byron wien from blackstone. great to have you here. surprises every year and we will dish these out through the course of the morning, talk about a few of them. we're joined with some of his predictions for the economy, john, welcome. >> happy new year. >> happy new year to you. m why don't we start with surprises because the economy is better than expected given what you hear in the headlines. >> yes. coming into the fiscal cliff resolution, stage one, the uncertainty was for 2013, if things went badly, all the tax hikes go through, you have a recession. given the dysfunctionality of washington, you would have thought there was a higher impact on hiring and other things and you would have thought people without have sat back to see how it resolved. we had a surprising employment growth under the circumstances. capital goods took a hit, and if washington could get out of the way, 2013 could be a decent year. >> what are the chances of that happening? >> we have to get through the debt ceiling and sequestration and clearly in the headli

. >> that was byron wien breaking down his trades for 2013. king dennis gartman think of the prediction? dennis, great to see you. >> good to be seen. >> ag commodities will go higher and it's because of climate change. what do you say? >> well, first of all, the climate is changing, i don't think man has much to do with it, i think mother nature has everything to do with it. clearly we've had an extraordinary drought for the last several years in the midwest. if you continue to have this drought, we will continue -- we will have problems creating a large enough corn crop. but we are going to plant a huge amount of acreage this year. we don't have to get enough rain to end the drought, we just have to get enough rain to get the crop through this year. we'll see what happens. byron will be absolutely right, if we put this crop into the ground and we continue get enough rain. there's plenty of fertilizer. we need rain to make grain. we'll see what's going on in april and may to see what the winter wheat crop is like. circumstances in kansas look

byron wien will join us and make a bold call on the market's next move. >> which is why i'll be looking forward to seeing that. thanks so much. >>> coming up, a casino stock hits the jackpot in china and a home appliance company pops on earnings. we have the plays in our top three trades. >>> facebook fails to improve the street triggering a number of downgrades but one top analyst says buy. you'll hear why, next, when we come back. is [ male announcer ] when it comes to the financial obstacles military families face, we understand. our financial advice is geared specifically to current and former military members and their families. [ laughs ] dad! dad! [ applause ] [ male announcer ] life brings obstacles. usaa brings retirement advice. call or visit us online. we're ready to help. learn more with our free usaa retirement guide. call 877-242-usaa. okay. [ male announcer ] with citibank's popmoney, dan can easily send money by email right from his citibank account. nice job ben. [ male announcer ] next up, the gutters. citibank popmoney. easier banking. standard at citibank. to deposit

because what you would gain from listen to go byron wien would pay for that. >> joe, i can't tell yououldn't have done it. i can just tell you i didn't have to do it. >> you can get information here that's worth much more than that. >> you know, it's just a fortune. people gain a lot from cnbc. >> even when i'm on, there's something valuable. >> let's not get carried away. >> my pick is -- >> a lot of happy peep. >> coming up, we've got the head of the consumer protection pure sounding off on the august's new rules when we come back. impact life expectancy in the u.s., real estate in hong kong, and the optics industry in germany? at t. rowe price, we understand the connections of a complex, global economy. it's just one reason over 75% of our mutual funds beat their 10-year lipper average. t. rowe price. invest with confidence. request a prospectus or summary prospectus with investment information, risks, fees and expenses to read and consider carefully before investing. [ male announcer ] how do you make 70,000 trades a second... ♪ reach one customer at a time? ♪ or help doctors turn