reimburse the broker/dealers who got caught in the middle. there he was with mark zuckerberg on the day that facebook became public. we'll watch for that very carefully. this set some precedence in some way, doesn't it? >> it really does. it's the largest ipo that has nasdaq has seen. today we've got a lot of unhappy investors. he's going to have lots to answer to. >> all right. on top of all of this, we have a major rally on wall street and in times square where you are, maria. here's something we haven't seen since april, a two-day rally win streak. positive for the year now. back in positive territory, back above the 200-day moving average after the major averages have all been hard hit essentially during the month of may. right now the dow is up 224 points and the best thing you can say about this rally is it's apparently the result of a lack of bad news today. something we'll talk about. we're at 2834 on nasdaq. a gain of 56 points, or 2% close to the highs of the session. and the s&p is up 23 plus points. back above 1300, maria. >> you know, we're waiting to see if we get that downgrade coming from moody's. i spoke to one trader who says that there is some speculation that the downgrade for the financials is going to happen after the close. maybe it's not going to be as some people thought. so that's part of the reason why we see the financials on fire today, bill. and that's leading things. the dow back in the black for 2012 now. is now the time to buy after this optimism? one guest says he's not ready to jump in because that time bomb, known as europe, is still ticking. >> let's bring it down now with brian shactman. zack is also joining us. ed, we start with you. you're throwing cold water on this rally. why? >> i don't necessarily want to throw cold water onto it. the headwind is europe and it's going to be europe for quite some time. anybody out there buying stocks, our companies and earnings come as a result of doing business outside the u.s. our big companies make their money outside our borders and we've got major problems in the world stemming right from europe. you've got to focus on europe. europe is going to tell the tale for the are rest of the year. >> but, zack, you say europe is not going to implode. you want to be in this market, don't you? >> well, i'd say if europe doesn't implode, i definitely want to be in this market. i agree, you're not going to plunge into this whole-hearted the europeans to replay a bad script from the 1920s. but assuming that doesn't happen, i think that the rest of the global concerns have kind of been laid delled onto this, whether it's china imploding, all of this has been put together in a pretty toxic stew and i think essentially as long as europe does not go the way of our worst fears, we're really back to where we were in march, which is a relatively stable, not overly exciting but still expanding global economic system. >> what's the catalyst here? brian, how would you explain this rally today? i know we're expecting that downgrade from moody's. are you thinking perhaps it's not going to be as bad as people thought? >> i think that's part of it. what's funny is when you hear oversold conditions, it's a euphamism. if you don't know what is going to happen with downgrades or bernanke tomorrow, why not cover it and move onward. the question is whether it's trusted. in talking to traders they say what is fundamentally different than it was last week? is there any less concern about europe than before he spoke this morning and the answer is nothing is fundamentally different and that's why there's a little bit of mistrust and the short explanation is a credible one when i have a lot of explanations explanations as to why we are rallying. >> rick, what is going on there? >> it's beyond bonds. i love that question. what has changed in 24 hours to cause silver to jump, gold to jump, energy to jump, the dollar to jump and interest rates and stocks to go up. there is only one thing that could do that and that is what is going on with the fed, the leakage with the article, the carrot by the fed that cushions stocks, whether they deliver or not, and the other thing is san diego and san jose. you can factor it in or not factor it in. but we've seen a lot of blah, blah, blah from politicians. what is going on in those areas of the country is action and maybe action is changing the equation a bit, at least to how people are going to trade and how the election will turn out. >> rick, what did you think of the ecb's comments this morning? they are going to sit on their hands and let the european governments themselves try to solve this problem economically over there? >> i think it's really refreshing to see a central banker and i thought he was brutally honest. what else can i do? it's up to the states and member countries and the banks to work this out. just like in our situation, eventually it's going to be something washington takes on or the city's municipalities and all of that is going to happen through the ballot box, whether june 17th or november. >> you say what else can he do? what else can the fed do that is going to be affected by -- >> nothing. they are just idling the car. the people in the house are saying, we're not ready to come out yet and they are sitting in the car idling and waiting and it's not really accomplishing anything. >> we've got to move this car along. thank you. we'll see you later. >> well, we've got 53 minutes left in the trading day with a gain of 230 points. do not miss. we've got a big show coming up today, right? >> this is a great rally, bill. a lot more ahead on this edition of the "closing bell." >> announcer: it's the interview everyone has been waiting for. and maria has it. exclusively. nasdaq's ceo bob greifeld finally answering the facebook questions people are asking from wall street to main street. with the world watching, what went wrong with one of the most anticipated ipos of all time? then, it's the interview that everyone is still talking about. >> does that mean they should extend the tax cuts? >> they will probably put everything off until next year. >> i want to thank you for having president clinton on. he's the gift that keeps on giving and i want to thank you for that. >> announcer: the fallout from maria's interview with bill clinton yesterday continuing today. and now one of president obama's top advisers responds. maria needs business. next. who have used androgel 1%, there's big news. presenting androgel 1.62%. both are used to treat men with low testosterone. androgel 1.62% is from the makers of the number one prescribed testosterone replacement therapy. it raises your testosterone levels, and... is concentrated, so you could use less gel. and with androgel 1.62%, you can save on your monthly prescription. 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this is big news. welcome back. about 50 minutes left in the trading session today. time for a quick market stat check. a quick rally on wall street. the dow jones industrial back above 200-day moving average. it's up 230 points, which is the high for the session right now at 12,357. maria would be the first to point out that today's rally is on much less volume than friday's selloff. energy, financials, tech among the biggest gainers. all 10 s&p 500 sectors have been trading to the upside so far today. check out these gainers in the financial sector. bank of america up 7%. mbia, genworth financial, lincoln financial all posting sharp increases. maria? >> thank you, bill. it was an interview yesterday i spoke with bill clinton on what should be done on the tax front. the answer is still causing a ripple effect. >> so what about this upcoming fiscal cliff? the markets have certainly been reacting to the idea that these bush tax cuts will expire at year end along with the spending programs that will expire. should nose those programs and tax cuts be extended? >> i think they should find a way to keep the expansion going. i don't have problem extending all of it now. including the current spending levels. they are still pretty low, the spending levels. >> citigroup, peter orszag, is joining me now. peter, you heard it. you agree with president clinton on extending the bush tax cuts at least temporarily, is that right? >> i did agree. >> i remember that. >> what we need to do is avoid this massive fiscal contraction at the beginning of next year. that would be disastrous for an economy on its behind heels and that's about to be hit by a bad shock from europe. we need to figure out how to avoid this big collapse and i think president clinton is right about that. personally, i would prefer to let all of the tax cuts expire and actually end them, don't mend them. end them and then come back with something else that has as much macroeconomic benefit but better structure. >> what would that be? >> what i would like, is a very big payroll tax cut tied to the unemployment rate. it stays in force as long as the unemployment rate is high and comes away as the unemployment rate comes down. we get on a better medium fiscal path. >> even hearing you talk about it, it's leadership. it's addressing the issues that we're all facing. how come we don't hear anybody in the administration talking about this? everybody is saying, we need to avoid the fiscal cliff at all costs. remember, it's not just the expiration of tax cuts but spending programs. >> it's worst than that because it's the debt limit which is the hardest thing of all to figure it out. >> i think what this is reflecting we've got a polarized country at this point. they have vastly different perspectives on what should be done and you've got a gunpointi gunpointing at your head. >> if these tax cuts expire, you're saying you don't think that's going to affect people negatively so long as -- >> no one -- i haven't heard anyone say we should just go along, fall off the cliff, fall into the ditch and stay there. that would be crazy. >> let me get your take on something else that the president said. he talked about recession and government spending. listen to this. >> it is still pretty low, the government spending levels. but i think they look high because there's a recession. so the taxes look lower than they really would be if we add 2.5, 3% growth and the spending is higher than it would be if we added 2.5 to 3% growth. so many people getting food stamps and unemployment and medicaid. >> are we in a recession? >> we're in the hard slot that follows the financial crisis. we're not all the way out of the deleveraging crisis. we're in a very weak labor market. >> so what happens in terms of this recovery? how come we are seeing such a tough recovery and it's been so tough to create jobs? this last jobs report, 69,000 jobs created, i think that surprised a lot of people who thought we were further along. >> unfortunately, this is what tends to happen. you have a long time to work your way out and, you know, typical is five years. hopefully we can beat that a little bit. you shouldn't expect the economy to start growing by gang busters. the biggest problem is the possibility that europe doesn't act aggressively enough, at least in positive territory, you get hit with a massive shock. that would be a disaster. >> let me ask you about the politics of it all. you know these guys. you worked in the white house and closely with this administration. what do you think happened? i'm sitting there with president clinton. you hear what he said, yeah, let's extend them all, temporarily at least, and we're in this recession and then suddenly after the close, after our interview matt, his spokesperson said, we have to put out a statement there. he's what he really meant. we don't want to extend the tax cuts on the richest american. is he getting bullied by president obama? >> my read was he doesn't want us to fall into that fiscal cliff but also said he didn't want to continue the tax cuts over the long term at least for operating people. inevitably what happens is people go on tv shows like this and might not phrase things exactly right and then there's a twitter and other hoopla that follows and then, yes, people get worked up and i'm sure there were conversations. >> you're not going to clarify this conversation after you get off the chair, right? >> no. >> peter, great to have you on the show. >> thank you. >> peter orszag, citigroup. we have a massive rally under way. market up better than 200 points on the dow industrials, bill. >> lululemon kicking the lid off of earnings tomorrow morning, whatever that means. whether this trendy apparel maker. >> i'm talking to nasdaq about the handling of facebook ipo. that's in the next hour of the "closing bell." join me for that. hope you won't miss it. support team usa and show our olympic spirit right in our own backyard. so we combined our citi thankyou points to make it happen. tom chipped in 10,000 points. karen kicked in 20,000. and by pooling more thankyou points from folks all over town, we were able to watch team usa... [ cheering ] in true london fashion. [ male announcer ] now citi thankyou visa card holders can combine the thankyou points they've earned and get even greater rewards. ♪ the market is continuing to rally. commodities getting a boost. let's get to sharon epperson. she's at the miami mention. >> crb index is higher on the session. a 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. >> you sound like you like this one. >> what about that? is it took expensive? >> they have beaten the eps numbers that are 12% on average. the stock has not performing that well on earnings day with a plus or minus 3 to 5% move. and what we've seen very recently and 88% of the companies beat the consensus numbers that underperformed on average, 320 basis points. we think heading into the risk tomorrow could be skewed to the down side. >> so do you like this category? let's face it. the consumers for this category are very fickle. you know, they will drop one brand for another just like that. do you like it right now? >> we really like the brand tremendously. we think the brand is incredibly high. our survey work would suggest that and our store checks are reinforcing that. overall the high end market, outside of lululemon, we think we could see some weakness over the near term. the stock market volatility is not helping. >> great. good to see you both. >> thank you. breaking news with kayla tausche back at headquarters. >> a statement from nasdaq, now the new york stock exchange has weighed in on what they call the interstreet subsidizing new york misstep. they have said that they have yet to receive full details of the plan but believe it would be an undue burden of competition as a guys for fairly compensating those impacted by the facebook ipo issues. they said that the deal allowed nasdaq to get market share that they otherwise would not have received and diverting order flow to nasdaq in order to receive that compensation is unfair to investors. the war continues. guys back to you. >> this is what i mentioned on street signs a while ago. anticipating this was happening because the new york stock exchange, like all of the other exchanges are going to say, here's my competitor getting market share, more market share because their fees are going to be lower as a result of the mess up. >> exactly. >> this is what the nyse is raising its hand about. if the nasdaq is going to get more business as a result of the lower fees, how does that impact the competitive landscape? >> exactly. and this statement dives into the fact that around the ipo prices that were not nasdaq-related to divert that compensation that should go to investors. >> correct. kayla, good stuff. we're in the final stretch of trading. dow jones industrial up 200 points. nasdaq up 54. we've got money moving into equities. and then fair or not, the nasdaq has take answer lot of the blame for the facebook fall off after botching that first day of trading three weeks ago. remember tom joyce, the head of knight capital? >> this was arguably the worst performance on an ipo, ever. but can you really blame nasdaq? coming up, because the man in charge of nasdaq, bob greifeld, will join me in the next hour on the "closing bell." tdd# 1-800-345-2550 i'm constantly working my screens. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 checking the charts. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 looking for support, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 resistance, breakouts, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 a few other tricks that i'll keep to myself. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 that's how i trade. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 and i do it all with charles schwab, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 because their streetsmart edge platform tdd# 1-800-345-2550 helps me trade quickly, intuitively. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 staying on top of the market is key! tdd# 1-800-345-2550 and the momentum tool, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 it lets me do it at a glance, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 so when things shift, i'm ready. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 then to track the stocks i have my eye on, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 i turn to schwab's high/low ticker. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 so i can spot a potential breakout tdd# 1-800-345-2550 before it breaks out. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 and get this...i can even trade, tdd# 1-800-345-2550 change my orders or check out my positions tdd# 1-800-345-2550 right on my chart. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 my system works for me. tdd# 1-800-345-2550 does yours work for you? 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let's move with precision. >> 11:30. that's what the headline said. we should receive the first rate at 11:30 a.m. eastern time. it's past that mark. >> it's just a delay rather than a problem. >> there we go. look. >> nasdaq is investigating an issue in delivering trade execution messages from the ipo cross and symbol fb. >> it's a tough day for nasdaq. i feel sorry for them having had such a conspicuous stumble here. >> there is disappointment that there was a log jam at the opening and there was put in a trade at 9:30. >> they are now going to deliver a manual report, what they call a manual report of participants. >> how badly does this reflect the nasdaq, do you think? >> we are still getting an e-mail from people who say they have yet to get that. >> wow, bill, no question it wasn't nasdaq's finest hour. account exchange be really blamed for facebook falling from 28 to 36? is this market cap lost? >> let's ask a few guys with different varying views? >> absolutely. i think a large part of this is how the underwriters at nasdaq and the issue was, they weren't able to do the job. from the first 30 minutes the stock didn't open and then market makers had no idea whether the markets had been felt. sentiment is very critical. >> brian, you say the pricing and size of the offering, it created this frenzy that nasdaq wasn't prepared for, right? >> yeah. well, we think the stock hit a price that would have gotten through any ways. we started inniitiation becausee thought the stock was fairly valued. >> from capital expenditures to the billion dollars of years, slowing revenue growth, and we have this 1.8 billion share overhang on the company. >> part of the issue, you're looking at pure fundamentals and when you look at fundamentals, we know that there are issues and have you seen all of those cancellations in that 11:00 to 11:30 a.m. time frame and you also would have gotten nervous and rather than buying and short, actually it did not get those cancellations and we have one price and they want it much higher. >> over time we've had a few weeks now and we highlight. >> the stock price and what it's done since the ipo, can we blame that on the nasdaq as well? >> well, for one, let's start with valuation. i mean, we know in traditional metrics this company is richly valued. it was richly valued at 38. it's richly valued today. at the end of the day it's an asset play. they have 540 million users. if you look at the valuation versus the daily users, it's actually not that expensive. the real problem is sentiment in the short term. number one, nasdaq mismanaged the ipo. number two, the underwriters, particularly morgan stanley's analysts, were taking down numbers a couple days. so sentiment got very negative very quickly. that's why the stock has been trading up the last couple of weeks. >> let me get your take real quick on the solutions. now nasdaq is coming up with the fund of $40 million. is this too late? >> number one, i think it's too little, too late. nasdaq has lost confidence with investors and people who want to do ipos in the future and also if you think about the magnitude and losses, from what we've seen, it's north of 100 million for a lot of the market makers collectively and then the nasdaq has put together effectively $13 million in cash and 23 million in trading credits. and it's really ten million of profits that nasdaq got from the ipo initially. there's no incremental cash away from the nasdaq here. so in our opinion, very much too little. >> all right. we're going to go at this point. thank you both for your thoughts on what has been a very contentious issue. we're hear more about that. with 24 minutes to close, hanging in there, a gain of 221 points on the dow. >> it's sustainable. we're going to check whether it's for real. we'll press them for some answers next. >> after the bell, in case you haven't heard, maria has the interview that everyone has been waiting for. the head of the nasdaq, bob greifeld, sits down for the exclusive coming up. how nasdaq handled the ipo, what went wrong. are they worried the new york stock exchange will try to poach the listing? 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>> with us to talk about that, ed is with us, antan financials. you're a sector of a specialized sector of financials. overall, what do you make of the rally that they have seen here lately? >> well, people have been related to europe, hence we get good headlines and unfortunately it's been index selling. people have been trading in groups. you have the regionals traded as a group and stock picking, which is my specialty, over the last couple of weeks, hasn't been that important although when it comes to the very small. >> and you like those regional banks, don't you? >> i like the fact that m and a is driven by all of the odd things. we have a slight yield curve which means revenue growth is tough. so really what you have is the bigger, healthier growth through cutting costs. >> the rumor is that we're going to get that downgrade from moody's but it may not be as bad as we thought. and we think it's going to be a two notch, not a three notch. do you think it happens at the close tonight? >> there's ground swell information flowing. it's been widely expected and morgan stanley gets downgraded two notches versus three. certainly the stock is acting very well this morning. >> what impact do you think central bank policy has on these financials in the banks right now? and there's a call that lower rates, would it? >> no, it wouldn't. any time you talk about a market raising interest rates, lowering interest rates, we've got ourselves a really bad market. usually stocks move based on earnings. we're going to look whether there is bad news or how bad the bad news is going to be. this is not a good, strong market. when you see these stock prices rise, i start selling into these. >> isn't this the kind of environment that you want to buy? you want to buy when things look the bleakest, don't you? >> it's not an isolated incident or a way of looking at it. if the market closes above 12,400, which it doesn't look like it's going to, it needs to stay up there for three or four days. stocks are 30% undervalued based on expected earnings. the question is, are they going to come in the way that they are forecasted? any time you have bond appreciation, sell out of your bonds. that's the most risky thing that you have because bonds are overvalued at this point. sell out of those bonds, look at utility stocks, master limited partnerships. if you see oil down in the low 80s, you pick up a yield of 8, 9%. possible total return. that's where i would be. >> that's a good yield. nice move in the number of these banks but we know how much market value has been lost in the last several months? what's the catalyst for long term? >> the money traders are going to trade with europe all the time. if you look at the other banks that are mortgage banking businesses, they are going to have great strong numbers because the giant move in rates has created refinance activity. there's a lot of mortgage lending going on. again, my long-term theme of consolidation is going to be incredibly powerful and you have to pick the markets. there's a lot of activities happening, small ones every day. i'm very excited about that. >> thank you both. antan, i'll see new a few minutes. 15 minutes to go and this market is strengthening. >> meanwhile, the white house is doing major damage control from my interview with former president bill clinton. i asked one of president obama's top economic advisers, jegene sperling, about it. one of the first major television interviews since facebook and its bumpy debut. >> bob greifeld is here with me. we're live today from times square. we're back in a moment. at u.s. trust, our expertise extends well beyond investment advice and research analysis. it includes proprietary offerings like our eldercare program, which helps provide for those who came before you. and our financial empowerment program, which helps prepare those who come next. resources like these have made us the number-one trust company. that's why generations of families have come to us to help build their own legacies. all right. a story that keeps unfolding here, more reaction to nasdaq's facebook reimbursement strategy. scott wapner has that for us. >> bill, thank you so much. this coming from the knight capital group, the broker dealer impacted. clearly we're disappointed that nasdaq fund doesn't come close to the loss like knight that traded on behalf of investors and suffered losses as a result of nasdaq's failure and connection with this ipo. their proposed solution to this problem is simply unacceptable. the company is evaluating all remedies under the law. i should note that tom joyce will be my guest tomorrow on the half-time show since he last appeared on "squawk on the street." >> looking forward to that, scott. maria, you have more ammunition from bob greifeld. the response has not been good so far. >> we have a list of some of the broker dealers and what their claims are. knight is saying that they lost between 30 and $35 million. you have citudel saying they lost 30 million, citi, another 20 million. the numbers are adding up to more than $100 million. a lot of talk out there, hearing up to $200 million. we have a $40 million fund. it doesn't added a up. people want to know, where is this money coming from and who is getting the money? where is it going? i suspect that nasdaq is addressing this. you're going to hear from a lot of people coming out from under the rock, bill. >> we'll see what the response is as we go through this next hour. in the meantime, everybody is talking about your interview with former president clinton yesterday and his comments about what to do about the bush tax cuts. you had a chance to talk with one of president obama's top economic advisers about that, right? >> yes, i did. i spoke be with gene sperling. i attended an event here in new york with the national economic council and i was one of the questioners at the new york economic club. i asked him about the fiscal cliff. listen to this exchange, bill. you tell me if you learned anything. >> are you saying you are willing to extend the tax cuts as wells a the spending programs like infrastructure, like unemployment benefits which will all expire at the end of the year? are you saying you are willing to extend the tax cuts and the spending programs right now beyond the end of the year? to avoid the fiscal cliff? >> i am saying we are willing to extend the tax cuts that are in place, the so-called bush tax cuts for those under $250,000. >> so, bill, this is the rough. bill clinton said i would avoid that fiscal cliff at all cost. >> the clarification from his spokesperson afterwards was that he wasn't including the 250,000 plus at that point. that is the bone of contention now for the white house. they want to let them go except for that one income level, right? >> what bill clinton said was that he would let them expire. >> yes, de. >> i'm sorry. that he would extend those tax cuts but with an end date and not. >> temporarily. >> that it wouldn't be open-ended. then after the interview they came back the statement saying that we don't think the rich, the highest earners, should see those tax cuts extended. >> coming up here. take a short break. when we come up, a closing countdown. s&p posting best gains since december. will fed chairman ben bernanke throw cold water on today's rally tomorrow when he testifies? 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