Moment. Payback, right . As somebody who has had trouble once or twice on the George Washington bridge getting close to arriving. But arriving on time, im now well, now were one for one, i guess, because i had my one incident a couple years ago, and then i got close a couple of times. Joe looks good. Very dapper and hes so quiet. What was that, joe . Keep the camera on me, please. Thats the joe we know and love. Anyway, joe is on his way. Again, he had trouble and hit a pothole just outside of new york. Hell be here in just a little bit. The Global Markets reacting to the feds decision to begin tapering next month. The dow surging to a new alltime high adding nearly 300 points to close at 16,167. In asia, a mixed reaction. In japan, the nikkei closed at a sixyear high gaining nearly 2 to close at 15,859. Right now in europe, youll see at least with the Early Morning action that they are getting some pretty positive numbers there. In france, the cac is up by 1. 4 . Same story in germany with the dax. The ftse is up almost 1 in london. The fed is going to cut bond pur purchases by 10 million a month beginning in january. Treasury purchases from 40 billion to 45 billion. The fed is keeping rates unchanged. While the labor markets have improved, they remain concerned about the Unemployment Rates and will keep rates at these levels well past the time when the jobless rate dips below 6. 5 . Now, the fomc voted 9 to 1 in favor of the tapering action. Today, the senate will be likely approving Janet Yellens decision to replace ben bernanke as the fed chairman. Check out the futures right now. Things have barely buzzed, but that was a massive rally yesterday, set things on a strong, upward trajectory. I think part of the reason for that was because of what happens with the tenyear. It was incredibly bell behaved. The tenyear did not take off in terms of the yield taking off. This was not a huge surprise even though the markets thought this was more likely to happen in january. And we should point out, 2. 891 . Andrew, again, i was razzing joe even before he got a flat tire. Hes had a rough morning partnership told him he needed to practice his bowing. I have to bow to you. I dont remember we didnt bet against each other on this one. , we were on the same side. So i can bow on behalf of joe. Well but i was wrong. I thought i could claim im right because i did think it would happen in january, but you see where im going with this. Oh, yeah, in terms of the bet. The only bet we made was the direction over or under. And i number was 2. 87 . So we are winning, but only by the skin of our teeth at this point. Joe points out this bet isnt effective until end of the day tomorrow. Im claiming beginning of the day tomorrow because im not here on monday. I would have never imagined it would have wallied the way it did. And i wonder whether it will hold up. That is pretty amazing. And this is something were going to be watching closely. But that was incredible Market Action yesterday, both between the tenyear barely budge, that yield and the stock market taking off like it did. I will say that joe was right in his reason for bringing up this set, which was his point was that the market was well prepared for this and he was right on that fact. In fact, squawk likes to give credit when credit is due. One day does not all i was going to say is one day does not make a trend, so it looks like everybody is well behaved, but the question is actually how long they will be well behaved for. And i wonder whether over the next couple of days as people understand what this all means where things will really go. Maybe. But its usually the knee jerk reaction that is a little bit more out of walk. But im impressed that the market took things in such stride. Now, we are pretty busy handing out credit today. If you were watching squawk box back on december 10th, you heard Steve Liesmans call on the fed taper. I wish i flew someone who knew. Well, we might have a guy who thinks he knows. Its impossible to know, isnt it . Well, this guy is closer than others and his name is steve liesman. A taper by the Federal Reserve at its next meeting now in my opinion looks more likely than not. The economic taet, the markets reaction to it and statements by fed officials all point to a strong possibility the fed could move next week to reduce the amount of stimulus it provides the economy. Steve joins us right now from washington and, steve, if we want to be honest about this, you are the one we need to be bowing to. You were totally right on this and i am glad i stuck with it because you are the one who led all of us here. Thanks. I need one of those things like joe has with the big head,ite . I thought thats why joes head was so big because of his good call on the market. Look, i think whats interesting here is you just Pay Attention to the data and what the fed says. And i was thinking that i made a bad call in september. And when i thought a lot about that, its because i didnt Pay Attention to the data. I had a call in august about the fed tapering in september and then that jobs number came in weak september 6th and i didnt change. Then this number came in and i was on the balance, it could happen, it may not, but then that jobs number came in and then i i think the important thing was what you talked about earlier, becky, which was the rates and how they reacted. The market was well prepared, the fed was concerned about the short end that the market believed in its promise to keep rates low. Thats what we got yesterday when thinking about what the news was. There were three pieces of news this that statement. First, the 10 billion taper. That was split evenly between the treasuries and the mbs. The second was a measured wind down. 10 billion is the burden of proof and then the economy plus or minus. And then that dovish rate guidance. I didnt think that was going to happen, becky. I thought the fed might hold that in their pocket. But, really, at the end of the take, i think bernanke took out a little insurance on this move to make sure that the markets understood that they were going to remain low for perhaps longer than the markets think. And i asked him about that question at the press conference yesterday. We couldnt put knit terms of another Unemployment Rate level specifically. So i expect it will be some time past the 6. 5 before all of the other variables well be looking at will line up in a way that will give us confidence that the labor market is Strong Enough to with stand the beginning of increases in rates. So we had john riding on yesterday and he began talking about this idea of why didnt wall street see this coming more. And then i had an offline conversation with him. Its not whether or not the fed is communicating right, but whether or not the market is listening to them. And its something to think about. We were in the lockup and i was talking to a reporter next to me while reading a statement. And the reporter said to me, you know what . Its easier to write the taper story than the no taper story. It made a lot more sense. I dont want to criticize what they were listening to or looking at, but its interesting to see through the process of why you had the call right or the call wrong and the taper story to me was always the more logical one. Steve, this is all coming at a time when janet yellen could be confirmed as early as today. If thats the case, does bernanke step down and let her step into that position sooner than january . I dont think so. I dont think theres any particular reason for it. Bernanke was asked what yellen thinks about this and he said shes fully on board. I suspect thats retireight. The market is less inclined to think that yellen is way more dovish than bernanke. I think they think shes a bit more dovish. But i think janet yellen as i said several times going back to her history in the Federal Reserve has had moments when shes been more hawkish than the board. Moments when shes been more dovish. I think you look at the information coming in, we may do 3 growth in the second half, that big number in the third quarter, and now we keep revising up. So this inventory may be offset, it may not be that big, but second of all offset be better employment. And you know what starts looking good . The stock market looks like theres less air underneath and it more Real Foundation and then the jobs number we had looked more real if were doing 3 growth. It would be stunning if this was an actual handoff, a smooth handoff, a smooth transition the way the fed had always hoped it would be. I think that i would be a little less surprised. I wouldnt say its quite so stunning, becky. Theres so much things that could go wrong. If they actually pulled this off, that to me is pretty amazing. Thats true. I guess what i bristle a little about is the idea of the fed not paying attention. We know theyre paying attention. We know theyre looking at all this information. And then guys come on our air and we think theyre looking at stuff the fed is not looking at. The fed is loot looking at an awful lot of stuff. Whether or not they come to the right conclusion, 17 people around the table, very interesting to me that they shifted from the hawkish Esther George and now the dissent is Eric Rosengren from boston who we know to be more on the dovish side of things. He thought it was premature. So i think the idea is, okay, lets give it that the fed is paengz occupation attention to the things were all looking at. What is the right conclusion here . Andrew. Here is the question that i have. I agree with all of the data and sort of policy mindset that youre talking about, but i wonder how shakespearean this is given the fact that yellen is probably going to be confirmed today, given that better 23457bky wa23457b bernanke wanted to have a legacy. Hes sort of tying the whole thing up with a bow and its very neat. I just wonder whether there was a conversation about whether they do it in september or early 2014. You dont think it has anything to do with the sort of personalities involved in all of this and history . You know, i have always argued it does, andrew, in the sense that these are real people making decisions. Its not done according to a formula. If this were the ecb, i would say much less having to do with personalities in the sense that they follow almost religionly this 2 inflation target. The feds Monetary Policy is, you know, a little bit of science and maybe a lot more art is probably the better way to put it. I think it has something to do with it, but look, at 735, 5, a said before, the fed would still be speeding on most roads in america. So its still doinl doing 75 billion of qe. Its still saying its data dependant. He hands off the first move, which maybe is mormon ewemental, but look, they would still be doing 35 billion by june with 10 billion incremental stepdown fess they do that. So theres still quite a bit of stimulus. If the fed stopped buying, it would still be buying. Because remember, theres another part of this program in which theyre rolling over all the maturing debt. Thats a whole other things theyre going to have to deal with later on. Theres quite a lot of stimulus and mow the better Economic Data is doing a little less stimulus. And i think maybe the up shot of this is maybe were a little more dovish, a little mormon ewemental than it is at the end of the day. People around the table may be changing, but this is a developed plan. Theres less of a jarring transition going from one leader to the next. You know, becky, one more thing to andrews question. It was really about personalities. It wouldnt have had qe3 to begin with. Im pretty sure bernanke did not want to go out with another qe program in place at all. But what he did is he looked at the economy in september 2012 and said, you know what . It needs more of this stuff, so he does it. I think hes happier that hes leading with a bit of a stip stepdown. But at the end of the day, i dont think thats ultimately what drove policy. You have to get 16 other members or 11 other members to vote for this policy. So i think it was something that could have been driven by that, but ultimately it was driven by policy. Steve, again, kudos to you for giving us all the heads up on this. I am very glad to have followed and to have lisped to you along the way. Were going to do this conversation again at 7 00. Joe will be here and i know he has a lot of questions for you, too. But again, steve liesman, thank you. Thanks, becky. As we mentioned, the futures have barely budged. Up by almost 300 . Stocks again hitting new highs after that fed anoinouncemenann. Take a look this morning at oil prices. Youll see right now that oil is down by about 16 cents, 97. 64. And the tenyear, again, this is the major story because the tenyear note, the bond market has been very well behaved with all of this. The yield at this point, 278. 89. The dollar was interesting, it did strengthen after the fed. You saw the dollar index rising to a twoweek high. And this morning, the dollar is higher once again against the euro. 1. 3679 against the euro. Gold prices ended at a 5 1 2 month low yesterday in the evening trade. Theyve been pushing closer to 1200. In fact, right now, down about 30. Thats a drop of over 2. 5 or just over 275 . 1,204. 60 an ounce. Right now, its time for the Global Markets report. Ro ross, a lot of green arrows there, as well. A lot of green arrows this morning. Good morning to you. Not quite smaching the strength of the reaction we saw in the u. S. Equities yesterday we we had 1. 7 , 1. 8 . A little less than that. But on the getgo this morning straight out of the gate, we were up only 30 stocks were down. A little bit more, around 45 stocks are now down, but heavily weighted to the upside. The ftse yesterday very flat at the close because we hadnt had the fed decision. It was up five points. This morning one 65. We are a percent higher. The rest of the gains across the market, 1. 4 , the xetra dax, cac 40 and ftse mib, as well. We had retail Sales Numbers out of the uk today, as well. A bit of a tick up from the previous month in october, up 0. 3 . There was concerns about the u. S. Retailers this christmas season, Discount Stores doing better than some of the big grocers. Now, another stock to focus here, dassault up nearly 25 because theyve got a big deal from brazil for their planes and Dassault Aviation down 3. 2 . Boeing lost out, as well. We were looking at treasury yields a moment ago. We had an auction out of spain today in both five and tenyear. This is going to be a test because in may, when we had tapering, we saw periphery yields rise, as well. Today we had a key bond auction post the tapering decision and yield owes five to ten years in that auction came down from where they were just a few weeks ago. So on at the moment, it has been seen as a risk on event rather than a risk off event, becky. Back to you. Ross, just curious, the taper may have come as a bit of a surprise to some economists who were watching. But the market seemed very well prepared for this. I guess the same can be said of our counterparts there in europe. Yeah. I spoke to a lot of traders in the last week and they thought it was 50 50 whether they went in december. A lot of traders said this was 50 50 in their heads. Thats where they were positioned. I had a number of guests, i had one guest that came on prethe jobs report and said the fed will taper in december. And that was before the jobs report. That was the day of the ecb decision. So the strok jobs number is solidifying what people had been anticipating and expecting. Yeah. So, you know, and i am for one, becky, absolutely delighted because you and i never again have to have this conversation that weve been having for serve months. That is a relief. I am very relieved. A Little Christmas present for all of us. Ross, thank you. We will check in with ross again tomorrow morning and, again, thats ross westgate. When we come back we have much more on the Market Reaction to the feds decision. Next, management guru Jeff Sonnenfeld on the biggest stories. And the executives you need to watch in 2014. Plus, we have a packed lineup of squawk box newsmakers this morning, including erskin bowles, judd gregg, tom freedman will be here on set and the ceos of tupperware, leonard, j. Crew and steve swartzman from the private equity powerhouse blackstone. More squawk box right after this. Tdd 18003452550. You see opportunities. Tdd 18003452550 at schwab, were here to help tdd 18003452550 turn inspiration into action. Tdd 18003452550 we have intuitive platforms tdd 18003452550 to help you discover whats trending. Tdd 18003452550 and seasoned market experts to help sharpen your instincts. Tdd 18003452550 so you can take charge tdd 18003452550 of your trading. Welcome back to squawk box. Were coming to you live from new york city, the yale ceo summit right here at the waldorf astoria. This is the 75th year 75th time. Im only 94. You guys have been putting this together and all sort of ceos come and were going to have a number of them on the program today. Steve swartzman will join us at 8 00. Mixky drexler will be with us and lenar and several others. Its off the record and you dont get to hear what goes on inside the room. But to the extent that you can, tell us about the psychology you think about the manner day ceo and in the context, actually, given the news of the taper. Whats going on inside the board room . Well, you know, some of the issues have to do with the loneliliness of high office. Right now, theyre so overprotected, overguarded, it used to be that people in your line of work and my line of work would call the ceo on the phone in their office and probably get them. Now its impossible. Even calling the crazy hours, tunes of pr people, the attorneys and the overly manicured statements make it har hard for them to learn. So everything is a runoff show presentation. They go off to Investor Relations pitches. What do they learn . We try to create a forum where its truly peer driven. Its off the record, as you know, and they can joust with each other. But they have some critical issues. One of them is a time frame issue. The Large Companies are very worried about activist investors. Were chipping away bone and muscle sometimes, noits just fat becau becau