you're watching first business: financial news, analysis, and today's investment ideas. good morning everybody, i'm angela miles. thank you for joining us today on first business.coming up in our show capitalizing on twitter... how the social network is helping traders make money. in today's cover story.... start ups soar... could this be a blowout year for tech funding... and...odd jobs: one man plays personal trainer for corporate america as a woman finds her sole passion making shoes. plus in traders unplugged...how the guys plan to profit on this years corn crop. scott bauer of trading advantage joins us now for tricks of the trade. thanks for being on our show this morning.

we're taking a look at how the presidential cycle affects the stock market. is this something you closely follow scott? > >not as a trader on a day-to- day basis but if you look historically dating back probably 70-80 years, this actually does make sense. there is absolutely a pattern to how the market works during the cycle. you look at it and the year before the election and the third year into the presidential cycle have historically been the two best years of the cycle to be in the market. not only on the upside but also those are the years with the least amount of decline. that makes sense. you have--the year before the president takes office, it's election time and everyone is positioning--both democrats and republicans--what they're gonna do for the economy, what they're gonna do for taxes. it's more of a feel good issue. once they get into office things seem to calm down a bit. in fact, the

first and second years after the president being in office are historically two of the least advantageous years in the marketplace. then as it comes closer and closer to reelection--so that third year in office is when things pick up again and there is absolutely a marked trend. > >would that cause you to put more money to work when you know that there's certainty-- when you know who has won the election and that this cycle is in play? > >if i wait until we find out who wins the election, there is only a 2 month window between the election and when the president actually takes office. so you really have to be in the market that whole year-- probably the 9 months before the election. that's historically when the biggest up markets have happened. again, as a trader, i'm not necessarily looking at that but if i was just a public retail investor in my ira account that is definitely a factor to think about. > >thank you for your insights today. for those who dream of being president of the company but need a little seed money, venture capital is heading in

droves toward mobile applications. v-c funding for mobile surpassed a billion dollars in the 3rd and 4th quarters of last year for the first time ever. and it's just one key trend for start-ups in 20-14. venture capital investments in mobile and telecom start-upswent up three percent, last year. and now account for 16% of all v-c deals. the mobile company that took home the most money was car-for-hire app "uber" with 285-million dollars. uber launched in 2009 and now pairs drivers with passengers in 26- countries worldwide. at a seminar for start ups, funding in 20-14 will likely come from non-traditional sources. "the funding for start-ups in 2014 will be a lot of private capital from things like kickstart or indigogo and places like that and individuals who are going to be investing personally." one start-up, contextmedia, which provides healthy lifestyle tips to patients in clinics has grown annual sales into the multi-millions. -- allowing its co-founders to invest more than a million

dollars in 22-other start-ups, many of them--health-related. "there's two things start-ups need to know when contacting physicians, they don't want the coolest and newest. they want the tried-and-true tested and error-proof. if you can partner with an institution--that will also help you be adopted by physicians." the seminar's organizers, chicago digital startups incubator, "1871" also shared another trend, paring away business functions that are not the core of your business. "wasting resources on hr is not going to differentiate you. when you shrink it to that, then it's possible to stay on top of what's important to your business." tullman suggests that starts ups won't lose cost containment abilities by outsourcing because of increased competition among service providers. overall,

more venture capital money went to internet companies that anywhere else--the fourth quarter of last year, the strongest in two years. the conventional wisdom that people who run companies in silicon valley are paid exorbitant salaries may be misguided. according to business insider 75% of tech company founders pay themselves less than $75-thousand per year. the data also shows that the younger the ceo, the less pay. founders who are 20 or younger pay themselves around $35- thousand. salaries don't tend to rise until there are at least ten people on the payroll. meanwhile, the highest starting salary for an m-b-a grad in the class of 20-13 is $375- thousand. that healthy paycheck is going to a 30-something graduate of northwestern university's kellogg school of management. a poets and quants analysis of starting salaries for top graduates of the world's best business schools shows that after kellogg was wharton, with a graduate earning $350- thousand. followed by $310-

thousand at columbia. $260- thousand at duke's fuqua and $250-thousand at the university of chicago's booth school of business. tech devices are helping slim down corporate fat. a company called retrofit has devised a way to whip top executives into shape who spend their days sitting in front of computers. retrofit provides one one one remote personal training through skype video conferencing, a tracking device and a wifi scale. 60% americans are overweight, so it's the vast majority. specifically in the corporate market this costs companies a lot of money, each overweight employee costs their boss $1,500 per year extra so do the math for the some of the companies we work with salesforce.com, google, etc. hundreds of millions of dollar per year. jeff hyman the founder of retrofit-- says he has lost 20 pounds on his program and most senior executives in the program have lost between 20 and 50 pounds. paying for health care and exercise programs comes into play for the companies

considered the top places to work. silicon valley tech firms ranked high on the fortune list. google is in the top spot, followed by software firm s-a-s. s-a-s has an on-site health care center that is also open to employee's family members. boston consulting group, edward jones, and quicken loans also offered quality perks to employees. whether you are at the top of a company or closer to the bottom financial planners say a rule of thumb is to save as much money as you can through your employers 401k plan. one survey shows 61% of all u.s. workers have access to a company sponsored pension or retirement plan. however, only 46% participate. the benefits to having money directly deducted from your pay check and into savings include--paying less in taxes on your earnings, having a cushion on top of social security, and your savings could increase if your company matches your money. you've heard the lament - "i can't afford to retire." or, "65's too young to retire." so - more & more older americans are starting

businesses. kauffman fast trac finds, nearly a quarter of all new start-ups were launched by people between 55 and 64. bloomberg research shows baby boomers have an advantage in terms of starting a business, as the generation tends to more educated, and have assets used to finance their start ups. michele markey is a vice president at kauffman fasttrac. "older americans really do come to the table with some wonderful experience and a lot of history. but with that they are also recognizing there are certain things that they still have alot to learn about what it takes to launch and build a business." data from the labor department finds 65% of americans ages 55 to 64 were working or seeking a job in 20-12 up from 56% a decade earlier. social media has transformed from a fun way to share pictures and personal information with your friends to a sophisticated method of tracking the financial market...diane moca has our report... far from silicon valley... chicago-based social market analytics has the feel of a

west coast start-up -- a trendy loft office with an open bar and drumset in the lobby... a team of hipster web developers and programmers... and a cool 'next generation' concept -- turning twitter's non-stop traffic into relevant data that can be mathematically analyzed and spit out to traders. "i can give you a heads-up when something is happening in the market." chartered financial analyst joe gits says he founded social market analytics because his clients kept asking for a way to track and quantify the market noise on twitter. "this was the sentiment changes around the fire, when that tesla car caught on fire... this was breaking in social media well before it came in the market as a whole." the company's software grabs all 500 million daily tweets and pulls out only those from professional traders and key players -- about 400,000 certified accounts. then the system determines which of those tweets have relevance to the market... and uses that

chatter to generate a positive or negative "sentiment score" for the 3000 largest publicly- held u-s companies -- updated every single minute.. 24/7. "twitter beats cnbc. if cnbc is finding out about it on twitter, we've already read it, quantified it, and sent it out to our clients." a stock research director from zacks has his doubts... and says investors want the kind of thorough and rigorous analysis that's outperformed the s&p 500 for 23 of the 26 years his firm has been providing investment advice. "i could pick a restaurant or movie or book from the buzz or twitter feed but i'd be very hesitant to recommend anybody to pick stocks." but dozens of money managers and hedge funds are paying from five to fifteen thousand a month for sma's constantly updated reports... and sma just began offering a user-friendly dashboard to day-traders for 29 to 99 dollars a month. partner mike grossman says investors who opened and closed the market trading sma's 'sentiment' winners would be up over 50 percent in the firm's

first two years -- a time of rising stock prices. "it has to prove itself over all parts of the cycle to be taken seriously." joe's team proved themselves to the new york stock exchange... who signed on as a distribution partner to provide its members with "sentiment scores" from sma. diane moca.. for first business news. the ceo of s-m-a says his reports should be just one element of an entire model used to make buying or selling decisions about stocks. coming up...spring cleaning your portfolio... insider tips on where money managers are investing. plus... in traders unplugged: market clues on tech stocks that could rise to the top. and, the story of how one woman followed her dream to success- one foot at a time. she shares her story next, with bill moller.

m ben affleck, and many actors have played the part of a u.s. serviceman in the movies, but for veterans like james crosby and so many other brave men and women, his service and his sacrifice for our country are real.

outside baghdad, a rocket attack blew up my humvee, killing one of my marines and leaving me paralyzed. [ben affleck] when james returned home, he, like many others, was in no condition to cope and advocate for the services he needed. fortunately, paralyzed veterans of america's trained experts were there to help him so he could concentrate on getting well. for over sixty years, paralyzed veterans of america has worked to ensure that our injured veterans get the medical, housing and auto benefits they have earned. i'm so thankful paralyzed veterans of america was there for me. surely those who sacrificed so much deserve no less. join me in supporting our paralyzed veterans. visit p-v-a dot org. how 'bout this for a career? shoemaker. for sara mcintosh, that's not an anachronism. you

design and make shoes by hand & run the chicago school of shoemaking. how do you get into shoemaking? as an artist, you could have been a sculptor, a pottery maker - but shoemaker? >>i started out wanting to make things so it was a very broad field at the time. and then we were doing a back to the land movement, building our own house, and trying to provide all of the things that we needed for ourselves.i got to a pair of shoes that were starting to wear out and i thought well, perhaps i can make these as well. >>and now you've got the school going. you're an artist first. did you know anything about running a business? >>no, and over the years i really tried to train myself to keep records and keep costs and things in balance but it has been a process all these 40 years. >>in the last 2 years your student body has grown by a factor of 4 and you're becoming more of a professional business person too. you've hired an executive director. >>absolutely. it was very much worth it because all of those details are not just ingrained in artists.

>>now these are some of the shoes that you made? >>yes. >>these are not clunky creations. these are artistic. these are beautiful. >>thank you. >>i assume that when you walk around with shoes like this people say where did you buy them? >>yes. where did you get your shoes! when i say i made them they are amazed. it's such a romantic notion to make your own shoes. >>it's kind of an old world lost art. are your students doing it because it's a hobby or do they want to get into the shoe biz too? >>i think it's both. they come to me because they're intrigued and they take the 2 day beginning shoemaking class where they make this shoe and they are so excited about the fact that they made something that's so tangible and so important to them that some of them want to continue. >>imelda marcos---there are people that know that shoes are a fashion statement. but these are a distinctive statement because if you made them you walk with a little more spring in your step. >>absolutely. they're very

comfortable as well because we build the shoes to the person's measurements. >>how many people in the world do this? >>i don't know. i think there's probably a dozen of us in the united states, maybe more in some other countries. >>well, hats off to you sara mccintosh. thanks so much. >>i appreciate it. thanks bill! in chart talk, profiting on "a cure." a money manager tells us about a health care stock on his radar. and coming up next in traders unplugged...is 20-14 throwing a curve ball to investors? we'll be right back.

time now to bring some levity into your life-- joining us from the floor of cme group.... alan knuckman and scott shellady here for traders unplugged...good morning guys. topic number one--down january. january was the first down month since may of 2013. what does this say for the rest of the year? alan: looking at the dow stocks--the dow has been hit harder. it was down 5% or so.

it was up last year obviously but didn't participate as much as the nasdaq. there are a lot of dow stocks that are at some key levels of support--coke, home depot, boeing. there's a lot of these stocks that you can look at from a risk-reward level. i think they have more upside here in the future. scott: i agree. i think by the end of the year it might be bruised and bloodied but i think you're gonna see some positive returns. i do think though that the economy is not doing as well as alan and his cohorts think it's doing. we will see some other stimulus other than qe. qe will be unwound from the taper because it's a bad economic policy but not because the economy can handle it. alan: 10,700 is the level to keep an eye on in the dow. angie: topic number 2--"pop" corn. we've had a record level of snow this year so what will that mean for moisture and corn crops? scott: the play on corn is we're gonna need some kind of weather scare to get it off mat. there's been a lot of selling of at the money volatility and rightfully so. alan: so from 580 down to 420-- the corn market has gone straight down. could this cause a bounce with this concern if it's too wet in the springtime? scott: maybe to 440--and if you do get that bounce all the

farmers that did not sell a thing this fall will let you have as much corn as you want--. alan: so what you're saying is that mother nature isn't guaranteed this year again? there won't be any problems...everything will be fine? scott: i didn't say that but you're trying to guarantee me that something bad will happen. alan: i think the reward potential is on the upside. $5 is the halfway point of this last selloff. scott: and there's no corn that's gonna come to market that where you will see 440 or 450. alan: every year is a new market! every year is a new year. scott: except for the farmer that did not sell their corn last year. angie: topic number 3--we want to get your predictions on tape--which tech stocks will perform the best this year? microsoft, yahoo, facebook? alan: i like them all. facebook not as much but i think apple had a sharp decline. it got to the halfway level of the october lows to the december highs. so i want to see some recovery there. but the pe ratio is only at 12 for apple. they're a serious money generating company. scott: i like marissa mayer, i like google. google's gonna come out with some more disruptive technology. i think

that ultimately it will be a tech wreck. you will have some tech stocks that do better than others but ulimately you have to remind yourselves that we've seen this from 1999-2001 when we've got some companies like facebook that are worth more than boeing and dow chemical combined. we do have a small problem there. everybody's got to really take a look at themselves in the mirror and realize what is actually produced here. alan: google sold off motorola and lost 10 billion dollars and they're fine with that so i think they're in very healthy shape. angie: here's the bonus round question for today... alan: milk. moo! scott: i'll say eat cause i don't. angie: it's milk. we totally made that one up. thanks for being on the show guys. have a good trading day. first business continues right after this.

hi, i'm ben affleck, and many actors have played the part of a u.s. serviceman in the movies, but for veterans like james crosby and so many other brave men and women,

his service and his sacrifice for our country are real. outside baghdad, a rocket attack blew up my humvee, killing one of my marines and leaving me paralyzed. [ben affleck] when james returned home, he, like many others, was in no condition to cope and advocate for the services he needed. fortunately, paralyzed veterans of america's trained experts were there to help him so he could concentrate on getting well. for over sixty years, paralyzed veterans of america has worked to ensure that our injured veterans get the medical, housing and auto benefits they have earned. i'm so thankful paralyzed veterans of america was there for me. surely those who sacrificed so much deserve no less. join me in supporting our paralyzed veterans. visit p-v-a dot org.

turning to chart talk this morning, matt shapiro--president of mws capital is standing by. good morning matt. > >good morning angie. > >is it time for investors to do some spring cleaning of their portfolios? > >absolutely. you have to position yourself to the end of the year and to the beginning to see what happened. you just have to play the game and let the year unfold. so now is the time to take a look at what worked and what didn't work. what looks attractive and what's your allocation that you want to do to get to the end of the year? > >it's been a big year for biotech and pharma stock as new treatments for diseases are being discovered--so what

stocks are you buying? > >i own those stocks widely and my play for healthcare is to spread your chips pretty broadly because you never know of course which stock is gonna hit it in terms of what drug or treatment or process. one stock i do like is thermofisher scientific that supplies all the research equipment to this old booming pharmaceutical industry. they became the number one worldwide provider of this equipment with the purchase of life technologies which has dna mapping equipment. that's one of the stocks i feel is sort of like the background but reliable and makes the equipment that all of these companies rely on for all those wonder drugs. > >that sounds like an exciting stock. what about some areas you would stay away from? > >i always tend to shy away from--i'm not gonna say the airlines or the car companies-- but companies that are in the industrial parts of the economy where there is huge assets that

they have to put together-- alcoa comes to mind. the economic profits for it aren't as high so i try to stick to more of the money managery kinds of stocks--your starbucks, your mcdonalds--that have high return on their assets and high profitability measures. > >matt thanks for being on our show today. > >you're welcome angie. that's a wrap for today. as always feel free to follow us on facebook and twitter or send us an email. we look forward to hearing from you. from all of us at first business, thank you for watching!

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