Yesterday late in the day we got another famous tweet from mr. Icahn saying he had written a new letter to apple. Weve heard some of the contents of that letter, which apparently is about to be made public, if it hasnt been already. Theres the tweet were referring to. The specifics that havent been shared completely as of yet or perhaps are just in the process of being shared is that mr. Icahn wants to tender immediately, buy apple for 150 billion worth of its shares. Its choking up jim over here. Right now he wants to tender an offer . At the current price is what hes asking for in the letter. He also says in the letter that he would not tender his own shares into that immediate tender offer, again of 150 billion. So roughly about a third of the market cap of the company at its current price. And he also said he would not tender. And he has raised the stakes on the earnings to 4. 7 million shares. It has been roughly 4 million shares. Were talking about a 2. 5 billion position for mr. Icahn who just took an 800 million profit on some of his netflix shares. Flabbergasted. I dont think you would expect this. This is kind of a nonstarter if you get this if youre apple. I dont know what the response is going to be, if any. I cant imagine they would entertain it. Lets say the quarters bad . Lets say the quarters good. What is the worst . I think you keep the pressure on the board. Apparently in the letter hes perfectly friendly in terms of praising management and how the companys run, but you want to keep the pressure on the board to continue to think about and do something with excess cash, which keeps building up and will build up. Of course, well find out how much from the Current Quarter that will be reported on monday. But youre right, you know, there are a lot of people not a lot but wonder whether well get guidance for the Fourth Quarter that wont be that great. Who knows which way the stocks will go. Interesting he would use 525 as a number when you conceivably its at market, why would you tender . I agree. This is a very exciting time for apple. Theyve got the new operating system,new phones, just did the ipad. Im sure people at apple are saying you youve got to be kidding me. Do you know people at the New York Times are saying we have to do this, theres like a window where you focus on the product. And suddenly hes an activist . Even at 2. 5 billion, thats far less than a 1 position. You wait till wednesday. Why would you do it today . By the way, questions we can ask carl when he os cnbc today at noon with scott wapner. Do you think thats why he did it today . I want some ratings for wapner. Carl in another three days well find out whether youre going to get 525, 425 or 625. Exactly. In the meantime, i love him. 3m posted betterthanexpected numbers and ford beat the street, 45 cents a share on an operating basis, also boosting its fullyear guidance, improved outlook in europe and latin america. Jim, 2 billion in cash generation is up from 1. 4. The only caveat, they are cutting some north american production. Its still going to be higher year over year but trimming about 15,000. They dont want to see the lots get too full. No. I think what really matters, the reason why went from 18 in 2011 down to half of that is because of europe. And they lowered the loss forecast for europe. Theyre still losing money. They also raised south america. So i hear you on the north america but ive been focused laserlike on fords core performance in europe and that seems to be coming to an end. On 3m, can i promote him . He is so noncommercial people probably dont know who runs 3m. The guy is just a joy, okay . And so are the numbers. The organic growth is terrific, the sales recap, he does some great presentations. They are just great numbers all over the world. Wow. This stock when it reported people said wait a second, he narrowed the range. Not that interesting. If they would even look at the presentation before they started trading it, they would see this was a great job by a great ceo, unaffected by the morace in washington. Its always been my father sold 3m products for years. Really . Yeah, yeah. He sold the board games and sold sashine ribbons, the bows. Always had a great relationship with 3m, its a Great International company. They did boost the forecast, looking for 675, streets at 670, local currency organic 35 versus the current 25. It looks like the numbers are depressed and you do have to add back the currency. Plus if the dollar gets weak. Only dupont really focused on it. But pension costs are coming down because of the Interest Rates going higher. A bit higher. Not much higher. Well, lately because of the were getting some bad numbers out of employment. Thats always worth the pmi in europe is good, pmi in china is good. Were awful because of our government. Yes, we are. Were awful because of our government. Its certainly not the people. The governments not as good as the people. By the way, were getting word that everyone is trying to log on to carls web site and nobody can. 525. Did he contract that to the same people he may need to have an address in the rose garden. Thats going to be a story all day, who can log on to the web site first. And what did apple do wrong except for having so much cash and issuing great products. Shame on them. I want a company that is a Financial Engineering company, i dont want a company thats a real engineering company. All true. Capital allocation is a part of running your company properly. If youre not allocating capital properly why not by netflix . That would have solved the social problems. That would have solved the problems for anybody, if they bought it right. Of course the only person who did buy is right is carl. Its just hard to fathom doing this between the ipad launch and the quarter. Youre not arguing that apples not overcapitalized. You just question his timing. If the Company Reports a quarter and they dont give you good guidance and the stock goes to 460 then 525 looks good. Then dont you wait and see . Something ticked him off. Youre right, though. Monday is the day that really will matter with that. Well see what the Fourth Quarter guidance is and how they divest it globally. Is it selling as strong as many people think . Apparently theres one quote here, if im hearing this right, a lot of people have died fighting tyranny. The least i can do is vote against it. Carl icahn. Really . I think that was a quote from a while ago. He likes, you know, in his offices hes got some very beautiful paintings, the battle scenes and things like that. Give me a higher stock price for apple . I can go there. I guess carl gave that line at a texaco annual meeting. Oh yes. Carls just he makes it fun. He does. He really does. Doesnt he make it fun . Especially when theres not much else going on. Thank you, carl. Meanwhile, we want to get to Bertha Coombs, who joins us from capitol hill the. Reporter good morning, carl. The title of this hearing is implementation failures congress didnt know. Today they are all finger pointing, deflecting blame, cgi, the key architect in terms of the hardware says the problem isnt them, the problem is software. Quality software services, a unit of United Health says its not their software, which is used to help identify people and to help get them registered. Part of the problem, they said, was a late decision to require registration first. No doubt theyre pointing the finger at health and Human Services department. Secretary Kathleen Sebelius wont be testifying until next week but certainly it does appear there are going to be a lot of fingers pointed at what her underlings were directing these contractors to do. Sirko, one of the contractors doing paper applications said so far theyve had about 16,000 of them feed through, a bunch of them have errors and its taking a lot of time to process them. Thats been an issue for the insurers. Some of them that reported this week said the errors are Getting Better in the few applications that are coming through, but they were at the white house yesterday clearly talking about some of these problems and it doesnt seem coincidental that following that meeting the white house and the Health Department said they were going to let slide the deadline for when people actually had to buy a policy. Now they only have to enroll for a policy six weeks later at march 31st. Lots of fireworks expected this morning. Well have an update coming up. Back to you. No one better to cover it, bertha. Thank you for that. When you speak with ceos in technology, theyve turned on obama in this thing. This thing is really big in the technology market, the problems with the web site. Because the companies are Great Customer relations management, great software. And the Canadian Company honestly, people are scratching their head saying how could he have let this happen and how is sebelius still doing her job . I dont know. Im not a political guy. I say hey, hows pcs . Let me tell you about sebelius. Theyre furious. Shes going to have her moment in the sun in a few days, thats for sure. When we come back, well break down some of the Airline Earnings for you, see how some of the carriers are earning. Also ahead, Boston Red Sox tom werner smiling about Boston Red Sox victory in the world series. Take one more look at futures here this morning. Well walk through claims, china, pmi, some of the european pmis, too. Up 49. Were back in a minute. Look at the night and it dont seem so lonely some new members of the team will be introduced. The chairman emeritus will distribute his usual wisdom. And you . Well, youre the chief life officer. You just need the right professional to help you take charge. All right. Of course much of the country focused on the inability to get on the Health Care Exchange web site to try to sign up. A lot of people also frustrated by carl icahns web site, trying to get that letter. We told you earlier the key to the letter that he sent yesterday to apple is that he wants the company to undertake an immediate tender offer for 150 billion worth of its stock, 525 a share. Icahn saying he wont tender into that and hes increased his ownership to 4. 7 million shares. Thats about 2. 467 billion dollars. Thats how much money it is. All of this doesnt seem to be likely to happen at all, but take a look at a cartoon that we have been able to at least download from the web site. As you see, theres a lot of people fighting tyranny. The least i can do is vote against it. Remember that was an early battle. I remember that, 1988. In fact, i remember calling carl, he called me back, i was a young reporter. It was late, he called me back, i was like ah, ah, ah i said why do you want to buy texaco. He said what do you mean why do i want to buy texaco . A great twa run. Theyre getting rid of this picture, the staggered board. I think hes having the time of his life. Taking time away from selling the product and deal with this. Even though again hes got well less than 1 of the company. I question well, lets see the quarter. It might be a nice play if the stock goes to 450 to say in my back pocket i got 525. Two Airlines Heading in opposite directions. United continental falling after it did miss the street despite higher quarter profits and cost cuts and southwest higher net profit for increased airfares. We had a decent year. We started out the year very strong. We saw some impacts in the spring and early summer from the tax increases and sequestration, but we had a really good summer. We had a great Third Quarter, alltime Third Quarter record, 231 Million Dollars and consumers were out there buying and flying. My favorite metric for kelly, fuel cost down 5. 1 in the quarter. Revenue per available seat mile up 5. 1 and united is lagging their rivals, their revenue up only 2. Delta had a fantastic quarter, an upgrade today for usairways. If you listen to what boeing is saying, maybe 50 of your cost is fuel. One of the reasons boeing has great numbers, this company is a renaissance. Theres not much competition at all. Its really hard to get new planes. An industry that never, ever earned its cost to capital. Not once. The sum total of the whole history is a loss, right . Absolutely. Are others, even wireless, amazingly enough. A big case coming up. Department of justice saying its antiamerican to have two together i took the antitrust course. Did you go to law school. I play one on tv. I passed the bar exam, which i always thought was incredible. New york. Thats a tough one. You could sit on the Supreme Court then. All rise, justice cramer. Why not . I can ask 20 questions as well as anybody. Why not. Can you imagine asking 20 questions in front of cramer . I think they would finally have to bring in cameras. If i am on the court, i want kangaroo court. The prosecution is always right. They dont pick those names out of the phone book. When we come back, how do you get back into the green after yesterdays fallback . Cramers mad dash is next. The president will speak at 10 35, this time on an immigration bill he wants congress to sign. A lot more still to come. Squawk on the street will be right back. [ male announcer ] when we built the cadillac ats from the ground up to be the worlds best sport sedan. People noticed. The cadillac ats 2013 north american car of the year. 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If you are what you say you are, a superstar, then have no fear, the cameras here seven minutes till the opening bell. Mad dash time. Well talk deals. Market leader, these companies that make these deals and their stock goes up, ive always said to you when will the bankers like really start pushing because look at this. Look at this theyre pushing. Its not helping but theyre pushing. This is the kind of run and they reported numbers as well. Yes. In germany. You can make this world wide scale, walgreen alliance. Mckesson saves the Health Care Companies money. And of course bankers are out there constantly talking about how often the acquirer stock goes up. They are, they are. But its not helping because you come back to the basic issues of ceo confidence, which is thats washington. Theyre buying a german company. Now, yesterday you were delightfully asking me when i was up at teavana about the Great American growth retailers, tractor supply, its very big, 9 billion company, reporting a blowout number, adding stores, really terrific. This is one of those stories, people doesnt realize, 1938, theres 1,200 stores, its a real company. And following up on yesterday, lumber liquidators, they hit the high number. This is a 3 billion retailer and, you know, theres one mention about that federal investigation. No analyst talks about it. Why do i focus on these companies . 17 come many store growth, adding stores left to right, got a new concept. Its all love, david. Its all about love. Until its not anymore. Exactly. Its great until its bad. And when do you ring the bell . You dont know. You dont know. And aura tractor supply. When you think of kohls, penn penneys obviously penneys troubled. They want oxygenated growth. This 3 billion company has caught the love affair of growth funds everywhere. 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Get up to 140 in mailin rebates when you buy four select tires with the Ford Service Credit card. Whered you get that sweater vest . Your ford dealer. Became big business overnight . Like, really big. Then expanded . Or their new product tanked . Or not . What if they embrace new technology instead . Imagine a companys future with the future of trading. Company profile. A Research Tool on thinkorswim. From td ameritrade. It was a pleasure meeting you for dinner at the end of september, the carl icahn letter, we have copies here at the desk. We could not be more supportive of you, the culture and the innovative spirit it engenders. Hes not going to go after management but he presses the board. He says 525, lets get it started, i know its a big number but its appropriate and relative to the size and strength of your company in terms of how much cash flow you generate and servicing amount of debt, you have 170 billion in the bank. Well see if it resonates at all. They obviously had a good dinner. Tim cook is its great to be able to meet him and talk to him about what hes doing as manager of the company. But you