Mad Money w/ Jim Cramer 3/31/25
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Hey, I'm Kramer. Welcome to Mad Money. Welcome to Kramerica. My friends, I'm just trying to make a little money. My job is not just to entertain, but try to put this all in context. Call me, 1-800-743-CBC. Tweet me, at Jim Kramer. All right, there's always a bull market somewhere. I end the show with that tagline every night. I say it because it's true. Look at today. The market looked hideous this morning, right on the heels of some horrific overnight futures action.

But after the S&P 500 reached a level where it was down 10% from its highs, where it held last time, we started snapping back with the Dow finishing the session up 418 points. The S&P gaining 0.55%. And even the NASDAQ didn't go down as much as it usually does. It was just down 0.14%. But it was a remarkable comeback, unthinkable even at 5 a.m. And a reminder that there is indeed a bull market somewhere. Even at the end of the worst quarter since 2022 for both the S&P and the NASDAQ. Remember, that was when there was a bambo.

Bear market. It was a rebound that for the first time in ages put some fear into the bears. I don't know about you, but it was nice, liberating even to have a day without fear, wasn't it? Let's look at the rebound's leaders to figure out why anyone's buying ahead of what I call the bash that heads in of your trading partner's day, also known as Wednesday, also known as Liberation Day. Got a lot of names, a lot of rubrics. Finally, I spied the financials as being good. Wow. What's that all about?

I think we may be going along the route that says there will be no tariffs on the banks, and the banks could soon be less regulated under this administration. Just this morning, Morgan Stanley talked about how Wells Fargo could be a huge winner if it finally sheds the darn asset cap implemented back in the early days of 2018, Feb. 8th, yes, right before the Eagles win. If you read the piece, you'd think that the stock is a screaming buy. It hit me from the first line. Quote, it's a new era for bank regulation.

Morgan Stanley said that once the asset cap is gone, it will allow Wells Fargo, which we own for the Travel Trust, to put up better loan growth, better trading revenues, and lower expenses. Wow. House of pleasure. I think that this piece was a bit of a life raft in the Atlantic. A note that says, hey, look at me, look

at me. Remember, the president said there'd be less regulation. Now it's going to happen. Hey, hey. Sure enough, Wells Fargo went up and it took the other big banks along with it. Continue with this theme of financial deregulation. We're hearing that the very contentious deal with Capital One stated to buy Discover Financial, it looks like it might close. It's been taking forever. There was supposed to be some regulatory resistance by the Department of Justice, but

the risk of the deal not closing seems now greatly diminished. Oh, that would be used for Capital One, which I think could easily go up 25 points once the acquisition closes. That's what we've been telling people who subscribe to the CBC Investing Club. Now, we believe Capital One, no matter what goes, it does fine. Again, the positive action here says the tariffs aside, there's a lot Trump could do that could allow entire segments of the market to zoom higher. The Walmart White House, where we get every day lower prices for stocks, maybe

is going to spare the financials. Good aisle. The health insurers are all roaring, too. Why? Because they're domestic, very hard to tariff. And they could go much higher if you want to avoid the tariff shroud. CVS, which owns Aetna, moved up again. Cigna's running. When you look at the regular insurance companies, think AIG, Travelers and Chubb, they're all winning. And Chubb just hit a new all-time high. Now, I think premiums can go higher. And the insurers seem like a target poor environment for the president's tariffs. The insurers, by the way, they're not anybody's friends that I know of.

The White House doesn't seem to mind, though, so maybe they're a buy. Talk about strange leadership. An outfit called Coupon Cabin has put out a survey showing that cord cutting may finally be coolie. That ignited the stocks of Fox and Warner Brothers Discovery. Big winners. The reason? Rising prices for streaming services means that cable TV is of better value. Makes sense. Of course, there's no tariff exposure. See the theme?

There's also seems to be a weird belief that somehow the tariffs won't hurt retail. I mean, I'd say you got very big moves saying TJS, Walmart, Dollar General, Dollar Tree. Maybe their stocks simply got too oversold or the tariffs are now baked in the stocks. We just don't know. But we do know that these retail stocks were rallying from the get go this morning. They'll definitely be hurt by tariffs. Every one of them. What's happening?

I could say that people just got too negative. I could say that when the S&P 500 touched down 10% again right at the opening, flirting with down 11, we held at those levels and that allowed us to bounce for a second time. Maybe you're seeing end of the quarter retirement contributions being put to work, overwhelming the sellers who then walked away. More on that later.

It's certainly, though, people, it's not random. This action seems to mock the idea that we're headed for a tariff-induced stagflation situation. Or perhaps let me posit something bigger. People are exhausted by this president. They don't know what he's going to do next. Thanks to his unpredictability, we're seeing so many bears, and they have had the whole quarter themselves. It belonged to them. Bears won. Investors, nothing.

Maybe, though, what really happened today is that things have simply gotten too negative. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, who writes an annual chairman's letter required reading for anyone in the markets, wrote some faithful words today. Quote, I hear from nearly every client, nearly every leader, nearly every person I talk to. They're more anxious about the economy than any time in recent memory. End quote.

I come back and say, I believe that. I believe that wholeheartedly. But let's think about what that really means for you and me. We have declining inflation, except the president's putting on inflationary tariffs. We have incredibly low unemployment, except where it's caused by the Trump administration. We have a market that was doing extremely well last year until the Trump administration showed a level of uncertainty that I can't recall any time since. Are you ready, Ski Daddy? Jimmy Carter.

which is the last time people were really worried about inflation, about stagflation, okay? Back then, stagflation was real. Now, Jimmy Carter, curious benchmark. Break out the cardigan sweater. I know it's a brutal comparison. You think I did it idly? I cannot think of another president in my lifetime who knocked down the stock market simply by opening his mouth than Jimmy Carter. Eureka, I have found him.

So let's look at it this way. Everything about this economy is good. Everything, everything, except one thing. We have a president who's very angry at everyone except Vladimir Putin. Well, no, maybe even Vladimir Putin. And his wrath has made investors so downcast and so negative that people have just given up. They want nothing to do with stocks, nothing to do with this world.

Because they're sure the White House will keep laying on the tariffs that seem to be wiping out your wealth and my wealth. In this environment, it's a wonder anyone's buying anything unless they think that the one person who's standing in the way of a great economy, one that could have incredible growth with lowered inflation, lower oil prices, less regulation, more confidence, will finally change the stripes. If Trump can lose the anger, drop the scale, stop diminishing our friends and rivals while making common cause with our enemies and generally start acting like he did in his first term, well, that would be huge for the stock market. As far as the stock market is concerned, though,

We need less Jimmy Carter, more Ronald Reagan. Bottom line, maybe Wednesday is a deliberation day. It's just the day when American investors may be finally liberated from the president's not-so-pro-business attitude once he gets the tariffs out of the way. Bob in Tennessee. Bob. Jim, thank you for your help. How about a quick twofer? Is Pfizer dead money?

Is Pfizer dead money? I mean, I think it's been mummified. I don't know. I mean, it's like, wow, look at that thing. Close the casket. What about you? You had a two-person idea. All right. Well, that's okay. Pfizer is unfortunately dead money. Dr. Borla is a terrific guy, but, you know, it doesn't in the stock. What can I say? He's a terrific guy. He's a terrific guy. Ed in Florida. Ed. Jim, booyah. Hey, man, you're the shining star of CNBC. I've watched you for years. I love your show. Ed, you're very kind.

Can I have my wife dialed in right now? She's very mad at me. She just drove back from Florida and says, well, you know, you really helped. And I didn't. Not at all. Not one bit. OK, you come to me anytime and I got lunch or dinner. But hey, so here's my question.

I don't diversify. I just go in super hard on whatever I do. I've been in and out of Verizon twice in a year, collectively up over 17 bucks a share, five giant dividends. And this weekend, I woke up twice dreaming that the market was burning down. So I got up this morning. That wasn't a dream. I sold everything. Oh, you did? Did you really? Did you dream? Did you sell everything? Or in real life, did you sell everything?

In real life, I sold everything, but I'm way up again. So short-term taxes suck. But, you know, Verizon has four great things.

they get paid because everyone wants their phone. They've got a great dividend. They've got a low price and a low P.E. And these stocks with 100 times plus P.E.s, I can't, in my mind, I can't ever buy that. But I don't understand why that stock doesn't do way better. But that's a utility. It's a utility, Ed. Look at American Electric Power, long my favorite. I mean, that stock trades like NVIDIA used to. I'd

rather be an AEP than an NVDA. Now, that is a statement and a half. Now, go back to sleep and buy those stocks back, all right? Let's go to Zach in Texas, please. Zach. Hey, Jim. How's it going? Second time caller. In fact, I asked you about NVIDIA in 2017 last time I talked to you. I like NVIDIA. My dog was still alive. My dog NVIDIA was still alive. He loves steak, by the way. All right, go ahead.

Dell, down here in Texas. What do you think about Dell going in the second quarter? Can I just call the bottom in Dell right here right now? Do you mind if I do that at 91? I mean, it's seven to...

It's at nine times earnings. Wake up, Michael Dunn, as the previous guest. Dell is at 91, I have to say. Fine. And by the way, just on Nvidia, let me just say, it surprises you the most when it's the most hated. And when I woke up this morning, I said it was the most hated stock I can recall in all history.

of 2025. Liberation might indeed happen this Wednesday, as investors in this market may finally be liberated from the uncertainty around tariffs. Well, man, tonight, I'm revisiting the 25 questions I posed for 2025's market. First, from rates to labor, I'm looking at the state of the macroeconomic environment as Q1 finally comes to an end. Then, I'm going sector by sector and giving you my latest on the themes I'm tracking later, what we can expect from tech stocks for the rest of 2025, and it's not that

horrible. I'm looking at the state of AI, cyber, and tariffs, and more. Stay with Kramer. Don't miss a second of Mad Money. Follow at Jim Kramer on X. Have a question? Tweet Kramer, hashtag MadMentions. 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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Indeed.com slash mad money. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring? Indeed is all you need. At the beginning of January, rather than making big, bold predictions about the course of the year to come, you know what I did? I decided to come clean and tell you what we didn't know, posing 25 questions for 2025. I figured the answers to these questions would control the direction of the market. Now that we've reached the end of the quarter, well, guess what? We've gotten some answers, although not as many as we'd like.

We came in this year with a profound sense of uncertainty, even as stocks have been roaring since the election. But as the new year unfolded, that uncertainty has morphed into widespread fear, which is why the Dow is off more than 1% for the year. The S&P is down almost 5%, and the Nasdaq is down more than 10%.

As bad as these first quarter numbers are, this market feels even worse because far too few of the big questions have been answered. When I originally laid these out, I had four big macro questions, one question for each of the 11 major sectors and 10 specific questions for tech. Tonight, I want to run through the answers and non-answers in the same format. I think it's very illuminating.

First, a macro question. Does the yield in the 10-year treasury go to 4% or 5% first? Or would it stay stuck in the middle? When we ran this exercise originally, we were a couple of weeks removed from the Fed's December meeting where they gave us a quarter point rate cut.

but then indicated they were done easing for the moment. The benchmark 10-year Treasury, the yield stood at just over 4.5% entering the year, and now it's just over 4.2%. Well, what's that about? Well, long-term rates initially screamed higher at the beginning of the year, with the 10-year reaching 4.8% in late January. Well, they then pulled back and stuck around the mid-4% range well into February. We were still worried about inflation at that point, not too concerned about the economy. But when the market started selling off hard,

Scared investors started piling into treasuries. It was a total flight to quality situation. So the 10-year yield came down rapidly in late February, touching a low of 4.1% in early March. That was astonishing. Since then, rates have firmed up a bit, but only a bit. Flight to quality.

So overall, long-term rates have gone lower this year. In 2024, that would have allowed the stock market to rally like crazy because we were so worried about interest rates, the way they were going. But in 2025, well, it's a different story because you never want to see Treasury yields plummeting because of recession fears. And the nature of these fears, that the president's aggressive tariffs might cause a slowdown, along with higher prices for all sorts of goods, also makes it harder for the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates. The Fed's projecting two rate cuts this year. The future traders are betting it'll be three.

I think it all depends on how bad the economy gets. If tariffs cause prices to soar, the consumer will stop spending. And then the Fed will have no choice. It will have to cut to cut. Not the way we like it, though. Either way, it sure looks like the 10-year is headed to 4%, definitely not 5%. Unfortunately, we may have to get there the hard way with a deteriorating economy. That's a suboptimal way to arrive at 4%, for certain.

Question two, coming into the year, will the labor market remain tight? The answer so far, it's certainly not as tight as it used to be. So far this year, we've gotten two employment reports and they were both softer than anticipated with continued job growth, but at a lower than expected pace. I like that in terms of inflation, but

I'd argue the week February job report contributed to the crescendo selling that made up the final portion of the broader sell-off in early March. And coming off two months of subpar job data, you better believe that a lot of people will be watching when we get that March labor report on Friday morning at 8.30.

At the end of the day, we still have job growth, even if it's more modest than it was a few months ago. Some people might even welcome a softening of the labor market because it would give the Fed another reason to start cutting rates again. But unfortunately, we now need to worry about the labor market for the first time in a while, and that's not a great feeling. Let's see what happens Friday, and we'll go from there. Question number three was a catch-all. What's going to happen in Washington? Oh, man.

Turns out this might have been the only question worth asking because Washington is making business headlines every day now. With the exception of some companies committing to building things here, all the headlines are bad. And that's been true ever since President Trump assumed office in January. And with a big new round of tariff announcements scheduled for Wednesday, what I call that Liberation Day, I don't expect that to change anytime soon. It's too scary for any business to do anything. Everyone's petrified. Even corporate law firms are petrified. We're all petrified.

Originally, when I asked this question, I simply wanted to highlight how little we knew about President Trump's second term agenda. A lot of people were betting it would look a lot like his first term agenda. But boy, I'd ever turn to be completely wrong. It's looking like the twenty four twenty four campaign Trump. Three months into the year, Trump, too, is clearly not the same as Trump won. And Wall Street's very unhappy. Everyone's terrified about the tariffs. And more important, they hate the spur of the moment, a way these tariffs have been rolled out. The odd embrace of the heavy left.

With the union of the auto workers? I mean, that's what a lot of people love, too. That is the most left-wing union in the country. As is the nearshoring that many companies did in Mexico in Trump 1. And everyone's just waiting for the Canadians to tariff lumber, jacking up the price of housing gigantically. Prime Minister Carney's not-so-secret weapon, and heaven knows housing's expensive enough.

The optimistic view is that once Liberation Day has come and gone, we might start to hear about some more pro-business agenda items that Wall Street was hoping from the Trump administration. Think deregulation, lower taxes. Maybe the White House will reach deals with some of our trading partners after these tariffs hit, and then they can partially roll back. Too optimistic? I hope not.

Probably is. Then there was the fourth question we asked at the beginning of the year. Will the expected corporate earnings growth materialize? At the time, the analysts were looking for 12 percent collective earnings growth for the S&P 500. But that struck me as a rather aggressive target. So how do things look on the earnings front now that the first quarter has come to an end? Well, a couple of things have happened. First, fourth quarter earnings were, by and large, much better than expected. So the full year for 2024 ended up looking real good.

Looking at the whole S&P 500, it collectively earned $245 per share. Street was only, the analysts were looking for $242. So 242, they did 245. That's not bad. Means we're against tougher comparisons. Second, the earnings estimate for 2025 have come down oh so slightly. As a result, the analysts are only forecasting 10% earnings growth for the S&P. That's a much more achievable target, which is positive. But honestly, it still strikes me as a bit aggressive, especially if the president hits us with a tariff meat cleaver on Wednesday rather than a tariff scalpel.

Will that easier target of 10% earnings growth materialize? That's now the question for the rest of 2025. We'll see how this earnings growth target holds up through the first quarter earnings season when some companies, especially those impacted by tariffs, might have to trim their forecast for the year. So that's how our four big macro questions have changed for the first three months of the year. Unfortunately, we don't have total clarity yet on the full answers to our questions. But where there's been more information, it's been negative.

Bottom line, when you look at the macro situation of the past few months, it's no wonder why stocks have had such a weak start to the year. The president's too angry. He's too sullen to be constructive. We don't know what the heck to do. Stick around after the break and I'll walk you through the rest of 25 questions for 2025 before the calendar flips to the second quarter. Oh, by the way, let's hope the fear subsides. But I think that you have to have fear monger in chief to go with that. And money's back in the break.

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EY, shape the future with confidence. Today, on the final day of a tough quarter, we're going over the 25 questions for 2025 that I posed at the beginning of the year, trying to figure out where we've gotten more clarity and where we haven't. Before the break, I covered the four big macro questions while there's still a lot of uncertainty. And the moments of clarity have been almost universally negative.

But now I'm getting more granular with the 11 questions that I said would define the 11 major sectors in the stock market. Maybe things will be happier and I'll be smiling. Why don't we start with communications? Well, we wondered if the advertising market would stay strong. Communications was the best-performing sector in 2024. It's been one of the worst performers of 2025. The short answer is that we haven't seen a meaningful deterioration of the advertising market, at least not yet. But people are now starting to worry about the ad market because it rarely holds up when consumer confidence collapses, as it has.

Believered, of course, by Washington. Something to watch out for once our early season gets rolling. Next, the financials, where we wonder if we see some tangible benefit from deregulation. Everyone was expecting this from the Trump administration, but they decided to put tariffs first. While there's been some positive developments on the regulatory front, the big thing Wall Street wanted was a better deal-making environment, thanks to a lighter touch from the FTC and the Department of Justice's antitrust division. So far, that hasn't really happened. In fact, the head of Trump's FTC has more or less said he's willing to block

mergers on what are basically political grounds, which is not what the market was hoping for. And lawyers who would normally be doing deals, well, they're fighting for their financial lives. For question number seven, we asked if the consumer was starting to get tapped out. Very prescient question, unfortunately. There's a reason the consumer discretionary sector has been the worst performing sector in 2025. The consumer is clearly getting tapped out and consumer sentiment is hideous. All that's mostly because of tariff worries.

I know that at various times over the past few years, investors have been more worried about the consumer than they should have been. That's why I don't want to read too much into a couple of months of soft consumer spending sentiment data. But without some clear evidence that the consumer is in better shape, it's tough to see the consumer discretionary sector mounting a major comeback anytime soon. Confidence is just too low.

Even, by the way, people are worried about Social Security. It's been a while since we've been worried about that. For tech, I said we had to know if the AI investment theme will continue to expand. That's something the whole market's been worrying about for months. Ever since the emergence of DeepSeek in January, there's been much less confidence in this theme, even as none of the major players have actually said they're planning to scale back their AI infrastructure investments. Now, I'm still guardedly optimistic on this one, especially after attending NVIDIA's GTC event earlier this month.

But you know what? It feels very lonely saying anything positive at all about NVIDIA or AI. Many people have given up on NVIDIA and AI, and it's lost its way. Although here's something that I thought I should point out. It's not the president's fault.

Ninth, can utilities actually meet the increased demand for power? At the beginning of the year, it looked like the data center had created this phenomenal bull market for electricity. But now it's being called into question. And we're wondering if utilities will even need to dramatically scale up their operations. The stocks in the business say they don't have to. How's Three Mile Island doing there, Mr. Microsoft? For now, though, I can tell you that the utilities have emerged as one of the better sectors in the markets here. But only because they're textbook recession-proof stocks with high dividends. You buy them when you are scared out of your wits.

Scared out of your wits, times M equals high price. Question 10. Which industrial subsectors will prove to be the most durable? We had a lot of great themes in the industrial space in January, but we've lost most of them, especially anything connected to the data center. However, aerospace is still working incredibly well. Apart from that, the waste management companies, they've worked good. Hey, 3M, Otis, Deere. House of Pleasure. Okay, that's the only ones I come up with. Question 11.

Well, this is interesting. The consumer stables. Can the packaged food stocks beat the GOP-1 weight loss worries? Three months later, it turns out that some of them can, but many of them can't. For example, Mondelez, a candy company, has done surprisingly well, up double digits year to date. Toblerone, yes, but Campbell's, General Mills and Conag are all in the red for the year.

Hmm. Question 12. Will the energy industry maintain its discipline in the drill baby drill era? For the last few years, oil and gas producers have been pretty restrained about bringing new production online because they don't want to cause an oversize situation and push down their own prices. So far, they've managed to maintain that discipline. The rig count's basically flatlined since late February. That's despite a nice rise in natural gas prices. Normally, you'd expect oil prices to come down when Wall Street's worried about a recession. But the

lack of new production has allowed oil to trade in a relatively tight range. Let's hope the discipline lasts. Question 13, real estate. Will we see more retailers closing stores in the face of bankruptcy?

Well, that's very important to the real estate investment trust. So far, we haven't seen too many retail bank sheets with the one big exception, Forever 21, which filed for bankruptcy just two weeks ago, and they're likely to close all their stores. Other than Forever 21, the absence of huge retailers going under makes me feel a tad sanguine about the retail REITs, including Realty Income Letter O with its bountiful 5% shield, and you get a check every month.

Question 14. How will Robert F. Kennedy Jr. impact health care as the secretary of health and human services? The group's become the second best performer of the year so far. RFK Jr. hasn't done that much damage. The bigger issue from Washington has been some drastic cuts to the funding that National Institutes of Health gives to early stage biotech companies. But that's more Elon Musk than RFK Jr. That said, we've got to stay on the case here because late Friday, Peter Marks,

The top vaccine official at the FDA resigned from his post, saying, quote, It has become clear that truth and transparency are not desired by the secretary, but rather he wishes subservient confirmation of his misinformation about and lies. Misinformation lies. All right. Not ideal. OK. Moderna is in the hot seat for its novel mRNA strategy, which seems to be disliked by RFK Jr.,

So while health care has been a relative outperform this year, that's partially because we haven't seen any notable disruptions from RFK Jr. yet. And it's probably too soon to celebrate this as a win. Let's put a pause on it. A pin in it, as they used to say. Finally, for the materials sector, we asked if lower-priced commodities can see their prices rise. Specifically, I was wondering about certain metals like copper and steel, plus agricultural commodities like soybeans and wheat.

Surprisingly, given the squishy macro backdrop, some commodities have actually firmed up, especially copper, which is now up more than 25% for the year. But that's the possible comeback in China. But most agricultural commodity prices have remained muted and certain industrial commodities moved meaningful lower. If it weren't for putting on those tariffs on everything that, well, I'd say that the Fed could really start cutting right now based on the materials complex.

And that's why the materials are a middle of the pack sector in 2025 with only a modest 2 percent gain. Not much to see here. The group can do better if the economy improves. But until you see that, I can't give you much of a reason to own the material stock. Bottom line. OK, that's our update for each of the 11 sector questions that I posed at the beginning of the year.

After the break, we're going to finish up with our 25 questions for 2025 update and a look at how our tech specific questions are playing out. Amazing that I think that the Fed would be in cut mode given how much things have come down. But then again, that's just the fear factor working all over the place.

Tina in Florida. Tina. Hey, Jim. Tina. I'm thinking about a company that has many very popular products out there. But given the situation with the tariffs and the fact that many of their products are manufactured in China and other Asian countries, I don't know if it's a good idea or not. What do you think of Decker Brands? Man, Decker's has just been, I mean, this thing has been crushed.

I mean, just crush. You would have to come in here. Oh, my. It's down 45 percent. A lot of people worried about Decker's, but a lot of people worried about Hoka, whether Nike is going to go back. You know what I'm going to say? At 18 times earnings with this stock down 50, 45 percent, I think you buy a little and then wait till it's down 50. This thing seems to be at this point a classic overreaction and desire to get it out of people's holdings. Let's go to Michael in New York. Michael.

Hi, Jim. How are you? I'm good, Michael. How are you doing?

Good. Well, I want to know your opinion on Netflix. I bought it a while ago, made some money with it, and I'm thinking to get back into it. How do you see Netflix for the future? Okay. Now, I saw someone today talk about a head and shoulder Netflix. All I can tell you is I watch Netflix, and I know everybody else watches Netflix. And Netflix is a great worldwide company, and it's done a lot of things right. It's only up 5% for the year. I think you can buy some Netflix. I think it's a really good situation because I like subscription model situations.

And I'll throw in every subscription model I think is good. Literally all of them. I'm even thinking about Peloton for heaven's sake. How about Brett in California? Brett. Jim Kramer, thank you for taking my call. Brett, thank you for calling.

Jim, just real quick before I ask my stock, I called in about three weeks ago, maybe a month ago, and asked about a company called Vital Farms. And you were familiar with it. You were definitely a man of your word. Thank you for doing that amazing segment on it. That was very educational. I just want to thank you for that. We went right to it. Another question.

Thank you so much. And then my question was, I added a stock in my Roth account, and I'm in my late 50s. It's called UnitedHealthcare. And I'm just trying to figure out how to buy this one. I have like a $2,000 cost basis, but I want to put about $5,000 investment. Should I buy it in slices or should I buy it in like full shares? I?

I think you have to wait for it to come down. It is one of those red hot stocks. Jeff Marks and I were talking today about whether to chase these red hot stocks that do well at a time when things are slowing down. United Health's certainly one of them. I've got to tell you, AbbVie's another. J&J's another. I want you to wait because this

What's happened every time it's spiked is it then goes down. I want you to wait, but I think it is the best of breed, and that does matter. All right, as we head into Q2, there's still a lot of sector-specific questions this market has to answer. Now you have my roadmap for how to approach them. Much more Mad Money, and I'm turning to tech.

and recapping what questions I still have for this most important sector. And with days until President Trump's Liberation Day, I'm weighing the short and long-term impact of tariffs on the state. And of course, all your calls for rapid fire tonight's just the lightning round. So stay with Kramer.

We're trying to make sense of a terrible first quarter tonight by revisiting what I thought were the 25 most pressing important questions of 2025 beginning at the beginning of January. So far, I've taken you through the first 15, but the last 10 were all about tech because three months ago, tech was the leader of this entire market. Needless to say, that is no longer the case. Let me walk through.

These are incredible. Let's start with 16. How will the AI infrastructure trade evolve? Three months ago, I thought we could be in for all sorts of exciting new technology. We went to that GTC conference with Jensen Wong. But so far this year, AI has only evolved in the direction of lower stock prices. NVIDIA now down almost 30% from its January highs.

If, like me, you're still believing the AI infrastructure theme, can you believe that I still am? I recommend circling the wagons around some of the best players in the space because everything related to AI has come down so much, you're not really chasing them anymore. I'd stick with my favorites, NVIDIA for chips, Broadcom for custom silicon accelerators, Arista for network equipment, and Dell for servers. Just be sure you're prepared for more short-term pain before you pull the trigger.

That said, almost all the people who own NVIDIA but have no idea what it is or thought it was like a hand cream like Nivea, well, they're gone. And bye. Question 17. Who will be the initial group of AI software winners? I figure we see a group of enterprise software companies that harness AI tools to make big money this year. No, that didn't happen at all. I'm not giving a hope. But look at the enterprise software companies who seem to be leading the way in AI. They've become some of the worst performers in all of tech. Adobe. Good.

Good company has launched several AI products, including generative AI tools to create photos or videos from text prompts. It's now down almost 14% for the year. Salesforce, which is launching its exciting agent force AI product, has seen its stock fall roughly 20%. ServiceNow, which is working to automate much of the back office, is off even more, down close to 25% year-to-date. ♪♪

So, again, I'll punt here. I think some of these will eventually be winners again, but their stocks are hated right now and they might stay hated for a while, even though I think that they're overly hated. Question number 18. Will the AIPC theme ever materialize? At this point, it's hard to be optimistic. Again, a tougher economy only makes it harder to sell these tricked out computers. That said, when we were in NVIDIA's GTC event two weeks ago,

I pose these same questions, these same concerns about the AIPC directly to Michael Dell, who said that it is, quote, undeniable that the long-awaited PC refresh is now starting. He's earned the benefit of the doubt. He's been in it for 40 years. I say buy Dell. I'm going to throw in Cisco. I'll give you a twofer. Question 19. Can the cyclical parts of the semiconductor cohort start growing again? Here we're talking about computers that make simpler chips for the industrial, automotive, and even consumer technology and market.

Those were all doing terribly at the end of last year. But we had some hope that the industry might see a recovery in 2025. Now, though, business is slowing, so it's hard to bet on companies that need a healthy economy in order to survive. We call them the IoT semis.

Of course, many of these cyclical semiconductor stocks have already gotten so cheap that they look like they're running out of downside. I mean, Texas Instruments is only down about 4% for the year, despite giving one of the worst conference calls we've heard since earnings season. But even if the downside is exhausted, that's not a reason to expect more upside.

Question 20. Will unprofitable growth tech names stay hot? Whoa. These things were on fire last year, but they have imploded over the last couple months. Look at SoundHound AI down 59% year to date. Big Bear AI down more than 35%. How about a space planet like Intuitive Machines off 59%? In the end, these high-flying tech stocks should never have been up that much to begin with. That is positive for the market. We want to throw off...

Froth extinguished. Well, guess what? Froth is being extinguished. Question 21. Can some legacy tech giants continue to rally? At the beginning of the year, old tech companies like IBM and Cisco were rallying nicely, and these have become some of the top performers in the group of 2025. I think they make really good hideouts in this environment with strong earnings, reasonable valuation, and legitimate growth opportunities in AI.

Question 22. Will cybersecurity continue to be unassailable? This has been one of the most dependable groups in tech for years, but they haven't been doing great in recent months. The two cybersecurity stocks that we own for the Chappell Trust, CrowdStrike and Palo Alto Networks, they're up 3% and down 6%, respectively. While that's better than the overall tech sector, it's not great.

Still, the cybersecurity firms have some of the best numbers in software, precisely because this is about non-discretionary as it gets. Big companies desperately need to protect themselves from hackers no matter what. Even if the stocks have come down, you know what, I'm going to stick with it. I'm sticking with cybersecurity. Question 23, Robotaxi, how's that race doing? This team has fallen out of favor in the past three months. The main thing you need to know is that Tesla's taken some steps.

reputational hits this year due to Elon Musk's highly polarizing involvement with the Trump administration. That's taking the robo-taxi story off the table, allowing ride-sharing plays like Uber to roar, although I'd argue that self-driving cabs were never a threat to them in the first place. Will these dynamics last? I still believe Tesla is an edge here thanks to Musk's close relationship with President Trump, but I'll admit that I didn't see this level of public backlash against Musk coming.

Question 24. This one's a doozy. What will be the impact of Trump's trade policies? When I posed this question in January, I was thinking in terms of the tech-specific trade policies enacted under Biden. Things like bans on advanced ship sales to China. I didn't realize we were looking at a full-blown worldwide trade war. One that would be, well, let's just say...

We might be winning, but it could be a Pyrrhic victory. This is an ongoing situation. We'll likely hear more later this week at Liberation Day festivities. But for now, the Trump White House hasn't been too eager to roll back Biden's trade limitations at all. Given the new president's attitude toward our trading partners, I bet he'll double down for rolling this stuff back. He's more likely to ban the selling of any chips, even potato chips at this point.

Finally, question 25. How will Trump help the cryptocurrency ecosystem? President Trump ran on a pro-crypto platform and he's already started delivering on the crypto agenda. Earlier this month, the White House held a crypto summit where it announced the establishment of a crypto reserve. Unfortunately, President Trump and his family have maybe gotten a little too into the crypto process. They've launched a Trump meme coin just before Inauguration Day, which has since plummeted in value.

They've moved the family business further into the crypto space where it's competing with existing industry players. As for Bitcoin's price, it peaked at an all-time high of $109,000 and change on Inauguration Day. Since then, it has fallen more than 20%. Meanwhile, the total market capital of cryptocurrencies peaked at roughly $3.7 trillion last December. And now it's pulled back to under $2.7 trillion. It's kind of like...

Kind of like Nvidia. My view, no matter how much President Trump has done for crypto, it could never live up to the hype. Here's the bottom line. One quarter into 2025 and we still have lots of questions about this year with very few answers. Maybe at the end of the second quarter we'll get a little clarity. Heaven knows we sure need it. Mad Money is back after the break. It is time! Time for the life of a crypto. It's all about where we're going. It's him. It's not going to be something I buy by myself. It's not just me or anyone on the call. It's not because there's so much difference. It's where it's applied. Play this out.

And then the lightning round is over. Are you ready? Let's start with Gary in Maryland. Gary. Hey, Jim. How are you doing? I'm doing well, Gary. How about you? Good. I'd like to give a shout out to Mr. Mark's business course. What's your opinion on the stock Visa? Absolutely. My feeling with the stock of Visa is that is what I call an up stock. I'm going to give it two for I like Ma too, which is MasterCard. They have no credit at risk and they're doing incredibly well. I like them. Let's go to Gabe in California. Gabe.

Booyah, Jim! Wow, I like that tongue roll. How can I help you? Yes, Jim. So I have this stock. It's been bouncing between 110 and 120. I thought I'd pick it up. At a good price, 105 ever since that has been dropping. I find myself in a house of pain. Five and a half feet deep to be exact. Jim,

What should I do with my position in Marvell Technologies? OK, Marvell has experienced a historic decline, which is incredible because it's actually in earnings having an historic advance. At this point, I have to tell you, I think Matt Murphy's stock has been punished enough. It does have a bit. I know, Mike, I know that without a doubt someone's going to say, Jim, did you not see the head and shoulder pattern here? I don't care. I think you buy a quarter position now. And then if it gets to 50, you buy a little more.

And that's why use a five point increment after that. And I think you'll do fine. Remember, he bought a ton of stock. Remember, he bought a million dollars with the stock up above here. Let's go to Marshall in Illinois. Marshall.

Jim, thanks for taking my call, buddy. I appreciate it. I'm thrilled you called, Marshall. Thank you. I've been watching the S&L Holdings drop since last July, and the price stabilized here recently. But in the last week, it's gone down another 9%. And what I don't get is they have a robust backlog, a decent net profit. They're earning. But remember, they're a Dutch company, and the president is the president.

The president of the United States will not help a Dutch company do business in China. And that business in China is what's really necessary. And he just will not let that happen. By the way, that's not new. The previous president felt the same way. So there are real issues with our trade partners in ASML because they own one of the most crucial parts of the entire semiconductor food chain. Let's go to Mark in Wisconsin. Mark.

Dr. Kramer, thank you for taking my call. My pleasure, Mark. What's happening? Dr. Maria is ticker symbol ADMA. ADMA, your thoughts?

Now, I have to do more work on ADMA, particularly because what I'm doing now in all this small biotechs is take a look at them versus what RFK is saying. It's too important for me to be able to cuff anything in biotech because if RFK doesn't like it, of course, the HHS, then I am on the wrong side of the trade. So we've got to be more careful there. I'll do more work. Timothy in Pennsylvania. Timothy.

Hey, how we doing, Jim? Booyah. Booyah to you. What's happening? I'm all right. I've been a listener since 2017, and I'm a first-time caller, so I want to thank you so much for taking my call. And I thank you for calling. How can I help?

Yeah, I just want to thank you first and foremost, you know, during these uncertain times and shaky markets for helping us out. Thank you, man. Thank you. You're very kind. Thank you.

Absolutely. Yes, sir. I wanted to get your take on a company I took a position in as well as an option. Dividends help, but the PE is roughly 16. The company's name is Wendy's. Okay. When I see that dividend...

That's almost 7%. That is what I call a red flag. You can't really have a dividend that high, apart from any of those, unless you're a utility company. I don't trust Wendy's. Eat the Baconator. Don't own this stock. And that, ladies and gentlemen, concludes the Lightning Round! The Lightning Round is sponsored by Charles Schwab.

For years, on the last day of every month, I'd make my retirement contribution. I try to do it without thinking about it like a robot because I don't want to time or play the market with my retirement money. It's meant to be a long-term investment, although at my age it's more kind of medium-term. But when you're in your 30s or 40s or 50s, you're putting that money to work for decades, so it's not worth trying to time the market.

What happens if that day where you try to avoid putting the money to work turns out to be one of the biggest days of the year? As the Grok-Generative AI platform tells me, that missing the best 30 days could cause you to miss an astonishing 83% of the market gains. These are the crucial days when you make so much of your gains for the year. Each year presents about seven days of gigantic performance. Can you really afford to miss those days? Against that is a realization that buying ahead of the president's so-called Liberation Day...

Seems to be one of the dumbest ideas imaginable. Who would do such a thing when we know that the president's increasingly angry at all sorts of leaders, all sorts of countries, all sorts of people, and he says he doesn't really care about the impact of his tariffs. As Trump put it, quote, I couldn't care less because if the prices on foreign cars go up, they're going to buy American cars, end quote. Sadly, each percent of GM's cars have parts made in Canada and Mexico, four or two. Plus, why wouldn't our car companies take advantage of the situation to raise prices?

No law against that. So the moment is certainly fraught. We have the White House floating a possible annexation of Greenland. I've been thinking about that for a while. Definitely not something that they're campaigning on. We have a Canadian Prime Minister, Mark Carney, saying the cordial relationship with our country is over. We still have no idea who will pay the tariffs, where and when and why.

In that situation, why would you buy anything? Well, wait a second. The funny thing about the markets, when you think there is no hope, when there is just nothing but gloom right now, when you sense no reason whatsoever to buy, there might be a reason to buy. You just don't know it yet.

My instincts are to wait until Liberation Day. But because of these statistics, I'm making my usual end of month retirement contribution today at the end of the day, because I'll tell you why. I fear missing one of those days, one of those big up days. And I fear that. And it's more palpable than missing than catching a down day. Get that.

After all, this whole sell-off comes down to two things. The alleged data center bubble and tariff terror ahead of Liberation Day. I think the latter will be nasty. The former of the data center has become a free-fire zone.

And there's no sign that it's going to improve. Unfortunately, that's where I feel the most vulnerable. Look at the relentless decline in NVIDIA, driven by so many negatives. Alibaba chairman Joe's size bubble comment, Microsoft's alleged spending slowdown. Now something from a publication that took a comment from Palo Alto's Nikesh Rohr totally out of context about paying up for power they didn't need. Throw in the debacle that was core weave in this whole AI edifice just feels totally hopeless.

That makes me think I'll regret it if I don't put some money into weakness. Nvidia often has these hideous declines, but historically, it's always been able to bounce back. Oh, this one is certainly more hideous than others.

You know, in some ways, it's a game time decision. I mean, look, the situation is incredibly fraught short term. But in the long term, I fear make you're making a mistake, a very big mistake. If you try to steer clear of this market right now, because the negatives are increasingly baked in at these levels. So is the fear factor. All that said, if today's comeback. Well, let's do this.

I'm going to put it to work tomorrow morning, but you know what happens? They give you the close of the day. Watch it be a big update. Like I said, there's always a bull market somewhere. I promise you I'll find it just for you right here on MidMoney. I'm Jim Cramer. See you tomorrow. 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.

You should not treat any opinion expressed by Jim Cramer as a specific inducement to make a particular investment or follow a particular strategy, but only as an expression of his opinion. Cramer's opinions are based upon information he considers reliable, but neither CNBC nor its affiliates and or subsidiaries warrant its completeness or accuracy, and it should not be relied upon as such. To view the full Mad Money Disclaimer, please visit cnbc.com forward slash madmoneydisclaimer.

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