Mad Money w/ Jim Cramer 3/7/25
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I'm here to level the playing field for all investors. There's always a bull market somewhere, and I promise to help you find it. Mad Money starts now. Hey, I'm Kramer. Welcome to Mad Money. Welcome to Kramerica. I'm with my friends. I'm just trying to make a little money. My job is not just to entertain, but to educate, to teach you. So call me at 1-800-743-CBC. Tweet me at Jim Kramer. I want you to listen to me. Breathe in. Breathe out. Slowly, like a minute.

And don't take any action until you're certain that you can handle any amount of pain if it goes against you. The House of Pain. If you think you can cope, then use the craziness that is happening in this stock market to start a position or to put money in an index fund that mirrors the S&P 500. Because I think you'll do fine. But if you can't take the pain...

Don't even think about it. This market's way too volatile, way too fragile. You're almost guaranteed to get hurt here, at least short term. So if you lack the mental fortitude, you'll end up buying high and selling low before you watch the market bounce right back as it did today, with the averages opening decently, then just getting hammered.

And then coming right back up, the Dow finishing up 223 points. It has to be advancing 0.5%. And then ASIC, after being so hideous I could barely look at it, gaining 0.7%. How can markets be so out of control? And they are.

Well, because, frankly, we are in a very emotional market. It's a market that's torn between buyers who see terrific opportunities because the market's down and the Walmart White House, where the president keeps trying to give you every day lower prices on stocks almost every time he talks. I wish I were kidding.

This morning, we got this non-farm payroll report from the Labor Department. And frankly, it was a perfect set of figures for the bulls. Decent job growth, not a lot of inflation. That's a great setup for investors who suddenly petrified that we are going to head into recession. Thanks to President Trump's mercurial attitude towards implementing his own agenda. But once the market opens, we hear that the president wants to put on new tariffs. I don't even know on who. And that's going to happen today.

Then some moronic money manager decides to sell billions of dollars worth of tech stocks and economically sensitive stocks at once while taking those proceeds and simultaneously using them to buy recession-proof names. That's what you saw today. The companies that make toothpaste, Uncrustables, Goldfish. It's the kind of colossally stupid move that distorts the entire market and misleads everyone who's watching the ticker. Not me, because I've done these trades, I've done these programs, and I saw it coming.

Nothing kills confidence like the whippy nature of these trades combined with the fear of presidential pain. So you get something like the fable cascade of selling that almost always marks a short term bottom, which is why I say breed, because if you can't, this will be a total market for you. Toto, as in turn off the oxygen. And with that little explainer, why don't we see what's lurking in our game plan for next week?

First, remember, we are in a clubber-laying market. No dispute about that, right, a la Rocky III, where the prediction is pain. And pain gets dispensed regularly, especially even on the weekend. Nothing stops.

So we should expect to come in on Monday with a whole new set of parameters about trade policy. And that's a big reason why we're seeing such violent repositionings on Fridays. They're afraid. The accounts are afraid. Individual earnings have been de-emphasized by the president's arbitrary dispensing of tariffs. And, of course, suspending of tariffs with each waffle we see people leaving this market. Because

I believe the stock market is still the greatest engine of wealth creation in history, but I often feel it cross purposes with the president now, even though I'm generally pro-tariff because our trading partners never play fair. But in the end, I'm a process guy. I like a planned rollout of tariffs. While Wall Street never likes tariffs, what it really hates, though, is uncertainty. It hates that more than tariffs. In this environment, individuals feel like individual stocks, they feel like playthings.

Play things of a White House that feels at war with itself. They're not playing things up. And you can't think of them that way or else you're going to miss some tremendous opportunities. For example, Monday, Oracle is going to report. And after the close, I bet they're going to have some really positive things to say. Now, Oracle, a very good software company, has become a great data center company, which was terrific until we learned that some Chinese outfit could create high-quality AI models using much less hardware.

That's a simplistic way to put it. But let's just be honest. The AI stocks have never traded the same since China revealed its deep-seeked source of, let's just say, of incredibly fast but much less expensive AI.

Does it make sense that that's the case? No, it just doesn't. But it certainly hurt the valuations of the semiconductor stocks. Last night, Broadcom reported an amazing quarter. Its stock condition reworded after the close. Then it got dragged down by that tech sell program I just mentioned before bouncing right back when it was that ridiculous contrived program was over. And it finished the day up more than 8%. But were you in there from the beginning to the end? Many people were in there.

people probably left at midday this kind of action has become the norm i expect oracle to have almost as good a quarter as broadcom and then do the same thing we've got some retailers reporting on tuesday morning i'm keen on dick's sporting goods which is pulling away from the others in the sports category i think they'll deliver very strong set of numbers and it jumps like a pole vaulter when that when you get that kind of number so it might be worth being in wednesday we get another chance to throw the market under the bus let me see the consumer price index number uh

If the CPI runs hot, I'm sure the numbers from a stock like Oracle simply won't matter at all. Sailor V, I'll tell you this. If we get a soft CPI and a soft PPI on Thursday, the drumbeat of a rate cut will grow so loud, so loud it might even overshadow the pain forecast for the White House. With cooler inflation readings, the Fed has no reason not to cut.

The most important part of the week comes Wednesday after the close, and that's when Adobe reports. It's got to break the spell of undeserved negativity surrounding its stock. I bet CEO Shantanu Narayan will deliver something that makes the stock worth owning into the print. Dollar General reports Thursday morning, and this one's been all over the map lately near the bottom of it.

I think this company and Dollar Tree have become the odd men out as Walmart is hammer prices so low that they guys can't compete. Dollar stores, they I don't know. They seem to be at the mercy of the big suppliers, not Walmart. I am not a.

of Dollar General or Dollar Tree. One stock I am a buyer of, though, is Costco, which reported excellent numbers last night and still got obliterated. Wait until Tuesday and then buy some. All the sellers will probably be done. It's a longstanding position for my travel trust. I actually want to buy more. I haven't wanted to do that in a very long time. After the close...

And by the way, it did not miss earnings. That's just wrong. Those are people who don't know how to read Costco's report. I do. After the close, we hear from Ulta Beauty and the new CEO, Keisha Steelman, has to explain how Ulta remains the most relevant, reasonably priced cosmetics chain. Prices have to be kept down to beat all the discounters. And while we're trying to get a bigger slice of the makeup, cosmetics have become the biggest battleground in the entire store.

And Ulta's got to win them back from Amazon. Finally, Friday, we get the Michigan Consumer Sentiment number. I didn't focus on this number much at all under President Biden because Biden was very predictable. So it was easy to make plans. Sure, Wall Street's hated many of Biden's policies, especially on interest, but he rarely took us by surprise. Trump surprises us every day. You see, that matters because we're a consumer-driven economy, people. If optimism rules, there are some otherwise very risky stocks that are just quite simply...

Worth buying. But if the pessimists are in charge, well, then all sorts of money managers will dump their economic incentive stocks only to watch them power up once they're done, like that moron manager did earlier today, wrecking midday's market. Again, the markets can handle any amount of negativity. What they can't handle is uncertainty.

The bottom line. Look, it's one of the toughest markets I've seen in years because if your portfolio is a quarterback, you have no defenders and you're getting sacked or being from the blind side every time. And let me tell you something. All sides are now blind sides. So if you want to buy a stock, make sure not to buy it all at once. Buy slowly because the stock you purchase might be down five points by the time you get your report. Irvin, Louisiana, Irv. Oh, hi, Jim.

How are you doing, buddy? I'm doing all right. Good. Anyway, my question is about Dow Chemicals. I sold some of my stock last week, and I need something to invest my profits into, and I've had Dow Chemicals on my mind since December. What's your thinking on this? Well, okay, so Dow is trading with all the other chemicals as if they are just –

calls on China turning around. It's a wrong thing, but that's, I got to tell you straight, that's what it's trading on. And therefore, that means it's not a stock you should own right now. And the yield might not protect you as people thought at 5% and 6%. Andrew in Washington. Andrew.

Hey, Jim, with strong travel demand, do you think Delta Airlines could be a buy? I do prefer United to Delta. The group is really under a lot of pressure right now, but I think that they're going to have a very strong summer. I would hold on. And now let's go to Sam in Pennsylvania. Sam. Jim, how are you? I'm good, Sam. How about you?

Good. So I'm calling today because I am becoming more concerned about Nike. You know, Jim, we value stocks on their future cash flow. And this is exactly what I fear Nike is hurting by putting out these low quality products. You see, as a consumer, we're not going to make a repeat purchase if the types that we're buying for the same price are falling apart twice as fast. So I really need a new CEO at Nike to hear me when I say focus on the quality of the product and the engagement will come.

Okay, so Sam, let me tell you how I feel about it. I think that Mr. Hill is doing exactly as you say. I also think that the stock looks very expensive, but maybe they're going to have an earnings acceleration. If I own Nike, I would certainly hold it. If the stock would have dropped back even to the low 70s, I myself might pick some up from my travel trust. So I think that Elliot Hill is making it work. I think he's doing a good job. Now, okay, listen to me. If

If you can handle pain, then I'm giving you my blessing to buy stocks, but you got to do it slowly. Slowly. Don't do it fast. You might get whipsawed here. Oh, man, money tonight. Are you getting an all-you-can-eat buffet with the pullback in restaurant stocks right now? I'm taking a closer look at some key names and giving you where I stand. Then you asked about a data center play, and I'm answering. Don't miss my take.

on a wild one that never used to be wild, PAL Industries. And after a choppy week for the markets, I'm helping you stay steady in all stocks with a round of MI Diversified. So I want you to stay with Kramer.

Don't miss a second of Mad Money. Follow at Jim Kramer on X. Have a question? Tweet Kramer. 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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Indeed.com slash madmoney. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring? Indeed is all you need. When the market's going up, everybody wants to wait for a pullback to buy stocks at a better price. But once stocks start rolling over, we get terrified, and we can't bring ourselves to pull the trigger.

Lately, we've experienced a wholesale liquidation. I think there's some great buying opportunities out there. You just need to know how to find them. That's why tonight I want to walk you through some of my favorite casual dining stocks because we've had many of their CEOs on the show giving us real insight into the business. Take Brinker, the parent company of Chili's and Maggiano's. We had CEO Kevin Hockman on the show at the end of January right after Brinker reported one of the best quarters I've ever seen. Chili's had 31% same-store sales growth, and the whole company earned $2.80 per share, nearly a full dollar.

full dollar ahead of the estimates. In response, the stock shot up more than 16% in a single day. And then it kept running all the way from 154 to 192 in early February. Since then, though, Brinker's pulled back hard to 141, down substantially from where it was trading before the quarter. So how the heck does a stock collapse like this in a little over a month after a pretty spectacular quarter? Now, some of it's pure profit taking. At the peak, Brinker was up mind-boggling 315% over the previous 12 months. Now, some of it's valuation. Some

Some of the companies, some of those companies keep talking about how they had softer traffic in early February. But that was bad weather. Some of its tariff worries weigh on consumer sentiment. Given the scale decline here, we've got to ask, is Brinker worth buying into weakness? Now, look, I've been a fan of this one for ages. I think the basic story hasn't changed at all. Brinker's been able to put up great numbers because it offers customers an incredible value proposition. At Chili's, you get an appetizer, endless chips and salsa, endless soft drinks and a burger, all for ten dollars.

$2.99. Need to wash it down? Well, try a $6 margarita of the month. This month, it's lemon drop. And by the way, they use top shelf tequila in this. This strategy has clearly been resonating with customers across all income levels. Chili's may be the only place where you can see your average family of five eating next to someone wearing brioni. Now, how do I know that? I'm the guy wearing the brioni!

Plus, when I spoke to CEO Kevin Hockman at the end of January, he was adamant that the last quarter was no flu. He explained that his team has been doing a great job of increasing the cultural relevance of Chili's with excellent ad plays, a lot of TikTok. That's not even factoring in Maggiano's, which seems to be kind of an afterthought for investors, but not for Kevin Hockman. The typical Maggiano's location does this in outstanding $10 million in average unit volume. And even though it only has 50 locations, that means it's got a ton of room to expand.

Plus, Brinker's stock is a heck of a lot cheaper than it was four or five weeks ago. Next up is Texas Roadhouse, TXRH, a stock I like so much we decided to buy some for the Chapel Trust. Two weeks ago, these guys reported what I thought was a darn good quarter with better-than-expected same-store sales, up 7.7%, alongside a healthy earnings beat. Sure, not as crazy as the results from Brinker, absolutely, but Texas Roadhouse is a much more mature company that just happens to be a real steady operator with a lot of room to grow.

Also, unlike Brinker, Texas Roadhouse has held up surprisingly well, with the stock down only a few bucks from early February, even as it had a tough week and a tough day. At one point, it was down $6.50 today. That said, I like this one for the same reason I like Brinker. Texas Roadhouse offers what I call relative value. It may be a steakhouse, but it's a bargain versus a competition. Where else can you get an eight-ounce steak with two sides for $9.99 on Wild West Wednesdays?

$5 margaritas. And, of course, the fresh rolls with cinnamon butter. Oh, my God. They come on the table. I can't stop eating when I go to this place. When we spoke to CEO Jerry Morgan just two weeks ago, he acknowledged that while the beginning of February was a bit choppy, recent trends were encouraging. Record Valentine's Day. Plus, Texas White House recently opened up their 750th system-wide location. They plan to open 30 restaurants this year across their three brands. There's a lot of room to expand. It doesn't hurt that the company's buying back stock hand over fist. Last year, they repurchased $80 million stock.

worth of shares, and they just announced a new $500 million buyback authorization alongside the latest quarter. Even though the stock hasn't been hit hard, it's been hit somewhat hard. It's still down nearly 30 points from its November highs. I think it's a proven winner. It can return to those levels, which is why we've been buying for the Chapel Trust, and we want to buy a heck of a lot more.

Next up is Cracker Barrel. Another one I'm really interested in. This is a stock that's fallen drastically over the past few weeks. But that's not without reason either, with management blaming not just the weather, but also macroeconomic uncertainty as a reason for some of the challenges in early February. That's suboptimal.

So what's there like about it then? How about the stellar set of numbers that the company just reported yesterday morning? With much better than expected same-store sales growth, macro uncertainty already baked into Cracker Barrel's four-year forecast at this point, which they raised, by the way. While management admitted that February got off to a challenging start, they said the last two weeks have seen meaningful improvement. I like that. Not too surprised when you remember that Cracker Barrel also represents a stellar value proposition like the other two.

Breakfast starting at $7.99 every day. By the way, even with the eggs, they've kept the price low. Dining offer, there's an $8.99 dining issue. But you've got to be in that loyalty club if you really want the bargains. Trust me, I pay much more for their country fried steak with sawmill gravy. Mmm.

Now, KakaoBrow is still very much a work in progress, something its CEO, Julie Messina, is quite candid about. On the conference call, she explained that this year is still an investment year before, quote, financial results will significantly improve by the second half of fiscal 2026 and further accelerate into fiscal 2027, end quote. No wonder the stock's been hard hit, down more than 33 percent from its highs at the end of January, despite yesterday's 7 percent gain.

Now, we had Julie on the show, and I point blank asked her if we can count on Cracker Barrel to be a refuge from all the craziness when you go to the stores, not the stock. She explained how the last two weeks have gone, mentioning that early February was only so bad because the weather was truly awful. They had to shut down some locations in Louisiana because it was snowing, for heaven's sake. Come on, that's not a common occurrence. At this point, the stock's almost pulled back to where it was trading when I started recommending it last summer. A U-turn. I think Cracker Barrel's a buy.

Remember, though, this is a turnaround story, which makes it a lot more risky than either Brinker or Texas Roadhouse. But the bottom line, when you look at these three casual dining places, their stocks are down big from their highs. I think they're absolutely worth buying. Even if the economy is truly headed for a nasty slowdown, these chains offer the consumer great value. And that's exactly what the consumer wants at this moment. Mad Money's back after the break.

Coming up, is the downturn in Powell Industries a sign of the times or a warning sign for underlying weakness? Kramer's eyeing the recent moves in the stock. Next. Every day, thousands of Comcast engineers and technologists create connectivity solutions that change the way we work, live, and play. Like Kunle, a Comcast engineer who is focused on revolutionizing the in-home Wi-Fi experience today and for the next generation.

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Last Thursday, we got a call from Don in Tennessee who wanted to know what the heck was happening with Powell Industries. It's one of the industrials I recommended last August, in part because it had transformed itself into more of a data center play. Now, here's the stock that rallied 113 percent from when I pounded it on the table last summer, though right through its highs in mid-November. But since then, it's given back all of its gains and then some. Buy, buy, buy!

In fact, the stock's now down more than eight bucks versus where it was trading when I first mentioned it on air. What a turn of fate. When Don asked me about it last week, he couldn't figure out the decline. Powell's got strong fundamentals, a low valuation, positive analyst coverage and strong earnings coverage. So why on earth has the stock become such a dog? So I promised to do some homework and get back to him.

If you don't remember, Power Industries is an old line industrial that makes its custom engineered equipment to control electricity. Now, okay, the old days, their customers were mainly oil and gas companies, but they had a great niche there. But lately, they've become a supplier of choice for any business that needs mission-critical electrical infrastructure. And of course, that very much includes the data center where all the AI action takes place.

And that's really the crux of the story. Powell put up incredible gains when the data center was hot, and now it's racking up big losses because nobody wants anything connected to the business at the moment. And yet the actual business has been good. It's the stock that's gone crazy. See, Powell Industries reported two quarters in November and February that were poorly received, but both seem pretty decent to me. Not perfect, but good enough. They had healthy backlog, excellent earnings. Now, some of the forward-looking metrics looked solid in this most recent quarter, too.

New orders were $269 million, which is up slightly for the previous quarter. They should have been up significantly, though. And Powell's backlog held firm at $1.3 billion. I would have liked to see much bigger. But it's been that same level for the past three quarters. Now, this is important because it shows you that these guys aren't just feasting on their old backlog, but it's not growing.

They're bringing in plenty of new business, too, and that will turn into the revenue in the future. But again, not enough new business. I'm just telling you how it is right now. On the latest conference call, CEO Brett Koep said that the company saw broad strength in its order, supported by an award from a large liquefied natural gas project. Overall, he said the company's finding success in the industrial utility and commercial markets. Sounds pretty good, right?

Now, if you only judge power industries by the fundamentals, it's very hard to figure out why the stocks become such a dog. Sure, their sales and earnings growth has slowed from last year's insanely high levels. But that's just the law of large numbers at work. This is still an industrial company with mid-20s revenue growth and mid-40s earnings growth. Ordinarily, that would make for a pretty darn attractive story. But this is not an ordinary moment, people.

It's been really interesting to watch Powell's stock since the calendar flipped to 2025. It actually went on a huge run in mid-January, climbing quickly from around $230 to nearly $330 in a blistering six-day rally at one point. That was right after SoftBank, Oracle, and OpenAI announced their $500 billion Stargate AI data center investment project at the White House. Like I said, when the data center was hot, this thing was unstoppable.

However, you live by the data center's sword, you die by the data center's sword. That January rally was followed almost immediately by a sickening 16% decline on January 27th. Did you know that that day is now known on Wall Street, at least, as Deep Seek Monday, when the AI data center stocks just collapsed after the release of a reportedly low-cost Chinese AI model that seemed to perform just as well as the U.S. competition while using far less hardware. Since then, PAL stock has become...

The House of Pay. Of course, Powell's not alone here. Everything connected with the data center theme, as I said at the top of the show, has been taken to the wood chip, including the old line industrial plays that look like they had made it last year. I think this is now overdone, but many think that the build out was overdone and we are now past our due date if we own these stocks.

Same goes for the other data center build-out derivatives, like the heating, ventilation, air conditioning plants that sell cooling equipment to keep these warehouses full of servers from overheating. Hey, you know, this week we had Carrier Global on the show. What a great company. That stock's down 19% from its October highs. Vertiv, which sells more specialized climate control equipment specifically for data centers, has fallen...

a PAL like 45% from its highs in late January. It's now important to own industrials that have no exposure to the data center. Basically, even old line industrials like PAL Industries have become speculative data center stocks as they caught fire last year. They're speculatives. Hear that?

They were trading on the prospects of this theme, even as they still had great fundamentals away from the theme. Once that theme got called into question by DeepSeek, many of your fellow shareholders decided after the hills. Doesn't matter, by the way, DeepSeek's initial numbers appear to have been extremely misleading. Doesn't even matter that the tech titans have announced huge capital expenditure budgets for 2025. They haven't really reined in their data center spending at all. But in the end, stocks like Palo Industries were propelled higher by momentum traders who liked them simply because they were going higher.

Once the data center story got called into question, these people sold en masse and crushed the share price. Now they're sitting on the sidelines and they still, let's say, are trying to wait for some clarity. Look at Nvidia. It reported a generally good quarter last week. Yet the stock just keeps getting pulverized. It had still one more terrible week that just ended, thank heavens.

Now, when you take a closer look at pal industries, I think this one's got a lot going for it. I see it only as a broken stock, not a broken company. After its recent sell-off, the darn thing's traded less than 12 times this year's earnings estimate. At these levels, I believe you've got to hold your nose and buy. I'm not alone. On Wednesday, analysts at the boutique research firm Roth Capital Partners, one of the few firms to cover the stock, published a bullish note after a meeting with management. As they see it, business is strong and the stock's ridiculously cheap.

So to Don in Tennessee, I simply have to say that there doesn't seem to be much wrong with power industries at all. Sorry for the fact that it's a data center play in a market that can't make up its mind about the group. The stock's been gutted like every AI derivative name, and it is one of the worst performers in the market. But the bottom line, I believe in this business, so I urge you to have some conviction and fight the trend. While it might feel scary to step in front of all the selling in power industries and the other data center plays, I think this is a case where you can use the widespread sense of panic. No, no!

to pick up shares in a high-quality industrial on the cheap. Nevertheless, if the negative drumbeat about the data center keeps up, you may have to own it for some time until people realize that this company is much more than a data center play. So after all the momentum players are washed out, it can finally mount a significant rally. Rich in Texas, Rich.

Hey, Jim. Thanks for taking my call. I've just got to wonder, have people completely given up on fundamentals? With expanding profits and revenues and increased demand and a P.E. of 7 and a forward P.E. of 5,

How are we not buying United Airlines to $140? Look, I am a buyer of United Airlines. I know it's down 15%, but it became, again, a momentum stock. I think you're right. I think it's cheap. The travel thesis is strong. If I had to pick up some United Airlines, I'd buy some here, then wait till around 70 and buy the rest. That's what I've been doing for the Travel Trust when I see stocks just like this. How about we go to Kyle in Illinois? Kyle.

Thanks for having me on the show, brother. I will keep it quick for you. Sure. Beacon roofing supply. There's a lot of shatter, obviously, right now. What are your thoughts? You're going to get a bid. It's going to take they're going to have to accept. I believe they will have to accept the offer from from Brad. They have from Ruben. I'm sorry. They have to accept the offer. These the hostile takeover offer.

that we're seeing right now. And if they don't do it, I think they're going to regret it because the takeover is at a higher price. It's QXO that is doing the buying. And I think you ought to buy this stock and take advantage of what I think is going to be a high bid price. All right.

There's widespread fear right now around the data center thesis. But if you believe in it like I do, then I think you can buy it, but you've got to put it away because you've got to get all the momentum, all these momentum players washed out of the stock. And that hasn't happened yet. Much more money ahead, including a round of my favorite game, Am I Diversified?

Then today's tape went up and down and around. But there's a simple explanation for the moves. I'm explaining technical trades behind the buys and sells and how you can prepare for future scenarios like this one. And of course, all your calls rapid fire. Tonight's edition of The Lighting Round. So stay with Kramer.

Markets all over the place right now, but I always say no one ever made it to I'm panicking. While the broader S&P 500 index just rounded out its worst week since September, certain individual stocks have actually been doing pretty well lately. However, if you are in all tech, you are in all nightmare. So you can't have all your eggs in one basket. And that's what we play in my Diverse Fund. This is where you call me. You tell me your top five holdings. I tell you if your portfolio is diversified enough, maybe you need to mix it up a little. Let's start with Dylan in New Jersey. Dylan, you're a first caller. What do you got for me?

Blue out, Jeff. Thanks for taking my call. Absolutely. I'm glad you called in. How can I help? So my stocks are Blue Out Capital, Palantir, SoFi, Robinhood, and NVIDIA. Am I diversified? Catch up there. Okay.

This is a really, really interesting portfolio because it's going to be undiversified because some of these stocks trade with each other because they are the equivalent of meme stocks. For instance, Robinhood, which is a very good broker, and Palantir and SoFi tend to trade together. We're going to have to make some changes here. We're going to sell the Palantir after that big pop at the close, four bucks off that Army truck, and we're going to put in...

A company that's just a staple of any portfolio. We're going to put in Bristol-Myers. Get some yield, get some drug. I'll feel much better because you have tech.

NVIDIA is obviously tech. I could have thrown that away, but you've got the GTC conference coming up. You've got FIN. You have FIN. Again, that's why I say there's overlap, but I can't just totally do it. No, I am going to do this. Never mind, because then Blue Owl is also financial. We can't have all these FINs. We need some sort of... You know what I want to put in here? I want to put in Enterprise Product Partners. Did some work on it today. It's got a good yield near top.

oil service pipeline. It just strikes me as something that could balance out some of these other stocks. Blew out, enterprise partners in. Sorry I had to do so much. It was like a major surgery. There was nothing I could do. I couldn't just, you know, I couldn't handle it on outpatient basis. And not only that, I obviously had to use anesthesia. Let's go to James in North Carolina. James. Good afternoon, sir. How are you? I am doing well. How about you?

Well, all things considered, I'm okay. The world is in the balance, but we'll see. All right, so nothing's perfect. Let's go to work.

Sure. My five stocks, they're across financials, infrastructure, and consumer. I got BlackRock. I got MazTech. I got Autodesk. I got Unilever. And I got local regional premium supermarket chain Ingalls, where I live in North Carolina, which has a tight margin sensitive to shocks that I use as a barometer. Because when things are good, it goes up. When things are bad, it goes down. And it's been trending down since December 22. Well, you know what? I'm going to take your word for that one.

We'll consider that, put that in the supermarket category. And I want to do some work on that, by the way. It's very interesting. I like your depiction of it. Master, we got infrastructure, BlackRock Financial. This stock has been a dog for me, candidly, for my travel trust. And we buy it. Why do we buy it? Because it's the best-run fin with no exposure to credit. So I'm saying, well, little. They've done this new infrastructure stuff that has some exposure to credit. But I'm okay with it. Unilever is actually not a great company. We're going to have to get rid of that. We're going to own...

We're going to put in a drug company right here. I'm stuck on Bristol-Myers today. We're going to put Bristol-Myers in there. Autodesk is a tech. So we have tech. We have a fin. We got info. We got a supermarket. And, well, we've got a drug company because Unilever's not that well run these days. Wow. This is hard. Now, you know what we're going to do? Let's go clear across the country. Let's go to Gregory in California. Gregory. Gregory.

Well, you just assumed that I'm in California, but you'd be right. I am in California. I'm driving right now up the side freeway from L.A. to the Bay Area, Jim. How is your Friday? What extra do you right now? Okay.

Being absolutely honest, I'm in Patterson, California, and I just stopped at the Dutch Brothers, and I have myself a Kokomo in my hand. That's what I want to hear. That just happened to be a place that I slept in when I was living in my car. I just want to see with you the same address. Let's go to work. Jim, you inspire me to practice what I preach because I know you do, at least to the best of our ability. So with that in mind.

As I head up to the Bay Area in my brand new Tesla, which is the first of my five stocks, the full self-driving mode, which is extraordinary, which wouldn't exist without the chip manufacturing equipment provided by Lam Research. All right. Annoyingly, I have to drive an hour or more outside of L.A. or the Bay Area in order to get my annihilator, or in this case, my Kokomo. Okay.

This is a good time right there to give us the stocks. Dutch Brothers? Let's go to work. Okay. The stocks for Am I Diversified? Oh. Dutch Brothers. Okay, go ahead. I'm ready. T-Mobile. T-Mobile. Bristol-Myers. Bristol-Myers. Do I owe you one more? Yeah, go ahead. I need all five. All five. Next.

So T-Mobile, Dutch Brothers, Lam Research, Bristol-Myers, Tesla,

Perfect. Now we really got to work. This is great. We tighten it up. It's just so great. OK, for some Mars, I've been choosing it all evening, so I can't tell. I can't tell now to get rid of it. Lambert Search is my absolute favorite for the semiconductor capital equipment side of my T-Mobile. It hasn't missed a quarter in years. That might seem we're doing a good job. The Dutch pros. Yeah, you just visited that stocks down 20 quick points. We want to do some buying there and Tesla. So we've got a car tech.

company, CarTech. Then we've got, well, let's just call it a restaurant for ease. We've got Telco. We have semiconductor cap equipment and we have drug. That's perfect diversification. And I think he drove from L.A. to San Francisco in the time that that call occurred. And therefore, because of that long across California questionnaire, we're going to have to stop. But I want to thank all our callers. We have money back here for the rest.

Coming up, Kramer takes your calls. And the sky's the limit. It's a fast-fire lightning round. Next. It is time. It's time for the lightning round. And then the lightning round is over. Are you ready? Let's get it done. It's time for the lightning round. I'm going to start with Tom in Wisconsin. Tony in Wisconsin. Tony.

Hey, Jim. A big hey there from northern Wisconsin. Wow. It must be beautiful there. Absolutely. Thanks for all the great advice over the years. Thank you so much. It's been so hard lately. It really makes me feel great that you said that. Thank you. Thank you very much. Well, I've been a long-term investor, and it takes a lot more to scare me than this. I like that. That's the right attitude. That's Ken Langone's attitude. Congratulations. Let's go to work.

Okay. About 20 years ago, I took a small position in a stock called Fiserv, a good Wisconsin-based company. They've done me right for over 20 years. Wondering what you think about them moving forward. I think they're one of the greatest fintechs. You know, everyone wanted to go into the really fancy new fintechs. You stick with the one that you have. You are doing really well. Thank you for the kind words. They mean a lot to me. I need to go to Bob in Illinois. Bob.

Hello, Jim. Bob. A while ago, you suggested Sempra Electric Utility Electric. Yes.

I bought some and about a month later, all of a sudden, it took a huge jump from high 80s to the likes. To tell you the truth, Bob, they did not do a good job. It was a bad quarter. It is very upsetting to me. I've spoken to Jeff Martin several times, the CEO, but there were several things that were definite misses. It does deserve to trade lower.

Yields almost 4%. I still can't tell you to buy. We have to see another quarter because it was that jarring. I wish I didn't have to say that, but Sempra did not deliver. That's just plain and simple. I need to go to Nick in New Jersey. Nick.

Booyah! Jimmy Cooks! Oh man, what's happening? Congrats on resigning. Congrats on resigning Vaughn. Yeah, Zach's the man. Zach's the man. I wanted to come on the show. I love that guy. Well, let's go to work. Absolutely. So this question comes to you courtesy of Groff. So Jim, the

I think it's a meme stock. It's a meme stock. And therefore, it's a battle between the logs and the shorts. I don't know who wins in the end, but it is a meme stock. It is not trading on the fundamentals, which are, frankly, paltry. Let's go to Alex in Pennsylvania. Alex.

Jim, great to speak with you. Same to you. Yeah. Thanks. What do you think of recursion pharmacy? Now let's drop back down again. And if you had to choose between Netflix and Disney to start a position now, which would you choose?

Well, I'll tell you, I'm reticent to pull the trigger on recursion because when they came on, it looked like they had a good level. And since then, it's just been disastrous. We're going to have to hold off. I've got to meet them face-to-face and see what's going on. Let's go to Greg in Illinois. Greg. Yes. How are you doing, Jim? I am doing well, Greg. What's happening with you?

Nothing exciting, except some bad weather in Chicago. Bad weather in Chicago? I'm going to note that over there, guys. Okay. Bad weather. That's Portillo's. We don't want to buy the stock of Portillo's then. Okay, so how can I help you, though?

I want to find out about One Oak. See what you think of it today. I have to tell you, I think One Oak may be the best run pipeline company in the country. And I think you should own it. That is not private. Oh, no. Oh, no skin. Enbridge is good, too. Don't want to hurt people's feelings. Let's go to Jerry in Missouri. Jerry. Hey, Jim. Thanks for taking my call. Of course, Jerry. What's happening?

Jim, I know you don't like accounting irregularities, but you haven't said that about this company lately. In fact, you kind of congratulated them on not being delisted.

Is it time to start building a position in Supermicro? There are still remedies that are needed. Until all the remedies happen, I am not going to approve it. In the meantime, that industry has become very cutthroat. Look at HPE today. If you want another winner in that space, it's going to be Michael Dell. And I do say at this level that it would be a good idea to buy Michael Dell's company. It is so low, it sells it

It's nine times earnings. And Michael Dell is fantastic at what he does. And also probably one of the most charitable people I've ever met. Let's go to Alex in Pennsylvania. Alex. Hey, Jim. Thanks for taking my call. I'm calling in about a real estate investment trust that I've been tracking for a little over a year and a half now. And I'm looking to increase my position. It's Farmland Partners Incorporated, ticker FTI.

Novel idea. I kind of like the idea as a spec because we know that we don't have enough farmland. So I think, you know what, I'm going to bless it. I thought a lot about it since Agco, which was an amazing, amazing bottom call that we got from Agco. We had them on recently. Let's go to Gary in Kansas. Gary. Hey, Jim. I want to say bless you for the help that you give to the individual investor like me. I've been a long time watcher and a first time caller.

The stock that I want your opinion on is an under-the-radar tech company that meets your standard of showing recent quarter-over-quarter growth and is profitable. They also pay a dividend of 3% and appear to be reasonably priced with a PE of 16. The stock symbol is STX Seagate Technology.

All right, Seagate. Okay, now this is a very cheap stock, but cheap for a reason. It's because the business is very cutthroat, and I suggest that if you wanted to go in this business, you wanted to go into storage, I am going to send you on to see a Broadcom. I'd rather see them. They've got storage, too. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the conclusion of the Lightning Round. The Lightning Round is sponsored by Charles Schwab.

On days like today, it's easy to miss the forest for the trees. But if you can grasp the big picture, you'll find incredible opportunities. Like I mentioned at the top of the show, the wild action you saw this morning was the result of what's known as a program trade. And I think you are owed an explanation of what that means. A fund manager who runs billions of dollars wanting to get out of the companies with exposure to tech and consumer spending

and get into defensive companies without much economic sensitivity. You saw huge swings out of software stocks, semiconductors, artificial intelligence, as well as the financials, and into the drugs and the healthcares and consumer packaged goods. The thought behind a program like this is simple. The manager believes that we're heading into a severe slowdown. So he wants to dump the stocks that need a strong economy and swap into stocks that do fine in a recession. And he wanted to do it in minutes.

And you can't really do that while impacting the stocks in a ridiculous way. So billions of dollars are pulled out of one basket with economic exposure and placed in another basket that allegedly has no economic exposure. And it's total lunacy, people, which is why the results of these moves were repealed as the day went on.

See, stocks can't handle the breakneck speed at which these programs are executed, and the broker working the program should have known that. Should have known better. What a fool. The techies and the retailers simply couldn't absorb all the selling at once. These stocks are part of a hand-picked basket, and they're large capital. Nvidia, Microsoft, ServiceNow, J.P. Morgan. Just because they're large capitalization, it doesn't mean they would...

be able to handle the selling pressure they will in the face of concentrated selling. Some things, same thing by the way with the buys. Stocks like Merck, United Healthcare, Bristol Myers, all recession proof, they flew up in insane fashion, wildly distorting the values. Second, I've executed these kinds of programs. I know how this is done. Whoever did this was a rank amateur. Anyone with half a brain knows that you can't swing stocks around like this without causing big swings in their prices. You always get a bad deal, especially on a Friday where there are fewer players.

Just bushling. Hidden by the secrecy of Wall Street, these clowns who executed the program will never be out of it. Boy, did they ever screw up. Finally, it's important to not just stand there and gape and do nothing. You must always have a list ready in an emergency. Stocks that you want to buy or sell when something moronic like this happens. For the investing club, we issued two bulletins to club members urging them to take action. Bought some banks, some texts on weakness, urged people to buy the stocks plus the lagging retailers and restaurants. We were restricted in the ones that we wanted to buy. Club members weren't. Hey, buy

By the way, we also sold shares in the same for some Myers. Why? Because it was up ridiculously because of the program buying. I couldn't resist the spike. It was right. Now, the vast majority of people who are watching this action mid-morning thought that there was something actually going on, something fundamental behind the swings. But in reality, we were just watching the poor execution of a stupid trade that some managers thought was clever to evolve.

So rather than taking the action to heart, what should you have done? You had to buy the stocks of companies that just reported excellent numbers when they were tumbling this morning. Last night, we got incredible results from Broadcom, the semiconductor and software company, excellent exposure to AI. This is one of the best quarters of the year. At one point, it was up 16 points. Then it was pushed down by the stupid program. And then it started rebounding later in the day, finished up 15 bucks. If you bought it when the program climaxed, you made a killing. Let me give you another. Gap.

Remember we had Richard Dixon on the show last night? Amazing set of numbers across the board. It was a cold shot. Gap finished the day up nearly 19%. But at one point this morning, I was up only half of that because of the program. Fabulous opportunity. I have total contempt for people who buy or sell once, distorting the whole market like this.

This isn't the 90s where there was all sorts of liquidity. This is 2025, and you're going to move stocks like this and get horrendous reports. Shame on the bozos. The next time something like this happens, don't panic. Take advantage of these clowns by taking the other side of the trade, but only if you're ready to move. Like I said, as always, we'll walk you somewhere, and I promise you I'll find it just for you right here on Mad Money. I'm Jim Cramer. See you Monday.

Thank you.

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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