Good wednesday morning, im Carl Quintanilla with Morgan Brennan and jon fortt. The president this morning set to tour the mac pro Assembly Plant with apple ceo tim cook. Eamon javers will raise the curtain on that this morning. Reporter youre playing just the two of us and it is going to be about just the two of them. The unlikely relationship between donald trump, the president of the United States, and tim cook, the ceo of apple cook has spent the past several months cultivating a relationship with donald trump largely, im told, by going through the trump family having conversations about technology with Melania Trump at dinner at the white house. Talking with ivanka trump about workforce issues hes cultivated that phone call relationship with the president. I asked the president why he seems to have such a good conversational ability with tim cook the president told me a couple of weeks ago, the reason is because cook is the one ceo in incorporate america who actually picks up the phone and calls him when he has something to talk about. Today he is going to have something to talk about. Its those looming december 15th tariffs that could affect apple products that are made in china and sold in the United States. Thats a big problem potentially for apple. Tim cook is going to want to take the opportunity here to tell the president to hold off on doing anything that might damage apple in that round of tariffs. The president , meanwhile, has got a lot at stake on his own. He is going to want to tell the country that his Tariff Program is working apple is able to produce the mac pro here in austin, texas, because it got some exemptions to tariffs and, therefore, the Tariff Program is enabling american manufacturers to produce and sell products here in the United States thats the message youre going to hear from the president well see the two of them together here in austin later this afternoon, guys. All right, eamon, stick with us here. We also wanting to bring in josh lipton on this one josh, the optics here are a bit strange because the mac pro for those who arent familiar is a 6,000 computer. The manufacturing process in austin does not require a lot of people its highly automated. Even that apple is saying they were going to have to move to china under these tariffs. So is this really providing the sort of backdrop the president wants to get his message across . Yeah. So a couple points i think youre dead on, jon, the mac pro is not going to be some type of high volume product, a 6,000 product it carries higher margins. You could argue at a time when other products are seeing slowing sales, every product maybe counts a bit more. But i think it is a chance for apple also in addition to sort of emphasize some broader themes it can emphasize, listen, were an american company, american brand, a big american employer remember, tim cook does employ roughly 137,000 people he can point to austin where he has 7,000 employees now. Apple says thats up 50 over the next five years. I thought its interesting the company did emphasize too were on track for that big bogey of this 350 billion contribution to the u. S. Economy by 2023. Those are all values that are important to this president , that are important to this administration, which is going to make a decision about whether companies do or dont earn those exemptions with those new levies potentially coming next month, guys. Eamon, so the president and s tim cook are going to be touring this facility, this final assembly for the computers but theres also this groundbreaking happening in austin as well so both of these things are happening simultaneously reporter apple has announced they have already done the groundbreaking of the separate facility so theres a bunch of different apple buildings in town. The place where well see the president and tim cook is actually not owned by apple, its owned by a contractor called flex and thats where they assemble the Mac Pro Computers you guys have been talking about. They have been very tightlipped about this whole thing we dont know exactly what were going to see other than a factory tour we dont know if well see remarks by the president and by tim cook here in austin, texas we dont know what the messaging is going to be from the president exactly. And we dont know whether were going to hear specifically from tim cook or any of the workers at this facility its apparently a nondescript facility, a suburban office park type vibe. Inside we might see some of the assembly that manufacture some of these components. Hey, josh, some of our viewers might remember a few years ago when the president said that tim cook had promised him three big plants in the United States. I wonder if theyll try to frame this as a step in the direction of fulfilling that promise yeah, three big plants. So, carl, listen, if you talk about the supply chain, apple designs and engineers all its products here. So in cities like cupertino and austin but most of those products are assembled in china it is hard to see how youre going to see those basic Assembly Line jobs come back here for any american executive, that would be a challenge obviously your costs would surge. You would have to take a hit to your bottom line, eat that or maybe youd try to raise the price on your products and risk denting demand its not to say that apple and other companies dont prioritize manufacturing jobs in fact youve seen apple do just that with its advanced manufacturing jobs, so making these investments in corning and finasar. But different jobs make different sense here in 2019. Just to make sure everybody understands the framing, the mac pro is being built here already. This isnt some brand new trump era thing happening. It was being built here already and they were going to have to move it to china because of tariffs. Also interesting in tim cooks strategy in engaging the president , eamon, i dont know if youve taken note of this as well at dreamforce just yesterday, i believe, he was on stage with mark benioff, hes vocal with how he disagrees with the administration issues like dreamers, he talked about hundreds of dreamers employed by apple. Many in retail who hes personally spoken with and theyre pushing hard against the administration there, but theyre going to take a nice walk today, eamon. Reporter thats right, jon tim cook is caught between two very hard rocks here, right . On the one hand hes got his employees in liberal Silicon Valley and a lot of the apple fan base, which are on the liberal side of the political spectrum, dont like this president very much. On the other hand, the other rock is this enormous financial interest that apple has in avoiding these tariffs on december 15th. If he can provide a platform for the president that the president is pleased by today, really give the president politically something to crow about, stroke the president s ego a little bit, if thats what it comes to, then tim cook will be putting his company in a better position financially. But the politics and the economics of this might be on opposite pages for tim cook today. Josh, how important is austin to apple im sorry, i missed that, morgan how important is austin and putting additional investment dollars into austin. Why is that so important to apple . Well, its important that theyre committing a billion dollars to build out this campus they did reiterate they have 7,000 people there, thats a jump of 50 . Like i said, this is they do assemble their products overseas, but its in places like austin where they design and engineer them. So it is critical, morgan, to that company all right bear in mind apple is having its best outperformance against the s p this year in about a decade, going back to 2009, so the stock has just been a monster. Guys, thanks you bet meantime, the biggest names in travel are in hollywood, florida, this morning for this years focus right conference. Seema mody is there and joins us with a special guest. Thank you joined by glenn fogle, ceo of booking holdings thank you for joining us here on squawk alley. Thanks for having me. Lets talk about some of the disruptors in travel the industry has long known about the ambitions of google in the travel industry but this quarter we really got to see the pain that google is starting to inflict. Booking fared better than some of the others, but still your stock is down 10 in the month of november. Expedia is down 30 . Whats happening here . Well, look, we are very happy with our Third Quarter numbers we came in 11 up year over year, better than the street expected earnings per share 20 adjusted eps. Thats really good numbers were happy with whats going on we like what were doing some of our competitors may have had a little of a hiccup certainly they may depend more on google than we do one of the things thats very important to us is getting people to come to us direct, by providing a better service, something that customers want. Were able to have them come direct and people depending on google or anything else, that could be their issue. Lets address the role google is playing given the emergence of this Big Technology player in travel, is more consolidation like ly in th travel space we built our company by doing acquisitions were always looking for what may fit and what may be good the truth of the matter is, though, whether youre a big player or small player, youve got to provide a Great Service if you can do it by buying another company, thats great. Were doing things organically thats putting together the connected trip, providing all the services, not just hotels anymore for us we have flights going, we have our open table doing restaurants, weve got attractio attractions, rental cars were putting together something thats so much better that people say, hey, im going to booking. Com. The decline youve seen in room rates, does that suggest softness in the consumer, the consumer pulling back on travel . Well, our numbers we dont see as being very soft 11 year over year is pretty good at our size we are the biggest player in the travel industry in terms of room nights so were pleased with that number. There are some areas of softness and i talked about that. You see things happen between the u. S. And china that impacts chinas economy, that impacts china travel. China outbound from the u. S. Is actually down year over year thats a surprise. Look on tv and you see things happening in hong kong not a lot of people are going to hong kong. Germany, soft economy there. Sluggishness there, that impacts. But overall travel is healthy and were pleased with whats happening. Jon fortt has a question back in studio. Hi, glenn i just heard you mention hong kong and i believe you mentioned before when talking about room rates being a bit soft that hong kong was an area im hoping you can give us some sense whats happening there are hotels discounting in hong kong to try to drive people back there . Hows traffic . And is that affecting the rest of asia . Yeah. Seeing whats happening in hong kong, you have a lot of people saying, gee, im not sure i want to travel to hong kong right now. When you have occupancy rates of a hotel go down, one of the first things theyll do is start cutting rates. As those rates go down, some people may say its a good time to travel. Other people say i just dont know if i want to go there or not. Certainly thats a way hotels will always try to get demand by dropping rates. Airbnb gearing up to go public next year how does that affect the way you try to gain market share in the shortterm market space . Our first apartments was more than 15 years ago so weve been in this business some time we have 6. 2 million listings in what we all the alternative accommodations, which is what goes against airbnb. Im pleased with the way we do the business be able to hshow a home, apartment and a villa on the same search result most times you dont know where you want to stay, youve got to look at the different options, look at the prices, look at the reviews. We offer all of that in one place. Whats really important, we dont at the ending of the funnel where youre ready to check out, we dont hit you with a travelers fee thats something our competitors do we dont do that also instant confirmation. Nothing more annoying than if you go to a site and you have to go back and forth with the host and then the person says to you, oh, i dont want to renting ito you. Booking. Com, every single property instant confirmation. You press go and youre done. Morgan has a question back in studio. I do, thanks, seema glenn, hi. Sticking with this part of the business, weve seen a reining in, in some cases a crackdown on a regulatory standpoint on home sharing. Jersey city here being probably the most highprofile recent example of it. How are you navigating that . Yeah, no, that is an important issue. We always believed that proper regulation is the way to go. You have a lot of stakeholders its not just the host, not just the traveler and not just us, its also the communities and taxes. You want people playing appropriate taxes for any type of accommodation so its definitely something we work with those regulators. We want to come up with something that is fair and equal for everybody. As long as theres a Playing Field that is level for everyone, were all in favor of it. Youre one of the more disruptor disruptive players in the Online Travel space, glenn. Youre not only an Online Travel company, the largest of them all, but you have investments in china. You also were one of the initial backers of facebooks libra, its stable coin. Three weeks ago you pulled out why . Well, look, we always say that we want to be involved in things that we think can be better for our industry. One of the things is lower the cost of transferring money around we have a lot of payments that are going around between a customer who wants to stay somewhere and then theres a host who has to get paid there are lots of different ways to get that money from one place to the other we are definitely interested in looking at that so we said, sure, well look at it having looked at it a bit, we decided maybe for us well just pull back and wait and see what happens because most important is that the regulators have to be comfortable with whatever comes up is good for everyone. So if the regulators approve that libra stable coin, wed be in favor of being part of it, or Something Else one of the things you probably saw is china is developing their own stable coin coming from the government under the peoples bank of china, theyre developing that. Theres an announcement in europe a few days ago where they say they should come up with their own stable coin too. I believe in the future using some type of blockchain way to transfer money around is going to be a better, more efficient, easier way to do it. We need to come up with something that is good, that is safe, we can deal with the privacy issues all the things you want to do. So you could support faceboo or another company if the regulators approve it, well be a participant any way to do any type of financial conditions. Jon back in studio. Glenn, i want to understand your Digital Advertising strategy in q2 Brand Marketing for you guys was up 41 . You said that was to drive direct traffic, which is important to you in the most recent quarter it was down 23 so i know that youre saying that direct traffic is important. Do you no longer need that Brand Marketing to drive that traffic . Are you just managing the comps year over year whats going on . Look, Brand Marketing is an important leg of any marketing table, you want to have that year over year for 2019 over 2018, we are up. Now, youre right, in the last quarter we were a little lower than we were the year before and i made that point both in the current call and the call before while we had new campaigns out that i thought were doing well, there were some areas i wasnt pleased with and overall it was okay we have a new cmo at booking. Com. Im very pleased that hes come in only for a few months were going to work with new things, see if we can come back with things that are even better we are not stopping Brand Marketing. But our company was built on experimentation. If things dont work, were more than willing to pull back, go back to the drawing board, come up with Something Better and go back at it. Morgan. Glenn, a lot of focus on the state of the consumer, health of the consumer this week, especially as investors digest retail earnings that have been a mixed bag. How would you describe the health of the consumer right now, especially given the fact that there had been some he headwinds in terms of Global Travel this year again, ill divide between global and u. S. Domestic globally its healthy with some pockets of problems. The u. S. Is a little bit better right now. The way i look at these things is look at occupancy rates in hotels, theyre up look at load factors on planes planes are filled. Look at what airlines are putting out in terms of what theyre filling on their planes, those are good numbers so i think its pretty healthy. The travel industry is weathering many storms, but right now as we head into a new year or close out 2019, whats the biggest risk you see right now . Well, look, there are so many risks. I go to sleep thinking about all of them all the time one of the benefits no matter what the risk is, your point about long term, weve been through a lot. Ive been in this business now 20 years weve had horrific problems from 2000 on yet travel continues in the long run to grow were the biggest player in the industry, so we can afford, any time theres a dip we can invest, come up with new things. Were able to spread our expenses across a much larger base and therefore we have an advantage over almost anybody in the space. Glenn, we appreciate you making time for us today. Thank you. Glenn fogle, ceo of booking holdings jon, coming up on the exchange ill speak to the founder of hotels coming up at 1 40 p. M. Eastern. Absolutely. You took the words right out of my mouth ive got a lot more from you coming up, looking forward to it everybody else, a lot more squawk alley still ahead stay with us [spokesman] if youve tried college but never finished, group cheering snhu lets you transfer up to 90 credits toward you bachelors degree. [woman] it doesnt matter how old you are, you can do it, you can finish. [spokesman] finish your degree at snhu. Edu cannabis stocks recovering a bit this morning after a losing streak regular risks, profit struggles weighing on sentiment. The nations largest cannabis retailer had a narrower than expected quarterly loss. Joining us now boris jordan is here at post 9 good to have you back. Good to be here. Talk about whats happened fundamentally and why you think sentiment has turned so weak. I think the fundamentals in the industry in the United States are only improving quarter on quarter were seeing substantial growth in all the Major Companies some companies are a little further behind their development so theyre still losing money. Curaleaf has turned the corner so we think youll see in the fourth and First Quarter a move towards positive net income as well and were growing at 300 a year so seeing substantial growth as far as the strong prices, i think what youre seeing is that canada has not performed as well were seeing but i think theres structural problems in the Canadian Market which need to be resolved because cannabis stocks are much wider invested in, it has a wider audience because its legal federally so anybody can invest in cannabis stocks. Weve seen u. S. Stocks go along with canadian stocks even though u. S. Results are far better. When you talk about the structural problems in canada, how much of that is regulatory and if so, what does that mean in many terms of lessons that can be learned as we see it legalized by states here in the u. S. It is regulatory for the most part in canada, you have two problems the first problem is that you have had federal government controls the sales points for cannabis they actually do the ordering of cannabis into their stores and because they didnt roll out the stores fast enough, you dont have the high demand coming into the stores as you would. Secondly, you dont have the products so if in the United States we basically have all products from a flower in its natural form all the way to edibles, vapes, different kinds of lotions and things like that, so you have a very different product mix canada doesnt have the products and has a government thats controlling the distribution. What should investors know about florida as a market thats important for your space youve got more than a quarter million registered patients, i believe, there you had a bit of a supply shortage in october, but things are looking better there youre really building up a big presence in that market. How much is it a bellwether . Florida and california are definitely the two biggest markets. New york if it changes some of its rules will be the third biggest state. Florida is a big important part of our business. Number two, we are behind in florida. Were the number two operator there. Not only is there 250,000 patients, but theres a backlog of 120,000 that are trying to get their cards. The state just cant move fast enough to register so its a very important state we expect it to be over 400,000 patients at the endi of next year and theres five of the Top Companies presenting there so i think youll see more and more companies doing well on the back of florida. Meantime, curaleaf is he headquartered in massachusetts you have lawmakers voting today on a ban of flavored tobacco that has extended to a certain extent to medical marijuana, vaping too how has that affected the company and how do you expect that to play out i think you have to distinguish between tobaccoflavored vaping and cannabis vaping. Tobacco, our teenagers are getting hooked on that with medical cannabis you dont have the same flavor problem the problem in thc cannabis was the vitamin e. I think weve now seen even the cdc came out and said that was a vitamin e problem. If you look at most of the tests that were done, none of the regulated stores and regulated product had vitamin e in them, so it really is a black market issue. We actually see that as a positive what will happen is people will start to migrate from the black market to the regulated market in order to get safe products. Will that happen on its own or do regulators need to press on the black market even more . Our opinion is regulators need to press on the black market the whole idea between legalization is move the product out of the black market. You probably remember during the prohibition period when people were going blindi this is the same thing people are buying them thinking theyre regulated and theyre not. If you buy from a regulated store in the state, youre not going to get that kind of a product. See if behavior changes given the news of the past few months. Well watch it youve got support from b of a today so its good to see you. Getting a check on where we standing across the major averages this morning, its a mixed picture. The dow and the s p both slipping further from their recent record highs. The dow is down 67 points. The nasdaq is in positive rror jt rely were back in a moment it was sophies big day. By the way, shes the next mozart. As usual we were behind schedule. But sophies enthusiasm cannot be dampened. Not even by a runaway donut. We powered through it in our toyota prius. Because a stars got to shine, no matter what. Its unbelievable what you can do in the prius. Toyota lets go places. But when i started seeing things, i didnt know what was happening. So i kept it in. He started believing things that werent true. I knew something was wrong. But i didnt say a word. During the course of their disease around 50 of people with parkinsons may experience hallucinations or delusions. But now, doctors are prescribing nuplazid. The only fda approved medicine. Proven to significantly reduce hallucinations and delusions related to parkinsons. Dont take nuplazid if you are allergic to its ingredients. Nuplazid can increase the risk of death in elderly people with dementiarelated psychosis and is not for treating symptoms unrelated to parkinsons disease. Nuplazid can cause changes in heart rhythm and should not be taken if you have certain abnormal heart rhythms or take other drugs that are known to cause changes in heart rhythm. Tell your doctor about any changes in medicines youre taking. The most common side effects are swelling of the arms and legs and confusion. We spoke up and it made all the difference. Ask your parkinsons specialist about nuplazid. Most people think of verizon as a reliable phone company. woman but to businesses, were a reliable partner. We Keep Companies ready for whats next. man we weave security into their business. Virtualize their operations. woman and build ai customer experiences. We also keep them ready for the next big opportunity. Like 5g. Almost all the fortune 500 partner with us. woman when it comes to digital transformation. Verizon keeps business ready. Welcome back, everyone im sue herera heres your cnbc news update at this hour. Defense secretary mark esper says the u. S. Is providing vietnam with a surplus American Ship for its coast guard speaking at the Diplomatic Academy in hanoi, he described the need to protect resources from what he says is chinese aggression. Combined with reclamation and militarization of outposts in the south china sea, chinas unilateral efforts to assert illegitimate Maritime Claims threaten other nations access to vital resources, undermine the stability of Regional Energy markets and increase the risk of conflict iranian president rouhani telling his cabinet the days of protests in iran were the result of a conspiracy involving regional actors as well as the United States. The unrest over rising fuel prices has killed at least 106 people across the country and thats according to amnesty international. Pope francis arriving in bangkok for the beginning of his threeday visit to thailand. He will meet with the countrys supreme buddhist leader as well as all of the catholic bishops of asia. You are up to date thats the news update at this hour back downtown to you on squawk alley. We continue to monitor the impeachment hearings with republicans doing theylan mui h reporter Gordon Sondland has been trying to draw a distinction between the conditions laid out for a white house meetings to the ukrainians and the conditions that were laid out for aid republicans are very likely to seize on the fact that sondland explicitly said that neither President Trump nor Rudy Giuliani ever made a connection between the investigations and aid. President trump never told me directly that the aid was conditioned on the meetings. The only thing we got directly from guiliani was that the burisma and 2016 elections were conditioned on the white house meeting. Reporter but democrats were able to press sondland to acknowledge that he eventually came to presume that the reason why security aid had been withheld was because there was yet to be a public commitment to the investigations is this kind of a two plus two equals four conclusion that you reached . Pretty much. Is the only logical conclusion to you that given all of these factors, that the aid was also a part of this quid pro quo . Yep reporter now, guys, the white house has said that President Trump would be watching parts of the hearing this morning so far, carl, we have seen the white house official twitter account post a message that said new hopes, same swamp. Back over to you. Yeah. Some reporters saying leaving the white house to get to austin well watch the president s schedule today, ylan, thank you very much. Earnings mover of the morning is target, hitting an alltime high earlier, surging after a big beat across the board, raising its outlook comps up 4. 5 , stocks up 12. Best day since august really about eight bucks away from doubling for the year. Were back in a minute people talking for every dollar you spend at a small business, an average of 67 cents stays local. Shop small and watch it add up. Small business saturday by American Express is november 30th. people talking for every dollar you spend at a small business, an average of 67 cents stays local. Shop small and watch it add up. Small business saturday by American Express is november 30th. The amount of Student Loan Debt i have, im embarrassed to even say. We just decided we didnt want debt any longer. I didnt realize how easy investing could be. Im Picking Companies that i believe in. I think sofi money is amazing. Thank you sofi. Sofi thank you, we love you. Welcome back to squawk alley. The president set to meet with apple ceo tim cook in austin, texas, just a few hours from now where the two will tour the manufacturing plant where the mac pro is assembled cook has gained more ground than other tech executives with the president with trump referring to the apple ceo as a friend of mine weighing in on this somewhat budding bromance is tech investor bradley tusk who joins us here as well as the former chief digital officer. Bradley, ill start with you what kl other companies, entrepreneurs, executives, learn from the way tim cook has been interacting with the president apple is an iconic, unique company so its hard for anyone to put themselves in apples shoes. But they have done a few things right. One is they recognized that they have customers with different political views and a business to run and have not conflated the two things youve seen uber conflate the two and make everybody mad and lose on all fronts tim cook says heres where my personal views are, heres my companys needs and wants and ill focus on that thats one two, trump read this somewhere this morning, cook calls him directly and gets him on the phone. Presumably every ceo cant just call the white house and get the president on the phone but maybe more can than you think. Because this president doesnt listen to his advisers and changes his mind all the time, hes the ear you need to be in you can hire great lobbyists and they can talk to the staffers, but the staffers have limited influence. Even if they get a yes in one meeting, it could be a no in the next. Is it a budding bromance or Good Business . It is Good Business we heard this morning that President Trump doesnt take the phone calls sometimes of his own staff and own ambassadors so here he is taking calls from tim cook i think that tim mr. Cook has done a really good job in really complicated waters he and apple are pro environment and pro immigration and those are things that are directly in competition with some of the goals of the Trump Administration but he has done a great job in navigating that. Bradley, you seem to imply im not sure the tim cook playbook is one that a lot of other ceos could follow. Apple is most of the time the most valuable company in the world. Its an iconic brand people seem to love their products the president cant say tim cook, whoever that is. He can. But i was thinking about that. Here are a few ways i think you could learn from tim cook and from apple okay. For example, later today apple is creating 20,000 new jobs in austin, texas. When amazon wanted to come here to new york city, they were only willing to do so for 3 billion in tax credits they got run out of town apple has created lots of jobs in new york and austin and other places they seem to just do what they need to do without having their hand out all the time. So thats one. Two, tim cook, you can agree or disagree with him on things, but it feels like he takes principled stands. Whether its on privacy or lgbt issues or immigration. If you believe that hes doing what he thinks is right, its a lot easier to say i can disagree with him on this and agree with him on that. So youre right, youre average ceo is never going to be apple, but i think apple has handled it well when other Companies Nearly as big like amazon or facebook really have not. I was surprised, sree, to see tim cook with benioff at dreamforce saying, yeah, were vocal with the administration when we disagree with them when it comes to dreamers or immigration. Right before you see the president youre openly talking about your disagreements not a lot of ceos would have those well, would have the guts. Guts is a good word for that. Id also say look at Companies Like foxconn and the entire narrative around jobs in america and how many jobs ivanka trump has created in america and compare that with apple and a couple of other companies that are really investing and making real jobs for real people. Those are things that resonate not just with the white house but with america at large. Thats what were seeing happening here bradley, how important is austin to apple . I mean theyre making this big investment theyre breaking ground on this new facility down there. Thats certainly in focus as well today, in addition to the assembly facility. Are we going to see more of that, especially in lower cost states like texas . I think you will. So number one, california has been very tough politically on Tech Companies in the last couple of years. One company saw costs go up 10 to 20 so i think they want alternatives with less regulation number two, it is so expensive to live anywhere near the valley that cost living is lower and its easier to attract engineers, easier to attract employees. Austin is a great city that produces engineers right out of u. T. In their hometown they have talent, better regulatory climate, better tax climate, Better Weather sometimes, and lower cost of living all right bradley, sree, thanks for joining us today well keep our eyes on this one as the day unfolds. Thanks. Still to come, the cofounder of lyft, what he told our wilfred frost ju a fstew moments ago. Thats next. Stay with us pe lace whe to learn about their medicare options. Before theyre on medicare. Come on in. Youre turning 65 soon . Yep. And youre retiring at 67 . Thats the plan well, youve come to the right place. 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With target soaring, well ask Pete Najarian what hes doing with shares as they hit a new record high. Plus the 2020 playbook with our Investment Committee and a top strategist from ubs wealth management. And well have three big energy names one firm says that are a buy right now. Its our call of the day well do that and more at noon morgan, well see you in just a few. Looking forward to it, scott, thank you. Wilfred frost sitting down with john zimmer just moments ago he joins us from new york with more from that interview wilf. Good morning, morgan. Indeed as you said just sat down with john zimmer the stock is down around 40 since the recent ipo i asked him whether he was feeling guilty about that fall and whether they priced the ipo too richly over our course of history, weve made a lot of our investors a lot of money i care about our employees, that have jobs from us, that have in some cases equity from us, so i feel a deep amount of responsibility i feel like the stock is undervalued and that weve had three quarters of beating expectations and that, yeah, over time people will see us put up more numbers and it will it will solve itself a lot more coming up in that interview, morgan, including competition with uber, potential international expansion, what it would take for lyft to buy a company like grubhub and also californias a. B. 5 law and whether that law was shortsighted or not coming up on closing bell at 3 00 p. M. Also another interview with rich barton, the cofournnder and ceo of zillow. Thank you. When we return, luxury auto brands in focus as the auto show kicks off this week. The ceo of mercedesbenz usa is with us right after this break were back in two. As usual we were behind schedule. But sophies enthusiasm cannot be dampened. Not even by a runaway donut. We powered through it in our toyota prius. Because a stars got to shine, no matter what. Its unbelievable what you can do in the prius. Toyota lets go places. Thats why Xfinity Mobile lets you design your own data. You can share 1, 3, or 10 gigs of data between lines, mix in lines of unlimited, and switch it up at any time. All with millions of secure wifi hotspots and the best lte everywhere else. Its a different kind of wireless network, designed to save you money. Switch and save up to 400 a year. And now get 250 off google pixel 4 during Xfinity Mobile beyond black friday. Thats simple. Easy. Awesome. Click, call or visit a store today. We take you to the south lawn president talking to reporters on his way to austin, texas. So thank you very much. Were going to austin, texas appear em is opening up a fantastic facility theyre spending a tremendous amount of money. Ive been asking tim cook from the day i got elected from the campaign ive been asking tim cook to, if they would, we want to see apple build here. That way you have no tariffs theres no tariffs when Companies Come to our country and they build, theres no tariffs the economy is doing unbelievably well. We continue to talk to china china wants to make a deal the question is do i want to make a deal because i like whats happening right now were taking in billions and billions of dollars. Im going to go very quickly, just a quick comment on whats going on in terms of testimony with ambassador sondland i just noticed one thing, and i would say that means its all over what do you want from ukraine, he asks me, screaming. What do you want from ukraine . I keep hearing all these different ideas and theories this is ambassador sondland speaking to me just happened. To which i turned off the television what do you want from ukraine . I keep hearing all these different ideas and theories what do you want, what do you want it was a very short and and abrt conversation that he had with me he said i was not in a good mood im always in a good mood. I dont know what that is. I just said now hes talking about what my response is. So he is going what do you want, what do you want, i hear all these theories, what do you want and now here is my response that he gave. Just gave. Ready . Do you have the cameras rolling . I want nothing that is what i want from ukraine. That is what i said. I want nothing i said it twice. So he goes he asked me the question what do you want, i keep hearing all these things. What do you want i dont know him very well i have not spoken to him much. This is not a man i know well. Seems like a nice guy though but i dont know him well. He was with other candidates he actually supported other candidates not me came in late but here is my response. Now, if you werent fake new, youd cover it properly. I say to the ambassador in response, i want nothing, i want nothing, i want no quid pro quo. Tell zelensky, president zelensky, to do the right thing. So here is my answer i want nothing i want nothing i want no quid pro quo tell zelensky to do the right thing. Then he says this is the final word from the president of the United States. I want nothing thank you, folks have a good time is that that is the presidene way to austin. Some comments in there on china trade and continuing to talk to them about a phase one deal which was originally floated as a deal on october 11th yes, and we should note what the president said there about apples facility in austin is not true maybe he misspoke. It is not a new manufacturing facility they have been manufacturing the mac pro there. They will continue manufacturing the mac pro there. The components that they need have a tariff exemption. So not as if apple is coming something new there. And they have been doing it with a Company Called flex which is also publicly traded. And i man j and i man jeamon javers, letsu reporter and he didnt take any questions from reporters those reporters at the White House South Lawn today were loaded for bear with questions from the sondland testimony which was relatively damaging for this president this morning. So the president not offering them the opportunity to get in with questions on that simply asserting his innocence and you can see his frustration what he has been seeing in the impeachment hearing. Meanwhile he is getting on the airplane coming here to austin as you have been talking about to visit this flex facility where apple manufactures the ma pro computers. And well watch the dynamic between President Trump and tim cook both men want something from each other, both men are a little bit you would imagine wary of each other tim cook was not necessarily a supporter of the president s nonetheless today they both need each other the president wants validation for his Tariff Program he says on the south lawn just there that ultimately hes been asking tim cook to build plants in the United States since his election tim cook needs the president to hold offer on some of the tariffs. He wants apple to escape scotfree december 15th if the president moves forward with any tariff increases so you can see that the president is coming into it with intense frustration about what is going on in washington. You know, i think a lot of what this highlights also is just how tricky some of these tariffs have been to the supply chains and to what it has meant to manufacture in the u. S. As well and in addition to apple, i think about Companies Like polaris that have final Assembly Plants here too, they import products and put it all together into their vehicles state side for consumers here how does this reflect back on what it has meant for apple to be able to make products like the mac pro here in the u. S. And how do you think that will prevail in the conversation or in the tour that we get between these would men today . Reporter in some ways apple is the poster child for the thing donald trump is trying to undo, which is globalization a lot of apple products are made in china iphone is the most important seller for apple, a Global Supply chain, a lot of the parts manufactured and assembled in china. Apple is saying here that they will assemble these mac pros, this is a 6,000 very high end computer here in austin, texas but that is a relatively small portion of their overall manufacture. And apple a is globalized company and donald trump is an anti globalization president ultimately if they were to shift phone manufacturing, that would be a big story. It would indeed they cant do it now because expertise doesnt exist here and so well watch that as the president aboards air force one. Meantime the l. A. Auto show is kicking of and phil lebeau is joining us with a special guest. Thank you nick speaks, the her smercedes First Electric goes on sale next spring yeah. You think the Tipping Point is close we will have to see dont put words in my mouth. We will have ten electric cars by 2022. This car will come next year as you say and then followed by two compact suv electric cars in 21. And then we will see how we can bring the American Public to love it as much as they love our cars already i know it is a which i cchic, but how do you get americans to say now i can believe in the electric vehicle i think it is getting cars on the road and having people speak of their experience positively and also a question of a little bit of pull from the electric standpoint, locally city access, someincentive is important but they are great cars and they happen to be electric. So you have the yourself in terms of performance and also in ben giting tefiting the environ. And you have run the operations in china for a number of years and you know the market well were seeing a slowdown. 16 straight months ever slower sales for the industry should we can be concerned i think that we like many other people have a significant footprint in china on any slowdown is a concern. I think that weve done a lot of work over the past years to bring the plan to a very positive level amongst chinese consumers. We have great partners in china, a great product lineup, a lot to make sure that our cars for china i understand. But you spend time there i dont see perhaps the same risks that i would see generally. But obviously any slowdown in china which is 24 Million People buying cars every year is going to have some effect. But im confident that we still have potential for growth in china. One last question this electric suv comes to market at a time when were seeing more and more ise insend stiffs for luxury vehicles are you worried. There is a book im reading that it says i have a very bad habit and it is difficult to play. It is difficult to break. I think that we have to look at the prices in the u. S. And we are significantly better than others but nevertheless it is something that is of concern Going Forward for sure nick speak, did a nice job, first time talking with us here. From the l. A. Auto show. Back to you. Come down and see us. Dont need to ask us twice. Great stuff as we continue to watch what has been happening at global autos well get fed minutes this afternoon and the president is now on his way to austin a big story both for the white house and for apple. For now lets get to the judge im scott wapner this hour, on target a blowout quarter, is this the best retail stock to own it is 12 noon and this is the halftime report. Target hitting alltime highs on the back of strong earnings we go shopping for other retail winners. Energy the worst performing sector this year, but a number of stocks in the Group Getting hit with a buy call. Well break them down. And betting on growth. Well tell you which stocks will lied the way in this market. The Investment Committee is ready to go. Halft