Nasdaq drawing our attention this hour. The index is up 9. 5 this year. Nasdaq 100 by the way on pace for its best quarter in years. Pete, the nasdaqs the only major average positive for march. And youve got the leadership coming from technology. You look at the fundamentals and facts of the earnings season, then you look at how everybody starts to read into, even this coming earnings season. We know april 13th, jpmorgan is going to kick it off. When we get to tech, how about the fact of what weve heard from many of these various Chip Companies post apple. Post many of the facebooks and many others. Valuations are still fair. Theres still growth and thats why these stocks continue. Why is this the sector that is outperforming so much . Is it the one u thats not so tied to what the fed says . The one not so sigh ed to healt care . No matter what happens, this is the space that continues to grow up. Because tech can grow. In a low growth environment. 2 right now. Some are speculating its less than that. It could also grow in higher growth environment. I think you have to stick with the end markets and where theres secular growth and that is social media. That is cloud. Companies that are transitioning from legacy stuff. So i think you can pick growth and value and the valuations are not that extended. These are the top s p performers. Act vision, sky work, smant sa tech, 28. Facebook is up 23. Yahoo up 21. Of course, apple is up 24 not out of the internet space, but its representative of just what this space has managed to do. There are so many sectors that are attractive here. Youre talking about the things growing nicely. And still have a great price. Apple is one of them. The stock price hasnt budged, but theres still great value there. Like an intel, like a cisco system, qualcomm. No matter what style you are, there is something to like. So, youre telling me its not too late the buy these names. Or is there a lot more room to go. Techs got a secular tail wind and but its b beyond that. Its 20 of the s p 500. This has been the leadership group. These are companies with the highest profit margins, the best growth stories regardless of what goes on with europe, with the u. S. , with brexit, republican versus democrat, interest rates. More and more of our lives are spent utilizing technology and by the way, theres another thing going on, which is interesting. If youre afraid of robots taking jobs or nation, the big story that black roc last night is one of a million stories that happens every day. The only way out is to own robots, by being invested in the companies that are bringing this type of radical change to every industry under sun. So theres some element of that. It all combines to come together and these are the stocks that are changing our lais every day. Robbi, do you like this space . Its been one of our favorite sectors. I think the main message is technology is changing the world more than people think. Its going to continue to do so. The Customer Base of these companies is going to continue to expand because companies recognize this evolution. Its your largest overweight, is your largest overweight. Its been and its been one that works. Partly, the secular drivers are there, this blackrock story that is Technology Creating efficiency for investors across the board. I think its changing the world more than we think. One other thing about technology. The economy can now grow without the same inflationary impulse weve seen before because the disinflati disinflationary effects. Barbarclays, start with facebook. They launched coverage at barclay, overweight, 154 bucks is their target. They say it is in their words, arguably the top consensus long in the group. Do we agree . So theres a sorry, the question of the stock has done so well, can you buy it here . I think look, i think you can buy it here, but you have to recognize the fact that one missed quarter, theres going to be a very, very large move to the downside. Because theres a lot of hot money in this stock and you can see the same for a lot. But when you think about facebook, tieing into this technology idea, keep in mind, this isnt a bad advertising. Theyve always said 50 of money spent on advertisinging the wasted. The problem is, we just dont know which half. Facebook does. Facebook knows exactly where the money being spent has the highest roi and thats why youre seeing them eat into traditional tv budget, display advertising. You want to call a top in that . Say tomorrow, that wont be the case . Very hard to do. Its not relative to the growth youre getting, its not that expensive. The its about 35 times forward. Youre growing about 35, 40 . You have depends on what numbers. Im looking at forward. The point of it 35, 40. Margin expansion here. Theyve invested heavily, but still able to grow their margins, so you get operating l leverage and the ad dollars are going to two places. Facebook b and google and thats not change iing soon. If snap thinks they can get that, i think its going to be a tough one for them to achieve. I think theres another thing, we know and were not mentioning here, theres a ton of cash this this space ch its one thing to have the cash an another thing to put it to use and youre starting to see the activity pick up. Youve seen mxpi picked up. Both by the way foreign company, so it gets around the repatriation of cash issue. Not even going to take the like the cherry on top. You dont need the cherry, youf got to sundae, these companies are willing to go to work. Cisco keeps picking off these acquisitions thats building up in security and internet of things business and thats percolatinging through the sector. I think seeing that cash go to work is important. Thats important because its also, we have much Bigger Companies now than we used to that are much more dominant of their spaces than they were. We had thousands of thousands of more publicly traded companies in the 1970s. Even in the 1990s than we do now. The wilshire 5000 could only get to 38,000. When you look at concentration in the tech sector, there comes a point in every poker game where one player has too many chips. Mathematically, you cant win. Theres no way. Theyre going to take you. Thats where facebook is right now. Thats where google is. Microsoft in a lot of respect, they can compete with each other, but theyre not facing an extra 100 companies that realistically have a shot to knock them off their perch and if youre zuckerberg, youre a king. People are coming to you with venture deals. You get the final say. Somebodys going to buy for 500 million, mark says well take it for a billion or we dont need it. Imagine being in that position. There are five guys in tech that have that. Its about the transformational process. When you talk of all the names you just brought up, where have they been able to maneuver themselves . Na della, intel, google. All of these companies have transformed themselves. Id even say an amazon. Stef has done a great job with it, but you look at valuation, i cant do it. And yet, what have they done . You look at the aws, the growth, e commerce continuing to grow. This is a company that continues to execute and its the ceos that are so good in the tight spaces. You go to amazon. Barclays, they ask the question, could amazon be the first to a 1 trillion market cap. Maybe amazon gets there first. They have overweight with 120 price target. I think apple beats them. Only one on the desk who owns amazon. Oyou have to deal with some f the parts analysis. Thats your issue, i get that. If you could do some of parts ang angel is, you can get to a higher price. Last fauquarter, margins were higher than expected. Maybe top line wasnt as robust, but still pretty darn strong. They got the margins right and if they can get that equation to continue, i think the stock continues to work higher. Stocks like have upended the entire Economic Framework of retail, theyre Game Changing and when you have a Game Changing process, a Game Changing business, youre in a benefit. Just a matter of what youre willing to pay up for. In the growth space, youre paying for growth. It was fashionable to look at amazon for like 15 years and say, oh, this time, its different. The its actually different and not only is it different for amazon, its different for macys, target, jc penney, walmart, go down the list. If youre a retailer, traditional, your best Case Scenario is mid single digit growth comps. Amazon said all right, if thats what theyre aiming for to keep costs low an not invest too much, were going to aim for Something Different and it worked. This isnt one of the million thing. Its not going to be repeated. I think the Investor Base when you look at amazon, what other stock does it sound like in terms of okay, you got a high valuation and a really creative guy whos running the whole show. It sounds like tesla. Where youve got an Investor Base that will continue to hold on to this stock until they wont. So, we mentioned Alphabet Google at the beginning of the conversation. They are overweight within 1,065. Im in that one. Price target. Overweight . Both. Both. And thats the one that has felt like he was thats the one that has the most real. Its a mike drop moment. Has the most reason bable valuation. Trading about 19, 20 times. Theyve multiple growth drivers. Margin expansion. I would will caution though shortterm. Scott. Hold on a second. Let me finish. I would be caution about the quarter coming up because they have issues with regards to youtube, so you mig get a better buying opportunity in this one, but longterm, the secular trends. Maybe buy half now and have after earnings. Another stock that doesnt get enough combo on this show. Is ebay. They niche wait overweight there, 4i buck, pete. I own it. Theyve got revenue growth, which you like. Its a turn around story and you start to look at this company, wow, this thing trades at an inexpensive sort of a level. Because of those reasons, we compare it to amazon. Ebay does what they do, but they do it extremely well and its too cheap right now. So on the value, when youre buying, how scared do we get when a growth stock becomes a value stock . I personally its a value stock with revenue growth. Its a revenue growth. Talk about google. It is entering value territory. You strip that cash out, i know steve weiss i was going to say apple. Its been a value stock for four years. My point though is to answer his question is is not very scared. And that would be your poster chil. You are correct. You are correct in apple. He is correct in general that usually, a fall in growth stock is something where youre going to get a hole in your hand. I dont think thats the case with google. I see the growth in revenues, the profit, the cash in the balance sheet. Why do i not you just dont want the next rim. Its funny. Were having this conversation about why do we think tech has outperformed the way it has and maybe its not as sensitive to some of the thing that is the other part of the market are. How do we feel today about the market . Dow is down nine of ten days. A lot of fed speak. Stan fisher maybe made people reassess where they thought the fed was going to be. Rosengren says no, look, you can get four hikes this year. So, markets, i think were in a bit of a place where political commentary because thats what the media is focused on right now, is maybe blurring fundamental progress because youre not getti a good look att because were in between Earnings Seasons right now. You see a trajectory, whats likely to be earnings in the First Quarter that are pretty good. Economic growth picking up. And so, i think well make it through this transition pretty elegantly. I dont think the feds going to do anything thats not pragmatic right now and so i think were in a sweet spot for seeing a positive risk on environment. To your point on weve seen this down eight day, our high was 24. 01 on the s p march 1st. What are we today . We havent moved. Reality check. Nine of ten days that are down on the dow, but ds not like weve moved. Not representative of the mark. On this sort of conversation over whether its the president , the fed, it is earnings that are ultimately going to you know u, sort of its all about the facts. We joked back and forth on this thing, but it is about the facts. Its about the fundamentals. If you focus on the fundamentals and facts, youve done very, very well. When you look at what stocks have performed, you look at technology, killeded it. When you look at the financials, they killed it, now theyve eased back because a lot of people have their concerns of the huge run it made, but theres still opportunity and when those facts come out again april 13th, jpmorgan. The message was one of resiliency. On monday, market could have any reason it wanted to go down. It hung in. That was the point. Again, we said you have an s p thats 1 from all time highs and in the meantime, you have a sitting president whos being invested for treason. If you told me that three months ago this was what was going to be in the news every day, agree or not, if you said thats what the nations going to be focused on, how far will the s p be from its high. I would have said 15 . Is it trump or fundamentals . It could be trumpamentals. It is until you get to earnings. Until you get to earnings and you can focus on fundamental, sorry, you can focus on fundamentals, thats very important. The Economic Data has been pretty good to support the fundamental, so you have the Economic Data good. Earnings are probably pret thety good and i think thats whats going to propel the market higher. What has been interesting has been the rotation this year. That is what the theme is this year. January started off with cyclicals, february was defensive. March has been a combination of a lot of things. When earnings come out, i think the market will be excited. No preannouncements. Two days away from the end of the quarter. Not count iing forward. Leave as an outliar. Micron going bananas. This has been a quiet preannouncement season. This bodes well. Heres what else is coming up on Halftime Report. Blackrock overhauling its active stock picking business. Planning to use more computers. The dao bait on man versus machine ahead. Dunkin brands cut to sell at sax. Its our call of the day. Plus, the halftime quarterly report. Were tracking the best winning and losing trades so far in 2017. Scott wapner and the traders are back in two minutes. Ckn two min. Usaa gives me the peace of mind ckn two min. And the security justike the marines did. The process through usaa is so effortless, that you feel like you a part of the family. I love that i can pass the membership to my children. Were the williams family, and were usaa members for life. We cut the price of trades to give investors even more value. And at 4. 95, you can trade with a clear advantage. Fidelity, where smarter investors will always be. Shares of Dunkin Brands under pressure today. The firm citing peak valuation, risk bs to growth as the reasons why. Josh, you own the stock. I think its a reason bable call. The stock has had a huge run. Its come a very long way. Got a premium valuation and quite frankly as a shareholder, theyve been spotty in terms of execution. They tend to have two good quarters, then one bad one. And so, if you get caught in this thing on one of those bad quarters, the punishment is severe. Because that premium valuation, so i dont mind if youre long this thing, take a profit, you see a rise in 50day. About 53 bucks, if it takes this level out, expect continueded sell iing pressure and take som gains, i may end up doing that. I think its a great company, but there might be a better opportunity. Its not like they see the floor dropping out below. Whats your average costs, what were you expecting to get out of it. Are there better opportunities with fresh cash. I think right now, there are i dont mind this call. I dont think necessarily theyre going to be wrong. This is the type of thing where you have a defined downside if you could work with the stock and maybe trail it. Stef, youre not a fan. Not at this valuation. Theyre trading at the same multiple. Yum has lagged year to late. I like it because i think theyre going through a transformation. Doing more refranchising. They have focused on cutting their coses and have a lot of costs they can cut and are working on pizza hut, which is a problem child, but some of their other businesses are okay. The one i had my eye on is starbucks. Havent been involved in that one in a long time. Its trading at 29 times forward. The reason i like it is you have this global brand, this opportunity in china and were hearing good things about the consumer in china. Thats really a nice upside for them. They have been at the forefront of digital and they are really the lee leader there, so if this were to pull back, thats the one id want to buy. I think 17 states did minimum wage hikes and probably more next year. Isnt that an issue for these names . Isnt that why they seem to have all stopped on a dime . I think thats a real issue. For all consumer companies. Any of the retailers. But this is a very labor intensive type of retailer. Thats why i like yum because its a special situation story. They are really trying to focus on cutting costs and rebranding themselves. I think that will off set some of the pressures from wage costs. Starbucks is a much more Global Company and they have other areas where they can grow, so thats where i think you want to be specific on which names in this space. Duncan is much more of a u. S. Company. Theyll have much more issues. How come in one talks about the transformation of leadership in the way they talk about disney and iger. That issue koseems to come up a the time. Howard schultz is is not running the company anymore. He had to come back to save it. I thats a real issue. I think hes still going to be very instrumental in driving the growth, particularly the International Growth and that is the reason why if you like starbucks and if you have a longer term horizon, thats how you can get excited about the story. Its almost hes there. I think that concept will work. That theme will work. As long as as schultz is is there. As long as hes still there. Doesnt have to be running the daytoday operations. But hes still the visionary. Apparently, he does. No, not saying hes not physically in the building, but hes not running the company anymore. Okay. Part of the leadership. Yes, he is. Who do you think runs the Trump Organization right now in real life . You think eric trump runs it seriously . On th