nat gas moving smartly and sharon epperson has the details. >> reporter: hi, sue. the heat is on and seeing that in the natural gas market and surged as much as 6% intraday on weather forecasts for two weeks. what does it mean? greater cooler demand and probably injections or additions to storage levels that will be less than expected. and so we are seeing prices that have hit the highest level we have seen for the month of june. key level next is $2.76. some traders say will we see the high we saw of this session first? but the fact remans there's plenty of natural gas out there, quite a lot, in fact. and we got to get past that $2.76 level to stop the down trend for natural gas. >>> microsoft has an unveiling tonight and says you can't afford to miss it. rumors are swirling. lots of talk. what are the facts? john forte is chasing down the rumors. what do we know, john? >> reporter: we don't know much, tyler. we know barnes & noble isn't part of it. probably not an ereader. last week a source said it was a developer eccentric event. another told me it's not. we wo

so sharon epperson is tracking the action for us at the nymex on that front. . >> hi, sue. we have a little bit of a rally going on here in the gold market going into the close. but we're off of the highs of the session by about $10 or so. right now trading at $1634. what traders are talking about really is bernanke. everybody's waiting to hear what he will say in this congressional testimony tomorrow. but they're also looking at the situation that we're seeing in europe and here in the u.s. and particularly after that nonfarm payroll down and rally ensued something has to be done. that's what the anticipation is, whether or not that plays out. that's why we're seeing a rally not only in gold today, but in silver. silver actually posting the biggest one-day gain we've seen in percentage terms in about five months time. big gains there. copper having its best day in two months as well. a lot of anticipation for bernanke. we'll see what happens. >> we'll see whether or not they're disappointed or not. he tends to play it close to the vest sometimes. thanks, sharo

here to put us to the test, sharon epperson. >> hello! >> hi.owing money away when we could be investing it wisely, right? >> we decided to take a look at things women buy all the time and decide whether or not it would have been better to buy stock in the company and held it for three years or kept the stuff in the closet. a lot of times we want to figure out, is it better to have bought something i know? that's what we tried to pick. we looked at prices from 2009 to last friday. now, that's past performance so it doesn't mean it will go that way. full disclosure, i don't own any individual stock so this is all the past. >> nothing to do with the future. this is the past. >> let's start with stuff. >> starbucks. >> wait a second! >> i didn't tell you how many. $100 worth of grandes or a month's worth of stuff. should you get the stuff or the stock? >> i know what i will say before you say. you go. >> i love the guy that owns starbucks. i would say stock. >> i would say stuff. >> you're looking at the leadership and you are right to look at the

. >> here with your guide is cnbc's personal correspondent sharon epperson.ere. >> can anyone get one of these parties together and make some money? >> anyone can get one of these parties started. this is an $8 billion industry. throwing these inhome parties. everybody wants to get a side hustle, they want to socialize and release some financial stress. whether it's paying for a vacation or bringing in extra cash for the household or something for themselves. >> there is a start-up cost. >> there is a difference between hosting the party. people think if i throw the party i'm going to make the money. you get discounts and half-priced items. if you become an independent business consultant, a stylist, advisor, that's where you make the money. >> let's start with the abcs. i have money in the bank and want to invite friends over and sell jewelry. what is the way to do it? >> first thing you should do is make sure it's a member of the direct sellers association. make sure you're in a company that's reputable. this is stella and dot. they are terrific. a lot of m

back to you, david. >> thanks very much, sharon epperson.ne name that we haven't mentioned and used to quite often, we talk about j.c. penney, the year anniversary of at least the announcement of ron johnson coming on. take a look at netflix. they had seen a rally in the early part of the year, you can see what's happened since. you go back about a year, you were talking about a stock over $300 a share, but those are right near new lows. it's fallen to below $4 billion. it's add to do a lot of value that create content. hey, you know what? we want you to buy "the good wife". >> or "matlock." that's available. >> they can say, here you go, here's your check. advisory, the question is ned flicks content contest, at a rapid enough rate, can they keep doing it? but that stock has given up all the gains and more, on the very strong first quarter. >> interesting. meantime viacom has issues, the ratings of dora the explorer. >> felipe duped was on "squawk box" earlier, talking a bit about that. >> nickelodeon, and just needing to refresh content an

let's get to sharon epperson. she's at the miami mention. >> crb index is higher on the session. lot had to do with the currency play. add to that, many traders on the floor are saying that central banks have to do something. and so that is what their anticipation is for more stimulus and why we perhaps are seeing this move here, particularly in metals, bill. we're going to be waiting, as is everyone, to see what bernanke has to say. back to you. >> lululemon, a trendy athletic line, let's talk about it in today's talking numbers. my dear friend enice and kimberly greenberg. do you like the chart on lululemon? >> if we look at the one-year chart, $64 is a very important level. and then acted as it rallied at the beginning of this year. >> let's remember, this rally has occurred when the market overall has been going lower. >> the second chart is going to show you what we're talking about. this is year to date. what is really interesting is recently you see lululemon make a high or low even after the jobs reports numbers. that shows me that buyers are getting more aggressive. >> y

, financial editor and author of "money rules" david bach, author of "debt free for life" and sharon eppersoncnbc's personal -- feeling so frisky of a the wedding. >> a shout out, parents night for you guys. >> let's get started with a skype question. this one coming from dawn who lives in maryland. dawn, good morning and what's your question? >> good morning. i'm actually a single mom in a relationship with a wonderful man. i have two kids in college and he has one in middle school and one in high school. we have begun talks of the m word. i'm wondering what you can recommend for pooling finances in second marriages. >> when you start talking about m words in marriage, dawn, congratulations, i'm sure he's a fantastic guy. you have to start talking about a prenup, which i know is not what you want to hear. you're coming to this relationship with kids, you're coming with kids, he's coming with kids, you have assets. it's going to guide how you handle the rest of your financial life. i am personally a fan of yours, mine, and ours accounts. that's how my husband and i do it and we are on our sec

tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 >>> i'm sharon epperson here at the nymex and looking at oil prices that settled at the lowest closing price that we have in eight months' time. keep in mind we did see a low below $82 a barrel on friday but that was intraday. this is the lowest settlement day here for crude oil below $83 since october of last year. now, of course, there have been some investment banks saying now's the time to go long commodities. goldman sachs mentioning the september contract for wti by technically speaking, other analysts say the corrective rally so' in oil is short lived and they're looking to sell the rallies over the short term. keeping your eye on technical levels around the $80 mark. some analysts are saying. continuing to watch, of course, what happens with the fine product, as well. not a great downdraft there with refinery problems, particularly in port arthur, texas. back to you. >> thank you so much. >>> meantime, let's get to julia boorstin. a big move in zinga stocks. when's doing it? >> down 6.5% earlier today and now 6%. two factors. comp store sales numbers revea

let's bring in dan dicker, president of merck black and our own sharon epperson. you know, it is kind of interesting. we're moving in to the peak travel season and yet trending downwards in terms of gasoline. will that continue to be the case? and is it helping at all in terms of consumer or not yet? >> well, first of all, i think that we are going to see a little bit lower prices but what i don't expect to see is an at least as good a drop in prices as 2011 and 2010. that's the first thing. i think that prices, in fact, are getting close to what's the summertime low for the year and that's the first question you got to take care of. second one is how much does it help? it's not helped enough. what we'd like to see is what we saw 11 months ago, 9 months ago with national prices around $2.50. we haven't had the same jolt as the went we are a very warm winter, very low heating oil prices. that spurred a great rally in the stock market. >> come on, dan. you got -- $3.50 a gallon a year ago with inflation. natural gas decline you referenced, the heating bills went dow

sharon epperson is tracking the rally. >> it's biggest rally of many commodities and metals and goldces on a tear today, up over 50 bucks settling here above $1,600 an ounce. keep in mind, of course, a lot of reaction to the deal in the eu and the fact that we're also seeing the end of the quarter and a pretty bad quarter, actually, for many commodities, as well. might be position squaring, as well, going on here. we are looking at silver up 5%. copper up over 5%. palladium and platinum up, as well. gold is set to be down significantly in the quarter. we have also seen a bit of a loss here in the holdings in the gld. it is down slightly, down about .5 or so after having gained 32 tons over the previous 3 months and looking at what we have seen of liquidation in the gold market, sue, but right now there is a rally on and depends on china news over the weekend. traders say whether the rally is maintained. back to you. >> thanks so much. >>> now to brian shactman. >> every single major s&p sector to the upside. con ed is weakeren that the overall sector, basically we have a heat wave in

sharon epperson will give us the commodities impact in just a moment. >>> the storm is a minimal tropicalnow, not moving very much. it could be the northeastern gulf for a while yet. a look at the stats here, now moving to the noest at 5 miles an hour. we have that circulation largely devoid of -- about 30% of the oil platforms have been evacuated. we've seen incredibly heavy rain, 10 inches in tampa, around tallahassee and farther south, there are water rescues ongoing because of the rain there. that will be an ongoing threat. the system is only very slowly going to come into florida. more heavy rain and potential for severe weather over the next couple days. >> now, let's see why concerns about debby are driving natural gas higher. for that we turns to sharon at the nymex. what they care about is how much production can be shut in. about 35% of natural gas production has been shut in. that's up about 12% from just a day ago. so that is something that has fueled this rice in natural gas futures, as well as above-normal temperatures for the next 6 to 10 days or so. in terms of what we're

sharon epperson tracking the action at the nymex. when's the latest on gold?ing like we'll close up about eight bucks or above. just above the 1625 level and seeing the traders around me very cautious here ahead of the greek elections in terms of their trade. we have seen some sideways trading in the last week or so but keep in mind that if we do see gold as a beneficiary of any conditional increase in monetary easing that could be a likely outcome of next week fomc meeting. again, also, the political climate in greece leads me to believe that gold will still be the safe haven play. we'll continue to watch what happens to gold versus silver and gold-silver ratio rally this week and underscores the global economic concerns and the weak economic data impacted silver negatively and gold outperformed and in the week ahead, keep your eye on the currency markets for direction in gold prices because further weakness in the dollar to help lift gold and further past month or so we have been in the range between 1525 and 1640 for gold and really it will depend even more

sharon epperson is tracking the action at the nymex.n today. >> mass liquidation of the long positions. it looks like the gold bulls really buckled here after the bernanke testimony really failed to offer any new insights on stimulus. really begs the question of what market participants were waiting to hear because really the fed chairman said basically what he's said all along. no one really thought he was going to stick his neck out and make any major comments on stimulus. the fact remains that what took us above that 1600 level back on friday, the weak jobs data, had given some of the bulls a reason to think that maybe something would happen, it didn't happen. and look what happened to copper as well. we are looking at that rally completely wiped out. remember the last time, sue, china cut its interest rates like this. that was back in 2008 in the midst of the crisis. doesn't say a lot of positive stuff about global industrial demand or the state of the chinese economy. so perhaps that's why that rally fizzled quite fast. >> i think

we have sharon epperson at the nymex. >> looking forward to thursday meeting.ay's action really was all about what happened in europe or what has not happened yet. still the great deal -- a great deal of uncertainty. pressure on the euro and causing the dollar to rally and commodities to fall. particularly oil prices and oil prices continue to take a beating here in electron wrik trading, falling below $82 a barrel. we are now poised to test last week's low. that was $81.21. from there, the bears say there is a clearget at $74.95 a barrel. that's what the bears there are saying that we could see oil prices fall to. particularly if we don't get any better resolution of what happen was greece with the elections over the weekend. and if we continue to see something negative come out of opec. back to you. >> sharon, thank you. the stock market is fading or has been in the final hour here. coming off if lows now. technology adding to the pressure. apple giving up earlier gains. bailout in spain had a short shelf life for investors. it lasted at least a half hour. bu

our sharon epperson has the final trades on the nymex.ood day for oil today. >> it was a good day for oil. oil finished up above $85 a barrel. but still off of the highs of this session. we saw much bigger gain in the brent crude market with prices there above $100 a barrel. and we're going to be looking ahead to what happens with the inventories for natural gas because we're going to get those in tomorrow's session. we saw natural gas today break a two-day rally. we'll get to see whether or not we still see pressure on nat gas prices once the inventory reports come out. back to you. >> sharon, thank you so much. >> all right, loyal viewer, you know one of the recuring themes on this fine program has been that of hopium. the idea that as the world's problems grow it could benefit america because foreign capital will come to the states looking for what it views as a safer investment. your next guest is seeing just that. one of new york city's largest commercial real estate brokages, maybe the largest and he's seen double in foreign investm

let's get to sharon epperson for the latest. >> simon, we're seeing a very light volume day here in theold market with the london metals exchange closed for the diamond jubilee. we are looking at gold prices right now before the close appear to have pulled back a bit after the tremendous rally on friday. up more than $60 on the session. and the biggest one-day gain since august of 2011. keep in mind this week there are a lot of things traders are waiting to hear from. and of course the ecb meeting on wednesday one of those factors. the other important factor will be what bernanke has to say in his testimony on thursday. and whether there's any hint of quantitative easing is what every goal trader is listening for. what the big play seems to be recently is taking another look at the gold mining stocks. if you look at what's happened over the last year and a half or so, gold prices have significantly outperformed the gold miners. but that's changed in the last couple of weeks. and traders say when you look at falling commodity prices, of course oil prices have fallen so dramatically. and

sharon epperson. >> this is the third session in a row food prices have closed bell on that $80 mark.bal growth, permeating this market. we do know that the eu is affirming the running oil ban that will take place july 1. some people say that's why it is not at session lows. we heard from the federal government 44% of oil production in the gulf of mexico is shut in due to tropical storm debby. it is weakening but having some impact. still looking at oil prices that have seen probably the worst quarter. we are on track important worst quarter we have seen for oil prices since december of 2008. we are looking at a number of firms lowering their oil price forecast and jpmorgan was among them. lowering their forecast to 106 for the brent contract. then finally take a look at what's happened in terms of what we are seeing in the natural gas market. natural gas popped as we did see shut-in there 35%. up natural gas production shut in the gulf of mexico. that's created a pop in natural gas that's heavily short market. and the biggest pop in the energy market surprisingly is in gasoline futur

i'm sharon epperson on the floor of the nymex, where oil prices are extremely weak this morning. we are seeing brent crude prices at the lowest levels in 16 months. a lot of the weakness has not only to do with europe, but weakening fundamentals as well as trader and analysts are analyzing what is happening in terms of the supply levels and demand levels particularly of the north sea crude. we now know that the opt temple over greece has faded and spain, we're seeing weakness, but add to that we are still waiting to see what comes up, the meetings held in moscow today and tomorrow between the western nations over the nuclear perhaps, softening iranian tensions, that is why morgan stanley says they believe we're seeing this correction. if brent crude does fall, they say expect opec to start cutting back on some production. in terms of the metals market, we are seeing gold under pressure as well, but not as low as it has been. keep in mind we still have not only spain, syria, egypt, the list goes on of problems around the world. that may help to support gold praises. >> thank you v

let's go to sharon epperson. every time i see oil pick up, it's been great for the stock market. head, sharon. >> we're watching developments in europe, jim, and we're seeing sideways trading this morning. we have basically flat prices for u.s. oil prices, brent prices slightly higher. but there are many factors for the oil market to watch in addition to the greek elections. we do have those talks in moscow on monday and tuesday, overrun nuclear programs. and even though not much came out of the last round of talks, they are waiting for those sanctions to begin on july 1st. so there's still definite lay reason to be bullish oil prices at this moment. we're keeping our eyes on the metals and we have seen a lift in gold and silver. some traders on the floor talking about the fact that we are likely to see some type of stimulus at some point and that is supportive of the precious metals. in terms of natural gas, we were talking about it earlier, that tremendous spike we saw in thursday's session of 14%. but the fact remains, there is plenty of natural gas out there and the government

sharon epperson at the nye an ex. >>> down 27 on the dow.e. bob pisani has more. >> remember, when we used to get a real bounce on these weekend euro bailouts. remember what happened in december? >> for days, possibly. >> for more than a month. we were up 80 points right at the open. look at the dow. it's really been straight down, really. as simon mentioned, a slight pop here. really, that's not the direction. we're clearly moving to the downside in all your major sectors. particularly material stocks. industrial stocks. the stocks that are involved in the global economy. all turned negative very, very early on. so materials and energy and industrials within the first 20 minutes, they went negative. you can see remain to the downside. a lot of comments this morning about the political ramifications of the spanish bailout. let's call it that. in fact, there apparently was not a lot of strings attached. perhaps no austerity. no imf program. that may be a little controversial. he may or may not have been level with the spanish people about thi

let's go to sharon epperson at the nymex. >> what's new is with the lows of the seg right now.is much of what you've talked about this morning in terms of the negative sentiment on global global growth weighing on oil prices. add to that the fact that some big banks are lowering their forecast for oil prices for this year and for next. and jpmorgan among them lowering their forecast by about 13 bucks to $106 for the brent contract. also the supply/demand picture is changing a bit. chinese demand actually weakening, at the weakness level that we've seen basically since the first quarter of 2009. opec continues its production growth above that 31 million barrel per day mark. that's been a consistent production level for the past seven months or so. we have plenty of oil coming out of the opec region. keep in mind, we're also watching what is happening in the gulf of mexico with tropical storm debby. and the oil markets seem to have shrugged this off. but the fact that 23% of oil production in the gulf and nearly 23% of natural gas production in the gulf has already been shut in d

in the meantime, a look at sharon epperson and what is going on, sharon? >> oil prices are rallying. we got that bounce after china unexpectedly cut its interest rates. this is is something that is showing we are in a correction phase but not necessarily a reversal from the lows that we saw a week ago. keep in mind, the wti contract rallied above $87 a barrel and brent is above 102. we've we're also watching some of the dubbish tone from the ecb and fed officials being supportive of oil prices. add to that, goldman sachs saying that the oil market is going to move into a supply deficit this summer with the sanctions against iran and world demand starting to pick back up. and even here behind me in the crude oil options pit, we're seeing a change in sentiment. traders saying that last week there was significant put buying now. it's a rush for calls and looking for calls particularly further out in december 2013 and decemb december 2014. back to you. >> brings to mind something that larry fink said at the end of the "squawk box" about nat gas. >> this is a g

sharon epperson talking about crude. we should touch on what crude is doing. it has been a while. as pointed out 74.95 a relatively good target near term, some support at 79. at what point does your tail wind argument turn into a real worry? i want we do need to see this refinery xae in both coasts expand. it doesn't look like it's going to. i'm still not concerned about the overall what it's say about the worldwide economy, because i think a lot of is is just trading back and forth. at these prices, a lot of the drilling we have seen is not going to happen. >> not economic. >> and we see 75, you need 80 for a lot of the drilling programs to be able to continue to be aggressive. we saw what happened when natural gas breached and went--e breeped and went below three. >>> we should also mention b of a with the fund manager survey, not only is cash at the highest level since january '09, when things were really bad, jim, the third highest ever in the history of the survey. >> these are things we would typically say buy buy buy off of, you but the contrary case has not worked. >> it's

. >> thanks very much, sharon epperson. >>> worth pointing out it is another monday without any mergerseen quite some time since we were able to call a monday a merger monday, hasn't it been? given at least the conversations i've been having with those who are practiced in the art of trying to get companies to merge or acquire, it is going to be a potentially quiet summer. in stark contrast, in fact, to what had been the hopes and beliefs of many market participants only a few months ago. certainly as we entered 2012. where given all-time high levels of cash on balance sheets for corporate america, given all-time low borrowing costs, and the fact that the few deals that had been done typically saw the acquirer's stock price go up, many anticipated we would start to see those kinds of large transformative deals that this market has been without for years. it would seem it is going to be another year without, as you take a look at global m & a year to date comparisons. that being may. see how that compares. you've got to go a long way back, don't you? okay. '09. but a long way back to rea

sharon epperson is at the nymex. >> rick set it up well what we're seeing in the action in the dollarse that will have an influence on the commodities market and commodities are on a tear. we are looking at oil up about 5% or so for the nymex contract. the wti contract. and big gains as well in silver and gold and in copper. gold prices have topped $1,600 an ounce today. up nearly 50 bucks on the session. that really doesn't show what has happened for the quarter. still pretty much in the red for the second quarter. in fact, oil prices are poised for their worst quarter since 2008. copper's down about 9% in the quarter. gold prices are poised for their worst quarter in eight years, david. it's still not a great quarter for commodities but with some of the book squaring that's going on right now, looking at a little bit of a lift across the board. back to you. >> joined now by scott cutler in front of the post where service now will soon open. you're talking about about 11.6 million shares, priced at $18. what's happening here, scott? >> what happens in the opening of an ipo, particula

. >> here with your guide is cnbc's personal correspondent sharon epperson.elves. >> there is a start-up cost. >> there is a difference between hosting the party. people think if i throw the party i'm going to make the money. you get discounts and half-priced items. if you become an independent business consultant, a skillist, advisor, that's where you make the money. >> let's start with the abcs. i have money in the bank and want to invite friends over and sell jewelry. >> first thing you should do is make sure it's a member of the direct sellers association. be in a company that is reputable. this is stella and dot. they are terrific. a lot of my friends sell this jewelry. they love it. start-up cost is about $199. you get $350 worth of jewelry. you pick the jewelry that you think your party is going to want to have. the potential profit you can make, the average trunk show is about $1,000 in sales. you get 25% commission. >> that adds up if you're hosting one a week. >> price point less. start-up cost here is $149. you get $1,000 worth of jewelry they choo

david bach, and sharon epperson from cnbc's personal finance correspondent. you for the shoutout in paris when i hear from you guys. it was so sweet. >> congrats. >>> let's get started with a skype question, this one coming from dawn, who lives in maryland. good morning and what's your question? >> good morning. i'm actually a single moment in a relationship with a wonderful man. i have two kids in college, and he has won in middle school and one in high school. we have begun talks of the "m" word. what can you recommend for pooling finances in second marriages? >> when you start talking about that "m" word, and congratulations, and i'm sure he's a fantastic guy, you have to start talking about a prenup, which i know is not what a lot of people want to here, but you're coming in with kids, he has kids, you're coming in with assets and he has assets, you have to protect yourself. the sooner you start that discussion and work out the details, the better. it will guide how you handle the rest of your financial life. i'm personally a fan of yours, mine and ours a