what did you do to this company to make it seem you did better when most companies are doing far worse than they did because last year's so strong? >> i think it's a little early for congratulations. we got out in front of the curve, jim, on this. frankly, we didn't see the economy getting better last spring. it wasn't getting worse at that point in time but we expected it to get worse and when it didn't we started taking aggressive actions on our cost structure because we knew that was the only thing we could control. and obviously when the economy really hit the wall in the fourth quarter we made a lot of decisions. you mentioned the one around the dividend, cut our capital spending and even got more aggressive on cost. >> but mr. faraci, on page 6 of the conference call, which i always urge everyone to do, you talked about the progression here. they stabilized in march, probably the low point. april was better than march, may was better than april, since may, so june, july, and august, first part of september, it's been more or less the same. when you said that, did you mean it's be

and if a company has great customer service. i kaunt it as a way to value the company more highly. eric in michigan. >> caller: hello, mr. cramer. love your show. i have a question about capital gains tax and investing. i think most people know marginal tax is 35% and capital gains is 15. even when you make a trade on a short-term stock, say you make $10 in a trade. if you keep that stock for a whole year and make $8, after uncle sam takes his cut, you'll still make more money on a long-term trade like that. and my question is. why don't you just make a portfolio with everything long term to take advantage of the difference in the tax rates? >> eric, i spent a lot of time on this issue. it's one of my issues. one of the things is you must never let the tax man control your situation. why? because so often i find people hold on to stocks to get preferred tax rates and then end up losing the profit because the company goes bad or the stock goes bad. many people made this mistake in 20. i politely disagree with you. don't worry about the tax man. worry about losing the profit. never c

in alabama, almost 90% is controlled by just one company. and without competition, the price of insurance goes up and quality goes down. and it makes it easier for insurance companies to treat their customers badly by cherry-picking the healthiest individuals and trying to drop ist sickest. by overcharges small businesses who have no leverage, and by jacking up rates. insurance executives don't do this because they're bad people, they do it because it's profitable. as one former insurance executive testified before congress, insurance companies are not only encouraged to find reasons to drop the seriously ill, they are rewarded for it. all of this is in service of meeting what this former executive called wall street's relentless profit expectations. now, i have no interest in putting insurance companies out of business. they provide a legitimate service and employee a lot of our friends and neighbors. i just want to hold them accountable. [ applause ] and the insurance reforms that i've already mentioned would do just that. but an additiona

the largest component of the company representing 43% of the company's revenue. and the wireless business is on fire thanks to the iphone. now, let's quote steven. sometimes what you have to do is say how did it get there, what made it do that? you're about to hear the quote that made it do that. stevenson said growth rates are accelerating. the end of the market where we are getting the kind of growth is the end market where we want to be strong. it is the high end. and so not only are we -- this is his quote. not only are we getting good subscriber growth but we are getting good solid arpus and -- don't woirks we'll get to arpu in a second. a lot of this is driven by the iphone, end quote. this past quarter at&t's average revenue per user, arpu, from data was up 26%. that is just unbelievable. that's what moved this -- that's why this went up. because stevenson was bullish right here. now, there are over 108 billion text messages sent in the att network in the second quarter. nearly double the amount sent in the year before. only 43% of them sent by my daughter

are planninto blow up the company. they're planning to. we went to san francisco, one of the things -- i met some teacher, the labor college -- i don't know remember where it is exactly, n.y. or dc, but on the east side, west side ast, i met the teacher, he inted me to san francisco. i was in s francisco one time, i don't see the teacher. the document, the republic -- at the end i come back to chicago and they invite me to san francisco -- how hmakes his plans, i talked to the teachers, and a tremendous deficit in california, they are planning to cut the budget. they are really concerned. what they really want is to learn from me what weid, they tried t split all over with the teachers, 3,000 teachers in california to try -- they will be really glad all theime. afte that, it was like a lawyer's conference, a thousand lawyers in california, honoring me for what we did in our strugg. it was real nice, it was my pleasre tbring everyone, let them know what is happening. they asked me -- we started running the plan. the lot

for one company, everything. that's coming up next on "your business." >>> it's not just any business, it's your business. that's why american express open is proud to present "your business" on msnbc. >>> hi there everyone. i'm j.j. hamburg. welcome to "your business" where we give you tips and advice on how to make your business grow. as the health care debates continues in washington, we take a closer look at what health care reform could mean to small business. representative sam graves is the ranking member of the house small business committee and he joins us today. hi there, congressman. thanks for joining us. >> thank you, j.j. >> you met with a group of small business owners earlier this week. what were they saying and looking for out of reform? >> they were very frustrateded. they want their health care costing to be affordable. they're very concerned about the taxes and mandates that are throughout in the bill that's being proposed, and they're worried about going out of business as a result of these t

let me comment on my company. >> i do not want to comment on their company.u are not familiar with the statement. >> i'm not familiar? >> no, you are not. >> how long have you been in the business? >> i have been my company since the beginning of 2001. >> heady ever heard of health care for americans now? >> no, i have not. >> well, let me ask you this. are you familiar with a recent study of the american medical association than 94% of the insurance market in the united states are highly concentrated? 94% of the insurance markets in the united states are highly concentrated? >> i'm not -- i would -- >> you're not familiar? >> not with those statistics. it's not an unfamiliar statistic in terms some markets don't have a lot of competition. >> well, do you contest this finding of them? >> i don't know enough to contest or affirm. >> okay. let's go down the line, again. miss farrell, you're a student -- you subscribe to ama journals. >> i am not aware of that study. >> you have never heard of it. >> richards you have never heard of it? >> no, i have not. >> let

-based company but a little bit of improvement next year. and the china business will drive the stock higher. >> as the transition takes longer than people think, you're still talking about $1.3 billion, and you're going to try to get a piece of that, and you want to look for investments that are actually participatinp. >> i think joe invested in a lot of companies that directly invest more. >> what investors don't realize in america is there are a number of chinese listed companies that don't get exposure. almost too much supply of chinese companies, not enough demand for the securities. we follow rino, which i just talked about, the environmental space, the great space to be in. china plastics, which we own. one car for every 100 people in china, 76 cars for every 100 people in america. tons of upside potential there. i think that's a great stock to buy as well. >> gentlemen, great to have you on the program. we appreciate it. >> thank you. >> we've got about 20 minutes before the closing bell sounds. the dow is down about 46 points. nasda

the public markets really shot right by that, and so it's difficult to find companies that are good companiest those valuations. you're really looking at situations where you're being asked to pay anywhere from seven to nine times for companies in most sectors. and that requires a degree of certainty about the economic environment that's not quite there yet, but that we hope will start to coalesce a little better over the next three to six months. >> other managers of smaller and mid-cap companies, scott, pardon me, will tell us from time to time that they still don't have access to credit that they need. and it's still very much a tight environment out there. not necessarily the larger companies, but certainly in the small and mid-cap range. how do you see that? >> i think that's probably right. i would say the credit markets have been nothing short of phenomenal over the course of the last 90 days, in terms of providing capital at reasonable -- still pretty rich pricing relative to where we were 18 months ago. but reasonable access to capital for larger companies. that's largely been done t

every company says things are good. you take it from the company's customers. which is why i'll be listening when kroger, huge supermarket chain, kroger reports on tuesday. it has the most thriving and robust private label business in the country. if they say good things about private label, you have to think treehouse and raw corp. and you've got to buy them. finally, icing on the cake, i am going to devour the housing starts number on thursday. okay? now, we had a huge bond market rally this week, and i think mortgage rates are going back to the 5% plane or even below that. 5% is the magic number where buyers come off the sidelines. there is a real sense of fear that when the federal housing tax credit goes away this year so will housing sales. that's wrok. remember i called the bottom of june 30th in a moment of incredible hubris? as mortgage money and the privacy homes are the real drivers we are going to see buyers. i believe price have hit rock bottom and now -- many people say jim play the home builders off this. also nonsense. if we see good housing sta

fo the company's to work together to get unorm standards which i thi dr. bac, mentioned might be happening i think is okay but i don't think that is the solution because theistandards are not to be different from the standards of any clinical laboratory offering comparable services. because i don't think consumers can tell the difference in general and i don't see any reason why they would think there is a difference based on the promotions that go on by the companies so i'm not being negative about this but i am trying to think of a way out of the dilemma suggest the industry stves ande move forward there is a level of quality asrance that all of these entities performing these tests and deliring the results to people must meet and that would be a good goal and how to do but i don't know. >> when you are driving that es beyond what the data are -- how far will the standards go? is it to the quality of the test to ask ron or does it go all the way through to regulations or standas for announcing the results, dplaying the results presenting them to customer

in alabama, almost 90% is controlled by just one company. without competition, the price of insurance goes up, and quality goes down. it makes it easier for insurance companies to treat their customers badly. by cherry picking the healthiest individuals and trying to drop the sickest. by overcharging small businesses who have no leverage, and by jacking up raments. insurance executives don't do this because they're bad people, they do it because it's profitable. as one former insurance executive testified before congress, insurance companies are not only encouraged to find reasons to drop the seriously ill, they are rewarded for it. all of this is in service of meeting what he called wall street's relentless profit expectations. now, i have no interest in putting insurance companies out of business. they provide a legitimate service and employ a lot of our friends and neighbors. i just want to hold them accountable. [ applause ] in the insurance reforms that i already mentioned will do just that. but inan additional step we can take is by ma

shabda interactive is the parent company of this company that also trades here on the nasdaq. the story of the day, rimm has been dragging us throughout much of the day. >> several factors impacting oil prices today. geopolitics, supply and demand, and technical factors, namely the dollar. we did see oil prices finish the session right around $66 a barrel, up slightly. still down considerably for the week. down about 8% for the weekend. in fact, we are posting a loss here. and for the week. and still within the lower end of the range we've been in for the past two months. a number of factors traders are watching today, we've got the durable goods data out. new home sales data was weak as well. then we also, though, had that overhang from that big supply bill that we had on wednesday, which really helped to take the market down both wednesday and thursday. but today that controversy over the nuclear plant set up by iran, the covert nuclear plant as president obama refers to them, of course, iran's president saying there's no secrecy involved. tra controversy helped support oil

we got a health care company, an aerospace company, an oil refiner and bank of america. a fastball. we've got -- ♪ hallelujah >> that was easy. >> he's more tom brady than he is youkilis. okay, let's go to -- >> caller: linda. >> ever see that? that's youkilis. let's go to linda in new jersey. >> caller: good evening. big boo-yah. >> exit 14. >> caller: i have pfizer, ups, google, goog, pepsico and altera, mo. >> oh, man, i'm ready to go to work on this. okay, let's see. what have we got? pfizer, my least favorite pharmaceutical. remember, this is more about sector analysis than it is about quality. altera, not my favorite in the group. i prefer xilinx. pepsi, finest soft drink company. i own it for action owners plus.com. ups, one of my absolutely favorite transports. kind of waiver on its 52-week wsh dedon't want to see a breakdown there. and google, i'll still reiterating my $600 price. a tech company, pepsi, drugs, so soda, the music throwing me off and a transport. we want to throw out altera and pick up, let's say hey, how about ratheon. i like that one lately. then we would b

it varies widely from company to company and product to product.ome of these products are extremely profitable and the one they want to move us into these high deductible plants, profit margins will expand greatly. they can make tons of money on this. so that is what they want to do in the future. it's why the trend is the way it is. but think of it this way. let's assume it is 3%, and let's assume the assumption, it is the truth, $250 billion of the money we spend on health care flowed through those seven companies last year alone in revenue, 3% of that is a ton of money. it's a lot of money in profit. so they will use sometimes small numbers to me to think it is inconsequential but it's a huge amount of money. >> let me go back to the example, how do we get a handle how much money is being wasted in this system because consumers are innocently or fearfully buying numerous plans to cover themselves when they are not needed. how do we get it back? but as the mechanism to get to that? i know the standard plan that's one of the goals of the reform le

the symbol of the company is aar. this is an incredibly well-run company. it reports on tuesday. the symbol is air. okay? again, i'm going to clear that just so you have it. air. now, this company has always given you the greatest tenor of the aerospace industry. do i care whether you buy or sell this? no, i just want you to learn from it. given what's happening, yesterday amr got its couple billion. the big aircraft leasing merger this morning. we're going to be paying incredibly close attention to see if we can come back and recommend the controversial stock boeing. how about wednesday? another really interesting tell here is, again, just a collateral damage, non-damage tell is auto zone. now, i have not been recommending auto zone to you, but i have been recommending monro muffler, mnro. we had mr. gross on, the ceo. it's now more than $10. it's a 56% win. i've got to figure out whether we should let it ride or not. if the auto parts market is strong, which is what auto zone will tell us because they're the biggest, i will reiterate that monro muffler should be bought. and the

australian uranium company. we'll check on crude prices for you now and see how they are doing ahead of the opec meeting. nymex light sweet crude at 69.07. brent crude trading right now looks like this. that's currently standing here -- we'll get that number for you as soon as possible we can. $67.59. how are the futures doing? good morning, mike. >> good afternoon, maura. it looks like the u.s. might be taking its cues from asia. whether it's what's going on in gold or all of the m&a news over the past couple of days and the week b for that matter, we see the futures at this point pointing to a much higher open on the dow, the s&p 500. keep in mind that the dow and the s&p are coming off their worst week in nearly two months. moving on to the treasury market, let's check the yield on the ten-year bund right now. it's sitting at 3726% on friday. the price of the benchmark ten-year treasury note here in the states did go down. the yield finished at 3.44%. it was up that day and it was down for the week, however.

pharmaceutical companies would get hit. but the president has made the decision he wants a package that would raise $300 billion in revenue. this is what max baucus has been working on. shepard that was secoretary of state hillary clinton. that's rahm emanuel walking down. the increases coming out of the senate finance plan from the democrat of montana, max baucus. seems like rough going for americans in general and the economy in general. >> it will be, but furthermore, when the president or members of the senate call for slowing the growth in health care spending, that's also going to mean cuts in hospital budgets. it's going to mean less nurses on the floor, less mri equipment, longer waits for treatments and it's going to mean layoffs, larry, because health care is the largest employer in the u.s. ten times the workforce of chrysler and gm. we have to remember that health care is part of the denominator. you know, i come from new york, which was just mentioned a moment ago. over 30% of the workforce in places like brook

what did you do to this company to make it seem you did better when most companies are doing far worse because last year's so strong? >> i think it's a little early for congratulations. we got out in front of the curve, jim, on this. frankly, we didn't see the economy getting better last spring. it wasn't getting worse at that point in time but we expected it to get worse and when it did we started taking aggressive actions on our cost structure because we knew that was the only thing we could control. and obviously when the economy really hit the wall in the fourth quarter we made a lot of decisions. you mentioned the one around the dividend, cut our capital spending and even got more aggressive on cost. >> but mr. faraci, on page 6 of the conference call, which i always urge everyone to do, you >> give me a little word on what you're doing right now with your debt. it seems like you're done, which made me think, but it wasn't clear from the conference call or the presentation at ubs where you actually stand on this dividend because it seemed like it was so binary, you're either going

companies don't pay taxes. companies merely collect tax. any tax levied on a company is paid for by either workers, consumers, or shareholders. there's no if, and, and buts about it. when austan was at the university of chicago he would have given you exactly the same answer i am giving you but he's working for an administration that's continuing the failed bush policies of big, wasteful government. he has no choice but to spin your viewers with an assertion that's absolutely nonsensical. they're raising taxes on average americans and this is just the beginning. we're going it see much higher taxes in the future if the government takes over health care. >> christian, do you think -- i mean just logically as someone who might take a drug, right? not -- as a regular person, that hurts my standard of living. it increases my cost. it's hard to say that that isn't an increase, isn't it? >> i mean, the question is really whether the companies will be able to pass on those things, and there's two issues. one is whether they pass it on and if it's

in alabama, almost 90% is controlled by just one company. and without competition, the price of insurance goes up and quality goes down. and it makes it easier for insurance companies to treat their customers badly. by cherry picking the healthiest individuals and trying to drop the sickest. by overcharging small businesses who have no leverage and by jacking up rates. insurance executives don't do this because they are bad people. they do it because it's profitable. as one former insurance executive testified before congress, insurance companies are not only encouraged to find reasons to drop the seriously ill, they are rewarded for it. all of this is in service of meeting what this former executive called wall street's relentless profit expectations. now, i have no interest in putting insurance companies out of business. they provide a legitimate service and employ a lot of our friends and neighbors. i just want to hold them accountable. [cheers and applause] the insurance reforms i have already mentioned would do just that. but an additio

>> i'd tell them that ppg is a great company. we have operations in all 20 of the g-20 companies. or countries. and i would tell them to continue to work on a coordinated economic policy. we've seen stimulus plans working in china, beginning to work here. we've had similar automotive scrappage plans in europe that have helped cushion this fall. so i would tell them that the most important message for the economies and for our consumers around the world is to continue this positive coordinated economic response to the crisis. >> mr. bunch, first i want to thank you for the straight answers. i also want to thank you for being willing at a time when most people were unwilling to say anything positive at all, being willing to say that your book of business was turning. i really appreciate your being on the show. thank you so much, sir. >> thank you very much, jim. good to be here. >> charles bunch, chairman and ceo of ppg. we get these ceos on, we ask them tough questions. when they give us good answers and they're right, you know what? >> buy buy buy! >> and ppg's included in that. a

oh, okay. >> caller: look this company has bought 90 companies over the last five years.nd i have heard three of them out of the 90 that they've purchased. youtube, doubleclick and the investment in aol. every other one has been a small, private company. i think that's what you will continue to see them do. >> mark, pleasure to talk with you. mark mahaney with citi. >>> several protests broke out in pittsburgh as the leaders arrived for the g-20 summit. president obama is there. rebouncing of the trade between u.s. and borrower and importer and china in that in exporter. by the way those are pictures that came in from pittsburgh a short while ago. any change in the status quo will impact the dollar and to export-led, and we should save more and consume less and export more, that has a major implication. the execution of that policy is massive. and that will spell, most likely, a devaluation of the dollar and an unpreciation of the bet. >> how does that happen? how day group of 20 leaders go in there, a group of 19 in there case, and tell that one person who represents chi

they take, they own company and they run out, but they own this company. and i met these guys in this place, and we spend the whole day talking about what happened over here and what they do in argentina. and it mak me think, like, in reality if we'd run the company, probably we'd be in the honors right now. but it was like, it was for nobody inform us. nobody give us -- nobody let us know that you could do that and you could be your own honor, i don't know. something, something we need to do because we saw the -- of the company, but it was just a couple guys. it was not in the cafeteria. they put a board, and it was in a locker room, and they have a projector. so they sid to -- it was like 20 people. it was not much people. >> if people are not familiar with it, the documentary about the classic documentary about factory takeovers was made by lewis and klein which is about a particular factory takver in around general argentina after the debacle of neoliberal structural adjustment in that country at the beginning of this decade. it's pretty widely availab

in alabama, almost 90% is controlled by just one company. without competition, the price of insurance goes up and quality goes down. it makes it easier for insurance companies to treat their customers badly, by cherry picking the healthiest individuals and trying to drop the sickest, by overcharging small businesses who have no leverage and by jacking up rates. insurance executives don't do this because they're bad people. they do it because it's profitable. as one former insurance executive testified before congress, insurance companies are not only encouraged to find reasons to drop the seriously ill, they are rewarded for it. all of this is in service of meeting what this former executive called wall street's relentless profit expectations. now, i have no interest in putting insurance companies out of business. they provide a legitimate service and employ a lot of our friends and neighbors. i just want to hold them accountable. the insurance reforms i've already mentioned would do just that. an additional step we can take to keep insuranc

i think you will see a lot smaller companies snatched up by a lot bigger companies. why deal with the credit markets if you have the cash on your balance sheet. when you are talking about a company like google. everybody is looking for the next big giant acquisition a billion dollars or more. i think you will see a series of much smaller acquisitions by google over the course of the next 12 months. but that one big fish out there for google that might be interesting as it tries to bolster its apps opportunities is possibly a google tie up with sales force. a lot of people have been talking about that one for several quarters and now the time might be right. shares are up and they might be able to finance part of that with stock. and because of the rally that we have seen. >> do you think that companies are comfortable enough with the environment that they are willing to part with the cash they have on their balance sheet? they have to be secure to not horde cash. >> i think trends are highly cyclical. they are driven by the confidence of the board of directors. i wou

company? how will xerox look? >> it's a beautiful question. i love it. it's great. xerox's strategy all along -- before we bought a.c.s. -- was to become -- not even 10 years out, even closer than that more of a services company. we are growing -- a document-services business is now about $3.5 billion of revenue. most of those services are around print and copy infrastructure. a.c.s. and xerox together allows that vision to become more of a reality significantly sooner. >> your competitors are getting into the services side, dell computer announcing acquisition, hewlett-packard -- whose market share are you going after? >> if you look at dell computer and hewlett-packard and even i.b.m., they're at a space -- it's called i.t.o. -- information-technology outsourcing. they're at the server, computer kind of infrastructure space. that's not where we play at all. we don't do that type of service. we provide a service right above that which is called document services. all of those services, i.t.o.

the company was on the hook for billions in credit default swaps.. and to prevent a run on other banks.. the u-s government stepped in... with several bailouts totaling 180 billion dollars. the total pot consists of 85 billion in emergency loans, a 60 billion dollar credit line from the federal reserve.. and a 40 billion dollar investment in aig's preferred shares. even as aig's obligations are being unwound... some market pros believe it's still too big to fail. "ripple effect... the fact is those tentacles are all over the place.. counterparties built their positions based on being paid off.. so this "too big to fail" still exists." "if the u.s. government doesn't continue to support aig, we will fail." aig's new ceo robert benmosche recently told the wallstreet journal quote: "if the u.s. government doesn't continue to support aig, we will fail," but critics argue.. as long as the government supports aig... the company is nothing but a slush fund for wall street ... according to janet tavakoli. "aig wants to stay alive.. what's happening is that i

ceos have tried to fix the company. why is the company worth saving? >> i think for several different reasons. one is it's the 25th anniversary of aol. i think when you look at the phases of the internet it started with access to the internet. the second face has been about platforms and technology. the third piece which we're excited about it and what i think will save the company is a real focus on content and building scalable content systems and they're bringing great content to the job. >> you had a plum job at google. why did you think it was worth making this your mission? >> i think it starts with the people at time warner and jeff is somebody i have looked up to for a long time. when we talked about the opportunity, for me it came down to three things. i think one is we have a great opportunity in the future of the web. when you think about the next business opportunity and the next $50 billion, it's really up for grabs. i think other areas have slowed down. we can build content. i think the second thing is aol has a lot of great assets. i thi

how these companies are doing that.nd then there are issues of -- there is current regulation on advertisement through the -- >> ftc. >> we have regulation today that we need to make sure informs. misleading information. so those need to be -- there is current regulation. we need to make sure it is enforced. we are recommending that those are actually enforced. with regard to direct to consumer testing we have in the process of developing a report. we pull information that we have done over the years. you have a copy of the draft report. at this point we don't have final recommendations, but you have a copy of the report that you can use. the other concern that we as a community have is on the education of the conditions and health care providers to not only understanding what the testing does, but actually how the air going to react. so those are some of the major concerns that the community has. >> okay. i'm going to take questions from the floor also in addition to persons around the table. i we will be able to make

but perhaps if asian company res going to do better, we may see more asian companies stepping out here. we've got the korean f-1 race coming up next year. so it's starting to look like the strength will be coming more from the asian economies as long as we don't see a double dip, i hope, going forward. >> so do you have a good seat in the house tomorrow? >> i hope so. hopefully the right car will win this time. last year they were -- so they should be the one. >> have fun. >> all right. we will. >> thank you so much for dropping by. right now, let's head over to india and check in on the markets there for the mumbai india business report. we have ream ma tendulkar. >> we're sitting on a bit of correction for the markets right now. but it's the broader universe which has managed to hold its head up in the fwreen. the ratio currently stands at 3 to 2. there is a lot of fund-raising that is taking place. reliance has fired the dhrp. the shareholders have approved raising fund up to $400 million. there is an exclusive that jp hite is looking to raise about $ 00 million. there is a lot of m

the bureaucrat gets it, the company gets. the consumer if they shopped smartly they get the savings and productivity. >> sounds good. what do you think of steve's plan? >> it is great but it won't work and here's why, because there is price fixing going on state by state between doctors, hospitals, insurers an drug companies. why is that happening? because the states have a lock on which insurance companies can operate in their own states and local politicians get a lot of money from the insurance lobby, and then the president didn't mention this problem and that is how you deregulate the state's lock hold on the market, on the health market, so how do you do that? make it like the auto insurer's market? price fixing cases are brought from texas to california, and until you get serious about it, you won't have competition. >> will the forbes' plan work? >> it will work. when you go to get a car or groceries, you care about the price. when you go to a doctor, you ask, well, gee, how much is it going to cost me? it is insane. i

we have a soft drink company. we have an oil company.e have a diversified in industrial and then look at this grouping here. medical device and drug. they trade together. maybe you don't think they should but they trade together so we're going to do a swap here. we're going to sell merck because i'm not crazy about that merger. it's too much dilution. and we're going to pick up a -- why don't we do this, pick up bank of america. we mentioned that earlier, we like that stock that's going to come in a little, i think that's a good idea. or a tech. a tsunami tech situation. now lets go to lynn oh in the state of flux, illinois. lyn. >> caller: good afternoon, jim. boo ya, to you. >> i like that. because for a second there i was thinking 122 points. it's inconceivable that the bears could lose by that much. >> caller: no it isn't. >> right. whoa. wow. okay. admission. how about an urlacher boo-yah. >> caller: there you go. i need your help. >> okay. >> caller: i recently took over a couple of 401(k)s from past employers managing myself with

>> the big problems with the insurance companies is there's a state monopoly on insurance companies.eid does not want to break state monopolies. allow people to shop across state lines, you have cut costs without a public option ppt the senate democratic leader will not go for it. the republicans have been pushing this plan which would cut costs immediately, get rid of pre-existing conditions. there's a deal to be made. i've said it many times. the senate will not go for it. >> joe, what's going to be the stumbling block of the three points in the president's speech tonight? these three excerpts that have been released. >> all three. the one major one you know is going to be public option. that's going to be it. here's what i hope the president does. i know the speech is already out there. he's not -- he's not going to change minds in congress. this is not a speech to congress. this is a speech to the american people. he's going to have to take a chapter from reagan's book. he's going to have to use living examples of everyday people. a child who was born or has childhood diabetes. a

a lot of fortune 500 companies use him. but-- i'm your only employee.e're gonna start using fedex to ship globally-- that means billions of potential customers. we're gonna be huge. good morning! you know business is a lot like football... i just don't understand... i'm sorry dick butkus. (announcer) we understand. you want to grow internationally. fedex express >>> welcome back to "fast money." that's cnbc townhall with secretary timothy geithner's just wrapped upp. we've got exclusive sound for you right now. here's what the secretary there to say. >> today because of the effectiveness of the actions we've taken, it's just the beginning. we've had more than $80 billion come back into the treasury. that money goes to reduce how much we have to borrow and it means that we have more resources available to do the necessary things our country needs. >> all right you saw steve liesman there, erin burnett is also hosting that special townhall event. that's tonight 7:00 p.m. on cnbc. so do not miss that. he is fielding questions from viewers across the countr

one reason isthat pharma companies have not been maintaining growth in r&d spending. in fact now as the recession kicks in they are starting to cut spending even further. >>reporter: and europe's big drugs companies have held r&d spending steady at around 15% of revenue over the past decade. compare that to american firms, who's spending has risen to 18% and it's easy to see why they now hold the lion's share - 65% - of new drug discoveries. >>: but scientists at aberystwyth university in wales think they have developed something that should help put europe back on the pharma map. >>russell: so professor adam, how does it feel to be experiencing such a huge amount of success with your work here? of course adam isn't going to answer me because adam is in fact a computer. he's part of the robot scientist here at aberystwyth university in wales, and he's the first ever robot to independently discover new scientific knowledge. >>reporter: developed to investigate the function of genes in a yeast cell - a substance commonly used in science as a model for human cells - this

. >>> next on "street signs," what do a battery company, a financial company, and an online gaming company, oh, and a hospital operator have in common? well, we'll tell you about what they have in common and why there are some trades there. >>> and also does president obama have a $100 million headache? what will his pay czar do about citigroup's $100 million man? the president can't blame this one on someone else. we'll be back. could someone toss me an eleven sixteenths wrench over here? here you go. eleven sixteenths... (announcer) from designing some of the world's cleanest and most fuel-efficient jet engines... to building more wind turbines than anyone in the country... the people of ge are working together... creating innovation today for america's tomorrow. thanks! no problem! [ telephone rings ] [ ring ] [ "catch the wind" plays ] what is the sign of a good decision? in the world of personal finance, it's massmutual. find strength and stability in a company that's owned by its policyholders. ask your advisor or visit massmutual.com. >>> eight ipos are set to debut next week. here

they do customer relationship software, a great company, niche company and they will be acquired but still, i think it will go significantly higher. crm. neil: adam what do you think of that? >> it is so gosh darn expensive, which will inhibit a takeover, i think, charles. neil: so what are you doing now? >> new month mining -- newmont mining. you get gold plus an outstanding operator with this. hasn't this been priced into the inflation spike or fear? >> never enough. neil: ben, what do you think? >> i love the fact that the most experienced nobel prize winning economists don't think they can predict inflation. no real person can he predict inflation but somehow adam can. i love you, adam. i would like you to do my cardiac care. i don't like your pick because i think it is a bet on a commodity and i think a commodity pick is too risky for the average investor and the average investor should stick with index funds and i have recommended the s&p index fund. newmont mine something too risky. spy is a cautious pick. i like cautious picks. why bet on a possibility? why not bet on the who

how do we know when a company or group of companies in a given sector are going to change? is the -- ivan boskey plan. i like to avoid crime and punishment stuff. no, we don't cheat. just to go off on a cautionary tangent. most guys who trade on inside information, get sloppy, lazy and cowardly. it hurts their game when they don't have the info. because they're scared to act without it. plus, the jail thing, really bad. sorry for a little digression. back on target. there are a couple of ways we can spot changes in earnings. you can start from the bottom. the horatio alger model. with retail you can go to the stores, watch the registry, count the transactions. you have got to do this in more than one store. at more than one time. this is not a mistake, it's not too time consuming. if you want to get in retail this is a pretty good way to judge things. when something is fleeing off the shelves at a pace that isn't reflected at earnings estimates, buy the stock of who ever makes it. pull the trigger for heavens sake. i did this with reebok during the aerobics boom at goldman

in alabama, almost 90% is controlled by just one company. without competition, the price of insurance goes up and quality goes down. it makes it easier for insurance companies to treat their customers badly by cherry picking the healthiest individuals and trying to drop the sickest. by overcharging small businesses who have no leverage. and by jacking up rates and insurance executives don't do this because they're bad people. they do it because it's profitable. as one former insurance executive testified before congress, insurance companies are not only encouraged to find reasons to drop the seriously ill, they are rewarded for it. all of this is in service of meeting what this former executive called wall street's relentless profit expectations. now, i have no interest in putting insurance companies out of business. they provide a legitimate service and employ a lot of our friends and neighbors. i just want to hold them accountable. [ applause ] insurance reforms that i already mentioned would do just that but an additional step we can take

this is a transformation of our company. we are not about one or two drugs, but leader in human health, animal health. primary specialty care, biologicalics. we are serving prenatal vitamins to alzheimer's drugs. that diversification transforms a company in no other way a deal has done. >> the premiere of "executive vision" tonight. >>> up next, charlie gasparino will tell us why there could be more changes in store for ubs. on bond prices, a little bit of profit taking and housing data, rise in prices there. you're watching european "closing bell," excuse me, american "closing bell." more after the brack. >>> the market down about 18 points on the dow. let's look at widely held shares. mixed market. wells fargo is lower, a number of financial services higher today. the other dow stocks, let's look how the dow components are faring. you can see the trouble. exxon under selling pressure as is at&t and verizon. that is why you have a decline of 19 points on the dow because beyond that you have a good move on the upside in boei

maybe that is not the company i want to invest in?. >> and why were you out there? >> i was speaking to the women's teamster's conference explaining what happened and then we did some workshops with them and i interviewed mr. hoffa. i really liked him. it was interesting to hear the other side of the story. >> great conversation. to catch the entire interview, go to our website. and tomorrow our interview with labor secretary hilda solis. final trade right after this. when this school district added aflac to complement their employee benefits package, guess who became the new teacher's pet? aflac, aflac, aflac, aflac, aflac find out more at... aflac! for business.com and the duck says... aflac! myth. head & shoulders is just for dandruff. myth. the fact is, it gives you... seven scalp and hair benefits including beautiful, 100% flake-free hair. respect the scalp. love the hair. how you could start saving. >>> time now for the final trade. kick it off. >> you can buy this stock back around 1.70 and let it ride again. >> take a look at

an entertainment company in imax, a pharmaceutical company. but neither of these are my favorite, but this is not about qualitative, it's more about diversification. u.s. steel is a steel company. microsoft and bank of america. we got a bank, a tech, a steel, an entertainment, and we've got pharma. holy cow, everyone understands this game. although the five "g" thing was a little too much for me. fithe same tools the pros use, so you can be a disciplined trader. by selecting from eight advanced triggers, your order gets executed, even when you're busy. and with trailing stops to help you lock in profits and minimize risk, you can be confident in your strategy, no matter which way the market moves. find out why more and more active traders are turning to fidelity for a smarter way to trade online. trade like a pro. trade k today. >> i promise you there's always a bull market somewhere and i'll find it for you. i'm jim cramer, see you tomorrow. >>> up next on "kudlow" a special on president obama's health care speech. we have senators, health ca

certainly some caution around converse by as trust companies to have those risks. take a look at directors and officers insurance as well key entrance port corporations of any size we will talk about the next time with aon analytics. online items after the show.... be sure to catch us online for a glimpse of the economy from behind an 18- wheeler...how one small trucking company is surviving the recession. plus, big movie studios gear up for the upcoming film festival season.... looking for the next break out hit...will the move payoff for studios... and investors? and... a check up on money market funds...you can find these stories and more on our website...first businessx.com. and straight ahead on the show... unemployment seems to be on the minds of most american's these days..especially our viewers....we dive into viewer mail...next. as expected with the unemployment rate hovering close to 10 percent loss of both coming in on the voicemail x and for some job hands but also a little bit of a critique about how we've been talking about jobs our first caller thing