Transcripts For CNBC Closing Bell 20240714

Decision. Bullard should have called for 75 basis points and he could have the job when powell steps down to spend more time with his calculations. I agree completely with bullard, his dissent on 50. Whats he thinking . Then i read his comments and said thats pretty smart it made total sense to me. On the bullard side, this gives you a sense of why its so reasonable i would be watching very carefully for any signs of a downturn. Of course, there are views on the other side as well, from the other dissenters i think the center of gravity, clearly the center of gravity on the committee is the second adjustment was appropriate. Thats right. Fed president jim bullard joins us here in just a moment josh got a cameo in that little mashup. Lucky you didnt wear the same tie. Some of my best work. Yeah, you have to give me the heads up on that. Building throughout the day, hopes of the trade deal, really good housing data. Yeah. What are you chalking it up to lets do housing first. Xhp, itb, housing related etfs, the names big in these indices period, full stop. Thats a trade weve been highlighting here on the show the days im on, talking about lenar, etfs themselves which one is your favorite . So i dont want toruin it, but my last chance trade dont ruin it. Is yet another belated name to this trade. So well put a pin in that youve seen the russell strong youve seen transport strong they had been weak last week its nice to see them bouncing back in addition to the strength in homebuilders, of course thats a story that continuously pops up and disappoints everyone some positive news in facebook, amazon these stocks have been under pressure both of them look terrible however, todays action looks like theyre trying to hammer out a bottom lastly, let me bring this up a lot of the biggest winners of the year are getting hit the hardest. Im talking about software as a service stock, cloud stocks, whole software space, workday, slack. I think that unwind is a function of whats happened with we work. People are rethinking these 30 times revenue stories and that makes sense. These are crowded trades and hedge funds trapped in some venture deals, also the Public Market when you need liquidity, you get it where you can, not where you want it. I think that explains the action there. I would not make more of that than what i just said. At least not yet. Josh is with us for the full first hour of the show lets drill down some of the big stories were watching today eamon javers has latest. Analyst nick mody from rbc, juul and sarah is having a look at nike trading at new highs today. Eamon, lets start with you. A source familiar with the matter, Washington Post reporting, breaking within the past couple of minutes, Washington Post reporting acting director Joseph Maguire threatened to resign if the white house didnt allow him to testify freely before congress about this ukraine situation the Washington Post reporting in the past couple of minutes here that he feared the white house might attempt to force him to stonewall when he provides testimony on thursday. That sets up a dramatic confrontation between democrats on capitol hill, republicans on capitol hill and the white house with the director, acting director of National Intelligence right in the center of that on thursday. So what weve seen throughout the day today is a president very much denying these allegations, saying its inappropriate for democrats to criticize him for this we just saw President Trump side by side with president zelensky of ukraine, president zelensky saying there that the call he had with President Trump is normal and said that nobody pushed me. A bit of a lifeline for the president of the United States sittohave the president of ukraine sitting side by side and saying there was nothing inappropriate about the phone call were going to see the president of the United States in this room taking questions from the press corps thats already assembled here about this matter and anything else. Its a free wheeling day for the president. Were expecting a free wheeling press conference in new york city back to you. Well take it when it happens. Eamon javers. Mike santoli has market dashboard. Sara, thanks. Market sniffing out volatility around election day next year. The real world, heavily hyped ipos maybe they didnt have the easiest time transitioning in the real world then by total request, a few stocks one big name youre very familiar with, sara, that by acclimatation, and corporate insiders cashing in and out relatively high numbers. Several dates down the road expected volatility, wells fargo derivative strategy group. The orange line here, if you wanted to buy, speculate on the level of volatility for the s p around the election, this is when you would do it thats your window, september to december of 2020 and you see it bid much higher than the period immediately before and immediately after that so, clearly, the market is saying theres going to be these predictable bumps out there with these identifiable catalysts, one of them being october 31st we have the brexit deadline as well as the fed. A little bit of a sign that in recent weeks people have decided everything being equal, its good to be a tight election in 2020 no matter what and maybe start to posture for that at this point, guys. Okay, mike. Thank you very much. Its been a wild week in the c suite as chief executives step down from their post, we works and juul ceo kevin burns is out, being replaced by casey crosswaithe and Philip Morris also announcing their ending their merger talks thanks very much, nick, for joining us the headline of kevin burns stepping down, you actually think its a positive for altria absolutely. Former chief growth officer of altria going over to work with juul or run juul al altria has a corps competence of regulations, through the Tobacco Industry juul Management Team are startup guys that came up with technology, great Product Design and didnt have the core competence required in a sector thats complicated like tobacco where youre dealing with Public Health its a good move, great move i would expect this to help the youth epidemic weve been seeing with ecigarettes the past few years. And yet altria shares are lower today, nick. Theyve been slammed in the last few months and theres some concerns about capital, especially when theyre holding so much of juul when this deal is, if it is permitted to go through. How do you balance that negative with all of the regulatory hurdles with your view on altria its a bit puzzling remember altria had a passive stake in juul, cant record Equity Income from juul even if theyre making money right now people have understand theres a separation here. Whatever happens to juul from a financial standpoint doesnt impact altria in any way, shape or form. Cash, earnings, revenue. Theres going to be no impact from juul on altria this year, next year or the year after. I hope the stock goes to zero i would tell anyone watching this, they should pay zero attention to anything to deal with earnings, revenue, chief growth manager, whatever they give the person that runs the company that sells poison to children this is stock that should be divested twothirds of the money is an esg standard, coming to the United States in a very big way. These stocks are getting kicked out of portfolios, millions of peoples portfolios at a time. I dont care if it trades at a 1 yield direct index and subtract copies like these. So we Sell Oil Stocks its not the same thing at all. Were talking about the executives core competency is getting raed right to the edge of the law. Thats juul what about Philip Morris it was 702 1 2 years ago its 40 theres no Investment Case to be made for companies that will not be part of the portfolio of the future people are not investing money into Companies Like this. You keep saying you hope it goes bust and to zero. I hope it does, truthfully. Moral position. Im not predicting it does. In fact, over the last 100 years, the best performing sector for both britain and the United States are to be alcoholo stocks im suggesting that investors en masse remove these from their portfolio. Its so unpopular it makes it a great Investment Opportunity because one day people will come around im not so sure. Esg and people investing in a socially responsible way is the mega trend of our generation and younger and people will not hold these stocks in their portfolios its not about the business, the execution. None of that is the point of what im saying. What im suggesting is you can own the index and you can x out stocks like this Telecom Companies pay high dividends, utilities you can own preferred stocks you can own anything other than this and thats what i would do. Nick mody, thank you. Thank you. After the break, our exclusive interview with James Bullard. Well ask about his dissent and the feds path going fwaorrd stay with us 49 minutes left till the close we trust usaa more than any other company out there. They give us excellent customer service, every time. Our 18 year old was in an accident. Usaa took care of her car rental, and getting her car towed. All i had to take care of was making sure that my daughter was ok. If i met another veteran, and they were with another insurance company, i would tell them, you need to join usaa because they have better rates, and better service. Were the gomez family. Were the rivera family. Were the kirby family, and we are usaa members for life. Get your Auto Insurance quote today. Classical Music playing throughout caught the markets attention as one of the fed officials who voted against a quarter rate cut last week but it was because he wanted a bigger cut jim bullard joins us now for an interview. Thank you for joining us. Thanks for having me. Why do you think this economy needs more accommodation at this moment and why do you think it needs more than all the other voting members on the fed . I think its prudent Risk Management at this juncture. I think it would have been better to go farther at this last meeting than the mantle of the committee wanted to go but still i would say the Committee Overall has made major changes during 2019 coming into 2019, we were expected to raise rates in the january, february, march timeframe. We went to a flat path and then in the july, august timeframe. Policy rate is still above the tenyear we probably have a little more to go here. The pushback i would give president bullard is that weve had a good economy here as well. Even housing has started to wake up as a result of those low Mortgage Rates some signs of stabilization in manufacturing, some firming in inflation. Those are some of the weak spots in a market thats less than 2 from record highs. So, why double down on the accommodation . Yeah. I think some of those effects are exactly what you would expect from the turnaround of Monetary Policy during 2019, housing in particular with lower Mortgage Rates thats just the kind of thing that you would expect Monetary Policy acts with long and variable lags. I would expect the effects to show up now in the second half of 2019 and in the first half of 2020. Does the fact that the word insurance cuts has been used by you in recent speeches and by the fed chair suggest that the data isnt that bad yet but you think it will get worse in the short term this is all about Risk Management and the Downside Risks of the economy. If the economy powers through, as it did in the late 90s, we can raise the rate back up the prudent thing to do, especially since inflation is below target, Inflation Expectations below target, i think the prudent thing to do is lower the policy rate right now. And we can come back. If we are going into a recession, why not save it till you need it . The keep your powder dry argument isnt as powerful as you might think. Most of the Research Says you should use the tools while you have them to try to manage the risk that you have like i say, if we play our cards right, as we did in 1998 when there was an agent currency crisis going on, we lowered the policy right at that time, then we raised the policy rate back up i think that was a prudent move at that time thats the kind of thing we would like to see here, keep this expansion going, keep the labor market performing well and keep the consumer on track. Where do you stand on the argument that trade is the biggest potential drawback to the Growth Outlook and Interest Rates arent the most effective tool to deal with that issue i think trade is the biggest issue. I think the global trade war has expanded quite a bit, compared to what people might have expected i think its going to take quite a while to get to agreements i think the chinese might have incentive to wait out this administration, see what happens at the election. I expect titfortat types of moves. So that trade uncertainty is having a lot of effect inside the u. S. , but its having even larger effect outside the u. S. , chilling Global Investment i think those ceos who come on your show and are thinking about a billion dollar investment somewhere around the world, theyre thinking twice theyre being very cautious because theyre not sure what the rules are going to be Going Forward and theyre not sure where they want to make the investment thats slowing the u. S. Economy. It could come back to bite the u. S. Economy. What about the u. S. Consumer, how confident are you that the u. S. Consumer can stay strong in the environment that you just laid out really has been a great spot in this overall economy yeah. I think if you just look at labor markets and consumption, youre going to come to the conclusionthat this is a great economy, but thats a backwardlooking way to think about things that the juncture i think its not surprising with unemployment near 50year low that you would have great Household Spending but when that breaks down, it will probably be too late. You dont want to wait until you see those kinds of indicators turning around theyre kind of lagging indicators you want to be more forward looking and take on board that this trade war has become more pernicious than we originally thought. You mentioned the yield curve earlier. Does the shape of the yield curve in itself worry you . To what extent do you think that shape is more influence, like in places of germany and japan than the likelihood of recession in the United States . I think our yields are, of course, influenced by global yields we have negative yields elsewhere in the g7. I think the shape of the yield curve in the u. S. , though, is sending a signal that markets are less, saying about future growth, future inflation than the fed s i dont see why our policy rate has to be above the general level of rates in the u. S. In this situation if were fighting a war against inflation, then that would be a concern, but thats not where were at here. Inflation is actually below target by a preferred measure and Inflation Expectations certainly seem well contained at this point so i think we have room to maneuver here. I think we can take out the insurance. Like i say, if we dont need it, thats okay. Well just take it back in 2020. So, what should the fed do in october . Would you advocate for a 50 basis point cut again . Wait a minute the committee went 25 last time. Just sitting here today, i would say another 25 basis points. Right but you wanted the 50 basis points. Right i would go another 25 before the end of the year. I would like to reserve judgment i dont like to prejudge meetings well see how the data come in if you guys are right and i should be more optimistic ill certainly take that on board. As for the dissent itself last time round, how did that go down internally . Was the chair disappointed in you . It was a beautiful thing. No i think were used to arguing things out at the open market committee. We have lots of different views. I think thats important we dont want to get trapped in group think. Certainly had people on the other side of this argument and theyre making their case as strongly as they can i think that shows that theres vigorous debate going on. One person on the opposite side of you is Eric Rosengren of the boston fed doesnt want to be cutting he talks about the costs of cutting and one of the more powerful charts was the one where it showed low Interest Rates are encouraging more leverage and riskier debt transactions just this idea that the more the fed cuts, the more it encourages risky behavior, more leverage in the system and more potential dangerous bubbles that could end up hurting in the long term. How do you respond to that yeah. I think coming into the 2007, 2009 crisis, we have better radar on this. My sense is that there may be a few areas of excessive risk taking but nothing on the order of magnitude of what we saw in the mid 2000s or for ma matter the late 1990s i dont think thats where the balance of risks are we would be better off protecting ourselves against the possibility of global slowdown feeding back into the u. S. Do you expect those people who say if we step back and go into a further loosening cycle we just delay the problems for much bigger fallout years down the line yeah, im not sure. One of the biggest risks we face is falling into the kind of negative Interest Rate trap that you see in europe today or in japan today. And if you get to that point, its kind of too late. Its very difficult to maneuver at that point, as europe is finding out. Its no that clear how we would proceed. Theres some things you can do its not that clear how you would proceed. I think the trick here is to try to use our tools while we can. And stay out of that kind of situation for as long as we can. How worrisome is this we had some volatility around the policy rate. That is something that the new york fed has done a good job of containing were going to continue that out. It looks like into october here through quarter end. And so im pretty sure that were in good shape for now. In medium term, i would like to see a repo facility that would complement our existing repo facility i thiching a repo facility would basically end this shortterm funding markets. It would meet an International Standard this is how other Central Banks handle this issue. I would also say this. This is a microeconomic issue about shortterm funding markets and volatility in those markets. In the big picture, these are too small of movements to have any macro impact. You dont want to enter the negative rates that some places like japan and germany have experienced but you do want to cut rates. Are you saying you would never go below zero, though, so its a couple of cuts but no further . Yeah. I think that the idea of insurance is to try to mitigate the Downside Risks hopefully, those risks will dissipate in the year ahead and then we would be able to take the rate back up to something that was more like what some Committee Members think the longer term neutral rate would be but as far as negative rates in the u. S. , i do think that there are some structural differences between the u. S. And europe and japan as far as how shortterm funding markets work so im doubtful it would work very well here, which is something ive said before i think the big picture is that you dont really twoont get into the situation where youre contemplating those kind of policies. If it doesnt dissipate, would you start qe again i think the fed would have to react to go down to zeero then make a decision whether we would want to use forward guidance, quantitative easing or other policy but those would be the most likely choices initially. That would be the case if we really got into a very large shock. We have these Downside Risks, as youre pointing out, relatively good performances, household consumption, labor markets i think were in good shape for now. Were taking on board the idea that we have the Downside Risk weve reduced the policy rate and made major changes to policy in 2019 and could take this back once the clouds blow over here. I think its fair to say youve become the favorite central banker, at least in the u. S. , of President Trump. Well, thank you youre my favorite tv personality as well. Of the president. Hang on. But thats a great compliment you are more aligned with the administration in terms of a 50 basis point cut. How does it make you feel that the president , which bashes the chairman on an almost daily basis on twitter because of his policies, is more aligned with you and people out there are saying that youre campaigning for the job. Yeah. Those of you that know me know that ive got my own views on policy and in every situation, i will express what those views are, because i see that as my role as president of the bank and member of the open market committee. So im presenting what i think is the best piece of advice that i can provide in this circumstance, taking Everything Else of whats going on in the u. S. Economy and in the world. Does chair powell know youre doing these sorts of interviews . Do you get his approval . Does he support the fact that youre coming out to call for more cuts than he wants . You know, were independent operators. Certainly these kinds of things get scheduled, as you guys know, quite a ways ahead of time we get lots of requests. I would say generally speaking about this issue, after the financial crisis, the demand for communication from the Federal Reserve sky rocketed and hasnt come down that much since then i think its important for all Committee Members, actually, to get out and talk because the private sector has many more people talking about fed policy. Its important for the policymakers to get their side of the story out and private sector commenters or others, political commenters can make their own xhepts on top of that. I thempg its up to us to drive the policy by talking regularly to Media Outlets like this one. Final quickie on news of day. Do you think the heating up of impeach. Effort by the house of representatives represents any kind of threat to the markets or economy in terms of uncertainty around policy and the election yeah. I dont know viewing it from a distance, this sounds like more investigation to me. Were used to dealing with Political Uncertainty as kind of a backdrop to Monetary Policy making this doesnt sound too different to me. I expect investors will have to take on board Political Uncertainty Going Forward until we get to the 2020 election. All right thank you for answering that James Bullard, thank you for joining us. Great thanks for having me thank you. President of the st. Louis Federal Reserve. You two each others favorites. I was saying spl i kn i know. The point i was trying to make is that the president tweeted that he has picked his favorite. He would have been better with janet yellen after all. Shelled have done what trump want. Had the more accommodative inclination . Shes so dovish, compared to powell. Would be good with bullard as well. Thats a thing that could happen. Under 30 minutes to go before the closing bell take a look at the dow up 166. Near session highs here. Still ahead a News Conference from President Trump set to kick off the top of the hour. Well bring it to you as soon as it starts. Coming up, well break down James Bullards comments, what they mean for the market josh brown and u. S. President of Credit Suisse will be here what do you look for i want free access to research. Yep, td ameritrades got that. Free access to every platform. Yeah, that too. I dont want any trade minimums. Yeah, i totally agree, they dont have any of those. I want to know what im paying upfront. Yes, absolutely. Do you just say yes to everything . Hm. Well i say no to kale. Mm. Yeah, they say if you blanch it its better, but that seems like a lot of work. No hidden fees. No platform fees. No trade minimums. And yes, its all at one low price. Td ameritrade. 25 minutes left of trade time cnbc news update with Contessa Brewer hi, contessa. House and Senate Democrats are rallying behind speaker Nancy Pelosis decision to open an impeachment inquiry, gop congressional leaders blasting the move. Impeachment is a very solemn, grave responsibility we all have and for this speaker to be going down this path and for this caucus to go down this path before theyve seen any evidence at all is something that is absolutely unprecedented in our history. New United Nations report shi projects three feet of rising seas by the end of the century, fewer fish, weakening currents and more damaging hurricanes the armys proposaling new limits as to who can be buried at Arlington National cemetery, trying to save space veterans retired under active duty and eligible for pay would no longer be eligible. Back to you. General motors news alert. Phil lebeau has this. Are gm sales hurting . Are people staying away from gm dealerships . We received a data from a consulting firm, gleaned data from the first week of the strike sales are as strong if not a little bit stronger than the same week in september a year ago. We should point out, guys, this is not a huge surprise a number of dealers who have said yeah, weve got plenty of supply what is a concern for dealers . Looming parts shortage because theyre going to be running low on parts for repairs thats a concern for dealers theyre not quite to the point where theyre seeing it. Its not far way in terms of sales theyre not seeing an impact at General Motors so far. Phil, thanks very much. Uhuh bet. St. Louis fed president James Bullard spoke with us moments ago. His take on insurance cuts. This is all about Risk Management and about the Downside Risks to the economy. If the economy powers through here as it did in the late 90s, then we can raise the policy rate back up the prudent thing to do right now, especially since inflation is below target, Inflation Expectation is below target, the prudent thing to do is lower the policy rate now. If all is well next year we can come back and go back to the previous level we were at. I dont know than, is he right . Is that whats going to happen two pieces of information here, economy growing roughly 2 inflation and 2. 25 gdp. Whats the volatility were insuring against market volatility is not swinging all over the place. Im not sure this is something that needs fed action. However what is an issue is the short end of the yield curve is inverted the market is saying the fed needs to fix that or it will create inflationary risk i agree with his conclusion, which is the fed is being forced by the market to act his narrative is really misdirected. Its not the economy its the Interest Rate market and yield curve they need to respond to. Are you saying that the market is more in the bullard camp the market thinks youre going to get three cuts. The reason is because thats what its going to take to fix the yield curve. If the fed signals theyre done here, the market will be very unhappy. Josh, you seemed disappointed in that interview. What did you disagree with i think his heart is in the right place but its incoherent. He spent summer of 2015 giving speeches about the dangers of low rates. Pe ratios are higher, bond yields are substantially lower, were financing junk debt. Corporate borrowing is at record highs. Now he thinks we should even lower rates. Either you think financial conditions are too tight and you need to loosen them. I dont think anyone in this building would say thats the case or youre saying for some reason you want to engender more borrowing. You want more leverage in the system i dont think anyone here would say that jonathan certainly wouldnt. What is the mechanism by which lowering overnight borrowing rates will do anything. Look at your call from housin housing. So we need to accelerate that if theres a lack of borrowing, theres a lack of demand its that people are you can lower rates to negative it doesnt make people say now is the time im going to build a new plant and hire 5,000 more people thats not how it works. If we believe its the trade problem causing a lack of borrowing at the time trump is in office you still have weak borrowing. Ultimately lower rates are not going to solve this. It keeps the stock market elevated doesnt it were 1 off record high. We have a Federal Reserve. We have this belief, sarah, gnat markets being pushed up by buy backs because cheap capital being borrowed thats not whats happening. Buy backs are happening because companies are like cash flow generation machines, generating so much cash flow that they have no choice. What about the yield curve, does that need to be corrected to keep the economy growing or is it indicative of whats going on in germany and japan . Think about this. If youre a bank, borrowing money at one rate and lending money at a lower rate, then youre going to start to pull it if youre an individual investing in a bond for retirement and you can get more money one month bank cd, youre not going to put your money out there. Its very unhealthy to have an inverted curve the fed has to understand that. Bullard should say what central bankers, i think, are going to start to say, which is these are fiscal issues, tad war related issues the fed is powerful. Its got its place its place is not to twiddle the knob. Do you really want to fight the if ned this market everyone is long. Whole world is long. I dont agree. If you look longer term, if we believe potential gdp is a little under 2 and the economy is growing over 2 , then the issue is is that, listen, what are the issues were having fewer babies, most of us. Productivity. Were living longer, and have a fixed retirement age ultimately the economy is slower and unless you can fix those issues, simply lowering Interest Rates doesnt solve them. Thanks for joining us, jonathan great to see you as always. You guys are not central bankers. The fed is lowering Interest Rates. Im going to have two more babies think about what were talking about. I dont think theyre trying to stimulate childbirth. Lets send it over to mike santoli for a Second Market dashboard. Save us, mike. Im not going to make those decisions based on what the fed does either. The real world, by some description, is Public Markets take a look at how ipos have performed according to a timeline, renaissance ipo. It doesnt include only the hot ones its interesting, this big comeback as the market came back, preparing for this wave of pretty heavily hyped un corner typed ipos you have your lyft ipo in the spring so sort of go in sideways with the ipo market here until we got the slack listing. That wasnt necessarily the greatest moment. The we work deal starts to fall apart. As josh was saying earlier, people have really started to rethink high value, no real cap profitability types that had loaded up the market i dont think its necessarily a huge warning signal for the market if anything, you could say its been pretty discerning in deciding which ones its going to buy and which ones its going to cast aside. Something to watch. Mike, thank you very much still to come here on the closing bell, ibms Martin Schroeter will join us nt,ex to discuss what it means for ibm and the Tech Industry. [leaf blower] you should be mad at leaf blowers. [beep] you should be mad your neighbor always wants to hang out. And you should be mad your smart fridge is unnecessarily complicated. But youre not mad, because you have e trade which isnt complicated. Their tools make trading quicker and simpler. So you can take on the markets with confidence. Dont get mad. Get e trade and start trading today. Hour 36 in the stakeout. As soon as the homeowners arrive, well inform them that Liberty Mutual customizes home insurance, so theyll only pay for what they need. Your turn to keep watch, limu. Wake me up if you see anything. [ snoring ] [ loud squawking and siren blaring ] only pay for what you need. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. A new kind of credit card. Created by apple, not a bank. With a better way to track where you spend. A new level of privacy and security. Daily cash you get back every day. And no fees. Not even hidden ones. Oh, and if you happen to be somewhere that doesnt accept apple pay yet, theres this. Nice. It also has the highest growth in manufacturing jobs in the us. Its a competition for the talent. Employees need more than just a paycheck. You definitely want to take advantage of all the benefits you can get. 2 3 of employees said that the workplace is an important source for personal savings and protection solutions. The workplace should be a source of financial security. Keeping your people happy is what keeps your people. Thats Financial Wellness. Put your employees on a path to Financial Wellness with prudential. The u. S. And japan outlining details of a trade deal today that would open up about opening japan up lowering tariffs in many japanese goods, including in the auto industry. Seen as a win for the Tech Industry in the u. S. Senior Vice President was in the room when the deal was signed and joins us now for cnbc exclusive interview to discuss the deals impact on ibm very good afternoon to you thanks for joining us. Thank you. What does this unleash, as it were, into your company specifically we were delighted with the leadership that the u. S. And japan have taken on this this is really the Gold Standard now in digital trade weve seen it in this administrations work on usmca as an example. It has the componentry that weve advocated for, in order to ensure every discussion whoa have with our clients, which is about digitization and ai, every discussion can continue. You need these robust frameworks to allow data to move. What do you need in terms of a trade deal for digital trade it ensures three things that are so critical of how our clients, again, think about enterprise we run the Banking Systems of the world, supply chains of the world. You need to be able to move data freely obviously, securely. And obviously theres certain data that will be protected in the country. You need pretty broad ability to move data around the world thats what this covers. It also covers the protection of our source code and the protection of our algorithms these kind of agreements codify that you really do need to codify that digital trade agreement theres free flow of data and we protect our ip really important. What if u. S. Bank or Japanese Bank had made transactions, none of this would have happened before it doesnt exist in most of the trade agreements there are pieces that sort of exist. One, this u. S. japan agreement, as i said, is Gold Standard. Tpp addresses some of these things its not as robust as what was just signed and usmca again also addresses these things thats not law yet those are the kind of agreements we need in place to codify, that allows the free flow of data. Are you saying this bilateral approach that President Trump has taken versus the traditional multilateral trade negotiations in deals is working out better for a company like ibm and the Tech Industry . In this case, because this is the Gold Standard, we needed a Gold Standard, now the rest of the world can follow along yes, we do need the rest of the world into these having the u. S. And japan in the trade agreement is very important. We need everybody else to follow along. Does that stimulate new business for you every discussion we have with our clients again is around how they compete and evolve in a hybrid cloud world, in a world of ai. It stimulates for them the ability to create new business models, the ability to try new things, in new markets all with the power of their data. This ensures them they can use their data in appropriate ways to drive their business forward. Thank you for joining us. Thank you. Still to come on closing bell, well have the close with 8 minutes left last chance trade is coming. President trump set to hold a e w s conference at the top of thhour well bring you live as soon as it begins. Dow is up 190. Doprevagen is the number oneild mempharmacistrecommendeding . Memory support brand. You can find it in the vitamin aisle in stores everywhere. Prevagen. Healthier brain. Better life. At verizon, were building the most powerful 5g experience for america. Thats why the nfl chose verizon. Because they need the massive capacity of 5g with ultra wideband, so more screaming, streaming, posting fans. Can experience 5g all at once. This is happening in 13 stadiums all across the country. Now if verizon 5g can do this for the nfl. Imagine what it can do for you. You should be mad at airports. Excuse me, where is gate 87 . You should be mad at nonseasoned travelers. And they took my toothpaste away. And you should be mad at people who take unnecessary risks. How dare you, hes my emotional support snake. But youre not mad, because you have e trade, whose tech helps you understand the risk and reward potential on an options trade its a paste. Its not liquid or a gel. And even explore whatif scenarios. Wheres gate 87 . Dont get mad. Get e trade and start trading today. Five minutes left of trade. I have two. First one is housing i talked about lenar we missed the breakout phm is the ticker, pulte homes publicly traded. Stock is in an immac late uptrend. Every dip is bought. There arent really any sellers here i think you can trail this with a stop loss, 50day moving average. Stay long as this continues. Much stronger than berkshire hathawa. Cincinnati financial, cinf. This goes up every day. The stock is unstoppable. And there are very few companies of this size this one might be on its way to becoming a mega cap. For right now its a midcap. Doesnt get a lot of attention again, technically immac late. If you were in Technical Analysis 101, this is the type of chart they would put on the board. Doesnt mean they would be completely perfect but you get long here, trail with the stock if youre a trader if youre an investor, you should be reading about the company, reading their filings and trying to understand why this thing looks so good and make a longer term decision i like it for both investors and traders. Over three minutes left of trade. Right near session highs, 176 points on the dow. Mike santoli has the third installment of the dashboard mike indemand hit stocks in a minute New York Stock Exchange breath today as this rally has gained a little bit of force as weve gone on through the day. Not quite 21. Thats not a bad one seems like a pretty decent rebound day after yesterdays backing off. Twoyear charts of nike, starbucks, visa. They all trade around 30 times forward earnings mega premium multiple, reliable, global brand franchise people like forever will repeat good performance. Is it a new nifty fifty . I dont know but they workup 80 . Of course, nike adding to that at a new alltime high. Second highest number in 12 years, notes from the ukrainian call, of course, and voices on trade from the president and a number of fronts all that combined, two day of tens, todays yields higher than yesterday, breaking a trend in the opposite direction were looking at a new close going back to 2017, may, 28 fresh high and as far as the markets, nasdaq, leader of the percentage pack today. Bertha, whats going on there . Bonds did help to fuel that turn around and stocks started lower. Were now near the highs of the session. Large caps, of course, among the big gainers today. Cintas better han expected earnings, uniform maker. Netflix snapping a fiveday losing streak, turning around on those china trade. Some capital match with ftc lawsuit and ebay one of those companies with the ceo loss of the meantime, amazon is increasing programming with cooking coming from discoverys tv its a natural for me in my kitchen. Certainly sounds terrific there, bertha. We were fading, it all turned around president said a china deal is coming whats it worth . 150 points we were helped by nikes good numbers. Boeing, united tech, banks moved up, goldman sachs. And decliners, very predictable. Health care, defensive sectors, united health, merck, pfizer, Procter Gamble and johnson johnson. Health Care Consumer weaker, cyclical stocks. Closing off the highs of the day. We made a strong push to 27,000 on the dow, just shy of that and are heading toward 3000 for the s p of the didnt make that one either but a strong showing for the day, almost 21. Theres the closing bell dow closing up 163 points. Welcome back to closing bell. Im sara eisen. And im wilfred frost nasdaq up 4 also a strong boupsback in the russell, which similarly has underperformed of late russell was up 1. 1 . Nike closing at a record high off the highs of the session still propelling the dow as the biggest winner there, adding 23 points to the 163point gain we are await iing the president News Conference as the house of representatives begins impeachment inquiry. First eamon javers as we wait President Trumps News Conference quite the dramatic setup into this event, eamon. Thats right, sara. Getting access to the complaint that is now the focal point of this impeachment inquiry into the president of the United States we may see more information breaking even as the president is talking in the room where i am here in new york city we may see information breaking out of capitol hill down in washington, simultaneously we have a couple of other balls in the air to tell you about one is this denial here now from the acting director of National Intelligence of that earlier Washington Post report now acting director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire said at no time have i considered resigning my position since assuming this role i have never quit anything in my life and im not going to start now. Im commit ted to leading the Intelligence Community to address the diverse and complex threats facing our nation. That sets up a dramatic moment on friday. The president has a chance to answer a host of questions this is a packed house in the room for the president of the United States. He is expecting a range of questions on ukraine got a little bit of a lifeline from the ukrainian president earlier today who said he did not feel, ultimately, he was pressured. He said no one pushed me and that the call he had with the president of the United States was totally normal a little bit of a political benefit to the president coming into this press conference well see what he says in a couple of minutes time, sara. Eamon, whatever people at home think about whats out there relating to this saga so far importantly hasnt seen a breakdown in general of support of dissent where likely well see a twothirds mantle in the senate against him. That looks extremely unlikely at this point. The question is whether house of representatives will even have enough to get to articles of impeach. Removal from office is way down the road from here first look at that house process to see how much momentum this impeachment inquiry is actually able to gain the president is rerunning his criticism of the Mueller Investigation saying this is a hoax, some of the exact lines he used to criticize the Mueller Investigation, now using that to criticize this ukraine investigation on capitol hill and rerunning some of bill clintons impeachment defense. Im the president trying to get things done for the American People im trying to pass legislation im focused on what americans really care about. Those guys on capitol hill are focused on impeachment and playing politics here. The president specifically mentioned lowering drug prices is something he would like to do also the usmca, mexico canada trade agreement with the United States are two priorities he says are being slowed down now as a result of this impeachment inquiry. Eamon, stay close, as we await the president. Mike, what do you think the market implications are around this not many immediate wise the one item of the economic agenda thats pending that really matters at this point is the trade deal the market doesnt love the hardline stance. If it was going to either soften up or be sidelined but beyond that. I dont know. Isnt there a risk if this weakens the president s hand in negotiations with xi jinping and the president doesnt get what he wants in terms of real change in chinese policy when it comes to american business, thats a negative and could prolong the trade fight. Its a net negative dos it open up another round of tariffs . Whoknows the market isnt clear it should be pricing in any of those scenarios three or four links down the chain. Charlie, latest couple of days of Political Drama alter your view on equities at all not really, wolf. The same stocks are cheap. The same stocks are expensive. Theres been articles about how High Net Worth individuals are convinced theres going to be a recession. So the stocks that are cheap are industrials and financials the stocks that are expensive are the defensive names and a lot of the tech names. Some of our favorites are trading in at ten times less earnings. You like industrials and financials because theyre cheap. What about Health Care Health care is traditionally a defensive name sector that tends to do well when people are worried about the economy. We have some names in that space that we think are very attractive lab corph. Big Movement Toward testing out of hospitals into lab corp and quest. Some of ours have gone because people are looking to be defensive. What do you make of the bounce in the fang stocks . I think, you know, sometimes stocks get over sold and there doesnt need to be reason to be over selling them. It doesnt look like unbridled decision that could pick back up tomorrow, though i wouldnt read too much into that aspect. Main point i want to leave everyone with is that impeach. Is not an event. Its a process this is going to be the new ambient noise behind everything we do in the markets the next, i dont know, six, 12 months its never going to end. Six separate committees investigating impeachment. Everything from potential Campaign Violations to National Security unrest. One thing people shouldnt be doing is fooling with their Asset Allocation or thinking theyll outsmart what the next political headline is going to be forget that stuff. Focus on what you were doing prior to Nancy Pelosis announcement last night and youll be way better off nixon and clinton. Stocks rose after both those scenarios. Im not saying we havent updated the science but its possible to go on with our lives while dc burps wouldnt be shocking to me if that happened, too. A news alert. Dom chiu has that for us at headquarters dom . Lease been focus on vaping and ecigarettes and smoking alternatives this is coming from the Georgia State department of Public Health identifying the states first death from a Vaping Associated illness. That brings the total death count from vapingrelated illnesses up to 10 nationwide. The first time the state of georgia has reported one theyve been documenting nine separate cases of vapingrelated illnesses. This is the first deaths that been confirmed they did offer a slight bette of color of whats happening here the patient had a history of heavy nicotine vaping but no reported history of vaping thc itself latest news items we have here sara, wilfred, cdc and states have been investigating 500plus instances of vapingrelated illnesses. It could be hundreds more than that the latest out of the state of georgia. Back over to you. Some of the other cases related to thc vaping in terms of the deaths, dom, thank you. Stop. Stop it now. Its enough. I like what the white house said about the flavors. Every states attorney general should be looking at it and shutting it down i understand were trying to get people off cigarettes. We can go back to the patch, the gum. Its okay. We dont need this shut it down its enough. It relates to a story in the markets today as well, which is the fact that the Philip Morris altria deal is no longer happening. Going back to the discussion we had, josh, you want all tobacco stocks or just respect to juul . My generation and younger, for us there are things more important than the incremental extra dollar we can make from an investment its not just that i think these stocks are going to work i would not consider under any circumstance giving my money to these people who every day wake up and try to figure out where the line is and how close to they can get its an epidemic teenagers, people not yet 18, have no business they cant buy this stuff legally. Theyre getting it theyre using it theres no purpose in having it be available im glad that unfortunately these deaths are bringing enough attention something will be done thats the only Silver Lining i can find and the sackler family, we let that run on for 15 years and i have no idea why. Well leave that there. James bullard sat down with us last hour, weighing in on what he thinks is the bigge esgest f the economy. I think trade is the biggest issue. Global trade war has expanded quite a bit. I think it will take quite a while to get to agreements thats slowing the global economy. That could come back to bite the u. S. Economy he also said he would back another 25 basis point cut by the end of the year. Although he didnt want to prejudge in the data does turn better where are you on the split inside the fed not dissimilar to the splits we have on the panel at cnbc. Sure. To some grow its the nature of where we are in the cycle. Things start to slow you dont know if you can extrapolate that down to a complete stall and therefore you have people like bullard who want to be more proactive about getting rates lower. The subtext, too, is that it doesnt matter that much were talking 1. 5, 2 . Its not n rate real people borrow its on the gesture of saying we take this seriously. I like the idea well take it back in 2020. You cant take it back. You cant its been done. Havent they take ep back the height hikes of next year . Now he just wants 25. When he was looking for 50, it wasnt above is beyond it was just he wanted it faster. Right. We have that sound bite lets listen in. I would go another 25 by the end of the year. I would like to preserve judgment i dont like to prejudge meetings if you guys are right and i should be more optimistic ill certainly take that on board. That is the most dovish member now saying only a further 25 basis points. Does it need to see more cuts to be supportive at these levels . Im more lonely with this view fundamentally, the market does not want to see a recession. It does not like to see signs of recession. It does not like to see people in the fed cutting rates because theyre seeing signs of recession. I frankly think were in a situation where borrowers could use a little more ofa reward these Interest Rates are low enough as i said on your program a number of times im seeing more signs of inflation cpi has been up above 2 when you include oil and food this idea that theres no inflation is not consistent with with the data. I do not think we should have another rate cut. By the way, just a quick note bullard is one of the few fed officials who is making the argument that the reason to do it is just to get a yield curve. Ive been puzzled that powell has not wanted to make that argument, that you can have it both ways in that case you can cut rates but dont need it because the economy needs rescued. Bullard is willing to make that argument. I think he has a little more pessimistic view. Sure. On what the data is telling us. He said he wants only one more because that would right side the short end of the deal. By the way, josh, we always break news on closing bell. You did a very good job with with that interview. Who his favorite tv personality was, real breaking news little disappointing, i must say. We are awaiting President Trump. Well bring you that press Conference Live as soon as it begins meantime, earnings are out and diana has it. Kb homes, 70 of share street was looking for 66 on revenue of 1. 6 billion. Thats pretty much in line net orders up 24 . That was higher than expected. Also deliveries higher than expected and average selling price actually slightly lower. Now the ceo jeff metzger said were extremely pleased with the strength of our quarter, rise double digit during each of our four regions community absorption pace sur passing last years robust performance while at the same time increasing prices in about 90 of our communities weve seen demand on the low end very strong and builders saying theyre trying to build more entry level homes. Clearly theyre able to raise prices in these areas. We got new home sales today and saw that again the homes that are selling on the move up to the luxury segment of the market very, very small percentage of this market. Clearly for the move up and luxury sectors at this time. Kb coming in again at a beat on that and also upgraded today by buckhorn at raymond james. He said that he really feels there is a lot more room to grow for kb home. He said the big drop started in may, 3. 4 30year fixed and by august we were down 3. 5 that really gave a boost to the builders they expect demand to continue through the fall little bump up in Mortgage Rates righe does not expect it to have a huge impact because were considerably lower on the 30year fixed than we were a year ago. Kb home saying he expects to have a strong end of the year as well. Diana, i was going to follow up and ask you about houpg we can expect this boom were seeing in Mortgage Rates if history says anything about whether its just. Thats the key. Remember were also getting into some very easy comps last year, last fall, Mortgage Rates really shot up to about 5 and thats when Home Builders saw the plummet. Comps now are going to be very easy forward into fall toward the end of the year. If Mortgage Rates should pop up significantly, that would hurt, newly built homes come at a price premium. Very strong demand, very low supply of existing homes for sale, especially on the low end. So people are looking toward the new homes. We did see in the new homes sales report a drop in supply of newly built for home sales you need to see the builders start to ramp up their production would like to see them stronger to see all that demand coming in theyll have to have something to give them backlogs are up a bit as well. Builders should ramp up. If Mortgage Rates go up, well see what buyers can afford. Diana, thank you so much for that stock did initially dip. Well get the stock price up for you in a moment. It dipped it was up 3 , 52week high its really given back only a modest amount of that. People are focused much more on the fact that the general story seems to have a little momentum behind it. The charts gave you the trade way before the news flow this is one of those things where these stocks broke out this spring, they told you what was going to happen and the follow through was almost every day, every week we stopped making new highs and now youre getting the news that the market had already been anticipating for six months now. So, charlie, is it too late to buy into the Home Builders . No. Mohawk, the carpet company, trading 11 times earnings. If we get anywhere near back to levels of new home starts. Its not really the existing homes sales that matter, one home moving from one person to another. Starts that matter for the economy and we still have a lot of room to improve there. We are, of course, still waiting for President Trumps press conference well bring you that live as soon as it begins. Updated perspective of what we might be able to expect, lets bring in ylan muiz. Lawmakers are now able to view that copy of the whistleblowers complaint, being made available to members of house and Senate Intelligence committee, viewing it in a secure location in the Capital House intel chairman adam schiff has walked into the room, is now taking a look at it. What we dont know is what exactly the form of this complaint will be. We saw the transcript of the phone call with the ukraine president was more like detailed notes, rough transcript of that call well see how much is redacted of course, thats a critical piece of information that both democrats and republican are looking for as they head into the big meeting tomorrow with acting dni chief joe maguire before the house committee, open hearing and speaking before the senate law marks now being able to get a little more information from the administration, digesting it its only strengthened their resolve to continue down this path of an impeachment inquiry its unlikely that will change after they look at this complaint. Ylan mui, thank you very much, in washington, as we await the president. We will take you there live as soon as we get it. Set to speak any moment now. We dont have much more on the schedule, mike just in terms of what you want to hear, i guess trade would be key. If there were a nod in that direction. Whats interesting today is a complete vague, throwaway comment that the president made earlier, maybe youll see a deal with china sooner than expected. The fact that the market is susceptible to rallying on this sort of vapor of an idea you might get something shows you its not really priced in yet. I fully support transparency on socalled whistleblower information, but insist on transparency from joe biden and his son hunter from the millions of dollars additionally, i demand transparency from democrats that went to ukraine and forced the president to do things under political threat more of the same as weve heard under the last 24 hours. Well bring you the president live when he steps out for that press conference. One ceo participating in meetings today, including with indias Prime Minister first on cnbc interview. Dirk van der putt. Thanks for being here. Thank you good to be here. Appearing to be firing on all cylinders right now, where are you in terms of the evolution you set out to execute at the beginning of your tenure now, at least a year in . Yes yes. Its almost two years. A year ago we sort of changed basically the strategy of the company. We had been largely focused on costs to drive our bottom line and a year ago we spiched to largely top line drive, the bottom line and the whole premise is that we would be able to grow the revenue of the business weve been able to do that, then i think that has been reflected in the performance of the stock pric price. How do you think about the sustainability of the results youve shown, especially the margin expansion, which the market has liked, in the face of other Food Companies not getting it done, like kraft heinz . First of all, snack markets around the world are growing weve also been able to price and so were probably in a situation where the markets are helping us and then on top of that, weve been successful in gaining or at least holding our market shares. Weve grown together with the market and i would say in general that is very different from what you can see in other food categories thats a big driver here. What about your international exposure, is that a help or hinderance are you starting to see some cyclical pressures there not really. The heavy growth or good growth in europe is driven by what we call seasonals, easter and some of these special dates where we are still under indexing we did a good job of executing well and that we can continue with that in the years ahead. I dont see necessarily a slowdown in europe. What about the strength of the dollar, how bad is it . That, of course, yes, if you look the our reported results, that is hurting us a little bit. I would say as a company, a good investment in that sense the dollar will go up and down and put a little bit of pressure on us. I think overall, we are an International Players a company. You mentioned snack something growing around the world is all snacking growing or is it more Healthy Snacking . Were sitting here with delicious oreo sandwiches, i think, and cadburys chocolate. You cant be farther away from those. Our two biggest brands are oreo and cadbury both are growing doubledigit at the moment theyre driven by purpose, but if you look at snacking roughly percentage wise health and wellness products are growing in the percentage growth rate, dollar wise, more indulgent snacks are growing three times in dollars than the health and wellness products are growing. Do you have any plans to resist buybacks, dividends or both at the moment were not planning to revisit. We are on our normal course of 2 billion of buybacks this year we said we will grow our dividends more than our operating income and were sticking to that. So far, so good yes. So you launched your purpose . I dont know what you call it. Purpose growth, right . Yes, yes. Which has been very important to you mindful snacking was at the top of that list how has it changed not cadburys. Also cadburys. If consumers really want to think about their health, we all know that they wont eat healthy product. Theyll also indulge the premise is if you snack mindfully, you think about what youre eating, you dont mindlessly go into a bag and start eating think about the taste, what youre doing and dont go overboard. Thats not a small snack. Its divisdivisabible, thoug dirk, we are awaiting the president. Theres questions about the stability of economic recovery, the consumer has been at the forefront of that. I know you benefit even in times of stress as a sort of defensive consumer staple. What are you seeing out of the u. S. Consumer right now . Basically a consumer that feels pretty good. As you said snacking isnt going with the as you would. We do not see any signs that the consumer is affected. Good to check in with you thank you for coming in. Thank you so much. We are waiting for the president. Lets get to eamon who is in the room, of course, with some of the latest and when we might be able to expect the president. Secretary of state mike pompeo, secretary treasury Steve Mnuchin. We are waiting the president. He is expected there any moment. In fact, there he is, the president of the United States, flanked by, it looks like, secretary of state mike pompeo and secretary treasury Steve Mnuchin. Lets listen in. Thank you all for being there. Weve had a tremendous three days in new york at the United Nations. The secretary general, i want to thank. Its been incredible whats taken place. He has been a fantastic host to a lot of countries i think we set a new record but youll have to check that out. We met very, very pretty extended periods of time either 22, one on one or just about at that level with pakistan, poland, new zealand, singapore, egypt, south korea, united kingdom, india, iraq, argentina, germany, brazil, france, japan, ukraine, honduras, el salvador, kuwait, qatar, oman, uae, chile, colombia, ecuador, peru. Other than that, we werent too busy over the last few days. Unfortunately the press doesnt even cover it. Weve made fantastic deals, like with japan for farmers we have a tremendous trade deal with japan. That doesnt get covered because you waste your time on nonsense. The pmi manufacturers index has gone substantially up. Larry kudlow, wherever you may be, please stand up. He gave me these numbers existing new home sales are tlut roof oil prices have gone down since the saudi arabia incident and substantially. We have plenty of oil. The extent of the increases, is that a correct statement thank you, larry kudlow. We think well make this little announcement to you. The socalled whistleblower, the one that didnt have any first class or first rate or second tier information from what i understand, youll have to figure that out for yourself, but i have spoken with leader Kevin Mccarthy and the republicans, many of them. We were going to do this anyway. Ive informed them, all of the house members, that i fully support transparency on the socalled whistleblower information, even though it was supposedly secondhand information. Which is sort of interesting other things have come out about the whistleblower that are maybe more interesting but also insist on transparency from joe biden and his son, hunter, on the millions of dollars that have been quickly and easily taken out of ukraine and china. Millions of dollars. Millions and millions of dollars taken out very rapidly while he was Vice President i think they should have transparency for that. Ive informed the leader about that and additionally had to demand transparency for democrats who went to ukraine and attempted to force the new president , who i met he is an outstanding person who i just met a good well ago he got elected on the basis of corruption he wants to end corruption in ukraine and i think thats great. They went there, wanted to force the new president to do things they wanted under the form of political threat they tleled him if he didnt do things thats what theyre accusing me of but i didnt do it. I didnt threaten anybody. The press was asking questions of the president of the ukraine and he said no pressure. I used the word pressure he said push but same thing. No push, no pressure, no nothing. Its all a hoax, folks its all a big hoax. The sad thing about this hoax is that we work so hard with all of these countryies i mean really hard ive been up from early in the morning till late in the evening and meeting with different countries, all for the good of our country and the press doesnt even cover all of this its really disappointing also to those countries that are with us and spend so much time with us we want transparency weve informed kevin mccart dhd about trance parsparency and sae for it we have almost 100 of the republican votes it got no attention but cnn reported robert menendez, and two others wrote a letter expressing concern at the closing of four investigations they said were critical. In the letter they implied that the support for u. S. Interest in ukraine was at stake, that if they wouldnt get the right thing, they wouldnt get any assistance doesnt that sound familiar . Doesnt that sound familiar . Chris murphy, who i have been dealing with on guns, so nice. No, we want to work it out theyre too busy wasting their time on the witch hunt senator chris murphy literally threatened the president of ukraine that if he doesnt do things right they wont have democrat support in congress you can look all of this up. One other thing. Im just going off certain notes and elements of what weve been do i doing over the last few days this just came up a few minutes ago. The amazon Washington Post put out a fake article that acting director National Intelligence skroef maguire, who ive gotten to know he was a tough cookie and i was shocked to hear this was going to quick, blaming the white house for something they wouldnt let him talk openly, freely i was shocked. I know joe hes tough tough guy. And i was surprised to hear he was going to quit. Before i could talk to him or anyone else, he put out a statement. I didnt speak to joe yet. He said at no time have i considered resigning my position in other words, the story in the Washington Post was a fake at no time have i considered resigning my position since assuming this role ive never quit anything in my life and im not going to start now. Im committed to leading the Intelligence Community to address the complex threats facing our nation. Thats from the acting director of National Intelligence a very good man, Joseph Maguire. Our country is the strongest its ever been economically. Our numbers are henomenal. Wilbur, thank you, larry, and everybody. Numbers are phenomenal economy is the strongest in the world, largest economy in the world. Had my opponent one, we would be second right now china was catching us so rapidly, we would have been second by this time. Unless somebody does a very poor job, were going to be first for a long way we picked up trillions and trillions of dollars in value and worth of our country and china has lost trillions and trillions of dollars and millions of jobs and their supply chain and they want to make a deal this year, america came to the United Nations stronger than we have ever been before. Since my election, the United States has not only brought our economy to a level weve never seen, the most jobs weve never had. Youve heard me say it many times. Africanamerican, asian american, hispanic american, best unemployment numbers weve ever had and the most and best employment numbers. 160 million. Very close to that number in jobs weve never been anywhere close. Wages are up and inequality is down something that people dont like writing about. Wages are up i used to speak during the campaign and i would talk about wages where people were making less money three years ago than they were making 20, 22 years ago. When i say three years ago, im talking in the area some time prior to the election. And they were doing very badly now for the first time in many years, wages are up and employment is up and unemployment is down in a week of active and ambitious diplomacy here at the United Nations, america renewed our friendships, advanced our values and made it clear to everyone that the United States will always defend our citizens to promote prosperity. I met with Prime Minister Boris Johnson at length. The united kingdom, continuing our discussions on magnificent new bilateral trade deal well see what happens with respect to brexit. I suspect well have a fantastic deal with the uk it should be a much bigger deal. Thats true with many countries. Well have much bigger trade deals with other countries that have an opportunity to come. They all want to do business with the United States, especially now earlier today, i stood alongside Prime Minister abe of japan, friend of mine, great gentleman. Had a great reelection. And we signed a terrific new trade deal which helps our farmers and ranchers and technology, really big beneficiaries. We held productive conversations with leaders of pakistan, india and many other nations achieving stronger ties of fair, res resiprocal trade we talked about cashmere whether its arbitration, remediation, ill do whatever i can. Theyre at very serious odds right now. Hopefully, that will get better. Look at the two gentlemen heading those countries, two good friends of mine i said fellows, work it out. Two nuclear countries,theyve got to work it out this week we also made incredible strides on National Security with president duda of poland, signing a joint declaration advancing defense cooperation. And theyve agreed to put up 100 of the money, something i dont think youve ever heard said before, hosting additional u. S. Military personnel from various other countries. Well be moving them around. Poland is building a phenomenal new facilities, spending everything theyre going to really do a job. Well be moving a few thousand soldiers together with Prime Minister lee of singapore, signing an important agreement extending our defense cooperation. This hasnt been changed in many years. And yesterday i met with perspective members of the middle east, sta teenlgic alliance, a group i know very well i know all of them through this effort the nations of the middle east are taking more responsibility for securing their own future and their own neighborhood theyre also reimbursing us and paying us for a lot of the military work we incredibly do because were now independent energy wise, were energy independent, we have very few boat goesing over to the middle east we used to have them going through the straits all the time you probably noticed that they havent gone after ours. Theyve gone after others. If they go after ours, theyll have a problem im not looking for trouble but if they do go after american boats theyre going to have trouble. But they say we dont see american boats over here anymore. Guatemala, honduras, with e s salvador today great young gentleman became president. Hes tough taking care of crime very impressive with him today and likewise with honduras, who we met we signed a Cooperation Agreement with both and also quali guatemala. Were trying to make a significant difference at our southern border. President Lopez Obrador has been outstanding and outstanding partner and he is doing a great job in mexico. The cartels are way down the numbers are way, way down. Were doing that without the help of congress, meaning the democrats in congress who wont give us a single vote to take care of loopholes. We have loopholes that are so horrible and would be so easy to fix. They know they should be fixed they dont want to give trump any credit its all about the election. Thats all they care about they dont care about our country. They care about the election with all the tremendous week weve done, whether its secretary mnuchin or pompeo, who had outstanding meetings, with all this tremendous work weve done, the press doesnt even cover it and the democrats did this hoax during United Nations week its perfect because this way it takes away from the tremendous achievements that were taking care of do iing that were involved in at new york city at the United Nations that was all planned like Everything Else. And the pitch hunt continues they look at the information, its a joke. Impeachment for that when you have a wonderful meeting or wonderful phone conversation i think you should ask actually, that was the second conversation i think we should ask for the first conversation also. I cant believe they havent theres a rumor out there, want the first conversation it was beautiful it was just a perfect conversation i think you should do that i think you should ask for vp pences conversation he had a couple of conversations also i could save you a lot of time they were all perfect. Nothing was mentioned of any import other than congratulations. But the word is that theyre going to ask for the first phone conversation you can have it any time you need it. And also mike pences conversations, which i think there were one or two of them. They were all perfect. Its very sad what the democrats are doing to this country. Theyre dividing, belittling, demeaning our country. So many leaders came up to me today and said sir, what you go through, no president has ever gone through and its so bad for your country. People laugh at the stupidity of what theyve asked for here, we could doasylum, all these Different Things so quickly. Loopholes and get rid of them. We make deals with mexico, guatemala, el salvador, honduras were doing it with them instead of with congress it got little coverage i went to the border its going up in new mexico, arizona. They really wanted that wall in san diego. They were begging me for a wall. I should take it out and move it to another location. We were with the governor, spoke to him a lot the governor of texas, Lieutenant Governor of texas, attorney general of texas, the senators of texas. Ted kroourz. Were building an incredible wall its going to be impossible to cross unless youre one hell of a mountain climber its very tough. It will be very tough to get people and drugs over those walls because theyre the real deal i went to the secretary of homeland security. He got all those people together i said give me four walls. Your optimum, every single thing included and they gave me 20 less, 20 less, 20 less, meaning 20 less we have the panels on top, anticlimb panels. I dont know if you noticed the steel on top we have a different design for a different area anticlimb is very tough we had people going out, real climbers, telling us which is the toughest to climb. These are anticlimb panels. Very tough to get across the wall is going up many miles a week we hope to have over 400, maybe as much as 500 miles, which will pretty much do it. You have natural barriers, mountains, really rough land that you cant cross easily. We think well have over 400 we could even have 500 miles to combat the malice corruption of the venezuelan and iranian dictatorship, i issued proclamation of entering into the you state of senior regime officials and their families and further to promote American Values on monday i was proud to be the first president in history to host a meeting at the United Nations im so surprised first president for this i cant believe that im first i spoke to franklin grim about that i cant believe it at the United Nations on protecting religious freedom and liberty for people around the world. Well some partisans and elected bureaucrats may choose to fight every day against the interests and beliefs of the American People, my administration is standing up for the american in lass in many many years you forgot the American People you totally forgot the American People this week every every week i really can say of my presidency were standing up for american prosperity, American Security and the american way of life and together with our friends and partners were building a more peaceful and promising future we have a tremendous relationship now with a lot of nations that are very happy with whats going on. And that includes in south america where theyve been so helpful, where nobody thought this would be possible the relationship with mexico is an example or el salvador or honduras or guatemala. Nobody even knew about it. Yeah we sent them hundreds of millions of dollars. And all we got back was caravans of people pouring in we had tremendous we had tremendous it was terrible. And weve got that stopped and the countries are now helping us and we stopped the payments by the way. We dont pay those countries that money anymore but i will tell you if theyre as gootd as they seem to be, theyre really doing a job on crime and stopping the wrong people from leaving and coming to the United States well be helping them a lot with Economic Development projects and other things so with that, we had a tremendous three days. It was beautiful to see. Made a lot of new friends. I read you a list of all the countries i saw, pretty much oneonone and its been very busy. But its been very railroad fruitful we could take couple of questions. Id love some questions on some of the things we accomplished at unga instead of phoney witch hunt questions which i know thats what you want to ask, because its probably better for you. But its not better for the country. Maybe well take a few questions, please. Thank you, mr. President. You suggested that you didnt do anything wrong in the course of your conversations with the ukrainian president. But can you explain to the American People why it is appropriate for an american president to ask a foreign leader for information about a political rival and what you would have said if you discovered that barack obama perhaps had asked a foreign leader for information about you before the campaign for the presidency. Well thats what he did, isnt it really when you think about the whole witch hunt was started and hopefully that will come out but there have been some fantastic books written that just came out, whether you look at greg jarrett or mccarthys book that just came out recently and so many other books. A lot of books are coming out when you read the books you see what they did to us, with what theyve done to this country a disgrace hurt this country very badly and no other president should have to go through what ive gone through the president the new president of ukraine is looking to stop corruption there is a lot of corruption going on and there was corruption i just told you about senators that threatened him with votes and no money coming into ukraine if they do things. Thats what people are trying to say i did. But the only difference is i didnt do it you look at the call it was perfect i didnt do it there was no quid pro quo but there was with biden and the senators and they threatened they said you do this, you do that, were not giving you votes thats thats the real deal so we have an honest group of people that have been maligned and, you know, its a lot of people say ill do ill do even better. Im very happy yesterday i guess we had a 53 poll and a lot of people say add ten points to anything anybody voting for trump you can add any time you get a poll you can add ten points or seven points or six points take it anyway you want. But i dont know if i consider that to be a compliment. But in one ways it a compliment. And i guess thats what happened in the last election far more people came to vote than anybody thought possible. Why should the American People then be comfortable with an american president asking a foreign leader for information about american citizen. Well, i think you could look at your senators and look at biden and look at all the other people but what were looking for is corruption an investigation started called the russian witch hunt affection italy and it was a total phoney scam it was set up by people within the government to tray and stop somebody from getting elected. And after that after that person namely me, won and convincingly won at 306 to 223 in the Electoral College, which by the way when you run a race if you run electoral if you go by the college, Electoral College thats a much different race than running popular vote and its like the 100 yard dash or the mile. You train differently. And i cant help it that my opponent didnt go to wisconsin and should have gone more to michigan and pennsylvania and other places but thats the way it is we won an election convincingly, convincingly and then you had the text message on, well, if she doesnt win weve got an insurance policy how bad was that you know what the insurance policy thats sort of what has been taking place over the last number of years, the insurance policy now, there are a lot of very dishonest people were the ones that played is it tragt. You know, the millions of people out there that are looking at whats going on, those people understand it. They see it. And they think its disgusting and our people are being hurt and our country is being hurt. When a nancy pelosi allows her position to be taken over by radical far left socialists or worse, thats pretty bad thats pretty bad. Especially when the senators and all of these other people have actually done what theyre accusing me of doing which i candidate do im going to have mike pompeo say a couple of weers words. Ill have Steve Mnuchin say a couple of words and then well do a couple more questions the mr. President , i thought id start by talking about iran. We had a productive week we saw the europeans take a position with respect to the attacks that took place in saiv, making clear this was iran, just as President Trump and i had been saying. And have now joined us in saying that the existing jcpo aframework is not going to work, not going to create middle east stability then we had meeting with the middle east allies as well the president joined for a meeting of the gcc where we talked about how we can help deter we want peace, we want a peaceful resolution with the Islamic Republic of iran we hope we can get that. In the end its up to the iranianen. Whether she choose violence and. We hope we can get the opportunity to negotiate with them get an outcome that good for both them, for the United States to make sure that they never have Nuclear Weapon aband that they cant foment terror with Ballistic Missiles in the way they have around the world i think we made Real Progress uniting the world on that here over the past few days thank you. Thank you, mike as secretary pompeo said on iran we had very good discussions with all our allies about the sanctions program which is the maximum pressure and unitien oh the sanctions program, the europeans making it clear they would not do anything without our consent. Then on the economic front we had the entire Economic Team here for the meetings, secretary ross, larry kudlow, ambassador lighthizer just left to go back to d. C working hard on trying to get usmca passed but we had a lot of productive discussions, the japanese trade deal and a lot of discussions on investing in the u. S. , more jobs in the u. S. , and more trade. Thank you. Okay. Go ahead, please. Thank you,s krissen that ill leave it to everybody else about impeach pmtment markets reacted positive processly after you spoke with china rather it would happen sooner than rather than unexpectedly yet the foreign minister of china says they have no sbepgs of unseating the United States. And yet they invest heavily in fraz and military. Not anymore maybe. What is the. Maybe they just say that. What is different this time the fact you are saying its progressing. I think its progressing. I want to make a deal. Theyre losing the supply chain. Do you have something specific. I dont want to say that but i can tell that you these two men and in this case more specifically steve were having very good conversations. And i guess its next week that a group is coming in and the week after so we have a lot of talks going on and also by telephone. They want to make a deal and you know why they want to make a deal because they are losing jobs. And because their supply chain is going to hell and companies are moving out of china. And theyre moving to lots of other places, including the United States. And thats not good thats far worse than they thought. By the way, in the meantime we are taking in billions and billions of dollars in tariffs were taking in tremendous numbers in tariffs and were helping our farmers who get targeted now by the way china is starting to buy our agricultural product again starting to go with the beef and all of the Different Things, pork, very big on pork but if you look and if you see and they actually put out i think a statement but they are starting heavy to buy our ag again. They want to make a deal and they should want to. The question is do we want to make a deal . If usmca doesnt pass through congress is that it for nafta. Thats a a shame. You know how i feel about nafta. I think thats the worst trade deal ever made although i also happen to think World Trade Organization was not one of the grates not one of the greats that was the creation of china which went like a rocketship from the day she signed. It was terrible. But no were going to find out thats going to be a very interesting question