davis, who needs capital and manpower, goes into business with wealthy san francisco merchant levi straussay 20, 1873, american blue jeans are born. a pair costs about a buck. levi's markets their denim overalls as the uniform of the working class. >> who bought them at the time? >> miners in the west, farmers, mechanics -- anybody that did hard labor would have bought levi's back then. >> that's because workers love how tough and durable the pants are, as this pair from 1890 proves. >> from the 1800s? i mean, they feel like they could be right now. they really could withstand a lot. >> absolutely. >> so it was all about strength? >> it was all about strength. >> now, here's something really important to remember in this "strange inheritance" tale. in 1906, the epic san francisco earthquake devastates the levi's headquarters... >> their building, it was completely leveled. >> ...along with all of levi's records and inventory. the first 30 years of the company's history -- gone. of course, for the next century and more, the company thrives. indeed, the pants it manufactures become an americ

and on our own website — levi strauss will use lasers to automate the way its jeans are made.ting faded or distressed looks. and don't forget — let's us know what you are spotting online — use the hashtag bbc—the—briefing that's it for business briefing this hour — but before we go, here are the markets. we can see asia has followed the us lead downwards. that's of course after the federal reserve chairjerome powell spoke yesterday. he gave an upbeat appraisal of the us economy — of course this combined with higher wage growth is worrying investors that there could be more interest rate hikes than they had expected this year. now looking at oil — we can see both brent crude and west texas continuing their fall. that's after industry numbers showed us crude stockpiles are rising — that's amid surging production in the country from shale producers. of course that's making it much harder for the likes of opec to end the global oil glut. up next — newsbriefing — we'll take you through the stories making headlines in the global media today including... the uk is waking up to anothe

if you look at some of the iconic american brands like lee vai straus -- levi strauss, he came here with nothing in his pocket, so to speak, but because he had a brother or sister already here and came to the country and built a wonderful brand. that's certainly the case with a number of companies here in the united states. >> desjardins: john arguing the desire in itself to come to america shows you have innovation in your blood. how would you defe a merit-based system. often i see countries like canada, they use english proficiency or education. how would you do it in a way that doesn't limit lower-income countries and doesn't sort of self-select for certain groups of people? >> well, the good thing about merit-based immigration is that you don't have to worry about certain countries. thct is the skills and abilities are spread around the wo cd. you know, be the bangladeshi engineer, theri ni doctor that comes to the united states. we want to bring people to the united states who are not only going to be able to support themselves but also contribute to the american economy and grow ou

including yelp, levi strauss and tesla.ting.com says the stock valuation is unjustifiable. it has $10 billion in long-term debt and expect today report a loss of $3.19 a share. that is down from a loss of $0.69 in the third quarter. however investing.com says don't bet against tesla. despite the numbers the stock continues to climb. when the opening bell rang this morning, the stock went up again. and right now it is up about $10 a share which is 3%. and look at the dow. it is up one full percent. 265 points on the upside. hit that through the correction mark and right back up. the nasdaq and the s&p 500 up. not as big percentage-wise. but the nasdaq is up almost half of a percent right now. remember that 50-state tour that mark zuckerberg took and everybody thought he was planning to run for president. well, he had a full-time pollster with hip. now the map checking on zuckerberg's approval rating is talking about what he was really doing. he says that he was checking to see what people thought of zuckerberg personally. he