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Squawk on the Street

Nasdaq's Record Run, Fed's Waller on Rates, Dimon on Succession 05/21/24

Carl Quintanilla and Jim Cramer discussed tech sector momentum one day after a record closing high for the Nasdaq -- and ahead of Nvidia's earnings report due out after the bell Wednesday. The anchors also stayed on top of market reaction to comments from Fed Governor Christopher Waller on rates and inflation. Also in focus: Jamie Dimon on retirement and JPMorgan Chase's succession plans, Lowe's and Macy's earnings, Michael Dell's take on AI PCs, Palo Alto slides, Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas' note on Tesla, AI and "Muskonomics."

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Duration:
45m
Broadcast on:
21 May 2024
Audio Format:
mp3

Carl Quintanilla and Jim Cramer discussed tech sector momentum one day after a record closing high for the Nasdaq -- and ahead of Nvidia's earnings report due out after the bellWednesday.

The anchors also stayed on top of market reaction to comments from Fed GovernorChristopher Waller on rates and inflation. Also in focus: Jamie Dimon on retirement and JPMorgan Chase's 

succession plans, Lowe's and Macy's earnings, Michael Dell's take on AI PCs, Palo Alto slides,  Morgan Stanley analyst AdamJonas' note on Tesla, AI and "Muskonomics." 

Squawk on the Street Disclaimer

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Pre-market's mixed as the market awaits NVIDIA. Tomorrow night in ways, Macy's, Lowe's Palo Alto in the meantime, oils down a buck and Brent back to a two-month low. A roadmap begins with waiting for NVIDIA, chip stocks helping to fuel the record highs for tech, and options do point to a big swing for NVIDIA when it reports tomorrow. Diamond succession plan. The JP Morgan Chase CEO's signal says retirement will come probably within five years, and a consumer check. Lowe's and Macy's delivering some quarterly beats. Let's begin though with the markets, Jim. And I guess, I don't know, a bit of the setup here, tech all-time high on the S&P. You know, I got to tell you, there are semiconductors yesterday that aren't even doing well, or at least had to be as hinted that things are turning. Texas Instruments gave you a little sense of things. The stock was just on fire. Micron on that basically capitulation call. Look, I've missed it, I'm going positive on it. It worked. Qualcomm, on the idea that some people are looking for their chips, even though they should be in abundance. Yesterday was a day where a Broadcom began to knock on the door. We're talking about a top 10 company in America. And if they would only split the stock. Do you know why I asked Jensen, whether he would split the stock, of course, Jensen being the CEO of NVIDIA, the one-man name. He's like, sure, now. And he said, well, consider it. Do you know what would happen if they split that stock? If you had a 10% move, it would be insane. It would be based on nothing. Well, we're going to get a 10 for one LRCX, along with a big buyback today. Well, you know, it's funny. Lamb has always been much more pro shareholder than the others. And that's hard. His apply materials are very pro-share. It's a good group. But I have to tell you, I think that Lamb is the intellectual property of so many. You know, when you say like you want to build a fat, like a secretary, you know, reminders of my build a fat. This is what is it? This is what's in it. This is what America really makes. You know, KLA, Lamb, this is what we really do. You know, even in Taiwan, semi, you go in there and think, well, it must be all time. And it's America. And there's this fascinating story on the tape today about ASML and Taiwan, semi being able to, what, turn off the chip machines if China invades Taiwan. In the event of nuclear war, we're fine. I mean, that was the strangest story. It's like, you know, hey, you know, when we go to war, well, I didn't know we were about to go to war. But if we do go to war, thank heavens, ASM's big systems will still work. I mean, we can pull the plug on them. No, no, guys, let's not issue things like that. Now, Lamb research is up with cool. It's up 60 points on the split. Now, warning to other people in semi-conductorville, if you do a split, that's a better way to get your stock up than beat. Maybe I gotta talk to Kesha. I'm sorry, the Kesha. Maybe I gotta talk to the Kesha about splitting your stock. We're gonna get to Palo Alto in a minute. We do have some breaking news on the Fed this morning, and for that, we're gonna turn to Steve Leisman. Morning, Steve. Good morning, Carl. Fed Governor Chris Waller in his speech in Washington, offering some guardedly dovish remarks, saying further increases in the policy rate are probably unnecessary. The Fed does need he says, or at least he says he needs, several more months of good inflation data before being comfortable to cut rates. But the important part here is he talks about the recent data, says progress on inflation seems to be resuming, and that's bouncing off the April inflation data and other economic data that's been out. Restrictive monetary policy, he believes right now, is helping to cool demand. The data suggests inflation is not accelerating. Progress, he says, quote, back on track. The April CPI was a relief, though he does acknowledge progress was modest. He expects moderation in economic activity, notes that the ISMs were below 50, goes on to say the consumers appear to be tempering their purchases, noting flat retail sales in April, along with delinquencies being on the rise for credit, cards and credit, other credit for consumers. He notes the easing of labor demand seems to have resumed. Wage growth, though, is still higher than he believes is consistent with a 2% target, but it's moderating. The Fed's monetary policy overall, he says, is at an appropriate rate, but downward pressure on inflation. I will be a chance to ask some specific questions about these comments today with Fed Governor Waller at 1 PM. Eastern Carl, these are pretty dovish take on the recent data from a guy who used to be well known as a hawk, Carl. Steve, whether this moves the ball forward in your view more than, say, master or daily yesterday? Well, absolutely. If he ends up being right, that this is the beginning of a resumption of inflation, the downward path, if he is right, that the data we've seen in April is the beginning of a moderation, then yes. You could imagine this creating the preconditions or the beginning of creating the preconditions for a rate cut. I've talked about this for a long time as a wrestler. You want to count one, two, three, at least of good inflation, except the wrestler keeps getting up. You've got to start the count again. Waller seems to be telling us, essentially, that April counts as one. Steve, thanks for that, good matter for our notes. A busy morning for you. We'll check in later. Steve Leesman joining us on Waller. How does that fold in, Jim? Look, I continue to think that, like Stephanie Link said, yesterday, we might get one, we get two. It won't really matter, or we can care about this direction. I've been focused on Red Lobster, and not just because of the $20 scampie that beat them. You know, guys, coming in, getting 16, 17 servings of it. That could always hurt you. But there are so few companies that have gone under. Now, the 36,000 people who work in Red Lobster, obviously, I feel bare for them knowing a joke about people losing their job, but they want to be in the restaurant and see all fine jobs. The managers are all fine jobs. We are not getting the kinds of bankruptcies that indicate good companies are not getting enough customers. You had to do, when you read Red Lobster, you almost have to leave in the end that they set out to destroy it. That's how bad it was. One point that General Counsel's running it, and they got a bunch of different owners, and they have these really onerous sell leasebacks, and it still didn't get crushed. I mean, it was still ticking. So I think you need to see real bankruptcies from real companies that don't have consumer demand because consumers pull back in order to get us to over 4% unemployment, and then I would feel like that you start getting the three, four, five cuts, but we don't have that. Yeah, Ed your identity yesterday, Jim, looking at consumer in particular, household, personal discretionary income per household, if you take out the COVID spike, it's never been higher. No, and you know what? I am tired of hearing about credit card delinquencies. When I look at Macy's, Tony Springs, terrific. You can't be a quarter miracle worker, but that was a really good quarter. And when you look at what Marvin's doing, Marvin Ellison at Lowe's, I have him on tonight, you know, look, I thought a week ago, I would have told you it's, we're in trouble. The contractors aren't doing well. Well, they're not doing well on the Home Depot side of the street, but maybe it's raining there. On this side of the street with Lowe's, they're doing well, and I have to tell you, I keep getting shot down from the thesis of the consumer not doing, not spending. Yesterday, I had Norwegian crews on. Oh, try getting one of the crews, I mean, and by the way, you can get a $500 room in the middle, but you have $1,000 on the outside, and they're just all sold out. So where is this consumer weakness to everyone? So yeah, I mean, the fact that it's a minus four comp at Lowe's, you think that's good management, managing the decline? Yes, absolutely, it's still better than what I expect. Marvin's got a terrific positive comp in Pro, which is really incredible. Now, they have, of course, I'm great on my numbers. The thing that you could say, well, listen to do it yourself, it's not that good, but we are in lawn and garden season. I got a plant this weekend or else I'm done. And positive comps in the lawn and garden and building materials, this is a really good quarter for really good quarter for lives. And you had Macy's raising the guy to touch. Barron's piece, turnaround plan, starting to pay off. I like what Tony's doing. Tony's spring has isolated 50 Macy's and decided, you know what, we're gonna put some money in those, see if we can't turn them. Those are working. The 50 had comps of 3.4%. They're ready to wear, which is really hard to get, that's a lot of money in that. Women's footwear and beauty, which has been horrendous. We're all strong. So obviously, Blue Mercury's good, Blue Mi's is good. He's gonna close the ones, they're underperformer. They continue to do that. Spring is, look, Ganette deserves to realize, Ganette came in and recognized, got to fix the balance sheet first. And that doesn't seem like anything visible, but that was a great move to fix the balance sheet. And then he started addressing the underperforming stores and some didn't work and some didn't. I like Tony's spring coming in hot. And I think if he can just close the ones that are underperforming in Macy's and get out of leases and continue with this plus recon, you're gonna wanna own that stock at 19. Geez, and they got a decent online business. I remember when Dave Tepper and I used to talk, Dave Tepper, one of the billionaire, you know, I might be a dead billionaire, here billionaire there. But we used to think that their online business is worth a great deal. So, so's the Panthers, even though they're not, they're suboptable teams. But I do think that that company's worth a lot more than it's selling for. - Meantime, Jim, we started yesterday's show talking about Morgan Stanley's Mike Wilson removing his downside. Now the stories are about Kalanovic, Marco Kalanovic at JPM being the last prominent bear. - He's digging in his onus, he's making sure that his hocus are still underneath the soil there. - I don't know, I think that yesterday he must've felt good that the Dow was down. And maybe he was looking at JPM Morgan being down the line and saying, "Yeah, we're gonna talk about diamond in the next block." - As you're being down the line at your own company, maybe that makes you. - Right, but he does say, you know, valuation's high, geopolitical risk, highest in a decade. That there's still, he's not changing his mind, he's not saying it's time to get in. - No, but I think yes, look at history. And you don't, this is what the great Marty Swag taught us. Don't fight the Fed, don't fight the tape, but when the Fed switches, you have to switch with it. It's kind of like John Maynard Keynes, you know, when the facts change, you have to change too. And I, look, I love a guy who's got some rigor, but at the same time, you've kept people out of one, and I'm doing a piece right now. This has been maybe the greatest rally I've ever seen. Because it's- - You mean since October? - Yeah, looking at me like, "Well, how'd you do? "I bought biotech, wow, brilliant. "How'd you do? "I bought some semis, hey, fantastic job." There's a lot of high fives in every single segment. Even the, you know, communications, although of course that's boosted by alphabet. You gotta be careful. - No, I mean, it's a- - You're doing it. - It says 90-something percentile rally. - Yeah, I mean, you know, I say to him, have you looked at American power lately? I mean, I've crushed you with American power. You know, Pacific Gas and Electric, it's crushed you. You know, honestly, these companies that are winning grow, here you go, this is a dark. - Dark, monkey and a dark boy. - 98%, holy cow, let me just do it again. - I might be able to, maybe I hit a constellation energy. - A constellation energy, or constellation brands, I don't care as long as it's a constellation. - It's a great- - There's a great stat out of Bloomberg today, John Authors. The S&P is almost 10% higher right now than the average forecaster at the beginning of the year said it would be at the end of the year. - John Authors has been a delight. He has always been contrary. He's not afraid to take on the establishment. And that's just a great stat. That is a great stat. - It does show how hard it is to call this market, right? I can call rates and call- - He said that geopolitical is the highest in a deck. - Yeah. - Okay. Well, I mean, where do you get it? I was at like Jamie. Jamie's always saying geopolitical is bad. Like, yeah, I wake up and ASMLF is talking about, don't worry, when Taiwan's invaded, we're cool. Okay, so that does present a bit of, but I think that if you didn't think there was a lot of geopolitical activity when President Trump was president, I don't know. I mean, I understand from some of the people in the cabinet that he just basically laid down the law to President Xi at the beginning about where the bombs would go if he did anything. So I just feel like that if he thinks that this is a very calm time, I think, versus the period the President Trump time. - Well, to your point on that, oil, Brent, as we mentioned, lower since mid-March, the Washington Post does have some reporting suggesting that maybe an offensive enderofa would be more limited, something the U.S. could look past. - Well, it does seem that the cabinet split there. And I always hesitate, always say it. I'm not a kinescent guy. I don't know exactly what's going on there, but I do know that what I see is that this thing did not, it's calmed down. Now, any minute could flare up and make you look bad, but I'm judging it by the fact that oil, if we didn't know anybody, it was kind of in free-fall even since the missiles flew into Iran. That was kind of a short-term peak. - I remember I was out at a party with some hedge fund managers who specifically are wrong and they were, again, saying, "Look out, oil's going to par." - Sure. - "Heaven't helped them if they ever would say a hundred." But it's important that only they speak in a language that nobody else pays. You said, "It's risk-on partner, going to par." I was like, "You know, will you give me the English "to hedge fund dictionary for heaven?" So I did it for 14 years. I know you try to make it so people don't understand, but it has not, the oil trade has not worked. The deflationary trades have worked. So I love the fella JP Morgan. I really do. What's his name? - Kalanovic? - Yeah. - I'll remember that. - We'll talk more about JP Morgan in particular what Jamie Diamond did say yesterday about succession at JP Morgan Chase. Take a look at the pre-market here. We're going to get to Palo Alto, Tesla. There's some Boeing news, Zoom, of course, and look forward to Tall and Urban tonight. - Oh man, tonight's big night. Tall is going to be just blow out. - Let's walk on the streets back in a moment. - From a flat tire in the city to a dead battery on a distant drive, AAA is partnering with T-Mobile for business to accelerate response times and get more drivers back on the road fast. Our nationwide connectivity powers location telematics, so AAA's fleet can find straight at drivers quickly while being fully equipped with the in-vehicle tools to have answers when they get there. This is elevating the member experience. This is AAA with T-Mobile for business. Take your business further at T-Mobile.com/now. - Norman, we need to pause this surgery. - What, doctor? 'Cause Xfinity Mobile just got even better. Now you're automatically connected to Wi-Fi speeds up to a gig while you're on the go. Plus, Xfinity Internet customers can buy one unlimited line and get one free for a year. - Visit XfinityMobile.com to learn more. Offer N621, restrictions apply. Xfinity Internet service and two new limited lines require. Reduce speeds after 30 gigabytes of usage per line. Data thresholds are vary. Actual Wi-Fi speeds vary, not guaranteed. - Jamie Diamond held court yesterday at JPMorgan Chase's Investor Day. And at that event, the 68-year-old CEO indicated he is moving closer to retirement. Here's what else he had to say after being asked about the bank succession plants. - I have the energy that I've always had. That's important. I think when I can't put the jersey on and give it full thing, I should leave, you know, basically. The board probably, it's up to them at the time. Well, I stay as chairman for a while. We'll see. But I think the, and we're on the way. I mean, we're moving people around. You guys, all the analysts and we've always asked that question, like, is there a good potential succession? You could evaluate the people you see as leaders yourself. And I think most of you would say, yeah, there are actually some really great potential CEOs here and stuff like that. So the timetable, you know, it's not five years anymore. - All right, said succession. Jim is, quote, well on its way. - People were concerned about the buyback that he's not gonna buy stock here. But as he was speaking, this stock turned into a free fall. And that's why the Dow was down. And this is a man no one wants to retire, which is actually quite a, really, really, you know, hats off to the guy. But he did cause a tremendous panic in his stock by acknowledging something that I think anyone other than Warren Buffett is accepted. I mean, he doesn't own the company. This is not, he's not JP Morgan or his son. And I think that people have to understand that he's loved and no one is ready for him to retire. But someday everybody returns. - Meantime on the macro, cautiously pessimistic in his words. - Well, he's got that rap. - Yes. - Can't change now. Like if he suddenly changed now and said, you know, happy days are here again. Like Judy Garland would be like, - Right. - She said US is in pretty good shape. The soft landing appears to be playing itself out. - And remember, we're the best in education. We have the best military. We have the best, but Jamie's a consistent fella. - Neighbors to the north and south, yes. - But I do, we have natural resources that are abundant. But I do think that the data from his bank shows you were pretty good shape. Look, he runs scared, which is what a good banker does. He runs scared. And I liked that. I did think that he, remember he came to, when I went to Philadelphia, he said that he thought the rates were gonna go to 6%. With the soft landing strategy, he's no longer saying that, which is kind of cool. - Meantime down the street of Morgan Stanley, quote Jim, our proprietary M&A tracker supports our call for a 35% year on year inflection and global completed M&A volume in Q2, which they've been calling, they went long, large camp banks a long time ago. - Well, that would be sensational. I know that there were people last week who were starting to talk about, what would happen if banks started collapsing? And they were saying that a bank could collapse, two weeks ago could collapse every week. And I think that's a bad call. The two banks that we've had trouble at, when I'm was in New York community, and that was because the Fed gave them the right to buy a bank that they shouldn't. And the other was a bank, Republic first in Philadelphia, with the management that had been checkered. So these were two that the FTIC could have stopped ahead of time, and they chose not to. Obviously the FTIC also under fire. - Yes. - Looks like Groomberg's going to leave. - That's not there. - Sheila Barrett, the comment yesterday about how he should. - I, yeah, I mean, and then it did seem like that Senator Warren was not as, was more reluctant to have him go, but there were people who, I just, look it, it just sounded bad. I mean, I want to go into the purion nature of what was happening here, but what the heck? - But you haven't had a lot of cold water thrown on a long bank thesis right now? - No, the banks are very strong, remember? I said, watch Wells, we obviously have a lot of people who think that City has made a major comeback. Bank of America is doing incredibly well, despite their bond portfolio. PNC's due to doing decently. The only bank that people continually say they get things about is Comaraca. Morgan Stanley well behind the group, my charitable trust known as Morgan Stanley betting that this is going to have a catch-up move, but it's tough to catch Wells, 'cause Sharpe is so great. - We'll get Kramer's mad dash, count down to the opening bell. Take a look at the pre-market again, and speaking of bonds, as Jim mentions, after those wallet comments, 10 year, almost back to 440. - Sweet. - Back in a moment. - Norman, we need to pause this surgery. - What, doctor? - 'Cause Xfinity Mobile just got even better. Now you're automatically connected to Wi-Fi speeds up to a gig while you're on the go. Plus, Xfinity Internet customers can buy one unlimited line and get one free for a year. - Visit Xfinitymobile.com to learn more. Offer N621, Restrictions Apply, Xfinity Internet Service, and two new limited lines require. Reduce speeds after 30 gigabytes of usage per line. Data threshold's very, actual Wi-Fi speeds very not guaranteed. Take a look at some NASDAQ 100 laggards a day after the NASDAQ itself did post an all-time high. Palo Alto is gonna be at the top of that list, and we are gonna check in with Jim on that quarter and some of the reaction to it, along with Micron and Qualcomm, some of the weakness in semis this morning. Opening bell in about five minutes. Don't forget, you can catch us anytime anywhere. Just listen to and follow the Squawk on the street, opening bell podcast. Kramer's mad dash as we count down to the bell. - We often talk about these surveys that are done about Apple, and usually they are junk. Most of them have been wrong. Many of them have gotten people to trade Apple rather than own them. But there's one place, a single source of wisdom I find about Apple, and that's Morgan Stanley. They have gotten it right, gotten it right, gotten it right. They just did their App Store revenue growth survey, accelerates in May, month to date 11.7%, which is tracking ahead of their forecast. And then you start talking about how China has had a very big acceleration month to date, largely driven by China, 11.1% year to date, versus what people are looking for at 3.6. Morgan Stanley's, for some reason, has data that has proven time and again to be right. This is very bullish because the App Store needs, you get the App Store, if you get these service revenue streams, they are now bigger than everything else that Apple has combined, other than the cell phone. You boost this up, and then you really find out that the bull case of China being back, and this is why I didn't like that case, so they found some suburb, but whatever, that had like three phones left. I mean, this stuff just drives me crazy. Morgan Stanley does not drive me crazy. They are what I call riggers, and they don't give themselves enough credit, so Eric Woodring, I'm giving you credit. (audience cheering) - Yes, Woodring is a hitter. As you take a look at Apple, coming off of that, those will 160s in April. Let's get the opening bell here, and the CBC Real-Time Exchange of the Big Board. It is BTIG celebrating its 18th commission for charity day. Bob Pissani is gonna be there, maybe this morning. - Everybody's here today. We would have so much fun at the party. We'd have to get that, thank you, Mr. Apple. - Yeah, and at the NASDAQ, it's an act, a mortgage insurance provider. Jim, you mentioned Apple. A lot of discussion yesterday, looking at the Microsoft hardware, and the Qualcomm partnership, some argued was a long-awaited response to what Apple did with the M1 four years ago. - Couldn't agree more. I know Qualcomm has been a horse. 120 goes to 200. I will say that maybe there's no, I wanted more follow-up on the AI. What is the implications of a dramatic refresh? We did have one U of Packard upgrade, but the refresh that they're talking about, which is that it'll be common to have this, this PC nickshirt this time, well, that means that everything that you have is going to be literally changed. And if that's the case, how can I not want to own U of Packard? How can I not want to own the venues where they sell PCs? And I don't get it. I think that that was lost in the shop yesterday. - Oh my God, yeah. - Everybody's PC is going to be obvious. - Jim's right, Barclays goes HPQ to equal weight. Higher multiple unit stabilization. AI PCs will help out. Also Dell with a positive catalyst call, I believe also at Barclays. - I was down four yesterday, and the stock was basically in free fall, just when he was with Jensen. Michael Dell is with Jensen. Obviously, Jensen, I'm not saying, he meets people and people get pictures, I get pictures, I mean, like I said, getting it right with Jensen is the single most important that you can do in the last two years. You have to be, and he's very easy to get right with, 'cause he's incredibly kind. By the way, can people, I just want it from one moment, most CEOs like to be tough guys. They just kind of gravitate to being tough. He is kind, and he will often tell you about you are kind, or he's kind, I mean, it's really important, and it's so, it's charming, but it's not meant to be charming. It's just his demeanor, a kind demeanor, I mean, versus like the tough guys that came out of GA. - Right. - I mean, they come out of GA, and it's like, okay, listen, I'm savage. Don't be savage, be kind. What's better, be kind. - Your point about NVIDIA, Jim, as we wait for tomorrow, this FTP, Sammazons, cloud arm, halting orders for the most advanced super chip to wait for a powerful new model, as they, investors fret, the FT says, about a dip in demand in the product cycle. - I'm like, I'm not worried. - Really? - No, I'm not worried. You know, this is history, history. - Implied volatility on NVIDIA is like, a plus percent, right? - Okay, so let's talk about that, NVIDIA. If this company is really indeed set up for the quarter, then imagine how many times you would have sold it. I mean, you would have sold it right after coming into this year, 'cause you said it can't duplicate. You would have sold it going into the last year's May, because it can't duplicate. And I come back and I just say, why do we know that there's gonna be a transition? I believe that this Amazon story, I think if we like went into it and said, how old are they? Well, they're number one. So if they're gonna be the first to have black one, now they may be, Matt is gonna have a lot of black one. This is the revolutionary super chip. But I think that they have. And it's not supposed to come out to the fall, but there's a relationship between Amazon and NVIDIA that is safer. And you can go look, there are videos of these two. There's a terrific one of Amazon with Slipsky, who is Slipsky from Amazon with NVIDIA. They are true partners, so you can sell it on this or you can just say, well, you know what, they must be very close to having the black one. And I know that the black one, one of the things that Jensen has said over and over again, this is not a 386 to 46, or you shouldn't order a 386, it's a 486. You can make it all work, they all work together, but I know that there, who's first in line? Amazon, now Zuckerberg has tried very hard to be first in line. Oracle wants to be first in line. But I don't want to sell NVIDIA and then the greatest companies of our time will want to be first in line. I mean, that's just, no, it's like Anthony Edwards. Like, who's playing this? Wow, yes. You know, you have these guys, and you know, you have the final four of the NBA, and they all are like, who's trying to get the chips? And Amazon will get the chips for anyone. We haven't touched on Palo Alto, which is obviously lower. Yeah, let me do that. There's still some comments, Jim, about how the stock needs to reset, or that this was just one chapter toward recovering. All right, no, okay, so the stock, this is how much the stock was up going in. Someone, there were a couple of guys who raised numbers to where they couldn't be beaten on Friday, and that's an old tactic. You know, a guy with a hold who raised numbers to where you can't be beaten, is a guy who wants the stock to go down. That's a time-honored tactic among analysts. I thought that Nikesh did a good job. The billings number he has said over and over again, and by the way, Salesforce said the same thing. You shouldn't be paying attention. You say attention to the remaining performance obligations, just for people at home. This is about the way you get cash in, and RPO is a little less regular to get cash in, but I like the quarter for the reasons that even Nikesh didn't get into. They won the United Health Contract. That was the biggest hack of the last few years. They witnessed the ascension. There's an ascension hack, I think they're going to have. That's a very big, possible chain. But they're getting the business. The platformization is working when they get a platform, instead of just a discrete individual unit, they've got 10 times the earnings. Everyone got caught up in the billings. Again, this was a much better quarter than last time. And by the way, he bought back a lot of stocks. So I think Nikesh, I'm not an Nikesh Basher. He has made a lot of money for people, and the quarter was a good quarter. He was on "Mad" last night, talked about the environment surrounding hacks. Let's take a quick listen to that. Nikesh is the optimistic about what's going on from an enforcement and sort of organization, organizing perspective in terms of how they are. Unfortunately, I think the hacks are here to stay. I think we are going to see more and more hacks going into the election. I think we're going to see more and more deep fakes, more and more AI being used to try and scam people. It is the wild rest as far as the use of AI is concerned. >> Most in the shuffle. I mean, what does he say? He is saying, if you want to know what industry has the greatest demand of our time, as much as I love NVIDIA, it's trying to stop hacks. And he's at the forefront, along with George Kurtz at CrowdStrike. Now George has never missed a quarter, so that's a very tough comparison. But I can tell you that I would love to be in a business where every day I get called by a major customer who says please help. That's a dream come true. >> And that's what he got at UnitedHealth. That's the call he got. >> There is one note, Jim, I won't name the firm, but a desk note today asking, I'd love to know what it feels like to be a generalist hopping on a Palo Alto call, because the metrics change every couple of years. There are things we're told that happened that are not visible in the numbers. Is the phrasing around RPOs and ARR, is that confusing? >> I am a generalist, but I have had the advantage of being taught by Mark, Mark Benia. And it was very stressful because I've had calls with Benia for I just said, I don't know, come on. I mean he's an ARR, he's an RPO, you know, FDR. And he just said, why don't you come out here and I walk through it. And he walked me through it more than once. Multiple, look, I took tears. >> So you can't blame an investor who's in software but occasionally get it confused. >> No, you can't. And when Mark decided to de-emphasize buildings, I said, I just got my arms 10 years later around buildings and you're telling me, I'm now going to look at remaining performers, but I will say this. Nick Hesh is right, buildings are not as important as the analysts. Now the call was much better than the previous, oh my God, the last call before this. It was like, tell me, you Nick Hesh, do you understand what did Palo Alto's not a town, it's a company? I mean, they were very, very flipped with him. There was one flip call last night and Nick Hesh just took the guy down so brutally, I just feel bad for him. I mean, I'd be walking around today saying, well, I got, you know, the Denny's grand slam put in my face, but I will tell you that I think Palo Alto was a fine quarter and they have the customers and we should go back instead of, I understand the gobblegope and it is a little confusing. But let's just break it out. Is there a lot of demand or is there a little demand? Because in the end, demand controls business and the demand there is extraordinary. So let's cut it out and recognize that demand says it's not billings, give him that. Now George Kurtz, when he, you know, CrowdStrike reports, they will give you the same demand picture. And I just think it's like every day you wake up and it's like the Defense Department call. It's a major hospital chain call. So I want to be in that business, I just don't want to have to describe how I book my works. >> Jim, on GLP1s today, Nestle announces a line of package goods for the GLP1 user. Lily's the number two SMP here this morning. >> Well, you know, the other day there was a story about how these outfits were because the authorities, the FDA's allowing different companies to come in. Well, good luck. I mean, it's, again, the movie is, you keep only it falls off the truck. I mean, there's just not enough, Lily. I think Nestle's very forward looking. Nestle might be an interesting stock now that Coco peeps. >> Oh yeah, a two month loan now, Coco. >> Yeah, and I think that's a perilous commodity right now when it has that kind of decline. But Eli Lilly, I'm still waiting for them to come out. I'm a little disappointed that they haven't come out with the dementia stuff that the FDA wanted right now. But this is another one where there's so much to me. Now, I've been with people who say, listen, people stop taking it after a year. I think that the trials that are going on make it so that if you have, you know, fatty liver, you can't stop taking it. Diabetes, you can't stop taking it. If there's any comorbidities, you can't stop taking it. The question is always the same thing. We'll be insures paid for it. And that, we're not sure about that. >> Interesting piece out of Bloomberg today about speaking of insurance, commercial property insurance in Florida because of climate change rising at five times the national rate. >> I don't know how people eat. Look, those people who are just doing this at taxes give me a break. I mean, that insurance, we looked at it, we looked at a place. Lisa loves real estate. 'Cause we're now living stocks. I mean, she has the equipment of a monopoly game. Oh, and they're air coming up. We just come air coming up. But where she just said, let's go look at beachfront property. And the, a lot of the guys have gotten wise, they don't like it. >> They don't like it. >> Yeah, they don't like it. >> Remember the late Mr. Fisherman ran Travis, he said, here's something you need to know. Don't ever buy Florida real estate. Because we're not going to write. And one day nobody's going to write because it's just too dangerous. And look, on June road, they don't write on the budget. >> Yeah, yeah. >> In this long island. So I, those were, that's going to hurt the, Jesus, and that's going to be CPI. >> Right. >> Right. >> Miserable. >> On the other hand, auto zone, Jim. I wonder if it's what you made of a couple quarters. Auto zone, there's zoom. We haven't gotten to. >> Well, auto zone, once again, they, this is when you buy it. Right here. Because they buy back stock like no other company. So you buy it right here. And they'll be buying back stock in three days. And you'll be really grateful that I mentioned it. Zoom. Oh God, Kelly Steckleburg is so nice. Eric is so nice. They have no growth. Well, 1% growth. And until they get actual growth there, you can own the stock. I love the zoom contact. And I feel so badly because I don't want it is true genius. And zoom is still the gold standard for a lot of people, but teams came in. Teams pops up when you lease one and you're trying to, try to disable teams. It can't be disabled. But the fact is, is that zoom has not been able to parlay what it has into a series of apps that we would like. And it's not parlayed into growth. So therefore, no growth, no one wants to buy it. By the way, DocuSign is in a similar situation. Again, you get these companies and you, you know, you're root for them, but they don't have growth. And when they don't have growth and, you know, these people, everybody wants rule of 40. They want big RPO, they want big billings. And I give you a company that grows at 1%. No. - Meantime, some of these other pandemic names, Jim Peloton doing some refinancing to alleviate the cash crunch, that's down 14. - Yeah, good luck there. That's another shrimps can't be correct. - Tesla's actually behaving pretty well here, Jim. Even amid analyst reports, just highlighting how dependent the company is on must not going away. - Well, I mean, look, it's Adam Jonas again. And thank heavens for Adam Jonas. I mean, he writes as much as Stephen King. And Stephen King's my favorite. Remember, he's the Charles Dickens of our team and people don't recognize that. He had a Kramer hardware with his with the C in one of his books. He's still convinced I have such an ego that he was like, watches our show. But when the piece that Jonas did on Tesla was brilliant, 'cause what he's basically saying is, if you want all that AI, and you don't want a car company, you got a vote, yes. - On the pay package. - Oh my God, we got a vote. Everyone in the world has to vote, yes, for that thing. 'Cause he's going to take his bat and his ball and go home. And then you're only on Tesla. 'Cause then you're stuck with a car company. I don't want a car company. If I want that, I'll go buy Ford Motor. - Right, there's a huge graphic in the report about the Muskonomy, I think, as he calls it. - You know, I just wanted to steal that now, you mentioned. - I figured a lot of people hadn't heard of it. I could integrate it or may have money. But then I'd feel bad. I'd have to credit you. - Yeah, but it's the SpaceX logo and the Tesla logo. And boring still? I don't know where I'm at. - Yeah, boring, Bob? - Yeah, yeah. - I want people to understand that you'll read. I mean, I'll read all these reports, right? And they're like, oh my God, let me break that. Oh, let me break that. And then Jonas hit you. And it's wow, you know, it's put up up. Jonas is just joy. I'm gonna call him a couple of pies. He's not allowed to talk to me 'cause of the stupid compliance reports. I'll just say, man, you're great. Just keep up the great work. I don't know. I mean, I don't want the guy to ever retire. - Yeah, he doesn't come on as much, but-- - He's so good. - In retail, Jim, we mentioned Lowe's and Macy's. Like a call on GPS today. A city goes positive catalyst. - I can't believe-- - And we will get urban tonight. - GPS has come all the way, gap stores has come all the way back down to where it almost yields three. This Richard Dixon was a long history man. It was like nine West. He's been around forever. He is turning that company around, starting with old Navy. I hope he, you know, gets banana and public grade. But I will say that this guy is for real. And I wanna do that trick. A&F and gap are for real. A&F doesn't, you know, it's not a turn. It's just been a relentless thing. There's a turn going on a gap. And I think that Dixon is a leader who has inspired people again. I like 'em. I'm just looking marveling at some of these charts and specialty gym. - A&F is fabulous. A&F just can't miss. I don't know how it's possible. It has been a very quiet, fantastic run in which the annals are just now turning, recognizing that it's real. Look at that. I mean, that's been one of the greatest talks of our time. Again, cutting back to this idea of the how hard it is. I mean, that store is packed anecdotally. And then you go look at the financials and you can take, it's a great thing people at home can do. You go to your A&F, it's packed. And there's a preponderance that are. Then you read through what they've done and you don't realize that for a long time now, they've been fantastic. I really like them. - Just to finish out the block here on JPM, Jim trying to get back some of the losses from yesterday, second best Dow name at the moment. - You know what, they do have a bench. Now, I've been marveling that when you have a company that doesn't have a lot of tight and 50 year olds that you've heard, you said to yourself, well, is Jamie really grooming? But then you say 12 times earnings for the best bank in the world? I'll pay 12 times earnings. I know that he felt that we don't know where his buyback really does live. But we do know that you're not paying a lot for the premier bank versus say the premier restaurant chain, the premier apparel company. It's really kind of mystifying why the premier bank doesn't have a higher price service, right? - Well, keep it like it. Huge succession story which will continue to monitor. - Oh, yeah. - In the coming quarters and maybe years. - Well. - Meantime as we go to break. Waller. - They're willingly wells. - Yes. - I'm sorry. - I know, the Waller headlines were initially taken as a bit hawkish, but then yields have settled back here this morning. - Yeah, don't worry about the yields. Look, I'm going to dig deeper. I'm not dismissing the Amazon volts orders of the dig. - I am saying that my contacts with Amazon, they are the most favorite nation, they are. - Take a look at the bonds at the screen here as we got the Dow, almost 30 and the S&P, roughly flat still holding 5,300 stay with us. Last week Comcast announced news about this new bundle, StreamSaver, the partnership with Peacock, Netflix and Apple TV. Jim now getting a little more information on pricing, current new Xfinity internet TV customers can add everyday price of 15 a month with no annual contracts as they argue it results in a savings of about 30% almost $100 a year. - Yeah, I mean, I was expressed frustration last week because I thought, first of all, no one ever deals with it. You know, Apple's really hard. They're not going to usually come to the table. This is a, I thought something that would move the stock. - I did, and obviously I own a lot of stock and it's important to me. But I was surprised that that didn't resonate. And I keep coming back to the coordinators. Younger people has to be too quite, quite often. Again, it's anecdotal, but I can't find a lot of people who watch us. And it's a great distribution. - Because they're watching you on other platforms. A different methods of distribution. - A lot of people who say, tell me about Jeff Morris. He seems like a great guy. And Jeff's in the, with me in my 10-20, and the constant refrain that I get from the young people I get is, you know, thank you for giving me a program that tells me everything I need. And it's like, no, look, the first things I've been in business forever is crushing. You take it personally. But the fact is, is that they don't want the bundle. And I want the bundle. And a lot of it is because I don't make any money. My baker daughter is not cleaning it up. She's doing as best as she possibly can. - Keep an eye on it. Obviously, it's very tumultuous days all around media. We'll get stopped trading with Jim in a minute as the market's holding some cards close to the vest ahead of Nvidia tomorrow. Back in a moment. It's time for Jim and stop trading. - I want to keep this simple. When you hear about all the different tariffs that Biden is putting when it's different solar, it seems like a big mishmash. - No, it's for first solar. No, he doesn't mean it for first solar because they don't ever want to say we favor this. Other than Jim and Mundo, they seem, no one in business seems to even talk to them. But first solar is the winner for solar and they do commercial. It's not just the individual who has to get credit and then try to sell the electricity to the grid. This is the company to own. And even though it has moved substantially, it still only sells for 14 times earnings. And I think it can put on more. It's also a very well-run non-promotional company. As opposed to many of the other solar companies, which would promote to death that they were allowed to. So these are the winners. It's a quiet, very, very good company. - Right. - Manufacturing. - It's still processing some of the news of recent tariffs. - Indeed. - So it's an eye, Jim? - Okay, I have Lowe's now. I've got one of the hazards of being here while the coal goes on is it's going from up to down. And we have to check out why that is. Marvin has done a remarkable job with Lowe's. He got a very bad hand when he got there in that they didn't have any technology. Let's see what happens. I know that everyone keeps hoping that told brothers say tonight. We'll say, you know what? We're seeing an unlock. But when you have a 7% jumbo to go get, and you're paying two and a half or three, it just doesn't happen. - Yeah. We'll see if there's any movement in the 30 year this week. Jim, we'll see you tonight. - Oh, fantastic. - Easy week continues. Mad money, 6 p.m. Eastern time. We'll be back in a moment with the Dow up 25. Don't go anywhere. - You've been listening to the opening hour of CNBC's "Squawk on the Street." - All opinions expressed by the "Squawk on the Street" participants are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of CNBC, NBC Universal, or their parent company, or affiliates. And may have been previously disseminated by them on television, radio, internet, or another medium. You should not treat any opinion expressed on this podcast as a specific inducement to make a particular investment or follow a particular strategy. But only as an expression of an opinion. Such opinions are based upon information, "Squawk on the Street" participants consider reliable. But neither CNBC nor its affiliates and/or subsidiaries warrant its completeness or accuracy and it should not be relied upon as such. 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