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act right now. call the number on your screen now! melissa: welcome. i am melissa francis. adam: and him out of of sheer hero. the crisis is far from over. the banks will not open until thursday at the very latest. melissa: could there be lurking problems as investors pour into real estate as landlords? adam: though plans to help regulators prevent another massive fraud. melissa: stolen or just missing?

it cannot find a vial of a virus that is a potential bioterror agent. adam: that brings a smile to someone's face. that is scary enough. nicole petallides watching your money and action. nicole: taking a look at a market that is looking pretty good. you saw the dow jones industrials and the s&p 500 getting close. the dow is near its record all of intraday high. just a few points away from the record all-time closing high. we are still maintaining. you see that we are maintaining of arrows. the majority of the dow components are a bit lower. we did it durable good orders that were helped by autos and

planes. the pictures. the street. let's take a look at boeing. they are saying that as the number one performer on the dow jones industrial. think of all the problems that the dreamliner had. they redid the battery in a way that these regulation. they had their main voyage yesterday and they will have another in the coming days. it is the best performer on the dow. melissa: thank you so much. january's case shiller index shows prices are up. new home sales falling in february. late last week, we learned that sales of existing homes were up over 10% from the year before. what is the real driving force behind this? we asked anthony sanders.

thank you so much for joining us. what you think of all that data? >> i call it the grumpy cat recovery. it is not a good as it seems. you are right on a percent plus year over year. in january, it was up 1%. it was up a whopping .01%. in other words, it did not move. melissa: you do not believe in it? those are a lot of factors put together at once. >> i believe there is a recovery happening. if you look at the cities where the prices went up, it was las vegas, phoenix, tampa, you know,

the same areas where we got hit the hardest by the bubble in three cities that actually took libor d.c., detroit, chicago. what is the difference between those two, investors. melissa: and a lot of what-ifs driving the recovery. the number is 30% so far in 2013. >> it is three years in a row of 30% cash transaction. that is way too high of a ratio. just play along with me here, suppose we take out 30% investors of the housing market, what would our recovery look like. melissa: why would we? why do we care? a recovery is a recovery. a purchase is a purchase.

what is wrong with that? >> there is nothing wrong with that per se. if we are looking how the average american household is faring, the rates are still the climbing. they are not getting back into the game the way the government had hoped. melissa: who cares. that is what the government wants is to get the average guy back in. >> i am a big believer in renting. we should remember that the last time around before we tried putting everyone from rental into housing. it is that this is an investor recovery that will not have lasting effects. melissa: why? >> how much can we support 100% cash transactions in the housing

market? eventually, the housing market will reach equilibrium. some big fonts have already pulled back on this model of purchasing housing to rent out. that yields just are not there. melissa: anthony sanders, interesting perspective. thank you so much for coming on. adam: one day sent cyprus received a last-minute bailout. banks still remain closed and that is intel thursday. any indication they will push the pay back any further? rich: protesters have been walking by. they have been almost daily here. they are angry about the bailout. >> they want to destroy our

country. they have all of these political issues. they are not helping the country. the banks are going down. they are not willing to invest in cyprus. there will not be any development forward. rich: for questions beyond when will the banks open. when it comes to the agreement upon this, how much worse can

the economy gets here already in recession. back to you. adam: we appreciate that. he will be reporting throughout the week from cyprus. they are talking a 40% haircut. we will get lou dobbs take on all of this coming up in ten minutes. melissa: droit citizens are up in arms. a man they did not elect takes over finances. >> a new sheriff in town. you just mentioned him. he is the emergency financial manager appointed to get detroit back on track. he was greeted by about 100 demonstrators. they are upset because he is likely to take a chainsaw to the municipal budget.

also upset because who they voted for have been muscled aside. >> the right to vote is beyond the visions of reconstruction. the right to vote matters. >> the newspapers ran a headline that or build up within all live branch. the $14 billion in long-term debt. >> if we can do this, i will have participated in one of the greatest turnarounds in the history of this country. >> he is likely to / visible jobs, / the payroll. he enjoys one luxury. he is appointed, not help it. he does not need to be popular.

melissa: interesting. thank you so much. adam: the infamous ponzi scheme where bernie madoff a speaking exclusively to fox business, he said "from my first interview to the media, i have said that the banks must have known and were complacent and contributing to my crime. although i have offered the bankruptcy trustee the information that would demonstrate in detail the complicit behavior of banks like jpmorgan, bank of new york, hsbc, citicorp and others, the trustee seems unwilling to act on my offer. therefore, i am offering this information to the appropriate government committees in the hope that this information will prove helpful of the appropriate institutions." melissa: no word yet. adam: this is operating within

the last 45 minutes. he is naming the banks now. we are reaching out to the banks. they have denied any complicit action. this is a move on his part to get out of jail just one last time. or is it legit? melissa: i know you have been in contact with him for a long time. adam: i think he wants a lot of attention. he has been sitting on information that he has not shared. he may have something -- he says he feels shame for what he did. he may want to try and right that wrong as best he can. melissa: we know you will stay on top of that story. how much is it costing you the taxpayer? adam: you could say -- and all closed look at that lease

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melissa: welcome back. let's check the market. nicole petallides is on the floor of the new york stock exchange. sitting at the 13 level to the downside at 5.5%. you can actually watch the exchange traded fund that fell to an all-time low.

the etf has showed about 70% of its value over the past year. so far this year are down about 35%. falling to an all-time low. that is key to watch. melissa: thank you so much. adam: you know i am a jaguar fan. the new york auto show kicks off this friday. fox business is their early giving you a sneak peek. jeff flock is there. jeff: here it is, adam. it does not get any better than this. no better than a way for a successful entrepreneur to award himself. he is president and ceo zero of

bentley america. you feel very positively about this market, about the stock market, you feel positive all around. >> the economy is moving the right way. all indicators are green. you can see the luxury market is moving in the right direction. jeff: take a look at the numbers on this direction. it is a fast car. top speed 200 miles per hour. it goes zero to 60 in four seconds. you feel good about people rewarding themselves again. when times were tough, an entrepreneur does not want to award himself with a card when they are laying people off.

>> you do not really need a luxury car. you do not need to buy a new one at this point in time. would you feel more confident, it is the right time. jeff: i want to put the numbers up in terms of bentley sales. last year it sold just over 7000 vehicles. i should say 2011. last year it was up 22%. this year, we are seeing and even bigger increase. >> so far this year, yes. jeff: number one market in the world for bentley would be china and growing fast. adam: a lot beautiful cars.

thank you. melissa: you are such a car junkie. adam: i love cars. the largest banks in cyprus are confiscating up to 40% of all bank account holdings over 100,000 euros. could it happen here in the united states? lou dobbs is next. melissa: you can see the dollar is stronger against all currencies except for in canada. we will be right back. ♪ i'm a conservative investor. but that doesn't mean i don't nt to make money. i love making money. i try to be smart with my investments. i also try to keep my costs down. what's your plan? ishares. low cost and tax efficient. find out why nine out of ten large professional investors choose ishares for their etfs. ishares by blackrock.

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>> at 22 minutes past the hour, i have your folks news minute. the u.s. supreme court is suggesting it has a way out of the veil on same-sex marriage. several justices raising doubts today that the case is properly before them. tomorrow the justices will you be other act. italy's highest criminal court has ordered a new trial for amanda knox and her former italian boyfriend in the murder of her british roommate.

knox calling the decision painful, but says she is confident she would be exonerated. wrongly predicting an early spring. ohio prosecutors who filed a indictment against the groundhog is saying he is dropping the charge after philip handler took the blame for the faulty forecast. that is a look at the headlines. back to melissa and adam. there you have it. melissa: they are blaming the handler. i love it. thank you so much. cyprus and the $13 billion budget moving forward. at a big cost to depositors. confiscating up to 40% of all because counsel holding within 100,000 euros. time now for lou dobbs.

lou: i do not think so. yet. the more that this administration and the crowded party try to emulate, the more likely that becomes the mind set for not only our political leaders in the federal government out but also the bureaucrats that make it up. this is all of the bank failures over the course of the past decade. not a single depositor. not a single depositor with insured assets have lost money. that is a remarkable track record for the fdic. adam: a lot of people are upset with this idea of taking up to 40% from the bank. when you are a depositor, you are actually a lender to that

institution. it is usually the creditors or the lenders that take a hit. why without the wrong? lou: a couple of things. there is a region that russians have enough money in their to basically go up about four times of the recipient economy. particularly, the regulators. they call this hot money in cyprus. what they mean is it is dirty money. that is the reason they are scooping 40% off of it. they want to kill the recipient banking system because it is filled with bad guys. i will just say that to you straight up. that is the deal. you say a depositor is a lender. they are a depositor.

the other factor that is, they are insured by the insurance corporation. they do so because that keeps us from having hot money. the true sense of the word simply and harms of demand deposits. this way they put quite readily their savings, their demand deposits in there. the banking system remains stable. that is the whole theory. melissa: what do you think cyprus looks like two or three years from now? what happens to the economy? what happens to their banking system was mark? lou: they have learned how to do some of what they do now, what to do it with cleverness and

instead of indifference but it will never be what it was. the eu does not want this crap going on in the european union. i am going to use this a lot. you are watching a number of people who are using these little events. we are talking about .2% of the european union economy to talk about how we will fold up like a bad lawnchair in this country. this is nuts. it is crazy talk. melissa: lou dobbs. i love it. i love it. you can catch legendary investor

on what to expect in the wake of cyprus is bailout deal. adam: i was just thinking what i would do with the money. lou: they look for opportunities. adam: we have to get back to what is happening with the euro. we will tell you what you need to know. melissa: entitlement nation. more taxpayer dollars are spent. that is a staggering number. adam: take a look at who is up and who is down on the dow. ♪

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what's in your wallet? adam: welcome back. time for stocks as we do every 15 minutes. let's head to the floor of the new york stock exchange. our own nicole petallides is standing by. nicole, what are you watching? >> supervalu which is a stock over 100% this year of 2013 with headlines talking about job kutz for supervalu. we're taking a look at the stock which is down almost 1% on the day. of course they had intense competition. rivals like kroger and wal-mart. they announced they will cut about 1100 jobs across the country. they're trying to revamp the business. one thing they also noted back in january. they announced a $3.3 billion deal to reduce their -pdebt and in doing so, they said they're selling five of their supermarket chains to an investor group led by cerberus capital management. obviously cutting jobs, trying it save some costs.

meantime the stock is unbelievable how well it has done this year in 2013. anybody would be happy with a return of 10% year-to-date. today down 1%. back to you. adam: nicole petallides on the floor of the new york stock exchange. we'll check in with nicole in 15 minutes and make sure your money is safe and snug. right now the euro is hovering knew 4-month lows against the dollar. as concern remains about the cyprus long-term outlook. our next guest says the fear of contagion it may fall as it spreads. we have technical strategist for forex. he joins me now. very simply i know the big money knows how to make money but when you're a small person like me how can you take advantage of this? do you have to play commodities? the dollar getting stronger, is that way you do it and or do you invest in currencies? >> if you're passively long dollars if you want to take an active approach open a

currency trading account. we're looking for the euro to continue to weaken because of crisis in cyprus. it is not just cyprus but it is broader eurozone has a whole and what it means for the policy framework going forward. adam: not only against the euro, against the yen but strengthening against a whole basket of currencies. this i would think, and this is where you will correct me, should bring undo the price of oil? should oil be falling in price yet we're seeing it go up? what am i saying in the equation that is going against it? >> british pound, japanese yen, a lot has to do with factors specific to those countries. there is ongoing crisis in the eurozone. the british pound in the u.k. they're facing a potential triple dip recession. current account figures due out tomorrow might show the largest current account deficit in the u.k. on record. in japan the central bank is actively weakening the currency with more printing. >> if the dollar is getting stronger could i in a simple way, make money, look at oil

as investment? yet oil is going up. yet i think it should be going down if oil is stronger. >> commodities respond to other factors. risk sentiment is one as well. what we've seen in the u.s., stocks are elevated. dow made record highs. s&p is climbing toward that level. generally when stocks in general are doing better you see commodities move higher as well. that is why that relationship with oil is seeing oil strengthen a bit. adam: on monday when we had the relief rally in europe before the comments from the one finance minister who the others said, shut up. we'll essentially use this bailout formula in the future should we need to do that we also saw the euro strengthening. it was a buck 30 to the dollar but then it fell. you're saying it will continue falling. how much further could it go? >> well initially we did see that rally because cyprus came to a deal. however because of the, i guess the uncertainty with regards to how they're going it handle future bailouts or bail-ins, even, we saw the

euro decline. it fell through a key technical levels which is 200 day simple moving average around the 128.80 level. if it stays underneath there we think it could down to the november lows of 126.50. adam: eric, thanks for being on the fox business network. >> thanks. melissa: about a government welfare costing you big bucks and could affect jobless data. here with more is liz macdonald and emac'sbot line. >> good to be with you, melissa and adam. this is called the defact safety net. we're seeing a startling rise in it. number of disability payments going out the door for the federal government. look at this number, $127.6 billion. that is the amount of government disability checks expected to go out the door this year. it is up 18% since 2010. it is nine times larger than what it was 30 years ago in terms of the dollar amounts. 11 million people are getting disability checks. that is triple the number 30

years ago. what you're looking a big question mark over this program. that jobless checks run out are more americans instead getting disability checks? are they switching to disability? so what you saw there, is 2.4 million people on disability checks since april 2010. so 2.4 million more. at the same time the number of people who were dropping out of the labor force, 2.5 million. so that means that essentially what happens is, when you go on disability you don't get counted among the unemployed. you essentially drop out of the labor force. so the question for federal lawmakers is this. only 5% of those cases are reviewed at social security. what is social security doing to make sure taxpayer money is not being wasted? we're seeing today mat i can rise too in the number of disability payments for musculoskeletal disorders or mental disorders. we haven't seen that list. they are toming the list of the federal government for disability checks. send it back to you,

melissa. melissa: liz, great reporting. thanks very much. adam:. >> sure. adam: charlie gasparino will have exclusive details on the battle for dell. melissa: a vial of a deadly virus gone missing? how does this happen? the shocking vulnerability of america's bioterror labs that. is ahead. adam: also a look at 10 and 30-year treasurys.

>> i'm dennis kneale with your fox business brief. durable goods orders surged up almost 6% in february, far better than expected and a rebound from the almost 5% plunge in orders the month before. durable goods include cars, dish walkers and other products built to last three years or more. the federal reserve is pressing citigroup to improve its anti-money laundering controls demanding citi submit a plan to improve companiwide oversight. the federal order expands on similar orders given to individual citigroup units last year. citigroup said it made substantial progress in strengthing compliance. >> ipo fund-raising jumping 50% this year. new stock issues raised $23 billion so far up from $15 billion in the same period last year. says dealogic the data firm. that is the latest from fox biz, giving you the power to prosper

adam: you know that old tag line, dude, you're getting a dell? there will be a lot of dudes. the battle for dell. charlie gasparino joins us on the phone with the latest for the bidding war for the computer-maker. here's charlie. >> where's my intro. anyway. i usually take these hits off intros i guess the question is why is dell considering the blackstone bid to be for the computer-maker to be management-friendly and who is likely to win? two things here which is pretty interesting. number one, dell wave ad noncompete clause for a former executive to work on the blackstone bid. david johnson joined blackstone from dell last february. what is interesting he is working on the bid. they waived sort of noncompete clause that was on his contract so he can work on this. so that is one reason why they think this thing is management-friendly. why blackstone does have a shot because of a former

dell executive would obviously be part of the management team. that is one thing we learned. second thing we learned, you talk to people at blackstone, they really think they are not in the driver's seat on this they think their odds are less than 50/to sort of win this thing. they still think that silverlake will prevail, silverlake and dell and michael dell the combined bid for obvious reasons. they have to go through due diligence. silverlake and dell spent a lot of time coming up with $13.50 offer. theirs is 14.25. they think silverlake and dell in the end will prevail. they're in there and they're serious but still they have a leg up. they have been talking to investors. they have a fairly compelling deal on the table considering the fact, that you know, dell is not exactly the dell of 20 years ago. this is a company that needs to be restructured and they really think that based on, they're going, they will know more once due diligence is done but right now you have to put silverlake and dell in the lead and

basically take carl icahn right out of the equation. i said it yesterday and i will say it again, his deal is a greenmail bid. it has no relevance to reality. there is no way he will be running a computer-maker. he is in there for the ride. maybe he will get a bump up. maybe he won't. i'm hoping he doesn't, i don't know he never comes on fox business. adam: you said it best. this is not the dell of 10 years ago. why would someone want to billions of dollars on this with when the world is switching from pc to tablets. >> which one? adam: blackstein. >> we don't know. pull back your expectations on blackstone winning this deal for this reason. the people there tell me they have to go through due diligence. they haven't done that yet and when they get done with that, you know, they are going to reassess. they still tell me that they are, that the silverlake deal is the likely winner here because they have done the due diligence. they have a plan apparently with mike call dell and

silverlake to remake the firm and they have an offer. they have $3.25. whether this, whether blackstone is able to, remember what private equity has to do. you have to remake the company, right? then you have to sell it for something more. may be too much of a chance when they get done with due diligence. it is interesting bidding war but may not be a bidding war at the end. they may pull out after due diligence. we'll know more in a month. if you lay odds, tough say odds-on-favorite, silverlake, michael dell. adam: charlie gasparino, giving you the odds. thank you very much, charlie. melissa: as we do every 15 minutes let's check the markets. nicole petallides on the floor of the new york stock exchange. nicole, you're watching some winners in the tech sector. >> that's right. i want to take first a look at netflix. netflix is on the move to the upside. pacific crest raised their price target to 2.25 from 1.50. that doesn't mean as much as what they said means. they have outperform rating.

they still see it as the clear global leader in subscription screaming video and that they have substantial opportunities to create value beyond our model's current representation over time. so the positive comments that go along with this price call and price target of $225 are certainly worth noting. specific crest talking about netflix. you see the stock up 7.5%. look at electronic arts which is also on the move to the upside. you have piper jaffray raising their price star get on electronic arts and they make video games and such, raising price target $23 up 20 bucks. upside potential to overweight from neutral. melissa: nicole, thanks so much. looking at commodities, helping oil prices which are on track for their third straight day of gains, look at that, up a buck 24 on the front month. crude now breaking through $96 a barrel. this is the highest level in more than a month. look at the spread between brent and west texas crude.

wti we call it. the gap is the lowest level in eight months that is interesting stat to watch. gains for crude are coming ahead of tomorrow's supply report which is expected to show that stocks rose 800,000 barrels last week. adam: think "andromeda" strain. night of the comet. this is no, no low-grade "b" movie. a lab in texas says it misplaced a vial of deadly virus. the virus was discovered misses last week at a routine check in the galveston national laboratory. the virus is usually carried by rats in venezuela. but people can get infected by hailing. if people were contaminated one-third would die from hemorraghic fever. the cdc was informed when the vial was discovered missing. the officials at the lab said it was most likely

destroyed and can not be used as a bioterror weapon. in a report from the government accountability office due out last week, it says that the united states is at increased risk for accidents at laboratories and no accident has been taken on lab safety issues since its last report in 2009. melissa: i thought you would finish that by i am blaming sequestration. i was sure that's where you were headed. adam: this weren't so scary, what is called the guarido, almost sounds a drink at applebee's with tequila. melissa: one-third you hemorrhage. adam: that is how series -- serious. melissa: what we learned from spacex's successful journey to the international space station. adam: what you don't pose facebook may still know. the latest effort to collect data on your private details is coming up next. friday night, buddy.

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melissa: so your birthday, high school, photos from the concert last week, facebook can turn anything into an ad but now it is looking outside the official network to target you in a new way and shibani joshi has that story. shibani. >> always get worried when facebook is trying to target you in a new way. it does have a billion users but it wants to get a little closer to the billion users. it feels like it doesn't know you as well as it could. instead of using all the information you give it, your birthday posts, anything about your likes or dislikes the company is going outside of facebook to get data to targeted as and

you in more relevant ways. back in february the company teamed up with four different data aggregators to get assets is lots of different things including government documents. a database with access to your spending habits and even a cookie tracking firm. the promise two out of these companies that facebook is working with are under investigation by the ftc for how they collect and use data. so remains to be determined whether or not facebook will have any longstanding relationship with these companies but certainly the company needs to do something, if you look at a whole promise of facebook. it ipo'd at $38 a share. it is far from those levels right now, trading around 25 1/2 bucks a share. so it is trying to do what it can and apparently doesn't have enough information about you. so it is going outside. melissa: whoa, that is an ugly chart. shibani joshi, thanks so much. adam: five hours after taking off from the international space station the cargo spaceship dragon

owned by spacex splashed down in the pacific. this was the ship's second of 12 planned missions under the $1.6 billion contract dragon has with spacex. they took food and parts to the crew and returned over one ton of data and old equipment collected for nasa. dragon is currently the only craft of capable and sending and returning goods from space. all others burn up upon reentry. don't you wish you could throw the garbage out and have it burn up on reentry. melissa: that would be tidy. adam: would be a lot easier. and all the data to go through that. what poor shlub at nasa has to go through that? melissa: on "money", we have the owner of sparkology.com. sure you haven't heard of that. adam: no. melissa: they went to elite colleges. they pay to get to introductions to women on the site, don't have to pay or graduated from top schools. it is all the business of

dataing -- dating which turned into huge money making industry. adam: that sounds unfair. melissa: may be unfair. more and more online dating sites. it is a huge business. they're popping up. adam: not going to say it, sound like marrying down. just as easy to marry rich. melissa: a lot of judgment in that statement you just made. adam: breaking news right now. the bank of cyprus says it does not accept, does not accept the resignation of the chairman and four directors according to a statement from the bank. ashley webster and tracy byrnes will have more coming up. melissa: that story keeps developing. all right. adam: also, more on the deal for dell which one is best for shareholders. dell analyst, peter mices weighs in on the most likely outcome from the dell bidding wwr. he joins tracy and ashley next on fox business. don't miss it. ♪

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tracy: hey, good afternoon, i'm racy byrnes. >> i'm ashley webster. stocks pushing higher gaining back yesterday's losses and then some. the s&p just a few points away from reaching its highest close ever. is today the day? we're watching the markets every move. tracy: americans losing confidence in this economy, partly on the billions in automatic spending cuts. how will the cuts plus that pesky payroll tax hike and upcoming tax refund shape the mood of the consumer ahead? we have a leading economist and he will share his take on all that in a moment. ashley: plus new concerns about housing's recovery. josh says, he was, by the way, one of the first to sound the alarm about the housing bubble years ago. now he is warning about a new housing trend. he will be our special guest straight ahead. a good numbers and bad numbers in housing. tracy: hard to decipher. it is all green right now. time for stocks as we go down to nicole petallides on

the floor of the exchange as we do every 15 minutes. happy tuesday. >> back at you, tracy and ashley. we're looking at a market that just won't quit, right? have been nervousness and jitters the vix pulled back. the dow jones industrials up 95 points. getting close to the all-time intraday high. we're almost at level. we were a few points away as the s&p 500. key levels to watch. closing high on the s&p 500 is 1565. you can see us sitting now at 1561. that is a gain of more than half of one percent. we're looking at our moves and how we've been moving. the vix has pulled back despite you have the wildcard over in europe. we've seen the euro hovering not too far off the lows back in november 22nd. we're seeing the euro a little bit weaker. dollar is stronger. oil and gold divergent. seeing gains across the

board. drug stocks, retailers, all doing very well for the most part. so far so good for the bulls out there as we continue to gain momentum. as we talk about cyprus later in the show at 2:30 i will talk directly with my first cows sign -- cousin irene who lives directly in cyprus. i will look for word to see how they're doing that there i haven't spoken actually with her. we speak electronically all the time but haven't heard her voice. i'm looking to hear her. tracy: that will be interesting to hear how the morale is down there. nicole, thanks for setting that up. ashley: we'll look forward to that. economy, new report with higher taxes and massive government spending cuts will have a clear impact on our nation's gdp. senior washington correspondent peter barnes has the details on all of this. peter. >> ashley, sometime in the next few days the president will sign the continuing budget resolution that will keep the government funded through the end of the fiscal year. it will lock in those

sequester spending cuts despite all of the president's criticism of those cuts. it is about $85 billion this year. about half falling on the pentagon. the president has complained that the cuts will hurt economic growth, cost 750,000 jobs according to the congressional budget office he says but the president doesn't mention the fiscal drag on the economy produced by the tax increases that he has advocated and won in negotiations with congress this year and last. and when you combine the effects of the spending cuts and the higher taxes, higher taxes, higher payroll taxes higher taxes on upper income earners and taxes imposed by obamacare the new york federal reserve now says that gdp will be 1.75% lower this year than it otherwise would have been. so some of the president's critics it is a double-standard. >> he wants to say that the sequester is going to lead to economic calamity and then all these other taxes

that he should be responsible for as well, he should be essentially held harmless for the economic drag that they may well inflict on the economy. >> in fact the cbo says that the higher taxes will have about an equal impact an the economy as the sequester stepping cuts. ashley? ashley: all right, peter barnes in d.c., thank you so much. tracy: shouldn't be a shocker to anybody. ashley: no. tracy: let's talk more about this. the automatic spending cuts are weighing down on the consumer economic outlook. the consumer sentiment index plunged to their a reading of 59.7, that is from 68 in february. how long will those cuts along with smaller paychecks and of course upcoming tax refunds? hmmm. how will that affect, impact consumers mood and spending? let's bring in drew matus deputy chief economist at ubs. some of them are great, some of them are really scary.

new york fed says gdp will be 1.75% lower. you're saying everyone will get a tax refun and bo spend some money. >> you have to watch what people do, not what they say. people are upset about the world. when you spend money, happy or sad, right? usually if you're a little concerned you're actually spending a little bit of money. you try to make yourself feel better. particularly, this is the key part, if you have a job. what we've seen claims numbers come down very sharply. fewer people are filing for unemployment insurance. that means they have a job, right? you have more jobs, less income, less fear of being laid off. all that tends to translate into good things. we haven't seen impact from the payroll tax hike. it just hasn't materialized. there is another new york fed study that suggests we shouldn't expect to see much of one at all. that is what ubs based its estimates on. that people will not respond too much to a higher payroll tax hike and at the same point we think that not the sequester is much to do about nothing but much to do about a minor thing rather than major impact a lot of

people are putting into it. ashley: drew, i want to mention durable goods. look, it was up 5.7%, the biggest jump since september but you take out transportation and it's really pretty a peoplic. so how do you read these numbers -- anemic. tracy said we see some of the numbers are good, some are not. it appears the economy is bumping along at best. >> for me, 70% of the connie is consumption. if you look at labor market numbers and all the things related to a consumer being active those are the numbers surprising economists to the upside. economists are looking at everything, oh look, there is sequester, there is this payroll tax increase, we're running through the giant regressions and none of us look out the window to see what our neighbors doing. probably because we don't have a lot of friends. we're economists after all. sometimes we can disconnect from the real world if we pay too much attention to the models. what the real world says

consumers are feeling more confident in their jobs, they're starting to see more income and they will spend it. tracy: bring this back to the market because you're sitting there on the ubs trading floor. bring the economy and economist in you, what do you tell traders on the floor, other than uncle ben will keep printing so make sure your clients are in this market? >> you know, the first thing i tell them, watch out for rising bond yields because the bond market will not like it if the economy keeps improving. it will want to go up. of course the fed is leaning against it as hard as they can. on the equity floor, what i'm telling them, there is reason equities are doing what they're doing. because these companies are actually making money. if you look at the behavior of the economy relative to what we call an economic surprise index which is fancy way of saying how bad your economist is, the surprises in the economy are actually very highly correlated with the movement in the equity market over time and the recent improvement we've seen is very highly correlated with the economic surprises we've

been seeing which are mostly to the upside? ashley: what worries you, drew. we saw enough of what is going on in cyprus to knock the stuffing out of the market but look wherewer are now. is there anything on the horizon that particular concerns you? >> there are always things. you have to worry about europe. you have to worry, you have to worry about political action in washington, that they might do something that messes things up. talk about how bad the sequester was going to be, very interesting that most of the economic data since the sequester hit is up, not down. obviously there is timing issue. but it is somewhat interesting to think about. you know, maybe people are happy that the budget deficit is being dealt with even if they don't like the way it is being dealt with. ashley: yeah. tracy: drew, i bet you have a lot of friends because you are a economist with a personality, sir. you come back anytime. >> that is rare thing. ashley: that is rare thing. tracy: sure is. ashley: thank you very much. we talked about housing a little bit. home prices rising at a pace not seen since before the

bubble burst but gram fisher josh rosner says there are warning signs within housing rebound. he is our special guest ahead. tracy: the dell bidding war is heating up. what is the best deal for shareholders. analyst, peter micek weighs in. let's check out oil. dow is up 92 points. oil up about a dollar -- $1.13. $95.95 a barrel. we'll be right back. the capital one cash rewards card

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ashley: sliding for a while but copper moving higher after positive manufacturing data here in the united states. sandra smith has today's trade. sandra. >> i'm trying to get a fancy chart ready for you guys here, tracy and ashley, that is copper versus gold. this is over the past year. copper prices have come down about 12%. copper is in the yellow. in the blue is gold.

gold has been winning. gold is actually down about 5%. so it has been outperforming copper but both are still negative over the past year. so i shortened this chart a little bit to year-to-date chart. they very closely track each other. copper more of an industrial metal. gold viewed as safe haven and hedge against inflation precious metal. but gold is still higher for the year, copper lower. analysts call for that to change. in particular bank of america, merrill lynch analysts say copper prices should rebound from current levels as we move into the second half of 2013. they're making a big bet that china, the biggest user of china the world, will increase its demand. the u.s., second biggest user will increase its demand. if i get out of this, guys, i will turn back to the copper chart, copper today actually about flat, but it has been, it rallied off to start the day because of better than expected durable goods orders. copper moves on stuff like that.

so something to keep in mind when you're looking whether or not you should invest in copper. by the way many plays in the stock market, freeport-mcmoran, a lot of those big mining stocks you can watch, a lot of etfs they all move at the price of the metal. bottom line, don't just look at gold and silver. a lot of wall street analysts say copper is has been the laggard. it will pick up. it will beat gold and silver the rest of the year. ashley: nice move. sandra, thanks very much. tracy: one metal that makes stuff. use it. as opposed to the door stop that is gold. how this for your tax dollars at work? the nonpartisan congressional research service says the government spent close to $4 million on former presidents last year. okay, george w. bush was the costliest. at more than a million 1/4. that covers pension, compensation, benefits for office staff and uncle sam picks up the tab for other stuff like travel, office

space and poseage believe it or not. taxpayers spent just under a million dollars on bill clinton. i thought that was light. i expected him to bill more. ashley: he is everywhere. tracy: half going to his harlem, new york, office space. george herbert walker bush cost taxpayers $850,000. that story doesn't bother me so much. ashley: ex-president, come on. tracy: wars, things like that. missed family functions. the least we could do. ashley: not cheap but we understand it. it is now quarter past the hour. time to check on those markets. let's go down to nicole petallides on the floor of the new york stock exchange. nicole still up nicely on the dow, 93, 94. >> good on wall street across the board on major averages. we have a story with monsanto and dupont. dupont pulling back just one-third of 1% but originally there was a deal it was a $1 billion jury verdict that dupont was ordered to pay monsanto in

august for infringing on some patents. instead, monsanto worked out their own deal. $1.75 billion in order to settle these lawsuits. a lot of people saying it is a smart deal for dupont. they will be paying over, from the year 2014 through 2017 some fixed royalty payments but they have rights to use some of the technology that is used to develop monsanto's leading genetic technology. it is a deal that goes forward over several years but should bode well for both of them. obviously we're talking about seeds and a new collaboration between the two. >> monsanto up 4.2%. nicole, thank you very much. tracy: coming up, you're not sold an the housing recovery? i'm sure not. graham fisher josh rosner says one housing bright spot could spell trouble in the next few years. he will explain that next. ashley: first let's look how the good ol' u.s. green back is dueing against foreign currencies as the dow is

moving higher. what about the euro that has been plummeting with the chaos in cyprus. pound down to 1.15. kind of a mixed bag today. we'll be right back. ♪ [ male announcer ] how could a luminous protein in jellyfish, impact life expectancy in the u.s., real estate in hong kong, and the optics industry in germany? at t. rowe price, we understand the connections of a complex, global economy. it's just one reason over 75% of our mutual funds beat their 10-year lipper average. t. rowe price. invest with confidence. request a prospectus or summary prospectus with investment iormation, risks, fees and expenses to read and consider carefully before investing.

>> at 20 minutes past the hour, hello, everybody i'm uma pemmaraju with your fox news minute. italy's highest court overturned the acquit al of former exchange student amanda knox and ordered a new trial. knox and her former boyfriend served prison time for the murder of knox's roommate back in 2007 but that conviction was later overturned. in virginia, governor bob mcdonnell has a bill that safeguards against voter fraud and free i.d. for any registered voter who does not have one. democrats denounced it to suppress votes of elderly, minorities and underprivileged. supreme court says using a police dog without a warrant to sniff for drugs outside of a house violates the homeowners's constitutional rights. it pertained to a race in miami. justin antonin scalia says the house and surroundings are constitutionally protected area. the evidence found in this particular case was thrown out. that is look at headlines making news right now on the

fox business network. back to ashley and tracy. ashley: uma, thank you so much. we appreciate that. let's talk about housing data. it is pointing to signs of a recovery. january home prices hat the biggest annual gain of seven years. february capped best back-to-back months in more than four years. with cash buyers making up 32% of home sales, are investors actually leading this recovery? let's bring in graham fisher's josh rosner, one of the first analysts by the way to sound the alarm on fannie, freddie and the credit ratings agencies before the housing crash and boy, did you ever be proven right on that one, josh. let's bring, let's look at this recovery as it is. is it being led by investors? >> yeah there is no question it is being led by investors. it is being led by banks who foreclosed taken over properties, selling off reo. ashley: real estate owned. >> real estate owned which is lower cost homes to investors who are buying them with the hopes of

buying large numb numbers of units. ashley: blocks. >> in a certain geographic area, managing them, turning them into rental properties. ashley: okay. >> so there's a whole host of issues here. but yes in simple answer, we have a investor-driven recovery and the question is, does it actually become self-sustaining with fewer and fewer properties available to purchase. and it is only bolstering the low end of the market. as long as it supports confidence by buyers --. ashley: it's good. >> it's good. the problem one of the lockups on the fund, in other words are investors raising money promising certain return rates, cap rates, if they aren't met you will see redemption and ultimately the properties come back into the market. ashley: here we go again. >> here we go again. this time the positive is they are mostly cash transactions. there is not really broader risk to anyone other than the investor. ashley: home prices though are recovering. >> home prices are recovering. again in these geographic markets and in large measure

in the price cohorts that are being bolstered by investors shares. ashley: you know, are we talking about regular inventories of these investors are buying or is it all distressed properties? >> almost all distressed properties. you're not seeing regular inventory again in the distressed markets. >> really what you're telling me it is not that healthy of a recovery. >> if you strip out almost all the investor share, we know almost 32% of sales were investor properties with some large portion of second homes which are really investor properties as well. that's, that, if you strip that out, it is not a very robust recovery. in fact it is still bouncing along the bottom. now, if in fact turns the psychology of a real purchaser around --. ashley: all the better. >> see home prices go up. that's a positive. you have to stop and say, hold on. as the economy recovers, as interest rates therefore start rising, home prices typically go the other way. ashley: that's true. >> mortgage rates rise.

>> yeah, wouldn't that change in the interest rates once we see that starting to edge up more, that perhaps would persuade more people to jump in due to the rates historically low levels? >> no question. you would have a initial burst of activity. that's a positive. it would start falling off but i think that is a fair question. the problem is ultimately demographics. are we creating enough households, interested in homeownership. ashley: okay. >> or on the other side, renting at a price these investors purchased the homes to rent them out. ashley: right. >> we're really still seeing household formation weak except in the upper age brackets with homeowner rates are already high. ashley: carl smith, wanted to ask you that, wrote an article in "forbes", said basically the near future credit standards are going to fall for homebuyers. he says that would allow homebuyers to make larger offers, allow young people to get into a home with perhaps little down payment.

large number of buyers and purchasing power will drive home prices into a bubble. >> yeah. i have a problem with that because if you look again, if you look at the demographics by age quintile, when you find is that the under 25 buyer, the 25 to 29 buyer, 29-34 buyer are cash constrained. they're not forming new households. they have a trillion dollars of student debters true. >> the economic outlook is still not good. if we see a robust jobs recovery, then that may change but we've got no sign of that. in fact if you look at household formation, we're still seeing, even through the end of 2012, the average age of household formation still rising. ashley: still rising. thank you so much, josh rosner, graham fisher and company managing director. as always, fascinating stuff. >> thanks for having me. ashley: all right. maybe not as healthy of a recovery as we think because it is investor driven.

interesting. no inventory. really hard to find new homes on the market. tracy: you know that first-hand. speaking of unhealthy, we have more protests in cyprus. banks remain closed, despite a bailout, a run on the banks still a concern. rich edson is alive from nicosia next. ashley: our very own nicole petallides. don't forget she will interview her cousin irene, who lives, i will get this wrong, in cyprus on the other side of nicosia. see how she is what she is doing to survives crisis. tracy: we'll look at some of the winners and losers on the s&p 500. netflix is at the top up 6%. we'll be right back. we went out and asked people a simple question:

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tracy: half past the hour. take a look at the dow 30. a lot more green than we have seen in a while. bank of america is your big loser today. not too much, still $12.27. let's go to the floor of the new york stock exchange, nicole petallides standing by with your special guest. we have been waiting for this all day. nicole: i have been waiting for this all day because it is a great opportunity to talk to my first cousin, irene petallides, who lives in cyprus. she is going to communicate with us now. can you hear me? >> i can hear you, yes. nicole: i love you and i miss you. you look as gorgeous as ever. i want to talk about the fact you have been sending me e-mails

regularly. people feel scared, betrayed, tell us how you are feeling and how the people you speak with regularly are feeling they are at this time. >> at the moment people are feeling the uncertainty and we don't know what the implications of this bailout is at the moment everybody is unsure in uncertain what tomorrow will bring for them and their children. nicole: you work for a prominent offshore shipping company and you haven't been paid, the banks have not been open since march 16. people must be nervous. what happens when the banks do open? >> it is going to be chaos, it is going to be a mad rush to the banks, everybody's going to want to get to the banks to get their money. wwe're afraid, the systems may crash because after 10 days of the enclosed the amount of work

that has to go through the system at all the banks, so we really don't know what will happen on thursday if the banks finally open. nicole: what do people say about being a part of cyprus and a part of the euro zone? he said everybody feels betrayed and we see a lot of the young people saying they don't want help, they don't even want to be a part of the euro zone in cyprus can live on its own, do you hear anybody saying anything about this? >> yes, there was talk about people saying we should just go bankrupt and come out of the euro zone. at this point we don't know, i don't know what would be the -@best solution. there will be a deflation of our cyprus towns, we will lose more money that way, i believe. nicole: you have a beautiful son, my gorgeous nephew.

you worry about his future at this point, right? >> absolutely, we don't know what tomorrow will bring, they have used us basically as a guinea pig and we don't know what tomorrow will bring with these cuts, these haircuts they are calling them, and the levies on people's savings. some over 100,000 they need to cut the heavy side done, but who knows what tomorrow will bring, if they will agree on lower amounts. nicole: i love you. it makes things very emotional to talk with irene, i wish you were right here next to me. in her notes to me, of all the immediate worries she has not been here in the states for years, don't know whether or not she will be here this summer. obviously she talks about the

uncertainty and the fear. you heard there may be chaos, a run on the banks in cyprus is a business matter, they have developed themselves over many years as a place for business, and we will see what happens. she used the phrase guinea pigs because we have heard other ministers say this may be a nice way to do structure for business on other banks under pressure. so we will see. ashley: very interesting stuff, really getting a first-hand accounts like that really brings home the chaos and the uncertainty beingqú felt across cyprus. rich edson on the other side in nicosia where there has been protest at the banks. what are you hearing and seeing? rich: very much the same thing, ashley. what you hear to describe the situation is a mess.

the bank of cyprus does not accept the resignation of the chairman and the four directors. the chairman tried to resign last night, the bank of cyprus is not accepting that resignation, so it continues in cyprus. there have been protests throughout the day coming from the parliament building, a parliament this morning with thousands of high school students and basically a broad-based sense of anger. >> i am mad with the situation in cyprus where the government is not helping out, they expect innocent people to pay for their own. >> in a few years i hope it rises again. rich: this tank behind me was supposed to be open today, that is what they thought was going to happen. they will not be open until

thursday. people accessing the atm right now because you cannot go inside and have not been able to do so for about 10 days. ashley: who knows, that could change any minute now. tracy: we have another problem facing the banks in cyprus, nobody knows how much money the banks have left or where it has gone, so when they finally reopen, could find out much of the 100,000 euro is already gone. gerri willis is here with that story. really scary. >> two big banks. cyprus and the bank of cyprus. guess what, both of these banks have offices in london, so what dthe smart people do? they went to london in took their money out where they were open. the people who launder money,

they can get at their money. who couldn't get to their money? the woman you just saw complaining about what is going on, the people in cyprus are the ones having trouble and have no options. i cannot imagine how frustrating this is. ashley: they are not getting paid, atms are running out of many and chaos, when are they going to open? we're now hearing thursday, that could change but can the system itself withstand what will happen when they do open? >> this has really been a failure of the bureaucrats to negotiate something. mistake after mistake after mistake. they delayed getting some sort of resolution with the eu, they were relying on the russians to do some kind of a deal with them, definitely doing that, that didn't happen, they didn't really have a plan for it.

i think you really have to look at these bureaucrats who tried to bow out, did not even want to negotiate, we're told they had to. we will get into this more tonight, also some great information you will want to hear about with the telecom industry, how the deal for cell phone may be ending soon, maybe going the way of the dinosaur. we will talk about.com a lot of other consumer stories. tracy: gerri willis tonight. i was thinking everything she says sounded like here at home. other than the russian part. ashley: that story is next. tracy: nissan selling 50,000 of

its all electric leaf vehicles. what is it like to drive and fill up this award-winning car? let's see how many people he can actually fit in that tank. your 10-year is unchanged, and your 30-year is down one basis point. we will be right back. it's a brand new start.

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>> i'm shibani joshi with your fox business brief in a fox business exclusive, bernie madoff claiming a big banks knew what he was up to. from prison, his e-mails, from my first interview to the media i said i must have known and were complicit in contributing to my crime although i've offered the bankruptcy trustee information that would demonstrate in detail the complicit behaviors of banks like jpmorgan and bank of new york, hsbc, citicorp and others, the trustee seems unwilling to act on my offer. the trustees telling fox business his credibility is highly suspect and has no substance value. the sec has declined to comment. that is the latest from the fox business report giving you the power to prosper.

tracy: one of the most popular video website, hulu, owned by three old-time broadcasters. that could be part of the problem. dennis kneale has more on the story. dennis: hulu was conceived in '07 as the answer to youtube and the internet. but now may be getting a new owner. hulu's three broadcast owners may be shopping for a buyer. hulu a classic case of how new upstarts win because they don't have old business to protect and they don't have to serve three giant masters. hulu amounts to a face-off between two media titans. the ceo of disney, abc's owner, a deal maker extraordinaire and rupert murdoch, the owner of

news corp., our parent company. busy splitting his empire into two. disney has done very well, and news corp. up even better, especially since announcing plans to break up back in june. news corp. says hulu should be a paid service. nbc gave up any state to win approval of nbc takeover by comcast. with no ties to anyone at work, that may be the best idea. netflix may be, amazon may be a satellite distributor like directv or dish. three scenarios possible, an outside buyer could come in, disney, or hulu multi-headed ownership could stay unchanged

and that could be the worst option. tracy: totally. i cannot even decide on lunch in my house. ashley: thank you. a quarter until, stocks every 15 minutes, let's go down to nicole petallides at the floor of the new york stock exchange. nicole: taking a look at sonic with the quarterly reports and forecasts, the stock up 7.75%. u.s. seed in the same time credit suisse rates and a price target for $11 up from $9.50 to pass in that area anyways. obviously a winner on their earnings. ashley: the dow still hanging in there about 90 points. tracy: what to do with dell. is it time to sell your shares?

next. ashley: plus an inside look in the world's best-selling electric car. taking us on a test drive coming up next. we look at some of the winners and losers on the nasdaq read we will be right back.

tracy: shares of dell in a holding pattern after blackstone and carl icahn through their hats in the ring with an offer to take the pc maker private. while dell's board members weigh in on all the competing bids,

our next guest says it is all about the price. equity manage analyst, it is alt the stock price, right? carl icahn at $15 per share, which many say is a throwaway offer, does not mean a lot at the end of the day. blackstone $14.25, dell 13.65. who is going to budge? >> frankly the math works for dell. the private equity business that is a pretty good return, so we would expect them to bump and for michael it is his legacy, his name on the door, don't think you would want to leave it any other way. tracy: charlie gasparino reported earlier the blackstone deal is management friendly because a former dell employee, executive, is on the deal. so he can get icon and blackstone to come together,

does that make the deal little bit better for shareholders? >> i would suspect so. i would imagine they have reached out to folks, all former hp, dell, compaq execs. they're looking a lot of ways to structure this. michael is not currently involved, and we just have a hard time seeing him leaving. their own money management firm, plenty of capital to do this. i have a hard time believing he will walk away from this. for blackstone and icahn, they have to find a way to out bid them. tracy: why would anybody want this? half of the profits come from pc sales, we know the pc is a dying breed, what are they going to do with this to keep it going? >> the focus of their strategy has been around the smb market. this provider, and we can see a

future where cloud type delivery models make a ton of sense and nobody close to catching dell in that category. that is what we would do, we have to think they're a lot smarter than we are. tracy: so now let's talk about stockholders. if i owned the stock, do i sell it going into this? >> i probably have outside of $15. you probably want to start looking elsewhere with your money. tracy: if you are not in the stock, are you getting into it now? >> no. you have to be very sophisticated, willing to pay high volume leverage to make up for the 40-cent return your going to get here. tracy: this will not happen at the end of the day, are you buying into that? >> it puts the employee customer is in turmoil, there's a lot of risk to the company. it is his name on the door, he

doesn't want to see his company hurt in any way. tracy: peter misek saying look elsewhere if you're a shareholder. thank you. >> appreciate it. ashley: our very own fox business is live all day with a preview, and who better than jeff flock taking a look at the 100% electric nissan leaf. it is perfect. jeff: i may be shocking in one way or another. this is the first ever live test drive of the 2013 nissan leaf. it is incredible we're getting the exclusive opportunity to do that today. i will talk to you and i will chat very carefully as we go into this new vehicle because this new vehicle is charging, you can't see them, but the front seat with me, you have

made a car that charges faster, goes farther and is cheaper. it sounds like magic. >> it is not magic but it is a reality. the new 2013 nissan leaf is cheaper than the previous model, better range, better it systems and is overall a much improved vehicle than previous models. >jeff: i am driving at about to make a quick u-turn here, hold on with me. as i do that. i think i can do that, and tremendous acceleration. what do you think the range is going to be on this? >> 90% charge at about 75. at 100% charge you can get 85 miles on a single charge with this vehicle. jeff: how is it you are able to make it cheaper? >> we made it cheaper by moving the manufacturing tennessee,

reducing the overall cost of the components that went into the vehicle. >> i am going to send it back to you guys, but it is great to be able to test these things. electric vehicle someday may take off, maybe someday soon. tracy: someday. ashley: he does everything. thank you very much, jeff flock. great stuff as always. tracy: i will be the girl who forget to plug in her car. i don't know. all right, you're dow is up 92 points, and sales are down in february as homebuilders ramp-up supply. will demand keep up? a fox business exclusive coming up. liz claman will take you through the last hour of trading. "countdown to the closing bell" is next. don't go anyway. g ] ♪ [ indistinct shouting ]

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