dad and said this is a catch 22. i idolized gordie so much. he was not only the greatest player to ever live, but he was just such a gentleman. so i remember saying to my dad, i'm kind of embarrassed a little bit to break gordie's record. he said you can't be like that. you know, gordie's very proud of what you accomplished, and he said, just remember one day when somebody breaks your record, you have the same dignity that gordie, and i looked at my dad and said, can i just enjoy this a couple days? >> points and assists, will that ever happen? this would be -- there's 54 left if this one falls, right? >> that's okay. i never played and thought about the records themselves. i was watching some great teams in some great cities. i always tell people, it's an

honor and privilege to play in the national hockey league. i never really sat back and looked at it. yeah, if i scored two goals that night, i wanted to get three and four. but those are things that drove me. i wanted to keep playing. i wanted to be successful each and every night. i said this before, you know, we used to play exhibition games in places that didn't have hockey in miami, tampa bay, places like kansas city. now our game is expanding, dallas, florida. dallas has won the stanley cup. tampa bay and florida both won stanley cups. so when i was younger and played exhibition games in those cities, i knew people may never see me play another game. so i prepared in september the same way i would prepare for a game in the stanley cup playoffs in may. >> yesterday, we were talking about the enormous valuations of nhl hockey teams these days.

the average team now worth $1.92 billion. it's just been on this wild ride. i'm curious what you think needs to happen for those numbers to continue on the upward trajectory, and sort of how the game can expand, what it takes. you are still the g.o.a.t. you are still singularly that name that is associated with professional hockey. obviously, there's lots of other stars today in the game, but what it takes to sort of get to that next level. >> yeah. well, listen, i think gary bettman and the owners in the national hockey league, what they have done is exceptional. i also go to the players and the partners, and i think ultimately it's the responsibility of the current-day players that they understand the scenario that they're in, that not only they're playing for their cities, but we're trying to expand and trying to make the

game even that much bigger and better. i think over the years, we've gone from a defensive minded league to a little more of an offensive minded game. similar to that of basketball. people love to see goals. they love to see action. and these players are elite players. they're elite athletes. the greatest thing about our players is not so much how good they are, but how great of people they are. they understand their commitment to going to schools and getting kids to play hockey and outdoor rinks. i know when i was in l.a., when we got there in 1988, there was like six high school teams. within three years, there was over 125 high school teams. so it's a matter of getting out in the communities and showing people the art of our game, the physical speed of the game, the beauty of our sport. i think that's what our players understand. that's part of being a national

hockey league hockey player. i think our game is stronger, bigger, and better today than it's ever been. i know the fans love watching the game, these players are tremendous athletes. so, you know, i think we're in a good spot. but we have to keep expanding and getting more and more kids interested, to want to play our game. if they want to play the game, they're going to want to watch the game, whether it's on tv or going to the game. it's just a partnership that the league and the players have to have on a continuous basis. >> really quickly, you came up with one of the sayings that i think has been more often quoted not only in sports but business, too. you said you don't skate to where the puck is, you skate to where the puck is going to be. have you been surprised how familiar it's become with so many people? >> well, you know, it's one of those things when i said it omody said to me, you're so small, you're so much

smaller than the rest of the players, you know, how do you compete and how do you do what you're doing against these guys? i said well, it's pretty simple. i have to use my brains out there, and i have to go to where the puck is going to be and not where it's been and stay ahead of these guys. it is surprising, i don't think a day that goes by that somebody doesn't come up to me and say i use your quote all the time. it's an honor and privilege for me and i'm glad people use it. >> i didn't know you could do this, but your dad built a rink, i think that helped obviously. but it's possible with this company that you're working with, boston based company, it's possible to get your kid -- to build it in a backyard. >> yeah. well, listen, for whatever reason i fell in love with hockey and had a passion for the sport at a young age.

by dad would take me to the local park. i would be out there for hours and hours. at some point he said to my mother, this is ridiculous. i'm freezing at these rinks. i'm going to build a rink in the backyard so i can sit this the kitchen and drink hot tea and watch my son skate for eight hours. when we talk about expanding and growing our game, giving kids a chance to play is a big part of it. yard work is unique, that you can build it as small as you want. it takes about an hour to put up. it's exciting. >> amazing. great. we've got some business goes on. we've got to get to where the puck's going, and that's jobless claims. so we have to get to that. pleasure having you on this morning. thank you. >> appreciate you guys. have a great day. >> you, too. >> rick santelli is standing by with those numbers. rick, take it away. >> yes, there's some surprises here, folks, on initial claims.

213,000. we continue to see them very, very well behaved. 213,000. well, that would be the lightest level going all the way back to the last week in april. now, here's a surprise. 1,908,000. we did not get our 24th consecutive 1.8 million. we now jumped to 1.9 plus million on continuing claims. we haven't had a 1.9 handle since november of 2021. now, let's continue. if we look at philly fed business outlook, expecting the number around 8, we instead get a negative number of minus 5.5. that would come to august when it was minus 7. so interest rates have moved up a bit. 4.31 right now, still minus one on a two-year. but we did see some volatility pushing ten-year yields back up towards that 4.41. here's something interesting.

we look at long data treasury yields, they have been compressed a bit. there's been some flight to safety issues, but consider this -- we now, including today, have had eight consecutive sessions where yield of .41% has been in the trading range. that's interesting when you think about it. the other big issue is europe. germany in particular. their third quarter wages were up almost 9%. best in over three decades. but we all know germany's future may not be so bright. the reason i bring it up, will that effect the ecb and what looks like a cemented in stone quarter point at the next meeting? only time will tell. back to you. >> rick, thank you. stick around, steve liesman joins us right now with more on this. steve, you've dug down into these numbers. what jumps out to you? >> i'm trying to understand why philly fed is negative. i'm looking at some of the

components, and they're not bad. the employment index rose. prices fell, which is good, considering we've been concerned about the inflation numbers. the six business conditions rose pretty sharply. 56.6, could reflect some positive or optimism about the incoming administration. and the capital expenditures was higher. i don't know if rick has some details there, and i'm trying to find the reason why the continuing claims rose. i'm not that concerned about it, especially because the input numbers, the number that rick read first, remains relatively low. not exactly sure why some people seem to be staying on it. i want to talk very quickly, guys, about an index that we follow from time to time when it spikes up. it's the economic policy uncertainty index. sit higher now, and i would suggest it's higher and rising over the past several months -- several weeks for a couple reasons. the first is the inflation

numbers. you can see they are unclear where the fed is going, and the incoming administration. what impact this has is unclear, it remains uncertain. we'll see as to whether or not it has an effect on business spending, which is something you'll want to watch. becky? >> okay. steve, thank you very much. coming up, more on the economy and the markets, and check out nvidia shares turning positive just in the last few minutes. "squawk box" will be right back.

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all right. the latest look at initial jobless claims coming in below expectations, continuing claims at their highest levels since 2021. joining us for more on the economy is green capital chief economic adviser. john, let's look at these numbers. you said it's the jobless claims that's really the big wow here. >> it is, because we had a little bit of a surge on the effects of hurricanes helene and milton. the numbers have not only gone back down, we're at the lowest level on initial jobless claims since april. it's the same level as a year ago. what does that say?

companies are not firing people at a faster rate. layoffs remain relatively low here. and so, you know, that's something that the fed certainly needs to take into consideration when it thinks about the pace of rate cuts. >> yet, you still have consumers a little hesitant. we heard from target this week, walmart had better numbers, but they're dealing in far fewer discretionary goods than target. anybody that's watching the retailers, there is concern that there's hesitancy and consumers focused on budgets. >> there's signs consumers are stretched. there are also signs that consumers are better off than we thought. when we got those revisions to the gdp data a month or so ago, we found that the savings rate was significantly higher over the last year than previously thought. so people have been saving more. so they have, in a sense, a

little more -- maybe dry powder is the wrong word, but a little less need to have to pare back to sustain their finances. >> if we were to bet on christmas this year, we've got target on the screen right now. what would you bet, if we looked to retail, just overall? you came in on january 5th, what would we say? >> you know, it's really hard, because economists live in a listenally adjusted world. it's like christmas every day. if you look around the city, you look coming down 5th avenue, things look pretty busy out there. so i don't know how christmas is going to be. i don't know for any particular retailer, but there is no sign, in my opinion, that consumers are getting ready to retrench here. >> back to this idea of what the fed should be doing. we look at this as a goldilocks

time where the economy is pretty good, earnings are strong, yet you have the fed cutting rates. do you think the fed is going to pull back and cut less than the market is expecting? >> the market is already expecting the fed is going to cut less than they said. september was really odd. the fed panicked, in pi opinion. cutting rates by half a point, we saw no justification for that. yes, policy was tight. yes, they could plan to cut rates a little gradually and get back to neutral. be you they panicked because they were worried that the economy was in rougher shape, that the unemployment rate might be going significantly higher. and since that fed meeting in september, and they've cut again since then, we've had, with the exception of the hurricane effects in october, a stronger jobs report. we've had upward revisions to gdp, so we know the economy is growing faster than 3% over the last year, and the current

quarter looks like it's very early days, but might be on track to something close to 3%. we know inflation has been a little higher than the fed has been expecting. >> the stock market, bitcoin. there's no reason -- you have nod said they were right about the 50 basis points. >> they were not right. the fed doesn't like to admit to mistakes, and the cut in -- at the last meeting in november i think was -- you can double down because they cut by a quarter. but it's like saying we're willing to do a bit more, but they have to re-evaluate what the outlook for rates is. and in particular, and we had john williams speak, the new york fed president this morning, in particular they have to really think about where is the neutral level of interest rates? they're saying adjusted for inflation in september, it's 0.9%. in the market, it's above 2%.

the market has a ten-year inflation adjusted yield of above 2%. and the fed really needs to stop guiding people to a destination that they don't know is the right number, and the market, evidence suggests that it's the wrong number. >> yeah. not even thinks that, but -- just given how all these things are happening, it doesn't immediately follow that you would have cut 75 basis points. >> no, it absolutely doesn't. they had one signal, the rise in the unemployment rate from a low of 3.4% to it got to 4.3% over the summer. that one signal was a signal that traditionally would have been a recession signal. but nothing else validated that signal. and how many indicators have we had during this pandemic and recovery that traditionally

would have -- like the inversion of the yield curve, would traditionally have pointed to a recession, and we haven't had it. now, you might argue that maybe in early 2022, with some of the gdp numbers, we went through a real butch. how do we get to recession here? we've had the sharp drop in housing. manufacturing is in recession. so those shoes have already dropped, and they're stabilizing with the exception of -- you pointed out the philadelphia fed index. i don't put too much weight in these regional manufacturing indexes from month to month. but it was negative this morning. but we know manufacturing is already in recession. it has been for a long period of time. so, you know, i think if the ted thinks about it, there's no need to stimulate the economy here. so they can sit back. what's wrong with sitting back for a few months? >> we were trying to get some dry powder to cut, and here we

are back to no reason. ises that's a great point. for the longest time, all these interventions this the market and buying bonds is because they had no dry powder. then they got rates up to 5.5% and sat with tons of dry powder, and you're right, they are spending it for no reason. >> john, thanks for coming in. coming up, a lot more on "squawk box." we have dan niles to join us on nvidia's latest results and stock action. the stock now in the green after what was in the red. we're going to explain what's going on here. next, what happens to electric vehicle friendly states like california if president-elect trump scraps federal ev incentives? our good friend and pal, phil lebeau, will join us from the west coast this morning with that story after the break. n'godot anywhere. you're watching "squawk box," and this is cnbc.

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team reportedly looking into getting rid of a $7500 tax credit for people who buy electric vehicles. we want to know what that could mean for states where americans buy a lot of evs and phil lebeau joins us now with that story. i guess you're in a state like that, phil. you're in quite a state. >> we are, joe. we're out here in los angeles for the l.a. auto show, which is predominantly focused on green vehicles, electric vehicles, hybrids. this state has long been way ahead of the rest of the country in terms of ev adoption. this year, evs make up one out of every five vehicles sold in this state. take a look at what the market share is for evs, 22%. hybrids, they're coming on strong in terms of demand in california. but look at ice, now down to just 60% of the vehicle sales here in california. when you talk about evs, keep in

mind that tesla has long been the dominant player out here. obviously, they made vehicles up in the silicon valley, still do, that are sold here in the state. that's a big reason for the momentum that they have here. but their sales are down more than 12% year over year, as more ev options come into the market. still, the model y remains the best-selling vehicle. not just best selling electric vehicle, best-selling vehicle by a wide gin in this state. nationwide, tesla still dominates the ev market, though the share is down under 50%. look at who is at number two, hyundai. why do i point this out? because hyundai is going to be unveiling its latest ev model, the ionic nine, which will go on sale next year. here in california, hyundai sales up 3.6% year to date. lots to discuss about the ionic 9, what's happening with ev

incentives and what's happening with hyundai with the incoming ceo. he's running the whole kit and kabutle, guys. always a good time when we talk with jose, because he's very candid. >> 22%, so what is the average -- what other states are big, massachusetts? i don't know, what other states have much higher than the national average? >> oregon, washington, colorado, i mean, these are states that have long been advocates for electric vehicles. >> but is it only 3%? what is it nationwide? >> 7.7%. 7.7% of the market nationwide. >> ee times that in california. >> thanks, phil. nvidia shares turning positive

earlier this hour. we're going to dive into that stock story, and big th th investor dan niles. that's next when "squawk box" returns after this.

welcome back.

nvidia shares falling following third quarter results because sales uidance wasn't quite what the most bullish on wall street were looking for. the stock now turning positive in the last half hour. joining us is dan niles, from niles investment management. i don't know if you saw, there was a tweet this morning from larry mcdonald talking about just your average $250 billion premarket trading change, right? that's literally how much the stock has moved in a morning. what do you make of it? >> well, i mean, the guidance had been given in a vacuum, the stock would be getting killed. but what saved them is commentary during the call and from the cfo. there were two things. they said number one, blackwell shipments are expected to exceed initial expectations, so people were very excited about that, that's their newest chip. but the really big thing is they said we expect demand to exceed supply for the next several

quarters in fiscal '26. so, if you want to, you know, believe the dream, that means they just reset the bar lower as you go into next year, and so, you know, depending -- you're in a really great seasonal time of the year for stocks, so people just want to believe in the santa claus rally. >> what's the explanation for the stock move, you know, cramer will be coming up in a couple minutes. he put out a thing this morning saying the early morning shorts now up against seven large price target raises. so there was seven analysts who have raised it. he said that the whole idea that they missed guidance is bogus. >> well, i respect jim a lot, but at the end of the day, out of the 59 analysts are so that have buy ratings on this, not one of them said they're going

to raise estimates by 1% for the upcoming quarter. so here's the thing, there's a short term and a long-term. the short term as i said earlier, people want to believe, it's that time of year, it's the santa claus rally, the best three months for stocks. you have an incoming administration that wants to cut taxes and deregulate. so you look at nvidia, and they're telling you demand is going to exceed supply for next year. so if you're a belief, you want to believe that, but there's no question the guidance was below expectations, which is why the stock was down. >> it sounds like you're the grinch then. if you don't want to buy into nvidia at these prices, which sounds like you don't, what would you spend your money on and would you sell out right now? >> what i'm trying to say to be clear here is, look, you're going to, at some point next year, i think you are going to run into an issue where you're going to need to see a return on investment for the money you're

putting in. so you can think about microsoft, right? they cut estimates after the quarter, they cut estimates after they reported the september quarter. so at a certain point, and they talked that we have hit a wall potentially with scaling loss. so i think at some point, you're going to get a pause to digest this. i think nvidia will double over the next several years again from here, so you have a way to go to build out the ai infrastructure. but you have to be honest, nobody saw this. the names we like, we like amazon. they had a really great quarter. we see a solid e-commerce season coming up. we're looking into areas like software, because if you do have a cutback in what you need to spend for ai cap ex, that should benefit companies. we like names like oracle. next year, it will be about networking this structure together and having enterprises get access to it.

>> what about microsoft? >> well, think about it this way, they have a 50% economic interest in openai and chatgpt. they've been raising cap ex. after they reported the june quarter, they guided below the street for september. after they reported the september quarter, they got it below the street for december. the ceo said on tuesday, asked the question, have we hit the wall with scaling laws? because that's what people have been discussing. so i want to see return on investment. microsoft's not showing that right now. people want to believe things will reaccelerate. it's not one of the names i'm looking at, because the last six months of results don't seem to support that. >> two other quick names. in the, ai universe. one is apple, which is in the conversation, and then there's salesforce that's out there with its agent and saying that is

working better today, he believes, than some of these models. >> yeah. with regards to apple, you know, again, they guided below the street. the big issue here with apple, you're not going to have the full ai features out for all ies until you get to next year with china. even this year, you'll get another update sometime in december. so it's been quite honestly a very disappointing rollout of their ai features. with regards to salesforce, that's actually a very interesting one. in the sense that it looks like they may be one of the software companies that's really going to benefit from ai being deployed. agent force is the name of their product, and that seems like it's seeing very good traction. so moving from semiconductors and putting more weight on software that benefits from all the two years of investment, not a bad idea. >> okay. dan niles, always great to see

you. thank you for your commentary and perspective on all of it. we'll see where this heads. a quick final check on the markets. green on the screen, the dow up 140 points. nasdaq looking to open up 94 points higher and crypto. we are closing in on 100,000. up close to 98,000 before. before, and we will see where it ends later today or at least what it will be tomorrow. join us then. "squawk on the street" begins right now. ♪ good thursday morning, welcome to "squawk on the street," i'm carl quintanilla with jim cramer and david faber at post nine of the new york stock exchange. futures, pretty steady here as nvidia goes green premarket on another solid quarter, another $2 billion revenue beat. jobless claims mean while near a six-month low. our road map begins with nvidia's beat and optimistic outlook for a.i. chip demand. the stock does erase