maria: been a great show today. dagen, matte, joseph, thank you so much. >> thank you, maria. maria: lots to cover. we will continue our focus on china and as you heard here first, the origins of the coronavirus. that does it for us today. have a great day. "varney & company" begins right now. stu, take it away. stuart: good morning, maria. good morning, everyone. now we can see just how badly this economy has been hit. 5.2 million newly unemployed. big number. in the last month, 21.8 million people have been thrown out of their job. it looks like by may, the jobless rate will be in the double digit range, maybe as high as 15%, maybe even higher than that. that is a 1930s style depression level. that's why the president later today will announce new guidelines for opening up parts of the economy in some areas. mr. trump has said we are past the peak of the virus and it's

time to lessen the economic pain, which we are clearly suffering. meanwhile, fox news has blown the lid off the china virus story. reliable sources suggest the virus began at a virology lab in wuhan, china. patient zero, the first person to get it, was a lab worker who went out into the city and spread the virus from there. now, the chinese authorities covered it up. they delayed action. they altered data and suppressed doctors and journalists who reported the truth. the story is an indictment of china and the communist authorities. it will dramatically change the u.s./china relationship. here's how the market's reacting to all of this. we got bad news on manufacturing in the philadelphia and new york area. we got a sharp drop in housing starts. and we've got those dreadful jobless numbers. but the dow is going to open on the upside, maybe up 90 points. that's almost a half percentage point. same story for the nasdaq and

also, look at the nasdaq, actually, that's going to be up more than 1%. green after dreadful economic news. look at the price of oil. the saudis and opec have announced production cuts of 20 million barrels a day but that's not lifted the price of oil above $20 a barrel. it's now at $20.30, barely above 20 bucks even. there is now a plan, by the way, to pay, to pay american drillers to keep the oil in the ground. gas continues to come down. today the national average comes in at $1.83. again, i'm looking at wisconsin for the cheapest gas in the nation. the average price there is all the way down to $1.26. amazing. this is going to be a landmark day. within hours we will hear from the president about reopening parts of the economy. "varney & company" is about to begin.

we're going to be announcing guidelines and we'll be talking about various states and it's very exciting. it's been a horrible time to see such death and destruction and they'll be safe, they'll be strong but we want to get our country back. we'll be the comeback kids, all of us. stuart: come in, scott shellady, joining us from afar. scott, you heard what the president had to say there. we are going to be the comeback kids. your thoughts on this, please? >> well, yeah, we are going to be the comeback kids. it's just how quickly you think that's going to happen. today's numbers show you we are still in a deep dive. this one size fits all of locking everybody up and locking every business down has proven not to have really worked out well, i think, so a rolling open is going to be a rolling recovery. i mean, that's what common sense would tell you. unless you think idaho, south dakota and north dakota and iowa

are this big economic engine that will really shoot us back. i think we have a little disconnect with the equities right now, off 15%, when we've got janet yellen calling for 30% contraction and jpmorgan calling for 30% contraction in the economy. we have a lot ahead of us. it will be a very bumpy road, not a rocket ship. we will have a rolling recovery with a rolling open. stuart: but i think, scott, that with all this bad news, that is terrible news that came out today, even so, the market is pointing up. now, that implies to me the market's looking to the other side, looking for that recovery. >> you're exactly right. we are all still arguing about how long a piece of string is. i absolutely see the market looking past this and actually getting a little bit buoyant, maybe ahead of themselves, because this is a psychological problem. we can't solve it with all this money. it does help, it's a nice place holder but it's still psychological. this thing is not going to be over, stuart, until a

75-year-old couple goes out for their 50th wedding anniversary in a very crowded chinese restaurant. when that happens, it's over and we are good to go. stuart: got you. scott, stay there. i've got more for you later. i want to get more into these jobless numbers. 5.25 million, the latest number of people claiming benefits. lauren, can you dig into this, please? give me some nuggets within the report. lauren: yeah. if you look at the past four weeks, the number is 22 million. that means 22 million americans in a month are unemployed. if you divide that by the size of the labor force, 155 million, you know what the unemployment rate we are talking about is? 14.2%. 14.2%. there are two questions we should be asking ourselves right now. the biggest question, how many and when will these 22 million workers get rehired and the second question is with the enhanced benefits because of the government, the cares act, a lot of folks, we saw this in particular in the state of rhode

island, they made sure that they signed up for unemployment benefits because they got more money. it was enhanced for them. stuart: okay. so you're looking at an unemployment rate of around 14%. that's depression levels indeed. okay. that's the dreadful economic news of the morning. actually, there's more of that as well. let's get to that china story. sources tell fox news the virus originated in a chinese lab. because they were trying to compete with the u.s. on the pharmaceutical front. susan, come into this and give us some context on this. susan: sources are telling fox news and our washington bureau is reporting there is increasing confidence that covid-19 actually originated from that wuhan virology lab, largest in the country, just a few miles outside the city center in wuhan. this is not part of china's attempt to build a bioweapon. instead, it was for china to prove that they can detain, contain and detect any sort of biochemical weapons in the future, but if this is true, this is not a good look for the

chinese president and the chinese communist party. the fact they can basically bungle and let out a virus into the population, this also adds to the credibility deficit of president xi right now. they are also dealing with a collapsing economy. we know china is expected to shrink about 10% in the first three months of this year, which would be the worst by the way for china since after tiananmen square, and when i explained the motivation of the chinese president, the chinese communist party, all they want to do is stay in power which has been hard to do for more than a few decades in communist regimes, and in order to do that, they have two motivations which is to keep the people of china healthy and rich, and two problems they are grappling with right now. stu, i would say this is pretty much a sharp deterioration between the two largest economies in the world. stuart: i think you are absolutely right. it would change the relationship forever, i would say. certainly in the immediate future. susan, i want to go back to you because you've got news from apple. let's move on to the corporate front for a second. what's your news?

susan: well, apple's reopening stores outside of china for the very first time. they expected to do that with the first in south korea. we know south korea has been testing, it's been getting a handle on coronavirus and stores around the world outside of china have been shut for the last few weeks. so china is open and stores across the rest of the world are going to slowly phase in according to apple. this is a big deal. they just launched that cheaper iphone yesterday and other devices. stuart: okay. apple is off on that news this morning. got it. now, let's get back to the other -- i'm going to call this the high anxiety number. that is the price of oil. okay, it's at $20.27 a barrel right now. that's extraordinary, because it's extraordinarily low, even though the saudis and the rest of opec have cut production by 20 million barrels a day. what you're looking at, $19 a barrel, is the lowest level since february 2002. the price of gas, this is important stuff, even though

we're not driving very much, we are down to $1.83. we like to keep you in touch with oil, gas as well as stocks. now let's turn to housing. i was saying earlier we had some grim economic news this morning and we've got grim economic news on housing. lauren, spell it out for us. lauren: we do. three things to tell you. fannie mae says home sales will fall about 15% this year with both supply and demand being down. we did just get a report on new home building housing starts in march, they fell more than 22%. but i wanted to give you some information about permits, future home building. we saw the multi-family category rise. what does that say to you? it says when we come out of this, we might not have as much money, we might be looking to rent rather than buy. so multi-family construction would be more popular in that event. that's what came up in the data we just crunched. stuart: that is absolutely

fascinating, isn't it. all right. thanks very much, lauren. now, one of the other blockbusters from the president's news conference yesterday afternoon, the virus update, was his threat to adjourn both chambers of congress. that's something that's never been done by any president. listen to this. watch the tape. >> the senate should either fulfill its duty and vote on my nominees or it should formally adjourn so that i can make recess appointments. if the house will not agree to that adjournment, i will exercise my constitutional authority to adjourn both chambers of congress. the current practice of leaving town while conducting phony pro forma sessions is a dereliction of duty that the american people cannot afford during this crisis. stuart: senator mike rounds, south dakota republican, with us

now. mr. senator, is the president saying basically let's not waste a good crisis? >> well, what he's saying is his nominations have been slow-walked by our democrat colleagues from the beginning of his administration. some of these are non-controversial. the non-controversial nominations should have been approved by unanimous consent. it should not have taken individual votes. we are still doing individual votes one at a time for the vast majority of his nominations. that's what he's frustrated with. i don't blame him at all for being angry about it. non-controversial nominations should be included as part of a package on a daily basis to be set forth. stuart: mr. senator, would you stay there for a second. i want to bring you back after the commercial and talk to you about the closing of that smithfield plant because that's very important to the food chain. meanwhile, check futures. again, despite all that dreadful economic news, the dow will open with a 100 point gain. you are at 23,500. in our 11:00 hour, actor

john ratzenberger, the "cheers" guy is helping blew collar workers and america get back to work. he's on the show. relief funding running out for small businesses. i want to know what congress is going to do about that. plus we will tell you the number of hours the average american is streaming every day. you will be astonished at the number. we'll be right back. you wouldn't accept an incomplete job from anyone else. why accept it from your allergy pills? flonase sensimist. nothing stronger. nothing gentler. nothing lasts longer. flonase sensimist. 24 hour non-drowsy allergy relief here's the thing about managing for your business.s when you've got public clouds,

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stuart: senator mike rounds with us now. senator, i have to ask you about that smithfield processing plant in south dakota. they've got 500 virus cases there. they are shut down and that threatens the food chain supply for the whole country. what can you do to get that

plant reopened? >> 3700 south dakotans want to go back to work. this is about any meat processing plant in the united states, this can happen at, where you have people close together. we are talking about a critical industry that has to get back to work. the company already started making changes. they need the same type of protective equipment you find on people that work in hospitals and other front line providers. stuart: you think they can get that equipment and get the processes worked out and get them back into that plant within -- by the end of the week? is that possible? >> perhaps not by the end of the week, but within several days, the answer is yes. we believe that that's a possibility. we know that that plant also provides protein for other plants around the country and with their production shut down, there will be other plants in other states that will have to shut down as well. smithfield desperately wants to get that plant back up and operational but it's got to be

safe for these south dakotans. they have to be in a safe position. this is one that once we get them back in, we don't want to have to shut it down again. stuart: yes, sir. senator mike rounds, south dakota republican, thank you very much for being with us, sir. always appreciate it. thanks very much. now this. relief funding for small businesses. the money's running out. congress can't seem to agree on how to get the money to those small businesses which clearly need it. hillary vaughn joins us. dig deeper into this, please. tell us what's going on. reporter: this is the update from just 30 minutes ago from the small business association. there have been 1.6 million applications from 4900 different lenders that have been approved and right now, the total amount of those loans, $339 billion and the reason why that's relevant is because a source at the small business association tells my colleague edward lawrence that once that number hits $340 billion, they basically run out of money. even though there has been $350 billion allocated for this paycheck protection program, $10

billion of that is going to be absorbed in lender fees. we are just $1 billion away right now of this program running out of money. that's the update from 30 minutes ago. overnight, we also have been getting updates that treasury secretary steven mnuchin has been in deep negotiations with house speaker nancy pelosi trying to work out a deal, something she thinks her caucus can stomach to get through the house to get more money for this program. she wants added things, more money for state and local governments, more money for hospitals, before she says her caucus can support this, but here's the problem. we are already hearing percolations from other republican lawmakers in the senate and the house that say treasury secretary mnuchin does not speak for all republicans in congress and they are worried he's going to make a deal with pelosi and that not all republicans are going to be able to stomach it and get behind it. so we are really in a stalemate here in terms of trying to get more money to congress. there is a little light at the end of the tunnel. the president is holding a call

with republican law makers later this morning, perhaps he's going to convince them to get on board with whatever mnuchin is able to work out with house speaker pelosi. stuart? stuart: all right, hillary, we understand exactly what's going on. got it. thanks very much. i want to get back to scott shellady and that report we are hearing that the government may be paying american drillers to keep their oil in the ground. that sounds like desperation to me, scott. >> yeah, unfortunately, that's a bad sign. it's not an uncommon sign. we've got a similar kind of program in the agricultural world across the map. so that's something that looks like it's going to be a bad situation. all you have to do, you've got a lot of smart people on the show but when we bring it down to nuts and bolts and say that look, when a case of beer is more expensive than a barrel of oil, houston, we've got a problem. stuart: yes. understood. i don't see how you restore

demand without getting america and the world back to work. because that's the essence of the problem. the crash in demand for oil and gas. scott, thanks for joining us. good stuff today. let's get to susan. you've got the numbers on how much we are all streaming in this virus environment. what have you got? susan: a lot. eight hours a day of content so that's a lot. the reason, we have a lot more free time on our hands and we are being stuck at home. so also, parents are allowing more of their kids to watch tv shows and movies during this pandemic so they are allowing them to stream. in fact, 55% in this survey, 65% of parents say yeah, i will get my kids to watch a little bit more. on average, the average american enjoys around four streaming services, think of netflix, hulu, disney plus and the like, and another 38% are usually logged in to five or more at any given time. but 75% of respondents say they have used more of the streaming

services since covid-19 and the outbreak and quarantines that are being involved but also 50% have cut the cord as well on some of these streaming services because look, we are in this environment, we are 25 million americans now out of work or close to it, so in order to save pennies, you have to cut off some of the ones you are actually paying for. stuart: okay. do you have news on starbucks, susan? have you got something for me there? susan: looks like they are reopening their stores or attempting to at this point. we heard from kevin johnson just setting out a memo to those in the media saying we are preparing to reopen cafes as local coronavirus conditions allow. so we have this reopening announcement later on today from president trump and hopefully some of the governors in terms of which states will reopen first. starbucks says we are preparing for that. starbucks has shut all restaurants across the u.s., only carryout and delivery have been available. it looks like big companies are also preparing for this reopening of america's economy as well.

stuart: fascinating. susan, thanks very much indeed. all right. we are a few minutes away from the opening bell. as we run up to the open of trading today, the dow is going to be up about 100 points. very nice gain for the nasdaq. up over 1%. we'll be back from wall street after this.

stuart: again, some details on united airlines. they are going to get, let's see, $5 billion from the government. $3.5 billion of that is just a pure grant. $1.5 billion is a low interest loan. that's what united is getting. ashley, come in, please. i think we are learning more about the terms of the wider airline bailout. what have you got for me? ashley: yeah, we are indeed. good morning, stu. well, essentially, about 30%, we

are told, will have to be paid back. now, as part of the deal, the government will receive warrants from the airlines, warrants is a security that entitles the holder, in this case the treasury department, to buy stock at a fixed price. it's a special right, if you like. indeed, the government, i.e. you, i and the taxpayers, will be able to buy a stake in these companies. they have the right to do that, at least. all of the companies will be apparently issuing these warrants, including southwest, jetblue, delta, american, united. southwest says it will be taking more than $2 billion. meanwhile, american and united say they will take $5 billion to $6 billion in aid essentially to cover payroll and keep workers going until we can get back in the air. certainly we are expecting a lot less capacity once we do get back and the airlines can start operating again properly. stuart: yeah. maybe that's why airline stocks, despite all that money, are down

again this morning. i might add that boeing, they are still deciding whether or not they want to take the billions of dollars coming in from the government. they are looking at the terms under which they will get that money. by the way, i think boeing's stock is down a little this morning. we are running up to the opening bell on wall street. we are about a minute away. this is going to be a big day for several reasons. number one, we have had some dreadful economic news earlier this morning. five million newly unemployed people, nearly 22 million newly unemployed in the last month. dreadful news on housing starts, down a whopping 22%. and the manufacturing activity in the philadelphia and new york areas, absolutely crashing. despite that, perhaps all this bad news was expected, despite that the market looks like it will be up just a fraction at least at the opening bell. the other factor is this afternoon, president trump is going to announce the new

guidelines for opening up at least parts of the economy in some parts of the country. maybe that's what the market's looking at. that would be a positive. you can get back to work and maybe come out of this depression, and we are in a depression, the market likes that. here we go. it is 9:30 precisely eastern time this thursday morning. we have just opened this market. we haven't got all the dow 30 stocks open yet. okay, they're open now. more than half of them are in the green. that means they've gone up. we just got a scattering of stocks in the red on the downside and in the early going, the very early going, we've just got a very tiny gain for the dow. we are up about, what, .1%. 20 points. that's it. check out the s&p, please. that of course is a broader market indicator. 500 stocks go into that index and it's a nice gain. it's up a half percentage point. that implies to me that there's one particular dow stock that's dragging everything down. i will check into that for you.

but the s&p, up .60%. solid gain, 2800 on the s&p. the nasdaq, i'm looking for a nice gain there. the technology stocks have been doing well and they have opened. the nasdaq up over 1%. very solid gain. now, let's have a look at amazon. they want to start testing employees for the virus. that's not why the stock is up so much. amazon is just deluged with orders during this virus crisis. look at that level. 2,340 a share. that's amazon for you. apple, they are going to open their first store outside of china. they have been closed around the world for some time. one store outside china will reopen. apple is at $287. netflix, they surged to a record high yesterday. i believe they are up some more now. yes, they are, $439 is your price on netflix. the clear winner from the virus epidemic and the streaming that we are all doing.

eight hours a day on average. show me disney. they just announced new content on disney plus for "star wars" day. nonetheless, the stock is virtually unchanged, $103 is your quote. the cruise lines, carnival could limit the number of passengers when they start sailing again. not sure when that's going to be. that's not doing the cruise lines much good. they are all down. tesla. elon musk will face a lawsuit after he tweeted about possibly checking or taking tesla private. this morning, tesla is down eight bucks at $720. have a look at starbucks. maybe reopening some cafes. that's up about a half percentage point. the big banks, check them, please. they are all in bad shape. they were certainly in bad shape yesterday with some dicey earnings. they are down again today. 1%, 1.5%, 2% on the downside for the financials. really taking it on the chin. then we go back to tesla. their stock is down this morning. susan, they are going to be

headed back to court. what's that all about? susan: the federal judge has ruled that shareholders can go ahead with their lawsuit against elon musk and tesla for claiming that they misled shareholders, musk in particular misled shareholders and tried to defraud them and cause all this stock volatility with that august 7th, 2018 tweet when he said taking tesla private at 420, who knows if that was a reference to a certain date, but he said funding secured and obviously, this did not turn out to be the truth. this caused actually the stock to spike and some would say killed some of the shorts out there. as for his settlement with the s.e.c., he was forced to step down from the chairmanship as a result of that tweet, he paid a $20 million fine and all his tweets now have to be edited by the communications department but shareholders will also get their day in court as well to see if they can get some sort of settlement from that infamous tweet. however, 420, look how far away we are from that so-called price

line when he said he was going to take the company private. stuart: yeah. that lawsuit's not doing him much good this morning. down 17 bucks a share. thanks. now, we like to concentrate on the winners coming out of this virus crisis. we've gone through netflix, clearly a winner. walmart's clearly a winner. so, too, is costco. we have got news on costco. tell me what you've got, ashley. ashley: yeah. the board saying it's going to raise the dividend for its shareholders by 8%. actually, to 70 cents from 65 cents. the first one being payable may 15th. the latest report from costco show that net sales jumped 12% in march. online sales growth of 48%, comp sales up 9.6%. of course, one of the few bright spots in all of this. by the way, they also announced they are going big into china, going to set up a new operation outside of shanghai. costco hiking its dividend by 8%. stuart: and $312 per share.

that's pretty good. let's get to google. lauren, are they -- they were on a hiring spree. are they scrapping it? lauren: yeah. they are. imagine that, stuart. this is like the richest company in silicon valley and even they are feeling the effects of coronavirus. obviously they make a lot of their money from ad spending and that has slowed down, so the ceo wrote a letter to employees and said, he said this. the entire global economy is hurting and google is not immune to the effects of this global pandemic so they are scrapping their plans to hire. it is also very difficult for them to train some of these workers that they intended to hire and get them the equipment that they need. so not laying off any workers, but not hiring as many as they had wanted to. stuart: it hasn't hurt the stock. it's at $1,271 a share. that's google for you. okay. check the big board. we have lost the gain. it was a very small gain at the opening bell.

that's for the dow industrials, at least. we have lost it. now we are down about .33% heading for roughly a 100 point loss after five minutes worth of business. we've got other indicators to check. how about the ten-year treasury yield. that's always the anxiety indicator. the lower it goes, the more anxiety. well, it's down today. .60%. that means money is going into the safety of treasuries, raising the price, lowering the yield. .6% on the ten-year. that's all you get. one more check of oil, please. are we still at $20 a barrel? okay. do gold, why not. gold is at $1746, up a little bit. crude oil at $20.24 per barrel. still really depressed. let's get back to amazon. planning to test all employees for the virus. what's the significance of that, susan? susan: well, it is significant because this is from jeff bezos's annual letter last night saying that amazon is doing all they can to contain the spread

of covid-19 and we have seen fulfillment center warehouse walkouts because they don't feel they are being protected and given the right personal protection gear in order to work in the fulfillment centers with a lot more employees standing side by side. as a result, you heard amazon this morning saying they are incrementally improving their testing capability and they are looking to simple testing equipment for a lab and they will start testing front line employees, and these wage increases they are paying for workers that will continue to work in these fulfillment centers, they say that's going to cost the company about half a billion dollars. we know amazon is experiencing a spike in orders right now so it's helping their business but they are also trying to protect their workers and probably protect their front line staff and their reputation as well. stuart: look at that stock. $2352 per share. up 45 today. quickly, ashley, what's this about price gouging at amazon? ashley: yeah, big problem,

apparently. more than 500,000 items have been removed from the site because of suspected price gouging. more than 6,000 accounts globally have been suspended because they are concerned they are using this pandemic to their own advantage. of course, they are now working, says jeff bezos in a letter to shareholders, the company now working with local attorney generals. in fact, 42 local ags are being given information about price gouging. stuart: got it. stock's still up 47 bucks. home sales predicted to fall, what, 15% this year. mortgage rates coming out at the top of the hour, we will tell you exactly what the mortgage rate is right now. did you get that $1200 stimulus check yet? that's chump change compared to what house democrats want. $2,000 a month for everybody. we will break it down for you. president trump will announce guidelines to reopen the economy today. will we bounce back quickly on

the economy? or is there a really long road to recovery? it's an open question. we will discuss it next. turn on my tv and boom, it's got all my favorite shows right there. i wish my trading platform worked like that. well have you tried thinkorswim? this is totally customizable, so you focus only on what you want. okay, it's got screeners and watchlists. and you can even see how your predictions might affect the value of the stocks you're interested in. now this is what i'm talking about. yeah, it'll free up more time for your... uh, true crime shows? british baking competitions. hm. didn't peg you for a crumpet guy. focus on what matters to you with thinkorswim. ♪

stuart: morgan stanley's stock is down this morning. i think that's got more to do with much lower interest rates than what their chief executive has been saying. he says the right way to reopen the economy is through a staggered return to work. i think that's what we're going to get. look at abbott, pharmaceutical guys, of course. their ceo says they are starting to see a flattening of the curve with how many tests they are distributing. that stock is up $91 a share on abbott labs. today, later on, we will hear from president trump about how he's proposing to reopen parts of the economy. gary kaltbaum with us. gary, let's talk about the economy first of all, as opposed to the market. do you see a v-shaped recovery?

we are in the depths of depression now. will we emerge on the other side real sharp-edged? >> i think there's going to be a sharp move off the lows just because of built-up demand but i just believe human nature of the consumer as well as business will dictate where things go. i use the word reassessment. i think there's going to be a reassessment all the way up based on what businesses see and based what the consumers feel. stuart: that's talking about the economy. we are taking a long time to figure out what consumers are going to do. what about the market? because the market anticipates well in advance the comeback of the economy. i think we have seen some of that already. what say you? >> most definitely, but beyond a little bit of a careful side now, stuart, i can tell you we are seeing great action in big cap tech, mega-cap tech. you know about amazon and netflix. but i have to tell you, the small caps are like near the lows. if we have a pullback they may break the lows.

transports are still terrible. it's a big divergent market. stay with the nasdaq, nasdaq 100 until it stops. stuart: am i safe in amazon, microsoft, netflix, walmart, costco? they are the winners of this virus situation. am i safe staying in them? >> i would definitely stay in right now. i don't know if i would be buying them after the move. that's when your risk picks up. if you own them right now, they are absolute keepers. that's 100% without a doubt where the big money is flowing. it seems like they are not stopping today. last i looked, the dow is down 100, the nasdaq was still up strong with socme of those name still leading. stuart: gary kaltbaum, always like to keep it short because there's a delay when we talk to each other. you did real well today. that was superb. you should get into broadcasting. >> thank you, stuart. take care. stuart: thank you very much indeed. all right. let's get back to netflix. it looks to me, susan, looks to

me like the lockdown is really helping them big-time. there's no doubt about that. susan: another record high for netflix. take a look at the stock today. we are expecting earnings on tuesday where analysts are pretty much pricing in that they will exceed guidance when it comes to the number of new paying subscribers. we are looking for 7.8 million in the first quarter of this year. netflix previously had said they only expect to maybe gain seven million new subscribers in the first three months of this year globally, but netflix is one of these stay-at-home winners. we talked about the eight hours of average streaming that the average americans are doing right now in this quarantine environment and netflix, by the way, has got a huge amount of upgrades this morning. goldman sachs says the stock will reach 490. morgan stanley says it will reach 450 at least. some are even going as high as 450. 480 from jpmorgan. everyone is pretty much jumping on board these streaming players will do well. let me ask you this, stu. if you take a look at the differences between netflix and

disney, which reported 50 million subscribers last week, disney hasn't really lifted as much as netflix. stuart: well, i don't know how many of those 50 million subscribers are actually paying dollars. susan: all paying. they are being weighed down probably by the parks. i would say if you look at the difference in the stock performance, there might be more value somewhere else. stuart: but then again, i don't know how many -- what people are watching on disney. i think a lot of it is kind of old stuff compared to netflix, which is all new stuff. anyway, i have to move on to cinemas because streaming wins, cinemas lose. ashley, how many pink slips are being handed out at cinemark? ashley: yeah. it's the third largest chain in the u.s. of course the industry getting crushed. 17,500 hourly workers have been furloughed and half of the corporate staff at cinemark have been laid off. 50% of those furloughed at its

texas headquarters will actually get just 20% of their salary so they get something, plus full benefits. those that do remain on staff, they will have their salaries cut by 50%. listen, they have also suspended the dividend, they are trying to shore up cash. but all of their 345 cinemas across the country have been closed since march 16th. stuart: all right. thanks, ash. now, zoom. another winner from the virus crisis. lauren, i think you've got news on a zoom competitor, is that correct? lauren: um-hum. zoom is not a winner today. the reason is their smaller competitor bluejeans is being acquired by verizon for less than $500 million. why. verizon also wants in on this work from home video conferencing trend. the difference between bluejeans and say skype or verizon is that bluejeans is tailored to the business community, corporate community, and it is not free. verizon hopes to use it as they

try to attract more corporate customers and as they roll out 5g. so zoom down 1.3% today and verizon stock is higher. stuart: yeah, but zoom is still way up there at nearly 150. got that. all right. thanks very much, lauren. lauren: it's had a good run. stuart: i will show you a brewery, a georgia brewery. they launched a new beer to honor dr. anthony fauci. the pale ale is made from superfood berries. fauci spring. good one. fine marketing, i would say. we have to check the state of the beer industry with america's oldest brewery, yuengling. that's coming up in the third hour. we will put them on the air again. first, high end hermes, how do you pronounce that? hermes. high end stuff. they brought in nearly $3 million worth of stuff on the first day that its flagship store reopened in china. nearly $3 million worth. will american shoppers splurge

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stuart: all right. we are waiting for the president to announce new guidelines for reopening parts of the economy. that's helping the nasdaq and the s&p but the dow is down 150

points. look at amazon. check this thing out. look at that, a brand new all time record high. look, it's up $62, 2.7%. $2369 a share. amazon's doing well. lyft, they have launched a new delivery service, meals, groceries, medical supplies, all new service during the crisis. everybody gets it. as for uber, people in new york city and miami, they can now call uber, call them for food deliveries. you know, like a phone call instead of using the app. uber is at 27. the french luxury brand hermes pulled in, what, $2.7 million on the first day that its flagship shop opened in china, reopened in china. michael, the question is will the rich people in america splurge when we get back to normal, so to speak? i say we won't. i say that people are very conscious of front line workers bearing the brunt of this struggle. they are the low paid people.

i think it would look terrible for rich people to splurge. what say you? >> yes, stuart, that's certainly true. what we have seen in china as life returns to something resembling normal, there's been an outburst of consumer spending. hermes is one of many examples. we can see companies are doing really well as things open there. in fact, nike and apple, the only place in the world where all of their stores are open right now is in china. as far as, you know, americans starting to splurge again on luxury, i think we are quite a ways away from that. there is some buzz in the retail industry talking about what people are calling revenge buying, so to get revenge on the virus that we want to go out and buy and spend our way into comfort and sort of battle the virus through bathing ourselves in luxury but i agree with you, it's not a good look right now. i don't think conspicuous

consumption, you know, when people are dying and are ill and our whole country is trying to struggle with getting the economy and work back open, that wouldn't be a good look and i think it's a ways off. stuart: i hear you. thanks for joining us. interesting stuff. now, sources tell fox news the virus likely came from a chinese lab. i'm asking trump's deputy security adviser, former deputy security adviser k.t. mcfarland, i will ask her about this blockbuster report on china. we are moments away from the mortgage rate reports. we will tell you what the 30-year fixed is pegged at in the latest week. we will have that for you after this. gage rates are at record lows. that's good news for veterans with va loans. that's me. by using your va streamline refi benefit, one call to newday usa can save you $2,000 a year. that's me. there's no income verification, no appraisal, and no out of pocket costs.

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stuart: look at that. precisely 10:00 eastern time own thursday morning. you know what that means. mortgage rates. dow is down 230. ashley what is the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rate? ashley: i don't know that you will be that impressed. it is 3.31%, stu. that is down from 3.33% last week. it has been near the all time lows for three straight weeks now. i can tell you the refinancing activity remains very strong. as far as home purchase demand as you can imagine very weak. those rates, 3.31% for a 30-year fixed-rate. there you have it. stuart: when the economy slips

into near depression, you don't expect many people to be out there buying houses. ashley: yeah. stuart: we have update on the other housing sectors as well. lauren, what have you got for me? lauren: ashley mentioned refinancing. they are up. applications to refinance up 192% on an annual basis. people are trying to save money, get better rates. housing market in general, fannie mae is predicting home sales will fall about 15% this year. supply is down. so is demand. people don't want strangers coming into their homes right now. millenials living in their parents basement, gen-z might be living in their parents basements now, housing starts in march, groundbreaking on new homes, fell more than 22% but permits are showing signs of life when you look at the multifamily sector. you might see renters, more of younger generation, gen-z,

living in their parents basement. it's true. stuart: living in their parents basement. ashley: i know. stuart: wonder how we feel about that? lauren: i feel bad for them. stuart: okay. i want to bring in our market watcher david bahnsen. david occasionally dabbles in the political field. he wrote a great book about senator elizabeth warren. david, i want your comment on this plan by the democrats to introduce a legislation which would pay all americans $2,000 a month. that is a proposal from the democrats. it is one of these universal income proposals by the looks of it. what do you make of it? ah, i think we've lost him. how about that? i keep saying to everybody, these are unusual tiles. we're bringing you guests from what, a dozen different

locations. we're on five different audio paths. so there is delay in the conversation, but nonetheless i still think we got a pretty good show for you. look at this. dow jones industrial average, down 230 points where the s&p s&p and nasdaq are on the up side. why is the dow down so much when other indicators are moving higher? we'll tell you. a couple stocks, dow stocks sharply lower. got goldman, that's a day stoke. that's way down. i have got boeing way down. that is dow stock. those three you put them all together, that accounts half of the loss of dow jones industrial average. so that explains why the dow is down so much whereas the tech stocks on the nasdaq are showing a nice healthy gain and broader indicator, the s&p, on the upside. now, i'm interested in las vegas.

not that i'm a gambling kind of guy, but i've always been interested in vegas for this extraordinary creation in the middle of the desert. susan, those casinos are closed but are they going to reopen? susan: the nevada governor says there is no timetable, no firm timetable for the reopening of these casinos. some of the casino operators are hardist hit. they have those problems in macau, which extraordinarily closed for 15 days, something we've never seen in the gaming enclave. in las vegas, casinos were toying from the idea of reopening as we'll hear from the president trump and the white house later on today. if they do, how will this look? they might have testing facilities on the side where casino operators, casino employees can get tested before they enter some properties. they might wear gloves and masks

in the future for those that work in the casinos, which is something similar that macau instituted as well. they will be checking for guest temperatures. obviously number of guests in the casinos each time until we get vaccine will be limited. as little as 1/3 of rooms available if and when when the casinos remain open. we'll see what happens after that. stuart: what a difference it would make for everybody, if you got an instant test. you talk up, you're tested. you got it, you're carrying it, you're not carrying it, you don't have it, in you come, how theout you would go. what a difference that would make. i don't think we're there. we restored our connection with david bahnsen. david, i don't know whether you heard question earlier. democrats have a plan to pay

adults, $2000 a month as relief from the depression style economy we have right you no. you have written extensively on this kind of a program. what do you make of it? >> funny you say adults, the legislation says 16 and over. i don't know about you, my summer job at 16 was not paying you $2,000 a month. the issue, i am very much online with the idea we need to get supply and production going in our economy and giving money directly to people is the least stimulative. now i recognize there is a need for a safety net. there are people who are hurting, and unemployed, need access to cash. i believe that it what our unemployment system is for which they put up to $600 a month on top of the state benefit. there are safety nets in place for those things. this direct injection of cash is the least stimulative of all things we could be doing to help this economy. stuart: david, i think it is a case never letting a crisis go

to waste. this is the way those want universal income plan get it through the side door during the virus crisis. i don't think it is going to happen, do you? >> i do not, no. i don't think they would even have the votes in their own party. i agree with you, this exactly what token gesture is intended to do. stuart: david, thanks for joining us. i'm sorry the line went down. i am glad we got you in at the end of the bloc. thank you, david bahnsen. we have a big hour coming up for you. we do. we have a big hour coming up for you. the world is locked down because of the virus, i say the lockdown, well it is, it is good for co2 emissions. hasn't this done more to lower co2 emissions than any other event in human history? i'm sure it has. does born lomborg agree with that analysis.

he is on the you show later this hour. murphy says we're in this not because anything china did. what does south carolina senator tim scott think about that? i'm asking him later this hour. we'll stay own china, the bombshell report, that they believe the virus originated in the lab in wuhan, the chinese scientists were trying to compete with the u.s. own viruses. that is my take coming up shortly. ktkt mcfarland will answer it. i'm good at my condo. well planned, well invested, well protected. voya. be confident to and through retirement.

stuart: fox news has broken the china virus story wide open. it is a full-scale indictment of communist china. leadership there was not truthful about the origins of the virus. delayed acknowledging the truth,

and thereby spread the virus throughout the world. from multiple reliable sources here's the story. scientists were working at a virology lab, they were studying viruses in wuhan a technician or certainly a lab worker at the lab reportedly became patient zero, that is, the first person who was known to have become infected with covid-19. that person went out into the city of wuhan and the virus spread from there. at first chinese authorities plamed what are called those wet markets, blaming the outbreak as a leap from animals to humans. not true according to sources. the virus came from the lack. the authorities covered it up. they altered data. they destroyed samples and suppressed doctors and journalists who told the truth. vital time was lost. flights overseas were allowed initially. the virus spread around the world.

it is the quote, costliest government coverup of all time. the fall out from this is immense. president trump withdrawn funding from the world health organization. he says they were complicit in china's coverup. there are moves in congress to hold china directly accountable. there is talk of suing china, holding them liable for the damage they have allegedly caused. the u.s.-china relationship is schurly going to change. one last point, where is the democrats, where is the media? we have yet to go see wholesale condemn nation of china. he have yet to see china held responsible. the truth is the left and media supporters blame president trump. they are doing it because they just can't get over their contempt for our president. but the fox news report blows them away. it is china has a lot of explaining to do. now watch this. >> multiple sources are telling fox news today that the united

states government now has high confidence that while the coronavirus is a naturally occurring virus, it eminated from a virology lab in wuhan. >> well i don't want to say that, john, but i will tell you more and more we're hearing the story and we'll see. when you say multiple sources, now there is a case where you can use the word sources but we are doing a very thorough examination of this horrible situation. stuart: all right. here is where we need kt mcfarland, former deputy national security advisor. kt joins us now. i don't think that any communist regime can admit the truth in this kind of a situation. do you? >> no. and your lead-in to this i could not have said it better, stuart. you summed everything up. the problem it is even worse. in communism any dictatorial situation whether it is russia or china, what's the first casualty? the truth. even at the expense as you point

out it has gone around the world. it is going to affect the world for decades. it is going to wipe out certain parts of the world. and yet the chinese still are stonewalling? they're not giving the information about the origins of this. they have even gone so far as to blackmail other countries to say you better say nice things about us or we're not going to give you or sell you masks. so when other countries said nice things, what happened? it turns out that the masks and other testing equipment and chinese sent was defective and faulty, the chinese knew that. in addition to that the chinese have gone to the international monetary fund, they have gone to the world bank, they have gone to the asian development bank. they are borrowing money like mad. why? they hope to buy up, western, american, british technology, and resource companies at fire-sale prices this is part of their plan to dominate the world and the 21st sentry will be the chinese global world order. first casualty of that is?

the truth. stuart: okay. spell it out for us if you can directly. what will the u.s. china relationship look like after this? >> well i think there are four possibilities. i have actually been in close touch with a number of people in the white house and the west wing and as far i see it, i'm not speaking for them, but as i see it, there are four likely possibilities. one, the united states and china find a way to work together in the global world going forward. evidence right now that doesn't look too possible. the second is that the chinese intend all along to replace the united states, to push us out of the pacific, to push us out of our domination of technology, and have it be the 21st century be the chinese century. chinese orders, chinese rules, china niece blackmail. the third possibility? well, that is one where the united states panned leads an alliance of democracies, free market capitalist countries,

countries which obey the rule of law on one hand and chinese try to set up their own system on the other. in other words a new cold war, but economic as well as potentially idealogical and political. the final which nobody wants, is some kind of a real conflict that no world order happens. so we have era of disorder. i think that the second two are the most likely possibilities. stuart: kt, thank you very much for being with us. you really spelled it out there. what you did was, you made us all understand how serious this situation is. and what we're up against with china. kt mcfarland. thank you very much. we appreciate it always. thank you. let's get a quick check of the markets for you. we're down over 200 points. i was mistaken earlier. i said it was just said the dow was down. but s&p is down. nasdaq on upside, technology doing well this morning

especially big name technology companies. how about hertz, the rental car people, are they going to stay in business? lauren, you have got news on them. lauren: that is a very good question. the "new york post" is reporting that they are asking for stimulus. they're asking for aid from the government. they are facing a 1 to 1 1/2 billion dollar short fall in the coming months. the post says they could file chapter 11 by sum per they don't get that aid. hertz shares are down 19% at $4.71, stuart. done by summer, perhaps. stuart: stuart: first they get hit by ubers of this world, now they get hit by the virus. my goodness, four dollars a share on hertz. thank you,. susan you have. susan: if they reacted to misleading posts. facebook added warnings to 40 million pieces of

misinformation about the coronavirus pandemic in its main social network in march. for instance, there was one dangerous theory that was circulatings on facebook saying that you could stop the spread and prevent getting coronavirus drinking bleach. this is something mark zuckerberg wants to prevent on the main site. back to you, stu. stuart: the stock is down two bucks, 174 on facebook. we talk about bed, bath & beyond, all the trouble it is having with the decline of bricks and more tar stores. there is news on bbb? what is it, lauren? lauren: it is positive. the stock is up. they did report earnings. they were not good. bush, i know you hate this, stuart but they were better than expected. of course the company like many companies pulled their guidance for 2020 but they did say something that is making investors believe there is hope for bed, bath & beyond. the company is investing online and strengthening their ability

where you order something online, go to the store, pick it up curbside, outside. that is positive. so with that, the latest quarterly results seeing a little better than many thought, this is a rare winner today, stuart. stuart: not bad, up 15, nearly 16%. how about that? thanks, lauren. when you get to my age and in this situation on the market, with the virus and all, you look for stocks that pay you a nice dividend and that dividend has to be safe. david bahnsen, actually we had trouble getting a line going there. he is back. we got him. david bahnsen knows all about dividend plays. you have got three stocks for us that pay high, safe dividend. i think the first one is broad com. tell me more. >> broadcom, ticker ago, has a 5% yield. it is up 50% from where its bottom was in the month of march, yet still substantially

off its highs there is plenty of room to go to get cac to normal sy. that is more than covered by free cash flow, earnings. it is a great acquisition story in the technology space. we definitely believe in the sustainability of that dividend. stuart: okay. next one is walgreens. what do they pay and is it safe? >> it you is definitely safe. they have been paying the dividend since 1934. you may have heard, we had a few things happen in our world since then and they continued paying the dividend every year since. walgreens of course, in a lot of ways benefits through this turmoil because there are certain things they sell people have to have. it is brick-and-mortar retail pharmacy. they have really stayed flat from where they were about a month ago. they're down on the year but, again, a 4.3% dividend yield that we believe is very safe and sustainable. and in fact going to continue to grow. stuart: david, you got 30 seconds to tell me about

verizon. >> well verizon i can talk in 30 seconds this is one of the safest, dividends. very low beta and tons of cash on their balance sheet. low debt, low leverage. 4.3% yield. the future of 5g i think that is 30 seconds, stuart. stuart: you know, david, we used to call that news you can use, useful news you can actually put into practice. mr. bahnsen, that was real good, broadcom, walgreens, verizon. i will check them. thank you very much, david. check this out, this woman is wearing a buzz lightyear helmet to protect herself while she goes to the grocery store. what is wrong with that? amidst the lockdown a snowstorm hit the chicago area. it makes the streets more treacherous. people are still out there.

house speaker nancy pelosi excluding the administration. tim scott will have his say on speaker pelosi. with people staying at home i say it has been good for co2 emissions. that's for sure. what does environmental it, borne lomborg think of that? he is next.

stuart: yeah, let me second that. thank you indeed to all the front line health care workers. you're good people. and all the rest of you who are on the front lines. the market coming back a bit. we were down 250. now we're down 170. still a little lower for the s&p but a nice gain for the nasdaq.

now my contention is, that this virus all around the world really slowing the economies down to a dead stop, that has cut co2 emissions more than any other event i think in human history. bjorn lomborg is with us. he is the environmentalist we know and love on this program. we call him a intelligent environmentalist. not an extremist by any means. i see him smiling from the introduction there. he joins us from the copenhagen directorship. bjorn, am i right? i think more co2 cuts than ever before because of the virus? >> absolutely. so we've seen it -- added reduction this year we even saw in the year just after the second world war. so it really is a big deal issue and it is something where we can say, well that shows what you can do if you want to cut carbon

emissions. you have to have enormous economic recession. obviously not is not what most people are willing to have to in order to reduce the co2 emissions. stuart: so how do we keep the cuts in co2 emissions going when we come out of this recession depression. the short answer, we don't. most of this comes from the fact that nobody is enjoying what they like about life. lockdowns are no fun. people want to go back to actually being able to drive, to be able to consume more, to be able to go flying, all these other things. in the long run if we want to do this we shouldn't try to do it through recession. you can't sell people on recession to fix climate change. we should do it through technology. if we can innovate green energy to become cheaper than fossil fuels everyone will switch. so this has to be about innovation, not about recession. nobody wants to see a repeat of

the 2020 corona. stuart: but, bjorn, i have to say that will be very difficult, because fossil fuels are now as cheap as they ever have been, especially oil. how do you do that? how do you innovate to the point where renewables are cheaper than dirt cheap oil? >> well, first of all, let's see how long, you're in much better position to see that, how long oil will stay that dirt cheap. but reality of course is, solar and wind in principle is also dirt cheap. the technology to extract it that costs money. remember, we're not there yet. but there is good reason to believe that as we progress, as we get better doing this, we will find ways to make renewable and other green technologies like nuclear and carbon capture, all these other technologies much, much cheaper. we still need to see if we can actually bring them down below fossil fuels as you point out, but if we can make them much cheaper, we have a much greater

chance of switching to green energy. if we don't, if we keep having fossil fuels by far the cheapest, obviously we won't succeed. stuart: okay. you have got 20 seconds to tell me, can we do that in the next 10 years? >> i think we can do some of it. look the u.s. has cut more carbon emissions than any other nation on the planet the last 10 years. why? because you invented fracking. you switched from coal to gas. that ehitmitt as lot less co2. get china to do the same. get the rest of the world -- similar technologies we can use the next couple decades. i think we can do some of it, yeah. stuart: excellent. bjorn lomborg, always direct and to the point even if we do have problem with the communication. you're a good man. thank you very much, bjorn. s.a.t.s, and acts, the tests,

what is the issue with that, lauren? lauren: they have been studying to prep it and take it. they haven't been able to. the april test was canceled. the june test was canceled. now the college board and act are developing a online take home test in the rare event that schools do not reopen in the fall and one million or so high school students that signed up to take these college admissions exams will need to take the test to get into college. but i can tell you this, some universities, including the university of california for the fall class of 2021 are making the a.c.t. and s.a.t. just optional requirements. so the future of the s.a.t. and the a.c.t. is in doubt right now, right, if it is option hal for some colleges and becomes an online take home test. stuart: yeah. yes. you are shaking your head and saying sort of what's with that?

the a.c.t. was under pressure before the virus and certainly under pressure after it. lauren, thank you. i think we got news on carnival cruise lines and i don't think it is good news. ash, spell it out. ashley: no, it's not, stuart, the cruise line continuing to defend it self from criticism the way it took action once we knew the virus was starting to spread. the carnival lines themselves said, look, each cruise ship is like a mini city and our response as this epidemic story grew was reasonable but they are already getting criticism from the cdc who accuses the cruise line of helping to fuel the crisis saying that a number of the cruises actually set sail well after the company knew it would be risky. cdc said nobody should be going on a cruise ship during a pandemic. the company is facing multiple lawsuits from passengers. we also understand the australian police are

investigating the company whether it misled them about the outbreak of the spry russ on a ship docked in sydney. they canceled all of their cruises in mid-march but they are having to defend how quickly they responded to the virus and actions they took. stuart: how about that? ashley, thank you very much indeed. we look at companies, we try to judge them in terms of the virus, how are they coping what are they doing about it? i see gopro stock is down this morning, 3 1/2%. i believe there is news on gopro. what have you got, lauren? lauren: what do you use gopro equipment for when you travel, taking an adventure? that is not happening. so the stock is down at 2.56 a share. the company is laying off more workers, about 200 additional workers and they're also cutting out the retailers, meaning if you want a gopro device direct to consumer. you go online, you buy it that way. this is a sign of the times. remember the ipo, 2014 we were

talking about a 12 billion-dollar valuation for this company. now, 400 million. stuart. stuart: ouch. how about that, my, how times change. thank you, lauren. one thing i can definitely say about the virus lockdown, people are i can drinking more, or let's say more alcohol is being consumed. we have a warning about that. ashley, who is giving us the warning here? ashley: well it's the w.h.o., not the band, the health organization. drinking alcohol during a lockdown is not helpful strategy even though many states deemed liquor stores essential and stayed open. they say the excessive drinking of alcohol while you stay indoors actually weakens the immune system and makes you more susceptible to the virus. they say it is a very dangerous myth that you believe that drinking a lot of vodka or whatever you drink, that alcohol

will help better protect you from covid-19. it is simply not true. they say above anything else, drinking excessively can lead to a host of other harmful out comes. that said, the sales of alcoholic beverages shot up in march, online sales up 243%. so there you go. stuart: why am i not surprised, ashley? [laughter]. all right. markets come back just a little bit, not that much. we're still down 200 for the dow. we're off about what, six points on the s&p. but that nasdaq still holding on to a nice gain. got a big show coming up for you. in our next hour, actor john ratzenberger will join us. he is a champion of blue-collar america. he will tell us how we can help blue-collar america through this crisis. but next, democrat senator chris murphy is blaming the crisis, it is all on president trump he says. he says the president didn't

take it seriously. south carolina tim scott joins us next on that very subject. ♪ ♪ i believe in working hard for what you've got ♪

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stuart: market shows a downside move, not as bad as it was. we're down 160 for the dow. 2/3 of 1%, fractional, tiny, tiny loss for the s&p. big gain for tech stocks on nasdaq. s&p just turned positive. and now this, senator chris murphy, connecticut democrat, he took to cnn last night to really slam the president and his handling of the virus. roll tape, please. >> it was just shocking how cavalier the administration was. this was at a time when the president really, you know, viewed this as a hoax. he said so on tv. the reason we're in the crisis we are today is not because of anything that china did, it is not anything because of the w.h.o. did, it is because of what this president, he didn't take this virus seriously.

woe were not able to keep every case out of the united states but we didn't have to have tens of thousands of people dying. stuart: wait a minute, not because of anything china did? has he seen our story on fox? the gentleman on the right-hand side of the screen is tim scott, republican, south carolina what do you make of what was just said about our president, senator? >> i find it, stuart, i find the comments reckless, irresponsible, fake news, fictional, fabricated. here is one thing i know for sure, we all know this, the world knows this, that wuhan province is where the virus started. now growing evidence it started in the lab. for the comments from the senator, those were reckless, just flawed, deeply flawed comments from someone who is a part of the approach that says we need to get rid of the president no matter what he does. listen, stuart. his containment strategy at the beginning of this virus saved, i

think, millions of lives. had he not cut off travel from china, we could be, we would be in far deeper trouble. the president's approach from containment, they were mitigation, now our focus testing, these are the type of qualities you want in a president who is leading both an economic recovery and at the same time, he is flattening the curve from a health care power perspective. stuart: senator, i want to move on to the stimulus packages we've seen what speaker pelosi, she is actually taking a shot at the president, a shot of her own. watch this, please. >> we want it to work for everyone. what we were finding out just in the first hours of it, is that the, it was not working for, shall we say underbanked. why would they want to cut that whole layer of people, mostly women, minority owned

businesses, native americans, rural america, veterans, all are participating and in those initiatives. stuart: senator, the speaker is saying that minorities were deliberately excluded, what do you make of that? >> varney, speaker pelosi says a lot of things i don't understand. i assume it is english but i don't really understand it. here is what i would say to that, in the cares act we had specifically one billion dollars for historically black colleges, universities brought to the table and passed and signed by this president. there were $10 million specifically to make sure that the minority businesses development agencies has resources to advertise and market in minority underserved communities. we had billions of dollars in phase two and phase three to provide for food stability and increase in health care. we have made testing free which helps all americans. there is no doubt that the one thing we did not do in this

legislation was forget about any american. and the quest again to put americans in silos based on race is another simple tactic that is a failed, tried, opportunity from the left to put more stain on the president and it is simply inaccurate, inconsistent with reality and also a part of that flawed approach from the left. stuart: the president as you know, talked about your book, he said our great senator from south carolina senator tim scott, a fantastic book, opportunity knocks. you are a capitalist, are you not, mr. senator? >> i am indeed. i learned a very valuable lesson from a mentor when i was 15, better to make a profit than an income. it is better to create jobs than just having a job. he encouraged me and instilled in me the desire to become an

entrepreneur. a chick-fil-a operator changed my economic life and that of my family, frankly put me on the path to understanding economic freedom as part of a foundation what makes this nation great, plus our faith of course. stuart: mr. senator, that is music to our ears. that this is a financial program and we just love to hear that stuff. mr. senator tim scott, thanks for joining us, we appreciate it. thank you very much. >> thank you, sir. stuart: i want to get to the small business loans that are getting out there. we have hillary vaughn with the latest news. i don't think it is good news, is it on the loans, hillary? reporter: it is not for many small businesses hoping to participate in the paycheck protection program but may have not had the chance to apply because now the small business administration officially run out of appropriations funding for this program. so they are no longer accepting or processing any new applications. they're also not enrolling any new lenders who may want to be able to participate in this

program for their clients. they are not able to enroll any new lenders at this time as well. so now, what this means is the paycheck protection program is closed for now until congress can get on board, come to a consensus, approve the $250 billion in extra funding that the president has asked congress to approve. there is still at a standstill. we are getting a little bit of new information about the two phone calls the president is going with house and senate lawmakers. those calls are bipartisan, republicans and democrats are participating in the phone calls with the president. the topic is reopening the economy but we are told that the conversation about the paycheck protection program will certainly is expected to come up in these conversations especially now, stuart, that it is fish letter run out of money. stuart: yes. let's hope for that. hillary, thank you very much indeed, right up to the spot minute right there. the market shows a loss now, narrowing loss.

we're down just 100 points. next new jersey's governor, phil murphy he wasn't thinking of the bill of rights when he issued a lockdown in the state to combat the virus. judge napolitano is all over that and the judge is next. attention veterans with va loans.

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>> by what the authority did you nullify the bill of rights in this order? how do you have the power to dough that? >> that is positive my pay grade, tucker. i wasn't thinking of the bill of rights when we did this we went to all, first of all we looked at the data. >> i can tell. >> people have to stay away from each other. stuart: i think which should go straight to judge andrew napolitano on this one. what do you make of this judge, what do you think, i got to tell you, you and i are increasingly seeing this the same way, i really worried about individual liberties and freedom when we come out on the other side of the virus. >> if you look at the streets of several cities in michigan, stuart, in which tens of thousands of people appeared to protest, not similar comments but similar reckless attitudes on the part of the governor of michigan about civil liberties

you can see that a lot of people are beginning to agree with us as well. governor murphy's comments are some of the most reprehensible, an down constitutional, in some criminal, i tell you in a moment i every heard out after public figure, a public official. he took an oath at the time he became governor of new jersey to preserve, protect the defend the constitution. the first taken amendments of which are commonly referred to as the bill of rights. the question that our colleague tucker carlson asked him last night could not have been more poignant and direct. by what authority do you nullify, governor murphy, the bill of rights? then governor murphy responds by saying it is above my pay grade. above his pay grade? that is exactly what he gets paid to do which is preserve, protect, defend the constitution of the united states. that's called, here is the crime, stuart, misconduct in office, intentionally failing to

do what your office and the law and the constitution command of you. stuart: okay. i want to move on to another but related subject and that is the release of prisoners because of the virus. 3500 released in california. 1100 in new york, 700 in illinois. is the public protected when criminals are released in this emergency? >> no, the public is not protected when criminals are released. but i've sensed more than 1000 people in my career. you anguish over what to do. you look at aggravating factors, the mitigating factors, you never anticipate, some untoward, unanticipatable event would suddenly spring people free. that is the bad side of this. the good side of it is, i am hoping that governors, not like governor murphy because he is doing it here, i have not faith in him, but i hope that governors are listening to prosecutors and going before

judges and the right decisions are being made to release people who are not violent, who are close to the end of their term in jail, who are in danger of getting sick or infecting others, and who really would be better off elsewhere. there are obviously going to make some mistakes but if they balance these factors appropriately they will do the right thing, rid the jails of people who shouldn't be there. people are still committing crime. still getting arrested but you don't want them to die in jail because of the virus. stuart: we're talking on top of each other but i'm trying to tell you essentially we're coming together on the issue of civil liberties. that's a very good thing, judge. okay. the market is coming back a bit. we're only bun 100 on the dow industrials. in our next hour, john ratzenberger joins us.

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stuart: 11:00 eastern time. right on the dot. we are up on the nasdaq, up on the s&p, down a little on the dow. now, dreadful economic news today. first of all, 5.2 million newly unemployed. that means in the last month, 21.8 million people have been thrown out of a job. housing starts were down 21%, that's an enormous decline, and manufacturing in the philadelphia and new york areas, virtually collapsed. dreadful economic news. but the dow is only down 80

points. now this. much of america is now in the third week of a lockdown. for some, it's been going on much longer. there are signs of virus stay-at-home fatigue, especially where rules are most strict and in some cases, inexplicable, for example in michigan. at the same time, the dire impact on the economy is becoming more apparent. 1930s style depressions are really painful, aren't they? just look at that unemployment number. america is ready for some relaxation and president trump will issue relaxation guidelines later today. he says the virus is peaked. he says the impact on the economy has been terrible for so many people. now is the time to start reopening. other countries have done it, notably germany. beginning next week, parts of america will be on the same track. it will be gradual but it's a start.

and that's good. if we are moving past the peak, it's surely time to start lessening the economic pain. let's be clear. once you start to relax the rules, it's very difficult to go back and enforce a new lockdown. this is the united states of america. it is a vast continent. tens of millions of us have been practicing social distance for decades. people don't like it when their individual liberty is restrained. so here it comes. the president gradually leading the country to the other side, out of the virus crisis. it is inevitable that his political opponents will say oh, he's just costing lives. the left wants to keep the lockdown in place. they love government control. but in a few hours, we will hear how the unwinding process will begin. the president is looking to the other side of this economic disaster. that's the upside, beyond the chasm. this really is a landmark day.

the third hour of "varney & company" starts now. we will have an economy that really comes back quickly and we'd like to see it more than match what we had before. what we had before was a miracle and we think this is going to be even more than a miracle. we're going to do it because we have the greatest people in the world. we'll also be speaking to america's governors tomorrow. we will be opening up states, some states much sooner than others, and we think some of the states can actually open up before the deadline of may 1st and i think that that will be a very exciting time indeed. stuart: there you have it. that's the president pledging to restore the economy, at least start the restoration process. market watcher jason katz is with me now. look, i know you are a market watcher, but do you think this

is the right time now, next week, to be lessening the economic pain? >> good morning, stuart. the conversation has clearly shifted and it's all about how and when to open the economy. so i have heard you all morning on your show discuss this. we don't want the cure to rival the disease. so i harken back to my basketball days and remember when i left the gym after practice, we flipped the lights off and they would go off like that. turning them back on when you got into the gym, it took awhile. that's what has to happen here. the market is discounting two quarters of abysmal economic and earnings news, and frankly, i think the market wants a slower, more thoughtful, careful opening that isn't made first but rather mid to late may at best. stuart: okay. i will get back to you shortly about the impact on the market and why the market is actually

going up with all this bad economic news. hold on for a second, jason. i want to go to susan. i know that the president has been making calls to big-time ceos today. can you tell me more about that? susan: four phone calls yesterday with 200 of the most influential and prominent ceos across the country from all parts of the economy and from different sectors, for instance, mark zuckerberg of facebook was on one of the calls, tim cook of apple and jeff bezos of amazon, which was interesting since president trump and jeff bezos haven't always seen eye-to-eye. but he took on board a lot of different i guess views on providing a blueprint for the economic reboot of the country once we get past this coronavirus. now, according to "wall street journal" reporting, no potential dates were discussed and no followup meeting has been scheduled but over and over again on these calls, apparently the ceos are very concerned about the lack of testing and in order for america to get back to normal, go out to restaurants, go back to movie theaters and go shopping once again, they need

to think and accordingly, apparently some of these ceos said we will provide our own testing for our own employees and also our customers, but it's interesting he's taking on board a lot of different opinions from banking, hospitality, leisure, you name it. this is what america needs right now. it was not meant to be closed, it's meant to be open. and business back up and running. stuart: got it. susan, thanks very much indeed. while susan was speaking, did you notice left-hand side of the screen, amazon has reached $2400 a share. walmart's pretty close to $130 a share. there are some real winners. look at that. $2410 is amazon's quote, up $101. microsoft reaching $175. remember, the high was $190. there are real winners here. walmart r walmart, target, winners from the virus impact. walmart and target pretty close to all time highs, certainly for walmart. back to jason katz. jason, do you think this market

is responding positively and i think it is responding fairly positively, to the idea that the president will start today to detail how we are going to reopen this economy? >> i think that's one of the many factors contributing to it. so if the president is unclear, you have to look to the future and it's prompting business leaders and business people to think about how they turn the light switch back on. so look, we are in earnings season, we know the news is bad. we are all about balance sheets this earnings season and can they access credit. so between the discussion of turning the economy back on slowly, the fact we have the shock and awe of $2.3 trillion of support to stem the tide to buy us time to be thoughtful about how we get back on track. stuart: very interesting, jason. we always appreciate you being on the show. the voice of reason and calm.

we kind of like that in these times. jason katz. thank you, sir. appreciate it. i've got to get to that fox news exclusive from bret baier. government sources are saying quote, there is increasing confidence that the virus outbreak escaped from a wuhan lab. this morning, china is responding to that report. ashley, come in and give me details of the china response. ashley: yeah. well, the chinese say this is absolutely not true and they point to the head of the world health organization as denying these claims. if you remember, the chinese government originally pointed to a local wet market, believing the transmission of the virus could have come from something like a bat to a human, then spread from there. now we have this report from fox news, exclusive report, we've got to point out the report itself from fox news does not say this was being created as some sort of bioweapon, some

unnatural genetic virus that was created in the lab. it's believed it was natural, it was just simply sloppy handling inside this virology lab in wuhan that probably was transmitted to a lab person, worker, who then went out into wuhan. that is the belief. what everyone can agree on and they do say the intel on this is inconclusive and the investigation is ongoing, but the chinese already responding, bottom line, saying this is simply not true and they point to the world health organization which we know that the w.h.o. simply parroted what they were being told, what was being told by the chinese government, without any independent confirmation or any evidence to say that what the chinese authorities were claiming was absolutely true. but there you have it. this investigation very interesting indeed. as we say, the one thing everyone agrees on was the coverup in the days and weeks following the emergence of the

virus in wuhan. stuart: the fight is on. ashley, thank you very much indeed. for many, for a long time now, we have been looking and trying to find the winners amongst stock prices for the virus attack. clearly amazon, walmart, microsoft, netflix, they are the winners. cinema companies, though, have been the losers. on the left-hand side of your screen, cinemark holdings are up 56 cents and there's news on them. what are they doing? lauren: they want to reopen. they want to reopen july 1st which would mean they would have been closed for three and a half months. in that three and a half months, 37 movies have been delayed. let's just say cinemark can open on july 1. what will they show? there's no new releases slated for the big screen for that time. they would first start showing old movies. they would limit seating in the theater to -- they say they can

make money if it's just 10% full so they would have to respect social distancing and obviously, shorter hours. but it just begs the question, i would love to go to a movie theater right now. do people feel comfortable doing that and what would they see? i can tell you this, because today, netflix has a bigger market cap than disney. that kind of spells the story for you. yes, disney is going into streaming but they also make a lot of movies, lot of the big movies that you see in the movie theaters. streaming is where it's at. we do know that the new "trolls" was released digitally. best digital release ever on easter weekend. so you know, are people going to want to go back into the theater and cinemark is hoping and making plans for that to happen. stuart: okay. we hear you. thanks very much indeed. there are concerns over the nation's food supply, meat supply in particular, pork supply in particular again. susan, what's the news on smithfield now? susan: top u.s. pork processor

is closing two more plants on top of the sioux falls, south dakota one. they are closing ones in wisconsin and missouri as well. they say employees at all three plants have tested positive for covid-19. also at the start of this month, beef, chicken, pork plants have closed across the country because of hundreds of cases of these workers contracting the virus, and looks like tyson foods has been impacted, smithfield, cargill, but you heard from sonny perdue, the agriculture secretary yesterday, saying america has enough food, it's a supply issue right now. demand will be there but we will get the food to people that need it. stuart: the south dakota senator, mike rounds, told us this morning that they are hoping to get the big smithfield plant there in south dakota back up and running within days. i believe that was his expression. there you have it. now, some stocks we want to check, go through them with you. first, bed, bath & beyond say their full year results will be

negatively impacted by the virus. of course they will be. the stock is up 20%. okay. got that. check jc penney. they skipped an interest payment of $12 million. there is speculation they are considering bankruptcy. the stock is actually up two cents. that is 9%. jc penney is at 25 cents per share. the mayor of los angeles, eric garcetti, says the virus could end all sports and concerts until 2021. how about that. more on that coming up this hour. as we reported earlier, the paycheck protection program has indeed run out of money for small businesses. blue collar guy and actor john ratzenberger joins me next. he will react to that running out of money. isten. and ready to help you find opportunity. so. let's talk. edward jones. it's time for investing to feel individual.

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excuse me, ladies. does anyone know where we might find the al of al's toy barn? >> i can help. i'm the tour guide. please keep your hands, arms and accessories inside the car and no flash photography. thank you. stuart: all right. of course, the voice there, the voice of ham, from "toy story" you know who that is. it's john ratzenberger. he's on the show right now. i've got limited time so let's get straight at it. you tell me what you are doing for made in america companies. go. on the phone: well, we have american made marketing, it will explain pretty much everything. once we are out of this pit that we are all in, once we start crawling out, there's a lot of

companies that are going to need help advertising and they can't afford it. so we are going to [ inaudible ] amongst ourselves who applied for the help that we have to offer and help them pro bono because they are going to need it, you know, generate messaging, you know, we can do -- stuart: okay. >> -- target everybody within a 15 minute area to let everyone know they're still in business, maybe give discounts to first responders, things like that. stuart: terrific, john. you could actually target ads for individual businesses in a very specific area. >> right. stuart: that's real good to me. look, i'm sorry, john, i'm terribly sorry, i'm flat out of time. i've got some breaking news here on the bipartisan opening up of the economy. john, please -- >> you mean that's more important than me, stuart?

all right. stuart: got it. we will get it in. promise. have we got blake burman handy right now? is he available? blake, are you there? right. i can't hear you. what? susan, okay. news about the new video chat app called house party. what have you got? susan: zoom having two million daily active users, house party is another booming company as well, also providing video conferencing but for the younger generation, and house party has 50 million new signups over the past month, a jump of 70 times its normal usage in some markets according to its co-founder. it is in apple's app store and apparently the most downloaded app in the social networking category every day since march 20th and over easter weekend, second most downloaded app if any category after zoom, taking the top spot.

house party is owned by epic games which makes fortnite but this is to show you that video conferencing is here to stay, it's not just zoom that's one of the main players. you also have house party and don't forget during these times of crisis, like 2008, this is where you find the newcomers and new upstarts and disruptors to the market versus uber was conceived during 2008. some people are looking for the new companies to invest in. stuart: my kids have told me about house party. i better take a look at it, i guess. susan, thank you very much indeed. i shall. i will, promise. check united airlines. they expect to receive, what, $5 billion from the government. $3.5 billion, that's a grant. you don't have to pay it back. the rest will be a low interest loan. the stock is down 9%. can't figure that one out. google, the chief executive there told workers the company is evaluating its investments for the rest of the year including hiring. they have had a hard time hiring

employees remotely. the stock, though, still going up. $1,261 per share. the beer maker, brewer, yuengling, say their sales are up in the pandemic. i'm not surprised. the company is pledging $100,000 to support relief organizations. more on that and yuengling later in the show. my next guest says bring back laissez-faire capitalism. dan henninger here to explain. there are times when our need to connect really matters. to keep customers and employees in the know.

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stuart: all right. two hours into the trading session, it's a thursday morning. a tiny loss for the dow industrials, despite some dreadful economic news this morning. we've got an upside move for the s&p and a big gain for the nasdaq. tech's doing very very well today. all right. take a look at the price of oil this morning. it had dipped to $19 a barrel. now it's $20 a barrel. we've got news on help for the drillers. what do you have, lauren? lauren: texas regulators, stuart, are considering a plan, something they haven't done since 1973, because it runs counter to their dna, interfering in the free market and telling the drillers and big

oil companies keep your oil in the ground. the reason is we have seen the price of oil come down drastically sfiet the deal between opec plus russia and they are not making money on oil because we are sitting home and not driving and using fuel. so that is something being considered. it is unlikely if they do actually mandate that, it would be the first time, like i said, since 1973. stuart: you're right. that's not in their dna, is it. keep the oil in the ground. don't bring it up. that's not a texas oil guy. that's for sure. all right. it's thursday. that means dan henninger has his column in the "wall street journal" and his column is all about bring back laissez-faire capitalism. i love it. i love it, dan. let me tell you something, if i may. you haven't got a prayer. this virus is being used by the left to impose government control, anything but laissez-faire. what do you say to that?

>> well, i say that yeah, look, the government created a bare bones economy as you have been describing, lowest industrial manufacturing production since world war ii. the economy is frozen so they created a bare bones economy. i think it's time for us to ask them to create a bare bones government. yes, the left will oppose it because they have opposed that since the end of the depression but you know, we have a federalist system, stuart. it isn't all just new york city and san francisco. there are 50 states and i think across those states, at the local, city and state level, that there are many politicians in texas, florida, who would be willing to take a regulatory holiday to simply step back so that the people who are capable of recreating jobs and creating new jobs are able to act freely because look, a u-shaped recovery, you have been talking about u-shape versus v-shape, we

need the sharpest v-shaped recovery we have ever had. we lost all these jobs in about five weeks. some of them are not coming back and the only way they are going to come back quickly is if the government steps away and gets off the back of the job creators. stuart: let me get this straight, dan. you don't see that free market economy, that free market attitude, in new york, new jersey, connecticut, illinois, california, out of the question? am i right? >> it's out of the question if the politicians are the ones to decide. i mean, that's an interesting point, stuart. i think that new york city where we are, the tristate area, is full of individuals, restauranteurs, small shop owners, who want nothing more than to get back to business but in jurisdictions like new york city, you have all sorts of middlemen, what we call mickey mouse inspectors, rules,

regulatio regulations, osha regulations and so forth that people usually have to comply with. if they are going to rebuild their businesses, they are going to have to be able to concentrate on those businesses 16 hours a day, not spending 25% of their time dealing with lawyers and the usual regulations in place. i think the people of new york city are capable of restoring this place as quickly as possible but the politicians would have to step back and i don't see mayor bill deblasio doing it. i don't know whether governor andrew cuomo would or not. it sounds to me as though he really does want to get the state's economy restarted and i think, look, we need a radical solution right now. we have to think differently if we are going to overcome the damage that's been done by government the last five weeks. stuart: absolutely. we've got to get back small government, laissez-faire, it's a dream and i'm dreaming it.

dan henninger, thanks for joining us. appreciate it. let's get to blake burman. he has breaking news from the white house. what have you got? reporter: we are getting a better idea of who president trump is talking to this morning. there was a 10:00 phone call earlier this morning between the president and members of the house of representatives. i'm told a bipartisan group from the house, probably a couple dozen or so, 20 to 25 different members. that was the first phone call. then at 11:00 this morning, so about half an hour ago, the president was set to speak with members of the senate. again, bipartisan. i'm told about most all of the senate republicans and then put on top of that a couple dozen, maybe a dozen, two dozen house republicans -- i'm sorry, senate democrats as well so you add it all up, the president speaking today probably to about 100 members or so from congress before he is set to speak with the governors this afternoon, which is before the federal guidelines we are led to believe will be coming out at about 5:00

this afternoon when the president briefs. so house, senate, bipartisan, governors this afternoon. those are essentially the last phone calls being made before we hear from the president later today. stuart: the word bipartisan when you are talking about relaxing restrictions on the economy, that's very very important. bipartisan. blake, thanks very much indeed, jumping in there. good stuff. now let's get back to the michigan protests. we saw them yesterday. they are protesting the extreme stay-at-home rules that michigan has ents stinstituted. what's new on this? ashley: michigan's governor gretchen whitmer has now criticized those protesters who gathered outside the capitol, many in their cars, as you can see from the video and grady trimble reporting yesterday, honking horns, waving flags, saying she's gone too far. she's acted erratically and those stay-at-home orders were a response, the governor says she believes the protesters who flooded the streets as well to

rally against the lockdown could have ended up prolonging the stay-at-home order because they were all in close, as you can see here, although not so many there, but certainly because they gathered in large crowds right there outside the capitol building, that's just going to help prolong the lockdown. but these people say they are upset, not only is there a dlou lockdown in place but she called for the banning of selling of non-essential items. she also says you can't cross the street to talk with neighbors, you can't get in your car and drive to friends or relatives. they say that is a step too far, that their civil liberties are being impinged upon but the michigan governor says look, we have a lot of cases of covid-19, number three in the country when it comes to reported cases and she says she understands their right to protest but she said it's irresponsible and again, she believes that it could very well extend the lockdown period which she has set for april

30th. stu? stuart: ashley, let me get your opinion on this. i think this is a very important point. this afternoon we are going to hear from the president with new guidelines on opening up the economy, maybe starting next week. i think the people are getting increasingly frustrated being locked down at home with stringent rules, and i think the president's new guidelines will be welcomed in many parts of the country. i'm asking your opinion. what do you think? ashley: i think there's a lot of anger out there. they understand but i think the time has come, the pent-up demand, we need to get back to work. we have to try and prevent any more damage which is, you know, obviously incredibly severe to the economy. there are places in this country who are ready to go right now. it's going to have to be done in a staggered fashion, we know that. in fact, switzerland just announced today that doctors and nail salons and hairdressers can open next week and a week and a half later, they are going to expand it to other businesses. i have a feeling that's what we

are going to see in this country but the demand is there. people want to get back to work. stuart: i need a haircut, as you can probably tell. all right. ashley webster, thanks very much indeed. yeah, really. you're all right, fella. you've got more than i have. susan, here's an inflammatory story for some people. california's giving money to illegals. susan: we are talking about $500 apiece to 150,000 illegal immigrants that live in the state because they have been left out of the $2.2 trillion stimulus package. they are not going to get the $1200 stimulus checks or the extra unemployment benefits of $600 a week according to gavin newsom so they are going to launch a $75 million disaster relief fund for illegal immigrants. around 10% of the california work force are illegal immigrants and according to the governor they pay around $2.5 billion in state and local taxes. so he feels that they should get some help as well. i think california has probably the largest illegal immigrant

population in the country at 2.2 million but if you look at the finances of california, some say we can't afford this right now. last year they had a trillion dollars in unfunded pension liabilities that they need to find the money to get somewhere. right? stuart: i just want to see if there's any opposition to that. what is the reaction to this? susan: senate republican leader says we should be spending this money on food banks, equipment for students to continue their education online and local governments that dreeare dealin with revenue losses so we can't afford this. gavin newsom feels there are people that are underrepresented, not taken care of right now that do contribute to the economy. stuart: okay. all right. thanks very much, susan. i'm looking at the market and seeing a very small decline for the dow industrials, down just under a half percentage point. that's in the red there. but a nice gain for the nasdaq,

up 1.5%. i will tell you now, big tech is doing very, very well today. amazon, over $2400 a share. new high right there. microsoft is up as well. walmart is up. lots of things going on here. nasdaq is way up, s&p is up, fractional loss for the dow. you've got a couple dow stocks which are dragging that particular index down. the white house and state debate when the economy can reopen. sports leagues are planning how they will reopen their doors, too. we have a live report on that coming up. yuengling, the beer people, their sales are up and we have a sixth generation family member from that company joining me next. with va mortgage rates suddenly

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stuart: look, despite dreadful economic news on unemployment and manufacturing in the philadelphia area and housing starts, it was all uniformly bad

news, we've got a nice gain for much of the market. the dow is down a fraction, .3%. just a couple dow stocks are hurting that average. i think the market is encouraged by president trump, who will this afternoon outline the new guidance, guidelines, for reopening at least parts of the economy. then we've got the alcohol stocks, if you want to put it like that. they have been doing very, very well recently because we are drinking up a storm at home as we are locked down. boston beer is at 4.19. they are all doing extremely well. however, ashley, the world health organization has something to say about all the alcohol reawe are drinking? ashley: they are saying don't. they say if you drink booze while stuck at home, it makes you more vulnerable to the virus because it gets to your immune system, it weakens it. so they say drinking during this

period does not serve you well. it's not a good coping strategy, as the w.h.o. says. by the way, alcoholic orders online, booze orders went up 243% in march. so a lot of people didn't get the memo from w.h.o. and the health organization also says don't buy into the myth that drinking a lot of alcohol, especially the hard spirits, maybe gin and vodka can actually help flush away covid-19. they say that's just a myth. it is simply not true and actually makes you more vulnerable, although i have to say every time i say w.h.o., social media lights up and says why on earth are we even quoting them because they are useless. i just want to preface that. stuart: got that out there. useless. very interesting. thanks very much. guess who is our next guest? her name is wendy, first name. last name, yuengling. she is the sixth generation

family member of the famous brewery. she's on your screens, ladies and gentlemen, right-hand side of the screen. wendy, i know you must be doing very well because everybody's locked down at home. will you please tell me how much your sales are up during this lockdown period? >> yeah, good morning. thank you for having me. we are certainly seeing the effects of the pandemic just like everybody else in our industry and across the country. fortunately, we are seeing off-premise business spiking. data was just reported that off-premise business is up 19% for the last at least 30 days and that's driven a lot by independent craft breweries which are driving that by almost 16%. unfortunately, the majority of our business or a good part of our business, almost 25%, 30% of it is the on-premise segment, so bars and restaurants and sporting venues are shut down so we are not able to sell to those

customers anymore. we have been trying to figure out how to focus on the hospitality industry and we are excited to be supporting the hospitality assistance response program of pennsylvania to support out of workers in the hospitality industry to help bars, waitresses, bartenders and wait staff throughout this crisis. it's certainly impacting everybody. stuart: yuengling, did you put money aside for that purpose? did you put $100,000 into this? >> we have committed $100,000 to various covid-19 relief efforts. part of that is going to the hospitality industry to support our home market in pennsylvania and part of it is also going to first responders. we are excited to be a partner with the gary sinise first responders foundation and they have created a dedicated emergency covid-19 combat service which will provide funds for ppe and essential gear for first responders that are fighting this crisis for us. stuart: that's terrific, wendy.

now, you are sixth generation in the family. you are still involved in the brewing business. when did yuengling start? what year? >> so we were founded in 1829 by my great great great grandfather and i am fortunate to work in the business alongside my three sisters so there's four of us that are sixth generation and we work side by side every day with our dad, who is fifth generation. american owned, family operated. we are really proud of that. stuart: american owned, family operated. so i can't buy your stock. is that true? >> you can't buy our stock but you can try our beer. i think you spoke to my sister jennifer a few months ago and hadn't had the opportunity to try our brand yet. yeah, you can certainly buy our beer. stuart: okay. i've got 30 seconds and i will give you a commercial. you tell me why yuengling is better than any other beer on the market and what an opportunity i'm giving you. >> well, thank you.

we have been around for 190 years because we make good beers but we also feel like we are around because we have been able to support those who have supported us for all this time, and so during this pandemic which is affecting everybody, we felt like it was incredibly important to support first responders and the hospitality industry, because we are seeing devastating effects across the entire country. so yeah, we make a great beer and we are going to get back out in the bars some day soon. cheers to everybody. stuart: we wish you the best of luck and cheers to you, wendy yuengling. thanks for being with us. we always appreciate it. thanks very much. we like to check the winners who are coming out of this virus episode. one of the winners is costco. more good news for costco shareholders. that company has raised the cash dividend by five cents. i believe that is an 8% jump in the dividend payout there. $318 on costco. pretty sure that's an all-time high. let's go to ash.

what have you got? ashley: the latest from governor cuomo of new york saying the number of hospitalizations has fallen below 18,000. the number of deaths in the last 24 hours, 606 compared to 700 the day before. and the number of new people going into the hospital now total 1900 in the last 24 hours. all the numbers going down. more light at the end of the tunnel. stuart: i love to hear that. thanks very much, ashley. more "varney" after this. hey, can i... hold on one second... sure. okay... okay! safe drivers save 40%!!! guys! guys! check it out. safe drivers save 40%!!! safe drivers save 40%! safe drivers save 40%!!! that's safe drivers save 40%. it is, that's safe drivers save 40%. - he's right there. - it's him! he's here. he's right here. - hi! - hi. hey! - that's totally him. - it's him! that's totally the guy. safe drivers do save 40%. click or call for a quote today.

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i think the nba has a moral obligation to come back as soon as we can and because people need sports. f if it means not having fans and streaming and broadcasting the games on television, i'm all for it because it's good for the psyche. for all the reasons we talked earlier about the side effects of an economic depression and not moving forward, we want to, you know, having sports will help us deal with that, will help us deal with those negative side effects and give people something to get excited about. stuart: yeah, there you have it. that's mark cuban. he was on the show on wednesday. by the way, on thursday, 23rd of march, he's going to be joining charles payne for what we are going to call a virtual town hall. next thursday, that is.

you can e-mail your questions if you would like to, and a lot of you have, e-mail it to investedinyou@foxbusiness.com. got that? very important stuff. mark cuban. great guy on the show. really opened up for us on wednesday. i'm sure he will do the same at the town hall next week. let's bring in grady trimble. i want more on sports coming back. grady, i first realized how bad this virus was when sports shut down. i mean, it was like a 24-hour period and everything went dark. you tell me about how they are going to come back. reporter: yeah, they closed kind of one by one and now they are all exploring options how to come back possibly one by one. the nfl, the latest to say look, we are looking into different ideas right now and we are talking about september for the nfl. their season is still scheduled to start then but it might look different than normal and games might look different than normal. for example, the season might be shortened according to a report

in "the washington post." another thing that the nfl is reportedly looking into is playing games in empty stadiums or partially empty stadiums and this as they are already preparing for the first ever virtual draft next week. so that's pro football. what about college football? that's a different story all together. we don't know when college students are going to return to campus, let alone when football will start again. that's a big money maker for schools. one school, the university of cincinnati, is already cutting at least one program that doesn't generate money, the university is announcing that soccer will be done away with. they won't have men's soccer for the upcoming season. so you certainly feel for those student athletes. stuart? stuart: yes, you do. they are the victims here, the student athletes whose year is gone. all right, grady, good stuff. thanks for joining us. i want to get back to ash, because he's got news on what the mayor of los angeles is saying about sports and concerts

and when they can come back with that. ashley: yeah. eric garcetti basically telling high level officials that when it comes to large gatherings such as concerts and sports, he could see a situation where they would not be allowed until 2021. california governor gavin newsom has always said the same thing, saying unless we get a widely available vaccine, they believe that sports and concerts should be put on the back burner until next year. stuart: okay. next year. got that. we've got a turnaround on the market, by the way. all green, dow, s&p, nasdaq. remember, this afternoon, the president is supposed to, i think he will, outline new guidelines for opening up the economy. that's a plus for the market. more "varney" after this. look, this isn't my first rodeo...

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i'm proud to be a part of aag, i trust 'em, i think you can too. trust aag for the best reverse mortgage solutions. so you can... retire better. stuart: i have to tell you there are serious winners out of this virus crisis. i will start with amazon. that is a winner 1/2. this morning amazon's stock price crossed $2400. look at it now, up nearly 6%. $138 higher, 2445 is the price. show me netflix, please. that is another huge winner in this marketplace. netflix is up 20 bucks. $447 a share. that is a streaming winner from the virus. walmart hit a all-time high earlier. not sure it is there now.

yes it is. 131 on walmart. that is where you have it today. this afternoon the president outlines guidelines for opening up the economy. i think that is very good for the markets. my time is up, neil, mr. cavuto, it's yours. neil: mr. varney, thank you very, very much. we'll follow up on amazon and netflix. two strong performers, record performers at that as you intimated. something giving market as little bit after prop up. news we're getting out of new york state. governor cuomo is having the daily press conference where he detailed hospitalizations regarding the covid-19 crisis are below 18,000 from around 18,335 yesterday. that rate came down from close to 18,800. that trend is coming down. the reason why i mention hospitalizations. they are considered to be a forward indicator. you get into the hospital, then the procedure