That a u. S. Judge has accepted a plea agreement with Lumber Liquidators. Right now we dont know exactly what the plea was or what the plea was for in terms of what charges they address. Still, the headline was moving the stock, the stock up about 9. 5 , right around just 10 54 a. M. , halted for volatility, reopened just now about a minute ago, now up by 6. 5 on heavier than average volumes, so we will bring you more. Right now, trading volatility around Lumber Liquidators on a bloomberg headline with a u. S. Judge. Back over to you guys. Thanks,dom. Keep us posted on that. Meanwhile, the rest of the markets giving up some of their gains, lower off the lows for the day. Twitter shares up sharply. A new report from the information out this morning says Mark Andreason and silver lake considering some sort of deal for the social network. Twitter shares as i mentioned, up this morning. They were up about 9 in premarket trading. But here with they are story is jessica lessen, cnbc contributor. Jessica, give us the gist of this story. So valley investors are definitely circling the wagons on twitter. Its been a big topic of conversation over the past week. And i think a lot of different groups are trying to run the numbers, trying to see if there is a deal. As i reported last night, we dont know if these talks are still active. So still who is actively looking. Silver lake and andreason horowitz had considered it. But i dont know that theyre still looking at a deal. But people are looking at the numbers. If the price goes down, people see a lot of value. I think its also very important to remember, though, twitter is a tough takeout target. Its got, you know, weak earnings, lots of cash, growth questions. So i dont necessarily think a deal is likely. But with earnings coming up, everyone is talking about it. Jessica, whats the issue here with google not just taking it out . Everybody is running with your silver lake an dreessen headline. But in your scoop, you say they have been talking to people about twitter. It seems to me, despite the issues you said around takeout, its cheap. You can take this thing out for sub 20 billion. The revenue 3 billion this year. What is the issue with google not just doing this. Its not just the money, john. Of its also what do you do with twitter, right . How would this help google grow its business . I think one area is perhaps messaging. Google is very interested in a messaging play to come at facebook. It doesnt have one right now. But i think you have to not just look at the price. But what are you getting when you buy the company . And youre getting, you know, some ad revenue. Google already has that. But i think those are the kinds of issues that management is looking at. So i just cant see a big takeout from a google likely at this point. Jessica, i imagine they would also get some antitrust concerns from people who think that theyre trying to take over the world. But i wonder, the private equity angle of this is the idea that it would be easier to fix what ails twitter in terms of getting that user growth going again, if they get off the Quarterly Earnings treadmill. And the flip side of that, if they were to go private, how would they incentivize employees . Wouldnt that just open up the floodgates and people go to places that seem like theyve got a more immediate payout . I think the private equity story is really one of whether you can make twitter more profitable. You still have a lot of revenue. Analysts are forecasting for 2016 about 3 billion in revenue. So the idea would be, if you can get some of the costs down, maybe by tackling things like infrastructure and just other costs, you can have a pretty profitable business. Now thats the thesis. But as you said, there are a lot of questions. Twitter has huge Employee Stock comp. Costs, which is one of them. And then there is a question of, would you do a private deal, would you do a pipe deal . Again, people just love to run the numbers. Its really important to say that i dont think theres something thats necessarily close to being done or, you know, imminent. Its all in the questions of the numbers. But i think, you know, the financial players are looking at revenue and earnings. And thats what theyre looking at for the potential. And normally, jessica, when you see a pipe deal, its for the purpose of a cash injection, which twitter doesnt necessarily need. The Big Questions here seem to be around the product. And i would love to get your reaction to a story that ran in the new yorker over the weekend. And one of the quotes said, if twitters realtime feed is its most powerful asset, and it is, its not difficult to see a futurer in which instagram, facebook or snapchat or peach, yes, im citing peach, they obvious ate the need for twitters offchanging ideas about social interaction. If youre going to do a deal for a company like this, dont you want to make sure that its product has staying power and that there is a product vision Going Forward . What is the talk around that, jessica . I think that article raised some excellent points. There is no doubt that the model of just a stream of news and information is not the most exciting, engaging, growth product area on the internet today. I mentioned messaging earlier. I think that is a new platform, that is something interesting. And where twitter has a product opportunity. We shouldnt forget, a number of major executives have just left twitter. So this is a company that does need a new product strategy. You cannot ignore the fact, it does have a nice advertising business right now. And so if youre looking at dollars that are going to be shifting from tv to digital, i think you can see a nice story around ad growth at twitter. But, of course, that will only last as long as the engagement the is. I think there are Big Questions there too. There have been Big Questions around the product for a long time. This is the tech world. Things go out of favor very, very quickly, and twitter is absolutely vulnerable to that right now. Jessica, i agree with you on the idea of it being a hassle for google to acquire. I dont think google cares about profitability of something this small. Fundamentally, they have no social strategy. Theres a trophy of realtime data. They have already had that data. Something doesnt make sense to me. I think it has to be government. No other reason why twitter google would be worried about the profitability of a 3 billion a year business. Although, john, the question is, would it go into google, would it go into other bets at this point . Well, this strikes me as the sort of thing you might want pa char running. But all of that is speculative. Were going to talk about google, but first our things to Jessica Lessin who broke this story. Thanks for joining us this morning. Great to be here. Next up, googles parent company, alphabet, set to report earnings after the bell. The earnings split into two segments. First is google, which contains things like search ads and youtube. The second will include some of googles what its calling other bets like google ventures, google fiber. And nest. John steinberg, where do you think investors will be focused . This is going to be a crazy Earnings Announcement. Whats going to happen is, its going to come out, what always happens when there is new classifications. There is going to be a lot of confusion around reading that other that other bet segment. The algorithms will be all confused when they try to do their trades around parsing the document. And my gut is how it trades at the time of the Earnings Announcement could be very different when the Earnings Call comes out. Were looking at a billion and a half dollars of losses. I think if they come in higher, investors will be upset. If they come in lower, there will be a sense of relief. They have been estimated to be as high as 5 billion. The losses for the other bets, john. How much will the core business have to cover here . I think a lot, and i think a lot of this quarter depends on the magic of ruth poreat, substantial to this point. I hark back to a quote from last quarters call, where ruth said, cap x and other bets is expected to increase through next year, as we continue to execute on the growth agenda there, in particular in access and energy, which contains the fiber business, among other efforts. In other words, were going to be spending more money in areas that arent making money yet. So given the quarter we just saw from amazon, versus the quarter we saw from facebook, how are investors going to take that . I think top line has a lot to do with it, because facebooks top line growth came in above where the street wanted, investors were willing to take. Okay, theyre spending more. Amazon, not as much. Does the fact that facebook had such a Strong Quarter hold any tea leaves we should be reading . Yes. Absolutely. Im completely in line with john. Its the amazon cost question that will apply to google. Its the facebook top line. And so goes facebook, so goes google. In terms of the top line. When advertisers look at these two companies, your consumer main stays, your staples or your google spending and facebook spending, they go in lockstep. Google is your dr, facebook is your branding and app install ads. It will be a blowout. The stock of google is roughly 5 away from the market cap of apple. Whats the likelihood for it that we see these two companies leap frog positions for the most valuable company in the world . I think its decently likely. I would also point out, google stock has held up a lot better through this very rough january that we just had than a lot of these other stocks had. Youre still trading at levels well above where they were in the fall and certainly in the summer. So its got some room to go down if investors sense a whiff of disappointment. So its different from facebook in that way which had room to rebound. Again, i agree. Now were at 20 times. Remember, this company traded as low as 15 times. So not as cheap as it used to be. Well, its up about 1 against a negative take today, of course. Its numbers this afternoon could change. Steinberg, youre going to stick around. For a little bit, yes. Yes indeed and were going to check on the markets right now, trading lets see. Dow is down about a half percent. The s p, as well. The nasdaq holding up a little bit better than that, down about a third of a percent. Shares of tesla falling after Morgan Stanleys adam jonas cut his price target on the stock on more than 100. The cut comes primarily for the model x and model 3 car sales. And check out shares of facebook in the green, and hitting a new alltime high. Facebook is up about 50 over the last year. And another update on lumber liquidator liquidators. Dom chu has the latest. John, the stock up 15 right now, and about 3 million shares worth of volume. To bring up up to speed on the context behind, this the stock did move on those bloomberg headlines, saying the company was getting ready to or rather a u. S. Judge was going to accept a plea agreement that the they had put in place. Just to bring some background on what that plea was, back in october, the company had entered a negotiation, and at least struck a deal with prosecutors and department of justice with regard to charges relating to the illegal importation of wood and false statements made alleged false statements made because of that. Now this is, again, a settlement that they agreed to back in october of last year. That is now being accepted by a judge. The agreement does include in the original agreement four misdemeanor care misdemeanor charges for violations of the federal lacey act and a single felony charge for the entry of goods by means of false statement. So again, well bring in more details. For right now, though, it appears as though the Lumber Liquidators settlement that bloomberg headlines said have been accepted in terms of a plea agreement by a u. S. Judge are related to the illegal importation of wood. Still waiting to see, john, if there is anything on the front of the formaldehyde wood. We are in the starting blocks of the 2016 election with todays iowa caucus, live on the ground with a Political Group backed by mark zuckerberg. And a rough month for tech stocks with names like amazon and netflix down more than 15 to start the year. Were going to look at where some of those big names could go from here. And a historically slow month for the ipo market. Well break down the numbers and look at what comes next. Squawk alley is back in a moment. The 2016 elections heating up with the Iowa Caucuses taking place today. Lets bring in cnbc john harwood, live in des moines, iowa this morning. Hey, john. Good morning. You know, its getting a little rough out on the campaign trail, as Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, ted cruz and donald trump sprint toward the finish line. Hillary clinton last night at a rally was suggesting that shes more practical and effective than Bernie Sanders. Bernie sanders is urging democrats to dream bigger than Hillary Clinton offers. And on the republican side, that trumpcruz rhetoric is getting pretty raw right now. Take a listen. Both trump and marco are attacking me. Theyre attacking me with all their might. And were drawing contrasts. And the contrasts are clear, and by the way, substantive and policybased. A vote for marco rubio is a vote for amnesty. And a vote for donald trump is a vote for obamacare. Ted cruz is a total liar. I am so against obamacare, ive been saying it for two years in my speeches. Im going to repeal and replace obamacare. I dont know where he gets this. But hes a liar. Now, here are the questions that iowa voters are going to answer tonight when they caucus in just a few hours from now. First of all, the question is whether Bernie Sanders and donald trump, who have had the biggest crowds, the most enthusiasm, can harness that support, turn it out for caucus night. Not as easy for a normal election. Those caucuses begin at 7 00 tonight. The second question is, whether the clinton and Cruz Campaign organizations are as good as advertised. Whether they can deliver their vote. Clinton has got a threepoint lead over sanders in the last Des Moines Register poll. Donald trump is ahead by five points of ted cruz. But a Good Organization might be able to erode that advantage. The third question is whether marco rubio, who you just heard donald trump or ted cruz allude to, can speak up into a close third place or even a spekd place. The register poll had him significantly behind donald trump. But hes hoping to have the kind of finish here that will sling shot him into new hampshire, and really make him the establishment alternative to these two outsiders. Trump and cruz, guys. Thank you, john. And with the iowa caucus just hours away, and candidates vying to draw in new voters, what are some of the leading issues heading into tonight . Todd schultz is president of forward. Us and joins us now. An interesting dustup that ive noticed over the past few days over ted cruzs charitable giving. Is that showing up on the radar at all out there with those core iowa caucusgoers, or is it more about immigration and the issues that youre more focused on . Were really focused just on immigration at this point. I think youll be able to know tonight on some of these other issues. What i can tell you, on the issue of immigration, we have seen in a couple candidates, trump, ted cruz, rick santorum, for the first time a major party putting forth people who are saying, theyre going to round up and deport 11. 5 Million People. Theyre going to eliminate highskilled immigration. And look, that may get you a win or second place in the Iowa Caucuses. That is a just horrible and fatal position in a general election. And so im curious to see what we see tonight versus what we may see in the future. Though i dont think people are going to be able to wiggle out of these positions. Todd, the Des Moines Register said 45 of voters do not have their mind made up. When you think about the yooutce of the Iowa Caucuses, how predictive can we treat it . I think its important to understand in politics, people tend to look at one election and look at it, and they dont understand the huge demographic differences. The Iowa Caucuses are going to be between 99 and 99. 5 white. Look at our general election. Look at the population we have here. Youre looking at 28, 29, 30 of a general election is going to be nonwhite. To put that into context, its 2. 5 times what that was 30 years ago. So what made a play at 30 in iowa could be a huge problem elsewhere. What. Is your core argument around the benefit to technology of the immigrations and specially talented worker visas . Whats a core argument youre making to voters around that . I think that as a nation historically, an immigration system and a country that welcomes immigrants has been our greatest competitive advantage. Thats incredibly true in a global economy. If you look at the role that high School Immigrants play in driving invasion and driving manufacturing, 40 of fortune 500 companies started by an immigrant or children of immigrants, half of startups in Silicon Valley started by one immigrant founder here. For us to thrive in the 21st century, we need a 21st century immigration system. Todd, it kind of feels like youre screaming at a wall mere, though. Because this anti immigrant rhetoric out of the gop has played so well to the base up to this point. If you look at trump really brought it to a new level. He continues to be in the lead. How do you need to change strategy in order to draw the right kind of attention, your message . Ill bring you back to what i said about an iowa caucus electorate. On this question of are we going to round up 11. 5 Million People . That has 1 in 5 americans in support of it. Now, that actually was probably 45 of an iowa caucus electorate. Incredibly conservative. So the question to m