>> annouer: this is "nightly siness report" with bill walking away. the chi executive of wells fargo is stepping down immediately from the scandal-plagued bank, and his most vocal critic cheers. next target. should profits be taxed more than earned income? that's what democrats are asking as they eye higher rates on long-term capital gains. new how one investor is taking a page from venture capitalists to identify and invest in the next generation of baseball stars. ose stories and much more tonight on "nightly business report" for thursday, mar and we do bid you a good evening, erybody, and welcome. sue is off tonight. stocks rose today as trade talks

between the u.s. and china resumed. we'll he more on that in a moment. we begin with late-breaking news tonight. a surprising resignation a wells fargo. ceo tim sloan is stepping down fective immediately. his departure was announced ngter the close tonight. he is b replaced on an interim basis by the bank'sco general sel. wells fargo, of course, has been under intense scrutinyau b of the fake account scandal of a few years ago which has resulted in more than $2 billion in fines. sloan was promoted to ceo and charged wit cleaning up the mess, but he is now the second ceo to step down because of it. senator elizabeth warren had been a very vocal critic of sloan's. leshe recently c on the federal reserve to maintain its growth cap on the bank until sloan was replaced. after the news, she tweeted this out tonight. about damn time, she wrote. tim sloan should have been fired a long time ago. he enabled wells fargo massive fake account scam. got rich off of it and then helped cover it

now let's make sure all the people hurel by w fargo scams get the relief they are owed. the stock initially moved higher in after-hour trading tonight following that announcement. to wall street now, andhe stock market where trade was once again in focus. u.s. officials are in beijing to resume talks between the world's tw largest economies, and nvestors cheered with hope today. the dow industrial average rose to 91 points to close at 25, 717, the nasdaq added 25, the s&p was up 10. eunice yoon has more tonight . >> trade representative robert lighthizer and treasurte secretaryn mnuchin are in beijing for their talks with china's vice premier. the two sides are going to hold discussions all day on friday and said that a lot more needs to be done. "the wall street journal" is reporting that the chise side

offering to make concessions to give access to the country's cloud competing industry. under the proposal, foreign tech firms would be allowed to own data centers as p pt of aot in a free trade zone. this is the second report indicating that chi is making offers in its technology sector. trump administration offtoials reuters that the chinese have put forth proposals on forced tech t transfet have gone further in the past in their size and scope. the reuters report said u.s. officials want to keep some of the tariffss leverage ove the chinese, but whether thene chi ill wanting to do that seems unlikely. sources familiar with the talks have t td met the two sides still need to clarify how and when tariffs wl be imposed, nail down undefined language and find a way to make the deal enforceable. separately, china's premier put a timetable on a new foreign investment law that's meant to end forced techtr sfers. he said it would go into effect next january and added we will

heed the inpurom various parties, especially foreign investors. to drive home the message tijt g is addressing the complaints of its trading partners, including the united states, the chinese vice premier heads to washington next week to coinue thenegotiations. for "nightly business report," i'm . well, with just one day left in the first quarter, investors must be feeling pretty good, ne part it wasn't just of the market that saw gains, but pretty much all of it. bob pisani is the new york >> we're about to wrap up the first quarter and overall investors should very pleased with their investment portfolios. even with all this hand wringing about lower bond yields, it's not just the s&p 500 which, by the way, is b having theest quarter since 2009, everything is up. and i mean everything. the stock market, the bond market, russell 20, the small cap index is up 12%. bonds are doi great. high-yield bond etfs are up 6%. corporate bondetfs are up . treasuries are up more than

and that doesn't include the dividend. what does it all mean? it means i you have portfolio with a 60/40 stock/bond sit u have about 9% this quarter. that's very impressive gains for a bancedportfolio. and you've been a winner even if you invest by sector. all 11 sectors are up on the quarter. technology stocks are the big gainers but energy stocks are also strong asil rallied. industrial stocks, which were dramatically oversoldt the end of the fourth quarter thanks to these global growth and trade y concerns, tnap back. they're up 15%. it's not bad for three months' work. for "nightly business report," i'm bob pisi at the new york stock exchange. we learned today that economic g.wth in the u slowed in the final three months of 2018. gross domestic product for the fourth quarter showeain of 2.2% in line with expectations but down from a previous estimate from the government.ut that full year growth for all of last year at a9%.

thually was the best year for the economy sinc 2015. but warren buffett is noticing a slowdown in economic activity. during a wide-ranging interview today, chairman of berkshire hathaway pointed to bnsf rail company that he says is signaling weaker growth. >> it looks like it's slowing down. i don't mean tt it's reversing course or anything, but it does seem from all of the businesses, but especially including railroad statistics, because they come so a fast they cover such a broad spectrum, and it gets distorted by whether people are hurrying up the pacific y're worried t about tariffs and all of that sort of thing. but i would say that it does look like the pace of increase in the economy has slowed down. >> if the u.s. economy is slowing down, it may be in par because economies overseas are hitting the brakes.

today the vice chair of the federal reserve said the central bank must pay clor attention to global growth risks because countries are linked more thanf ever because trade and financial transactions. during his speech today, he explained how the u.s. economy could be shocked by a global downturn. >> the shock will impact the u.s. through direct trade links, lowering the demand for. u exports and, thus, lowering gdp. second, the foreign recession would lead to lower interest rates abroad, and other things equal wou tend to raise the value of the dollar, which in turn could have an impact on exports and trade. >> he emphasized that policyma rs cannot ignore those kinds of risks. ea> to the housing market now. today weed that home buyers signed fewer contracts to buy existing homeseb inary when compared to january. but mortgage rates have continued going lower since th, and those lower rates have ma feeling enthusiastic about the spring selling market. diana olick has more.

>> reporter: at a sunday open house in bethesda, maryland c- >>ck it out. >> reporter: -- home buyers were taking advantage of warmer weather and lower mortgage rates. >> everything is falling into place. interest rates are going down,t the w is nice, we have some houses to look at and people are excited. >> reporter: thing b werey at this five bedroom colonial listed for $1.25 million. but while the supply of homes for sale is little higher than last spring, the market is still very competitive. >> it seems like there are fewer houses on the market that are more affordable, and it also seems that they go very quickly. so within the first couple weeks of showr:g. >> reporonya and her husband, matthew, want more space for their young family. >>k if we l toward the upper end of our price range, it seems like there's more option p >> reportece is still clearly an issue, while the price gains in most markets are shrinking, the run-up over the last few years was dramatic. even falling mortgage rates arer not making up it. pending home sales in february,

which measures signed contracts during the month, fell from january and were down sizeably from a year ago. the average rate on the 30-year fixe saw a recent peak just over 5% last november but then gan falling slowly. rates were around 4.5% in pbruary. in tt week, the rate took the steepest dive in a decade, falling to right around 4%. the hope in the housing market is that this latest drop will really juice spring sales, but demand has been strong for a long time. it will really come downo wha today's buyers can afford. >> people have been on a knife'd about whether they can afford a house and lower mortgage rates mean more buye. as had an unusual effect. there's almost no slack in the system. because wages haven't kept up with home prices, people are having to borrow the money. when it gets easier to do that, we see more buyers. >> reporter: and that bethesda home that was open on the weekend went under contract on tuesday. i'm diana olick in washington.

>> in washington a proposal is being floated that has grabbed wall street's attention. john harwoeports the democrats are looking at raising the tax rate on long-term capital gains. john joins us from d.c. tonight. it's no surprise the democrats want to raise taxes on the wealthiest of americans. so why go after capital gains? >> reporter:bill, you know, alexandria ocasio-cortez, the fiery freshman house memberrom w york, drew a lot of attention with her 70% rate. th's a high rate. it sounds high to a lot of people. democrats wanto draw a contrast with republicans on work versus wealth, and so they're focusing in on capital gains rates, which are eylower. e talking about raising them to not as high as 70% in any event, and they ayink that tho frame in the 2020 campaign a better argument that will appeal to a wider array of voters. >> so what proposals are we that? so far on >> reporter: well, you've got bernie sanders who wants to equalize the ordinary incomend

capital gains rates, raise them both to 54%. that's not likelyo fly. sohn delany, former private equity executive se'll just make the capital gains rate the same as the personal rate now, that's 37%. elizabeth warren has a wealth tax, which is different, but tht interestinng about her wealth tax is what she would do is tax on a mark to market basis the value of assets as they appreciate, not just when they're sold, which is what happens under existing law. shback withinny the party on any of this? >> reporter: yes. larry summers, the former treasury secretary, told me if you raise the capital gains rate over 30%, you will actually cost the governmentat moneyr than gain it because selling capital gains is voluntary- realizing capital gains is voluntary, depending on sales. if you dcourage sales, you'll get less revenue and so larry summers said what's the point ot going t high. >> john harwood in washington. thanks, john. >> reporter: you bet. time to take a look at somes of toda upgrades and

downgrades. fedex was downgraded today to neutral from positive. the analyst said the stock will remain under prearure in the t a new source of cash flow. the price target is now 92 dhat stock rose 1% to $177.90. seawoas upgraded to buy fromneutral. the analyst calls that theme park operator a leader in its industry and can benefit from improving economies of scal price target now is $34. that stock was up a fraction to $24.68. m beverage was named a top pick at credit suisse today. the analyst cited the company's growth potential and pointed to slowing momentum at new competitor bang. the price target, 5. shares dipped to $54.46. still ead, startups promise to disrupt the financial services industry, but that's not exactly how it's been

as you may knowes lyft m its debut on wall street tomorrow, and tonight it priced its tipo $72 a share. that was at the high ending of the expected range. that values the company as more than $20 billion. lyft is one of thet highly anticipated ipos of the year. >> meanwhil the government is suing facebook. the department of housing and urban development alleges that the company engaged in housing discrimination. the laws claims that facebook allowed advertisers to restrict who was able to see ads on the platform based on race and national origin. the department says that violating the federal fair housing act. facebook says it is surprised by

this decision. amazon said today it is adding 800 jobs to its tech hub in austin, texas.ns those positill focus on engineering and cloud computing. the expansion follows apple'sno cement last year that it will invest $1 billion into a ne cpus in that city. whole foods, which is owned by amazon, is headquartered in austin, texas. the federal trade commission has shut down four operations that it said were responsible for billions of robo calls. according to the ftc, the groups pitche w ae array of services from debt relief to home security to fake charities. the agency has been calling on one companies and wireless carriers to help combat the ammers. according to "the wall street journal" robo callers so fn have b fined more than $200 million since 2015. but at th point the government has only collected $6,700 of that amount. it's no secret that

technology is causing rapid changes in many industries. tech startups are looking to reinvent just about everything these days, includi the way we bank. buhat industry's evolution is not exactly going as some had planned. deidre bosa is in san f for us tonight. >> reporter: if you ever paid a bill using your phone or opened savings account online, then you're part of the fast-growing industry which stands for financia technology. startups were widely expected to challenge the tradition banking industry by making it asier and faster to save, borrow and manage your money without ever even having to walk into a loc branch, but that total disruption never happened. as it turned out,startups and established banks instead are working together. there's chase' acquition of payment start upwe pay. citi's partnership with betterment. and this week apple announced a credit card with goldman processed by mastercard. at the ideas festival organized

by the banks policy institute here in san francisco, large banks and startups are on stage together talking aut more collaboration. >> i think s back when you go back to the launch of apple pay and the like,se that was an indicator that i think mostrsompanies unnd. in today's world to succeed, rather than try and control everything yourself way to work is through partnerships. >> we think of ourselves today as aplatform, not a product company. and that's a large part of our growth is based o that definition and that extension. >> reporter: experts also say the future of banking involves block chain, the technology behind crypcurrencies like bitcoin, but how and when block chain transfonds thetry is still unclear, even for those banks that have made big th investments i technology. >> i am bearish. i think that and i hope that it works. i want it to make us better, but

i have not yet seen a use case that tells me i'm be dependent on it in ten years. >> even the ceo of startup ripple which wants to transform the wayon financial institu move money around the world acknowledge that progress has stalled but tayst block chain will play a central role in banki in the digital future, it will just taketime. >> in many ways it's been great for the industry. somee who was saying bitcoin is a fraud is now leaning in and bringing credibility. >> reporter: as for what's next, participants expect more changes to the normally staid financial services factor and any transformation will n by newcomers and old-timers alike. movado shares are ticking higher and that's where we begin tonight's market focus. the luxury watch maker reported better-than-expected earnings thanks to a 35% increase in sales over the holiday quarter. the ceo said it is the lineup of

newly acquired brands are ne ping to boost its on sales. shares soared by 22% today to $40.06. accenture increased its full year guidance. it cited its push into digital and investments in cloud services. it plans to spend up to $1.5 billion on deals during the current fisl year. the stock gained 5% to $175.12. meblwhile, kstone is reportedly dropping out of an auction for nielsen and reports say apoll global management is also losing interest in that television ratings company. the auction was expected to be completed this month. but the latest developme pressured the stock. it fell 11% today to $23.66. a lawsuit against boeing has now been filed over the the ethiopian airlines jet. the suit was filed by the family of one of the passengers on that

flight. it alleges that boeing had defectively designed the automatic flight control system of its 737 max jets. investors, though, shrugged the news off. the stock gained a fraction to $374.44. coming up, the big money in >> reporter: college basketball's sweet 16 kic off tonight, and gaming companies and casinos are hoping for some sweet returns. i'm contessa brewer. coming up on "nightly business report," how these companies are hoping for a piece of the march maess ac. lastight a jury awarded a

california man $80 million in damages after he claimed that the weed killer roundup caused his cancer. the m h used that product on his 56-acre property for two decades. bayer now owns monsanto, the maker of roundup. it insists that the weed killer is safe and said that it will appeal this verdict. in the meanti though, bayer and monsanto still face hundreds of other lawsuits tied to roundup. > well, the sweet 16 portion of the ncaa men's basketball tournament gets unde today, and so far march madness has been big money for bookies and in sports books. with sports betting now legal iy tates outside nevada, contessa brewer has a look at all of the ways that americans can get a piece of the action now. she reports tonight from east therford. >> reporter: for the first time in history, the sports book here at the meadowlands is accepting bets on march a madnes a slew of other sports. >> we're all excited about .th >> reporter: the american gaming

association predicts one in five adults will wager a total of $8.5 billion. much of that on those college basketball brackets. but legal sportsooks are also getting a piece of the action. big business surpassing even the super bowl. in, neva traditionally march madness brings in 65% of e sports betting action for the year. now a total of eight states have legalized sports betting and 30 others are moving forward. analysts predict new jersey alone could draw 25% of nevada's handle. casinos and online platforms are rushing to cash in. fan duel now grabs 50% of the market share in new jeey. formatt king is hoping widespread regulation. >> nobody should ever kid themselves that the need for good, stable, frienrey lation because if you don't have that, then you can't compete against the illegal guys. >> reporter: and it's these li mle devices,ile gambling, that will drive the profits of

this industry. how important is it? in february, super bowl, fan duel brought in a milli and a half dollars through this sports $6.5, but it brought in million through online and mobile bets. just this wk rhode island passed a measure into law to thesesports gambling, and companies are counting on more states to follow suit. >> if you really want to bring thellegal market into the regulated market, then it's very important that they haves acc to mobile sports betting. that's what we have today. >> reporter: for investors looking at direct exposure to e u.s. market, it's not quite as easy as making a bet on your one. david katz, analyst at jeffreys technology to the or platform providers or overseas. >> reporter: the bricks and mortaraso companies don't look to make the most money from sports bettin t it technology and platform providers that are best positioned. d even the uk companies, william hill, patty power and

gvc that are covered by our uk colleagues are best positioned for the u.s. sports betting business. orter: for now gaming companies are intent on growing markhare and lobbying more states to legalize sports wagers. fan duel is betting march madness could wind up making this its best month ever it's expecting sweet returns for the sweet 16. fonightly business report," contessa brewer, east rutherford, new jersey. and on this opening day for major league baseball, we have this story of a former pitcher who i investing in minor league players and stealing a page from venture capital playbooks. eric emi has the story in new york tonight. >> reporter: well, the stock market may be facing volatile re times, t a creative way to get uncorrelated returns. investing in baseball players. a company called big league advance has raised more than $150 million to buy equity stakes in minor league baseball

plaers. the ide is simple. the players get an up front payment, but it's not a loan. they can keep the money in returning, big league advance gets a percentage of any eventual major league baseba. the company has invested in over 130 players so far, including fernando jtatis and jose asuda. michael shwimer, a former major leagueer pit himself, found the company. >> our kind of company mottos big league advance, buy players for player h we mighte a scale of a million dollars for 10%, but $1,000 every one. the player can say, okay, i'll do $300,000 for 3%. so our average deal is in the 300,000 to $500,000 range. >> a typical minor league player might make less than $10,000 a year so getting an upfront payment of $300,000 could be

life-changing money. several superstar player b includince harper and manny machado each signed contracts worth over $300 million. earning a small percentage of a contract like that would be a big win for the investors. it just like venture capital, losing a small amount of money on most investments with hopes that a few superstars make up for all the rest. >> if you iest in ten tech o startups and or two become facebook and google, you'll do pretty well. >> reporter: one benefit of this type of investing is that baseball salaries are not correlated to the whims of the stock market. the catch, though, is it requires investors to be patient. >> it's a very long-term investment. you're not free agent until six years wit a majoreague team. you're seeing that with bryce harper now and manny machado and others. and so the tale is very long. on an individual player investment, we're not expecting a return for at least six or seven years. >> reporter: for "nightly

business report," i'm eric chemi in new york city and before we go, one final look at the day on wall street. as we geteady for the ending of the first quarter, the dow today rose 91 points, nbc aasda added 25 and the s&p was up 10 as traders watch for developments out of beijing on those trade negotiations in ina. tomorrow we'll see how the lyft ipo does on wall street as well. at's "nightly business report" for tonight. i'm bill griffeth. thanks for watching, everybody. we'll seow is

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