Good wednesday morning i am carl king with jon fortt. Dow is up 128. Tech sector leads the s p. For more on tech, bring in Victor Anthony and elly wheeler, partner. Welcome to you both. Welcome to tech resilience in the face of the selloff, even though we can parse, fang, talk about underperformance within that right i mean, there are certain names that are underperforming facebook and alphabet. Ironically, those are two names with multiple support but they have secular growth drivers. From all of them, market share gains across the board, ecommerce and advertising but in the case of netflix, subscriber growth that continues to be strong i am buying alphabet, a buy on facebook and amazon. Hold on netflix for now. But i am optimistic bought all these names. Facebook and alphabet, were talking later this hour about regulatory threats do you think thats effecting them, those two in particular . I think for alphabet, eu overhang has been an issue for several years. It will continue to be an issue until they resolve it. For facebook, they were all over the russian indictment, part of whats playing in the stock as well somewhat. And macys, apart from that, not sure i think over time they tend to resolve themselves and investors focus on growth and profitability, management, solid governance is what i look for in these names. Elly, you have a number of consumer and ecommerce in your portfolio. Wondering your take on the walmart quarter. The stock really took a dive yesterday and there are a number of companies it seems that arent living up to perhaps the investors early hopes on what they would become. Some of them seem to have trouble growing beyond the initial enthusiastic Customer Base whats your take on walmart and for everybody not aemmazon . Thats the age old conversation they tend to be the topic of conversation in different board rooms. You see the effects of what they do, buying whole foods we look at it on a macro level things that i am spending every day in at the early stage are relevant to these things usually in a few years so walmart, tough quarter. Overall being aggressive making the right moves interesting to see how the companies will react well see more m and a which for us is good overall, i think theres a ton of opportunity you mention td hard for things to keep growing. I dont think thats the case, the growth is different. Isnt all online, Customer Acquisition is as inexpensive off line as online when that happens for different types of companies is whats different, but theres plenty of room to grow youre seeing that with breakout winners. Who do you think is getting it right Smaller Companies doing well . Well, you see sold shipt to target, company out of birmingham, alabama, great story, amazing founding team, built a great business in delivery of groceries primarily, doing so through a Subscriber Base it was a great Business Model opposed to one off type ordering if you get them under subscription, you order more it is in smaller cities, it is not serving the smaller millennial in new york looking at solving real problems and you see it bear out. I wonder about that hold on netflix. If it is the amazon of content, if youre believing their algorithm, they can tell what the viewer wants, investing content specifically around that, shouldnt that hold turn into a buy because they grow into that valuation eventually it is possible. Depends what disney does i think disney will be a significant competitor for netflix in coming years. I thought that about amazon, amazon prime that didnt turn out i think disney has better content slate ahead in terms of what theyre able to do. Theyll be able to siphon some subscriber growth away, slow to the growth curve of netflix in the coming years the competition concerns me. Im an accountant purist it is a wrinkle in a model that i just need to be able to come across before i am able to recommend a stock. I agree they are benefitting from huge secular Growth Initiative happening with Television Viewership moving online. Are you closing the book on amazon video efforts or not . Im not listen, i think amazon has multiple different secular levels, advertising being a bigger piece the video piece theyre investing a bit. I am expecting them to make bigger acquisitions, maybe sports angle may help them drive more subscriber viewership and user growth. Well see how that works out over time. I have one more quick question and have to wrap this up ellie, everybody on wall street watching rising rates, expected to get expectations for more rate hikes how close are you watching as someone that invests in Smaller Companies . We are watching it not just this quarter but next quarter, what trends are the next several years. What impacted us in terms of low Interest Rate environment is the sheer amount of capital in what used to be cottage industry. Venture capital. Tremendous capital now chasing private companies, yields have been so low. I think it will take a fairly dramatic shift for that to change, but thats where it effects us most. A topic for a different day good story Victor Anthony and wheeler, thanks apple is reportedly in talks to buy cobalt, metal used in batteries. Josh has details bloomberg is reporting apple is in talks to buy long term supplies of cobalt from miners for the first time apple traditionally looked to suppliers to buy the metal tim Cooks Company is apparently seeking contracts to secure several thousand metric tons of cobalt in a year for five years or longer. Apple declining comments on the story. Cobalt used in a variety of products, including mobile phones, tablets, Notebook Computers and electric vehicles. 53 of Global Production for relargeable batteries, the bulk of that goes to portable electronics. There are around ten grams of cobalt in your smart phone, one ounce in your laptop electric vehicles account for a relatively small amount of that market, but it is seen as the biggest growth area in years ahead. Demand helped drive a big move in price of cobalt which is high in the past 18 months. A Trading Company based in the uk that specializes in cobalt says it makes sense that apple would be trying to lockdown supply directly from the miners themselves, and durbin says because apple would then know exactly where cobalt is coming from last year apple did suspend buying cobalt from a supplier in congo that filed reports of child labor and dangerous work conditions, miners using hand tools with little oversight and few safety measures. Apple now lists a full list of cobalt amazon launching over the Counter Health products. Details straight ahead. And Charles Duhigg creating buzz with his latest piece in New York Times, the case against google and more olympic updates when squawk alley continues in mitea nu feel that . Thats the beat of Global Markets, the rhythm of the world. But to us, its the pace of tomorrow. With ingenuity, technologies, and markets expertise we create the possible. And when you do that, you dont chase the pace of tomorrow. You set it. Nasdaq. Rewrite tomorrow. Two,that was awful. Why are you so good at this . Had a coach in high school. Really helped me up my game. I had a coach. Math. Ooh. So, why dont traders have coaches . Who says they dont . Coach mcadoo you know, at td ameritrade, we offer free access to coaches and a full education curriculum just to help you improve your skills. Boom thats lesson one. Education to take your trading to the next level. Only with td ameritrade. Amazon launched over the Counter Health products. Another addition to health care, taking a pharmacy retail chain front of store amazon quietly launched over the Counter Health products called basic care, made exclusively for amazon, and launched in august has 60 products from ibuprofen to nicotine gum to allergy medicine, hair regrowt treatment. Look at the tag line they market it as transparent, authentic, basic adding whats a central disruptive idea behind amazons moves in the Health Care Space at large, that is everyone should have basic Health Care Needs met without having to pay for extras like expensive marketing. Take pricing of ibuprofen. Less than half the price of similar offerings from cvs and walgreen while the price of otc cludrugsa change, this will not. This is something amazon has done in ecommerce theyre applying that play book to health care, not just otc drugs but medical supplies and creating a Health Care Company with jpmorgan and Berkshire Hathaway away aimed at reducing costs. Recent moves by big pharmacy retail chains are in part response to protect themselves from the growing amazon threat as you have been talking about through the morning, the move into otc drugs, another private label for it ups the competition, battle with another large rival walmart which is hurting from slow down in ecommerce sales back to you. Thank you for more, joined by james thompson, former amazon executive and current partner at buy box experts and scott chickareli good morning to you. I wonder play book wise, used to be in the beginning amazon competed on price. Mostly they dont do that any more seems to be on convenience you saw Amazon Basics with batteries and cables now basic care is private label the new avenue for price competition for amazon private label does a couple things for amazon. It adds more selection, lower prices, gives amazon the opportunity to pursue a more aggressive stance with some of the Large National brands that may or may not be wholesaling to them today you think of what products amazon ultimately wants, yes, they want customers to shop on amazon but want all of the big National Brands, even if customers are pushed towards purchasing lower priced amazon options. Scott if youre johnson and johnson or glaxo smith klein, what do you do, do you do what amazon wants, play and give them brands on a lower price or pursue other strategic avenue to work around amazon well, what i think youve seen the retailers do, they have been dealing with it longer than health care companies, you need to be price competitive. Seen walmart deal, best buy, a slew of retailers said i am going to sacrifice margin to be more competitive with amazon over time. If i am the big companies, what i would probably do is have some sort of separation between basic product and higher brand of product where you have exclusive distribution, where amazon wont get access to x, y and z, whatever brands those happen to be. James, you used to work at amazon the idea of private label and private label medicines, idea of building out Transition Network with trucks and trailers, we have seen other retailers do it through the years. Is this just amazon becoming a bigger retailer to compete with the likes of walmart i dont think it is just introducing private label for the purpose of private label one of the things amazon can do is look at their billions of transactions, figure out where there are gaps, where are customers searching but not buying because National Brands may be too expensive, how does amazon fill gaps to be sure they get that share in customers wallets. When i think about what they do for private label, it is filling those gaps and using data to pinpoint the exact areas where there is opportunity for amazon to be profitable james, how do you explain to people what you think their off line retail strategy will be in the next couple of years by that, i mean the degree to which they want physical presence on street corners across the United States yes i think we start by looking at who the customer is that amazon is going after theyre going after the prime customer this is not about going after every consumer that might have brick and mortar Shopping Experience it is figuring out how to get more of that wallet that the prime customer has when they acquired whole foods, it was one entree into how do you get to more prime customers wallets. I dont think that amazon and walmart, for example, i dont think theyre competing for the same customer. As i think about what was reported yesterday with walmart starting to reduce the amount of marketing that theyre going to be doing for the urban young premium customer, thats the prime customer walmart is basically saying were not going after them any more i think amazon is now saying i want to get one more in to scott. From another perspective, is amazon trying to vertically integrate, become more like apple . You look at echo and alexa down, whole foods, private label stuff, are they integrating after first being more horizontal yeah, and james certainly has a good perspective on that the two of us have spoken in the past i think thats exactly what theyre trying to do they had to make massive investment on the Technology Side to create cloud business. What else have we done built out transition capabilities theyre going to push into not just following ups or fedex but in a sense almost competing with them i think thats what amazon is trying to do theyre trying to do a revenue grab from lots of different verticals, not just retail big move. James, scott, thanks for helping us understand it thanks a lot. Thank you. When we come back, andrew ross storken with the big business of snow making. The dow is up 102 points now. The s p 500 up for theseventh time in eight days as well as the w. More squawk alley after this everyone has a thing. That binge watch over the weekend thing. That back from the dead or robotcowboy thing. Or maybe its watching satisfyinglysatisfying things. Organic avocado on everything thing. Doing it yourself or tagging a friend thing. More checkingin or checking out things. Like faaaaaaaaaar out of this world things. Far out. More revolutions in the making thing. That play like a girl thing. Is it a 4 your eyez only, thing. More of a no role modelz thing. That tripledouble thing. Is he the g. O. A. T. . Thing. No, not that goat thing. No no no no no no no more saving the world from the darkness thing. That selfie game strong thing. That fourlegged friends thing. Oo la la at t gives you more for your thing. More entertainment, internet, and unlimited plans. More for your thing. Yeah, thats our thing. When it might be time to buy or sell . With fidelitys realtime analytics, youll get clear, actionable alerts about potential Investment Opportunities in real time. Fidelity. Open an account today. Lets get to andrew in pyeongchang, south korea theres so much to talk about after last nights events in prime time hey, andrew. There is, carl. We will talk a little sports, olympic sports in a moment theres a little olympic business that many people really dont think about or talk about but probably the biggest business here, the business of snow making. By the time the olympians hit the slopes, two snow making companies have already passed the finish line. Phase two in 2015 and phase two in 2016. They make snow for most downhill competitions. We have so many races betweenal bien a between alpine the michigan based snow makers provided powder for Alpine Skiing and biathlon. Men and womens downhill is the longest, steepest, meanest terrain in the industry. In terms of installing snow making equipment and designing that snow making system and making snow, i would say it is the most challenging venue. It is not uncommon for a host city need to hire multiple snow makers one venue can require as much as 8 million square feet of snow. The friendly competitors bring a combined 80 years and 13 olympics of experience to pyeongchang and the most advanced technology. They have 60 Global Market share, smi is more prevalent in the United States. The host city purchases snow making systems for the four venues with snow sports, plans to turn pyeongchang into Winter Sports destination after the games end. Both companies see the most growth in asia china is definitely the market booming in our industry, one of the few places new skiers are being built. They have the boom going on with the 2022 olympics being in beijing, and the government made commitment to create new skiers and snowboarders and more enthusiasts, and promoting investment in the resort industry no surprise, both Companies Plan to bid for the snow making contracts in beijing in 2022 i should mention, theres a science to snow making, it is not just putting water through the machines sometimes theyre laying down ice, and layers of snow, ice again, some cases mixing sand to create textures. It is a remarkable thing before we go, and i think, carl, you might have thought you didnt have to be humiliated one more time, and i apologize for this, but we have a little video that we didnt get a chance to show yesterday which i thought i would leave you with, which is a little bit of a visit that carl and i had to whats called korea house here at the park this is nice. Pretty cool so were in team korea house. This is it. Going to try hanbok traditional. Ill be the king, you be a noble. The elite. My turn he is a noble man and i am the king do i outrank you . You work for me ill cut your taxes first. This is what i would wear at the office as the king i like the square belt. Im going to be wearing this on squawk tuesday. How is that good to be king can i interest you in samsung . Welcome to korea house the king is speaking. Im going to send it back to the king from this noble man here in pyeongchang. You know, sometimes i say to myself yeah. My take is basically if my career ends, then yours ends too. So i dont feel as bad about it. We go down together lets try to get rid of that tape there might be people, could be screen shots, see if we can avoid that anyway, great to see you. You too, andrew im just disappointed that you didnt wear it onset, like you threatened on tape all right. Lets get to seema mody with the european close hello, morgan mixed session in europe. The ftse getting a lift on earnings news. Glen core announcing profits quadrupled in 2017, helped by strong gains in its Trading Division as Commodity Prices moved higher, thanks to surge in cash flow, the company says theyll pay almost 3 million in dividends and consider acquisitions quite the come back. Up 25 in the past one year. Looking at financials, lloyds posting a profit miss. Stocks are higher. British bank confirmed 1 billion pound Share Buy Back and 20 dividend hike. Theyll invest to improve digital bank services. Stock up 3 . The uk experienced strongsts quarters of growth since the 2018 recession unemployment rose fourth quarter. Labor participation increased as did wages. We talk a lot about wages here, in the uk, up 2. 5 year after year flash composite fell this month, but still at levels indicating the fastest pace of Economic Growth in more than a decade in europe interestingly enough, pound and euro trading lower against the u. S. Green backs still some notable Economic News on the eurozone front. Back to you. Thank you, seema. Coming up, big tech backlash Pulitzer Prize winner joins us to dcuisss the case against google more squawk alley after this i am Courtney Reagan a turkish spokesman is going to clear kurdish fighters, despite attempt by Syrian Government forces to enter the region the spokesman saying the convoy of 50 vehicles had retreated, adding their aim was a bid for syrian propaganda. At least 25 People Killed when a bus veered off a highway and tumbled down a cliff in peru 20 more were injured it is not clear how many people were on the bus. An uber rolling out express pool in l. A. , miami, philadelphia links riders that travel to similar destinations, cost up to 75 less than regular rides but have to walk a couple blocks to be picked up at a common location. More americans claim to save extra money they get back from tax refunds according to go banking rates. 43 put it in a savings account, up from 41 last year. Another third using the money to pay down debt. Thats also down from a year ago. Thats your cnbc news update for now, over to squawk alley. Thank you very much. Concerns over big tech dominance take center stage. In New York Times in depth rorlt called the case against google they say theyre squelching competition before it begins should the government step in. Joining us, columnist Charles Duhigg joins us. Thanks. Good to see you. You tell this through a personal lens through specific characters on how google is able to crush innovation. At this point, google is the front door for the internet for millions and perhaps billions. If you want something on the internet, you go to google that means if google decides they dont like your website, if you are down ranked, dont show up on the first page, youre essentially invisible. That happened to a number of people, including folks i profiled they ran afoul of google rules, some say because google thought they didnt want that type of competition. As a result, their business evaporated. And then the next step is to argue or have debate about the degree to which antitrust laws are effective remedying that. Thats right. This is going on actively here and in europe, all over the world. Europe said that google is in a legal monopoly, needs to change how it behaves theres pressure in the u. S. For our regulators to treat it as they treated microsoft in the 1990s or standard oil when they broke up the companies this is what, 8,000 word article. A long article. In mag sean publishing, incredible space, speaks to how important it is. Something that jumped out, the ftc staff was collecting quietly complaints about google for years. How come nothing has come of this sooner . This has been going on since 2012. Long time the wall street journal was great on reporting this. They got us the report the ftc accidently emailed some reporters, internal confidential communication report they released whats important is some ftc staff recommended over a decade ago that the ftc ought to sue google, it was violating aenlt tru antitrust laws there are questions why they did that it was under the Obama Administration and the administration was close to google the point being, the system said were not Going Forward with this, but theres a change in attitude people love google i love google. Everyone does. It is what we use to find stuff online but theres been growing realization how dangerous it is to have these mega corporations, no longer living in a world where competition is a click away, theres a handful of companies, just five of them, that control almost everything online. Trust isnt part of the issue, antitrust law in the United States wasnt built for these types of Companies Companies like google and facebook have done a nice job operating within the letter of the law, as far as it is written in the past. The question i have, does the u. S. Need to adopt Something Like european antitrust law, where it is more like do you harm competition versus harm consumers. Googles defense is competitors may not like it, but this is better for the user. Great question. Thats the debate going on a couple of decades. How should laws be designed to get the best outcomes. Important to realize antitrust is not about justice we dont punish companies because theyre successful, it is politicians saying this is the type of economy we want. We want giants or we dont giants are okay as long as consumers benefit or we want competition and think that giants once they reach a certain size should be ham strung by certain rules. It is an important debate. Debate taking place now. The Digital Economy only makes it more complicated. We know Companies Like facebook and google get better as they get bigger thats Network Effects the question becomes how big should the government allow them to get before we say it is enough. Would you argue your piece argues for a break up or not i would say it argues for legitimate questions to be asked. I dont know if breakup is the right remedy most importantly, i argue that investigation is often times the remedy itself. Thats what happened with microsoft. Basically the u. S. Government lost in court when they sued microsoft, even though it won, it lost. Just the investigation was enough to get microsoft to change how it behaves. As a result, they dont compete with google or crush google when they could have. Google becomes a huge company. Similarly, if the u. S. Government said they were investigating google and thinking about antitrust, you would see a lot of changes how the company behaves. Do you go into why bing was offset good question how many use bing. And they had the resources. Thats right. This is what we know about the Digital Economy, tends to be winner take all. Whoever gets there first often ends up winning, which is great in some respects, other respects it starts to raise questions, do we need to curb that how big is too big charles, do rules need to change before antitrust action can be taken thats my question under the current regime, is it fair to say were judging you under a set of rules we makeup as we judge you as opposed to here are the new rules and now were judging under those . I dont think the rules need to change. Everyone i have spoken to says the laws as written are perfectly designed to regulate even Digital Companies however, it does take regulators and courts saying were going to adapt laws for today were going to apply them. That takes a certain willingness. One interesting thing, now that europe has done it, and they fined google over 2 billion, now that europe has done it, you can use existing laws to reign it in the question is will american regulators lawmakers, do they have willingness to do so. It is a great read. In the paper this sunday although it is online already. Thanks for joining us. Thanks for having me. When we come back, stock buy backs hitting record highs after the tax cut. Are companies doing the right thing with new found cash . Quggg tohain tt estion stay with us feel that . Thats the beat of Global Markets, the rhythm of the world. But to us, its the pace of tomorrow. With ingenuity, technologies, and markets expertise we create the possible. And when you do that, you dont chase the pace of tomorrow. You set it. Nasdaq. Rewrite tomorrow. At holiday inn express, we cant guarantee that youll be able to contain yourself at our breakfast bar. Morning, egg white omelet. Sup lady bacon fruit, there it is but we can guarantee that youll get the best price when you book with us. Holiday inn express. Be the readiest. I am scott walker. Coming up, stunning call about where stocks could go in the days ahead he is here live for an interview you cant afford to miss. And hedge fund heavy weight that booked a january to forget. What he is doing to rebound. And with the nasdaq recovering losses, is the tech trade about to leave again halftime report, noon eastern. Top of the hour. See you in a tad more than 15 minutes. See you there thanks, scott. With u. S. Companies citing tax reform as reason for strong earnings, some ceos promise not only employee bonuses but Share Buy Backs and investment into the companies. Take a listen. For us, tyson, about 300 billion benefit. We did send some of that to front line employees in the form of bonuses, and accelerate cap x. We have Great Projects to execute, best thing for shareholders and the company we are continuing the investment trend beyond just the one time bonus because this is as you know going to be year over year a tremendous, tremendous tail wind for us. One of the best things pass few months is passage of tax reform i would like to thank the administration on the hill for getting this done. We said this was the biggest thing we could do to unleash economic kmeenergy and were seeing it. We have been talking that it looked like there would be tax reform officially passed talking at business round table and other organizations about sending a message to existing employees, and how much we appreciated them the second goal was to say were going to invest in the business, in the case same day announced to spend at least 50 billion in the next five years in capital, and thats the certainty of what these tax reform allow companies to do. Couple weeks later, we had healthy growth in our investments and also in our return of capital. Comcast is the Parent Company of cnbc. With estimates showing 6 billion going to workers, 171 going to shareholders, some wonder if stock buy backs are the best use of profits. With us, data Tech Research cofounder, and professor of economics. Bill, i want to start with you you did a recent analysis where Corporate America is putting tax savings. You found that vast majority is going to buy backs explain. It is nothing new this has been going on since mid 1980s. Companies have been prioritizing distribution to shareholders and in 1997, buy backs as a mode of distribution to shareholders surfaced dividends for 2007, 2016, s p 500 companies spent 4 trillion on buy backs. 3. 9 trillion on dividends that total 9 of net income theyre not vesting in the companies, thats not just investing in Capital Equipment and r d, it is investing in people that get higher wages as they help create value of the Innovative Products and thats whats not happening thats why we see concentration of income among the richest households going on, getting worse over time, and disappearance of middle class jobs buy backs have a lot of blame to bear for that. And certainly you make some good points, bill. Nick, isnt it not an either or scenario heres what i mean by that you have a lot of workers at a lot of companies with 401 k s and stock purchase plans you have teachers, First Responders with pensions you see stock buy back, isnt that good for middle class working americans . It is whenever you walk into a Public Company in this country, first thing you see is the stock price. It informs a lot of corporate decision making. When stock prices rise, labor markets tend to improve. Ceos and boards have more confidence to expand it isnt just a matter of what wages are, and a rising market provides signal but it is okay to higher and pay more it isnt just as simple as buy backs are good or bad. The stock market and labor markets inform what those two things do. Bill, theres no question when the stock price goes up, thats much better for the ceo and the other c level executives than for front line workers. My question is we have seen charts that show wage growth in the middle class has been flat since the 80s what changes that. What market force is there going to be that actually changes the equation so workers get the benefit when theres Something LikeCorporate Tax cut well, first of all, theres a big difference between dividends and buy backs. Dividends, you get money for Holding Shares if you hold shares, you want the company to reinvest in work products when you sell shares, if it is well managed, Company Stock price will be higher buy backs incentivize gains from buying and selling shares and the main beneficiaries of buy backs are people in the business of buying and selling shares, including investment banks, hedge fund managers, and Corporate Executives the way stock, compensation and stock buy back awards are structured, so when you get the boost, open mark purchases, stock price goes up, they can cash in the fact is it is not Public Information when companies are doing the buy backs, which is when youre getting the boost to the stock price. Interesting, goldman had a note yesterday, nick, they said the correction coincided with the uyout by the blackout, and corporations are now the largest source of demand for equities. Biggest problem is theyre procyclical. They do that when they have money, when the cycle is peaking. Tend to buy back at the top. At the bottom when they dont have cash and stock is cheaper, they dont have cash to buy it back it has an exacerbating effect over time. And also worth noting netflix, boeing, fedex, some drug makers, companies that put a lot of investments back into their own businesses, and have been some of the best performing stocks guys, love to keep talking about this unfortunately we have to leave it there thank you for joining us when we come back, has the dollar index bottomed . We go live to the cme for santelli the dow continues to hold on to recent gains squawk alley is back in a minute [fbi agent] youre a brave man, mr. Stevens. Your testimony will save lives. Mr. Stevens . This is your new name. This is your new house. And a perfectly inconspicuous suv. You must become invisible. [hero] ill take my chances. You know whats not awesome . Gigspeed internet. When only certain people can get it. Lets fix that. Lets give this guy gig really . And these kids, and these guys, him, ah. Oh hello. That lady, these houses yes, yes and yes. And dont forget about them. Uh huh, sure. Still yes xfinity delivers gig speed to more homes than anyone. Now you can get it, too. Welcome to the party. Lets get to the cme group this morning and get the santelli exchange. Hey, rick. Hey, carl you know, many are looking at the dollar index, and it really has had some better days has it bottomed . Lets go to the charts this is the dollar index chart yeartodate starts on the 29th of december a couple of things to jump out right off the bat. We settle at 2. 12, made a high for the year at 92. 53. The low for the year at 88. 60. The first thing is, if you average those out, basically, its right around there. So you can see, right around 90. 60. That we failed here, we failed here but, of course, this time we didnt know what the low was going to be. But this makes it that much more important. The other thing thats really interesting on this chart is the symmetry see these question marks those are dates. Well get to that in a minute. But the point is, if we start to trade above the 90. 5, so lets make it 90. 60, theyre so close together this thing is going to go. How high it goes, thats what i find the most fascinating of all. You know how much i like symmetrical charts so this is the chart that time date i talked about was january 9th. The middle part was february 9th. All things being equal, the next date should be around march 9th. So here we are right around here so thats the key. If we get above this, it could be a pretty juicy trade. And also remember, if you get above settlement, after a nice kind of quasi Double Bottom with this w shape, its pretty powerful, especially when you think that we closed at 102. 20, the previous year. There could be a lot of room in the dollar index back to you. All right, thank you, Rick Santelli when we come back, youve heard about the efforts to make commercial space travel a reality. Yay but where are you going to put that luggage once you land the details of a new lgiodng venture, straight ahead. Stay with us at fidelity, trades are now just 4. 95. 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. Say goodbye to youll of this once w welcome back Vice President mike pence is in florida right now, leading the second meeting of the recently had reviv revived National Space council pence addressed in his opening remarks. Theres no reason our own federal government should stand in the way of trail blazing companies that are forging and reforging American Leadership in space. Today the National Space council will discuss new policy recommendations to break down these bureaucratic hurdles. So that would presumably make it easier for Companies Like spacex or blue origin, who are working on new rockets but also for people like hotel mogul Robert Bigelow that will sell and manage private stations one of the inflatable modules is already in orbit, attached to the interNational Space station. The plan to sell them to commercial companies with a longterm goal of using these habitats to house space tourists bigelow is developing new bigger prototypes that will launch as early as 2021, and all comes as the Trump Administration is looking to potentially hand over management and funding of the iss two private companies by 2025 thats a market that doesnt currently exist. This is uncharted territory. The reason bigelow says hes investing millions this year just to quantify what demand for his private space stations could be its one more piece in the puzzle to colonize space a subject to get more and more attention today as this meeting on Florida Space coast continues. You mentioned the wild west the law thats going to have to be written, the legal text on National Security and Property Rights and safety standards. I mean, basically starting with nothing on some of these areas. How do you regulate Something Like mining and asteroid. Whose asteroid is it . These are plans and proposals, and Companies Working towards these that are in the works right now. Im sure San Francisco and new york will figure out room taxes somehow for those air mattresses that well all be staying in the inflatable space stations its pretty incredible. It is fascinating what a great beep. There hasnt been much like it in our lifetime. Markets for the time being have been holding on to pretty decent gains at 115, not quite erasing the losses of yesterday. It was our fifth 1 decline of the year on tuesday. Thats more than we had in all of 2017, which kind of tells you about what last year was really like yeah. Lots of head fakes so far. Amazon and alphabet, i have to note, up quite a bit today amazon nearly 2 alphabet, 2. 5. Yeah, youre right. Fed minutes in a couple hours. Lets get to the judge and the half and welcome to the halftime report, im scott wapner. Our top trade this hour, beware of the retest. Why one halftime regular says stocks are about to fall sharply again, even as the comeback from the correction continues today with us for the hour, joe terranova, steve weise, aaron brown, rich sapperstein. Lets get to the call from the chief market strategist, tony dwyer. With us today from new york. He says history is not on the side of the bulls. That stocks will retest their earlier lows and all of it could happen within days tony, good tseyo