thank you very much. >>> so john paulson is bullish on housing. home renovations. how can investors get in on the action in that sliver of the housing world? diana olick has more. eye, diane. >> hello. in d.c. you have one renovation, another one next door, another one behind that in the alley and pat turn around because behind that dumpster is a third renovation on one street. that means billions of dollars, thousands of new jobs and big boost to stocks that fuel this business. take a look at numbers here. remodeling spending, just by homeowners alone, that is owner occupant hit 2007 peak of $146 billion. only to fall to $110 billion by 2011 according to a new report by the harvard joint center for housing. now it comes back to the 120 range and this doesn't include the $10 billion spent by foreclosure investors rehabbing to rent. jumping 9% last year and poised it make double-digit gains this year. >> the interest rates have helped a lot. and people are not as afraid to invest in their homes. for a while there, everyone was, you know, scared to

google always gives you another chance to buy it. >> hedge fund manager john paulson revealing some ofis market plays during an appearance in new york city. kate kelly was there and joins us with some of his bullish bets. >> so paulson unveiled what amounts to essentially a four-part bullish thesis on u.s. recovery last night with the centerpiece being housing. prices are up, the number of homes for sale is relatively low and this sets the stage for a rebound in building he thinks which make it is a great time to consider investing in residential real estate. he also talked about the u.s. energy turnaround which he thinks will benefit chemical and petrochemical companies. he thinks factors like low electricity prices will stimulate investment. other parts of his thesis involves credit which he thinks is slowly recovering and equities. how paulson is playing all this is only partly clear. he's a big owner of nexton, the global energy company soon to be taken over. he also owns axo nobel. but at least check his top holdings were prior primarily i financial, pharma and gold which he conti

we had a graphic that attacked him and i want to say -- >> but an attack on john paulson may be a littlerranted. it seemed like paulson -- >> you don't think so? >> i actually don't think so. >> why? >> i think there are aspects of john's firm that are going to do quite well next year. >> what happens, though, at a firm like that when they are so under water that mathematically, to get back to flat, to get to new high ground for so much of the new money that came in, what -- >> listen, we've done a lot of research on that firm. i think he has a very competent staff that are loyal to him. he's a disciplined and patient guy. he's made enough money where he can subsidize that run back to the top. and this is not a guy that i would be betting against and john will be in a one-on-one interview with me at salt in las vegas -- >> opposite positions at a time he took the positions, you'd do much better. he exited a lot of his financial positions and then he bet against european debt at a time when it was time to be in european debt. >> that does happen in the markets. we can stand on the sidelin

john paulson bullish, anchored in his theory that housing is going to do very well this year.recovery already and that's likely to continue. he pointed to a couple of things. he said mortgage rates are at an all-time low. the number of houses available on the market are at essentially a ten-year low. so it's a very attractive time to buy. he thinks this will all put pressure on building efforts and we'll see a much stronger recovery in terms of building new homes than in quite a long time. the most positive change in housing, he said, since the lehman's brothers collapse in september of 2008. he thinks the stock market rally we saw last year and seeing so far this year is heartening. he thinks stock investing is much better in terms of an individual investor opportunity than credit investing, if you look at the overall returns. he also said he's very positive on the u.s. energy market. that we're seeing quite a turn-around there. he noted that chemicals, petro chemicals, and other energy related stocks may benefit from this recovery. unclear whether he's investing in some of t

john paulson, famously shorted the housing market. hedge fund guy.e was calling what we saw. this week, maybe a week ago, he said, this is the time. this is the time to buy. cheryl: brian lewis. thank you santa why pleasure. thank you for having me. dennis: next up, why new work safety rules may force the porn industry to leave california. steven hirsch is here from vivid. cheryl: list claimant will go one-on-one with a drugmaker and davos. ♪ it's a new day. if your a man with low testosterone, you should know that axiron is here. the only underarm treatment for low t. that's right, the one you apply to the underarm. axiron is not for use in women or anyone younger than 18. axiron can transfer to others through direct contact. women, especially those who are or who may become pregnant, and children should avoid contact where axiron is applied as unexpected signs of puberty in children or changes in body hair or increased acne in women may occur. report these signs and symptoms to your doctor if they occur. tell your doctor about all medical condition

john paulson's flagship advantage fund made up some lost ground in december.year loss to about 14.3%. still not great. most of paulson's other funds did have positive decembers, as well. paulson's gold fund slid another 5% last month and was down a total of 24.6% for the year. also in the news the federal government's consumer watch dog set to unveil new home lending rules this week. "the wall street journal" reporting the move could potentially reshape the mortgage market by ushering more standization preventing a return of the exotic loans that powered the housing bubble. there will be standards all mortgage lenders are likely to follow. the new rules are expected to be contentious because they will determine the types of loans that banks are going to be offering as well as to whom and on what terms. there have been concerns the new regulations would restrict credit and make getting a mortgage too hard. i'm sure some of the gentlemen around this table have views on that, as well. >> that's right. in fact for more on the mortgage market we are joined by quick

the selection of john snow and hank paulson and now jack lew, there are two things that all of them have? common. the one is they're all close to the president in terms of ideology and thoughts. the second thing is they essentially compound on what the president ran on. if you look in the case of baker, reagan, reagan was one of the key people in charge of the budget office in 1981, and then reagan makes him his treasury secretary. same thing with bob rubin. the issue that the president ptsdz to tackle are domestic debt issues. he wants to get -- he wants to get this. in his opinion there's no better person sitting in treasury to tackle that than jack lew. >> i do want to point out one thing as we talk about diversity, and we had jen saki on the show yesterday. she said while the president has a very diverse -- >> a woman who works for president obama. >> and she made the point that we have a pipeline problem. if you actually look at sort of where women are at -- we did a little researching as we are want to do on this television program -- 50% -- 50.8% of the country is female, but they

administration, or if you look at the selection of a hank paulson succeeding john snowe in the secondese are people who not only the president's personally close with but people who very much continue to compound on what the president said is going to be their economic issues. and doesn't jack lew do that as well? >> i don't think i'd agree that paulson fits that pattern. i don't think bush and him were personally close. i think he was somewhat in a different world. and yes, again, i don't have -- i'm not arguing with the jack lew appointment. i think it makes a lot of sense. i think he's an incredibly good public servant. what i'm saying is in totality, you have a set of economic positions, council of economic advisers, national economics council, office of management and budget, treasury secretary and a handful of others that matter. and you're not seeing anybody new brought into any of them. and i think it is somewhat unusual to have the totality of the economic team, there has not been one outsider brought into the economic team since the initial round of appointments in 2009. tha

how about the past three in john snow, if you look at him, there he is right here, came from csx corporation. henri paulsonin from goldman sachs. coming over here, geithner came from the new york fed. why is this important? he will be an advocate for the white house. they have other responsibilities. collecting taxes. irs report is up to them. issuing the debt. other things that treasury secretary has to have some form of independence. also, tyler, think about it being a loss for the white house itself. not having somebody with credentials that the market can latch on to, to advocate policies. here are credentials of jack lew in the screen we call, you don't know jack. you can see very much political. look at the next bit. twice serving as budget director and most recently as chief of staff. unless you count the preef time he spent at citigroup as being that piece of independence or new york university. it is not the kind of thing tyler that market will say, you know what? he is one of us. that raises questions about the policy and also we talked about is he is the guy who will be in the chair standing up