that. but bias for the last half hour or so has been to the downside slightly, but that could change as we go into the hour. >> and also our own jim cramer is worried. he will join us here in a couple minutes to tell us why he doesn't like some of the patterns he's seeing across the stock market, and it is changing how he's investing. find out to see what he's doing and why. also, in arizona this new law that would allow businesses to deny service to gay people may never be signed by the governor because big companies are now speaking out against this law. sending letters to governor brewer. one of those companies is pushing back against the law and will join us on "the closing bell" today. let's take stock of markets here. we are seeing small declines across all the major indexes. the dow off 20 points. the nasdaq off 5. the s&p 500 off 1. as mentioned yesterday at this hour, it looked like we'd be closing at new highs. we'll see how the final hour of trade pans out right now. >> all right. let's bring in our guests for our closing bell explain. danny hughes, rex macy, drew in order -- nor dlike and rick santelli. everybody joining us today, rick aside, is cautiously optimistic. danny, the caution. what is the caution about? what are you concerned about even as this market does try to power higher? >> so much caution actually and we've kind of had our foot a little on the break for a while but you still had to participate in the markets like we've talked about. you know, the fed and the government have really incentivized corporate cash hoarding over the past few years, and corporations have found better roi in delivering buybacks and dividends, and, you know, at some point that's got to come to an end. so that's a big worry i think going forward in the market. how do you invite investors into your stock? so new investors. and how do you keep the guys invested in your stock that would traditionally be in fixed income products if it weren't for the fed? >> so are you -- let me put this this way. you're investing but holding your breath. is that it? >> well, not holding our breath exactly. we still have to remain active. there's still interesting investments to be made out there, but it's the going forward issue, bill. >> there's always a bull market somewhere. >> where do we go from here? >> i think jim cramer could tell us about that in a little bit. rex, it's interesting to look at the dispersion of what people think is going on in the economy. i have people telling me you have to look at how much more sluggishly the u.s. economy is going to grow over time and here are all the reasons why globally we're in a deleveraging phase and interest rates are headed lower. at the same time people are passing around this narrative about 1996 and saying after we had a miss in january on weather, we had a strong february payroll number, and then the ten-year was rallying. in other words, people don't really seem to know right now what the paradigm is. what's your read? >> well, you know, that should give you a lot of confidence and comfort. that is -- what you have just described is a balance in the market. you have got, if you will, buyers and sellers on both sides people making good cases for it to move higher and for it to move lower. it's not a one-sided market which is when you get extremes either on the down side or up side. it makes me feel more comfortable. i'm comfortable with the equity market. i would be short on the bond market but we see the economy getting better slowly. all the data you're pointing to really gets to the fact that we're going to have three yards and a cloud of dust. >> three yards and a cloud of dust? what was that reference? >> three yards and a cloud of dust. it's an old football reference. >> okay. >> back before there was a lot of passing. the idea is we're going to grind and make first downs, but it's going to be slow growing in 2014 after a stupendous year in '13. >> super bowl did set the tone. >> ier in hea er inever heard t. drew, you would look at fixed income, is that for safety reasons or do you think there's growth in fixed income? >> from our point of view we would suggest maintaining your active diversification. there are niches we are actively investing. we think investors should maintain their broad based diversification. what we look at is we think the economy and the stock market are two separate animals on the same sa vanna. the federal reserve has been pumping liquidity into the market. with the equity market, what we see is the federal reserve is tapering, but with their $10 billion program over the next several meetings, it's still going to take to the end of the year for them to be done with that program. that's $315 billion of new liquidity being injected into the market and an expansion of the balance sheet. what we found statistically is going back to 2009 when qe started, for every $100 billion of qe that's entered the marketplace, the s&p has moved higher by 42 points. so that translates to a 1976 target on the s&p which is another 7% from here. so as long as the federal reserve is still in the marketplace and regardless of tapering, they're still printing money, the balance sheet is still expanding, we would be active investors in equities. we think there are challenges in the economy and challenges with this quarter but it is going -- we think it ak selling rates. >> i'm chuckling because there seems to be a lot of couching going on, a lot of fancy ways of saying we're not sure what's happening. and to rex's point, that's fine. that's what makes a market. i want to know what some of the high conviction trades are right here. drew, any thoughts? dani? >> sorry, did you say dani? >> dani, go ahead. >> sure. you know, kelly, i think there's a lot of things that you can look at out there, particularly companies that are actually investing in their future. so cap ex increases. there's an awful lot of companies that are actually investing in the future in 2014. big increases in cap ex. >> you want to invest in those names. >> in those names and in names that also -- they could also have buybacks and dividends as well. they're not mutually exclusive. i think that, you know, u.p.s. is a big one. $2.5 billion in 2014. t-mobile. energy is a big space as well. >> goldman's whole note focuses on the picks and shovels plays that might support a cap ex boom. >> rick, if there is a conviction buy right now, gold would be one of them, wouldn't it? what does that say about the market? >> you know, i think gold could easily go up. i thought it would make a bottom earlier this year, but i guess i'm still thinking about those yards of dust because when i think of going yard, i think of a home run, and i think the fed has allowed corporate profits to go three yards. we're talking 900 foot home runs. so corporate profits are going great. dani is worried today. i have been worried for two years. but being worried in this environment doesn't mean you necessarily short the market. but as i look up at the fixed income and i have been harping on this, here we are, we've seen a 2.69% yield in tens while the s&p is flirting with all-time highs. i know you have jim coming up, and that's great, but i think i have the best soothsayer in the world. just looking at these interest rates that failed to follow the stock market up tell me that it's all not good in investment land, but picking tops and picking bottoms is always a dicey endeavor. >> yes, it is. and, look, that's what it comes down to. going back to this question as well, so, dani raised an interest point, pick the companies that are doing a lot of investment, a lot of capital expenditure. rex, what about you? what's your winning strategy here? >> well, i think in the big picture you want to keep some powder try because i think there will be more opportunities in the months to come. >> so cash is your answer? >> no, no. i would be more at my normal -- closer to our normal asset allocation. we're a little heavier on stocks than bonds just because at a 2.70% ten-year we're not too fond of the bond market. >> where i come from, dry powder is cash. >> well, you can look -- >> keep the powder dry. >> where i came from it was dry powder, too, but when you don't get anything on your cash, i'm not sure it's good dry powder. >> that's exactly the point i think we're talking about here is the fed is wanting to force everybody into the risk assets because you're not getting anything to hold cash right now even though so many companies are. drew, your conviction if there is one. >> that's the key issue. you're bringing up the exact point i think everybody on the panel is trying to suggest is we are in an environment where the fed is one of the biggest players, the federal government and new legislation is a big player. the economy itself has not found very sure footing. we're not in the 1990s where we're seeing 5%, 6%, 7% gdp growth rates. you have to advise looking at multiple different opportunities, diversification, risk reduction, not piling into a single trade because the reality -- >> you try a little bit of everything. >> nobody knows the exact future. >> say it again. say it again. the reality is nobody knows the future. exactly. >> we're in an environment of higher risk and higher volatility. that's the reality. when you have a player that has introduced $4 trillion into the marketplace, you know, asset prices get skewed and you have to invest based upon what are the knowns, and we know the fed is there. we know they're going to be there through the end of the year. i know our panelist, rick santelli has harped on that before, but that's the facts, they're there. we need to advise and invest based upon that. >> there you go. thank you all, folks. >> thanks. >> thanks for your thoughts today. i wonder if anybody would consider bitcoin a conviction buy right now. >> yeah. part of a diversified portfolio? >> we'll get to that coming up. heading to the close, we've got 50 minutes left in the trading session. if anything, we're slowly moving south. the dow is down 27 points. the s&p is down 2 points. we're about 3 points away from an all-time closing high. keep an eye on that for you. >> losing altitude again, second day in a row this week as we head into the close. the s&p even so may be flirting with another record high, but "mad money's" jim kramer is getting a little worried about this market. changing the way he's investing. should you follow his lead? jim will join us. also, disney, they're the second best dow performer this year. they're raising their theme park prices and debuting a digital movie app. is this all news a dream come true for shareholders or is it still overvalued? we'll have a stock brawl. and who wouldn't want investment advice from warren but fet right on their phone personalized? now you can get it sort of. coming up, we'll hear from the ceo of a company behind quote, unquote, warren, a service that can give you instant answers to your financial services. think siri for investors or financial anchors. you're watching cnbc, first in business worldwide. ameriprise asked people a simple question: in retirement, will you outlive your money? uhhh. no, that can't happen. that's the thing, you don't know how long it has to last. everyone has retirement questions. so ameriprise created the exclusive.. confident retirement approach. now you and your ameripise advisor can get the real answers you need. well, knowing gives you confidence. start building your confident retirement today. well, disney had some magical news, if you will, for investors. a new digital movie service and a price increase at its parks. that's magical. joule. >> boorstin has details. >> disney is teaming up with apple to make buys its movies more attractive announcing a cloud based digital movie service. it allows consumers to stream for download 420 disney, pixar, and marvel movies and watch them on any apple device. it's launching with itunes just as hit frozen goes on sale for $20 a download. disney's tapping into a growing business. industry wide digital film sales grew 50% to $1 billion last year. though it's launching just with apple, disney is in negotiation to add access through other platforms the likes of amazon, microsoft, xbox. the magic kingdom park at disney world orlando just raised prices by $4. it now costs $99 for one day ticket. disney's investment in new parks attractions does seem to be paying off despite raising parks prices a year ago. revenue at its resorts division grew 6% last quarter from a year earlier. bill and kelly? >> all right, julia, thank you very much. so is it a good time to buy more of disney's magic right now? let's hash it out. where an investment in the mouse house could be heading. you're not exactly bearish on this stock. you have a hold on it right now, right? >> yes, could not get behind the story but not saying anything is wrong. >> why wouldn't you buy the shares right now? >> well, i think in order to buy in this market after what media stocks did last year, last two years is you either need to look at the upside to estimates, which is extremely hard for disney. first of all, because there are a lot of moving parts, and then there is you need $30 million in ebitda to move it a penny. or you need a catalyst for expansion which i do not see. the relative pe is the highest very near the three-year high so that's where i stand. >> just expensive right now. >> barton, basically this is a stock that almost the entire analyst community loves, that people have called a bulls dream quarter after their last earnings report. why do you think if we just heard it takes another $30 billion in additional profit to move the estimates higher from where they are today, would is that achievable? why do you like the shares here? >> disney i think is actually not expensive at these prices. the growinge eps i think midteens. our $80 price target is very beatable. these guys are in a cycle where they're putting out new franchises and it's hard for people to understand the power of this. "frozen" is a movie that will do $1 billion box office. it will drive close to $500 million in profit over its life. there will be a sequel, licensed merchandise, theme park rides. they've got "star wars" coming out in a couple years. each one of those movies could drive money to the bottom line. it will be a sequel every other year. i could see the stock being easily a double digit performer from here. we've got a price target that's up close to that, and i think there's upside to our price target. i think this company, you know, i think is driving good earnings leverage off the parts of their business that are hard for people to understand. so i think there's upside to estimates. >> vassili, i see you have a price target of $74. is that when you would step back in to buy. >> yeah, i would like that. but if i may, i would like to comment what barton was saying. i don't disagree "frozen" is a big franchise but the benefit you need to know before the movie comes out it's going to be a $900 million plus and that's extremely hard to judge. also about "star wars," i don't have anything "star wars," but we're talking about a film that hasn't been written yet. so that's where i find it challenging to get behind the disney story. >> barton, by the way, disney had the weather potentially working in their favor. it sounds like driving people south out of the cold in the northeast is one of the reasons they've done is well lately. >> you have got someone who is benefiting from the weather. >> exactly. last word, barton? >> there's a lot more to this than the weather. i mean, people are going to disney parks because they're putting in hundreds of millions of dollars into new attractions. they're going because people love the content. underneath it all is espn which is just an unshakeable franchise giving you good, steady profit growth year after year. i think disney is a stock that's been great and i think it's got more good days ahead of it. >> we've got to go. thank you, guys. >> thank you, gentlemen. >> thank you. >> about 40 minutes left to go into the close, and as mentioned, stocks are losing momentum. not even momentum, bill, because we're negative. they're sinking a little more. dow is off 37 points at this hour, and the s&p 500 giving up about 3. the nasdaq is off 10. >> when we come back, bitcoin may have fallen off the digital currency mountain, but despite the implosion overnight, second market ceo barry silvers is with us, and he's launching a u.s.-based bitcoin exchange. we'll find out what he thinks he knows about bitcoin that others do not. and the man behind the goldman sachs elevator gossip has been uncovered and it turns out he's never worked for goldman. how damaging was it? your best tweets on that subject coming up. we'll be right back. ...return on investment wall isn't a street... isn't the only return i'm looking forward to... for some, every dollar is earned with sweat, sacrifice, courage. which is why usaa is honored to help our members with everything from investing for retirement to saving for college. our commitment to current and former military members and the man behind the with all the opinions about stocks out there, how do you know which ones to follow? the equity summary score consolidates the ratings of up to 10 independent research providers into a single score that's weighted based on how accurate they've been in the past. i'm howard spielberg of fidelity investments. the equity summary score is one more innovative reason serious investors are choosing fidelity. call or click to open your fidelity account today. like carpools... polly wants to know if we can pick her up. yeah, we can make room. yeah. 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[ male announcer ] the best thing to share? a data plan. ♪ new at&t mobile share value plans for business. our best value plans ever. for example, you can get 10 gigs of data to share. and 5 lines would be $175 a month. plus you can add a line anytime for $15 a month. sharing's never been better for business. ♪ welcome back. so here is a look at bitcoin where prices plunged after it went offline, closed all transactions and mary thompson joins us. >> after going dark last night, they say they're just taking a break in light of a rash of negative reports about the exchange. in a statement it said a decision was taken to close all transactions for the time being in order to protect the site and our users. we will be closely monitoring the situation and will react accordingly. now, no word from the exchange on the hundreds of thousands of bitcoins reportedly locked up in mt. gox accounts. clients haven't been able to access those accounts for several weeks now. as a result, the mt. gox debacle, the latest in a series of troubles for the digital coin. still believers have lost a lot of money lately. bitcoin is down 54% from its december peak, and that volatility is another issue plaguing bitcoin and is likely to slow its adoption by a broader segment of the. lati population. >> let's bring in second market founder barry silver, you're still a believer in bitcoin. off vested interest. you're in the process of trying to put together an exchange to replace mt. gox. what do you hear about them? are they folding? they're being pretty coy. >> certainly never a dull day in bitcoin land. i don't want to speculate on the rumors but i think it highlights the need for a well-run, regulated u.s. exchange and that's really what we're focused on right now. >> mary, i want to bring you into this conversation as well. i mean, look, how much do you think this will draw more attention from regulators who up to this point have been pretty laissez-faire about the growth of bitcoin. >> we spoke to ben and he maintains that laissez-faire attitude. we had a regulator in alabama saying he's issuing a consumer alert. barry, what was your reaction that you heard from some of the regulators and lawmakers you say you have been talking to in trying to set up the exchange? when they heard about mt. gox, what's the reaction? did they say we don't want to get involved in this or not? >> actually i think quite the opposite. the regulators and ep the banks are saying digital currency is not going away and it's important to have a safe, secure exchange. if you believe that digital currency is here to stay, and i really do think that is the general consensus right now, there's a lot of support that we're seeing down in d.c. from the regulators as well as wall street. >> so, barry, you want to start an exchange which you say will provide price stability to bitcoin as well as transaction transparency essentially. the problem though with bitcoin continues to be safety. there are people hacking into digital wallets. there is malware out there that is stealing bitcoin. you have problems -- we really don't even know what happened with mt. gox, but there are technical problems. you might set up an exchange but that doesn't eliminate what seems to be the real problem here is that either the krip toe currency or the infrastructure around it isn't secure. >> well, i think the protocol itself is absolutely secure. this has really nothing to do with bitcoin itself. it's the infrastructure the companies are built on top of it. and you just have to remember that bitcoin is very early. this is like the early internet days. there's going to be early players that don't necessarily take the right precautions, run businesses effectively. now we're seeing real money coming from venture capital industry, marc andreessen invested $25 million in a company coiled coin base, fred wilson in union square investing in the same company. you have the who's who of venture money building the next group of companies that will make it easy to buy -- >> to some extent, barry, these guys, they have nothing to lose. they have their money to lose, but what i mean is there's an investment here, an opportunity, and these currencies have proven if you get in early, you might capture more of that benefit as they're built out. that's a different thing than saying this is something that's safe for the general public. >> you have to separate bitcoin the digital currency from bitcoin the technology. there really is no debate that bitcoin as this protocol, as this technology, it has the potential to radically transform the way people send money, the way merchant's accept payments and that's where all the money is being invested. i don't think you can separate the currency from the in fact because you need the monetary base and quite frankly the exchange to make it possible. >> let me pursue mary's question in a different way. isn't it possible that bitcoin as a digital currency is damaged goods? it's beyond repair? you have the problems with mt. gox, and they're missing 744,000 bitcoins, somewhere missing around this world. the use that bitcoin has been put into use for, for drug running or whatever it has been, money running. digital currencies may have a future but does it have to be bitcoin? >> it doesn't have to be -- i believe it is bitcoin. if you look at the price performance of bitcoin today, major, major hit of mt. gox and the rumors, but it is still a $6 billion monitor base of digital currency. the supporters, both early and more recent adopters, our confidence has not been shaken at all. >> i have to ask you though, you were trying to set up a structure that basically will involve certain costs and certain legal costs especially. it might mean a lack of -- i should say a withdrawal of some of the features some people are attracted because of bitcoin whether it's anonymity or a faster way, a cheaper way to change money. when you set up this legal structure, how do you make sure you maintain all the characters of the digital currency that its biggest advocates want to keep? >> well, our structure that we envision is actually a collaboration among the global banks, the bit counsel companies, and the regulators. we have had a number of very in-depth conversations with all the key players. there's a lot of interest in coming together to build an exchange and also actually a central clearing business. so the idea is to create an exchange, clearing, as well as an sro or self-regulatory organization that will provide the gorer nance and oversight. >> who are the global banks you're speaking with? in speaking with a lot of them, certainly they're starting to do some research on it, they're looking at it with some interest. i haven't heard anything from any of the ones i have spoken to who say this is the future, we want to invest in it. so tell us who you have been speaking with and who on wall street are the ones behind this willing to back your venture. >> so i'm not going to name names. there's been half a dozen bankses we're in conversations with right now and i would just say stay tuned. >> that's a tease. thank you, barry. >> thanks, barry. >> thanks for having me. >> mary, appreciate it. >> yeah, good job. heading toward the close. 30 minutes left in the trading session. the market drifting south. the dow down 39 points. it's the s&p we're watching to see if it can close at a new high. we're five points below a new all-time high right now. in the meantime, samsung unveiling its latest smart watch. yes, we have another wearable device. the question is whether this one will be a game changer in the wearable space. will it struggle like the original version? 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alka seltzer plus severe sinus fights your tough sinus symptoms plus your runny nose. oh what a relief it is here is a look at shares of jpmorgan. down almost 2%. kayla tausche joins us. we know they've had the investor day. what can you tell us? >> dimon and his deputies all day have sounded a positive tone about the future for jpmorgan chase while acknowledging some near-term headwinds for the bank, namely capital. dimon just wrapping up his comments moments ago and acknowledging they have $900 billion in safe assets sitting at the federal reserve. that will continue to be a headwind because they can't lend a lot of that money out because they're keeping it for their liquidity ratio. it will also keep them from significantly increasing the amount of money that they'll give back to shareholders. dimon saying their c-car submission, which is how the fed will determine what they can give back to the shareholders is not fundamentally different than the $6 billion in buybacks they got approved for last year. he did make a comment about the weather. he said a drop in fixed income trading revenue we saw toward the end of last year was just weather and could continue into the beginning of this year. we didn't get an especially optimistic tone about the investment bank which is still having a hard time keeping that return on equity target going, but he did seem very optimistic about the u.s. economy. he said taper will be volatile, but the market will be able to absorb it. he said fiscal policy has been a surprise strong point in the economy and he feels good about where the economy is in its recovery process. >> kayla, thanks. notice he also was talking about how apple and maybe google i think it was trying to eat jpmorgan's lunch. the space, bill, between tech, payments, banking is all becoming very hazy. samsung has introduced some fun gadgets. our next guest has brought a couple for us to see. >> yes. mark spoonhauer is editor in chef of laptop mag.com and they're both watches. we're all going to be wearing tech watches eventually. >> i guess we're going feature retro to a certain degree. what i love about this one in particular is this is the gear fit. >> so you do have the fit one. >> this is the first -- >> how about i do this. tell us about it and i'll hold it. >> it has a curved display. it's the first device of its kind with a curved color display and it sort of looks like the future. this looks like the future of wearable devices -- >> would you wear this, kelly? >> let me have a look. let's see. now, the interesting thing about some of these devices, i'm never -- i don't wear a fit bit but many of my friends do. >> it's very similar. >> they're a little worried about some of the recalls lately with the products and some of the wearable tech devices, want to make sure they're safe but do you put it on the wrist or more of an arm band? >> you put it on the wrist. there's a heart rate monitor on the under side. >> when you're out running, you can monitor your heart rate and tweet at the same time. >> terrifying thought. >> similar to a smart watch, you can get notifications on this device and control femedia play back. this is more full featured. >> this i recognize. >> this is the gear two. it has some of the features of the original like the built-in camera. you can control your tv with it. this is going to be the more expensive of the two. >> what's interesting is of the two, there's been a lot more buzz about the fit bit -- i keep calling it the fit bit. >> because that's where the market is going. the whole wearables market is going to be about $30 billion by 2018, and i think the ones that focus on fitness will be the ones leading the charge because that's what people really care about. so this one will track your steps, your heart rate and really just your progress in general and it will sync with a phone like this. they're doing a good job of rounding out the ecosystem. >> put differently, while it does srng with your phone it has to sync with your phone so there are a lot of people saying is this really that feasible? are people going to have -- if they're using a bluetooth would have to have their phone right there. does that inhibit a lot of the adoption? >> not necessarily. these are designed to be more standalone devices. that goes a step further because it has built in four gigs of memory. you can take your miusic play list to go. >> i have my laptop, i have my ipad, my blackberry, why do i need one of those guys? what does that add to my tech life? >> i don't think it's going to be -- replace anything. i think at the beginning it will be more about complementing devices. this is sort of like the hub and everything else acts around it, but the pc as we know is suffering. this is going to be the new hub and all the other gadgets will act around it. >> have we put to rest concerns about wearing all this technology on your body, especially some of the blue trut bluetooth, the is it you have that's more powerful. >> this is low power bluetooth so it's less radiation. they don't act as standalone phones. they communicate with other device that is have the radio inside. >> price point? >> not yet. if i had a guess, this was around $299 when it came out. i wouldn't be surprised if this was slightly under it, maybe $199 change but we'll have to see. >> $199 for the orange one -- >> i'm guessing. >> and the black one was about $299. >> exactly. >> yeah. >> good to see you. >> okay. >> this could finally be the year of the wearable device. we'll see. mark, thank you. >> we will see. i would much rather wear it here than i would here. >> i could see you doing that watch. >> that's me all right. where were we? >> the dow is only off 22 points at this hour. although we are still negative across all major indexes. sure only by a little bit but it looks like, bill, at this hour we will once again approach perhaps test, if you will, but in the reclaim new highs. >> still have three points to go there to the upside. how is the market going to close? jim cramer wouldn't be surprised if the answer is not well. he's cautious. he's worried. is he bearish? we'll tell us coming up in a moment. and after the bell, pimco's bill gross long hail as the bond king is being presented as a monarch who rules with fear and an iron hand if you read "the wall street journal." but is it true that a lot of people who are successful later get accused of being a bad boss? it's all later on "the closing bell." he gave me some blood tests... showed it was low t. that's it. it was a number. 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uh-oh. geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. we know we're not the center of your life, but we'll do our best to help you connect to what is. well, the s&p may be flirting with all-time highs today, but not everybody is running with the bulls right now. >> our very own jim cramer said on his "mad money" show last night that he's worried about the market here and turning a little more bearish and he joins us now with more on what's gotten him concerned. jim, it is great to see you. >> welcome back, sir. >> what are the red flags for you here? >> i want to use the term skeptical because the market is at 17 times earnings but we've got two tracks developing. we've got a rational track and that's the banks are rational, some of the retailers are rational, some of the technology is rational. then the second track which is bordering on what i think could be the third rail if we're not careful. talking about tesla. when i hear a price target that is double what the price target was before, i think of qualcomm in december of 1999. the fabled $1,000 price target. i don't want to see this kind of stuff because it draws people in and makes people blindsided. i'm trying to prevent that. >> you had -- and the hoopla over facebook and their purchase of whatsapp at $19 billion. we are getting a little frothy with the valuations that we're hearing about in some of the deals, too, right? >> i think here is the problem. if you're facebook, you're looking at a think like whatsapp and say if that would come public it would probably be valued $30 billion compared to twitter, compared to yelp, compared to linkedin. maybe all the comparisons are false. that's what we saw. $19 billion looks like a bargain versus what it might go in the ipo market but if they don't monetize it correctly, bill, then it's a mistake. if they monetize it correctly, yes, it will be terrific. >> jim, i love hearing from people who have been in and out of the market for so many years, how they view today in terms of historical parallels. so to you is this a market like the late '90s? is it the mid '90s? is it even useful to make that kind of comparison? >> it is useful to say if a few more things happen, then we need to be more than concerned. for instance, if there are a lot of companies that write checks to other companies for numbers we don't know, netflix writing a check to the parent company of this network comcast and it drives the stock up 10%, i don't want to see that. if we see a lot more ipos based on vapor, i don't want to see that. we have a stock today, it is a great company, zulily, okay, i even said this morning on "squawk on the street," this should be up a couple box today, maybe even more. 16 bucks? i mean, i need that to happen over 16 weeks, not over 16 minutes. >> wow, jim, we're showing that right now. 36% higher today? >> it's a technology company. it can be a rifval to amazon. that's great. that doesn't mean it should go up 15 points. starbucks worried about coffee prices, that goes down a little. disney has been rallying every day since the quarter. takes a little breather. i don't want anyone to ever lose money in the market, but we need some good, meaning stocks not going up every day on nothing. but we have this other track and i'm talking tonight about tesla and i have to tell you, yes, it's absolutely true, if they can -- if he has a battery technology that's disruptive to the trillion dollar grid of electricity in this country, my hat off to him. otherwise that price target puts it above gm and ford. ford is going to make more cars per hour than they make per year. it's a concern. >> exactly. >> i'm skeptical. >> you're skeptical. what does that mean then -- what's the takeaway for the individual investor watching us right now. what is jim cramer telling them to do here then? >> i think if you own some netflix, which i have liked at $100, i liked at $400, take some of the cash off the darn thing. you can play with the house's money at this point. if you really like tesla, well, terrific, you just made enough you can take out some of that money. and maybe reapply it to a company that's selling at 14, 15 times earnings that maybe actually could be undervalued. look, this is not a blanket assault. google is not an expensive stock when it comes to 2016, '17. that's the time frame people use. i'm saying when i see stocks go up and i hear those price targets, when i hear the double the price target, i am thinking, okay, nasdaq, we're going back to the composite, we're going to that week in march where it goes to 5,000. we're 14 years later. we're still not that close to it. i don't want the attack of the price targets. >> yeah. that would take us back to the '90s then. >> yes. >> thanks, jim. looking forward to the show tonight. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> you have the interview with phil fernandez. >> and i have domino's. they're not an expensive stock. i'm okay with that one. >> they're delivering the pizzas, jim. >> and a technology company as well. >> that's what dunkin' donuts told us. >> you can see him tonight at 6:00 p.m. eastern time on cnbc. art cashin just told me $1 billion for sale as we head to the close. we might get more selling pressure as we head to the bell with 12 minutes left. the industrial average is down about 40 points right now. >> now, and this is fascinating, is tax reform back on the table? a new gop plan has emerged that promises to cut rates and also tax the super rich. so what's the catch? and is it really going to happen? that's all coming up next. i always say be the man with the plan but with less energy, moodiness, and a low sex drive, i had to do something. i saw my doctor. a blood test showed it was low testosterone, not age. we talked about axiron the only underarm low t treatment that can restore t levels to normal in about two weeks in most men. axiron is not for use in women or anyone younger than 18 or men with prostate or breast cancer. women, especially those who are or who may become pregnant, and children should avoid contact where axiron is applied as unexpected signs of puberty in children or changes in body hair or increased acne in women may occur. report these symptoms to your doctor. tell your doctor about all medical conditions and medications. serious side effects could include increased risk of prostate cancer, worsening prostate symptoms, decreased sperm count, ankle, feet or body swelling, enlarged or painful breasts, problems breathing while sleeping and blood clots in the legs. common side effects include skin redness or irritation where applied, increased red blood cell count, headache, diarrhea, vomiting, and increase in psa. ask your doctor about axiron. if you have a business idea, we have a personalized legal solution that's right for you. with easy step-by-step guidance, we're here to help you turn your dream into a reality. start your business today with legalzoom. about eight minutes left in the trading session here. art cashin telling us there was $1 billion for sale. a lot of supply coming to the market at close, could push stock prices lower. the dow down 35 points. the s&p down 3.75, 4.5 points away from an all-time high. larry cantor, managing director at barclay's is with me. i know you're more the long-term perspective guy, baugh lateut ls market is acting like it's walking into a stiff wind. >> i don't really see that. i think after the 30% gain last year, we were down before, now we're kind of flat, that's pretty good with the fed tapering and the economy looking like it's slowing. if anything coming into this year, bill, i thought the biggest risk was the economy would grow too fast and people thought once the fed stopped tapering, they would start hiking rates. now with inflation coming in and growth on the soft side, everybody is believing the fed that tapering doesn't mean tightening. that's pretty good market -- thing for the markets. you have seen the fixed income market pretty stable as well. >> you take comfort -- maybe comfort isn't the right word, but you believe the slowdown we're seeing in like housing and some of the manufacturing reports we've been getting lately are not all that great. you think that's okay. you wouldn't panic about that right now. >> right. i think it's okay for the markets. i think the markets have very little to worry about. there's no big fight going on in washington. i don't think anybody is worried about a recession. it's just that we're not getting the kind of growth bounce everybody expected. now, admittedly, we've had terrible weather and it's hard to parse out how much of this is weather but we saw in the second ha of last year growth in excess of 3%. we saw a big rise in inventories and now you're paying the price. i think house something going to be fine. >> what about jim cramer's point he made, the teslas and netflixs and some of the high flyers getting out of hand. does that concern you? >> a little bit for those stocks. you have to worry about anything that's just zooming up and has only one direction. but the overall market does not look crazy, and, you know, again, the economic environment here is pretty good. i think it's easy to believe the fed. you're not going to see any tight. ing this year. remember, even though they're tapering, they're still pumping in a lot of money into the market for the rest of this year. >> i got it. larry, good to see you. >> thanks, bill. >> larry cantor joining us. we're going to take a break and come back with the closing countdown for this tuesday. after the bell, the 20th century regarded as the american century for its explosive growth, but coming up a new book says the best is yet to come, and we are on the brink of an economic renaissance in the 21st century here in the united states. how likely is that? we'll find out. stay with us. peace of mind is important when you're running a successful business. so we provide it services you can rely on. with centurylink as your trusted it partner, you'll experience reliable uptime for the network and services you depend on. multi-layered security solutions keep your information safe, and secure. and responsive dedicated support meets your needs, and eases your mind. centurylink. your link to what's next. sometimes they just drop in. always obvious. cme group can help you navigate risks and capture opportunities. we enable you to reach global markets and drive forward with broader possibilities. cme group: how the world advances. [ bell ringing, applause ] five tech stocks with more than a 10%... change in after-market trading. ♪ all the tech stocks with a market cap... of at least 50 billion... are up on the day. 12 low-volume stocks... breaking into 52-week highs. six upcoming earnings plays... that recently gapped up. [ male announcer ] now the world is your trading floor. get real-time market scanning wherever you are with the mobile trader app. from td ameritrade. coming up on the two-minute mark with the dow down 36. first, let's go to seema mody with some breaking news. >> the u.s. department of transportation says oil by rail shipments must move under stricter haaser douse material classification. they must test oil samples before shipment. bill, that's the latest. >> that recent spill several months ago, that was a big problem there and they are trying to find safer ways to transport energy products around the country here. quickly, the s&p down 3.5. doesn't look like we will get an all-time high. you would need to be at 1,848 and change. we're at 1,844 right now. there were a couple bright spots this morning. macy's and home depot did turn in earnings. both are trading appreciably higher. home depot up 4% with macy's up 6%, bob pisani. >> these are the two strong ones. >> they were the outliers. >> that's right. i'll tell you what you want to watch for, tjx, ross stores, they will be reporting this week. they haven't said too much, and they were big darlings. i think they'll be more interesting. because we knew these guys were going to be strong. they were in the market area everybody liked. >> at some point traders are going to throw in the towel and say if we can't get a new all-time high, it's going to be $poi -- >> the slope down in the last hour is not as dramatic but we just drift lower. we haven't been able to close at a new high two days in a row. technically now this gets a little more iffy. they start talking about this a little bit more. but overall i would note a lot of market laggards like energy are starts to move up. it's not like -- it's turning around a little bit. it just can't hit new highs. >> by the way, happy birthday yesterday. >> thank you. >> thank you, bob. see you later. we'll close out this trading day. again, disappointment for the bulls. no all-time high for the s&p 500. the dow down 28. stay tuned for hour two of "the closing bell" now with kelly evans and company. i'll see you tomorrow, kelly. >> thank you, bill. yes, wee just hit the closing bell and let's see what's happening. i'm kelly evans and stocks have given back their earlier gains. here is how we're finishing up the day. the dow will give up 26 points. not the worst of the session but not the positive we were looking for. the s&p 500, the nasdaq giving up about 1/10 of a percent. 1,845, that closing level is not going to do it. let's get right to it with today's panel and it's a goods one. joining me marcus lemonis, sharon epperson, josh brown, and shark tank investor, author of "the cold, hard truth on men, women, and money," kevin o'leary. josh brown, you had a piece today where you effectively called this out as a frothy market. it echoes some of the concerns jim cramer was telling us he had in the tech space. how worried should people be -- granted we were a little down today -- but generally speaking about the market? >> tech space -- let's talk about the biotech space which would make the tech space blush right now. this is a sector that's up 70%, seven zero, over the last year. that's the entire industry's worth of stocks. 122 of the biotechs in the russell 1000 are not even profitable, and i think what we really want to focus on here is that this can continue for a long time. so just saying it's frothy in and of itself is not indicative of a market top. i think if you think about, look, the nasdaq in 1999 in january was at 90 times earnings, you would have said that's frothy, and then the nasdaq went on to go up another 130% from there. so i think that's what the hot money is focused on right now. >> mr. wonderful, i want to know if this is a mr. wonderful stock market still because you've liked it generally here. do you think for people who might have been on the sidelines, it's still safe to get in the water? >> the only concern i have other than josh is a negative nelly on this thing is this. i don't see confirmation in the bond market. i would love to see a three handle on the ten-year telling me that all these great earnings we're seeing confirmed by the bond market. that's why you should be -- >> sharon, what about the signals coming from your space? it's like just as soon as we had a january, a february rally in some of the metals and industries, now we're starting to look a little softer and china concerns are socoming to e fore. >> look at natural gas. we've seen the biggest two day slight in natural gas prices that we've seen in six years. we had gotten pretty high in natural gas prices and it was driven by some fundamentals but a lot of speculative buying driving prices up. that's something we're seeing in terms of the pull back in nat gas. you mentioned china as a factor and perhaps what we're seeing in the oil market with a little bit of pressure on those prices, but also looking at what the supply situation is going to look like. so that also may keep a little bit of a lid on oil but oil seems to be on pretty much of an upward momentum. >> we've been having this discussion on the show about what's happening with profits in this economy. frankly, the s&p 500 for whatever the fed's role has been has pretty much tracked the increase in profits from the lows during the recession. there could be no more appropriate time to bring "the profit q profit" back this evening. >> i'm excited about the retail numbers. i'm feeling good about the pent up demand we'll see in the spring. >> you're a believer in the pent up story? >> i am. >> are you seeing any evidence of this in camping world? >> i see it in my own business. and a lot of businesses i'm invested in. those companies who have their inventories in good shape and have good margin disciplines are going to be just fine. >> there's been an energy hit of $20 billion because of higher bills. we've seen consumer confidence sagging a little bit. what gives you the confidence, especially whether it's in your business or across in these others that if you buy that inventory right now, that consumer is going to show up in march, show up in april, show up in may? >> sunshine and warm weather is what gives me the confidence. nobody wants to go outside right now, so the minute we get a little sunshine, and we've seen it over the last week, we had a couple breaks in warm weather in retail sales went through the roof. >> i want to get "fast money" contributor steve grasso into this conversation as well. he's just off the floor, and, steve, here is my question. i don't love to play the charts, but if you talk about the chatter around here, it's been whether the s&p can test and recapture that 1848 level. it didn't do it again today. how significant is that? >> well, here is the thing, when technicals work, once you keep pounding against a certain resistance or beating down against a support level, the more you do it, the more it weakens it. right now we're in no man's land, right? if we break through, there's no other resistance. so we kind of just float from there. having said that, this is a great time to be taking profits because no one knows where this market is going. nobody on that panel, no one here. >> kelly, i want to bring two other charts, i don't know if we'll get them up there in time, but this is what a lot of guys are fixated on right now. what led us down this year were retailers. they got smoked coming into january. here is something you should be aware of though. the xrt is now leadership once again. it's up 8.9% off the lows from february 3rd. >> wow. >> that is just scorching hot right now. the other thing is the all country world index, this is a chart a lot of people are pointing to. it's just taken out the may of 2008 highs. this is 44 countries from around the world, 85% of the investable markets. this is a very significant breakout, and if you look into the internals, almost everything is working within. >> go ahead, steve. >> it's also people betting on the fact that this weather issue is going to be a kitchen sink event, but also with the debt ceiling agreement, you wind up getting those tax returns back out, those checks back in the mail, so people have more discretionary spending. but tough look at nat gas prices. they're up tremendous year-over-year. that could hit the wall. >> this is what's so interesting. it comes back to what we were talking about. if everything seems to be lining up for maybe clear sailing ahead, then why is it that the ten-year interest rate is trading at 2.7% and it's actually come down this year and there are plenty of guys on the street who think it could go to 2.5%? >> here is an upside scenario that could happen over the next four months. gdp growth which is the tide that rises everything would probably -- right now we're in an anemic situation, 1% gsmq1. if we could see a 4% gdp, then you would see the handle on the ten-year cross over to 3.00%. that's the upside scenario. if we don't get, that i think we're going to go flat to down in q2. >> it's mixed signals, sharon, is it not? it's no man's land, i love that phrase. it feels like we're in a little bit of no man's land and everyone is trying to sort it out. >> i think some individual investors will take the refund checks and they will hoard them and see how this plays out. the idea as soon as they get those checks they're going to then invest or go out and buy something right away, i'm not so sure. a lot of people are very concerned about their client's money and very concerned about where to put it right now, and they're saying the individual investors, the clients that they have are saying they want to keep it on the sidelines until they see a clear path ahead. >> steve, go ahead. >> sharon knows this better than anybody. i spoke about it yesterday on closing bell. the average price of nat gas was $2, now it's four spot 88. that's a huge increase. people start catching up on their bills, that's costing them to heat their homes. >> what should people who are getting that refund check do with the refund check this year? i know it's going to change a little bit but let's boil it down. >> you log on to mt. gox.com, put the bar mitzvah money in it with the refund check. >> i'm laughing but it's a serious issue. there are a lot of people who are trying to get money out of mt. gox and can't and others who are saying it's just growing pains. >> i'm going to agree with kevin. if we can get a little growth in the gdp, i don't think 3.5% to 4% is real stick but if we can be north of 2.5% touching 3%, we'll be in good shape. the credit market for consumers is still pretty good. if you get the refund checks, depends how liberal the credit market is going to be in lending to -- >> you are talking very positive. we need a good corporate tax restructuring. we need good corporate tax reform. then you get your gdp numbers. i think everyone on that panel can agree on that. >> i will say, the proposal that the republican congressman is likely to put forward as we understand it would involve some mix of a surcharge on the wea h wealthy and would maybe do something with the mortgage deduction/exemption, but more importantly this would bring the corporate tax rate down to let's call it -- income tax rate to 25% from a high of almost 40%. the jct, the joint center of taxation, says it could add a percentage to gdp growth each year. >> it sounds like s&p 2,000 at that point. >> guys, last thoughts here before we have to jump. just want to circle back to this sell-off we saw a little bit today and, josh, is there anything about the fact that we just couldn't make it happen today that has you a little bit more worried? >> i guess i don't buy into no man's land. i think we're less than 1% off of all-time highs. this market obviously deserves the benefit of the doubt. every time it's had a pull back, you have had people put their pinkie to the corner of their mouth and a change in character? no, not yet. it hasn't happened yet. in the meantime, the trend is still in force. all of the internals are backing up this move and i don't think it will be a long time before we see us punch through, and when we do, maybe that will be accompanied by something taxwise or the weather gets better or whatever. >> and the ten-year would confirm. >> it could happen tomorrow. who knows. >> guys, thanks. you can catch steve coming up on "fast money" at 5:00 p.m. in just under an hour's time. forget all the talk about a sluggish economy, the u.s. is on the brink of a dramatic growth face. author joel kurtzman is making that argument in his latest book. find out which sectors he thinks will solidify's america's position as the dominant economic power of this century. also ahead firestorm in arizona. apple, national football league, and pets mart, just a few names that have taken a stand against controversial legislation that would allow businesses to deny service to gay and lesbian customers. keep it right here. you're watching cnbc, first in business worldwide. price. and walk limit automatically tries to find it for you. just set your start and end price. and let it do its thing. wow, more fan mail. hey ray, my uncle wanted to say thanks for idea hub. o well tell him i said you're welcome. he loves how he can click on it and get specific actionable trade ideas with their probabilities throughout the day. yea, and these ideas are across the board -- bullish, bearish and neutral. i think you need a bigger desk, pal. another one? 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[ male announcer ] so come trade at the place that's all about options and futures. optionsxpress. open an account today and get a $150 amazon.com gift card when you call 1-888-330-3137 now. optionsxpress by charles schwab. welcome back. another near miss today for the s&p as it tried to recapture its all-time high. the dow also in the red but hardly big losses. let's get more from seema mody. >> let's start with some of the big after the bell movers. first solar shares tanking. revenue and earnings came in way la low estimates. guidance also short of expectations. and then there's dreamworks animation also lower on earnings of 20 cents, missing street estimates of 32 cents. fourth quarter earnings results included an impairment charge of $13.5 million or a loss of 12 cents per share on its turbo film. in terms of today's big winners, tesla on fire. the best performing stock on the s&p 500. two big reasons here, morgan stanley putting out a bullish note writing tesla has the opportunity to not only disrupt the car industry but the electric utility industry by customersizing battery packs and the tesla model s named "consumer reports" top auto pick for 2014. blackberry shares on the move after rolling out a new phone for the indonesian market. ceo john chen talked to cnbc about bbm, it's blackberry messaging service and how that presents a big opportunity. cisco marking the biggest bond sale of the year. the book was oversubscribed. some are wondering where they're not using the $47 billion of cash on its books. most of its cash is overseas and they would rather borrow at low rates. and river bed tech. back to you, kelly. >> seema, thank you. despite the recent weak employment report, our next guest cites four key reasons why america is on the brink of an enormous economic growth spurt. which us a joel kurtzman. he's the author of "unleashing the second american century." joel, great to see you. >> great to see you. thank you. >> it's interesting to watch the way that publishing trends change because a couple years ago every book on the newsstand it seemed was about how there was never going to be growth in this country again, the great stagnation, that whole theme. what makes you so confident now that just a couple years into the recovery things have dramatically changed or have you always felt this way? >> well, no, i did not start out optimistic. it took me a long time in studying a lot of facts before i changed my mind. and what i have seen is that we have enormous amounts of creativity that people are not taking into account, and they're not sufficiently taking into account the energy revolution. those are transformational. >> and i want to bring the panel in on this as well. there's four tenets you're talking about. you mentioned creativity in energy. gigantic amounts of capital and unrivaled manufacturing depths. how many of these are truly specific to america? are these four things resources that other countries don't posse possess? >> absolutely in terms of the changing energy landscape. i mean, i think joel is right. the reason why it's changing and why he's changed his opinion is five years ago you couldn't say that we are where we are today in terms of the reserves we have, in terms of the production that we have, and in terms of the way that that is happening and the way that's going to be transported as well and perhaps exported as well. so that has changed dramatically and that's a very north american centric development. >> joel, what do you think? >> yeah, it's only happening here. the technology that we've developed, we're a decade at least ahead of the rest of the world. we have more deposits now that are addressable than any other country in the world. this is transformational. take the industrial might of the united states and put saudi arabia on top, and that's our future. >> and, marcus, you see this firsthand, kind of the incubation level, you have experienced this. is it the factors he cites or is it something else and these are just symptoms of some kind of, you know, american human capital? >> if you visit businesses like kevin and i do and you're dealing with people that are on the front lines and in the factories and in the warehouses working, the american spirit is not beatable. the work ethic i think that's starting to come back that may have faded in the mid '90s where people felt entitled, starting to really go away. the generation that's really leading the pack i think are the kids that have been out of college for 10 or 12 years who are willing to do whatever it takes to make a living and whatever it takes to make that business successful. >> kevin, what's your perspective on this? >> i think there's something missing on joel's shopping list of upside. i want to ask you about it. you don't talk about the regulatory environment, particularly for small business in america, which represents 23 million businesses. it's also 54% of the sales in our economy. and definitely there's been a sea change of negativity on the regulatory environment that holds them back from hiring. why aren't you discussing that in this study? >> well, that's a big issue. the regulatory framework, whether we're talking about financial regulation or whether we're talking about business, and the tax structure as well. but i think that these regulatory issues can hold us back, but they can't stop us. the forces forward are just too strong. >> joel, if you're right, what does that mean for growth in this country, for inflation, for productivity? just yesterday we were having a discussion with marshall auerback who says the growth rate is much lower and that was echoed by the cb o when they were looking at the impact of obamacare. >> i don't agree with that at all. i think that our long-term prognosis for the next ten years is extremely strong. i don't think that you can have the energy bonanza that we have and not see an effect across the entire economy. so people who say that our growth is going to be slow are not taking that fully into account. >> and so bottom line, what kind of growth are you talking about? are you saying we're going to have another late '90s moment here in this country just as everyone was writing it off? >> yes, i think so, and i think it will be longer. >> all right. thank you so much for joining us. this is going to be fascinating. i think we're all hoping that there is some sort of animal spirits element here so we'll watch it. thank you, joel. >> you're welcome. now, meanwhile, the meet is on in arizona, speaking of unique things in the states. governor jan brewer facing pressure from the likes of apple and petsmart to veto is controversial bill that would allow businesses to deny services to gays and lesbians. one of the companies speaking out joins us next. understand my charts, and spend more time trading. their quick trade bar lets my account follow me online so i can react in real-time. plus, my local scottrade office is there to help. because they know i don't trade like everybody. i trade like me. i'm with scottrade. 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[ male announcer ] you'll be able to visit any doctor or hospital that accepts medicare patients. plus, there are no networks, and virtually no referrals needed. see why millions of people have already enrolled in the only medicare supplement insurance plans endorsed by aarp. don't wait. call now. welcome back. arizona's governor is feeling the economic heat. they say money talks, and it's talking loud and clear as some big names are urging the governor to veto legislation that would allow businesses asserting religious beliefs to deny confservices to gays and lesbians. >> backers of the bill say it protects business owners' religious freedom. gays and lesbians say it gives businesses a right to discriminate. marriott, apple, and american airlines along those urging governor jan brewer to veto the bill. intel has just weighed in against it. so has the organizing committee for next year's super bowl as well as other business groups. >> we've had four companies call us to tell us that we'll be dropped from their list as a potential investment location unless governor brewer very toes the bill. >> the business groups say the law and all its controversy would hurt the state competitively, but the libertarian cato institute thinks that concern may be overblown. >> it is not an invitation to discrimina discriminate. it's a way of reinforcing that religious liberty is an important value just like equality under the law is an important value. >> nbc news citing people familiar with governor brewer's thinking says she's leaning toward vetoing the bill, but she has until the end of friday to decide. officially, she says she hasn't decided yet. >> scott, the clock is ticking. thank you so much. with us now is david lenhart, the ceo of pets mart which is headquartered in phoenix, arizona. david, it's great to see you. what would you like to see the governor do here? >> great to see you, kelly, and thanks. this is an important topic. we absolutely would like to see the governor veto this bill. we think it's bad for arizona business. we think it's bad for the people of arizona. >> david, do you think arizona more broadly is becoming toxic to business? >> you know, we're a hometown company here in arizona. we've been here for the last 26 years. arizona is good for business, but this bill is not, and it undermines that, and that's why we are urging the governor to veto this bill. >> are you urging this from a personal point of view? is this something you're hearing from employees? what is your main concern as a business? >> yeah, we are hearing this both from our associates and our customers. at petsmart diversity and inclusion is a key piece of who we are, a key piece of our culture. we fundamentally believe our communities, our customers, and our associates all deserve equal respect, and this bill does not do that, and that's why we are absolutely opposed to it and urging the governor to veto it. >> as i understand, if she doesn't veto it, it does become law after this weekend. what do you do in that case come monday morning? >> yeah. first of all, i hope that does not happen. that's one of the reasons i'm here today. but if it does happen, we will continue to work with our legislators, continue to work with the governor to minimize its impact. >> you would leave the state? >> we're a hometown company, kelly, as i said. we've been here 26 years. arizona is good for business, and we would continue to work with our legislators and the governor to, you know, minimize the impact. >> i assume you have raised these concerns with the legislature and the governor's office directly? >> yes, we have. we've actually attached our name to a coalition led by the arizona technology council. it is many small and large businesses across the state that are all, again, in support of the governor vetoing this bill. >> and can you tell our viewers in this country or across the world who may be watching why it is that this bill has already become legislation? is it something about the belief system that arizona has? no one paid much attention to it and suddenly it was an issue? how have events transpired to this point? >> yeah, kelly, i don't pretend to be an expert on arizona politics, but what i can tell you is fundamentally as a corporation and as petsmart, we fundamentally believe in diversity and inclusion, and this bill undermines that concept, and that's, again, why we are very strongly urging the governor to veto it. >> so we're not overstating it here by saying this bill, if it stands, would allow businesses to turn away gay and lesbians if they didn't believe -- if that wasn't in accordance with their belief system? >> we believe that that absolutely could be the case, and, again, that goes against who we are as a company, which is why we're speaking out so strongly against this. >> david, thank you so much for joining us. again, appreciate it. david is the ceo of petsmart headquartered in phoenix, arizona. >> thank you, kelly. public shouting matches, a man at the top running amok. "the wall street journal" painting an unflattering portrait of pimco co-founder bill gross. he just denied it here on cnbc this afternoon. after the break, we'll discuss if a certain amount of aggression comes with the territory of building a mega business. we'll be right back. ameriprise asked people a simple question: can you keep your lifestyle in retirement? i don't want to think about the alternative. i don't even know how to answer that. i mean, no one knows how long their money is going to last. i try not to worry, but you worry. what happens when your paychecks stop? because everyone has retirement questions. ameriprise created the exclusive confident retirement approach. to get the real answers you need. start building your confident retirement today. welcome back. former pimco ceo mohammed el-erian left the firm in january leaving the financial word to speculate as to why. and today "the wall street journal" reporting that personal clashes with founder bill gross drove el-erian away. the article painted an unflattering picture of the culture and bill pimco himself. earlier gross said the story was overblown and down played the report. it's not the first time someone who is mega successful has been accused of being a jerk. steve jobs, in fact, comes to mind in in case. here to weigh in with more, jeff cox, finance eder to of cnbc.com. he want to get thoughts from our financial, but, jeff, first your take. is this the flip side of the success coin? >> well, kelly, i think it was harry truman who said if you want a friend, get a dog. i think that that's very true in politics. it's also very true in business. when you get into the high finance world, a lot of ceos have a reputation for being tough managers. to me managing is always about three words. it's about setting the tone. and how you act as a manager is going to set the tone. now, the other part of that is what are your results. for a long time for a guy like bill gross the results were there, so you couldn't hear about those kind of stories. now the results aren't there is much. pimco had a tough year, they're having a mediocrier the ieyear year. >> there's a staying institutions are the shadows of men. when it comes to some of the banks in particular, we've seen a lot of focus on corporate culture and whether it was fostering bad behavior, for example. but in this case, and i really -- i want to hear what kevin has to say about this, in particular kevin, does success excuse bad behavior? does success -- is bad behavior necessarily a part of success? how do you disentangle these issues? >> i look at it as an investor. i'm not investing to make friends. i'm investing to make money. i don't care if the manager is difficult to work with. all i care about is execution of the business plan and results. >> you don't care how the sausage gets made, right, kevin? >> i don't care, but gross is in a different situation because it's very easy to measure his metric every day, and there he is sitting on billions of dollars of ten-year government debt which i think right now is a land mine, a toxic waste because when rates move up, you are going to lose a lot of money in that portfolio. it was easy to make money in his strategy for decades as rates went down. not so easy now. that poor guy is in a pressure cooker. i don't blame him. >> it absolutely is a pressure cooker. it's a tough business. josh, you know a little bit about that. >> we're not just talking generically about business. this is the investment business. it's very different. you can do everything right as kevin said, you can execute. i do this, i do that, and it works. and on wall street, that's not the way things go down. sometimes you can be perfect, but the results don't do your way. when it happens for a prolonged period, which is what we're seeing with some of the major funds at pimco which is not billions but trillions, there's a lot of pressure. there's ego on the line -- >> let's -- >> you could see two guys who respect each other kind of -- i have been on trading desks where the market has gone against us. i can tell you this is not that rare. >> marcus? >> let's get back to the focus which is what's the behavior like and is success an excuse for having bad behavior? the answer is no. so i invest to make money, too, but i expect people to behave in a way that's consistent -- >> wait a minute, some people would say you're guilty of bad behavior because you're mean to the people involved in trying to shore -- >> that's kevin. i'm not mean to the people. i get them focused on the basic principles of making sure their place doesn't close, but i always do it with respect and i always do it with a sense of discipline. and what i want people to do is not say, if he has success, he has a license to be a jerk. >> right. >> you don't have a license to be a jerk. under any circumstance. >> people say that steve jobs to some extent had a license to be a jerk. in fact, if you look at the narrative surrounding him, it justifies over time his behavior through what he achieved and that's true with a lot of people whether they're artists, certainly musicians. >> i think it's fascinating to focus on the personalities of these ceos. i was a sociology major, i love that. as an investor, what matters is are they making money for you and do they have a plan in place to continue to do so. and i think what we're learning now with the situation that they have at pimco is now they have six deputy chief investment officers. they're trying to set a secession plan in place, trying to set up people who will be contrarian to bill gross as mohammed perhaps was. you do need that -- >> to a large extent. >> you need that in order to continue to make money. that's what investors should be caring about and as long as the returns on their pimco -- >> but that's quite a statement. >> kelly -- >> pimco total return fund could not have possibly had a good year last year. >> it had a bad year. >> it's $242 billion in bonds. it's not going anywhere. they don't have license to ride the s&p. so i think if you look at all bond funds, you didn't have this much turmoil at the top let's say where dan fuss is running the shop or a doubleline. this is a pretty specific personality clash. >> if i could circle back on my original point here, this really comes down to, like i said, when bill gross was doing very well and as kevin said when it was a convenient environment aroundizy for him to do well, you didn't hear about bill gross' behavior. now, when the results aren't there, you're going to hear about these things, and you're going to see what kind of a tone is bill gross setting, and when things go bad, can he keep his head and can he steer pimco back to the place where it was before. >> let's be honest, i don't care if bill gross gets his employees hosed down with water and hits them with an electric cattle prod, i want to know -- >> that's the point i'm making. he's got to deliver and he's not delivering now. >> if he can beat the index, that's all i care about. >> he's not beating -- >> that's the question though, right? >> he's even with the index this year. >> if you only invest with people because they're nice, you're probably going to go broke. i think there's a balance between being tough but being respectful. >> i would like to see a motif built around companies that are held by nice, quote, unquote, ceos. >> they don't really exist. >> that's exactly the point. who can think of an example -- >> in sports they talk about somebody being a players' coach. usually synonymous with being a loser. >> can you think of a ceo who is lauded for being a good guy? >> let's sing kumbaya. all i care about is returns. >> is it possible you can be both? does being successful -- >> yes. >> you can be a good guy and be successful, but on the street we all have a thick skin and there's a reason for it. the guys that get results are the guys that are really tough on the people that work for them but there's a line that you don't have to cross either. >> all right. guys, thank you. lower -- thank you, jeff. you can read more about his piece online, cnbc.com. lower tax rates but a new surtax on the rich. house republicans are proposing a sirchly fid code that would slash the tax rate but there are a few catches. up next, how would you like to have warren buffett give you investment advice on your computer? 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with us now the co-founder and ceo daniel nadler. welcome, first of all. >> thank you. >> are you here trying to destroy what's built around us by giving everyone a little individual warren buffett in their phone? >> we're trying to augment the tools people have. a lot of the tools you have see are 20 or 30 years old. financial technology has not kept up. you can ask your iphone very complex questions like what's the fastest way to get to whole foods and it has to do some intensive computations, if you want to ask a computer system what happens to u.s. defense stocks, there's no system you can that using natural language. >> you're confident you can build that kind of system? >> you're trying to get people further along the line of data. trying to surface data as quickly as you can. the engineering challenge is building a natural language interface you can ask financial questions of. we're already there at answer your question. in terms of the data you surf. >> is it all about building a framework and a system whereby it's about recognizing that i may be asking, you know, should i put -- should i invest in apple? is it about identifying my personal information to see whether that's a good idea for me or is it about analyzing the market and macroconditions and apple itself and then being able to deliver a response? >> it's more the latter. more about analyzing the market. more about creating a statistical an notation of the world. if you watch a sports game and lebron james is at the three-point line, it will tell you his shooting percentage. events happen in the macroenvironment. there's no statistical an notation of the world. there's no real time annotation. >> if this works as you envision, give us one example how that might work for a given query. >> a real example was july 3rd of 2013 when oil prices topped $100 a barrel. there was the morsi coup in egypt. a lot of traders were wondering what happens under these conditions, when oil is trading above $100. we've created a system you can ask in natural language how do energy stocks trade in the 24 hours following civil unrest in the middle east or/and oil prices trading above $100 a barrel. that's an example. >> you're letting the phone take my job. that's fine. i will find something else to do. >> hopefully the phone will augment your job. >> and a i can invest better as a result. daniel, thank you for being here. lower tax rates, new surtax on the so-called rich. wait until you hear if that surtax applies to you. we'll be right back. lities becoe reality. with centurylink as your trusted partner, our visionary cloud infrastructure and global broadband network free you to focus on what matters. with custom communications solutions and responsive, dedicated support, we constantly evolve to meet your needs. every day of the week. centurylink® your link to what's next. make it happen with fidelity active trader pro. it's one more innovative reason serious investors are choosing fidelity. call or click to open your fidelity account today. we still run into problems. that's why liberty mutual insurance offers accident forgiveness if you qualify, and new car replacement, standard with our auto policies. so call liberty mutual at... today. and if you switch, you could save up to $423. liberty mutual insurance. responsibility. what's your policy? welcome back. with some breaking news on sac capital, kate kelly joins us now. >> thanks so much. we've been waiting for some details about the reorganization of sac capital into a family office, and we know as of today they're going to reorganize into four different units, long/short, macro, quad, and steve's personal investments. their new name which they're in the process of finalizing will be announced sometime in april. the new structure takes affect may 1st. a couple interesting tidbits, the staff has shrunked to 850 employees. there will be the appointment of a chief surveillance officer or cfo, someone who will ward off the type of activity that got them in trouble, insider trading convictions of former employees and so on. >> wow. some big structural news, kate, for one of the biggest firms out there. thank you so much. >> thank you. >> i should also mention, kelly, they've returned almost all of their public money which is something they were going to try to do. >> that still leaves them with how many billions of steve's own money? >> i heard they would have $9 billion in total. still a pretty impressive amount of money overall for a firm that once managed up to 16, then more recently 14 and now 9. >> and a series of insider trading scandals. thank you. republicans putting out a simplified tax proposal calling for an income tax rate cut but also a surtax on high earners. john harwood joining us with the latest details. is there any chance of this moving forward and democrats signing on? >> no. and there's not very good chance of republicans sign on either in terms of the entire party. just a little reality check on this. mitch mcconnell, the senate republican leader, came out from a party before losing that chairmanship. here's what's in that draft. first of all, just like the reagan tax reform in the 1980s, it collapses to two rates and they're lower than reagan's. they're 10 and 25 rather than the 15 and 28 that ronald regan had. there is a 10% surtax on income over $250,000 -- over $450,000, rather, the plan is expected to have the tax rates at 10 or 25 for 99% of taxpayers. 40% of capital gains tax would be excluded from taxation. there's also a bank tax, this gives you one of the reasons why, kelly, this will be controversial among republicans as well. in order to get those rates down to 25%, you've got to do an awful lot in terms of raising revenue elsewhere. so there's going to be a version of the financial crisis responsibility fee that obama proposed a couple of years ago. so-called bank tax. there's all sorts of deductions that are likely to be trimmed in this proposal and that's why they're not talking about those today. that's why republicans don't want to move it, because if you limit the exclusion for health care premiums that employers pay, that can be called a tax on health care. if you exclude the charitable exemption or reduce the exemption for charitable giving, that is going to generate opposition. the same on local and state tax deductio deductions, mortgages. it's a big mine field. >> a big mine field is the best way to put it. john, thank you so much. i want to open up the discussion now to the panel and look at what's kind of ironic about this, it reminds me of the immigration infrastructure thing. this is what people want to do and why it will never happen. >> you might as well talk about a marshall invasion. this will never get through the senate. it's almost like an opening to a conversation rather than anything in its completion. >> if we pretend that it could politically get done, do you find any reason why there are problems with what's being proposed? >> yeah, because they'll roll back the surtax. they won't be revenue neutral. all you'll get is the tax cut. at the end of the day those earning 450 and up is the cutoff, there's no way that's happening. >> why? >> it's politically unpalatable. >> it seems like now is the environment for it to be politically -- >> i would like to see us tackle repatriation of all of this capital that they're holding overseas because they're deathly afraid of paying taxes on it. i would rather see that come in country and be unleashed, something like that. i don't see why mortgage interest deductions or something like that should go. >> what do you think? >> i'm having a hard time with those ideas. that's a manifesto of really bad ideas. any time that you dissuade people to invest capital or punish success in america. >> we would be lowering the income tax. we would be exempting 10some of it. >> over 450 of capital gains. why would i do that if i was being charged a surcharge for success? >> what would you do? >> the only modern economy in the world that doesn't have a user tax. i would drop tax rates to corporations to zero and i'd put the personal income tax to 25% and then tax everything that you want to use on your own discretion. user taxes are everywhere. they're ubiquitous. they work. you can decide what you want to work. >> sharon? >> i don't think this has any chance of going anywhere, and when you talk to folks about what is being proposed here, no one thinks it's going to get, as john mentioned, any traction, even among republicans broadly. so i think we're just talking about kind of semantics here, but one of the things that may perhaps be more palatable to some on the democratic side would be seeing at least some continued taxation on these higher income levels. i don't know if the surtax -- >> that's the investment income. what the super wealthy are most interested in protecting. >> that's the bulk of their income. >> we have to go to markets. quick last thought here. marcus. >> i haven't seen the math on all of this. i don't know what it will add up to or subtract to. it seems like what sharon said, pie in the sky. >> we need a template. we need to get the discussion going. if nothing else, a follow-up for that reason. get the final tweets in. what's less damaging to goldman sachs. it never actually worked there. turns out he worked for citi. you can tweet us your thoughts at cnbc "closing bell." we'll get to that after this. which is why usaa is honored to help our members with everything from investing for retirement to saving for college. our commitment to current and former military members and their families is without equal. ♪ [ indistinct shouting ] [ male announcer ] time and sales data. split-second stats. 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[ indistinct shouting, bell dinging ] ...you'll bust your brain box. ♪ all on thinkorswim from td ameritrade. ♪ welcome back. in case you haven't heard today, the @gselevator has been revealed. the guy doesn't work at goldman sachs. is this less damaging? there have been much more damaging lies told in elevators. >> i think it's more damaging that goldman was looking for the guy inside the company when he wasn't even there. are you surprised at this one? >> i think we should start pimpoelevator. love that handle. >> you guys were having a tee bait about the minimum wage during one of the last breaks and have you resolved anything on this issue? washington and fix it? >> there's no debate. it's a really bad idea. >> great idea. >> fantastic idea. >> the reason it's a bad idea is some incremental job is not being created because a vendor or business operator, will it's take massachusetts, there are 17 employees, they will not hire another one until they find out if they're paying $4 more for the existing ones. the market should decide not some government officials. >> raising the minimum wage is a good idea for a couple of reasons. number one, people can't live off of $8.50. >> they'll be living off of zero because they don't have a job. >> people spend money on advertising, travel, nonsense. it's better to pay them. >> i guess we didn't resolve something. thank you all for being here this afternoon. really appreciate it. by the way, be sure you can catch kevin o'leary on the "shark tank" marathon. it is "shark tank tuesday" after all. and "the profit" is on at 10:00 p.m. marcus, any teasers? >> no, i'm trying to be like kevin. >> mr. wonderful. >> like him. >> aren't we all. "fast money" is coming up in a few seconds. melis melissa, lee, what's on tap? >> hey, kel, it's crazy here. the brouhaha, the implosion of bitcoin. we have the guy who's been out since valentine's day protesting. he is still there and he is going to phone into the show. you will not believe what he says about bitcoin now. >> all right. >> oh, by the way, kelly, did you know that it's the reformed broker's birthday today. >> it's your birthday? >> it is. >> it's karen finerman's birthday. >> tonight we have a very special surprise. a series of surprises, actually. >> i can't believe you didn't tell me. i'm not wishing you happy birthday. your present was hanging out with all of us. over to you, melissa. >> thanks, kel. we're playing all of karen's favorite songs throughout the hour. "fast money" starts right now. in new york city's times square. we have tim see more, steve bros so he, karen

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