report" with tyler mathisen and su. adding to a most volatile week. two major reasons behind the market's big swing. weather the storm. our market monitor has a list of stocks to buy that may provide some stability for your portfolio. >> and getting short. when does betting against a stock go from a legitimate investment strategy to a down right vendetta? all that and more on "nightly business report" for friday 13th of march. good evening, everyone and welcome. friday the 13th lived up to its name on wall street turning into an unlucky day for stocks. the dow jones industrial average

tumbled 175 points to 17,749. its fourth triple digit move in five sections. midday the index off as much as 55 points. nasdaq sank 21 and the s&p 500 off 12. all the s were lower for the week and it was the third straight weekly decline for the dow and the s&p 500. as for crude, prices sank. wti nearing its 2015 closing lows after the international energy agency said u.s. production continues to climb despite low prices. bob pisani at the new york stock exchange now with two big reasons behind the swing. >> reporter: it was a choppy week that ended on a weak note. the key driver was the dollar's strength and the euro's weakness but late in the week oil off the return has an issue. the dollar strength and the europe weakness is playing havoc in the stock market. first, forcing money out of u.s.

stocks and into europe in general. like germany, italy and franls all up this week and germany at historic highs. germany a big exporter. helps them. it's playing havoc with companies that have t operations overseas like ibm and intel. all of which underperformed the markets this week. oil reared its ugly head again toward the end of the week as it approached the lows we saw in january. lows have been quiet recently but the combination of increasing supply and the dollar strength is again pressuring prices. the energy sector was far and away the worst performer this week down about 3.6%. finally, interest rates for utilities ahead of the next week a source of anxiety. for "nightly business report," i'm bob pisani at the new york stock exchange. as for the economy, producer prices fell in february for a fourth straight month another

sign of inflation. wholesale prices declined 4.5% last month that excludes the food and energy components that fell the same amount. inflation is something obviously the federal reserve is watching very closely and sentiment among consumers in march dropped from the prior month. our market monitor tonight said we'll talk more about the market and rates and stocks he thinks you should own as the volatility picks up. people's private client. nice to have you here. you think volatility is here to stay for this particular market. >> we had five years of very fortunate markets, very little volatility. been very in terms of interest rates and markets at record highs. we've been low this week by a very low volatility and low interest rate environment. that can't go on forever. >> we've been listening for most

of this week the market is down because the dollar is down. the dollar is up. the dollar is moving. i thought we wanted a strong dollar. >> that was exactly what worked for us in the late '90s. there's two things. i think the dollar is strong for two reasons. our economy is the one place in the world things are working. that's a great thing. and also our federal reserve is looking to be a little bit tighter in terms of monetary policy compared to other central banks around the world. if you have a growing economy and a bank that treating the currency really well, that's going to attract a lot of capital. that's what happen in the late '90s. that's a positive for the next couple of years. >> the big debate is when the fed will move up on interest rates. is the market strong enough to take a move to the side in interest rates? >> i wou much prefer to see a fed that's raising interest rates because you have a decent economy than a fed that has to stay at zero because we've got a major problem and the economy is unhappy to see that and the fed has been very good in terms of

projecting what they're going to do. next week they were talking about removing the patience phrase in the dialogue. they've been conveyed to the dialogue and that's in part where the dollar is already strong. >> let's move to a couple stock picks beginning with abbott labs. i want you to profile that one but also are these picks defensive, offensive? where would you place them? >> yes. all of the above. the last five years have been very good. next five years, maybe not so much. not really the entry right wee but if we don't have smooth sailing the next year. well these companies have been around since the 1800. i have to start there. we think abbott labs can persist, a good dividend, great management. the balance sheet is good. if you find companies with good balance sheets consistent cash

flows, you can probably take money over time. >> alexon on your list. >> they've raised dividend consistently for many decades now. it is a very consistent company. they've faced some challenges the stocks pulled back. enter 15 points or so. we think it offers long-term doubt here. they are tied to some sensitive sey in the oil patch. careful in terms of volatility but long-term, it makes a lot of sense. >> i remember having a tran sister raid sister radio. >> maybe not the sexiest business but make all kind of things in health care. diagnostic tools, et cetera so forth. maybe not real glamorous but consistent. they made an acquisition in the future. >> i do not remember having an emerson. >> oh of course not. >> kevin, thank you so much. have a good weekend. ty? let's talk about the debt limit to keep everybody on an

upbeat frame of mind. the treasury department began taking eliminating to avoid that breach. the agency will suspend the issue until certain securities to keep the nation's bills paid. and congress urged to raise the debt limit as quickly as possible. now to europe where an international economic conference that's been held in italy for the past 40 years is taking place. heads of state, business leaders and finance ministers are all meeting to discuss the outlook. julia chatterley has more from lake cuomo, italy. >> reporter: may be tranquil here in lake cuomo in italy, but i can tell you, the talk was tough. discussing just how europe can compete with the u.s. going forward and get its growth back on track. it's a meeting that takes place twice a year bringing together global leaders, ceos, also investors to discuss the event

taking place in the financial markets today and greece to accept the stage. yans arrived here early and a barrage of questions from journalists. he talked about the possibility of a greek exit from the euro zone and the markets. he said, rook,look they've got it wrong in the past and again. again he talked about the possibility of debt restructuring. we know what the germans feel about this. they don't want rising hassles across the euro. he taufbed the european central bank the live slug of money in the economy right now. he said, look, they're treat it harshly. he reiterated it again. there's so many open questions about how greece finances itself in the short-term. he said they'll come up with a reform plan early, but still, a lot of questions to ask about just how they fund themselves in the short-term. the highlight speaker tomorrow and he's not shy about sharing

his views, so expect new events over the weekend. for "nightly business report," i'm julia chatterley in lake como, >> back to new jersey now. now two companies find themselves in the middle of battles with short sellers. first, there's herbalife. investor leading a campaign against the company acknowledged that a firm he hired to attack herbalife has been contacted by the fbi about possible manipulation of the stock. but today, akman said he's not been directly contacted by authorities. >> certainly not by the fbi or doj. i would say we have proactively and offensively been to the doj to make our case about herbalife but no we haven't gotten any subpoenas asking to testify about market manipulation or anything else with our conduct

in respect to liquidators, stock goes lower and subject of intense scrutiny since the story questioning the safety of its products aired on "60 minutes" last month. tom sullivan the chairman defended his company's products. >> from day one, we've always taken care of our customers, given a good product at a good price. we don't skimp on the product. our laminate is safe. we're not going to ruin the reputation of the company. >> both stocks seen big swings as a result of being in the target of short salers. lumber liquidators down 15%. >> what exactly does it mean when an investor shorts a stock? here's a look at how it works and the risks involved. >> reporter: if you're convinced the price of a stock is going down you can still make money by shorting that stock. here's how. say that stock is currently

worth $50 a share. you can borrow ten shares and then sell them even though they're not yours for $500. if you're right, and the stock price drops to say, $30 a share, you can buy those ten shares for $300. once you fulfill your obligation to return the stock that you borrowed you're left with a profit of $200. not bad. but your potential profit is capped since the most that stock price can fall is $50. your potential loss though is not capped. the stock price could go up and up with no ceiling. say the price hits $800 before you buy it back. your loss in that case $7500. ouch. that's why shorting a stock is one of the riskier poxes you can take and swimming upstream against all the people working to make that company a success and not to mention those who boulgt the stock expecting its

price to rise and the stock market's historical trend which is up. >> so should you ever short sell a stock? let's find out from michael santo yn finance. why do people say things about short sellers? >> most people in the market wish would happen is that stock prices over time go up and i think because short sellers do face that opposing current when they try to make money on stocks going down they often pick companies that they feel like they have the goods on. where they basically can tell a story that says not only we think their business is going to decline a little bit but maybe they have accounting problems or they havr issues that the company is concealing. the short sellers seem as if they're kind of going on about an expose or something and trying to tarnish a company. >> are short sellers doing a service to possible investors or a disservice because they may be

saying things that are negative about a company? >> they're certainly doing a service to the overall market. short sells, first of all, research has shown that heavily shorted stocks over time tend to underperform. so seemingly where there's smoke, there's fire. and also markets do best when all information from all sides of an argument are out in the open and you have all investors that can kind of act on it as they see fit. that's usually better for market fishlt si in aggregate, it's a good thing. not in every situation. >> what executives will criticize short sellers, as did the founder of liquidators and he has a vested interest in hammering on it. they never complain when investors talk up the stock, do they? >> absolutely not. they're kind of preaching to the hometown fans when they tell investors short sellers are to blame for declines in their stock and unjustified.

>> at what point does a short seller's hammering on a stock cross that line and become an effort to manipulate the price of the stock if he or she really believes sincerely what he or she knows about the stock is true? >> requires an intent to deceive the market about something. not just intent but a coordinated effort to do so. it can't just be stating an opinion. it can't even be gist statejust stating false information. you have to be proven to have somehow rigged the market from deceitful information. >> for the individual investor michael, is shorting a prudent idea? it does take knowledge of the markets. you don't have a lot of protection in there either. >> it's a very tough game. i mean a lot of people really you'd have to have a real edge in terms of information. i think for most people some

people keep short sales in their books. just really as a hedge and say, look, if things go badly in this part of the economy, maybe i'll protect it with other options. exchange traded fund that basically go the other way opposite of the market. yeah. >> you know michael, let's say i walk into a store and it's a big chain store and i just don't like that store anymore. i think it's going down. you can pick your store there. i'm not going to name any. would that be a reason to go and short the stocks? >> no more reason than if you go into a store and absolutely love the experience you want to buy the stock. obviously, anecdotal information in either direction sounds like inefficient reason to go with an investment. >> michael santoli, yahoo finance. ahead, why it may seem the force is with disney shares. big hurdles remains for one of the world's most recognizable

disney's ceo has been at the job for ten years and the stock is up about 300% during that time. shares trading about $106 a share, just shy of the all-time high. and while it may seem like the company is firing on all cylinders, some challenges do >> reporter: big powerful brands and digital innovation are helping the magic kingdom soar to new heights. disney's frozen sequel and three new star wars films due out over the next three years are more than just movies.

they're valuable intellectual property. part of bob iger's strategy to build or buy brands to the movie studio consumer digital properties and park. the strategy helped disney shares triple since bob iger was appointed ceo ten years ago today. >> the magic will only last so long. >> we'll see that strategy at this weekend's box office with cinderella plus a frozen short ahead of it. expect to grow $60 million in the u.s. and to go on to match maleficent with 760 growth last year but "cinderella" more. cost half as much as maleficent to produce. >> outlook is great and disney i think very strong. we follow cinderella with avengers two with may and then star wars. a lot of great stuff in between. >> reporter: packed with two pixar films.

iger has big challenges before leaving his post in 2018 as the way people pay for content changes. biggest chunk comes from tv networks which are tied to the tv bundle. >> i think the biggest challenge over time is that is the maintenance of that basic bundle and pay tv which is really crucial to espn. >> reporter: to stay ahead of the thread of cord cutting, he's offering espn as part of over the top tv service. and studios a better way for the short form content in higher demand. content still rules the magic kingdom. iger is just looking for new ways to distribute it. for "nightly business report," i'm julia boorstin in los angeles. general motors settles a high profile case related to an ignition switch recall and that's where we begin tonight's market focus. the auto maker settled with the parents of a woman who died with a faulty ignition switch. the family had previously

settled with gm before the automaker admitted it knew of the flaw prior to issuing a recall. the settlement amount not disclosed, but what was disclosed today, the share price down 38 cents at $38.05. general electric to egypt part of a nearly $2 billion deal to increase power capacity in the country. the company will invest $200 million in an economic zone near the suez canal and investments after years of political turmoil. general electric stock off more than 1% at $25.04. and inc. posting a high profit. parents of ann taylor struggled because of discounting and competition. today, it laid out a plan to cut $35 million in costs by 2016. the stock popped 8% to $40.45. investment technology group is in talks to buy the brokerage service provider according to a

bloom berg report. con vergex could be but the deal could fall through. this comes more than a deal after admitting to defrauding customers of millions by concealing mark-ups on stock trades. investment t almost 15% to $27.91 and coming up curing congestion. more goods are moving by rail and that is causing a big headache on the tracks. federal reserve will nominate market action next week. here's what to watch with the

new unique under way. central bank holds a two-day policy meeting. chair janet yellin will release the statement wednesday and hold a press conference. after the close of trading on wednesday, some reshuffling in the dow jones industrial average. apple replaces at&t and the dow component, nike reports earnings thursday. backlogs delays there's a gridlock problem plaguing our nation's rail system. as the economy improves more goods are traveling across the country by rail leading to traffic jams on the tracks. and as morgan brennan reports from belleview, ohio companies are making big investments to fix th. >> reporter: they call it the belleview symphony. and it's only getting louder. >> we are currently processing 1800 cars a day and that number grows to 28 rkds 30030 cars a day.

>> alleviates congestion. >> reporter: $165 million into doubling capacity where the train car filled with coal grain, even corn syrup comes through each day to be sorted and sent out to other parts of north america. but as more goods move by rail, companies struggled with unprecedented congestion. >> it was a major concern last year. we did not provide the level of service that our customers have come to expect. that was for a couple of reasons. >> reporter: reasons like the fact that freight volumes are returning to prerecession levels though the mix of goods has changed with more crude oil, autos on the tracks. last year congestion weighed on service times and operating costs as railroads struggled to keep up with the demand, especially a traffic cho point like chicago. to combat the problem, investments like the one here are across the way on 140,000

miles of freight railroad tracks. >> they're going all across the country. they're going in to new yards. for example, to handle intermodal containers. they're going into at ports to handle imports and exports. again, hiring people steeling the ground. >> reporter: this year the association of american railroads forecast the industry will invest a record $29 billion. analysts say the investments are already beginning to pay off with rail service times beginning to improve but how much depends on two factors. federal regulations about crude by rail which could have ripple effects across the entire network and also the backlogs at the west coast ports that have already weighed on freight volumes this year. still, here at belleview, more mean less dwell time cutting down on journeys by as much as two days. a big step in getting rail service on the right track. for "nightly business report," i'm morgan brennan in belleview

finally tonight, superstitious fears on wall street about friday the 13th aren't so overhyped, as it turns out. especially when they fall in march. that's the 19 0u80s. five friday the 13ths in march and most have been seeing the dow and s&p low as they were today. >> who knew. that does it for "nightly business report" tonight. i'm sue herera. we want to remind you this is the time of year your public television station seeks your support. >> i'm tyler mathisen. on behalf of your public television station, thank you so much for your support. have a great weekend, everybody, and we'll see you back here monday night.

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