← CNBC's "Fast Money"
CNBC's "Fast Money"
Rates Spike, Stocks Pull Back On Rising Inflation… And CEOs Joining Trump’s China Trip 5/12/26
00:43:30
Yields rising, with stocks pulling back from records, as investors digest this morning’s hotter-than-expected inflation data. How the Iran War and surging energy prices are impacting the U.S. economy, and how the Fast Money traders are navigating the equity volatility. Plus your next lightning fast prime package, Ebay rebuffs Gamestop’s takeover bid, and where the Chartmaster sees one gold miner heading after a big run over the past few years. Fast Money Disclaimer
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- [00:00]
Melissa Lee
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- [00:31]
Julia Boorstin
Are you as confident as you should
- [00:32]
Julie Beal
be when it comes to growing your business?
- [00:34]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Is your strategy ready to execute today?
- [00:37]
Julie Beal
If cash flows aren't where they need
- [00:39]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
to be, growth could be at risk,
- [00:40]
Julia Boorstin
especially in the eyes of your investors, board members and the business press.
- [00:45]
Julie Beal
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- [01:02]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Live from the NASDAQ markets in the heart of New York City's Times Square, this is FAST money. Here's what's on tap tonight. Rising inflation, yields spiking here and around the world and stocks pulling back from records as inflation climbs to its highest rate nearly three years are climbing yields a warning sign stocks should pay attention to. We'll debate that. Plus delivery updates out of Amazon and FedEx. Ebay passes on GameStop's offer. Surprise, surprise, some big opportunity in small caps and a technical check on when it of Guy's old clam stocks. Why the chartmaster says one gold miner could be losing its luster after shining bright over the last few years. I'm Melissa Lee, come to you live from CB at the nasdaq. On the desk tonight, Karen Feinerman, Dan Nathan, Guy Dami and Julie Beal. We start off with the inflation jolts that ripple throughout the markets today. Headlines CPI rising by its most in the three years led by soaring energy prices, though food and shelter costs also rose sharply. That nudge the S and P fractionally lower, pushing tech stocks down nearly three quarters of a percent. But the real impact being felt in yields here and around the world. Japan's 10 year government bond yield topping 2.5% now at 29 year highs. Over in Europe, the UK 10 year gilt hitting 18 year highs while French and German notes hit near 15 year highs with traders betting on ECB rate hikes and here in the US treasuries were weaker across the curve. Two year yields hitting their highest level since late March, the 10 year rising almost 5 basis points while the 30 year yield reclaimed the 5% level. So what message are all of these moves sending? Guy, what do you think?
- [02:34]
Karen Feinerman
Well, inflation's a problem without question. This is a global thing as well. And I think there are also global credit concerns, but they have not manifested their way into our stock market for whatever reason. We had a guest on last night, he talked about four and three quarters in a ten year being sort of that line of demarcation maybe, but at some point the market's gonna wake up and say, hey, I understand yields are going higher because there's some growth here and the economy's not as bad as people like me say that is. But I think 70% of it is. There's an inflation problem and it's a real problem. And at some point the market wakes up and say, wait a second, maybe these valuations don't make sense in a higher yield environment.
- [03:09]
Dan Nathan
Yeah, but the market has to wake up, right? If you think about 4, 4, 5 in the 10 year, you know, last time we were here meaningfully was back in July of 2025 and you had an S&P that was 6,000. Here it is at 7,400. It just doesn't seem to be bothered whatsoever. And obviously I think there's going to be a point in which to guys with 475 or 5, it's going to matter. You know, that equity risk premium is something that's razor thin right now. And sooner or later when you have to have some sort of fundamental shift and it might not be something geopolitical. We've been talking about rising yields all over the world for a long time. I'm just a dumb stock and options guy. I don't know what that means, but it hasn't meant anything for a while, at least for our stock market. If you look at what's going on in the option market, it's a free for all. I mean the skew to the call side is something that very unique. You usually see it in times like this, maybe right before you're ready for a bit of a pullback. It just shows a level of euphoria that we haven't seen in a long time. But the one thing is like when we're waiting for a sell off off, I mean just think of what we've had over the last few years. Every time the market sells off, we're making new highs in the not so distant future. This one's a runaway breakout here and I just don't know how it's sustainable, but I'm not sure yields is going to be the thing right here.
- [04:17]
Guy Adami
So I think the market is just sort of looking through this Iran conflict and that ultimately there'll be a resolution and things will calm down and that we will see oil come down. And so as that happens, that that deflationary effect or less inflationary effect will be positive. However, you know, I think we've all said it, oil is not going back to where it was. It's going to a floor that is much higher than the old floor. So I do think that inflation is here to stay. I don't know if it's going to be this hot or not. We'll see. But I do think this tiny pullback and this pullback is so tiny, what happened today relative to what has been happening, it could hardly be called anything is I don't think that this is the end of the AI run. The spend is just too big. I don't know when it'll happen. It will surely happen at some point, but I don't think this is the end of it. Could it go down more than here? Of course, and still have that be not a consequential move at all. But I think there's still optimism about oil coming down, inflation being under control, but we're far from a cut. I don't think we're anywhere near a cut up.
- [05:26]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
So if inflation remains higher for longer at a higher level, if energy prices remain at a higher sort of base level, even if they come off. Julie Beal the question is can the consumer who's already stretched weather that? I mean already with today's CPI report it was 3.8% headline average hourly earnings increased 3.6% in the last read. So basically inflation is eating up wage gains at this point. That's trouble.
- [05:51]
Julie Beal
It's for sure trouble. We know that anytime we have this kind of outpacing of wage growth relative to overall inflation, that can be trouble. And we know that oil prices are more meaningful for the low income consumer than they are for the mid and higher income consumer, it takes up more of their wages. So they're already very much under pressure. And I think what's important to note is when you peel apart the layers of cpi, what you're seeing is where is it sticky and stubborn and that's in services. And I think that actually makes it a little bit harder to say that we're going to have a real big snapback very quickly. When we have services inflation, it tends to be stickier than when we just have core goods deflation and inflation. So that's my concern actually is that the underlying dynamics are not just oil. We point to oil because it's really easy to point at, but actually that other elements of the economy are quite strong and that that's causing a lot of upward pressure on pricing.
- [06:46]
Karen Feinerman
That's fair. And again, inflation's been a problem. It continues to be a problem. Karen just mentioned Kevin Warsh is walking in with Bus or. I agree. And now the fact that there's only one rate cut, I think priced into September of 2027 and there's just so much chance of a rate hike over that period of time, I think is interesting. I think the good news at Karen's point is The S&P 500 is at an all time it doesn't seem to care, but at what point does it care? And I do think we're getting precariously close. I think the problem that the market's going to find is in the form of a bond move. That's something that Paul Tudor Jones said recently and Jamie Dimon said the same thing a couple weeks ago.
- [07:20]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
The market wants to though continue to buy the AI trade. I mean, within, underneath the surface, what you saw is semiconductors were down 6% at lows and they finished the day down 3%. Nvidia hit a new high, went down by a percent or so and then finished the day higher. I mean there is this want to still cycle into these trades despite what's going on with the economy.
- [07:39]
Karen Feinerman
Right.
- [07:40]
Dan Nathan
Because it's one of the things that I guess you could put your finger on that's working. I mean, Karen just said it. We just got earnings from the hyperscalers. They just committed to $700 billion in spend over the next nine to 12 months. And you know, again that's been going on. It's been doubling, it's been doubling, but at some point it's going to decelerate pretty meaningfully. We haven't seen a pullback in demand yet. If there is a pullback in demand, we're going to be looking at an over capacity situation. You might say, well that's great. You know, they're going to be creating all of this infrastructure that's going to be leveraged over the next five to 10 years. But the stock market has pulled forward a lot of that. If you look at the stocks, ok, the ETF that tracks the SOX index, the soxx, not the smh which is really top heavy to the names that have really outperformed. That's Nvidia and Taiwan semi this thing. The Soxx has rallied 70% from its March lows. 70%. The top three holdings are AMD, Micron and Intel. These are three companies that are darlings right now. But if you go and look back over the last 25 years, they've been dogs. These companies have misexecuted, they've missed entire, you know, segments or, or, or themes, you know, sec in the market and they're not good at manufacturing. And that's the intel thing. Intel's gone back and forth, back and forth. They're going to be a fab. They're not going to be a fab. So I just don't know why you're going to buy the Sox here when those three names have had these 200, 300% rallies just in the last year and they're, that's driving the train in this thing. To me I just feel like if you look at the SOX that was down one point today, 5, 6% if we have an S&P that's down 5%, these are going to be down 15, 20%.
- [09:09]
Guy Adami
So did you say the last 25 years when you were talking about these names?
- [09:13]
Dan Nathan
Of course, I mean like. But my point is the cyclical nature of them. And intel missed almost every major technological shift. AMD was just an also ran for years.
- [09:22]
Guy Adami
Well, I think it's hard to say. AMD's terrible and Intel's terrible. What happened was that AMD got better, got way better. They still both suck. Well, I don't know, I, I didn't
- [09:32]
Dan Nathan
think, I mean Jensen probably thinks they both suck and I don't know what
- [09:36]
Guy Adami
Jensen thinks, but I don't know.
- [09:38]
Dan Nathan
Jensen's not particular worried, okay about AMD and he hasn't been over the last three years, you know what I mean? And intel, maybe they serve some sort of function now because he used to say Hopper's going to be great for inference but then a lot of folks are like Hopper's too expensive. And if you're telling me that the depreciation of these things is four, five, seven years, then why do I need to upgrade? Because I already bought these things, right? So all of a sudden now CPU clusters are going to work. Well, they're going to work until there's major advances and they're just not up to speed. So Nvidia remains in the catbird seat despite all of this custom Silicon tp', all this sort of stuff. Now everyone is scattering really aggressively trying to get second third sources. But that doesn't make these good companies. And really we're not going to know for a while until we see this sort of performance. So to me, you know, have a ball. Go buy intel from 20 to 125.
- [10:28]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Julie, your thoughts?
- [10:29]
Julie Beal
I mean, would anyone here really Want to own AMD or Intel for the next 5 years? Eyes closed, go off to a desert island? Like I wouldn't. Right. I think that it's really in vogue in the same way that low wasted jeans have made a comeback. And that's horrific too. I just don't think that these are the highest of high quality companies. They're just really benefiting from a cyclical trend and upswing. And you know, just like loas de jeans, this too shall pass.
- [10:54]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
I hope one does.
- [10:55]
Dan Nathan
Hope.
- [10:56]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Now let's get to a big change at the fda. Commissioner Marty Makary is officially out after more than a year at the helm of the agency. The details and the impact now from Angelica Peebles. Angelica.
- [11:06]
Angelica Peebles
Hey, Melissa.
- [11:07]
Julie Beal
That's right.
- [11:07]
Angelica Peebles
Makary is out and top food official Kyle Diamantes will step in as acting commissioner. A senior administration official telling me that Makary's ouster is really the result of a series of issues versus one final straw. That official says that they're moving quickly. They hope to name a permanent successor in a matter of weeks, but it's too early to name potential replacements. A new commissioner would need to be confirmed by the Senate and it could be politically tricky right now, especially since they'll need the blessing of Senator Bill Cassidy. Remember, he nearly blocked RFK jr's nomination and Trump endorsed Cassidy's opponent in his reelection bid. So that's a question mark. And in the meantime, Makary's departure leaves another hole at the FDA where you already have acting directors leading some of the major centers, including those that oversee the regulation of drugs and biologic. Then there's the status of programs that McCary created, like the commissioner's national priority voucher pilot program. And there's a hearing for that scheduled in June. So we'll have a sense of what happens there pretty soon.
- [12:03]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Guys, Angelica, in terms of the acting heads of the two other centers for biologics and drug evaluation, was it up to Makary to appoint those or I mean, why did those go? Where are they still vacant, effectively?
- [12:17]
Angelica Peebles
Well, I think that's a big question mark. Right? Because you, of course, you remember what happened with CBER, you had Vinay Prasad, who was McCary's pick, and he was very vocal and arguably, you could say one of McCary's biggest problems. And so that now that we haven't seen a replacement could have to do with this, and we'll have to see exactly what direction that they take that in. And right now, the acting head of cedar, Tracy Beth Hogue, is also seen as one of McCary's, one of McCary's people. So that I think her status is a big question to me. What happens to her? Does she become permanent? And, you know, that has just been. Both of those positions have really gone through these back and forth. They've had people in and out really, over the last year since McCary's been there. And so those are two positions that I would look forward to see. Do you see those named in the absence of a permanent commissioner, or do we need to wait to have that next person come in and see who they decide to put there? But again, that could take some time.
- [13:11]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Yeah, it's been a real revolving door. Angelica, thank you. Angelica Peebles. For more now on the impact today's resignation of the FDA commissioner will have on pharma and biotech, let's bring in Mizzou host Jared Hulse. Jared, great to have you with us.
- [13:22]
Jared Hulse
Thank you.
- [13:23]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
I would think initially it's, it's a positive, but then there's whole unknown of, well, who's going to replace him?
- [13:28]
Jared Hulse
Right, Exactly. That was my thought, too. I mean, on the surface, I think investors never really liked this Makari administration from the start. So I think you get a boost in, in valuation maybe over the near term. But again, we don't know whether the new, you know, acting commissioner, commissioner, interim commissioner, will stick around for too long and if not, who that replacement will be. Will it be someone who's more aligned with rfk? Will it be someone who's not? So I think yes, on the surface, positive. But a lot of questions here.
- [14:00]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
What is the biggest outstanding issue in your mind? Angelica had touched on, for instance, the national priority vouchers and the questions about that. I mean, are there certain companies that have more on the line tied to what Makary has done at the FDA under his tenure so far?
- [14:17]
Jared Hulse
Well, I think companies like Unicure and Replimmune and arguably Biohaven and Disc Medicine have all been in the crosshairs to some degree with respect to the FDA and some of the FDA decisions. And then what Makari and Prasad have said about those decisions and reversed them Flipped them, delayed them, what have you. So there have been controversies. Obviously the index, the XBI has been very good despite it all. So I've kind of been of the view that yes, there's been some theatrics for sure, but it hasn't had a massive impact picture.
- [14:51]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
But I mean, realistically, let's say for replimune, right, which had early indications that its experimental cancer drug would be approved, and then it. There was a reversal there. They ultimately had to lay off 60% of their workforce afterwards. I mean, are they mortally wounded or is there actually hope? If there is an FDA commissioner whose views are aligned in science and seen
- [15:09]
Jared Hulse
as more stable, yeah, it's possible that it's not. It's certainly not dead yet. A lot of these companies reincarnate over time and reinvent themselves and they have to go through things that are unfortunate, but then they kind of find better footing. So again, depending on who the personnel is, maybe there's a meeting of the minds that happens at some point and that can be rectified.
- [15:29]
Karen Feinerman
Understanding it's a couple steps away. But can you make a through line to M and a activity in the space through the fda, depending on who he or she is?
- [15:40]
Jared Hulse
That's a really tough one. I think what it comes down to is if there is a. If there's a better sort of pattern between companies and the FDA that's more predictable and we can look at what the agency has said to, you know, any party and we can bridge that through the development timeline to the approval timeline. And large cap pharma is sort of on board and every. Everything sort of makes sense from a general standpoint, then I think it will lead to more. You would have to think that if there is more visibility on these programs, then that will lead to more deals in time. I mean, we already think it's going to be a great year, of course, but could be better.
- [16:22]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Do you think? How would you character characterize the drug approval process under Marty Makary, just so we can gauge like how that could change? I mean, was it that chaotic? Was there not a lack of transparency? Were there a lot of lot more unknowns than in other FDA commissioner tenures?
- [16:39]
Jared Hulse
I mean, not in my opinion, really. I mean, I know a lot of other investors and analysts across the street have said that this has been an incredibly disorganized administration at the FDA level so far. I think it's debatable. I think we can go back through the COVID years. There were a number of complete response letters and about faces that the FDA had when we thought there was line of sight and there actually weren't. It just, it's not totally clear whether we're ever gonna be in a position where the first meeting between the FDA and any company in this industry is going to be sort of the final, the final final with respect to timelines and how these development stage companies track. We don't know the rules can change intermittently. I think that's been the biggest issue that investors have had with Makari is that the FDA personnel employees have given some sort of feedback and then Makari and or other people under his leadership have said actually no, we're going to do it our way. You kind of want to a commissioner here who's very hands off and lets the FDA leadership do what it does and steps back unless there's a major ordeal. You don't really want someone that's as publicly facing, I don't believe as Makari has been.
- [17:57]
Guy Adami
So if you were Trump, would you pick someone that the RFK junior Contingency would like or would you go the other way and pick somebody different than that to sort of please as many people as you can?
- [18:11]
Jared Hulse
And I think at the end of the day you want someone who's not very controversial and again, who will let the fda, you know, the people that have worked for the FDA for a number of years and had the expertise kind of decide the fate of the companies in this industry and not meddle as much. I think that would be the preferential. What Trump decides to do is obviously impossible to call. I mean it could be this interim, you know, the interim FDA head for a while. We don't know that, you know, that could last a number of years. That could last two weeks. Don't know.
- [18:43]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Jared, thank you.
- [18:44]
Jared Hulse
Thank you.
- [18:45]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Jared Hulse of Mizuho. We saw the reactions unicure, replimmune, also moderna, some questions about whether or not vaccines, how they'll be viewed under a new FDA commissioner.
- [18:57]
Karen Feinerman
Yeah, that's why I asked the question because I think you can make a argument that in a new regime you could have more M and A because you could potentially have more clarity and basically more stability in those seats. And it gives big cap pharma sort of the, the I think the confidence to sort of make these deals. I have to say this because over the last couple weeks I've been dead wrong. Insmed very quietly has been cut in half since I think the last time he's been on. I don't think the story has changed at all. Obviously the stock has, but I think there's a huge opportunity in INSM right now.
- [19:28]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Coming up, a delivery update while your next prime package could be at your doorstep in just 30 minutes. And what the CEO of FedEx had to say about his company's recent rally, plus credibility concerns why eBay is shrugging off GameStop's takeover bid and the choice words they use to describe the offer don't go anywhere. Fast Money's back into.
- [19:48]
Melissa Lee
This is Fast Money with Melissa Lee right here on cnbc.
- [19:59]
Jared Hulse
Modern enterprise is made up of a
- [20:01]
Karen Feinerman
lot of moving parts, and Comcast business
- [20:03]
Dan Nathan
helps you orchestrate it all with SD
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Karen Feinerman
WAN working at scale to keep 150
- [20:08]
Jared Hulse
hospital locations connected and working as one plus SASE and zero trust security, protecting
- [20:14]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
financial data across a bank's 2,000 branches,
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Jared Hulse
and AI powered networking that optimizes traffic across five continents. No one does business like Comcast business.
- [20:24]
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- [21:24]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
What made you confident that you could do something that hadn't been done before? I have no fear of failure.
- [21:30]
Julia Boorstin
Trailblazing women Changing the game One of
- [21:33]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
my favorite pieces of advice Think about
- [21:35]
Angelica Peebles
what your boss's boss needs.
- [21:38]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Leadership can look in many, many different forms. It really does come down to just trusting yourself.
- [21:43]
Julie Beal
Life is short and you just gotta think big to accomplish big things.
- [21:46]
Julia Boorstin
Julia Boorstin hosts CNBC Changemakers and Power Players. New episodes every Tuesday, wherever you get your podcasts.
- [21:55]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Welcome back to Fast Money. Amazon announcing it will expand its 30 minute delivery service Amazon now to more cities around the country as it lands the latest blow in the delivery wars. The service originally rolled out in Seattle and Philadelphia in December. Amazon now delivers things like groceries, household essentials and locally relevant items. But it's not cheap. $13.99 for non prime customers and $3.99 for prime subscribers, plus a $2 fee for orders less than $15. The rollout not enough to keep Amazon from getting caught in today's tec? Was it enough to scare Target and Walmart investors, both of those Amazon competitors jumping today? It is amazing how quickly you can get things and how quickly people want things and are willing to pay for things. But Julie B. I'm wondering what you think this means for Amazon's business.
- [22:40]
Julie Beal
Well, I mean, I always say that the worst thing that ever happened to the rest of retail was Amazon figuring out that they could sell excess capacity because it meant that they could really continue to invest aggressively in their go to market with their delivery business. And they have these really analog moats around the business in terms of delivery trucks and just like very physical infrastructure. And I think they're just continuing to plow money into that as they continue to be able to really generate a lot of revenue in their hyperscaler business and continue to be really relevant as a behemoth. The problem is, is it's really hard to find alternatives outside of Amazon once you're really hooked in. And I think that they recognize that the faster they do it, the more that becomes true.
- [23:18]
Guy Adami
I mean, they just do an enormous, tremendous job of just locking you in and you know, it's just so easy. And I don't even use Alexa and that would be just so even easier if did. But you know, it's interesting to me when I look at Amazon, the stock and I think about the valuation there and I don't know what AWS should be. It should be high, that valuation. And you look at Walmart and that PE is much higher than Amazon, right? And if that's just the retail part of the business, then oh my God, what are you getting the rest of Amazon for? And so, I mean, I think, I don't know. Amazon has a lot of upside from here, from both sides of the business, right.
- [23:58]
Dan Nathan
Years ago a lot of analysts did these, some of the parts, right? And they were basically saying that you're getting the North American retail business for free. And so when you think about the adoption of prime over the last, you know, 15 years or so and you just gave the pricing for what this sort of delivery is going to be, you know, they've had tremendous operating margin improvement. I think that's had something to do with at least, you know, growing into that valuation. X AWS it was sub, I think 1% going back to 2022. Now it's close to 7%. So near term I suspect this to be a headwind to margins as they get greater adoption. But ultimate like Amazon does, it's going to be like a big leverage story from then on.
- [24:32]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Meanwhile, FedEx CEO Raj Subramanian telling Jim Cramer in a wide ranging interview he's not impressed by Amazon's new service. Take a listen.
- [24:42]
Dan Nathan
The true network is something you can pick up in any one part of the world and get it to any other part of the world in a couple of days. And for that you need a system like what we have here and the networks around the world.
- [24:54]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
World.
- [24:55]
Dan Nathan
That's not what was announced at all.
- [24:59]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Catch a full interview on Mad Money at the top of the hour.
- [25:03]
Karen Feinerman
Finally you can, you know, the case we had made for years of valuation in FedEx which didn't work, is actually now starting to work. I mean FedEx has been doing extraordinarily well the stock over the last couple months and I still think it's cheap here at 17 times next year's numbers and juxtapose what FedEx has done over the last year with what UPS has done. I mean UPS is right around a multi year low low. FedEx is trading at an all time high and probably deservedly so.
- [25:27]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Yeah. Julie, do you like FedEx or UPS?
- [25:30]
Julie Beal
Probably FedEx. I think from an execution standpoint, I think they've been in a much better position. Obviously the valuation reflects that, but I'd still rather go with the higher quality play.
- [25:41]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
There's a lot more fast money to come. Here's what's coming up next.
- [25:46]
Melissa Lee
Turning down a bid, why eBay is passing on GameStop's takeover proposal and the choice of words they had for the offer. Plus a technical take on one gold miner that could be losing its luster. What the Chartmaster sees in store for one of Guy's old clam stocks. You're watching Fast Money live from the NASDAQ market site in Times Square. We're back right after this.
- [26:17]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
What made you confident that you could do something that hadn't been done before? I have no fear of failure.
- [26:23]
Julia Boorstin
Trailblazer women changing the game.
- [26:26]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
One of my favorite pieces of advice,
- [26:28]
Angelica Peebles
think about what your boss's boss needs.
- [26:31]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Leadership can look in many, many different forms. It really does come down to just trusting yourself.
- [26:36]
Julie Beal
Life is short and you Just gotta think big to accomplish big things.
- [26:39]
Julia Boorstin
Julia Boorstin hosts CNBC Changemakers and power players. New episodes every Tuesday, wherever you get your podcasts.
- [26:49]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Welcome back to fast money. Today, eBay rejecting GameStop's $56 billion takeover bid, saying quote, it is neither nor attractive. Cnbc had asked GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen last week about how the company would fund the deal, but he offered few details. EBay shares ending the day of 2% while GameStop dropped more than 3%. Excuse me, I'm not sure if this is actually a surprise. I mean Ryan Cohen last week just kept saying half cash, half stock. Look at the website. But apparently ebay looked at the website and didn't like it still. What do you think, Dan?
- [27:23]
Dan Nathan
I think that if everything from the year 1999 is making new all time highs, eBay should also be which it is right now. But this is also a company. I remember a case that they were making about all the data that they have. This goes back five, maybe seven years or something like that. And the opportunity that maybe even longer to take that unstructured data, have it structured, get basically, you know, a more, I guess a better retail experience, compete better with some of the existing six. This company, you know, has a good balance sheet. You know, it's got good growth. Still, believe it or not, there's a lot of things that a AI could probably really help them do and I would expect them. I didn't listen to the last call, but they're probably saying a lot about AI and there's probably a future for them as you think about it. So to me, I think ebay is kind of interesting here.
- [28:05]
Guy Adami
Well, so no surprise on the M and A front. It, it wasn't credible or it wasn't attractive, right? Neither of those two. They, they had to. The only thing that would have been shocking with this rejection is had they not rejected it and said we'll engage. No way were they going to do that, nor did they need to. And I thought that performance, I don't know what to call it interview was absurd. I either he didn't understand saying I don't understand the question. That's not really what he meant. He meant was you guys are idiots. I think was his basically structure, right? About the structure which he never addressed in the collar, the fix, if it was fixed or a, you know, a collar, anything like that. Um, and there was a great article I read today pointing out they would have to issue more shares than the entire GameStop already. So really, in effect you are issuing eBay shares to eBay.
- [29:01]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Right.
- [29:02]
Guy Adami
They don't. And. And a little bit of GameStop business thrown in, huh?
- [29:06]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
So definitely not.
- [29:07]
Guy Adami
I can see why it was not attractive nor correct.
- [29:09]
Karen Feinerman
Yeah, well, when they say not attractive in terms of the valuation that they're that 56 or $57 billion, because that's.
- [29:17]
Guy Adami
How do you even know that that's a valuation? Right.
- [29:20]
Dan Nathan
Well, of course they should say so.
- [29:21]
Karen Feinerman
I guess my point is, so for ebay to walk away from that side of it understanding that GameStop wasn't probably viable, I mean, they're basically saying the company's too cheap here, which I'm sure every company feels that they are. The question is, will we come back a month from now and say, you know what? EBay sort of tok tick themselves because it's had a tremendous run to the upside. It's not expensive, but it's interesting to see where the stock is a month or so from now.
- [29:43]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
A lot of analysts, you know, in response to the GameStop offer, issued notes saying, you know, eBay is very attractive here. It's in the middle of turnaround. That is really working. We're seeing the results here. Julie. I don't know. Do you like ebay here?
- [29:56]
Julie Beal
I. I mean, yeah, it's. I think it is doing the right things and I think it makes sense to be recognizing the operational improvements. But, you know, this is a little bit like my wife and I, we love to go out to dinner, we sit at the bar. There's always some guy that hits on us. And it's neither attractive nor credible to
- [30:12]
Dan Nathan
us that they do that.
- [30:14]
Julie Beal
Not for us, you know, and this feels like exactly the same energy.
- [30:18]
Megan Cassell
Energy.
- [30:21]
Guy Adami
Okay. Can I just point out one other thing about this? Beside that's really funny, the GameStop thing. I mean, GameStop was several points higher before this started, so it added pressure. And now with the rejection and it seeming to be over for the moment, you would think that GameStop would go back to where it was, but it's not. But it's not interesting. What is that? Yeah. Anyway, yeah.
- [30:43]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Coming up, Trump's trip to the mainland, all the CEOs he's bringing with him to China, and how the meeting could impact their companies. The details when Fast Money money returns.
- [30:55]
Melissa Lee
Missed a moment of fast. Catch us anytime on the Go follow the Fast Money podcast. We're back right after this.
- [31:10]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Welcome back to Fast Money Stocks closing mix. But finishing off their lows of the day as investors digested this morning's hotter than expected CPI data. The Dow with a small gain up 56 points. And now on a three day winning streak, the S&P down 2.10of percent and the NASDAQ falling three quarters of a percent, its worst day in two weeks. WTI crude jumping 4%, settling above $102 a barrel. Well, President Trump embarking on a major trip to China today where he will meet with President Xi Jinping. CNBC's Megan Cassell has got the very latest. Megan?
- [31:41]
Megan Cassell
Hey, Melissa. That's right. President Trump is now officially on his way to Beijing. He's set to arrive on Wednesday morning, Washington time. So that's Wednesday evening local and the real festivities kick off on Thursday. There's a bilateral meeting with President Xi in the morning and that CEO studded state banquet in the evening. Sixteen top executives are part of the US Delegation and expected to be there at that dinner, including Elon Musk, Tim Cook, David Solomon, among others. Now, the president spoke with reporters from the White House South Lawn on his way out of town today. And he spoke a bit about the trip. He was asked, for example, whether he'd be talking to President Xi for help, whether he'd be asking President Xi for help pressuring Iran to make a deal. And Trump said no because he said, quote, I don't think we need any help with Iran. He also acknowledged that he has what he described as a lot of things to discuss with President Xi, but he said Iran wouldn't be one of them because, quote, we have Iran very much under control. Now Trump says that the two leaders will be talking about trade more than anything else. Melissa. I'd say that's showing what he would like to focus on. But clearly Iran is going to be the dominant topic of this trip. Now, one last point. Trump was also asked what his red line would be to end the ceasefire, what would rise to a violation of the ceasefire for him. And he replied, we'll be thinking about that on the flight.
- [32:54]
Julie Beal
So one thing to watch.
- [32:55]
Megan Cassell
Maybe we'll get more on that once he gets there. Melissa.
- [32:59]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
All right, Megan, thank you. Megan Casella. Meanwhile, big tech pulling back from record highs. Today's biggest laggards include Qualcomm, tumbling more than 11%. Qualcomm is today's worst performer in the S&P 500. Intel Micron, Advanced Micro Devices also weaker today. For more on where the tech trade from here, let's bring in Dan Ives, global head of technology research at Wedbush. Dan, great to have you with us.
- [33:20]
Dan Ives
Great to be here.
- [33:22]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
You think the tech trade could go higher by about 10%? What feels.
- [33:26]
Dan Ives
I think, I think that could be conservative. I mean, to me, you know, everything we're seeing from demand perspective, it's accelerating relative to use cases, relative to our Asia trip. Demand and Supply, it's called 12 to 1 for Nvidia chips. And I view that just more as a catalyst. I, in my view it's third inning, one out, and that's, you know, I think that's bullish relative to software semis and infrastructure.
- [33:52]
Dan Nathan
Hey, Dan, where will you go away from semis? I know you were just in Asia, you just kind of referred to that. You spent like a week and a half there. You're probably talking to a lot of hardware makers there. So that's where you're getting a sense of the demand. But outside of that, right? I mean, I know that you've been poking around some of these SaaS names. Is, is there unusual values there?
- [34:11]
Dan Ives
Yeah, look, Dan, I think that to me is going to be the key trade. I mean, like when I look at what's happened in Microsoft, I think ServiceNow, way, way oversold. I look at Salesforce and I Look at Cybersecurity, CrowdStrike, Palo Alto, among others. And it speaks to my view the derivatives, the second, third, fourth derivatives is where you have to see around the corner. And I think software continues to be the area in the winner circle in terms of the use cases. Playing Palantir, among others.
- [34:43]
Karen Feinerman
Dan, is there any asymmetrical risk in this meeting tomorrow in China in terms of what hap, what Taiwan is? Is it a pawn? Is it a bargaining chip? Does that come into consideration at all?
- [34:55]
Dan Ives
Yeah, I think, I mean that definitely is at play. I think the more sensitivity to the market is around Nvidia chips and just the restrictions selling into China. I could tell you, you know, from, from being in the region. That is really the hot air that I think everyone's focused on because side of the poker game, it's about raw materials. You talk about what could disrupt a trade. I don't think it does, but those are the keys. Chips, raw materials.
- [35:23]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
So is it a bad signal that Jensen Huang is not on this trip?
- [35:27]
Dan Ives
Yeah, it's funny because, I mean, you reading into that, I actually think there's some poker going on because you don't want the bigger poker chip. And what's probably the biggest poker poker chip, it's the godfather of AI gents. And, and I think him being there is strategic in terms of, you know, like I, if he was there, that would be face to face with the Chinese. And I Think to some extent that is for the US the biggest focus will they be able to sell chips into the US And I you know from China I think that continues to be the issue.
- [36:05]
Guy Adami
So Dan, it's Karen, thanks for being on. So what is your number one and two favorite ways to play the whole
- [36:11]
Dan Ives
AI expansion Look I mean we talk about you know chips, software and we continue to be bullish on you know Nvidia, AMD and others but, but I think it's, it's playing the derivatives. It's on the hyperscale side. I think Google right now is the best position. They check every box in terms of Gemini to what we're seeing on cloud Amazon. You know I know you talk about on the show before an awakening in terms of some of the parts and the AWS piece and then we talk about Oracle. I think that's sort of the awakening of the giant that continues to be a way disconnected trade that, that we're seeing out in the market.
- [36:48]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Does, does the run in memory make sense to you? Does it run in intel make sense to you, Dan?
- [36:55]
Dan Ives
Till I was in Korea I questioned it a bit weaving there. I don't, I mean I think it just continues to be it's a memory super cycle sandisk Micron continue to go higher. Now look in terms of intel has that gotten maybe over its skis a bit? I think it could have but I think investors they're, they're trying to stretch for what are the opportunities on the second third derivatives and obviously intel they're in the right spot. I would still much rather own an investor Nvidia or an AMD with Lisa Su than Intel relative to the Ron's had.
- [37:30]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
All right Dan, great to speak with you. Thanks.
- [37:32]
Dan Ives
Thank you.
- [37:33]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Dan Ives, wedbush what do you think Dan?
- [37:36]
Dan Nathan
I think there's something really interesting happened today that we haven't mentioned. CME Group with a company called Data Intelligence. That's a, it's silicon data. Silicon data maybe. Did you guys talk about it?
- [37:46]
Dan Ives
Four o' clock maybe?
- [37:47]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
We sure did.
- [37:47]
Dan Nathan
Oh geez. I should have been watching. I was getting my makeup on. Look at this. You know you got to take care of the money maker. No. So I think it's really interesting that they launched or they're going to be launch, you know this, this compute futures, right. So you know you think about how you know farmers, you know hedge with you know futures and the like. So if you are a buyer of compute and all the things that go into it, you can actually hedge and I think that'll be really interesting to see if we start seeing some or less volatility as far as pricing. If you have the ability to kind of think about it from a commodity standpoint and how you might hedge it.
- [38:18]
Karen Feinerman
Terry Duffy, once again ahead of the curve. I mean, you know, we're, we're friends but and I happen to think he's the greatest CEO out there and he's watching and he's watching right now. My friendship doesn't mean I'm biased, but it doesn't mean I'm wrong. But quickly going back to Google, you know, Karen can speak to this. This is one of her if not biggest holdings at 26 times next year's numbers. I still don't think it's expensive despite the run that it's had.
- [38:41]
Guy Adami
Agree.
- [38:42]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Yes.
- [38:42]
Guy Adami
We don't have a ton of time. No. There's so much to like about it. I mean on every front it's not a crazy amount of money. And you know, there's so many parts that are working. We never even get to Waymo and YouTube and searches which is really doing really well. Year ago things were very different.
- [38:57]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Coming up we're going to check in on guys clam or at least one of the stocks in his acronym from last year. Why the chartmaster says the gold miner. This gold miner is losing its luster and what the technicals are telling him Fast money is back into. Welcome back to Fast Money. The Vaneck Gold Miners ETF on an incredible run, doubling in the last year. But since the start of the war with Iran, the miners have been struggling down over 15%. Now the Chartmaster is saying it is time to put away your picks and shovels and sell one popular miner. It was the A in guy's clam last year.
- [39:36]
Karen Feinerman
Yes, it was two years ago.
- [39:37]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Agnico Eagle.
- [39:39]
Karen Feinerman
When was the clam?
- [39:40]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Was it two years? Last year was two. Oh, last year.
- [39:43]
Guy Adami
Two.
- [39:43]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Two years ago. Time flies when we're talking about bad acronyms. Carter, Braxton, Wirth, what do you see in the charts?
- [39:50]
Carter Braxton Worth
Well, it certainly helped your acronym but let's get right to it. Five, six charts, they're always identical. That's the plan. And then we put things on them. So the first chart, if you'll see here, is Agnico Eagle, a great winner. I mean going from 45 to 255 in a beautiful ascent on exactly a two year period. Now let's put some lines and arrows. The first iteration you'll see some arrows here and they look random but they're not. Third chart These arrows depict exactly the circumstance that the stock has ascended in this beautiful uptrend line. And now we have converging trend lines. This formation gets resolved one way or the other. Next chart we have a down arrow. That's a judgment. Of course, others might say these are beautiful charts, except you've got the arrow wrong, Carter. It's a green arrow. It's going to be resolved up. But what we have here is the topping formation. Next iteration, you'll see it is a minor head and shoulders top. And I think that is the issue. It's noteworthy before we get to the last chart, that AEM is underperforming. New Dumont on underperforming Barrick. It's at one year relative lows of those two other marquee names. Final chart here is the Channel. And often you get an equal and opposite move. Having blown out through the upper band of the channel, I think we're going to undercut the lower band. So we're sellers here of aem.
- [41:09]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Just curious, Carter, what do you see more broadly for gold and for miners?
- [41:14]
Carter Braxton Worth
Right, well, we have the blow off peak, of course, of January and we've never recouped those, dropping 20% in two days. And so I think those highs are going to be good highs for a while and I'll be reducing exposure to theme and reducing exposure to miners in particular.
- [41:30]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
All right, Carter, Thanks. Carter Braxton Worth, how are you feeling about the Clam now? I mean, the Clam is in the past.
- [41:37]
Karen Feinerman
It is in the past. Many things are 49 minutes of the show is in the past. It was a great. Listen, valuation's not a problem, although it's more expensive than a Newmont, for example. And that head and shoulders is scary. That uptrend line looks, looks extraordinarily vulnerable. So I hear what he's saying. And if rates continue to go higher here, that's going to be a bit of a headwind for gold as well. So unfortunately, I'm sort of with Carter on this one.
- [42:01]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Yeah. Julie, does gold have a place in your portfolio?
- [42:05]
Julie Beal
No, I mean, we just, we're really not interested in things that don't cash flow. And that's always been a thing that said I love to wear it. So, you know, that's how it shows
- [42:14]
Karen Feinerman
up at the bar with our wife.
- [42:17]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Right.
- [42:17]
Karen Feinerman
Where a bunch of dopes are, you
- [42:18]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
know, hidden on them.
- [42:19]
Karen Feinerman
It's ridiculous.
- [42:21]
Guy Adami
Good for you that you have had the gold coal for a long time from a low base and now you look at your high.
- [42:28]
Melissa Lee
But.
- [42:28]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Well, Louis Yamada the great Louisiana.
- [42:31]
Karen Feinerman
Who's watching right now?
- [42:32]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Sure she is. Coming up, big opportunity in small caps and names. Julie Beal is eyeing in the group as a Russell outperforms a broader market this year. Those stocks when Fast Money returns. Welcome back to fast money. The Russell 2000 nearly doubling the gains of the S&P 500 since the beginning of the year up nearly 15%. But can the outperformance continue? For more on the state of small caps and a few names, she's looking at Julie Beal. What are you looking at?
- [43:05]
Julie Beal
Yeah, it's been kind of an unusual rally that we've seen in small caps. It's really been driven by higher beta names and lower quality. So a lot of industrials and semiconductors companies with very low return on equity well outperforming those with higher over squeeze. It's an unusual dynamic that you see when you're coming out of a recession and you're like what recession? Well, small cap was in its own little earnings recession, its own little like private earnings recession that it was enjoying. But going forward, if you look at earnings projections for the rest of the year, small cap still looks like it's going to trend ahead of large cap. So I think it's still a good place to be but I would prefer to be focused on higher quality names that haven't run nearly as as much. One that I like is Cardinal Infrastructure. This is a company that's in construction but a lot of their contracts are not bid out. So they're negotiated and they have some exposure tangentially to data centers. It's not the primary part of their business but you get some of that juice which I think is nice. And Hinge Healthcare, this is a virtual PT company. I think that AI is a huge benefit to them in terms of being able to automate and make their operations so much more efficient and it enables them to pass on those cost benefits to the companies that they serve service. So I think these are two higher quality small cap names. Valuation looks pretty reasonable, believe it or not and I think gives you the exposure to the asset class with less risk than just owning it passively and having 40% non earning companies. No thank you.
- [44:35]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Cardinal's chart looks like a data center related kind of chart. Julie, what, what is the primary part of their business?
- [44:42]
Julie Beal
Most of what they're doing is they're building out in the southeast and so they have a lot of relationships with home builders to build out a lot of the infrastructure and they're very vert integrated so you don't have any subcontractors that you have to work with and that's why these larger customers really like working with them. They're able to deliver and deliver really effectively. Some of the business is connected to data centers and so they're getting some of that juice. But most of the business is really kind of the core infrastructure that I think has more earnings stability to it.
- [45:11]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Guy, what do you think?
- [45:12]
Karen Feinerman
Well, it's a sell the news event because they reported this morning the backlog I think was up something like some ridiculous number, 60% from the prior year. So good for for them. But I think she's onto something here. Valuation is obviously stretched, but the growth is there.
- [45:25]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
All right, up next, final trades. Time for the final trade.
- [45:36]
Julie Beal
Julie Beal Bentley is a sophomore name I think can survive the AI deluge.
- [45:42]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Karen yes, we talk about it a
- [45:45]
Guy Adami
bunch on the show.
- [45:46]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Google.
- [45:46]
Guy Adami
This is not a name no one's ever heard of before for sure. But I always come back to this decision. If I own none, would I buy it right here? And the answer is yes, I would.
- [45:55]
Dan Nathan
Dan Nathan Yes, CME the forementioned CME Group the stock acts contrary to what the stock market does. Stock markets rallied 10% over the last month or so. I think CME Group has come back 10% or so.
- [46:06]
Karen Feinerman
Like fun show tonight. We learned about Julie Field, lots of
- [46:11]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
about Julie Beal, all sorts of things
- [46:15]
Karen Feinerman
in SMED too cheap here.
- [46:17]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
All right, thanks for watching Fast Money. See you back here to mark five. Mad Money with Jim Cramer starts right now.
- [46:25]
Julia Boorstin
All opinions expressed by the Fast Money participants are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of CNBC or its 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 the Fast Money 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. To view the full Fast Money disclaimer, please visit cnbc.com fastmoneydisclaimer what made you
- [46:58]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
confident that you could do something that hadn't been done before? I have no fear of failure.
- [47:03]
Julia Boorstin
Trailblazing women, Changing the game One of
- [47:06]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
my favorite pieces of advice Think about
- [47:08]
Angelica Peebles
about what your boss's boss needs.
- [47:11]
Fast Money Host (likely Melissa Lee or main host)
Leadership can look in many, many different forms. It really does come down to just trusting yourself.
- [47:16]
Julie Beal
Life is short and you just got to think big to accomplish big things.
- [47:19]
Julia Boorstin
Julia Boorstin hosts CNBC Changemakers and Power Players. New episodes every Tuesday. Wherever you get your podcasts.