Be nauseated by the companies that have already reported with the sole exception of tech, which is once between getting a pass. We could have more days like today where the dow lost 174 points, s p tumbled. 62 , nasdaq shed. 63 . It was much uglier at one point during the day. What makes me so sure earnings season could actually be so difficult . I think its because were rooting for lower inflation and less wage growth. But so far we just arent getting that scenario. Oh, yeah, we had a onetwo punch today of a hotter than expected Consumer Price index coupled with a Government Bond auction of 30year treasuries that fell flat. Causing the bond market to get crushed while the yields soared. What the heck is the government even doing offering a 30year treasury right now . They know nothing its the birkenstock of bonds. To reference an ipo that smelled like dirty feet. Pricing 46 bucks just before falling to 37 and change after the first two days of trading. Another day like today and it will be buy one get one, bogo. So much for barbies shoes. The market will come up with a negative interpretation for whatever comes their way and the pain the house of pain. Tends to lass for more than one session. Now, i dont believe in trying to game earnings because its just too hard. But postearnings i am flabbergasted how tough this markets become. We do have a sneak peek of how it reacts to earnings, though. Pepsico, the true starting gun of earnings season, and it reported an excellent set of numbers two days ago. Not only did pep crush the estimates, they gave you a glorious forecast and uncharacteristically they also gave you a forecast for next year. What a confidence booster. Hallelujah that was easy. Except today the stocks down hideously. Not just because no one believes pepsico will be immune to the new weight loss drugs but because its now seen as too expensive. You arent going to he get a win in a stock that sells for over 20 times earnings especially when the Underlying Company makes fattening foods even if they promise to change their stripes or make smaller packages. These new weight loss drugs are still roiling everything in the food and beverage space. Theres a lot of denial and its a conundrum for Food Companies that havent seen any decline in their businesses like pepsi. Pepsi actually saw an acceleration of sales. I thought the quarter was terrific. If they begin to say they adjust to these drugs, i dont know, maybe smaller packages, they dont seem to know its not the size of the package, its the fact that these new weight loss drugs make snack foods seem repulsive. They take away your cravings. And without the craving a greased up potato chip is no longer appealing. Even if you still like them youll eat three and then youll be full. Given that possibility, shouldnt pepsicos stock trade at a much lower price to erin aings multiple . Its a subject of business. Should pepsico trade as low as the stock of conagra at ten times earnings or maybe calnova . General mills at 14 times earnings . Good company. These food stocks were all way tooexpensive going into earnings season and now were finding out how people really feel about their suddenly not so safe Business Models with three and change dividend yields versus the 20year treasury safety blanket at just over 5 . And thats really the reason why the stock of pepsico cant catch a break. Speaking of stocks that are too rich in value, hormel, a stock weve liked very much over time, did an aristocrat. It ran into a buzz saw today at its analyst meeting. It was a pincer move, higher costs and hidden worries about the glp1 drugs because they have plenty of stuff in their product line that could make you obese, if you really went to town, that is, unless you were taking wegovy or mounjaro. Were now at a moment when people dont know anything about these drugs other than the fact theyre vultures picking the liver out of the pro meetingian packaged goods companies. I always wanted to use prometheus in the show and i just managed to work him in. Now, you shouldnt fear everything. You can always come into the earnings season derisked and ready for upgrades. This morning walgreens, youve been there, ive been there, reported a suboptimal set of numbers. Carl quintanilla asked me about it. I tell him it was time to buy buy buy buy buy buy buy you see, theres a new person running walgreens, a Knowledgeable HealthCare Industry veteran. Exactly what is needed at this company. And he will reinvent it. Soon im betting it will no longer be what i call a theft machine. When i was in San Francisco a couple of years ago i saw the person in front of me at a now closed walgreens rob the register using a knife. No one seemed to think anything of it. It was just another day at work. And then i was in del rey i saw a thin man stuff his sweater to the point where it looked like he needed wegovy. I mention td to the woman at the register. She said thats okay, hes in here all the time. Never thought of that. Now, i dont think that the new Ceo Tim Wentworth will zone out like that. I dont think hes going to tolerate having his stores get robbed so easily. More important hell be the person who steers walgreens toward being not just drugstore but your health care company. Ive been thinking about this. Im going to come up with something. Its a brainstorm. Stay tuned. Focus. Its hard to shoplift health care. I hate that a nearby Walgreens Pharmacy where i literally spent thousands of dollars sent me some stupid form letter that its closing this week. Its bad enough i cant get anyone to help me open a lock to buy some gillette razor blades which of course i now have on an amazon subscription. I dont know if wentworth can truly change the stores. Maybe the whole place should just be one endless line of vending machines anyway, the Health Care Business is not an afterthought. Thats why i think walgreens is a good buy even though i can only wonder how the do not forget, walgreens wholeheartedly embraced theranos before it was revealed as a total fraud. Now were on the eve of the banks reporting and i think these companies are already defrocked, derisked, whatever you want to say. Bank of america which sells at eight times earnings slink down to seven . Im not sure. But i know it has more room to run if the reports say anything good. Were partial to wells fargo for the Charitable Trust which is coming in at a blistering eight times earnings. With a 3. 5 yield. If Ceo Charlie Scharf can say anything positive at all i think the stock can jump. The problem is that pesky yield curve. We know the bond market wrecks the banks at every turn. Clubbing them like you know what i say. Thats it. We have to be wary of being too negative. If the bond market behaves like it has the last couple days, if theres no new issuance of longterm paper by the treasury they know nothing if we get some less hot economic numbers then we will stabilize. But right now the combination of higher rates and these drugs that impact diabetes, obesity, renal failure, heavy drinking and strokes and even high blood pressure, not to mention sleep apnea, have been anathema to the stock market. Especially the overvalued packaged food plays. Bottom line, when the price to earnings multiples are too high and the yields are too low, youd better deliver a perfect quarter or else your stocks going to get pancaked. The problem is pepsico did report a perfect quarter and hormel had a pretty darn good analyst meeting. But when we were finished you were digging into a can of spam with some doritos and i think a market fueled by wegovy and mounjaro is not ready for that particular combination. Hence why im worried about earnings season and im saying it could be a pretty rough one if the backdrop makes things more difficult. Unless a stock has already been hammered into oblivion. Randy in california. Randy caller hi, jim. How are you today . Randy, i am in good shape. How about you . Caller im great. Im trying to diversify for my grandchildren and i want a stock that i can sit on for 10 or 15 years. And im looking at caterpillar for two reasons. The past decade its doubled its stock price. And weve got all the infrastructure money thats going to be trickling down to the states. So your opinion randy, youve got what i call horse sense. I think jim appleby is an amazing ceo. Hes turned caterpillar around. Im not kidding, theyre about trying to make money. I know that sounds like a shocker, but believe me, the old caterpillar, ha. Now, heres the thing. The infrastructure moneys coming. The dividends going to go up. There will be a buyback. I think you should buy it right here. My Charitable Trust owns it and were really proud of it and were going to buy more if it comes in. How about we go to tyler in california. Tyler caller big booyah from california. How are you doing, jim . Im doing well. Getting over my quadruple hernia like it was yesterday. Caller nice. I wanted to ask you about instacart. What do you think . Instacart. They also call that thing what is it like cry baby or something, maple tree . Heres what i think about instakart. They know nothing sell sell sell the house of pain. They know nothing going back on that one because i like if. Did i miss oh. How about this . [ boos ] and finally im throwing this one in because i like the bull. Uhoh. Oh, my. And i did a 140 with a bad elbow. Brian in pennsylvania. Brian. Caller hi, jim. Thanks for taking my call. No problem. Caller i do want to mention that even though im a mets fan i am rooting for the phillies in the current series. Yes yes and its tonight. And ill tell you, bryce harper stared down that shortstop. I mean, what the heck . Making fun of h. O. F. . Not on my watch. Whats going on . Caller jim, my question is over the summer i bought some shares in tmobile and they recently announced the intention to pay a dividend but they havent declared the x date or the official amount per share yet. I want to know what your feeling is on that and if i should buy more. Let me tell you something. This thing is run by a guy i am by the name of mike seaver. And he is about as good as it gets. And theyve done a fabulous job. Its the only one of the three telcos that i am recommending, and i think you can buy more tmobile. My hat is off to them. Theyre just phenomenal. Okay. Right now the combination of higher rates and high multiples is setting us up for a little more dangerous earnings season than im ready for. Look, it never pays to be too negative. But its becoming clear that the bar has been set a little high for a lot of companies. On mad money tonight i know the street shows its love for the jobs report, but ive set my sights on something new. The stealth contender in the data realm that you need to know about. Im sharing why i think the cpi may soon see its star rise as the age of inflation anxiety continues to unfold. It is not like the age of aquarius. Remember that play . I dont have it. Then yesterday we hosted our monthly meeting for cnbc investing Club Subscribers and we couldnt get to all of your amazing questions. So we decided to keep the momentum going with another round tonight. You dont want to miss it. And delta airlines, symbol dal, released earnings. The stock fell in response. Weve got to figure out what the heck happened. So stay with cramer announcer dont miss a second of mad money. Follow jimcramer on twitter. Have a question . Tweet cramer. Madtweets. Send jim an email to madmoney cnbc. Com. Or give us a call at 1800743cnbc. Miss something . Head to madmoney. Cnbc. Com. swords clashing had enough . No. Arthritis. Here. Aspercreme arthritis. Full prescriptionstrength . Reduces inflammation . Thank the gods. Dont thank them too soon. Kick pain in the aspercreme. This is american infrastructure, a prime target for cyberattacks. But the same aipowered security that protects all of google also defends these services for everyone who lives here. I always tell you that the labor departments monthly nonfarm payroll support is the single most important set of Economic Data we get from the government. Last friday we got a good one. Strong job growth. Paired with lower than expected wage inflation. That number ultimately allowed the averages to roar and fueled this weeks rally. The feds making Real Progress in the fight against inflation. But if the jobs report is the most important Economic Indicator the Consumer Price index, cpi, has become the second most important, at least in this era of concern about inflation. I call that, by the way, ecai, era of concern about inflation. Thats an acronym that i just made up. Ever since we realized that inflation was a serious problem, really for the first time in decades, this remember it was too high yet better than fared cpi reading on october 13th of last year. Last year, thats when the averages bottomed. A year ago. More recently the august 2023 cpi reading delivered on september 13th came in high, up 3. 7 year over year when wall street was looking for 3. 6 , with the biggest month over month increase in over a year and thats been disastrous for the stock market. A sign that inflation remains stubborn and the fed will need to lower the boom on us. A week later they started talking about keeping rates higher for longer. In response the averages got steamrolled. For weeks it was the cpi that did it. And thats why we were paying such close attention this week when we got the cpi. We had a pool going for september 2023. And what did we learn . First, this is really important. The socalled headline numbers were a touch too high. The overall Consumer Price index reading was up. 4 month over month. And up 3. 7 year over year. Both about ten basis points, thats what we call them, thats that little number at the end, points higher than what wall street was looking for. In slightly better news, core cpi reading, which strips out food and energy costs because theyre so variable, was in line with expectations. That was good. Up. 3 month over month and up 4. 1 year over year. It was good, not great. But it was the too hot overall cpi reading that controlled todays action. The yield on the benchmark tenyear treasury which was at 4. 51 and tame just before the report came out, spiked to 4. 65 and vicious just after 10 00 a. M. , before moving higher in the afternoon after a bad treasury and closed the day at 4. 7. This is a very big move. Stocks take their cue from the bond markets particularly when you have big moves like this. So the averages did roll over. In premarket trading the dow actually looked like it was going to be up 150 points. But once we saw these numbers the whole market gradually rolled over. As it just looked more negative. Thats the surface level story here. But the cpi reports chock full of information. Lets dig deeper. The overall Consumer Price index number can be broken down into four subgroups, food, energy, every other commodity and services exexcluding energy services. Ever since inflation peaked last summer theres been Real Progress in all categories except for services. For the sixth cpi reports before today Energy Inflation actually went negative. Food inflations been declining steadily. And inflation from every other commodity has also pretty much gone away. So how did the september numbers turn out . Lets take a look bucket by bucket. The first energy came in negative for the seventh straight month thanks to the big decline in fuel oil that was down 5. 1 year over year. And especially utility gas service, which was down about 20 . Having said that, energys been helping less and less for the past three months. In september Energy Prices were only down. 5 year over year thanks to the runup in crude. Second, commodities exexcluding food and energy didnt hurt us either. That category was almost perfectly flat year over year. While we had low single digit price increases in apparel we also saw an 8 plunlage in used car prices. That specific mix seems vulnerable to me. With the oil strike getting worse and new car prices already going up, used car prices according to car percent, you cant expect used car prices to keep falling, right . Going forward, we might need to see prices to cool off in these other categories to make up for that. For the time being, though, this bucket isnt the issue. As for the food category, it could have been worse. Food inflation tbz to decelerate. Probably dont know it if you go to the supermarket it seems like its still high, up 3. 7 year over year, mostly driven by restaurants with a 6 increase in food away from home. Not great. But if food was the only problem this would have been a very encouraging cpi report. The real issue here is services excluding energy. And that was up 5. 7 . Year over year. Way too high. Thats thanks to a 9 uptick in Transportation Services and a 7. 2 increase in shelter price, meaning rent. Medical care actually got cheaper, down 2. 6 . That offset big spikes in housing and transportation. Thats what powell cares about. While these numbers are not good, it shouldnt come as a surprise to anyone plane tickets are more expensive, Ride Sharing Services have raised prices and rents too darn high. That said theres a case to be made that were likely to get . Relief on both fronts going forward. The Airline Stocks are healthied right now because investors believe consumers are increasingly tapped out while Many Airlines have added capacity creating more competition. Meanwhile, as the job market cools youll see more lyft and uber drivers, which might help tamp down those prices too. As for shelter the stickiest of all, look, average Mortgage Rates are marching steadily toward 8 . Youd Better Believe thats going to impact the price of homes, which will eventually filter down to rent. Even before the cpi report came out this morning there was an important report from Appraisal FirmMiller Samuel prepared for the big Real Estate Brokerage davis hellman. They say median rents actually slipped in september, industry rates rose and new lease signings went down. Now, one month does not a trend make, but its encouraging. Despite the marketwide pullback today i dont think many people will overreact to the cpi. According to the cme fed watch tool which measures the likelihood of a fed rate hike based on fed funds futures. Well likely have a rate hike at the next meeting barely changed. Now only at 11. 8 up slightly from 9. 1 yesterday. Still down significantly from 20 a week ago. In the end the cpi report wasnt great but it wasnt that bad either and investors kept their composure taking the slightly too hot inflation number in stride. At one point it looked like stocks might end the day in positive territory. The rally started too late as far as im concerned. It really put the kibosh on the rally with that bad treasury auction of the 30yearing offering by the u. S. Government. That caused an increase in longterm rates and that was hideous. Bottom line im just glad weve gotten through the two Major Economic reports of the month without any major issues. Now we can finally move on to earnings season which uno unofficially kicks off with a handful of big banks reporting tomorrow. At last we can make our buy and sell decisions based on what individual companies are saying, not based on the latest macro developments. Personally, i cant wait. Announcer coming up deltas profit took off after a strong summer. But will fuel costs knock the stock back to the economy cabin . Stick with cramer. Meet gold bond daily healing. A powerhouse lotion that moisturizes, heals, and smooths dry skin. With 7 moisturizers 3 vitamins. And. New gold bond healing sensitive. Clinically shown to heal moisturize dry, sensitive skin. Gold bond. I got the cabin for three days. Its gonna be sweet what . Im 12 hours short. Have a fun weekend. Unnecessary action hero unnecessary. Was that necessary . No. Neither is a blown weekend. With paycom, employees do their own payroll so you can fix problems before they become problems. Hmm get paycom and make the unnecessary, unnecessary. See you down the line. What do we make of the airlines . I know you care about them very much. After we heard about what delta air said this morning. Its been a wild ride. As the world recovered from the pandemic the airlines soared on the back of a postcovid travel boom. That was that long on money short on time thesis that i talked about constantly. The boom got rolling in the spring of last year but by the end we got to the end of the summer and ive got to tell you something, it started hitting some real turbulence. Sell sell sell worried about the health of the consumer, whos also still feeling the pinch from inflation. Doesnt help that student loan payments came back last month actually this month. At the same time the price of oil has rebounded hard from its lows. Meaning airlines will be squeezed by higher fuel costs. Since the highs in july, the jets, jets etf, which tracks the group has fallen 28 . In part thats because weve seen a bunch of negative preannouncements from the airlines. Just last month Spirit Airlines and frontier both lowered their Third Quarter guidance. Spirit blaming heightened promotional activity. Frontier talked about operational challenges. These two Budget Airlines are heavily weighted toward lower income consumers, though. Whereas the Larger Airlines tend to have more exposure to premium customers. Maybe spirit and frontier cant tell the full story. But we also heard from american airlines. We get a call on that every week. Who despite raising guidance on available seat growth lowered their forecast to total revenue per available seat mile as well as cutting their operating margin and earnings per share guidance. American blamed fuel costs. Fair enough. The one airline that were really interested in, though, is delta. This has long been my favorite. Since 1982 i started recommending if you wanted an Airline Stock you had to do delta. Last month delta preannounced Third Quarter results in an industry conference. They actually raised the midpoint of their forecast in revenue and revenue per available seat mile but they also cut their Earnings Guidance thanks to fuel costs. In response the stock tumbled 9 through the preannouncement through last nights close. This morning we got the full results from delta. What did we learn . Lets go over this. Starting at the top delta delivered 13 Revenue Growth. In line with the preannounced outlook. And actually slightly above what wall street was looking for. The small revenue beat was driven by slightly hirer available seat miles which is Industry Speak for capacity. While deltas total revenue per available seat mile was down 2. 5 year over year. That was also in line with their guidance. Overall the Company Still managed to cobble together an eightcent earnings beat off a 1. 95 basis. Thats 35 Earnings Growth year over year. Thats not shabby. Yet the stock ended up falling more than 2 today. Because after the big preannouncement we cared much less about the results, much more about the forecast of the Conference Call commentary. Similar to what we heard in deltas preannouncement last month, they saw strength in hiring customers in the premium cabin. By the way, these are not business. Premium cabin for the most part is travelrelated. Up 70 coming in an oppressive 39 . First class and Business Class are doing fine. No wonder transport costs were up big in the cpi report, right . This is real bad news for lowcost carriers like frontier and spirit because it means that theres been a split between the highend travel and lowend travel with highend holding up much better. In an interview earlier today with cnbcs very own phil lebeau deltas Ceo Ed Bastian noted hes seeing some softness in certain segments, mostly on the lower fare side of the industry. But also he stressed deltas very different from those lowcost carriers. Listen to this. We got premium, which is continuing to drive the strength of the business. Weve got international, which was gangbusters. International revenues were up 35 themselves in the quarter. Weve got a tremendous amount of businesses starting to return. We talk about postlabor day wed see a takeout. We see a lot of it starting to come back. I like that. I thought he had a lot of good things to say. What about the health of Corporate Travel . Lebeau also posed the question he noted the Airlines Seen ten more points of market share return the last 30 or 40 days luckily driven by all the companies that have mandated return to the office of late. That means no more zoom, got to go see the customer. Of course if everythings so great why did the stock get hit today . It was the guidance. While delta raised its full year Revenue Growth forecast to 20 that was the high end of the previous range they also cut their operating margin growth, their guidance 50 basis points. Slashed their Earnings Guidance to the low end of the prior range. Delta had been talking about making 6 to 7 bucks a share. On top of that the company cut its Free Cash Flow forecast from 3 billion to 2 billion. Thats terrible. Higher fuel and maintenance costs. If delta was going to cut its full year growth and maintenance numbers they when they preannounced to the down side last month better just to rip off the bandaid. What do we do . Despite the guide down a lot of what i saw from delta actually makes me feel more sanguine about travel rather than an end to the travel boom we might just be experiencing some turbulence. Of course this doesnt apply to the entire industry. We think that lowcost carriers are going to struggle. But deltas going increasingly highend. That business is holding up fine. How about the cost side of the equation . Well, managements done a good job of cutting costs that they can control. The airlines are still hostage to oil prices and with another war in the middle east its hard to argue that fuel costs are going to come down too much from these levels. Heres the bottom line. The most important airline has reported. Deltas results tell me that you need to get a lot more selective if you want to own any airline here. If youre willing to stick your neck out and own one and make no mistake about it, thats what you are doing, sticking your neck out, it needs to be like delta with a High Percentage of premium seating and a bigs International Business because thats whats working here. Given the stocks already down nearly 30 from its highs in july. But remember, youve got to be prepared for turbulence. Sell sell sell buy buy buy joseph in new york. Joseph. Caller hey, jim, how are we doing . Joseph, im doing fine. How about you . Caller fine, thank you. Im a senior here. Im sitting on the. Com having a cocktail and i thought id call you for some insight. Can i join you . Can i just join you . I have right now i would like a id take a tanqueray and tonic. A slice of lime, please. Caller i listened to the ceo of a company there. He sounded very optimistic. He has some good plans. I see theres a lot of insider buying. A lot of the officers have bought shares. Whats your insight on lyft . I went positive on david risher because i think hes so good. A couple people called me and said jim, you know, hes rusty, he doesnt have it. I dont know. I think hes terrific. And we need two of these. We cant just have uber. My betting is on i am this with rish. You cant see it. But im taking all the chips and going in on rish. How about mary in idaho . Mary. Caller hi, jim. Nice to talk to you again. My grandmas name is mary. So you make me feel good about this. Nana mary. Caller great news. I do feel better about it. Due to the uaw strike continuing and expanding and the pullback it seems to have on the manufacturers stock prices, i hold a position with both stellantis and ford and im wondering what your recommendation is, to buy more, hold what ive got, sell what ive got and youve got to hold. The price to erin aings multiples are so low it tells me the estimates are too high. I thought ford was good to put ought the best and final. My Charitable Trust owns it. Its a horrible chart. And the union i think i have to call now. I think the unions got to do a deal because its going to hurt the whole country. Deltas results are in. Its time to get more selective in the sector. But if you want to stick with an airline here you have to pick one with a Business Model like delta. Much more mad money. One of my favorite analysts in the show is getting to talk directly to cramericans. Were taking questions from you cnbc investing club members. If youre not a club member, what the heck are you waiting for . Then yesterday we got news that excel was buying Pioneer Natural Resources 60 billion. The ftc watching all of mows megamergers like a hawk. Should there be concern when it comes to getting a deal done . I dont know. We own pioneer. And of course all your calls rapidfire in tonights edition of the lightning round. So stick with cramer when youre looking for answers, its good to have help. Because the right information, at the right time, may make all the difference. At humana, we know thats especially true when youre looking for a Medicare Supplement insurance plan. Thats why were offering seven things every Medicare Supplement should have. Its yours free, just for calling the number on your screen. And when you call, a knowledgeable, licensed agentproducer can answer any questions you have and help you choose the plan thats right for you. The call is free, and theres no obligation. You see, medicare covers only about 80 of your part b medical expenses. The rest is up to you. Thats why so many people purchase Medicare Supplement insurance plans like those offered by humana. Theyre designed to help you save money, and pay some of the costs medicare doesnt. Depending on the Medicare Supplement plan you select, you could have no deductibles or copayments for doctor visits, hospital stays, emergency care, and more. You can keep the doctors you have now, ones you know and trust, with no referrals needed. Plus, you can get medical care anywhere in the country, even when youre traveling with humana, you get a competitive monthly premium, and personalized service, from a healthcare partner working to make healthcare simpler and easier for you. You can choose from a wide range of standardized plans. Each one is designed to work seamlessly with medicare and help save you money so how do you find the plan thats right for you . One that fits your needs and your budget . Call humana now at the number on your screen for this free guide. Its just one of the ways that humana is making healthcare simpler. And when you call, a knowledgeable, licensed agentproducer can answer any questions you have and help you choose the plan thats right for you. The call is free, and theres no obligation. You know medicare wont cover all your medical costs. So, call now and see why a Medicare Supplement plan from a company like humana just might be the answer. You might have missed it. Yesterday we held our investing Club Monthly Meeting where my colleague jeff marks and i go through the thought process for the club, discuss our current holdings, and take some member questions. It is one of my favorite things to do because i love answering the questions from club members. And we always have more questions than time to take them. So thats why we thought maybe wed do some leftover ones tonight and give you a taste of what our monthly meeting looks like. Its a different part of me, a little different you get a little mix it up here. And if youre not a part of the club and want to be, and i want you to be, well, you can be a member. You can open the camera on your phone and scan this qr code. I even know how to do this. You do it by the one behind me and then you become a member or go to cnbc. Com investingclub. See this . I have this on my shirt and like i have one of these. You hold your camera up to it and it tells you what to do. But you have to get the little yellow things. My daughter told me to wait for those. And she was very angry once when i couldnt figure it out. But now im good to go as ive figured it out. So can you. Like a menu. You know . First up were taking a question from brian, whos from hawaii, who asks what do you think about the direction of the oil as an investor . Is it time to exit oil before it heads farther south . I rely on technicians on this and also rusty brazil from rbn. Com. My technicians carly garner. They both thought it would stall out between 95 and 100. I shared that with you. It was like an exact bingo call. And i think that these stocks you know, we had a huge home run in this pioneer. Huge. Because we got the exxon deal. I think you should always have one or two of these. We have a natural gas stock called coterra. Weve interviewed the company a couple times. Its just fantastic. Why dont we take a second question . This one is from jim who says, jimmy, everyone when i was growing up in philadelphia, they all called me jimmy, i need some love for sofi. I know you said earlier this year this is it. Whats up with sofi. Sofi was at 4 we were at the big ceo council. And he came on and said listen, i am not in trouble, the bank is fine, we got no real bad loans, were doing terrific. I asked if we needed to do equity. He said absolutely not. And then we proceeded to get a run to where i cant even reach, thats how high it is. Now, we then got hit with a wave of profit taking. And then if you notice right here, this is where all the banks went down, including sofi. Now, all the other banks, though, didnt go up like this. Theyre all still down. So i think we have to think twice about being critical about anthony noto. I think hes doing a very, very good job. All right. Now lets just the bank stocks, theyre horrible. Now lets go to wesley, who asks, im watching the food sector stocks crater. Conagra, campbells, dar, which is like i dont know. You really dont want to own that. Its more of a rendering company. Theyre at the 52week lows. Their p e values are near single digit. Why are they so out of favor . Should i take a small position . Is there a leading indicator of a change in direction . Yields tended to buoy them and keep them up because treasuries were so low. Now treasuries you can get a 20year piece of paper which is my fave for 5 . Thats riskfree. You get your money back, 5 . You dont get that out of a conagra, which also has 5 . Campbells has a little bit lower than that. Then the second thing is this glp1s came along. Now, these are very specific drugs. Wegovy and mounjaro. And these are drugs you take them you shoot up sorry, i shouldnt say shoot up. Its like an injectable. Thats what they call it. Injectable. And its 1. 0. And you put it in your leg or put it in your stomach, wherever you want and then you start losing weight. And if you start losing weight you know what happens, youre eating less because you dont want the food. So you have these Companies Like campbells soup. And lets say you would have this is a good example. Lets say you have the chicken gumbo. I like the chicken gumbo very much. You put a can, then you put a can of water in and then you put it in a microwave. You would only feel like after you had half of it like man, im done with this. Whereas you probably would have just scarfed it up before. And thats the problem. The volumes of these Food Companies, you just dont need as much. And thats why their stocks are going down, because people feel as these things become more mainstream and maybe the Insurance Companies pay for it you wont need the volume of food. Thats why the food stocks are what i call in flux. Lets go to another question. Another jim. Weve got a lot of jims here. Boeing stock continues to slide. What are the factors for deciding its an opportunity to buy . David faber used to make fun of me because we owned it for the trust. He with finally gave up. It was too horrendous. The problem is boeing is very specific. I think that it is not run as well as it should be. I think you need to be hands on, youve got to be in the factories every minute, youve got to be talking to people, building coalitions, youve got to be knowing your workers. Youve got to figure out whats going on, make sure theres no errors. And boeing i dont thinks done that. If i were to run boeing dont put anything out. Id like to run a big company before im done. I would be on that factory floor every day going to the south, going to northwest, because thats what it takes to build a plane. Okay . Boeing builds the best planes but you need that help. Next we have a question from robert in florida, who asks do you think nee is a good longterm buy at these levels after the big price drop . The answer is no. And ill tell you why. Because i cant figure out why this one fell so deep. And ive made a ton of calls on textera. It is acting so funny i cant get in it. I have to make a lot of calls to figure out whats going on and then forget about it. That means its way too hard for everybody because ive got contacts everywhere and i cant figure it out. You want to join the club . Lets say youre regina gilgan, shes my executive producer, she should take the cell phone oh, she has the flip phone. Never mind. Mad moneys back after the break. Announcer coming up, cramer takes your calls and the sky is the limit. Its a fastfire lightning round. Next. This is Spring Semester at fairfieldsuisun unified. They switched to google tools for education because theres never been a reported Ransomware Attack on a chromebook. Now theyre focused on learning knowing that their data is secure. hi, my name is damion clark. And if you have both medicare and medicaid, i have some really encouraging news that youll definitely want to hear. Depending on the plans available in your area, you may be eligible to get extra benefits with a humana Medicare Advantage dualeligible special needs plan. All of these plans include a Healthy Options allowance. A monthly allowance to help pay for eligible groceries, utilities, rent, and overthecounter items like vitamins, pain relievers, firstaid supplies and more. The Healthy Options allowance is loaded onto a prepaid card each month. And whatever you dont spend, carries over from each month. Other benefits on these plans include free rides to and from your medical appointments. 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If youre eligible, they can even help enroll you over the phone in a humana Medicare Advantage dualeligible special needs plan. So, call now. Humana. A more human way to healthcare. Only the sleep number climate360 smart bed lets you both sleep up to 13 degrees cooler or warmer on either side, and at your ideal level of comfort. Your sleep number setting the allnew queen sleep number® c2 smart bed is only 880. Sleep next level. Shop now only at sleep number. It is time its time for the lightning round on cramers mad money. Buy buy buy, sell sell sell play until you hear this sound and then the lightning round is over. Are you ready, skeedaddy . Time for the lightning round on cramers mad money. Ill start with raj in california. Caller this is raj bagai from california. Chargepoint. No, thats losing money. Were not going to touch it. Tibs in indiana. Caller im wondering what you think of phathom pharmaceuticals. Gas troes very tough. I mike in nebraska. Caller how are you doing . Im doing well. How about you, partner . Caller im doing good. Lazr. Losing too much money again. Auto related. We have to say no to that too. How about we go to john in illinois . John. Caller hi, jim. In 2024 weve got amd, intel, google and microsoft putting out ai chips. What is the effect of this on Taiwan Semiconductor . I like Taiwan Semiconductor very much. My only risk there is china and i am concerned but i think it will be okay. Lets go to george in arizona. George. Caller hi there, jim. This is george from green valley, arizona. Good to have you on the show. Caller wondering what you think about exxon. Ive been trading i like exxon very much. Very wellrun company. They do a lot of great things. I think it has been one of my longeststanding recommendations and you should buy the stock. Lets go to mark in wisconsin. Mark. Caller dr. Cramer, thank you for taking my call. My pleasure. Whats happening . Caller okay. Bought this Semiconductor Stock as a spec. Develops cuttingedge Technology Using gallium nitrate. Also theyve just been certified carbon neutral. The first Semiconductor Company in the world to be so certified. So should i be buying more ticker mvtf . So many semiconductors are making a ton of money here. Were not going to buy one that is actually losing money. Were going to have to say no to navitas. Now we want to go not sure who we should go to. Maybe we go to smitty. Smitty, whats up . Caller hey, jimmy chill. I am fourth time caller, very longtime and a very happy club member. Oh, thank you. I hope you liked yesterdays club meeting. We tried so hard, jeff and i, to put together a good narrative. Hope you liked it. Caller it was awesome. Jimmy, the company im calling you about again is there has been a lot of insider buying to the tune of about 2 1 2 months ago a director bought 41 million worth of stock. Two weeks ago another director bought 10 million worth of the stock. And then i believe the ceo even bought some. The company im calling about is biohaven. Oh. Okay. This is this is vlad chorch. And i think vlad is oh my god, the stock just had such a big move. I dont know. You know vlad. He did nurtech. Fantastic. American Migraine Foundation chief spokesperson. And he developed it so ive said good things about him. What can i say . Lets go to kevin in ohio. Kevin. Caller cramer, whats happening, man . I dont know, big guy. You tell me. Caller all right. So the street told me this week that there was a lot of love for defense contractors out there, right . Correct. Caller lets mix it up a little bit. All right . Who has been getting a lot of love out there . Rtx corp. Thats because of their commercial business has gotten very tough because they had a problem with that one engine. I dont think we can touch it still. I like your spirit but you wouldnt to be in Northrop Grumman or lockheed martin. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the conclusion of the lightning round announcer the lightning round is sponsored by charles schwab. Coming up, is exxonmobil enough to steer this merger past an adversarial ftc . Cramer has more. Next. Explore endless design possibilities. To find your personal style. Endless hardie® siding colors. Textures and styles. Its possible. With james hardie™. Its possible. Heres why you should switch from chrome to duckduckgo. Duckduckgo is a browser you download to your mobile and desktop devices. Unlike chrome, the duckduckgo browser has privacy builtin. It comes with a private alternative to google search, which doesn■t spy on your searches, and it blocks cookies and creepy ads. And theres no catch. Its free. We make money from ads, but they dont follow you around. Join the millions of people taking back their privacy by downloading duckduckgo on mobile and desktop today. If your company isnt big enough to sustain itself why not merge with a larger operation and make more money together . For me that defines exxons acquisition of Pioneer Natural Resources, a big Charitable Trust name where pioneer shareholders like the trust will get almost 60 billion worth of exxon stock. But what if the federal trade commission is against it . What if the government says its anticompetitive or argues it will stifle innovation . Thats certainly the reaction many of us rec from the ftc. Pioneer, while exxons got 6 . Together thats 15 independent past regulators would never have a problem with one oil company having 15 of a particular shale play. But our current ftc director lina khan shes more ideologically opposed to mergers than her predecessors. If you look at the deck for the merger exxon emphasizes that by combining their technology theyll give a great return to pioneer shareholders. They talk about generating doubledigit returns by controlling costs and the deal should be immediately accretive to earnings. The best outin the permian basin. There are 1 billion in synergies by the second year, even better by joining forces theyll produce 150,000 more Barrels Per Day than they could do separately. Thats what a mergers supposed to be about. Winners on all sides. And yet you know what i heard instantly from a lot of people who follow mergers, the federal trade commissioner, lina khan, will try to block it. I dont know if thats true. But given the ftcs recent track record of making specious arguments to block large deals i could see them going there. Maybe theyll hold pioneer is such an important supplier for gas stations that the buying entity is going to foreclose its rivals for its own economic benefit to consumers detriment . Which is the argument the ftc used when they tried to block microsofts takeover of activision. They claimed it would enclosing competition. Maybe the ftc will say there will be less competition because drillers wont want to work for the combined entity for some reason. Maybe bundling clauss also known as synergies that includes many firings with workers paying the price. The usual litany of antibusiness charges. Because lina khan sees all mergers as anticompetitive attempts by the richer to get richer at the expense of everyone else. Like it or not capitalism is legal in the united states. Thats why the ftc might try to block this deal on the thinnest of pretexts. Although when they do this they tend to get challenged in court and lately judges have begun to shoot them down. No competition would be stifled here their market shares too small 15 of one particular region thats nothing Rockefeller Standard Oil had 100 of the entire market. Now, thats concentration. If the ftc does block the deal theyll be keeping 150,000 barrels a day off the market at a time when the whole countrys desperate thrower the price at the pump. I think the deal will also keep the cost of drilling down bay creating an excess supply of labor that knows about the drilling. America benefits from exxon acquiring pioneer you benefit but lina khans ftc has such a dogmatic hatred for all merge merzers they might try to fight it th anyway. If thats the ethos i wish theyd come sxot say it. Right now lawyers are telling companies do not make any acquisitions because the ftc will try to block it no matter what, they say wait for i anew chairperson. Thats the state of play right now. The current ftc may be divorced from the laws theyre supposed to enforce. Heres what i have to say to lina khan either do your actual job or own up to your antibusiness agenda and simply announce that all deals will be blocked no matter what. Does it matter that capitalism, the law of the land, not to this ftc, not to lina khan. Unfortunately the Biden Administration doesnt seem to have a problem with khan. Presumably they could rein her h. E. R. In if they wanted to. They must like the way she thinks. Fortunately the judiciary hasnt gone crazy. So they have overruled khans ftc in some cases but fighting them in court makes the whole process of merging a lot more complicated the ftc stands to have a huge chilling effect. And that is bad i would contend not just for business but for everyone. I like to say theres always a bull market somewhere and i promise to try to find it just for you right here on mad money im jim cramer. See you tomorrow. Last call starts now. Right now on last call, doubling down controversy around the israelhamas. Stomach uaw strike hitting the automakers and profitable plants. The union leader at the center will join us. Stomach a knockout blow for Sam Bankmanfried . Caroline ellison rubbing her explosive testimony, the lead prosecutor who took down bernie made off with a reaction. The end of power outages. A proposal shaking up the energy industry. Breaking chinas grip. A u. S