how does this pick target as well as something like philip morris? >> my clients are basically retired. they live off their income. when i'm looking for individual stock i'm looking for something that can keep us in the united states in those large caps. when we're talking about people moving away into europe, outside of large u.s., i'm looking for great name here in the u.s. target has smashed when they tried to go into canada. they didn't understand the market. they had a big visa card hacking scandal. adam: right. >> right now it has great dividend. it is better than 10-year treasury. a name we all know. they're doing bang up business. along with philip morris international, i think that is what will keep money here. you're less likely to have sal you players take -- value players take money out and chase abroad. cheryl: point about target. it is up 20% so far this year. people were discounting. he is talking about target and philip morris,. what do you say about the consumer now? if we're confident they're spending and we find out they're not so

they split philip morris up. you have philip morris and mn. is the one i would invest in. people outside of america are still smoking. china may crack down on it. i think it will be a good investment. anything with smoking -- the core smoking customers in america, to your point, i think they'll continue to crack down more and more and more. and plus, i think this health consciousness movement is starting to work. i would stay outside. matt: yeah. huge dividend. pm international. amazing earnings. i would go with that as well. >> if you don't care about killing people, go for it, buddy. pm. charles: i have to get to twitter. we had a lot of tweets. micah from twitter. pld and spg. real estate investment trusts, people say, what happens to them when interest rates go up, bob? >> listen, they've been very controversial over the years with reits. years ago a lot of people were doing it. it will affect the values. they're looked upon very suspiciously now. so there's a concern the way the money should go. charles: you would avoid them? >> i stay fa

that a country trying to protect its kids from getting cancer is being sued by philip morris because it might cost them profits. so this is not only just a health issue in this case of cancer prevention, this is an issue of basic democracy. do the people of uruguay do the people of australia do the people of any country have a right to be very vigorous in protecting the health of their kids and their citizens without worrying about being sued by a cigarette manufacturer who is trying to poison these kids with deadly products? so this is not only a health issues, it is a basic democratic issue, and if philip morris wins this case, it will be sending a message to every government in the world you can't be aggressive in trying to protect your kids from cigarettes. that's one example. let me give you another example equally outrageous. mr. president, on this investor state provision a french waste management firm is suing for $110 million under the france-egypt bilateral investment treaty over changes to egypt's labor laws, including an increase in the minimum wage. now, let me be honest

. >>> the ceo of philip morris international is here. the booming business of ecigs. the second hour of "squawk box" begins right now. >>> live from the beating heart of business, new york city, this is "squawk box." >>> welcome back to "squawk box" right here on cnbc first in business worldwide. becky quick is off today. we got a market alert because there are red arrows in the u.s. equity futures at this hour in a very big way, you're looking at the dow look like it will open up 25 points and the s&p 500 off about 11 points. and all of that in part a function of the bond market. the yield on the ten-year treasury is at the highest level since december. much more on the markets coming up in a moment but, first, michelle has a run down of today's other top stories. >>> weekly jobless claims hit the tape at 8:30 a.m. eastern time and forecasters expect first-time filings of $275,000. we're also going to get march consumer credit later this afternoon. >>> in technology news a linkedin land grab. the city council denying google about 70% of

. >> reporter: christine, from the very beginning, philadelphia philip morris police were focused on excessive speed. this tells me they knew there were no problem was the tracks signals or train. that was based on inspection documents and checks the trains and tracks had gone through before the derailment. in their mind that can mean two things. reckless behavior or intentional act. both could justify criminal charges. but the ntsb is the lead investigator and it is not ready to rule out other potential factors like train performance. they held off on the arrest. the ntsb has the train engineer's phone. they also have phone records. we do know that phone calls were made and text messages were sent on the day of the incident. what they have not nailed down is whether the calls and texts were sent while he was operating the train. investigators are now matching the time stamps from the engineer's cell phone records with multiple data sources like the train's recorder and outward facing video from the train, recorded radio communications and surveillance video. lastly we also learned b

one of the most egregious examples is philip morris. now, i kind of take this personally. as long as i have been around congress, in the house and the senate i've had a battle with tobacco companies. it happens to be the only product which when used according to manufacturers directions will kill you and can still be sold legally. so i don't happen to think tobacco companies are in the best interests of public health for america or any other country. about 26 years ago i passed a law banning smoking on airplanes. it's the first time tobacco companies had ever lost. i passed it in the house. my good friend, the late frank lautenberg of new jersey passed it over here. it's the law of the land. for over 25 years nobody smokes on your airplane. tobacco companies the fought us every single step of the way. philip morris, one of the largest tobacco producers in the world, is aggressively challenging domestic tobacco laws around the world using the same investor state dispute settlement that is going to be included in this agreement. in australia example after the highest court r

the dream is to sell a business to philip morris for $100 million, you know.never have to work again. casey jones, come here. both my parents are entrepreneurs, you know, feel like it runs in my family. this is college for me. this is me learning. it was like working in here. brian and caitlin were showing confidence in me, something to have people believe in you and as soon as that happened just like a switch flipped for me. they are no different from me, you know. brian didn't finish his degree in college and he's out here just doing it. it's about how bad you want it. >> does it smell like weed yet? >> oh, my gosh. >> hi, momma. >> my parents are coming today. my mother has never seen weed. my mom's going to [ bleep ] herself. >> this is ally, her mom brenda. this is steve. >> nice to meet you. >> nice to meet you as well. >> this is pretty crazy. >> this is weed. >> i've seen it before. >> oh, you have. i was under the assumption you've never seen it. >> we have all of our buds here. if you open them up and smell them, they are all different. they are all

the dream is to sell a business to philip morris for $100 million, you know.e to work again. casey jones, come here. both my parents are entrepreneurs, you know, feel like it runs in my family. this is college for me. this is me learning. it was like working in here. brian and caitlin were showing confidence in me, something to have people believe in you and as soon as that happened just like a switch flipped for me. they are no different from me, you know. brian didn't finish his degree in college and he's out here just doing it. it's about how bad you want it. >> does it smell like weed yet? >> oh, my gosh. >> hi, momma. >> my parents are coming today. my mother has never seen weed. my mom's going to [ bleep ] herself. >> this is ally, her mom brenda. this is steve. >> nice to meet you. >> nice to meet you as well. >> this is pretty crazy. >> this is weed. >> i've seen it before. >> oh, you have. i was under the assumption you've never seen it. >> we have all of our buds here. if you open them up and smell them, they are all different. they are all very diff

al: but philip morris is going to court in australia and uruguay to overturn anti-smoking provisions.n't want to encourage that. penny: we are not trying to encourage changing in regulations. there's nothing in this that would change american regulations. al: why couldn't someone come and bring a similar case against our anti-smoking provisions? secretary prtizker: because you are not going to face a different set of laws or rules. what you are going to face is it -- is a fair legal process in investor state dispute resolution. i'm not suggesting it is better than american courts. i'm suggesting it is important that both american and foreign companies get a fair hearing. with the appropriate laws in place. the track record does not suggest any of our laws are at threat. al: final question. they say even -- this president is fine. we know he is not going to engage in those activities. let's say in two years there is a president cruz, and he negotiated deal with the europeans to make it easier to go to this tribunal and overturn something like that. why not just get rid of the provision

for example, togo, australia uruguay are all being sued by tobacco companies, philip morris the leading one to prevent them from introducing health warnings on the cigarette packet. amy: that we have in the united states on our own cigarette packages. julian: yes. and it's not an even playing field. let's say, ok, well, we're going to make it easier for companies to sue the government , maybe, that's right, maybe the government is too powerful and companies should have a right to sue the government in various circumstances. but it's only multinational that is get this right. u.s. companies operating purely in the u.s. in relation to investment that is happen in the u.s. will not have this right, whereas large companies that are multinationals, that have registrations overseas, can structure things such that they're taking investments in the u.s. and that then gives them the right to sue the government over it. now, it's not so easy to get up these cases and win them. however, the chilling effect, the concern that there might be such a case is severe. each one of these cases on average g

. >> hunt: but philip morris is going to court in australia and uruguay to try to overturn anti-smoking provisions packaging provisions. that's not the thing we want to encourage. >> we're not trying to change regulation. there's nothing in this process that will change american laws or regulation. >> hunt: but why couldn't someone bring a similar case against one of our anti-smoking provisions and say -- >> because you're not going to face a different set of laws or rules. what you're going to face is a fair legal process in the investor state dispute resolution. >> hunt: and better that kind of court than american courts? >> i'm not suggesting it's better than an american court. i'm suggesting it's important both american and foreign companies get a fair hearing with the law -- appropriate laws in place. i don't see -- the track record does not suggest any of our laws or regulations are a threat. >> hunt: final questio on this. what warren and others say seven dodd-frank could be a threat. this president, they say we know he won't engage in the activities we don't like, but let's say

that a country trying to protect its kids from getting cancer is being sued by philip morris because it might cost them profits. so this is not only just a health issue in this case of cancer prevention, this is an issue of basic democracy. do the people of uruguay do the people of australia do the people of any country have a right to be very vigorous in protecting the health of their kids and their citizens without worrying about being sued by a cigarette manufacturer who is trying to poison these kids with deadly products? so this is not only a health issues, it is a basic democratic issue, and if philip morris wins this case, it will be sending a message to every government in the world you can't be aggressive in trying to protect your kids from cigarettes. that's one example. let me give you another example equally outrageous. mr. president, on this investor state provision a french waste management firm is suing for $110 million under the france-egypt bilateral investment treaty over changes to egypt's labor laws, including an increase in the minimum wage. now, let me be honest

philip morris hong kong entity bought shares in philip morris' australian entity 10 months after australia announced plain packaging rules. it seems philip morris did this for no other purpose than to gain access to the isds provision in the hong kong-australia bilateral investment treaty. isds is just another arrow in the quiver of legal options available to multinational corporations and no other entity or person. the consequences for public health safety, and the environment far outweigh any real or imagined benefit of isds. and for these reasons i oppose fast-track and any trade agreement that contains an isds provision. thank you madam president. i yield the floor. i suggest the absence of a quorum is. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: mr. wyden: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from oregon. mr. wyden: i ask unanimous consent to vacate the quorum call. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. wyden: madam president i talked a little bit this morning about this whole issue and a very serious issue it is, of cur