Transcripts For CNBC Power Lunch 20170608

And big bets against one of the most wellknown Tech Companies out all also all matter to you and your money and we hit it all as power lunch begins right now. Welcome to power lunch, im melissa lee. Lets look at the markets right now. Dow and nasdaq hitting alltime highs during the comey testimony. Take a look at the vxx right now. Take a look at that below 10, 9. 93. Financials leaving the markets today this on the back of the house vote of overhaul of doddfrank. Jp morgan, bank of america, Goldman Sachs among the top performers. And take a look at some of the names hitting alltime highs today, netflix, united health, fed ex, ebay. Thank you. Well, we begin where else with the Political Drama in washington, d. C. Aimen jaifrs like millions of others listening on every single word of the fascinating comey hearing and he joins us with reaction and an update. Thats right. There were a number of astonishing moments. Let me bring you two of those. One was when the former fbi director used the l word which you rarely hear in plit washington discourse about the president of the United States. He said the president might lie. Here is what the former director of the fbi had to say i was honestly concerned that he might lie about the nature of our meeting, so i thought it really important to document. That combination of things i never experienced before, but it led me to believe i got to write it down and got to write it down in a very detailed way. Comey there saying because he left the meeting with the president feeling concerned about the meeting, concerned the president might lie about it, thats when he began his process of memorializing every single interaction he had with the president whether it was on the phone or in person. Comey also saying here is Something Else i never really heard any washington official do admitting that he orchestrated a leak through a third party to the media. Here is what comey had to say about how he got a copy of his memo out to the media. President tweeted on friday after i got fired that i better hope theres not tapes. I woke up in the middle of night on monday night because it didnt dawn on me originally that there might be corroboration for our conversation, there might be a tape. And my judgment was, i needed to get that out into the public square. So i asked a friend of mine to share the content of the memo with the reporter. Didnt do it myself for a variety of reasons, but i asked him to because i thought that might prompt the appointment of a special council. So, that admission there comey saying he deliberately orchestrated the leak in order to prompt the appointment of a special council and it was all in response to the president s tweet about potentially having tapes of comey. Comey saying in the hearing today that he hopes there are tapes and he hopes that those will be released. He says his feelings wont be hurt if he feels the president was secretly taping him. Well see how the white house responds to that if they do admit there is a tapings system of some kind or they were recorded in some way. Until now, they havent been willing to acknowledge one way or the other anything about that tweet that the president made which now turns out to have been very consequential because it prompted comey to initiate the leak which ultimately as we know led to appointment of a special council. We now know that that leak was done to Daniel Richman a special adviser to comey. He admitted that when he was approached. Yes, i was the one who leaked it to the New York Times. But lets not forget, there is another hearing. Theres a 1 00 p. M. Right now a closed door hearing in a specially toward the end of the comey public hearing comey said a number of times, these are not things he could discuss in an open forrum. What, if anything, do we know about what will be discussed in the closed door session . Reporter well, comey gave us a couple of bread crumbs to follow throughout the course of the hearing. On one occasion he said he knew something classified about attorney general Jeff Sessions he couldnt reveal in open session but that classified information led him to believe that the attorney general was not going to continue on as part of the russia investigation and, in fact, we know that the attorney general later recused himself. I imagine that would come up along with a whole series of other conversations about what exactly comey knew about this russia situation and when he knew it. All this seems to point to the notion that perhaps there is not an obstruction of justice case to even be made. If comey is releasing the memo to get to the press because he wants a prompt the appointment of a special council, then it seems like if he thought there were charges of obstruction of justice that could be brought he would have gone that route. Reporter well, i dont know. I mean, he might not have been finished with his investigation. He certainly felt after he was fired that the firing itself could play a role in this and whether the president s state of mind as he fired comey, why did he do it . Did he do it to shut down the Russian Investigation . Could that be part of a broader case a prosecutor might make of obstruction of justice. What comey said in the hearing today was the question of whether this was a obstruction of justice, whether it was a crime for the president to do this will be up to the special counsel. Well see where that lands as well. Thank you. Now lets go to capitol hill following the aftermath of comeys testimony. Ylan . Reporter guys, we just saw comey leave the hearing room right over my shoulder here and make his way toward that second closed door session that hell be having with lawmakers in just a few minutes. Now, this was a packed hearing where people waited for hours to get in. One of the people attending was preet ba har ra. And i spoke with him very briefly about why he is. He told me that it is, quote, a matter of great public interest. And of course he had been live tweeting portions of that hearing saying that some of the president s decisions sounded wrong and that they were not the right thing to do. Now, certainly comey received praise from both republicans and democrats during the hearing for his integrity and for his service, but republicans did press him, john mccain brought up the Hillary Clinton email investigation saying that perhaps theres a double standard in how the fbi conducts these investigations separately, how Speaker Paul Ryan appeared to defend the Trump Administration by saying that the president is, quote, new at this and that he is not familiar with the protocols of washington. Well bring you more as we have it from the lawmakers, guys. Ylan in washington, thank you very much. We are also waiting for a statement from President Trumps personal attorney. As soon as that comes out, we will take it live the moment that it begins. Lets bring in now chris sweker, former fbi assistant direct r and john carlin, former attorney general for the u. S. Department of Justices National security division. John, many headlines coming out of the comey hearing but perhaps only one thing ultimately matters. In your opinion, did the former fbi director say anything that could imply the president might be investigated or even indicted for obstruction of justice into an fbi investigation . So i think what you have to realize is what obstruction mean. So the definition of obstruction of justice is that someone with corrupt intent decides to interfere or impede an election. And what we have here is testimony that the president of the United States had a private meeting with the director of the fbi and that in the private meeting with the director of the fbi he pressured him to drop the investigation of Michael Flynn. Then theres testimony about a lot of other surrounding circumstances. So at the end of day, this isnt probably going to be a decision thats ever decided by a criminal prosecutor because theres department of justice guidance that says you cant indict a sitting president. That means its going to go back to congress. If they believe that the director of the fbi was fired because the president didnt like and wanted to influence the way he was doing an investigation into russia and you have certain statements to that effect and the flynn conversation, then that could rise to the level of an Impeachable Offense and that will be up to the members of congress ultimately to determine. Yeah. Because theres a couple applicable statutes here, seems to apply the most and that is based the outlines objection threats against agencies or departments. Theres a key here, dont want to go too far into the legal weeds here, the key is whether somebody corruptly or any threatening or letter or communication influences obstructs or impedes or endeavors to influence any kind of an investigation may be subject. Here is the key, if i say to you, john, with regards to the Flynn Investigation, let it go. If i say to you, let it go. The same words different mental purpose. If we dont get any of those alleged trump tapes, do you believe we will ever know how this was actually said . Because that could go directly to intent and purpose for the conversation. I think you need to look more broadly than just that conversation, right . So as a prosecutor what you would look at is all the surrounding circumstances. In that sense, the private meeting that was had inside the white house, the one on one meeting with the loyalty request. Then the meeting where his superior was ordered out of the room f theres corroboration that event took place and one on one meeting between the president and the director of the fbi thats contemporaneously recorded. Then you have the fact that there are at least two other occasions where the president requests to remove the clouds surrounding the Russian Investigation and ultimately the director of the fbi is fired and after hes fired the president says that one of the reasons for firing him was because of the russia thing, when you put that all together, that will be the type of total facts that you look at. And the question will be for congress to decide was and what do the American People think, did the president fire director comey because he wasnt happy with the way the russia investigation was going. If thats the case, thats the definition of obstruction. And chris, well get to you in just a moment. John, just to go down this legal route, who else could be called in order to establish corrupt intent in all the circumstances that you described are very interesting and could add the context to it, but they are circumstances. How do we actually prove that there was corrupt intent on the part of the president . Who else could be called . You would have to look at what other you do a full investigation and see if there are other conversations that either the president had with his sub ord nants he made clear what his intent was and whether or not he did or didnt want to interfere with this with this investigation. You have the president s own statements because hes tweeted about it that that was sorry he said both tweeted about it and said it in a live interview. So that would go to intent as well. And there may be other circumstances that have to do with who was under investigation at the time and how the president was informed about those. That will come out through the special council investigation. Chris, you can probably imagine what it might be like to be in comeys shoes. Given what weve heard from the testimony, the sorts of meetings and things that were said to him and the things he said to the president , what whats your interpretation of these events . Yeah, the thing that disturbs me the most is that the head of the fbi, a guy who essentially has spent at least half his career in prosecutions and with the fbi did if he felt like some type of predication existed to open an investigation for obstruction, either he or his executives that were aware of these interactions should have made a referral, the head of the Criminal Division position i once held of the fbi or over to the department of justice albeit not the attorney general who they felt like was about to recuse himself any way, but theres a process in place for this under the attorney general guidelines that he knows, former director comey knows and agents know and Justice Department attorneys know. If theres sufficient facts of predications to open an investigation, you make a referral and you open up at least a prelim narp inquiry, which is a very lobar. A full investigation takes a little more. Comey, though, chris admitted basically. He said that he was not strong enough. That effectively implied that he was afraid because it was the president. Yeah. Unfortunately i mean, i know former director comey. He is absolutely 100 honest. Hes candid. He is speaking from the heart. But what i saw through all those interactions that he documented was a man who wanted to keep his job. We see it in corporate america, something wrong is happening, people inside the Corporation Want to blow the whistle or do something about it, but theyre overwhelmed by the power of the ceo. And in this case, i feel like he sort of fell in line and documented it as sort of a cya exercise. I admire former director comey, worked with him over the years, but i just think he had a human weakness here that he was a man that really wanted to keep his job. And im sure one thing that did come out many people in his pox would want to keep their job as well. But at this point, that doesnt change the fact or the facts, the interactions and obstruction of justice case could still be brought regardless of whether or not he wanted to fall in line at the moment and regardless of why hes bringing up at this point. Whats your opinion on that given the interactions that youve read about . I think one of the revelations from his testimony, which i had a question mark about, was whether the special council was going to look at this, or whether he was going to stay within the parameters of the russian collusion investigation. That question was answered today. The special Council Former director mueller is looking at this issue. Yes, it could lead to a potential obstruction charge or investigation any way as it was just pointed out the president may have some type of immunity. But, you know, even impeachment has to be based on high crimes or misdemeanors, so there has to be some kind of violation here. Ive worked with that obstruction statute over the years as head of the Criminal Division. Its a very difficult statute to work with. It is very vague, very sort of broad. Theres actually 1503, 1505 and 1515 1512. And 15112. I want to go back to Something Else, chris, that probably wont get the attention because the attention will be on the sitting president which is james comey also admitted that acting attorney general or then attorney general Loretta Lynch pressured him to change his language when he called the email investigation for Hillary Clinton an investigation and that lynch asked him to change the word to a matter rather than an investigation. Comey admitted that, quote, made him queasy. In your experience of the fbi, how common is it that high level politicians, whether it be President Trump or an attorney general of the United States is having these kinds of conversations with the nations highest Law Enforcement official . Well, more so the attorney general than the president of the United States because technically the fbi director reports to the Deputy Attorney general, so theres a line of report or authority there that we always respect when i was with the bureau. He clearly stepped outside his boundaries when he made a prosecutive decision in essence and then talked about it publicly. So, you know, theres a lot of things you can quibble about a lot of things, but his judgment was off in several different parts of that investigation of clinton the clinton emails. And then subsequently he got stuck with his own you know, with his own the things that he had already laid in place which was ill confirm some investigations but i wont confirm others. And it looked like he was being very selective about that. Chris, appreciate your time. Well leave it there. Up next with the market is making of all the fireworks on the hill nmplt. As voters in the uk head to the polls what impact will this election have on markets around the world. Could this be the start of a wave of retailers leaving the stock market . Power lunch will be back in two. I joined the army in july of 98. I did active duty 11 years. And two in the reserves. Our 18 year old was in an accident. When i call usaa it was that voice asking me, is your daughter ok . Thats where i felt relief. It actually helped to know that somebody else cared and wanted make sure that i was okay. That was really great. Were the rivera family, and we will be with usaa for life. Usaa. We know what it means to serve. Call today to talk about your insurance needs. Were opening more Xfinity Stores closer to you. Visit us today and learn how to get the most out of all your services, like xfinity x1. Well put the power in your hands, so you can see how x1 is changing the way you experience tv with features like voice remote, making it easier and more fun than ever. Theres more in store than you imagine. Visit an xfinity store today and see for yourself. Xfinity, the future of awesome. On a normal day, the election in england would top your headlines, but today anything from normal. Still, dont lose sight of the big vote for the Prime Minister of the uk. The future of england ultimately leaving the eu may just be in question. Willford frost is london as the uk heads to the ballot box. Will fred . Thanks, brian. Yes, indeed the story of this election has really been one of a disappointing campaign by the Prime Minister theresa may. Her poll lead when she announced the election a couple of months ago was as much as 20 points. It has slimmed. The ft poll of polls average now stands at an 8point lead. But, even at eight points that is a pretty big lead on polling day itself by uk political standards. And should be enough for her to increase her working majority of 17. But, what if we got a surprise . What if she failed to do that . This is gold man sacks take. They say, either a tiny and hence politically compromised conservative majority or a Hung Parliament or a labourled coalition would increase uncertainty, policy risk and most likely push down sterling. That view certainly tallies with what the pound has been doing this week. It has been rising as may as finally stopped the rot and seen her average poll lead increase in the last two days from six points to eight points. The exit polls, guys, out at 5 00 p. M. Eastern time, all eyes on sterling at that point. Absolutely. Thank you so much, wilfred frost from london. Any fears about the uk election has not stopped investors from investing in the region. They are out we are forming the s p 500. So is your better money off overseas or in the u. S. . Lets bring in jack and anastasia amaroso. Good to see you both. Jack, ill kick it off with you. If you had to put money to work at this moment, and you had to choose, would it be europe or the u. S. . I would say europe. Really just for a number of reasons fundamentally, europe is moving higher than the u. S. The purchasing Managers Index pretty much across the board is higher than it is here at home. The currencies, euro and pound most notably are trading between 7 and 10 cheaper to the u. S. Dollars. So youve got a currency benefit, but most importantly equity valuation, probably trading around 15, 15 discount to the u. S. And given the fact that the u. S. Is pushing alltime highs and that europe is still more than 20 below its alltime high suggests at least theres a little more room to run on the upside there. Anastasia, would you also vote for europe in youre nodding your head yes, i guess so. I would indeed. But i would take it slightly different spin on the story and that is one of the things that jack mentioned is the currency benefit. But i would actually say the currency benefit has already sort of played out and the expointing sector of europe and the stocks have done very well from the earnings perspective. But what i look to capitalize on in europe is actually recovery in the domestic economy and recovery in the infrastructure and the cap x sector of the economy. That is something we have not seen for quite some time. U. S. Has underinvested massively, but so has europe. You think of the environment today, you have earnings strongest in seven years and you have credit costs that are the lowest as many years at least. So that creates a very attractive environment for corporations to actually start investing some of that money and i think cap x and infrastructure names will be the beneficiaries of that. Jack, whats your take on whats going on in the u. S. Markets right now, the dow, the nasdaq hitting records highs in the todays, the vxx is below 10. Seems like nothing d rattle this market. Its harder for the average investor to hear you say europe is the better place when theyre seeing the markets domestically hit highs a after highs. True. So i think that this is its a great story. In fact, i would argue that if i felt that the u. S. Would decline, say, 5 or 10 , im not so sure i would be as big a fan of europe because they are closely linked. I believe my base case is that we get, you know, single digit gains out of the u. S. Between now and the end of the year, but we get double digit gains overseas. So it is predicated on the direction of the u. S. We do need to continue to make incremental progress here at home. There are some concerns. The fact is that economic surprises right now are disappointing when you look at the Economic Data coming in based on where economists had forecast. Anastasia, quickly do you think u. S. Stocks are overvalued right now . I dont think theyre overvalued, but earnings will need to continue to deliver. And i think for now we are still in a sweet spot for earnings for all right. I think we had a problem with the shot obviously, but our thanks to anastasia and jack. We say keep an answer short, thats what we mean, folks. Thats what you get. She was short, concise. The bears are circling the snap stock. The lockup expiration nears down 16 over the past three months. A new note highlighting the companies slowing daily average growth, average user growth and saying they dont expect it to pick back up. Lets bring in anthony, senior analyst. Great to have you with us. Hey, thanks for having me, me slay. The lockup is something we highlighted on fast money for weeks now. Yeah. But now its coming closer to the time and up to i believe its 80 of the shares outstanding are eligible for sale or so. What do you think is going to happen . You know, its interesting that the lockup comes before the quarter, so i think that theres going to be a lot of attention on the last data points and whats likely going to happen in the second quarter. And so, you know, we only have these app down load data points we track and according to our analysis we they the competition facebook and instagram are starting to really take share in terms of those new users. We think that snapchat is having a problem attracting and retaining new users. And so there may be a number of reasons for that, which weve talked about in our research and our report. Look, i have a reduced rating on the stock. I think its overvalued. I think its a risky and speculative stock and the data is starting to bare that out and revenue is also at the same time for a number of reasons decelerating dramatically. I think there will be pressure on the stock to answer your question ahead and through the lockup, yes. How much pressure makes snap a buying opportunity . Its dramatically overvalued when you look at twitter which trades at roughly four times next years sales and snap in at least closer to 12, right . My target price is 14. And i think that in order for me to buy the stock, you know, i would want it to be substantial discount to the 14. So, its possible that there could be furts downside to this stock. It could be a single digit stock . I think it could be. On reasonable sort of just quickly, as a parent im going to ask this as well. What does snap offer that instagram and facebook dont besides sort of the veil of teenage anonymity . Anything it values as a business proposition . The competitive eng in term of the product set the innovation the features whether its lenses and filters and such was greater six months ago. I think that some of those product sets are being replicated by instagram and by facebook aggressively. And so if youre a teenager, if youre someone who is using social media, the difference between the two apps is getting sort of narrower and narrower, right . So thats the issue because youre starting to see distribution all your friends, all your contacts were already on instagram and so if the product is not much different to move off of facebook or instagram, theres less of a reason. Theres less of sort of competitive mode for snapchat. Im still thinking about the single digit stock notion. Anthony, good to see you. Thanks. Even on a day like today we are not losing sight of the bigmoney stories that impact you. Coming up, nordstrom may be going private. Could this be the start of a new trend in retail as they try to stop the retail bleeding from their stock prices. Were still awaiting a statement from mark cass wits, the moment that begins we will bring it live. Power lunch back in two minutes. Hi there, i have your cnbc news update. Here is whats happening right now. Ukrainian police say someone hurled an explosive device on the grounds of the u. S. Embassy in kiev. No one got hurt. In a statement the embassy confirmed the exemployees and does not consider this a terrorist act. Polling stations are open across britain today. British Prime Minister theresa may and Opposition Leader Jeremy Corbin cast their vote this morning. Energy secretary rick perry is in beijing. He met with chinas vice premier and other chinese officials. Its the First Official meeting between china and the Trump Administration since trumps decision to pull the u. S. Out of the paris climate accord. Some new Jersey Police officers could get fired for the way they responded after a chase that ended in this fiery crash. An innocent victim sunday emerged with his clothes on fire, dropped to the ground, police converged on him and one kicked him. Then they dragged him to the flames as you can see in the video. That man is in the hospital with severe injuries. Prosecutors are looking into it. Thats the cnbc news update at this hour. Brian, back to you. Thank you very much. Straight ahead, more on the hearing that captured americas attention, including how some restaurant entrepreneurs are looking to capitalize. Stick around. But first, get to the bond market and rick san telly who is tracking a bit of move in the bonds on the back of this hearing. Rick . Yeah, you know, its really fascinating, brian, because when yields are moving down it was hard to peg anything to the story. And usually when theres a high drama you dont have to have a translator tell you what the high drama was. We all watch. Make your own decisions. But rates did float up a bit, which is really fascinating. The market certainly has an opinion. You can see the intraday of tens. You can see it. Look at intraday, they pretty much moved the same way. Right around the beginning of that hearing was the high yield. Look at it intraday dollar index, same pattern. We want to watch that and were going to break. Stay tuned as brian pointed out, President Trumps personal lawyers going to be making a statement and we will bring it to you live when it happens. So dont touch that dial. Welcome to holiday inn thank you wait, i have something for you making every stay a special stay. Holiday inn, smiles ahead. Whether for big meetings or little getaways, member always save more at holidayinn. Com the bars and restaurants of washington, d. C. Were crowded with congressional staffers today. Of course, watching the comey hearings like a senatorial super bowl. Diana is looking at how washingtons eateries are cashing in. Hi, diana. Hey, look, this is jaws tavern near capitol hill, a residential neighborhood. Earlier this week they posted on facebook that they would be opening two hours early and would have screens throughout the restaurant showing the testimony. Well, over 600 people on facebook said they would attend. Over 4,000 said they were interested. By 9 30 a. M. This morning they were lined up. The place was packed. Now, you think about why people gather at a restaurant or a bar to watch an event, usually its a big sporting event or its election night. Theres a lot of cheering. There are different teams. This was not the case. I have covered those events. This was absolute serious silence for the first hour of the testimony. People were wrapped. They were not talking to each other. They were watching. When we asked them why they chose to come here, they said that they saw this as a National Historic event, and they simply didnt want to watch it alone. I just think this is a really unique moment to be in d. C. I definitely want to take advantage of the fact that im here sort of in the center of all of this craziness and enjoy it while doing so. I feel like this is history in the making. This is one of the most exciting things weve seen in politics, and i just did not want to miss it. Because its kind of like watching the world cup or something. Its more fun to watch it with a group of People Better on the same team as you are than at home. And the restaurant did very well. They said over 500 people were served here this morning and two hours that they normally wouldnt be open. Some other restaurants and bars did the same thing. There was a little fun. There was another restaurant that was saying that they would do free vodka shots for every trump tweet. I guess they didnt have to do any of that. Here they did have the fbi burger that is fried chicken, bacon and iceberg lettuce. A lot of people ordered it. So thats everyones gone now, though, and it was really quite an ent to watch these people so wrapped in attention. Back to you guys. Did all the drinks glasses come with a leak . Reporter im voir. We had an ambulance go by. Not worth repeating. Thank you very much. Cue the ambulance. Perfect. I thought it was funny. Lets talk more about the comey testimony. Former george w. Bush aide and founder and editor of the weekly standard. Bill, first to you. You noted today you tweeted this out theres a big difference between naive or foolish conduct by the president and criminal obstruction. From what you heard, is there anything that comey said that would take this matter from simply being a series of bad decisions by the president to one that could lead to an indictment. First of all, brian, that really was a bad joke i got to say. Its too bad but thats okay if thats what the cnbc audience likes. You have to give them middaybreak there of levity. Its been a serious day, bill. Thats a good point. Its a serious moment. It was a very bad day with donald trump. I dont agree with his defenders who are heaving sighs of relief. We dont know theres a crime commit ord impeachable defense. We will know when Robert Mueller finishes his investigation. What we do know the incoming president of the United States behaved in a way that is not suitable for a president to behave. And its pretty hard to have an innocent explanation of why he cared so much to have jim comey hurry over for a one on one dinner and why he kicked everyone out of the oval office to have a one on one meeting with james comey. So i think you dont know that theres a crime or Impeachable Offense. It makes it hard to have an innocent view of Donald Trumps voters here. I dont know if anybody does. I would agree with everything you said. Even a lot of Trump Supporters would say, man, those are foolish things to do in getting everybody out of the room, but i would argue this, if we dont get any more information and absent any of these tapes that trump has famously tweeted an eluded to, do you think this goes any further . Well, it may not go any further for quite a while, but bill is right. There is a special prosecutor now looking at this. One of the challenges and one of the things i think wasnt covered today was senator rich from idaho very effectively made the point that donald trump said he hoped the fbi director would stop the Flynn Investigation. And that was a good moment for trump. The problem is earlier in the testimony he said that he thought that bob mueller was, in fact, looking at obstruction of justice as a possibility. And so, what happens in these investigations is they have many tentacles and they often uncover other things. And thats the challenge for trump right now is that had he not engaged in this, this probably would have gone away. But now theres an independent investigator looking at all, you know, matters of this russian issue, including the flynn issue. Bill, i know theres a lot we dont know yet and you acknowledge that as well, but whats your initial gut feel after this testimony that youve heard in the q a session. Does your view of the Trump Administration, the longevity, the effectiveness of the Trump Administration, has that changed based on what we heard today . I mean, it confirms my inclination to believe i dont know, who knows. My inclination is that he will not be a very effective president. Any normal congressman watching this thought, whoa, i can have confidence as Donald Trumps judgment as president. Lets just sign on to his agenda and defend him full throatedly. I dont think were going to see that. Longevity is another story. Then youre talking impeachment and very high bar and very hard thing to impeach and convict. The overall narrative of the Trump Administration, guy who had trouble in the first five months, popularity, Approval Rating is high 30s, very low 40s, not getting legislation through. I think this was a damaging day. He is a guy who does not seem to understand what the office of the presidency is about. Theres been some commentary that trump this was a good day for trump or that he came out ahead. Theres no good day for trump. Theres no good day for america, sara, would you agree when you have a live hearing from the former fbi director effectively saying he was so afraid the president was going to lie to him that he rushed out to his car. In no way is this any kind of a good day for anybody particularly the United States of america. But we have to move on. What do you think happens in the next weeks and months . Does this heat up . Or does this kind of fade away . Well, i think a little bit of both, brian. I think it both heats up. Youll start to see white house staffers be interviewed. Theyll have to lawyer up. Theres possibility for subpoenas of records. That having worked in a white house where that happens, it has a detrimental effect on the day to day functioning of the building. And even the best administrations that are mostly organized and contain these things are impacted by them. This one is not as well organized. It seems to be consuming them at the moment. I think, though, bob mueller may take a long time for this investigation. We may get back to some normalcy on capitol hill. What trump really needs to do is turn his focus exclusively to tax reform, to Health Care Reform and really stop tweeting, top causing these distractions in many ways we are sitting here today talking because he could not let this go with comey and thus a special prosecutor was appointed. Sara, bills point was that theres so much damage to this administration at this point that people arent going to sign on the agenda. You saying you believe that could still work out . Its much harder. Its certainly much harder, but republicans do control it and its in the Republican Partys interest control the congress and its in the partys interest to get things done. There are other people on the ballot in 2018, the president isnt. So, its in paul ryans interest and Mitch Mcconnells interest to make sure some things get done on capitol hill. And trump may be able to benefit from that politically a bit as time goes by, but it is. Its very tough to recover from these investigations. They typically dont happen this early in administration. Yeah, bill f youre a 2018, your seat is up for grabs in 2018 as a republican, do you double down on the president or do you step away . I mean, i personally would step away just because i would like to see a Republican Party that isnt wed at the hips or joined at the hip to donald trump and Republican Party whose views and principals arent trumpist, you know. Thats my personal view. So i would be happy if more people distanced themselves from trump. Having said that, i cant say that that would necessarily save the house or that would help them electorally. Theyre in a tough bind. They have Trump Supporters in the primaries who may not turn out, who may go against them. The primaries may not turn out in general election if they go away from trump, embrace trump, plenty of independents who would like a check on trump in congress. If i were a republican, i would say im going to vote my conscious, vote for republican and conservative principle. Im not a rubber stamp for donald trump and im not going to turn a blind eye to things he may have done that are wrong. I think voters want to see a congress that is serious about its oversight. I thought that was good about you mentioned earlier as an american it was a tough day. I thought actually the senators conducted themselves pretty well, though, and i think you felt like the system work. We have a constitutional system, separation of powers, independent fbi that is sort of independent and with the special counsel who will have a Serious Investigation and Republican Controlled Senate that put together a pretty good hearing today. I would a i agree with that. Thank you both very much. Important day for america. Thanks. Nordstrom shares are spiking. Retailer exploring going private. Is this a trend we might start seeing in the struggling retail space. And were still waiting a statement from President Trumps attorney. Well bring that to you live as soon as it begins. Power lunch is back in two. It starts a chain reaction. Thats heard throughout the connected business world. At t Network Security helps protect business, from the largest Financial Markets to the smallest transactions, by sensing cyberattacks in near real time and automatically deploying countermeasures. Keeping the world of business connected and protected. Thats the power of and. 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 509 on auto insurance. Call for a free quote today. Liberty stands with you™ Liberty Mutual insurance. Welcome back to power lunch. Breaking news on the u. S. Banking front. Matt xames the coo of Jp Morgan Chase and company is leaving. The comment from jamie diamond while im sad to see him leave, i respect his decision and all he has done at Jp Morgan Chase. Mr. Zames himself says hes proud of his work. Jamie has been a true mentor, its been a privilege to be a member of his team. Its being framed in the press release as a friendly departure. We dont have the reasons for it, yet, but this is a significant departure. He was seen as, if not the heir apparent, one or two parents. He is the coo, oversees lots of different parts of the business and along with the head of the Consumer Bank gordon smith and the head of the Asset Management firm probably one of three leading contenders to take over from jamie diamond one day. We dont know the reason for his departure. Well be digging into that for more information from the company any minute now. Guys . That breaking news on j. P. On wilford pros with that breaking news. Much more the comey hearings and new highs for the markets. How could they happen at the same time . Well talk about that with street talk coming up. Power lunch is back in two minutes. So you can own the road. Tracktuned handling, so you can conquer corners. Aggressivestyling, so you can break away from everyone else. Experience the exhilaration of the bold lexus is. Experience amazing. Shares at sfrod strum spiking today after announcing its going private. Lets bring in david, the Adviser Group and research officer. Dana great to have you with us. Thank you for having me. The Nordstrom Family owns 21 of the company in terms of the stock do you think this is something that could happen . I think so. The stock has been under a tremendous amount of pressure. And they want to continue to make i want investments, and with not being paid and being penalized and some instances for being forward thinking, i think they are reevaluating what its going to take to move the stock to higher level in this current environment. Right. In terms of thinking of what other company could be next nordstrom is an Interesting Company because the family owns some of the stocks in the company. I think its got 2. 7 billion in debt or so compared to its equity which is 6. 6 billion. Do any other companies fit the bill in terms of candidates for going private in your view . When you think of other companies who have family ownership who could have Something Like this it could be a dillards. Another store where the family owns a significant chunk. It doesnt seem out of the question. You know dana you do this because you dont believe the public equity markets are accurately reflecting the underlying value. The nordstrom families obviously believe that tchl do you think theres anyone out there that has one family that may decide the same . Thats why i mentioned dillards because the family stake is like that too. This arent many like a nordstrom and a dillards and some of it depends at the point and time where the companies are in the investment cycles. In terms of going private, you dont necessarily need a family stake in it you need a Significant Shareholder to lead the way and an equity partner. Getting back to the debt loans, the private equity dont want a balance on the debt sheet. Are there any other companies that fit that slice of the view . Look what you have lately, you have chatter about acrow com me and the position that will come there, theres another where the discussion is going on. In the past theres been a discussion with gap separate their businesses but it doesnt seem like thats in the cards right now. Dana were going to leave it there. Thanks for phoning in appreciate it. I realize i largely asked the same question you just asked. The viewers wonder how could that happen, its not that were not listening people are talking in this ear so i cant always hear whats happening in the other ear. Coming up tomorrow were getting into the delivery business, place your stock on the stock youd like. Email us at power lunch cnbc. Com. Our panelist will answer questions and tell us if you should buy, sell or place a stock. Pick a stock, mail, tweet us, overnight us. You could mail us well use it for well get it for next year. You just did the same thing for me. I dont like being on the same wave length. Moving on. James comey isnt the only testimony on the well talk about what this mean for the banks and your money straight ahead on power lunch. Im plishls lee. Director james comey grilled on the hill. Deregulation Nation Congress working on a plan to roll back the big banks. What itll mean for them. Forget this stocks outperforming all this year almost up 60 . Power lunch starts right now. Investors are shrugging off the comey hearing requesting continuing to buy stocks. The dow hitting another high. Earlier as the sclould fear gauge falls. Its not about all comey for your money. You play election, stabilizing also playing a role on the mark. Banks doing well. Well get more on the financials coming up. Utilities are the worst performers of the day. Eamon javers in washington with the latest on comeys testimony. We are awaiting a statement from the president s personal attorney, that will happen over at the National Press club across town from where im standing on capitol hill. I want to bring you two key pieces of that testimony here. Theres a couple issues that will be chewed apart for days and days. One is an issue of what the president meant when he said to at the time fbi director he hopes he can see his way clear to letting the Michael Flynn investigation go. There was an exchange about what the idea of i hope means. Heres how that went down. I took it as a direction. Its the president of the United States with me alone saying i hope this. I took it as this is what he wants me to do. I didnt obey that but thats the way i took it. You may have taken his direction but thats not what he said. Correct. He said i hope. Those are the exact words correct. You done know anybody who is ever been charged for hopping something is that a fair statement . I dont as i sit here. Thatll be a question debated for several days, weeks to come. You can see the outline of what the senator was saying of a potential Trump Defense here, he was just expressing a desire to move past this, not issuing a direction. Comey saying he felt he had been directed by the president. We also say james comey who was reflective of his own role and was asked at one point, why didnt you confront the president one on one, behind closed doors and tell him his behavior here was in appropriate and wrong. And comey was reflective on his own role. Heres what he said. I was a bit stunned and didnt have the presence of mind. And i dont know, you know i dont want to make you sound like im captain kraj just. I dont know if i had the presence of mind i would have said sir, thats wrong. It didnt come to my mind, what came to my mind is be careful what you said and i said i agree flynn is a good guy. What we learned is quite a bit how this unfolded including the fact it was the president s tweets about the fact that he might have tapes of comey, that prompted comey to go out and leak the memo he created documenting his interactions with the president. He made that memo a nonclassified memo, clearly thinking it might be in his best interest to put that out publicly later and it will be difficult to do that if it was a classified memo. The president tweets, that promises comey to leak and that leads to a special counsel. Comey saying it will be up to the special counsel, Robert Mueller to determine whether or not the president obstructed justice. Eamon i know youre there but we just got Marc Kasowitz thats trumps attorneys statement. Im going to give you guys the relevant information out of this. Kasowitz begin by saying the president did not wrong and comey confirmed that by stating that there was never real pressure to end the investigation. The most interesting part of this, the fire if you will comes at the very end. And this is what trumps personal attorney is going to say, talking about james comeys leaks to the press. Although mr. Comey testified he only leaked the memos in response to a tweet, the Public Record reveals the New York Times is reporting from these memos, the day before the reference tweet occurred. Which belies mr. Comeys excuse for this unauthorized disclosure of privileged information and appearance to be retaliatory. Well leave it to the appropriate authorities to determine whether hes leaks should be investigated along with all others being investigated as well. Melissa, Marc Kasowitz and the president coming out hard against comey implying that comeys leaks themselves become a massive investigation at some point. Director comey say he didnt personally leak them to the press he asked a close adviser of his to go to the press. Remember the New York Times reported who he told to say it is james comey through dan rich mono. Exactly. The other thing thats interesting is the president is directly disputed something mr. Comey said during testimony. This reads, the president also never told mr. Comey i need loyal, i expect loyalty in former stan former substance. So hes saying mr. Comey got it wrong when it comes to demanding loyalty and that was an interesting upon in the testimony. And the word getting all the attention in mr. Comeys testimony today, the trump team is calling comey a lie here today. Mischaracterizing the testimony. Im reading from Marc Kasowitzs statement, hes trumps personal attorney, quote although mr. Comey testified he only leaked the memos in response to a tweet, the Public Record reveals that the New York Times was quoting from these memos the day before the referenced tweet. So the trump team is saying comey says he responded to a tweet, the tweet was a day after he had apparently leaked information to the New York Times that reference this as well. Right. Lets bring in jeff land sa. Jeffrey friend kel. Jacob i will start it off with you. Learning from this statement that mr. Kasowitz recently we leased, it sounds as if he believes there are grounds for mr. Comey himself to be investigated for leaking the contents of that memo to the media. Do you believe that is the case . The best defense is a strong offensive. I actually ascribe to that approach in practice too. Director comey was very specific in terms of how he enabled that information to become available particularly, in the non you know the nonprivileged, nonconfidence shl nature. What was more striking was the candor that comey brought to this. I think a lot of this discussion and ultimately this is off your question, comes back youre talking violations and earlier with comment tarts about obstruction of justice, i dont think, ill go on record, i dont think this sties the definition of obstruction of justice. Even though some of the elements are met, but the unique point that we havent talked about is that there is a pending proceeding. An fbi investigation does not meet that elementary element, the pending proceeding. You dont see cases, jeff will probably confirm this, where theres one against the other youre not usually charging these questions. Jeff you want to come in. In terms of the leaking the memo charges youre not going to get that because it was his personal writing. If it had have been a document or i agree to that, sorry to jump in but you have to agree what the trump team is trying to do is discredit jaime comey. Thats correct. As you said the best defense is a best offensive and thats exactly whats going on with this memo. The president was not being in verdicted for concluding with or obstruction the investigation, they said it numerous times throughout this written statement, jacob, does that change anything . The fact that they are highlighting it so much . No, theyre highlighting what is really selfserving and any good defense lawyer does that. I would go back and the other thing probably great to engage, is this whole concept which really instruct me what director comey said early on. That he felt he had a need to memorialize his conversation with the president. You know, we we only investigative side, when i was there, and jeff will confirm this, you take those kinds of notes, you make those notes when you have an expectation or belief that this is going to become part of a permanent record. And for him to say this is the first time he had to memorialized his conversation with a president of the United States because he expected the president to lie, that to me was as astounding, that was striking and somewhat frightening. Jeff, have you taken count them rains notes before . Absolutely. And what was the circumstances of that . Well, the notes that you take that are going to be used in a criminal prosecution, you take those notes and those become part of the evidence. Theyre almost better in many cases than the written document that derive from those notes because you take those. And thats an important thing. If i ever thought someone was going to use what i said or a conferring between me and another person in a future setting yes, id write thing down right away and make sure they were documented so they at the closest point and time to that conversation. So it can never be a claim that time had passed and i forgot the context of the conversation jacob brian one quick point. That also goes to the whole issue of director everybody else being keysexcused from them and director comey being alone. Jeff will share with you on every case he did he was never alone on interviewing witnesses. When im interviewing witnesses as a defense lawyer im never alone theres someone else there. You always want to prepare that someone else being a witness so you yourself dont have to testify. That makes it as weve heard today director comeys word. And that is enough for a prosecutor to decide not to bring a case. That was a have strategic move on the president s part and its obvious why attorney general session was uncomfortable about that, but nevertheless director comey recognized he need to memorialized. Jeff, and thats a separate issue. What this was, attorney general sessions may have known that comey did not feel that he could speak about it in a public form. Jacob, im going back to that maneuver. When it comes to an obstruction charge, im not a practicing attorney by any means but i do understand the purpose, the intent of the threat goes into whether you can charge somebody. Do you think asking others to leave the room would hurt or help any president against the president . It comes back to the element of the defense. Is that the state of mind that goes to corruptly intending or endeavoring to influence or impede or obstruct. Its part of that circumstantial evidence that you would that ultimately youd make. Even director comey didnt come out and say i was instructed, you know with an immediate direct consequence. I come back to what i said earlier about the absence of their being a proceeding. This is an investigation, you can argue theres knowledge of the investigation going on but i believe in the entire history of the statute that investigation itself is qualified as a proceeding. Sorry to move it along so much, we are akuwaiting Marc Kasowitz so we may have to jump out in any moment. Jeff, again, as you said its a he said, he said any of this point absent any of these tapes that the president has eluded to in tweets, does anything further become of this for the president of the United States . I personally dont believe so. With just that conversation and thats the only thing they have i dont think it goes anywhere. Thats for Robert Mueller to decide based on other evidence that they gather and present to impanel grand jury if it ever gets to that situation and that point. Jacob, it also sounded like you dont believe there could be any charges brought in terms of obstruction of justice. Is there other witnesses to be called in order to finance more details surrounding what is happening . Absolutely. I think one other critical point, you know the standard for impeachment is different. High crimes and misdemeanors and that is defined by the aadjudicate of body, the senate itself. So, theres a lot of uncertainty here and we go back to richard nixon, back to bill clinton, you know those were obstruction of justice allegations. So everything is beginning to turn on the bob Mueller Investigation and i think you know, theres going to be a long period i think you were talking about this before theres begun to be a long period of quiet because one thing youre going to be certain of is bob mueller will conduct a extremely thorough investigation. Director comey regarded the trust of his agents, he was highly regarded in the bureau. Youre going to have careerbureau l agents conducting this investigation. Thai going to be aggressive and push this to see if there are violations. Thanks jacob and jeff we appreciate it. Were waiting on Marc Kasowitz in just a moment. Something else in kasowitz expected text is they deny the president ever told comey to let flynn go. Remember, James Comey Testifies under oath today. We are awaiting trumps personal attorneys comments. You see a look at the White House Press briefing room. Back with more after this. I love to see businesses that just started from ground up grow into further success. It just feels good to know that im helping someone else. My first goal is to learn about their business, what theyre currently doing in their advertising. Pull some research, create a great story. Trying to figure out some way of building some kind of trust in a very quick moment. You have to love to work with people. Our goal, without a doubt, is that all customers are satisfied before they leave. While we are waiting President Trumps personal attorney to make a statement for the National Press club, theres another story happening on capitol hill that could impact your money. House the voting on a bill that could scale back much of the dodd frank legislation. Before we get to dodd frank i got to and you what did you make of todays hearing . Do you think this will progress any further with an investigation of the president , mr. Cuss stauf . I havent followed any of the testimony today i havent watched it. I have been working on the annual choice bill that were going to vote on this afternoon. I havent watched or read thinking so anything you tell me is going to be news to me. Representative kelli . I read the written testimony yesterday i have been following just on social media whats going on today. Its troubling but i think the most important thing is we get the facts and not rush to any kind of judgment. The american have the right to know the answers to all the questions that have been posed and congress should act after all those facts have been gathered. Okay. Despite Everything Else thats going on, we have two of our elective represents still working. You guys do disagree about the choice act. Representative kel b ill start with you. What is the argument against it . First of all to be clear, i acknowledge it and i know a lot of democrats do that there are changes we should make to dodd frank emphasis as its relates to smaller institutions. There is too much in this bill that goes too far. Returning us to a time where we dont have the vocal rule in place for example, which would allow Financial Institutions simply a good afternoamble with benefit. A complaint database which forms customers about what those institutions are up to. Theres just too much that takes us back to the Regulatory Environment that was many place before the big crash that led to the great recession, its too much for us to take . Is everything though, representative kildee is everything bad in this business doesnt this allow Community Bank to do more, allow more businesses on main street to get loans and expand the businesses higher . In any bill theres 600 pamgs im likely to find things i like, and there are 600 pages that were included that were bipartisan. But where we go too far is going back to the regulatory entiermt in place prior to crash. Taking away the Consumer Financial bowureau to could there be changes that wed accept, absolutely. This bill was not a bipartisan product, it could have been but it was not. Representative cuss that you have in terms of a Consumer Financial is there anything youd be willing to bargain on in order to achieve more bipartisan support . I like the way the bill is written now, the cfvp has gone too far, too many rules and leglations regulations. If you talk to the banks that have been created by cvpp its like they create the rules out of thin air. How do you reform and get out of the dog house, theres no instructions. So id like to proposal to change it to consumer Law Enforcement agency to have a director whose appointed by the president , whose regulated by congress and whose moneys appropriate by congress. Because that is part of the reason weve seen in my opinion, anemic growth over the last six, seven year couples. The Banking System which were going to vote on, tax reform which i hope we vote on later this year to reform or tax system, and healthcare cost which we all know have been out of control, especially which obamacare which weve voted to repeal and replace a month or so ago. Im going to ask this last question here, because this is a day where we have been transfixed by capitol hill. Representative cuss stauf do you have any reluctance or the way you go about your business is that impacted at all by the of whats going on on capitol hill . We had so many strategist say its going to be duffel for trump to get his agenda through because republicans wont necessarily want to be on the trump train fully. Whats your view . My opinion is we can walk and chew gum at the same time. Were capable of passing laws, in fact we have passed for laws in these first x number of days in the Trump Administration than we have or bills rather going all the way back 30 years to george w. Bush. And the Trump Administration has signed more bills into law, if you look at the period into the early part of june going back to judge picture bush, were getting our work done and thats demonstrated were going to pass the demonstration act this afternoon. All right gentlemen thank you well leave it. Were seeing tremendous strength from the recently banks today up 3. 5 . We are waiting still for trumps personal attorney to speak at the National Press club. That was expected to begin around 1340 eastern 1 30 eastern time. Were just under an hour late for this event. Cnbc did obtain a statement, there are key parts where he says the president denies ever requesting james comey to let the Flynn Investigation go. James comey testified under oath to the opposite today. Trumps attorney will be going after james comeys honesty or time line in recollecting when he responded to a tweet by leaking a memo to a friend who then leaked it to the New York Times. Well take a short break, well be back hopefully with the trumpattorney comment after this. Were about to reveal our mystery chart had a great run this year. Well explain next on power luch ps we recently had a heart attack. But we are not victims. We are survivors. We are survivors. We are survivors. And now we take brilinta. For people whove been hospitalized for a heart attack. 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If you cant afford your medication, astrazeneca. May be able to help. Any moment now president Donald Trumps personal attorney Marc Kasowitz expected to make a statements responding to james comeys testimony. Some of the terms from kasowitz denies that President Trump denied that he ever quote, let flynn go. Denying at any time did President Trump request, order or threaten in any way james comey to let the Flynn Investigation go. He also questions james comeys time line. James comey of course admitting today he was a leaker through the New York Times to a friend in law school and he said he did it only a tweet appeared. Well hear right now, he will refute that lets listen in. This is Marc Kasowitz, president Donald Trumps personal attorney, hell make a short statement and we will not be taking questions. This is also michael bow with the kasowitz Law Enforcement. Ladies and gentlemen im Marc Kasowitz President Trumps personal lawyer. Prior to numerous false accounts leading up to todays hearing, mr. Comey has confirmed what he told President Trump privately. That is that the president was not under investigation as part of any probe into russian interference. The president he mr. Comey also admitted that there is no evidence that a single vote changed as a result of any russian interference. Mr. Comeys testimony also makes clear that the president never sought to impede the investigation into attempted russian interference in the tex2016 election. In fact according mr. Comey the president cold mr. Comey, quote, it will be good to find out close quote. In that investigation if there was quote, some satellite associates of his that did something wrong, close quote. And he, President Trump did not exclude anyone from that statement. Consistent with that statement, the president never informed or substance, directed or suggested that mr. Comey stop investigating anyone, including the president never suggested that mr. Comey quote, let flynn go, close quote. As the president publicly stated the next day, he did say to mr. Comey, quote, general flynn is a good guy, he has been through a lot, close quote. And also quote, asked how general flynn is doing, close quote. Admiral rogers testified today that the president never, quote, directed him to do anything illegal, immorale, unethical or anyone appropriate, close quote, and never never quote, pressured him to do so, close quote. Director koets, coates said the same thing. The president likewise never pressured mr. Comey. The president also never told mr. Comey, quote i need loyalty, i expect loyalty, close quote. He never said it in forum and he never said it in substance. Of course, the office of the president is entitled to expect loyalty from those who are serving the administration, and from before this president and from before this president took office to this day, it is overwhelmingly clear that there have been and continued to be those in government who are actively attempting to undermined this administration with selective and illegal leaks of classified information and privileged communications. Mr. Comey has now admitted that he is one of these leakers. Today, mr. Comey admitted that he unijune laterally and serp tissuesly made disclosures to the press. The leaks of this privileged information begin no later than march 2017 when friends of mr. Comey have stated that he disclosed to them the conversations that he had with the president during their january 27th, 2017 dinner, and february 14th, 2017 white house meeting. Today, mr. Comey admitted that he leaked to friends of his, purported memos of those privileged communications. One of which he testified was classified. Mr. Comey also testified that immediately after he was terminated, he authorized his friends to leak the contents of those memos to the press in order to, in mr. Comeys words, quote, prompt the appointment of a special counsel, close quote. Although mr. Roe my testified that he only leaked the memos in response to a tweet, the Public Record reveals that the New York Times was quoting from those memos the day before the referenced tweet which belyles mr. Comeys excuse from this unauthorized disclosure and appears to be retaliatory. We will leave it to the appropriate authorities to determine whether these leaks should be investigated along with all the others that are being investigated. In sum, it is now established that the president was not being investigated for conclude colewding with or attempting obstruct an investigation. As the committee pointed out today, these important facts for the country to know are the only fact that have been been leaked during the course of these events. As he said yesterday, the president feels completely vindicated and is eager to accou continuing moving toward with his agenda, with the business of this country and his public cloud removed. Thank you. That was President Trumps personal attorney Marc Kasowitz responding to jaime comeys testimony. A lot was said there. Lets bring in kayla at the white house. Hey brian, Marc Kasowitz said at the outset he would not be taking questions, first he said the president did have a discussion with the former fbi director about the former fbi director mike flynn but that conversation was limed to a few remarks. Which he said flynn has been through a lot, he asked how he was doing and that he was a good guy. The statement went further denying that the president asked to drop the Flynn Investigation or sought to impede the current investigati investigation john going. He didnt just say that on his statement he went to on the record, under oath commentary in his prepared statement to actually lean on, but the line share of that statement as you just heard actually considered the leaking that former fbi director comey acknowledged in his testimony earlier this morning. Saying that he did alert a close colleague and a member of the Colombia Law School staff whos been a character witness of his in the past to share the contents of that memo with the New York Times. Despite the fact it was comeys believe and certain believes of certain members that the contend of those memos were unclassified and written and a classified way. You just heard the president s attorney describe them as privileged information. His attorney trying to pin the wrong doing on the leakers and sharing of this perhaps not classified by privileged information with the public. Kayla thank you. Lets us bring in andy card former white house chief of staff under president bush. Andy, kayla brought up i want to ask you about that final point she was mentioning, the idea of prinked communicating. You worked in the white house every day for a long time, is all communication with a president one on one quote, privileged communication or is there some sort of difference . You know, i dont think the statute may not even be a statute that addresses that so, i think its subject to a debate. Obviously, the president should have Privilege Communications with his staffers. Im not sure that that relates to, you know the advice and counsel he might be giving to somebody whos working at the fbi. So, to me its hard let me i would protect the right of president to get unvarnished counsel and advice. And it is important here andy i think because it goes to obviously trumps offensive play which looks like part of that could include going after comey legally for these leaks. So, i think thats why its relevant here. And i wonder let me and it a different way. In your years at the white house, if somebody were to come in whos not a white house staffer, either fbi or department of defense, would that assume that any conversation with the president would be privileged . I think they probably would assume that or they would lets put it this way. They should assume its not something they should talk about without kind of permission. First of all, i dont think there would be a time where i would recommend the president meet alone with somebody. So it would have been kind of a rare thing. You usually want to have another witness in the room because it does turn down he said he said. Those are never good debates to have. If youre in a position to have advised President Trump would you have advised him to have his personal lawyer make a statement after the comey testimony . It seems sort of an interesting move to make considering its still under investigation right now. Well, this is something thats not in the white house, this is his private attorney. I think its appropriate that the socalled war room and the private counsel are now handling any responses because this is really not a white house problem, its a white house concern. The problem rest to what happened before the election and maybe what is happening as a result of what happened before the election is now being investigated. I dont like the idea of getting the white house itself all wrapped around the axle of the Russian Investigation when they have a big job to do of protecting the United States and offering advice and counsel to other countries around the world and diplomacy and getting legislation so i do think the tunnel vision and theres a distinction that you make but it is a white house problem with the perception the agendas going to be difficult because of whats beginning on on capitol hill and because of an ongoing investigation. If you were the chief of staff how do you make that recede into the background in order to make the investigation specifically . You dont have a way of you have to keep your head down and do your job. I would be compartmentalizing the investigation and what theyre doing, i would say dont be involved in that, well cooperate when its appropriate. If you have a concern go to the white house counsel, hell tell you how you should act but do your job. I was chief of staff when there was an investigation at the white house over the valley plain situation. I tried to have compartmentalize that so it didnt engage and interrupt the work that had to be done at the white house while this important special counsel was doing his work ill say this, the Trump Administration has been criticized for not being able to fill important slots. I have reported we have reported that a lot of people are unwilling to work in administration because they dont know where its going to end up. Theres no way an administration that is already by many accounts short staffed that this is a positivefilling those important jobs. It is not a positive, it is a real challenge and Reince Priebus and the team at the white house has a significant challenge to overcome. The president should be working to help them meet this challenge. I hope the president cuts back on the tweets, does taste his words before he spits them out, bring some dismeant, if you dont have discipline in the oval office its hard to invite it into the rest of the warehouse. Andy carr thank you. Thank you. More power lunch ahead. Stick around. At fidelity, trades are now just 4. 95. We cut the price of trades to give investors even more value. And at 4. 95, you can trade with a clear advantage. Fidelity, where smarter investors will always be. The comey testimony dominated the headlines but theres another major mark story were following closely, the uk elections polls closing in two hours. Joining us from london is daniel booth. With us also is sandy vilry. D danelle ill kick it off with you. Youre front row to what elections going on and also front row to the ecb. Is there anything that can includes the fed thinking in terms of the statement . No if anything being front and center here in london, especially since i was here on saturday night when the terrorist attack occurred it really is all eyes on the uk election switch, obviously thats not the case in the United States given the comey testimony today. Sandy, whats so striking is we had the comey testimony and we had the vix go down below ten. We had the markets and nasdaq as well as the dow hitting record high today. Whats happening here . How do you get your head around where evaluations are right now and the in action of where the margts which seem to be marketmoving events . You look at what you couple that with next week were probably going to have our fed moved up 20 basis points, thats probably a 90 plus probability. So when you see the action and financials moving higher its telling you Interest Rates might be going up domestically. So were focused on smaller cap domestic securities as oppose to the largely multi nationals and investigating overseas. Are you investored in financial specifically sandy, because it seems the house vote on the torchoice act which woule the replacement for dodd frank . We have smaller bank regionals that we think are going to do well in this environment. If we get more deregulation coming from this Trump Administration or the other its going to be more of a tail end i guess. Last were talked danielle weave getting more data points in regards to the jobbed today. Do you think thats going to influence whats said about future rate hikes and also the course of the Balance Sheet . I think that right now that the fed and members of the federal committee are taking a step back. Theyre not going to disappoint the markets next week giving the 90 probability for the next rate hike but weve seen upside surprises on this national claim aside from i think beneficials are going to be looking for lee way to step back and sown for dub ish in the weeks to come. You know danielle on a separate note we did a story about people in washington, d. C. And new york sitting outside at bars. Youre in london its 7 48 there watching the comey testimony, how much interest are you seeing if the comey testimony on the treats of london . Oh, i was amazed. I got into the car to come over to the cnbc studios here in london and the minute i stepped in the car that there was the testimony live. Theres a lot of focus on the Trump Administration, theres curiosity with londoners here but everyone is waiting for the polls to close. Just in two hours, i think that what we saw with the pound and the footsy being as flat as it was theres a growing nudge that teresa theresa may in her heart aligned, its in distinctive it was bizarre listening to comey testify live today. Thank guys good to see you. In the markets, one aspect doing well, the banks theorizing especially but the kb index dowr the year, the banks, as we continue the market coverage in the wake of the comey testimony coming up. 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. Time for trading nation, lets look at the bank stocks. Gina, theres a lot going on, but inside the markets, beneath the Regional Bank stocks, a great day, despite the ten year up a little bit. What do you think of the move . Well, i think that the bank stocks have been rallying because of whats happening with doddfrank today regarding the vote. And if this vote went through, you would see Compliance Costs for banks cut in half. It would be benefit the large banks as well as the small bank, so i think this would be considered a benefit certainly for banks, and that that has been a big component, banks have been under pressure because weve seen a bear flattening of the yield curve for the several months now, the short end going up, while the long end is going down. Theres not good for banks. Banks need a big spread. Today, we have not seen that spread moving in any direction. In fact, the markets have just been moving in parallel up on the yield curve, but i think this is all about doddfrank and Compliance Costs and what it means for bank earnings. Okay. There you go. Bill, you heard the fundamental perspective, whats the bank stocks, more to go . You know, the fund. Ales and technicals working well together here today. Obviously, the doddfrank vote, but theres soothing in the markets, this dark cloud that everybody was waiting for with this comey testimony, but the technical difficulties are doing work, but theres 2 to the market to move. On top of that with the fed meeting next week, once you get past this gauntlet of activity here, at the end of the week, then i think the treasury yields bump up a little bit into the fed meeting, and that should be supportive to banks next week as well. Dont forget the fed meeting. We talked about that with another big week next week. Gina, bill, thank you very much. Reminder for more trading nation, go to the website at tradingnation. Cnbc. Com. Check, please is next. Tomorrow, we are delivering buy, sell, or hold recommendations. Place your order now. Email us at powerlunch cnbc. Com or tweet us. By the way, be nice, and well respond. By the way, dom is here giving out recommendations on the panel. My buddy from fast money. Ill be hosting the show. Individual stocks, shares of alibaba surging, investor day, Revenue Growth numbers, saying growth for the year would be 45 4549 in 2018 topping expectations. Gross merchandise of volume could reach 1 trillion by 2020. Keep in mind, this is a stock that year to date has done better than facebook as well as amazon, in fact, a lot of the chinese internet stocks, brian, have done extremely well, beating faang. Tonight, we talk about alternative faang in terms of chinese internet. Thats a tease. Sounds dangerous. On a serious note, if the story could not get more complicated, it just did. President trumps personal attorney came out saying the New York Times ran a story about leaks before comey leaked it, suggesting that comey may have either misrecollected or lied about the timeline of when he leaked information to the press. Moments ago, the times said, nope, our story ran after comey sent us the adodocuments, so th New York Times counters trumps attorney countering comey. If you make sense of this, america, you are smarter than we are. A complicated story just got more complicated. Interesting final hour, a point off the session lows and s p 500. Watching that closely. Thank you so much for watching power lunch. Closing bell to wrap this all up begins now. I took it as a direction, they took it as this is what they want me to do. I didnt obey that, but thats how i took it. Taken as direction, but thats not what he said . Correct. He said, i hope . Exact words, correct. You dont know of anyone thats been charged for hoping something, is that a fair statement . I dont, as i sit here. Why didnt you stop and say, mr. President , this is wrong . I cant discuss this with you . Great question. Maybe if i were