facebook and instagram. next week we'll be discussing the global economic implications of the coronavirus outbreak. that's right here on "the stree" thank you very much for joining us. ♪ jack: welcome to "barron's roundtable" where we get behind the headlines and prepare you for the week ahead. i'm jack otter. we begin with what we think are the three most important things investors should be thinking about right now. major upheaval in the energy market with oil supply overwhelming demand. who are the biggest losers and what it means for prices at the pump. but coronavirus still this control of the market as the medical industry rushes to develop treatment and the pandemic retesting food companies as growth stocks, which ones are benefiting from consumers cooking and eating at home. on the barron's virtual round table, ben, karl and jack. great to see you, guys.

wish we were together again. so the word unprecedented is getting quite a workout over the past month or so. jack, it certainly applies to what was happening in the energy market over the past week. >> right at the start of the week the energy markets -- you know what? let's get weird. i know you think you've seen weird, but how does -$37 sound on a barrel of crude oil? does that mean i can go to a gas station, they'll pea me to if fill up the car? that's not what it means. in the futures market, each contract has to do with a specific type of oil delivered to a specific place at a specific time, and on april 20th when that may west texas intermediate contract came due, you better have had a pipeline and storage tank willing to accept your oil in oklahoma or you got closed with next to zero liquidity. most people didn't have it, so so we had prices go sharply negative.

now -- jack: if you have a boat that holds oil, that's a nice thing. >> funny you mentioned that because on my street wise podcast for barron's, i spoke with the chief of a shipping company. they've rarely done better. free cash flow is up more than 50% right now. june delivery of oil is cheap. september delivery of oil is more education pepsive because right now, look, the roads are empty. we hope that by the end of the summer we're going to be driving and getting back to normal. you know what? take my oil, don't send it anywhere, just give me a few months, and then i'll try to sell that oil for more. jack: if we do, in fact, get driving this summer, i assume consumers are going to see low prices at the pump. >> that is the silver lining. i saw a national average, it's well below $2. some parts of the country are below $1.50, prices they haven't seen in a decade.

but again, we have to go somewhere in order to feel the benefit of those price. jack: ben, early on in the week it was clearly oil that was in control of the stock market, but then the focus shifted to over the week. >> yeah, that's right. the stock market saw this, everybody that was watching what was happening with oil kind of went what's going on, and then the market started to fall. at first it was mainly energy stocks and things exposed to oil, or but then it shifted to the rest of the market. by wednesday it was like, okay, what's next? and the market rallied back pretty nice. then a drug trial of a gilead drug to treat coronavirus was accidentally released, and it showed disappointing results. there's a lot of requests about this trial and what it really means, but just that headline knocked 400 points off the dow. the dow went from up 400 to flat on the day. that just shows everyone is focused on the coronavirus right now. the sooner we can get a cure,

the sooner we can get reopened, the better things will be. it's an obvious statement, but that's what the market cares about right now. jack: where else are you seeing cracks in the market over the past week? >> that's the problem, after energy everyone's looking for where the next bad, where the next unexpected event is going to come from. some of them are kind of obvious. there's the emerging markets where you're seeing the currencies of places like mexico and brazil and russia and turkey really get hit hard. their stock markets too. just because everyone knows that these countries, they don't have the fiscal balance sheets, and right now currency that was weak would normally be a good thing, but there's no exporting right now. so there is no silver lining to this. another area we have to watch is municipal bonds. we have senator mcconnell thinks states should just declare bankruptcy. you can imagine that if that would happen, the market would really not be happy about it at all. jack: yeah, absolutely. carlton, one bit of good news, i

guess, is that in the food market people are going to the grocery store. you have to stand in line, and they're cooking at home. >> exactly. it's really amazing because when you look at the packaged food companies, they were largely forgotten years ago. people were shopping in the outer ring, now they're going to the center of the store. we're looking at general mills, campbell's soup, conagra and kraft heinz. last year warren buffett said he overpaid for kraft, but now we're seeing that these stocks are having a bit of a rally. maybe not where they were way back in 2015. and some may be wondering, okay, is there still room to run here? it seems like there is because a lot of these stocks are still trading a little bit below the broader market's pe multiple. people are looking for shelf-stable food, it's out with kale -- yeah, jack? >> it's jack howe. i'm looking at a can of spa get

owes, i've bot some chef boyardee ravioli, and that's what i'm wondering, are people going after these legacy brands because they're trying to stock the garage with something that can stay on the shelf a little while right now? >> exactly. there's only so much fridge and freezer space, so a lot of people are going to these canned goods. so packaged food sale are up about 24% for the week epping april 4th. i mean, that's incredible. so there's still a lot of room for these companies even as the economy comes back online. i think a lot of shoppers still will be cooking at home. [inaudible conversations] >> just so you know, you can taste the boyardee region of italy in every bite. [laughter] jack: i'm going to tell my children the next time they complain about food, i grew up on that stuff, and i'm going to serve them a lot of chef boyardee. [laughter] coming up, if former kansas city fed on how the plunge in oil prices will impact the economy and should we worry about isn't just a department.

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in your area at lexus.com/people first jack jon as the scrambles, it's dealg with plunging oil prices, states desperate for cash, an ever increasing national debt. here to help us sort it all out, thomas hand ec. thanks for joining us. let's start with what these crisis meetings are like. you've been in them. what's the feeling in that room or, i guess in this case, on that zoom. and how do you sort through everything and decide, okay, this is at the top of the agenda. >> you have some staff briefings to kind of set the stage, and then you get input from the different individuals, presidents and governors that kind offing dreier their understanding of the situation and their views. and then the chairman, in this

case jay powell if, would outline what he thinks is an option for the committee, fomc committee, to follow going forward, and he would lay that out. jack: i do want to ask you about what's going on in the oil market and how this might reverberate across the economy. is it possible some of these drills will go bankruptcy? could that be a net to banks that are lending to them. >> i think that the industry industry and oil particularly has had a hard time. now, other commodities have as well. but this is unusual because you started with a price war between vape what and -- saudi arabia and russia, and then it carried over into this terrible pandemic where demand has just dropped off. you are seeing this collapse in prices. there is pressure on producers all over the world and certainly in the united states, and you will see some bankruptcies.

now, there are some differences, perhaps. the larger producers will work way through. i think the president was talking the other day about helping them out, smaller producers may -- [inaudible] by those larger producers, and you'll see some consolation of the industry. but in the -- consolidation of the industry. but i think the importance of oil and energy to the united states would mean there's support that goes to the producers just like it has for other, other participants including the banks themselves. jack: gotcha. i a with want to switch over to state budgets. obviously, states are very strapped right now. and should the fed do anything to support them? >> well, the fed is supporting them right now. i think it's a half billion dollars, excuse me, $500 billion of support in the markets for municipal bonds to try and make sure there's a market for them. whether they do more than that,

i don't think they should be doing direct grants or direct investments. that's up to the government itself. but the fed is doing its part in terms of providing liquidity in that a market, and i think that has served that a market well at least to this point. jack: gotcha. so, obviously, we are running up big deficits and adding to the national debt during this crisis. most people seem to agree that the alternative would be worse. but looking way down the road once we get past this, are you worried about inflationary forces? >> well, to agree with you to begin with, i think that the government and the federal reserve has to provide immediate support. but it does put an obligation on them, on the fed and the administration and the congress to move down the road now. -- to look down the road now. we are mortgage future generations for the president, so we need to be thinking about

how we do that. as we do it, it continues on as it did in the last decade, as it continues on, it does misallocate resources, and that does affect future wealth generation, and so those are important factors to consider at the moment, not just town the road sometime, but at the moment. how are we going to exit from this emergency actions and make sure the economy stays strong well into the future. jon jack yeah, we'll certainly be dealing with that for a long time. tom hoenig, thank you very much. coming up next, the newest barron's big money poll shows exactly what some of the country's most successful investors expect from the market. stay right there. ♪ awesome internet.

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♪ ♪ jackie: right to your barron's survey. some to have most successful money manager in the country on where they think the economy is going. it may surprise you. here to weigh in is morgan stanley cio lisa shallot. you and your team titled a recent report too far too fast and suggested that the recent runup is just a bear market rally. does that mean you think investors should not be chasing stocks right now? >> no. actuallying quite the opposite. i think the point we're trying to make is that investors really need to think about act e investing as opposed to just the pass i index -- passive index. right now we know that the the index, the s&p 500 index is going to -- [inaudible] and our sense is that a huge portion of that is really driven with by the fact that the s&p

500 as an index is extraordinarily concentrated with the top five stocks actually representing about 22% of that index. there are another 300 companies in that index that actually represent less than a tenth of a percent each. and so so our view is the index itself, this crowding into the fangs and the growth names and names that dominate the index, nominate the nasdaq really probably have made a full move here. and we'd much rather see investors be active stock pickers and owning some of the things that are going to work as we come out of this recession over the next 12 months. so that would be areas like financials, like energy, like industrials, like materials,

some of the more cyclical and value style-oriented sectors of this market as opposed to just chasing the index which has been quite crowded and very vulnerable to momentum. jack: well, certainly right now if active management is ever going to shine, right now would be its time. interesting you pick energy, that's a bold choice, and, you know, our big money poll we saw a big split over that. so i think it was the second pick amongst the bulls, but it was also the top pick amongst the bears saying it would do worse. i want to run a couple of the other results by you. 39% of those we polled were bullish on stocks this year, but that jumps to 83% for 2021. we also asked them about when growth would resume and, of course, that was mixed, but the plurality thought that that in q4, fourth quarter 2020, is when we get out of recession and go back to growth.

how do you guys feel about that? >> so, you know, at morgan stan we've had a view that this is going to be -- morgan stanley e that this is going to a v or u-shaped recovery and it's probably going to take us 18 months to get fully threw it, and we won't with really be in a growth phase from an economy standpoint until the fourth quarter of 2021. but what we have to remember is that stock markets are anticipatory discounting machines and that the market looks ahead. it's one of the reasons why we're sitting here with record unemployment numbers and yet the stock market has held up and held this most recent rally. so for us, the reality is that we think that over the next 12 months the stock market is going to be higher and anticipating the improvement at the end of 2021 and pricing that as early

as january. finish. jack: i want to ask you about jay powell. usually in these polls anyone in government gets a wad ranking from the -- a bad ranking from the people we survey, but in this particular one powell's fed got very high marks. do you feel the same? have they done a good job? >> look, i think the fed has done everything that is in their mandate and their power to do. certainly in terms of their responsiveness to the situation, to the crisis. look, i think that the top thing for the fed at this point is going to be what is left, how creative can they be moving forward, have they run out of room? they are at the zero bound. what do they do at the zero bound. and so that's going to require a lot of finesse, a lot of creativity and a lot of very strong communication from here. so i don't think that the challenges for the fed are easy, but i do think we have to over

the last 90 days we have to give them an a+for boldnesses, for being responsive, for being proactive. they do deserve an a + + in my mind over the last 60 days, for sure. jack: i think jack howe's jumping in. >> i didn't have a bad connection. did you say you like energy? because it's been a while since i heard something positive about energy now. why do you like it, what do you like there? >> look, i think the fundamental thing that always helps us decide what side of a trade we're on is how are the stocks and how are the credits responding to the news flow. we got some pretty provocative news flow at the start of this week that the futures market was highly disrupt ared, that the main contracts went negative, moments when it looks like the

june contract were going negative. and yet, and yet the stocks of the major enps held up. the credit of the major en ps held up. that signaled to us that there is a great degree of confidence in the overall futures curve when you look out 6-9 months in oil and that the market, quote-up quote, gets the joke that the enps are hedged over the intermediate term. jack: unfortunately, i do have to cut you off there. i really like those insights and thanks especially for getting that word in there. [laughter] up next, round table members give their investment ideas for the coming week. stay right there. ♪ ♪ in these uncertain times, look after yourself, your family, your friends.

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♪ ♪ jack: jack, i know you like excitement in your food choices, but when it comes to the market, you're saying give me some boredom. >> i'm excited about.com right now, i think. i mean, look, late last week thursday into friday we saw not much going on in the stock market. i like a time when not everything goes frantic 3% in a day every which way. our pal al root from barron's likes closer, they make pump, valves, that's just my kind of boring. it's been beaten down, but these are replacement parts that continue to be in demand even during down times, so this company can hold up pretty well. the price unusually cheap. buy some and take a nap. jack: that sounds great at this point in the market right now. i want to get an actionable investment idea from our other panelists as well.

carlton, i'm going to start with you. jack likes cars in a can, but you're going healthier. [laughter] >> absolutely. i've got to say going to the grocery store is the eye light of my week now -- highlight. so we're taking a look at krause farmers' a market. we talk about how soup companies are doing well, sprouts is one of the grocers that is still trading at a discount. it's one i'm keeping an eye on. jon and, ben, we are in the middle of a pandemic. you're looking at a medical opportunity. >> yeah. stocks like johnson & johnson and eli lilly have broken out, so investors might be wary of getting in right now. but another one who hasn't broken out yet is rome. it's also -- roche. it's this big multi-national pharmaceutical company, looks like it could break out too, it's an interesting opportunity. jack: thanks a lot, ben. thank you, jack and carlton, as well. to read more, check out this

week's edition at barron's.com and don't forget follow us on twitter. that is all for us. wash your hands, keep on your masks, and we'll see you next week on "barron's rounding table." ♪ ♪ >> from the fox is studios in new york city, this is maria bartiromo's "wall street." maria: and happy weekend, everybody. welcome to the program that analyzes the week that was and helps position you for the week ahead. i'm maria bartiromo. thanks so much for joining us. coming up, labor secretary eugene scalia is here to talk about mounting jobless claims and what can be done to get america back to work as this weekend we see a rolling open for certain states. first, though, dealing with china post-covid-19, regardless of the level of culpability it's clear that a new policy will have to be developed in handling china after this worldwide pandemic. the only question