Axa announces plans to float a Minority Stake in its u. S. Operations, as the french insurer reports First Quarter revenue shy of analyst estimates. Ings First Quarter underlying pretax results exceed expectations, but the companys cfo tells this program demand is still soft. Demand is still quite low. So you have to work really hard in order to get your lending volume in. Thats why we are so flash and happy with the 5. 7 billion. Good morning. Glad youre with us on wednesday. We have a lot to get through. Lets kick things off. A Stunning Development in washington. President trump has fired fbi director james comey who had been conducting an investigation into possible connections between trumps president ial campaign and russia. According to a white house statement, trump acted on recommendations from Deputy Attorney general rosenstein and jeff sessions. Bot richard burr the republican senator leading the Senate Investigator into the possible russian ties said he is troubled by the timing and reasoning of director comeys termination. Blaine alexander has more on this story. Reporter james comey went to los angeles as fbi director, tonight hes flying back to washington as a private citizen fired by President Trump. The President Trump made a decision that should be applauded by all members of congress. The public by in large will agree he lost the ability to lead the fbi. Reporter tonight comey outraged. His departure coming as the fbi investigates Trump Campaign ties to russia and election tampering. Are people going to suspect coverup. Absolutely. Comey was not fired because of hillary. Comey was fired because of the russians. The timing makes this clear. Reporter in his termination letter, the president said he wanted to restore public trust, while also pointing out that comey said three separate times that mr. Trump himself was not under investigation. Republicans giving a more muted response. It came as a surprise to me, i wonder if its not the inevitable conclusion. I regret that that took place. The president does have that authority. Reporter the white house says this was ultimately the president s decision, the recommendation came from Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein and attorney general jeff sessions. The white house says a search for a permanent replacement begins immediately. Blayne alexander, nbc news, the white house. I wonder how Hillary Clinton must be taking this. Mr. Trump will meet with Sergey Lavrov at the white house today. This will be the highest level between the president and the russian government since he took office. Lets have a quick look at the markets. The comey firing was treated as a bit of a riskoff event. That was shown in the dollar ini index overnight. Lets turn our attention to the action in terms of the European Equity markets. The ftse 100 is off by 0. 1 . The dax coming off the record highs of yesterday, off by 24 points. The cac 40 is off by 0. 34 . If we move on to the sectors, this is still very much driven by the earnings we had oututili. Axa higher because of the float of the u. S. Business. Construction material off by 0. 9 . This is after heidelbach cement had disappointing numbers. Shares of Barratt Development expects its profit to be at the top end of estimates. It says it is benefitting from solid Market Conditions driven by rising house prices, cheap mortgages and Government Schemes to promote homeownership. Shares of campari have touched a record high as the u. S. Strategy appears to be paying off. The companys earnings topped expectations with organic sales increasing by almost 6 , thanks to a Strong Performance in north, central and eastern europe. Earlier we asked the ceo if he is planning more acquisitions. If you take all the groups in our industry, we only account for 15 of volume, and north of 20 in value. So there are a lot of great businesses which are independently owned out there. There are succession issues, go to market issues, were always there to provide help. At the same time theres innovation starting to happen. Two months ago we acquired bulldog gin, which was created by an exinvestment banker, six or seven years ago. Thats one of the most vibrant brands in the premium jim category. Ing reported stronger than expected profit. They enjoyed a 6. 7 billion rise in customer deposits while bad loans fell. The lowrate environment may continue to be a problem in the future according to the ceo. Its not only fair to complain about low Interest Rates because they help the economy and on the credit side and the risk will stay lower. At the same time rates below zero are becoming a problem for the future. Because in the end, if it is below zero, then it is difficult to pass that on to retail clients. So somewhere in the future that might result in a margin squeeze. Low is okay. But too low and certainly below zero for a long period of time will become an issue. First quarter operating profit at aholddelhaize topped expectations. The dutch retail group ceo said he expects sales to improve further in the Second Quarter including in the u. S. Amid tough competition. Im positive that the impact of the competition in the u. S. Market, we are ready for that, weve been investing heavily in our stores, remodeling our stores. Competition is part of life. Its everywhere in the world. I invite you to email the show. The address is streetsignseurope cnbc. Com. You can also find us on twitter, street signstreetsignseurope ct me at carolincnbc. On the other side of the break, we have the ceo of italys top bank. If you have if he questions, let us know. Well put those to him. Coming up, find out why low volatility may not linger for long. Well be back in two. The shows about to start how do i look . Like a bald penguin. [ laughing ] show me the Billboard Music awards. Show me top artist. Show me the top hot 100 artist. They give awards for being hot and 100 years old . Well take 2 [ laughing ] xfinity x1 gives you exclusive access to the best of the Billboard Music awards just by using your voice. The Billboard Music awards. Sunday, may 21st eight seven central only on abc. Lets talk about banks. We have got Intesa Sanpaolo with net income 11. 8 . Strong fee income, an increase of 10 . The italian lender saying core capital ratio is at 12. 5 , down 0. 4 from the end of december. Im glad that weve now got with us carlo macina, the ceo of inte Intesa Sanpaolo. From other banks, weve seen a strong start to the year. How did that play out for you . In our case, the driving area has been web management. We completed the transformation of our bank into a wealth M Management Company and delivered the strongest results. In three years time, we increased by 80 billion youre we are a unique case in europe, because having Strong Capital position were in yew niece uni position to pay dividend to share holders. Deutsche bank points out that your bank is a play based on Wealth Management and higher dividend. I want to stick with the Wealth Management angle. Youre trying to top the immense wealth sitting within the private sector in italy. You wouldnt think that, but theres immense potential there. Beyond italy, where you are looking . Beyond italy, we are concentrating on 200 billion euros of wealth, 100 billion euro is already in list of clients that we gave to our relationship manager. So i think we can continue in italy to deliver at the same speed that we had in in the past Business Plan. Another area important for us is china. We decided to invest in china, and we said we want to replicate our model also in china, especially with personal and private clients. Can that be replicated . Theres so much competition out in china. I talked to some of the biggest Wealth Managers in the world, theyre very active. They have got much bigger fire power when it comes to allocating some resources there. Can you compete with those players . But they are concentrated on high net worth. We are not competing with high net worth. If you work with private client, personal, you cant replicate our model. It is a model working with a strong retail franchise, with affluent clients in china we want to replicate the same. We have one of the leading banks of this area, we are working with the community, so we think we can replicate, but not competing with ubs, making another different job the one we are doing knitly. In italy. Are you also saying you are able to keep up your margin . Thats right. Thats a place where were strong, private but not ultra high net worth. We are a different story, but a story that is delivering sustainable commissions. And it is also the area in which we have the higher margin per client. So, Wealth Management, thats one of the key growth areas that youre looking at. The other attraction to investors is the dividend. You are paying out 17. 8 cents a share, an 8 dividend yield, thats a hefty dividend yield. Can that grow . My expectation is we will continue to grow strong. Other competitors that are growing in Corporate Investment banking we are growing in Wealth Management. Without capital. So having a Strong Capital position, you can continue to generate income revenues without absorption of capital. So you are in unique position to have net capital and pay significant dividend. We will release a new Business Plan in 2018 that we will set figures for next year. But the expectation is to have Significant Growth in revenues coming from commissions. To tell you about an upside potential that we have, because if you consider that in the future Interest Rates will increase, we have a sensitivity in which premium increases 100 business points in Interest Rates, we will have an increase 1. 1 billion euros in Net Interest Margin because we are also a strong franchise. So in my view we are unique opportunity to grow in revenues, so net income, dividend and capital. We will talk about the ecb and potentially tightening Monetary Policy in a minute. I want to come back to the fact that you dropped a steak in j generale. Do you not think will you revisit those plans to build a bank and insure a type of organization . Is that not on the cards anymore . Its clear that if you are a ceo of a big organization, big market cap, it is your duty to look at different options for growth. Especially if you want to become and to remain and have your leadership in Wealth Management. At the same time its your duty to make the job of creating value for your shareholders. At sanpaolo, number one. As a general rule you want to grow organically or are you looking at we wanted to grow organically. As i told you, we have already 100 billion euros. We delivered 80 billion euros and increased by 10 our commission base if we can increase another 100 billion euros in volume we can also increase in the next Business Plan. Lets talk about the ecb. A lot of people in the market say macron was the main trigger for the ecb to start tightening. Do you agree with that view . I think that in the end, in one year, a couple of years, we will have for sure a reduction in that and increase in Interest Rates. So maintaining this approach will come to an end in my view after the german election. So we will remain with this condition until the end of the year. Starting from 2018, its likely that Interest Rates can increase and there could be some reduction in the amount of government bonds bought by the ecb. But again, youre a bank that was desperately weighing for higher net interest income. Thats been under pressure in the First Quarter again. Do you not feel like the ecb is giving itself too much time to wait for growth and inflation to pick up further . Were already seeing those two metrics at healthy levels. Should it move faster . It is clear that on the other side we have some benefits to real economy. Being a big bank you have to consider impacts on real economy. The expectation is that Interest Rates will increase, if you are a strong wealth Management Company you can have advantages in a zero rate environment like the one in which we are operating. Until 1 positive interest rate, we will remain a strong Wealth Management franchise and a strong retail benefiting from increase in Interest Rates. My expectation is that we will have an increase in Interest Rates, this will bring us a lot of revenues coming from Market Conditions and not from our actions. What do you think was the main factor for the rerating of the banking stocks over the last couple months . Was it the capital hike by unicredit, by deutsche bank, Credit Suisse or the macron victory or what essentially is it . What were seeing out there is a massive rerating. That must be good for you guys, too. It is clear from one side we have some reduction in systemic risks. Unicredit, deutsche bank. So it is probably 30 reduction in systemic risks. But also something related to the possibility to reinforce the eurozone to eliminate any kind of expectation of euro pick up. The possibility to have Something Different in the way in which eurozone can act. This is something that i consider really very important. It could be 50 . And the other part is an increase in Interest Rates. It is clear that increasing Interest Rates, you can have some benefits. Retail banks have more benefit, but also the system will have benefit in increasing Interest Rates. Its a combination of factors. Do you think that maybe european investors are placing too much hope, pinning too much hope on emanuel macron and one specific candidate . We saw a similar story back in the day with matteo renzi. He didnt quite fulfill all the expectations. It is clear that we are now in a phase in which the first point is avoiding the risk of populism and possible eurozone threat or problematic situation. Thats the first part of the story. Delivering on actions, ability to manage accounts. Thats the second part of the story. The main part of the point is to avoid the risk of having eurozone pick up. Also the coming back of renzi in good shape in italy is in my view another good Value Proposition for investors, because having also strong leader in italy could be a big thing for the market. Can he beat the five Star Movement . Does he have the credibility coming back . He won the primaries convincingly. I dont want to get into political analysis, but if you look at italy, italy is a country with 6 trillion of wealth of italian families. Its difficult in a country like this can decide to have a government that could be that could put some threat the wealth of italian people. In my expectation, the possibility to have a strong leader like renzi or centerright leader as the winning competition could be the likely results for the future. We have to talk to you about npls in italy. We cannot talk to you about that. If i look at your statement from the First Quarter, your inflows of bad loan s during the First Quarter was the lowest since the creation of the bank ten years ago. Thats reassuring. What about the rest of the Banking Sector . We have an advantage coming from our ability to underwrite credit. Its clear we have a situation much better than the system, but in any case all real economies benefiting from the growth in gdp. Now were at sustainable 1 growth. Italy, not china but it is likely japan. Coming back to 1 gdp, i think that for the condition, the italian Banking System is assuring the situation not only for san paolo. Were seeing jes staley coming under pressure because of this whistleblower incident. I wonder, do you think theres too much scrutiny when it comes to bankers, or are they moving into behavior characterized by precrisis behavior . I think in any case the situation is completely different. Now we can look at the bute chore, the ba future, the banking landscape in a different way. Thank you so much for your time. In other news, axa says it will float a Minority Stake in its Life Insurance unit in the united states. The french insurer said it would bring Financial Flexibility to its strategy. Axa posted a slight miss on First Quarter revenues. Lets dig deep neither story with gemma acton. Investors seemed to like this. They do the stock was up initially more, over 2 , up to 2. 5 initially. Its come off since then, but its a weak day for markets. Look whats happening here. A lot of confusion last week when a lot of the allianz board was replaced and the ceo was replaced. Very clear why axa had done that. Now looking at the fact that its going to be a u. S. Ipo of the Life Insurance business and the stake that axa has in allianz, which is about 64 , we understand the strategic rational for that. Do you feel this is a trend in the overall industry . Some rivals like metlife have done similar things. Should we expect more of these disposals, if you will . What weve seen is a lot of restructuring of businesses, insurers have been selective about what they plan to press ahead with going forward. What they dispose of in the meantime. Thats right. We cant expect huge Earnings Growth from european insurers in the current climate. Axa got rid of its uk life business last year. Its saying clearly it wants to go after health, it wants to go after specialist pay and asia. Doing the ipo they say it will give them proceeds to pursue this opportunity. Thank you very much for that plenty more street signs coming up after this short break. Well be talking to others who reported numbers today. Stay tuned. [vo] when it comes to investing, looking from a fresh perspective can make all the difference. It can provide what we call an unlock a realization that often reveals a better path forward. At wells fargo, its our expertise in finding this kind of insight that has lead us to become one of the largest investment and Wealth Management firms in the country. Discover how we can help find your unlock. Welcome back. Youre still watching street signs. Im carolin roth. These are your headlines. President trump fires fbi director jaming co ines somcomee middle of the agencys investigation into campaign ties to russia, stunning capitol hill. I said to him, mr. President , youre making a mistake. I didnt receive an answer. We completed the transformation of our bank into a wealth Management Company, we delivered the strongest results among all Wealth Management players in terms of growth. We are a unique case in europe. A toast to campari shares. The Italian Liquor company has an earnings beat as a Strong Performance in europe boosts sales. Ings First Quarter underlying pretax results exceed expectations, but the companys cfo tells cnbc demand is still soft. Demand is still quite low. You have to work really hard in order to get your lending volume in thats why we are so particularly happy with the 5. 7 billion. Lets get back to our top story. President trump has fired fbi director james comey who had been conducting an investigation into possible connections between trumps president ial campaign and russia. According to a white house statement, trump acted on recommendations from Deputy Attorney general rosenstein and attorney general jeff sessions. Republican and Democratic Leaders in congress both expressed concern over the move. Richard burr, the republican senator leading the Senate Investigator into the possible russian ties said he is troubled by the timing and reasoning of director comeys termination. Lets get to tracie potts for some reaction. Talk about a political earthquake here. What is the feeling the morning after in washington . The morning after there are lots of questions about why this happened. The white house released letters explaining that it was because of the clinton email investigation, but all of that information has been out there for months. Last july when comey came out publicly. And in october near election day when he brought up the emails that were on Anthony Weiners laptop. All of that has been out there. Whats new is that comey testified a few days ago about it according to rosenstein didnt take the fall, didnt fall on his sword and say he made mistakes in that investigation. The timing of this is what is raising lots of questions among democrats and republicans. Comey was heading the russia investigation which President Trump pointed out in his letter firing comey that hes not a target of. The president told him thr said the target. Now this firing is raising eyebrows on capitol hill. Democrats say this is the basis for a special prosecutor in that case. They want someone independent in the Justice Department overlooking this. They insist that they wont vote for a new fbi director until they get it. Exactly those demands for a special prosecutor, theyre coming from chuck schumer. He also said first it was sally yates, then bharara, now comey. When it comes to a special prosecutor, are they gaining traction with this demand . The firing of comey will raise questions about who is in charge now. We know it cant be the attorney general. He recused himself from anything having to do with russia. Anything having do with the clinton emails, though he recommended the firing based on the clinton emails. So thats a question thats going to come up. It cant be jeff sessions. It cant be someone beholden to President Trump. Who is going to lead this fbi investigation . Is it going to be an independent career prosecutor . Or is it going to be someone who may have ties to it all . Those are the questions being raised. Certainly the sudden firing really without warning here of james comey is going to add fuel to this push to get an independent prosecutor in there. Thats a very, very important point. Thank you very much for that. Always appreciate it. He thought he was getting pranked, find out why james comey thought the news of his resignation was a joke. Thats on cnbc. Com. President trump will meet with Russian Foreign minister Sergey Lavrov at the white house today. This will be the highest level inperson meeting between the president and the russian government since he took office. Lets show you where u. S. Futures are trading this morning. Were still a few hours away from the start of the trading session. Looking mixed. The s p 500 is seen off by less than half a point. The dow jones seen higher 10 points. The nasdaq off 1. 5 points. This after another low volatility day yesterday but another record close for the nasdaq. The nasdaq posted its fourth straight day of gains getting a boost from apple whose market cap is now above 800 billion. When it comes to the European Equity trade, we are underwater. The cac 40 off by a third of a percent after rising nicely yesterday. The dax hitting a record high. This morning seeing a bit of profit taking, off by 0. 2 . We are still driven by earnings news. Seeing outperformance in financials given that ing posted better than expect the numbers. And news about a u. S. Float from axa. When it comes to the fx markets, we saw the comey story having a bit of a negative impact on the dollar, that was treated as a riskoff event. Euro dollar is slightly higher to the tune of 108. 85. The dollar yen is back below the 114 handle. Keep in mind that draghi is speeching before t speaking before the Dutch Parliament today. Dozens of conservative mps could befin finding out today whethif they will be charged with fraud relating to the 2017 aelection th election. The uk Prime Minister warned that only her party could negotiate a successful brexit. What weve seen from other parties is attempts to disrupt negotiating process, to undermine the task that lies ahead. Weve seen some of them wanting to have second referendumens, wanting to open up the old dwigs. What divisions. What i see going around the country is people actually saying we want the government to get on with it. We want the government to deliver brexit and make a success of it. Opposition leader, Jeremy Corbyn launched the labour partys campaign in manchester. Corbyn blastsaid his party woul clamp down on dodgers. When have they stood up to their financial backers and demand our money back . Instead, they make others foot the bill. They make our nurses, our careers, our soldiers, our disabl disabled, our young people trying to get a home of their own, our elderly looking for dignity in retirement, and those working hard to get on, they make them foot the bill. This makes me angry. I know it makes the people of britain angry too. To so today i say to tax cheats that rip off people, enough is enough. Psp investment has shrugged off brexit uncertaintily opening a new office london. Im pleased to be joined by the president and ceo of psp investments. Why london . I think we believe that london will remain a Financial Center of europe. It is hard to think that we can replicate the talent, infrastructure, and the relationship and the Network Based here. So were confident that london will remain very important. It could be a number of big banks to send staff el whersewh but the decisionmaking center will remain here. It feels like some of the activity will be more decentralized. Some tof movie of it moving to system of it frankfurt. Do you think youll open up Satellite Office theres or will it only be london . Its unlikely well open another Satellite Office on the continent. Well concentrate all of our investment activities here. Because its likely to remain the decision center, to us it doesnt affect us if theres a middle office or back Office Activity elsewhere. We want to be in the heart of the action. I think it will remain here. Why the increased focus on europe . Because of the quality assets youre seeing here . Is it because of the Political Landscape . Which has been changing to the ben fet efit of risky asset man. It seems populism has been rejected by in large in europe. Weve been invested in europe for the past ten years. Having a presence here is increasing local knowledge. Its important as we continue to grow. Also increases exponentially the pool of talent that we can recruit in asset classes. And finally a lot of our peer or competitors are based here, either onhe continent or mostly here in london. Its not only a competitive advantage to have an office here, not to make sure that were at a competitive disadvantage visavis our peers. When we talk about your investment allocation, you have a strong focus on infrastructure. 47 of your Capital Allocation in europe is on infrastructure and pe. Something else we saw in pe is the industry sitting on a lot of dry powder, record dry powder. Thats because there are not that many compelling assets to envest in. Are you still finding that . Ive been doing this for a long time now. Ive heard this element of a lot of capital chasing too few deals. I think where it starts to be worrisome is when we see our partners in the private equity world start paying really crazy prices for asset. We have not seen that. I think theyve been mostly disciplined, as have we. And its important for us to have strong allocation in liquid and private investment because were in the fortunate position of being a net inflow of contribution, visavis the benefits were paying. Therefore the liquid asset, i believe, are still paying a premium over the public market. If you pick the right one. And thats what weve been trying to do in private equity infrastructure, private debt also, and our allocation to real estate. Equally in real estate, what were seeing in commercial but also residential real estate, in places like germany, the bun bundesbank has been warning of a heating up of the property market. In the uk weve been in this bubbly territory. Do you think thats coming off a boil now with brexit . I think brexit will create some shortterm volatility. Im sure im not telling you something you have not heard before but were a longterm investor. Thats important for us. We need to go through cycles. There will be, especially in this political world right now, a lot of uncertainty, not just in europe, in the uk, but everywhere in the world. So its all about picking up the right assets. And i think weve done that. Clearly theres some sectors that are more interesting in real estate, like student housing, student will continue to come to the uk to be educated. In the office space, weve put our sales down a bit. Well be assured that if we find a marquee asset, well act on it. We also want to see how this brexit thing will play out for the real estate market. Im curious about your clients risk tolerance, as a pension fund you have a certain maturity that you have to fulfill and pay out. But given that so much of your investments is in Something Like real estate, not something completely liquid in pe, which, again, not entirely liquid. Do you feel your clients are very much 5 teaccepting of the higher risk profile . I think they are. They are dictating the higher risk profile they want us to take. Because of this net inflow we have a longerterm view on assets. This situation will dwindle down until about 2032, where then we will be paying more benefit than we received contribution. As we come to that date, we will definitely adjust Asset Allocation, for the time being we think its optimal where it is. How will your Asset Allocation change once rates rise . They have been rising in the u. S. , but what about europe . I think that even if the rate rises, we will be in a lowrate environment. I dont think our Asset Allocation will change that much. We may reveal the fixed income side of our Asset Allocation, but i dont think well make major adjustment in a higher rate environment. I would think it would be more attractive to be in real estate or pe rather than fixed income. Thank you very much for that. The president and ceo of psp investments. A new show premieres on cnbc today, its called the brave ones. Well have a sneak preview after this break. Dont miss it. Cnc has the brave ones. First meet the man behind the driverless car, street view and google class. Whats next for sebastian . The brave ones. Welcome back. The newly elected president of south korea has been sworn into office. Moon jaein got more than 47 of the votes. Chery kang, tell us about this new president. He comes after this monthlong political scandal and the protest leadership vacuum. I think he understands that the need to emphasize the need for armny harmony in this especially when he understands he will need support from the National Assembly to get the cash net formed and also to push for the reforms he promised as a candidate. He is for charitable reforms and also fiscal spending. I think geopolitically this election result could add a little bit more uncertainty at least in the shortterm. Yes, it is day one for president moon in south korea. We could have a little more patience. As some comments came out, some of the comments that he made in the swearingin ceremony this morning, he said, yes, i am willing to go to washington right away if need be. So, he shows he understands the importance of the alliance with the united states. But he also added that hes willing to fly out to pyongyang at the same time if conditions are met. A lot of ambassadors and observers what his version of a sunshine policy a pro north korea policy will look like moving forward. Regarding thaad, the antiu. S. Missile Defense System to be deployed in south korea, he said he is willing to negotiate this issue with china and the u. S. I wonder if hes willing to go back on this agreement that was signed by the previous administration. Chery, thank you very much for that. An increase in demand in european Residential Construction has held wienerberger with a 15 rise in First Quarter profit. The brickmaker said they were expecting ebita to grow by 9 this year. We are joined by the ceo of weinerberger. Is china a sweet spot for you . Yes, the Residential Market picked up nicely in eastern europe, the uk is doing fine, especially germany, they have a good housing market. I think we are set for a good year in 2017. You mentioned the uk. You said there are good running rates in the uk, youre not seeing margin erosion. We are seeing inflation picking up, to what extent will that put pressure on you and you will have to raise prices . At this stage costs are low, but we see some indications for the second half of the year which sort of put this into creation. But still this year i dont see any margin erosion or pressure on that issue for the uk business. When it comes to the rest of your markets, specifically in eastern europe, also in germany, if the economies are doing so incredibly well, and they are, europe seems to be growing faster than the u. S. Right now, at some point this will put upward pressure on wages. Again, that should be a big cost factor for you. Indeed. We have wage increases already and have seen over the last couple of years. If you look into yeern euroeast european markets, keep in mind we have strong labor markets in hungary, poland, the czech republic, because as you correctly pointed out, the economy is doing well. Wage increases have been there. We deal with that. We have been rather capable of passing on this sort of inflationary Cost Increases to our clients. All right. I guess were seeing higher prices then in those regions. Lets talk about the u. S. Market. Hugely important market for you. Thats also a Market Driven in part by the trump euphoria but also by the Business Cycle were in. Do you feel like some of it is fading now . Again, weve seen a disappointing First Quarter print. Whats the disconnect there between the euphoria and the more disappointing showings now in the economy . I think you see our business is not a quarter by quarter business, even if we have to publish results. If you talk about Residential Housing market in the u. S. , you have seen over the last five, six years a continuous upward movement in this market. It will grow slightly also this year. Im confident that in the one and twofamily houses here we will see a strong onesingle digit growth in the market this year over all the u. S. Housing market. And im not sort of a pessimist in the sense that we will see here a major change in the new Residential Construction in the u. S. Right now. But on the other side politically, we did not see any sort of program or this idea coming through or materialize in the infrastructure or in the Residential Housing market yet. All right. Heimo, well leave it here. The brave ones will be aired for the first time on cnbc in europe and the middle east tonight. Its a new program that charts the rise of some of the worlds most successful entrepreneurs through intimate oneonone interviews. The star of the First Episode is the german ceo and founder of udacity, a former Vice President at google and professor of science at stanford. Heres what you can expect from the man who led the development of googles selfdriving car. Udacity today is the reinvention of university. I listened to a young fellow in silicon who started cannes academy. His videos went viral. I was sitting at stanford with my class of 15 thinking god, i can do that. We expected maybe 500 students at best. When everything was said and done, we had 160,000 students. With this one class i had more teaching impact than the entire Academic Field combined. I realized, my god, something la to be done. I went to my dean at stanford and i said im done with tenure. Im quitting. People really doubted whether i was sane. If you believe in something, you believe in it hard enough, it will happen. Might not happen the way you want it to happen, but its going to happen. Vision has to be steadfast. You are making it possible. Thank you. Before we wrap up the show, heres another quick look at u. S. Markets in early trade. The s p 500 seen opening higher to 0. 4. The dow jones seen up by 10 points. The nasdaq just fractionally higher. Once again, probably a very low volatility day. Maybe another record close for the nasdaq as the nasdaq posted its fourth straight day of gains yesterday getting a boost from apple yesterday. Thats it for todays show. Im carolin roth. Worldwide exchange is up next. Well see you same time same place tomorrow. Byebye. Finding time to get things done isnt easy. But weve got the Digital Tools to help. Now with xfinitys my account, you can figure things out easily, so you wont even have to call us. Change your wifi password to something you can actually remember, instantly. Add that premium channel, and watch the show everyones talking about, tonight. And the bill you need to pay . Do it in seconds. Because we should fit into your life, not the other way around. Go to xfinity. Com myaccount good morning. Breaking news. President trump fires fbi director james comey. A live report from washington straight ahead. Mixed arrows across europe and asia this morning. And blame cnbc again. Disney shares dropping on concerns of sports channel subscribers. Its may 10, 2017, and Worldwide Exchange begins right now. Good