eamon javers has the details. eamon? >> hi, kelly. well, cnbc has confirmed that president barack obama is going to name as the acting commissioner of the irs daniel wefrl, he's the comptroller of the office of management and budget. not a flashy or high-profile figure here inside washington, but he's been a long-time washington player, known as a green eye shades guy, who's been responsible in his current role in implementing the governmental sequester and dealing with all the bureaucratic blocking and tackling involved in that. according to sources, a white house official telling cnbc the president will nominate mr. werfel as the commissioner of the irs on an acting basis and we can expect that announcement anytime now, guys. >> all right, eamon, we'll look forward to that. >>> meantime, gold is continuing to lose its shine today. bertha coombs is at the nymex with those details. >> interesting today, because we did have the dollar easing back and that did float some commodities, just into positive territory, but not gold, down

eamon? >> we thought that eric holder, the attorney general's testimony here before the house judiciary committee might get a little bit heated over this irs investigation issue or even the ap issue about obtaining phone records of journalists. instead, we got a near meltdown over an entirely different issue, a whistle-blower lawsuit case, a long-simmering controversy. take a look at this exchange. this is congressman darrell issa, who is grilling holder about some decisions that the department of justice made in that whistle-blower saga. take a listen. >> when i look at the request and try to be as responsive as we can. i'm sure there must have been a good reason why only the to and from parts were -- >> yes, you didn't want us to see the details. mr. attorney general -- >> no, no -- that's what you typically do -- >> knowing the to and from -- >> i'm not going to stop talking now. >> mr. chairman, would you

eamon javers with the story. eamon? >> hi, maria. the news was about as good as you're going to get coming out of washington today. the report saying, take a look here at some of the highlights, that social security now has enough funds to operate through 2033. it also said that after 2033, tax revenues could finance some spending on about three quarters of the benefits that are promised through 2087. and finally id sate that medicare has sufficient funds to operate through 2026. and that's actually two years later than they had said last year, so that's a good sign. treasury secretary jack lew was cautiously optimistic in his comments earlier today. >> social security and medicare are meeting their commitments today and they will continue to meet their commitments in the years ahead. yet as the trustee's reports have been indicating for a while now, these programs face long-term challenges. >> now, maria, that year of 2033 was actually the same exact year they picked last year, so social security kind of treading water here. and tha

let's go to eamon javers on capitol hill. he's been monitoring the discussion. eamon? >> we expected some tough questions here for tim cook, as they talks to the senate in the wake of this release, which reveals apple created three companies that in fact are stateless there, not registered for tax purposes in any country anywhere around the world. what we doesn't expect is much of the fireworks would happen over before tim cook sought done to take a listen to rand paul just now. >> frankly i'm offended by the tone and tenure. i'm offended by a $4 trillion government, bullies, berating and badgering one of the america's greats success stories. if anyone should be on trial here, it should be congress.

eamon javers has been covering this story all day and he joins us. eamon? >> hi,ç lmaria.it was a tough day to be steven miller, the ousted chief of the irs, the acting chief of the irs. he was ousted earlier in the week by the obama administration, but he was the guy in the hot seat today, testifying. mostly republicans asking very tough questions. democrats also weighing in with some skepticism, some outrage of their own. but take a look at some of these moments that steven miller had today. >> so that was a lot of questions, sir. >> it's one. how can we conclude that you did not mislead this committee? >> i did not mislead this committee. >> you're law enforcement, for crying out loud. i was a cop morefor 33 years. now, you raised your right hand today. did this committee have the right to know what you knew? yes or no? >> i answered all questions truthfully. i also will tell you that it was -- >> let me ask -- i'm going to -- i'm going to go to mr. george, because my time is -- you're not going to cooperate with me, mr. miller, and you've been

eamon javers has the whole laundry list of developments for us. eamon? >> hi, bill. well, multiple developments here on a day of complicated and interlocking political scandals here in washington and a day where we saw sort of a split screen of press conferences from the department of justice and from the white house. start over at the department of justice, where the attorney general made some news in talking about this irs scandal. the question there, whether the irs improperly or now potentially illegally used political criteria to go after certain groups. take a listen to the attorney general. >> i have ordered an investigation to be begun. the fbi is coordinating with the justice department to see if any laws were broken in connection with those matters related to the irs. those were, i think, as everyone can agree, if not criminal, they were certainly outrageous and unacceptable. but we are examining the facts to see if there were criminal violations. >> and just as the department of justice is doing some examination and investigation,

eamon javers has that story for us now. hi, eamon. >> "the wall street journal" reporting that at the cme there is a 10 mill i second gap there who have them co-located at the cme and they're being able to get buy and sell orders in the market before everybody else. that's called latency, the time gap between you know something and the rest of the market knows something and there are ways to profit from that. i talked to the cftc's bart chillton about the frequency of trading and he said one of the things he would like to see is he would like to see the high frequency traders with the cftc so he would know who they are. take a listen. >> the second largest trader by volume at the chicago merc an tile exchange in the past and maybe still today is a high-frequency trader located in prague. if i want to get the books and records because i think something potentially ney fai

eamon javers following the hearing from washington. >> good evening. there were a few answers. miller testified for just about four hours all told, republicans, very eager to get answers to their questions, producing a number of very uncomfortable moments for miller. take a look. >> so that was a lot of questions, sir. >>ith one. how can we conclude you did not mislead this committee? >> i did not mislead the committee. >> you are a law enforcement agency for crying out loud. i was a cop for 33 years. you raised your right hand today. did this committee had the right to know what you knew? yes or no? >> i answered all questions truthfully, i also will tell you that it was -- >> let me ask you -- i'm going to go to mr. george because you're not going to cooperate with me, mr. miller, and you have been uncooperative during the hearing. >> what day did the conversation take place? >> i would have to look back at my notes. >> you had notes? >> i would have to find them. >> why did you say you have notes if you don't have notes? >> sir, please. >> this is absolutely an overreach and

today eamon javers is in a secure location watching a team of internet sleuths, internet defenders, he's with us live. >>> norwegian cruise lines launching a brand-new ship, and not a dingy, folks. it is docked in manhattan right now. simon hobbs is on boor, recording on the embattled

today eamon javers is in a secure location watching a team of internet sleuths, internet defenders, he's with us live. >>> norwegian cruise lines launching a brand-new ship, and not a dingy, folks. it is docked in manhattan right now. simon hobbs is on boor, recording on the embattled industry, while showing us that the luxury that awaits the first passengers on this levi athan of the seas. >>> plus a story the whole country is talking about. >> i've been missing for ten years, and i'm out here, i'm free now. >> i came home and i was in my living room eating my big mac, and we hear this girl going nuts on the door. a shocking, stunning, disturbing story. three young women kidnapped separately in cleveland, finally freed at a dramatic rescue and 911 call. we will have details coming up.

eamon javers, thank you, sir. speaking of government bailouts, aig has made an incredible comeback following its bailout in 2008, but is it better a company now than it was before? mary thompson has all the details plus an interview with aig's ceo, bob benmoshe. >> we had a chance to speak to mr. benmoshe earlier. benmoshe the engineer behind the company's significant turnaround and his answer to the question, is the company better off today? well, in some ways, he said, yes. >> i think it's a simpler company, more focused company, so therefore, in my mind, easier to manage and one i think that is much more secure for the future. so i think it's better from that point of view. >> a better future for aig means addressing rating agency's concerns about the company's funding profile, getting the okay to pay a dividend or buyback stock from the federal reserve, once it officially becomes aig's regulator, and most of all, improving profitability at its core pnc

static warbles ] >>> let's go to eamon javers with breaking news on the inspector general's report on the irs. >> well that inspector general's report is out now. my colleague john harwood printed this one out. it is hot off the presses and we're going through it right now. i've spoken with an official who is familiar with the contents of this report who gave me a rundown on what it is that we're seeing here. a couple of key points from the report that we should highlight here for you. the report asked were there inappropriate criteria used here by the irs to scrutinize conservative groups. the report concludes, i'm told by the official yes, there were inappropriate criteria. another question were there inappropriate delays in approving the tax status of some of these conservative groups. and finally, were the irs folks asking inappropriate questions about these conservative groups? and i'm told on that question as well, the report concludes, yes, they were asking inappropriate questions of the conservative groups. another couple of points here in compiling this report they

eamon javers, good morning. >> the house oversight committee will announce that it will hold a hearing next wednesday looking into this whole question of irs, political targeting of non-profit conservative groups expected to testify and be invited to this hearing will be russell george, the inspector general and lois lerner and also neil roland the deputy treasury of the treasury. and the former irs commissioner will also be invited to testify at that hearing on wednesday of next week. they're going to announce that later this morning. that will join a long list of other congressional hearings, house, ways and means is expected to look into this, as well as over on the senate side, the permanent select committee on investigation. so now we have at least three committees here that will be digging into this irs hearing and what i am told about this oversight committee hearing is that aides will be looking into the question of where did this all begin?

cnbc's eamon javers joins us with details. good evening. >> good evening, this is the report you're talking about. it's a report from the inspector general, who deals with the irs. let's walk through a couple key

larry kudlow and eamon javers joins us now this is an issue that gained a lot of traction and steam right now. >> melissa, as you know, the president met with some of his treasury department advisers, regarding the ifrp rs scandal. irs in the tresry want it. if i had to make a wild guess without knowing anything, you will see him take greater actions, the you dig into it. so that's one possibility. >> yeah, ayman, no surprise, a lot of lawmakers out there are call, for heads to rom on this. >> reporter: that's right, mellissa. this administration has been on its heels as far as scandal. we do know what the speaker of the house said should happen. take a listen to john boehner earlier. >> my question isn't about who's going to resign.

mind, as we bring in john harwood and eamon javers. the white house is facing heat over benghazi, the i.r.s. matter, the associated press. the attorney general will hold a news conference in about 20 minutes, delayed from a 1:00 p.m. start time. he's going to be talking principally on medicare fraud, but do you expect he's going to get queried about this a.p. story as well as the other things in the news? >> tyler, if you look at that front row, that press conference that you just saw, the empty podium, the front row of reporters are all chomping at the bit, i can guarantee you to ask questions about eric holder's personal knowledge about this organization, what did he sign off on, and when did she sign off? one of the question toss watch for is whether or not eric holder will recuse himself in any of they. the question here is why did the department of justice feel it was necessary to go after phone records for over 20 phone lines impacting as many as 20 reporters, the department of

any real national security -- >> and eamon javers, if there were any food safety concerns, that would be the agriculture department's area, wouldn't it be? and they don't have the ability to block this deal. >> that's right, it would be the fda, and i talked to the fda a little while ago, and they say they don't even have any process whereby they could step in and block any kind of corporate acquisition as one company to another. they don't even view it as their place to even comment on this deal. the fda is focused entirely on the regulation after the fact. so you imagine they'll be doing that in this case. but there's no process by which they could object, you know, up-front. >> peter, can i ask -- let me ask you this. i was going to make this point. if for some reason this deal were prohibited by the u.s. arm of the u.s. government, do you know what would happen to all of the takeover premiums in the united states. it would go away. you want to deny shareholders in america all that money? >> michelle, this deal is going through. i mean, there's no national security implications. bu

eamon javers has the latest on that story from washington. >> reporter: "the wall street journal" reporting this morning that at the cme, some high-frequency traders have figured out that they can get as much as a ten millisecond advantage over their competitors and get a heads up on price information and that's something that's got a lot of people scratching their heads and wondering whether or not there's an unfair advantage here for high-frequency traders. it's an issue that i talked to bart chilton from the cftc about a little while ago. he said one thing he would like to see at least for a start is for high-frequency traders to register with the cftc. take a listen. >> the second largest trader, by volume, at the chicago mercantile exchange, in the past, and maybe still today, is a high-frequency trader located in prague. now, if i want to get the books and records, because i think something potentially nefarious has gone on, i'm not going to have any luck getting this information from prague. >> now, i talked to the cme

eamon javers has more. >> on the front lineses of the cyber war things look much different than u.s. military veterans are used to, just ask former u.s. major general. >> unlike most of my experience in the military where i had clear, technical advantage, and there are lots of us that are compared to the people that are coming at us don't have so much technical advantage. >> in the army fastbend who now oversees advanced information systems for contracting firm accelus always had the upper hand when it came to technology and manpower and in cyberspace that's not always the case. they can find themselves tangling with elite chinese army units probing every nook and crane of the u.s. defense and industrial base. >> you find you have an adversary that's adapting very, very quickly. >> that's forcing the united states to adapt quickly, too. on monday for the first time the pentagon made it clear what many in the u.s. government had discussed obliquely before. the u.s. government is being

eamon javers is still with us. you know, iowa man, the issue of tax havens is really nothing new and the corporations who have used them in the past or attempted to use them in the past. i can't help but wonder if by using apple as the poster child, smart levin and others think that the issue is going to get more traction. >> well, absolutely, scott. the senators here think that they would like to see tax reform done in this country and they'd like to see something done about what they call these loopholes here. and i should say that apple has said it doesn't use tax gimmicks. what levin was talking about when he said the holy grail of tax avoidance is this question of subsidiaries of apple that are not tax residence in any jurisdiction around the world. they may be legally registered in ireland, but they're not official tax residents of the country, also not of the united states or any country anywhere around the world. that is the thing that the committee is saying has never been seen before by them. and a lot of

eamon javers, let's get the latest. wide-range -- >> brian, kind of stunning there, the range of issues he was responding to there, let's start with some of the news here. holder said he has ordered an investigation to be begun by the fbi and the department of justice into this irs situation, a situation that he called outrageous and unacceptable. he said he's not clear whether any laws were broken will, but the department of justice are investigating to see what is happening there. haz all about whether or not the irs improperly or potentially now legally subject patriot tea party groups to a higher level of scrutiny when they submitted applications to tax-empty status. he also talked about this other situation, saying that he recused himself -- he testified, rather, back in june of 2012, now interviewed in connection with the situation, and the

cnbc's eamon javers joins us with more on what she said. >> good morning, andrew. she's only been on the job for 18 days and she came here in the ic icon 14s to lay out her vision for a global regulatory regime and we had a is chance to catch up with her backstage and we asked her about the bogus a.p. tweet we saw last week and how it moved the markets. here's her answer. take a listen. >> i think we all have to realize that events like that have happened before. it remind us of several things. it reminds us that our system whether we're an issuer can be tapped interest. therefore we want to make state of the art safeguards to prevent that as much as possible if -- if -- sorry. if false information gets out there it's important for companies to correct that as soon as they can. >> she also talked about the thicket of global regulatory agencies and the numbers of contacts she's had with

cnbc's eamon javers joins us with details. good evening. >> good evening, this is the report you're talking about. it's a report from the inspector general, who deals with the irs. let's walk through a couple key findings here that have been absorbing washington over the past couple days. now is our first chance to actually dive in and read the report. here's what they said they found. they found that the irs has used inappropriate criteria that identified tea party and other groups applying for tax exempt status. the irs also caused delays in processing certain applications, and it issued unnecessary information requests to groups for information such as who their donors are and other identifying information about how they operated. so take a look at some of the criteria here that the tigta report says the irs was using in krut scrutinizing some of these entities, looking for the name tea party or patriots or 912 group used in the case file. they say the issues include government spending or government debt or taxes.

eamon javers on capitol hill right now watching it all. >> apple ceo tim cook emerged largely unscathed from this hearing today. that was against the expectations of many here in washington, who looked at the report that the senate subcommittee put out last week and thought it could be a much more damaging hearing for tim cook and the other apple executives. there were a couple of uncomfortable moments for all three apple executives who testified today, but maybe the most uncomfortable moment happened before they testified, and that's when rand paul, the senator from kentucky, sort of called into question the entire purpose and function of this hearing, really getting under the skin of senator carl levin, the chairman of the committee, who called the hearing in the first place. take a look at this exchange. >> frankly, i'm offended by the tone and tenor of this hearing. i'm offended by a $4 trillion government bullying, berating, and badgering one of the america tease greatest success stories. if anyone should be on trial here, it should be congress. i frankly think the committee

over to you, eamon. >> reporter: hi, sue. take a look at some of these pictures. various web sites around the web have been assaulted by this team, which is apparently some combination of anonymous and islamic-based cyberattackers. they're putting up pictures defacing some of the web sites, causing problems basically, but nothing that seems too, too severe at least so far, but there's a lot of evidence these attackers have been very active today across the entire internet. this comes one day after the pentagon for the first time really called out chinese cyberhackers, and laid out in specific what they think the chinese military is doing. take a look at this report that the pentagon put out yesterday, saying china is using its computer net work exploitation, to support economic and defense industrial-based sectors that support u.s., national defense programs. and speaking of u.s. national defense programs, where i'm standing right here is the cyberincident response center, part of a compete calls excelus. as such they're on the receiving end of a lot of activity.

eamon? >> reporter: we've already had a couple of fireworks here this morning. cook has been testifying. early yerp before the hearing began, senator rand paul questioned having this hearing in the first place. got under the skin of chairman carl levin here. take a listen to this exchange. and -- and maybe we don't have the exchange. let me tell you what happened there. rand paul said he was offended by this hearing. he thought if anything congress ought to be apologizing it to apple instead of criticizing apple for doing what every company does, rand paul said, trying to lower its taxes. he said nobody's out there trying to maximize their taxes. everyone is trying to lower their taxes. levin responded to that in classic senate fashion, not by naming paul but, wait a second, this hearing is entirely appropriate. john mccain chimed in in defense of levin himself. mccain saying that he was offended anyone would accuse levin of bullying -- i think we do have that tape now ready to go. let's take a listen to this exchange. >> apple has real operations with apple emp

cnbc's eamon javers has the latest from the nation's capital. eamon? >> well, it's hot off the presses here. here's the report being put out this hour by the senate permanent subcommittee on investigations. they've been doing a month's long look into how different companies are structured in terms of their offshore tax structure and what they've done here is take a very deep dive into apple, how it's structured around the world. and there's several top line findings. let me bring those to you right here. first of all, the company, the subcommittee here is saying that apple has several entities that are not declared tax residents of any jurisdiction at all anywhere in the world. these entities were legally registered in ireland, but they're not tax residents of ireland. one of those entities is apple operations international. it had net income of $30 billion between 2009 and 2012. >> forgive me, i'm going to send it over to senator levin who is speaking regarding this issue. we're going to take that live. listen in. >> companies shift huge amounts of th

eamon, you've been watching and listening, i imagine this will be a litmus test for some of the other internationals. >> reporter: that's right. in fact this particular subcommittee has been going company by company doing case studies. they're looking at apple releasing pretty revealing report last night, which revealed in fact that apple had created three subsidiary corporations that were not tax residents of any country anywhere in the world, and we expected that tim cook was going to face some grilling on that issue. what we didn't expect was this moment that we had with senator rand paul that came out even before tim cook began to testify. take a listen. >> frankly i'm offended by the tone and tenor of this hearing. i'm offended by a $4 trillion government bullying, berating and badgesering one of the america's greatest success stories. if anyone should be on trial here, it could be congress. i frankly think the committee should apologize to apple. i this that congress should be on trial here for creating a bizarre and byzantine tax code. >> you're free to apologize if you wish. y

over to you, eamon. >> we've got a little bit of a strange situation going on here in washington.ou're right. tim cook from apple will be here in washington tomorrow. he'll be testifying before the permanent subcommittee on investigates. that's an investigative committee up on capitol hill headed by carl levin that's been engaging in a long running series of investigations into american companies and how they treat their offshore income for tax purposes. they've previously looked at hue let pa-- hewlett-packard and otr companies. what we've obtained in the last few minutes are some testimony on behalf of apple. we're not being told whose testimony this is. whether this is tim cook's testimony or not. but this is testimony on behalf of apple that they're going to deliver tomorrow before the subcommitt subcommittee. what we've got here in a strange way now is apple's defense here to what the subcommittee will reveal tomorrow. the subcommittee's findings are embargoed until 7:00 p.m. tonight. what we've got is a defense here from apple of its conduct and tax structure. what we don't

eamon. >> we saw this bullish consumer number and a lot of people followed up on that, but the questionere people doing just before the release of that number at 10:00 exactly this morning? remember, consumer confident is put out by a private group called the conference board at exactly 10:00 a.m. take a look at this chart. and what you'll see here in a chart provided to us by nanex llc is an explosion in trading at 9:59:59. that is about a quarter of a second before the release of the data. we see thousands of shares being traded here. the price going up pretty dramatically, very quickly right at that initial burst at 754 milliseconds well before the release of the high age of high freerktcy trading. they said there was no breach of the information and frankly we have nod received any phone calls on this. they put out the information at exactly 10:00. so whatever happened before then would have been something that happened before this information was publicly available. now, there's a couple of explanations that could explain this, scott. one of them simply is that somebody made a very

>> eamon, thank you. joining us right now, dennis killaher of better markets.the latest example that insiders are rigging the game for their own benefit. on the other side of the debate, al drina aldridge, both join us right now. >> hi, maria. >> dennis, let me kick it off with you. you say this is another example of the insiders rigging the markets for their own benefit? >> well, it's pretty clear that we've seen what high-speed computer trading has been doing in the equity markets. this is a very important report to show what it's not doing in the commodity markets. keeping in mind, the commodity markets are very important for edging, for producers of commodities, for everything from our food stuffs to fuels. it affects every single american family in a very important away. the cme and commodity market sell themselves as being fair and open with a level playing field. and what this article in the "wall street journal" showed today is that just isn't always the case. that there are people getting a time advantage and an information advantage, they're basically