Is it Time to Buy Stocks? 3/12/25
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Welcome to the Halftime Report. I'm Scott Wapner. Front and center this hour, the still unsettled market trying to bounce today. We will discuss and debate the road ahead with the investment committee. Joining me for the hour, Joe Terranova, Shannon Sikosha, Stephen Weiss and Rob Seachin. We will show you the markets here. Dow under some pressure. We still have the S&P and the Nasdaq in positive territory. CPI cooler than expected. All of you know that by now.

We're still on edge, though, because of the trade war and the way that some suggest it's being managed. Wall Street Journal headlines sort of capturing it, where they suggest Trump's economic message spooking some of his own advisers, investors. Well, they're caught in the middle, caught in no man's land, if you will. You do have this feeling, Joe, that rallies are being sold. People are suggesting, well, there's a lack of clarity. We need more.

Treasury Secretary gave clarity. He said we're going through a detox. This is what detox looks like, isn't it? Yeah, I think in fact it is. We're going to see a significant reduction in government spending. We saw a ramp up in government spending in the second half of 2024. We're recalibrating that. I think we're recalibrating a variety of different things.

within the marketplace right now so ike i i i i've spoken frequently on the network of last several days about this there's two things the administration economically wants lower oil prices lower interest rates so they are not going to be troubled by seeing the economy cool because that will motivate the federal reserve ultimately to lower rates the process

by which the markets are digesting that is we are still searching for leadership momentum was the leadership it has now stepped back it is no longer leadership and the market is searching for that leader step i still believe that this week potentially you could have a little bit of a tactical bounce nothing more than that tactical bounce this period of uncertainty it's going to extend until a tax bill is actually presented

and delivered and put into law. So truest, Shannon, today, which downgraded U.S. equities a couple of weeks ago, suggests using any bounce to modestly dial back exposure. The problem is a so-called detox trade is a sell. It's not a buy at this point, is it?

Right. I mean, I think that's the challenge here. And what investors are facing is that, you know, you're really trying to balance out the long term benefits of a transition to public to private sector spending and investment from public sector spending. And so that unfortunately, there's a lag there, Scott, when you think about the time horizon and the path to get to that.

And just because there's tariffs put on doesn't necessarily mean that the manufacturing economy is going to be able to produce and fill that gap. We're not going to have those ready substitutes. And so I think the challenge here is that investors are looking at their portfolios. To Joe's point, there have been a number of factors that have unwound. Now they're looking at, well, what are the expectations for GDP this year? Have I ratcheted those all the way back from, say, 2.25% to 2.4%? Are you ratcheting that back down to 2%?

you going even lower than that, Scott? And so I think trying to find the balance between what could actually produce earnings growth in these more cyclical parts of the sector, even against a backdrop

backdrop of slower economic growth is really the challenge. This idea that public sector is going to transition to private sector, whether it be in the employment market or whether that be in the production market, that takes time and the market has to find a place where they're comfortable in this interim period. How would you describe the psyche right now of private clients at Neuberger?

You're a Neuberger, NB private wealth. I think there are a lot of people who are offsides on where we are relative to where they thought we might be. I don't care what level of the wealth spectrum you're on. You could be caught offsides and bad positioning. And we've seen some of that within this market. How would you answer that?

I think the challenge is that after the last couple of years, a lot of clients have been positioned to take advantage of some of these trades. And so while we're looking at areas like concentration and looking at those positions that we have been recommending clients pull back from, I think the other thing that they're very conscious of is if we are entering into a new period where return expectations, even the more tempered ones that, for instance, we had coming into this year, are

Are those realistic? Are bonds going to be able to protect the same way that they have historically and not like what we experienced in 2022? What's going to happen from a fiscal sustainability perspective? But most importantly, they're asking, is my portfolio positioned against the backdrop of this policy uncertainty? Or to your point, am I off sides if some of these tariffs are extended, if there's sustained potential uncertainty and unrest?

Our view and what we're telling clients is that from a long-term perspective, coming back to your long-term strategic allocations, looking at what those were crafted for to actually achieve your goals, I think is more important than getting caught up in the day-to-day policy changes. - Weiss, we asked a question right there on the screen, is it time to buy stocks? Simple question, maybe a complex answer.

It is a complex answer because it's not a general, you know, overall yes. It's always a yes regardless of the environment. If stocks hit your price targets that you're comfortable getting in and if you believe the fundamentals,

are durable and ultimately that you'll make money as you look at whatever your time horizon is. Some have a year, some have three years, some have 10 years. So yes, specifically on stocks that hit your screen and say, I want to buy.

However, broadly for the market, my exposure is still lower than it's been in a few years. You can't claim victory with one CPI number, particularly when it's backward looking. Nonetheless, the market, particularly the NASDAQ, was looking for a reason to bounce. Yeah, any reason. I mean, you're getting the bounce. Obviously, you are, Rob. Tech's getting a little bit of a bounce. I mean, NVIDIA has been up.

reasonably sharply today. It's up 6%. Tesla's up. A bunch of the Momo names, Palantir, Applovin, among others are up. We're still substantially off of our record highs though for many of the mega cap names. Tesla included in that, down 49%. Nvidia down 25% from its record high. Amazon is as well. You have made a move though. If I ask you the question, has tech corrected enough? Is it time to buy tech?

You make a move today that suggests you think maybe it is.

Yesterday, actually. Yesterday, today. But we did. At the end of the year, we talked about it a lot on this show. We thought their tech was very extended. Actually, a lot of the high momentum names were very extended. And we reduced things like Vistra Energy. You saw us trimming those things, Broadcom, trimming Broadcom at year end. And what we did is we bought the value index. We also bought a bunch of value names where we were,

bought the value index at that time at the expense of our technology overweight, which we had all the way through December. Value has outperformed tech by 12.5% since that time. Yesterday, we trimmed that value overweight. We cut it in half. There's still some great trends in financials, so we didn't want to totally take that out. But we did take out half of it, and we started buying tech. And in fact,

In the last couple days, kind of like Steve's been doing, I think, I've heard him on the show a little bit, for clients that had a lot of cash, we've been selectively putting our toe in the water. Names that we're adding are names like NVIDIA. We've been adding NVIDIA on this re-rating.

because it's become meaningfully more attractive from a price standpoint. We've also added Amazon, which trades at a pretty big discount to what it's been trading at historically, despite the fact that it's expensive relative to the consumer sector. And so I think when you have moves like this, when you break below the 200-day moving average, and since the global financial crisis, every time you've broken below that 200-day moving average,

14 of 15 times you've seen positive returns one year later. So it doesn't mean that we've seen the lows, but you better be in an athletic stance and ready to take advantage of this. And anybody that just paralyzed by this has got the wrong viewpoint. I'm not selling into the strength. I'm looking to buy as things weaken, possibly more from here, but definitely own things that we've wanted to own. Well, because...

this is a game not about trying to time things perfectly. It's just trying to take advantage of dislocations in some respects that you see that will be advantageous and viewed as such over the long term. Kind of like Altimeter's Brad Gerstner, who, just like Rob Seachin, has been buying NVIDIA, he said today on this network during this pullback. Let's listen.

Periods of uncertainty. We have high economic uncertainty, high political uncertainty, and high technological uncertainty. And high multiples. Right, at all-time high multiples. So there's only one thing that can happen. Discount rates have to go up, right? Risk premiums have to go up. And when they do, multiples come down. So for us, that was just a period to say, okay, we'll go to the sidelines. We'll wait this out a little bit. We've seen the markets come back in. And I have to tell you, we were buying some yesterday.

because now you see Nvidia at 18 or 19 times next year's earnings. Now you're getting paid. All right, so that's Gerstner talking about Nvidia. Weiss, you bought more meta.

As I said, Meta's down 17% from its record high. Don't know if the bottom in Meta is in or not. It is up almost 3% today. Why now? Even for somebody who's grown more cautious, who has more cash than they've had for the recent period of time we're talking about, why deploy some of it at Meta now? Well, look, Meta, and I said this when stocks were trading at the highs, was overvalued. And I knew it would correct because...

because it just couldn't maintain that valuation. That was euphoria on Trump's win, which was obviously misplaced. So I was willing to suffer for it coming down. And I had trimmed, I had a supersized position, and I had trimmed a little bit. Now at this point, when you're selling at a slight discount to the market, despite having, I would say, not complete,

protection against the craziness and the chaos in D.C., but pretty good protection, except for the supply chain for data centers, which they are largely having others build, which is a small number relative to the overall revenue. So I think that's the time to step up when the multiple comes down.

Look, could it go lower? Absolutely could it go lower. You know, it could go lower. But to your point, you can't market time. It's impossible. So when I bought the stock, when I added to it yesterday, it was my final trade yesterday, and I added to a couple others. I don't know if you want to talk about that. Well, you bought more Taiwan Semi and Netflix. Right, right. And the reason is those are companies where I'm very confident in the fundamentals and

And I believe whether I'm wrong on the trade, because they're all good sized positions already, that I'm willing to stick with them. Versus going into the stocks that I sold a lot of, which were truly just trades. You don't want to get married to trades and find a different reason to own them. These I own because of the fundamentals.

So it'll give me an opportunity to participate in the bounce of the market that I thought would be coming. I do not think it's sustainable, but you know, I've got a lot of cash. Can I add to that Meta comment that he made? Because you asked me something on the February 27th show. Meta was up 20% for the year. We haven't changed our positioning, not at all. We've owned it since December of 22. It's our largest overweight in the portfolio. You said, would you buy more?

I said, no, this stock's way ahead to Steve's point. We can be patient and still own it. It's re-rated by 20%. Today, if you were to ask me that question, I think you can in fact be a buyer of that name. And if you take a look at Netflix also, I'm looking at companies that are insulated. Netflix, you know, people have cut the cord. So what will they do before they cut Netflix?

They'll cut the services, stream services you're not happy with. You can also trade down, go to the ad support service. With Taiwan Semi,

Look, I don't think anybody's crazy enough to stop the supply chain for semiconductor chips. And I don't think there'll be heavy tariffs on it, particularly when they talk about investing. But they've got a queue that are people waiting for capacity. We hear NVIDIA talk about that all the time. So to me, this stock is very undervalued here. 19 times. Yeah.

And I don't see, by the way, I don't see where NVIDIA is trading at night stops next year. It's still significant. It's like 25. Yeah, but he was talking about 26. That's what I'm talking about. You know, these guys aren't the only ones who are doing this kind of movement within the market. Our Stephanie Link is as well and has been. And she's told you about it every time she's been on the show and sometimes when she hasn't, like right now.

She joins us to talk about some moves, Steph, that you've made. You bought more Amazon, you bought more Palo Alto, and you bought more Target, which has been really beaten up. But give me the mega cap view first through your Amazon purchase. Sure. So I trimmed Amazon in early February. Stock is down 19% since then. It's now trading at a pretty interesting valuation, in my mind, 13 times EBITDA.

historical average of 17 and a half times. When I sold Amazon, it was at 17 times EBITDA. So it was rich relative to its history. And we know, Scott, that the story on retail, the bigger getting bigger, Amazon, Walmart, Costco, they have

46% market share. Amazon has 28% market share. And Amazon actually grew their market share 410 basis points in the past quarter. So they're humming there. Profitability at AWS is absolutely on the rise. And I think there's still capacity constraints. So I expect second half of the year to see an acceleration in AWS. So I like that one very much. Palo Alto is a fairly new position, Scott. I only started buying it about a month ago. It's down 14% though since I bought it.

And, you know, I'm a big believer in cybersecurity, and these guys are a top five player in the cybersecurity sector. And they are building out scale through platformization, which could be a $15 billion annualized recurring revenue opportunity for them. So I think the biggest thing is that it's trading at 14 times price to sales, which is not cheap.

But CrowdStrike is trading at 22 times. It's recovered all of its valuation discounts post the glitch that they had. So I sold CrowdStrike and bought the Palo Alto. Yeah, it's the target one, frankly, that I'd like to hear more about because there are some serious questions, obviously, about where the psyche of the consumer currently is, not to mention a company that's had some issues of late. Why now? Why this?

100%. This is a turnaround story, but I think you're seeing hints of improvement. The stock is down 24% since February. It's trading at 12 times earnings, and they just gave you earnings guidance for this full year, which I thought were actually better than expected, and it yields 4%. This has never been a traffic problem, Scott.

Traffic in the past quarter, the past several quarters, have been in the 2% level. They just haven't had the right product mix. They had more discretionary versus consumables. But last quarter, you actually saw an improvement in discretionary and their same-store sales feed expectations, 1.5%. It's a tough environment across the board in retail, but I think they're doing all the right things. The issue with

target is they're going to now need to string along quarters like they just had for the next couple of quarters to get the confidence back from investors because it's been very inconsistent. But I do think that while it's a show-me story, I do think that they have the right products. Their inventories are under control. They're focused on where they need to be, which is operating margin expansion.

Those are all additions to positions you already had. You do have a fresh buy that will do now rather than wait till the next time you're on. NextEra Energy is a new position. So you've been raising cash, you've been putting cash to work, and now you are even lower in cash because this is a new buy in NextEra.

Exactly. So I had 9% cash two weeks ago. Now I have 5% cash. I've never owned NextEra because it's always been super expensive. On average, it's traded at 30 times. It's now trading at 18 times, 14 times EBITDA versus 16 times historical. It's down 15% from its high. And this is the highest quality and above average growth in the utility industry. And I really like the fact that they have a joint venture with GE Vrnova. You know I'm familiar with that

company. They're going to build out natural gas plants. They're focusing on data center. And the company has a great balance sheet. And they have a $6 billion buyback and a 3% dividend. So I just thought down 15% for number one company in the industry. I started with a small position, and I'll just continue to add, make it bigger. All right.

Good stuff. Steph, thanks for joining us, taking us through these. We appreciate that. We'll see you soon. Stephanie Link. Joe, since she mentions GE Vernova, it is worth noting that momentum stocks like that one are bouncing pretty good today. GE Vernova is up 6.5%. Palantir is up near 7%. If you go down the list, Applovin almost 8%. Vistra is up today.

Vertiv is up today. Really, the ones that have been at the epicenter of all this selling are getting a nice bounce. Some are going to say, well, maybe the unwind, maybe the deleveraging in those names is running its course or has. And perhaps there's a bit of a jump back into these names, thinking that it got too beaten up.

up. All right. So what I look at prioritizes things like sentiment, positioning. Steve and I had a conversation about this before the show. And that's why I believe we are set up for a tactical bounce this week. I think we've reached that point. We had such a dramatic power

paradigm shift a complete 180 in terms of where we were sentiment position to where we are today last 24 hours you are beginning to see some of the momentum names i'm going to use the word stabilize that's in fact what's happening now is stabilization enough to lift the entire market possibly you're seeing today nvidia is trading well i also think what's interesting about today

was if you are bullish this morning after that CPI report, you thought that's it. We're off to the races. The bottom is in yesterday. Then you had that dramatic intraday reversal, and that really shakes your perspective on, oh, gosh.

This market is just engulfed in a period of corrective behavior and there's no bounce in sight. Well, guess what? We went down, we challenged yesterday's low, we held. Let's see where we close today because we go out on the highs today. That's a nice little interim setup.

over the next several weeks. The market, you know, over the last 15 or so minutes has tried to make an even better move towards positive, certainly on the Dow. The president was on the tape saying he has the right to adjust tariffs

planning to lower taxes if Democrats behave. Those are the president's words, but you know the idea of adjusting tariffs. Yeah. They obviously have, you know, made the point that they're content for a little bit of disturbance. Right. That's the word that the president himself has used. But, you know, at some point,

You don't want to see the whole story unravel before it even gets started. But, you know, adjusting tariffs, we've had a number of adjustments in tariffs, right? The equivocation, the quickest being going to 50% on Canada and then quickly reversing it. Look, today, you know, we're sort of, the tone is like it's somewhat of an all-clear.

People should realize we could be sitting here tomorrow, PPI comes in much hotter than expected, then it's another woe is me. So you can't get over your skis on one data point. I'm not saying everybody is. Everybody's very balanced in what they're saying, but that's just the reality. And the price increases will go through quicker on PPI. You'll feel them than you do on CPI. UBS today is sticking by 6,600.

for the end of the year, RBC, by the same number. Yes, they admit that the growth scare idea has increased significantly. That's not breaking any news. But they're still sticking by their target. David Koston has cut his target to 6,200 from 65.

Ned Davis also believes that a little bit of the panic is overdone and is going to reverse. Remember, it was a couple of days ago where Jonathan Krinsky put out a note looking for a tactical bounce this week as well. Ned Davis research says we're likely to see widespread recognition that the fears have not been justified, in which case equities will start recovering from extreme pessimism. That's a very early call, by the way. You can't say it because the damage has not been done yet. The damage will be done.

So you may have an all clear for a moment in time to get PPI, but believe me, it just started. I think what it really comes down to, if you came into the year with certain growth, inflation, trade expectations, it's a much broader outcome that we're seeing here. So there's more places that this market can go, Scott.

And so I think when you want to say it's all clear and there might be this kind of short-term bounce, I think at the end of the day, what you're really trying to do is you're really trying to figure out if the stocks that you wanted to own coming into this year, that you felt the valuations were stretched, have they re-rated? Have they re-rated enough?

And coupling that with what are your expectations? Because we all sat here at the beginning of the year and talked about how we expected earnings growth to broaden. That earnings growth can only broaden if we have an at-trend U.S. economy. And so that's where you really have to marry, is the valuation appropriate for the names I want to own, based on what my changed growth and inflation expectations are. Have banks gotten beaten up enough? What do you think? Because you look at the...

The bank trade over the last month has been brutal. Almost every major bank stock is down 16%. They're all in that ballpark. Bank of America is down 13%, but you get the point. Has there been enough of a washout in that space? Has that been overdone towards growth scare, recession, hysteria? Maybe not. Financials are still in an uptrend. We're choosing to stay with that trade, so that's fine. But I think to just comment on what we've been talking about,

Markets like 2015, markets like 2018, where we came into those years with the expectation that we had this year that there was going to be a lot of volatility. That doesn't mean you know the outcome. Good luck trying to figure out what this president's going to do, what the policies are going to mean. Good luck. What I would tell you is when you have years like that,

There's plenty of opportunity to make money when the stocks or the positions that you want to own, the long-term thesis that you want to own, come in and allow you to buy them. There was much, much money made by investors in those years, and the market went nowhere.

So anybody that's trying to predict the next day's outcome or trade off a news flow, that makes no sense because it's too unpredictable. You do have, speaking of the financials, you do have some bullish call today on regionals. I mean, the Russell's gotten wiped down 18 percent from its 52 week high.

Wells is bullish on the regionals. Go long, they say. You've got some of these names. I do. A fair amount. I think more than anybody on the show. I do. Look, we've got 39 holdings in the financial sector. First of all, probably, arguably, some of the names that I think the momentum has completely gone in. Let me step away from the regionals for a second here. It's names like PayPal. It's names like Block.

where there was so much excitement at the end of the year. I don't know that I see the environment, the clarity surrounding the economic environment where I could support continued ownership of the regionals. We'll see what the strategy does at the end of April. But what am I worried about? Am I worried about slowing growth and rising inflation? That's an awful scenario. That's stagflation. Am I more concerned about

a rise in inflation, singular rise in inflation? Or am I worried about a slowing growing economy?

economy. Well, the Fed can respond to that. So I think you look at the financial sector in totality, you have to understand there's been a tremendous amount of capital that's been allocated in that direction because, quote unquote, Scott, it was defined as momentum and it was defined as momentum for the very first time in several years. The only industries that have endured and have been resilient through this sell off, it's been insurance and some of the exchanges.

Other than that, I think you have to call into question the ability to sustain ownership of these financials going beyond the next quarter. Let's get a news alert now with our Steve Kovach. Steve, what do we know?

Hey there, Scott. This is coming from Reuters headline we're getting about an FTC court hearing going on right now. This is the case the FTC put against Amazon back in 2023. And now the FTC is saying they need to delay its trial against Amazon because of, quote, severe resource shortfalls in terms of both money and personnel. Now, this is the case the FTC filed under the last administration regarding Amazon Prime allegations.

These allegations say things like they've made it hard to cancel and kind of sign people up without them necessarily knowing. Still, I will add the new FTC chair, Andrew Ferguson, as our Amon Javers has been reporting yesterday and this morning, is still taking a really aggressive stance

against M&A and big technology companies. So don't, even though the theme going into this administration was M&A and the FTC would go easier on companies, that doesn't seem to be happening. Still, though, they're citing a lack of personnel and resources to move forward, at least for now, with this case, Scott.

All right, Steve Kovach, thank you very much. You mean when you fire that many people and you cut all of that, you don't have the resources for it? It's kind of crazy, but you can see more of this, lots more of it. The FDA, as I mentioned before, they're frozen. They have their resumes out. Everybody, they're looking for the next job, not focusing on what's here. And when you fire the entire device department,

you know, and then hiring back a week later, of course you're going to have this. So this is troubling for the economy. Now imagine if the FTC were spending money. And I believe that we're bloated, okay? But there's a right way to do it, and there's a wrong way to do it. No, it's just not often that you see a headline like that. And I think that everybody sort of had the same kind of reaction to that. We're going to take a break. We'll come back. We'll do our calls of the day. We'll tell you how to play the hard-hit airlines, which...

And now, a next-level moment from AT&T business. Say you've sent out a gigantic shipment of pillows, and they need to be there in time for International Sleep Day. You've got AT&T 5G, so you're fully confident. But...

The vendor isn't responding. An international sleep day is tomorrow. Luckily, AT&T 5G lets you deal with any issues with ease, so the pillows will get delivered and everyone can sleep soundly, especially you. AT&T 5G requires a compatible plan and device. Coverage not available everywhere. Learn more at att.com slash 5G network.

Are you still quoting 30-year-old movies? Have you said cool beans in the past 90 days? Do you think Discover isn't widely accepted? If this sounds like you, you're stuck in the past. Discover is accepted at 99% of places that take credit cards nationwide. And every time you make a purchase with your card, you automatically earn cash back. Welcome to the now. It pays to discover. Learn more at discover.com slash credit card based on the February 2024 Nelson report.

Breaking earnings after the bell, a CNBC exclusive. Adobe CEO. First word on Q1 numbers, AI breakthroughs, the state of the sector. Inside an analysis for investors. John Ford, Morgan Brennan, closing bell overtime. 4 Eastern, CNBC.

All right, let's talk airlines because they've been in the news this week, as you know, because of Delta. Well, now United Airlines gets the price target lowered to $110 from 125. That's at Bank of America. Price target also down at Barclays to 140 from 150. This is looking at the worst week now since August of 24 for United.

American Airlines price target trimmed at Bank of America. You're looking at the worst week since May of 24 for American Airlines. And again, Delta really started this with that dour outlook. And that stock is having its worst week since March of 2022. Joe owns United. Joe owns Delta. Joe owns this segment. I do. You own it. Scott, I want to be clear about something because I had someone yesterday after our airline conversation call me up and said, you know,

You sounded pretty bearish about Delta when you were speaking with Steve and Jimmy. And you own these positions. You're on CNBC. Why are you not defending the positions in a publicly traded fund?

And the reason I'm not doing that is I'm going to be transparent. There's a quarterly rebalance in which these stocks could go out. So I am going to tell you, I agree with every one of these price cuts because I think the positive momentum in the airlines has been lost. It was great while it was there. We enjoyed it. In terms of the fundamentals, there's now a clear and present challenge to revenue growth. You're talking about lower fares and you're talking about a

a potential fair war. Demand is beginning to wane. So I'm going to be transparent on that. Look, I wanted a publicly traded fund so people could see my performance. And if I'm going to do that, then I'm going to be transparent about what I see in front of me. I'm going to call balls and strikes. Yes, we own it. We can't do anything about it right now. But these stocks don't look good. OK, thank you for that.

No one else owns any of these names. But the good news is Jimmy will be there to buy them from you. He might. He might. He was defending Delta yesterday. We mentioned a shopping list for this pullback. RBC has one today. ServiceNow, IBM, Iron Mountain. They named those as stocks to buy on durable sales growth. I think the sell-off is overdone in those names. Rob, you own IBM.

Yeah, we've owned it for a while. We bought it in May. It's up about 56% versus the market up nine. Feels like it's a little more fully valued right here, seeing modest revenue growth, margin expansion.

Now it's, though, from a price standpoint, more in line with the software peers. I do think long term they're a beneficiary of continued IT spend and kind of AI initiatives that companies are taking. So it's a solid company. I don't know if it's a screaming buy that it once was, but we're going to continue to own it. What about AbbVie?

Target goes to 195 from 165 at Barenburg, which you own. Coincidentally, we added it on the same day. Now, this is a stock that's a little cheaper, industry-leading profitability. They have a great drug pipeline focused on some hot areas like Botox, arthritis, and

you know, high quality characteristics and it's on pace to produce low double digit earnings growth consistently. So we'll probably like this a little more here. Let's do something real quick on Uber, which was reiterated by today, which Weiss, you recently sold and Joe, you continue to own. You guys...

have a view on this call. Is it a buy here or did Weiss make the right move and get rid of it in a place where, well, you own it personally or in the ETF? I own it personally. Okay. So you actually can be tactical. I can be tactical. And look, to me, this stock seems range bound between 60 and 80. I had sold it out previously at around 74. Stocks went down to the low 60s. Bill Baruch made a great buy down there, by the way. Now the stock has recovered.

After Bill Ackman got in, I told myself, look, I believe in this company over the long term. I'm going to establish a position. I'm going to forget about it, put it away, because I do think this is a $100 stock. I do think this is a victim of the overall market environment itself. That's one of the reasons it's not idiosyncratic. It's the market. Okay.

Speaking of the market, I had mentioned a little while ago that we were making a run at positive, at least on the Dow, and that the president was making some comments about tax cuts and tariffs. We will go to Eamon Javers now as the president is speaking at the White House. What are we learning here, Eamon?

Scott, that's right. He's talking tariffs. He's in the Oval Office right now with the Prime Minister, Ortiz Such of Ireland, for a St. Patrick's Day event. But he is talking tariffs to the press pool. What we know so far, Scott, is that he's talking about Ireland in particular. He says the Irish took our pharmaceutical and other companies away through taxation from the United States. He said he called it proper taxation by the Irish, but suggested that the United States wants to balance out the trade deficit with Ireland. He also says

that he is going to go ahead with the reciprocal tariffs. That, remember, deadline is coming up on April the 2nd. He said we're going to have flexibility on tariffs, but there'll be little flexibility once the tariffs come in, seeming to imply here, Scott, that there's a period of negotiation between now and April 2nd where countries and companies can still negotiate a little bit with this White House as to what those tariffs will be. He's also talking about the EU, saying that the EU doesn't take foreign products or

cars from the United States. And he says that the United States will absolutely put tariffs on cars. So that's something to watch for as well. So we will wait and see these comments when they come back out of the Oval Office and give us the videotape, so we can see all the nuance and body language. But, clearly, the president is signaling he's going to go ahead with the reciprocal tariffs.

on April 2nd, despite what we've seen on all the markets over the past couple of weeks. The president saying he believes ultimately when the markets get a sense of what he's doing here, markets will soar. Scott. Yeah. Well, we are moving positive across the board. So we'll see how this all develops throughout the day. I mean, everything, you know, is everything and always a negotiation. I mean, that's just the way it is.

And the markets are going to move in real time on every word that you deliver us from the White House. We'll see the tape, I suppose, when it's ready. Eamon, thank you very much. That's Eamon Javers. You bet. On the North Lawn of the White House for us with the very latest. But just to recap here, NASDAQ positive by about 300 points. That's 1.7 percent. S&P good for getting closer to a 1 percent gain today. And even the Dow, which was down the most throughout much of the morning today, is getting a little bit of a lift to some 22 points. But after the kind of selling we've seen of late,

I suppose we'll take any bit of green on the board. Straight ahead, your ETF edge, how you can buy some downside protection for the volatility we've seen. We'll tell you coming up.

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We're back on Halftime. I'm Angelica Peebles with your CNBC News Update. A government lawyer is asking a federal judge in Manhattan to move the legal fight over the detention of Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil to New Jersey or Louisiana, where he's currently being held.

A U.S. district court ordered the graduate student not to be deported while the court considers a legal challenge from his lawyers after immigration enforcement agents arrested Khalil, who is a permanent U.S. resident, in New York on Saturday over his participation in Colombia's pro-Palestinian protests.

Voters in Greenland rejected President Trump's bid to control their island at the ballot box Tuesday. A center-right pro-business party, which is anti-Trump and never held power before, won 30 percent of the vote. And Spotify says it paid more than $10 billion in royalties to the music industry last year. The streaming service added that represents more than 60 percent of its total revenue in 2024, and the payout is the largest music industry history.

The company is trying to counter criticism that has failed to share the wealth from the era of streaming music. Scott, back over to you. Angelica, thanks very much for that. Thank you. Angelica Puglis to Bob Pisani now with today's ETF Edge. Downside protection, we're talking about that.

Bob, we need it, Scott. With all the turmoil in the markets, there is increasing interest in ETFs that provide downside protection. Now, one strategy known as buffers use options to provide downside protection. Let's talk with Brian Lake. He's the head of America's ETF distribution at Goldman Sachs. And Brian, Goldman just came out with a buffer ETF last week. I want you to explain to us, how do these buffers work? What kind of protection are you getting? And what are you giving up on the upside? Yeah, well...

Bob, you're an investor, I'm an investor. We think about how investors come at this and there's more uncertainty than ever these days, whether it's tariffs, whether it's geopolitical, whether it's the broadening out of the Mag7, investors have a lot of questions.

The beauty of a buffer strategy and the ones that we launched, the suite of three products, is they can provide downside protection. So they'll protect between 5% and 15% on the downside while also allowing you to participate in upside, often 5% to 7% on the upside. And with all that uncertainty, that helps give investors

a level of comfort that they can deploy these in their portfolio. There's three of these, I know, and each one resets every three months. I know it's very important to buy near the reset date, then hold them throughout the entire period. Why is that an important part of this strategy? Yeah, we made it really easy. That's why we did a suite of these, because as you say, each of them reset each month, but we staggered the launches.

So at the beginning of each month, there is an ETF that's now resetting its buffer point to give you that downside protection and the upside participation. So thinking about that is where you want to look. And that resets every quarter to your point. But we have all three. So each month, it's ready to go. I want the viewers to understand here, what's the risks? What are the considerations here of investing in these buffer products? So there's obviously some timing issues, it seems.

Tell us about that expense ratios, market conditions. What's the risks? Yeah, well, these are tried and true strategies. These have been the types of strategies that sophisticated investors have been deploying for years. We're now making them available in an ETF. But because you're using equities and using some options to help get these buffer outcomes, there is some embedded costs that come along with that. And so the expense ratio on the products is 50 basis points. You should be aware of that. But we think being a

able to buy these through the ETF listed on the exchange is a really good value. Tell me about flows last few weeks. Yeah, no, like this space has doubled over the last year. And so we think that there's going to continue to be interest for investors that are looking for these outcomes. All right. Thanks, Brian. We're going to have a lot more on this and talk about

buying protection, using buffer products and other products to provide downside protection. That's going to be coming up on ETF Edge at 1.10 p.m. Eastern Time. Brian is going to be joined by Mike Akins from ETF Action. A lot of strategies here on protecting the downside. It's ETFEdge.CNBC.com. Scott, back to you. Yeah, Bob, thank you very much. We'll continue that theme, really, with the protecting against this volatility because Goldman Sachs today,

is out with a list it calls the stable stock list. We'll tell you what they are and trade them next. Well, if you're worried about a recession like the market seems to be of late, Goldman says you should own their stable growth basket.

AutoZone is in there, Home Depot. We have ownership. All of these names are our own. AutoZone, Home Depot, S&P Global, Fastenal, Rollins, Oracle, Verisk, AutoZone, Rob Seachin, 2U, First. These companies have delivered the most stable EBITDA growth in the S&P during the past decade, according to Goldman. So AutoZone, long-term beneficiary of an aging auto fleet. Also, you have tariffs that are obviously going to raise the price of cars.

People are going to be focused on fixing what they have versus buying new vehicles, and AutoZone is going to continue to be a defensive beneficiary. S&P Global, Joe, on the list.

to a certain extent resilient in the face of an economic contraction. The need for financial services information is there. Moody's, Faxset, S&P Global, these are the three names you could own. I like S&P Global first. We own that. Secondarily, I like Faxset. What about Rollins?

Rollins, Fastenal, industrial names, manufacturing recovery, maybe a recovery in construction space. I like those two industrial names. I also like Republic Services and Howmet. Siech, Verisk. What about Verisk? Yeah, it's an information services company that helps improve the underwriting standards of the insurance industry and helps them mitigate risk. It's been a very consistent grower.

grower. So no surprise it's on their depots on their depot

I think it could be pretty interesting as you start to see rates come in, the demand for housing will go up. It's always been an unbelievable high quality business, but that's what could be the catalyzer here. They're eight years into this reinvestment cycle. They're probably two years out from really being able to deliver this one Home Depot. And this is the time, if you're interested, to be looking at the stock. Okay. Lastly, Oracle. Joe, what do you think of Oracle? Stock's up 4% today.

Part of the software sell-off. Wasn't particularly excited about recent earnings. I like the cybersecurity theme. And to that point, a software name we don't talk about much, Israeli-based checkpoint software. That's the name to own. Okay. Santoli is next with his midday word. Are you following the Halftime Report podcast? What are you waiting for? Look for us in your favorite podcasting app. Follow the Halftime Podcast now.

Senior markets commentator Mike Santoli here with us for his midday word. We're trying to scratch and claw our way back. How do you feel about this price action today? You know, it's not the most emphatic or convincing response to a somewhat oversold market, to a benign CPI report and all the other conditions that have been falling into place that would suggest we were due for some kind of a reflex bounce. But not all bad. Obviously, you guys were talking about how it looks as if the heavy selling, the forced selling is

dried up in the former momentum leaders. Maybe the big cap tech stocks, ex-Apple, can start to act like somewhat macro defense like they used to. And that's OK. But the way the bond market shrugged at the CPI number is at least worth noting. Yields have remained firm. Obviously, maybe we got some supply stuff. We're going to reserve judgment as to the inflation path.

given tariffs. But I think that that's a little bit dissonant to what we might have expected here today. So, you know, I think you still have to reserve. Everyone is in that mode of saying, yeah, we should rally soon. Maybe we have to get a little more kind of washed out. But even the first rally is going to be suspect. So maybe the first three to five percent rally you have to take with a grain of salt.

So that's always the mode we're in right now. And I think that people don't feel like this market's going to run away from them to the upside, right or wrong. Well, it's hard to rally, I guess, when you're feeling like you've got to look over your shoulder. Yeah, yeah, that's a big part of it. And the idea that the things you've been looking for over your shoulder are more likely to kind of reduce the expectation for either earnings or the multiple you'll put on it than not. But look, some of the work has been done.

I've been a little bit unnerved by the orderly, linear nature of this down channel for three weeks. I mean, it just seems like this kind of pretty determined sell down. At some point, that should that should dry up and we'll see if if anything is coming to the buy zone valuation wise. Yeah, I'll see you on the closing bell. Good stuff, Mike, as always. That's Mike Santoli. We'll do finals next. Before finals, let's take a look at shares of Apple today, which have been lower than

big call today from eric woodring of morgan stanley he is the well-followed analyst over there cut the price target today to 252 from 275

Lack of compelling AI features part of it. We all know about the China issues. Those have persisted. Rob, you own the stock. What do you make of this move today by this guy? I think he's right. Valuation's still high. You know, the reason we own it is we've owned it for a very long time. This is something we trimmed aggressively coming into the year. It's down, I think, 12% or so since.

And so I think it's the right move to be cautious here. He's going to be on with me, by the way, today, closing bell, 3 o'clock. So don't miss that. Eric Woodring, live. Let's do final trades. Rob, why don't you give me one while I'm with you? Yep. We're going to go with NVIDIA because we've been a buyer of it. Okay. All right. Steve Weiss. Taiwan semi. Can't tell you what it's going to do tomorrow with PPI, but I like long-term. Okay. Also a buyer, you have been, Shannon.

Sure. Developed ex-U.S. equities. This amount of stimulus that Germany is talking about could end up being greater than reunification. Okay. Joey T., T for transparency. Took an initial personal position in Amazon on the close on Monday. As it goes higher, I'm going to continue to add. You've been listening to CNBC's Halftime Report, the podcast. You can always catch us live weekdays at 12 Eastern, only on CNBC.

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