Dark in there. Lets start right into the game plan, since weve got so many Big Companies reporting. Bank of america. They have cost shareholders little but grief. The fed needs them the most to get going. It cant make as much money unless the fed raises rates. Will they surprise us . Perhaps. But bank of america is no j. P. Morgan. After the bell ibm reports stocks have been on a fabulous tear. Ibm has reported disappointing earnings for three straight years thats an incredibly long losing street. Watson is real, but the good news has not been able to trump the bad news of the older legacy business getting weaker. Thats the problem. After the last quarter, i thought the stock had come down enough to finally tell you to buy it and it would bounce. It has room to grow. Two more very Controversial Companies come after the close on monday. Its netflix and yahoo. The former acts like death. Its in the penalty box. Nobodys expecting much this time around. Thats a positive. I think the market caps too small for the opportunity. But i dont pin down on when the acceleration will occur. Yahoos a special situation. We either want to hear its breaking up and has solid bids for its businesses or we want to hear that rick hill, the savior of novellus is going to be appointed chairman of the board. Sometimes a stock catches the fancy investors and it becomes a true market darling. Right now that company is johnson and johnson. You know ive been a huge backer of this stock and all the things that the ceo has done to make change a competitive powerhouse with a dominant pharmaceutical peep line. Its just performing fantastically. But it has given more than a few nose bleeds. Me . I hope it sells off enough so that people who dont own it yet can buy it. It is that solid a story. J j. United health. This been fits from huge technological advantage. Great data interpretation as well as moves, abandoning unprofitable obamacare exchanges. Sometimes the Company Sells off its extremely conservative, and theres a complexity to the core. But every pull back has been a buying opportunity. We also hear from goldman sachs. Its amazing this company hasnt been able to get its stocks higher. Despite having some of the smartest minds around. Yes, im an alumnus of goldman. But they havent been able to take the calculated risk that used to make it so special. I think banks are getting better. We heard that from j. P. Morgan. We have a confounding one, and thats microsoft. You have to ask yourself, is sis fuss going to punish you again . And has the company been helped bay possible turn in personal computers . As evidenced by the upsized surprise from seagate, the disc drive maker earlier this week . I find myself far from confident about this situation. Because microsoft paid a lot for linked in. Its hard to find highquality pharmaceuticals with stocks that are well off their highs and still have a decent yield, but one of them is abbott labs. The ceo is a genius. Im going to like and youre going to like what we hear. After the close we get reports the opposite of abbott. I am worried that amx has completely lost its way, and i dont believe its current leadership can turn things around. Thursday morning we hear from dominos pizza. Dpz. Last time it was slaughtered, on good but not great numbers. Why . Because they werent up to the surprise stuff. Na is a little precarious. But i believe the ceo will get dominoes back on track. It actually never really left the track. Its just the expectations were too high. How about a company with expectations very low, with a stock that sells at five times earnings, and thats a 5 yield. Welcome to general motors. Some worries with selfdriving cars. How about the end of our love affair with cars. You know what . Ive said stay away from gm. Yields tempting, but in the end, its just a bond. Travelers also reports thursday morning. This is a very misunderstood misunderstood interprice. Travelers is the finest Insurance Company in the land. It could have a lot of room to run if they get things right, but almost no one seems to think they will. Chipot chipotle, slumber j and tar bucks. I find chipotles stock increasingly compelling, particularly around the 400 level. I think you put some on, as they say in the business. How about slumbership . They cut its workforce and been doing better than everyone else. Still, its in the oil and gas business. So if oil jumps, thats tnot going to matter. We buy more if it comes in before or after the quarter. Same goes for starbucks. The company had to raise wages. My advice, this one you wait until you see the Quarterly Report before you buy. Finally on friday, two of my ultra faves. Honeywell and general electric. Both companies have been out and about with their ceos talking very positive about their businesses as of late. My suggestion, if either stock comes down because of some exojnous event . Pull the trigger. Buy, buy, buy, buy, buy, buy theyre that good. And honeywell, id like to see the soontobe retired ceo sm h smashsmash earnings. Opportunities mostly come after the quarters when the shorttempered hot heads democrdump because they dont know how to understand a conference call. And the earning season tifinall begins. Dallas in new york. Caller booyah, jim. Im calling to ask about amd. Yeah, you know, im inclined to like amd. Because i think the intel competition is lessening. I know its 5. Bruce does Technical Work for me at real money. Com. This is one he likes and i like too. Were both blessing it. All right, youve got the game plan for the week. Ill give you one of them for the rest of your life. Whether youre just starting out or approaching retirement, im going to help you set up your 401 k . Then the answer, what is a wath . And im answering all your tweets jimcramer. So dont go anywhere. Dont miss a second of mad money. Follow jimcramer on twitter. Have a question . Tweet cramer, madtweets. Send jim an email to mad money cnbc. Com. Or give us a call at 1800743cnbc. Miss something . Head to madmoney. Cnbc. Com. In a world held back by compromise, businesses need the agility to do one thing another. Only at t has the network, people, and partners to help companies be. Local global. Open secure. Because no one knows like at t. Pg i help customerss, how with their bills. Day . Theres different rates to fit different needs, so listening is a huge part of my job. Because customers want to know that you hear them. They have kids, they have families, they have priorities. I definitely understand that. I have three children, i was a stay at home mom, i didnt have money to pay the bills, and so i put myself in their shoes. And im going to do all that i can to lower their bills and to help their situation. To choose the rate plan that works best for your family, visit pge. Com rates. Together, were building a better california. Shooting in the streets of istanbul right now as the military attempts a coup. Martial law claims to have taken over the country. All flighting in and out of ataturk the airport are canceled. Erdogan urged people to take to the streets against the coup. For continuing coverage, log on to cnbc. Com this evening. Anybody who has a High School Diploma has almost certainly take and course in geometry and can graduate from college with a host of language and have an understanding of quantum physics. But you know what they almost never teach you in high school . Financial lit reracy. Im not talk being about economics. You can still learn nothing about how to balance a darn checkbook, let alone how to invest your money wisely. Its like the third rail of the whole educational system. And thats why i am on a constachbts mission to teach you about every aspect of managing your money so youll be a better investor with retirement and playing around with what i call your mad money portfolio hallelujah which is one of the reasons i wrote get rich carefully to begin with. A 401 k plan, which is where you keep the bulk of are your retirement funds, for those of you who have been living in a cave the last 20 years, 401 k s are the main way people save. Along with the i ra. Not the irish the republican army. Im talking about the retirement account. The whole idea puts you to sleep . Hear me out. Youre going to need to know this stuff. This shows different. At this point, its pretty much conventional wisdom that you have to invest in your 401 k . A lot of experts will tell you to max it out. The maximum the contribution seems to be going up over time. But either way, its a serious chunk of change and they come from your pretax income. However, i am not one of those people who thinks you should max out your 401 k . The truth is, they can be a real mixed bag. Boo with a couple really great features and a lot of bad ones, too. And those features will eat away, sometimes at fees that are almost totally hidden from you that are actually quite upsetting to me. Im going to tell you whether it makes sense to contribute more to your own 401 k or put that cash to better use somewhere else. The best thing is its tax deferred. You pay no taxes on what you put in. Then your money compounds. Totally tax free until you decide to start making withdrawals. Regular viewers of the show im a huge believer in the power of compounding. Suppose youre 30 years old, and you start investing 30,000 a year in your 401 k . If you choose your investments wisely, you should be able to generate as much as a 7 return on average. Over the next several years youll be contributing 150,000 to your 401 k plan. By the time that youre 60, that 5,000 a year pretax income would be worth 511,000. It could be a lot lower, thats how important compounding is. You only ever have to pay taxes on your 401 k money once, and thats when you decide to withdraw it. And since youll likely be retired by then, most of you will pay a lower rate than when you were when you first earned it. Thats one reason to like 401 k plans. The second, Many Employers will match. For every dollar, your employer maycents. That is free money. You never want to walk away from free money. But if you dont get free money from your employer, i think its a much less compelling option. There are a lot of things about a 401 k that can be really bad, which is, why, if you dont get a match from your employer i think its better to save for retirement via the ira. You can only contribute 6500 a year if youre over 50. 401 k plans vary. Many give you a 401 k plan with limited options. Times you get a choose between a dozen mutual funds. For those of you who cant pick your own stocks, my number one rule is before you contribute to your 401 k plan, you want a nice, low expense index fund. If your 401 k doesnt offer that, shame on your company. 24e then go with a selfdirected fidelity, so you can have control over your money. One more negative, within a 401 k you have to pay that mutual funds fees. This is really important. But your 401 k ad administrato he will also charge fees. Boo meaning that all the money that 401 k saves you on taxes can club you back with the fees. Fees are probably the reason if theyre not the way they should be. The company you work for offers an employer match, then you want to put money in until its maxed out. And after that put any additional Retirement Savings into an ira, but if theres no employer match or theres an employer match but they dont give you any options worth investing in, you would be better to skip the 401 k and go directly to an ira immediately. Deborah. Caller i have a twopart question regarding the value of listening to a companys earnings conference call. Okay. Caller the first part is, how can we decide what we want to do, in other words, what action we want to take based on the earnings report, since the stock frequently will behave in a contradictory fashion to the report. For example a company can report good earnings but guide lower on the revenue and earnings Going Forward and the stock will go up. The second, where you might think that it should go down, right . The second part of my question is, im on the west coast, so the calls frequently are at 7 00 and 8 00 a. M. Eastern time. So for me, the value of listening to the call is diminished, because im not going to get up at 4 00 or 5 00 a. M. To listen to it. So im not going to take any action on that call. Heres the solution to this, deborah. You have no gun to your head, unlike the hedge funds, you can listen at your leisure. Im not trying to get anybody ahead of a quarter to buy a stock. But you want to listen to the call or read it, go to yahoo finance, get some of the research, street. Com, cnbc. Get some research, match the expectations with what was said, take a longerterm view. Thats the advantage of the individual investor. You dont have to play that day. Doug in nevada. Doug . Caller booyah, mr. K. Okay. Caller my question is i have a 401, fairly substantial. Would it be advisable for me to change that to selfdirected ira . It depends on the match. You want to get the max match so to speak, and then after that, yes, or, but if its just, its six of one and one halfdozen of the other. And if its not that good that you can be in the 401 k , then yes, i want you to be in a selfdirected ira. Let me help you take control of your financial future. If your company matches your contribution, max that out. But if you dont get an employer match or you tonight have investable options go straight to the ira. On mad tonight, you just got your diploma, so now what . Then, too busy to invest in individual stocks . Thats fine. Plus, there are many roads to a healthy retirement. Stick with cramer. Discover how a lexus master craftsman turns an ordinary experience into an extraordinary one. Get great offers at the lexus golden opportunity sales event. Lease the 2016 es 350 for 329 a month for 36 months and well make your first months payment. See your lexus dealer. We live in a world where you have more choices about where to invest your money than ever before. A virtual infinity of etfs, you name it. But sometimes having more options makes it yes, maimposs decide which ones are right or wrong for you. And you have never had more options for mutual funds than now. I hate the way many of the sectorbased etfs, the one that let you buy and sell a entire group, i hate the way theyve been warping the way the whole stock market trades. If youre in an etf, i have to urge you to find out about them. They can all advertise. The companies that run these funds, they want your money. One of the biggest mistakes you can make as an individual investor is to give it to them with a few significant exceptions. Unfortunately, this is also one of the most common money mistakes out there. Most people in this country equate investing with putting their money in mutual funds. Many of you dont have a choice. A lot of 401 k plans dont want you to pick individual stocks. They just give you a menu of mutual funds to choose from, which is why i think all else being equal, an ira is a better way to invest for retirement for you. Why am i railing against something thats an institution in this country . Simple. If youre investing in mutual funds, youre most likely, to put it delicately, youre getting hosed. I dont want to paint with too broad a brush here. Theres worthwhile mutual funds, and ill tell you how to find them in a minute. But first you need to understand the problem with the mutual fund model. My main beef is with actively managed mutual funds, people decides which stocks and securities to buy and sell, weve got problems. Unlike hedge funds, they collect fees, and the amount of money they make depends on their aum. Assets under management. What theyre really being paid to do is bring in more money from more investors. Sales people for their funds. And thats part of the reason in study after study. The vast majority underperform their benchmarks, like the s p 500. Its performance will most likely fall short, fall short of the s p 500. Make matters worse, even though actively managed funds consistently underperform the market, they have some of the highest fees in the business. How do you like that . They dont do as well as the bench mark, and they charge more. Boo so even if your fund does manage to beat the benchmarks, it could be eaten up by fees and youll end up with an underperforming investment versus being in a simple index fund. [ buzz ] there are some with fabulous managers. And im going to tell you how to find them another time. When a mutual fund has Great Results for a long time, theyll put their foot down. At a certain point, when it becomes too big, it becomes incredibly difficult to beat the market. As a general rule, if youre going to invest in mutual funds, the fees are too high a. The best strategy is to manage your own portfolio. Thats what i talk about night after night on mad money. But for those of you who dont have the time, or if your 401 k plan wont let you own them, let me tell you the smart way. You can write this down, a cheap, lowcost index fund, with an S P Index Fund you have a vehicle that will let you participate in the market. The whole thing is to save you the effort and time. Thats why i think its insane when people start owning multiple mutual funds, by its very nature, funds should be diversified. There are a lot of etfs out there, but theres no reason for you to have much involvement in them. That time would be better spent picking individual stocks. As for etfs, in most cases these are for trading, not for investing. Many etfs rebalance every day. Theyre not set up for longterm performance. There are some exceptions. The etf that i like if to play for gold, but if youre not a pro and not managing a portfolio and not day trading every single day, you probably shouldnt be fooling around with those etfs either. At the end of the day, a cheap S P Index Fund is the least bad way to manage your money, better than the bulk of mutual funds. And if you do have the time i think you can beat the performance of an index fund by picking stocks yourself, which is the entire reason i do this show every night. If you dont have the time, though, then dont overthink it. Just one cheap S P Index Fund is indeed the best way to go. Mary in maryland. Mary . Caller booyah, jim. Mmhm. Caller i started listening to you a while back. Then i started buying stocks on your advice. Thank you. Caller now im looking at my portfolio here, and jim, jim, mine eyes have seen the glory. So i want to get a little fancier and perhaps buy some china stocks. Hmm. Caller however, im curious about adrs and possible exposure to foreign currency, change rates. So can you educramer us . You want to own individual stocks and the businesses are good, i dont really care where they are or the currency if the business is that great. The stock will go higher. But if youre buying an adr and its in a european country and the euro is being weakened by central bank issues, you will not do well even if the stock does well, all things being neutral, im fine with it. But if they are, you got to stay away. Matthew in new york. Matthew . Caller ba, ba, ba booyah, jim. Booyah back at you. Caller i just started maxing out my ira. Realizing times on my side, i want to go for an aggressive allocation and growth to take on risk. Im unsure how to do that. How would you allocate i think you want to have the fastest young growth stocks, and those are, tends to be found in technology sector. But also of course in biotech. Dont go too crazy. Im liable to have one or two stocks of companies that arent making money, no more than that. But those are the most fertile areas. Junior growth stocks. Companies that are worth 1 billion or less, one of those two. These are all fine. You can do those, because if you lose money, youve got the rest of your life to make it back. Sorry, not so much mutual love here. Picking stocks, still the best way to manage your money. If you dont have time, please, please, please, go with the cheap s p 500 fund. Now theres much more mad money ahead, including how to find the best path to a healthy retirement, depending on your income. Then presentiim responding tweets without the 140 character restriction. Let me tell you about whether it makes sense for you to use a regular 401 k or ira or for you to go with a roth, which is the term im sure youve heard countless times but may not have understood. I know weve talked about an ira, and a 401 k plan to invest for retirement. Im not going to beat a dead horse here. But this is the subject i get a ton of questions about. Should i put my money in a roth ira or a regular one . Aside from the earned income tax credit, the roth may be the single best thing our government has done since the end of the war on poverty. Ive told you all about how regular ira les you take pretax income, vfts it, and then your gains can compound year after year, decade after decade totally tax free until you decide to withdraw that money. A roth ira works differently. With a roth you make contributions with aftertax income, putting money into a roth wont decrease your tax bill, on the other hand, once your money is in a roth, you will never pay taxes on it again, as long as your cash remains in the account you dont pay Capital Gains or dividend tax, and when you withdraw it, which can you do without penalty after age 59 1 2, you dont pay taxes. With a roth you pay taxes now so you dont pay taxing 30 or 40 years from now when you retire. And you wont get hit a 10 penalty, which is what happens when you try to withdraw money from a regular ira before you hit that magic age of 59 1 2. Your gains dont get taxed within the account, but once you start withdrawing the money, every penny you take out is taxed as ordinary income, when youre trying to decide between a regular ira or roth, youre deciding whether it makes more sense to pay now with a roth. Of y you have to figure out whether you will be in a higher bracket or a lower one. Let me give you a quick rule of thumb. For anyone whose marginal tax rate is 25 or less, which is most of america, i think you want to go with a roth. Better to take a hit up front than allow it to compound tax free for life. For those of you who dont have the opportunity to pick your own, park your money in a lowcost index fund that mirrors the s p 500. As you get older, can you add bonds. Until you retire, stocks should make up the majority of your investmen investments. Its contrary to conventional wisdom. I want stocks, not bonds, until later. How about a roth 401 k . This works like a roth ira. You never pay money on that again because its a 401 k plan. For example, the government says the contribution is 18,000 unliu. You can take advantage of one of these as long as your employer decides to geo s ts to give you. If you taxes are inexraably headed higher. Then a roth where you pay taxes now and nothing in the future, that is so the way to go, even if youre making a lot of money in the present. For those of you young people who only become politically conscious under the obama administration, it may seem like theres no way to stop the plight of higher taxes, but history says different, and i believe we can close the deficit without substantially raising taxes. Thats about as political as im going to get on this show. But those are beyond our control and ability to predict. A roth 401 k or roth ira lets you pay those rates now and never let you worry about taxes again for your retirement money. Its that simple. And when youre saving for retirement, dont worry about what could go catastrophically wrong 30 or 40 years in the future. Worry about making the best choices right now. Mad moneys back after the break. In the streets of istanbul in ankara, the Turkish Military attempts a coup. The crowds appear to be cheering for the tanks as they roll into the city. This after they declared martial law. All flights in and out of atatu ataturk airport grounded. President erdogan called on the people to take to the streets against the coup and that the coup plotters would pay a heavy price. The u. S. State Department Says u. S. Citizens should stay indoo indoors. For complete coverage, log on to cnbc. Com. Lately,ivy be ive eivy been lot of stories about the crushing student loan debt. Its an incredibly high figure. And its not just that it really stinks to graduate and immediately realize it might take decades to pay back those loans. In study after study, kids who graduate with no debt end up being worth a lot more money than their classmates who have outstanding stufbts loans. Im kochb staptsly coming out here and telling you how to use the stock market. And i want you to use it to make serious money. For any of you who are parents or thinking of becoming parents, let me tell you right now that there are very few things you can do for your children that are better than paying for as much of their College Education as you can afford. We know that College Graduates have a much easier time getting jobs, especially in our current climate where unemployment is still too high. And they ultimately make more money. If i were to make like an abe maslow hierarchy, i would tell you its more important for you to save and invest for retirement. For those of you who are parents, how could your own retirement possibly be more important than making sure your kids have the best future possible . Simple, because believe me, if you reach retirement age and you dont have enough money to pay for your kids, who do you think is going to support you . Your kids. You dont want to be a burden on them. So take care of yourselves first of however, after oyouve saved enough for retirement, then its time to start thinking about college. The best way to save for college is through a 529 plan. These plans do vary by state. But the general rules are true all across the country. There are two kinds of 529 plans. First, some states let you use a 529 as a way to hedge against tuition inflation by buying tuition credits at todays prices that can be used in the future. Thats not what im talking about, though. I want you to use the 529 savings plan. The rules differ from state to state. Generally, a 529 doesnt let you mapg your own portfolio. You have to pick and choose. This is not my favorite way to do things. I prefer you to have control of your assets and the selection of which stocks to buy, and which actual instruments. But 529s have so much going for them, im going to swallow this one flaw. When can you only choose between funds, go for a lowcost fund that mirroring the market. Youll see in many of these 529 plans. Since its weighted by market cap, its performance will be very similar to the s p which contains the 500 largest companies, what are the rules . Lets say you just had your first child, congratulations if you can afford it, you should start a 529 with your kid as the ben fishery right then and right there. Maybe a couple days later, although you just had a baby. I traded a big box of alcoa throughout the birthing. Not one of my finest moments. But heres the good part, once your money is in the 529 plan, you dont pay any taxes on your gains, so you let them compound. Its a lot like a roth ira, except for college rather than retirement. Because of federal gift tax laws, you can only contribute 14,000 a year if youre single, 28,000 if youre married and you file your taxes jointly, still,nas nthats a heck of a f money. And your childrens grandparents can contribtd, too. Although for Financial Aid reasons, its better to have a parent do it. Lets say for some reason you or your parents are sitting on a really huge sum of money. One of the cool things about a 5 54 529 plan, you can invest 70,000 right from the start, or if youre married and file joichtsly, you can contribute 140,000. For the next five years you wont be able to contribute anything without getting hit by the gift tax, which is something you dont wanted, but honestly, after you drop that kind of money, you wont need to make that many contributions. You want to get that money into your kids 529 as quickly as possible. Its all about the power of compounding. You dont pay taxes within 529. So if you can contrive to contribute 70,000 right off the bat, the rule of thumb is that over time youll make an average of roughly 8 per year. I know the stock market is actually a lot more volatile than that. If stocks perform like they have historically, you can double your investment in about nine years. By the time they are 18, they will double and double again. If you started with 70,000, after 18 years, you could have as much as 280,000. Thats enough for a fancy, expensive private College Education, and a decent chunk of law school to boot. Its worth keeping in mind that frontsd loading as possible is good. Last thing about saving for college, any money that you dont use can you transfer to another relative, parents, cousins. If your ungrateful kid decides not to go to college, you can withdraw the money, but in that case youll have to pay taxes on any of your gains along with a 10 penalty. No, paying for your kids education isnt as important financially as providing for yourself in retirement. But if you have children, after youve made enough retirement contributions, putting money in a college fund should be the next thing on the agenda. Its the best way to protect your kids from the crushing burden of student loan. For your retirement, you wanted to celebrate the little things, before they get too big. And that is why you invest. The best returns arent just measured in dollars. Td ameritrade. Weve got to get to some of your tweets that youve been sending me jimcramer. Including some that are very nice and smart. Here we go. At Kenneth Fagen tweets, i love you, jim. I love you Kenneth Fagen 23. How about that . Its requited in my book. Some people call me jack tatum. No, im a tweet guy. Why care about shortterm hit if you have longterm investment strategy. Amen. How many times have i said i like xyz stock. It goes down that day and people want to burn me in effigy or scalding oil . It doesnt have to be that day, think a little longer term. Here we have a viewer who wants to know, aside from your home, what should you have under your belt to trade better. Peter lynch, theyre available on amazon. Beat the street. You may want to look at some of david darsts books. He taught me a lot at goldman stac. Do you ever sleep . Winky face. No, i dont sleep. Okay. Now weve answered that question. Now, of btw, which i think stands for by the way, im following your know what you own motto or kwyo. Cleaning my portfolio of yolo. You only live once, so i totally agree with you. Heres crabo. Im in the market because of you. Sir, give all the haters a big booya booyah. Let me give you a hides up. I love the haters. Youre why im in this game. Congratulations, and stick with cramer professor of cramer, i have a cake of victory lap and pat yourself on the back, white wave foods, booyah to you, my friend. Thank you weve been nothing that one for a long time. Mccormick spice. I keep this on my desk, not just to remind me about the ratings. Im an eagles fan. At a time when you cant go outside without your makeup, for fear of someones highdefinition of cell phone catching you with your ugly face on. Thats why i always spray paint myself before i go out. I cant afford otherwise. Boo no one has better nerds or dots or fresher cow tails. Those are cramer staples. A bull market somewhere, and i promise to try to find it just for you, right here on mad money. Im jim cramer, and ill see you next time. Narrator in this episode of american greed. A mother and son from ukraine live like American Royalty off a 50 million fraud perpetrated on u. S. Taxpayers. They had milliondollar homes in staten island. They drove 100,000plus cars. Narrator but when hidden cameras catch them paying kickbacks to medicare patients, they learn they cant keep their secret forever. And when the department of justice puts the squeeze on mommy dearest, only one question remains. It came down to, was a mother going to let her son take the fall for her . Narrator and later. Are you interested in the movies . Do you like to make money . Narrator . The leaders of a makeshift movie studio use a