Friday, its what makes the markets move here, including todd where the dow dipped 22 point, s p inched up 0. 18 , the nasdaq advanced 0. 31 . While the trump factor is always going to be with us, it certainly isnt the be all and end all. What matters during earnings season are the numbers, the readthroughs and the derivatives of those numbers are driving stocks. What do i mean by these concepts . What makes them so important . Lets start with the nasdaq. Did you notice the intraday pep in its step . Do you know what caused it . The nasdaqs intraday bounce had everything to do with a Company Called asml. Asml. A Dutch Semiconductor equipment maker that reported outstanding numbers last night, causing the stock to rally more than seven points. All right. You may not know this 54 billion company, but youve definitely heard of their clients. Think intel, samsung, taiwan semitexas instruments, which order gigantic, expensive pieces of equipment from asml in order to make all sorts of chips that go into all kinds of devices from the internet of things, cell phones, personal computers, and aton mus cars. When Semiconductor Companies by equipment from asml, theyre making a real commitment, a commitment to produce smaller, faster, better chips that could be used well into this next decade. Like i said, this stuff is expensive, and purchasing Semiconductor Equipment means putting down a lot of money up front. So what happens when asml gives us such an incredibly bullish forecast like it did this morning . The readthrough here is straightforward. We got major rallies in the cell phone chip makers like skyworks and qorvo. We got a big lift in broadcom which makes all sorts of telecommunication chips micron roared. Meanwhile, amd, which is down 13 just since the beginning of 2017, finally seemed to stem its decline. We got a nice move up in Western Digital because asml told us flash chips are in high demand. Analog devices and qualcomm moved up too with qualcomms run being Pretty Amazing given all the negative chatter about an fdc investigation over pricing. Even the formerly red hot now ice cold nvidia saw its stock rally. Im calling it a bull chip jailbreak. Yet these are only the simple derivatives moves of this one remarkable Dutch Semiconductor equipment maker. The easy pin action. On the other hand, you can also get negative readthroughs. This morning, target really got walloped and for good reason. The Company Reported terribly disappointing numbers. With its bricks and mortar business down 3 of late and management slashed their guidance, whats the problem . Simple. Its about targets incredibly positive ecommerce numbers. Just amazingly strong. I think you could even say too strong given that they cannibalized the actual bricks and mortar stores. Thats very negative because target sells a lot of food, and if you dont come by the stores, you dont buy the food. Hence which that business had a low single digit decline. If you dont swing by, you might not purchase some entertainment or electronic gadgets, driving that business down high single digits. Thats the problem with oldline retailing. The whole edifice was built around the store no matter what they do with ecommerce. So as matthew boss from jpmorgan has told us over and over again, when you build out an ecommerce platform, you open yourself up to countless competitors, who make it possible for customers to price compare online while also seriously cutting down on the oomt of impulse buying people do in the store. There goes kohls and macys and walmart and jcpenney and all the other usual suspects. Sure, it didnt help that the president elect now seems open to socalled border taxes that would ding these retailers even as he just told the wall street journal the other day that he thinks that plan is too complicated. You cant bank on trump to be predictable because he, himself, would tell you hes an unpredictable kind of guy. Target stock down four bucks in heavy trading. That was the tinder for these derivative fires that will not be easily put out. But how about some winners from the strength of targets Online Business . Do you know what people buy when they see numbers like these . Thy reach for companies that are part of the awesome from offline to online. They reach for fedex and ups. Both had nice rallies. Now, i know you want to hear about the banks. Was Goldman Sachs so bad that the stock deserved to be down a buck and change . Was citi hideous enough to justify todays smackdown . No and no. These stocks are just victims of circumstance. Circumstances that come from reporting after magnificent rallies. As i said in our game plan last friday, it might not even matter what these banks report. Goldman sachs was up some 40 in advance of the quarter, which means it was due for some profittaking. I dont think the profittaking is over yet because the firms partners are heavily compensated in stock, and the window for them to sell opens right after the company reports. Given that everybody involved has a profit since goldmans last quarter and given that there are shrewd people who believe as i do that nobody ever got hurt taking a profit theyre the ones who taught me that i think more selling could lie ahead. I say let it happen. Theres room for the banks to stall or even to fall, and then theres room to buy because of coming rate hikes and deregulation, which will allow banks to buy back more stock boy, citi bought a lot of stock back and cut compliance costs. Those are all longterm themes that can drive these stocks higher after the profittaking runs its course. Finally the transports. When United Continental reported, management said their business had turned the corner. I sure hope so. Six months ago this 74 stock was at 47. After that kind of run, i think that warranted an attaboy. Like the banks, the group has moved up too for the moment. Something very special has to happen to those airlines to propel them further. Something like what happened to the rail stocks tonight. On tuesday, csx reported a good, not great, quarter, and the stock, which had been rallying for ages naturally sold off. But after the close tonight, Canadian Pacific announced a new ceo, and the new ceo immediately said the consolidation is inevitab inevitable, so the group is soaring after hours. Finally you could get a lot of positive readthroughs tomorrow in tech after netflix reported a spectacular quarter tonight with record customer gains. 7 million both at home and abroad, giving them a total of nearly 94 million customers. News which sent the stock up about ten points in after hours trading. Do i have to tell you what goes up when netflix goes higher . Fang facebook, amazon, and google, now alphabet, travel with the n, netflix. Fact of life of eenkz season. Bottom line, in a world where it seems like tons of things arent making sense anymore, at least you know these moves arent random. Somehow considering the craziness of preinaugural washington, i find the whole exercise rather comforting. Lets go to daniel in north carolina, please, daniel. Caller jim, a big eagles booyah all the way from north carolina. Whats up . Caller im curious. Im a recent college graduate, and im wondering about investing in tesla stock. Is that a good idea . All right. Im glad you said youre a recent college graduate. We have a lot of younger people calling. I think that tesla is a cult stock, but people who love the tesla love the stock. If you love it, youre young enough to be able to endure whatever it throws at you. Losses of of course positives. So i think its okay for you to own it. I think its a cult stock. I have no way to value the stock on earnings or sales or anything else. Richard in connecticut, richard. Caller hey, jim. First time, long time. Thanks for taking my call. Of course. Caller im calling about conseeco, cno, a long Time Employee of bankers life. As you probably know, its their largest subsidiary. Right. Caller back during the final crisis, the stock actually hit around 25 cents. I watched it for a while. I jumped in at a dollar, and its trading around 19 right now. Ive been buying incrementally over the time. It pays a small dividend. Im kind of thinking of using it towards retirement. I have a horizon of about six years. You think i should just keep buying some more . No. I got to tell you that stocks up a lot in the last year. I think that kind of insurance product is a very hard product to value. You should take advantage of the fact United Health has come down three after what i regarded was a great quarter. That would be a better buy. How about noor in california, noor. Caller i was looking at sprint corporation. Whats your advice on possibly investing with them given that theyre, you know, pretty much revolutionized japans Wireless Industry . I think sprint is doing very well, and i think tmobile is doing very well. There was a lot of chatter today about combinations. Either way, theyre doing well. Now, all that said, i think that you have to recognize that theyve run, but i wouldnt i would not get in the way of someone who wanted to buy some sprint stock here. Phil in my home state of new jersey, phil. Caller booyah, jim. How are you . Im good. How about you . Caller good. Im calling in regards to coit. I own 400 shares and i was thinking about purchasing more shares. Is it worth adding to my position . You know what i would do if i wanted to own kite . I would wait because this is not a trump stock, not a trump stock. I would wait until theres a tweet. Lets say a president ial tweet as of friday that bashes the drug companies. Then if you want to buy kite, that is going to be your moment. All right, readthroughs and derivatives. Connect the dots in this market and you can understand the action and get yourself ahead of the game. On mad money tonight, is this market a friend of the farmer . This business had been down and out, but now some stocks are growing like a weed. Im eyeing one play that may be making its way out of the dog house. Then ever since trumps election, this markets been hungry to find stocks that can thrive off the new administration. However, not all the names that have run are created equal. Tonight im telling if whirlpool is an anointed one or maybe just a poser. And is splunk out of the funk . Is it time to make an investment in the company . Ive got the ceo. So stick with cramer. Announcer dont miss a second of mad money. Follow jimcramer on twitter. Have a question . Tweet cramer, madtweets. Send jim an email to madmoney cnbc. Com or give us a call at 1800743cnbc. Miss something . Head to madmoney. Cnbc. Com. E stussshe ere, we know there are a ton of down and out sectors that ignited after the election and have been roaring pretty much ever since even as the markets been stalled lately. But theres one formerly despised cohort that was already rebounding before trumps surprise victory, and its only gotten stronger since then. Im talking about the remarkable comeback and something ive been mentioning very subtly, the agriculture business. Take fmc, frank, mary, charlie for all you home gamers. Fmc corp. Is mainly a Chemical Company that caters to the ag market although they also produce lithium as well as having a health and fitness kicker. But this heart and soul of the company is agricultural chemicals and that accounts for nearly 70 of its sales. Now, like most of the ag complex, fmc stock peaked in the summer of 2014 and spent the next year and a half in a brutal nosedive. But over the last 11odd months, you know what . Fmc has been on fire. Rallying more than 80 since its lows last february. Just like weve seen and talked about with agco, the big maker of farm equipment. Buy, buy. Fmc has been making an extraordinary recovery. So we got to ask ourselves, what the heck is going on here . How did this stock go from a deadbeat to a market darling and, more importantly, can its remarkable run temperature . Let me give you the background. Fmc corp. Has a number of different lines of business. On the kennel cal side, they make all sorts of pesticides and seed treatments. They also have nich berks where they make ingredients in food and drugs. Finally fmc also makes lithium compounds, which it primarily sells to companies that make rechargeable batteries. Think cell phones, laptops and, of course, electric cars. Now, the fmc of today is very different from the fmc of just a few years ago. In 2014 and 2015, the company sold its two big commodity divisions, soda ash and hydrogen, and then in 2015 when the agriculture industry was still getting hammered, fmc stepped up and bought chem nova, a danish producer of Crop Protection products for 1. 8 billion. This was visionary. These moves together made fmc much more of an agriculture Oriented Company and also dramatically increased the companys exposure to europe, which is very aggressive about subsidizing its own farmers. At the time of the chem nova deal, you might not have seen that enticing, but its clear that the people running fmc were playing a long game and realized this business would become a heck of a lot more valuable once the ag market rebounded. Sooner or later it always does because the feed the world thesis is one of the great secular growth stories of all time. Sure enough, thats exactly what happened. When fmc reported last may, the company delivered a nice top and bottom line beat and raised their fullyear earnings forecast thanks in part to the tremendous strength of the companys lithium business. The stock jumped 9 on the news even though the ag business continued to suffer from lower volumes, not to mention that super freakin strong dollar, which has been a big problem for american exporters. In short, even before the ag market started to rebound, fmc was beating the earnings estimates, so it shouldnt have been that surprising when the Company Reported a blowout quarter in early november, and the stock surged into the stratosphere, rallying 10. 5 in a single session. The reason . Even though most analysts seemed reluctant to declare a bottom in agriculture at the time, fmc came out on its Conference Call and gave us some very bullish commentary, particularly about their big latin american business. Let me give you a snippet. Quote, in ag solutions compared to last year, we saw an improved start of the season in latin america, officially in brazil, a stronger performance in both asia and north america, end quote. Even though fmcs volumes werent so hot, pricing had finally started to improve, and the Company Finally annualized the impact of that strong dollar. Plus their lithium business, its just on fire, up 22 yearoveryear. All in all this was the first time in six quarters that the Company Posted actual Earnings Growth, and what growth it was. It was up 59 . Since then the stock has continued to climb as weve gotten more and more good news. On november 30th, fmc spoke at citigroups basic materials conference, predicting high single digit Earnings Growth for their ag business for 2017 thanks to synergies from that chem nova acquisition. Even better, management predicted theyd generate 40 Earnings Growth in that little Lithium Division that i mentioned, with much of that thanks to substantially higher prices and volumes. Why is this lithium business so strong . Okay. If you want any kind of device with a remargeable battery, its almost certainly a lithium ion battery. The demand for this stuff has been rising steadily for years as people kept buying more and more electronics. But recently the lithium business has accelerated even harder thanks to the growth of electric vehicles. Your average laptop battery contains roughly an ounce of lithium, but the average electric car battery, 44 pounds of lithium. And a tesla, 112 pounds thats a gigantic and fastgrowing source of demand that should keep bolstering fmcs lithium business for years to come. Then on december 12, Goldman Sachs added fmc to their conviction buy list, saying the broader ag market is approaching the bottom. And on top of that, fmc has got both the integration of chem nova and their red hot lithium business to bolster its growth. The latest development . It just keeps getting better. Roughly two weeks ago monsanto, the seed maker, reported a stunningly positive quarter. Even better, monsanto told us that they saw doubledigit growth in latin america during the quarter, some of which has to do with the rebound in the brazilian real and some of which comes down to stronger demand. Fmc now has a big latin America Business and if farmers in brazil are paying up for monsanto seeds, weve got the derivative, okay . Weve got the readthrough. Now, fmc itself reports in three weeks. So if what we heard from monsanto is any guide, i think were looking at a pretty excellent quarter ahead. Theres just one thing you might be worried about. The stock has run more than 80 in the last 11 months, so were not early here. I can see how you feel like maybe we missed the move. However, even after this run, fmc trades at just under 18 times forward earnings. More expensive than dow chemical at 14 times. Cheaper than dupont or monsanto. When you look out to 2018, fmc trades at just under 16 times those numbers, and i expect the 2018 estimates could turn out too be too low, possibly way too low in the nascent rebound in agriculture continues. I think fmc should trade at a premium, especially when you consider its smaller lithium business growing at that 40 clip. Put it all together, this stock starts to seem pretty darn cheap even after the remarkable rally. Maybe the better way to think of it is that fmc traded as high as 84 back in 2014 and went as low as 32 last year. It probably should never have been that low in the first place, and with the shares price back up to 58, fmc has still got a long ways to go before it comes anywhere near its old highs. I like that. Heres the bottom line. After spending years in the dog house, fmc corp. Made a fabulous comeback in 2016 thanks to the broader come ba i think fmc is still cheap here and its worth buying into any weakness market wide as we head into the next Earnings Report in less than three weeks. All right