Closing Bell - Closing Bell: A Big Unknown Now Revealed 1/30/26

Episode Date: January 30, 2026

What does President Trump’s nomination of Kevin Warsh for Fed Chair mean for stocks? We discuss with Professor Jeremy Siegel and Tom Lee from Fundstrat. Plus, Former Fed Vice Chair Roger Ferguson and CNBC’s Steve Liesman tell us what the road ahead for the Fed looks like now. Plus, star Apple analyst Erik Woodring gives us his first reaction to that company’s results. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

All right, welcome to closing bell. Thanks, guys. I'm Scott Wapner, live from Post 9 here at the New York Stock Exchange. This maker break hour begins with a Worshack test for stocks. As the markets react to a new nominee for the Fed, we'll discuss what Kevin Worse means to some big-time trades in this market, and they are moving sharply today. In the meantime, we show you the scorecard with 60 to go in regulation. Stocks, they've been red all day long, and some very, very popular trades have been unwinding a bit. Silver slammed after its huge run. Take a look at that, 27%. Gold is also lower by about 7.5%.

So we're watching all of that. We've been talking a lot about the dollar after being at a four-year low. The dollar getting a boost today as well. The index up about three quarters of 1%. Individual stocks today, Apple, not doing too much. After a really great earnings report, that chart tells the story.

We will ask Morgan Stanley analyst Eric Woodring if there is more to that story when he joins us in just a little bit. It takes us to our talk of the tape, the road ahead for stocks, with a big unknown now revealed. Let's welcome in our panel today, CNBC contributor Fund Stratt's Tom Lee and the Wharton School Professor of Finance, Wisdom Tree Chief Economist, Jeremy Siegel. Gentlemen, it's great to have you. Professor, I'll start with you. You call this an excellent choice of Mr. Worse, your first pick. Why? He's the most experienced.

I think he did a great job during the financial crisis. He's gotten, as you know, praise across the board from central bankers, not only those on Wall Street. And, you know, certainly he likes a lot of Trump's policy, but he's not going to be a lackey. He's not going to be a toadie. I mean, you know, look at the dollar jumped. I think it was a lot of international concern. Trump was going to put one in and it's just going to lower, lower interest rates. Well, that's not happening.

I think he picked the most responsible, qualified man here. And I think that's very positive for Wall Street and the dollar. Oh, interesting commentary there, Professor Tom Lee. You agree with that. And what do you make of the very trades that I highlighted at the very top of this show? Because it's so dramatic. Silver's rollover today, as was the run-up that we've seen. Yeah.

Well, I think it is a good choice for Fed share. And the move in gold and silver today, it's an interruption. So clearly the market is rethinking the implications of a new Fed share. I think the timing was a surprise because it all kind of came out last night. And I think it's very healthy, actually, for silver and gold to be seeing some profit taking because that was a juggernaut trade that I think in many ways was like a vortex sucking risk asset. risk appetite from everything else into those two trades. You think those two trades are done?

I mean, you talk almost as if you think this is merely a pause that might refresh. The velocity of the move out of silver today is somewhat startling to look out. The market's not supposed to act that way. Yeah. I don't care what happened back in like in 1980 or whatever. It's not supposed to do this. That's right. You know, I think there is some fundamental reasons for silver to be rising.

And gold is, of course, now should hold up. place in someone's portfolio. But those were parabolic moves. I think you're right that could look like blow off tops similar to 7980. We won't know with the fullness of time. Okay, Professor, what do you make of those trades? We often talk so heavily about stocks and we will, but these are the moves that have grabbed everyone's attention. Gold, silver, dollar, probably find a few other things too. When you, I mean, I agree with Tom. When you have so many momentum players that join gold and silver, just playing that trend. This is exactly the type of reaction you get, you know, that parabolic move down and then a little, any little piece of news, a little selling, and maybe

just the confidence, hey, Warsh is not going to debase the, you know, the currency. That's enough to trigger this sort of reaction. This could be the high for quite a while, but I still think that, you know, I agree that, you know, having a sliver of gold or some gold in your portfolio is probably still a good idea. I mean, it is good counter-cyclical asset. It does diversify against risk assets. Okay. So, Tom, your call on the market has consistently been

that you think we're going to have what you describe as a three-phase market. You have great start to the year, and in all respects, we've seen that. We've hit record highs this week again on the S&P. You're going to get a drawdown. You've even used the words, bare market, and then we're going to get a nice ramp into year.

year-end that you think can get us to 7,700 by the end of the year on the S&P explain? Well, it has been a good start, and as you know, many people kind of follow what markets do in January, because that sets the tone for the year, and we're on a positive start, plus the first week was positive. It's a good omen, so I actually think our 7,700 is probably low. I think the S&P could maybe even do 8,000. We're not sure. But we also know that there's a few things that need to be digested, you know, three years of good gains, a lot of good news is priced in. There could be a policy shock. There's been a lot more, and maybe part of it is the White House picking winners and losers in front of the midterms. And the third is that we have

a new Fed that the market is going to test. And I mean, today is a taste of it, right, that we have an announcement of it, and the market's already picking winners and losers among commodities or assets or dollar. So I think those can contribute to a drawdown. Last year, it was a policy shock that took us down 20%. Professor, how does that summation from student Lee sound? Yeah. Thomas

gutsyer than I am in making short-term predictions. He has actually a fairly good record. I would like his opinion. We do see rotation. I mean, the AI phenomenon is

magical. Might this be the first year in three years where we see the other 493 stocks outperform or not. I'm calling, I wouldn't be surprised if the S&P only did 5 to 10% this year, but the non-Meg 7, the rest, did 10 to 15 or even more. It's really hard to say when that might come, and, you know, AI is still booming. But I think I would like to know his opinion. Are there more, is there more competition, more doubts about adoption, more fear that there could be a technological breakthrough that might penetrate some of the most of these great stocks. Do you want to answer that? Because

you're pretty bullish, these names. Yeah. Well, one, all of them are linked to the importance of AI, and as the tentacles and AI grows, they all benefit. I think a lot of the progress in AI is invisible at the moment. That's why we're markets are kind of questioning things like what Microsoft reported, but I think that those invisible gains then lead to productivity. But it's at the same breadth this year, I think the market is broadening because we've seen a lot of other trades work besides the Mag 7. And it's not a bad thing. I mean, that to me is not late cycle. A broadening of the market is as a mid-cycle phenomenon, right? Because basic materials are doing well, small caps are doing well. A lot of industrials.

and health care. So that's a sign of a broader market, which is the other 493. It's a sign, I guess, Professor, of what some would describe as a run-at-hot economy that is a run-at-hot stock market, and all those cyclical areas are the ones that would do well. Now, normally, after we would get a few of the mega-cap earnings reports, I would ask you, well, what did we learn about the mega-cap stocks this week? But I don't think we learned anything, because I think the group shouldn't be discussed anymore as a group. And we learned whatever we did about Microsoft, and we learned something different about meta, and thus the stocks reacted differently. I've never seen, you know, the Mag 7 react so

differently. They usually just go together, and we think of them as a group. But, you know, just continuing what Tom said, really only 15 to 20 percent of firms have really really really even begun to use the potential of AI. And I mean, those are the ones that I think really have a great opportunity to really raise their profits. And we might see layoffs, et cetera, and so on. But that's part of cost-cutting in a technological boom. And that's why I think in some way, they have the potential to outperform the MAG-7 this year. We know you start out at 17, 18 times earnings. You don't need much above expectations at all to really have a good move with a profit increase. Let's talk about earnings real quick before I let you go. We, you know, we start out with

the shrimp cocktail. The bank started out. Now we get the meat potatoes. And we're starting to get the entrees like the companies that really, really matter. Estimates are high. We're exceeding them to this point. What's interesting to me is the price action has not necessarily matched the reporting. Reports good, price action, not so much. Even among those. that have done well, meta excluded. Yeah, yeah, the numbers played out. If you compare this quarter versus last quarter, companies that are beating are rising a lot less,

basically half a percent now five-day gain versus 2% last quarter. But the ones that missed were falling 5.5% last quarter. They're falling 3%. So the market is almost taking the edge off on earnings results. But I think you did point something out that's true. I think it's the first time ever that META and Microsoft

had a divergent move. They've almost always moved directly on the same day, and one was down 11%, one was up 11%. I'm getting the numbers wrong, but that your point's well made. That's like a three or four standard deviation divergence. Professor, lastly to you,

are you confident that earnings can live up to the height because they really have to? It's where the growth, so to speak, in this market's going to come from. It's not really going to come from multiple expansion anymore. It has to come through earnings. What do you make of that? Well, it certainly has to come through earnings for the Mag 7. But, you know, I don't, you know, the non-Mag 7 are still selling at 18, 19 forward earnings. And, you know, I think that's

extremely reasonable. Certainly, I mean, the outlook, listen, we got to grab, let's hope we got this government shutdown taken care of, this really good Fed pick out of the way we have one little more speed bump to go. We need to know what Scotus says about tariffs. That's going to come, you know, at the end of February. And after that, you know, let AI do its work. I think the skies look clear for a really great year in 2026. All right. We'll take your forecast for now. Professor, we'll talk to you soon along with Tom Lee. Appreciate both of you. Enjoy the weekend. And I know we'll see you soon. We did discuss this choice for the Fed Chair, Kevin Warsh. Now let's bring in our senior economics reporter Steve Leasman, along with former Fed

Vice Chairman Roger Ferguson for more. Mr. Ferguson's great to see you, Steve. Always good to have you. Roger, you first. What is your reaction to the Worse pick? First, I would say not surprised. Many people expect that to be the outcome. Secondly, I think now in some sense for him, the hard work begins. He's got to get through a Senate hearing, which should be smooth, but it's against the back. of a lot of politics. More importantly, once he's in the seat, he's got to continue the process of figuring out this very unusual economy and very importantly trying to get a consensus built out of a Fed that right now is really quite divided.

And finally, most importantly, doing all of that while reassuring the markets that he is an independent actor. So, you know, good choice. And now I'd say the harder part begins. Okay. Steve, you know, a lot is being made, obviously, of Mr. Warsh's views, not only of the Fed itself over the years, but his calls on inflation that didn't come to fruition at a time when the labor market was softening. I thought it was interesting. I saw from Renaissance Macro, now, they're frequent guests on our program, and they put on social media, quote,

Kevin Warsh has been a monetary policy hawk his entire career. And most importantly, during a time when the labor markets fell out of bed, his doveshness today stems from convenience. The president risks getting duped. I read that because I want to ask you, does Worse need to run from his past? Can he? Is there anything to emerge from?

You know, I think Roger sort of said it. I'm going to say it a little differently, which is what Worse needs to do is leave his dogma at the door. And I think that's really the key. He has been, he is a little bit. he is a member of the Hoover Institute, and I went out to their annual gatherings every year, and every one of them every time. There he is, I think, maybe at the Hoover Institute. I don't know. But no matter where the Fed was, it wasn't tight enough. If the Fed was easy, they should have been tighter.

If the Fed was tight, it should have been tighter still. And so now this idea that Kevin is going to be something of a dove relative to the president's policies, I guess he'll give it a go. But I'm fairly confident, Scott, that if it doesn't work out, he would turn tail pretty quickly and start to raise interest rates in order to combat inflation that was not under control. And it's interesting to think about whether or not the market will test him. The market somehow finds a way, I don't know if it's ever consciously or not, to test every Fed chair. And the test is this. Are you willing to give up the economy and economic growth in order to control inflation. It's the ultimate test that the bond market wants to know. And I think Kevin is up

to that job, but he may have to leave some of the dogma at the door. I mean, Roger, these were points of advocacy in many respects. He wasn't the Fed chair. Of course, he's a former Fed governor. One can learn from their so-called mistakes, though. Can they not? Jay Powell has admittedly made mistakes around transitory and and some other things, keeping policy too loose for too long, a central banker is capable of learning and adopting and adjusting? No, absolutely. Central bankers, I hate to break it to,

are only human, and so yes, they will learn from their mistakes. More importantly, central bankers have two other traits that are very important. One is learning from history. And so, you know, in the central bank community, Arthur Burns, demonized, Paul Volcker, Deified. Everyone wants to be on the Paul Volcker side. And most importantly, I think there's now, broadly speaking, understanding that inflation is a really pernicious tax on everyone.

And so, you know, creating and maintaining inflation fighting credibility will be extremely important. The final point I'd make is the past is the past. Once you become the chair of the FMC and the chair of the board of governors, The degree of responsibility changes quite dramatically. You're not one of seven. You're the leader. And any commitments you may have made to anyone at all also go out the window.

And so I think it will be a new day once he gets through and then we'll watch him. And he will be tested to prove that he's got the ability to be more like Paul Volker, if that's what's called for, or Ben Bernanke, if that's what's called for, but certainly not Arthur Burns. I mean, the past, in many respects, Steve, is critically important in this sense. and I point to what Lloyd Blankfine posted on social media just a short time ago as well. And we'll show it to you and I'll read it. Some forget that the Fed's job is more than monetary policy. Over many weeks and weekends during the financial crisis, under great pressure,

Kevin Worse was a very effective Fed board governor involved in crafting and implementing initiatives that averted even greater calamity. He's battle tested, Steve, in ways that maybe other central bankers are not. Yes. I know that to be true, having talked quite a bit with Kevin during the financial crisis. He was on it. He was critical. And he was a good man to having the job. And this really raises the question that the market is asking itself. Because, and maybe Roger can comment on this if there's time. But Kevin, I think, fashions himself a little bit more like the 19th century idea that Badgett laid out, which is that the Fed's job is to provide liquidity in a crisis and then go away.

And his big beef with the subsequent feds and the Fed then was that it didn't go away. It kept the monstrous balance sheet there and inserted itself essentially into the economy in ways that it maybe shouldn't have been or at least created criticism. So the question becomes that you ask yourself, Scott, is if there is a crisis, does Kevin do what Kevin said he should, he would have done in 2009 and 10, which is to liquefy, put a lot of money out there, but then when the crisis is over, remove that. And that's something I think the market may worry about, which is to what extent and to over what period of time would the Fed have the markets back in the event of a crisis? I mean, I think if nothing else, Roger, you know,

because he's, he's so battle tested, and that was one hell of a battle, that it's going to be hard to shake him in that role. He's, he's seen a lot. As, as, they say, and he'd be able to react to it. I want to ask you lastly, though, about perspective changes that we might see to the Fed, as it relates to Fed speak, so to speak, and guidance. He thinks you all talk too much when you're in the job. Do you think that that needs to be changed,

and do you think that forward guidance should go away? I think forward guidance has a place, but I would discard doing it from using it too much. And what we've seen right now is, enticing the economy is in transition. The Fed is uncertain about its policy. It's best to be honest to say we don't know. And I give Jay Powell and his colleagues a great deal of credit for letting go of Ford of guidance when it made no sense and focus on the reality of where they really are, which is data dependent. So I'd argue forward guidance is a tool in the toolkit. It should be

used when it's appropriate and set aside when it's not. And the idea here is to not be very dogmatic, but to be very pragmatic in order to get the job done. I mean, Steve, lastly to you, Fed speak is good for us. Maybe not so good for you. I mean, you know, if it goes away, that would not be great for a senior economics reporter because you like to soak in everything you can get from these folks, and it helps you shape how they may be thinking about policy decisions that could impact the markets and the economy that you cover so closely.

Yeah, I, as a matter of relationship, religion do not believe that Fed officials talk too much. But here's the thing. Scott, I actually just wrote a whole magazine piece about this in International Economy magazine. What's weird about all this, Scott, is it works. Somehow, leading up to the meeting with 19 different people giving multiple speeches in the intermeeting period and all this data coming out, the market is fairly able, with little volatility, to suss out what the Fed is going to do. And I think that if you're going to have transparency, which is a democratic responsibility, it also provides for better monetary policy. Because if you complain about all the people talking

now, let's remember the time, and I happen to be a young reporter at the time, when they didn't talk at all. And I'm not sure, and no, I am sure, that was worse monetary policy when we didn't know what they thought. Now we know what they think, and we do better monetary policy. So there. We'll leave it there. That's a good point to make lastly. Steve, thank you. Roger, we'll talk to you soon as well. Appreciate both of you. Let's send it now to Christina Parts and Nevolos for a look at the biggest names moving into this Friday. Close. Hi there.

Hi, let's start with Verizon shares because they're on pace for their best day since October 2008. After beating expectations in the fourth quarter and delivering full year profit guidance just above estimates, Verizon saw strong additions for both broadband and mobile and expects that trend to actually continue into 2026. The CEO, Dan Schulman, actually saying in a release that, quote, Verizon will no longer be a hunting ground for our competitors. Shares are almost 12% higher. Meantime, Western Digital is lower. Despite a Q-2 beat and guidance better than expectations,

analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald cited high expectations for this memory storage company into the print following strong earnings from competitors Seagate that came out earlier this week, but nonetheless, shares are down 14%. Last but not least, KLA Corp, also on pace for its worst day since October 2024, despite beating estimates in Q2 as its outlook just really disappointed analysts, especially compared to peer land research. KLA cited timing effects and lithography linked spending in the guide. That's for those really expensive EUV machines that are used for light.

But it could also be the company trying to temper expectations for what's been a red-hot stock as of late. shares down 15% Scott. All right. We'll see in a little bit. Christina, thanks. We're just getting started here coming up next. The star Apple analyst Eric Woodring. He'll join us with his first take on those Apple results.

Why is the stock doing more if the quarter was so good? It'll tell us next. We are back. Apple shares doing very little today despite a blowout quarter. For more on why that is, let's bring in Eric Woodring. He covers that company from Morgan Stanley. It's nice to see you. Welcome back.

Thank you for having me, Scott. I mean, they literally invented the words blowout quarter for what Apple just did. And yet the stock is doing absolutely nothing. Why? The market doesn't like uncertainty. And coming into earnings, I think we all expected a blowout iPhone quarter. I think it was more than a blowout iPhone quarter, quite frankly. But the uncertainty still lies around memory costs and the impact that memory costs will have in the future.

and Apple didn't really ring fence the risk that's associated with memory costs beyond the March quarter. So frankly, I think you should feel a little bit better after that quarter because the March quarter gross margin guide was, frankly, fantastic, given everything that is going on. But at the end of the day, we don't know what's going to happen in June. There are a lot of different outcomes that we could foresee, and the market doesn't like uncertainty. So despite a quote blowout, you know, we think. think it's going to take 90 days before Apple could really get some traction back in shares, just because this uncertainty will linger until we get to next earnings in late April. I mean, it's interesting when you talk about memory being such an issue that almost tells me

that I need to look at the trajectory of micron stock and others in that space, which obviously you don't cover. To see what they're doing, they've gone parabolic for a reason. The same reason that Apple is being hurt, you suggest, by those rising costs. Yeah, that's right. And again, I've been fairly vocally cautious on my entire group. I have more underweights and overweights at this moment, simply because my company's IT hardware, they are huge buyers of memory,

and memory prices have gone parabolic. And while we can absolutely make the claim, and I believe it this, that Apple is better positioned, right? They have pricing power. They're clearly going through a product cycle. Over 40% of gross profit comes from high margin services, completely unaffected by memory prices. The fact of the matter is that everybody that buys memory chips is paying more. That doesn't matter if you're the largest hyperscaler, the largest consumer electronics company, or the smallest company that buys memory.

Everybody is paying more. So it is a risk. But again, I think you can feel better. That's why Apple stock is at least up today, despite most of my group. broke being down because you did have a blowout iPhone quarter. You did get a good gross margin guide. We are hearing about better mix, but there's still uncertainties. You just can't put that to rest when we don't get much information beyond the March quarter. Can you make the leap that says because the quarter was so good and the iPhone remains so strong that it just

buys the company more time to get AI right, that this at the very minimum, put somewhat of a floor under the story because their bread and butter product remains so robust sure i think that that's fair and again we're talking kind of about short-term dynamics and if you take a big step back we're big believers that apple can go through multiple years of iPhone growth here as you come out with multiple new form factors uh... foldable this fall

the twentieth anniversary iphone eighteen months from now uh... there's pricing tailwinds again We think Apple has pricing power. China was up 38% year over year. One of the best quarters I've seen in China, from China in several years. And then AI is just kind of this question mark, right?

We know that they now have a partnership with Google. That's fantastic. The underlying foundation model will be driven by Google Gemini. So there's credibility behind that product. But for me, when I think about Apple and AI, first and foremost, they're a product company. They have to sell good products. and then they have to monetize that with services over the long term.

AI potentially can be a new monetization tool. It's the question that I asked on the earnings call last night, but it's very hard to convince consumers, the average consumer, to buy a product because of software. You usually buy it because it looks different, it feels different, but underlying software changes are hard to sell to the average consumer. I think Apple, when we get to the developer conference this summer, their message on AI really has to be specific.

What can I do different with this technology on my Apple devices that I haven't been able to do before and that I can't do on any other platform and any other device? I think that is really left to be seen. It's not in the stock price today. It is an upside call option, but I don't think we can give Apple any credit for AI today simply because there is too much that is a question mark, quite frankly.

But do you feel satiated of sorts by the answer you got? to that question on the call, and what was it? No, but at the end of the day, Apple is a product company. iPhones are going to grow about 22% this year. That is the best year since 2021. Services is growing kind of that low teams, low double digits, which we needed to sustain to get that positive mix shift for gross margins, and we'll learn more about AI in the future.

Apple, to be fair, never shares future details on products or software innovation. So I shouldn't expect them to give me information. Do I want it? Of course, the entire market wants it. But we have to be patient. That's just the name of the game here. All right. You always give us important information to think about.

Eric, thanks. We'll see you soon. Thanks so much, Scott. Eric Woodring, Morgan Stanley. Coming up, the race to an IPO, OpenAI and Anthropic. They are eyeing big market debuts and they are racing to beat one another. Maybe to this place, as a matter of fact, we will discuss next. It's an AI arms race of a different kind to go public.

Open AI said to be looking at a fourth quarter IPO as it tries to beat Anthropic and others to market. Kate Rooney joining us now with more. This is interesting. Yeah, Scott. So Open AI could debut in Q4 and if so investors, tech investors especially are really gearing up for what could be a record-setting year for public offerings. It comes on the heels of a mega week for private market deals. Open AI, we reported on track to raise as much as 100. billion dollars from Amazon and others. Anthropic, meanwhile, closing in on a $20 billion round,

and then SpaceX reportedly considering merging with XAI or Tesla. All of these deals are pushing up valuations in private markets for just these three companies alone. It's just around just under $2 trillion. I'm told by investors, these recent private rounds were actually meant to be the final fundraise ahead of these IPOs. SpaceX, I'm told by a source slated to go this summer. It could be as early as June if it doesn't end up combining with Tesla. The journal also reporting Open AIs and talks to list this year. Maybe Q4, I am told by a source, OpenAI has not set an IPO date, but a Q4 is a possibility rival Anthropic.

Also preparing at some point this year could end up being later. If you look at predictions markets, though, putting the odds for all of these companies, now above 50 percent. SpaceX is closer to 80 percent on Cali. I have been talking to investors in these AI giants who say companies are serving, Certainly getting IPO ready. One banker compared the IPO competition to Uber and Lyft back in 2019. Lyft, if you remember, was able to list about a month before Uber and really set the public market price and narrative, Scott. So I was going to ask you why being first matters so much, but is that the exact reason you try and set the market of where it is?

Set the tone, tell your story to Wall Street, Scott. So that would be the positive that you don't want to be sort of priced off of your competitor that might have a different business. in the case of Anthropic versus Open AI, sort of different strategies. I would say on the other side of this, the negative might be that you don't get to test the waters. SpaceX is a different business, but if you're Open AI going after Anthropic or vice versa, you can actually kind of see the appetite, see the demand and then sort of adjust. But, you know, they are really hiring professionals. If you look at Sarah Fryer at Open Eye, the CFO, she's taking multiple companies public.

They're really working on the narrative from what I've told. And it'll be interesting to see kind of what their message is to Wall Street, one's really seen as a consumer company, one's more enterprise, but Open AI has been trying to get that enterprise business, which is key. I mean, we don't have the prospectus yet, but profitability is going to be a big deal for these guys. And lastly, it's interesting in and of itself that when asked prior, including on this network, I think, the last time, in fact, that he was on, Sam Altman didn't sound like he was in any hurry in any way to take Open AI public. Yeah. I mean, it's interesting. It's a surprise, honestly, coming back. and hearing that these companies are thinking about listing. There is sort of seen at this window,

but a lot of this, you know, you think of this private market pool as sort of endless capital. From what I'm hearing, this was sort of the last leg of the private market financing. They just have an endless demand for capital. Public markets are one way to tap it. I'm also told there's probably going to be a lot of retail interest in these names. So it's great marketing and advertising for these companies. It's a way to raise money. And if everybody's going for it, you can probably mean that top three. You don't want to be sort of waiting to be number five on the list. And then you really, that's when bankers worry about, you know, is there enough demand to actually absorb that level of IPOs?

We didn't even mention names like Databricks. But there's other AI companies also looking at this. Sure. Brave New Worlds, perhaps, for Mr. Altman and Amadeh, as they think about these public markets. Kate, thanks. That's Kate Rooney. Up next, the battle brewing between one of the most powerful men on Wall Street and one of the most powerful men in crypto. The show details behind this drama.

You don't want to miss it. We'll do it next. We're back with Bitcoin hitting its lowest level in about two months today, now down about 35% from its record high back in October. And the Wall Street Journal reporting today, the Trump administration getting closer to revealing rules to foster more growth in cryptocurrencies. Meantime, some apparent drama recently

between the most public crypto CEO, Brian Armstrong of Coinbase and J.P. Morgan, CEO, Jamie. Diamond. Leslie Picker joins us now with these details. Les. Hey, Scott, yeah, that Davos clash that you're referring to occurred after Armstrong publicly withdrew his support for a major Senate crypto bill due to a variety of reasons, including a draft amendment that would have killed rewards on stable coins. Now, I'm told that Diamond was upset about some of the comments Armstrong had been making about this on business TV that he believed were misinformation. Here's one example.

I think Americans should be able to earn more money on their money. Banks should have to compete on a level playing field. And if the American people feel like the banks are not paying high enough interest rates and stable coin rewards can offer them more, then maybe the bank should have to pay higher interest rates to compete, right? J.P. Morgan's view is that the coin base is that coinbase wants the upside of the banking model with none of the regulatory costs. Banks, of course, for decades have needed to abide by capital requirements

and liquidity coverage rules and resolution planning and anti-money. money laundering rules and significant supervision in order to pay interest on deposits and, of course, lend those out. Coinbase telling CNBC in a statement, quote, the fight over rewards is really an anomaly in our collaborative relationship with the banks. We work closely with them and have announced multiple partnerships where we power their digital asset infrastructure. The fight over rewards is one of those only in DC phenomena. Now, I'm told by multiple sources that there is a meeting on Monday at the White House with several trade associations. Coinbase is expected to have representation there as well. The goal, of course, is to find a compromise to bring that bill out of a stalled state.

Scott? This drama in Davos, though, culminated, I guess apparently with Mr. Diamond saying something directly to Mr. Armstrong. Yeah, that's the Wall Street Journal. Wall Street Journal is reporting that he basically pointed his finger at Mr. Armstrong, who was in a restaurant and basically said, you know, you're full of S-H-I-T. I don't know if I can even spell that out on cable. I guess I can. I feel like I've done it before. You did.

But this idea, I'm told he was upset because he'd been kind of watching Brian Armstrong go on multiple business TV networks, of course, including hours. And saying various talking points that may not have been necessarily lies per se, but something that Diamond perceived to be misinformation for the broader public. And so he was pretty fired up over that. Okay. Les, thank you. Leslie Picker.

Coming up next, we check the biggest movers into the close. The bell is back after this. Getting some news out of Blue Origin. Kate Rooney is back with that. Hi, Kate. Hi, Scott. So Blue Origin, of course, Jeff Bezos's space company, a competitor to SpaceX,

company just saying in a press release that it's hitting pause on its space tourism flights, shifting resources towards bigger goal of putting people, on the moon. Company says here in the release, redirecting teams from New Shepard, that is the tourism side of the business, and then adding funding to accelerate development of lunar capabilities, aligning here with NASA's push to return astronauts

to the moon. Company, as I mentioned, competitor to SpaceX, we just talked about, potentially going public this year, does reflect, they say, strategic decision, also potentially politics at play here is Washington and the White House, a lot more focused on geopolitics and national security in space, Scott. All right, Kate, thank you. That's

Kate Rooney again. Market Zone's coming up next. We're now in the closing bell market zone. Truist Keith Lerner and BTIG's Jonathan Crenske are here to break down these crucial moments of the trading day. Plus Pippa Stevens is tracking the action. We talked about at the very top of this show in medals today. And Pippa, we're going to begin with you. Tell us more about what's happening here. Eye popping on the way up and now eye popping on the way down.

Silver's worst day since 1980 falling more than 31%. Now, Miller, Tobaccox, Matt Maley, saying most of this is likely forced selling. The worst nomination triggered a jump in the dollar, which in turn, triggered the start of the unwind. He added that crashes rarely happened due to fundamentals. It's almost always about margin calls. The 50-day moving average is 74, so even with today's big drop, we are sitting well above that and well above the 200 day at 4846. Now, yesterday, Silver was tracking for its best month since 1979, but it's now ending January up 11%. That's only the best month since last month. Platinum and palladium also down double digits on the day, while gold

shed 8%. Scott? All right, Pippa. Thank you very much for that look. Keith Lerner, I come to you first because you downgraded gold today, as a matter of fact. Yeah, well, we actually downgraded it yesterday morning, Scott. So we are lucky to put the piece out before the sell-off today. And the main reason for it is that the gold had become about 40% above its 200-day moving average. That's the most extended we've seen since the 80s.

So in our view, and I know yesterday morning, we just said, that it was vulnerable to any bad news. And when you have something that moves up so quickly, the move down could be also just as abrupt. And as it was, as Pippa just mentioned, silver before today was up 60% for the month. And it was more than 140% above its 200-day moving average. So again, that rubber band got too stressed. And we're seeing kind of that abrupt reversal today. All right. So, Khrinsky, you look at the charts. Is this done? Where does it go from here? No, I think the points Keith made are some of the same points we were making earlier this week.

You combine that with the volume profile, you know, on a notional basis, we're seeing all-time record highs for gold and silver. And they're, you know, in some cases, trading as much as the spy ETF. So just things we haven't really seen much. So they could get a short-term bounce, you know, given the 30% move in silver. But ultimately, I think silver probably is going back to that primary breakout point from earlier in this year. around $55. You know, the other thing I'm watching, and I mentioned it at the top of the show with Eric Woodring, memory stocks.

Micron is the greatest example to use because if you look at a chart over the last year, even six months, it's ridiculous to look at, along with the other names. Is that overdone? Overbought? What's up? Yeah, so Micron, again, using the percentage above the $200 and more than the average, it's over 130% above its 200-8, that's more than at any point. in its history, even at the peak of the dot-com bubble.

And so, look, the memory space has been the spot to be, not just in tech, but in the overall market. But I think when you get to that level of extreme, like we saw in the precious metals, that leaves it vulnerable to any bad news. You also saw Sandisk, you know, have blowout earnings last night opened up massively this morning and is closing, you know, down around near the low. So that type of price action on good news tells you a lot of good news is priced in. and there's probably some vulnerability in the space there.

Keith, you take anything away from the mega caps that we got, since we're talking about tech, the earnings that we got this week, and we look ahead now to some critical ones next? Yeah, you know, it looks to me that we still have some more resting to do with tech. We have to remember tech almost doubled the S&P off the April lows, and we're basically seeing this consolidation. The good news, Scott, is if we look at relative valuations for the sector now, is down to about 17% from a premium that was about 37% just a couple of months ago.

And that's the cheapest relative to the overall market that we've seen since 2021. We are, of course, seeing this kind of divergence within the sector. But I think long-term tech is still fine. I just think the way it's reacted to these earnings means we probably have more of this digestion period. And really, the next big earnings report is in VINIA at the end of February. Well, I mean, we do get alphabet in Amazon next week. I mean, those are important. Those are kind of important.

And communication services are at fresh, absolute, and relative highs in an area we still like. Jonathan, what about the market itself? Maybe more volatile of late. Maybe it's settled down now once Davos was out of the mix. Are we done with that bout of volatility? So, look, you know, we came into mid-January at that 7,000 level. Big psychological numbers do tend to have. cause some turbulence, and we're seeing a little bit of that now. We come into February,

which is a seasonally weaker month, especially in the back half of February. And I think when you look at what's going on in the tech space with software, getting, you know, breaking down like it is, and semi's kind of extended and vulnerable, that could lead to some further headwinds, you know, given how big of a weighting tech is within the S&P. I think the good news is we still think, you know, areas like small caps can work. We're seeing some more defensive sector. like reeds and utilities hold up okay. So there's spots to be, but I do think the overall market probably still is a little bit more volatility into February. All right. We'll see. Gentlemen, thank you. Enjoy the weekend. I know we'll be talking to both

of you soon. We'll take a look at the markets here as we head towards the close. We're about 30 seconds away. The bells are going to start ringing momentarily, though. The big news of the day, Kevin Warsh, nominated by the president to be the successor to Chair Jay Powell. That continues to show itself in some respects in certain parts of the market, whether it's the dollar, maybe a little bit of rates, but certainly the medals, which are rolling over, as we said. The majors are all going to go out red as we go.