Mad Money w/ Jim Cramer 2/27/25
44:48 Share

Meet Venu on the NYSE American, symbol V-E-N-U, disrupting a multi-billion dollar live music industry. Venu owns and operates upscale music venues, outdoor amphitheaters with seven revenue sources, $166 million in assets, luxury suite sales of $77 million in 2024,

$200 million expected in 2025. 56% year-over-year growth. Venue on the NYSE American. V-E-N-U.

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Hey, I'm Kramer. Welcome to Bad Money. Welcome to Kramerica. Other people, my friends, I'm just trying to save you a little money. My job is not just to entertain, but to put everything in context. And I got a lot of work to do today. So call me at 1-800-733-CBC. Tweet me, Jim Kramer. President Trump is out there fighting inflation every day, except not the way we want him to do it.

He's fighting inflation, not in the mall, not in the supermarket, but in the stock market. He's trying to give us everyday lower prices. He's rolling back stock prices point by point. And if he keeps it up, he will indeed get us back to pre-COVID levels. Consider today's giveaway prices. With the Dow dipping 194 points, that's to be told by 1.59%. NASDAQ plunging 2.78%. Oh!

Bargains galore. These prices, they're positively insane. Look, in the end, somebody has to pay for Trump's tariffs. Might as well be the shareholders of the quantum computing plays or the companies with AI in their name or nuclear power fads or anybody that has anything imported from China. All this pace, we got to get some free samples, don't you think? I mean, it's like Costco here. Trump's giving us a buy one, get one sales and still no one is buying. It's a tech-filled Costco without customers.

Now, one thing I know is retail. I'm always on the lookout for goods that can hold their value. I can do it in stocks, too. So on a day when NVIDIA is on sale, despite reporting the best possible quarter, I'm going to give you a list of the protected stocks, the ones I think can hold value because they have nothing to do with the biggest reason our stocks are rolling over. And that is tariffs. Tariffs.

So I'm going to tell you what stocks that could be somewhat insulated from Trump's tariff team. These are the stocks that can hold their value no matter what country's next on the tariff target. Let's go from Australia to Zimbabwe.

Let's do it by process of elimination, starting with tech. First, nothing that can be sold to China has a chance to get out of this thing unscathed. Nothing that has parts made in Taiwan can hold its value. Nothing that's crafted in China can stay up. If we can't be sure where the next tower is going to land, we can't own these stocks until they go lower, and then we can't.

If there's nothing to ameliorate the pain a tech company might face by making huge investments and creating thousands of jobs in this country, and I'm thinking about the $500 billion that Apple's spending, then I've got to stick with stocks that are the least likely to get hit. Mag7. Apple and Amazon have too many products selling overseas these days. Alphabet ad model based on commerce. No thank you. NVIDIA. Oh, please. Not today, Satan.

Microsoft, still reeling from co-pilot insinuations from our own Mark Benioff. I say our own just because he did it here. But this company's too international. Meta, diffuse ad story, less in competition, not so bad. Koi, hey, how about this? Tesla, must. The second most powerful man in government might buy you immunity from tariffs on your goods, but somehow you still end up with a lower stock price anyway.

You know what that leaves in tech? The cybersecurity plays. Of course, before you buy CrowdStrike, after reading their threat assessment paper today, the one that says North Koreans are infiltrating our workforce through work-from-home programs, fifth column style, you need to know that this cohort's been rolling over for the last couple of weeks. Still, at least they're software companies with no tariff exposure, and that's going to be very valuable for the next four years. I say buy them.

Health care is tough. Lots of tariff immunity, but not a lot of immunity from RFK Jr., the Health and Human Services Secretary. Oh, and let's not forget Doge, which is cutting its teeth. That's all it's doing on USAID and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau rollback. Sorry. We know that Medicare and Medicaid could be next. They could potentially crush the stocks of pretty much everything in the group. I don't know. Let's have an intuitive search. We'll put that one on the buy list.

Retail. Are you kidding me? We stopped making things in this country years ago as part of the bargain we had with Mexico and China, where Americans get cheap goods much cheaper than we could possibly make here in return for wiping out almost 100% of our manufacturing capacity. Oh, it was a great deal, endorsed by both Republicans and Democrats. It was kind of like a reverse poltergeist situation. We moved the jobs, but we didn't move the gravestones.

It's a tough one to swallow. But we know this. Those seamstress jobs, along with those who make the looms, those people who know one end of a hammer from another, they're not going to get their old jobs back because these days we have no expertise in it whatsoever. And even if we did, we'd be a high cost producer that can't compete.

It's got to import insane amounts of merchandise, which is why retail's a wasteland. How about consumer packaged goods? The makers of these products, long ago they decided the real money was overseas. They couldn't make enough money here. We'd have to find one that didn't diversify internationally, perhaps because it didn't know how to do it. Maybe that makes it immune now. That's Clorox! If it's the All-American profile.

Might make for a good investment. Food. Okay, I got one. McCormick. International arm. Might be okay, because they're not going to put tariffs on spices, are they? And it's not going to be hurt by GOP. Spice don't mean anything to GOP. Nor does it seem to be a candidate for any sort of presidential edict. You might want to buy some Coca-Cola, but it does come in a can sometimes. Could be tariffed. Transports. Are you kidding me? These trade on commerce, and tariffs means commerce is going to be taxed globally, so business will slow, no matter what. When you raise the price of something, you won't sell enough. How?

How about autos? Sorry, tough one. NAFTA, the forerunner of Trump's trade deal in his first term, was meant to have autos go back and forth across the border to make them manufactured better. They were the essence of free trade. If you want Ford and GM stock to be lower, just put a 30% tariff on Mexico. That's what they get for believing in the government's processes and promises.

Oil and gas, tempting. I can make a strong case that you can own the pipeline stocks, good yield. You're going to see interest rates go lower because there's not as much work as there was. I like enterprise product partners, simple good. Utilities work, too. Sempre, after California lowered the boom on them. Mark left your power. It's well run. A sop to the endless love for nuclear. I'm going to give you energy.

Oh, and let's throw in pretty much every bank. The number one is Wells Fargo. It's American. It's well run. It's been a poster boy for the regulators, which are now going to be gutted, sprayed and neutered. And I've got another one later in the show. So you better stay tuned. Restaurants work. Not a lot of imports for these. I like Brinker. I hit Bailey today. Texas Roadhouse ladder may be the most American of any restaurant chain, Texas and Roadhouse.

And now I want to give you the number one name in the entire S&P 500. And that one number one name is Nucor, the best steelmaker in the land, if not the world. It's the one that's been targeted the most by aggressively by China. But the tariffs means that China's steel trans ship from Mexico, they're not going to get it anymore unless China builds a giant tunnel under the Picos.

A Belt and Road Initiative. Who knows what those crafty people do? I don't want to be too dire about this everyday lower price initiative by the President of the United States, but because this is a stock show, I have to tell you something. At times, I'm going to say it. I've been missing old President Biden. Sure, he seemed to dislike anything business whatsoever and all the business people in the world, but he didn't understand the stock market, so at least he was consistent. Here's the bottom line. Wall Street hates tariffs, but what it hates even more is inconsistency and unpredictability. I'm actually pro-tariff. That's not the point. I

I think the market will be in much better shape if President Trump used what I would call rapidly escalating tariffs. You start them at 15 percent, you go up 5 percent every single week, and you stop at 15 percent. Because at least we then have some clarity on what's coming, and more important, when it will occur. And you can buy NVIDIA. Gary in Nevada. Gary!

Hello, Jim Cramer. How are you today? Gary, it's just a banner day. I'm pro-nuke and I'm pro-quantum. What a day. That's great. So I always like your special effects, your soundboard. How many different sounds do you have on that? I have 247 sounds in my head, but I only represent about 22 right here.

Well, that's good. That's good. So listen, I took your advice on Boeing. I sold a couple of shares, but you know, I took a limited order on a good till cancel on a lower price. And I've been able to take advantage of that a couple of times. It's really paid off.

Well, look, it's actually in a real sell off. You're going to get a bad price. And I remember when we had the flash crash, everybody who had those things got just completely ripped off. So I want to be careful. You can do it for some, but please don't do it for more. You might get lucky, but then you might get unlucky. I've seen people buy a stock at 60 and the stock finishes the day of 45. That's what worries me. You know what we need to do? We need to go to Brian in Virginia. Brian.

Jimbo Kramer. All right, partner. What's shaking?

Hey, so, hey, first off, I just want to thank you for all you do. I mean, I've been listening to you for the last 10 years. Thank you. And you do great for all of us. Oh, thank you, man. I'm out there. I'm certainly out there. I think we all have to admit that I am out there. That's it. That's it. Hey, so my stock, it's one of your favorites. It seems to perform well when rates go down.

but it's just been beaten up so badly recently. What do we think on Toll Brothers here? Okay, so we thought when rates were going up that it would hit Till. It never did. And then suddenly just the tsunami comes along. It's selling at eight times earnings, which means the estimates are way too high. We have to have estimates come down, and then we'll relook at Toll. But you're absolutely right. I think they're great, and I think Doug Urely is the bomb. Do you think Doug Urely's ever been called the bomb? Okay.

Okay, here we go. Wall Street hates tariffs, but we know that. I like tariffs. I just like a little certainty in the way they're applied, you know? Maybe just a little certainty? Just kidding. All right, on Mad Money Tonight, how is the first ever NYSE traded company now working with AI? I'm learning more about BNY's tech transformation. Top brass. Then you called in about egg producer. Oh, God, eggs.

They're ridiculous, right? Well, we talked about we talked a little piece here on Vital Farms. And later, does the recent pullback in Martin Marietta Materials gives you a strong chance to build a position? I'm looking closer at the Stocks Foundation. And let me tell you, as between rocks and quantum and tokens, I'll take rocks. Stable print.

Don't miss a second of Mad Money. Follow at Jim Cramer on X. Have a question? Tweet Cramer. Hashtag Mad Mentions. Send Jim an email to madmoneyatcnbc.com or give us a call at 1-800-743-CNBC. Miss something? Head to madmoney.cnbc.com.

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EY, shape the future with confidence. If you've been to the grocery store recently, you have seen sky-high beef prices, insane coffee prices, rising corn prices, and most notably, borderline extortionate egg prices. Thanks to a nasty bird flu outbreak, when they killed 20 million hens in the fourth quarter, the average price of a dozen eggs in this country is $8.11. That's nearly triple the 10-year average. No wonder people are upset about inflation.

I bring this up because last Wednesday, Brett in California called in to ask about a company called Vital Farms, which is pasture raised egg producer. And I said, I got to do some more work on this thing. I decided to wait for the company to report. Now that we've seen the earnings this morning, the stocks, well, it's getting hammered down 9 percent today.

Good that I waited. So what do we do with this egg producer? Vital Farms came public in 2022. I'm sorry, in 2020 at $22 per share. But the stock quickly shot up to the low 40s in its first couple of days of trading for spending the next couple of years going steadily lower. This thing finally bottomed at seven bucks and changed in mid-2022. Even by the end of 2023, it had only bounced back to 15. But then...

Last year, the stock caught fire. Vital Farms surged to $48 last summer before pulling back to the low 30s as of today. This one caught fire because it was a genuinely great growth story. Nobody cared about growth in 2022, right, or most of 2023. But by last year, the whole group came back in style into Wall Street and suddenly learned how to appreciate skyrocketing earnings numbers again. And make no mistake about it, Vital Farms has been a growth machine. Now, coming into this year, Wall Street seemed pretty bullish on this one. Sanguine.

Vital Farms has taken share with its humanely raised eggs, allowing them to charge a premium price for a commodity product. Plus, as the bird flu outbreak started gaining steam, some analysts figured that Vital Farms would be a big beneficiary, as their cheaper competitors would be forced to raise prices. Suddenly, these formerly expensive eggs are looking a whole lot less pricey in comparison. In fact, these guys haven't raised prices in over a year, despite the bird flu epidemic pushing up the cost of non-branded eggs.

So what the heck happened then with the quarter when Vital Farms reported this morning? They delivered an excellent set of numbers. A clean top and bottom line beat. 30% like-for-like revenue growth. 280 pieces, points of gross margin expansion. 23 cents of earnings per share. This true is over 16 cents.

Looking to the future, Voto Farms acknowledged that its supply constraint. But the CEO said, and I quote, as the year progresses, we believe the supply chain investments we made in 2024 and in 2025 will begin bearing fruit. We expect our business to accelerate the second half of the year as we add to our supply, helping drive us toward our ambitious net revenue and adjusted EBITDA guidance for 2025 and beyond. And hey, management issued a very impressive full year forecast calling for at least 22 percent net revenue growth, 50%.

15% adjusted earnings before interest taxes, depreciation, and amortization. What a story, right? Now, after these numbers were published at around 7.30,

Vital Farms stocks soared in pre-market trading, as you could expect, up more than 10% at one point just before the open. The stock opened up nearly 7%, and it looks set for a very big gain today. But almost immediately after the open, the stock reversed, moving into negative territory, and it stayed down, ending the day down, a hideous 9% decline. And it's not a tech stock, it's an egg stock. So what the heck then went wrong here? Well, not good.

Alongside its quarterly report, Vital Farms filed its 2024 annual report today. That's the 10K. And that document indicated it included the disclosure of what is known as a material weakness in the company's internal control over financial reporting. Material weakness is an accounting issue. Accounting related to how Vital Farms tracks orders and invoices its customers. Something that impacts revenue and accounts receivable. Wow. Revenue when it's impacted very bad.

Butterfarms explained, quote, controlled deficiencies did not result in a material misstatement of our consolidated financial statements and related notes, end quote. OK, but they said they've instituted a plan to solve the problem. Then they mentioned that, quote, there is a reasonable possibility that a material misstatement of the financial statements would not be prevented or detected on a timely basis. End quote. That is nothing, nothing you ever want to hear. OK.

As far as accounting issues go, this one doesn't sound like a huge deal. But if you see this kind of statement, it's hard to trust the numbers. And I hate that. One more thing. Just yesterday, the Trump administration started rolling out a plan to combat avian flu and reduce egg prices. In an op-ed published in the Journal, I don't know if you saw it, the Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins, the USDA, announced a plan to invest up to $1 billion as part of a plan to solve the problem. Will these efforts work?

But I look like a poultry farmer? I mean, who knows? But I will say that the Vital Farms CEO sounded pretty optimistic about the plans announced yesterday during his appearance on CNBC this morning. And for what it's worth,

yesterday, for the first time since September 6th, the price of eggs didn't go up versus the prior day. So maybe that's positive, though not necessarily for vital farms. It does if it means that the temporary price advantage goes away. So those are the details. But let's get an answer for Brett in California. OK, what should we do with vital farms going forward? Now, unfortunately, this is really my rule. OK, I have to stay on the sidelines here. So I've got a hard and fast rule that says and I used to have it on my machine. I

Accounting irregularities equals selling. Okay? Accounting irregularities equals selling. While this specific accounting issue doesn't actually seem that bad at first glance, I created these rules for a reason. And virtually every time I've gone against them, it's blown up in my face. Plus, if the Trump administration's new plan to fight bird flu actually works...

Well, that's bad news for Vital Farms. Bert Flue has made everybody else in the industry raise the prices, which is why Vital Farms premium eggs suddenly sell at a similar price to regular eggs. If we fix the egg shortage, everybody else's egg prices will come down and their product will look expensive again. To be clear, I hope the government plans work because I want lower egg prices for you, for me, for everybody. It's just that the lower egg prices, not good news for Vital Farms. Longer term, I think it's worth circling back to this one. But they've got to fix their accounting issues.

Until that happens, I'm not eager to stick my neck out for Vital Farms. More broadly, this whole exercise shows you how difficult it can be to identify high-quality stocks. Yesterday, Vital Farms looked like a great story. Now it's a questionable story thanks to the accounting issues. I honestly think Brett in California had a pretty good thesis here, and the reported numbers we just saw from Vital Farms this morning certainly bear that out. And yet, because of this opaque analysis,

accounting problem. Shareholders are sitting on a big loss today. Rather than the big gain, it looked like they'd get in pre-market trading. That's just how it goes. Bottom line, thanks to Brett for calling in about Vital Farms. I hope that they get their books in order, and I'm sure they can one day, and then we can look at this thing down the road. But accounting irregularities, they equal sell. I do believe it's a good company with an enticing stock, but I'm not ready to endorse it. Tyler in Florida. Tyler.

Hey, Jim. Listen, all my friends spend all their money there. How are we feeling about Chipotle? All right. You know, Chipotle is a growth stock. Now, I just I preface by saying the growth stocks are suddenly incredibly out of favor. I think Chipotle is good. It's come down a lot. I think that that's got boat register a good job. I think it's actually pretty decent level to start a position. Please don't buy this all at once. This stock has been become very erratic of late. Frank in New York. Frank. Hey.

Hey, Jim. How are you doing today? You know, Frank's tough day for our friends in tech. So I'm going to say it's just an OK day. How about you? I'm a tech and I'm drowning. I'm drowning. So a friend of mine, a friend of mine lives in Kansas City. He says the Dutch brothers. He says there's a line there every day. I don't have one by me up here in Westchester.

But are they starting to take a lot of customers? They're not here. No, no, they're not. But they're not in New York yet. The stock has had a big run. We had, by the way, just so you know, we had Christine Barone on. Ever since she's come in, this stock has been a rocket ship. You know, look, it now has 126 times earnings. I am a big believer in Dutch Pro, but I will tell you this. I do think that the Brothers Dutch stock could cool off a little bit before you need to start buying. And I would do that. All right.

Look, only once Vital Farms gets its books in order. Not until then. I think you should consider putting a few of your eggs in this basket. We can't yet, though. Hey, much more mounting ahead, including my deep dive on infrastructure with the CEO of Martin Marietta Materials. Then what's the road ahead for NVIDIA after this incredible hammering today? I'm going to tell you where I stand on today's decline. I've been pretty quiet about it until tonight. And all your calls rapid fire in tonight's edition of The Lightning Round. So stay with Brain Powered.

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If you've been to the grocery store recently, you have seen sky-high beef prices, insane coffee prices, rising corn prices, and most notably, borderline extortionate egg prices. Thanks to a nasty bird flu outbreak, when they killed 20 million hens in the fourth quarter, the average price of a dozen eggs in this country is about $8.11. That's nearly triple the 10-year average. No wonder people are upset about inflation.

I bring this up because last Wednesday, Brett in California called in to ask about a company called Vital Farms, which is pasture raised egg producer. And I said, I got to do some more work on this thing. I decided to wait for the company to report. Now that we've seen the earnings this morning, the stocks, well, it's getting hammered down 9 percent today.

Good that I waited. So what do we do with this egg producer? Vital Farms came public in 2022, I'm sorry, in 2020 at $22 per share. But the stock quickly shot up to the low 40s in its first couple of days of trading for spending the next couple of years going steadily lower. This thing finally bottomed at $7 and changed in mid-2022. Even by the end of 2023, it had only bounced back to $15. But then...

Last year, the stock caught fire. Vital Farms surged to $48 last summer before pulling back to the low 30s as of today. This one caught fire because it was a genuinely great growth story. Nobody cared about growth in 2022, right, or most of 2023. But by last year, the whole group came back in style into Wall Street and suddenly learned how to appreciate skyrocketing earnings numbers again. And make no mistake about it, Vital Farms has been a growth machine. Now, coming into this year, Wall Street seemed pretty bullish on this one. Sanguine.

Vital Farms has taken share with its humanely raised eggs, allowing them to charge a premium price for a commodity product. Plus, as the bird flu outbreak started gaining steam, some analysts figured that Vital Farms would be a big beneficiary, as their cheaper competitors would be forced to raise prices. Suddenly, these formerly expensive eggs are looking a whole lot less pricey in comparison. In fact, these guys haven't raised prices in over a year, despite the bird flu epidemic pushing up the cost of non-branded eggs.

So what the heck happened then with the quarter when Vital Farms reported this morning? They delivered an excellent set of numbers. A clean top and bottom line beat. 30% like-for-like revenue growth. 280 pieces, points of gross margin expansion. 23 cents of earnings per share. This year we're looking for 16 cents.

Looking to the future, Voto Farms acknowledged that its supply constraint. But the CEO said, and I quote, as the year progresses, we believe the supply chain investments we made in 2024 and in 2025 will begin bearing fruit. We expect our business to accelerate the second half of the year as we add to our supply, helping drive us toward our ambitious net revenue and adjusted EBITDA guidance for 2025 and beyond. And hey, management issued a very impressive full year forecast calling for at least 22 percent net revenue growth, 50%.

15% adjusted earnings before interest taxes, depreciation, and amortization. What a story, right? Now, after these numbers were published at around 7.30,

Vital Farms stocks soared in pre-market trading, as you could expect, up more than 10% at one point just before the open. The stock opened up nearly 7%, and it looks set for a very big gain today. But almost immediately after the open, the stock reversed, moving into negative territory, and it stayed down, ending the day down, a hideous 9% decline. And it's not a tech stock. It's an egg stock. So what the heck then went wrong here? Well, not good.

Alongside its quarterly report, Vital Farms filed its 2024 annual report today. That's the 10K. And that document included the disclosure of what is known as a material weakness in the company's internal control over financial reporting. Material weakness is an accounting issue. Accounting related to how Vital Farms tracks orders and invoices its customers. Something that impacts revenue and accounts receivable. Wow. Revenue when it's impacted very badly.

Butterfarms explained, quote, controlled deficiencies did not result in a material misstatement of our consolidated financial statements and related notes, end quote. OK, but they said they've instituted a plan to solve the problem. Then they mentioned that, quote, there is a reasonable possibility that a material misstatement of the financial statements would not be prevented or detected on a timely basis. End quote. That is nothing, nothing you ever want to hear. OK.

As far as accounting issues go, this one doesn't sound like a huge deal. But if you see this kind of statement, it's hard to trust the numbers. And I hate that. One more thing. Just yesterday, the Trump administration started rolling out a plan to combat avian flu and reduce egg prices. In an op-ed published in the Journal, I don't know if you saw it, the Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins, the USDA, announced a plan to invest up to $1 billion as part of a plan to solve the problem. Will these efforts work?

But I look like a poultry farmer? I mean, who knows? But I will say that the Vital Farms CEO sounded pretty optimistic about the plans announced yesterday during his appearance on CNBC this morning. And for what it's worth,

yesterday, for the first time since September 6th, the price of eggs didn't go up versus the prior day. So maybe that's positive, though not necessarily for vital farms. It does if it means that the temporary price advantage goes away. So those are the details. But let's get an answer for Brett in California. OK, what should we do with vital farms going forward? Now, unfortunately, this is really my rule. OK, I have to stay on the sidelines here. So I've got a hard and fast rule that says and I used to have it on my machine. I

Accounting irregularities equals selling. Okay? Accounting irregularities equals selling. While this specific accounting issue doesn't actually seem that bad at first glance, I created these rules for a reason. And virtually every time I've gone against them, it's blown up in my face. Plus, if the Trump administration's new plan to fight bird flu actually works...

Well, that's bad news for Vital Farms. Bert Flue has made everybody else in the industry raise the prices, which is why Vital Farms premium eggs suddenly sell at a similar price to regular eggs. If we fix the egg shortage, everybody else's egg prices will come down and their product will look expensive again. To be clear, I hope the government plans work because I want lower egg prices for you, for me, for everybody. It's just that the lower egg prices, not good news for Vital Farms. Longer term, I think it's worth circling back to this one. But they've got to fix their accounting issues.

Until that happens, I'm not eager to stick my neck out for Vital Farms. More broadly, this whole exercise shows you how difficult it can be to identify high-quality stocks. Yesterday, Vital Farms looked like a great story. Now it's a questionable story thanks to the accounting issues. I honestly think Brett in California had a pretty good thesis here, and the reported numbers we just saw from Vital Farms this morning certainly bear that out. And yet, because of this opaque analysis,

accounting problem. Shareholders are sitting on a big loss today. Rather than the big gain, it looked like they're getting pre-market trading. That's just how it goes. Bottom line, thanks to Brett for calling in about Vital Farms. I hope that they get their books in order, and I'm sure they can one day, and then we can look at this thing down the road. But accounting irregularities, they equal sell. I do believe it's a good company with an enticing stock, but I'm not ready to endorse it. Tyler in Florida. Tyler.

Hey, Jim. Listen, all my friends spend all their money there. How are we feeling about Chipotle? All right. You know, Chipotle is a growth stock. Now, I just I preface by saying the growth stocks are suddenly incredibly out of favor. I think Chipotle is good. It's come down a lot. I think that that's got boat register a good job. I think it's actually pretty decent level to start a position. Please don't buy this all at once. This stock has been become very erratic of late. Frank in New York. Frank. Hey.

Hey, Jim. How are you doing today? You know, Frank's tough day for our friends in tech. So I'm going to say it's just an OK day. How about you? I'm a tech and I'm drowning. I'm drowning. So a friend of mine, a friend of mine lives in Kansas City. He says the Dutch brothers. He says there's a line there every day. I don't have one by me up here in Westchester.

But are they starting to take a lot of customers? They're not here. No, no, they're not. But they're not in New York yet. The stock has had a big run. We had, by the way, just so you know, we had Christine Barone on. Ever since she's come in, this stock has been a rocket ship. You know, look, it now has 126 times earnings. I am a big believer in Dutch Pro, but I will tell you this. I do think that the Brothers Dutch stock could cool off a little bit before you need to start buying. And I would do that. All right.

Look, only once Vital Farms gets its books in order. Not until then. I think you should consider putting a few of your eggs in this basket. We can't yet, though. Hey, much more mounting ahead, including my deep dive on infrastructure with the CEO of Martin Marietta Materials. Then what's the road ahead for NVIDIA after this incredible hammering today? I'm going to tell you where I stand on today's decline. I've been pretty quiet about it until tonight. And all your calls rapid fire in tonight's edition of The Lightning Round. So stay with Framers.

What a make of the curious recent decline in the stock of Martin Marietta Materials, the big supplier of building products like aggregates, cement, concrete and asphalt. When the company reported earlier this month, its results were fine. Nice antidote to tech, by the way. Right now, it seems like public spending on infrastructure is bolstering the numbers. There's still a lot of funds yet to be dispersed from Joe Biden's big infrastructure bill. But the private sector side, maybe it's lagging.

Does that justify, though, a Martin Marietta's 24% pullback since its November highs? And could business get a lot better now that long-term interest rates are coming down? Or is that just merely a sign of the slowing economy? Let's take a close look with Ward Knight. He's the chairman and president and CEO of Martin Marietta Materials. We'll learn more. Mr. Knight, welcome.

Welcome back. It's been too long. Jim, it's great to be here. Thank you, Ward. Well, Ward, you have always been a good barometer of the entire country for everything because people should understand you do infrastructure, but you also do non-residential and you do residential. Can you give us a, let's just say, an outlook on all three of those businesses? You know what? I think all three are going to be nice, steady, and up this year. I think public's going to be better than private. To your point, when the IIJA was signed into law in November of 2021,

If somebody had thought we'd be here today and only about 30% of those funds had found its way into commerce, they probably would not have believed it. But if you think about it, that bill expires at the end of 2026.

which means 2025 ought to see a lot of public works. 2026 ought to see a lot of public works. In the states in which we're located, the state DOTs are in very good position. So I think public looks good. I think your commentary on private's right. It's going to be driven by what happens with interest rates and residential.

But residential single-family housing is 7 million homes underbuilt. Well, let's talk about that because there was a really great piece recently in what places the Atlantic, I like the Atlantic, but I'm just saying in terms of business stuff. And it just talked about, look, what you're seeing is zoning and that there are people who've been able to take control of neighborhoods and cities and made the zoning so difficult to build that you shouldn't think it's just because the builders don't want to build. Is that an accurate depiction of what happens in many parts of our country?

I think it's a degree of accuracy. Land use is a challenge. There's no question about that.

But in the southeast, in the southwest, which have seen such population demographic shifts come their way, part of what we're seeing is home builders are buying land, but they're also in the process of just what you said, entitling land. So we're going to see how long it takes to go through the entitlement. From our perspective, public looks good. We think private's in a slow, steady recovery. And what you've seen in Martin Marietta through cycles is we're always profitable. We've never cut or suspended a dividend. We see that continuing.

Now, I do want to talk about something. There are many people right now who probably heard you say, well, look, in that Biden bill, it's still 26, has only 30 percent dispersed. And they may just say, no, wait a second. That is something that the president is going to say. I want the 70 percent clawed back.

But that's illegal, isn't it? Well, a couple of things. One, the 70 percent that we're talking about is relative to highways, bridges, roads and streets, which are the things on the heavy side I think this president's really all about. So if we're looking at things that may see some shifting, I don't think it's necessarily going to be in that. Because if you think back to why then former President Trump was lobbying against the infrastructure bill, it's because he didn't think enough of what was going to real infrastructure structure.

We're on the real infrastructure side of it. So number one, I think those funds are protected. Number two, even if they weren't, I think philosophically, we're not in a place that they're in peril. Understood. Now, you have also had a very good handle on large projects. I'm excited to see that you're involved with Stargate. Now, most people don't know anything about Stargate. So maybe you can give us a little sense of what's going on. Well, Stargate is going to be about $500 billion that are going to be poured into the economy relative to AI and open AI and otherwise.

And what's interesting to me is seeing where some of that is already going. So you hear Stargate. I don't think your first default position is going to be what's happening in Abilene, Texas. But actually, there's a lot underway right now in Abilene, Texas. We have a very compelling business there that we bought actually

late last year, and we're already seeing contracts for several hundred thousand tons that are going to these types of projects. But what's interesting to me, Jim, is the square footage of these and the aggregates intensities of these are actually quite attractive. Well, I do want people to understand that there is good money in rocks. You first schooled me a long time ago. They're not really rocks, first of all. But second, it's really very big related to giant projects like that, but also housing projects.

You have done incredibly well, even though there hasn't been that much housing built. There hasn't been that much housing built over the last several years. And as we noted, it's remarkably underbuilt today. It's just incredible. Two issues, availability and affordability. And big population trend swings. And what we care deeply about, though, Jim, is single family housing, because that's going to be

20 to 30 percent more aggregates intensive than multifamily. So I know you're a follower of the bond market. Rates have just gone down pretty heavily. And what I'm concerned about is rates are going down because of panic, of fear, of lack of process and more mercurial nature of the government versus just an orderly slowdown. Which one would you think it is? Look, at the end of the day, process is going to win. It's big. It's complicated.

We need discipline. We need predictability. And I think those are the things that we'll see more of, not less of. And as that occurs, we'll see more stability in the marketplace. And even right now, you're generating just the usual amount of gigantic cash.

Well, we're and we're expanding margins. I mean, to think about a year last year where volumes were challenged because the economy wasn't what people thought. And actually, we're an outdoor sport. So we saw pretty heavy weather hits in Q2 and Q3. We saw volumes down for the year. We saw margins actually nicely expand. We expect nice expansion into this year and frankly, well beyond. Last question is I want to put a question of you were put to me last night.

which was he's in Rochester. He said, we've had more cold degree days than ever. The roads are full of potholes. Should I buy Martin Marietta materials? And I said, look, rather than cuff it, I'm going to ask the man, is that a reason to buy an aggregates company? You know what? Freeze thaw in Rochester or somewhere in Minnesota or someplace else.

makes that cycle in highways, bridges, roads and streets from a maintenance perspective always grow. With us you're going to get that in some cold weather markets. You're also going to get the growth that we're going to see in the warm weather markets as well. Look, infrastructure is still woefully underbuilt in the United States. We're not a discretionary product. If they're putting down concrete or asphalt, we're 85 percent of concrete and 95 percent of asphalt. It can't be done without crushing. I like that and I like slow, I like steady.

And I can do without, there's no tariff coming against you, right? It's just... Nothing that should be meaningful to us. Our supply chain is almost totally domestic. Oh, my. It might affect steel, but then we're going to supply more material to the domestic steel industry. Well, I like it. I talked at the top of the show about who does not face tariffs. And I've got to tell you, Ward and I, Chairman and President of Martin Marietta Materials, does not face tariffs. Mad Money's back in for the break.

It is time. It's time for the lightning round. And then the lightning round is over. Are you ready? Let's go with Brett in Louisiana. Brett. A South Louisiana Mardi Gras bouillard, too, you chief. Frankly, that's a true bouillard. That's where it's from. You know it. My stock is Celestica, a key supply chain efficiencies partner.

It is coming to its own in a way that I cannot believe it. And everyone's piled in on it. Now, because of the fact that we got that downturn, you're going to get a chance to buy it. It sells at 22 times earnings. I want you to wait until it's at 20 times earnings below the S&P, and you can pull the trigger. That would probably put it at, I'd say, $80. Let's go to Jack in Ohio. Jack. Hey, thanks for helping me out, Jimmy. Of course, Jack. Absolutely. A buying for the dividend, buying for the dividend, and it's on a pullback.

Is it OK to add some shares? K.E.Y. Key Corp. K.E.Y. OK, so Jeff Marks and I were kicking things around. I said, we got to own more banks. We got to maybe own B.M.Y. And I said, how about key for the travel trust? Because of that dividend, you're on to something. I like your thinking. We had Chris Gorman on. Seems like a terrific guy. Let's go to Chris in New York. Chris.

Hey, Jim, what's going on? Quick congrats to you and a shout out to the birds for bringing home the Super Bowl. Go birds. Thank you. With Vlad Tenev from Robin Hood. Yeah, what do they go? Right. I was actually interested in competitive there. Perhaps the legend on the street, Thomas Petterfee and the interactive brokerage group. They're good. Stocks very high. Stocks are very expensive, but they're good. Let's go to Nensu in Pennsylvania. Nensu.

Good evening, Mr. Kramer. Thank you for taking my call. Of course. I want to know your thoughts on Nebius Holdings, symbol N-E-I-S. Yeah, we did a little takeout on Nebius Holdings, and we felt like it's kind of a, look, it's a big money loser that people are buying because it's part of everything that's going on right now in the cloud. I don't want to be a part of it, period, end of story. Let's go to Ted in Massachusetts. Ted.

Hey, Jim, long time listener. You're doing a wonderful show. People are really benefiting from it. Thank you. I've been wondering about all this AI stuff and the power requirements. And I've been looking at a company in Lynchburg, Virginia, BWI.

Okay, that's nuclear. You know, look, Bloom is off the road to nuclear. It was never really there. We don't have any sort of initiative that really makes nuclear the right thing. Small modular nuclear power is still not happening. It's going to be 2033 before we see anything new in nuclear. That is just too far from it. I'm telling the truth now. I mean, I'm done with it. I don't want to hear about it anymore. Let's go to Don in Tennessee. Don.

Hey, Jim. Second time caller, multiple year club investor. Excellent. I'm with you and I watch your show every night. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. I'm in the house of pain, Jim, on this stock. It's got a heavy short interest, but it's not treating me right. Even though it's got great fundamentals, low P.E., it's making money. The analysts are positive on it. Potentially a 40 percent upside on the EPS next quarter.

but it just keeps going the wrong way. What should I do with this POWL pal industries?

You know, that is just a really good company. I totally agree with you. I don't get it. I just, I mean, we've done takeouts on it. Now they did, I mean, look, does it have the big revenue growth that I want? Yeah. I'm just confused. I have to come back again. We did a takeout on it earlier. I am going to go back and huddle with my chief scientist, Ben Stiller. We're going to figure out what the heck is going on here. Let's go to Tony in Illinois. Tony.

I'm a University of Illinois, Bonning, Illinois, night, pool yard from McKenry, Illinois. I like that. I have a dog name, Tony. That's apropos of nothing. That's apropos of absolutely nothing. Go ahead.

Handsome dog, no doubt. Looking at the energy needs going forward until nuclear fusion is commercially viable, which is likely decades off, what do you think about investing in small modular reactor companies? They're also decades off. You know, I kept waiting for more deals to occur and waiting and waiting. It's a new year and they're not happening. And I'm not seeing them from Vranova. I'm not seeing them from anyone. So I've become very, very skeptical. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the conclusion of the Lightning Round.

The Lightning Round is sponsored by Charles Schwab. Coming up, fresh off NVIDIA's earnings report, Kramer is breaking down what the future looks like for the company and the demand for its AI chips. Next. Sometimes during earnings season, Wall Street gets a quarter dead wrong, which is why we have the stock of NVIDIA getting hammered today when it would have been up in another tape.

Of course, as Clint Eastwood told the now late great Gene Hackman in Unforgiven, deserves got nothing to do with it. The stock price went down. If you own it, you're worth less than yesterday. In that sense, NVIDIA, long one of my faves, is now wrongly regarded as a loser. But let's talk about what NVIDIA, the real company, does. It's chips, it's software, what they do. Let's get into one of the use cases, not just talk about China. Something that I hope will come at NVIDIA's GTC conference, the equivalent of Woodstock for all things AI next month.

I think the use cases for their chips are huge, although who knows how much that matters when the company's in the crosshairs of potential tariffs. But enough about China. Let me tell you what NVIDIA can accomplish in the right hands. Let's take these one by one. I like classical music. I'm not a big fan of Tchaikovsky, and I don't mind Prokofiev. But when I ask Amazon Alexa to play Tchaikovsky's beautiful violin concerto number two, I do expect her to put it on. No, she constantly confuses Tchaikovsky and Prokofiev.

But Alexa's a one-dimensional child, not worth paying for if you can't get the composers right. The distinction meant nothing to her. She just makes the same mistake over and over again. Sure, I hear endlessly that Amazon's going to have its own better chips that can tell the difference in your speech, but that's just not the case, and billions in potential revenue is lost. NVIDIA's new Blackwell chips can solve the problem. It will apologize. It'll get the music right. It will ask me which violinist I want. I will say I want David Oistrakh from the Cleveland Philharmonic. It will be played, and I'll happily pay Amazon seven smackers a month for the process.

Okay, now let's say you're a freight forwarder. You've got hundreds of thousands of packages a day at an airport. You need dozens of people to lift the boxes out of the trucks, put them in the right place, stack them, and get them ready for the next truck. It is drudgery. You can't get anyone to do that for less than 100 Gs these days with health benefits, which they'll need because if they drop a box, good chance they're going to end up in the hospital. But suppose you get NVIDIA's Blackwell chips in that warehouse.

You pay $60,000 for a robot one time only. You get a machine that will never make a mistake in lifting and will never make a mistake in placing. It will never get hurt or show up late to work because it's such a crummy job. It will never be drunk or sick or even angry. A bargain.

Then finally you come downstairs at your house. You want a cup of coffee, but not just any coffee. You want 8 o'clock coffee. The cup is made, but that's not enough. You want to be asked if you want half and half today, maybe almond milk. You can say, no, I want cream. He doesn't know what you want, but he'll look for it, and he's going to find it if it's there. How much would you pay for that versus something that doesn't know your preferences? Right now, most AI offerings are just too stupid to do anything but sort through everything that's written and summarize it. Big deal. Drudgery. Fixed.

But doing the other thing, iterative, subservient, gracious, that's what every one of these hyperscalers really wants. They just don't know how to communicate it. It can't get that with the current chips. They're too slow and too dumb. They can do things, but not the things people will pay for. NVIDIA's next generation chips, though, they can do things and you will pay for them. So what's next for the stock?

and nothing because we don't know how much it's going to cost to make anything because the president hasn't decided yet. The tariff person in chief sets the price these days because the chips are manufactured in Taiwan. And in Trump's eyes, Taiwan's just another word of the state that's taking advantage of America, forcing us to pay for their defense while taking our jobs in a real politic world. China takes Taiwan next, right? We can't get any chips because we don't have the ability to make them here.

So NVIDIA's got no chips for us. China gets Tchaikovsky in half and half. We can't find anyone to lift boxes. And the stock of NVIDIA, you saw it today. It's just a crying shame. I like to say there's always a bull market somewhere. I promise you I'll find it just for you, right here on MadMoney. I'm Jim Cramer. See you next time.

All opinions expressed by Jim Cramer on this podcast are solely Cramer's opinions and do not reflect the opinions of CNBC, NBCUniversal, or their parent company or affiliates, and may have been previously disseminated by Cramer on television, radio, internet, or another medium.

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