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Halftime Report
Nvidia hits a $4 Trillion Market Cap 7/9/25
00:44:31
Scott Wapner and the Investment Committee discuss Nvidia hitting a four trillion market cap for the first time and what it means for the stock and sector. Plus, Bill Baruch is launching a new portfolio focused on miners and precious metals, he calls in with the details. And later, we get to the Setup on some key names reporting this week. Investment Committee Disclosures
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- [00:00]
Joe Terranova
A rich life isn't a straight line to a destination on the horizon. Sometimes it takes an unexpected turn with.
- [00:08]
Steve Weiss
Detours, new possibilities and even another passenger or three.
- [00:15]
Joe Terranova
And with 100 years of navigating ups and downs, you can count on Edward Jones to help guide you through it all. Because life is a winding path made.
- [00:24]
Steve Weiss
Rich by the people you walk it with. Let's find your rich together. Edward Jones, Member, SIPC on WhatsApp, no one can see or hear your personal messages. Whether it's a voice call message or sending a password to WhatsApp, it's all just this. So whether you're sharing the streaming password in the family chat or trading those late night voice messages that could basically become a podcast, your personal messages stay between you, your friends and your family. No one else, not even us. WhatsApp message privately.
- [01:03]
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 of Scott Wapner. Front and center this Hour, the first $4 trillion company, Nvidia hitting that major market milestone. We discuss and debate what stocks to best own right now with committee joining me for the hour, Joe Terranova, Steve Weiss, Jim Laventhal, Bryn talking to along in just a moment because with Nvidia hitting 4 trillion, we have to hear from her too. We will check the markets. There we are, green across the board. NASDAQ at a new high, guys. Joe, the NASDAQ's up almost 40% from its April low. We'll call it 39%. That is remarkable in and of itself.
- [01:50]
Jim Laventhal
This is a big story and I know a lot of people. Middle of the summer, Nvidia hits $4 trillion. This literally underscores and highlights the biggest argument right now in the financial services industry. What's the bigger risk concentrating or diversifying? Nvidia hits $4 trillion. There are five companies right now with a market cap greater than $2 trillion. Then you have eight companies with a market cap greater than $1 trillion. But how about this? Palantir is the 24th largest company in the United States. It has a market cap of 330 billion. To get the top 25, all you need is 300 billion. That's coca Cola. So it under how? Over the last several years we have had this dramatic concentrated performance from these AI leaders. Look, the AI leaders right now and they're all above $1 trillion. It's in video, it is Microsoft. And guess what, it's also Broadcom. Those are the top three. But you have to ask yourself as a portfolio manager if in fact you can actually concentrate. We all talk about, well, we have a portfolio on the show. The Jyoti has 125 stocks. Jyoti isn't going to eight stocks or 10 stocks. And that's why the last several years, the overwhelming majority of portfolio managers are underperforming their benchmarks because the performance is so narrow. And that really brings the question, where's the risk? Do you just diversify and underperform or do you actually concentrate, participate, and then at some point the other shoe drops.
- [03:29]
Scott Wapner
If you've concentrated, if we will call it that. Weiss Nvidia is up 89% from the April low. I said the Nasdaq's up 40. Okay. Met is up 66% since the low. Amazon 48, Microsoft 46. Alphabet and Apple are below that at 25 and 24 respectively. But that underscores for everybody where the concentrated, to Joe's point, bet has worked. Worked big time.
- [03:56]
Jim Laventhal
Yeah.
- [03:57]
Bryn Talkington
And while I'm a proud investor in Jyoti and diversification, that's diversification by portfolio. Because to me and Warren Buffett will tell you this, the great investors will all tell you this. Dave Tepper Diversification is the enemy of performance. So you do your work and you stick by those names in a concentrated portfolio. So my weightings are in big cap tech. There will be periods of time that I underperform as earlier this year. But given the bottoms up fundamentals of those companies, whether it's Metta, whether it's Microsoft pick up, they will continue to outperform because they've got balance sheets, they've got a dominant market share that is growing. The only thing getting to their way and get in their way, and that would be short term, is if the government comes and says you got to break them out. And that's supported by a judgment. I don't think that will be the case. But even then I will tell you that some of the parts are worth more than the whole. So I continue to keep my focus there, my concentration. And the four big names, I mean, they're close to 50% of my portfolio. They weren't when I went in, but they've grown. I've weeded out some of the others. So I recognize the risk here. I recognize the overvaluation. 30 times forward earnings for Meta and for the others. But I'm also comfortable with it because overvaluation is A moment in time, the fundamentals catch up.
- [05:21]
Scott Wapner
Diversification for diversification sake isn't a winning strategy. Right. And this is a different kind of market than, you know, many of you grew up with.
- [05:33]
Jasmine
Yep.
- [05:34]
Scott Wapner
You have such a powerful trend in AI that it has, it has given investors every reason to not be overly diversified to the points that were, were made here. The question is, after this incredible run, what do you do now?
- [05:51]
Jasmine
I think you can find a degree of diversification. I don't think it has to be all Mag seven or even all tech, but I would take this in steps. So within tech, you can get diversification. You can get diversification into AI adjacent stocks that maybe haven't run up as much. Cisco, Oracle still has some room in the tank if you ask me. You can get into the value tech stocks, the Goulds. IB is performing well. You can go into other sectors that are performing well right now. Now, I want to start with what I would avoid. Utilities and staples are overpriced. And even if the market goes down because of their expensiveness, I don't think they'll be defensive.
- [06:27]
Jim Laventhal
That's not traditional.
- [06:28]
Jasmine
Let me just, let me, let me.
- [06:30]
Scott Wapner
Know that's not too quick.
- [06:32]
Jasmine
Slow down. Okay. There are sectors outside of tech, outside of the concentrated area that you can. Joe, I see you smiling, but you'll agree with me. Financials, industrials, you can go there and you can make some very good returns. What I'm saying here in the gradation of diversification. I agree. Just diversifying and saying I got to have 3% in utilities because the S&P 500 has 3% in utilities. Thumbs down from me.
- [06:55]
Scott Wapner
I want to hear Joe's point. Go.
- [06:56]
Jim Laventhal
So you can't, you can't, you can't underscore the fact that the last several years the prevailing tailwind and arguably the saving grace of the market has been AI. If we have an AI, where would this market be? So then you can't say, okay, I'm going to diversify with other adjacent names. That's not pure diversification. You could maybe say, I'll insert a JP Morgan, I'll insert a Berkshire Hathaway, I'll insert a Wal Mart or an Eli Lilly. That gives you a degree of diversification. But if you're staying with the AI thesis and the surroundings of technology.
- [07:30]
Jasmine
Steps. I was taking it in steps. I started with the AI adjacent, I moved to different sectors. Your point? Point I agree with. I was taking it in steps because we started out with the rallies concentrated in AI said, just take IT in steps to get diversification.
- [07:43]
Jim Laventhal
That's what.
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Jasmine
And I did stop because there are sectors that I just don't think you need to be in.
- [07:47]
Bryn Talkington
You know, let me make this point. Even if you think you're diversified by just owning the S and P, that diversification has taken a major hit. Because we go back a decade or so, you'll see that info technology, which is a lot of companies we're talking about, was only 10% of the S&P. Now it's 32%. So you're going to have to look outside that to diversify. Now, it's great diversification I have, but also, you know, when you take a look at managers, 75 to 80% to your point, underperform the S and P every year and guess what? It's not the same. A lot of them are the same. But my point is that even those that have outperformance and said, oh, they come on and say, oh, I'm going to overweight tech or I'm going to underweight this, which to me is a bunch of crap, right? Because all you're saying is I'm managing to the S and P rather than managing to return that. You know, you'll see those that have that overperformance in a year fall back to below the 75%.
- [08:41]
Scott Wapner
Let's bring in Brin, who's with us to talk about Nvidia hitting 4 trillion. Certainly one of the more high profile members of the committee to be in this name for a very long time. What does this move mean to you? What does this milestone mean? Brent?
- [08:55]
Joe Terranova
I think the milestone is, where it's incredible is, you know, Nvidia's numbers won't come out until the end of August. We have a $4 trillion company that's going to grow revenues this quarter at 51% and earnings at 46%. So I think in, you know, they're on a different calendar year in 20 or fiscal year in 2026, this company probably does five and a half dollars of earnings. It's just incredible to have a company this size still growing revenues and earnings so quickly. I think we have to remember though, it's almost been exactly a year where Nvidia has been basically sideways between 140 and 100. So you had to be patient. Over the last year I've been selling calls, but now that you've had this base that it's broken out of and I think that really, to me what's catalyzed a lot of things is when Mark Zuckerberg has come out and is poaching these engineers for $100 million signing bonuses. And so if you think that AI is getting long in the tooth, look again. I think it's just like going in from third to fourth gear from these hyperscaler spending which we'll all hear about in the next couple of weeks. So I think it's really interesting and exciting, not interesting, but exciting about Nvidia that it's finally broken out of that one year base. And so you could easily see this name creep up into the 2000s because of this strong earnings and revenue growth. So I think we're in this moment of time. And Nvidia, as Joe we talked about the other day, you know, Nvidia I think will continue to be a strong performer towards the end of the year, I think.
- [10:25]
Jim Laventhal
Absolutely. I agree. Technically you're seeing a breakout and this is where the spending is, you know. And let's talk for a second about Broadcom because they don't get enough credit for contributing to building out the AI infrastructure. Yes, we want faster chips, we want faster processing, but you also need faster networking. And that's exactly what they're doing with the xpu. They're delivering faster networking. And it is all right now a world in which the spending is being geared toward those that can actually provide the opportunity, where you don't have to stack the chips, where one chip ultimately is enough. And that's why they're in the sweet spot. I don't see the spending at any point dissipating. We've had moments over the last year where we thought that you'd see a slowdown in spending. Steve, you've been accurate in pointing out you didn't believe that was going to occur. And just look at Apple. Look at the reasoning behind why Apple is currently being punished because they don't seem to have a steady direction on AI.
- [11:26]
Bryn Talkington
They don't innovate, as I've said many times. But look, the story, let's not forget the base story in AI, it's the fastest adoption of any technology technology in history, faster than the Internet, which was free to users. A lot of users are paying subscriptions for chat, GDP and others. So it will continue. But what's most interesting about despite the major capex budgets, it's not only the ones on the receiving end, like in video, it's the ones on the spending end and you typically don't see that. So it's a very unusual time.
- [11:57]
Scott Wapner
I thought Melius Research had an interesting note and Brent, I'll get your take on this too because they, they look at the landscape and I think partly to Joe's point, they're in agreement where they're like okay, you want to continue to buy a semis but they say to exercise caution on SAS names. They want you to continue to buy the Nvidia, they want you to buy AMD and they want you to buy Joe's Broadcom, but they don't really want you to you to buy Salesforce nor do they want you to buy Workday or Adobe. They see where the puck maybe is going and they want you to go there. Do you agree with that call?
- [12:39]
Joe Terranova
I think that what we'll see, I mean Salesforce is expensive obviously Marc Benioff, they're spending a ton of money with their Agentix but I think it's an open field. So I think the, the report is sound. But I still think it's early days though. Obviously Salesforce, ServiceNow, all of those companies do so much more than just agentix, agents, etc. But I do think though that there will be winners and losers. And as we remember going back to 2012, the early days of the cloud, no one believed in it, no one believed in it at all. But it actually allowed Microsoft to rerate Amazon to rewrite. And so I feel like we're in these early days where we don't get, we are not going to know who the winners and losers are. So I wouldn't take this piece and say Sales, Salesforce or servicenow but I would just say it's early days and so there'll be a lot more winners and losers. But I think Nvidia, Microsoft, Palantir are clearly going to be the winners in the space over the next couple of years.
- [13:33]
Scott Wapner
Brian, good to have you on. Thanks for jumping on to talk about Nvidia. Had to hear from you today. Brent, talking in back with us in the days ahead. I am almost certain of that. More SAS names. I mean you don't you no longer own something Salesforce?
- [13:45]
Jim Laventhal
No.
- [13:46]
Scott Wapner
I think many of our viewers probably do. But you do have Oracle and ServiceNow and Viva and Docusign and Zoom if you want to talk about so called, you know, SAS names.
- [13:57]
Jim Laventhal
Yeah. And clearly the winner there has been Oracle. I think Jimmy, you're participating in that with me as well. I've had a couple of years later there are some other names, DocuSign, Zoom.
- [14:08]
Scott Wapner
By the way, Oracle, your Oracle up 88% since the bottom. If you really want to know how powerful the AI trade has been, look beyond the mega caps because the core weaves of the world are up 250%. Quantum computing, IonQ, which was a brand name that she brought to us originally, up 118%. Power names like Vertiv, Oracle 88, Vernova 86, Broadcom 78, Dell 70, 72, Constellation Energy 68, Eaton and IBM, respectively, 43 and 31%. So you need to really look beyond the mega caps to see where the best gains have been.
- [14:45]
Jim Laventhal
Yes, and I think you're at a little bit of an inflection point. I think what we witnessed in the last 12 months was that there was this period in 2024 where software outperformed semis. And it was on the premise that software was now going to take the handoff on the tailwind of artificial intelligence advancing towards generative AI. I think now we're back at that inflection point where we're going to see the return, both in the form of sentiment positioning, to the semiconductor names. One of my favorite semiconductor names which is clearly breaking out is KLA Corp. We do not own it in the Jyoti, obviously. We've owned it in the past and it certainly will be a candidate when we rebalance at the end of July.
- [15:25]
Jasmine
The other semi caps. Do you have a mat? We've a mat we've talked about.
- [15:28]
Jim Laventhal
We've talked about. So semi equipment names, they're rebuilding the positioning, they're seeing the momentum being reestablished once again. But I think it's an inflection point. I think Adam Parker on Closing Bell talked about this with you several months ago where it was, okay, let's now go away from software names. Let's move into the semi names. And that's proving to. To have the fruition. But if I can really, it's Oracle that stands out in the software.
- [15:51]
Jasmine
If I can just point out that what you're describing has a lot more to do with sentiment than fundamental. All right, the semi cap equipment names, the theory behind that, the thesis has remained constant for several years, but they went through that period, as you pointed out, the 24, that nobody liked it. Now they're coming into vogue and that happens with these subsectors. I do think, as we're talking about these sub sectors, that you can pick stocks. Scott, forgive me, because I go to this often, but you didn't mention it. Cisco is in the early stages of what Oracle started to do three years ago. Oracle, prior to three years ago was looked at as just a database company. They got this Oracle cloud infrastructure going and their multiple Shot up from the high teens to the now the low 30s. Cisco is in the early stages of doing the same thing and for the same reason the same drivers are there, which is you're building out all this infrastructure for AI. It's going to come to Cisco's benefit.
- [16:42]
Bryn Talkington
You know, there's an ugly side to this too. If you take a look at a company and this is to our point and to what they were saying on Salesforce. Take a look at TTech Holdings. I used to own this a number of years ago. Stock trade up to 100, great momentum, their call centers. So they're the first to be disintermediated by AI. It's reflecting the share price that's gone from 100 down to 5. And the fear is that you see that with Adobe because by these chips and by AI, you're empowering businesses to create the products that Salesforce has that others have. And not only that, tailored to their specific needs rather than general product at cheaper prices.
- [17:22]
Scott Wapner
Well, there's a, there's a chart for you to show, I guess the story that you're talking about.
- [17:27]
Bryn Talkington
Yep.
- [17:29]
Scott Wapner
What was, I don't know what the high was, but $105 stock.
- [17:32]
Jim Laventhal
Yeah.
- [17:33]
Scott Wapner
What's the market cap now?
- [17:34]
Bryn Talkington
Market cap, it's a micro cap. 248 million. It traded at 100, you know, as recently or 120 actually was the peak.
- [17:43]
Scott Wapner
That's even lower now.
- [17:44]
Bryn Talkington
2120.
- [17:45]
Scott Wapner
That's even lower now than the threshold of what we even talk about.
- [17:48]
Bryn Talkington
Right.
- [17:48]
Scott Wapner
On this program. It's only relevant because of the slide from 100 bucks to 5.
- [17:54]
Bryn Talkington
And the AI story, what I can do to a company.
- [17:56]
Jim Laventhal
To Steve's point, not everyone WINS in the AI story. If we could show a chart, a one year chart of Adobe, that stock's down 33% over the last 12 months. Absolutely. Because it's cannibalizing the existing products that they have and that they've put in place.
- [18:14]
Scott Wapner
So let me just move on because aside from tech, which we've spent a good amount of time on, it really has been a large cap move that's carry the market to new highs. It's why the S and P has so dramatically outperformed the equal weight. Because it's the, the big guns in the market are the ones that are performing. Caterpillar, for example, up 47% since the April bottom. Disney up 49% since the April bottom. Netflix is up 46% since the bottom. You get the theme here. I bring all three of those up because there were calls today. Caterpillar upgraded at Melius, quote, we're coming back to a buy rating after a short six months on the sidelines. Weiss, you own that stock and you did buy more of the XLI today, which is the industrials etf.
- [18:58]
Bryn Talkington
Yeah. So look, the tax bill undisputedly is going to help companies that sell equipment, you know, not $100 machines, 100 million dollar machines like Asmel, but, but Caterpillar and other equipment. And the ability to deduct that is great. Rather than amortizing it. You had that, but it just made it better. So, and I do believe, believe that you'll see a resurgence in the economy as soon as we get the tariff situation settled. So I don't regard this as expensive. In the old days it probably was an inflated multiple. But under the new valuation paradigm in the market, where I would argue that the market's insensitive to valuation, this to me was a compelling buy when I bought it. And then, you know, as I mentioned, I think last week, week before I sized up the position to a corporate position, now I went more into the XLI because I'm doing work on a number of components in the xli. And before I'm able to do my work, I think you continue to see a move upward. This is breaking out. So I want to add to that position, participate.
- [20:02]
Scott Wapner
I mentioned Disney. 140 goes to 140 from 125. That's at Citi. They still want you to buy it. We believe earnings will focus on performance of domestic parks, direct to consumer profitability and the upcoming launch of the ESPN flagship product. Jimmy, you own it again, 49% since the bottom.
- [20:20]
Jasmine
That was a pretty strong list of positives that you just went through from the analyst. And I totally agree. There's a lot of shots on goal here. Now, the stock right now is consolidating in this $120 to $125 range. After the gains that you pointed out, Scott, I think probably it's not going to do too much other than this range until the next earnings report comes out. It trades at around 20 times a four forward multiple. It's not cheap, it's not terribly expensive. But for it to go higher from here, it's going to have to outperform on earnings, which it's done solidly for the last two years. And based on all the things that you just listed, which I totally agree, I think it will continue to outperform on earnings. Steve, you just mentioned a resurgence in the economy. People are going to go. They already are going on the cruise lines. They're going to Disney World, Disneyland. It doesn't matter what the ticket prices are. They are going. It'll show up in earnings.
- [21:06]
Scott Wapner
There was a downgrade the other day of Netflix for no other reason than the stock has just been one of the best in the market for this year and it is up 46% since the April bottom. There's your year to date chart which is, you know, you take that period out. Obviously it has been a place to play offense and defense. Joe, I'll give you this one. Citi reiterates it neutral today they've had a huge run. We expect Netflix to report its revenue and EBIT modestly ahead of sell side estimates.
- [21:39]
Jim Laventhal
Yeah, but then the following quarter after that, I think you're going to see an uptick. The content, the suite of content for the end of 2025 looks excellent. The live sports programming, I think you stay with Netflix and any opportunity you get to buy it on a dip. You want to do that. I would also put Spotify in that spot. Same conversation. Both of those stocks are slightly higher today. Both of those stocks last several days have had mild corrections.
- [22:03]
Scott Wapner
All right, Financials want to talk about those two because they've played a big part. Certainly JPM and Goldman have. That's why Financials as a group have been at a record high as well. They report earnings next week. You guys already know that. Several downgrades yesterday a week ahead of the earnings. Now you get some upgrades. KBW says JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley outperformance. Jimmy, you want to take jpm?
- [22:27]
Jasmine
Yeah, I mean I've said this for quite some time that if you're going to own any of the financial stocks and this goes for any sector, frankly, you have to own the best of breed. I do think JP Morgan is at the top of the list. We can argue about whether Goldman Sachs or somebody else but you know, it's in that category. Then after that you fill in around it. Now JP Morgan is not cheap relative to the rest of them, but that's okay. It is the leader. And what we've seen with the JP Morgan is when things go wrong in the financial sector, not my prediction, but that they come out of it looking stronger. We can look two years ago when they picked up First Republic and the assets there. That's the beauty of being the biggest and the best in any sector. So I do like JP Morgan here because fundamentally I like the financial sector with less regulation and with a booming economy.
- [23:11]
Scott Wapner
B of A says of the earnings that are coming up the stocks are likely to need support from positive EPS revisions. They do obviously like the large cap US banks. It just brings me back to what Mike Mayo has always said right. Goliath is winning. I think was was the way that he, he talked about those. Joe Goldman if you're going to have a renewed IPO and M& A cycle, well no surprise that that one's been doing well.
- [23:38]
Jim Laventhal
And you're. You are already having that. That M and a is up 6% year on year. We're seeing a little bit of a turnaround. May was a very strong month as it relates to M and A Investment banking has been very strong. I always talk about the engagement of the retail community. They are participating in the markets. I think the other thing that's benefited a lot of these large money center banks and I'm of the belief you stay with them in terms of positioning. I'm obviously long JP Morgan personally and through the etf I'm long Goldman Sachs personally. But you stay with this. I think the other thing that has happened is you have seen a positioning rotation. Six months ago we were on this desk talking about the financial sector. About what insurance companies and the strength of insurance companies within the financial sector. Whether it was progressive or travelers. Look at the charts of all these insurance companies. Property and casualty insurance brokers have rolled over. Where have the capital actually gone? It's gone into the money center banks. Not going into regional banks. Regional banks right now somewhat conflicted in terms of where their near term direction.
- [24:39]
Scott Wapner
You have a lot of those?
- [24:40]
Jasmine
I do.
- [24:41]
Jim Laventhal
And the ones that are working. Huntington bank is working. I know that got a downgrade. Citizens Financial is working. M and T is working. But I have others that aren't working. Regions super regional USB not working.
- [24:52]
Scott Wapner
Are they going to work in this? Are they going to work here?
- [24:55]
Jim Laventhal
I don't know that we're going to see the fundamental tailwind in any of these. I right now my, my sentiment surrounding regionals is somewhat unsure about the direction that they're going to take because I don't see conviction in the earnings or.
- [25:12]
Bryn Talkington
Conviction in the technical the regionals when the strongest tailwinds are in the larger banks.
- [25:18]
Jim Laventhal
So the regionals for the upside, the.
- [25:21]
Scott Wapner
Upside that you haven't gotten but like.
- [25:22]
Bryn Talkington
Where'S the come from here? I think the upside is muted and that that's the point trying to make.
- [25:29]
Jim Laventhal
I think from a fundamental perspective I agree with you. I want to have the ownership of the large money center banks over the regionals. But I understand why the strategy went into the regional banks. It had a strong lift at the end of the year on the belief that the regionals would get strong regulatory relief and earnings growth on a favorable economic environment. I don't know if that's been reality or not.
- [25:50]
Jasmine
I just, I want to point out a lot of times people like me and others talk about deregulation, we kind of throw it out there. Let's put some more detail to that. The stress test that came out from the Fed a couple of weeks ago made it clear that these companies are well capitalized and they're going to return capital to shareholders. You also have the supplemental leverage ratio, which look like it's going to be reduced or at least taken away, which gives more room for these companies to return capital to shareholders. That's what those are sort of things that we're talking about when we talk about deregulation.
- [26:17]
Jim Laventhal
Charles Schwab, Interactive Brokers. Robin Hood. Those three names, I think each one of them strong tailwinds behind.
- [26:23]
Bryn Talkington
I just can't get. I keep looking at Robin Hood and valuation. Can't get there.
- [26:27]
Scott Wapner
All right, we're going to take a break. When we come back, Bill Baruch is going to join us. He just launched a new portfolio. We're going to tell you what's in it and how you can play it in two minutes.
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- [29:04]
Scott Wapner
All right, Gold's rally taking a bit of a breather over the past few weeks. However, half time committee member Bill Baruch still sees a big opportunity there and elsewhere in the mining space. It's good to see you. So you just launched a new portfolio centered around mining. Tell our viewers more please.
- [29:20]
Bill Baruch
Absolutely. Thanks for having me on about this. The, the idea here is gold. We have a really great background in commodities. My team and I have worked really hard putting this together and working through this. We, we were great with materials and we modeled it off. The exciting thing is we're modeling this off of our concentrated alpha portfolio. I talk about an air often and where we owe no more than 10 names and can raise up 50 up to 50% cash. You know for instance Nvidia was a 20% holding in that from 2022 on. Now this is focused on mining and we're doing that same concept and own no more than 10 names. And I've talked about on there too. Gold's in a generational breakout and we think there is still tremendous upside down. Think about this. You know gold represents 20% of all reserve assets of all central banks in the world. It's now surpassed the Euro and people have Talked about Basel 3 for the last few years. It's been in works but gold is now a tier one asset actually as of July of 2025. So this month this actually began. These central banks are buying gold and mark my words, I mean you're going to see gold begin to back currencies some maybe down the road back the Chinese Yuan or a stablecoin dollar. So really what this means is it Expands it makes it sticky cash flow margins for these miners and we think we're in a tremendous super cycle for miners.
- [30:39]
Scott Wapner
Hang on, hang on two seconds. Can we please put back up the list of the stocks that are, that are in here? Because I want to make sure our viewers understand the actual names that are in your new portfolio and I want you to talk about some of them. Why specifically you think that it's Agnico Eagle, it's Newman, it's Barrick, it's Core Mining, it's Wheaton, its first Majestic Silver because obviously it's beyond gold.
- [31:06]
Bill Baruch
Yeah, yeah. Our focus is, is gold. We're lean heavy into gold and what we are open and we do think things like silver or potentially copper can make their miners can make their way in there. But here it is from, from the top is a Newmont and, and Barrick, I mean those it's a three, it's a three headed horse race here, you know and ultimately Magnico is the best in breed. They have the best management. This stock has continued to break out to new record highs. I mean the cash flow that these miners are seeing is to continue to power them. But Newmont and Barrick they do have some room to catch up. They can catch up. New A Newmont still has to reaches it's 50% below its 2022 high. Barrick it's about 50% below its 2021 high. So we have these three headed up top here and there are heaviest weight. We do acknowledge that we've seen a bit of a run this year so we're taking our time in allocating to the portfolio and ramping it up here in the coming month. But these three up top we like Wheaton Precious Metals that's a, that's a wpm a great well run company. Co War Cohort's a Chicago based company. They I've talked about on air before. We've owned it in our, in our main portfolios on and off very well. Well run by Mitch Krebs. They've actually made some tremendous acquisitions in silver which leads me to talk about silver. We think silver has a lot of catching up to do to gold. This year silver is just trading about $37. The gold silver ratio has expanded out to 100 meaning gold is significantly outpaced silver and we think silver can catch up. So first Majestic is in the bottom part of the portfolio, the bottom part of the 10 names. But we think that has a lot of volatility but can really outperform to the upside if silver Gets going.
- [32:52]
Scott Wapner
Yeah. What do you make of the, the, the President's 50% tariff on copper idea?
- [33:00]
Bill Baruch
It came out as a surprise here. Luckily, you know, we're positioning in copper in our, in our CTA or mining or metals. Metal, cta. That's something we've been talking about on air before. I just took it for face value that they're going to talk about this being a 50% tariff. I think there's some leg room to work through this before it's official. You know, I think the market itself is, it was pretty shocked. Good run. We monetized that, that move in copper, kind of waiting for it to settle in. I think the interesting thing here is, is if we're going to put those type of tariffs on the US Imports of copper, then then we're to understand where is the mining capacity going to come from. Freeport, we own in portfolios right now and the main portfolio that I talk about on air most often, and we think they're really in a tremendous position here. They have tremendous capacity with the leading capacity here in the US at their El Paso, Texas facility. So, so we like the move. I think it's going to continue to be volatile and, you know, we'll take it at face value right now as news evolves.
- [34:01]
Scott Wapner
All right, good stuff. Thanks for coming on. I appreciate that. That's Bill Baruch. Just real quick, you own Newmont, so your thoughts on this grouping of stocks that he has put together?
- [34:11]
Jim Laventhal
Well, obviously there's strong momentum right now behind the precious metals. Just real quick, on copper, Morgan Stanley put out this morning 36% of copper demand in the United States comes from imports. So let's be careful here. Freeport McMoRan obviously is the play. Phoenix based company, Southern Copper, another Phoenix based company. Those are the plays to have the correlation to rising US Copper prices. But size your position accordingly. I think there might be some variance here. Chile, one of the largest exporters of copper to the United States. Do they get some relief from the administration? Look, this affects everything. This affects data centers, this affects automobiles, power generation. This is a big deal for the economy. Let's see what the details are as we progress towards August 1st.
- [34:59]
Scott Wapner
All right, the headlines with Silvana and now. Hi, Silvana.
- [35:01]
Joe Terranova
He's got. Good afternoon. President Biden's former White House doctor, Kevin o' Connor is refusing to answer questions at a hearing before the House oversight committee. Invoking Dr. Client privilege and his Fifth Amendment rights. The committee is looking into the former president's alleged cognitive decline while in office. The fight between the White House and Harvard University is heating up. The Trump administration today said the Department of Homeland Security is planning to subpoena the school in response to Harvard's refusing request for information about its exchange program certification. Meanwhile, the Department of Education NHS said they notified the school's accreditor that it may have violated anti discrimination laws and citing anti Semitism on campus. And after 20 years as team principal, Red Bull has fired Christian Horner. In its statement today, Red Bull didn't share its reason for firing Horner, but said he will forever remain an important part of the team's history. The announcement comes more than a year after Horner was accused of misconduct toward a team employee. He was cleared after an investigation. Scott.
- [36:09]
Scott Wapner
All right, Silvana, thank you. That's Silvana now. Coming up next, we have the setup. There are many stocks with some news to come in the days ahead in Taiwan Semi and Costco and Delta and more. I'll talk about them next.
- [36:24]
Steve Weiss
Close your eyes.
- [36:25]
Joe Terranova
Exhale.
- [36:26]
Steve Weiss
Feel your body relax and let go of whatever you're carrying today.
- [36:31]
Joe Terranova
Well, I'm letting go of the worry that I wouldn't get my new contacts in time for this class. I got them delivered free from 1-800-contacts. Oh my gosh, they're so fast.
- [36:40]
Steve Weiss
And breathe. Oh, sorry.
- [36:42]
Joe Terranova
I almost couldn't breathe when I saw the discount they gave me on my first order. Oh, sorry. Namaste.
- [36:48]
Steve Weiss
Visit 1-800-contacts.com today to save on your first order. 1-800-contacts. 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.
- [37:40]
Scott Wapner
Set up. There are several names with stuff coming up. Taiwan Semi. Monthly sales are out tomorrow. Weiss, you own that stock.
- [37:46]
Bryn Talkington
I have no reason to believe that it can be anything but very strong. I mean, take a look at Nvidia. One of the reasons that's up, people are queuing off Taiwan Semi, which makes the chips from Nvidia.
- [37:56]
Scott Wapner
Hey, Joe. Costco reports June sales after the bit bell. And that is today.
- [38:00]
Jim Laventhal
Yes, today and May and April were somewhat disappointing. Let me clarify. I wouldn't say disappointing, but certainly a slowdown relative to what we have been seeing. It looks like the trend of strong Monthly sales gain is being reversed. We'd like to see an uptick here in the month of June. We'll find out this afternoon. That might be enough. Stock is sitting right at the 200 day moving average. Maybe that reignites what has been very strong bullish momentum.
- [38:24]
Scott Wapner
Been a market performer, right. I mean it's matched the S and P. It has. Shares of Costco have. Delta it reports tomorrow morning. Also reiterated overweight today at Barclays. 58 bucks is the price target. Ed Bastin, the CEO will be on squawk box 7:00am 7:10am to be exact. And that's an exclusive interview.
- [38:43]
Jasmine
Jimmy, I think this is very simple. The analyst community is too negative. They slashed estimates understandably after April 2nd. This year's estimates went down 25%. Next year's estimates went down 20% and they have not budged since then. So if you don't think that the economic outlook has gotten better since April 2nd, I don't know what to tell you. It clearly has and the analyst estimates have not gone up with it. So there is room for the company to outperform and give guidance. Better than expected.
- [39:11]
Scott Wapner
Has the outlook gone up as the economic outlook gotten better from has the third April. But has the outlook really gotten that much better?
- [39:21]
Jasmine
I definitely think so. I. To me it's inarguable. I mean we were talking about things like, you know, we're not going to see. We're going to see layoffs, we're going to see empty shelves, nobody's going to travel, everybody's hunkering down. I remember.
- [39:35]
Scott Wapner
I mean it's obvious that the worst of the projections have not happened.
- [39:39]
Jasmine
Yes, right.
- [39:41]
Bryn Talkington
Yet.
- [39:42]
Jasmine
Okay, so you know what I'm saying. I do know what you're saying. Let's go back to.
- [39:46]
Scott Wapner
It's not like the data has been remember, let's be honest.
- [39:49]
Jasmine
Yeah, but remember the recession predictions which then cropped up towards like close to 100% and now they're back down to, depending on whom you talk to 25, 30%. That's what I'm talking about. This is a company, this is an industry that's going to live and die on how the economic activity goes.
- [40:03]
Scott Wapner
Okay, how about, well, United's next week. You want to airlines here?
- [40:08]
Jasmine
Yeah, I do.
- [40:08]
Jim Laventhal
I think it's part of the conversation of pricing power and I think right now there are a select few in the airline industry that have that pricing power. You can make the argument that Delta and United are two best in class in that regard. Maybe it's because of the pricing in the front of the plane.
- [40:23]
Bryn Talkington
It's because of the hubs they control. Yeah, it's in the region might be as well. But look at other airlines.
- [40:27]
Jim Laventhal
Look at an airline like JetBlue.
- [40:28]
Jasmine
You're describing this point.
- [40:30]
Jim Laventhal
You're describing a great environment for the airline industry, but yet Jet Blue can't.
- [40:34]
Jasmine
Get out of the low cost. Carriers are not the place to be, period.
- [40:37]
Bryn Talkington
Well, they don't control the hubs. I mean, you know, Atlanta, you know Newark, Chicago, big travel centers so controlled by single airlines.
- [40:46]
Scott Wapner
All right. So he's next with his midday word after this quick break. All right. We are back on the halftime report, our friends at GOLF Channel following the PGA Tour stop this week, it's the Genesis Scottish Open. Golf Channel's Rex Hoggard joins us live from Scotland with what to expect. And you have yourself one heck of a field to report on. Rex, Scheffler, McElroy, Schauffle, Fleetwood, Morikawa, Oberg, and on and on and on.
- [41:30]
H
Scott, you start at the very top. When you talk about this field, you're absolutely right. It includes world number one, Scotty Scheffler, as you pointed out, and world number two, Rory McIlroy. And Scotty has been as dominant as he ever has been so far this season. He's won three times, including the PGA Championship, and is the clear favorite coming into this event. Now, Rory, it's been a little bit different. He was dominant early. He also won three times, including the Masters, which completed the career Grand Slam, winning that for the first time. But he's gone into a bit of a slump since then. And he's admitted that it's a bit hard finding the motivation to keep going after you reach such a career goal. But he's also admitted that if anything is going to break him out of that slump and give him a reason to be motivated. It's these two weeks in the UK playing this week at the Scottish Open, of course, next week at the Open Championship in Northern Ireland, where he's from. Now, the other half of the story always when we come to Scotland is the weather. But looking at this week's forecast, it's actually very, very good. There's only a slight chance of rain on Saturday for the third round, and wind is going to be a bit of an issue. It's going to gust to about 20 miles an hour on Thursday, so players will have to deal with that. But it all factors into why players are flocking to this event. It's the best possible way to prepare for next week's Open Championship. Only two Lynx courses on the PGA Tour this week and next week. It gives players an opportunity to get acclimated to the time zone, to the weather, how the ball comes off the turf. It is by far the best way to prepare for the year's final major championship.
- [42:51]
Scott Wapner
I was thinking about the weather. It looks gorgeous behind you. So let's see what the weekend brings. Rex, thank you. Enjoy. That's Rex Hoggard joining us from North Berwick in Scotland ahead of that tournament. Be sure to watch it. Golf Channel's coverage of the Genesis Scottish Open begins tomorrow. Round one, 11am Eastern Time, promises to be a good weekend. Up next, Mike Santoli with his midday word. Senior markets commentator Mike Santoli is here with his midday word. I know everybody's talking about Nvidia and with good reason. But I was just looking at a stock we talked about at the top of the show, too, and It's Broadcom and Hock 10. He deserves some love to here that stocks up 116% since the bottom. This has been far more than just an Nvidia story.
- [43:54]
Jim Laventhal
It's been basically those two and over the last couple of years, really, it's not just recently. So, yes, the aggregate market cap isn't there, but the percentage gain is pretty close. And it's really in sort of contrast to the rest of semi. So it's sort of how even within all the sectors we have this kind of clustering at the top of enthusiasm and valuation in general. You know, it's funny, we get to the $4 trillion threshold for a minute, market backs off. It seems a little bit too cute that that would be a mission accomplished moment. I looked back the other trillion dollar thresholds that Nvidia hit, you actually had a little bit of a short term peak, but like weeks later, like within a few weeks, it was kind of like, okay, we've run out of it for the short term. But other than that, market continues not to take the bait on the tariff headlines. I think that may be your main takeaway.
- [44:42]
Scott Wapner
So we wait a week until we get earnings start to come in and.
- [44:45]
Jim Laventhal
Then you start to feel and have something else to react to besides the market's own kind of pushing and pulling. You know, you see the small caps hanging in there today. I said yesterday the market's trying to work off the overbought condition in a kind of benign way. We'll see if that be could continue.
- [44:59]
Scott Wapner
All right. I'll see you in a couple hours. On the closing bell, it's Mike Santoli. We'll do finals after this break. All right, we're back. Let's talk health care for a moment because the president is threatening to impose up to 200% tariffs on pharmaceuticals, quote very soon. Lilly got reiterated a buy today. Thousand dollars is the price target and that is at B of A. Joe, you own that name and I presume a lot of our viewers probably do to thousand dollars from 785.
- [45:46]
Jim Laventhal
They have the clear lead in the obesity diabetes franchise. The fundamentals fundamentals are remarkably strong. It's been a little bit of a deterioration in the momentum factor here over the last several months, but still this name is a name that we've owned for quite some time and it's reward us in doing so. Approaching $1 trillion. I think it'll get there ultimately.
- [46:03]
Scott Wapner
Jimmy of ABB, the AstraZeneca Verdex, this threat of tariffs on pharma do anything for you?
- [46:08]
Jasmine
I don't like it. I don't like it. I think it explains why there's been recent weakness in the pharmaceutical sector. That said, there have been pharmaceuticals that have done well this year. Thankfully it's Vertex, it's Abbvie. They've done well on the year to date, but they've had some weakness recently. And I do think it's directly related to this. I hope to use the term that Mike used that the market overall doesn't take the bait on this and that this is just a head fake as.
- [46:31]
Jim Laventhal
Most of the tariffs have been quickly on Amgen. Amgen is a name that I own personally and the. Yep. Both has performed well. In addition, another health care name working Veeva Systems.
- [46:41]
Scott Wapner
All right, we'll do Finals next, 3 o' clock Eastern Time. The professor, Jeremy Siegel with me today, Jeff DeGraff also joining Goldman's Elizabeth Burton, Gabriella Santos, Ali Flynn Phillips. We got a full lineup. I hope you'll join us in a couple hours. Time to see what these markets do over the final stretch.
- [47:03]
Jasmine
Farmer Jim, we were talking about industrials a lot during the A segment and a solid mid cap industrial is Wabtech. If we're going to be building things, we're going to need to move stuff by rail and that plays right to this railroad equipment manufacturer's strengths.
- [47:17]
Scott Wapner
Okay. I purposely didn't go to you, Weiss, in the health care conversation as I thought you were going to do. UnitedHealth is your final trade. Why did you choose it as your final trade?
- [47:27]
Bryn Talkington
Because it's down today on the Journal article and that's not new news. And there are two sides to every sort of story. They don't report till the end of the month. I think there's an opportunity to trade it from here into the earnings.
- [47:38]
Jim Laventhal
Joey Jash has very strong pricing power.
- [47:41]
Scott Wapner
All right, good stuff. I'll see you on the Bell 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.
- [47:58]
Steve Weiss
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.