Closing Bell - Washington Dominates Markets Again 1/14/26

Episode Date: January 14, 2026

Charles Bobrinskoy of Ariel Investments explains why inflation remains a key concern for investors and why value is outperforming so far this year. Coverage then turns to Washington, with Eamon Javers on the latest from the White House, Michael Froman of the Council on Foreign Relations discussing geopolitical risks tied to Greenland and Iran, and Emily Wilkins breaking down momentum behind a congressional stock trading ban. Former Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher weighs on Chair Powell’s challenges. Plus, Tesla’s push toward full self-driving with our Phil LeBeau. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

And that is the end of regulation of Marsh. We're in the closing belt of New York Stock Exchange. Vinehill Capital, doing the honors at the NASDAQ really was a mixed Wednesday bag in the markets today. The Dow down a touch, still though up over the past week. The SNP 500, NASDAQ, the bigger decliners. The SNP lower by about six-tenths of a percent, the NASDAQ, down 1 percent, but wasn't all bad. Not all index is lower. Small caps, the star today.

And by the way, so far this year, the Russell 2000 up today and up nearly, 4% in a month inside the NASDAQ, big tech, a big bust. All of these super cap seven, not so super today. They all fell. Microsoft, Tesla, Netflix, they all lost over 2%. A bit of a brutal day for big bank investors. Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Citigroup, all reporting earnings, and all getting a bit of a Bronx cheer on the numbers.

Three banks with a combined market cap of around $800 billion, all losing more than 3%. In the meantime, they just talked about it. Crude oil rising again before ending lower oil right around $60 a barrel here in the States. Energy stocks, though, they have been hot lately. Exxon, Chevron, Total energies, all hitting new record highs today. Also hot, the metals. Silver looking downright golden. And now over $90 an ounce, silver just $30 an ounce one year ago. In a little more than a month, silver had its first close above 60, above 70, above 7. above 80 and now above 90. Oh, copper, it also keeps going higher as well. All right, everybody, there is your scorecard on Wall Street. Welcome to closing bell over time. I am Brian Sullivan, riding with you all week long, and let's get you over the hump on this Wednesday. And we're going to start with big tech, which got a little bit smaller today. The NASDAQ posting its worst day in about a month. Let's get more on that. And the markets in general with Sima Modi.

Hey, Brian, let's talk about where we saw the weakness in tech, starting with Mag 7, all trading lower as the market counts down to Microsoft results next week. And that rotation that we've been seeing into chips, that also stall with names like Nvidia trading down by 1.4%. Oracle reversing yesterday's gains following a subset of bondholders filing a lawsuit, alleging the company did not disclose that it would be needing to take out additional debt to finance his data center expansion plans, shares ending lower by 4.3% at the lows of the day. the real weakness really has centered around Salesforce. It ended off the lows of the day, but this launch of Anthropics AI agent prompting questions around competition, market share. And for context, Salesforce is now down about 25% over the past one year compared to the 19% gain that we have seen in the S&P 500.

Let's broaden the conversation. Look at some of the other software names like Asana and HubSpot, both seen by analysts as vulnerable to the threat of AI. Cybersecurity names trading down on this report. that claims Beijing is banning Chinese companies from using U.S. and Israeli cybersecurity software. The China exposure for these names minimal, but yet these stocks treading down, Paula Alto, ending the day flat. For software as a whole, Brian, RBC Capital's Rishi Jullery is saying AI is widening the gap between the innovative companies that can build truly AI native solutions and the companies who aren't innovating fast enough, earnings will provide that key gut check.

I've heard about this AI thing and I think it might have a future, Simomodi. Thank you. Thanks. All right, from stocks now to the bond market yields, they continue to come down a bit today. Following this morning's producer price index data and retail sales as well, we know mortgage refinancing also popping. But Rick Santelli, give us the lowdown on the bond market today, sir. Yeah, this was a very counterintuitive session for treasuries. Consider this. If you look at a two-year chart of year-over-year X food, X energy, X-trade, X-trade, X-E, X-energy, X-trade. PPI, the real core. It was at 3.5%. That's a biggie. But the way the data is released and all the government shutdown effects, well, we had NOVE data in many cases before we had ACCA data. So that

really changes things because ACC was kind of hot and it made November look a little less warm because the market today has a ball flattener. Think about it. We have hot year-over-year PPI and interest rates across the whole curve go down. Long rates, most sensitive, the long-term inflation, go down more than short-term yields. Two years down two, a ten years down four. It really is quite counterintuitive, although, to be fair, the month-over-month data, especially cord zero, was rather tame. Now, if you look at a 12-hour chart of two-year, you can see there wasn't a whole lot of

volatility around any of the data points today. Now, if you go to a 10-year, a two-day's very revealing. Today's two-year did not trade under its spikes from yesterday, but the 10-year did. It's trading below yesterday's low yields, hence you have that flattening. And if you look at a year-to-date of tens, all that I've been talking about recently is top of the range, top of the range. We can't get a close over 420.

We keep knocking on the door. Today, it was the other end of the range. We were hovering around that 413, so we're covering both sides of it, this week. Whichever side we break out, look for some follow-through. Brian, back to you. All right, 4.14, Rick Santelli, thank you. All right. That down, let's get more now on the markets and your money and also maybe some big money opportunities for you. Joining us now. Charles Babinskoy, he is vice chairman of aerial investments. He comes armed with some big ideas and a couple of stock picks as well. Oil, the big story. Oil was rising earlier today. The president

kind of signaling he may not attack Iran imminently. Oil, pull. back down, but you put Venezuela in there, you put Iran in there, SLB, the company formerly known as Schlumberzee, at some point I'll stop saying that, Charles. That stock has been doing well lately. One of your favorites, why? Well, oil is part of the general commodity index, a commodity group of companies that are going to go up with inflation. And there's other companies in that space. There's real estate. There's precious metals. There are all kinds of assets, hard assets that are more valuable in an inflationary environment. And as Rick just said, we've got a number of factors pointing to higher inflation. We've got a PPI number that is above

3% year over year, not this 2%, the Fed keeps talking about. So oil, which is basically trading at the same place that traded in 1980, an inflation adjusted basis has gone nowhere, is actually poised, I think, to be one of the asset groups, the commodities that moves higher. Yeah, fascinating because you're exactly right. Oil, by the way, tends to live around 60 or 70 bucks a barrel overall for long periods of time. Intra month, intra-week, intra-year, it can move. But to your point, there it goes. But SLB was it $31 at its lows in April? It's now at 46 and change. That's effectively a 50% gain to what do you ascribe that. Is it just an inflation trade? No. So it is actually going to benefit. It's one of the names that I'm most confident would benefit from more activity in Venezuela.

Slumberjay has focused their business internationally. They've gotten out of most of the Permian in the U.S., and they are very, very good at helping big oil companies explore and then execute. And the one thing that they don't care that much about is whether their clients make a lot of money or lose a lot of money, drilling oil. They just need activity. I think we're going to have more activity, and they're going to be. a prime beneficiary. They are Chevron's partner in Venezuela. Others I've talked to suggest you might be exactly right. APA used to be known as Apache. They changed their name. Still a huge natural gas business. In fact, the largest natural gas producer in northern Africa, at least Western natural gas producer. APA, not a name that gets a lot of love or attention. Why is it on your radar? Well, they have a huge find off of the coast of Suriname, very close to Venezuela, and they're

doing that with Total. They're going to start producing a lot of oil next year. They are very well positioned in natural gas in the U.S., as you said, and it's just fundamentally extremely cheap. The stock is trading at less than 10 times earnings when Chevron and Exxon are trading at 20 times earnings. So it's a very asset-rich play that's not getting the credit for the upcoming increase in earnings that's going to come from Suriname. Yeah, APA there. Your other picks don't have time now, Sphere, Madison Square Garden Entertainment, long-lived Bob Weir and The Grateful Dead and and Co. Charles Wilbinstoy of Ariel, thank you very much. Do appreciate that. Thanks, Brian. All right. Meetty, President Trump says the U.S. needs Greenland or else China or Russia might take it.

We'll have the latest. His officials from Greenland and Denmark visit the White House. Plus, another move for oil. We just talked about it. Rose, then fell. We'll get more on that and some of the big international stories that could impact your money. A lot more to do. You're watching Closing Bell overtime. We're back right after this. Trump today continuing is pushed to control Greenland while the country's foreign minister visits the White House.

Amen Jabbers covering that meeting and has more from Washington. Amen. Yeah, Brian, we saw the foreign ministers of Greenland and Denmark come out to brief the press at the Danish embassy here in Washington shortly after that meeting broke up. And what they described was essentially a stalemate. between the United States. They said that Greenland read out their red lines

in terms of not being subsumed into the United States. They said a disagreement remains. We saw the Denmark team say that it's just hard to function in this environment with these constant threats. But they did say that talks are going to continue. They say they're going to put together a high level working group, no detail on what that is to continue conversations. Maybe some kind of diplomatic off-ramp

in that high-level working group there. We'll wait and see. We still haven't gotten any readout on this meeting from the U.S. side. So all we have to go on right now is what the Danish and Greenland side have been saying this afternoon. Meanwhile, we saw the president moving oil markets in the Oval Office talking to reporters a short time ago. He initially indicated that there was some sort of de-escalatory message. And then later in that same Oval Office session, Brian, he provided a little bit more detail on exactly what information he was getting from Iran that made him confident that the killing there had. stopped or would be stopping. Here's what he said. We have been informed by very important sources

on the other side and they said the killing is stopped and the executions won't take place. There was supposed to be a lot of executions today and that the executions won't take place and we're going to find out. I mean, I'll find out after this. You'll find out. But we've been told on good authority and I hope it's true. So you saw the president there, Brian, referring to very important sources on the other side, not clear. there to me necessarily whether he's talking about direct communications between Washington and Tehran or whether that's U.S. intelligence gathering information from sources in Tehran. Nonetheless, presidents seemed pretty confident there that the killing had stopped.

And that sent that de-escalatory signal that the market seemed to like and it moved the oil market. Yeah, but that doesn't indicate or give us an indication, I should say, Amin, of what the president's thinking may be about Iran longer term. We're talking about a short-term thing and what is the biggest revolt or uprising protests, whatever word you want to use against the Ayatollah since 2009 or 1979 with the Shaw. Yeah, no, that's right. I mean, I think this is a temporary signal, but it's sent, you know, at least for this afternoon, maybe. You know, people who were wiping the sweat off their brows in terms of whether there might be U.S. military action in Iran.

you know, the long-term resolution to this crisis clearly, you know, is still out there. And we just don't know where it's going to land for now. But I think markets just reacting to that signal from the president saying, you know, the killing is stopped. And that was his red line in Iran. He was warning the regime there. If you kill these protesters, if there's a mass hanging, the U.S. is going to respond in Iran. That we seem to be backing away from that. But again, it's all for the moment.

Yeah. And also seemingly indicating there has been. indeed a lot of killing over the last week or so, killing of likely civilians. Amon Javvers, thank you very much. For more on all of this, let us bring a Council on Foreign Relations and former U.S. trade representative, Michael Frommon. Michael, I want to start with Greenland first. A lot of talk about rare earths.

The U.S. just ordering a couple months ago a bunch of icebreakers from Finland. Do you believe that Greenland is strategically important to the United States? Well, I think that Greenland is strategically located and is important to Arctic security. And it's a concern of the United States. It's a concern of NATO and it has been. And I think with the president shining a light on Greenland, I think it's underscored that with the melting of the polar ice caps, there's a lot more activity over the top. Russia and China are cooperating more.

Although when we were there, we took a mission there in August, a group of people, fact-finding mission. When asked whether there was Chinese presence or any activity there, there was none to be found. But I think it's important that we sort of focus on the underlying issue, which is what do we need to do to ensure Arctic security? And there, I think the president, referring to NATO, is a positive sign. I don't think we need to own Greenland ourselves or to invade it or to buy it. The Danes are very happy to work with us, as are the Greenlanders, to ensure that Greenland play a strategic role. You know, we used to have 17 military bases on Greenland at the height of the Cold War. Now we have one. We have an agreement with Denmark about ramping up

military presence there. It's already well in place. So there's a foundation on which we can build to address the legitimate underlying issues around Arctic security without questioning the sovereignty of Denmark or of the Greenlanders. Well, do you believe, and I'm asking you to speculate, I know, Michael, but do you believe that a lot of what we're seeing for the president, as is his nature is part of that negotiation because you've got the Germans. They're sending some reconnaissance soldiers to Denmark. Denmark and Greenland, both representatives there because Greenland is an independent nation but relies on Denmark for its economy, health care, and education. That part of all of this is that delicate dance to just get more

cooperation. I'm not saying we're going to go back to 17 bases, Michael, but would you agree we need more of a presence there, given the opening up, of some of the Arctic waterways? Well, I do. I mean, first of all, Greenland is part of the kingdom of Denmark. It's part of Denmark. And to your point, I think there is opportunity to ramp up a military presence in Greenland, whether it's U.S. or NATO.

The Greenlanders are very open. All we have to do is ask. They've made clear they want U.S. cooperation. They want NATO cooperation. And the NATO's got some ideas about an Arctic century force that could be put, in Greenlands and make sure that Russia and China don't take advantage of the melting polar ice caps at the expense of Arctic security for the West. I think that's a good place to start. Yeah, now going back quickly to Iran, Michael, obviously a larger issue in the short term.

We don't get a lot of really good information. We have some social media videos. It's a closed nation. They've been cutting off the internet, Starlink Elon Musk, trying to kind of open that back up. How does this play out? Is this just another? crushed uprising by people desperate for their freedom and we kind of go on as we were or do the people win this time and establish real change or regime change in Iran? Great question. Frankly, too uncertain to have a real answer to it. I mean, certainly Iran is in a weakened position, a weaker position they've ever been in. Their proxies have been decimated, their military's been decimated, got no air air air.

defense, their missile program, and their nuclear program have been setbacks significantly, although there are concerns about them trying to rebuild their missile program. They've got 50% inflation, 70% inflation for food. Their currency has fallen 80% against the U.S. dollar over the last year. And you are seeing larger protests than in recent memory. Now this is a regime that has been very effective in the past of using force and putting down protests and whether or not they will succeed this time, it remains to be seen. And so, but it's more widespread. It started with merchants in the, in the bazaar in Tehran.

Now it's spread to a lot of other cities, to ethnic minorities. It feels different this time, but I wouldn't underestimate the capacity of the regime to be brutal in its capacity to try and put down these kinds of protests. Yeah, we don't know how many. You heard the president say the killing had stopped, and there's been estimates that more than 10,000 have been killed. We can't confirm that. I doubt we'll ever get confirmation officially from Iran for obvious reasons.

But tough situation there, rooting for the people. Michael Fruman, really appreciate your time today, sir. Thank you. Thanks for having me. All right. Other big news coming out of Washington today, the effort to get Congress to ban itself from trading stocks. A lot of money's on the line here. Emily Wilkins, joining us now with more on how this is going.

Emily. Hey, Brian. Well, look, some good news. If you're supportive of the ban, it would ban lawmakers from, buying new stocks and it cleared its first hurdle today. It was approved by a House panel. Now, this was a party-line vote and it was on a bill that has momentum to potentially pass on the House floor, but you have a big hurdle here in that a growing number of Democrats are coming out as opposed to this bill. And it's not because they're opposed to this ban on stock trading.

It's because they say the bill is a watered down half measure. They say that because under this bill, lawmakers, they can continue to hold stocks that they had when they were elected. They can So trade commodities, futures, they can buy diversified funds, plus they can use dividends from the stocks that they currently own to actually go ahead and buy new shares. So lawmakers will also be able to sell stocks. They just have to give seven days public notice before they can do so. Now, several amendments offered by Democrats today

to further crackdown on insider trading were rejected, and Democrats are going to try to force a vote on a different measure that would not only ban lawmakers from holding or buying stocks, but also apply to the president and the vice president. So we're definitely going to be seeing more action on this issue. Although unless some bipartisanship emerges, it's really hard to see this bill becoming law at this point. Brian?

Do we have any idea? By the way, Emily, I'm putting on the spot a little bit. It's okay if you don't know. But do we haven't had any idea why they would vote this down? I mean, other than we're really good at trading stocks and we all want to get rich? I mean, Brian, part of it is that they think that they can go further on this. I mean, there have been bipartisan bills that we saw that were introduced just last

Congress that would say, hey, you can't hold stocks, you got to divest, you can't do commodities, can't do futures, a lot of restrictions on there. And Democrats are saying, hey, we need to push for a stronger bill here, not the one that we've got right now. Emily, got even more news to ask you about unrelated to what we just talked about. You had some comments from Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong about the crypto bill. What's he saying? Yeah, Brian. So look, tomorrow's going to be kind of the start of the Super Bowl for crypto when it comes to legislation on Capitol Hill. This is the big bill, the rules of the road that they have been pushing for, talking for, up on Capitol Hill, lobbying for. But now you are seeing Coinbase, which has really been leading the charge on crypto, their CEO, Brian Armstrong, coming out and saying, look, this bill simply is not good enough. If it passes, will be in a worse place than where we are now. He cited a number of concerns, including there's been a really tense battle between banks and crypto over whether crypto can offer these interests like rewards on stable coins. And neither banks or crypto are happy with what's been put out in this draft of the bill.

We are expecting it to be amended tomorrow. We're expecting some very feisty debate around this. But we also know that Tim Scott, the chair of the committee who's holding it, says, look, there needs to be a vote. We need to move this forward. So to be seen on exactly which lawmakers are going to vote for it and how this bill is going to continue to evolve if it can get coin basis support. If they can't get the bank support, we'll have to see if they're actually able to get the number of votes for it to cross the finish line.

All right, good stuff on two big important bills that are sitting out there. Emily Wilkins, thank you very much. All right. In the meantime, folks, we've got a news alert happening right now on Disney. Julia Borsden with that. Hey, Brian, Disney is announcing a new enterprise marketing and brand organization and is appointing Assad Ayaz as the company's chief marketing and brand officer. He's been chief brand officer since 2023. and this is the first time in Disney's history that has ever had a CMO. Now, Disney is calling this a new enterprise organization saying it's the first of its kind at a traditional media company, and it aims to align the company's marketing teams across its businesses

to have a more connected approach to how it reaches audiences, advances the business goals of each segment, and the company as a whole. Ayaz will report directly to CEO Bob Eiger, Eiger saying, quote, as our businesses have evolved, it's clear we need a... company-wide role that ensures brand consistency, the chief marketing and brand officer role is critical for this moment. Of course, this comes as we wait for news of who Disney's board will appoint to take over from Iger as CEO. The company has said it will make the announcement in early 2026. Now, in other media executive news, Paramount just announcing it's appointing Dennis Sinelli as CFO. He was previously CFO of Scale AI and before that head of mobility for Uber.

Paramount is also adding Andrew Campion to its board as an independent director. He's currently the chairman and CEO of Unrivaled Sports. And he's also on the board of Starbucks. He was previously a longtime Nike executive. Brian? All right. Double dose there of media news. Julia, thank you very much.

All right, back to the markets, folks. Check out shares of Intel and check out Moderna. Over five years, 2021 through 2025, both stops. absolute dogs. Intel lost a quarter of its value. Moderna lost nearly three quarters from the COVID vaccine highs. But guess what? So far this year, those are two of the hottest stocks in the world, both up more than 30% in a couple of days. We'll get more on both of those names.

But before that, Michael Santoli is back looking at some long time-langing sectors, which kind of like those stocks and I don't know, maybe some, actors are having their moment. Stick around. All right, welcome back. Hope you're having a great Wednesday, wherever you may be. A lot of the so-called underdogs certainly have had their moment in the sun to kick off 2026. And even a few lagging sectors showing signs of life. The big question, is this kind of just your usual January reshuffle or something with a little more staying power? Let's bring in senior markets commentator Michael Santoli, kind of tracking some of these. plot twists in the early year market rotation.

You know, Brian, some of this is things that have been predicted or hoped for for a while. One of those being small cap, Russell 2000, now actually has eclipsed the S&P 500 in terms of price gain for a one-year basis. So this is really coming out of the Dolgium. See how deep we got down in April. I would point out on a five-year basis, the S&P still has a 60 percentage point advantage. But clearly, the small guys, the less profitable companies are gaining. on the big tech winners that are driving the S&P 500. Now, take a look on a sector basis.

Really aggressive moves just this month higher in basic materials. And ex-LP, of course, consumer staples relative to financials. Financial is a consensus trade, worked most of last year. This time you have the unloved commodity-based stocks, and then especially consumer staples. Nobody's got a nice thing to say about them. They're somewhat washed out and obviously less growthy. Take a look at how the valuations of what you would consider more defensive,

stable stocks. This is the low volatility stocks in the S&P, and that's dividend, select dividends, so higher dividend payers. You see how cheap they are, kind of gone down in valuation. And this right here is what I want to focus on. Valuation relative to the S&P 500 along this scale, never been lower for dividend stocks or for low volatility stocks. So the cost of perceived safety anyway is pretty low on historical scale, Brian. Yeah, certainly is. When will we get some kind of confirmation on the Santoli scale, when will we know? It's probably a matter of months. I think you have to go through a couple of earning season and see if, in fact, you know,

the stable stocks, the low volatility stocks are not going to work if we're in a galloping bull market, right? If everything is risk appetites are rising, the IPOs are happening, and all the rest of it. So it's kind of like they're going to work if we have a little more of a volatile period and maybe somehow a seldom news response to some of those earnings. that's what we got to, I guess, keep an eye on. Good stuff. Mike Santoli, thank you very much. Yep.

All right, let's now get a CNBC news update with Kate Rooney. Hey there, Brian. Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee are asking NYU and Columbia for information on alleged connections to the late sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein. Representative Jamie Raskin said today, survivors provided evidence to the committee that Epstein lured young women, some of them minors, by promising them admission into those universities.

Raskin also says Epstein later paid tuition for several of them. Meanwhile, federal investigators say Boeing warned plane owners in 2011 about a broken part that contributed to the UPS plane crash in November that killed 15 people. The National Transportation Safety Board says there were four previous failures of the part that helped secure the aircraft's engines to the wings, but Boeing at the time determined it was not a flight safety issue. And finally, President Trump signed a bipartisan bill into law this after. allowing schools to offer whole milk to students that reverses an Obama era restriction that

limited the options to fat-free or low-fat milk. The Trump administration unveiled a new food pyramid last week that emphasizes full-fat dairy, proteins, and healthy fats. Brian, back to you. All right. Kate Rooney, thank you very much. Meantime, President Trump continuing his attacks on Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. And now one senator suggesting that Powell ends the drama by resigning. The last former Dallas Federal Reserve President Richard Fisher, what he thinks of that. And we have an idea.

What we're going to ask him anyway? About that and more. That's next. All right, welcome, but welcome back to overtime. Tech stock selling off a little bit today. You had a 1% decline for the NASDAQ. The Dow did end up down, but it paired its losses, ending down only 42 points. Small caps, kind of the star, the Russell 2000, actually rose

about 7 tenths of 1%. It is now very quietly, by the way, up about 4% in a month. But big banks, they were lower following more earnings. But the week is not done yet. It's been a busy week already, but you got Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley numbers tomorrow. We'll get you ready for those reports coming up. And by the way, look at this turnaround in oil. Oil settled at $62 a barrel at $2.30.

Then you had some comments from President Trump that indicated the U.S. may not be ready to imminently strike Iraq. That set oil down. A little bit of an olive branch maybe to Iran and the global oil markets. Oil fell a bit on those news or headlines. Oil at $60.40 right now. In the meantime, we continue to monitor the standoff between President Trump and Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Senator Kevin Kramer, who sits on the banking committee, offered to play a sort of peacemaker,

saying that Powell should step down in exchange for avoiding an indictment. He elaborated that on money movers earlier today. I don't think it's a secret that the administration would like Jay Powell out. They would have liked them out a long time ago. So would I. I'm just, all I'm suggesting is that if you want to put this behind us sooner rather than later and deal with the other big issues of the day, which this is detracting from, this would be, in my view, an elegant way out of it.

All right, for more with that and more is former Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher, also CBC contributor, a man who is chuckling. My guess is, Richard, I have no idea what you're going to say. You may surprise us, but my guess is your reaction to the possibility of Jerome Fisher stepping down or Jerome Powell stepping down is somewhere between 0% chance and when hell freezes over. You know what I'm going to say. Well, I know you. Look, he is convinced, it appears, that he is in a right. And the worst thing to do would be to step down and sacrifice the independence of the Fed.

He's got support from every central bank governor that counts in the world at large, of Jamie Diamond, the head of other banks, of Republican senators on the committee that are much higher ranking than Senator Kramer. And it may be an elegant solution from the standpoint of the presidency. It is not an elegant solution from the standpoint of the federal responsibility. serve. Even French Hill, who's a very thoughtful congressperson and a powerful congressperson and a Republican, he has said that he would like to see the end to this thing. It's a waste of time. And I think the president has other things to do than to worry about Jay Powell.

Let me ask you this, though. And I'm not going to take the other side, but I'll play sort of foil, which is Jerome Powell came out on Sunday night, extraordinarily rare video message, kind of broke the news in a way to the market. We know there had been some requests for information months ago from Janine Piro. She had to kind of come out and say, well, I asked for information. They never got back to me, so I never wanted to do this. Do you think it was right for Jerome Powell to do the video message to kind of, in some weird way, kind of break the news to the country?

Yeah, I think he'd had enough. He's been taunted forever years now by the president, at least since he got reelected. And Ms. Piro is pretty much a puppet of the president, so I don't view her as an independent thinker. By the way, Senator Kramer, who you referred to, broke it on another place. He broke it with Larry Cudley's show in Fox News. We know what their bias is. She was a Fox News commentary. We know her bias is.

So I don't take it that seriously. again, I'm sure that Powell and his personal lawyers because he's being sued personally or indicted personally, possibly. They've thought this through. And they're awfully good, by the way. He got Conley in that firm. And they've been very successful in turning back a lot what the president wants. There are four men reported as finalists, Kevin Warsh, Kevin Hassett, Christopher Waller,

and Rick Reeder of Black Rock. Right. We know that Kevin Hassett currently works for the White House. So we'll kind of put them to the side. If you're one of the other three, does learning this information, Richard, does it change the way you think about maybe accepting the job, even if you're the final choice?

Because now you're worried, if I don't do exactly what the president or the White House wants, am I now at risk? Does it alter your thinking about taking the job? Alter my thinking, but I don't think it alters now. of the three other candidates. They're all capable people. They realize they have to carry 18 other people at the table. They also realize the New York Fed is the vice chairman of the FOMC, and I said, not the vice chairman of the system. And that voice is very important, and he's made his view

very clear, that is the head of the New York Fed, that he feels that the Fed shouldn't be dittle with. And they're just going to have to win an argument. Right now, it appears that Steve Myron is unable to carry the table by doing what the president wants. So I don't expect, by the way, there to be a rate cut at this next meeting. There's an interesting thing in the CPI data. Motor vehicle insurance was omitted, and we know that's been under a lot of pressure. Why was it in the data? I don't know.

It may have added another 10th or so. Peter Bukfair has been very good about that. You should have them on the show to talk about it. But I don't see any need for them to move. And if they don't, of course, the president will get on his high horse again and criticize J-PAL and criticize the committee. But remember, those three plus HACET are going to have to carry a committee. And they're 19 people. They're just one, even if they're chair.

They're not a dictator. And I think that is what they're going to have to deal with. They're all capable people, in my view. Well, at some point, we're going to get some kind of an answer from the president on who, and it wouldn't, by the way, knowing this president a little bit, just from the outside looking in, wouldn't surprise me if there was like a mystery fifth person out there that he comes in hot with, we shall see. It could be the Secretary of the Treasury, by the way. He was spending a lot of time when he meets with these people, asking questions,

not about interest rates, but how the system works. The president likes to grab a headline. He likes to do things that are historically unprecedented. Yeah. And I would say that's a small tail risk. It still is a tail risk. But who knows who he's going to choose and where they And we have seen someone else. Janet Yellen, go from Fed to Treasury and vice versa. I don't think he's going to pick Janet, by the way. I don't think so. I think she's out of the running, a wild guest by me.

Richard Fisher, great to have you on, as always. Thank you very much. Thank you. All right. Meantime, folks, Elon Musk announcing a substantial change to a key part of Tesla's autonomous driving strategy. Up next, the news and the likely impact. All right, we got a lot to talk about today because Intel just keeps going up.

It's up another 3% today. Let's talk about that and some of the other red hot stocks this year. It's bringing somebody it's always red hot, coming in hot. Guy Adami, on set, ready to go, fast money set at the NASDAQ market site. I mean, Guy Adami, what in the world is going on with Intel? Because as far as I know, hasn't been some fundamental change in the business. That's an excellent point by you, Brian, is I know that's something you like to do. You only make excellent points.

I will say this. Obviously, the administration and the continued sort of commentary out of the administration about Intel is leading in charge. But at some point, they have to sort of figure it out. And all the things that were sort of concerning to traders and investors prior to the administration's stake have not gone away. So I look at the stock, looking at the valuation that it trades at, looking at inter-earnings, looking at a level now that we last traded in topped out at in January 20 of 2024. And I say, you know what? You got to sort of move your feet into earnings.

And I believe they're reported under 22nd. So I think Intel has a business problem still. I don't think that's been fixed by the administration's foray into it. And I think you've got to take profits into earnings. Okay, take profits. I wonder if the shorts are getting scared out of here as well. Another stock, the kind of the one that we teased going into the break. That's a TV term guy, Dami.

Tease. Sandisk, up 63%. I got a little help from NVIDIA last week with the CEO, Jensen Wong, talking about it, but 63% in 10 days? Highly cyclical, highly commoditized space. What the market is saying, we've had analysts on our show, CNBC's Fast Money, which will come to you in about six minutes, saying that, in fact, it is different this time. But you know what? You still got to prove to me that it is, and I'm not convinced.

It's trading like a biotech stock. I mean, pull that back over the last three or four years, and you'll see a stock that's going parabolic. So I understand the enthusiasm around it. I just don't think it's different this time. I don't think there's some paradigm shift for the microns and the sand disks and the western digitals of the world. I got to correct you. It's about six and a half minutes.

Now it's about six minutes. I'm sorry, Brian. It's fair enough. Apology accepted. Turning now over to biotech, Moderna. Yes, sir. Up 17% so far this week. Listen, I know the stock's well off.

It's COVID highs a few years ago, but what do you make a Moderna? a bearish to bullish reversal textbook now pull that out about a year and you'll see that we traded down the levels we last saw I think in early 2020 held and now sort of rolling higher now it's not a valuation thing I don't think they figured out their problems but I think what you're going to see here now in the space is the chase for things that the market views to be cheap and it's happening across a swath of names in both biotech and big cap farm and I think modern is probably getting caught up in that so Despite the move that it's had, as you just pointed out, I think there's further room to the upside. Quickly? Further as opposed to farther. I know that drives Melissa crazy. One's a measure of distance. The other one, I think a measure of time or whatever.

We're going to further this conversation, but we don't have a lot of time. Silver. There you go. Silver. What the heck is going on with silver? Well, Steve Grasso sitting next to me is mentioned it, and I will mention it as well. It has become the industrial metal now everybody's talking about, and I think we've done a good job here on this show about it. This is going to be a triple-digit thing, and I think the market is not taking into consideration some of the warning signs that both gold and silver are flashing. So silver continues to work.

The equities around silver work, and gold does as well, Brian Sullivan. Would you say Brasso is champing at the bit? Because chomping is correct technically, but it actually is champing. No, it's champing. Yes. By the way, I know I got a wrap, and Paul's going to be mad at me. That's one of the producers there. But we are revealing some of our acronyms for 2026, Brian.

and I'm sure you're going to be riveted by that. I hope one of them is champ, because you guys all deserve it. You're all heroes to me. Guy Dami, thank you. Big bank earnings rolling on tomorrow. Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley taking center stage what you need to know. You're champing it to bit to learn, and you will right after this. All right, Leslie Picker, joining us now with a preview of two big bank earnings tomorrow morning.

Leslie. Hey, Brian. Yeah, the Wall Street-oriented businesses, a bit of a mixed bag in the fourth quarter. those that we've seen so far. Investment banking fees at Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and J.P. Morgan were more muted each either flat and down year-over-year. City Group, an outlier, with fees up 35% due to growth in advisory and debt capital markets. analysts are expecting a jump from the two reports we'll get tomorrow. With Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, the street is expecting investment banking revenue to rise 29% for Morgan Stanley, and Goldman Sachs's fees are estimated to be

26% higher. These two firms are more levered to the strength in the capital market, so if estimates prove out, that should be a boon to their earnings that we'll see in the morning. Sales and trading performances, which have contributed to banks' earnings beats in prior quarters more recently, were also dispersed. JPMorgan and B.V.A saw its markets' businesses higher, especially on the equity side. City, though, saw declines in the quarter. Goldman and Morgan Stanley are estimated to have gains in markets in 4Q. Most important, though, of course, Brian will be the color we get from executives on the conference calls, which are due out later tomorrow morning. Brian? Leslie, thank you very much. That's it for us. Fast begins right now.