we have the ftc to do something about it. ere are different ways to measure success of the government agency like the ftc you can have a number of shots it's taken or how high it same to come you can look at his record in court and legal significance of theed winds. you can look at the material impact they have had the tangible benefits the people and concrete ways the light could be better. what's truly been humbling and astonishing about the ftc's work is that by all of the centers, it's off the charts. by sheer volume of output the ftc has issued a record number of rules, the latest in a record number of cases, conducted numerous market studies, looking at everything from infant formula storage to the practice of pharmacy benefit managers commit to investments partnerships and a.i. we've used all of their advocacy tools filing briefs with horse commit leaders to federal agencies, had offering expertise to state legislatures predict with one big victory in court, since 2021 from the ftc has a 43 mergers abandoned in light of

well, we at the ftc did do something about it. there are different ways to measure the success of a government agency like the ftc. you can count the number of shots that it's taken or how high it is aimed, you can look at its record in court and the legal significance of its wins. you can look at the material impact the agency has had, the tangible benefits that people have seen and the concrete ways that life is better. what's truly been humbling and astonishing about the ftc's work that by all of these standards it has been off the charts. by share volume ftc has issued number of rules and record number ofd cases. we've conducted numerous market studies looking at everything from infant formula shortages and benefits managers to investment and partnerships inar ai. and we have used all of our advocacy tools following briefs with courts, submitting comment letters to federal agencies and offering expertise to state legislators. we won big victories in court since 2021 the ftc has seen 43 mergers with 8an blocks after te filing of

that is what the ftc was worried about. the merger has been blocked so the upstream company has no incentive to shut off access to any one player. we have seen a number of players downstream who are currently racing to develop these multi-cancer early detection tests and succeed. chair klobuchar:. . -- very good. while serving in the justice department, the assistant attorney general express concerned about the efficacy of complex settlements and posing hard to enforce rules and restrictions on companies and spoke in favor of structural remedies like breakups and divestitures. professor newman, can you talk about the types of cases you think are most appropriate for structural remedies? i will ask the same thing of you, professor alford, about when these can be most effective. professor newman? mr. newman: when it comes to horizontal mergers it is hard to think of a better remedy than a structural remedy. when it comes to a lot of vertical mergers, a structural remedy offers advantages over a behavioral play nice remedy. i t

topics included antitrust merger enforcement, challenges to the ftc rulemaking authority and how they prioritize consumer protections. the brookings institution hosted the discussion. >> happy new year. brookings is devoted on the question of how to sustain an inclusive democracy. we have a fantastic event today. the chair will provide remarks and will sit with the most recent recipient of the doj top antitrust award, the sherman award. it's a tremendous pleasure to introduce lina khan. she got her start in antitrust as a business reporter and researcher examining consolidation across markets from airlines to chicken farming. she has focused on exercising the full swing other statutory authorities regularly engaging with and hearing from the public and ensuring the agency is updating its tools and skill sets to tackle new market realities and next-generation challenges. priority initiatives have included a proposed rule to ban noncompete clauses, scrutinizing dominant middlemen across sectors, protecting sensitive data from unchecked surveillance and fighting for americans rights to a

nominees to had the doj and ftc also show these concerns. congress can have a constructive role in addressing big tech monopolies. it can pass procompetitive mid- legislation like the america act or american innovation and choice online act, such legislation could've passed in 2022, but for $250 million that was spent by big tech lobbyists to block such measures from even coming to the floor after super majority votes out of committee. it also could hold hearings a potential big tech remedies in the pending litigation, and the unethical manner in which they have defended their monopoly abuse. on mergers, the incoming administration will challenge incoming horizontal and vertical mergers. that approach was taken in the first trump administration and an even greater extent in the biden administration. what likely will change is reversal of the general skepticism towards mergers and acquisitions. consent decrees were strongly disfavored in the biden administration, the reasoning was it is simple injunctions are easier to enforce than complex set

yesterday i look at the top selling weight-loss products on amazon and even with the ftc actions against coffee marketers, green coffee is still a product in the top 20 20 sg products. the rest of the products are related projects which understand was featured on your show, dr. oz but it also was highlighted as a product in the advertisers use it to scam consumers buy a fake website come to be women's health magazine. what was on your show did talk about the side effects? i know senator mccaskill is questioned at length about this big he said this was two years ago. you are not making these claims anymore. you talk about the side effects then and the deceptive practices come out of that change how you contacted your show? >> i brought transcripts of different shows. in each case we have an expert who spends their entire life dealing with dietary supplements, talk about different products. the review fusses and minuses. i went through a few these pages but i look at these scripps and i think i wish they just played another 30 seconds of the clip they use for the advertisements that we oft

the district court of florida said the ftc. w appealing that. i think we're right on the law. i think we have a duty to the american people to eliminate non-competes if we think they're violating the law, and thousands of non-competes have already been dropped for workers because of the ftc's efforts. >> you've been in this well enough for years. you've learned a lot, i hope you've learned a lot. what would you have done differently, given what you know now? and given that you've became a symbol to a large degree for many industries, which by the way, turned out to ultimately vote for president trump interestingly. whether you think about that, whether you think that that matters. whether you think about the long term viability. you talk about back sliding court cases today that may get undone later. i assume you would have wanted, even though you don't think you're political, you would have wanted vice president harris to have won or president biden to have won. when you think about the long term nature of this, what would you

one of the reasons the cftc and ftc and the u.s. markets is so important is dollar hedgemony and we need to protect that. on the other hand, part of protecting that status is allowing for innovation and another part is protecting the integrity of the market. another former boss of mine, senator dodge, chris dodge, says, i don't believe nobody has lost sleep thinking that our markets are not guarded and the financial crisis rattled that and one of the reasons we needed to come back strong with dodd-frank to reassure the world that our markets were in fact, most protected while allowing for that innovation. how did you handle that balance? what did you learn from your time and what do you think the future of regulation should be as the clip of invasion innovation seems to be on a curve? >> i couldn't agree more with senator dodd and i think that's right, that the u.s. markets are the most liquid, transparent, deepest and desired in the world because of regulation. and there's always going to be issue around the margins of what's right

the ftc's report shows how government programs and our employers are the ones who are carrying the cost for this exceedingly expensive system. wow. >> we'll have to leave the conversation there. it's really interesting, though, and kind of like you said, really surprising that this is happening. but you yourself not surprised. you've been following it more closely than we have. i know. antonio, thanks so much for joining us today. >> thank you so much for having me. absolutely. >> back now to our bay area weather. a live look across the oakland estuary on this beautiful afternoon on a tuesday with the golden sunset as the hour begins for sunset, as we could say, we'll bring back mark tamayo now with a look at what's ahead. hi, mark. hi, there. >> christina. yeah, no big changes. headed our way in the bay area forecast. it's kind of tricky because you wake up, you wake up first thing in the morning. it feels so cold out there with temperatures in the 30s and 40s and into the afternoon hours. actually, it feels like a spring like day with temperatures in the 60s. take a look though. anoth

yesterday i look at the top selling weight-loss products on amazon and even with the ftc actions againsten coffee marketers, green coffee is still a product in the top 20 20 sg products. the rest of the products are related projects which understand was featured on your show, dr. oz but it also was highlighted as a product in the advertisers use it to scam consumers buy a fake website come to be women's health magazine. what was on your show did talk about the side effects? i know senator mccaskill is questioned at length about this big he said this was two years ago. you are not making these claims anymore. you talk about the side effects then and the deceptive practices come out of that change how you contacted your show? >> i brought transcripts of different shows. in each case we have an expert who spends their entire life dealing with dietary supplements, talk about different products. the review fusses and minuses. i went through a few these pages but i look at these scripps and i think i wish they just played another 30 seconds of the clip they use for the advertisements that we o

pepsi is denying the allegations and says the ftc lawsuit is wrong, both factually and legally. let's talk about wall street. plenty of green on the big board today, with the three major indexes posting their first weekly gain of the new year, the dow added 334 points, the nasdaq advanced 291 and the s&p gained 59. the gains come after investors received back to back reports showing inflationary pressures were softening somewhat. kobe bryant's widow helping fire victims in a victims of the la wildfires. vanessa bryant,t, the wife of te late kobe bryant, held a giveaway today at dodger stadium. bryant and her mambacita foundation handed out free kobe sneakers and other essentials to kids impacted by the fires. she shared on social media that she and kobe lived in pacific palisades in the early days of their marriage, and she said their house was on the street where the fire first broke out. wow. don't forget you can watch our newscast 24/7 on pluto and other streaming platforms. raj mathai joins us now with what's coming up next at 530. here's what we're working on as we head into

what is the freeze on and mandate at the ftc. the second is the ipo market which is stalled. thousand tech startups that are ready to go with an ipo. of those can be let loose and m&a deals are coming back in fashion that is ultimately how the vast majority of tech companies have exits and the more exits there are the more capital there are to institutional investors so they can keep deploying more capital into companies and i expect 1/3 of my deals to go to 0 but when there is a constant flow of capital i keep making more bets when there is no exits and no liquidity everything dries up, and 3 or 4 deals a year, 6 or 7 startups, might have had successful business. it is important, the overall trade stuff donald trump talks about. taylor: we have breaking news. donald trump signing just now an executive order on crypto currency at the white house just moments ago. the executive order establishes the presidential working group on digital asset markets to strengthen us leadership in digital finance, the working group will be tasked with developing a federal regulatory framework

that includes the fbi see, the ftc, treasury. on't know the timeline for many of these appointments and changes, but certainly we are nervous about that. it is a good question. one of the places we watched is the cfpb, the consumer financial product bureau which absolutely matters to regular consumers. we've been surprised that the head of it has not been removed yet as he is one of our biggest consumer champions. i think we are watching all the agencies to pay attention to when and who. host: we saw the decision by the trumpet ministration yesterday, federal-aid is being frozen in some aspects. as far as the move itself, what do you think about it and what is the long-term and short-term damage? guest: that is a pretty scary move. there's a lot of confusion about the freezing of federal grants. real people are going to be impacted. this is money that goes to universities, to nonprofits. these are the paychecks of regular americans across the country that are certainly -- suddenly uncertain. we are incredibly concerned. if it move

i think 2024 was a year of many deals getting pushback or flat out no you can't merge from the ftc, newf his first actions was to tell everyone in the agencies to put sand in the gear of the m&a he told the ftc and the justice department, trump is going to do the opposite and banks are going to be allowed to combine in some of the artificial barriers about what you can do are going to go away. i think m&a will be a bright spot certainly in our business. maria: you participated in the leadership strategy on shafting demographics in implication for growth, tell me about that you been ceo of stifel since 1997 the longest active ceo in the brokerage industry and look at the returns you had on your watch, congratulations. >> thank you, it is been fun. one of the things, not the davos skits the reports right but the biggest thing that will happen they said there's a report that said we will create 170 million jobs but we will limit the 90 million jobs that's a net gain of 70 million jobs but what will happen, a.i. a.i. agents and what they're going to do the productivity is going to be unbeli

the ftc did not go after any of the food companies to try to figure out why those prices are so high.rget where the working person intersects with inflation. and one of them is gasoline. and you don't want prices higher. but the president was along with secretary granholm, about to cut off our plan to expand natural gas. thank heaven. look how much natural gas went up, just because it's snowing in some places. >> retail gasoline was not a deterrent in the election. >> is it possible that the current president is trying to send up the price of energy? that would be a nasty legacy for him. >> we'll see. we'll see. certainly the nat gas story has been a big one. not just here, but in europe as well. >> we own cottarra for the travel trust. that has the least expensive natural gas. it's been a disappointment as has anything energy. maybe the weather is what was needed. i don't know. energy has been a real bear. chevron being a classic example. it's just been a dog, which is amazing, because mike werth is a fantastic ceo. >> hydrogen, while we're on the topic. some treasury rules plugs up

cutting costs for average americans pretty jeff wants contract to keep up with the lawn musk and the ftcthey can make more in profits predict wants to make sure that he can continue to make its funds in china none of them are interested in lowering costs of their interesting cutting deals with donald trump to make the companies and their executives mortgage. richer. i appreciate senator schumer talking about the most impossible thing that happened yesterday, the pardoning of 1500 writers and many of them engaged it brutal brutal acts of violence against police officers predict and that's against democracy when assault political violence, becomes legitimized and celebrated but it is all part of same story pretty because this white house is about one simple thing. they saw it crystal clear yesterday come here if help out donald trump personally, if you donate a billion dollars to his campaign, and he storm the capitol and his name, to him in power, he will help you. but if you are just an ordinary gas station owner out there were security guard the guesswork close to minimum wage, he does

the ftc is duplicitous and it should be. you go i have a question on china. i thought it was interesting yesterday that scott bessent said china is already starting behind the eight ball because it has not met the end of the 2020 deal in terms of buying all of the agriculture from america that is said that it would. what does that mean in terms of president trump's early days once he gets going monday. do you support removing chinese stocks that trade on our exchanges if there are no blacklists it's amazing you have companies on the dod blacklist and they still trade on the exchanges. >> i think this a administration over the last four years you've seen a light touch with china and an effort to play footsie with the chinese in allowing them to get away with so much. i think the trump administration is going to be a lot tougher and they will use tools at their disposal like the delisting in the tiktok band. i don't know how it will resolve itself. but i do think trump is fully in control and given all the powers at his dispos

getting bigger that is about to change president trump change in the leadership and agencies from the ftcthe d.o.j., let me get you taken 2025 what would you expect in m&a and capital market businesslike ipo. >> the backdrop from a research team which is the best in the world is 2.4% growth to gdp to nine states and 25 last year soft landings it's just trend growth that's a good backdrop without having to take the risk of approval that means deals will go through the m&a pipeline was full a lot of conversation you could not completely convert enter transaction a lot of private equity firms had ipo ready to go and needed to get in the market but the strength of the market increases with the ipo gone on the market has to be kept his earned money or very discrete businesses, those are getting done in trading up that says the capital can put the work, investment banking fee is a 44% fourth-quarter last use nearly that for the year. >> you came into this company at a terrible time during the global financial crisis. tell me how the environment is different today. >> in those times we were not

and it's one of those things where i think the legal part of all this, the ftc, the sec, we as journalists are going to have to work much harder because there is going to be less regulation from the top, from the top of government on these businesses. for some, that's good. it means more creation of wealth, perhaps more creation of jobs, but also it may be a bending of the rules. so we're really going to have to watch. but so far president trump is making it clear to these business leaders, i'm in your corner. we're going to work together, and we're going to make a whole lot of money. and, you know, that is in one way a success, but it's also something we have to watch. okay. all right, scott, thanks so much. you bet. by the way, it wasn't all celebrations today for president trump. the president got down to business. he signed a lot of executive orders today, reversing some policies from the biden administration. trump has signed an order to pull the u.s. from the paris accords. he has also ordered a temporary freeze on hiring for federal workers. the president also ordered all federal wo

it's part of a settlement between the ftc and the companies. the new york times, gm collected and sold data on millions of vehicles to insurance companies without notifying door, asking for drivers, permission. gm says it has this continued its smart driver program across all of its vehicles. apple has suspended its news alerts generated by artificial intelligence after it sent out some false headlines. >> the company disable the feature on thursday and then added a notification that warns user alerts may produce unexpected result while in beta, the notification summaries feature was part of the apple intelligence update in ios 18.1 to briefly explain news articles. but it was quickly criticized for spreading misinformation. that wasn't part of the story. so apple says the new update to the notifications will be more clear. the discount airline with a recognizable all yellow planes that will air handing out some pink slips as it works through bankruptcy issues. spirit airlines says it is eliminating 200 jobs and in attempt to cut costs. this co

shares of snap falling as the ftc says it's referring it complaint to the justice department concerning use of its a.i. chat bot. the ftc claims it negatively impacted young users. and shares are down 4%. mike. >> all right, kristina, glad i didn't have to correct your fruns pronunciation. >> somebody watching is going to say something. >> that's right. that's all right. thank you. > stl >>ilahead, shares of unitedhealth sinking following its quarterly report. we'll drill down on those results with an analyst. do you have a life insurance policy you no longer need? now you can sell your policy - even a term policy - for an immediate cash payment. call coventry direct to learn more. we thought we had planned carefully for our retirement. but we quickly realized we needed a way to supplement our income. our friend sold their policy to help pay their medical bills, and that got me thinking. maybe selling our policy could help with our retirement. i'm skeptical, so i did some research and called coventry direct. they explained life insurance is a valuable asset that can be sold. we learned

a new report from the ftc claims companies known as pharmacy benefit managers or pbms, profited by billions of dollars by raising the prices of specialty drugs to treat cancer, hiv and other conditions. the report claims between 2017 and 2022, pbms, caremark rx, express scripts and optum rx generated more than $7 billion in revenue. pbms only exist in the us and negotiate prices with insurers, drug makers and pharmacies. >> what impact are you seeing this have on consumers? >> the individual patient does not directly benefit from those negotiations, and that's one of the reasons why drugs are often unaffordable, even for americans who have full insurance. >> the pharmaceutical care management association, which represents pbms, calls the ftc report baseless and without substantiating evidence. pbms have been under scrutiny in congress, but one recent proposal aimed at improving accountability failed to advance. the house passed a new bill banning transgender athletes from girls and women's sports. it's the latest move in a cultural war that's played out from the campaign trail to the volley

the regulatory agencies underneath him. that is going to be critical. you'll recall that ftc case is about potentially unwinding the acquisitions of instagram and whatsapp. it's massive for meta's business, and we're seeing with tiktok right now, like regulators do have the ability lawmakers have the ability to really be punitive towards your company. and so i think they're just trying to get ahead of all of that. and they're doing it in this very rapid fire way. i'm sure it's shocking to employees. >> yeah. and brian, we saw zuckerberg going on joe rogan's podcast this week. he blasted the biden officials for asking facebook to take down posts on vaccine misinformation and called for a, quote, new kind of cultural elite. what did you think about that appearance and what he had to say? >> yeah, i mean, it reminds me that this guy has been all buttoned up. i feel like he's the kind of guy that's like letting his letting his collar out, like letting his hair grow out. he's letting it all loose. >> like, esthetically, he even looks looser, right? >> that's what he's doing. yes,

. >>> the ftc is suing pepsico, saying it gave an unnamed retailer more favorable prices. according to sip source, wine sales tumbled 6% from 2023. >>> and bob dylan's draft lyrics for the 1965 hit song "tambourine man" sold at auction for $508,000. "early today" will be right back. ♪ ♪ [whoosh of steam] [trickle of espresso pouring out] [whoosh of espresso settling] [pouring espresso into cup] [sliding coffee on counter] [person sipping their coffee] ah mornings! cough? congestion? i'm feeling better. all in one and done... with mucinex kickstart. aaaaaaaaaaaaa. - headache? - better now. mucinex kickstart gives all-in-one and done relief with a morning jolt of instant cooling sensation. it's comeback season. mom's gonna love this! alright kids come on. it's time for bed! ( ♪♪ ) good morning, mr. snuggles. make breakfast special with the cocoa and hazelnutty goodness of nutella. ( ♪♪ ) long after guests leave, viruses and bacteria linger. air fresheners add a scent. but only lysol air sanitizer helps erase the trace, eliminating odor and killing 99.9% of viruses and bacteri

last year, the ftc received over 1 million reports of identity theft. protect yourself with the id defender. this unique product will safeguard your personal information on bills, bank statements, medical records, even prescription bottles. the rollers effectively mask sensitive data, keeping it hidden from identity. thieves don't become a victim of identity theft. defend your identity with id defender. scan the qr code on your screen or visit. true crime news.com/safety for essential items that keep you informed and protected. for the latest breaking crime news, go to true crime news.com. watch more exclusive content 24 over seven on our youtube channel. follow us at my true crime news. you can also listen to our podcast. brand new episodes drop every week and sign up for our newsletter so you don't miss a thing. that's it for today's true crime news, i'm anna garcia. see you next time, everyone. crime - a dead woman lying alone on a distant hill. could investigators determine anything else by looking over the body? - she had significant skull fractures

we thought about what you saw during the biden administration and you had the ftc and a doj that were tough on deals. and now there is an expectation that in the trump administration, this will be a lot leaner. is there a reasonable expectation that perhaps investors are also maybe going too far here, that there will still be a clampdown in some areas given that there is still concern out there about some of the large giants across many industries? >> i guess the way i would characterize the regulatory prospect is it is going to be a reversion to the rule of law which is what we saw for decades, and in those contexts, there were still investigations and acquisitions, several remedies, and in some deals their work. so what we expect is a reversion to what we saw in prior administrations. it's not going to be wide open doors, it's going to be a review based on precedent and based on the rule of law and if there are transactions that have implications they will be a dialogue and potentially remedies that lead to resolution. sonali: 30 seconds left, biggest prediction from 2025. >> bigges

obviously google is there bigger competitive in google is being sued by the ftc. it is political and i know you have been focused on this. think of these tech ceos who have individually donated to the trump inauguration fund, done it individually, $1 million. the list goes on and the companies are doing it. they want to take pressure off from the regulators. they want to have this situation where they are deemed to be on the right side of this. i want to make one last point. there is so much hypocrisy in this. meta has 3.3 billion monthly active users. that's one third of the people on the planet. over one third are in india. india is a backsliding democracy. india sensors their news and internet. what is mark zuckerberg going to do in the largest populace geography they have? free speech here which is disinformation if you think of the way a lot of politicians use it. how elon musk used twitter and trump used truth social during this last election. we will see this stuff, we will see the hypocrisy of all of this is a place out in different parts of the world relat

so the negative there at least according to the ftc theory of the case a settlement never litigated that people could be discovered who, you know, because you're running through an algorithm to discover people who might want mental health was of service right so maybe that's a sensitive area so that's a privacy violation but also flip side to that there could be an a positive you're discovering people that could potentially need mental health counseling and they find online -- so their big externality when is we use data say i've consented into being a training set and that training set will be made to find sensitive characteristics for the rest of the world and a.i. context so that's, you know, sort of another reason. so my punch line here -- is in -- i normally would say i'm really cognizant of overtime but i really don't care. [laughter] so -- the -- but you know, so the punch line here for me is, is i again this is my economist -- i think the way what are the solutions, i mean, you know, there are things that i think that this sort of property and trading calling it property and some

. >> the ftc for number 7th may be getting ready to suee country's biggest apartment landlord. all street journal reports the lawsuit accuses greystar of charging renters hidden fees for things like trash removal and doing background checks on tenants. the company manages over 100,000 apartments, including dozens of buildings across the bay area. >> if you want to hang out at starbucks or use their bathroom, you're going to have to buy something. the coffee chain is reversing its policy of being open to everyone. even if you haven't purchased a thing. it's part of a new code of conduct that also bans harassment, smoking, drug use, panhandling and drinking alcohol outside. starbucks implemented the no purchase necessary policy back in 2018 after two black men who hadn't purchased anything were arrested at a location in philadelphia. those arrests created a national controversy. >> amazon is ending its try before you buy program. the service allows prime members to order up to six clothing items to try on before purchasing. customers have seven days to return any unwanted items. t

you've got the head of the ftc suing companies. if that is taken off the table, even if the ftc is in the next administration, the idea of not getting sued is pleasurable. you can dream. david, no one can dream of a deal because they are afraid of being sued. you don't like jail or getting sued. >> there are plenty of things on the show we fail to cover that we should but this is not one of them. the three of us sat and talked repeatedly. by the way, it rattled around in your brain endlessly for years. this is not new. yes, we are well aware of the impact of the doj, your other buddy there. >> i was told by my lawyer he did not like big tech. carl, they hated big tech. did we cover that story? >> to your point, there are -- i mean, my only question now is hope is so strong for an incredibly strong year and my only question now is whether, in fact, it will be fulfilled or if they will fall short of expectations because people in the industry have gotten so optimistic at this point. a potential deal. >> david, what was incredible was

think you're going to see more ipos come back and a lot of deal making beginning to happen with the friendlier ftc overhang. you're going to see a lot more activity in the biotech sector. >> in terms of vc money, john, maybe a year or two ago, it was anything that had to do with obesity would get money. how has that changed, if at all, given the performance of the publicly traded stocks, weren't as strong in 2024? >> i think you're going to continue to see investments go into the obesity space but that won't be the only space where you'll see them taking place. certainly, i think a key theme will be large market opportunities. so that's cardio met bolics, within which you have the obesity opportunities. i think the obesity opportunities people are going to be looking at going forward will be to work and identify pill form, looking at side effects with the glp-1, especially long term. looking at drugs that might be able to preserve or build up muscle mass are going to be the next generation where you'll see investment activity. you'll also see continued investment in neuro. there's going to be a lo

caroline: the ftc chair has support from vice president elect. ll you see enthusiasm around future m&a in tech? jason: lina khan has 72 hours left on the job. her replacement has taken a more balanced approach, more favorable to advancing u.s. innovation. the president is a tech innovator, surrounding himself with innovators coming into office, people serving in crucial roles that understand the vital role the u.s. tech industry plays in economic growth. as far as trade and export around tech, we run a $300 billion surplus in the u.s. on digital trade, exports of u.s. tech around the world. as long as we can place regulators as the president-elect is looking to do who are willing to listen to industry and make sure balance is struck between national security and economic growth, we will be in a better place for the next four years. caroline: thanks for your time. coming up, more on tiktok. the decision on the supreme court. ♪ power e*trade's award-winning trading app makes trading easier. with its customizable options chain, easy-to-use tools and

obviously google is their biggest competitor relating to that and google is being sued by the ftc and the like. this is clearly political and i know you've been really focused on this. think about all these tech ceos who have individually donated to the trump inauguration fund. they've done it individually $1 million. tim cook did that, mark zuckerberg, and their companies are also doing it. they want to take some pressure off from the regulators and continue to have this sort of situation where they're deemed to be on the right side of this. this is really important. there's so much hypocrisy in this, okay? meta has 3.3 billion monthly active users. that's a third of the people on the planet. over a third of those people are in india. india is a back sliding democracy. india censors their news and their internet. what is mark zuckerberg going to do in the largest populous geography they have? this is really free speech if you think how a lot of politicians use this, thinking of how elon musk used twitter and trump using truth social during his last election. i think we'll see the hyp

that's up to the justice department and the ftc to prosecute and not up to any two bit prytanea new york to try and relitigate the whole election out of 2016. justice department looked into this and ftc and decided not to bring cases and merchan and bragg tried to take this accounting law and tried to turn it into a claim that trump somehow stolen the 2016 election. while the 2024 results, i think, give a lie to that. liz: this is a real clear abuse of the justice system to go after a political rival? final word. >> yes. in fact i think if merchan goes ahead and i think trump would be entirely justified to think of ways to retaliate against new york city. for example, the justice department should investigate them for violating civil rights. liz: john yoo, you're so smart, thank you for breaking this down with us. good to have you back on. see you again soon. >> thanks, liz. >> i think his fitness to serve is proven by him serving and serving with excellence and distinction and continuing to lead the world. >> we have a very bold and vibrant president. >> you all call this the cheap fake

what makes us -- what's encouraging is the two commissioners in the ftc, the two republican commissionerss the worst cases they have seen in many years. >> i saw that. >> had really no substance. we believe in the legal system, and we'll obviously defend ourselves. and you know, i think common sense will prevail. >> ramon, thank you so much for the time in davos. good to see you always. we're not done, don't miss the ceo of gap, richard dixon, he's going to join me later to talk about the turn around that he has engineered in all four of their brands. >> and what a turnaround that's been. fascinating. see you in a bit. >>> as we go to break, watch horton today. the homebuilder beats estimates, reaffirms the full-year guidance. not exactly helping the stock this morning in a fairly constructive take. dow's up 250. just off a session high. stay with us. >>> welcome back to "squawk on the street." i'm seema mody with your update. the dismissals of january 6th-related cases are under way as incarcerated rioters are set to be released from jail and prison following sweeping pardons from presid

getting new people at the s.e.c., the ftc. the enforcement hasn't changed.ed more about m&a but that's just beginning's haven't seen the ipos or associated training. the e will go higher we think. in addition to that the multiple hasn't expanded enough. you've had 15 years of upward regulatory presh perp not resolved in three, six months. >> overall view for the stock market this year? a target yet? >> we do. >> i'm serious. didn't mean to make a joke. >> seven 007. >> that's right. forgot about that. seven 00. triple o wasn't dw enough? >> no. wasn't good enough. >> what's going to get us there? exactly what we're seeing. right? people are worried about, oh, tariffs this, tariffs that, trump this, trump that'slook at the fundamentals. the fundamentals are pretty damn good. right? in addition to that you have an economy that i think is better than expected. you have credit spreads still very tight. you have the cost of capital beginning to come down and not exceptionally high to begin with and m&a is just beginning to kick up. throw that altogether, and you

. >> steve: officials warning of mass bank fraud scams after 2 million incidents were reported to the ftc life savings in some cases costing people $4 billion. the cyber tax hitting consumers on credit cards, payment apps, banks, even gift cards. so, is there a way to uncompromise your data? keep it safe? get it off the internet? kurt the cyberguy joins us right now for "tech tuesday." kurt, this is a very big problem. and if you could make it easy, so that people can essentially make their phones bullet-proof, what would you tell them to do? >> it's real hard to make them bullet proof -- good morning to you, steve. they are getting so good at scamming all of us, even super smart people i know get scammed, you got a woman in virginia lost $700,000 transferring out of her wells fargo account. another person 100 grand. it's a scam call that comes. in it's an email or a text. it sounds so legit. it's so believable. but i have to just bring it back to this. if somebody, whether they called you, texted you, reached out on social media, i don't care how they reached you, if they are asking you

you know my view of the ftc. seventh question. for the consumers are they getting tapped out?have been asking for two of the three years now, right? and the answer has proven to be a resounding no. so worth asking again now that consumers are demanding value these days. we will get the first clues the next week and a half when dozens of consumer disagenciary companies presented icr conference in orlando. we get preannouncements there and see how the holiday season went. that fantastic conference, i enjoy it. got a lot of behind-the-scenes news. technology. can the a.i. investment boom continue? we are doing a whole section on tech questions after the break. but this is become a huge theme. we got encouraging -- when brad smith president of microsoft said in a blog post that they will be investing a cullel ool $80 billion to data centers this year. i say nvidia. question nine. can the utilities meet our nation's increased need for power? i am not sure. up 19.5% last year thanks to ridiculous demand for electricity. i think they deserve to work but they can't keep running them u

flood of mergers and acquisitions i've been telling you to expect under a trump antitrust regime the ftc taken a hard line on m & a. they are hostile to corporate consolidate. companies figured it's not worth the effort no guaranteed success. that's why when trump won in november, it became obvious we were looking at a deluge of deals. these companies couldn't even bring themselves to wait for inauguration day we have gotten a slew of merger activity monday morning, disney will combine hulu with fubo it offers a streaming content on live sports. disney is acquiring fubo 70% stake in the entity. they are snapping this up to save litigation. by the way, after the close in a bullish announcement, disney have 157 million global users streaming content with ads we talked about buying more for the trust at the 10:20 morning meeting. i'm frozen and can't buy any i like what i'm seeing the hulu deal was the appetizer. monday night through tuesday, we got several multi-billion dollar m & a transactions starting with the medical device maker stryker buying inari it is complimentary to the neurovas

that's another thing we've been talking about because of course with the changes in leadership at the ftc. >> i think it's going to be a strong year for m&a as well, particularly as you point out the changes in the administration. it's a very business friendly environment that's being created in this new administration and i think that's the reason why there's so much optimism on the u.s. in particular. and a lot of reason for optimism on the global economy given the u.s.'s leading role in the global economy. maria: president trump has had an idea a minute. his latest idea is about investing in america into a.i. and data centers. the president announced a major investment yesterday, joining forces with oracle, soft bank and open a.i. on the star gate project, $500 billion, half a trillion dollars coming from these companies into the united states in the next four years to build a.i. data centers in the united states. the three company ceos committed $1,100,0$100 billion up front. a.i. a topic at the world economic forum. how does that play into your thinking for the year. >> a.i. is going

we're watching shares of cvs and cig that and united health and they are dipping initially after the ftccountry's largest managers hiked the prices, the markups in some cases were by thousands of percent and helped the group rate get billions of dollars. the group calls the report flawed and incomplete but taking a look at the stocks right now, we're seeing united health up over 4% and cigna up over 2% and cvs health up over 7.5%. we'll be back right after this. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ at state street, we know everyone's trying to get somewhere. ♪♪ take the next step toward your future, by investing in the s&p 500 with spy. getting there starts here. >>> welcome back. southern california is again facing extremely critical fire conditions caused by new period of santa ana winds today. across parts of los angeles andventura counties. so far wildfires destroyed or damaged more than 12,000 structures turning entire neighborhoods into ash and rubble. as of yesterday, more than 92,000 people in the los angeles county. they were under evacuation orders with another 89,000 under evacuation warnings. our contes

biden's antitrust regulators, the ftc and justice department will be fabulous for the market.he despised every deal. no matter how great to might have been for the economy or you or the average worker. she is in the end way over her head. her swan song, a case point that raises the price of alcohol for everyone if she wins. a real asset to president biden. with him out of the way, deals will help rationalize smaller companies, banking, retail, pharma, compete against the big dogs. fantastic for the stock market. just fantastic. you know, we have had developing shortage of equities. we are not getting big ipos yet. if we do, i am confident it will still have a shrinking share cap. you remember the stock market is a market and like any other market when there is not enough supply, you get higher prices. third, what happens if trump's tariffs turn out to be negotiable? a smart non-program won't be good for world trade. if you own stocks and want them higher you hope for negotiable tariffs that cause lower prices to us or make multinational companies move their manufacturing base

shares ended 5% in the red after the ftc would refer a complaint to the department of justice.for today's show. have a great weekend. i'm silvia amaro. orwi ehae"s mi "wlddexcng icong up next. let's say you're deep in a show or a game or the game. on a train, at home, at work. okay, maybe not at work. point is at xfinity. we're constantly engineering new ways to get the entertainment you love to you faster and easier than ever. that's what i do. is that love island? >>> it's 5:00 a.m. here at cnbc global headquarters. welcome to "worldwide exchange." here's your "five@5." >>> tech under pressure as investor attention moves the different parts of the market. apple seeing its worst day in months. >>> american oligarch. over what president biden calls a dangerous conversation of power among the ultra wealthy. >>> the interest in the red hot tech falling off what could be a signal to the end of a very brief speculation bubble. >>> plus, the supreme court could