stock up almost 100 percent of the last year. we sit down with the chairman and ceo and will ask when you're housing when remain high. eighty-one exclusive. and fed members take on a rock star-like status as investors and the media its rail their every move for hands on what the fed will do next. a couple of key pieces. we will tell you what you missed an what it means for your money. experts say commercial travel will become a reality, but once in space how will you pay for staff? and what if you see something that is a better deal on mars? how about paypall galactic? we will explain. "countdown to the closing bell" starts right now. ♪ cheryl: i'm cheryl casone in for liz claman. it is the last hour of trading, and just a short time ago, the cftc, the commodities futures

trading commission announcing civil charges against former mfglobal head, a former new jersey governor and ceo of goldman, jon corzine. we will talk to a cftc commissioner about what this all means. interest rates are rising and rising more. the 30 year fixed mortgage rate averaging 4.46%, up from 88%. this is the highest weekly average since july 28 the 2011 to also the biggest weekly jump. all of this according to freddie mac. and rates have been rising ever since june 19th when fed chairman jim -- ben bernanke and has the potential for reducing his bond buying program over the fed. meanwhile, two of the chairman's board members up speaking today. we will tell you exactly what they said and how the markets are reacting to all of this. here's a hint for you. look at gold, falling at this

point. it is now 12003. the dow more than $25. 2640. they expect the trend to continue as interest rates continue to rise. team coverage on that one. nicole petallides. on the floor of the new york stock exchange where she is following all the market action. peter barnes with double duty in action in washington. following what the 45 fed board members are saying. we also have rich edson in chicago at the cme. he is following the great old exit is. first, nicole, your deadlines please. >> reporter: the bulls are taking charge. three days in a row of gains for the dow jones industrials. we have not seen that in some time, coupled with, hello, down 15,000 once again after the dow dropped about 1,000 points. cheryl: thank you. peter barnes in washington. your headline please. >> reporter: i love your tea's there, cheryl, about how we are following these fed officials around like they are rock stars. let me tell you, today they were

all singing and playing the same tent. details in a minute. cheryl: markets loving that. rich edson, your headline. >> reporter: gold was finally up today. we have physical demand that came back. we thought we had finally found a floor. then what? it collapsed. hello did it go? we will tell you. cheryl: that is a headline, rich edson. you never disappoint me. all right. j.c. penney in the green can again today. jeff flock at the new york stock thhs change. were you hearing? >> reporter: the whole market has gone up, but j.c. penney in particular continues to do really well. earlier in the week, one of the analysts was focusing on j.c. penney and saying that they really are seeing these early signs of recovery for this week, this retailer over the last year or so, but they have seen improvements since ron johnson has been out. promotions and things that they have been instituting since his departure are starting to kick in, and they see potential going forward as a result of these

positive comments earlier this week. we continue to see j.c. penney on the run to the upside. cheryl: thank you very much. let's get right to our floor show. traders standing by at the new york stock these days, cme, and the nymex. let's get to these traders. mark knew standing by at the new york stock exchange. peter barnes talking more about comments. how much gravity to their words put on the markets today in your opinion, mark? >> i don't think a whole lot. i think that in general it is following through from the last couple of days. up almost 400 points. it is almost 3%. don't forget, we are down almost 5 percent from late may. interestingly enough, lot of volatility. traders reelly do not know what to do with all this volatility. the appetite for risk is somewhat diminished, but they're is a little bit more clarity with regards to qe which is a little bit encouraging to have all of the fed as basically talking what bernanke wanted to say in the first place, that is here to stay, the policy will be

someone accommodative, the economic data it does improve and we could see tapering. for the time being there is no reason to worry. we have seen rates actually back off in the last couple of days. mortgage rates are high, with the actual ten year comes from 270 down to 250 in the last few days. one day, less than a month in quarter. indices right now are set to finish up about 3% or so for the quarter, but yet still down 1% for the month of jim. as of now we are set to raise this trend of seven straight months of positive gains for the market. cheryl: you can also make them argument that we had a nice upside surprise for the month of may. let's go over to kevin at the cme. a lot of economic news coming out today. housing, initial claims, commodities and moving, especially gold. what are you watching? >> when you look at the data, it was very good. certainly lending support to both the equity and commodity side. all except the old command at think it is just one asset class that everyone is looking and

saying, ma'am, we have had such a nice run over the last few years and it is time to take some profit off of the table. we are looking further down the road. right now the fed members are telling as, stimuluses year for the intermediate term. i think people looking at that much further down the road now taking profits and moving that money elsewhere. cheryl: you're telling me that you think that the fed has been really what has been choosing of the market and you are already looking six months ahead to when we are going to have stimulus began to back off? >> i think that -- i certainly think that is what the gold market is looking at. when you look at it here in the near term for equities and particularly interest rates and what they have done, certainly trying to figure out what is going to happen in the next three months as the fed will pull the table out and end the stimulus or will they continue with that type of program? gold is really trying to factor that out six to 12 months further and people are figuring that something will happen and

we will have to pull back some of the stimulus as the economy continues to improve as we have seen from the economic data today. cheryl: let's go over to jonathan at the nymex. gold seems to be the big commodity story in the metals, but what about the crude market? >> crude has been on a tear higher, especially since last week's pullback. we mentioned last week that we thought it was going to be more of a correction and a real trend downward which seems to be what has happened, and we are getting back to the $98 level. i don't think that it is going to get much above that tomorrow. probably going to slowly just trade in a range going into next week. the long holiday week. a loo of people are positioning themselves for this uncertainty with the middle east tensions, potential more accommodative policies by the fed can afford. and there is still some weather problems of canada which has been affecting pipelines. and i think anybody wants to go into this holiday weekend short. cheryl: that is a very good point. we will see how trading resumes tomorrow. mark, kevin, jonathan,

gentlemen, thanks to all of you. we were just talking about those comments from the fed president. the new york fed president, the latest official to pour cold water on chairman ben bernanke's talk about tampering. peter barnes standing by in washington with the latest developments. first, you were just on a conference call. two stories, first a conference call about the cftc civil charges. a former mfglobal ceo jon corzine. >> reporter: well, i have just gone through this 47 page complaint. the lawsuit that the cftc has filed against jon corzine and take -- mfglobal. they reveal some of the conversations that were recorded internally by the company when it was collapsing and the company's -- financial firms do this all the time for legal reasons. let me read you a couple of things from the complaint. it says that on october 6th, 2011, in response to the firm's liquidity stresses jon corzine told a mfglobal treasury department employee that they were going to do all the things that they could not to draw down

on the revolving line of credit they had with morgan chase the next day, even if that meant going-in the mfglobal customer accounts. jon corzine knew that going-in the customer accounts would be a violation of firm policy and then this, and another recorded conversation on october 26, the global treasurer relayed to the holding company cfo and another employee that he had told jon corzine that the firm's liquidity situation was not sustainable and that the situation is grave and, in fact, it says that jon corzine disparagingly nicknamed the global treasurer the grave digger. so lots of details on this case and the complaint. now on to the fed. three fed officials are doing damage control for ben bernanke today, trying to calm financial markets after the germans press conference last week setting interest rates. repeating the comments thus lowering and tapering could come later this year if the economy

keeps improving. job creation improves, but they all hit hard. the course of quantitative easing will depend on the data, meaning the meeting as bernanke also said, but which fed officials fear investors did not pay as much attention to. >> it seems to me, the chairman said thinking of a smoking analogy, that we will use the patch and we will use it flexibly and some in the markets reacted as if he said cold turkey. >> this is not a bolt from the blue. there was a range of possibilities. this is bigger than i would have hoped, but, again, it is still in motion. my policy including the pace of asset purchases depends upon the economic outlook, not the calendar. >> reporter: one more thing from the jon corzine complaint that i just read. the global treasurer said to his employees, we have to tell john -- jon corzine that enough is enough. we need to take the keys away from him. [laughter] back to you.

had to get that in. cheryl: i'm glad you did. misery loves company. forty-seven pages i am holding in my hand as well and going through right now. >> reporter: okay. cheryl: peter barnes, thank you very much. two big stories. the markets have a lot to follow. fifty minutes to go. again, the cftc just announcing civil charges against former mfglobal head jon corzine. up next, the man behind those charges, a cftc commissioner bart tilton will be joining as. also, one money manager making a big bet on small-cap stocks ahead of the russell rebalance which is tomorrow. we will give you his best plays coming up next. ♪ she's always been able to brighten your day.

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♪ cheryl: the commodities futures trading commission is charging a former mfglobal ceo jon corzine with misuse of $1 billion of customer funds. joining me now is the man behind these charges, a cftc commissioner bart chilton, also on set with me here in new york, charlie gasparino, business correspondent who has been all over this story from the beginning. thank you for being here. you're the man of the hour, of the day. the biggest question is, does

this guarantee at all in any way, shape or form restitution for those that jon corzine, frankly, you know, misguided and ms. levin ripped off at the end of the day? >> a, well, there are a couple of things going on here. we have the lawsuit that we are charging both senator jon corzine and ms. o'brien with certain things. and then we have our suit against mfglobal holdings and mfglobal futures commissions merchant, not to get in the weeds, sorry. the mfglobal futures commission merchant, we are trying to reach a settlement with them that would require 100 percent restitution for customers. that has to be approved y the court, so i am hopeful that that will happen, but we're working on that. cheryl: charlie wants to ask you about another side of it. >> reporter: i read most of this 46 pages. the one word that i have not seen him what you put out is the word fraud. are you guys charging jon

corzine with civil fraud? >> no. charlie, we are charging him with his violations of law with regard to segregated funds. segregated finest hour customer money. >> reporter: i know that. >> that money is supposed to be sacrosanct. it is a violation of that. >> reporter: a lot of people would say this is pretty weak tea. if you cannot charge a ceo of a company that obviously misused funds. you can bar customer funds. you decide to put it back that day. we all know that. >> no, you can't. no, charlie, you can't. >> reporter: are you sure about that. >> charlie 55. >> reporter: and not try to argue about the law. >> good, because i know what i'm talking about. >> reporter: why is it that you are not charging him with fraud? of this guy did was so bad, which u.s.a. is so bad, i'd aussie of fraud charge and it's not just me. at been inundated with e-mails from foxbusiness.com customers who still have not gotten their money back, by the way. some people have gotten 3 percent.

and you guys hit them with jars that is not fraud which quite frankly we rode on foxbusiness.com that he did not have the proper controls in place two years ago. it took the best years to come up with this? >> maybe you should send out the 51 police, charlie. we will deputize you. >> reporter: you can any date. i will bring the charges within a week. >> that me tell you what the law is and how -- we are charging. i'd rather tell you what the importance of what we are saying in our court documents. >> reporter: that's fine. cheryl: okay. well, let's talk about what took so long to get here. one of the things that are correspondent -- we have all been going through this 47 page complaint obviously investor looking at every page, but at the same time, these recorded calls, the facts that jon corzine is committed scenes from us from the we are seeing here in the complaint, on record, he did not want to tap the line of credit, what is that enough, is

that fraud or is that just in your opinion just that katie made a mistake in this? >> our allegations and what we have filed in court today with regard to a mr. karzai now that he violated the law with regard to using customer money because the was a controlling person. and with regard to ms. o'brien, she aided and abetted in the misuse of those customer funds. a billion dollars worth of customer funds, those are serious violations. we are going forward with them, and we also have charged in our fourth count with regard to mr. mr. jon corzine, with regard to his ability to -- failure to supervise that none of this should have gone on, that these nearly a billion dollars in money moving around like a shell game should not have gone on. it was his failure to supervise the cause that to occur. serious charges. i am pleased that we are doing it and hope that the jury in this case comes up with and at -- equable punishment.

>> reporter: de say they're serious charges, what are the sanctions? what is the worst that can happen? of the season will cause a he is not going to jail. was the worst thing that can happen to jon corzine? >> we had last 45 and that is absolutely right. as a matter for the apartment of justice. people do the crime in my view they should do -- do the time. we're asking for civil monetary penalties and restitution. what does actually amount to will be up to the court, the jury. i hope it is significant. >> reporter: you're asking for a lifetime ban? >> we actually are asking for a trading band, too. thank you for reminding me. >> reporter: is a lifetime? >> yes. >> reporter: one thing i should point out, if you guys cannot bring a frrud charge against him, okay, the criminal guys definitely can't. cheryl: great minds think alike because that was my next question to you, the criminal side of this. we have already gone through this.

it is a civil lawsuit, but there is no criminal charge. we will there ever be criminal charges against jon corzine? >> i really cannot speak to it. it is out of my lane because i'm a criminal guy. i'm a civil back. there are many times where i wish we have more authority in that regard. i have spoken about it a lot, but today i am focused, we are doing, we are charging given what the laws are right now today. cheryl: okay. bart chilton cftc commissioner. thank you for being here. we appreciated. charlie gasparino, again, who has been all over this story. >> reporter: you going to the beach as me? my contract ends in a couple of years. maybe i could call him up. cheryl: maybe you could. >> reporter: the cftc does not have a right to cachet it like that fbi or dea. cheryl: 27 pages. the legal complaint. >> reporter: the bar for fraud in the civil case is pretty low. the question is, he did not answered, why didn't they charge him with fraud. every mfglobal customer is asking that right now.

cheryl: thank you very much. good stuff. thank you for coming on the show. the closing bell will ring in 38 minutes. right now above battle over men's wear house getting heated as the ousted founder fights back. we have his spicy response to the company after the break. and, housing. here is the big question. the bubble? willis stay out? we're going to ask that. the ceo and president coming up in a fox business exclusive interview. ♪

cheryl: men's warehouse founder, george zimmer, doesn't like the way the company's board is making him look, and now he is firing back with an open letter on his ousting. adam shapiro has more on this story. >> reporter: this is one of those boardroom battles that gets juicier and juicier. men's warehouse shares with up today, but before we get into the nitty-gritty, let's look at the olden days when they were all much better friends. take a look at the old ad. >> you're going to like the way you look, i guarantee it. >> you might guarantee it, but you're going to have a hard time doing it when when you're not on the board with. they fired him as the executive chairman last week.

at the time the board actually said mr. zimmer had difficulty accepting the fact that the men's warehouse was a public company. they were saying he wanted to take them private, but mr. zimmer actually put out a letter last night addressing these allegations, and he said, this is a quote: >> r eporter: now, in that letter mr. zimmer actually points out that what he suggested to the board is that they explore the possibility of going private and perhaps to turn some of the wealth to the shareholders when they would do that. he said it was just a suggestion, but the board is saying they don't like the fact he hasn't been in control for the last two years. he tried to get control, and it's not going to happen. get ready for a good old-fashioned fight. cheryl? cheryl: and also the fact that he's the face of the company. without him fronting those commercial, you have a whole era that disappears with him.

>> reporter: you do, but, you know, this company's been around since 1973. they had 2.4 billion, almost 2.5 billion in sales in 2012, and it's more than just men's warehouse. there's different men's clothing. my generation of guys, when i lived in cleveland, i was buying at men's wearhouse. everybody has a story. but i think they might be able to make it without george. cheryl: everybody has a media market news story as well. [laughter] >> media market. cheryl: all right. adam shapiro, great story. thank you very much, adam. >> thank you. cheryl: all right. markets are trading higher for a third straight session after a slew of encouraging comments from the fed officials today. will the euphoria last or will market jitters take charge once again? joining me now is dan veru, executive vice president and cio. good to see you. >> good to see you. cheryl: we had two fed officials coming out and making comments, and the market seems to like what they're saying. mr. dudley said i don't think

the chairman was trying to send a signal to the market about a possible taper in qe, and he went on to make more comments here. are they that market sensitive at the fed? is that what we're seeing here? >> not in terms of the actual end point, i think it's the rate of change and how fast it happens. what they want to do is slow down the movement upward in interest rates, in by opinion -- in my opinion. we bought houses when interest rates were 6%, 8%, 10% -- cheryl: different economy though. >> different economy back then. that's right. but that's what you want to catch up. you want the market to catch up and calibrate to that so there aren't the unintended consequences of bond market losses by banks and things like that. if it's slow and steady and it's a result of an upward-sloping economy, that's ultimately where they want to see interest rates go. and they want a steeper yield curve so the banks can benefit.

cheryl: you have to wonder when they're sitting in washington or whenever they happen to be if they're looking at the markets and thinking did we make a mistake? who knows? the volatility, we have had an incredible volatile month of june. are you concerned that we're seeing some type of sea change, or do you think that this is just typical summer low volume high volatility? >> well, we've had some very high volume days and some very low volume days as well. volatility's definitely picked up. i would say when it got down to kind of the 12, 13, that's not sustainable for a longer period of time. but neither is the low 20s which we hit very briefly a couple of days ago. i think my guess is that we'll kind of trend in kind of the mid to upper teens which is probably the right calibration for what's of a bumpy period. but, again, if you're a long-term investor, you should opportunity to --s as an cheryl: sure. >> -- sharpen your pencil, get

your buy list out and buy on those sloppy days. cheryl: i'm glad you brought that up. you, you know, you're talking small caps, and some say they don't get the love that the large caps do, especially when we're talking about microsoft and ge. but really the russell is outperforming at this point the s&p and the dow on a percentage basis. do you think that that continues, though, or do you think that we shift over and see the s&p 500 take off? >> you know, if i had a dime for every time somebody told me now's the time to buy a large cap and avoid the small caps, it's just not going to happen. it's not likely to happen. in the last five years, actually, the s&p's only outperformed one of those years. so, you know, again, small companies do something unique. they typically can grow from a smaller base. they don't have the law of large numbers. companies are faced with getting growth, and let's face it, we're likely going to be in a slow upward-moving, upward-grinding gdp type of environment.

cheryl: and the rebalances we should see tomorrow on the russell index. any thoughts on that? >> they telegraph it much better in the last several years and with derivatives, the impact is definitely less. cheryl: okay. real quick, i want to get to a couple of picks you had in april. one of the stocks was bill bare et corporation. the stock is up more than 5%, and that's with the month of june tobacco to haved into that -- factored into that. are you sticking behind this name? >> i would put more money into work at this level. shares have pulled back modestly. i think there's a lot of asset value. it's a u.s. gas and oil story, and i think that there is a lot of value to be unlocked. cheryl: and you also picked a small business company, small business development company, new mountain finance. the stock has been under some pressure since you picked it. >> it's a little bit lower, but this is a company that pays a 9.5% dividend yield. the yield is growing. this is an extremely smart management team -- cheryl: strong buy? >> i would say, i would back the

truck up. cheryl: back the truck up. >> yeah, i mean -- cheryl: well, that is a strong buy. [laughter] >> i mean, it's a shorter duration type of fixed -- cheryl: dan review -- ve radio, good to see you again. closing closing bell going to ring, we've got 28 minutes to go. pending home sales jumping to more than a six-year high and one home builder ready to ramp up production and meet demand. we're going to talk to ara hovnanian. it's a fox business exclusive. and since the major indices are down for the month, it may be time to beep up course -- beef up your portfolio. ticker symbol cal, holds cattle and lean hogs contract, it's up about 4.5% this month. dan's shaking his head. we'll be right back. ♪ ♪ [ kitt ] you know what's impressive?

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♪ ♪ >> i'm jo ling kent with your fox business brief. countries around the world are joining forces on illegal medications sold online. the fda along with 99 countries took action against more than 9600 web sites for apparently selling potentially dangerous and unapproved prescription drugs online. global drug sales may outpace passenger cars by the end of the decade as demand for falling deliveries in europe according to daimler chief executive wolfgang bernard. he said truck sales may expand by 50% by 2020.

and would you pay $13,000 for a tv? that's how much it'll cost customers in south korea for samsung's new curved 55-inch tv. the price tag is more than five times the cost of an lc dtv of the same size. samsung will start shipping the tvs to overseas markets in july. now we continue to our "countdown to the closing bell" today with cheryl casone. ♪ ♪ cheryl: the dow is up triple digits again today. nicole standing by at the new york stock exchange, and, of course, we've got jeff flock watching commodities at the cme. nicole, to you first. yahoo! and aol both moving higher today. what are you watching? >> right. it's a sea of green on wall street. we have a couple of names we do want to focus on. we'll begin with aol, bring it right to the post here. the stock is up 2.7% already which, of course, makes a lot of money from web video, now is trying to make more, and that's by, you know those pop-ups that

say you may also like this? because they know what you may like, for whatever reason they follow you and know these things? but they are teaming up with a web content recommendation engine, and so that should help them along and as a result with this news here, this stock is already up over 20% this year, continues to gain strength. also watching yahoo! today with an up arrow. they are adding jobs in nebraska, but big news is that they are going to be giving users the ability to customize their news stream. so that's interesting for those folks who are hot on yahoo! for news, because it'll be a little more customized, just what you like. that's the latest here on the floor of the new york stock exchange. now it's over to jeff flock. jeff? >> if you're going to customize your portfolio, nicole, i suggest you don't include gold. take a look at the intraday on gold today. settling now up a little -- well, up not on the day, but settling up from where it was at 1211.60. i look at the board here in

chicago, and i see 1202. so the futures still pretty bearish. today was the first day in three years gold got below 1200, trading there for a time. not a good day for gold. also not a good day for natural gas, even a worse day for natural gas in terms of another commodity mover down 4%. we're close to 3.50 again on nat gas, maybe a good time to get in. oil up today, up about a buck and a half, up about a percentage and a half, and corn, the last of the big movers today, down about a percent. i am in, though, the lean hog pit. why do you think i'm in the lean hog pit, cheryl, do you suspect? i'll tell you why whether you care or not. if you looked at all the commodities over the course of this past quarter, lean hogs is where you would have made most money. 8% up for the quarter, almost every other commodity crashed this quarter. crushed. crashed, whatever you want to call it. cheryl: more than light cattle. i'm actually surprised by that. >> more than live cattle although live cattle was the

other one that was up along the with rice. it's a clean pit, look at this. there's very little trash on the floor. traders on the floor of the cme. cheryl: there's a joke there, but gotta run. jeff flock live at the cme, thank you very much. well, increasing home sales and rising prices are signaling a steady housing recovery. how is one of the largest publicly-traded home builders feeling? let's ask ara love neighbor van, chairman, ceo and president of hovnanian enterprises joins me now. so many questions for you, but i do want to start with a quote you gave. demographics is destiny in the home-building business. who is your demographic right now? >> well, demographics in terms of the growing u.s. population. in the end, demand for our product is driven by population growth. and the good news is the population is growing in the united states right now. cheryl: where are we seeing that growth? because the baby boomers are still trying to build the portfolio, they're the ones that would either be going down to the smaller home or buying that second home, that retirement

home as well. that particular consumer which i know is crucial to you has been under pressure. what do you say? >> well, net-net take births minus deaths and look at marriages and divorces and the number of children, the number of households which is actually the key subsegment of population is projected to grow between 1.2 and 1.4 million people every year this decade. cheryl: i want to talk about your stock. it's been -- the housing sector of all the builders in 2012, the leading sector of the year last year. your stock is up almost 100% year-over-year, yet goldman sachs puts a sell on you. what do ceos when you see that, what do you say to yourself? do you roll your eyes? do you pound the table? >> you know, we have to do our primary business, and there's a lot of noise out there, and one moment everybody's excited about home builders or our stock, the next moment everybody's nervous. we just put our head down and keep marching forward. right now it's an incredible

opportunity by historical standards. we're out buying land, we're growing our revenues, growing our deliveries and our home prices just like case shiller are increasing and that's why our margins have been going up. cheryl: we've heard there's actually pressure in the construction industry to find construction workers because they all shifted trades five years ago. are you finding trouble getting those homes built, getting staffed to build? >> it is accurate. it is more challenging right now because housing sales and starts have been going up so much. it is more challenging. cheryl: let's talk about financing. you mentioned land deals. some of the smaller builders have reported they're having trouble getting financing to acquire new land. that's been crucial, obviously, for your business as well on a larger scale. does that affect you at all? >> it actually gives advantages to companies like ourselves that have access to long-term capital that private builders that depend on bank capital cannot get right now. so there's definitely more concentration, more land

acquisition, more deliveries coming from the larger home builder t -- builders right now. cheryl: interest rates today, two-year high for interest rates. you worried? >> you know, obviously, i'd love for them to stay as low as they are -- cheryl: we all would. [laughter] >> in 1983, the first year after the '81-'82 recession, mortgage rates were over 13%, and we had more than double the housing starts that we do right now. so people lose perspective. in the end, you've got to have shelter. the population's growing, you need more houses in the country. cheryl: but is that a lower income individual, medium income, high income? we are hearing that lower income individual is still not in the housing market which would signal there's an upside to be found here. >> i think you're exactly right. interestingly, the lower income or traditional first-time home buyer has not been able to come in as much because more no gang qualification -- mortgage qualification standards have gotten so strict, stricter than we've seen in decades and

decades, that it's difficult for them to enter. it will return to normal underwriting standards at some point and kick in afterburners on the recovery. cheryl: we're hearing still, yeah, banks are taking four, five, six months to get loans through the books. got to be frustrating. ara hovnanian, thank you for speaking with us exclusively today. >> glad to be here. cheryl: closing bell gonna ring, we've got 14 minutes to go. nike is going to be reporting earnings after the bell today. analysts are worried about the china impact. we're going to break down what it means for the stock, coming up next. ♪ ♪ we went out and asked people a simple question: how old is the olde person you'venown? we gave people a sticker and had them show us. we learned a lot of us have known someone who's lived well into their 90s. and th's a great thing but even though we're living longer, one thing that hasn't changed much is the oicial retirement age. ♪ the question is how do you make sure you have the money you need

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cheryl: nike set to report earnings aftr the bell today, the street expecting 74 cents a share,

about a 25% jump from this time last year. analysts expect nike to bring in $6.6 billion in revenue fueled largely by price hikes. corrine that friedman is equity research vice president and "wall street journal"'s number one rated clothing accessory analyst. she joins me now. you like nike. what are the top three things you're looking for in this report tonight? >> so we're going to take a look at growth margins, first of all. we're concerned they might be under pressure relative to their guidance. and walk that down last quarter. second, we're going to be looking at china and what's going on there. too muchs were -- futures were up last quarter for the first time positively. this quarter they warned that don't get too excited about that. the revenues might be a little bit lower than what the futures are guiding to, and we're also concerned about margins there in china. and lastly, we're looking for, you know, what's going on with running. running, basketball shoes have been boosting the quarter also with higher asp and we're

looking for slight improvement ii running which should help sentiment. cheryl: okay. what would be a catalyst for them to be seeing improvement in the running? >> weatter is turning finally in the northeast in particular. it was a cold and rainy spring. cheryl: that is a good point. i have not run in the park yet. right now you've got a neutral on the stock. right now you don't think the stock is really the right place to buy, but what is a good entry point? >> price target right now is 56. we do think it's trading 25% above with where it's -- its peak multiple has been. but we do like the stock, we do like the brand. we wouldn't be adding to the position, but we would be holding. cheryl: what kind of business do you like the most about nike? clothing, shoes, sponsorship deals, but is there a particular piece you like from apparel? aye got to ask you about this. >> well, we do like the basketball trend right now, 25-26% year to date.

we do think that's a fashion trend that's going to continue into the fall, so we do like that. cheryl: all right, you've got so much to say about nike, bringing you back for "after the bell." we're going to keep you hostage, you're going to come back with us as well. closing bell going to be ringing eight minutes from now, and three new companies are making their stock market debut today. we're going to show you how they're performing, coming up next. ♪ ♪ [ male announcer] surprise -- you're having triplets.

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of big debuts to talk about. let me give you these names before i turn it over to dave asman. first, hd supplies, a spin-off of home depot currently, that is one there. next we've got cdw corporations trading higher after its price at a bottom of a projected range, that it had lowered at the last minute actually. and then also tremor also debuted today. so three companies watching. there's tremor for you, trmr debuted today. so three new companies, david asman, debuting on a day when the dow up triple digits. david: bother? cheryl: we used to be neighbors, i know. david: both on screen and off screen. cheryl: we live a block apart. david: bottom line, nice market rally. so much has to do with what the federal reserve is telling people. i mean, this is a campaign, a real -- i've never seen an active cam bane by the -- campaign by the federal reserve.

jon hilsenrath knows what's going on like nobody else, he's going to come on to talk about this -- cheryl: you have a good report with him, and i know that ben bernanke and he have quite the relationship as well. david: and we've got more on jon corzine, leading to some fireworks during the last hour. we're going to continue that. let's go to nicole petallides at the new york stock exchange. you know, one of the biggest recipients of the benefits of all of this talk over the past week trying to get interest rates down a little bit have been home builders. they have been taking off pretty nicely, and today was no exception, right? >> reporter: right. they fluctuate based on what mortgage rates may be or other pieces of news, qe, but today another piece of news showing that pending home sales, existing home sales the highest levels in about six years, and that gave them a nice boost. cheryl: the national bank of greece taking a major hit today, nicole, this is your backyard. what happened? >> reporter: right. well, they had the short sale rule where they put a ban, you couldn't short some of these bank stocks. now they're reinstituting that,

and that could put pressure on them. david: nicole, we have somebody coming up who's saying financials should be avoided, that they're due for a comedown, but they have been doing very well in the past couple days, again, for the same reason as the home builders, because of the cheap money they think is going to continue to flow. >> reporter: right. and financials are doing very well, but they're a very volatile group. it'll be interesting to hear what the reasons are not to get in the group this time, but there are people thinking short term these markets are heading higherr but later in the summer, we may pull back across the board, financials and everything else. cheryl: nicole, we're looking at that group again, the top sector of 2012, but also you look at home builders, ara hovnanian was on talking about the fact that he still thinks the home builders have a lot of run to go. of course, the ceo of a home builder, but he made some very good points about interest rates and financing from banks that, actually, things are getting better. >> reporter: right. there are people who think you've got to speak positively.

david: and there is the closing bell. the closing bell on this thursday. here's the third day in a row we've had the market, a nice uptick in the market after a few down days and concerns we were going into that 5-6% slide that many people still think is coming before the end of the summer, but not so today. we are building on the gains of yesterday and the day before, up over 15,000. it's nice to see that number again. we haven't seen it in a while. s&p 500 also doing well, although percentage wise a little less than the dow. nasdaq up nicely, and look at the russell 2000, those small and mid-sized caps -- cheryl: right. david: really taking off. cheryl: dan veru was talking about them, he says you've got to go for small caps, play the small caps game. well, here is a look at your front page headlines. the labor department reporting initial jobless claims declined last week to 346,000. continuing claims also dropped, falling to the lowest level in more than a month. david: and this is good news. we've been worried about consumers because