If this doesnt wreak of romance, i just do not know what does. A valentines day tour of new york citys biggest Sewage Treatment plant. This is not a joke. The city says tickets for threehour tours are nearly sold out and highlights include the giant eggshaped receptacles. Thanks for watching street signs. History always repeats itself. Closing bell is next. Hi, everybody. Good afternoon. Welcome to the closing bell. Im Maria Bartiromo here at the new york stock exchange. Stocks mixed at this hour. The dow struggling to stay above the 14,000 level and the nasdaq modestly higher. Just a reversal. Im bill griffith. Well see if the dow can rally back. Were at the lows of the day right now but also following these stories on todays ram. The ceo of dow component cisco will be with us. John chambers will join us moments after the Company Reports earnings. Will the results move us closer or further away from a new high . Plus a lot more to get into with the always outspoken John Chambers. Hes terrific and how is this for an odd couple. Facebook founder and Ceo Mark Zuckerberg having new Jersey Republican governor Chris Christie over to his house tonight. Heres a clue. Knew you would like that. Serve lots of food. Give me a break, bill. A live report and well explain whats behind this unlikely friendship. Also. It will be one more day until that Carnival Cruise ship is towed into port. A total tragedy, and now theres a dispute about conditions on board. Carnival saying its fine but passengers saying its a nightmare. Well get a firsthand account from the ship. Lets kick off the final hour of trading. Enter the final stretch and the markets are mixed. Dow jones industrial average down about 61 points. Thats off the worst levels of the day which were hit 15 minutes or so ago. 13,956 the last trade on the blue chip trade. Apple was the problem in the nymex yesterday. Yes, it was. S p 500, dekrein ofcline of point, fractional move. Lets get into todays Market Action in our closing bell exchange. Nathan bacharach and ed botowski along with our own Steve Liesman and rick santelli. Thanks for joining us. Nathan, i read you are 50 50 right now, 50 stocks, 50 bonds. Why not all in on stocks these days . Because ive got to live with clients who want to retire, and they want to make sure their money doesnt die before they do, bill. All right. Right now im waiting to see whether or not washington did mess things up which they are very capable of doing. I dont feel as if the sequester is really getting the attention that it deserves right now, and i think that the consumer is waiting to see if in fact we can get through and finish getting the 4 trillion worth of cuts that we need to get done so that everybody will be happy. If we dont do that, i think the consumer is going to go back in their shell and it will look like fourth quarter. If, however, we see washington doesnt screw things up anymore then i think very likely youll see a nice a Second Quarter that looks a lot like the Third Quarter last year. A big bet that youre making. Steve liesman, separate facts from fiction for us what. Will sequestration do to the economy, in your view . What are we expecting to happen if in fact these automatic cuts do happen come march 1 . No doubt it will be a hit to the economy, and its a hit thats going to, you know, join with the payroll tax increase thats happened, along with higher gas prices which hopefully given some of the news today we might get a little relief from. Ill tell you that the outlook on this mornings retail Sales Numbers were sort of really watched with a guarded eye. They werent too bad. They didnt revise away decembers gains, but with those payroll tax increases hitting and the rising gas prices theres concern that there is yet to be a hit to come from the from the higher taxes, maria, so join that to reduced federal spending that could help from the sequester. I think thats absolutely right what was said earlier, that washington could yet mess up what is a 2 economy. Ed, whats your thought on that, especially one of the big stories were following is this currency war to the bottom which seems to benefit equities right now, but, you know, how does that factor into all of this right now, do you think . Well, it factors quite a bit. You know, really what youre having is a race to the bottom in terms of equities excuse me in, terms of currencies. Saw venezuela do it. Right. Will see more european nation dozen it and obviously japan is doing it, and what that does is it makes our currency worth less so they do it, the countries do it, including our country, to try to make our exports more attractive, and that will help our stock prices basically because there might be more earnings because a lot of our earnings come from outside our borders. Thats why were seeing the devaluation of the currencies. Does that make you want to buy stocks more. I dont know where it ends. No question about it. In fact im really surprised that hes 50 50 in terms of his portfolios because i dont know any good reason to not only buy a bond right now but to own one because they have all gone up in value but the yield to maturity over the next ten years is very, very small. I advise all my clients to get out of any Interest Rate sensitive bonds today. Not hold on. Get out of them. I cant afford to play with other peoples money, ed. Got to live with people long in and long out. I think well see a trading range here. Go ahead, nathan. What were going to see is a trading range on bond. Every time they go over over 2, they will go back and bounce around for a while. This is not a recovery that will run away and destroy bond value much as we saw in the late 70s. Is that what youre seeing, rick santelli, in terms of this trading range . Yes, but theres a couple of caveats. As we move towards lower and lower yields over the last five years, even when they were just under 3 or just under 2, principal appreciation was a driving force. Those that were in bonds would say, well, i feel safer, but, heck, the price goes up and i dont do badly. Its not just about the rate. After we reach the historic low under 140 theres a bit less of that so even though i do think the best days of rates are behind us, i think the correction is going to be small, maybe 2. 25 to 2. 50, i dont cede see it on the wild side but to add into everybodys currency argument, theres one other reasons why weakening currencies for indebted nations is good, you get to pay everybody back in cheaper currency. Rick, were refinancing all of our debt and doing it at 2 . All of america wishes they could do that. Its going to be great. Ill tell you something. Energy costs will it be to go down. Well become energy selfsufficient and you watch what happens to the cost of manufacturing. Im going to bet you our manufacturing does well because not because our dollar is going to weaken because well actually have less expenses going out to energy and that will make us competitive. But unless the next energy czar the president appoints like the past one thinks maybe put a tax on gas to get it to 10 so the motor mounds for the windmills on chevys works a whole lot better. Rick, you can bring your Blood Pressure down. He wont have to do it. Well have enough cheap energy that were going to be okay with. That really probably the single sort of biggest conversation amongst leaders in davos, that for the u. S. , probably the biggest opportunity for actual moving the needle in terms of energy is shale. But, maria thats true. Dramatic globalismcations in terms of the u. S. Current account deficit. If you think about the money we ship now to opec and some of that possibly not being shipped there. Were trying to figure out. From the two investors on the panel, nathan and ed. Yeah. How do you buy into the shale story if in fact it is one of the single most important things in terms of job creation and growth . Maria, im right down here, maria, in the dallas area where we have the shale. I have personal investments in the barnett shale, we have clients with investments there and one of the great ways to do it is buy an exchangetraded fund that will appreciate as National Gas Prices do. Final word here, nathan. Well be pushing so much shale out of ohio that well become the next dallas, thank you very much. I hope so because you need something good to happen up there. I always heard cincinnati was the center of the world, is that right . We are. Id be playing north dakota real estate. Thats where to put your money. All right, guys. Sioui later. Appreciate your time. I think they would be fun at lunch, do you . A lot of fun. The other big story were talking today. Shares of General Electric and comcast, the parent company, both rallying after the cable giant acquired the rest of the stake in Nbc Universal. Josh lipton with more on the story. Over to you, josh. Reporter comcast is saying it will buy the rest of Nbc Universal and investors cheering that decision. Comcast in the green hitting an historic high. Now up over 45 in just the past 12 months. A number of analysts increasing their estimates and price targets for come comfort including credit suisse, analysts upgrading comcast to outperform with a price target of 48 bucks. Credit suisse telling clients the acquisition gives comcast free access to all the cash flows at Nbc Universal and believe they are positioned for solid ebitda growth. Ge popping within the s p 500. The industrials the Top Performing sector, and within the industrials, ge is your top performer as we hit into the close. Ge heading a 52week high today. Analysts reminding us that ge has been vocal about wanting to return cash to shareholders, and this accelerates the plan to do so. Back to you guys. Not that were counting josh, the highest level ge has seen in five years, four and a half years. Its true. But who is counting. 50 minutes before the closing bell sounds on wall street, a market down 60 points on the Dow Jones Industrial average. When we come back, some banks hitting new highs today, big ones, too. Is that Group Something you want to own right now . Well look at the banks and where the money is going for the stock market. Tanger factory outlets shares down despite beating expectations, but the stock is up over 20 over the last year. Well talk to the ceo and get the state of his business and what that says about the state of the economy with steven tanger. Dow component results could have a big impact on your investments and tomorrows trading. Well bring you an exclusive interview with the man behind the numbers. Ciscos chairman and ceo John Chambers coming up. But we can still help you see your big picture. With the fidelity guided portfolio summary, you choose which accounts to track and use fidelitys analytics to spot trends, gain insights, and figure out what you want to do next. All in one place. Im Meredith Stoddard and i helped create the fidelity guided portfolio summary. Its one more innovative reason serious investors are choosing fidelity. Now get 200 free trades when you open an account. Im up next, but now im singing the heartburn blues. Hold on, prilosec isnt for fast relief. Cue up alkaseltzer. It stops heartburn fast. Oh what a relief it is lets take a look at the big group and financial. Jpmorgan, goldman sachs, hitting 52week highs earlier today, so are the banks a buy for 2013 or have we seen the best . Well do talking numbers and focus on the Financial Sector etf called the xfl. J. C. Ohara on the technical side and Heather Hughes on the fundamental side. J. V. , lets talk about this. Would you prefer buying the financial etf or s p etf . Right now, maria, im really interested in the financial etf, and the reason being is we have a tremendous longterm base pattern that has formed over the last few years and price right now is breaking to the upside which is extremely bearish. For all you guys who look at the 07 highs to the 09 lows, looking at the 38 retracement level. We move a little bit higher up, these financial could be off to the raises. Now, do i prefer this over the market as the s p . I believe so. The next chart i brought along is a longer term chart looking at both the financial compared to the s p. They have moved lock step at the beginning of the 2,000s. After the financial crisis the s p actually rebounded ahead ahead of the Financial Sector. Right now the Financial Sector. They were able to clean up their balance cheat and have room to play catchup and i actually like the financials here. Heather, do you agree . Im not a fobonachi guy, but we have to look at the Mortgage Applications and the deline in those this morning. Over the past four weeks Interest Rates have started to rise and the banks are the financials certainly get most of their profits from the landing side or the housing side of the banking industry, so at lease levels unless the mortgage supply and demand for such continues to increase, its a little hard to be as bullish in the Financial Sector. That seems to be the consensus in the retail space. I agree with you. There are a lot of headwinds facing the Financial Sector but also a tremendous amount of demand for the individual fundamental stocks. Look how the xlf performed versus the rest of the market 10 compared to 18 . The financials have surprised to the upside an average of 14 versus 5 for the rest of the market. Certainly weve seen new highs today as you stated from stocks like bank of america, a 52week high since may of 08, but, look, this is due in part from the feds easing. They are buying 85 billion of these mbss every month, as we know. If and when they withdraw that liquidity prior to the 6. 5 unemployment target, then can the banks still have a healthy lending industry to keep them propped up . Im not sure, j. C. I guess the question is we know the financials have done so well, but who is to say they will do that well from here on out . Maria, ill say this lastly. Look at the seasonality. March, april and may are the three best months to be long financials with april being a relative outperformer and in the financials best month, so we still have some tail winds here pushing us higher into the summer. All right. Well leave it there. Well be watching that. Thanks very much to boast you. Appreciate it. Thank you. I guess another question is if the financials dont continue this ride, does that hurt the s p . Absolutely. Is that connected . For the last couple of years financials have been a leader in this market. Energy and financial, and both are going lower right now, and thats pushing the dow down near the lows of the day. We are down 61 points at this hour. Lets talk energy. Higher taxes and gasoline prices taking a byte out of retail sales. Up next, well talk with the ceo of Tanger Outlets on the state of the consumer. Cue the music. Yes. Talk about an odd couple. Facebook Ceo Mark Zuckerberg who hosted president barack obama president obama at a facebook town hall two years ago is holding a big reelection fundraiser for new jerseys very republican governor Chris Christie. Find out whats behind this new lo lovefest in the democrat stronghold of silicon valley. Thats coming up later on the closing bell. Tdd 18003452550 this morning, im going to trade in hong kong. 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Retail sales increased just 0. 1 for the month of january, and as you mentioned payroll taxes are higher. Gasoline prices are higher, but you know what, the stock market is doing better, housing is recovering, and you know what, the Unemployment Rate is getting better, too, so you can see here the retail index has outperformed the benchmark s p 500 so some retail movers on the announcement today because the Broader Market