Transcripts For CNBC Squawk On The Street 20150324

Rid of patient, so to speak. Great. Now were at 1. 9 again. Lets get to our road map. It starts with the markets, futures as you saw pointing to a slightly higher open helped by Consumer Prices that rose for the First Time Since october. Plus Chesapeake Energy blaming weak commodities for its decision to cut cap x this year. Of course its not alone. Carl icahn boosted his stake in the company to 11 , that was just out yesterday. Tragedy in europe up to 150 people are believed dead after a germanwings airliner crashes in southern france. Want to get to another story that we. Reporter have just been breaking. Mary thompson has. Ruth porat of Morgan Stanley. Thats right. Ruth porat is leaving that firm and she will become the cfo of google google. Wall street veteran moving to Silicon Valley. Shes been with Morgan Stanley for 28 years. Among the roles including ceo or cfo, she has been the lead tech banking, she led the companys banking franchise and also of course to serve the company to deal with changing Regulatory Environment as cfo. Shes starting at google on may 26th. Of course, replacing Patrick Pichet at google. Ruth porat a key executive, key figure at Morgan Stanley for the last five to seven years as cfo and before that uninvestment banking area. She will be the cfo of do. Thanks very much. Interesting, of course particularly in light of continued conversation going on about the lack of female representation in Silicon Valley. Very good point. We should point out, googles cfo will be leaving. He was the, i call him the climb every mountain cfo, wrote that long letter sound of music kind of thing. Climb every mountain follow his dream. I thought that he was very good on the call it was genuine, his departure. Porat, these are people who are known as being tough on the numbers, ruth porat tough on numbers. I know you have a relationship with her. I come back and i say, you know what . Google said they were going to have discipline. On the Conference Call there was a moment where google said we care about the stock price. Kind of like oh thank you. But that i mean it was an odd moment. Right. Guys contrary to Public Opinion we actually care. But this shows you, really ruth porat is exacting tough, and you wont be able to write checks to guys who say we have to put a man on uranus now. Thats out. That whole pluto thing, gone. Plutos not even a planet. Right. Thats what shes going to use to kill that initiative. Your point is well taken. The fact is its not an unimportant role at these companies, just to make sure the spending that takes place, the attention to wall street main that she will have is simply a result of having been a part of for her entire career. So it may be viewed positively. It will be viewed positively. Not that the current occupant has not been seen as one who has been fairly disciplined. Hes terrific. Remember there was a time when people used to say about google adults are not in charge and that changed although spending habits on different efforts yet to yield results from a wall street perspective continue there you dont bring in porat in order to check off a lot of things. You bring in porat to say we need to communicate the story better we need to be tougher. Google is getting part of a religion. My Charitable Trust own temperatures im thrilled ruth is one of the best cfos ive come to respect on wall street. You view this as a positive step. He was terrific on the call. But ruth porat is a seasoned terrific cfo who has been through hell and back with Morgan Stanley. She wasnt in the cfo role during the she was in financial she was in financial services. I happen to respect her judgment, respect her work. I think that we all on wall street, you know anyone who has followed that company, has said ruth porat, i want to hear what she has to say i sure what she does there. It will be good. It will be good. It will be good. All right. Little facetious on google but mostly because of the conference calm they said we have to cut out with the google glasses. They mentioned google glasses as something, look, it didnt work. Started thinking what wont work. Now theyre Going Forward and thinking porat will be a fantastic helping to allocate capital. She also was cohead of Technology Investment banking. In light of this lawsuit going on that i think goes to the jury soon. Absolutely right. You know it is time i mean look, i feel like who am i to say Silicon Valley should have more women . But i think a dad with two daughters, its like hey, come on focus on this stuff. Lets get a focus on the marks here as well. Consumer prices rebounded in february they were up. 2 , as gasoline prices increased for the First Time Since june. Prices rose by the same amount if you strip out food and energy. Overseas Manufacturing Activity in china dipped to 11month low as new orders shrank. Separately, Business Activity in the eurozone accelerated faster than some people thought although i will give it to you, talking green shoots a long time ago. Uk no inflation. China, like this europe like this. Right. Which is what . This is china. Thats europe. This is breitling replaced by apple april 10th. Thats their growth rate. In other words, chinas deceleration of the growth rate is happening. Pmi was disappointing. How about like this . All right. Can you do the kama sutra . Can you do that . Dont look at me like that. This is how you look at me all the time. I know. What does it mean for the market which has had a nice run, certainly since i was last year a little over a week ago. This rally, the most recent spurt, business the euro being stronger than we think. You know the trade has been euro going lower, dollar going higher. So now the hedge funds are flummoxed. Trying to figure out what happens next . I think they wanted the euro lower, they being central bank. But business is really great. Its going to be hard to done watch the tenyear in germany, watch the tenyear in spain. I think that it takes greece off of the table as being the major issue. And i see theyre trying to make nice, greeks and germans. Interesting nazi talk by the way. Excuse knee. Third reich. Literally. Where . In the greek parliament. Yes. About reparations for the nazis. There are you know its not like germany doesnt take this stuff seriously. Germans have been you know look you know what they have given reparations to people in israel. Im not saying theyre going to take that off the table in greece. At least speaking in terms of were dealing with oil below 50. Right. Dealing with extremely strong dollar. Right. Certainly not just weve talked often about brazil the real, what could be problems there, not just euro. If the dollars not red hot, people have a chance to hedge, companies can catch their breath and we can solve the greece thing because, you know if you have a stronger germany and a stronger italy, stronger spain, you can say greece is an outlier and all of these things are positive versus china, where if youre in the iron ore business or copper business maybe we talk about freeport later, youre like wow, we dont have the horses. Yeah. One point i wanted to get your response on, you know buybacks are an important component of the underlying totally. Did you see the numbers . Almost a trillion. Blackout periods that come towards the end of the quarter, beginning of a new quarter when companies are going to be reporting earnings. Were entering into one fairly soon. Someone pointed out there is volatility around those area because the blackout period you dont have Companies Buying back their stock. Very much. Thats a great point. You often see like a company like goldman which has sometimes in the buyback and after they report they cant buy back stock. Its before as well. I just think its something to keep in mind because there are moments where it seems like theres no bid underneath and a lot is that the companys arent there. Some of the buybacks like time warners buyback, cbs buyback, theyre just there. Disneys buyback, they live. The buybacks live. They live . They do live. They live. All right. Lets move on now to obviously disturbing news. A pang planessenger plane crashing in the french alps 150 people feared dead. David, yes, indeed its a sad day here in europe. 144 passengers and 6 crew feared dead after a Germanwings Flight crashed in the southeast of france. The plane took off 4 55 eastern time from barcelona en route to dusseldorf in germany, crashing near the italian boarder in france at 6 20 a. M. Eastern time. 150 souls on board all presumed dead according to president hollande. We have heard from him and the ceo expressing deepest sympathies. Lif tan 15 the Parent Company to german wings. The plane was an airbus a 320. Its believed that the plane is 24 years old and has been with luf luf lufthansa since 1991. Confirmation from president hollande that all are presumed dead. Thus far, access on the ground has been limited, given that the plane is around 2 kilometers up in the alps some 6,000 feet. Therefore, so far, just presumption all of the lives were sadly lost but no confirmation of that fact yet. Well bring you more as and when we get it. Okay. Be careful on the age of planes. Not as relevant. These planes are they have long lives. I mean it was an old plane, i know from boeing and airbus we should not its not necessarily dispositive. Right. You wont if you maintain them they will last a very long time. If youre with boeing one of the things youre conscious of these things are amazing. Dont necessarily just say, you know, its a 1990s plane. I dont know the details but i dont want people to presume, because its an old plane. Well be following this story throughout the morning. Carl icahn ups his stake in chesapeake. Also ahead, live interview with Penny Pritzker on trade deals attracting investment and keeping the u. S. Competitive. Another look at futures before we hit our first break on squawk on the street. We are set up for maybe a mixed to flat open. Right. Were back after this. Return on investment isnt the only return im 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 their families is without equal. Start investing with as little as fifty dollars. Opportunities arent always obvious. Sometimes they just drop in. 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. Were on to energy here at skauk on the squawk on the street. Chesapeake. Carl icahn raised the stake from 10 to 11 . Shares of Whiting Petroleum more interesting story, down sharply. The oil producer announced plans to sell 35 million shares of common stock to reduce its debt load, which is 5. 6 billion. Its a common theme in energy right now. Oh man. Companies levered, we saw freeport cut the dividend as well. Lets start with whiting, because i think you and i, at least have been aware of the first the stories that it was for sale stock went up sharply. And now, they hit the market with 35 million shares. Jim, let me share one comment. I talked to a couple of guys approached by jpmorgan, which is selling the stock on behalf of whiting. They said any bids a good bid. Give us your bid. Any bids a good bid. One of mine bid 29 im not going to get hurt on it. Whiting, which will open sharply lower. I think what people have to recognize is that they bought a company, okay bought a secondrate company, they bought kodiak. Kodiak had been for sale they pulled it back. In order to become the largest produce flr the bakken not all oil is equal. Bakken is the most expensive to produce, and theres real problems getting it out of the bakken. They basically paid 3. 8 billion. I dont know what the companys worth. Its 6 billion last night. Wow. Yeah but diluting themselves to make sure they have a future which thats been you can live to fight another day, you do. They did it to be opportunistic. Not everybody some of the companies are taking advantage of this and being opportunistic. Canada did a big deal that was survive ability. But, yes, this is the way of the future. Sole of the companies are raising money to buy the companies that cant get a bid. Right. Of course, the case of whiting, you had it shoot up on takeover rumors, you followed this closely well this is embarrassing. This is a company they are pricing this thing. The other ones theyre not in the hole like this. This smacks of desperation. Yeah. The stock could be down 19 . Well give you details when the deal gets done whether its 29 or 30 well see. Stock trading around or bid ask around 39. A buzz kill for the group. Chesapeake it contributed to atypical year last year a bad year for him. He ups his stake. Hes nothing if not, you know chesapeake has, i was dealing with my folks at rbn talking about the mark west pipeline. I went to see chesapeakes pods in the utica shale. And they have a ready place to put their natural gas but natural gas pricing pods . Well thats where they put the drilling the rigs. Pods. Right. Its a pad. Heres the thing you need to know about chesapeake. Yes. They made a big bet utica would have oil. When i was with aubrey we realized natural gasp the problem with natural gas is its even worse for pricing than oil. So when you but chesapeakes sold assets. Yes. At good prices and i think chesapeakes got viability. This is one of those if i were chesapeake i would say, carl how would you like to buy 25 of the company . Hes been there for quite some time. Aubrey mcclendon is no longer there and hes got issues at american energy. Raised billions of capital and the bonds are trading poorly. The marcellus is producing, you know i dont know 12 times it was producing a few years ago. Theres just so much natural gasp natural gas we have oil when you hear no place to put it, dent believe. Were importing 7 million a day. If theres no place to put it why would we need to import any . Freeport which we have discuss in the past may have picked the wrong tile to go into oil and glassas. Last time in they cut thats a reference to airplane. Yes. The last time they cut was 2008. They cut their dividend from 2 down to zero suspended it in 2008. The tostock was at nine. They caught the bottom. An opportunist will say copper was yesterday. I warn you not to be opportunistic as you might like. The Balance Sheet is not as good. They have since bought an oil company, which seems to be a high price. Play not have been the best timing. Kodiak and freeport all of the kazcasualtyies because they got excited when they thought ill would grow to the sky. Not kodiak. Whiting bought kodiak. And freeport did a lot of pieing at the top. At the top. Yeah. All right. Weve got a mad dash coming up with my partner over there we head to the opening bell. Another look at futures. We had been looking as though wed have an up open no longer. More squawk on the street after this. Hello. I am technology that is changing investing forever. I am a fully automated Investment Advisory service. I can help you choose the right portfolio. Monitor it. And even rebalance it. Ive been called innovative. Revolutionary. And just plain smart. Id blush at the compliment if i could. But i cant. So. I wont. Say hello at intelligent. Schwab. Com all right. Six minutes until the opening bell. Mad dash on a tuesday. Ive got to remember my first day of the week but not yours. Im going mr. Amazon. You did an amazing documentary that included a lot about the web services. Theyre going around town piper says he likes the delivery experiment in miami and baltimore. But what i think is important, going around, people are trying to assess how much Amazon Web Services might be losing because that would indicate how much the Merchandising Department is making. David, Amazon Services can they turn that off, turn that on one day make that a profitable enterprise . It grows incredibly fast. Yes. We dont know specifics because its included although this may change in the other line. Thats the key thing. So theres not a great deal of transparency as there often is not with amazon in terms of some units. We are left to guess. Its an opaque company. The analysts are really want to go out and say this is a great opportunity to buy this. Cfos out on tour. You know what . Ive felt this is a momentum stock. The momentums stalled, i think its going to pick up. You do . Yes. Next . Now, thinking of antimomentum, son, u. S. Not sonus in my house which allows kids to blast plymy ears this makes cable set top box components, it was held earlier, and when its held its like wow, you know you read the release. The release says dont worry about it. If youre dont worry about it . Dont worry about it. Dont worry about what . Weve lost a third of the market cap today . You took the words out of my mouth. Dont worry about that. This is historically been a tough business. Broad coms in the business. Cisco, which my Charitable Trust owns. Cable set top box is knower to russly difficult and theyre in it. What might i ask is the problem . Do we know. Its shortfall in orders apparently. We dont really know. Its not as much information as we would like about who the customer is. Thats what im going to spend a lot of time digging today, because id like to know. Right. Because the stocks down badly. Yes, i do notice that. Right. Thats not a three for two split. Thats something to worry about. Right. Visa went down a lot but that was a four for one split. Right. Not related to the business. No. Here youve got, yes, yeah a third. I shouldnt be laughing. No youre not having a good day. More on that, following facebook which we didnt get to. Holy cow. How could we not get to . Whiting, shares are held. Its not borat. No thats sasha. Its porat. Were back after this. Can it make a dentist appointment when my teeth are ready . Can it track my crews performance, and protect their heads . Can it tell the Flight Attendant to please not wake me this time . At cognizant, we see opportunities for every company. To meet the new digital demands of their customers. Can it process my Insurance Claim . Like, right now . Can it download a track while im sampling it . Can my keys find me . With the power of digital, analytics and automation now every little thing can provide even greater value. Ok, so can it tell the doctor how long you have to wear this thing . The answer is yes, it can. So, the question your customers are really asking is can your business deliver . Youre watching cnbcs squawk on the street. Live from the Financial Capital of the world with the opening bell ringing in just about two seconds, actually. We came in real tight here. Tuesday not sure what else to say here. What i always ask you at this time. I come back to the mineral stocks are weak. Theres an interesting note today. Want to know what the stock of the day is . Yes. Its kimberly clark. Wells recommends hold to buy. But cuts numbers, david. Now you know a number cut is not synonymous. This is a relative call versus other stocks. Watch that it can go up on a number cut that tells you what people want, the economys weaker. And i know the cpi, we should be covering it thats an odd number the cpi today, because people some people think we want inflation. You know we dont want inflation, we dont want of course. When you strip out, oil down yearoveryear, 19 . By the way, let me tell you who did the honors here. Lattice strategy and over at the nasdaq ireland south by southwest winner Editing Platform trakax. Thats a mouthful. Realtime exchange at hq. More red on the board. Look, when you come in you got these stories themselves that arent that all positive i mean i can make cowan says maybe the airline numbers wont be that strong. Airlines have been a leader. We have number cuts at wells. The xcf differs cut. And, david, whiting is 12 of this s p is related to oil and gas, and that is just whitings coloring all of the thinking. This sons is covering a lot of tech though thats related to set top, which is a competitive business that can bring down a lot of stocks. When it comes to energy though, theres a point to be made here which is and they should know i wont name their name, but you take the big delusion at a steep discount cut your dividend but to my point earlier, you live to fight another day. Right. You know it is equivalent to what the Financial Companies face in the crisis or leading up to the financial crisis. Many of them should have sold equity. Yes. Lehman brothers should have sold as much as it possibly could have. But they were buying back stocks and felt like idiots to be able to sell stocks. Youre so right, these companies are more survival oriented. We dont know when they could have survived. Maybe. They needed to sell equity. These guys were in the process of cleaning up Balance Sheets. Whiting will sell lower than it closed yesterday. They may be here in a year or two as a result. If youre new to white, maybe you wasnt to get into n. Today. 30 bucks. Whitings going to be at 30. Thats where theyre selling the stock 30. What im hearing at least. People go back to is theyre going back to growth. I see they come back to netflix, positive notes about netflix today. Yes. Its like Barclays Says netflix, we like it. Cantor says streaming Services Clear winner. But when you get netflix that can kind of move that can be a beacon for growth stock investing which is bring back money to biotech, for instance. So were going to rotate back into that group which has been weaker. Well by stocks like monster beverage. Right. To the research you noted from barclays and cantor they talk about netflix, as the musthave of the whole group. Interesting, must have. We have more and more unbundled packages. What do you think . Makes sense. Given the price point and what they are offer and their investment willingness to invest in content, you can see how if you have 15 channels you might want netflix to be one of them. Dont you agree . The question to me is sports. If youre a sports fan, youre going to take the price up so high regardless. Right. Even with only broadband, youre still going pay 50 for broadband, netflix, do you want hbo . That will cost another 15. You think the bundle is a bargen. I wonder what extent were going to start to see when you look at what people are going to want whats available to them in the bundle how much of it will how much will trade off. Not that i dont believe unbundling is a trend here to stay and it will pick up speed, i do. But im curious to see what the overall price comparisons will be. Youre right. Think about the stations watching the ncaa games on dialing around. Tbs. Tbs. I need tbs for like four saturdays of my life but ive got to pay for it. Right. Right . Thats the problem. I want i went bob iger shifts the college bowls, the big the champion he puts it on espn, i dont have a choice. Nfl will do a digital game. Interesting. I felt that google should bid for that contract. Everyone was frightened that they would. Google would say, listen we want the whole nfl. But, yes, i think youre right. Maybe there is a the a la cartes not as cheap as we think. But well great point. You want netflix. Right. Netflix will be a winner although they are investing a great deal. Great point. I kept thinking that maybe you get it like 40 50 bucks a month. But when you layer on. Youve got to pay for broadband. But people take that out of the equation paying for broadband anyway. Cables got this pricing umbrella. Say cable offered a break, half of the channels. That could hurt their profitability. Its a great story. Its young versus old. Younger people i got the new apple 6, im watching it like its hike High Resolution really cool. Right. Watching espn. The cost of sports is continues to be the key variable. Yes. We mentions google. It is up on the announcement of ruth porat, cf of of Morgan Stanley moving to become the cfo of the company. Yeah. There are people who know she becomes one of highest profeel will in Silicon Valley. Right. We know her for her long tenure on wall street ran the Financial Institutions group at Morgan Stanley, also was cohead of technology. Mary meeker also came originally. Another person i love. She was on the sell side at Morgan Stanley but then went into Venture Capital. Class of 79 stanford. Shes a seasoned hand very smart from porat. Yes. Going back out to california. Yes. You know thats her roots. That stock is responding positively. Of course the current cfo as we pointed out, wrote that long goodbye email telling us that he was going to be climbing mountains. I loved his goodbye. It played me think im a reflective person, as you know and it made me think for 35 40 secondizes i should do what theyre saying backpacking. The key question with porat, can she shift sentiment on the stock regarding Capital Allocation . I think she can. Thats the question. I think she can. Can she, will they let her . Why would you hire her if you wasnt to . Why would you hire anthony noto at twitter. These are not ftroop people. Facebook that stock also up this morning. Did you read that article . 240 billion market value. Alibaba, quite some time where alibabas market cap exceeded that of facebook. Facebook has clearly surpassed that. Story in the New York Times saying theyre taking they will host the content, in other words, they will partner with the like of new york sometimes. Thats great if you have a totally advertising model which is getting crushed here. As we know on mobile the ads are getting crushed, getting cpms incredibly low. Little money for advertising. I thought it was interesting they made aention the New York Times. This would gaff the times model. I wouz shockas shocked to see New York Times considering facebook. It would be disastrous for their bottom line. You cant make it up in advertising because the advertising market, which is run by google in terms of the carpet bombing that they do we know programmatics, programmatic code for youre not going to make any money, we are. Thats what programmatic means. Its a shark tank. Its a good show, shark tank. Well produced. Bob pisani. A mixes open, financials, escapeles, industrials, to the downside. Strength in certain pockets in energy and technology stocks. The euros stronger earlier. Thats a problem normally for us. Its weakened in the last hour. Most of europe is on the positive side. Germanys been up all morning. Remember, were 1 or 2 from historic highs in germany and multiyear highs in france. Want to talk about dividend cuts. You mentioned freeport. But its rare for a company to cut its dividend. Freeport, big copper and gold company cut from 31 and change to 5 cents a quarter on the dividend yield. They talk about Additional Capital costs reductions. I dont want to focus on freeport. Its rare to cut a dividend. Its only happened three times this year in the s p 500. Freeports done it. But encodid it before and Diamond Offshore made a significant cut. Other than that thats it this year. A few last year. I remember Consol Energy also cut but not often. In fact i went back ten years, i didnt know myself how many times this happened but only 240 dividend cuts. Thats not much dealing with 500 companies over 10 years. Over 3,000 dividend increases in last 10 years of the 240 dividend cuts half of them have been in financials and almost all of that has occurred since 2008 since the financial crisis. As you know the banks are restoring the dividends. So its very clear where those dividend cuts occurred and doesnt happen very often. Lets move on here. I want to talk about biggest dividend payers that are out there. I know everybody says apples the biggest dividend payer. But that hasnt been true for a while. Exxon the biggest dividend payer. The buybacks reduces the amount theyre paying out. Exxon, apple, microsoft. Exxon increased its differ every year since april 2007 every april since 2007. They have increased their dividend every year for 32 years. But what theyve done in april for the last seven years. Everybodys watching april now for exxon to see whether they increase the dividend. Remember theyre paying i think 69 cents a quarter now. Yield is 3. 2 . Everybody expects them to go to 70 cents. A big event to see if they can maintain ta dividend. Thats why a lot of people are buying that freeport cutting dividend on lower commodity prices. Copper has been strong the last several days because of the dollars weak. Its ironic theyre talking about that. There you see the weakness. Want to let you know a big ipo next week. Well talk about that tomorrow. Nothing going on in ipos. But go daddy next week generating a lot of interest. Thats a kkr deal a company you know well. Yes, indeed. Thank you very much bob pisani. Lets head to the bond pits. Rick santelli joins us from the cm cme group in chicago. This isnt much different than weve seen in a lot of mornings. The Euro Currency up powerfully 5 of the 6 last sessions. Its given up a bit of ground. As you look at intraday of tens you can see were dipping below 1. 90, open the chart up. Well do several charts starting in february. Look at the pattern there. And of course theres two levels below traders will watch. 186 from the flash crash in october of last year. Current yield low for the year around 163 to 165. Keep that date. Look at the pattern of continue year rates minus bund rates. Look how similar it is. That is not lost on traders. Keep the same day look at euro versus dollar doesnt quite look the same but the mirror image does. Look at dollar index, it looks very similar as does the or several charts. What traders are look at is high correlations with regard to movement because of whats go on with the ecb and maybe delayed fed. Last chart is dax, somewhat similar, less developed. Of course new home sales yet. At the moment 1. 10 the stopper for euro and it backed away. Pay attention to that level as well. Back to you. Thank you, rick santelli. French authorities said they expect no survivors after a german plane carrying at least 142 passengers and 6 crew members crashed in southern france. Joining us washington nbcs tom costello, who will give us more details. The flight left barcelona early in spain and departed for dusseldorf germany, but at about 10 47 a. M. The plane ran into trouble, that is when pilots transcoded out an emergency on their transpotter. Transmitted 7700 the emergency signal for a mechanical problem in flight. It then saw the plane descend in a rather orderly fashion from 38,000 feet down to 5,000 feet and then it appears disappeared. We believe the plane may have crashed into a mountain at that point in southern alps. At this point, a remote area the rescue teams on the scene do not believe there arefully survivors. The queekeys to find the black boxes, cockpit voice and flight data recorders which should tell investigators what was happening between the pilots what were they saying what problem were they dealing with and in addition what was happening mechanically to the plane, to the engines, what were the flaps like, what was the seings what was the head the speed, all of that will be on that flight data recorder. But this may be a while because it is in such a remote area. This is the first time that this germanwings airline, which is a budget airline, owned by lufthansa, the first time it has been involved in a fatal crash. The first fatal crash for lufthansa since 1993. The first fatal crash involvinging aa commercial airliner in france since the concord crash in 2000. More questions than answers but when you have 90 to 95 of crashes occurring on takeoff or landing, its extraordinarily rare to have an event in flight like this which leads to several scenarios which might include the crew or all of the passengers incapacitated by a cabin pressure event, about a smoke event, by a fire event. We simply dont know and probably wont know until we end up getting that flight data recorder and the cockpit voice reporter. A lot of people in shock and mourning in the early stage of this investigation. Back to you. Thank you, tom costello from nbc. An analyst whose new price target on apple calls for market cap close to 1 trillion. Well be right back. In my world, wall isnt a street. Return on investment isnt the only return im 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. 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Also, by the way, separately they did 1 billion agragregate principal of 1. 25 convertible senior notes in 2010. Whiting raises a good amount of money, at significant delusion to shareholders, 30 bucks. I was hearing it would be. Wells fargo, its all very good wells fargo, theyre saying they announced debt equity deal logical moves, shores up Balance Sheet, good to do before it closes the window. Last line says what we believe that whiting scale, asset quality within one of u. S. Preeminent Group plays means the company will remain on the short list of potential takeout targets. Unclear why they would why anybody would buy and or move to sell after they have just sold right. Wouldnt you strike a billion worth of stock. These guys have a hold on it. I would say that you do not own this for the takeout now. You point it because you think oil can go back you own it because the bakken if you think the bakken stuff is very good its like lighter fluid. Right. I by the way, whiting, before they bought kodiak was one of my favorites. I didnt like the kodiak buy because it was expensive. People didnt know oil was going to crash. Thats the whiting post. We say offering there, its done. So they priced it at 30 a share, thats where it got done. As i said jpmorgan calling, saying any bids a good bid, well take it. Talking about a stock that was 39. This is the first one of the deals other than goodrich where it smacks of desperation. You can keep an eye on it. It is as you saw, the post behind us they havent opened the stock as yet. Im not negative on the market as the market indicates here. I think theres potential leadership. Im seeing nasdaq names come forward. The problem is when you have all of the stocks sloshing around it has to find a home first because its kind of debilitating to people saying wait a second we cant all guy google although i like porat. You like porat. Very much. The stocks up almost 2 . More red than green thus far. Sons has that problem with set top boxes. Not that big a part of cisco. No. I mentioned John Chambers could tell you its not, john would say, jim, come clean, we do have this business. I think the world of john. I think hes cisco, my Charitable Trust, the stock goes higher. Higher. Got it. Wheres your apple watch . I dont have an apple watch. Waiting for the breitling. When is that coming to me . Stop trading with jim. Barbara just bought a bike. She wrote a tweet about it. You cant learn much from that. But take data from millions of tweets combine that with your companys supply chain and sales data. Apply ibm analytics and expertise, and all of a sudden, you can learn which bikes to build what to make them from, where to sell them. Because barbara and the world just told you how to build a better bike. Theres a new way to work and its made with ibm. Now with the xfinity tv go app, you can watch live tv anytime. Its never been easier with so Many Networks all in one place. Get live tv whenever you want. The xfinity tv go app. Now with live tv on the go. Enjoy over wifi or on Verizon Wireless 4g lte. Plus enjoy special savings when you purchase any new Verizon Wireless smartphone or tablet from comcast. Visit comcast. Com wireless to learn more. Whiting has opened for trading, 35 millions shares at 30 the stocks above where they priced it. Thats bullish. Get that piece priced and the rest of the market will focus on google going high. Want to talk about for stop trading that mccormack is doing well. Consumer products are doing better. Give plea a chance to do entree to stop trading. Come on. I kind of jumped the gun. Only thing im here for. Time now for cramer and stop trading. I think people are going like Mccormack Allen Wilson is an amacing guy. Its a baltimore company. People from baltimore and philadelphia have chips on their shoulder, like were great and youre not. Mccormick, plotting along. People say why dont generics hurt . They make those, too its imim impossible to cook without mc mccormick it doesnt work. You need your surprises. Variety is the spice of life. We all need mccormick you see mccormick. Mccormick is worldwide. Mccormick is a great company. Once again, people doubting it thought they they wrote it off, they dont have the growth. Wilson delivers. Mccormick goes higher and that could help the consumer package group. I think the biotechs can bounce back, googles a leader. And netflix is responding to the pied piper saying is it going to be in new a la carte menu when we used to go out we had no money, never order allahla la cart. Maybe the a la cartes not as cheap as we think. Im from philadelphia. We want price fixed. Dont order like the lobster. Never order the soda until the food comes because otherwise youll have two. Youll fill up. Thats the legacy of the depression. Speaking. What do you have on mad tonight . Yesterday, the amn, this is susan ringing the bell knows more about the man power of health care and michael small, go go a company, youre familiar, if you tried inflight, wifi. I know that theres some dispute which is the best. We want to hear what go go has to say. See you later. Ill be in new jersey. That was fun. What do you dont even i was just got to go. We better go. Coming up, breaking news on new home sales top of the hour. Live interview with commerce secretary Penny Pritzker. Well be right back. At mfs, we believe in the power of active management. Our teams collaborate around the world, which leads to better decisions for our clients. Put our global active management expertise to work for you. Mfs. There is no expertise without collaboration. Hello. I am here to offer sophisticated investing strategies. My technology can help you choose the right portfolio. Monitor it. And automatically rebalance it. All without charging advisory fees, account service fees or commissions. That may be hard to compute. But im a computer. So trust me. It computes. Say hello at intelligent. Schwab. Com 80 of the poor in africa are rural farmers. 96 of them are doing rainfed agriculture. Theyre all competing with each other; theyre all making very low margins making enough to survive but not enough to get out of poverty. So kickstart designs low cost irrigation pumps enabling them to grow high value crops throughout the year so you can make a lot of money. Its all very well to have a whole lot of small innovations but unless we can scale it up enough to where we are talking about millions of farmers, were not going to solve their biggest challenge. This is precisely where the kind of finance that citi is giving us is enabling us to scale up on a much more rapid pace. When we talk to the farmers and ask them whats the most important thing. First of all they say we can feed our families. Secondly, we can send our children to school. Its really that first step that allows them to get out of poverty and most importantly have money left over to plan for the future they want. Good morning. Welcome back to squawk on the street. Im simon hobbs with sara eisen and david faber. Carl is off on assignment today. Marks relatively flat. Weve got breaking news at this hour. New home sales out. Lets go to chicago. Rick santelli with the numbers. Rick . Well, we had a hit, we had a miss. The hit, new home sales for february, up close to 8 . Really jumping over expectations coming out at 539,000 units seasonally annualized and adjusted. Thats up 7. 8, to be exact. The miss the march read on richmond fed, minus 8. We havent had a minus number in exactly one year, mar of of last year minus 5. Of course that fits in on the housing number. This is a powerful number because you have to go back quite a ways to find a stronger number. Im looking like april of 08, april of 80, have not had a number as strong as 559,000. Housing isnt correcting and healing as fast as we want. But this number is a step in the right direction. Sara, back to you. All right. Rick you, know that means. Weve got to go do diana olick for more color on the strong numbers. Yes strong to say the least. We had a revision to januarys numbers, from 481,000 to 500,000. So really great overall. Supply 4. 7, thats very low, we were at 5. 4 month supply. Thats the crux of the problem today, so few existing homes for sale realtors are begging them to build more. Supply dropped dramatically to a 4. 7 month supply. Prices went up again. They went up over about 4 from 268,000 a year ago in february to 275,500. Builders tell you theyre building higher ofend stuff, seeing higher demand. We need to see people sell existing homes move up to pricier homes to get firsttime buyers in get inventory available. Its a great sales number. Love to see a better Housing Starts number. Back to you. A lot of people in europe very shaken today. Let me take you live to cologne in germany, where the germanwings News Conference the low cost subsidiary of lufthansa is it to start a News Conference. Lufthansa confirmed the crash of flight 9525. Carrying 144 passengers and 6 crew members. We will bring you any additional news from that News Conference as we work our way through. Phil lebeau joins us from chicago. What are you able to tell us . Right now theyre trying to see how quickly they can get to the crash area which is in a remote part of the friend. Alps at about 6500 feet. Its in a remote area that is act sell ibl only by helicopter not by foot. Let me show you on a map where this plane went down. It was en route from barcelona to dusseldorf when the plane crashed. In this area, there are reports that there are some helicopters that have gone up have seen some debris, but it is in a crevasse with a steep terrain area. So its going to take some time for rescue and search crews to get to that area to get some more information. Lets talk about this plane. The a320 had 150 people on board, 144 passengers, 7 crew members. It crashed at 10 47 a. M. 52 minutes into flight. We do know that the pilots were able to sent out an Emergency Alert shortly before the plane went down but it was in a rapid descent, not a freefall but rapid descent. The germanwings a320 that were talking about here flight number 4u9525 built in 1991. Ive had people saying is that an old plane in . In Airline Terms its above average in terms of middle aged planes but its within the range of planes that can be flown for commercial services. And again, when taking a look at what happened here take a look at map, the pilots did send out an Emergency Alert. In the span of less than ten minutes the plane descended 30,000 feet. Talking 35,400 feet per minute. The pilots wanted to get to the ground as quickly as possible but we dont know what may have prompted this. Was it a mechanical issue . Was there some type of incident on board the plane . At this point, we have to wait to see when we get flight data recorders. Thats when well have a better sense of what exactly happened. As weve been talking about all morning, its highly unusual for a plane, at cruising altitude to have an incident that causes it to crash. Most crashes, about 90 , 95 happen at takeoff and at landing. When something happens in the middle of the flight like this it tends to be mechanical and severe in nature and thats obviously what receiveseen here hopefully well get more information when they find the flight data recorders to know what happen on board the a320. Terrifying. 30,000 feet in 10 minutes . Yeah. Terrifying. Joining us on the phone, the former ntbs chairman jim hall. Welcome. This is a real work horse for business and leisure travelers. There are, i believe, 6,000 a320s in service, another 5,000 on order 0 from the Airline Industry. What would you say to people watching now . Well the Aviation Industry responds is organized to respond, unfortunately, to events like this. Hopefully we will find out through the recorders what occurred whether this is operational or mechanical or some sort of potential criminal activity. You cant rule anything out at this point. Yes. Our colleague tom costello at nbc in d. C. Is reporting that a digital code was sent out, 7700. Which would toned suggestend to suggest it was a mechanical problem. Im not sure if youre able to spread any light on that detail. The descent of the craft was extremely rapid. If you this is not your area i assume ntsb wont be on the ground here but what would the priorities be now . Well the First Priority of course, is going to be to get to the crash site, even though there has been indication that there are no survivors. Its important to verify that fact on the ground and hopefully that can be done very soon. Also the recorders will be the very first item that the rescue crews will be looking for once they verify that there are no survivors of the aircraft. And reading out those recorders, hopefully will provide information although we still are lacking one of the items that i would have recommended in 1999 as chairman of the nstb, cameras in the cockpit. I assume theyre going to be looking for the black box, figure out the conversation between the pilot and the copilot. Obviously, were speculating at this point jim, but how does an aircraft lose that kind of attitude so quickly . What are the possibilities of what could have happened . Well you know there could have been any number of things from some sort of mechanical problem or even an operational failure, as we saw in the air france accident off the coast of brazil. So its you know the rapid descend certainly indicates they had a problem, i guess theres information that is constantly being communicated mechanically from this plane to the ground. So there may be more information that lufthansa has that will be revealed in this press conference in the near future. Mr. Hall let me take you back to the point that you made that you when you were at ntsb pressuring for there to be cameras in the cockpits. When we lost of course, the malaysian flight in asia there was a similar discussion about whether aircraft should really be streaming data on a continual basis basis somewhere, where we can see it instantaneously and form a better opinion in realtime. Why is the Airline Industry not bending to those requests . Well the International Civil Aviation Organization is looking at deployable recorders which is another item ive recommended, as well as realtime transmission. But the realtime information is really more for the location of the aircraft. It cannot transmit enough data to provide, you know an exact picture of what happened. You know as you know how many aircraft are in the sky at any one particular time the amount of data to be transmitted, i dont think we are there yet, with being able to be sure that can be done in a secure manner. We seem to be doing it with the apple watch but lets leave that to one side sir. Clearly, no flights have been grounded at the moment. Why is that . Is that simply a cost benefit analysis there were too many flights in the air now . Well no. I think it is a practical analysis that aviation is extremely safe. If there were to be another aviation incident in the immediate future then you might want to ground the aircraft as we saw on 9 11. But you know one aircraft accident as regrettable as it is, is unfortunately very is fortunately very rare in our day and time. Its good to talk to you, sir, thank you for joining us at short notice. Jim hall former ntsb chairman. Lets talk about these markets now. A turnaround here early in the trading session. U. S. Stocks are actually higher now. The dows up by three after better economic date it we got Consumer Prices earlier, rising for the First Time Since october, and the new home sales just out with a nice positive surprise. Most weve seen in years. Lets bring in Michelle Meyer and bill stone, chief Investment Strategy at pnc asset management. New home Sales Numbers encouraging want does it say about the health of the housing mark and sort of the bumps that we have seen lately . Is it because of the bad weather . The dow is very noisy. Theres conflicting signals out of the recent indicators. New home sales today strong for february. Housing starts out earlier in the month were weak particularly for Single Family building. And it looked like the weather really held back Single Family starts. I think it probably suggests that the fact that new home sales looked healthier, demand is improving and we will get the rebound in the spring months in terms of construction. So i think you do want to take this as a positive read on the housing market. The improvement in the labor market, i think, matters a great deal for housing. People have jobs feel more confident they will have their jobs in the future as well. Is it enough bill to keep equity markets propelled, already sitting near record highs. A datadependent fed. How is the data looking for you . Do you have a clear sense of it . Well i think as we were talking about here well the First Quarter so far in the u. S. Anyway has been soft. So thats been difficult. I think maybe the better news all these the housing number today was good and helpful we think it turned around. Were looking for over 3 gdp growth here in the u. S. But obviously youve got to see the real data. I think the other big part of the story is that were seeing some improvement out of europe. We got the pmis out of europe overnight and because of the size of the economy and finally finding maybe some legs underneath it theres some you know, less i guess, nervousness around the some of the earnings picture here in the u. S. Thats an important point, the stronger european economy should help our earning. Is it enough to blunt some of the impact of the strong dollar which people have been very worried about . You know i dont know it may help the dollar side. I think youre seeing it in the sense that the dollars selling off a bit. The bigger issue on the headline numbers energy which obviously well ven actually europe will help out with in the sense they have demand for energy but takes a lot of time. If you set aside the energy and just kind of look at things ill say controllable by in the shorter term by the economies yes, i think that should help stabilize that picture and perhaps improve it. Michelle theres been so much fed speak in the last 24 hours, Williams Bullard on the tape stanley fischer, vice chairman, it seems like theyre sending the same signal and that is, yes, were looking at raising Interest Rates this year but dont be too scared its going to be gradual, its going to be a steady increase in rates. Is that the message . I think theyre trying to emphasize this idea they are going to be normalizing policy. Theyre not starting aggressive hiking cycle. Theyre not hiking to cool an overheated economy but normalizing from the extraordinary accommodation that we had when we were still fighting a deep recession. So, yeah that is the right message. Of course, its data dependent. We need to see that rebound in growth into the second quarter. We need to see consistent job growth and signs that inflation is trending higher. Whats the message youre taking away, bill, as an equity market investor from the Federal Reserve . Does it impact your decisions here when it comes to stocks . You know it certainly, at least in the short run, obviously the markets are taking away that the fed is going to keep rates lower longer. I think the markets more thinking september. We actually think it may be as quick as july for us. But you know you see Interest Rate sensitive stocks rallying in particular last week. But i think i take away the same story which is the feds raising rates or going to eventually raise rates because the economys getting stronger though that may cause volatility in the markets in the u. S. The longer story or the intermediate term story is a positive one and its supportive. Utilities, Consumer Staples and Information Technology stocks higher again today. Thanks for the conversation. Its a flat market with the dow up three and the s p 500 up half a point. Final arguments in the gender discrimination trial of ellen powell in san francisco. Our own scott cohn is at the courthouse with more. A lot of people watching this decision. Reporter thats right. Not just because of ellen powell but because this case hasek posed what was a dirty little secret in Silicon Valley it is very much a boys club. The question is whether allen powell is the proper poster woman to tell the story. No question shes got the credential credentials, 45, princeton undergrad, harvard business, harvard law, joined as a junior partner at Venture Capital firm and claims that she was prevented from going further because of the pervasive gender bias at the firm. The allegations, gender discrimination that she was denied promotions denied opportunities for compensation because of her sex and denied the ability to serve on corporate boards that she might otherwise have been able to do. The company retaliated after she broke off a consensual affair with a senior partner and further after she filed this lawsuit in 2012. Also that Kleiner Perkins reveal prevailed to prevent bias. The judge ruled she can try to collect punitive damages. In addition to 16 million in actual damages, she says she suffered this verdict, if it goes her way could go into the hundreds of millions. Kleiner perkins presented a different picture of ellen powell, someone notoriously difficult to get along with not promoted but a lot of men were not promoted at the same time and they trotted out experts that said this firm relatively speaking good for women. In the fourweek trial of whos who in Silicon Valley the legendary senior partner john door was on the stand. Mary meeker queen of the internet, said it is a good place for women although she was well established in the business before she became a seen why partner. And so today the order of business instructions to jury that will get under way a short time from now, closing arguments from both sides, more jury instructions and the jury will get this case likely some time this afternoon. No matter what they decide guys, this has already had implications for Silicon Valley in the way things are done in what has been a boys club. Well watch for the ver. Scott cohen on an important trial in san francisco. Coming up, mississippicrosoft Morgan Stanley loses its cfo and google gains. Can the run in pharma and Health Stocks continue. Saras interview with secretary of commerce Penny Pritzker. Thats straight ahead. Female announcer sundays your last chance to save big during sleep trains triple choice sale. For a limited time you can choose up to 48 months interestfree financing on a huge selection of tempurpedic models. Or choose to save hundreds on Simmons Beautyrest mattress sets. You can even choose 300 in free gifts with sleep trains most popular Stearns Foster mattresses. The triple choice sale ends sunday at sleep train. Sleep train your ticket to a better nights sleep the dows up tip points. Over to dom chu. Home builder stocks are up more than that that on the heel of the better than expected new home sales number for february which sits at sevenyear high. Share of k. B. Home lennar you name them all upside standouts in the market. Also trades to watch as we head into sara afternoon session. Back over to you. Yep, after we saw the build in new home sales, highest since february 2080. One of the most powerful women on wall street to become one of the most powerful women in Silicon Valley. Ruth porat stepping down to be cfo of google. Mary thompson has more. Youve spoken with her a number of times. Thats right. Leaving a firm that shes called home 28 year one where porat served as investment banking, covering tech and Financial Firms and part of the Senior Management team. In a memo Ceo James Gorman wrote with a heavy heart we see her goal. Ruths work has been instrumental in putting Morgan Stanley on our front foot again. Named cfo january 2010. When she joins google the tech giant will be getting an executive who not only has deep experience running a Balance Sheet but navigating corridors of washington, d. C. As Morgan Stanleys cfo she guided the firm through a changing regulatory landscape. During the financial crisis she led the team advising the treasury on handling fannie mae and freddie mac. Advised new york fed on its efforts to save aig. President obama considered her for deputy secretary though porat withdrew her name. Seen as a possible successor to gorman and a mentor to many especially women at the firm weep did have a chance to speak with her at morgans executive womens conference which porat spearheaded. I wanted to focus on something that brought together women from the investing and the corporate side and the theme of the conference has been getting the edge. Porat will be succeeded the Morgan Stanley by jonathan pruzan, cohead of the firms global Financial Institutions group. Hell take that role at the end of april. Its david. You know its funny, you think porat and out toman, i dont want to say a huge echo does but at least two people who could have taken over for gorman at some point, though hes still a young man, have left the firm in the last year or so. No, i think you point out something that a number of people have been talking about, that being said as you said, mr. Gorman, i believe, is 55 56, it isnt expected hes going anywhere soon. Given what hes done with the company, i dont think anyones anxious to see him leave. As you said two very key people athat the firm left recently and that raises questions about whats happening within that firm but Morgan Stanley will tell you they have a very deep bench. Where does this leave women in position of power on wall street . Well you do have Morgan Stanley excuse me jpmorgan of course, you have the cfo there, shes a woman, her name escape me marion lake. Thank you. I apologize for that. Mary erdos who runswell Management Firm at jpmorgan. So there are women in very high powered positions on wall street but again, porat held one of these positions for a long time. She joins a group in Silicon Valley, you try to think of women in the top tier of the executive groups. Of course you have katz the cf om o of google. Oracle. Coceo. And sam berg. Not many. The trial puts it in perspective scott cohen was covering today. Coming up check on high flying pharma stocks exclusive interview with Penny Pritzker the commerce secretary. Well be right back on squawk on the street. F no regrets plays throughout biotech getting all of the attention. Big pharma stocks on a roll this year. Take a look at spdr pharmaceutical etf, up 20 . If you look at health care sector, its done better. A rally of almost 30 over the last 12 months. Joining us now, cnbc contributor and partner at claremont partners, barbara ryan. Good morning. A lot of people im loving the way these stocks have performed but there will be people who are concerned theyve missed out. Absolutely. I mean these stocks whether its biotech, Pharma Health care have had enormous runs but we have too look at a number of things that are really driving. One is the level of innovation. This morning merck announce theyd halted a trial early for a a drug as it beat out the first drug in that market bristolmyers. This is great stuff. You know biogen last week with some really compelling although early and small number of patients data and alzheimers, a graveyard for development. Almost every year hcv drugs that cure 98 of patients in 12 weeks combined with the fact we see tremendous consolidation. This is a oneoffstructural charng the change . Big pharma they have to buy and see whether the huge prices thats profitable. Is it a oneoff change to position for in. I think that the reality is that this iseshas been go on since the beginning of time weep tend to go through cycles where theres tremendous productivity in r and d and other periods they drill dry holes if you will. People looked at gileads purchase at 11 billion several years ago, as being crazy, and now of course you know theyll probably have 11 billion in sales from one single drug. So you know beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. What do we buy . What should people look at now in. Youve got Companies Like actavis the mark is high on prospects. Thats not innovation, is it . Its due to the role of strategy they seem to be pursuing . And the fact theyre inverted as well, which done hurt. You bring up a great point. Dont forget theyre going to spend close to 2 billion in r d, allergans a company driven by innovation by botox but your points well taken. The market is going to be is going to continue in this environment to be willing to pay a lot, a big premium for growth. Companies like pfizer which are finally innovating in their own right, and also continue to deliver shareholder value, they just bought hispe rflt a. Pfizers innovating . They just introduced a drug for breast cancer, a revolutionary immunooncology drug. In addition to financially innovating. Yes, to lead the charge there. And i think biotech companies, like his sparian that have had great data come through. All of the companies this year that have done secondaries and done straight up Radius Health another one. Development Stage Companies that have phase iii assets that have yet to be partnered, driving a lot of value. Good to see you. Great to see you. Thank you for your time. Barbara ryan from claremont partners. Spiky today, david. You should go on vacation more often. Wow. Coming up an update on the plane crash in europe and then an interview with a commerce secretary, Penny Pritzker. Well be right back. Now with the xfinity tv go app, you can watch live tv anytime. Its never been easier with so Many Networks all in one place. Get live tv whenever you want. The xfinity tv go app. Now with live tv on the go. Enjoy over wifi or on Verizon Wireless 4g lte. Plus enjoy special savings when you purchase any new Verizon Wireless smartphone or tablet from comcast. Visit comcast. Com wireless to learn more. Good morning. Im sue herera. Heres your cnbc update. Search teams struggling to get to the remote region in the french alps where a jet carrying 150 people crashed today. A website that tracks passenger jetted revealed the flight path of the a320 jet en route from barcelona, spain to dusseldorf germany. No survivors are expected. Well have more throughout the program. Afghanistans president visit Arlington National cemetery this morning paying his respects at tomb of the unknowns. He was accompanied by Vice President biden and defense secretary ashton carter. Ghani is scheduled to meet with president obama later today. Indias Economic Growth will top chinas as growth in china is expected to slow. An jellgelina jolie has written an oned. In 2013 she announced she had a preventive double mastectomy. There that is your cnbc news update at this hour. Back to you. America is open for business and Foreign Investment the message president obama delivered yesterday to more than 1200 investors and executives. I want to talk about why mesh americas not the only the right place for you to invest but why americas the safest strongest, smartest, place for you to invest than weve been in a very long time. However, new Government Data found that such investment actually fell 60 last year and given the dollar surge, some are worried about new money coming in. Joining us now exclusive from the select usa Investment Summit u. S. Secretary of commerce, Penny Pritzker. Good to see you, mrs. Secretary. Great to be with you. So there is some concern that the strong dollar makes it more expensive for foreigners to invest here. I know David Ruben Stein said that was a hot topic of conversation at this summit. Do you see that as a barrier to investment . You know what i see at the summit is the fact that americas open for business. We have over 1,000 foreign firm that here with us that are interested in doing business. We have 500 Economic Development officers from around all 50 states and 6 territories. And whats happening here at our summit is a lot of business. And thats what im hearing about. While the strong dollar may be something that is being talked about, most of these companies are looking at investing in the United States for a very long time. They know the dollar fluctuates up and down. They want to be here because they see the strongest Consumer Market in the world. They see the largest market in the world. They see a place that respects rule of law and intellectual property protection. They know we invest in r d, we have some of the great 16 of the 25 greatest universities in the world. This is a place they want to be. And most important, they see the productivity and the ingenuity and creativity of our workforce. I have been talking to ceos for the last 48 hours and what theyre interested in is being here. What type of questions do you field from them . We also have among the highest Corporate Tax rates and we also are struggling to get trade deals done and have a sort of gridlocky partisan environment in washington. Is that the kind of concerns and questions youre getting . No. The two issues that i really am getting are how do i get started . So what we did is we put on a select usa boot camp on sunday for 300 Companies Interested in how do i begin investing in the United States. The other issue i hear about is visas. We have been working the state department has been working at both our embassies and consulates to be able to get processed visas more quickly. The president and president she agreed to extend the visas with china to continue years, which is improving our visa. And then yesterday, the there was an announcement that were clarifying how one gets an l1b visa for foreign firms that want to send a technical expert to work with the company, how will they be able to get the person in the country more easily. Were doing things to make it easier for firms, both american firms to do business abroad and export, but foreign firms to do business here. You know why . We know that those firms create good jobs. Yeah. You know one of the sources of strnt that you strength is the Energy Revolution in the country. Now that oil prices have plunged 50 plus percent, do you see that as harmful to a large part of our economy that was growing, robust, hiring and that was spending . Well what im seeing is first of all, Lower Oil Prices is good for the consumer it puts more money in the consumers pocket. Second manufacturing firms are seeing a boon because of their cost of energy has declined. So you know theres, yes, a little bit less investment in oil productivity or production, but theyre seeing a lot of counter veiling positives and frankly the u. S. Is still the Number One Energy producer in the world. So netnet the United States is in a good position. And low cost and Abundant Energy is actually attracting more firms to wanting to invest in the United States. Im curious also with your take on jobs because its been a while since weve spoken. The Unemployment Rate has fallen down to 5. 5 more jobs are being created since before the financial crisis and the recession. But why havent wages picked up . What do you see as the problem here . I think whats happening is youre seeing job creation grow and youre seeing wages really depends on what sector youre talking about. If you look in data oriented jobs or technology areas, theres Enormous Growth in wages. And so theres it depends on really which sector. I also think, as unemployment continues to fall, as we have more and more businesses growing here in america, more and more businesses wanting to invest here in america, i think you will see wages grow. Already. The case for america, madam secretary, always good to talk to you. Thanks for joining us from the select usa conference. Secretary Penny Pritzker. Thank you. Coming up on squawk alley, an analyst who has used price targets on apple call for a market cap close to 1 trillion. Well be right back. At mfs, we believe in the power of active management. Our teams collaborate around the world, which leads to better decisions for our clients. Put our global active management expertise to work for you. Mfs. There is no expertise without collaboration. Retail investors buy into the market. That is a sign you should sell . Are housing stocks a good bet for your money . Catch those stories and more. Squawk on the street returns after this. Ops. So if you get a trade idea about, say organic food stocks schwab can help. With a trading specialist just a tap away. Whats on your mind lisa . Id like to talk about a trade idea. Lets hear it. [ male announcer ] see how schwab can help light a way forward. So you can make your move wherever you are. And start working on your next big idea. [ male announcer ] ours was the first modern airliner, revolutionary by every standard. And that became our passion. To always build Something Better airplanes that fly cleaner and farther on less fuel. That redefine comfort and connect the world like never before. After all, you cant turn dreams into airplanes unless your passion for innovation is nonstop. The s p 500 is little changed but take a look at Consumer Staples moving higher. In the lead dom chu back at hq with more on my favorite sector. Yes, it is your favorite sector, Consumer Products in focus. Staple stocks the Top Performing s p. Keurig Green Mountain pepsico led by shares of spice and seasonings maker mick core mick the best performer in the s p 500 Consumer Staples sector on the heels of reporting better than expected earnings and sales. Shares up by 5 . Simon, you could say theyre spicing up the morning trade. Back over to you. Thanks dom. French authorities expect no survivors after a german plane carrying at least 142 passengers and 6 crew members crashed today in southern france. We have a team effort on this. One of them cnbcs willford frost join us from london. Thank you for that. Yes, weve heard more details in the last half Hour Press Conference from the ceo of germanwings the aircraft carrier. He confirmed to us that the flight took off from barcelona 5 01 eastern time, it was en route to dusseldorf and reached its regular cruising high of 38,000 feet by 5 45 a. M. And then took eight minutes to decline to 6,000 feet. It had that decline because of character via radar not with the cockpit than decline is still unexexplained unexexplained. We lost coloradontact 5 45 and crashed thereafter into the alps in southeast of france. Its still at an altitude around 6,000 feet. That is why at the moment the passengers are not confirms to have been dead but sadly thought to have passed away. There were 150 souls on board, so we have learned more about the aircraft. Its an a320 with lufthansa since 1991 the ceo has no issue with age of the aircraft the captain had over ten years of Flight Experience including more than 6,000 hours Flight Experience on an a320. That is the latest. The search operation continues, helicopters spotted wreckage but havent reached the wreckage on the ground. Back to you. Thank you. Well be right back. Opinions. Theres no shortage in this world. Who do you trust . Whose analysis is accurate . How do you make sense of it all . A simple unbiased stock score consolidated from the opinions of independent analysts. Is that too much to ask . Nope. Equity summary score powered by starmine, will help you execute your ideas with speed and conviction. And its only on fidelity. Com. Open an account and find more of the expertise you need to be a better investor. Now with the xfinity tv go app, you can watch live tv anytime. Its never been easier with so Many Networks all in one place. Get live tv whenever you want. The xfinity tv go app. Now with live tv on the go. Enjoy over wifi or on Verizon Wireless 4g lte. Plus enjoy special savings when you purchase any new Verizon Wireless smartphone or tablet from comcast. Visit comcast. Com wireless to learn more. Welcome back to squawk on the street. Rick santelli here. New home sales were pretty good today. Im going to welcome my guest, a housing guy, thanks mark hanson for taking the time today. Youre welcome. All right. So when i comb through the data heres what jumped out at me. About prices and financing, financing for 30yaer fixed is close to 3. 75. The historic low at 3. 31. Financing isnt the issue. Prices, though they were down when you look at the sequential down close to 5 year over year a very small increase of 2. 6 with looking at it through those prisms what do you see in explaining todays new home sales number . Low rates, plunge in rates, always spurs demand it staelgs demand from the future. Weve seen that for the past five or six years. In todays headline number were ive talked to you about this now for years, rick its called the laws of low numbers, aggressive rounding and season al lal adjustments. Does anybody really believe that northeast sales jumped 87 year over year in february while midwest dropped 4 . Its not like everybody in the northeast goes out house shopping when theyre snowed in. We have a situation where you take all four regions round them up or down to the nearest thousand, sometimes 12 sprinkle seasonal adjustments on top and come out with wild 10 up or down changes. Say the trend is higher which the trend is slightly higher running 4le85,000 we need to keep it in context but they are improving. Continue. Were trending slightly higher were still 40 , 50 below 30yaer averages and consensus estimates for the nirvana world we had one or two years ago we were going to go into were supposed to be 650 to 700,000 this year. Demand is weak. Weve had a demand less house price recovery, not a demand recovery in housing. Whats it going to take to get that demand up . Lower rates. Much lower rates. Exotic loans coming back. Income going through the roof. Or house prices dropping. My contention is house prices have to come in because of the historical demand price divergence weve seen in this marketplace. We just simply i agree on all your list except for one. Mortgage rates have to come a lot lower, once again, i really dont think that the issue is people cant afford a 3. 75 new mortage. New home sales only about 17 of the entire housing market. Give me what grade you think were going tonish up the rest of the year for housing in general. This month in february well look really good compared to what the rest of the year will look like. Especially if rates tick higher. Remember, the Southern Region today made up 59 of all new home sales and responsible for 70 of the year over year gains in the Southern Region has serious headwinds with currency in oil. And, you know, this number has to be taken with a grain of salt. Mark hanson thank you. Thank you for showing up today and sara eisen, its now in your court. Thank you, rick santelli. Were going to change the topic to space. A virtual monopoly on Space Exploration challenged by elon musks spacex. Jane wells has more with a look inside the united launch facility in alabama. As weve learned again today defying gravity is risky business. Nothing defying gravity than the core booster of a delta rocket built by United Launch Alliance owned by boeing and lockheed martin. First time theyve let anyone in here live. Theyve never been busier and never faced more fierce competition. This is a liquid oxygen tank for a delta 4 booster. Ula builds the delta rockets here in a massive space but theyre about to announce a new rocket one that would be powered by an american engine possibly by jeff bezos blue origin. The new rocket is a direct challenge to elon musks spacex which will start competing against ula for military launches claiming they can could it for less lowering costs here is critical. How much faster would you say it is now to put one of these together than when you started . When i started . 30 to 40 faster and were expecting to get that same amount here in the next few years. Now, ula has a perfect record of 94 launches. Spacex has a shorter record much shorter, but perfect too and the president s of both companies sparred before Congress Last week. I dont know how to build a 44 400 million rocket the more difficult question how am i less expensive than ula, i dont understand how ula is as expensive as they are. From our perspective when launching National Security missions some of which are mull it ty billion dollar oneofakind assets upon which lives depend reliability matters. Here is u rls challenge. A new engine may not be ready until 2022. That is a gap which spacex may be able to exploit. We will ask ulas ceo tori bruno in a live interview on power lunch. They want the public to name the new rocket eagle, freedom or galaxy 1 which abbreviates to go. Back to you. All right. Very cool shot. Thanks very much jane wells, with the latest in the race for space. Meantime internet stocks including amazon twitter and facebook are moving up this morning. Top analyst mark mahaney will be on squawk alley live in just a few minutes. These days, the most important person in your business could be a software developer. So, hows the app coming . Weve got to make something great. Hows the app coming . Weve got to do it fast. Lets do this on bluemix. 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At google headquarters in mountainview, california 11 00 a. M. On wall street and squawk alley is live. Good tuesday morning. Weve got a full house on squawk alley here at post nine. Joining us is dennis berman