phil lebeau "nighlty business re chicago. >>> and from cars to trains now. union pacific, the largest u.s. rail posted first quarter profits and sales below analyst estimates the compy sited congestion at ports and weak coal demand and shares were lower by 2% as a result. and while union pacific and other rails come under pressure it is a different story for another transportation sector trucks. morgan brennan has more. >> trains versus trucks. on the the tale of two stories of transports. as oil is weak growth is transitioning to trucking's bread and butter. this is playing out in earnings. >> railings are strucking to put mid single-digit enk together and a big beneficiary of cheap diesel fult is posting phenomenal earnings growth. >> due to large demand and rising earning cost. union pacific reporting this morning. until now they had rock solid results but the first quarter missed analyst estimates with volume at 22%. saver kansas city southern had lower guidance. and as fuel costs fall. other companies have all beat on earnings posting big year over year

phil lebeau has the best and worst airlines. >> flying frustration. travelers in the u.s. are getting squeezed by cramped planes and more delays. and they don't like it. >> the experience isn't always great because they keep putting more and more seating in there. and then some of the airlines charge you for a seat with more leg room. >> i think the prices favor the airlines that doesn't really favor the passenger, the quality, it really doesn't favor the passenger. >> airlines did worse in all four areas measured by the study. including on time ai'vals, mishandled bags and customer complaints. why? since merging a few years back airlines have packed more seats into fewer planes. while charging passengers for services that used to be free. like changing a ti. this year, for the third straight year virgin america ranked as the top airline, followed by hawaiian delta, jet blue and alaska. at the bottom were regional carriers envoy, express jet and skywest. right behind united and frontier. don't expect this study to dramatically change how airlines operate. they're profitabl

phil lebeau is live in chicago with details. phil? >> mandy this is a new study from j.d. power, and it shows us what we want when it comes to connectivity and technology in a vehicle, and it might surprise a few people. the latest study from j.d. power shows that when it comes to the latest most preferred technology in a vehicle, consumers want safety, not connectivity. connectivity rates much lower on the list. car buyers are willing, however, to spend for the technology between $2,000 and $3,500 if they find that technology is going to help them behind the wheel. what are the most desired auto tech features? blind spot detection as well as prevention. we're already seeing that on a number of vehicles. night vision collision mitigation and avoidance systems well camera and rear-view mirror systems. think about it all of these are basically out there in the market already and we've seen them in other cars so we're comfortable with them already. by comparison the study found just 19% of those studied or surveyed i should point out, 5,300 people surveyed only 19% want auton

phil lebeau covering tesla today. let's get to the cme group in chicago with the dow up 43.ndeed, today we had rebecca corbin on and the theme there, of course, is getting ready for earnings season, alcoa up the first this afternoon. much of her survey had lots of information that moved in a lot of different directions but one area that didn't move in a different direction that is, of course, when her respondents, investors globally, see the first fed tightening. whether st. loueves liesman or rebecca corbin's survey, everybody is focusing on the same period, september, fall of this year. why? because the fed's pretty much driven us to that location. but here's the thing. i am sure that the fed wants everything to work out well. we all want everything to work out well. we'll learn in the minutes how much debate was going on behind the scenes, exactly as to how the weels wheels on the goal post will be used in the future and if the tightening/end of accommodation to the current level is going to change in the here and now. the important part to realize is, if you listen to fe

our own phil lebeau got behind the wheel to find out just how dangerous it is.u to see the full video next on "power lunch." important person in your business could be a software developer. so, how's the app coming? we've got to make something great. how's the app coming? we've got to do it fast. let's do this on bluemix. you can build apps with analytics, big data, even ibm watson. that could give us the edge. let's do this on bluemix. it can provide code for you. we could be first to market. because being best is priority one. being first is priority one. there's a new way to work and it's made with ibm. (trader vo) watching. waiting. for that moment, when right place meets right time. and when i find it, i go for it. (announcer vo) at scottrade, we share your passion for trading. that's why we give you the edge, with innovative charting and trading features, plus powerful mobile apps. and now, get up to a two-thousand-dollar cash bonus when you roll over your 401k or ira accounts. details at scottrade.com/retire. >> toted millions of americans are text and dr

phil lebeau in chicago with the details. good morning, phil. >> hey, carl.th we get from the department of transportation a report card on how the airlines did, going back over a couple months. we're looking at february from the d.o.t. and for the month of february 72% of the flights on time. we had a series of snowstorms particularly in the northeast that were creating a lot of travel problems. the top three airlines in terms of on flying or on time flights, alaska at 85%, followed by hawaiian at 82% and delta at 78%. the bottom three when it comes to on time arrival, the old american eagle, frontier airlines and jetblue at 59.7%. i'm not surprised by the jetblue given the fact that their hub in boston was hit hard in february by a number of storms. there were five flights that sat on the tarmac more than four hours in the month of february and five other flights that sat on the tarmac for at least three hours in the month of february and again, all of these were related to storms somewhere keeping those aircraft from taking off and, therefore, parking them

phil lebeau, i'll take it from there, great interview. under pressure by about .33%. as the overall markets have been climbing back into positive territory, they've been weaker on the day. dow down 121 at the lowest. nasdaq down about 1% as well. we did get a weaker-than-expected consumer confidence number. but case shiller for february came in a touch higher than expected. shares of merck rallying after earnings topped expectations, first quarter profit did fall 44%, but merck is still one of the biggest gainers this morning. up by about 5%, carl. quite a move. given all the other earnings names we've seen in the parade. >> best day for merck since january, believe it or not. ton of great names joining us here on "squawk alley." on tap for the next hour, former yahoo president, sue decker, the co-founder of linkedin, reed hoffman and the ceo of t-mobile, john ledger, dow recaptured gains. ♪ if you're looking for a car that drives you... ...and takes the wheel right from your very hands... ...this isn't that car. the first and only car wi

phil lebeau is live in chicago with details. >> right now the gm conference call is going on.here the company is positioned. she is adamant although these numbers may have disappointed, those on wall street like where the company is positioned. let's go through the numbers for the first quarter. it was a miss on both top and bottom line. bottom line coming in 86 cents a share. street expecting 97 cents. as far as revenue, later than expected by almost $2 billion. coming in at $35.7 billion. what was behind the earnings miss? there was a currency impact with the brazilian real. that is above 9 cents out of the miss attributed this morning and higher than expected adjusted tax rate. a number of analysts were expecting tax rate to come in at 24%. it came in at 28%. there were positives in the first quarter for general motors when you get past the top and bottom line. first of all, north american profit of $2.2 billion. the strongest first quarter ever for general motors since it went public again in 2010. china profit of $500 million continues to outpace sales in that country whi

phil lebeau is covering it all for us from chicago. >> last week when boeing reported earnings a lot of focus on the cash flow for the company. while it may have disappointed on earnings day, the rest of this year the company is keeping with its guidance. today at the annual meeting, most of the material was what we expected to be covered in terms of jim mcnerney ceo, giving an outlook for the future and very optimistic about the outlook. there have been some investors who have questioned what's going to happen with boeing charleston. will the machinists unionize there? they pulled having a vote last year because they wouldn't have enough support to get it ratified. after the meeting today, i talked with jim mcnerney about his expectation for when the machinists might vote again or might have an initial vote in charleston. >> they didn't think they had the numbers evidently this time. we don't think they will anytime soon. but they will keep trying. we assume they will keep trying. so this probably will not be the last petition. >> and as you take a look at shares of boeing over the

phil lebeau in chicago. news from tesla. >> tyler, they're upgrading the base level entry level model s. i say entry level even though it's priced at $75,000. here's what's happening with the model s. the 60 kilowatt battery pack that's go away. it's being replaced by 70 kilowatt battery pack version. they're going to call this the model s 70d. it has greater range, greater horsepower. it will be all wheel drive but it will not have the insane mode, and the price jumps up about $5,000 to $75,000. when you are looking at the model s price range, keep in mind the average model s sells for about $93,000, but this is the starting price. there you see the 70d and $75,000. the 85d at $86,200. the p85d with the insane mode that's the most performance version, that starts at just over $106,000. why is tesla doing this? clearly there's more competition when you are looking at the luxury car market. particularly in the $60,000 to $90,000 range. there's been a number of entries there. tesla believes that this new 70d v

phil lebeau, just how hot are car sales? >> fantastic. the business has never been better. back to five six years ago, people were saying this is a bad industry to be in. right now it's at record profits. in fact, the latest numbers from the national auto dealers association shows 2014 profits for the average dealership net, before taxes, was more than $1 million. the profit margin unchanged at 2.2%. but when you look at where the dealerships make their money, it's easy to see why last year was probably a pretty good one for most dealerships. most dealerships make half of their profits, i should point out, not revenue, in the service bays. the finance and insurance industry is worth 20% and new cars and used cars those sales bring in 15% of the profits. and the used car market has really started to heat up. we don't talk about the used car market a whole lot, but last year more than 41 million used vehicles were sold. the average used price, over $18,000. almost $19,000, and what we're showing you is a mannheim used car auction. those are dealers or their representatives bi

phil lebeau is live in chicago with details. phil? >> mandy, this is a new study from j.d. we want when it comes to connectivity and technology in a vehicle, and it might surprise a few people. the latest study from j.d. power shows that when it comes to the latest most preferred technology in a vehicle, consumers want safety, not connectivity. connectivity rates much lower on the list. car buyers are willing, however, to spend for the technology between $2,000 and $3,500 if they find that technology is going to help them behind the

fill -- phil lebeau what happened?e has been asked to rule whether general motors keeps its shield that was given as part of the bankruptcy plan. that's the shield that was put in place as part of bailout for general motors. a federal judge has ruled today that gm is entitled to that shield. which essentially means that anybody who had a loved one or was involved in an accident involving a defective ignition switch before general motors declared bankruptcy, they're likely not going to be able to sue general motors because of that shield. as a result of this decision, this is highly anticipated, watch shares of general motors tomorrow, because people will be sitting there saying all right, at least gm can now define its exposure in terms of the defective ignition switches. accidents after the bankruptcy are still open for lawsuits. anything before bankruptcy, which is the bulk of when most of these accidents happened they're not going to be going to court. guys, back to you. >> i definitely want to talk about the stock.

phil lebeau live in chicago with details on this announcement. phil?e getting a little more with the base level model s and paying a little bit more if you enter or buy a model s at the entry level. the 60 kilowatt battery pack that's going away being replaced by what they're calling the model s 70 d, a 70 kilowatt per hour battery pack. it's going to have greater range. the range 240 miles, about 32 miles more than with the previous entry level model s, dual motor all-wheel drive, not rear wheel drive, all-wheel drive, $70,000, 5,000 more than the current entry level model s. people are saying why would tesla do this? a couple things going on here. they're offering autopilot and super charging hardware with this vehicle. the autopilot software in the latest software will be available. three new colors for the new model s. but keep in mind there will not be an insane mode. you only get that with the p-85d. a lot texting an e-mailing where's the p-85d insane mode in the entry level model. you're not going to have it. for tesla this is an important year.

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phil lebeau is live from chicago with that story. >> melissa, this is because of a ruling that came oute this afternoon from a federal bankruptcy judge. there were a number of lawyers who had filed lawsuits against general motors alleging that the company should be held liable for any ignition switch accidents, economic loss zpen accidents, that happened prior to 2009 when the company filed for bankruptcy. in bankruptcy as part of the bailout, general motors was given shields so it could not be held liable for any accidents, not just with the ignition switch, but any accidents prior to june of '09. the judge today ruled that they can be restricted or given the shield from those accidents. this limits the ignition switch accident exposure for general motors. the compensation that was set up and open to people who may have had loved ones who passed away or were injured in accidents before 2009 and after 2009. that fund closed at the end of january. so for those who were rolling the dice, melissa, who thought you know what? we think that general motors still has exposure here and should st

. >> phil lebeau with compensation numbers from gm's proxy filing. >>> coming up, shares of amazon rallying after earnings topped he is matsz. but the real headline was the full reveal of the company's cloud business. amazon's chief technology officer will break it down. amazon shares up nearly 15%. "squawk alley" will be right back. financial noise financial noise financial noise so if you get a trade idea about, say, organic food stocks, schwab can help. with a trading specialist just a tap away. what's on your mind, lisa? i'd like to talk about a trade idea. let's hear it. [ male announcer ] see how schwab can help light a way forward. so you can make your move, wherever you are. and start working on your next big idea. ♪ >>> let's bring in simon hobbs as we get you to the close in the uk and across continental europe. >> you can see a good rally, the stage was set early with some good confidence data from germany. the efo survey rising to a ten-month high. the momentum may be slowing according to jp morgan. the greek stock market is up over 3%. t

phil lebeau is at chicago's o'hare. good morning, phil. >> good morning, carl.e have the top and worst rated airlines among the 12 that are rated by wichita state university and embry riddle. at the top of the list virgin america, followed by hawaiian delta moves up to number three, rated as the most improved and jetblue at number four. converselity bottom of the list three regional envoy/american eagle as the worst, express jet, skywest and at number nine the worst rated full-service nationwide airline is united airlines. you might be saying to yourself there you go. if you had united as an investor, would your performance reflect that? no united versus virgin america over the last six months no comparison united up almost 50%, easily outperforming virgin america. back to you. >> phil thank you very much. >> i have to tell you. right now, spirit air, he's saying how could continental be that bad. we at least try. we try to be bad. we're going lowest costs from here to there. they're trying to get, he was laughing this morning, having a good belly laugh. some pe

phil lebeau live with the ceo. good morning. >> thank you sara.tech center where you basically have a grand opening taking place. this is increasingly the focus for your company, is it not? >> one of our key priorities is driving innovation. it's every part of our business. part is having a research center here in silicon valley. when we are done by the end of the year we'll have one of the largest automotive research teams here. we are staffed up about a 1/3. we added about 40 folks in areas of autonomy connected vehicles mobility, those type of things. we are excited about showing off the lab here. >> this is the future. let's talk about the present. economic numbers show the economy is slowing in some capacity. gdp, consumer confidence numbers are not that great. are you noticing any slowdown in demand for new vehicles? >> not really. we have to put the gdp numbers we saw yesterday into perspective. part of it is obviously a bit of a tough winter. those may have had an impact on the gdp numbers. consumer confidence is down. still at a very heal

phil lebeau live in chicago with us for more on the announcement. >> we're going to see quarterly salesrobably every quarter this year from tesla as they ramp up production dramatically. the news coming out on friday surprised a few people because typically, tesla releases quarterly sales announcements when they do their quarterly earnings. now the company has shifted and will announce quarterly sales numbers pretty much at the end of every quarter. 55% increase over the first quarter of 2014. the target for this year deliveries of 55,000 vehicles. that would be a dramatic increase compared to 30,000, or roughly speaking 31,000 32,000 for all of 2014. look at quarter to quarter sequentially, the increase in deliveries. keep in mind as you look at that for the first quarter of 2015 we will see a dramatic increase as they bring on the model x. the back end is where you're going to see the number of increases. model x being the biggest change. we expect some deliveries to trickle out in the third quarter, but really the fourth quarter will be the focus there. can they get china on track. t

phil lebeau thank you very much. >> never been more than four can't imagine seven. >> knock on wood phil, knock on wood. how are stocks fairing at 1:08 p.m. eastern time? the dow is hugging the flat line s&p flat, pretty much across the board where we see the most action, if you call it that, the russell 2,000 small caps down a third percent. bob is on the floor with the action. bob? >> hey, melissa. sideways action. i want to show the s&p 500 because it sure looks like people were selling the u.s. to buy europe. europe had a great day. down -- that's 1130 the low point where europe closed. we move positive, but largely sideways. germany, you see what i mean here ux here, buys europe throughout the day, the imf loan installment, we are near historic highs in germany, but everybody up 1 to 2% in europe today. oil stocks ho hum, xop, again, up, down up down all this week, the week for this. we were on the verge of breaking out on tuesday. i was very excited, and then oil couldn't get over 54 and fell apart, everything came back down again. oil has to rise more for us to get back up. i don'

phil lebeau, a glimmer of hope on the recall front for a change? we'll talk about that in a little bit. new data from the national auto dealers association showing how profitable it is to be in auto dealer now. last year the most profitable year ever for auto dealers here in the u.s. compared to with five six years ago when business was hurting then had record high revenue, brought in $806 billion, you do all of the math it works out average dealership, before taxes, posted a net profit of more than $1 million. the profit margin was flat compared to with 2013 at 2.2%. look at auto dealership stocks investors are realizing this is where money's being made. look at the returns for these publicly traded auto dealership stocks over the last year. one reason why the dealerships have done so well because of the service side of the business has been extremely busy. a lot of that is being driven by the recall work that they've done in the last year. but if you take a look at what's happened with recalls in the first quarter of this year relative will last

phil lebeau is live in california with more. >> brian, this announcement will be made by elon musk.y unit that he will unveil for reporters. at that time it will be interesting to see if we see just one unit or two units. there have been some reports that we'll see both a home battery storage unit as well as a business or small business battery storage unit. the whole idea here is that with these units, you'll be able to store power or in some cases, if you have let's say solar panels on your roof you can return electricity to the grid depending on how it's set up. all of this has to play into the giga factory which tesla is building scheduled opening in 2017. the capacity eventually will be a half million lithium ion batteries annually. many will go into battery packs for tesla and other manufacturers but also for stationary storage units. as you look at shares of tesla, keep in mind this is typically a stock that before a product announcement it tends to move it quite a bit. then after the announcement there's a bit of a sell-off. people say how soon will be see some revenue. the

steve, i see one of your picks is also alaska air, a stock we were talking about earlier on with phil lebeauwerlunch.cnbc.com and see why ed and steve say this may be a good yore for active managers and which of the stocks may do well. >>> well from conservation to new regulations, what will it take to solve california's water crisis? jane wells has been looking for answers. jane? >> reporter: mandy surf's up here in carlsbad. look at all that water off california. the problem is it's got salt in it. up next, desallination finally comes to california but it ain't cheap. we'll have that story next. >>> the city in today's powerhouse is home to the first pizzaria in america. this city has over 722 miles of subway tracks and 48 fortune 500 companies are headquartered here. can you name that city? [intercom] drivers to your marks... go! it's chaos out there. but the m-class sees in your blind spot... pulls you back into your lane... even brakes all by itself. it's almost like it couldn't crash... even if it tried. m-class. see your authorized dealer for exceptional offers through mercedes-benz f

let's get over to phil lebeau. drew this is a miss on the top and bottom line by ford. ford earning $1.4 billion. 3 cents shy of what analysts were expectsingexpecting. about $2 billion shy of what wall street was expecting. let's explain why ford believes there is a miss on the bottom lineup they say the tax rate of 34% is not what most analysts were forecasting. they say they guided analysts to expect the higher tax rate and most of those analysts came in with a tax rate at 29%. revenue coming in lighter because 70% of the miss was due to the weaker currency particularly the impact of osales over in europe. where you look at where ford lost money and made money in the future, north america continues to be the strength. really all the automakers making $1.3 billion there. they lost money in europe and south america and had improved results there. asia pacific, ford has maintained its over all guidance of making 9.5 to $9 billion this year but raising expectations going from 8% to 9% it up to 8.5% to 9.5%. finally,

phil lebeau joins us from chicago's o'hare airport with the latest details. hey, phil. >> hey, joe.ut for 25 straight years and this year the results will give the specific airlines in about an hour, but this year the overall headline is that the quality of airline service has declined yet again. basically seems like what we have is two worlds of airlines. great for investors, not good for those who are flying. all four measurements in this survey they all went down. this is the worst rating in terms of airline quality service here in the u.s. since 2008. we talk about the four measurements that make up this study. take a look at all of these and how they performed within the last year. consumer complaints up 17%. on time flights down 2%. there was a slight increase in the number of people who were denied boardings or who were bumped from flights and mishandled backmishand baggage that was up 11%. further coner foriferfirmation that this airline service is not working for those who are flying. >> they just seem to have not gotten their act together. there is a lot of consoldag and a

. >> phil lebeau, there you have it. thank you for that. are we going to talk music? artist. you don't know the live album so you do it because it is a live album. that doesn't really count. >> we are winning it so to speak. >> i knew "live at the filmore with the allman brothers." >> our executive producers have been putting this together. this is the rolling stone list. are we going to see our list? >> this kicked us off talking about this. "live at the apollo." the allman brothers. number three was johnny cash. those are significant albums. >> that's almost a cultural iconic time. i don't know if it's that good. >> it's johnny cash. >> join us tomorrow. becky will be in omaha. "squawk on the street" begins right now. >>> good thursday morning. welcome to "squawk on the street." i'm carl quintanilla with jim cramer and dave faber. jim took the red eye and premarket is seeing red as the nikkei has its worst day since january. a lot of earnings to get to. oil up 40% from its march lows and the ten-year yield creeping up to almost actually to 2.07 as jobless claims hit