Games in my life. President obama is in a study of his morning on his way to a nato summit that will focus on the confrontation with russia. The meeting comes after a day of confusion in ukraine as the government there announced a ceasefire with russia backed insurgents and the east but the separatists said there was no deal and the government seems to retract his earlier statement. Here is president obama this morning in fact, russia is financingo stop , in many casesg joining of Russian Troops activities in ukraine and is series about a political settlement, that is something we all hope for. I have said consistently our strong,ce is a productive, cooperative russia. What is really going on . Our chief washington correspondent peter cook is with us in new york and Ryan Chilcote is on the phone from wales, the site of the nato summit. Help me dissect this. What is going on . There was quite a bit of confusion this morning. President ukrainian said weve got a permanent ceasefire agreed upon the russians said no, we have agreed to steps toward a ceasefire. Right now, the russian president announced his own peace plan. He outlined it today on a trip. O mongolia his plan calls for the progression rebels to end their offense of an Ukrainian Military to get out of the cities east of the country. Its a sevenpoint plan so it is not easy and nothing about this conflict has been easy and nothing has actually flowed in a linear fashion. It is progress in a way and it certainly a little bit clear than the confusion we had this morning. In. Eter, weigh i think youre in the president s voice the skepticism and whether Vladimir Putin can deliver on this plan. The timing is suspicious. Youve got the president of United States in estonia effectively sending a huge symbolic mission to the message to the russia that we are defending the Baltic States and he is headed to this meeting and wales with nato members where the ideas to foster unity have a Rapid Reaction force of nato Member States that could respond if russia went beyond ukraine. I think the mood within the administration that was highly skeptical that this is something real. If it is, thats a good step. Ryan, why dont we perceive any of that skepticism and the statements from that ukrainian president . He seems to be optimistic. This is a statement he put out on his website so is difficult to read between the lines. Sure, the timing of this is highly suspect. Its not just because president obama is in estonia or because of the nato summit which kicks off tomorrow but also because the eu has been working with United States to impose new sanctions and they have the selfimposed deadline of friday. This is kind of a down to the wire, 11th hour, move that some within nato will see as an effort by the russian president to throw stardust into their eyes. And word of sanctions. Some of the nato countries in eu countries might be a little bit nervous going ahead with sanctions right now for fear of punishing president putin when maybe he is going to do something constructive. We should definitely be suspicious of the timing but this will go down to the wire. The russian president said his peace plan will be discussed in belarus on friday by the Contact Group and the germans have already told us anonymously that if the Contact Group says this is a peace plan that they are supportive of, we actually could see the sanctions put on hold. Do you want to weigh in . In thate got to factor president obama was hoping to deliver a coherent message at the nato summit and you have the issue of the islamic states in the middle east taking attention away from nato members. There are a lot of factors in play. The president has to juggle all of these and he wants to deliver a unified message and did not talk about the ceasefire and estonia short time ago. He will meet with u. S. Troops and wants to send the russians a very strong message right now about nato unity and u. S. Interest in ukraine going forward. Again, wait and see and trust but verify. We will be checking back in with you later in the hour. Thank you both. Cvs has officially quit tobacco. Cigarettes, cigars and chew and snuff are all disappearing from the shelves of 7700 cvs pharmacies which is costly. They expect to lose some 2 billion in annual revenue but the ceo says its for the sake isyour health and cvs starting a quit Smoking Campaign and changing its name to cvs health. We go to the New York Stock Exchange and the ceo of cvs. , given the fact that you are changing your name to cvs health back in february when you announced the plan to stop selling tobacco, you said it was the right thing to do. Us want to including know if the right thing to do ultimately includes ceasing to sell other unhealthy things like sugary drinks or beer, the kind of thing. , chips, aell products bar of candy in those night cannot be compared to a pack of cigarettes. The talk to a nutritionist or dietitian, they will tell you those products taken in moderation or the occasional use have not been proven to cause medical problems. The same cannot be said about tobacco. There is no amount of tobacco that can be considered safe. And the last year, they have compared sugar to be the new nicotine with halloween around the corner, what is the nutritional benefit of sugary candy . We are not talking red wine. Those products taken in moderation or the occasional use its very difficult to compare those products to a pack of tobacco where there is no amount of tobacco use that can be considered safe. Its a fair question inasmuch as you are trying to position your company as something other than a pharmacy. You are trying to position your self further up the healthcare food chain. You have minute linux and you are a pharmacy benefits manager. You want people to think of cbs as a healthy alternative to other pharmacies. It makes sense. Its the same kind of disconnect you have when you go to the hospital and there is a vending machine there with garbage, stuff that is not good for you. There are many things we do to help people on their path to better health. You mentioned our instore medical clinics that are seeing people, about 50 of the patients are on nights and weekends. The fact that we are helping patients every day stay adherent to their protrusion medications and many other products and services that we are offering our clients, what is this renaming Campaign Going to cost you . We are going to be talking about the fact that we announced back in february that walking away from the tobacco category will cost 2 billion in revenue. We changed our corporate name to meant abovehich is are more than 7700c vs pharmacies. You will see some advertisements in the broadcast media and in print. Talking more about the benefits of cvs health. I assume you expect a hike in sales revenues, what number . We announced on our Second QuarterEarnings Call that we have been awarded over 5 billion in new business in this current selling season. We know that people are looking at is more as a Healthcare Company and the Innovative Products and services we are bringing to market are resonating for our clients and their members. Specifically as it concerns your minute clinics, the walkin services, how much of an opportunity is there for cvs to displace other, more established Healthcare Providers because the cost of health care is going up . Inflation in Health Care May have slowed but it still continues to be a more defensive. We do not see the role of our minute clinics as replacing the primary care physician. We see it as being complementary to the primary care medical home. Businessf of our occurs on nights and weekends. We think we are moving business out of the emergency room into our clinics at a much lower cost. What about the rest of the healthcare ecosystem . How else might cvs participate . Thanre more diversified your competitors but beyond walkin clinics and firms a benefits and drugstore sales, what can you do . I think you are seeing the evolving role of pharmacists a Nurse Practitioners changing. They are the most Accessible Health care professionals in our health care system. They are providing services such as immunizations. Than 24,000 pharmacists are doing some terrific things to help people get on and say on their prescribed medications. About half of all americans today suffer from one or more chronic diseases whether it is hypertension or diabetes and asthma. Our hot pharmacists are doing a terrific job helping those health. O better our pharmacists are doing a terrific job helping those people onto better health. Cvs has been an americancentered company. Would purchase a pharmacy chain about 15 months ago in brazil. It was our first entry overseas. We said we didnt have the experience operating international and we wanted to understand and gain the learning. It has been a year and its been a terrific experience so far. There is more to come on our international plans. Chief rivals, walgreens, has come under a lot of criticism for confounding expectations i comes to tax policy. They had an opportunity to do an inversion and chose not to and the stock has been hammered. If anybody can use an inversion, its cvs. Of pay a Corporate Tax rate 39 . What is your position on inversion . Needr position is we comprehensive Corporate Tax reform and have been talking about that for the last several years. We will continue to talk about that. Concerned that tax inversions perhaps may further erode the tax base. Have you considered an inversion as a means . It would require buying a fairly large drugstore company somewhere overseas 20 benefits. Have you thought about it . We have not contemplated that is a strategy. Our focus is on comprehensive tax reform. We believe that will allow us to accelerate investments and in turn promote job and economic growth. Do to bringyou comprehensive tax reform to america . Congress is not doing anything about it. Drum continue to beat that in terms of the need in with some as well as special Interest Groups that have a common view of comprehensive reform. With thank you very much and good to see you this morning. Larry merlo. That, by the way. The name change . And i like no cigarettes in the store. I like that cigarettes dont have the place in this world for my kids as they did when i was growing up. My kids hardly know what they are. I like that. Time for the news feed. Samsung may be trying to steal apples thunder. Six days before the new iphone was unveiled, samsung is rolling out its own the products. One of them is a galaxy note smartphone with a wraparound screen that extends beyond the front of the device. New jersey governor chris lawyersis becoming a best friend. His administration has spent more than 50 million on outside lawyers in the last two years largely because of the George Washington bridge traffic scandal. Has named the new head of Corporate Banking and securities for north america. He is tom humphrey who spent two decades at Lehman Brothers where he ran fixed income currencies and commodities sales. He is replacing jeff mayer who was named chairman of First Key Holdings in Real Estate Finance company. There you go, a big hire. These kind of hires are what makes someone a people inside thanks so frustrated. When the big job comes up at these banks, they dont promote from within and bring somebody from the outside. We have talked before about the degree to which Deutsche Bank and other firms do a good job of managing the Human Resource side. They develop peoples careers to the point where they are the right person for the job, he or she. Or whether they need to go outside. I would like to see more of hes. Es and less of the weve got all the numbers on august auto sales next. Life in the slow lane we will take you to a state where there is always traffic jam on the information superhighway. Welcome back to Market Makers. A great august for chrysler with sales last month jumping a whopping 20 and they say this could be the best year for the industry since 2006. Gm, ford and toyota released their numbers today under and our matt miller has been coming through the reports. The best year since 2001. I had to read it a few times before i actually believed it was true. Forecasting 17. 4 u. S. Vehicle sales this year sorry, 17. 4 million vehicle sales which includes medium and heavyduty trucks. Normally, when people forecast Something Like this analysts talk about cars and light trucks. At that medium to heavy duty trucks normally account for 200,000 sales. And sayake those out take out 300,000, that still a Pretty Amazing feat because analysts are only looking for 16. 6 million cars to be sold this year. They have a very optimistic outlook and the reason is they are doing so well. 53 consecutive months of sales gains because of the jeeps you are looking at. Chrysler sales were up 20 to the best of any major automaker. Toyota just came out with a gain of six point something. Are up 49 in august and Chryslers Ram truck sales are up 39 . Whats the rationale behind this . Americans are feeling more comfortable about lying big suvs and trucks again. The redneck in us is coming back. There is no redneck in me. There is a lot of redneck in may. The best thing as banks are willing to loan more money to rednecks than they were ever before. Car loans are easier to get that at any time in history. I think that includes 2007 and 2008. Is that a good thing . In 2005 we said it was great. Eight, what were those people buying houses they cannot afford . I am not making a value judgment. I am excited about the superlatives. Whenjust an exciting time we can say that more than 70 million cars are being sold. Time for an exciting Mortgage Brokers in 2005. Why are these trends not playing to the favor of gm . Gm did not start from as low a bar is chrysler. For did not start as low. Agreed too marchioni by chrysler, it would have been left for dead had fiat not come in and picked it up. Wears equilibrium . Is chrysler back to where theoretically should be . I mean i think sergio has done a great job of revamping the chrysler lineup. He has done an especially good job of improving the quality of jeeps which were always popular vehicles but the quality had fallen so low that nobody wanted them anymore. The same is true of chryslers. He has done a great job of selling a product to the demographic that wants to buy chryslers. Frankly, he is having a better time with chrysler and jeep and ram than he is with fiat and alfa romeo. He still has not released the alfa romeo 4seater. You are so enthused today. I love this industry. I know it. Is and sergiomarchioni magical character in the auto industry. Now that alan mulally has gone, he is it for sure. The italiancanadian that he is. Market makers will be back in a couple of moments. Whats better than an italiancanadian . Coming up, earnings at Jefferies Group rose almost sevenfold in the past quarter and we will see what this says about the prospects for wall streets bigger firms. Plus, it is not all about call of duty and the latest grand theft auto we will show you the Video Game Company that is not targeting ladies. You are watching Market Makers , we got more after the break. Live from bloomberg headquarters in new york, this is Market Makers. Its 10 30 a. M. In new york city. Its time for one of our favorite topics, banking. Jeffries is out early with thirdquarter earnings and the wall street firm scored big. Investment banking revenues soared and so did sales in trading. Is this a sign of what to expect from the other bigger wall street firms . Is it too early to declare that banking is back . Here to answer the question is the managing directordevin ryan. You dont specifically cover jeffries but when you saw these numbers, or you blown out of the water . Where on earth does is coming from . It was definitely a good result from jeffries. It cannot take away from it. You look at what drove it, Investment Banking is saying great data across the board. M a is up 50 and equity issue is issuances up 40 . The area that was surprising was the resilience in sales and thats what people are focused on. Thats a positive three through read through. The ceo of jeffries wants us to believe there are certain things about jeffries that are different that are special. It focuses on health care. It focuses on technology. Its a bank that was not bailed out by the fed. To what degree do those make the results from jeffreys idiosyncratic or do they speak to a cyclical rebound and wall street . I think you have to separate the businesses. Think we are clearly starting to see the rebound. Challenging and the news from jeffries is more of a function of the month so we saw and they are on a different schedule when they report. Its too early to declare a cyclical recovery in sales and trading but its still a good result in trading. Have all the same regulatory constraints that some of the other banks do. What difference does that make . I think it makes a difference on the margin. I think the results we are seeing from jeffries are a little bit of a proxy from what i am tracking in industry data. I would not say this is an aberration. It would not surprise you if we were to see sales and trading revenue double at Goldman Sachs or citigroup . A i think you have to take step back and look at the context of what happened last year at them. It was a good quarter last years are was incredibly low. A good quarter fo