Transcripts For CNBC Closing Bell 20170815

Coach, advanced autoparts and even home depot is on the red and thats dragging the dow down well tell you whats behind these big moves. Four people have left President Trumps Manufacturing Council in the wake of trumps reaction to the deadly violence in charlottesville this weekend. Is it a sign President Trump is losing support from the Business Community in general. And after the bell our friend Mohamed Elerian talks about whether geopolitical tensions and north korea could still be a risk factor. Always look forward to talking to mohammed. Lets take a look at the ugly day for retail Courtney Reagan has all the numbers the numbers, the big numbers, the High Altitude numbers were good, but the stocks are just getting slammed today, courtney. Reporter and i think thats the point, bill. If you look at the stock movement, you may not realized there was actually good in todays retail report, though it wasnt really the case for dicks Sporting Goods. Shares here hitting sevenyear lows after missing across the board after particularly the comp sales and guidance sharply off what analysts are looking for. The Sporting Goods and retail apparel says its going to increase discounting for the rest of the year to try to hold on to market share weakness and hunting, licensed goods and Athletic Apparel more than offset the strength that it saw in ecommerce, footwear and golf shares there down almost 22 consumers may not be buying hunting equipment, but they are spending on their homes, so home depot is beating acrosstheboard Streak Continues this quarter comp sales, again, much stronger than expected, particularly in the key u. S. Market. The strength is broadbased across merchandise categories and gearing physical doityourselfers and pros as a result, home depot upping its fullyear sales and earnings forecast, but shares getting dumped on all that retail pessimism anyways. Coachs quarter mixed with an earnings beat, but due largely to a lower tax rate. Revenue missed, comp sales stronger than anticipated, though at a lower rate of gross margin some charges in the quarter are clouding whats really happening with coachs business. Those shares are down 14 . Marshalls, t. J. Maxx and home goods Parent Company tjx beating on revenues and comp and its guidance on the fullyear earnings below the street. It the does have a conservative history when it comes to that though, so investors are looking past it for tjx shares, at least slightly higher. Thats the one where were seeing some green. Bill still amazing that home depot can putter a better than 6 comp and its not enough. Right. And i think part of of this also, courtney, maybe even back me up or disagree with me, we just highlights more for me that we have too many retailers numbers are good overall consumers are benefiting but not all retailers are because they are beating each other up to gain market share at the expense of profitability. Reporter more retailers and more distribution points than ever before. For a long time youve been able to order on the phone or catalog and now you have online hand the store, and the retailers are trying to give you everything that you want all the time were very fractured youve got small names like asos which operates online only in the u. S. And operates overseas thats taking share hand we dont really talk about that, but youre probably seeing that pull some spending away from the gaps of the world as well. So more choices hand more distribution points. Makes it really hard to grab share and continue to grab share over time. All right thank you, courtney. Thank you, courtney well see you later. And well see her next hour when Urban Outfitters reports. The fun continues. Not over yet. Lets get to our Closing Bell Exchange for this tuesday. The dow is up 12 points. Been struggling up and down today. Home depot, as we mentioned, one of the drags there larry glazer from mayflower advisers is with us today, keith bliss and Rick Santelli checks in from the cme in chicago keith, what is do you make of this we had that bounceback yesterday and now were kind of hovering here is retail a plus or a minus for stocks overall do you think . Its definitely a mine us its no secret if you look at retail, the bricks and mortar retailers being down but yet the transport companies are starting to rally back a little bit airlines got oversold and if you lock at some of the Parcel Service Companies Like ups and fedex, they are doing okay, and i think the two are somewhat linked together. When you talk about retail and how it will be a drag on the market, and it will be for some time, again, the bricks and mortar retailers, but then you take a look at the online retailers as courtney was talking about, they are doing well and thats a direct reflection inside the transport companies who take the look. The market, broadly speaking, bill, we got very oversold short term last thursday when he had the washout on the north korea jitters. It was a bounceback. The vix got very overbought and that always moves in the opposite direction where we are in the market, all the major trend lines have been reestablished, still above the moving averages. I see no reason even though the debate has intensifying for the 20 thats coming, i dont see anything on the near term horizon thats so. In terms of your market shopping bag, larry, what are you looking at these days . The world may have dodged the north Korean Missile threat but it may not dodge the volatility that could be looming. You see the distinction between retail sales and retailers themselves, and with that we see the antif. A. N. G. Trade and lots of Companies Get affect the by the antif. A. N. G. Trade, a sweeping sentiment not all of retail is going away. With retail sales, the fed is very much in the game. When you get the pickup in volatility its good for companies that are going against the f. A. N. G. , a company like disney will compete with netflix. Larry, hang on a second if you want to trade against the f. A. N. G. Names i understand that. Sure. But to talk as if this spike in volatility is coming now, people have been saying this for years, and they keep getting burned. Great, no question. Look, how did people feel last week when you had just two days and big spike in the vix maybe thats a precursor to things that are coming the Strong Manufacturing retail sales is a catalyst to keep the fed in the came that spike in rates could mean a spike in volatility Investor Sentiment has driven this market, Consumer Sentiment and Business Sentiment across the board. That sentiment is fleeting and fragile. Not the same as economic data. If you get any market volatility you lose the wealth effect i talked to had a home depot contractor yesterday who said business is as good as it ever gets, okay, and sometimes thats when you want to take a few chips off the table when its as good as it ever gets and expect that volatility so you can you be in a position to take advantage of when it happens. You know famed Hedge Fund Manager david teppert is sticking to his guns, short bonds right now. Plenty of people are, but they keep getting their head handed to themselves because rates refused to go much higher from here what do you make of all of that. They all kind of refused to go much lower. Case in point. If you listen to what our previous guest just said theres been four main vix events this year, and if you overlay year to date of vix on top of tenyear note rates, what youll find is when you get into the low 2. 20s or god forbid under 2. 20, thats when the vix owe kearns have happened, the big spikes first of all, i think with respect to the vix, as long as were five or six basis points a cushion, i think its going to moderate the point im trying to make is that its a range mentality, and i think the range mentality has served most investors well if you start looking for the big breakouts or the big breakdowns, you dont seem to get another followthrough to make it a Profitable Trading strategy, and in the case of tepper, listen, i agree, that the next big 25basis point move in a timely fashion will most likely be rates to the upside. I just think that the range mentality and considering where were at would be 2. 20 or 2. 30 is what youre supposed to Pay Attention to and if mows of that is 2. 25 and high, i think vix will be at bay heres the next period to Pay Attention to, jackson hole, 24 to 26, most of that over a weekend and Central Banks are really at at epicenter of what moves markets, youll have plenty to think about with all the lip service that normalization may or may not get, especially from mario draghi all right guys, we need to go at this point. Thank you all. Appreciate your thoughts on todays market action. How great is our staff in the control room there somebody was just furiously drawing out that chart comparing that vix with the tenyear yield. Just like magic. Your guy on it. Whats that amazing just like amazing kreskin. Another ceo wearing in on the president s Manufacturing Council and Kayla Tausche is here with that. Reporter this tame tease alex gorski, the ceo of Johnson Johnson and saying after much deliberation the company has responsibility to remain engaged, not as a way to support any specific political agenda but as a way to represent the values of our credo as crucial Public Policy is discussed and developed. He says that he respects the decision of the other ceos who have chosen to withdraw and that thats a matter of personal conscience but that it is Johnson Johnsons responsibility, especially its Crucial Health care policy is being written to remain engaged in this discussion Johnson Johnson saying hell stay on this council, hell remain engage, kelly and bill, in the conversation. Thank you, Kayla Tausche, in washington. Big name Hedge Fund Managers making moves in struggling ipos in blue apron and snap leslie picker, is there opportunity . What are you finding a lot of dumpage going on, kelly. The first full quarter that snap has been a Public Company and just like the photos sold through snapchat the stock saw disappearing owners. Had about 550,000 shares at the end of the First Quarter third point had 2. 25 mill, appaloosa 100,000 and Moore Capital had 1. 3 million. Three months later all of these managers, except soros had divested thereto was a time when hedge funds loved snap heres david tepper on squawk box in early march. Im not jumping through the hoop to buy the 2180 but should it, you know, go down to the original offer price i would love to buy the stock there. Im a believing in the company its a valuation question to me. Where to me im in the nowhere land of valuation right here now, he confirmed to me today he did acquire a very small position but no longer hold shares of snap those who did hold on saw the value decline about 21 during the quarter. Blue apron went public the day the Quarter Ended and Public Disclosures indicate 18 Hedge Fund Managers bought shares including jana which took a 2 stake which was interesting because jana was interested in whole foods. Ultimately whole foods agreed to be acquired by amazon, a deal that turned away many investors from blue aprons ipo except jana apparently, guys. People were joking that jana is now trying to help the very company that it helped kill by then selling whole foods to amazon or Something Like that. Exactly, and its important to know, especially with blue apron, because theres only one trading day that we know about with this company because the 13f files we sift through, the last one is june 30th hand thats the day blue apron started trading so we dont know if the 18 Hedge Fund Managers have subsequently traded out some people have. One thing im wondering when it comes to the ipos, how many big managers are getting in for the prop, profiting from that and out of the stock in other words, is it emblematic they wouldnt doesnt that. Are they getting an allocation, benefit on day one and then move on and they have already made that are 20 or what if you talk to the book runners, the people who build the bookend and ipo, they divvy up the shares to different types of investors there are levels of quality that you would divvy to, so the first quality would be your fidelities, your trowes you say that they will hold on to it for the long run after that are the hedge funds, and then the people building the book have the list of hedge funds who they know that tend to stick with their ipos for longer and the hedge funds who do tend to sell out if theres a pop if youre a company or book runner, you want people in there for a long time. With blue aprons ipo that did not happen shares are trading at half the price they were after they priced clearly that book was made up of a lot of people who decided to sell that stock pretty quickly. See if they have a seat at the table the next time around or if they get put in timeout you dumped it. Youre out of here. And i love the word dumpage im going to use that from now on. Thank you, leslie. See you guys. 45 minutes to go. Lets check in on marks. Dow hanging on a gain of 19 points fighting back into positive territory. The s p up a point and nasdaq lower by one and russell up nine. And three more ceos following mercks chief resigning from president s Manufacturing Council. And as weve established the Retail Sector is under pressure. Coming up, a debate on whether theres better Shopping Opportunities for luxury retailers or discounters thats coming up. We want to hear from you, reach out to the show via facebook, twitter or send us an email over at closingbell nbcuni. Com. The first survivor of alzheimers disease is out there. And the Alzheimers Association is going to make it happen. But we wont get there without you. Visit alz. Org to join the fight. Stay with me, mr. Parker. To join the fight. When a critical patient is far from the hospital, the hospital must come to the patient. Stay with me, mr. Parker. The at t network is helping First Responders connect with medical teams in near real time. Stay with me, mr. Parker. Saving time when it matters most. Stay with me, mrs. Parker. Thats the power of and. Lets take a look at some of the movers in the market today, sink any financi Synchrony Financial shares had been down around 18 this year before that purchase was revealed and today its up 4. 6 . Goldman sachs downgrading corning to sell from neutral and cutting its price target from 26 to 29, trading at 28 right now there are concerns about rising inventories of television lcd screens and falling prices kelly. And three more members of President Trumps Manufacturing Council have stepped down. That includes under armours ceo kevin plank and intels ceo brain krzanich in reaction to President Trumps reaction to the violence in charlottesville. Earlier this year, kevin plank praised President Trump on cnbc for being pro business calling him an asset to the u. S. I think hes highly passionate you know, to have such a probusiness president is something thats a real asset for this country i think people should really grab that opportunity. He loves to build. I dont think theres any surprises here you know, when you look at the president , so he wants to build thing and make bold decisions and is decisive. I like those who publish and it rate versus think, think, think. Mr. Plank faced criticism for those words. Steph curry, one of under armors most popular endorsers says i agree with that description if you remove the et from asset. So, should ceos be mixing business and politics to begin with joining us is the former Dallas Mavericks coowner and motorcycle mazlanski good to see you both today. Thank you. Frank, i mean, ive got a big question about this, but let me get your first blush response. I mean, is there too much mixing of business and politics right now . No. I think business and politics is always mixed, but Kenneth Frazier is the epitome of the American Dream when you look at his background, the son of a janitor, the grandson of a slave, and you take a look at what this man has done in his career, its phenomenal its what we should embrace, and and he should make a decision based on his own conscience, which he did, and donald trump should not be going after him in the manner that hes gone after him and now his company because he made a conscious decision to say that i did not like the way you handled your saturday press conference i think its very, very direct, and i think that, you know, these other two ceos, kevin plank in particular, based on my mba background, i understand completely why hes had to do what hes had to do. Okay. So i would just suggest that it, you know, i think these ceos are really taking a look at whats the impact of being involved direct with donald trump . And is there anything, michael, that you would added to that you know well, first of all ken frazier came forward to say i need to take a stand on this other ceos have looked at it and some have done the same thing and others said i dont think i need to do the same thing . This isnt about politics and this is about business and values for a lot of ceos, they are first looking at their conscience like ken frazier did in saying that this is not consistent with the values that i believe in, but they are also looking at their broader business, their values and the different stakeholders that they have to that they have to appeal to. You can almost look at walmart came out and said that they are staying in the council. A number of other companies came out and said that they are leaving. You can almost overlay the values of the voters in the core areas that these businesses serve and get a sense of where they are going to land on issues like this. Companies that serve more urban areas, more liberal areas. Michael, do we need partisan businesses mean, the whole point of the structure of business is to kind of keep it from necessarily being swept one way or the other and if Companies Feel like they have to put on the political stripes that best most of their customers, thats isnt that a bigger issue for them to have to xwrapgrapple with i think it is a big issue and i think they have a difficult line to toe. Customers follow their employees and follow their customers customers are saying we want to do business with companies that share our values and employees want to join companies that share their values thats a reality and they have to deal with that. Well see more of this i believe that the era of the fencesitter corporation is over companies will have to take positions on these issues, and they will have to tell both their employees and their customers where they stand. Frank, heres the question i have though, and, you know, going using michaels answer as a context there the question why join a president ial council, whatever it is . Youve got ken frazier who in personal protest resigns but you had doug dillon of walmart and now the ceo of j j saying they are going to stay because their businesses already employ a diverse base of employees and doug mcmillon, especially, he says he feels like they need to be at the table to promote more diversity in this country, so youre looking at it from two different points of view, so you ask why they join these these councils to begin with here. Well, i mean, i think they want to serve of their country and not to disagree with michael, but i dont believe that any of these companies are sectored in a way that they are concerned about appealing to either minorities or some certain community. Niece are national and International Companies that ultimately have to make a decision about, you know, are they going to be involved with an stains . You have to understand, this is not a political comment that im making i voted for donald trump i believe his policies to be very pro business. I have no ideology whatsoever here, but when you start taking shots at these guys when they decide based on their own conscience that they want to step down and you start calling them grandstanders, and you start shooting at a guy like Kenneth Frazier, youre not going to gain a lot of support for doing that. All right guys, thank you both frank and michael, thank you for joining us today. Thanks, bill. Appreciate it should we go to the break . What a good idea 35 minutes left in the trading session. The dow is up 26 points, back above 22,000 right now when we come back, highlights of your interview, a terrific interview yesterday with fired Google Engineer james damore well find out the one thing that he regrets about that couldnt version diversity memo that cost him his job. Minutes away from president frtrtus statement on inasucre well bring that to you live as soon as it begins at trump tower live in new york city. Stay with us hey gary, what are you doing . Oh hey john, im connecting our brains so we can share our amazing trading knowledge. Thats a great idea, but why dont you just go to thinkorswims chat rooms where you can share strategies, ideas, even actual trades with market professionals and thousands of other traders . I know. Your brain told my brain before you told my face. Mmm, blueberry . Tap into the knowledge of other traders on thinkorswim. Only at td ameritrade. Welcome back yesterday i spoke with the fired Google Engineer who published a memo critical of googles Diversity Efforts and despite the firing he told me yesterday he still google and its ceo sundar is a very Competent Person he muss handled the situation, but there needs to be many changes at google, especially in upper management for example, there was no one in upper management that felt like they could support me in any way because the angry mob would have gone against them. I also asked him if he would walk anything back or change anything he wrote, and here was his response to that i think i definitely wouldnt have used the word neuroticism even though thats the official term used in psychology because that has a negative connotation but of all the actual content i havent seen really disputed or proven false, and i think that hopefully there is a lot of good that happens from this, so its really hard to regret anything i i will at the risk of being misinformed, seemingly misinformed, as i said to you, i was surprised at how young he is i hadnt seen any pictures of james before this, and i assumed he was my age, given his point of view, and i know im going to take knocks for that, but hes a very seemingly thoughtful young man. But your assumption goes to what he was saying, you know, he feels like he has a different point of view than many young people even, lets say and Young People Working in tech and Silicon Valley and there are others who did share his thoughts on that and felt like there wasnt really a way to air it. Its sparked a debate, but are we achieving anything with this debate yet . I mean, who knows. Is it just going to peter out and we go back to the way it has been. The ironic thing would be if google needed to bring in an outside speaker like james damore to explain different points of view on this, i dont know, and i dont know if its unique to google or what other companies can try to do about it maybe awareness is the whole point. I asked him whether he supported some of the boycotts or protests in Different Things that have been capped in support of him against google and thats where he sort of said, look, i like google i support google he didnt necessarily support those efforts which i also found interesting. Very interesting. We enjoyed watch the whole thing online if you missed it and time for a cnbc news update with sue herera. Hi, kelly thanks so much heres whats happening at this hour, Everyone Health insurance premiums of many customers of obamacare would rise by 20 in 2018 if President Trump follows through on a threat to stop billions of dollars of payments to health insurers, and that estimate is according to the congressional budget office. The republican primary in alabamas special election for the seat that belonged to attorney general Jeff Sessions seat Luther Strange arrived to cast his ballot along with his wife President Trump urging alabama republicans to vote for strange. And construction crews are beginning to wrap up the renovation work at the white house. The repairs and improvements cost some 3. 4 million President Trump is scheduled to return to the white house early next week. And Maria Sharapova has been granted a wild card entry to the u. S. Open and will take part in a grand slam event for first time in 18 months. She has not entered a major tournament since the Australian Open in 2016 when she tested positive for the banned drug you are up to date thats the update this hour. Bill, kelly, become downtown to you. Sue, thanks very much on we go 28 minutes left in the staying situation and joining me on floor of the next Stock Exchange peter costa of empire executions how are you doing today, sir im doing well. David tepper says were nowhere near a frenzy in the stock market and maintains his long positions in this market. He says were going higher i hate to go against what david tepper says because hes probably one of the brightest Hedge Fund Guys in the last 20 years. I dont think its a frothy market by any means, but i think weve reached a point of proper valuation or maybe had a little bit too proper valuation and for me when you have a properly valued company, where is it going to go unless it has something new to offer to increase growth and earnings and i dont see all that much out there thats showing me theres room for these companies, you know, s p 500, dow stocks, whatever, and theres not a lot of not value but i dont think theres anything that thats really striking right now that i want to get into. Even i mean, we have the turbulence last week over north korea and then suddenly when it seems like the tensions are easing, big rally yesterday. So theres still the tendency to want to buy the dip here. And i think that people are and this is theres two points actually. One of them is people are completely ignoring the risk thats overseas and what that could potentially mean weve spoken about that before the second thinging is we havet really touched on what etfs are doing to this market you ask guys that are more the professors or what not, university people, who would come up with some sort of study and determine what that is doing to the market. I think that there is something there, because these markets should not be trading the way they are this, and they continue to go higher because money is moving into etfs, and it has to go somewhere so i think theres something to that, and i think we have to look into it a little bit more. Call your local professor and find out what that is all about. Ill find one. Thank you, peter. See you later. Kelly . The dow up 19 right now the s p is hanging on to a onepoint gain and the nasdaq and russell are lower right now. The Amazon Effect is really starting to take a bite out of Grocery Store retailers. Next, well look at the grocers feel the biggest fallout from the retail giant, and speaking of retail. Coming up, well also debate whether you should go to the bargain shopping bin for discount or to luxury store operators for the better bet right now. Youre watching cnbc, first in business worldwide i put everything into my business. And i had all these points from my chase ink card. So i bought ingredients, utensils, even made custom donut cutters. Wow all with points. Thats how i created the ripple the doughnut in a doughnut in a doughnut. Suddenly its everywhere. I mean, it really took off. What will you create with your points . Learn more about the ink business preferred card. Weve talked a whole lot about the Amazon Effect on the traditional brick and mortar retailers. Landon dowdy has more. Landon reporter hey there also, kell de. We continue our sectoromics series this time zeroing in on the grocer and how much impact the Amazon Effect really has the Food Retail Group is down the most this year at 16 while the larger staple sector is up about 7 whole foods is the top performer of 35 , but that hasnt always been the case. Shares were down nearly 43 from january 2014 up until the day before the acquisition announcement, and then amazon stepped in, whole foods soared on the news of the ecommerce giants nearly 14 billion offer on june 16th, and while whole foods got a whole big boost from the Amazon Effect, other staples felt the Ripple Effect kroger taking more than 9 that day, losing 2 billion off of it market cap costco dipping 7 , shedding a whopping 5. 6 billion in market and cap. Campbells soup and conagra down more than 2 and they havent bounced back and food inflation issues and higher costs and competitive pricing pressures. Back over to you. Thats a recipe you can argue that the response is overdone, but, hey, the market knows all, and they are just trying to figure out who is going to be hurt the worst when they finally consummate the deal. Where are they going i think home depot shows that thats the idea. Okay they have come for the traditional retailers and come for the Food Retailers are they going for the appliances, too . I love that an earlier guest called amazon the boogie man watch out. Thanks, landon. Thanks, guys. 20 minutes left in the tom brady session. A mixed day. The dow and s p and nasdaq are positive but the russ sell stumbling, down eight points right now. President trump is at trump tower here in new york city today. Hes expected to make a statement on infrastructure and sign an executive order in that area any minute now. Well tell you whats coming up on that in just a moment here. And, would you pay 10 a month to see all the movies you want at the box office thats a proposal put forth by a netflix cofounder, but ll iwit work thats coming up on closing bell. Okay President Trump is about to speak about infrastructure hes going to sign an executive order. Kayla tausche is here to describe for us what to expect kayla . Were expecting, bill, to see the president accompanied by his transportation secretary gar, gary cohn his chief economic adviser as well as treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin as he signed this executive order thats targeting the permitting process, something that the president has taken aim at for months saying its stymieing private investment in infrastructure and also disincentivizing the pursuit of projects like the roads and bridges. They set up prior infrastructure events that took 660 years to build a bridge and 16 a road and eight years on average to get the permits for a lot of these projects this is exactly what they are going to do. Trying to set protocol and streamline the permits through one federal agency they are also going to set a twoyear completion goal, and the president in the past has said he doesnt want to earmark money for these projects if its not shovel ready within 90 days. Thats a pretty ambitious target to be sure, this is an agenda item that the Obama Administration looked at as well the Obama Administration created the federal permitting Improvement Council as well as creating a dashboard to track the process of the permitting process. Immediately after the financial crisis the Obama Administration put forth a roughly 800 billion Stimulus Program and permitting was a part that have process as well so well see exactly what the details of this executive order are. Exactly what it does for the permitting process and what the private sector reaction is to this as we talk about these Advisory Councils that the president has established, in an executive orderlyier this summer he set up a formal Infrastructure Advisory Council but didnt say exactly who would be on it and then there were environmental groups that decided to sue over the lack of transparency so thats something that were waiting for details on and could be harder for him to get executives to actually be on board given the controversy that weve seen this week guys are the is the delay i mean, its probably a number of reasons, Environmental Concerns, a lack of government workers to try and work through the red tape i mean, what whats causing the big delays for the most part, do we know well, the delays, bill for infrastructure or the delays for actually assembling the council because they are two separate issues. The infrastructure. They are trying to streamline to a twoyear process where you itemized its taken many, many more years is the that because of Environmental Concerns or otherwise . Both, and just the sheer number of agencies that are involved in these sort of things, because if youre building an interstate, then you need to sign off for various states, their internal agencies, federal agencies, depends on where youre getting the money from, if its grants, if its from private sector investments. Theres a whole host of issue and theres a whole image of the president unrolling the sixfoot long scroll on the permitting process. Thats something he wants to streamline. Well see if he can kayla, thank you, and well hear from the president shortly. Yes, we will. Dow moving a little bit higher, up 28 points, s p higher and the nasdaq is two points in the green with the russell lagging by eight. As weve shown you, Retail Stocks hit hard. Up next, two analysts who say investors should buy into specific parts of the Retail Business they just disagreen on which one. We love that is it luxury versus discounters . Mep. L get to the debate on that co u stay with me, mr. Parker. When a critical patient is far from the hospital, the hospital must come to the patient. Stay with me, mr. Parker. The at t network is helping First Responders connect with medical teams in near real time. Stay with me, mr. Parker. Saving time when it matters most. Stay with me, mrs. Parker. Thats the power of and. Im living that yacht life, life, life top speed fifty knots life on the caribbean seas its a champagne and models potpourri on my yacht made of cuban mahogany, gany, gany, gany, gany watch this dont get mad bell mnemonic get e trade and get invested well, look at this art cashin just stopped by and told us the market on close orders are to the buy side big time, 1 billion to buy the imbalance. Wow. And art said its been like that for about the past hour so it theoretically you could put a bid on the market. The dow up 23, so there might be some sellers coming in that meet some of the buy pressure but well see as we head towards the close. Were waiting are to the president at trump tower in new york city. Hell be coming out to make a statement on infrastructure and sign this executive order which would seek to set a twoyear goal for the completion of the permitting process for major Infrastructure Projects that kayla just told us about, and that should get underway in a moment. A twoyear goal for the permitting process, precompletion. Just to get it started. So we may probably interrupt this segment retail earnings kicked off this week, and those stocks disappointed across the board from coach to dicks Sporting Goods to home depot. They are all lower today. In this environment, is it better to shop for luxury or the discounty are tailer joining us is liz from proforma who favors luxury and jen who prefers the discounters. Liz, you like coach despite the morning its just had. Why . I think the brands are more valuable longer term and coach has faced a difficult quarter here there was, you know, some disappointment around the guidance, but i think in general the stories like coach, like kors, like ralph lauren have been selfhelp stories coach may be further along and expectations got high after seeing what happened with coach and ralph lauren these brands have more viability longer term and they are closer to the end of doing what they needed to do, taking their hard medicine. And jan youre looking in the discount area, youre looking at specifics, ross stores, burlington and t. J. Maxx why those . Well, i basically believe if youre not online, if youre not local or if youre not offprice youre in trouble because thats where the customer is going and thats whats gaining market share. I dont disagree with liz that strong brands are also one of the things that can win in this environment, but right now i prefer ross and burlington to tj because i think they have more growth opportunity, and i think that its a better deal for the investor, but i do think the offprice space will take damage from amazon and will get hurt eventually by the online players, but right now offprice is winning market share, and like i say online is and local is you cant see the upper end gaining market share aspirational retail is not winning. I agree with liz that coach is an interesting play because its been through the shadow of the valley of death and come out the other side a better retailer done nice acquisitions that will be accretive i do like coach, but that space is still pretty tough. The ceo of dicks Sporting Goods. They was speaking specifically about Sporting Goods retailers, but i wonder if we can broaden it out saying they are in panic mode, all trying to price to achieve market share over profitability, and you can see that in a lot of industries right now. Are we in panic mode i think a lot of us are people that sill other peoples brands, retailers that sell other peoples brands are more in panic mode because they are looking down the barrel of amazon and they are in panic mode i think, you know, taking it back to like tj and ross, certainly they are gaining share right now, but i think over time the customer is shifting to preferring endless aisle over sort of the Treasure Hunt experience, so tj, ross, burlington, they also sell other peoples brands and its a matter of time before they start to really see their business suffer as a result of amazon. What would you say to that, jan, especially considering the companies that you like here, t. J. Maxx, these are some of the Favorite Places to hide out or to kind of, you know, look at the gains that youve made despite this environment isnt that a good place to be selling rather than buying them . A good place to be hiding out for a while. I still think its a market share gainer i do think longer term its a big profnl i happen to be in las vegas with 50,000 of my closest friends in retailing, and panic would be an understatement i would say people are very, very panicked about whats going on in the industry so liz is certainly right about that across the board thats true there are companies that are doing fine and there are companies that will do fine, but in general they are taking a lot of advantage from amazon and from something to go online themselves and spending a lot of money to do it. So, im curious i i didnt expect both of you to agree on the panic mode as easily as you have so how does this end where do we go from here then, liz . I think theres going to continue to be a shakeout and tj and ross are very strong players, and they will continue to exist as i mentioned, the luxury guys have already pulled back on distribution they have pulled back on promotions, so were going to see Smaller Companies and hopefully more Viable Companies longer term, but youve got to figure out how to play with amazon. Do you keep an eye on cash what company, how much cash they have here that you can tell how long they can weather this panic storm . Yeah, i think if we think about the traditional discounters like target and walmart, some of the things that they are doing in terms of going out and buying brands and digitally native brands and trying to regain relevance buying buying distribution platforms so that they can solve the last mile, all of those are very important the small guys are suffering the most, and the Department Stores who had their heads in the sand for too long, but i think that those with cash, some vision and an ability to figure out where to play versus amazon will be fine over the long term, though there might be some hard years in between. Some reckoning. Jap, you mentioned you would only want to be online, local or offprice or otherwise theres trouble. Going back to the issue of coach, kors and ralph lauren which liz does like, what would your strategy be to them isnt there something to be said to hold the price point and go more direct to the consumer, or should they get more involved with one of the channels youre describing no, no, coach has shown us the way. Pull back on distribution, sell through your own supply, dont give them too much product and pull back from the outlets and the offprice space. The bad news is you saw what coach had to go through to get there. Ralph lauren is just starting that process really and michael kors is way behind them in starting that process, so with that space theres a lot of work to do to be a good Healthy Business again, so its not that i dont like coach i think they have led the way in showing how to do it, but its just really hard to get done as a Public Company because people dont like it when you dramatically cut back and have lower sales because you cut back and you see consolidation then inevitably youve had coach by kate spade and jimmy chu by michael kors. Who else . Those are good moves. Im not going on record who else will be purchased. So its not over yet . I think there will be a continual consolidation, and i think cash is king you really need to have a dominant, you know, cash position, have a strong Balance Sheet to be able to do the investing that you need to transform your business, or weather the storm if you need to rationalize such as kors and coach have done or are doing. I understand, liz, coach kind of said, look, we dont think amazon is a luxury platform we want to get deeply involved with right now but it seems like theres a lot of high income shoppers using amazon prime all the time and i think that data backs it up. If youre coach, why not go in with the big splashy thing saying were on amazon, prime, a great refund policy and return policy and, you know, we can get this product right to you, easy and and kind of remembering your preferences and what you may like. I hi it remains to be seen. They are probably evaluating it. I think that like nike did, you know, if you can go in with a strong brand presence and its brand enhancing and allows you to reach a customer base, and i think amazon really wants to be supportive of the retail ecosystem, as least the brand ecosystem so they want to find ways to work with Companies Like coach without being too destructive to the brand. They are all going to be on amazon. They are launching their wardrobe efforts, amazon is doing plenty of private label stuff with its whole amazon recall initiative. If coach doesnt put its products directly on platform, i wonder if they will do it themselves. Well never know because now we have the president on his infrastructure executive order lets listen in. Great to be back in new york with all of our friends and some great friends outside the building, i must tell you. I want to thank all of our distinguished guests who are with us today, including members of our cabinet treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin, omb director mick mulvaney, and, of course, our transportation secretary doing a fabulous job, elaine chou. Thank you all for doing an incredible job on what were discussing today which is infrastructure weve just had a great set of briefings upstairs on our infrastructure agenda. My administration is working every day to deliver the world class infrastructure that our people deserve and frankly that our country deserves thats j i just signed a new executive order to dramatically reform the nations badly broken infrastructure permitting process. Just blocks away is the Empire State Building it took 11 months to build the Empire State Building. But today it can take as long as a decade and much more than that many, many stores where it takes 20 and 25 years just to get approvals to Start Construction of a fairly routine highway. Highway builders must get up to 16 different approvals involving 9 different federal agencies governed by 29 different statutes one agency alone can stall a project for many, many years and even decades not only does this cost our economy billions of dollars, but it also denies our citizens the safe and modern infrastructure they deserve this overregulated permitting process is a massive selfinflicted wound on our country. Its disgraceful denying our people muchneeded investments in their community, and i just want to show you this because it was just shown to me, and i think im going to show it to the media both real and fake media, by the way. This is what it takes to get something approved today elaine, you can see that so this is what it takes permitting process flow chart. Thats a flow chart. So that can go out to 20 years this shows about ten, but that can go out to about 20 years to get something approved this is for a highway. Ive seen a highway recently in a certain state, i wont mention its name its 17 years. I could have built it for 4 million or 5 million without the permitting process it costs hundreds of millions of dollars, but it took 17 years to get it approved and many, many, many, many pages of Environmental Impact studies this is what we will bring it down to. This is less than two years. This is going to happen quickly. Thats what im signing today. This will be less than two years for a highway. So its going to be quick. Its going to be a very streamlined process, and by the way, if it doesnt mean environmental safeguards, were not going to approve it, very simple were not going to approve it, so this is maybe this one will say lets throw the other one away would anybody like it from the media . Would anybody like that long beautiful chart, you can have it so my executive order also requires agencies to Work Together efficiently by requiring one lead agency for each major infrastructure project. It also holds agencies accountable if they fail to streamline their review process. So each agency is accountable. Were going to get infrastructure built quickly and inexpensively relatively speaking and the infrastructure process will go. No longer will we tout one jobkilling delay after another and no longer will we do this at the expense of hardworking americans. I know the process i had to get permits for this building, i built all of the buildings that i built in manhattan and other places, and i will tell you that the consultants are rich people. They go around making it very difficult. They lobby congress. They lobby state governments, city governments to make it very difficult so that you have to hire consul pts and you have to pay them a fortune no longer will we allow the the infrastructure of our magnificent country to crumble in decay while protecting the environment, we will build gleaming new roads, bridges, waterways, tunnels and highways. We will rebuild our country with American Workers, american iron, american aluminum, american steel. We will create millions of new jobs and make million of American Dreams come true. Our infrastructure will again be the best in the world. We used to have the greatest infrastructure anywhere in the world, and today were like a third world country. We are literally like a third world country. Our infrastructure will again be the best, and we will restore the pride in our communities, our nation and all over the United States. Well be proud again so i want to thank everybody for being here god bless you. God bless the United States, and and if you have any questions we have mick, you can come up here, please, come on up. Mick mill veiny. If you have any questions, please, feel free to ask. Why do you think the ceos are leaving your Manufacturing Council . Because they are not taking their job seriously as it pertains to this country we want jobs, manufacturing in this country if you look at some of those people that youre talking about, they are outside of the country. They are having a lot of their product made outside if you look at merck race an example. Take a look at excuse me, excuse me. Take a look at where their product is made. Its made outside of our country. We want products made in the country. Now, i have to tell you. Some of the folks that will leave, they are leaving out of embarrassment because they make their products outside and ive been lecturing them, including the gentleman that youre referring to, about you have to bring it back to this country. You cant do it necessarily in ireland and all of these other places you have to bring this work back to this country. Thats what i want i want manufacturing to be back into the United States so that American Workers can benefit. Why did you wait so long i didnt wait long. I didnt wait long i didnt wait long. 48 hours. I wanted to make sure unlike most politicians, that what i said was correct. Not make a quick statement the statement i made on saturday, the first statement, was a fine statement, but you dont make statements that direct unless you know the fact. It takes a little while to get the facts. You still dont know the facts, and its a very, very important process to me, and its a very important statement, so i dont want to go quickly and just make a statement for the stake of making a political statement i want to know the facts if you go back to i brought it i brought it as assayed remember this, saturday we condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence it the has no place in america, and then i went on from there. Now, heres the thing. Excuse me. Excuse me. Take it nice and easy. Heres the thing when i make a statement, i like to be correct. I want the facts this event just happened in fact, a lot of the event didnt even happen yet, as we were speaking. This event just happened before i make a statement, i need the facts, so i dont want to rush into a statement so making the statement when i made it was excellent. In fact, the young woman who i hear is a fantastic young woman, and it was on nbc, her mother wrote me and said through i guess twitter, social media, the nicest things, and i very much appreciated that i hear she was a fine, really actually an incredible young woman, but her mother on twitter thanked me for what i said an honestly if the press were not fake and it was honest, the press would have said what i said was very nice but unlike you and unlike excuse me. Unlike you and unlike the media, before i make a statement i like to know the facts. [ all talking at once how how about a how about a couple of infrastructure questions. Was that terrorism . The ceo of walmart said you missed a critical opportunity to help bring the country together. Did you . Not at all. I think the country look, you take a look. Ive created over a million jobs since im president. The country is booming, the stock market is setting records. We have the highest employment numbers weve ever had in the history of our country were doing record business. We have the highest levels of enthusiasm so the head of walmart, when i know, who is a very nice guy, was making a political statement. I mean, i do it the same way, you know, why because i want to make sure, when i make a statement that the statement is correct, and there was no way there was no way of making a correct statement that early i had to see the facts, unlike a lot of reporters unlike a lot of reporters. I wanted to see the facts, and the facts as they started coming out were very well stated in fact, everybody said his statement was beautiful. If he would have made it sooner that would have been good. I couldnt have made it sooner because i didnt know all of the facts. Frankly, people still dont know all of the facts it was very important excuse me excuse me. It was very important to me to get the facts out and correctly because if i would have made a fast statement and the first statement was made without knowing much other than what we were seeing. The second statement was made with knowledge, with great knowledge. Theres still things excuse me theres still things that people dont know i want to make a statement with knowledge. I wanted to know the facts two questions was this terrorism, and can you tell us how youre feeling about your chief strategy steve bannon. I think the driver of the car is a disgrace to himself, his family and this country, and that is you can call it terrorism. Y you can call it murder you can call it whatever you want i would call it as fastest one to come up with a good verdict there is a question, is it murder, is it terrorism and then you get into legal semantics the driver of the car is a murderer and what he did was a horrible, horrible inexcusable thing. Can you tell us how youre feeling about your chief strategist, mr. Bannon. Steve bannon i never spoke to mr. Bannon about it. Can you tell us broadly do you still have confidence in steve . Well, well see look i like mr. Bannon, hes a friend of mine, but mr. Bannon came on very late, you know that i went through 17 senators, governors and i won all the primaries. Mr. Bannon came on very much later than that and i like him hes a good man. He is not a racist i can tell you that. Hes a good person he actually gets a very unfair press in that regard, but well see what happens with mr. Bannon, but hes a good person and i think the press treats him frankly very unfairly do you have confidence in him . Youve been called on to defend your National Security adviser h. R. Mcmaster. I have already done it. I did it the last time. Senator mccain senator mccain, the one who voted against obamacare. You mean senator mccain who voted against us Getting Good Health Care . Mr. Mccain said that the altright is behind these attacks, and he linked that same group to those you who perpetrated the attack in charlottesville. I cant tell you im sure senator mccain must know what hes talking about, but when you say the altright you define it. Define it for me come on, lets go. Senator mccain defined them as the same groups. What about the what about the altleft that came charging at you say at the altright. Do they have any semblance of guilt . Let me ask you this. What about the fact that they came charging, that they cam charging with clubs in their hands, swinging clubs, do they have any problem i think they do. So, you know, as far as im concerned, that was a horrible, horrible day wait a minute. Im not finish im not finished, fake news. That was a horrible day. Is it the same level as the neonazis . I will tell you i watch that much more closely than you people watched it, and you have you had a group on one side that was bad and you had a group on the other side that was also very violent, and nobody wants to say that, but ill say it right now. You had a group on the other side that came charging in without a permit and they were very, very violent [ all talking at once go ahead. Do you think what you call the altleft is the same as neonazis . Those people, all of those people excuse me. Ive condemned neonazis ive condemned many different groups, but not all of those people were neonazis, believe them not all of those people were White Supremacists, by any stretch. Those people were also there because they wanted to protest the taking down of a statue robert e. Lee. So excuse me. And you take a look at some of the groups and you see, and you know it if you were honest reporters which youre not but many of the people were there to protest the taking down of the statue of robert e. Lee. This week its robert e. Lee i noticed that Stonewall Jackson is coming down i wonder is it George Washington next week and is it Thomas Jefferson the week after you know, you really do have to ask yourself where does it stop . But they were there to protest excuse me, you take a look the night before, they were there to protest the taking down of the statue of the robert e. Lee. Infrastructure question. Go ahead. Should statues of robert e. Lee stay up . I would say thats up to a local town, community, or the federal government depending on where it is located. Are you against the confederacy . How concerned are you about Race Relations in america and do you think things have gotten worse or better since youve taken office i think they have gotten better or look, they have been frayed for a long time, and you can ask president obama about that because he would make speeches about it, but i believe that the fact that i brought in, it will be soon, millions of jobs, you can see where companies are moving back into our country. I think thats going to have a Tremendous Positive impact on Race Relations we have companies coming back into our country we have two Car Companies that Just Announced knocksion in wisconsin Just Announced. We have many companies, i say pouring back into the country. I think thats going to have a Huge Positive impact on Race Relations. You know what . Its jobs. What people want now, they want jobs they want great jobs with good pay, and when they have that, you watch how Race Relations will be, and ill tell you, were spending a lot of money on the inner cities were fixing the inner cities. Were doing far more than anybody has done with respect to the inner cities its a priority for me, and its very important mr. President , are you putting what youre calling the altleft and White Supremacists on the same moral plane . Im not putting anybody on a moral plane. What im saying this is you had a group on one side and a group at each other and they came at each other with clubs and it was vicious and horrible and it was a horrible thing to watch, but there is another side. There was a group on this side, you can call them the left, youve just called them the left that came violently attacking the other group, so you can say what you want but thats at way it is. Mr. President , your words you said there was hatred and violence well, i do think i think theres blame on both sides. You look at both sides i think theres blame on both sides and i have no doubt about it, and you dont have any doubt about it either and and and and if you reported it accurately, you would say it. Neonazis started this in charlottesville. Excuse me. To protest the removal of that you have some very bad people in that group, but you also had people that were very fine people on both sides you had people in that group excuse me, excuse me i saw the same pictures as you did. You had people in that group that were there to protest the taking down to them a very, very important statue and the renaming of a park from robert e. Lee to another name. George washington and robert e. Lee George Washington was a slave owner, so will George Washington now lose his status . Are we excuse me. Are we going to take down are we going to take down statues of George Washington . How about Thomas Jefferson what do you think of thomas jeff shon you is like him. I do love Thomas Jefferson. Are we going to take down a statue he was a major slave owner are we going to take down the statue youre changing history. Youre changing culture and you had people, and im not talking about the neonassies and the white nationalists because they should be condemned totally, but you had many people in in a group other than neonazis and white nationalists, okay, and the press has treated them absolutely unfairly. Now, in the other group also, you had some fine people, but you also had troublemakers and you see them come with the black outfits and with the helmets and with the baseball bats, youve got a lot youve got a lot of bad people in the other group. You were saying the press has treated white nationalists unfairly i didnt understand what you were saying. There were people in that real, and i looked the night before if you look, there were people protesting very quietly the taking down of the salt u of robert e. Lee. Im sure in that group there were some bad ones the following day it looked like they had some rough bad people neonazis, white nationalists, whatever you want to call them but you had a lot of people in that group that were there to innocently protest and very legally protest, because you know, i dont know if you know it, they had a permit. The other group didnt have a permit so i only tell you this. There are two sides to a story i thought what took place was a horrible moment for our country, a horrible moment, but there are two sides to the story does anybody have a does anybody you have an infrastructure question. What makes you think you can get an infrastructure bill you didnt get health care. You know, ill tell you we came very close with health care unfortunately, john mccain decided to vote against it at the last minute. Youll have to ask john mccain why he did that. We came very close to health care well end up Getting Health Care but well get the infrastructure actually, infrastructure is something that i think well have bipartisan support on i actually think democrats will go along with the infrastructure. Mr. President , have you spoke have you spoken to the family of the victim of the car attack ill be reaching lout. I was very i thought that the statement put out. The mothers statement i thought was a beautiful statement. I it was something that i really appreciated i thought it was terrific, and really under under the kind of stress that shes under and of the heartache that shes under i thought putting out that statement to me was really something i wont forget thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you. What about the nazis that support you . Do you plan on going to charlottesville. Do you think youre helping the nation i own a house in charlottesville. Where is it oh, boy, its going its in charlottesville. It is the winery. I mean marx i know a lot about charlottesville. Charlottesville is a great place thats been very badly hurt over the last couple of days. I own actually one of the largest wineries in the United States thats in charlottesville. Mr. President , what do you think needs to be done to overcome the racial divides in this country i really think that jobs can have a big impact. If we continue to create jobs. Over a million, substantially more than a million, and you can see just the other day, the Car Companies coming in with foxconn. I think if we continue to create jobs at levels that im that im creating jobs, i think thats going to have a tremendous impact, positive impact on Race Relations. And what you have said today, how do you think they will impact people will be working and making much more money. Your remarks today . And the other thing, very important, i believe wages will start going up they havent gone up for a long time i believe wages now, because the economy is doing so well with respect to employment and unemployment, i believe wages will start to go up. I think that will have a tremendously positive impact on Race Relations President Trump taking questions in a fiery and impromptu press conference after an infrastructure event here in manhattan. He touched on a number of issues from trying to clarify his statement to the charlottesville terrorist attack on saturday, and the way that he handled that, to touching on steve bannon, members of his cabinet, and whether steve bannon will continue to be part of his inner circle saying hes a good man. Well see what happens trump also reiterating his commitment to helping inner cities and creating jobs when pressed on the issue of whether Race Relations have improved in all of this after going back to the issue of merckxs ken frazier, stepping down from that group and saying, again, that he thinks the people doing so are not taking their job seriously as it pertains to this country because they are making their products outside of it lets get to Kayla Tausche for more, kayla, theres so much here you know, clearly the president wanted to seize the opportunity. Im sure theres going to be here for his critics as for any hope that he had of trying to calm things down. Theres a lot town pack here, kelly, but clearly the president was anticipating questions about his response initially to the attack in charlottesville because he brought his statement with him he said i knew i was going to get questions about it and i want to go ahead and reread it he said it was wanting him to be based in facts to not name specifically White Supremacists and neonazis as the cause of the violence earlier on and he said there were fabulous people on both sides, that it was impossible to make a blanket statement about who each of these groups was comprised by, but he did say the unite to right protest had a permit and the others didnt, and that was one of the reasons why he was attacking both sides for the violence in that instance. He did talk about the fact that ceos have been resigning from his Advisory Council ken frazier specifically cited his response to charlottesville, but the president said that the reason why he was resigning from the council is because he was ashamed that his company, merck, makes so much of its product base overseas, and, of course, the guide post of the Manufacturing Council is to bring more manufacturing back to the United States. So well see if we get a response from merck on that point. You talked about the president s personnel at the white house he did make the comment, that he did not speak with steve bannon before he made his response after the Charlottesville Violence over the weekend. Some were saying maybe the reason he didnt condemn those specific groups was because of guidance from bannon and he said they didnt speak about it and well see what happens with mr. Bannon hes a very good person. That line in particular has not been a good omen for white house officials in the past when their standing is still being sorted out by the president so well see what happens there kell de, a lot of people were not expecting to get the president to answer questions on this impromptu basis, not least of which all of the questions that he just answered for the last 20 or so minutes. And were seeing elaine chiao, also mrs. Mitch mcconnell, another person who the president has been trading words with back and forth. I want to play in case the viewers missed it what the president did have to say when asked about members of his Manufacturing Council stepping down heres what he said. Some of the nokes that will leave, they are leaving out of embarrassment because they are make their products outside and ive been lecturing them, including the gentleman that youre referring to, about you have to bring it back to this country. You cant necessarily do it in ireland and all of these other places you want to bring this work back to the country thats what i want. Again, the president moments ago speaking about why he believes people are leaving his Manufacturing Council. John harwood joins us from washington now with more, john, on whether the president was able to squarely address the criticism that has swirled since this weekend, the Manufacturing Council members who have stepped down the president clearly trying to turn a page. Reporter well, he squarely addressed it, but he hurt himself in the process for example, when he said about those executives who left is plain lip not true had it been true, he wouldnt have invited them on to his Manufacturing Council in the first place. It was obvious that he has a hard time processing the fact that the moral instincts that he displayed over the weekend are being criticized and seem to have fallen short by most americans and, therefore, hes looking for ways to justify them, and he continued to do that stunningly about the protest and counterprotest again, he cast an eke lens between White Supremacists and neonazis and people who were on hand to protest those people now, set aside for a moment the individual interactions between some of those people you and whether violence was instigated by some individuals who were protesting the neonazis and White Supremacists a young woman was killed by someone who was accused of driving his car into the counterprotesters, but more significantly this was an event that was instigated by White Supremacists and neonazis, this unite the right movement now he tried to justify that but saying, well, they were defending the robert e. Lee statue, that charlottesville was going to take down and suggesting that that was a worthy cause and where are you going to stop, and are you going to go after George Washington and Thomas Jefferson hes simply not connecting himself with the moral sentiments that the majority of the American People feel as a result of that hes digging himself into a deeper and deeper hole. John, the president was trying, it seemed to separate the altright from White Supremacists and neonazis he said, quote, unquote, in pressing a reporter to define the altright. And he said what about the altleft that came charging. Every time he was asked about neonazis and White Supremacists saying they were condemned he said theres nothing correct about what happened in that case is he correct in trying to separate those two groups, altright from White Supremacists and neonazis or is there no separation to draw . I think really there isnt a meaningful separation to draw. Youre talking about i mean, its always difficult to put a blanket definite on any group of individual human beings, but what has combined the altright, what steve bannon championed at breitbart was the idea of defending on the basis of racial identity and national identity, both of them its sort of an ethnonationalism the traditional notion of the United States that that those people feel is their birth right, and the country has been changing weve got tremendous amount of diversity in the country, more and more with every passing year people feel aggrieved by that in a cultural sense and in an economic sense, and and, you know, there are many people who feel frustrations in life, but the people who were driving this protest are people with a specific motivation that is reflected in the presence of david duke and Richard Spencer and the leaders of these groups that are way outside the mainstream of american life, and the president is having difficulty accommodating that reality. Perhaps most disturbing is that we talk about neonazi websites all the time. Eamon javers just left that fractious press conference eamon, what did you make of everything that just played out . Reporter kelly, i dont think we can overstate the political significance of what we just witnessed here at trump tower. Let me reset the scene for where we were this afternoon going into todays press conference. This was a moment when the president had been criticized for being tepid in his response to what nationalists and neonazis rioting in Charlottesville Virginia mainstream business leaders, some of them, were beginning to step away and distance themselves from the president. The ceo of walmart felt compelled to issue a statement criticizing the president. United states, something i dont think weve ever seen before, criticizing him specifically by name for the way he handled this situation. Thats where he was going in, and then we had this press conference where the president exhibited emotion, anger, frustration, took question after question on this issue and what he did today was double or triple down on his National Statement of saturday backing more of the more conciliatory scripted remarks yesterday i dont think weve ever seen a president compared robert e. Lee and George Washington before i dont think weve seen a president defending a crowd that contained neonazis and White Supremacists saying some of the said were good and he attacked the folks called the altleft sayinging there were very bad people in the group there. All that have goes back to the tone and doubles down and amplifies the tone of his comments on saturday that he was already being criticized for this president has just made a very big political bet that hes going to double down on his Political Base and thats going to see the day here. Well have to wait and see what the response is from the other ceos, but if you think they were sort of putting their fingers in the air and seeing which way the wind was blowing they saw some wind blowing very hard today at trump tower. Eamon, thank you. Joining us is Mohamed Elerian who is the former chair of president obamas development council. Mohammed, do you any that more executives are going to feel that they are, you know, feel compelled to step down, whether its on the Manufacturing Council or any of the other various councils at the white house right now . Kelly, as i think as weve heard, this is going to increase precious youres on ceo and more generally this is going to amplify the media discussion and the controversies about the aftermath to the terrible incident in charlottesville, the terrorist incident its going to amplify the discussion about Steve Bannons future its going to amplify the discussions about race relation and all that is diverting away from what the objective of this announcement was was to focus on infrastructure, something that has a lot of support across the country and jobs and wages, so its its sad that once again a good economic discussion is going to be drowned out completely by all these other things in fact, mohammed, at the ver end we said why should we expect it to happen on infrastructure because it hasnt happened on obamacare on tax and the president squarely seemed to blame john mccain, the senator who did not vote when push came to shove to pass the repeal and replace bill where does that leave you on what part of the white house agenda does get enacted from here so that was a single question on the purpose of the announcement of infrastructure, and i think the speaker was correct in noting that this is being done through executive order and not being done through congress why is that important . Its because its the issue that has the most common support. People want to streamline the approval process people want to improve the interagency is as someone said, this is what president barack obama tried to do it, and, again, if you cant take something with as broad agreement to congress, how about the other stuff thats more complicated, tax reform, a lot more complicated the budget is going to be a lot more complicated, so it just tells you how difficult the politics are to things that economically theres quite a bit of agreement on. Mohamed, is it possible if the president seeing the reaction to his comments today alongside Everything Else decides that its time to let steve bannon go, does that actually flip the narrative around 180 degrees as far as his agenda for people to say perhaps hes going to move in more of the direction that gary cohn and others would like to see in terms of business friendly policies instead of the tariffs and more nationalistic policies that is could undermine growth the other people who are much Better Qualified to speak to this i cant even think of speaking to what the white house politics look like, but what you said at the end is important which is there is a set of identified progrowth measures. This is not an engineering problem. This is an implementation problem, and the quicker we pivot to that, the better it is for the economy, the better it is for markets, and the pivot is absolutely critical. Our reporters in washington and in new york and in eamons case are Still Standing by im onl, i just wanted to go back to you with the same question about the president s inner circle do you think its possible that he sees whats happened even again this afternoon, any more fallout that might be coming his way and decides this is the moment to let steve bannon go . It sounded like when he was talking about steve bannon in trump tower that he was talking about somebody who has already left the white house, somebody he liked very much but he came on very late in the campaign and wasnt a significant figure. Very much minimizing and distancing minimizing Steve Bannons role and distancing himself from steve bannon. I think the other piece of trumps language that stood out to me is when he was talking about the ceos who will leave. He talked about the ceos who will leave the council, possibly an indication that he knows that there are some other names who are start to depart. This is a president who is very frustrated very resentful of the way that he feels hes been treated, and you saw that frustration and resent on full display here at trump tower. The question is politically what that gets him. It will might have been sort of an emotional moment of catharsis for the president as an individual here and you look at this press Conference Performance today and you look at what the political benefit was that the president was trying to achieve. How will this be received among two important groups, the republican senators on capitol hill that hes going to need to pass his legislation and the Corporate Executives who are wrestling with decisions about how they should relate with this president and white house. Thats to be determined and well wait and see how that happens. Joining us now is or republican strategist and former press secretary for marco rubio. Thanks for joining us. Wanted your reaction of what you heard from the president hand how you expect Corporate America may respond. Thanks for having me. As a republican strategist, as a professional communicator, i was really stunned at what i saw there. Look, President Trump needs to get over this episode as soon as possible so he can move on to talking about his agenda, but by going back effectively going back on what he said yesterday and relitigating his statements from start, hes only keeping this story alive, and ive got to tell you, republicans hate this topic they hate this story they hate that this is an issue. They dont want to be talking they dont want to be answering the question why wont donald trump condemn white supremists thats a very uncomfortable question because there is no good answer for that he should be condemning them, much more forcefully than he is, and so he needs to move beyond this as soon as possible, stating the obvious. He needs to move beyond it and this was a big step pc wards we can now pretty much guarantee thats all well talk about for the rest of the week and it puts republicans in congress and potential allies in Corporate America in a very difficult situation. Rob cox from reuters breaking news is also here with me. How would you interpreting this in terms of the fallout for Corporate America as you mentioned, for markets and so on i mean, its open season. Anyone on those councils now has every reason theres no reason for them to stay. I mean, hes already precipitated he said that you folks i know youre all going to leave. Have you a president here, so stunning, who looks increasingly isolated, from his own party the pictures going around twitter right now of general kelly with his head down behind the president , you know, just almost in shock. I mean, this is the the problem, and i think mohamed said it right. We were here to listen to what really could have been a fantastic opportunity to talk about infrastructure youve got trillions of deferred maintenance. Theres actually really good ideas coming out of the white house that are Public Private partnerships, privatizations, oh, my god, a word we used to use in europe a lot and we havent even gotten to in this country. These are all really good ideas and we wont get anywhere near them because of this chaos. Alex conant still with us, this brings up a Communications Point which is theres nobody i believe still in that role since what happened with Anthony Scaramucci and since general kelly came in and tried to clean things up. If you have somebody who is strong in there to keep the president on message and perhaps be trying to get whatever the president was trying to get across the media better themselves, would that have been a better way to move forward anything would have been better than what we just witnessed from a communications perspective. The challenge is that donald trump has always been his own communications director. You can be the best Communications Strategist in the country, but if the president is going to do things like he just did today or wake up every morning and fire off some offmessage tweets as he has over the last couple of days it, it just blows up any sort of messaging calendar that the white house is putting together. Youre right, they dont have anyone in the Communications Directors job currently, but you can see the white house staff around him trying to help him and give him the opportunity to talk about infrastructure which he was supposed to talk about today and instead he steps all over his own message time and time again, and i dont really i dont blame the staff for that i think the problem is that the president clearly wanted to engage on this topic he must not realize how really damaging it is to his larger agenda when we lose entire weeks to talking about these sorts of stories. And mohamed, before we go, just to kind of wrap this up from the point of view, again, of whether the president is the able to move forward on some of these agenda items, whether the gop congress feels like it can and should and needs to rally around him and rally themselves together to get these items passed do you feel as though this is a step back for that as well yeah. I think the hope was that todays announcement would be a catalyst because people agree on infrastructure and the scope of Public Private partnerships but this will not be the case. This is not a catalyst this will amplify other discussions that are not progrowth discussions all right thank you, everybody for joining us alex conant, Kayla Tausche, john harwood and im an javers and Mohamed Elerian, and robert cox, thanks for joining us. And wells fargo and some breaking news right after the break on closing bell. [car tires screech] [bell rings] alex conant, Kayla Tausche, john alex conant, Kayla Tausche, john music stops bell rings welcome back we do have break news at wells fargo at this hour sue herera at this howe. The wells fargo has elevated the former fed governor Elizabeth Duke to the chairmanship role. She was the vice chair of wells fargo representing the banks biggest and stoppingest response yet to the High Percentage of shareholders who you may recall voted against reelecting the board many of the board of directors atits annual motorin in april, so as a result of that ms. Duke will maintain her current position until january 1st. Thats when she will become the new chairman in addition to that, two other directors resigned, and an independent director who was with Price Waterhouse coopers will become an independent director on the board. Kelly, back to you. Sue, thank you. Rob, not seeing Much Movement in wells shares. Look, this scandal is the scandal that keeps giving, right . Its unfolding incrementally and largely because youve got a pretty stodgy board. Youve got a company with a real cultural i mean, this crossselling, misselling scandal goes back decades, and its taking them a long time, and as they go along they are blundering through making the incremental changes. You had tim sloan step up when stumpf left. It came down a little bit when they added cohn recently the tenure is Something Like eight and a half years its going to take a little while. But is this the kind of step now where they can say to the elizabeth warrens and to the public and to the shareholders and and own and even to themselves, weve done the changes and the board shakeup. Elizabeth duke is a serious person and brings credibility. She wont go in there and rubber stamp things thats not the kind of person she is so i think thats good the real problem is they put Timothy Sloan in it was a really too quick decision they put him in. At the time there was criticism for john stumpf saying they were saying this i go is the heir apparent so lets bring him in he was soaked in the same culture, a guy who ran and was the cfo during the period of time when the misselling was taking place. I look at uber and wonder if the absence of any type of management at that time and effectively trying to govern by committee and having them with this sort of awkwardly public search for somebody to come in and take it over and litigation between the board, im not saying the situation is directly analogous. You do want to have like a rudderless board but it also just tells you how this board hadnt even really thought through success properly so they didnt really have a plan b and every board needs a plan b particularly with guys like stumpf who was not a spring chicken. I think we mentioned that Elizabeth Duke is coming from the fed. She was on the feds federal board of governors. Yes in the past we would have said theres a revolving door between now it seems like thats a whole the issue with wells. Why do you think shes qualified is what im trying to say to come in and enhance all of those needs that wells has right now i mean, she comes from the primary regulators of the major banks in the country it may be revolving, but its also a pointof you she knows what regulators are thinking, and thats thats got to be helpful to the board of wells fargo at the same time, she injekts credibility, like warren bauf fet buying the stock when someone like that comes in its an enendorsement. Would not have stepped up to be the chairperson. Wells fargo, as i mentioned, shares not moving too much but potentially big news with those changes at the board urban outfiters is out with its earnings well see if it did well enough in todays retail wreck. Well have the results when we come right back. These days families want to be connected 24 7. Thats why at comcast were continuing to make our services more reliable than ever. Like technology that can update itself. An advanced fibernetwork infrustructure. New, more Reliable Equipment for your home. And a new culture built around customer service. It all adds up to our most Reliable Network ever. One that keeps you connected to what matters most. Welcome back Urban Outfitters is out with its earnings and its already been volatile for retail. Take a look at shares after mourps hours. Up about 14 from heavy volume about three times average volume earnings coming in at 44 cents, that beats analyst expectations of 37 cents per 145share. Revenue stronger than expected Comp Store Sales were down 4. 9 , but that was much bhern what the better than what the analysts were forecasting Urban Outfitters, an thra anthropology still negative, but threepeat up better than analysts forecast. But the ceo is disappointed with the forecast, but he has strategies and in addition tips Going Forward that he hopes will help turn things around. But all in all, a pretty good report yeah, so Urban Outfitters maha it drop the comps down, yeah. And granted the stock moves into on this tells you everything urban as i was asking liz about this last hour, she said they are inconsistent and i almost feel like as good as the share price reaction may be for investors that its future evidence of this choppiness that is very true Urban Outfitters is just one of the retail everies that is fairly inconsistent from quarter to quarter its hard to figure out the trends there but home depot is very consistent and consistent to the positive side. Really there was nothing not to like in that home depot report when i spoke with the cfo, there wasnt anything in our conversation that i could point to that would drive those shares lower. I think its just the overall retail pessimism in the market its really, really hard to shake. That does happen sometimes with shares of home depot on earnings days outside of even the period of time that were in right now with all of the reports. So really good is not even good enough and Profit Margins are in focus as well. That will certainly be something that people should listen to on that urban call. Courtney, thank you. Its been a long day for you bristolmyers falling more than 2 after hours. Well tell you what is driving that drop when we come back. music stops bell rings your insurance on time. Tap one little bumper, and up go your rates. What good is having insurance if you get punished for using it . News flash nobodys perfect. For drivers with accident forgiveness, Liberty Mutual wont raise your rates due to your first accident. Switch and you could save 782 on home and auto insurance. Call for a free quote today. Liberty stands with you™ Liberty Mutual insurance. At ally, we offer low rates on home loans. But if thats not enough, we offer our price match guarantee too. And if thats not enough. We should move. Our home team will help you every step of the way. Still not enough . Its smaller than id like. Well help you finance your dream home. Its perfect. Oh, was this built on an ancient Burial Ground . Okay. Then well have her cleanse you house of evil spirits. Well do anything, spiritual chatter seriously anything to help you get your home. Ally. Do it right. upbeat dance music bell ringing welcome back lets send you over to meck terrete meg ter recommend. Were checking out shares of bristolmyers. They just released results of a phase three study of its two drugs. Were seeing mix the results bristolmyers down about 2. 5 after hours. While the study did meet one of the primary goals of the trial, it missed on another one at least the results werent statistically significant. However they are encouraged by the totality of the data and they continue to run the trial this was in first line previously untreated Kidney Cancer but driving bristolmyers down about 2. 5 meg, stay with us i want to play what the president had to say just a few moments ago about ceos who left his manufacturing xoun still including the ceo of merck some of the folks that will leave, they are leaving out of embarrassment because they make their products outside and ive been lecturing them including the gentleman that you are referring to about you have to bring it back to this country. You cant do it necessarily in ireland and all of these other places you have to bring this work back to this country. That is what i want. Meg, has the company responded to what he said . We did reach out and ask if kens decision had changed at all and they said no, kens decision has not changed and of course we will be looking into those ideas that there are manufacturing employees outside of the United States as for other health care ceos, weve reached out to Johnson Johnson just put out that statement about its ceo saying that felt a responsibility to remain engaged havent heard back from j and j on this. All right meg, thank you rob, i think were probably going to hear more now from companies that are in a difficult spot members not just of Manufacturing Council, we focussed on that at great length, but a whom bunch advising the president because his whole point is i want to bring the people into the white house. Weve seen numerous events with them together. Intels ceo being one example of somebody who has gone Standing Shoulder to shoulder with the president to leaving the council. Right now they are all questioning where there is a greater liability of being soemp associated with the president. And at the same time, there is the other side do you want to be the side receiving the tweet that says make viagra of america. You are not sure what which one will be the best option. I think a lot of them though will probably find that a bad tweet maybe doesnt hurt you and weve heard from ed renzi who said if he was on one of those councils, he would have given the president and earful about his response, about the more appropriate way to handle it renzi who would have supported the president in the past. With these depart churs, if companies are choosing to walk away rather than influencing the president , does not increase the risk of what may happen down the road on so easo early on when jamn was rumored to go to pressutrea argued that he would be a great person to have in the white house. You cant and if people like jamie or gary cohn or some of these other folks dont go, then who does go . So what you really have is just like a company that conditiokot good people, it declines so that is a worry all right good point that does it for closing bell. Fast money begins right now. Fast money does start right now. Im Michelle Carusocabrera in for in lays is lee our traders are on the desk. Is e our traders are on the desk. All in white shirts tonight. And we start with the press conference heard round the world. 3rd doub President Trump doubling down on Race Relations in erk in and the ceos who have met his Manufacturing Council. Eamon javers is at trump tower where it all went down he has the latest. Reporter we just witnessed here at trump tower wa