Gearing Up for a Huge Week 7/25/25

Summary

Halftime Report: Gearing Up for a Huge Week (07/25/2025)

Host: Scott Wapner
Guests: Stephanie Link, Jim Laventhal, Jason Snipe, Rob Seachen
Release Date: July 25, 2025
Air Time: Weekdays 12-1 PM ET on CNBC TV

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1. Market Overview and Upcoming Week's Agenda

[01:02] Scott Wapner:
Scott opens the discussion by highlighting the significant events slated for the upcoming week, including a Federal Reserve decision, mega-cap earnings reports from giants like Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, and Apple, as well as the looming tariff deadline. He emphasizes the market's current bullish stance, noting, "Piper Sandler says we believe this bull market still has legs to run until the end of the year."

[02:03] Jim Laventhal:
Jim echoes optimism in the short term, suggesting that earnings will "deliver" and that market momentum remains strong on a weekly basis despite some stretched positioning.

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2. Speculative Trading and Market Volatility

[03:53] Jim Laventhal:
Jim cautions against the "speculative fervor" overtaking parts of the market, particularly meme stocks and high-beta sectors, stating, "The speculative fervor that is starting to overtake markets... is something you should pay attention to."

[03:53] Scott Wapner:
Scott references a Goldman Sachs note, "sharp increases in speculative trading activity historically signal above average near-term returns but poor medium-term prospects," highlighting concerns about potential market drawdowns due to speculative surges.

[04:14] Stephanie Link:
Stephanie balances the concern by pointing out the strong fundamentals, mentioning that 32% of S&P 500 companies have reported better-than-expected revenue and earnings growth. She observes, "The fundamentals on the other parts of the market are really very, very strong."

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3. Earnings Highlights: Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, and Google

Meta Platforms (formerly Facebook):

[05:12] Stephanie Link:
Stephanie anticipates a strong quarter for Meta, praising their AI monetization efforts. She notes, "AI in ads has increased 7% time spent at Facebook and 6% time spent at Instagram and price per ad is up 10%."

[05:43] Jim Laventhal:
Jim commends Meta's diversified product base and management, emphasizing their leadership in AI integration.

Amazon:

[14:25] Jason Snipe:
Jason expresses confidence in Amazon's AWS growth, highlighting its status as the largest player in the cloud market with a $120 billion business. "It's the number one player in the game, and I think you'll see continued growth."

[16:40] Stephanie Link:
She adds that Amazon's profitability is improving, with North American margins expected to reach about 6.5%, and anticipates an acceleration in operational efficiency.

Microsoft:

[10:00] Jim Laventhal:
Jim underscores Microsoft's role in AI advancements, positioning it as a beneficiary of increased capital spending in the tech sector.

Apple:

[17:07] Jim Laventhal:
Jim addresses Apple's premium valuation but remains neutral, focusing on its diversified product offerings and strong management team.

[17:55] Jason Snipe:
Jason emphasizes the need for Apple to enhance its generative AI strategy to sustain earnings revisions, noting, "They need to pull a rabbit out of the hat with regards to generative AI."

Google:

[05:43] Stephanie Link:
Stephanie highlights Google's increased capital expenditure by $10 billion, reinforcing the strength of the AI narrative and future growth prospects.

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4. Federal Reserve Decision and Economic Outlook

[22:20] Rob Seachin:
Rob discusses the President's comments on the Fed, suggesting that any hint of rate cuts beyond September and December might not align with the Fed's current stance. He notes, "The Fed's going to be interesting given the spectacle of yesterday at the Federal Reserve building."

[24:10] Rob Seachin:
Rob scrutinizes the interaction between President Biden and Fed Chair Powell, interpreting Powell's demeanor as resistant to immediate rate cuts.

[25:44] Scott Wapner:
Scott speculates on potential Fed language adjustments, such as considering rate changes if tariff effects remain muted, but remains skeptical about imminent rate cuts.

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5. Trade Negotiations: US-EU Relations

[28:29] Stephanie Link:
Stephanie updates on US-EU trade talks, mentioning European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen's announcement of a meeting in Scotland to discuss transatlantic trade relations before the August 1 tariff deadline. She states, "Maybe we will get a deal in time."

[29:08] Jason Snipe:
Jason highlights the positive impact of reduced trade policy uncertainty, suggesting that companies are more inclined to expand and invest due to growing profits and cheaper capital.

[30:36] Scott Wapner:
Scott ties the improved trade negotiations to IBM's positive outlook, reinforcing the theme of economic resilience.

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6. Sector Spotlight: Materials and Gold Mining

[40:51] Stephanie Link:
Stephanie and Dom Chu delve into the materials sector, particularly gold mining stocks. Newmont Mining and Freeport McMoRan stand out, with Newmont up ~75% year-to-date and Freeport up ~17%. Analysts are bullish, with target prices suggesting substantial upside.

[42:10] Stephanie Link:
She clarifies her position on Freeport, emphasizing its copper revenue, which constitutes 74% of its revenues. She explains, "If copper continues to be strong, that's $200 million in EBITDA per $0.10 per pound change in copper."

[43:02] Scott Wapner:
Scott addresses the lack of gold exposure in their portfolio, prompting a discussion on the role of gold as a hedge.

[43:35] Jason Snipe:
Jason reiterates his position on gold as a hedge against extreme scenarios but doesn't consider it a core investment, emphasizing a strong dollar and continued foreign investment in American assets.

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7. Company Calls of the Day

Gilead Sciences:

[36:09] Scott Wapner:
Needham upgrades Gilead to a buy with a $133 price target, citing positive survey results for their HIV franchise.

[36:31] Jim Laventhal:
Jim supports the upgrade, highlighting Gilead's high-quality and reasonable valuation, "This is a great way to get quality exposure at a reasonable price."

Chipotle Mexican Grill:

[37:16] Stephanie Link:
Stephanie remains cautious about Chipotle, noting the recent earnings miss and questioning the sustainability of its reversal, "I have to figure out if I'm... going to be buying more."

Procter & Gamble (PG):

[39:50] Jason Snipe:
Despite JPMorgan downgrading PG to neutral, Jason continues to hold, pointing to 7 out of 10 categories improving organically and a solid dividend yield.

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8. Additional Highlights

AstraZeneca:

[45:19] Jason Snipe:
Jason sees AstraZeneca as a breakout candidate due to its attractive valuation, diverse product portfolio, and strong pipeline, despite recent underperformance in the healthcare sector.

Qualcomm:

[46:28] Jim Laventhal:
Jim discusses Qualcomm's diversification away from handsets into automotive and IoT, anticipating improved performance in the next quarter.

Las Vegas Sands:

[31:03] Scott Wapner:
Stephanie notes positive earnings from Las Vegas Sands, particularly in Singapore and Macao, and anticipates further market share gains.

Workday:

[32:09] Jim Laventhal:
Jim recommends adding Workday to the portfolio, citing its affordable valuation and critical role in corporate operational efficiency with its AI product suite.

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9. Closing Remarks and Upcoming Events

Scott concludes the episode by touching on sectoral performances, mentioning the strong finish in industrials and materials, and previews the next reporting segment. He emphasizes the importance of staying informed about market movements and upcoming earnings reports.

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Notable Quotes:

• Scott Wapner: "These high beta, very expensive parts of the market is something you should pay attention to." [03:12]

• Stephanie Link: "The fundamentals on the other parts of the market are really very, very strong." [04:23]

• Jason Snipe: "If copper continues to be strong, that's $200 million in EBITDA per $0.10 per pound change in copper." [42:15]

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Conclusion

The episode of Halftime Report provides a comprehensive analysis of the current market landscape, emphasizing the balance between strong earnings fundamentals and the potential risks posed by speculative trading activities. Key highlights include optimistic forecasts for major tech companies, cautious optimism regarding the Federal Reserve's policy decisions, ongoing positive developments in US-EU trade negotiations, and lucrative opportunities within the materials sector, particularly in gold and copper mining. The discussion underscores the importance of diversified investments and staying vigilant about market trends to navigate the forthcoming busy trading week effectively.

Transcript

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[Scott Wapner]

I'm Scott Wapner and you're listening to CNBC's Halftime Report, the podcast the most profitable hour of the trading day. We record this live weekdays at 12 Eastern. Listen in. All right, guys, thanks so much. Welcome to the Halftime Report. I'm Scott Wapner, front and center this hour, gearing up for that huge week ahead that Carl and Sarah were just talking about. A Fed decision, more mega cap earnings tariff deadline on more than that too. We're trade all of it with the investment committee. Joining me for the hour today, Stephanie Link, Jim Laventhal, Jason Snipe, Rob Seachen, S and P, Nasdaq, they are at record highs and they are extending those gains yet again today. Rob, it's good to have you back. We do have a very big week on tap. We'll show you the calendar. Piper Sandler says we believe this bull market still has legs to run until the end of the year. Has to get over if it's going to run, it has to get over some hurdles next week. All right, the Fed decision, Metta, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, the tariff deadline job and who knows what else we think.

[Jim Laventhal]

I think in the short run earnings are absolutely going to deliver. I think you're going to see that. I also think positioning is in stretched and so there's room to run momentum while it's breaking on a daily basis, still pretty strong on a weekly basis. So I think at least in the short run we can see some positive momentum continue. Intermediate term, it gets a little a little more scary because of valuations. But you know, that's a terrible timing tool. There's no way to gauge that when.

[Scott Wapner]

It'S a terrible investing tool. Also, forget about the timing I mean, depending on what, right? If they look rich now, maybe. But if growth is going to be better than people thought, maybe not.

[Jim Laventhal]

Careful of new paradigms. Scott, you know, these are things that I think you have to pay attention to and you can get growth at a reasonable price while still paying attention to valuation. I just think that the speculative fervor that is starting to overtake markets meme stocks in in very expensive parts of the market is something you should pay.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay, I'm glad you bring that up because there's a note that I have here on my phone that's making the rounds within the last 30 minutes or so. Okay. It's from Goldman Sachs trading desk in which they say sharp increases in speculative trading activity historically signal above average near term equ returns but poor medium term prospects. That's according again to Goldman Sachs. When such trading surges occur, they say they typically bring slightly higher near term volatility and often lead to eventual market drawdowns. The pattern has been especially pronounced during the recent period. That's what Rob Steph, let me add.

[Jim Laventhal]

To that really mean stocks. It's high beta, it's unprofitable, low quality, unprofitable Tech ark. Nothing again but ark is a sign of speculative fervor. Meme coins. These are all things that are up 50 to 100% since the April lows. 50 to 100%.

[Scott Wapner]

Is this like a point of worry at this point? Because there's been a lot of speculative stuff that's gone up a bunch.

[Stephanie Link]

There's no question. I worry about it a lot and my eyes are on it every day. All of us are watching it. But I come back to 32% of the companies in the S&P 500 have reported so far. And it's broad based. It's 5% total revenue growth. It's 8% earnings growth. That's better than expected. The economy is still growing so I'm not whistling past the graveyard on the meme stuff but the fundamentals on the other parts of the market are really very, very strong. And as I mentioned, it is very broad based. And I think next week the most important thing Scott, it will be the tech earnings because Metta, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple is 19% of the S&P5 and so it will mean something. Now Google, we learn so much from Google. Advertising is strong. Congrats to you on the Google.

[Jason Snipe]

Very kind of you and I thank.

[Stephanie Link]

You too and maybe even you, but I'm the only one that doesn't own the Google. But that's okay. I own Meta and I own Amazon. But we learned that advertising is quite strong. We learned that cloud accelerated. I think that Meta is going to have a great quarter because they're the ones that are monetizing AI the best. But what I was most impressed about is that we saw that Google increased their capex and capex by $10 billion. So the AI story is still alive and well. And that just goes back to. That's not, that's not me.

[Scott Wapner]

Let's, let's not.

[Stephanie Link]

That's fundamental.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay, let's not, let's not go quite into all that yet. The feeling I get from this conversation is that there's a chair and three legs of the chair are really strong. The earnings, the economy, the consumer, the outlook, whatever, one leg has some cracks in it. That's the meme stocks, that's the momentum stuff, that's the low quality stuff, that's the high beta stuff and everything is fine. Assuming that leg doesn't break off the chair because then you don't know where you're going to fall. Are we at that place?

[Jason Snipe]

I'm not worried about that leg breaking off. I think we're all watching it. It's good to talk about it, but I'm not worried that if it breaks off that somehow it's going to take the market with.

[Scott Wapner]

But that's what the crux of this note is about. Yeah, that it often leads to market drawdowns when, that, when you have a, you know, this high fervor, highly speculative environment and when that has a problem, inevitably it causes the market to have a bit of a problem. Not like a massive problem. But yeah, if you're going to get a big drawdown in those kinds of names that have put the extra fuel on this barbecue. You're not worried about that at all?

[Jason Snipe]

Yeah, I'm not sure that I'm going to use the three legged stool analogy because simply the other legs are so darn small.

[Scott Wapner]

That's good because I used a four legged chair. So why would you use a stool if I already used the chair? Stay with me. Stay with me.

[Stephanie Link]

Okay.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay.

[Rob Seachin]

All right.

[Jason Snipe]

Even better. You can take a four legged chair and make it a three legged stool and it still keeps everybody upright.

[Scott Wapner]

You want to use like a six legged something? Stay with me.

[Jason Snipe]

Okay. You know what I mean?

[Unknown]

You ruin it.

[Jason Snipe]

You know what I like, Scott? I'm not ruining it. I like pretty pictures. And you know what are some pretty pictures right now are the pictures of earnings revisions on stocks that have already reported. So I don't care if it's Alphabet, I don't care if it's Delta Airlines, Citigroup. When you look at what analysts are doing to the revisions of these earnings going forward, they're hooking up. And that's something that can support the stock stock market over the long run and power you through whatever may happen with the meme stocks, which I don't think anybody on the desk here is participating.

[Scott Wapner]

No, but the, the, well, some people have participated in some of the names that have gone up in such outsized and hyperbolic parabolic looking, looking ways. And by the way, as part of this Goldman note, Jason, they say the indicator about speculative trading now sits at its highest level on record outside of 98 to 01 and 2020 to 2021.

[Unknown]

Yeah. And you know, I don't play in that sandbox, but I respect the point and I understand, you know what, what potentially is the outcome of some of this trading activity in the speculative names you might play.

[Scott Wapner]

See, I want to make sure we're clear on this. Okay. I am not specifically talking, nor are they just simply talking about so called meme stocks.

[Unknown]

Right.

[Scott Wapner]

There are many widely held names and love names within the high beta ETF for sure. Or things that have very high valuation that are obviously good companies. I don't need to go down like Palantir, things like that.

[Stephanie Link]

Yep.

[Scott Wapner]

So let's not act like App lovin. Let's not act like oh, I don't own any of that.

[Rob Seachin]

Right, right, right, right.

[Scott Wapner]

Stops.

[Unknown]

I agree, I agree.

[Scott Wapner]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

And I, and I think to Steph's point, what I'm more focused on is the breath. Breath has been positive. You're Talking about an 80% beat rate, you know, for the 30% plus percent names that have reported. Next week is super bowl week which you already just described, where we have another third of the S and P reporting. Right.

[Scott Wapner]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

And for me, I agree. I think the tech names are going to be extremely important. We got four of the seven hitting the, hitting the tape next week. Metta, Amazon, Microsoft. Right. So and I think those numbers, Apple and I think those numbers are going to be positive and because of the read through we saw from Google with all the levers that they had to pull and kind of the concern going in to, to, to the print and how much these names have run, you've seen them deliver. So I think we'll see more of that next week.

[Scott Wapner]

The B of A flow show today says you've got risk on until bond yields in the US go above 5.1%. You could take a look at the curve. They're not that far away, right? They're not that far away. I mean, you can look at what's happening, in other words, bond markets around the world. But yields have been creeping up of late. There's no doubt about that. Could we show a whole look, guys, aboard of all of the curve? Yeah, there you go. I mean, you're 494 on the 3440. We'll see what the Fed does next week too, by the way, and we'll get to that later. But if there's one thing we learned this week, and Steph really hit the nail on the head, is that these companies, Rob, are spending and spending and spending and they don't really care about the return on the investment today. The question is, is it going to come tomorrow? You're buying. You're buying that dream. You are. You own Microsoft. You're buying that dream. Wedbush $600 target. They maintain outperform. Dan Ives calling that stock the Scotty Scheffler of software. For those of you who are not golf golfers, that guy's good. He's like. I'm not saying he's Tiger, but he's like crushing everybody these days. So that gives you an indicator, Rob.

[Jim Laventhal]

We would use, you and I, Scott, the Michael Jordan or Steph Curry of this space. And it's hard to argue that they're not the highest quality technology company in the world. But stock's not cheap. We own it. We are neutral to Microsoft. It's been something that we've episodic. Episodically trimmed, regrettably. Diversified management, diversified product base, great management team. This a company that is firing on all cylinders. They will be a beneficiary of everything that is happening. As will matter who's arguably been the largest player to be able to monetize AI at this point. So I just think you're going to continue to see enormous cap spending which supports the semis, the Broadcoms, the Nvidia is all those, all those types of business that I know Steph and I have been investing in and talking about on the show this year. And I don't see any slowdown for that. That said, just to bring it back to the speculative fervor. Okay, just for one second, make it a second train.

[Scott Wapner]

It's left that station now.

[Jim Laventhal]

You, you need to be able to say that forward returns are coming in. You can already see with each earnings beat there's less and less upside side with that beat and why? It's because that relative positioning people are all in, not institutions. Individual investors are all in on the speculation. And so forward returns draw back a little bit. I think these businesses which are very large part of the market, which drive the market, are firing on all cylinders. So they're not going to be the ones that are completely impacted. You might have ebbs and flows, but this is a long term story that remains intact.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay, that was about 70 quick seconds, but neither here nor there. Now we're going to move and we're going to talk about meta because of the spend. Steph, the CapEx guide is 64 to 72 billion. That's up 83% year on year. Those numbers don't mean much to people other than wow, that's big. And they continue to grow and you don't care as the shareholder. I had someone say this week, I think it was maybe it was Ives who said the spending is actually bullish, not a negative on any of these companies. Do you feel that way?

[Stephanie Link]

Yeah, it's going to fuel future growth. Absolutely. By the way, 70 billion if they spend this year, their free cash flow is 34 billion after that. Right. So they have so much free cash flow and they have monetized AI. AI in ads has increased 7% time spent at Facebook and 6% time spent at Instagram and price per ad is up 10%. So I expect to see very strong results there. Improving results. I like that he's being really aggressive on buying people people and getting more talent in Zuckerberg. Yeah, I do. I really like that a lot. So I think they're going to be this. I think the quarter is going to be great. The biggest question is the overall expense guide. Right. That's the thing. We don't want that to go higher in terms of the, the opex piece. So that's the thing I'm going to be watching. But I think this is going to be great. I really do. And I don't think it's expensive. At 18 times EBITDA trades in line with this historical average.

[Scott Wapner]

How do we feel about Amazon which got maintained by today to 65 monas, Krespie and Hart, everybody on the desk like Mr. Snipe owns this name. Are we optimistic going in?

[Unknown]

So I think as it relates to Amazon, I think for the couple things for me, one, the consumer is obviously hung in there, which I think is a unique positive for them. Prime Day, which is not Prime Day anymore, it's Prime Week, will not be in the numbers. But it was positive and I think that's a good number for the stock going forward.

[Scott Wapner]

No, but you're talking about things that are not at the heart of what this company about to get into. But you're bearing the lead. Everybody wants to know where AWS growth is. What are you willing to pay for the whatever level of growth that aws. That's the whole story.

[Unknown]

It is the whole story. And it's the largest player in the marketplace, obviously, on cloud, it was up 17% last last quarter. I think you'll see us similar number. It's $120 billion business.

[Rob Seachin]

Right.

[Unknown]

So. And you're seeing, I mean, Google Cloud was up a lot. Azure was up a lot. I think this is the number one player in the game, and I think you'll see continued growth.

[Scott Wapner]

You could talk about them from a marketplace standpoint, but they'll tell you, well, we want to be what we were in retail to AI. Yeah, they want to be an AI marketplace.

[Jason Snipe]

Look at Amazon Web Services is very big. I think we have to be realistic that the growth rate in Amazon Web Services a year or two years ago may not be the same today, simply because it's big. That doesn't mean that it's. That it's doing poorly. I mean, one of the things that worked with Alphabet this week is that their Google Web Services is smaller, so the growth rates look bigger. I, by no means am throwing shade at Amazon. I think it's going to be a very good quarter. I actually wouldn't give, you know, I wouldn't pass on the idea that the overall consumer business actually powers them as well. And I'm happy that we're not talking about that.

[Scott Wapner]

Yeah, I know, but you're not going to pay. You're not paying the multiple multiple. You're paying for the consumer business as the multiple gets bigger.

[Jason Snipe]

This is a good discussion. This is a good discussion. I don't think it's as expensive as we used to talk about Amazon.

[Scott Wapner]

I didn't say it's expensive. I didn't say it's expensive. You're not paying 29 times for buying your shaving cream on. On Amazon profitability.

[Jason Snipe]

Here's what I'm saying to you is I get your point. I do. I think actually that maybe the consumer business is underrepresented 37 times forward, by.

[Stephanie Link]

The way, but it's 14 times EBITDA.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay.

[Stephanie Link]

Versus 18 times historical. And I would argue North America. Maybe you don't want to pay that kind of a multiple just for that. But the profitability is improving. It's you're going to see margins improve in North America to be about six and a half percent. That's what people want. They want them to be more profitable. And us, they had supply chain issues in the last couple of years quarters and they're actually going to lapse those and that actually is very easy comparison. So I actually think there's a chance you could see an acceleration simple story.

[Jim Laventhal]

It's, it's a story of operational leverage which you talked about and exposure to two secular growth areas. That's, that's the story. And the operational leverage that comes from everything that stuff's talking about is what investors are going to pay attention to. Do you get operating leverage from your business as you continue to, to scale and they are getting more efficient. No question.

[Scott Wapner]

The bar maybe for everybody is high. I don't know how high the bar is for Apple at this point coming into this particular quarter because these particular numbers. Well, because we're waiting for more action if you want to use that word on what their AI strategy truly is going to look like. Needham is cautious into the earnings. They must articulate a Gen AI action plan, says Needham. Jim, Jason, Rob, you own the stock.

[Jason Snipe]

Jim, I'll just make this quick. I talked about pretty pictures in the, in the start of this a block. But I'll tell you what, the picture of earnings revisions for Apple is not a pretty picture. They need to turn it around. I mean in the proverbial sense they need to pull a rabbit out of the hat. Was that Dan Ives you were just quoting whoever you were quoting? That's exactly right. They need to pull something out of the hat with regards to generative AI and get these earnings revisions going higher. They're going down right now. That needs, needs to turn around at the multiple that we see on Apple.

[Scott Wapner]

We optimistic now. What's the story?

[Jim Laventhal]

It's a name that we're underweight right now. We trimmed it earlier this year because of premium valuation relative to their growth rate, a lackluster product refresh cycle. And the fact that you know that we own it at all is because the gains we have and the management team is hard to bet against. Really hard to bet against.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay, okay. Let's talk about IBM. It's the AI story. We bring it up because Steph owns the name. We haven't heard from her yet this week. It's been a tough week for that stock. As you know off the their guide and the CEO says Arvind Krishna said the other day, I quoted this the other day. I'll quote it again because I think it's meaningful for how CEOs think about the current environment and where they think the future is going to lead. Quote, I've turned from being, I used the word cautious optimism at the end of the first quarter. I would now turn my way, all the way to optimism around the macro environment. Stephanie Ling heard that and she's like okay, well I'm going to buy more of IBM because I believe him and I believe the story at one point.

[Stephanie Link]

It was down 10% yesterday, Scott, that's ridiculous. Very, very high expectations. Headed into the print it was up 18% in the past year, up 42%. And Arvind did deliver on the growth on the turnaround because he had total revenue growth of 18%, earnings growth of 15%, operating margins up 320 basis points, gross margins of 230 basis points. Free cash flow grew 9%. Consulting was fine and better than Accenture. And I've said that I think they're taking share. I absolutely think that's the case. Infrastructure helped by Mainframe. I know people don't pay for that as much as because it's a very cyclical business, but still up 12% in infrastructure. It was software that decelerated that people were nervous about. But I look at Red Hat and I look at the double digit bookings that they have and the fact that it accelerated a 12% growth. I'm not alarmed at all at the software slowing down from six to three and a half percent. I think down 10% was a gift. I think this is going to be much higher a year from now.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay, you mentioned infrastructure. That's been a key point part of the story from certainly a industrial standpoint. You could check out CNBC Pro for this. But I'll just give you the headlines here. It's the best sector, not tech industrials best sector because of its trade deals, its power surge. We're up 16% on industrials because of stocks like Stephanie's GE Vernova which is up almost 90% this year. It's the second best performer in the S&P up 14% on Wednesday after they beat Johnson Controls. Quanta Services have been all time highs this week too. You own both GEV and Quantum Services do.

[Stephanie Link]

And Eaton and Rockwell and Vertiv all of the same theme. So I'm very exposed to this electrification we are going to have. It's going to be decades. This is a decade long thing. $4 trillion is going to be spent between now and 2025. GE Vernova was really quite good. I mean, record backlog. It's booked a bill over 1.3 times. They're talking about power organic growth going forward for the full year, 6 to 7%. But that electrification organic growth at this size of a company at 20%, that is enormous. It bodes well for all of the stock, the stocks that I just mentioned and then some.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay, now we'll end with what is going to be at the end of, well, the mid midweek and then the end. We got a Fed meeting, got the tariff deadline. You got a jobs report. The Fed's going to be interesting given the spectacle of yesterday at the Federal Reserve building in Washington, D.C. which Steve Liesman watched very closely along with everybody else. He joins us now. And then the commentary, Steve, that we got from the president this morning of his conversation with Jay Powell in the hard hat yesterday, in which the president this morning said that he got the impression from the Fed chair that he might be ready to lower rates. Now, I don't know if next week's going to be live or not, but you know, who wants it to be?

[Rob Seachin]

Well, it's always live, Scott.

[Scott Wapner]

Yeah, but you know what I mean.

[Rob Seachin]

I think the President. Yeah, I know what you mean. I think the president might be reading a little bit into some gestures by the chair. I don't I remember there was one who said if you lower rates and the chair laughed. I wouldn't say a lap is necessary necessarily an agreement. I don't think the Fed's going to lower rates next week. The market doesn't think that there's a 2.6% probability which, you know, maybe Jim Leventhal wants to take a flyer on that on a Friday afternoon, I don't know. But that's where at 3%. But more confidence in September and that's where it's kind of been, Scott, September and December both out there as likely rate cuts. The committee have said two cuts this year. There's seven who don't want to cut at all. There's nine who want to cut at least one or more or 12 want to cut at least one or more. So that's where we're at right now. I don't think the Fed chair is going to knuckle under anything. And I think the temperature, by the way, after that meeting, judged by statements from the Fed and the president, is a little bit cooler today on the Fire Powell front.

[Scott Wapner]

Well, we'll see what happens next week once if you're correct and the market is because it's not Betting on anything next week when he doesn't cut rates, what the reaction from the White House is going to be. I thought it was interesting, to say the least, yesterday where the Fed chair was almost fact checking the President in real time as they were standing next to each other. It's just an extraordinary set of events and pictures like the one you're seeing here of these men in hard hats. There's the senator next to them, of course. I mean, what'd you make of the whole, the whole thing, Steve? I mean, I don't even, I don't know, man.

[Rob Seachin]

If you could, if you could go back. I'm still wondering and trying to report why Tim Scott was not wearing a hard hat. I don't know. Did nobody care about the Senator? I was a little concerned about that particular aspect of it all. Everybody else is a hard hat. I'm not the Secret Service guy and not Tim Scott. So I'm worried about that. Look, it was bizarre, Scott. There was only one reason for it. It was a showpiece. It was to get there, to ratchet up the heat on the chair. What's interesting about it though is you come in with this idea, we're going to raise the temperature and you walk away with a temperature cooler. Maybe it was that moment that Powell Factor checked him and said, no, Mr. President, you're wrong. He was all orchestrated, right? He put on a thing and said it's 3.1 billion. And the chair said what? I never heard that. And it was in the Fed documents. What they were talking about was a building back in 2021 that was finished then. So probably is, probably should not be in the total if you want to have a conversation about the controversy. But Scott, maybe more importantly is this what could happen next week is the Fed could throw a little language in there that says, hey, if this, I don't know exactly the wording, but if this tariff effect ends up or continues to be muted the way it's been, you know, the committee might consider adjustments to the funds rate or something along those lines, make some positive comments about the drift of inflation. So of course I don't think that satisfies a president who wants a 1% funds rate, but it might, you know, keep the committee together and point the market to the idea that it's correct about forecasting those September rate cuts.

[Scott Wapner]

Going to be fun to watch the whole thing unfold next week, in which I presume you will be in the room. As always, Steve Liesman. Thank you. Good weekend to you. We'll see much of you.

[Rob Seachin]

Have a great weekend. Yeah, thanks as well.

[Scott Wapner]

All right, up next, more committee moves. Steph and Rob have more to document for you and we'll do that in.

[Stephanie Link]

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[Scott Wapner]

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[Jason Snipe]

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[Scott Wapner]

C Sales Associate for d details on.

[Edward Jones]

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[Rob Seachin]

Welcome back.

[Scott Wapner]

We do have some fresh trade headlines to get to. Mega Casella in DC has that for us. What are we learning here?

[Stephanie Link]

Hey Scott, it's good news for U S EU trade talks, potentially. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen just posting in the last few minutes on social media saying following a good call with President Trump, we have agreed to meet in Scotland on Sunday to discuss transatlantic trade relations and how we can keep them strong. So Scott, this comes as the two sides are trying to negotiate a deal. We know both sides really want to get a deal done by next Friday, August 1, before those threatened 30% tariffs would take effect. And this tweet comes as one the president is on his way to Scotland right now for what is primarily a golf trip over this weekend, though he's also meeting with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer while he's there talking trade with him as well.

[Edward Jones]

And it comes after the president this.

[Stephanie Link]

Morning said he saw maybe a 50 50, maybe a slightly less than 50, 50 chance that the US would be able to strike a deal with the EU by next Friday. He also said the EU would have to buy down their tariffs. Some interesting language there suggesting there will have some investment in the US in exchange for him agreeing to lower that 30% tariff rate from the level where it's threatened to be right now. So now we know they'll meet on Sunday. Maybe we will get a deal in time.

[Scott Wapner]

Scott all right, you'll let us know, Megan. Thanks. Megan casella, Market likes any bit of incremental positive, obviously on this, which makes it even harder to be negative ahead of any perceived trade deals before the deadline of the first. Right.

[Jason Snipe]

The economy has been incredibly resilient for quite some time, but especially since the April 2nd Liberation Day announcement. It's surprised a lot of people, but it was not going to continue forever. I'm talking about the economic resiliency. We needed trade policy uncertainty to, to decline and we're getting that in spades. I mean, we're getting a lot of decrease in trade policy uncertainty. Companies now are figuring out where to expand, where to hire, where to build plants, and they're going to do it because profits are growing and regardless of what the Fed does, capital is cheap. They're going to expand.

[Scott Wapner]

Well, look, go right back to what I read from Arvind Christian of IBM. Yeah, that quote kind of says it all from fog to dissipating fog. Now you can actually have some visibility as a corporate leader.

[Jason Snipe]

And I'll add to it, we've already said it. But you know, the capex spend from the hyperscalers, let's add one little detail to that. There's a lot of international, international air build out going on. Think about what's going on in the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Europe is going to catch up with this. There's there's an international flavor to this as well.

[Stephanie Link]

You're also seeing consumer sentiment starting to improve as well. And that's important in addition to business sentiment because you're getting a little bit more of the unknowns to be known, period.

[Scott Wapner]

All right, so let's go on that theme a little bit. We'll segue to some moves, but we'll take your buying more of Las Vegas sand. Yeah.

[Stephanie Link]

The stock is actually flat year to date and the expectations are really low for the earnings, but they were actually quite good. Singapore is on fire for them. That's about 40% of their revenues. And it was. It beat expectations by 44% and Macao was less bad and actually the margins were actually better. So that's much more of the business. That's 60% of the revenues. And so that's what we're rooting for. But interestingly enough, the capex was $400 million shareholders lower than expectations. And that tells me that they're getting to the end of the renovation cycle in Macao and that's what we need because they've been losing market share. And I think that is going to be the story for the second half of this year into next.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay, Robert, a new buy. We'll do that first. It is Workday. Tell me more.

[Jim Laventhal]

Yeah. Not the most exciting company, despite their great commercials that we all know. Right. They. You are a rock star.

[Scott Wapner]

Workday.

[Jason Snipe]

All rock stars.

[Scott Wapner]

Right.

[Jim Laventhal]

But it's cheap. It trades at a 20% discount to its peers. It's down about 7% year to date. They're obviously an HR management business, but they've got a great AI product suite. And what we're excited about is as corporations focus on operational efficiency and driving more productivity, they're going to be critical in that environment. And their product suite has proven that to be the case. So we like it.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay. You added more to energy.

[Jim Laventhal]

We did. This is one. We took a little gains last year. You remember in January on the show bought energy cheaply. This is a company that has half the debt of its industry peers. We're a big believer in this power production theme as it relates to AI. And this is a high quality producer with a diversified platform and a tilt towards natural gas. And so we bought some more. It's no longer cheap at 20 times. We talked about that on the show last time. What is cheap for utility? I think the playbook may have been thrown out there in this current world.

[Scott Wapner]

You sold TPL Texas Pacific Land.

[Jim Laventhal]

Not that it's a bad business. It's a tax loss. We have very little of those. This is something we bought. Short term tax loss still is still a great company we with but with declining rig counts in a range bound oil price, it's not something we think there's a lot of near term opportunity.

[Scott Wapner]

And you trim some KLA core.

[Jim Laventhal]

Why this is a valuation call. It's been a great performer for us. I think it's up like 45, 50% year to date at 27 times. It's no longer, no longer cheap and so we're just resizing the position.

[Scott Wapner]

All right. We'll get the headlines now with Julia Boorstin, ajb.

[Edward Jones]

Hey Scott, thanks so much. Latest here is that Israel will let foreign countries drop aid into Gaza starting today. That's according to an Israeli army radio. In May, Israel lifted its aid blockade, but it placed restrictions for access that it said is necessary to keep militant.

[Stephanie Link]

Groups from taking the aid.

[Edward Jones]

The Israeli military has yet to respond. Lori Valo Debel, dubbed the Doomsday mom, said to be sentenced today in her.

[Stephanie Link]

Murder conspiracy trial in Arizona.

[Edward Jones]

In April, Valo Debel was found guilty of conspiring to kill her fourth husband and the now ex husband of her niece in 2019. Valo Debel is currently serving life sentences in Idaho for the deaths of her two youngest children and her current husband's first wife. And Meta says it will stop political advertising on its platform in the EU starting in October. The social media company said today that it made the decision because of the EU's new rules on political ads designed to increase transparency in election campaigns. Met his announcement follows a similar decision.

[Stephanie Link]

Google made in November.

[Edward Jones]

Back over to you.

[Scott Wapner]

All right, Julia, thank you. That's Julie Borson. Up next, calls of the day, including a big upgrade for a health care stock. Rob just added more to it. We'll tell you the call. We'll tell you why he added more as well. Dow's good for 100. We're back after that. This.

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All lowercase.

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Go to shopify.compodcastfree to upgrade your selling today. All right, we're back.

[Scott Wapner]

Let's do some calls. The first one's Needham. They upgraded Gilead today to a buy. 133 is the price target. They like a positive survey that they got for one of their drugs. 70% of Gilead's revenue comes from the HIV franchise. So it was related to that. Rob Secchin owns that name and you bought more. Correct.

[Jim Laventhal]

It's up a good bit year to date, up like 28%. Still trades cheap. Very high quality company with a reasonable valuation. I think that that change is just further success in that platform in which they're starting to dominate. And so this is a great way to get quality exposure at a reasonable price.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay, let's talk about Chipotle. It's been a brutal week. We know that. Coming off the worst day in like eight years. It was reiterated by today at Truist. That's after the earnings. The same store sales miss is what totally upset the market. They think that it creates a strong buying opportunity. Now, Stephanie Link didn't buy more, so maybe you disagree.

[Stephanie Link]

I don't know. I'm kind of thinking about it, to be honest with you. It really wasn't a good quarter. There was really very little that I could say was positive. The only thing I can say is that they said June saw positive comps versus the quarter which had negative comps and that your two year stack is running 7 to 8% on comps. So you have to kind of smooth it out. They have easy comps going forward. That should help and new products. But this is going to take some time. So I have to figure out if I'm, if I want to be that patient because I think it's going to take more than just two quarters to see this stock reverse.

[Scott Wapner]

Let me ask you this, and I mean this with no disrespect whatsoever to the current CEO at all. How much of the prior performance was due to Brian Niccol? How much of what we're witnessing now has nothing to do with anything other than he left it a good time to leave and maybe the fundamentals were rolling a little bit on some of what this company had going on.

[Stephanie Link]

That's entirely possible. But he hasn't, you know, really done much with Starbucks. This is Brian Niccol. I mean, not yet.

[Scott Wapner]

That's a lift in its own right.

[Stephanie Link]

That's a big Big. Big was a lift.

[Scott Wapner]

Was a lift when he got there.

[Stephanie Link]

I mean, if you look at the chart, and I don't really look at charts all that often, but if you look at the chart, it was rolling over just before Brian Nicholl actually left. So, yeah, trends were softening. But I do think that this company is best in class in terms of products, and that's what they do well. And. And Boatwright is very, very good at kind of the systems and digital and the operational part of things because he was the coo. So I think it's a transition. There's no question. I think there's a soft macro. Consumer was really mixed in April, and.

[Scott Wapner]

Maybe there's more competition. Isn't there like things like, I don't know, Shack and Kava and whatever else?

[Stephanie Link]

There is more competition, but I think they can handle it. And I can think that they hold their own with regards to products. I really do think a big part of it was the macro. Think about what was going on in April and May of this year on the consumer front. We had terrible consumer sentiment numbers and confidence numbers. Everyone was freaked out over tariffs. So, you know, they've got, as I say, easy comparison second half of the year. And then you have this whole new product story. So, you know, it's down a lot. It's down a lot. I don't want to sell it down here. Okay. I'm not sure I'm going to be buying more.

[Scott Wapner]

All right. Jason said quickly on Proctor, which got downgraded to neutral from jpm. I thought the commentary on this note was specifically negative, really negative. We expect another lackluster quarter and normalization of category growth. Lower income consumers in developed markets are more cautious and PG is more dependent on DM than M. What do you think about that?

[Unknown]

Yeah, it's an interesting call. I mean, guess what I mean. 1% revenue growth and 2% earnings growth is not exactly lighting anybody's hair on fire. It is a multinational. The dollar is weakening. So I think that could be a plus. You know, a 2.7% yield I think is positive as well. 7 out of 10 of their categories are improving organically. So I still continue to hold this one. We'll see how the quarter comes in and the proceeding the quarter's pros.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay, we'll take a quick break straight ahead. We do have a secular sector, Scotty Scheffler sector, a sector spotlight on materials and what is working specifically in that space. We got your playbook next. We're back. We're taking a Look at the materials sector. One of the best performers this month are Dom Chu, standing by with a look at one standout group within that sector. Dom? Yes, that's the glittering one, Scott. It's gold, up 26% so far this.

[Stephanie Link]

Year, hitting record territory for the yellow metal.

[Scott Wapner]

Now today in sector nomics, we're reporting.

[Stephanie Link]

On the gold mining stocks in the.

[Scott Wapner]

S and P materials sector. That sector, by the way, is up 8% so far this year. And the two key mining players in the material sector are both Newmont Mining, the best stock in the sector, by the way. So far this year it's up about.

[Stephanie Link]

75%, hitting a new high on Wednesday.

[Scott Wapner]

There's also Freeport McMoRan, which ranks fifth.

[Stephanie Link]

Or so out of the 26 stocks in the entire sector. It's up roughly 17% on a year to date basis.

[Scott Wapner]

Now, both stocks clearly are outperforming the overall sector and the broader market. The Gold Mining ETF, the ticker GDX is up roughly 58% on that year to date basis as well.

[Stephanie Link]

The analysts are pretty bullish on both of these miners. According to data from FactSet on Newmont.

[Scott Wapner]

18 say buy, 19 analysts say hold, and just one says sell it. Their average target price is 7% off where the stock stands currently. And for Freeport McMoRan, 14 analysts counted by them are buy rated 18 holds and no sells. The average target price there is about $52 and change.

[Stephanie Link]

That's 17% higher than where the stock stands today. So the gold miners, all that glitters.

[Scott Wapner]

Is not always, but in this year, Scott, it is gold. I'll send things back over to you, Dom. Thank you very much. Dom Chu. Stephanie Link. You own Freeport.

[Stephanie Link]

I do. It's not a gold play, though. Really?

[Scott Wapner]

No, not at all.

[Stephanie Link]

Right. It's 74% of their revenues is copper.

[Scott Wapner]

Copper.

[Stephanie Link]

But they do have gold and some molybdenum exposure. They had a good quarter. They actually beat on copper and gold and they actually guided higher on copper for the second half of the year, 10% higher. And that has margin implications that are pretty positive. So I like copper. I like copper a heck of a lot better than oil. In fact, I don't really own that much oil anymore. And I would be adding to this one for every $0.10 per pound change in copper at Freeport, that's $200 million in EBITDA. So you can see the leverage there. If copper continues to be strong. It's up 25% year to date.

[Scott Wapner]

No gold exposure, Rob? No. Why not?

[Jim Laventhal]

An Asset that has a yield, not really an asset that. That we believed in or ever invested.

[Scott Wapner]

In, either an equity related to it or the precious metal itself.

[Jason Snipe]

Jimmy, obviously we've missed this. Not in it would look at it here as a hedge. Not particularly as it's going higher on an absolute basis, but if you have a doomsday scenario that American exceptionalism is over, that the dollar is going to continue to decline, that inflation or stagflation is going to rear its ugly head, then gold is the place to be. That's not my base case. It's not. And as a firm, we continue to look at this, but we haven't pulled the trigger on it. If we did, it would only be a hedge.

[Jim Laventhal]

Gold is a hedge against unexpected inflation and catastrophic geopolitical events.

[Rob Seachin]

Sure.

[Scott Wapner]

But he also threw the fact that the dollar has been declining and that he doesn't expect that to continue. Whereas I thought it was really interesting of all the things that the President said this morning on his way out the door to Scotland was talking about the weak dollar as being an asset in his mind. And it didn't sound like he wanted that to change.

[Jason Snipe]

It's a problem. I don't like that. And you're absolutely right, and it bothers me. There are a lot of policies that I do agree with. That's not one that I agree with. I'm a strong dollar policy advocate. I think it's reflective of American exceptionalism. I do think that's what's eventually going to. To come through is that people want to be in American assets. In the first part of this year, there was outflow that has certainly stabilized. We see that in the treasury flows. And I think that we're going to see treasury flows continue to show foreigners buying American assets and not just treasury stocks as well. I think the dollar will go higher. Look, the President has his policy. It helps for exports. I get it. But you know what? I think that's mispronounced placed. I think you can have a strong dollar and a strong economy, including reducing the trade deficit.

[Scott Wapner]

All right, we'll do the setup next. All right. The mega caps are obviously going to take the opportunity Oxygen next week, but there are some other important companies that are reporting. AstraZeneca is Tuesday before the Bill Bell Asian. Jimmy, that's you.

[Jason Snipe]

AstraZeneca just one of many pharmaceutical stocks that have not really done well. The health care sector hasn't done well. I do think that there's a lot of room for AstraZeneca to break out because last year There was a China inquiry into their business business practices that I think they're putting behind them. Very attractively valued broad based product portfolio and strong pipeline.

[Scott Wapner]

All right, Qualcomm, Wednesday, I want to make sure we get to this because I got three people who own the stock and I really want to hear the kind of song you all are going to sing about this one which is so dramatically underperforming. What's up, Jason Snipe?

[Jim Laventhal]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

So clearly they're not taking, they're not in the upswing of the semi Tree. They're only up 3% year to date. So but here's the story with Qualcomm. It's always been over the last few years a diversification story, Right? Diversifying away from the handset game. So last quarter Handsets were up 12%, but automotive was up 59% and IoT was up 27%. There was also some concern going into the quarter about tariffs. We've talked about in the show today about how companies and management teams are managing through that. I think this will be a better quarter for them, this one.

[Scott Wapner]

All right, we shall see. We'll come back to you on that finals next. Head into the weekend on a high note. The markets certainly are acting that way now as the S and P and Nasdaq extend their gains. Some positive trade headlines leading us that way. Closing bell today, Tom Lee, Cameron Dawson, Mohamed El Erian. So we're going to have a good finish to this week. Rob Seachin, your final trades.

[Jim Laventhal]

What Gilead we took, we talked about it earlier.

[Scott Wapner]

Okay.

[Unknown]

Jason Snipe, Blackstone, really strong quarter farmer.

[Jason Snipe]

Jim Disney ready to break out a consolidation.

[Scott Wapner]

All right.

[Stephanie Link]

And Stephanie link by the 5% dip in visa.

[Scott Wapner]

All right, everybody, good weekend. I'll see you on the bell. The exchange begins right now. You've been listening to CNBC's Halftime Report, the podcast. You can always catch us live weekdays at 12 Eastern only on CNBC.

[Edward Jones]

All opinions expressed by the Halftime Report participants are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of CNBC, NBCUniversal, 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 the Halftime Report 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 halftime report disclaimer, please visit cnbc.com halftime reportdisclaimer is it time to reimagine your future? The right business skills may make a difference in your career. At Capella University, we offer a relevant education that's designed to focus on what you need to know in the business world. We'll teach professional skills to help you pursue your goals like business management, strategic planning, and effective communication, and you can apply these skills right away. A different future is closer than you think with Capella University. Learn more at Capella. Eduardo.