Earlier, just up a hint now, just a touch. Meanwhile, the nasdaq, the s p500, and the russell, as you can see, down slightly on the day after christmas. Retail stocks are casting a follow on the market, the s p500, the high end end names, all in the red. We got coach, high end retailers such as tiffany moving lower, ralph lauren, urban jut fitters lower on poor data on sales this Holiday Season, and its all due to the latest Holiday Spending figures that the stocks move lower. Sales decreasing at a slow pace since the recession hit in 2008 according to the mastercard survey, the latest one. Well pick apart the numbers later on in the show. Hey, but check out crude oil, jumping today, up more than 2 , 3 on the day, near 91 bucks a barrel. First, theres optimism about a budget deal, perhaps in the next few days, optimism, isnt it, and supply concerns, iran is conducting naval test exercises and a strait of hormuz beginning tomorrow through the weekend. That could be a touchy situation and, hence more support for oil. The price of crude up nearly 3 . Right to the floor. We have traders on the new york stock exchange, the cme group, and the imex. We start with crude, perhaps iraq scaling down its production. We got iran doing their naval exercises again, and perhaps a little bit of optimism that washington will finally get it done, but either way, look at it, hoil of to the upside. Yeah, i think all the reasons mentioned are partly why were up higher today. I also think this is just a technical rally. We broke out above key resistance levels. I think we can trade up to 92. 09, the next level up. Theres a report of a terrorist threat thwarted in united arab emirates, and we have early indications inter next crude oil number is a draw. Bullish as well. Ashlie williams thank ashley thank you. Firstly, doreen, what happened . Well, we are negative again, but wiped most of the losses on the day on a very quiet day. Very, vie quiet. As you pointed out, ashley, retailers what everybodys looking at because its a predicter and indication of how consumers feel, and gdp in 2013, you know, consumers are 70 of the number, and it doesnt really, the numbers were hearing about this Holiday Season does not reflect well for beginning of 2013 so were all nervous about that. Ashley were just going to drift until they do something in washington . I think so. I mean, the likelihood of them getting something done in washington, i think, is slim to none. The fact that the president is coming back early indicates to me that hes getting a little more worried about it than initially we thought he was, and with the retail numbers coming out today, i think he should be. Ashley yeah, no kidding. Cme, gary, i wanted to talk gold with you. Well, first off, we saw the u. S. Dollar hit had a two year high against the japanese yen appearing the japanese are printing money, but gold is stuck in a range right now. Why is that . Well, normally, in a time like this, you see it be the flight to safety. Ashley yeah. Were seeing the euro dollar. Everybodys going there because theres no negative news. Hang on to your hats for the gold. I believe well see it getting to 1680 weeks end and tach that 1700 mark. Again, everybodys worried about the two letters, fc, fiscal cliff, and pulling from the u. S. Dollar, the yen is pulling back, the new regem thats in there, they are doing what they need to do, and nobodys going to gold right now. Silver is sneaking up slowly, above the 30 range. Well see that take off. Reason for that is we look at china. Chinas economy is turning the corner. Thats also helping with what you folks talked about earlier in the crude oil. See how it plays out. Even though its a light volume week as far as trading ashley still, though, a downward trend with the chart. Whats the story with silver . Well, you saw silver pull back with gold. Normally, they run, and now what were seeing is theres a little bit more demand. Chinas picking up the pace a little. We are seeing silver thats up, what, 24 cents as of today . Not a bad move from a one day, especially in the light volume. Ashley if we get it done on the fiscal cliff, will we see a selloff in metals . I dont believe that we will. Europe right now is the safe haven. Theres no negative news. By any means, they are not done with all thats going on over there. Everything is focused here on the u. S. And the fiscal cliff, and until that is resolved, if it gets resolved, the traders are pulling back, volatilitys high, and theres going to be very thin volume in the markets. Its not going to take much to get gold and silver back up. Well, back to cindy quickly. If we have a deal, is it bullish for oil . Shes already gone. Ill ask doreen, youre with us, arent you . I am. Volume, today, by the way, 37 below the three month average. Could lead to some volatility, but we have not seen that, have we . We have not, but vix is up at 19, a little bit higher. The hope is to get more volume here, otherwise, you know, the fiscal cliff is killing everything. Everything. These guys dont get it in washington. I dont know why. I hope they come to their senses soon. Ashley nobody knows why, but im tired of saying fiscal cliff, i know that. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you. And cindy who ran off. Thank you very much. Thats the floor show. Washington running out of time to avert the fiscal cliff and after plan b, well, that got nowhere, the house g. O. P. Insists its the senates turn to suggest a plan, but the senate, well, yet to make a move. Peter barnes joining us from dc with the littest on, what, doesnt seem to be going anywhere . We have the speaker, peter, stuck in a blizzard in ohio. Yeah, thats right, ash, and weve got the senate coming back in tomorrow, and the president coming back into tossen so everybody into town so everybody is looking to harry reid, the Senate Democratic leader and the president to make a move here in the standoff, white house and Senate Democratic staff were discussing steps to avert the cliff monday. We didnt get an update on the status of the conversations from the white house today. A spokesperson for senator reid saying, quote, nothing to report, no conversations with republicans yet. Senate republican leader Mitch Mcconnell who can filibuster anything reid proposes, a spokesperson saying, quote, no outream from dems. We are waiting on senate democrats. If nothings done, january 1st, the nation faces a 5 trillion tax increase over ten years through the expiration of the bush tax cuts and assuming congress does not approve the patch anded medicare doc fix, and other things. The lapse of the tax cuts means the top tax rate reverts to 39. 6 from 35 now. Taxes would also go up for lower income earners. The maximum low rate would revert to 15 from 10 now, and investors see Capital Gains rate revert from 20 , revert to 20 , rather from 15 now. Depending on what analysis you look at, average families could pay 2,000 to 4,000 more in taxes next year. Ashley . Ashley thats the why its called the cliff. Thank you, peter. You bet. Ashley the speaker stuck in a storm, but the phones do work. Bell ringing soon, and amazon known for customer service, especially over the holidays, but its not cared over to the web hosting business. Merry christmas for hollywood. Ticket sales going through the roof. Details when count down returns. Well, earlier, of course, we touched on the weakness in retail after disappointing data. Well, Technology Shares under pressure, especially the large cap names. The selling could be due to uncertainty on a budget deal and folks just wanting to lock in gains, potentially, of course, before taxes on Capital Gains go up next year. Maybe not such a surprise. Check out the spider select technology fund, an etf, exposure to the likes of, yes, app 8, and soft apple, and Software Makers and stocks. Xlk, the name, and its dropping. Apple, of course, look at what apples doing, down today, about 1 , but it is up 27 this year. Google moving higher. Microsoft and ebay lower today, especially ebay down, well, nearly a buck today on the trade. All right, so about, oh, about 47 minutes left of trading on the day after christmas. The markets still trying to get back to the water mark. They are now down about six points after briefly getting above in positive territory. Tech stocks the worst. Case index showing home prices on the rise, a good thing. Check in on how this moves the markets, if at all, nicoles on the new york stock exchange, and jeff flock at the cme. Nicole . The home builders, a great day to take a look, and the numbers, talk about the month over month, down. 1 , which is an improvement over what analyst had the exception with a 2 , and year over year with a gain that out paced the analysts expectations. The group is mixed today. Jrhorton down 1 , and kb homes gaining 1 . The group has done well. I chose these names to give a look over 52 weeks. I mean, 376 , that is the gain that we are seeing on hovnanian. 376 . I said it again just in case you missed it the first time. Weve seen the housing recovery underway, and todays numbers echo that sentiment. Its been slow; however, and each time you get the numbers in, theres experts like David Blitzer saying its an upbeat assessment saying the recovery is gathering strength. Back to you. Ashley encouraging sign, slow and steady, could be awhile before we are close back to normal. Right. Whatever normal is. Nicole, thank you. Jeff, whats going on with oil and line lumber . Well, true, you know, the numbers really inching up in lumber as well. Im in the lumber pit. Trading concluded, but this is a small pit, six or seven or eight guys in here, and i say guys, because they are usually guys. The lumber numbers, up 3. 5 today, and lumbers traded in board feet, the contract, you know, whats a board foot, by the way, a foot that doesnt have anything to do. No, a board foot is a one foot length of lumber thats one foot wide and one inch thick. Up 15, a thousand board feet here today, but the biggest mover in terms of volume is oil, as you pointed out, a big move for oil today, wti up the most its been to the highest level in two months, the last number i had was up over almost 891 91 a barrel, 2. 5 for the day. The middle east, traders, not so much fiscal cliff optimism, nobody has optimism on that, but stuff from the middle east as guests earlier pointed out. A terror cell foiled, and thats not a foiled, even though it was foiled by the uae, its more indicative theres probably theres trouble there, and military exercises in iran and cut in production bid kurds in iraq. Thats the oil and line lumber. No bored feet here either. Thank you very much. Ashley two new movies certainly a hit at the box office over the holidays. You may have seen one or both. I dont know, Dennis Kneale has the story. Dennis hello, ashley. A clash at the box office. The rap. Com called it battle of the sexes at the multiplexes. Movie fans had a choice, would the men see django, a violent rrated western or would the women hold the poir and, instead, opt for les miz . The musical based on a novel from 1862. Well, the results are in. The women won. Les miz, com cast june veer sal studios took the top stop kicking the keester of quinton. The django got second place at 15 million. The fox film parental guidance with a respectable 7 million on christmas day, and the weekend box office, leading up to tuesday holiday, theres the hobbit an unexpected journey, and the tom cruise vehicle coming in second over 15 mill, and three others, rise of the guardians, and lincoln rounding out the film. Les miz opened in japan beating the hobbit, a far bigger film, and ds jango set a bigger rrated film record on christmas day. The blood fest vested by a musical, thats got to be hard for qin ton to take. Ashley . Ashley thats the power of women. Well see les miz. Dennis, thank you. Of course, imax carrying both that and hobbit. Its up 2. 5 , and you see the imax, not bad, moving cliesly, but the Box Office Hits gives imax a big boost today, an offshoot of the holiday block buster movie business. Closing bell ringing in about 41 minutes, consumer spending, of course, roughly twothirds of gdp, and the economy is better, how do you play the retailers in the new year . Scott of bbc Capital Markets has a 2013 shopping list, two of them are high players, no doubt, but the other, perhaps available in the counsel with a cheap skin uggs back in demand and ideas in retail. Thats up next in a fox business exclusive. Ashley power mover. Welcome back, amazon a weak link on the nasdaq today with shares down 3. 67 as you see, making the Online Retailing giant the power mover of the hour in the wrong direction. Whats going on . Theres concerns about the web services, business, and netflix was knocked out christmas eve. Great, huh . Affecting 27 million sub scriners thanks to a problem with amazon who hosts the data. Other Companies May think twice using amazon for web hosting needs given the outage at netf netflix. Look at the 12year stock here, up 44 this year, so, yes, the outage was bad news, but it could be just a catalyst for some profit taking as well as we head towards, well, almost the end of the year. Taking a look at what else is going on on the floor today. Barely made it above the water line, down a little bit now, and out to nicole. Nicole . Lets go to adam first. Im sorry. Retailers. Thats all right. Ashley slashing profits. Nicoles nicer to look at. Ashley adam, no disrespect to you, i thought we were going to nicole. We go to her so often, of course. Every 15 minutes. Ashley exactly. Tell me about retail and the problem on the Retail Stocks today. Do i have to, ashley . Its not a pretty picture. Ashley im afraid so. This year, projections for Holiday Shopping growth over last year are revised and revised down. In fact, some expectations are that this is the worst retail season weve had for Holiday Shopping since 2008. Now, according to mastercards spending polls, and thats a track of everything, cash, checks, and credit cards, we will see growth between or saw growth between october 28th and december 24th of seven tenths of a percent. Put that in perspective, in 2011, same time frame, sales grew by 2 . Giving you a lot of reasons for this most of which they seem to believe was Superstorm Sandy that hit the big shopping areas and 5 lot of the big a lot of the big Population Centers on the east coast, and people there in new york, new england did not shop, and that was sufficient enough to bring down the numbers nationwide. There was a built of a rebound prior to christmas, but not enough to put us back on track for what the National Retail federation says is their prediction for the Holiday Shopping season. 4. 1 growth over last year, 586 billion season, but others say, no, nrf is off, and, in fact, shopper trek on monday revised from 3. 3 to 2. 5 growth. Expect to see big sales, especially when you consider, nrf says, i think, that retailers make anywhere from 20 to 40 of revenue in the Holiday Shopping season, could be bad news for a lot of people. Ashley could indeed. Adam, thank you very much. Yep. Ashley theres a holiday hangover today, no doubt about, that but they have to help customers know when a sale is a sale. Scott, bbc Capital Markets retail analyst joining me in a fox business exclusive. Scott, what do you mean . People are told when a sale a really a sale in well, it started in 2008 during the recession. Gonzo promotions, 7 0 off, 80 off, telling customers they need to come in today to buy, and retailers waning themselves off of that. This year, we noticed through channel checks there was more of an every day low prices strategy. Walmarts, the expert at it, Customers Trust walmart when its the lowest price. Walk into a retailer like joseph a. Banks continue substantiately offering by one, get one. Ashley sometimes buy one get five free. The message is come in every day and get a suit for 200. I dont think that resinates with the customer. Dress barn, part of the retail group of a company we follow, sold sweaters for 12 each. Last year, they may have been 25, but it was buy one, get one free. The deal may have been better this year, but in the customers minds, unless you build the trust knowing they are getting the lowest price possible, its a tough challenge. Ashley you say that yes is the worst performance, apparently, from one analyst, the worst since 2008. You say we blame the wrong things for this. Who should we be blaming . Well, its always a product thing with retail. What we focused on is that, well, the overall growth data is not great, people that are doing well, that have been doing well, or continue to do well, and so, you know, ugg boots, for example, a hot commodity this christmas. Michael kors watches are popular. Sweaters, winter jackets, external factors impacting them. Ashley 2013, who do you like and not like going into the new year . Apparel is the tough category. You have to be picky in apparel. We like hanes brands, and the other is carters, baby clothes. Both Companies Sell products and are less discretionary and benefit from lower cotton costs year over year. Carters last quarter, growth margin up about a thousand basis points, and youll see that tail wind into the first half of the year. Hanes brands has a deleveraging event using the lower cotton costs to pay the debt and go from a highly leveraged company to a regular, sort of under leveraged. Ashley jcp, talking of pennys, 1 that strategy working for them . Well, jcpenney attempts the Everyday Low Price strategy, didnt work in 2012. Whats going for them they have the confidence in the suppliers. The suppliers like carters and hanes that we follow are willing to work with them to invest in shop and shops and create product exclusive to jcpenney. I dont know if thats happening in 2013. I know from our stand point, the companies we follow, they are going to get the list if jcpenney improves in 13 , and thats a possible catalyst. Ashley interesting. Who do you not like . Well, a company we just recently lowered a rating on is afena retail group, great management team, but they are in the sweet spot of where the customers shopping, and thats in the value oriented miss category, women averages age of 3060. They have enough stuff in the closet, they are the first ones to stop shopping. Ashley thank you, Capital Markets retail analyst, thank you very much. Appreciate it. Much, appreciate it. The closing bell ringing under half an hour. Opportunities in europe, you heard me right, europe. Even with the debt crisis and austerity measures. Running the Scout International fund, that fund up about 20 this year finding bargains throughout europe land. The global footprint. Up next with a fox business exclusive. [ malennouncer ] its tt time of year again. Time for citi price rewind. Because your daughter really wants that pink castle thing. And you realldont want to pay more thayou have to. Only citi price rewind automatically searches for the lowest price. And if it findone, you get refunded the difference. Just use your citi ca and register your purchase online. Have a super sparkly day ok. [ male announcer ] now all youeed is a magic carriage. Citi price rewind. Start saving at citi. Com pricerewind. We believe the more you know, the better you trade. So we have ongoing webinars and interactive learning, plus, inbranch seminars at over 500 locations, where our dedicated support teams help you know more so your money can do more. [ rodger ] at scottrade, seven dollar trades are just the start. Our teams have the information you want when you need it. Its anothereason more investors are saying. [ all ] im with scottrade. I am adam shapiro with our fox business brief. Stocks are swinging between gains and losses. We have five days left before the fiscal cliff. Washington preparing for another round of wheeling and dealing tomorrow. Right now the dow was trying to find direction, down this. 10 points. A downturn after being ordered to pay nearly 1. 2 billion in damage in a Patent Infringement lawsuit. Sued for infringing patents related to data storage technology. Edmunds. Com predicting new car sales will slow in the new year but still plenty of optimism in the auto industry. Consumers will continue to benefit from new models, new technology potentially lower prices as automakers continue to fight for market share. We continue countdown to the closing bell with ashley webster. Ashley lets go to Nicole Petallides at the floor of the new york stock exchange. Shares of rim, research in motion. Rim it is for real. Shares of research in motion. Research in motion has been beaten down the past couple of sessions. Concerns of a new structure put in effect, and what they were going to do is use a tear factor, those tiers, is unclears unclear how they were going to break down. It contributes to the research in motion revenue. For two days we saw the selling from the blackberry maker, and now it is bouncing back and a nice performance. Talking to the analyst talking positively saying it has been beaten down. The blackberry 10, january 30. Put it on your calendar. Ashley people looking for that. Doing better. Thank you. The u. S. Struggles to think about the fiscal cliff, is it time to invest your money abroad, overseas . While europe has many problems of its own is an understatement, joining us now, investment chief economic strategist, fox business exclusive. Thank you very much for joining us. International fund up 20 year to date, how did you manage to do that . It has been mainly issues with a substantial weight in europe, 50 little underweight compared, but we have had a substantial bet they are. But basically issue selection. Within germany the companies have done well, in general it has been an issue selection. Ashley you think of areas being well, europe is not one of them. He mentioned germany, even germany is being dragged down to what is going on in the region as a whole. How do you pick the stocks . You like the multinationals, dont you . One thing that we have invested in his multinationals. Companies around the world, spain, peril around the world. Cars around the world. Multinational companies that are doing stuff right in this environment. We think that is the formula, broadbased market and the people that are executing within that. Ashley arent you concerned about continued volatility in that area . Italian elections coming up in february, german elections not far behind that, has to be seen whether Angela Merkel can survive that. Does that give you cause for concern . There is no question about that. Every election that has happened in the last two or three years, the incumbent has been evicted from office. You can worry about Angela Merkel, our guess is she is doing other than the rest of them and will survive, theres plenty to worry about that is what makes overall the market depressed and therefore attractive. Ashley you like the auto sector and insurance, tell us a little bit about that. Insurance kind of our chicken way of finance. We are not comfortable with the euro banks we think the Insurance Companies are in much better shape, they came off of catastrophic losses last year so the p e ratios are a little higher than they appear. Not as high as they appear rather. This year or next years estimate fairly reasonable and they mentioned a four and. 5 yield roughly, it is an attractive package. It is on a worldwide upturn in consumer demand is not happening fast. Like in this country were all those are selling at her and we think the economy here and abroad is slowly building up momentum. We need to remember stock investing is in essence investing in a leading indicator. The market leads the economy, if we wait for the economy to say it is all clear, we will miss most of the price action. We think this is a time to be shopping. Ashley notice on the allocation around the world, the asian investments make up about 21 , or thereabouts of your portfolio. Do you expect to be set up as we go down the line . Or down the road a little bit . We raised japan a little bit. Itll be interesting to see, theyre going the opposite direction from europe. And now the Prime Minister wants to in essence practice stimulus in monetary policy, fiscal policy. Itll be interesting to see how that works out. We think pushing down the yen will be part of it and that has been the big drag on the industry is the currency has stayed high for about three years now. So we will see how that shakes out. Ashley we are already out of time. Scout investment chief International Equities strategist, likes europe. Thank you for joining us. A pleasure, good to be here. Ashley the closing bell ringing in about 60 minutes or thereabouts. A conundrum in the gold market if you own the precious metal, you made out like a bandit, but minors have been dead money. Find out why the chief Investment Officer at securitys balloon is loading up on mining stocks. Coming up next in a fox business exclusive. Ashley earlier we touched on the weakness in retail and technology stocks. On the flipside we have strengthened technology stocks. A fairly lackluster tape. It is up, as you can see, half a percent on the day. Many economic names are part of this. If you believe Global Growth will tolerate and the problems in washington are temporary, materials may continue until 2013. So Natural Resources up nicely on the day. A lot of green arrows making him the best performers on the s p 500 today. That stock up 18 over the past month. The big copper and gold producer up nicely. 0. 50 on the day. Valet, the brazilian mining giant, and the coal producer, Peabody Energy another green arrow up 0. 41 on the day. All good performers to counteract some of the retail and stocks that have been a real drag today. Five days left until we dive over the fiscal cliff, is there any chance washington will settle on a deal . My next guest says deal or no deal, the stocks will be stuck in neutral for the next two years. Oh, dear. Joining us, chief Investment Officer of security for lou. Joining us by phone. Two years we will be bumbling along. Whether we hit a deal or not. What makes you say that . It is about several things. Global growth slowing, debt levels and developed economies are high. Starting the next area in the government sectors. Tax rates are going up, so when you combine those things together, to makes for potential recessionary conditions. We have had markets bubbling across the world in the last three and a half years, time to take a breather in my opinion. Ashley you see us and they wont get past the september highs. You truly believe that . I do. You go back to what the market will do, the recessionary conditions for the present and the market tends to go down, not up. We look at the recession going into one, around nine months on average, the market tends to decline over 15 to 18 months which tells me september and october represented the highs, we will be looking at 2014 before we see the lows and probably 2015 before we can exceed those highs. Ashley gdp dropping by 2 . The latest housing numbers continue to be well not spectacular, certainly heading in the right direction. It seems to me that the more optimistic in your outlook. Housing and the stock market to different asset classes. Housing has gone down a lot with the housing rate, it will continue to recover. Remember what hosting is, does not an investment, closer to consumption item, it is important part of our economy, part of the overall growth. Housing and stocks are clearly two different asset classes, so i do think housing could do fine, even do well, no different than the 2000 to 2002. If the prices come up, consumers and homeowners still better, they spend more, perhaps businesses will start unleashing cash and will start hiring more. Kind of a stumble for, isnt it . There will be some tailwinds like that, but keep in mind the headwind coming from some of the things republicans and democrats agree on only fiscal cliff will cut gdp growth substantially. You think what effect the Government Spending 7 plus of our gdp on debt to bases every year for the last four years, youre talking about north of a trillion dollars economic impact. Ashley you say stay away from equities, what in particular . Longterm treasuries a deflation hedge. The stability and coupons, emerging market coupons for some holdings in newly emerging market equities. Keep in mind i am not saying stay completely away from equities. Normal risk exposure. Ashley what about gold, do you like the mining stocks as compared to the gold etf . I do like the mining stocks trading at 30year lows and price relative to gold. If you own some equities, it is preferable in the gold sector. Ashley Investment Officer joining us by phone this afternoon. Thank you so much. The closing bell rings fairly soon here, under six minutes time. Can you guess which Tech Companies are up more than 100 this year . Known as the google china poised to take on apple with new technology. We will tell you what it is right after the break. [ indistinct shouting ] [ indistinct shouting ] [ male announcer ] time and sales data. Splitsecond stats. [ indistinct shouting ] its so close to the options floor. [ indistinct shouting, bell dinging ]. Youll bust your brain box. All onhinkorswim from td ameritrade. Ashley shares of chinese Search Engine with a new up today around 5 . The Company Reportedly designed intelligence Recognition Program like apple series for the platform of google play. Reportedly slated to release the feature some time this week. The new app will offer voice responses with the help of a gigantic database for the Search Engine to the stock up nicely today hitting its high point midafternoon still up around 5 , shares up more than 100 this year. Not bad at all. For the very latest, lets go over to david asman and shibani joshi. David thank you very much. Shibani joshi taking liz claman spot for the day. Lets go to Nicole Petallides. I said hello or early this morning. At the new york stock exchange. We have seen upside down this today, but look at what happened to oil. The huge jump in oil, up