but they are a bit below moodies and s&p.raders are quick to point out it's about quantitative easement. jim, back to you. >> let's check out the latest with energy and metals. sharon? >> we have a little bit of strength in the dollar and that, of course, is helping to pressure oil prices. but keep your eye on brett crude, those prices are basically flat. traders are trying to anticipate what will come of tomorrow's talks in baghdad between iran and u.n. security council members as well as germany about iran's nuclear program. we already heard from the international atomic agency which met with officials over the weekend. there has been some agreement reached on nuclear inspections. and that, some are saying -- irie rain yan officials are saying keep in mind that oil embargo goes into effect july 1st. the u.s. and europe saying no, we're not going to make any changes to what we want to happen. and so we'll have to see what happens tomorrow at those talks in baghdad. that is going to be the key data point, the key point that i

i just think that s&p and moody's represent one of the great duopolies today. us the litigation against s&p for the role in the housing crisis giving aaa ratings to pieces of mortgage back paper that turns out to be junk has left the firm totally unscathed since it got free speech protection. this is much ado about nothing. it's a side show. and while s&p is the largest part, it's not the only part. once they get rid of the textbook business, i think you'll see some of the pieces unlocked, like this thing called plats, the energy information service. given the commodities, hedge funds trade them in and out, pension funds, the value of plats has never been greater. since you have a whole new class of buys who need their service. we also know that mcgraw hill is coming out with major cost cuts expected to deliver $100 million of cost savings by the end of the year, they've got hundreds of people working to find where costs can be cut. buyback going on. they've got a very aggressive buyback since the beginning of 2011. they have repurchased 36 million shares and an

so that does suggest that either s&p and fitch and moody's were wrong to be so negative about the u.s.' ability and willingness to repay or that you're all guilty of group-think and the market is actually working in the opposite direction. so can you give us an example of where you will completely disagree in ratings completely differently? >> in the sovereign base? >> in any space. doesn't matter. anything where you all completely disagreed? >> the defbs of completely disagree. we have different ratings. i would say we do have a different rating. >> let me be specific. do you have an entity you are on credit watch to upgrade where another agency has its own credit watch to downgrade, for example, where you're setting the direction in completely opposite ways? >> i'd have to check, but if my memory is correct, i think we'd move to a negative outlook on south africa and i think during that time i think moody's may have taken a positive rating action. there certainly have been instance where is each of the rating agencies have certainly maintained different ratings during different cour

when they get back to investment grade, which they can do in the coming months with s&p and moody's,will be a big pop for the stock. >> and they've got to clear up concession issues. >> they do. >> and i'm sure they will in a timely fashion. we can only hope. paul, good to see you. thank you for joining us you today. maria? >> financials as well as on the nasdaq, green mountain, dragging this market down lower. down 58 points. are you ready for retirement? a new blackrock survey on how employees are preparing for the golden age. what mistakes you must avoid. first, courtney reagan following all of the under the radar movers. court? >> certainly under the radar movers on ratings. but possibly from not carrying a competitive investor of colored jeans, i'll flashback to the '80s fashion coming up on the "closing bell." [ crunches ] mmm. ♪ [ male announcer ] pringles... bursting with more flavor. [ crunch! ] >>> welcome back. we have breaking news on facebook. let's go to kate kelly. she's working the phone on us. >> i have details on the road show. it kicks off in earnest on money. they

concern now about spain putting a damper on things on wall treat moody's maybe about to downgrade spanish banks, dow, s, nasdaq all trading lower and bloomberg trading to the down side. busy day at facebook employees spending their last hours as when they are working for a privately traded company the shares will price tonight they start trading on the nasdaq tomorrow what is shaping up to be the second largest ipo in u.s. history. live at the new york stock exchange, i'm jane king. >>> 6 48. >> let's turn things over to mike still -- still cloudy but without the drizzle we had morning. >> exactly drier air starting to move in more sunshine today. good morning. from vollmer peak looking back at mount diablo some of the clouds, less prevalent and dominating than yesterday this time. high clouds the signal that the new air mass is coming in riding over mount diablo this morning. if you step out now, lower to middle 50s consistent with the cloud cover same around the monterey bay. sunny, breezy everywhere this afternoon partly cloudy, cooler tonight and warmer afternoons are coming everywhere this weekend

. >> bath salts can cause ha lo s hallucinations and extreme paranoia. john moodynows the dangers all too well. his son, 29-year-old jared, bought them near the gas station near his missouri home. jared committed suicide. his father got to the hospital just in time to say goodbye. >> about ten minutes later, his heart started to go and in 15 minutes he was gone. >> reporter: what did the people selling bath salts have to say? i went back to that new york head shop. do you know how dangerous this stuff is? >> they're bath salts. >> reporter: bath salts. and what are bath salts used for? >> for the bath. >> reporter: for the bath. but you tell people to snort this stuff. >> some people do that, yeah. >> reporter: also on hidden camera, we met andrew freeman of minneapolis, minnesota who is manufacturing and distributing his own brand of bath salts called bliss. >> is this your unique group? >> freeman thought he was meeting with a potential investor, but he was really speaking with a "dateline" producer. >> how do you know what to brew it with? >> i've been around lo

of how what we are talking about matters on the ground, so when we look for example at moody's downgrading the bank si want to know specifically what does the downgrade of those banks in spain and italy mean for those nations? what should those nations now be thinking about and what does it mean for us who, ourself, experienced a downgrade recently. >> what will happen in the states is somebody in utah who is a state that exports the most to europe. folks in europe are downgraded and, and they cannot buy as much, so when we talk about in 2012 how it affects us, states are going to go down, and certain states and not across the board. certain states more than others, but we will see a tangible effect across the pond. >> and there is another lesson to step back. why should we, and i felt that the nation we did instead of a dow jones index we did a doug jones index, and look at it through the prism of people. spain has youth unemployment of 50%, and inflation is -- and my point is that let me draw a lesson i think for 2012 for president obama if i could. i think that the lesson is that he wisely resiste

going out for growth means how do you finance it and that could have other triggers like the s&p or moody'sand just the market might freak out. >> okay. thank you very much. we have to leave it here. james stays with us. make sure that you tune in on monday because cnbc will be live in athens bringing you all of the latest from the greek capital on those elections. and speaking of elections in london here, the ballots are closed now and the vote is being counted on the mayoral elections across the uk. citizens also voting on their local council elects. but how is the ruling coalition expected to fair? julia chatter sly has the lates. >> thanks very much. it looks like a tough day for the conservative party. not unexpected seeing that weakening for the current government at this midway point particularly given the austerity measures that they're having to every ple chimplement. and bear in mind only 30% actually go to polls and analysts saying they don't expect that the result today will impact current economic policy. for now we do a wait the votes on the london elections. conservatives ver

and late today moody's cut the credit ratings of 16 spanish banks. the dow shed 156 points. the nasdaq dropped 60. the s&p 500 fell 20. >> tom: business in the mid- atlantic states shrank this month. the philadelphia federal reserve's manufacturing index fell into negative territory for the first time in eight months. >> tom: wal-mart's return to it's low price roots helped it ring up big earnings gains in the first quarter. the world's largest retailer earned $3.7 billion. that's a $1.09 a share, which was much better than expected. as erika miller reports, it's a sign the company's turnaround is working. >> reporter: when you think of wal-mart, you probably think of every day low prices. the company made the smart decision to re-emphasize that promise, boosting sales and traffic. the retailer also added more items to its shelves. >> "typically, they've run about 75,000 s.k.u.'s in a store. at some point they had scaled back on that. but now they've brought that number back up, and that's sort of another reason their sales have come back a bit." >> reporter: sales rose nearly 6% at wal-mart's u.s. stor