Transcripts For FBC Markets Now 20130220

On every purchase every day. Told you id get half. Whats in your walle ashley good afternoon, everybody. Tracy commodities crushed. We are live at the cme to find out what is going on. Ashley fighting back against Cyber Attacks. Chris eng from veracode joining us with how businesses can protect themselves. Tracy and what this means for ticket prices for the rest of the year. Ashley companies hoarding cash by the trillions and not just apple were talking about, what they are doing with it straight ahead. Tracy would you wear this . The usps may be dropping saturday mail delivery but they are offering up a new clothing line instead. Chanel post office, youve got to see this to believe it. But first, time for stocks as we do every 15 minutes before the New York Stock Exchange, Nicole Petallides is back. Back above 14,000, that is good news. Nicole this morning moving to hide who havent seen in five years trading as high as 14,058. So edging higher and higher and that pulls back. Unusual to see the market punch through and pull back. Right now the dow, nasdaq and the s p all in the red. But we have a few things factoring in. The minutes are due in the next hour, something certainly weighing on the market. A strong dollar, that can push the market as well. We talked about the emerging Market Making materials and commodities pulling back a bit, but the big picture, all through the major averages are up about 10 this year alone. There is the s p 500, right now 1524, down half a percent. That is a Beautiful Run from the lows we incurred. Tracy we will see you in 15 minutes. Ashley commodities getting crushed, oil and gold plunging. Phil flynn in the pits of the cme. What is going on . Phil it was all about china. A lot of the big buyers in china have beehas been slowing down oe purchases, but we have seen a lot more gone. 2000 contracts set aside almost immediately, lot of talk hedge fund getting out are in trouble, but also some talk about iran. The big troubles over the u. N. Plus germany on top of the five Security Council members supposedly getting ready to make an offer to iran on the Nuclear Problem they just cant refuse. Another reason we see the prices go down. Also seeing the price of gasoline, everybody talking about how it has gone up every day. Wwere down about 0. 07 per gallon, almost 0. 08 per gallon, some major rework on gasoline. You also look at gold and silver, gold prices with a lot of liquidation in gold and silver down 0. 79 right now. Nobody wants medals right now. At a fiveyear high, that is downward pressure on metal. Little more confident about global stock market, not as confident in the middle playwrights now. Ashley a lot of news and a lot of action. Thank you so much. Tracy so what would you do if you found out an application that runs in your car, dvd player made you an easy target for cyber attack . It is just that easy to be victimized to how confirms and be so vulnerable . Shibani joshi is here with this severe cyber attack and it is just getting worse, isnt it . Shibani it is crazy. We brought you twitter, facebook and then apple joining the list yesterday the company acknowledged in a statement it had been hit in a mack attack. We should have it. Apple identified now where which is a limited number of the java plugin for browsers. No evidence any data has left apple. Even though there are conflicting reports about where the attacks originated from, some say china, some say eastern europe, some say china. There is one Common Threat that we know exist among all of them, and that is java. It is very out there and accessible making it easy for you to access that no matter what rows are your one, matter what computer device, even a mobile phone. The problem is there has been a lot of issues with the java programming. Last year they deemed 2012 the year java vulnerability because 50 of web attacks originally did in some sort of breach of attack using java. Even the department of Homeland Security warned about an issue in january. It was fixed for the knowledge that could be more problems. This is an issue that started with java sending shockwaves around Silicon Valley and the web world really. It is all one the shoulders of oracle. What everybody says the most defensiveffective thing you cans disable java read you can go to the website, go to the Software Update and install the update that went live last night. Make sure you are upgraded. Basically 3 billion devices, devices running java. This is the source of the Cyber Attacks. You have to protect yourself. A Software Update will not do it. Tracy that is good stuff. And scary. Ashley thank you very much. Cyber attacks on major corporations like apple just highlighting serious gaps in the security, so how should we protect ourselves when they clearly no longer are enough. Nobody knows better than chris eng who heads up research at veracode. Chris, thank you so much for joining us. We just entered into a new phase of hacking when it comes to corporations being hit like this under these Cyber Attacks. Yesterdays report talking about chinese hacking operations really brought Cyber Security to the forefront yet again, specifically relating to corporate espionage and some data that can be stolen from companies, intellectual properties and so on. An attacker will go after company, they will target the people or they will target the technology in yesterdays report was talking about people, spear phishing attacks to get people to click on malicious attacks as a way of getting into organizations. The other side offthe coin is attacking the software that businesses use to carry out their daily business. Those Software Publications of the things protecting important data and intellectual property. Ashley our reporter Shibani Joshi saying the java program is especially vulnerable. It will take care of that, does the threat lessened considerably farther other ways to get into the system . There are lots of ways hackers can get into a system. Vulnerabilities in applications like java are one way. But a typical large enterprise, most of those applications and enterprises are using hundreds of applications to conduct their daily business. They write themselves, some purchased from other companies and there are lots of security holes built into that Software Application that can be exploited. They have to pay more attention to the Security Posture of the software they are using. Ashley it seems to me how could companies not take this threat seriously and if they are not, is it a matter of cost, is it expensive to have the latest anticyber attack software . Companies are spending a lot of money in networks, spending on the firewall and antivirus. Every business runs on software. There is not enough of a focus spent on securing that software and understanding the risks inherent in those pieces of software. Every time you read about in the news a huge database being preached like 10 million credit cards, those are related to software text, usually attack that is a result of a coding weakness in the program that was able to be exploited. There are all these points of attack they have based on a large number of software allocations they are using. Ashley is there anyway that ant they can actually stop this or are they always going to find a way through the defenses . A colleague of mine said recently he will never stop people from getting incoming have to stop them from getting the data out. Ashley that is a good way of putting it. Thank you for having me. Tracy he is right. Ashley they will always find a way in. Tracy you are going to keep going. Ashley lets take a look at these pictures. This is california, the snow and ice is heading east, kansas bracing for almost 2 feet of snow. The latest forecast ahead. Tracy and how satisfied are you with the job congress is doing . Apparently the parents voted this time. How americans really feel heading into the next budget battle. This is 100,000. We asked total strangers to watch it for us thank you so much. I appreciate it. Ill be right back. They didnt take a dime. How much in fees does your bank take to watch your money . If your bank takes more money than a stranger, you need an ally. Ally bank. Your money needs an ally. Announcer you never know when, but thieves can steal your identity and turn your life upside down. Hi. Hi. You know, i can save you 15 today if you open up a charge card account with us. You just read my mind. Announcer just one little piece of information and they can open bogus accounts, stealing your credit, your money and ruining your reputation. 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You have so much to protect and nothing to lose when you call lifelock now to get two full months of Identity Theft protection risk free. Thats right, 60 days riskfree. Use promo code gethelp. If youre not completely satisfied, notify lifelock and you wont pay a cent. Order now and also get this shredder to keep your documents out of the wrong hands a 29 dollar value, free. Get protected now. Call the number on your screen or go to lifelock. Com to try lifelock protection risk free for a full 60 days. Use promo code gethelp. Pluset this document shredder free but only if you act right now. Call the number on your screen now ashley we have a fox business stock alert for you. Watching officemax and office depot. By the rumor, sell the news. Buying officemax offered 1 billion, that announcement came after reports said the deal was unveiled immaturely. Tracy staples having a nice day. So lets make some more money. Charles payne is here with the market. Kind of chilling until the minutes. Charles we are just kind of chilling. Listen, you can call it a bull market, bear market, but why think the bear market we have been in is more like a shark. I get really nervous when the market moves sideways for any extended period of time. We are at 25 cash right now, i have to tell you, we just talked about office depot, officemax. I heard people talk about how this is a good time for the economy. Are you kidding . It is not a great sign for the economy. Dell . Michael dell try to take back his own company, looking to do some things behind the scenes, but no takeover battle and higher battle. Heinz was more of a world deal. Not seen the kind of things were looking for. The market is grappling for things. What i wanted to kind of talk about with the audience is key members on the downside. Lets talk about the key support levels. It is a key number that i like to see if we drift on no news, the market to make a stand, the number that must hold the moving average, lets just call it 13,600. If for any reason we get hurt and got out to that level, that is the market must make a stand. Certainly want to see the market make a stand. Once all the news went away, some form of analysts. Would find a way to go up but so far has not been able to find a catalyst. And im a little bit nervous on the talks of sequestration. The president yesterday was talking if the white house those things are getting bad and just trying to set up the escape hatch so they cannot blame it, the economy fell apart, but we get worried when they speak like that. It feels like that, time goes so much slower, doesnt it . Tracy were kind of flying here. Ashley little after 15 minutes past the hour. Nicole petallides on the floor of the nyse. The tech movers. Nicole a look at some of the names taking a look at apple, a name we have followed so closely, down to 435 and here it is right here, 451 off of 2 with concerns in asia. Fox con there may be a hiring freeze where they have the assembly line, there was some speculation there wasnt enough demand for the iphone. They did not comment on that. Recently the iphone outpaced the Samsung Galaxy with a hiring freeze and demand has hit apple stock today. Yahoo pulling back. Tracy it does, a little redesign, they are trying. You know who else is trying, delta. Falling on deaf ears. But how long can the flyers avoid rising prices . Joining us with his outlook next. Ashley take a look at how the dollar is faring. We will be right back. i 22 minutes past the hour, this is your fox news minute. In kansas city, search crews found the remains of one person at the site of last night gas explosion and fire that destroyed a restaurant. Authorities have not said if the bodies that of the missing female restaurant employee last seen before the blast. 50 people injured, six are still hospitalized. Defense secretary Warning Congress the vast majority of dod 800,000 civilian workers will be placed on administrative furloughs if forced spending occurred. It is scheduled to hit on march 1. Former illinois congressman Jesse Jackson junior pled guilty to misusing 750,000 of campaign funds. Facing roughly four years in prison at the june sentencing. Jacksons wife, sandra, great gy took the deal earlier with federal prosecutors and is due in court later this afternoon. Those are your headlines. Now back to ashley. Ashley thank you very much, we appreciate that. Good news is still bad news. Americans Approval Rating of congress rising last month by a whopping 1 , that is still 50 of americans actually approve of congress and 81 disapprove of the way it is handling the job according to the latest gallup poll. No word on whether or not congress is thrilled about the latest poll because they are on vacation this week. Tracy dont you want to know who the 1 is best changed their mind . It is somebodys grandma. Ashley may be. Still not good. Tracy last nights Delta Airlines attempted to hike prices on domestic airfare for the second time this week. This is the fourth attempt to hike prices in 2013 alone. The past three attempts have failed. Our next guest is here to tell us whether recent attempts havent worked. You get the old big guys, trying to jack prices and then what, people basically dont buy them . First of all, airlines are probing two constituencies. They just got hit earlier this year with their paycheck coming off of a rough and tepid economy and testing their competitors to see if they will come along. If your race by 1 you will be on page 20 from each had a ford to be there very long before you start losing sales. Tracy there is a fine line between raising ticket prices and scaring people like me away to say i am not spending that kind of money to fly my family. Before they could run the aircraft 25, 30 empty. Today 95 per barrel oil, they have to completely fill every empty middle seat and they still have to discount to some degree because people will not buy a middle seat ticket unless the price is right especially in a tough economy. We have a lot of mergers and consolidation occurring affecting prices down the road 2015 and beyond. Airlines are having a difficulty passing on fuel cost in a variety of other things. Tracy the list is a mile long underneath what you thought was your really good ticket price. Right now it is driving the Price International tickets, average fuel surcharge roundtrip. Youre paying 600 before they charge for airfare. Youre looking at 1000 ticket, so right now international is being driven by fuel costs, domestic being driven relatively low because people dont have enough money to fill the empty middle seat right now. Tracy are the airlines going to keep charging prices . People trying to nudge them up . Speak on average theyre trying to raise prices between 4 10 per roundtrip. Their batting anywhere from. 400. 500 the last couple of years. I dont expect that to change much. Limited success, maybe five or six hikes this year equivalent to 5 increase this year. Tracy that was awesome, although the bearer of bad news. Thank you so much for all that insight. Im not even going to ask ashley about his airline experience. Ashley american airlines. Im over it now. Almost. You pay more for that. Despite the market higher in 2013, Companies Still holding trillions in cash. What will get them spending again, if ever. Tracy the ceo of Dunkin Brands taking a stand on the Affordable Care wreck. What changes he is lobbying for coming up after the break. Friday night, buddy. You are gonna need a wingman. And with my cash back, you are money. Forget him. My Airline Miles will take your game worldwide. What im really looking for is i got two words for you rewards. Theres got to be better cards than this. [ male announcer ] theres a better way with creditcds. Com. Compare hundreds of cards from all the major banks to find the one thats right for you. Its simple. Search, compare, and apply at creditcards. Com. First rounds on me. Ashley all right. Time for stocks now. Lets head to the floor of the New York Stock Exchange where our very own Nicole Petallides is standing by. Nicole, boeing one of the top gainers on the dow today. Thats right. So lets take a look at the stock right here. It is up 1. 3 . A great move for boeing. 75. 63 is where it is trading at the current move. It actually moved into positive territory for the year. Over the three months, look at three months it is still a winner up almost 3 during that time. There is no doubt that the dreamliner has been plagued, right, with all kinds of issues from fires to battery issues. Theyre working on all those things obviously. New products they have to get out all the kinks they are supposedly working on this at the same time the question is when. Air indias chairman says boeing is trying to get the jets back in service by early april. Of course boeing hasnt confirmed that. Back to you. Ashley nicole, thanks very much. Tracy the market may be up this year but Corporate America is really continuing to hoard cash, likely posting a record high in the Fourth Quarter. What will get Companies Spending again and who more importantly is holding the most cash . Howard silverblatt is senior index analyst for S P Dow Jones indices and he joins us now. Everyone thinks apple is the big cash hoarder, the big culprit. Not so . They have a lot of cash but keep out of current assets. It is in investments. They have over 97 billion and most of it is level two. Officially if you go it is microsoft and google that have the most cash sitting on there. Technology uses the most cash because thee use it for options and as well as r d along with health care. But in general, companies are sitting on what we believe is going to be a record amount of cash this year at the end of the year. While theyre spending theyre making more. Even though the earnings seem to be tilting down the cash flow is very good. We may have a record cash flow this year. Ashley howard, a lot of this money is being held somewhere overseas . Yes. Ashley multinational corporations, want lower taxes. Everyone is praying for repatriation comes through whether it does or doesnt. There are ways to use some of that cash but the bottom line there is significant amount of cash still being held here. Companies are choosing not to spend it at this point in time. Not that they have to do one thing over another. They can do almost all of it. Even if they want to limit the amount of taxes they have to pay, it is a matter of choice. In this case theyre uncertain about the future, where were going over the next six months and six years. The things they have done in the past with cash doesnt account for much, right . Buying back shares. Even issuing a dividend while they did was clearly because of tax law reasons. It wasnt to advance the company at all. Theyre doing the minimum amount they have to. Buybacks they keep pace with options to protect earnings from dilution. Tracy right. Were seeing that with a decent quarter. The market was good. They were picking up from Capital Expenditures. It may be a record Fourth Quarter for Capital Expenditures but were not seeing expansion. Were not seeing facility build or third shift coming in. Were seeing maintenance go in there. Same with dividends. Companies, we had a record amount of dividends last quarter. However companies are still only paying out 36 of what they make. Historically it is 52 . So they are being stingy. Ashley is there any credibility to the notion out there that a lot of these rich executives of these companies are waiting for president obama to leave the oval office before they actually jump in with more investment and hiring . I assume you mean four years as compared to just . Ashley yes, exactly. I would have no reading on that but that is a long time. Ashley it is. Executives have to deal with what companies are doing now. I believe if we get some guidance, good or bad, when you know what is going to happen, if i told you the market would change 20 this year your first question would be up or down . With that little direction there. How is corporate planner can you decide to make a plan or to do hiring or do cutbacks even. That is what is keeping the cash there. When they do start to spend, theyre going to spend it all. Tracy weve been hearing this for, jeez, seems forever. Uncertainty. Yearandahalf, two years. We still have it. Now we have, the next ratings number which is of course the sequester. Whether it goes or doesnt go. Tracy this will keep going on. Howard silverblatt, thanks so much for that. Thanks for having me. Ashley interesting stuff. Here is a story for you. Dunkin brands, the company that owns Dunkin Donuts is lobbying the government to change its definition of a fulltime worker. The company telling fox business it is asking the government to set threshold for you fulltime work at 40 hours a week rather than 30. Dunkin said the number of hours a fulltime employee works each week should be consistent with federal and state laws. With fewer workers to insure, dunkin would save money under the president obamas Affordable Care act. The company says that is not the purpose of its efforts. Shares of Dunkin Brands up 26 this year although moving slightly lower today. Big debate over that 30, 40 hour threshold. Tracy ceo of kroger says portions of the bill are not workable. A lot of are having issues with this. Ashley yep. Tracy herb a life, Fourth Quarter estimates and Charlie Gasparino will join us about the call. Ashley the weather may give us a good excuse to stay indoors until friday. Well have the forecast ahead. A look at the 10 and 30year treasurys as we head to the break. [ cows moo ] [ sizzling ] more rain. [ thunder rumbles ] [ male announcer ] when the world moves. Futures move first. Learn futures from experienced pros with dedicated chats and daily live webinars. And trade with papermoney to testdrive the market. All on thinkorswim. From td ameritrade. All on thinkorswim. Today is gonna be an important day for us. You ready . We wanna be our brothers keeper. Whats number two we wanna do . Bring it up to 90 decatherms. How bout ya, joe . Lets go ahead and bring it online. Atntion on site, attention on site. Now starting unit nine. Some of the worlds cleanest gas turbines are now powering some of americas biggest cities. Siemen answers. Im Cheryl Casone with your fox business brief. Stocks are up having in afternoon trading ahead of the latest minutes from the federal open Market Committee january meeting. Look at the dow. Were down 24 points at 14,011. The fbi is investigating a big options trade made before the announcement of the 23 billion h. J. Heinz buyout. The move raises stakes for traders who allegedly use ad swiss account last wednesday to make that bet. The judge in the sec civil case will have a hearing on friday in manhattan whether the freeze should be remain in place. Sony is expected to reveal the new playstation 4 at an event in new york city. This comes after lackluster launch of nintendos wii u. That is the latest from the fox business network, giving you the power to prosper. Tracy a big storm leaving parts of california and arizona covered in snow. It is making its way across the country. Parts of the midwest could see a foot of the white stuff. Fox news meteorologist janice dean, the weather machine, in the Weather Center with the latest. No more snow, janice. I can not promise that, im sorry, tracy. We could get two feet of snow. Even perhaps across portions of the plain states when all is said and done. Lets take a look at it right now. A low pressure area is just across Southern California moving into the four corners. This is the main event. It really hasnt even got its act together. Ahead of this were seeing snow across the plain states. This is just ahead of the big blockbuster storm well be talking about thursday into friday. You see where the snow is across portions of kansas, missouri. You got the freezing rain, sleet line over southern oklahoma in towards arkansas. Arkansas, im concerned that you could have an ice storm on your hands tomorrow. So well certainly keep you posted on that. Quarter of an inch to half an inch of ice on the roadways, power lines, could be very destructive. We could see two feet of snow across the mountains of california. As we get into the main event, thursday morning into friday, portions of these areas could see a foot to two feet of snow. Theres our accumulation. Some cases maybe even over two feet of snow. Then of course were going to watch this area in pink that could give us the potential for freezing rain and or sleet. Not to mention we could see tornados across texas, portions of louisiana, into mississippi and arkansas. Several, several tornados in this area. So multifaceted storm bringing all sorts of weather. Well keep up to date from the fox news extreme Weather Center. Tracy holy extreme, janice dean. Ashley a holy mess. Tracy like everything you ever learned in science class all in one. Thank you. Of course. Ashley wow all right. From one storm to another, herbalife posting a rise in profit and improved outlook for the coming year and confirming our very own Charlie Gasparinos reporting of a stock Buyback Program. Charlie here with the latest details after the companys Analyst Conference call today. I dont know why the wall street journal came out with kind of a bizarre story that said, even though the Company Announced that they could, they were likely to do a Buyback Program that after we reported that they were starting to buy back albeit slowly but starting to buy back they came out with a story that kind of misled the markets that they werent buying back. As we know they are buying. It is fairly significant. Apparently threw half of their billion dollars they had authorized to buy back at the last meeting they had. Today was the Fourth Quarter earnings and the Conference Call, Fourth Quarter earnings after the bell yesterday. Conference call today with Ceo Michael Johnson and des walsh, the president. Interesting things to touch on. Shares are down after going up. Lots of stuff going on. You know, carl icahn putting money in. Betterthanexpected earnings. But you know this was kind of interesting. Yes, they said they are doing the repurchase program. Theyre about halfway you there the billion. They may do more. Even though the stock is down. Heres why i think the stock is down. Herbalife will more clearly delineate between customers and distributors. That is from the ceo today, michael johnson. What does that mean . Well we do know theres no, herbalife says they been contacted by the ftc, the federal trade commission which could, could deem it a ponzi, a pyramid scheme. Thats what bill ackman, the short seller on the stock is saying everybody. So that is not happening. But they have been contacted, they have confirmed by the Securities Exchange commission, the sec. What is the sec worried about with these . Not necessarily whether its a pyramid scheme. They are worried about herbalife properly discloses its financials. When you see a ompany right now say well more clearly delineate between customers and distributors which is the heart of its business model, right . Ashley right. They have distributors. Distributors get paid a fee and presumeably get customers. What ackman says all the distributors are doing, paying fee. Theyre not getting enough customers. Hence it is a pyramid scheme that will collapse at one point when you cant get anymore distributors. They will clearly delineate between the two. I suspect, this is putting my reporters hat on they expect trouble from the sec or looking to head off trouble from the the sec on disclosure. Two. Things, if youre worried about the stock at least in the midterm. Ashley yeah. You have to worry about the overhang of an sec investigation or being fined or sanctioned in some way because of this disclosure issue thhyre pointing out. Theyre pointing out they need to do it better. If thats what theyre saying you can bet the sec will say the same thing. Ashley have we had anymore comments from ackman . We were talking yesterday he would go through the latest results with a finetooth comb to look for something to bolster his argument . He is not saying anything. I emailed contacted him. He hasnt commented. At some point he will come out with the his side of the story. He is getting a lot of negative press. There was editorial on the wall street journal of all places which sort of took issue with him. The press, hold man jenkins, which i think is really good writer. The he took issue with ackmans attempt to get regulators to close down or sanction herbalife. I will say this about bill. Ive known him for a long time. He is really smart. He is generally onto something. That said i cant tell you whether this is pyramid scheme or not. When i interviewed des walsh, he is president of the herbalife here on fox business, one of the things i couldnt get my hands around the notion of distributors as customers. These people are going to sell, that they actually consume the product as well. Ashley charlie, i dont want to interresult but were being told ackman was not allowed to ask questions on the Conference Call. Yeah. Okay. Interesting. He is not quite an investor in the stock. Ashley yeah. You say he is an analyst . Reports are that ackman was asked, ackman tried to get in on the Conference Call . Ashley yes. Told he cant ask questions. I knew that. Did he try to get in on the Conference Call . Ashley that, i dont know. Knowing ackman, probably yes. Because they wouldnt let me. Tracy was on the call and unable to ask questions. You couldnt ask a question either . I want to see what weve got here. Herbalife spokesman didnt respond to request for comment, ackman, Pershing Square. Ackman is out with headlines. Ashley talking of which. What he is saying is, says the firm wasnt permitted. So he is saying he tried. From what i understand. Ashley yeah. Analyst tried several times to ask questions. Tracy i mean Pershing Square. Tracy they didnt pick him. It wasnt quite ackman. It was an analyst at Pershing Square who was trying to get on. Tracy you had said yesterday you predicted the ceo would be very practiced, very rehearsed. Ashley by rote. Tracy was he . I think he was very much in the cone fines, if you look at what they, if you look at, it is interesting that des walsh played a role. I think he is better spokesman for the company. Im not saying there is anything wrong with mr. Michael johnson, i dont know. I think des is little sharper on his feet. He handled a lot of questions. He handled the questions about the sec and who contacted who. Clearly they contacted the sec but the sec contacted them because they obviously started some sort of formal inquiry into the company and you think it is over these disclosures. I think it is funny ackman tried to get a cheap headline. Let me in. Tracy you into he would try. Thats what i like about him. Ashley Charlie Gasparino, great stuff, charlie. Stay tuned as they say. Appreciate it. All right, it is that time as we do every 15 minutes, check on the markets. Go back to Nicole Petallides at nyse. Looking at two major movers today. Thats right, tracy and ashley. Looking at two major movers, one at an annual high, and one at an an yall low. Gartman. Basically the long and short garmin. They sell Navigation Systems in your car, gps, where am i going, that is not doing as well as they had anticipated. Below estimates. The stock dropped. Look at a winner here. Lazboy moving to new highs. They are doing well with new sales. These are not the 1972 chairs. They are beefing up the products. The stock is up 16 . Obviously doing well with the sales. Thats why youre seeing a winner for lazboy. Ashley nothing wrong with 192 chairs. Comfy, beer holder. It was all good. Nicole, thank you. Home Building Permits jumping to a 4 1 2year high. Coming up well tell you how to play the housing recovery without investing in the homebuilders. Tracy the u. S. Postal Service Working it . Well on the runway . Come on. Thats right. The cashstrapped usps delivering a new fashion line. Well be right back. Whats next . Hes going to apply testosterone to his underarm. Axiron, the only underarm treatment for low t, can restore testosterone levels back to normal in most men. Axiron is not for use in women or anyone younger than 18. Axiron can transfer to others through direct contact. 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Ashley well lumber prices have been on a tear over the last year but with this mornings report from the Commerce Department saying Housing Starts fell last month, could lumbers run be coming to an end . Jeff flock at a lumber company in chicago. Jeff . Always right on the ground, up close and personal. Where you see all the different lumber Companies Represented here. This is harrys lumber been in business for as long as anybody can remember in chicago. Lets go right to the Housing Starts numbers. Disappointment. If you look closely at the number, a lot of that was multifamily starts that were down. Single family was up. Youre seeing a lot more activity . Yes. There is definitely more activity now than there has been in the past, however, because of the price of lumber today which is record highs, i dont know how well it will be in the future. I was going to say. Take a look at the homebuilders etf. Or actually the Home Construction etf compared to weyerhaeuser. We have weyerhaeuser right over here. You do a lot of business, ira, walk over with me, with weyerhaeuser. That tracking almost perfectly. When the housing business is booming the lumber business is booming. Absolutely. No question about it. The other one is loews. Look at lowes tracking, those guys are almost in sync as well. This is what drives the economy. Absolutely that is what drives the economy. Place like lowes, home depot, theyre selling other commodities other than lumber. Their sales can be up by selliig other products which are not related to lumber. Theyre trading those. Leave you with the stock board of the home builders. Theyre trading today, ashley, the headline, which is us whoing starts down. I tell you, i think there is lot more to be optimistic about in there, even though youre seeing red on the board for homebuilders. Ashley something indeed. Jeff flock, as you say up close and personal, on the ground, on the story. Thanks so much. Tracy well the Postal Service survived, rain, heat and snow for hundreds of years. Now theyre hoping to help you survive it too. The usps partnering with a Fashion Company who will design and produce the clothing line at no cost to the post office, believe it or not. Now the usps will receive a small percentage of sales from the Clothing Company when its mens line is introduced in department and specialty stores. Why small . Will this be enough for the cashstrapped post office which lost over a billion dollars last quarter and announced it is ending saturday mail delivery. Ashley sandals and long black socks, optional. Are they going to have usps and the eagle and everything . Tracy rain, heat and snow is the fashion line. Just like chanel. Rolls off the tung. Ashley rolls off something. Coming up at the top of the hour the fed releases minutes of its last meeting. The markets are waiting for it. Will there be more clues about the stimulus program, whether it will be slowed down or stopped this year . Breaking news in minutes. Announcer you never know when, but ieves can steal your identity and turn your life upside down. Hi. Hi. You know, i can save you 15 today if you open up a charge card account with us. You just read my mind. Piece of information and they can open bogus accounts, stealing your credit, your money and ruining your reputation. Thats why you need lifelock to relentlessly protect what matters most. [beeping. ] helping stop crooks before your identity is attacked. And now you can have the most comprehensive Identity Theft protection available today. Lifelock ultimate. So for protection you just cant get anywhere else, get lifelock ultimate. I didnt know how serious Identity Theft was until i lost my credit and eventually i lost my home. Announcer credit monitoring is not enough, because it tells you after the fact, sometimes as much as 30 days later. With lifelock, as soon as our network spots a threat to your identity, youll get a proactive risk alert, protecting you before you become a victim. Identity theft was a huge, huge problem for me and its gone away because of lifelock. Announcer while no one can stop all identity eft, if criminals do steal your information, lifelock will help fix it, with our 1 million service guarantee. Dont wait until you become the next victim. You have so much to protect and nothing to lose when you call lifelock now to get two full months of Identity Theft protection risk free. Thats right, 60 days riskfree. Use promo code gethelp. If youre not completely satisfied, notify lifelock and you wont pay a cent. Order now and also get this shredder to keep your documents out of the wrong hands a 29 dollar value, free. Get protected now. Call the number on your screen or go to lifelock. Com to try lifelock protection risk free for a full 60 days. Use promo code gethelp. Plus get this document shredder free but only if you act right now. Call the number on your screen now the capital one cash rewards card gives you 1 cash back on all purchases, plus a 50 annual bonus. And everyone but her likes 50 more cash, but i have an idea. Do you want a princess dress . Yes. Cupcakes . Yes. Do you want an etchasketch . Yes do you want 50 more cash . No. You got talent. [ male announcer ] the capital one cash rewards card gives you 1 cash back on every purchase plus a 50 annual bonus on the cash you earn. Its the card for people who like more cash. Whats in your wallet . I usually say that. Ashley good afternoon, everybody, im ashley webster. Tracy and im tracy byrnes. The Federal Reserve is about to release the minutes of their last policy meeting. Will they give us any clues when they will pull the plug on stimulus . We will have the breaking details from washington. Republican senator robb portman says america cant compete globally with our current tax code. He is calling for a sweeping overhaul. Our very own rich edson sat down with an exclusive interview with the ohio senator. Peter barnes in d. C. Trace, a tugofwar inside the fed when to stop quantitative easing to make sure the qe 4 bond purchases do not turn into qe forever, the minutes show no clear direction on that issue. They say, quote, several participants emphasized the fomc should be prepared to vary the pace of asset purchases either in response to changes in the Economic Outlook or as its evaluation of efficacy of and costs of such purchases evolve, a number about participants stated an ongoing evaluation of efficacy costs and risk asset purchases might well lead the committee to end or taper its purchases before is judge ad substantial improvement in the outlook in the labor market had occurred. The fed of course very focused on improvement in the labor markets here. But several others argued that the potential costs of reducing or ending asset purchases too soon were also significant, or that asset purchases should continue until a substantial improvement in the Labor Market Outlook had occurred. Hope that clarifies everybody for you. Now a mum number of participants also talked about holding onto the feds 3 trillion bond portfolio for longer according to the minutes which could help keep Interest Rates low for a longer period. The minutes also say that the fomc will renew its Bond Purchase Program at its meeting scheduled for next month. Tracy and ashley. Ashley peter, thank you. It could rain or might not rain. One or the other. Tracy what do you want to eat . You get three different answers. Ashley there is the talk that perhaps they could wiped down the purchases without seeing significant improvement in the labor force. So thats somewhat interesting. But the market is not really reacting at this point. Tracy perhaps. Ashley moving a little bit lower. Tracy perhaps. We should go to Nicole Petallides on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Nicole, how did you read that . Only thing i noticed, a couple of things. Obviously it says there is no clear direction and the fed is ready, armed and ready, right . So they will vary the asset purchases as needed. What we did see for the dow was the dow dropped from 14,12, down to basically 14,000. The dollar gained a little bit. Also the 10year yield also went up a little bit. That was the reaction to those fed minutes. Those were the exact three things that actually occurred as the fed minutes broke. You see the Market Selling off. What they didnt say, qe forever is forever and were ready with that and keep on going. Instead they will consider all the options. It puts obviously uncertainty back on the table. Thats why youre seeing a little bit of selling off happening here. That is worth noting, right . The dollar, the market, the ten year bond. Those are the three things im looking at here. Tracy excellent points, nicole. The uncertainty is back, right . Ashley it is for sure. For reaction to the fed minutes, lets bring in zane brown, partner and fixed income stratguest at lord abbett. What did you take of the statement or parts of the statement that peter barnes read to us from d. C. . Both the fixed income and equity marrets are likely to be disappointed. Were tired of the debate in washington and congress. The last thing we expected is this level of intense debate in the fed. Were used to more leadership from the fed. If they really cant collectively decide what they want to do, especially in the face of sequestration, which is going to be more fiscal drag, the 2 payroll tax, which is fiscal drag, youre entering a period of great uncertainty in terms of economic growth, you would have thought they would have at least focused on that and also, during the most recent meeting we got the announcement of a negative gdp for the Fourth Quarter. You thought, would have thought that would have within formed, informed the fed to maybe lean in the direction of providing more certainty of accommodation, at least until some kind of an economic threshold is approached. Tracy right. I agree with you. You want these people to have a little bit more clarity of what theyre doing. Now it sounds like they dont know what to do. You start to worry about the exit strategy about, right . That is a concern for everyone. How will they get out of this and unravel this without making a total mess . That certainly is a concern. It shouldnt be a concern probably in 2013. Tracy right. That is probably more in 2015 but it is an extraordinary concern because always in the past, whenever you had an end or a change in fed policy, you started with short rates going higher, and you had an inverted yield curve. Were likely, in this scenario, to have exactly the opposite because everybodiness how many longterm securities the fed has. If when they approach, time to change policy, all of a sudden people will say whoa, keep me away from longterm treasurys. Tracy right. You could have a steepening of the yield curve, not an inversion. Ashley at least, zane, we had some mention in there, we may end up winding down purchases even if the unemployment situation hasnt improved significantly. That is the first time i really heard that. Do you think thats the case . That we cant hang on forever . We cant have qe forever until the unemployment rates get to where they want to . Unfortunately i interpret it a little bit different and it suggests to me theyre willing to give up on this before they actually make visual progress in their stated objective of reducing unemployment. So that is a little bit of a concern. We certainly dont want the fed to lose their battle to improve the economy and reduce unemployment but theyre basically suggesting, we might stop this before we actually see proof that weve actually made significant progress. Thats a concern. Ashley i could argue that they havent made that, given the amount of money that has been poured in. Anyway. So true. Ashley zane brown, lord abbett. Thanks for joining us. Interesting stuff. We appreciate it. The market is coming back a little bit. It was down almost 40 points. But coming back down 16 points. Commodities are seeing big losses today. Oil down big. Gold hitting its lowest level in six months. For more lets bring in Lincoln Ellis at the cme. Weve seen a lot of action in the cme pits today. What has been the biggest reason for that move . Well, look, i think the market is just digesting what we have been seeing come out of the data over the course of the last three to four weeks, that is were in a bit of a soft patch. Were in a spring seasonal soft patch. That is being reflected across the commodity complex today. The bubble, that the fed has put into equity prices is starting to leak over in some places into the commodity complex, particularly into the energy sector. You see that pullback today. Interesting on the back of zanes comments you saw gold drop another 50 basis points, down almost 2 today on the back of those fed minutes. Ashley does this drop continue . Maybe not at this pace but does it have further to fall . In the gold market, probably. If you have a serious and significant debate at Federal Reserve about the longterm effects of both asset purchases and bond price directions, you could definitely see investors flee gold and you would see a much stronger dollar. You see a little bit of that today. Ashley all right. Lincoln ellis, of the cme. Thank you so much. Really appreciate it. You bet. Tracy lets keep talking commodities here. Gas prices have climbed for the last 34 straight days. I think i said this every day. Ashley 33 days yesterday. Tracy this is according to the aaa. Now even the u. S. Government admits that state and local taxes are to blame for driving gas prices higher. Is that really all there is . Liz macdonald is here. Is that what were blaming now . This is interesting. It is so ironic the u. S. Energy Administration Agency sent me a note. Have you noticed what is going on in texas, louisiana, the gulfport region. The amount of oil on inventory is down 12 1 2 million barrels. That is 50 more than average going back to 1981 since the government started tracking this. Why did they drop the amount of oil on hold there, down there in the gulf region . Look at the statement from the Energy Information administration. The incentive is state taxes. Theyre saying u. S. Oil inventories basically decline in september as oil cut under the circumstances the tax they have to pay on oil holdings. That is really interesting. Tracy what . That is admin mission, there is incentive to keep inventories lower to keep state tax bills to texas and louisiana lower. The markets are taking this into account. It is baked into the oil price. We talked to oil traders. Theyre saying hey, wait a second, supply, demand, oil is guy ratting on supply and demand. If youre dropping supply purposely for the tax bill that is interesting. Were tracking california, hawaii, alaska. They have really high state taxes. That is where you will see gas bills really high for drivers out there. 50 cents, 60 cents youre going to see also in the upper midwest and new york and new jersey. That is the map were trying to show you earlier. So you know, that is a real issue. A dozen cities in the u. S. , rather than in california have gas above four bucks a gallon. Tracy look at map, connecticut, illinois, new york, all the states that cant afford it. California. Were talking new hampshire, wyoming, washington thinking about raising state taxes on gas too. This is growing trend that may be happening down the road. Nothing up sets a driver than price at pump. Ashley just ask tracy. Ask tracy. Tracy youre making me really cranksy. Ashley oh great. Thank you, emac. Always delighted. Ashley appreciate it. From that to the chinese army that is blamed for reese hack attacks in the u. S. Are we in a cyber war with china . How can we defend ourselves . Tracy our rich edson has a exclusive interview with republican senator robb portman is holding us back from competing in the global marketplace. As we do every day at this time of day look how oil is trading off emacs report. It is down 2. 15, 2. 18 a barrel. 94. 48. Well be right back tdd 18003452550 when im trading, im totally fosed. Tdd 18003452550 tdd 18003452550 and the streetsmart edge trading platformrom charles schwab. Tdd 180034525 gives me tools that help mfind opportunities more easily. Tdd 103452550 i can even access it from the cloud and trade on any computer. Tdd 18003452550 and with schwab mobile, tdd 18003452550 i can focus on trading anyplace, anytime. Tdd 18003452550 until i choose to focus on something else. Tdd 180034550 all this with no trade minimums. Tdd 18003452550 and only 8. 95 a trade. Tdd 18003452550 open an account with a 50,000 deposit, tdd 8003452550 and get 6 months commissionfree trades. Tdd 18003452550 call 18667513261. I dont have to leave my desk and get up and go to the post office anymore. [ male announcer ] with stamps. Com you can print real u. S. Postag for all your letters and packages. I have exactly the amount of postage i need, the instant i need it. Can you print only stamps . No. First class. Priority mail. Certified. International. And the mail manicks it up. I dont leave the shop anymore. [ male announcer ] get a 4 week trial plus 100 in extras including postage and a digital scale. Go to stamps. Com tv and never go to the post office again. Tracy that time of day to make money with Charles Payne. We have stock with equipment services. Charles . Were starting to rebuild a little bit in this country . Tracy dirty fingernail rally. Dirty fingernail. We got the housing data out. The best part of the report was housing permits. 4 1 2year high. 925,000 unit rate, up significantly from a year ago. That continues. That bodes very well for this particular company which sells, rents and leases equipment. All kind of stuff. Ashley Construction Equipment . Work platforms. Excavators, trains, welders, anything you need, they do it. The reason i find this one interesting, last year, united rentals, i mentioned the stock threetimes. It has been explosive. They mostly have a rental business model. This company has sort of seen the light. In the third quarter, rentals were up 27 for them. Whereas the new Equipment Sales were only up 5 . New sales were down 8 . Theyre understanding, listen, lets adopt this model, as Companies Come back, even the companies flush with cash, they will not necessarily go out and buy equipment but they will certainly rent that equipment. Ashley what about this price right now . Im glad you mentioned that. Look at this longterm chart. This stock every time it gets here the last several years arent 20 bucks it falls and gets hammered pretty good. Were at monumental point. If it breaks out, there is no resistance. This was 37 stock in 2006. They report march 5th. If they beat i think well get the breakout were looking for. A breakout for this stock i think will take it 20 to the upside. Tracy Charles Payne. I shouldnt be allowed to say dirty fingernail rally because i said dirty finger rally. I should not be allowed to say that. It is the dirty fingernail rally. The girl from jersey always gets the finger thing wrong. Ashley going downhill rapidly, guys. Thank you, charles. See you later. Ashley a quarter past. Time to check the markets. Nicole petallides will hopefully get us out of this. Nicole, breaking news on office depot and officemax. Thats right. The office depot the ceo has come out with clarity and actually blaming Thompson Reuters today for that deal really snafu, you can call it. Obviously this morning we heard about the deal. And then later found that it was pulled and was only a draft of a press release and the stocks actually were halted after trading began. Here on the floor of the stock exchange. So with news pending. And then the proper news came out, right . So you do, now the blame game is on. You do have office depot blaming Thomson Reuters for the deal, news being released too early. Back to you. Ashley all right, nicole. A little more of the story than we know now. Well be back in 15 minutes. Thank you. Tracy just like when youre a kid you cant wait to tell the secret. Cant keep a secret. Ashley people like you and i, thats why were in the news business. We cant keep a secret. Love to tell everyone. Tracy the city of detroit is going broke. Thats a shocker. A state review found detroit has not come up with a good enough plan to fix the budget mess which includes 14 billion in longterm liabilities like their pensions. The governor of michigan, rick snyder, has 30 days to find an emergency manager to come up with a new plan to get detroit out of this financial miss. Some fiscal experts say bankruptcy is detroits only way out of this. But state officials are not ccnsidering that route just yet at least for now, but, huh. Ashley sad. Tracy right. Ashley motown. Tracy bummer, right . Ashley it is. Tracy just, there is no bright light at the end of this tunnel it doesnt seem. Fighting back against hack attacks. Find out what the government is doing for u. S. Businesses against what are believed to be attacks by the chinese army. Ashley look how the dollar is moving. It has been strong. Is helping to push those Commodity Prices down. Well be right back. Ens. Answer. At 21 minutes past the hour im arthel negative develop with your fox news minute. Lance armstrongs Attorney Says he will not meet with the u. S. Antidoping agency. They wanted to interview armstrong under oath to discover his knowledge of performanceenhancing drug use in cycling. Today was the deadline to agree to an interview. The usada said armstrongs cooperation could lead to a reduction of the lifetime ban . The sport. The large majority of 800,000 dod workers will be place on administrative furlough if forced spending cuts are allowed to occur. Former congressman jess he is jack is, jr. Is guilty of using 750,000 in campaign funds. Jacksons wife sandra agreed to a plea deal earlier with federal prosecutors and is also due in court later this afternoon. Those are the latest headlines. Get you now back to tracy. Tracy arthel neville, thank you very much. Ashley the u. S. Is blaming china for a recent string of Cyber Attacks and the white house is prepare to take action and considering trade fines against china. Peter barnes in washington with details on this. Peter. Thats right, ashley. The administration is set to release a report next hour that will discuss possible new fines and trade sanctions against china for cyber threat according to sources. Attorney general eric holder will be heading this press conference. The u. S. Is trying to step up efforts to prevent chinese hacking which hit dozens of u. S. Companies according to a separate report from mandiant, a sigher security firm. Mandiant report says the Chinese Military is behind a lot of the hacking. That report is increasing pressure on the u. S. To take more foresful action against china for what experts say has been years of systemic espionage. We know that trade secret theft can cripple a companys competitive advantage in foreign markets, diminish export prospects around the globe and put american jobs in jeopardy. That strategy improves the American Government and economy and supports jobs in the united states. Just last week the president signed a new executive order to beef up u. S. Cybersecurity efforts but new programs such as better information sharing about cyberthreats between u. S. Intelligence agencies and companies will take time to roll out. Ashley and tracy. Ashley well see if that does anything. Peter barnes, thank you so much. Appreciate it. Tracy all right. So you got burgers, beer and cheesecake. That is lunch. Ashley breakfast and dinner, you name it. Tracy apparently it is whats on the menu for earnings after the bell today. Sandra smith has todays trade. Were hungry. Maybe even breakfast for some of us. Give me your best boston act accent. Boston beer made a name in the craft beer trade. Boston beers stock is up 18 . They report earnings after the bell. They are expected to post earnings of 1. 24 a share that has been a thriving stock. Then there is cheesecake factory. Both stocks are up ahead of its earnings. This has been much more volatile stock in 2013. Big questions in the Earnings Report are food costs for cheesecake factory. Think about the portions they put on the plate. Effects of Hurricane Sandy will likely show up in the report. The stock is only up 3 . It is needing a boost. You move on to waffles and pancakes. Dennys corporation. This is unchanged ahead of earnings after the bell tonight. It got a downgrade today. So not too good for the company but a very cheap stock, if youre looking for one after the bell, tonight, guys. Pe, price to earnings ratio on dennys, five. You wont find many stocks out there that are that cheap. Keep that in mind. Jack in the box reporting after the bell. This stock right in line with the broader market. Up 7 so far this year. Look for all the familiar names after the bell tonight, tracy and ashley. Ashley thank you. Dennys cheap. Breakfast cant get any cheap. Plate of food for four bucks. Tracy i was going to say for the same price. Ashley exactly. Thank you. Tracy it is day two. Fox business for complete coverage of all of todays earnings on after the bell at 4 00 p. M. Eastern. Ashley all right. Tax reform, House Speaker thinks it is a waste of time to battle with the president but one republican senator disagrees. Rich edson has an exclusive interview with ohio senator rob portman. That is coming up next. Tracy first as we head out to break, the dow is out 26 points with the fed minutes. Joy global, that is a Charles Payne favorite, up almost 5 . Well be right back. Announcer you never know when, but thieves can steal your identity and turn your life upside down. Hi. Hi. You know, i can save you 15 today if you open up a charge card account with us. You just read my mind. Announcer just one little piece of information and they can en bogus accounts, stealing your credit, your money and ruining your reputation. Thats why you need lifelock to relentlessly protect what matters most. [beeping. ] helping stop crooks before your identity is attacked. And now you can have the most comprehensive Identity Theft protection available today. Lifelock ultimate. So for protection you just cant get anywhere else, get lifelock ultimate. I didnt know how serious Identity Theft was until i lost my credit and eventually i lost my home. Announcer credit monitoring is not enough, because it tell you after the fact, sometimes as much as 30 days later. With lifelock, as soon as our network spots a threat to your identityyoull get a proactive ri alert, protecting you before you become a victim. Identity theft was a huge, huge problem for me and its gone away because of lifelock. Announcer while no one can stop all Identity Theft, if criminals do steal your information, lifelock will help fix it, with our 1 million serviceuarantee. Dont wait until you become the next victim. You have so much to otect and nothing to lose when you call lifelock now to get two full months of Identity Theft protection risk free. Thats right, 60 days riskfree. Use promo code gethelp. If youre not mpletely satisfied, notify lifelock and you wont pay a cent. Order now and also get this shredder to keep your documents out of the wrong hands a 29 dollar value, free. Get protected now. Call the number on your screen or go to lifelock. Com to try lifelock protection risk free for a full 60 days. Use promo code gethp. Plus get this document shredder free but only if you act right now. Call the number on your screen now the. Ashley all right. Look at the dow 30. More red and green. Boeing in the green trying to get a fix on that dream liner. A number of stocks losing ground today. Industrials. Oil companies and beyond. That sets the floor of the New York Stock Exchange where Nicole Petallides is standing by. Were not done by much. Reporter when you talk about blowing, when you talk about blowing, you talk about and the union that of 30 dow components are in the green for the year. We are tapping these highs. 14,058 today. What do you think . Going higher . To the possibility, i think, its still there. We talked before about the market and how it trades and the sentiment. We need days like today, days where the market takes a pause. You see some shortterm trading, profit coming off the table. A lot of economic news, earning season still going on, winding down. Days like today, very healthy for the market. Reporter are we going higher . To fill the going higher. Youre going to see Economic Data helped us move higher and higher. Earnings season adding. Reporter a lot to talk about this. They basically said we are ready and prepared. He think we need that forever . I think the wording in which they used should continue and remain on the table. Having those boats theyre available will help the sentiment of the investors coming into the market. In the long run is into this market is doing fine and its own reporter all right. Thank you. Some good insight. The fact that the market is going higher is a good sign as well. Ashley all right. Thank you. Rebecca and 15 minutes. Tracy republican senator rob portman pushing for overhaul of the tax code and jeff flock is live from ohio where he spoke exclusively to the senator this morning you know, proctor and gamble. Reporter of procter and gamble research facility. We met with senator portman this morning. He said that the environment in washington, despite doubts from some folks in d. C. , he says it is conducive to actually accomplishing tax reform. Shopping around a proposal that would lower the Corporate Tax rate to 25 , cut a bunch of deductions to mostly unspecified. Right now he says he is in discussions with the democratic cosponsor. Democrats in the senate. Expressing some interest. If that level of interest willing to put out a specific brand. That may not be the best way to do it anyway. You can imagine the list. The Senate Democrats on the finance committee primarily. And they all realize what really what we realize which is the current tax cut is inefficient, antiquated, add a date, bad for jobs, incredibly complicated to really difficult for citizens and u. S. Companies to comply with. Its time to fix it. Reporter there are ongoing discussions between democrats and republicans, especially in the senate. There really has not reached a point yet still in either house of congress where a democrat and republican have signed onto a Corporate Tax proposal, but that in those discussions are still continuing. We talked about the senators time and the Super Committee, that committee that was established with lawmakers designed to find some 1 trillion in savings that eventually failed. Well, i congressman out there is suggesting that we reconvene this Super Committee. Portman says he is done with that. Get your response to a quote from congressman john barrell. He writes to congressional leaders, a right to urge you to immediately reconvene the Super Committee. What do you think of that . That was a painful experience. I took this seriously. I thought it was for real. I think there were a few problems with it. One, the short timeframe, second, the president was not providing the coverage support that he should have. He issued a veto even before we had our first serious meeting on possible outcomes. I dont think the Super Committee is the way to do it. Reporter the discussions continue on deficit reduction and, of course, tax reform. He believes that congress could actually get that done this year tracy that would be like a big old Christmas Present if we could do that, and hes right. Totally antiquated. Half the procter and gamble stuff is overseas because of its. Ashley very true. All right. Breaking news. The wall street journal reporting that a boeing will discuss a proposed fix for the seventh tracy byrnes battery problem that the faa chief on friday, the faa would not confirm saying, we just dont comment on potential meetings. They have a team of engineers working on this lithium battery problem 24 hours a day. As you can imagine. These have been grounded. That is obviously bad news. The stock moving higher today as they say they think they may have a fix for the faa to look at. The athletic puck is launching a Twitter Campaign for a popular celebrity. Were joined now with the details. Reporter the answer is irrepressible mascot watching a Twitter Campaign this week reading for Actor Ben Affleck to win the oscar this sunday for our go as best picture. It is a case study of tell a big brand new social media to cash in on a current events. Attaching itself to the oscars just as affleck himself was stunned by hollywood with and then on is fun for best picture but did not nominate him for directing your starring in it. In this case the campaign will cost affleck zero. It is not even paying the actor time. Just wishing him well. So where did the Playful Campaign come from . It all started in a recent sketch on saturday night live. The affleck. A true story. I heard his speech was terrible. The director was ben affleck. Ashley that that marketers thinking. The bird already has been said to be tweeting from his hospital bed as he recovers from a broken beak. So 30,000 admirers of sense and good will wishes. Now deduct those fans to enjoy our twitter chair. Go to the has tagged the well deck. Turns out that the first consideration was a affleck but decided against it. Does not have to stop you from using the much better has tagged because a new world of social media the masses can pretty much do whatever they want. He did get some of the vote, didnt he . Reporter directors jealous of the actor. You already get. Ashley that is probably it. Thank you so much. All right. Robots taking over operating rooms. Expensive machines . Are they the way of the future . We will have a doctor here who is the chief of robotics at the hospital in new york city. Tracy as we do every day, lets take a look at your ten and 30 year treasurys as we head out to break. The 10year is unchanged. Your 30year is not moving much either. Unchanged. We will be right back. To grow, we have to boost our social media visibility. More likes. More tweets. So, beginning today, my son brock and his whole team will be our new senior social media strategists. Any questions . Since we make radiator valves wouldnt it be better if we just let fedex help us to expand to new markets . Hmm gotta admit thats better than a few likes. I dont have the door code. Whos that . He won a contest online to be ceo for the day. How am i supposed to run a business here without an office . [ male announcer ] fast, reliable deliveries worldwide. Fedex. Reporter em Shibani Joshi with your fox business brief. Internal probe of the financial dealings of outgoing ceo did not find any intentional misconduct. The companys board also concluded that no antitrust laws were violated in connection with the acquisition of michigan oil and gas rights in 2010. And Many Americans had a hard time paying down their creditcard debt the last three months of 2012 due to holiday spending. Credit reporting agency trans union says payments at least 90 days overdue jumped about 9 . And it looks like the end of saturday mail delivery is not the only way the Postal Service is trying to keep itself afloat. The agency is launching a new line of clothing, and accessories. Thats not a joke. Is the latest from the fox business network, giving you the power to prosper. Tracy breaking news. Oil closing down 2. 20 at 94. 46 a barrel. He think we will feel that . No. Thats all i got. Ashley all right. Hell listen, the use of robots in operating rooms is on the rise. Critics argue that robotic lee insisted surgerys are not any more efficient or better for the patient than leprous topics surgerys and cost of a lot more money. Dr. David somebody is the chief of robotics and minimally invasive surgery. I cannot say it. Even harder to do. He is here with more on the benefits of robotic surgery is. It is a fascinating scifi type of technology that we have no and hospitals. Thank you for being here. Have robotics really changed or are in the process of changing how we go about surgerys . It really depends on the procedure youre talking about. Certainly in my field when youre talking about prostate cancer, for the last decade it really revolutionize the way we went from open surgery where we had a lot of blood in transfusions, longer hospital stays to the point where people are going home the next day. There is less pain. Certainly it is a delicate instrument, and the robot is used to do those. And obviously it has a lot of people. Again, the experience of the surgeon and the person behind the robot is even more important than the technology. That is a big message. Now, it has moved on for women, for a hysterectomy. One of the big articles that just recently came out is that theyre using more and more of these robotic surgery is. And that is a big debate, whether it is better than lappers up surgery or not. And we are still waiting for the data to come. It has not shown a huge improvement in cost. Ashley you mentioned cost. Ultimately it comes down to dollars and cents. A much more expensive is it to use robotic means for surgery as opposed to the traditional . The cost of the robot is about 2 million, so there is a big initial cost. Every time you use it is two to 3,000 for all these instruments. Now, if the surgeon is efficient and the problem that were having right now is that we have a gynecologist that is an excellent laparoscope surgeon. We dont see a huge benefit, but person to person and hospital the hospital, they really have to look at the program and make sure that the patients are not staying in the operating room much logging usual. That is going to add more to the cost and more expense. Ashley do Insurance Companies cover robotics or do they it is an excellent point. From the business standpoint the reimbursement for robotics the laparoscopic is the same. Gospels after really think about this very carefully. Just buying the robot is not going to turn into a cost benefit unless you have an excellent program, surges that are efficient, its either going at it and making sure that the patient is not spending much longer hours in the operating room. Ashley quickly, it seems to me that the training will be different because almost like in a pilot in a simulator that is pretty much the type of training you will have to do with these robotics. Its funny bring this up because that is done when i talked about the last ten years. I dont think you should spend the best hours in the operating room to teach. The simulations and other labs. The way to get to teach our residents and students before they come in. Ashley fascinating. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Tracy practicing on me. Ashley of volunteer. Tracy quarter till. It is time for stocks. Nicole petallides still on the floor of the stock exchange. Reporter want to take a look here at Toll Brothers on a day where you get the numbers, the Housing Starts and Building Permits. A little disappointing, but Building Permits are on the rise lets take a look. Down nearly 6 because of his own news. Came out with the quarterly numbers demanded turns up the closing and orders that they have seen have been on the rise. However, the selling prices, the average selling prices have dropped. That, in turn, cut into revenues. Their numbers greatly missed the wall street analyst estimates, and when he missed those estimates of wall street this is what happens to the stock, down nearly 6 percent right now. Not a good date. Tracy not at all. Thanks. We will see you at the top of the hour. Lumber companies have been getting a boost from the recovery in the housing market. Sending lumber prices to record highs. The mib about to get chopped. Our very own jeff flock is a lumber company in chicago to tell you why. Ashley lets take a look in some of the winners on the nasdaq as we head to the break. Monster beverage up over 2 . You can see the rest. Well be right back. [ male announcer ] to hold a patent that has changed the modern world. Would define you as an innovator. 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Tdd 18003452550 until i choose to focus on something else. Tdd 18003452550 l this with no trade minimums. Tdd 18003452550 and only 8. 95 a trade. Tdd 18003452550 open an account with a 50,000 deposit, tdd 18003452550 and get 6 months commissionfree trades. Tdd 18003452550 call 18667513261. Ashley january Housing Stock scandal expectations this morning. Homebuilder confidence also fell for this month. Whatoeoes it mean for lumber prices which are falling from a recent eight year high . Jeff flock up close and personal to find out at a lumber company in chicago. Reporter is this an Inflection Point . Obviously, we take a look at the Housing Starts numbers. You look at the six months charge in d. C. , obviously this is a pullback. Take a look at lumber. Had been on a tremendous run. In 8year high. I will tell you. Kerrys lumber. As lumber got more room to run . All of the newsletters im reading say that it still can get higher, but i personally think it cant go too much higher because it will just stymied production. People will be able to build a house. Reporter take a look was stocks did for the home builders. If you look all the big home builders, they fell out of bed. The other homeimprovement stocks did not do so bad. Home depot and lowes, Lumber Liquidators even and erupted a. They do more than lumber. They do what the number. Theyre selling appliances, things besides lumber. But i dont think they rely on number for the numbers. Reporter all lumber. Take a look at this. Love to be in a lumber yard. Wish you could smell was like. This is wonderful. See if it has more room to make a run. Ashley jeff flock in chicago. Tibet we can smell it. We know where its like. Tracy after four years of stagnant growth, the commercial realestate market is roaring back. Sales of 24 in 2012 and so far the trend has been in core markets would securitized lending markets ramping back up and lending standards listening. Many experts expect broadbased improvement this year. For more on this we are joined by president of john b. Levy and company, jon levy himself. Lets first talk about core markets. What are the core markets . Five or six. Washington, boston to new york, chicago, san francisco, l. A. Those of a 24hour cities with all of the people considering. Tracy strength in offices, barbara buildings, condos. Not in offices. Apartments for sure. We are seeing a lot more building. For example, in washington starts this year will probably triple the average for new apartments. That is a lot, especially in an area with concerns about the fiscal cliff. Tracy i find it interesting. Everyone does the chevron or by calculation. More and more lately is leading toward buying. And yet youre saying rentals are still on the rise. Said the buying is a good deal right now because rentals are going up. Markets are tight. But eventually it will be so cheap to borrow money to buy a house that it has to flip. Tracy the true market. A huge market. And, in fact, right now its interesting. Were illustrates since the collapse. This, to me, is an incredible time to borrow as much as you can for as long as you can because it will be there forever tracy we saw the numbers go up, but a lot of that had to do with tax. Some of it did, but those are the sellers. For every seller there is a buyer. So buyers are starting to become a little bit more optimistic. Part of this is because the Securities Market is back. So instead of just being able to invest in six or eight you can invest in 3242 or 50. Securitized lending really does broaden the platform. Tracy do you worry about strip malls going the way of the dodo bird because of the internet, brick and mortar going away . I do. Everybody does. The internet is making a big making a huge impact. Best buy is a perfect example. Fewer stores and stores are having smaller. That being said, there are still stunned that you want to own. Grocery anchor is the favorite. Some apartments. Office buildings are still problematic because businesses are having a hard time deciding whether they want to expand, and many are just contracting. Tracy bill will, of course commencing that they will open stores. Youre saying is the multifamily units that youre looking at, not so much the Office Buildings multifamily is the hot thing. We still like hotels. We like them because if you believe that business is coming back, they can raise their rates every night. Mattel said not had much of a play, but we think it is coming that way. I still think that although multifamily has room to run, its getting toward the top, getting a little topheavy. Tracy as you said, cheaper to buy. Thank you so much for being here. Pleasure. Tracy some good news. Ashley indeed. All right. Pop tourism coming to colorado under the states new marijuana laws tourists would be free to buy as marijuana in colorado as long as theyre over 21 years old. But it is no freeforall. People buying pot could see purchasing cabs as low as an aide to an expert transaction. It would also still be illegal to transport across state lines. The state task force has until the end of the month to recommend regulations. They could bring a lot of money to a budding pop tourism business. In a joke about Rocky Mountain high you want to say. Go for it. Tracy im just thinking about every college kid in the world right now is planning their spring break trip to colorado because you get a freebie. Ashley i think youre right. But its interesting to see. There is this whole state and federal law battle. A little hazy. Lets put it that way. Between that dows start to move lower, down 71 points, we lost some ground after the fed minutes. But then it kind of gave it back. Now were seeing the market drop just a little bit. Tracy dont go anywhere. Liz claman will take you through this last hour of trading. The ceo of mgm resorts stock about the casino operators plans to double down in macau. Countdown to the closing bell is next. Dont go anywhere