CNBCfix - Fast Money Review

[CNBCfix Halftime Report/Fast Money Review Archive — July 2025]

July 31 just passed; get ready for a program chock-ful of JOET rebalancing

It didn't take long for Thursday's (7/31) Halftime crew, including guest host Frank Holland, to realize there was really nothing to talk about.

So Josh Brown talked about how great tech companies are (Zzzzzzzz). "Every one of us every morning should wake up and say 'Thank God for the AI/capex story,'" Brown said.

Jenny Harrington talked about how much money she's made on META but said it looks expensive now. Frank pointed out that Jenny's multiple is "27 and a half" while Frank says "our system" says 29. And since everyone on the show always has different multiples for the same stock, how does anyone actually know what the multiple is?

Bill Baruch said MSFT isn't even at a record high "relative to the Q's."

Bill also said AAPL is the lowest it's been relative to the Q's "since the summer of 2020."

Bill said there's "well-defined support" for META at 740.

Happy Birthday, Jessica — er, Jenny

Malcolm Ethridge on Thursday's (7/31) Halftime Report mentioned Google's payment to AAPL to be the dominant search engine, and then what he said set off the Spider Sense.

Malcolm said that "just that 1 payment alone represents something like 10% of Apple's earnings."

(We don't know if that means total earnings or services earnings, but actually, from the "AI" answers we got from Google searching, it sounds like Malcolm's in the ballpark this time.) (#PANW)

Josh Brown said that AMZN's multiple is 36 times earnings, the lowest it's been since coming public.

Leslie Picker recapped her interview with Jamie Dimon (Zzzzzzz). Jamie Dimon interviews on CNBC are always characterized as "wide-ranging," although we didn't hear that term Thursday.

Discussing FIG's pending IPO during the show, whichi Frank Holland kept referring to all during the program, Jenny Harrington said, "It smells like 1998."

Josh added to SHAK. Bill Baruch bought LNG, saying the EU will need LNG imports.

Bill said he doesn't know where the bottom is in copper but there's "quite a bit of upside in the 2nd half of the year." Jenny said there's huge demand for copper and "no end in sight."

Josh wished Jenny a Happy "30th birthday." Jenny said her birthday is Tuesday. Josh has previously suggested that Jessica Chastain could play Jenny in a movie. This page wholeheartedly agrees, wants to hear more about this topic, and wonders why this topic isn't discussed more often on the program.

Judge is still talking
about Eddy Cue

Jim Lebenthal on Wednesday's (7/30) Halftime Report said the market is "kind of overbought."

Jim predicted a "very good report" from MSFT, but he said the market's "ignoring all news" now. Jim said Joe Terranova, who was on the panel Wednesday, looked "askance" at him on Monday when Jim suggested a 5-7% pullback.

Jim demanded to know why Joe was "so down on the Alphabet price response???" Jim said GOOGL was "trickling higher and higher." Judge asked Jim what GOOGL is up since earnings; Jim said "about 4%." Judge said "It was up 20% into the print over the last 3 months."

Judge actually mentioned "the quote-unquote Eddy Cue selloff (snicker)."

Jim and Weiss both made GOOGL their Final Trade.

Jim said a company as large as MSFT going up 5% on the print would be "unhealthy."

Steve Weiss said he'll stick with META; "why would I sell." Judge wondered why Weiss is the only TSM long on the panel and didn't get much of an answer.

Joe at one point pronounced it "Microscoff" (sic) (snicker).

Joe referred to "revenue glowth (sic) (snicker)" of V before correcting himself.

Karen Finerman on Fast Money mentioned "GDChee" (sic) (snicker) before correcting herself.

Inferring momentum

On Wednesday's (7/30) Halftime Report, another predict-the-Fed exercise.

Judge told Joe Terranova that the S&P has gone 24 trading days "without a 1% move in either (pronounced EYE-ther) direction," the longest stretch since October 2024. (Or basically, the longest in 9 whole months.)

Joe said it's a "quiet market," which is what you "never sell," according to the slogan.

Joe said the Mag 7 has the most momentum he's seen since the fall of 2023. Judge said Joe was "inferring" momentum scores from the Mag 7; we're not quite sure "inferring" is the correct term, it's like someone reading off baseball stats and someone else saying those stats are "inferred," but maybe Joe was doing actual inferring.

Steve Weiss said the market is "without catalysts" now. Weiss gave the Fed a 10% chance of cutting on Wednesday. He predicted "more than one dissent."

Steve Liesman said the Halftime panelists are "so over tariffs," but the Fed is not.

Judge said Jackson Hole may carry a "special bit of weight" (snicker) this year.

Bryn Talkington said she doesn't see a cut today as even "on the table," but what will be interesting is what Donald Trump says after the Fed meeting. (This review was posted overnight Wednesday-Thursday.)

Weiss: FTAI to 200

In what became a needlessly lengthy discussion, Jim Lebenthal on Wednesday's (7/30) Halftime Report admitted he sold V; Judge aired a clip of Jim Cramer in the morning mocking V sellers.

Jim protested, "I'm selling high!"

Judge said V isn't back to its old high (we think that was June, and February also was higher than now) and Jim is selling in an "uptrend." Judge even tried to make a submarine analogy for Jim. Jim said the stock to him was "always overpriced"; he was just raising funds, but now he's "done raising cash."

Bryn Talkington said she's in "Camp Lebenthal" as far as not holding stocks forever, but there are few companies in the position of V.

Bryn said she started buying HOOD last December around the 40s. But Bryn's been called away at times, and now, "a lot of great news is priced in" and she wouldn't add at 105.

Steve Weiss said the most "cost-efficient" way to play crypto is the IBIT.

Late in the show, Weiss revealed he sold UNH, apparently around 267; he thinks it's "dead money" even though management is "doing all the right things."

Weiss added to FTAI and said "I think it can go to 200."

Judge promised Jeffrey Gundlach on Closing Bell, not on Wednesday after the Powell remarks, but Monday, when it's all had time to "marinate." We'll see if Jeffrey mentions "Mr. Magoo."

Judge raises a phenomenal question about the fast-food space

It was just a little soundbite at the end of the show.

But it was such a great question, we've got to hand it to Judge for a fantastic ad lib on Tuesday's (7/29) Halftime Report.

The subject was CMG, and Stephanie Link was saying you'll have to wait a quarter for the stock to get back on track, though she's "torn" (snicker) about whether to buy it now.

Stephanie then said CMG is "best in class."

Judge wondered, "What class is that, by the way."

Stephanie's answer was "quick serve."

That's a curious response. How is "quick serve" any different than "fast food"? And does Stephanie consider CMG in a different "class" than, say, SHAK or SBUX or PTLO or MCD?

Years ago, someone came up with "fast casual," for fast-food places that were considered more upscale, because "fast food" has kind of a stigma.

It's definitely true that there are people who go to Chipotle who won't set foot in Burger King or Arby's.

But whether the stocks should be regarded as different business models, we're a little skeptical.

Judge said the market's "debating" whether CMG is No. 1.

Joe suggests September cut is not priced in

Joe Terranova at the top of Tuesday's (7/29) Halftime Report said this market is a "classic example for me really of Buy high, take a pause, sell higher later."

Joe pointed out that Alphabet didn't have "good follow through" after strong earnings. Judge said "I get ya," but "we did run a lot into the number."

Josh Brown, citing SPOT and PYPL (this writer is long SPOT), said that companies beating are "somewhat rewarded," but those missing or just OK are getting "absolutely hammered." Josh said we still haven't gotten reports from the "most tariff-exposed sectors."

Joe maintained, "The bulls have 1 card in their pocket for this quarter, and I think that's the rate cut in September, and I don't know that it's priced in to the market yet." (Actually, we would say it's not, because this page is not as certain about that cut as Joe is.)

Kevin Simpson gushed about the "infrastructure" of RBLX, HOOD and AXP, which Kevin said all "control (snicker) the younger demographic."

Josh said a lot of people took "fliers" on certain "low-quality" names, which can "roll really hard" during selloffs, but most people aren't putting "serious money" into those parts of the market.

Joe predicts lower SPOT

Tuesday's (7/29) Halftime crew took up SPOT. (This writer is long SPOT.)

With SPOT on the screen graphic trading at 617, Joe Terranova predicted, "The stock probably will fall further," because "it is owned" and people are "overweight" in positioning.

Joe said it was a good quarter, but the problem was higher expenses in employee compensation. Joe insisted it's got "multiple tailwinds" and "12 months from now, you'll certainly be rewarded."

In Final Trades, Josh Brown said SPOT was down "too much" and he was looking to buy.

By the end of the day, it was at $620, so we'll see if Joe's right about it going lower.

If all the Halftime panelists have been promising for so long that the cybersecurity space will consolidate, why haven’t they been telling people to buy the smaller players instead of CRWD and PANW?

In a rare breaking-stock-news discussion on the Halftime Report, Judge's panel on Tuesday (7/29) got to take a crack in real-time at the PANW-CYBR news.

Stephanie Link said buying Cyberark would make PANW's revenue "skyrocket," though she's "not happy" that PANW was down on the news, but she thinks it's a good long-term move.

Stephanie said "the big 5" are just going to get bigger and bigger. Josh Brown said "there are too many vendors" in the space, so this is a "super-rational" deal.

Joe Terranova, who historically likes to mention Palo Alto, invoked Pete Najarian in stating, "This would be an absolutely phenomenal acquisition for Palo Alto." Kevin Simpson too said buying Cyberark would be a great deal for PANW.

On Fast Money, Guy Adami said the day's price action in PANW was not good, and the stock may be "dicey" for a while.

‘8th inning’ on ‘tariff stuff’

Stephanie Link, who can't entertain the thought of bearishness with anything, said on Tuesday's (7/29) Halftime Report that UNH's tumble "wasn't about the quarter; it was about the guidance."

Stephanie said the new CEO is "kitchen-sinking" the quarter. Stephanie said she "always expected" that 2026 would be the turnaround year.

Joe Terranova said RCL's report wasn't perfect, "and it needed to be perfect."

Josh Brown talked up utilities and said DTE is his favorite.

Joe said the market seems to be "somewhat yawning" at reports about the China tariff talks. Stephanie bluntly said, "I think we're in like the 8th inning on all this tariff stuff." Kevin Simpson said he's anticipating a 90-day extension.

Joe made some buys in energy, specifically refiners, MPC, PSX and VLO. He didn't want to concentrate in 1 name, so he divided the outlay into 3 stocks.

Santoli was squeezed in at the 56-minute mark. To our surprise, instead of getting just a soundbite, he was able to deliver a full spiel, but it was because Judge was skipping the typical commercial block just before Final Trades.

A comment about seasonal ‘weird stuff’ brings memories of Jeremy Siegel’s call for an emergency 50-basis-point rate cut in August 2024

Joe Terranova opened Monday's (7/28) Halftime Report saying the market "feels exhausted," but he's not saying "sell out of your positions," just "don't be an aggressive buyer up here."

Judge decided that "'exhaustion' implies something more dramatic than a 'rest.'"

Steve Weiss said he agrees with Joe that there's not a short term "bull case," but he's not sure the market's exhausted.

Jim "Gangbusters" Lebenthal said we've got a "solid expectation" that the Fed won't "raise rates" (snicker) (wouldn't the president like that) but will "telegraph" a cut in September.

"The market has climbed the wall of worry," Jim asserted, adding, "Seasonally (sic redundant), this is the time of year where weird stuff happens," citing last year's yen-carry selloff (oh yeah, the Jeremy Siegel gift that Guy Adami called an "out of body experience" on the part of Jeremy) (see our archive).

Joe was suggesting sentiment has become a lot stronger in 6-8 weeks, but then Judge said that Tom Lee is still calling this "a hated V-shaped recovery." Weiss scoffed that he's been hearing that for a "decade."

Judge said he has trouble with the notion of "overt bullishness" and "there's still a healthy dose of skepticism." Weiss said "they're overtly whining" but still fully invested.

At one point, Judge was back to talking about his "4-legged chair" (snicker) in which he originally either mentioned 4 or 5 legs depending on your interpretation (see below).

Jim was talking about having dry powder to use in selloffs but not rushing in right now. Judge said Jim was "talkin' out of both sides of your mouth," being "a little cavalier" about shrugging at a 5-7% drop as "no big whoop" when Judge says it would be "a little bit painful." Jim acknowledged, "there is a little bit of talking out of both sides of my mouth."

Jim actually cites law of large numbers for ADBE’s struggles; Guy hints at 325 for UNH

Judge on Monday's (7/28) Halftime Report said Wolfe trimmed its ADBE target. Jim Lebenthal said he's on his "last nerve (snicker) with this stock." He's giving it 1 more earnings report.

Joe Terranova said ADBE is getting "cannibalized" by AI. Jim said it's not, but he didn't mean "to get so uproarious (snicker)" with Joe, prompting chuckles from Steve Weiss, Joe and Judge. Jim protested that ADBE trades like it's going to get clobbered, but it's not happening. Joe asked Jim about the "significant deceleration in revenue." Jim suggested it reflects "the law of large numbers." Weiss said we don't know how ADBE "shakes out" with AI.

Joe said the competition for SPOT has "focused elsewhere," so SPOT is "in a good position" and has had a 10% pullback in July, so there's an opportunity to get in. (This writer is long SPOT.)

Joe asserted that PG is "eating the tariff costs." Judge pointed out that "staples aren't exactly in favor." Joe said it's "more about" incurring tariff costs. Judge countered that "Tariffs haven't even been in place that long." Joe said PG "rolled over in March," which was the "beginning stages" of preparing for tariffs.

Judge peppered Weiss to make a defense of UNH given that Weiss owns the stock. Weiss admitted "I don't know" what will happen with the earnings report. Weiss said the stock can get past $300 but it won't happen overnight. (Um, check out Guy Adami's opinion below.)

Santoli said we've got a "much more uninhibited (snicker) market."

Weiss bought UBER and predicted a "good quarter."

On Monday's Fast Money, Karen Finerman noted how much some stocks such as NFLX (this writer is long NFLX) have rallied since early April. "You've gotta have some protection," Karen said.

Guy Adami suggested UNH gets back to 325 and stated, "Anything just on the margins that's encouraging, and this stock goes up 25, 30 dollars tomorrow."

But what does Eddy Cue think about PLTR’s valuation?

Rob Sechan at the top of Friday's (7/25) Halftime Report predicted earnings will deliver (Zzzzzzzzz). But Rob said "speculative fervor" is "starting to overtake markets" and is something we should pay attention to.

Stephanie Link admitted, "I worry about it a lot."

Judge curiously said he gets the sense that "there's a chair, and 3 legs of the chair are really strong. The earnings, the economy, the consumer, the outlook, whatever (those are actually 4 things). One leg has some cracks in it. That's the meme stocks, that's the momentum stuff, that's the low-quality stuff, that's the high-beta stuff, and everything is fine assuming that leg doesn't break off the chair."

Jim Lebenthal, who had a quiet show, said, "I'm not worried about that leg breaking off."

Jason Snipe declared, "I don't play in that sandbox." That prompted Judge to interject that some of those high-beta names are quality companies such as PLTR, and, "Let's not act like, 'Oh, I don't own any of that ... stuff,'" Judge said, emphasizing the word "stuff" multiple times.

Rob said he has "episodically trimmed" (snicker) MSFT.

Stephanie said IBM being down 10% was a "gift."

Steve Liesman said he's still wondering why Sen. Tim Scott wasn't wearing a hard hat during Donald Trump's visit to the Fed; Steve called the event "bizarre."

Jim asserted, "We're gettin' a lot of decrease (snicker) in trade policy uncertainty."

Rob bought more NRG. Rob bought more GILD.

Stephanie said she's "thinking about" what to do with CMG.

Stephanie said the CMG chart "was rolling over just before Brian Niccol actually left."

Jim suggested if you have a "doomsday scenario," then "gold is the place to be."

On Fast Money, Karen Finerman said the VIX "broke 15 today" and she "put on some market hedges," suggesting the market has come "too far, too fast."

Guy Adami no longer thinks Powell’s firing is ‘imminent’

On Thursday's (7/24) Fast Money, which started off with Eamon Javers continuing his Donald Trump/Jerome Powell coverage, Guy Adami took up the possibility of Jay getting fired.

Guy admitted, "I don't think necessarily that something is imminent. I thought that a couple weeks ago (sic) (actually just a week ago). I thought he was at a point of anger where he was gonna push a button over the weekend. Doesn't look like it's gonna happen."

Judge mentions Eddy Cue but just misses Donald Trump’s trip to the Federal Reserve

Judge on Thursday's (7/24) Closing Bell mentioned "the Eddy Cue selloff" on Closing Bell, as he had earlier on the Halftime Report (see below).

But Closing Bell ended a little too soon to catch any coverage of Donald Trump's trip to the Federal Reserve, so that event ended up on Closing Bell Overtime (they had to wind the coverage around Stacy Rasgon).

Eamon Javers contended that, "As provocative as this visit to the Fed is," Javers saw it as "the president backing off of Jay Powell," citing Donald Trump's answer to the question of whether the remodeling is a "fireball offense," which was, "No, I wouldn't put it in that category."

Jon Fortt agreed "that is what the president said, verbally, but visually, it seemed to me he was communicating something different."

Continuing on Fast Money, Eamon called it "dramatic," a "power play," "unprecedented" and "awkward."

Jim gave the Eddy Cue selloff the Heisman

The top of Thursday's (7/24) Halftime Report featured Judge wearing that coral jacket that he doesn't wear very often a robust discussion about Alphabet/GOOGL.

Judge mentioned "the Eddy Cue selloff" (snicker) at the top of the show and then gave Jim Lebenthal credit for calling that GOOGL selloff overblown. Jim said he's definitely not saying Google has a "monopoly," but it's a "competitive race" in which Google is strong, and that Alphabet is "more than just search."

Jim said you can "buy it right here," which Kevin Simpson agreed with. Kevin said Jim's no "dinosaur" and that Kevin is "almost exclusively Google" on his phone, and on his PC, it's "70% Google, 30% ChatGPT." (On the other hand, Jenny Harrington, who wasn't on Thursday, says she's "borderline" as to not even using Google search anymore.) (See below.)

Malcolm Ethridge said an Alphabet "breakup would be great" because he'd love to own YouTube as a standalone entity. Malcolm said for now, Google's AI tools on Samsung phones "blow anything Apple has right now out of the water," but Apple's bound to catch up, so Malcolm doesn't see a reason to own Alphabet.

Jim said it would "worry" him more if everyone was pro-Alphabet. Josh Brown asked Jim, "Why was Google paying Apple $50 billion to be the default search engine on every Apple IOS device."

Jim responded, "You're speaking rhetorically, right? It's to get traffic."

Josh said "No" and stressed the "$50 billion" again. Jim admitted, "That's a cost," and Jim was actually "happy" that those costs came in above expectations.

Josh stressed that it's a "highly cyclical company" dependent on ad spend, and the report is confirmation that the economy held up.

Judge said it's a "gift" to Alphabet owners that the stock isn't "overly expensive." Jim said "too much bad news was priced in."

What does Eddy Cue think of the cost of the Fed building renovation?

A portion of Thursday's (7/24) Halftime Report was spent on TSLA/UBER.

Kevin Simpson, who's long TSLA, admitted that he can't make a fundamental case to buy TSLA now but, of course, you can sell. Out. Of. The. Money. Calls. Against it.

Jim Lebenthal said that as a GM owner, it makes him "shudder" (snicker) to think of TSLA's valuation, and "if this thing got valued as a car company, it's down 90%, and I'm being- I'm being generous."

Josh said "the profitable part of the business" for TSLA is selling environmental credits, which isn't as robust apparently as in previous quarters.

Josh repeated his old saw about UBER trading opposite to whatever the TSLA news is.

Judge said MH's IPO was experiencing "not the greatest open." Josh said they should call it "McGraw Hill AI," a good point.

Jim said "the airline industry has clearly decided that there are 2 companies that are working," DAL and UAL, and it's "kinda surprising" that AAL can't join them. Jim said he still tracks TSA passenger counts and there are "healthy flows," even if some parts of the planes have more demands than others (maybe it comes down to where Eddy Cue sits on planes).

Josh Brown bought more OTIS and called it "recession-proof."

Kevin Simpson touted how much he made "in a few short hours" selling a covered call on RTX.

Josh said the CMG chart is a "mess." (Wonder if Eddy Cue eats there.)

Josh said it's a "shame" that they don't talk enough about CBOE.

Malcolm said SPOT has "still got room to go." (This writer is long SPOT.) Josh wondered, "How did Apple let them get to 700 million users?" Kevin said, "I use both products ... they own this space. Spotify blows it away."

Steve Grasso says CMG is a ‘bad setup’ for trying to order more than 1 thing

On Wednesday's (7/23) Fast Money, Steve Grasso made some interesting observations about Chipotle.

Steve said it was a "big thing" for the company to lose Brian Niccol; "everything that is inflationary is on their menu."

But that wasn't the most interesting comment. Rather, Steve explained that "trying to order more than 1 thing" at Chipotle is virtually impossible. It's a "bad setup," Steve says, and would require Chipotle to be "2 deep in people" to properly handle orders.

Jeremy Siegel says the right move for Powell is to resign

We happened to catch Jeremy Siegel on Judge's Closing Bell on Wednesday (7/23). Jeremy indicated the market looks good, with a fairly high level of enthusiasm actually.

At the end of the discussion, Judge asked Jeremy about comments Jeremy apparently made Friday suggesting Jay Powell should resign.

Jeremy on Wednesday said, good or bad, he wants Donald Trump to "own" this economy, that if things go south, the Fed will be blamed, and if things go great, Trump will get the credit, and that Powell is already sort of a lame duck, and that presidents appoint Fed officials all the time, so it's not like presidents aren't always exerting influence over the Fed.

Jeremy also acknowledged that he thinks rates should be lower.

Judge questioned if a Powell exit would be a "slippery slope."

Judge is back!

On Wednesday's (7/23) Fast Money, Gene Munster asserted that the Alphabet earnings results demonstrate that "Google is a habit."

Hours earlier, ahead of the earnings, 1) Judge was back on the Halftime Report, and 2) Steve Weiss protested that he got rid of 95% of his GOOGL position, so even if it doubled from here, "it really wouldn't matter."

Judge referred to the "Eddy Cue selloff" (snicker) and said GOOGL is up 25% since then. Jenny Harrington shrugged, "That's a small time period." Jenny said it's up 1% YTD and 5% over the last 52 weeks.

Jenny said, "I am borderline not using Google to search anymore." Weiss said the multiple already reflects that. Judge said Alphabet has "always" been the cheapest of the Mag 7.

"Google has all of our data," said Bryn Talkington, and it could easily "make a really powerful AI assistant," but it would "freak everybody out."

Judge noted the big slide in FI; Jenny Harrington said she bought more. Jenny started off saying she paid $25 a share for it 12 years ago (which doesn't really mean anything today except a big tax bill to come, but whatever). "This is the definition of a permanent compounder," Jenny insisted.

Because of a technical issue, we weren't quite able to catch the entire Halftime Wednesday. (Blame the IT Dept.)

Judge asked Joe Terranova if Weiss "behaved himself" while Judge was off.

Joe said the market's been a "continuation of really, really good news" while Judge was away.

Actually, they want the correct answer, not scraped AI slop from Reddit or Wiki

On Tuesday's (7/22) Halftime Report, Josh Brown described internet usage this way:

"The consumer has grown accustomed to a new way of search. They don't want Google to tell them which website to go to to find the answer. They just want the answer," Brown asserted.

At the top of the show, guest host Frank Holland said "front and center" is whether the rally is on "fumes" (snicker).

Josh said if you're a "serious investor," then "a pause would be absolutely fine."

Josh pointed out what KSS was doing and said it would be a mistake to point to stocks such as that one as "indicative of a toppy market."

Joe Terranova again started off with the "semiconductor industry (a term he used twice) (Zzzzzz)." Confusing cause with effect, Joe said if you're looking for a bearish signal, it would be if semiconductor stocks stalled despite great earnings.

Kate Moore, who hasn't been on the show in ages, said some Megacap Tech names are "extremely well-owned."

Joe said despite their run, financials are the "3rd lowest valuation out of 11 S&P sectors." In any discussion of banks, someone is bound to advise owning the "money-center banks" rather than the regionals (that was Joe this time). Joe mentioned SCHW and IBKR; Josh said he thinks IBKR goes "way higher."

Joe complains about capital-loss deduction being capped at $3,000 since 1978

Eamon Javers on Tuesday's (7/22) Halftime reported on remarks at the White House (which typically interrupts the program, but Tuesday, they didn't go to it live).

Eamon said there's talk about dropping capital gains taxes on housing sales. Guest host Frank Holland suggested "every Realtor in America" may be having "champagne" over that news.

Joe Terranova offered, "There's a lot of nuanced things that the administration could do. One of the things that bothers me is since 1978, the capital loss deduction in this country has been $3,000. Think about that. Since 1978, that's all you could deduct, is $3,000. I think it's time to take a look at that as well."

This page doesn't disagree with Joe (and we certainly have zero expertise in tax advice), but we have to note that there's a little more to the story, that the rest of those losses actually can be carried forward, so if you happen to lose 50 grand in a year on stocks, you deduct 3 grand, you can take the 47 grand later.

Stephanie Link said she's "excited" about the execution of DHI; she likes the stock "a lot" for the long term but the sector does need interest rates to come down.

Joe said defense and aerospace stocks have tilted toward aerospace. Josh suggested TOST could be "in the running" to join the S&P by year-end.

Josh suggested EXE and DE might be losing momentum, though he wouldn't "overreact" to the DE pullback.

Stephanie Link said she bought FCX. Joe said the stock also benefits from the price of gold climbing. Josh said "this chart looks great" and "I think Steph's gonna make some money here."

Weiss says buying the dip isn’t anything ‘brilliant’

Early into Monday's (7/21) Halftime Report, guest host Courtney Reagan told Steve Weiss that Mike Wilson thinks "dips are meant to be bought."

Weiss said "I don't think that's anything that's brilliant," adding that the market's at an all-time high, so "dips are always meant to be bought."

Weiss said that what Mike really means is that it's been "so long" since we've had a "meaningful" correction that actually lasted a long time. (Actually it was late 2021 through 2022; can always root for another one of those.)

Weiss suggested staying with winners, even if they get a little overvalued.

Sarat Sethi agreed with Courtney that there are issues for the market, such as, there's still a tariff overhang and a couple of wars going on, but earnings have been OK.

Amy Raskin suggested there's "a lot of good news baked into earnings."

Amy said September is "usually not a great month."

Joe Terranova (who clearly doesn't really understand how these personal battles work) actually said with a straight face that Donald Trump "can just sit back and wait" because the data will prompt the Fed to lower rates.

Joe said we've had a V-shaped recovery, which Joe said is "very difficult for human beings to emotionally engage in (snicker)." Joe said tech earnings could be a catalyst in "either (pronounced EYE-ther) direction."

Joe pointed out the momentum in semiconductors and said the SMH is "absolutely your tell" and "ultimate indicator" as to whether the market keeps climbing.

CLF soars, and Jim’s not on the show

On Monday's (7/21) Halftime Report, Steve Weiss jabbed at "all these analysts" who hiked NFLX targets ahead of what was a great earnings report and "did nobody any favors" because despite the report and guidance, "people start seeing ghosts" and sell the stock. (This writer is long NFLX.)

Weiss said even if someone told him META was going to miss in this report, "I'm gonna do nothing about it. Because I'm not gonna pay taxes."

Sarat Sethi talked up YouTube as the underrated part of GOOGL, but Amy Raskin said she's "kinda underweight" because it will trade on "search."

Amy said, "Google will do better if AI slows down." Joe Terranova said, "I don't think that's happening."

Weiss said you can't convince TSLA bulls that the stock's overvalued, that Elon Musk "doesn't care about corporate governance" or that he's doing too much. Weiss said Jim Chanos kept a "whole spreadsheet (snicker) of everybody that left" at TSLA. Weiss even said, "It's really even not worth talking about in my view," even though he talks about it all the time.

Guest host Courtney Reagan said Morgan Stanley raised its UBER target to 115 from 95. Joe said it may not get to $100 before August earnings, but ultimately $100 will be a "floor."

Weiss had throat-clearing issues, especially while relating once again the Brad Jacobs story/QXO.

Weiss said Brad brings a "Tupperware container" with homemade lunch to work.

Amy Raskin trimmed GS because it's had a good run, and the decision was "kind of justified" because the stock didn't move much after earnings.

Joe said BRK's position in DPZ "maybe hasn't worked out particularly well" and that BRK also has positions in Japan, also some of its big energy positions haven't been working as well as others.

Jenny: ‘I don’t see how we end up up 14% on the year. I don’t think we have another 7% in the 2nd half’

Jenny Harrington opened Friday's (7/18) Halftime Report saying what she always says she doesn't see big gains in the market, of course citing "stretched" valuation.

Jenny stated, "I don't see how we end up up 14% on the year. I don't think we have another 7% in the 2nd half." But Jenny said the market probably won't go down much either, so it'll all be a "meh."

But Jenny said Megacap Tech is only a "little" stretched in valuation. "Apple's on the short list. Google's kind of on the short list," Jenny said, and after Steve Weiss wondered if that meant stocks to short; Jenny said no, she means on the "short list" to buy.

Weiss scoffed at the NFLX selloff. (This writer is long NFLX.) "Netflix has sold off so many times on earnings that if you sold because of that, then, you made a mistake," Weiss said, adding that the 5% drop Friday is "nothing" and suggested it's because analysts raised price targets going into the print and traders sold the news.

After the A Block, Julia Boorstin recapped the NFLX earnings call. Julia said "with no major surprises" in the report, "more analysts are on the sidelines."

Kevin Simpson said he wrote a covered call a day ago on half his NFLX position ahead of earnings, a $1,245 July 25 strike for $57 that he was able to close out Friday morning for $12. The implied volatility of these big names going into earnings is something you "almost can't resist," Kevin said. Kevin nevertheless said it's a stock you can own "forever."

Jenny said DIS and NFLX are "completely different businesses."

Weiss said "my bet" is that the Aug. 1 tariff deadline gets extended. "I think the mistake they made, uh, the administration, was, advertising 'We're gonna get this done quickly.' Trade deals take a long- they take years." Though Weiss said we'll see "agreements in principle."

Weiss agreed with Jenny on valuation and stated, "I don't see the Fed easing in September." Jenny said she doesn't see it either.

Weiss said Donald Trump has put Jay Powell "back on his heels a little bit" and as a result, Powell is probably "more resistant to cutting."

Kevin noted the big run of HOOD since April but "I'm not ready to bet against it." Kevin said profit-taking in PLTR makes sense, but "I'm just not ready to get out of it," and he can write calls against stocks that may be "a little bit extended."

Jenny said she sees "pockets of froth." (She said that term about 3-4 times.)

Guest host Frank Holland said "50% of the earnings are coming from the Mag 7." Weiss said he owns Mag 7 stocks and bluntly stated that he's "glad" they're such a high percentage of the S&P earnings and "I'd love 'em to be 75% of the S&P."

Weiss stated, "We keep citing all these numbers like, '30 years since you had this kind of spread in valuation.' Who cares?" Weiss explained that these companies' balance sheet and management all factor into the valuation.

Jenny complained that "growth differentials are narrowing" for Megacap Tech.

Weiss claimed AI is "the fastest adoption of any technology in history."

Kevin sold a 180 call, but Bryn suggested NVDA $200 back on July 2

Kevin Simpson on Friday's (7/18) Halftime Report said he doesn't know if he'd be buying TSLA ahead of the print, but he called it a "call-writer's dream."

Kevin said he wrote a 1-month covered call at 180 on NVDA for $3.50. Steve Weiss noted those calls expire before the next NVDA report.

Kevin bought more AAPL, saying he "liquidated" his position last December at 247½.

Viewers heard that we're now looking at 15-20% tariffs on Europe.

Kevin bought HD and mentioned high rates. Guest host Frank Holland said the average 30-year is 6.8% and noted, "It seems to trade on the mortgage rates."

Jenny Harrington said there's a "huge bifurcation" between high-end consumers and apparently lower-end consumers and said AXP's customer base is still doing well.

Angelica Peebles provided an update on SRPT. Kevin said the catalyst for LLY is delivering an "oral drug." Jenny said MTRN is in her disciplined growth strategy and it's a stock never talked about on the show. Jenny first said it's "down 5% year to date" but then said it's "down 6% this year," but it was up "a lot" before this year.

Jenny said she owns VZ as "kind of a bond equivalent." Kevin Simpson said "Go IBM."

For Final Trades, Weiss said NFLX, Kevin said RTX and Jenny said FCX, a name that in the early days of Fast Money was mentioned all the time but nowadays, not so much.

Josh claims he’s the person ‘most associated with Nvidia’

On Thursday's (7/17) Halftime Report, Josh Brown said he is giving followers "permission" to sell NVDA.

Josh bluntly explained, "For the last 11 years, I've become the person that's been the most associated with Nvidia ... People walk up to me on the street, they comment to me in stores, airports, you name it."

Josh said the question he's getting now is not does he still like NVDA, it's "should I sell some Nvidia." Josh said he's not selling, but for those who are "nervous," with a market cap at $4 trillion, it's OK to sell.

Guest host Frank Holland questioned whether Josh or Cramer is "most associated with Nvidia." Josh insisted, "I came on this show in 2015 and I said Nvidia should be in the FANG. And that's when Netflix was the 'N.'"

Sure sounds like everyone on Halftime is expecting a pullback

At the beginning of Thursday's (7/17) Halftime Report, Josh Brown said it's "very obvious" that "now is not the time to be getting more bullish than you were a month ago, or 6 weeks ago," and we wondered how that's "very obvious." #soundslikeamarkettimingcall

Joe Terranova again mentioned the September rate cut he's been predicting and suggested there's not really an "inflection point" in the market now, but he advised staying "anchored."

Moments later, Joe echoed Josh, stating, "You probably don't wanna get more bullish right here." #soundslikeanothermarkettimingcall

Bill Baruch is trimming the QQQ. (This writer is long QQQ.) Bill crowed a bit about, "This is why you take risks like we did in April," that you can "monetize it right here." Bill predicted some "churn" in the market. Bill said he can see a great 2nd half but only after we "work through the digestion of the run." #soundslikeyetanothermarkettimingcall

Joe actually claims ‘Apple TV’s not so bad’

Bill Baruch revealed on Thursday's (7/17) Halftime Report that he bought more AAPL, stating, "When Apple's unloved, you close your eyes, and you buy it."

Josh Brown backed the move but said "it's a little bit technically in no-man's land." Josh said pressure's on Tim Cook for a new product and predicted anticipation for whenever that comes and pointed out that AAPL going to 250 is no different than a $21 stock going to $25.

Joe Terranova actually said with a straight face, "Look, I heard so many years ago that ... Apple should buy Netflix, because Apple is behind in streaming ... they probably should've, but OK, they- they ended up OK. Apple TV's not so bad. ... They come around eventually." (As if NFLX would be what it is today if AAPL had bought it 10 years ago.) (This writer is long NFLX.)

As a matter of fact, during the show's Daily NFLX Conversation®, Joe said he'll stay "anchored" to the position; he's "willing to ride through" a possible correction.

Josh hailed NFLX for dropping the quarterly subscriber updates and said that it's profitability that matters. Guest host Frank Holland wondered if "average revenue per user" is important. Josh said "guidance" is what matters, and Bill said "margins." Josh said "transparency is good," but NFLX has "retrained (snicker) the Street" into recognizing this is a "business" and not a guessing "game" like "jellybeans in a jar."

On Thursday's Fast Money, Karen Finerman observed that NFLX basically met high expectations and the Street/options market correctly guessed the afterhours move.

‘Have to be long’ bitcoin

Bill Baruch on Thursday's (7/17) Halftime Report said bitcoin has a "lot of tailwinds" and if it stays above $110,000, $112,000, "you have to be long."

Joe Terranova said he's not going to be "overwhelmingly excited about the airlines," though he said Jim Lebenthal (who wasn't on Thursday's show) "gets all giddy about airlines" and "congratulations, Jimmy."

Bill trimmed CAT, WAB and MTZ. Joe said the JOET has a "significant overweight" to industrials and that industrials are the year's top sector. Joe talked up PWR, which looks like it would've been a great buy in early April.

Josh Brown said he finally unloaded PFE. He said he didn't lose much money on it, but it's hard to find a stock as bad as this one.

One of the stocks on Josh's best-stocks list is JOBY. Josh said he "brought the stock to the show" on June 17 (actually June 12); he didn't expect that it'd be "up 104% since then." Josh reiterated that it's "highly speculative" and he's not telling people to buy it right now, but it's an exciting company.

Josh said FAST is the "Amazon of the construction business" and that for a couple years, every dip in the stock is getting bought.

Josh said he has sat through "maybe 500" SHAK downgrades. He said it's had an "outstanding run" and it would make sense to consolidate.

Bill said he could be adding to MCD in "coming weeks."

Josh said there's a "fundamental story" in TOST as well as momentum.

Guy Adami suggests a weekend Powell firing, while Karen says such a move would ‘get crypto moving’

Wednesday's (7/16) Fast Money, guest hosted by Court (above), led off with a crisp discussion about the possibility of Jerome Powell being fired.

Steve Grasso called this "much ado about nothing" and pointed out "Philip Jefferson would take over," and Philip Jefferson was appointed by Joe Biden, so Donald Trump wouldn't get the "wanted result," and "if you can't get the wanted result, why do it."

But if we did get a selloff (presumably on a firing), Steve said, "that would be the greatest buying opportunity of the last couple of weeks," but Grasso suggested "I don't even think we'd get a selloff," the market has "moved past this."

Tim Seymour though said, "I actually do think that if he was fired, it's a big deal," even though markets could "shrug." Tim questioned what 25 more basis points would do and said the "biggest risk" would be the long end of the curve in 6 months or more.

Karen Finerman said she agrees with Tim in that if Powell actually were fired, the market would react "much more dramatically." Karen further stated that if the Fed chair is fired, "you will get crypto moving. For sure." Karen suggested that maybe such a possibility has been moving recent crypto prices.

Guy Adami said of Donald Trump's interest in firing Powell, "I do actually think he's gonna give it a shot ... over the weekend, and, you know, he's gonna wait until Friday or Saturday because that's typically when people wait for these things. Danny Moses calls them the Friday Night Dirties, and I think there's a real possibility of that happening."

Guy pointed out that there's still "considerable pressure on the U.S. dollar," which Guy said may be the goal. Guy said that "When you're in a $37 trillion hole sitting on top of a $27 trillion economy, you're not gonna grow your way out, you're gonna sorta devalue-your-currency your way out."

Steve Liesman joined and Court said Steve Liesman wasn't supposed to be working Wednesday. Steve said he's "really worried" that Karen is right, if the "strategy" is to "pump up crypto," then "that's the most dangerous strategy I could possibly think of."

Steve Liesman then credited Tim Seymour with the observation about the dollar being in "danger" if we go to a "Third World Federal Reserve Bank," while it was only Guy who spoke about the dollar.

Courtney suggested other presidents have disagreed with Fed leaders before, but this feels "markedly different." Steve Liesman said "there is absolutely nothing like this," there's not "any analog" to these kinds of public statements from a president about a Fed chair. Steve Liesman said someone told him it's to "distract from Epstein" and someone else said it's to "distract from the deficit."

Given another opportunity after the Loretta Mester interview, Grasso stated, "I think every Fed chair is a political person."

Weiss says Powell has done a ‘great job’

Evidently it's now "highly unlikely" that Jay Powell gets fired, according to news reported on Wednesday's (7/16) Halftime Report, which was guest hosted by Frank Holland.

Joe Terranova said if Jay got fired, the "2 trouble spots" would be the dollar and the "long end of the curve."

Joe then reiterated his prediction that there will be a cut Sept. 17, so "the president doesn't have to do this."

Steve Weiss said the market has taken a "wait and see attitude." Weiss said the Fed post has been "sacred ground" and there has to be "checks and balances in government, and that's one of the critical ones."

Weiss said it'd be a "mistake" to cut rates just to "support their tax bill" and "help all their friends around the country, right, similar to what is being done with private equity."

Weiss doesn't think it'd be a "good thing for the market." Weiss called Kevin Hassett "obviously smart" but "he's also a sycophant." Weiss said of Powell, "He's made mistakes, but I think he's overall done a great job."

Joe and Weiss disagreed over whether there's data supporting NOT cutting (Joe said there isn't) or justifying cutting (Weiss said there isn't). Weiss said, "I don't think that September's a slam dunk at all."

Sarat Sethi pointed out, "The more you refinance short term, the higher the rate's gonna go long term."

Later in the show, Weiss said to "follow the path" on crypto; he said it'll keep the momentum, and "eventually they'll find a use case for it." (Seems like Karen Finerman found one on Fast Money.)

Weiss made IBIT his Final Trade.

Joe warns that PLTR could ‘easily’ have a 25-30% drop over next 6 months

On Wednesday's (7/16) Halftime Report, Joe Terranova said bank stocks in the wake of earnings look like "Good news and bad price action."

Joe said there could be a correction in financial stocks, "which candidly is a little bit overdue."

Steve Weiss talked up GS despite however it was trading. Sarat Sethi was enthusiastic about banks but not terribly excited about BAC, saying it's like a "jack of all trades" and it's the only big bank on his "watch list." Sarat moments later clarified to guest host Frank Holland that if there's a pullback, he'd add to MS, not BAC, where the catalysts are harder to find. Joe made a lengthy case for money-center banks over regionals (Zzzzzzz).

Sarat Sethi said he's not "taking a victory lap" on JNJ.

Sarat said DEO has been "terrible" since Debra Crew became CEO, "stock's down 40%." Joe kind of shrugged that TSLA got a "technical bounce" since July 4 week, "but it's a very strong one."

Mizuho actually raised PLTR to "neutral." Joe said he has to be "a little bit careful" about discussing the stock because we're nearing rebalancing for the JOET. Joe said PLTR is up like 400+% in the past year, and the JOET bought it at 16 in early 2024. Joe cautioned about "elevated volatility" and said if he were making the call on whether to keep the stock, he's not sure he would've kept it this long. Joe said the stock could "easily" fall 25-30% over 6 months. Joe called PLTR "arguably the No. 1 identifiable momentum stock in the market."

Frank actually called Weiss "Joe." Weiss again talked up Brad Jacobs and QXO.

Joe said it "seems to make sense" that private equity would become available in 401(k) plans. Weiss said he's "not so sure investors don't do better just buying the indices, buying the S&P and buying the Q's."

Notice how CNBC spells ‘estimates’

Jim Lebenthal on Tuesday's (7/15) Halftime Report said he was telling guest host Frank Holland before the show that he'd like to have 7-10% cash going into earnings "to be able to pick up some names that will indubitably (snicker) get hit for the wrong reasons during earnings season."

Jim said ORCL has "basically tripled" in the 2½ years he's owned it.

Basically everyone gushed about Megacap Tech and AI.

Jason Snipe actually started to call Frank "Scott."

Jim admitted after the A Block that he trimmed JPM, though there's "nothing negative" about the stock; "it's simply too much in the portfolio." But he's not trimming C, which is an even bigger position for him. Josh Brown pinned a $100 on C and said it's an "outstanding" name. Josh made a joke about, "The world needs ditch-diggers too."

In the show's daily update on NFLX, Josh said, "I probably would not be a buyer ahead of this number," predicting a possible "sell the news reaction" this week. (This writer is long NFLX.) On the other hand, he'd buy IBKR going into the print, it's a "potential breakout in progress." Jason continues to like NFLX but suggested the password-sharing crackdown and ad tier as catalysts are probably in the past, so it's about operating income.

OTIS, which Josh was touting a while back, got an upgrade from JPMorgan. Josh said maintenance is the "real business" here. Fair enough, but we're not sure why that's different now than, oh, anytime in the last 40 years.

Josh again made the case for how UBER will "win" with a "strategy of inclusiveness" as autonomous rides start picking up. Stephanie Link agreed with UBER's strengths but said she wouldn't chase it here.

In Final Trades, Jim said DIS' pullback "sets it up for the next leg higher."

Josh: NVDA ‘tough’ to buy Tuesday

Josh Brown gushed praise on NVDA at the top of Tuesday's (7/15) Halftime Report but said "this is a really tough stock to buy today ... given how much it's run up just in the last couple weeks."

Jim Lebenthal said he could see NVDA having a pause.

Guest host Frank Holland then cut to Sully, who was interviewing Howard Lutnick at some kind of Trump Cabinet (but also slightly bipartisan because Josh Shapiro was there) Pittsburgh conference (NOT about whether the Steelers are loaded ... or over the hill). Howard said it's OK for NVDA to sell its "4th best" stuff to China.

Howard claimed, "The Biden administration sorta hated American companies." Sully protested, "You can't say that." Howard insisted, "Oh come on, they tried to break 'em up and all this sort of stuff."

As The Exchange got underway after the Halftime Report, Sully was interviewing Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, and Sully and Kelly were talking about Lollapalooza and Sully admitted, "I'm about 20 years past my Lollapalooza prime."

Grasso: Bitcoin figures to go ‘much, much higher’

On Monday's (7/14) Halftime Report, Steve Weiss said he bought more IBIT and said Donald Trump has "between 60 and 80% of his net worth in bitcoin."

Weiss also predicted, "Eventually they'll figure out a use case for it because there's not one right now."

Joe Terranova wondered why not buy bitcoin itself rather than buying IBIT. Weiss said it's "easier" to trade it with IBIT.

On Fast Money, Steve Grasso said some people think bitcoin will get to $200,000 this year; he wouldn't say if he's one of those people, but he does think it goes "much, much higher from here." Karen Finerman apparently agreed with everything Grasso said.

In what was an instant great moment on Fast Money, Tim Seymour was joined by his mother for Final Trades.

Jim having a ‘gangbusters’ year

Monday's (7/14) Halftime Report, guest-hosted by Frank Holland, would've been fairly humdrum — OK, let's face it, it actually was kind of humdrum — if not for Steve Weiss' blunt assessment of the economic landscape.

"The market's ignoring every risk," Weiss grumbled, citing the Fed and debt. Weiss referred to "Kevin Haslett (sic) (not corrected by Frank)," who Weiss said is "smart guy" but who has "zero credibility for what he says" about tariffs not affecting consumers.

On tariffs, Weiss said of Donald Trump, "He's gonna have to renegotiate" and "at some point, he's not gonna TACO it." But Weiss shrugged that the market will continue ignoring these risks. Then he said it would be "extremely disappointing" if 75% of companies didn't beat on earnings; Frank asked him if that's what Steve expects and he said yes, but we aren't totally sure if the question meant does he expect 75% will beat or 75% won't beat.

Jim Lebenthal insisted he's "not negative," but this has been a "gangbusters year" for him, and he's just raising a little funds from trimming ORCL, and he wants "dry powder" to buy the stocks that sell off for a "capricious (snicker) reason."

Weiss complained that capex spending is still on "pause" despite passage of the big beautiful bill.

Judge missed an analyst note on NFLX

Joe Terranova on Monday's (7/14) Halftime Report said the market got "desensitized" to tariff, um, activity after the May U.S.-China meeting in Geneva; Joe said on Sundays, people start trading futures down, but the market demonstrated resiliency again Monday.

Joe said the July S&P range has been "quiet," and "you don't sell a quiet market." (Joe repeated that advice during Final Trades.)

Joe seemed puzzled that KKR got a downgrade. Morgan Stanley made a bull call on TSM; Steve Weiss agreed with it.

Joe joked that Jim Lebenthal "probably wrote" the WYNN upgrade by Deutsche Bank.

Shannon Saccocia suggested tech may be a "safety valve."

Guest host Frank Holland said Evercore hiked its NFLX target from 1,150 to 1,350. Joe said, "I see it bouncing here." (This writer is long NFLX, which gets mentioned about every day on the program.)

Guy Adami always likes to say, ‘Price is truth’*

Jim Lebenthal on Friday's (7/11) Halftime Report made the case for QCOM, saying it's "so darn cheap" because "everybody thinks it's a cellphone manufacturer."

Judge insisted, "The market's smarter than that."

Jim responded, while tossing in C at 60% of tangible book, "No it is not, Scott ... the market is NOT smart!"

Josh Brown offered that "people get all excited" during short term Russell relief rallies; "the mean reversion is not the trend." Josh wondered how many conversations he's had in the last 10 years with the panel about JPM being worth its higher valuation than other banks because it's the "better company" and "the market is smart" in pricing in "quality."

Jim said, "I've owned JPMorgan for more years than I, I could count," and "it's not a pushback" to Josh, but C isn't an "alternate" to JPM, it can be owned "in addition to" JPM.

Judge then claimed that Jim was "running from" strength in trimming ORCL. Jim chuckled and said "Scott, I love you," the stock's become a "very big position" and he'll "sleep like a baby" having trimmed it.

Judge eventually said, "I'm not hating on anybody for taking profits in a stock that's up a lot," but it tells a little bit of a "psychology" story.

Stephanie Link bought TOL, saying that with "just 1 rate cut," the homebuilders will "fly."

Judge said "I don't think the market's stupid, um, like Jim does, obviously," but the market "knows that rate cuts are coming," so isn't Stephanie's trade priced in, "theoretically." Stephanie said lower rates will unleash "pent-up demand."

(On Friday's Fast Money, Mike Khouw actually said "Price is truth.")

Josh sounds for a while like he’s on AM radio

For much of Friday's (7/11) Halftime Report, Josh Brown's mike wasn't right.

Josh curiously posed the question of whether the stock market by 2030 will be more interested in AI, or "the things that, um, the president puts on Truth Social in 20-, you know, in-, in, uh, in the year 2025."

(We think that means that long-term investors should shrug off presidential comments on social media.)

Josh said early in the show that credit spreads didn't blow out and international stocks have done OK.

Then came the person who will find any and every reason not to buy a tech stock. Jenny Harrington told Judge, "There's lots of non-Mag 7 that are simply compelling."

Jim Lebenthal chimed in, "I'm with Jenny on this. I think there is a lot of room to be a stock-picker here."

Jim said there's a lot of attractive stocks in health care. Jim said it's not a market where you have to "hold your nose" to buy stocks. Judge wondered if Jim was "insinuating" that you have to "hold your nose" to buy large cap stocks. Jim said, "Some of them," including MSFT because of the multiple, but not Alphabet and NVDA.

Jim took a small victory lap on owning DAL, which he talked up earlier in the week. Jenny said, "I think you have to hold your nose to own Walmart," which has a multiple that of course is not "justified." AN UNJUSTIFIED MULTIPLE!!!! EVERYONE'S GOIN' BROKE!!!!!

Stephanie Link said she can "justify" AMZN at 14 times EBITDA because it's historically traded at 18 times.

Dividend yields at ‘all-time lows’

Judge on Friday's (7/11) Halftime Report said Wolfe Research is negative on REITs (Zzzzzzzzzz).

Judge said Jenny Harrington spends a "fair amount" of time at REIT conferences and owns 10 of them. Jenny explained that there's "incredible opportunity" when the "whole sector gets punished." Jenny then rattled off how much these portfolios are up this year, starting with CCI; Jenny said "the only loser in the portfolio for the year to date is Easterly Government Properties." Jenny insisted, "You cannot paint the sector with a broad brush."

Jenny claimed the sector is "accessible" and (snicker) "fun."

Judge said dividend-paying stocks have tracked the S&P, but according to Deutsche Bank, yields "are nearing their all-time lows." Jenny stressed that the yield is low, but not the "absolute number of dividends paid," which last year was an all-time record and 7% higher than 2023; "The reason the yield is low is because the market's up so much."

Jenny said to find higher yields, "you have to seek it out."

If Judge is bored by NFLX analysts, he doesn’t have to mention their reports on the show

Judge on Friday's (7/11) Halftime Report seemed to be complaining that the NFLX "chase," in which analysts constantly update price targets, has gotten "repetitive." (This writer is long NFLX.)

Josh Brown said he's not selling NFLX. He said recently it's had a "larger" pullback than usual.

Stephanie Link "averaged down" into VRT.

Jim Lebenthal said he got "tweaked" by somebody because he sold MP at 33. "It was a $10 stock a year ago," Jim crowed.

Josh said recently he's been more interested in Solana than bitcoin.

Some people think 7,000 is not ‘crazy,’ Judge says

We wondered if we might see Joe on Thursday's (7/10) Halftime Report attempting a weekly attendance sweep, but no. Josh Brown was back from vacation, and Judge started off the show telling Josh, "The floor is yours, sir (snicker)."

"This should be a fairly good earnings quarter (Zzzzzz)," Brown asserted. Josh said tariffs are "petering out" and said we "got through the tax debate" and wondered, "What are you really worried about," other than the "exogenous event."

(Unfortunately, Thursday's show didn't have the typical collection of permabears who could've answered Josh's question.) (Actually this page could answer for them, but let's not beat a dead horse.)

Bryn Talkington said the market's "anesthetized" to tariff threats but not "anesthetized" to Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Bryn predicted "1 or 2 rate cuts" and said, "It does feel like the market should be higher 6 months from now."

Judge revealed, "I've had people tell me 7,000's not- doesn't sound crazy." Kevin Simpson though said reaching 7,000 this year is "a little bit of a stretch," citing the earliest possible rate cut as "September at best."

Josh said rates are "probably" too high, but year-end stock performance shouldn't be pegged to whatever cuts we get; "nobody should root for medicine." Josh said the "top 20%" of the country is "accelerating" their spending because of their "brokerage accounts."

NVDA 100 produces a headline

Well into the A Block on Thursday's (7/10) Halftime Report, Judge observed that "16½ minutes into our program," the discussion had been "concentrated" on Big Tech.

(Translation: There were no headlines on the CLF front.)

Josh Brown though, referring to market leadership, said "it's not as concentrated as you think," as JPM has outperformed 5 of the Mag 7 over the last 5 years. Judge insisted "it is concentrated at cap size."

Judge said Seaport gave NVDA a $100 target (Hey, it got Seaport a headline) and a "sell" rating. Jason Snipe shrugged that Seaport also downgraded NFLX. (This writer is long NFLX.) Jason said data center momentum is "intact."

Bryn Talkington brought up Zuck's supposed $100 million signing bonuses.

Josh talked up AMZN, saying it's "not getting enough credit" for the importance of AWS in this "AI decade."

Judge said Bryn bought TSLA on Monday at 293 and sold August 320 calls for $14.50. Bryn said Kevin Simpson, who was on the panel, "should've" done the same trade.

Josh (pro UBER) said he disagrees with Dan Ives (pro TSLA) over the whole ride-hailing scene.

Fast food reward programs

Late on Thursday's (7/10) Halftime Report, during the non-Big Tech portion of the show (snicker), Judge for some reason was hectoring Jason Snipe because Jason sold LOW after owning it for a couple years.

Jason said he thinks the trade in housing is going to be the builders. Judge seemed in disbelief that Jason would sell it "now" given that the housing trade has "seen the worst."

Jason reiterated that he thinks the builders will move "when this thing turns." Jason said he'll look at LOW later in the year (so much for Joe's concern about people getting back into stocks after selling them (see below)).

Meanwhile, Kevin Simpson bought DKNG but drew a blank when trying to come up with the duopoly name, FanDuel.

Kevin bought more MRK (Zzzzzzz).

Judge said Goldman is upping MCD to Buy/345. Kevin touted the prospects of MCD's rewards program (snicker).

Jason still likes COST. Bryn Talkington said private equity stocks are a better option for investors than private equity in general.

Josh said he's in CVX though it's not the "focus" of his portfolio.

Josh talked up ANSS and said he doesn't think he's ever heard it mentioned on the show. He said it's been in a "huge consolidation" for the last 4 years. Josh said he'd hold it as long as it holds 350.

Judge said bitcoin hit a "new (sic redundant) record high." Josh talked up Solana as a play for whatever it means to "tokenize assets."

Bill says gold miners in a ‘tremendous supercycle’

Wednesday's (7/9) Halftime Report was a strong, crisp show, and the most interesting commentary occurred when Bill Baruch joined remotely after the A Block to explain how he's modeled a new gold portfolio "focused on mining" with no more than 10 names.

Bill said he thinks the miners are in a "tremendous supercycle."

Judge to his credit asked producers to repost the screen text showing the stocks in this portfolio. Bill said it's basically a "3-headed horse race" led by AEM, NEM and B, with AEM the "best in breed." (This writer has no position in AEM, NEM, B or any of the miners Bill listed.) Bill also talked up the catch-up prospects of silver.

Joe suggested FCX and SCCO as copper plays but cautioned that it's kind of a fluid situation.

Weiss says money managers talking on TV about overweighting/underweighting sectors is a ‘bunch of crap’

At the top of Wednesday's (7/9) Halftime Report, Joe Terranova called NVDA's achievement of $4 trillion a "big story" and said it "literally underscores (um, not sure that "literally underscores" is possible) and highlights" the "biggest argument" in financial services: "What's the bigger risk: Concentrating, or diversifying?"

(Joe basically answered his own question a few moments later when he questioned where the market would be without AI, but more on that in a moment.)

Joe said there are 5 companies with a market cap over $2 trillion, and 8 over $1 trillion. Joe pointed to PLTR's valuation and said it "underscores how over the last several years, we have had this dramatic concentrated performance from these AI leaders."

Joe noted/complained "the JOET has 125 stocks," which is why the "overwhelming majority of portfolio managers are underperforming their benchmarks because the performance is so narrow." Joe indicated that it's been, or still is, "diversify and underperform."

Steve Weiss said "the great investors" such as Warren Buffett and David Tepper will tell you, "Diversification is the enemy of performance." Weiss said his "weightings" are in big-cap tech. Weiss said "the 4 big names" amount to "close to 50% of my portfolio." (But Judge never asked Weiss when we're going to get the "intermediate term" bad stuff that Weiss predicted in April/May.)

Judge bluntly declared, "Diversification for diversification's sake, um, isn't a winning strategy."

Jim Lebenthal said you can have a "degree (snicker) of diversification." Jim contended that "you can get diversification into AI-adjacent stocks that maybe haven't run up as much," such as ORCL and CSCO.

Jim started to say he'd avoid the "overpriced" utilities and staples. Joe butted in, stating, "That's not traditional diversification." Jim said "slow down," and Judge allowed Jim to continue with his thoughts on sectors.

Then Judge said he wanted to hear what Joe was going to say. Joe declared, "The last several years, the prevailing tailwind and arguably the saving grace of the market has been AI. If we hadn't had AI, where would this market be?" Joe then said, in response to what Jim was saying, you can't diversify "with other AI-adjacent names." Jim insisted he was "taking it in steps" (snicker).

Weiss said even if you think you're diversified by owning the S&P, that theory's taken a "major hit," because "info technology" has risen from 10% of the S&P to 32%. Weiss said 75-80% of managers underperform the S&P every year; they come on TV and say "Oh, I'm gonna overweight tech, or I'm gonna underweight this,' which to me is a bunch of crap, right, 'cause all you're saying is 'I'm managing for the S&P,' rather than managing to return."

On Fast Money, Karen Finerman likened NVDA's gain to "Roger Bannister." (That's a pretty good sports analogy.) Steve Grasso, who has expressed recent skepticism about NVDA only to have the stock run to new highs, said he still thinks its advantages get "chipped away."

Versant is really into the Golf Channel (a/k/a Bryn says NVDA can ‘easily’ reach 200)

Bryn Talkington joined Wednesday's (7/9) Halftime Report to say it's "just incredible" for a company the size of NVDA to be growing earnings this fast. Bryn said it's been in a range but now breaking out, and that AI is only going from "3rd to 4th gear." Bryn said of NVDA that we could "easily see this name creep up into the 200s."

Bryn said that back in 2012, "the early days" of the cloud, "no one believed in it. No one believed in it at all." (Seriously? No one "believed" in the cloud in 2012?)

Jim Lebenthal said CSCO is like ORCL about 3 years ago, and if we had a dollar for every time Jim has said CSCO is the so-and-so of some really great tech stock of years ago, we'd be wealthy. Weiss pointed out the "ugly side" of AI, which is that TTEC has plummeted from $100 to $5 because its call centers are the "first" to be "disintermediated" by AI. Judge was fascinated by the TTEC chart. Joe Terranova said "not everyone wins" and pointed to ADBE.

Weiss bought more XLI (Zzzzzzzzzz). Jim said he doesn't think DIS will climb until earnings, assuming it outperforms, which he thinks it will. (Tip: He always thinks so.)

Judge said Citi reiterated NFLX as "neutral" while the screen text said Citi reiterated NFLX as a "buy." Joe said he'd buy it on a dip and would do the same with SPOT. (This writer is long NFLX and SPOT.)

Jim said it's "OK" that JPM is not cheap, and then the panel somehow talked about regional banks. Weiss wondered "why own the regionals" when the big banks have the strongest tailwinds. Joe said that based on fundamentals, he agrees with Weiss.

Jim said analysts are "too negative" on DAL. Judge questioned Jim's contention that the "outlook" really has gotten better since April 2. "I definitely think so," Jim insisted, calling it "inarguable." Jim said "recession predictions" had surged to "close to 100%." Everyone seemed to agree that the smaller, discount airlines are not the place to be.

Judge did yet another Golf Channel update on the week's big tournament (apparently it's the Scottish Open). We heard that playing in this tournament is the "best way" to prepare for the British Open.

For his Final Trade, Weiss picked UNH, a stock he recommends/buys every so often and then walks back on some level.

Joe still seems to think that selling a stock means you can’t ever buy it again

On Tuesday's (7/8) Halftime Report, Joe Terranova again was making the spiel about how supposedly hard it is to get back into stocks after selling them.

Here's what Joe's really saying: If you've got big gains in some high-quality stocks, you can try to time a Q3 correction, but you're probably better off standing pat.

That's perfectly good advice that this page doesn't disagree with.

However, the way Joe's been phrasing this advice this week has prompted some head-scratching.

On Tuesday, Joe conceded there could be a "correction" with the year's best stocks, but "the problem that I have for the long-term investor, is how do you return to ownership of those names once again."

Well, as this page said a day ago (see below), we don't think there's any law against buying the shares again.

Joe continued, "You can make the statement, 'Well, you just go buy it again.'" (Yes, that's the statement this page made (see below).) Joe explained, "OK, there's tax consequences in that for some people that are watching the show and are longer-term investors."

So what Joe's saying is that there's tax consequences for selling stocks with big gains. "Return to ownership" is not the issue; it's paying a big tax bill even if you end up owning the same stocks (though the new ownership would be a much higher basis, but whatever).

This page maintains that anyone who isn't sure how to do "return to ownership" merely needs to hit the "Buy" button on their online account.

Joe said the stocks he's talking about — naming NFLX, SPOT, CRWD, FTNT, cybersecurity — have "a fundamental strong tailwind" for those names. (This writer is long NFLX, SPOT, CRWD.)

Jenny gives Judge’s bull market
the Heisman

Judge on Tuesday's (7/8) Halftime Report got off on the wrong foot with Jenny Harrington as to whether Jenny finally agrees this is a bull market.

Jenny said "it's tough," which Judge quibbled with, demanding, "what's tough about it."

Butting in, Brian Belski suggested, "It's tough to be a doubter." Jenny said "Not really," because ... of course ... she's "fully invested."

Jenny said if your "expectations get messed up" and you expect more than you're going to get and think you "deserve" 20% returns, you start "behaving badly" and it leads to "wealth destruction" (snicker). Jenny drew an analogy to a football coach drawing up a play (picture above) and considering things that could go wrong with the play. "I cannot get excited," Jenny affirmed.

We'd prefer that the show resume discussions about who would play Jenny in the movie, as that's an exciting topic — we're still agreeing with Josh Brown on Jessica Chastain, though Amy Adams/Emma Stone aren't out of the question.

As a matter of fact, we should even start extending that conversation to others. For example, it occurs to us that Judge Reinhold, cinematically, can pass for Scott Wapner ... so we could actually have Judge playing Judge!!

Joe??? We're sure Joe would want De Niro, but we're all in on Ruffalo. For a long time, we've had Sydney Pollack pegged for Weiss. John Saxon (like Pollack, deceased) would fit the bill for Jim.

Anyway ... Judge said David Kostin has a range of S&P targets. Belski congratulated David as well as Savita for raising their targets, though he said they have "different constituencies" (snicker) (isn't the S&P the same to everyone?).

Joe Terranova pointed out that on Tuesday, "The momentum names are selling off."

"We're constructive (Zzzzzzzz) on equities," said Shannon Saccocia, before raising Judge's eyebrows by saying she's "neutral large cap." She said she's been that way "the whole time." Judge concluded, "You missed the whole thing then." But of course, Shannon said she was ... "fully invested" the whole time ... (but she was "neutral") ...

‘Bulls---’ heard on live TV

During the A Block on Tuesday's (7/8) Halftime Report, Judge cut to President Donald Trump's remarks at a Cabinet meeting. The president said, "We get a lot of bulls--- thrown at us by Putin, if you wanna know the truth. He's very nice, all the time, but it turns out to be meaningless."

Donald Trump addressed reports that he changed the tariff, um, end game to Aug. 1, insisting, "I didn't make a change. Clarification, maybe."

After Judge cut away from the Cabinet meeting, Brian Belski said he's into LULU more than NKE. Jenny Harrington sold OGN, which Judge has brought up recently, and said she got $10 instead of the $8 she could've gotten. Jenny also bought VICI.

Belski bought FITB (Zzzzzzzz); he said you need to own "a bunch of these" (snicker).

Judge said Dan Ives thinks TSLA is at a "tipping point" as far as Elon Musk and political ... stuff. Belski said he's hanging with the stock. Jenny said UBER's multiple and gain make her "uncomfortable," but the stock is "still kinda compelling."

Moments after the show ended, Grandpa Barry Bannister on The Exchange discussed his prediction for a 12% slide in the 2nd half of the year. Barry predicted the economy would be "slowing sharply in the 2nd half" and that we have 3% inflation by year-end. "I think inflation's pretty sticky," Barry contended.

Tom Lee was the leadoff guest on Tuesday's Closing Bell and said this is "the most hated V-shaped rally ever," and Tom thinks P.E.s "should be expanding."

The Fast Money crew on Tuesday spent a lot of time at the top of the show on bank-stock valuations (Zzzzzzzz). Guy Adami said he wasn't trying to be funny, but valuations don't matter until they matter. Karen Finerman also got a chance to introduce the new season of the How She Does It podcast. The Season 2 premiere is Jenna Bush Hager. Karen said every person on the podcast has a career that's "not linear." Karen said of her guests, "I love hearing how they got there." Well, we gotta think that being the daughter of a president kind of opens some doors.

Judge is talking over everyone all during the program

On Monday's (7/7) Halftime Report, Joe Terranova predicted the UBER chart will "move higher" and that the market cap can "maybe triple" over 5 years.

Steve Weiss laboriously tried to get Joe to agree with Weiss' theory that UBER shareholders don't fear the robotaxi because the Uber model in which drivers service their own cars is economically superior to robotaxis. Joe said he agrees, allowing Weiss to complain about how overvalued TSLA is.

Joe, not Judge, who was out in space apparently, impressively got Weiss to clarify that Weiss was calling TSLA, not UBER, overvalued. Jim Lebenthal said Alphabet is in the middle of the pack but predicted it will do a "Secretariat on the way home."

Weiss didn't mind the NFLX downgrade (this writer is long NFLX) and said the long term looks good and he doesn't want to sell just to avoid perhaps a "bumpy" short term; "Why take the tax hit." Um, well, the problem is that, in most circumstances, you don't actually get the proceeds without incurring the tax liability, and the longer you wait, the tax liability only grows higher. But whatever.

Judge said CRWD got a Piper downgrade. (This writer is long CRWD.) Joe said it's in the "same conversation" as NFLX, which prompted Judge to say "that's why we just did" and that Joe "should be a producer" for noticing that. Judge and Joe then talked over each other until Judge asked if Joe was "sleeping" during the NFLX discussion. Joe protested that the "characteristics" of the 2 companies are very similar. Joe said he understands profit taking, but then the question would be by Q4, "How am I getting back in once again." (Um, by buying some shares?) Joe concluded by tossing in SPOT (this writer is long SPOT) and saying you want to buy any "corrective" activity in those three names. (This writer owns all 3.)

Judge declares supply-side economics are underway

Fairly early into Monday's (7/7) Halftime Report, Judge made a declaration about the presidential administration: "They're making a big bet on classic supply-side, uh, economics."

Jim said, "That's exactly right." Judge said it means, "Flood the zone with the opportunity to spend more, make more, reinvest more and thus earnings grow more, the economy grows more."

Jim said it's the first time in months he's heard "supply side," but that's "exactly what it is."

Judge refuses to have a ‘match’ with Weiss over level of CEOs Weiss is talking to

Joe Terranova said at the top of Monday's (7/7) Halftime Report that momentum stocks are "still holding serve" and "The table in the near term still looks good."

But for Q3, repeatedly pointing to earnings season starting July 15, Joe thinks "at best, we're flat to lower."

Joe predicted, "I think we are going to learn that corporations have absorbed the tariff cost," which means "significant margin compression."

Jim Lebenthal though said June CPI is also July 15 and said that if tariffs are causing inflation, it'll have to show up by the time of that report.

Steve Weiss said it's "likely" that we'll start to see a tariff impact on July 15 as the pre-tariff stocking up fades away. Weiss predicted inflation "takes a foothold" in the 2nd half.

Weiss said "we're gonna run out of time on delays" on tariffs and further contended that "all the good news from the Trump administration has already been seen and discounted in the market."

"I'm still fully invested," Weiss admitted, before predicting a "softer" earnings season and "somewhat muted" guidance. (Translation: He's long but he's bearish so he's "right" no matter what happens.) Weiss said people are looking at things through "rose-colored glasses."

Judge protested that people just think there's more "clarity." Weiss said he's talking to "different CEOs" than Judge is. Judge said "you're not talkin' to the biggest CEOs in- in America," but Judge said he and Weiss won't have a "match" about this. Weiss said he's talking to "pretty big CEOs," but, "You brought it up, not me."

Judge said Vietnam "covers a large swath of American business" and that some kind of deal "has to" occur with China.

Weiss said he's the "first one on the desk" who predicted a 90-day tariff delay, "so the market's over- OD'd on tariff news."

Joe insisted he sees a pullback, but not "12%."

Around the end of the A Block, Megan Cassella reported on tariffs on Japan. Referring to what he said at the top of the show, apparently about tariff delays, Weiss said, "I'm used to being right, just not proven right so quickly." Judge said "it took about 27 minutes or so; we'll see if you're wrong in the next 3, or 4, 5."

Weiss said Donald Trump has to keep the tariffs for maybe up to a quarter "to show he means business," but Joe said "they're economically unsustainable for either party," so they'll have to be "relaxed back." Jim said, "These letters are a cattle prod, that's all it is, and the market sees through it."

Google reliers are a ‘loser’

Bryn Talkington made a brief appearance on Monday's (7/7) Halftime Report, saying of Elon/Trump and third parties, "I'm actually surprised that people are surprised about this."

Bryn suggested interest deductability for Tesla buyers will help offset the loss of an EV credit. Bryn said her preferred TSLA strategy is to sell upside calls, as she always does.

Joe Terranova suggested a 48 stop on EQT (Zzzzzzzzz). Jim Lebenthal joshed with the rest of the crew about whether WYNN can or would get into the JOET. Jim again stressed that he doesn't think WYNN should move with whatever the Macau sentiment of the day is. As Judge talked over everyone, as he was prone to do all show, Joe said if it's really about Vegas, then note that Goldman has MGM at a sell. Jim said WYNN, not MGM, is the "premier property" in Vegas.

CNBC's Phil LeBeau said the "narrative" about airline summer bookings weakening isn't exactly what the airlines are saying. Jim said it's an issue of whether the bookings are in the "front of the plane." Judge said he's seen price offers where airlines are "obviously trying to coax" people into the "back end of the plane," sometimes with price differences of "10 to 11 times" between back and front. Jim suggested prices to Indianapolis may not be much, but if you're flying to San Francisco and L.A., "You're payin', buddy."

Later on Monday Tim Seymour was summoned to Kelly’s Exchange to discuss threatened BRIC tariffs. "The reality is, it's all somewhat dollar weaker (Zzzzzzzz)," Tim said.

Way back, pre-holiday, on Thursday when the markets had an early close, Rich Greenfield on Closing Bell Overtime touted RDDT and how it's going to be scraped by AI for all kinds of supposedly relevant facts (or is it relevant supposed facts); he was asked by Morgan Brennan, "If Reddit's the winner, who are the losers?"

Rich responded, "I mean the losers honestly are the vast majority of the Web" (gulp).

Rich added that "The Economist may survive" because it has a "loyal" following, but, "If you rely on Google for search traffic as a publisher, content publisher, you are in deep, deep trouble. You're a loser."

On Thursday's Squawk Box, Andrew Ross Sorkin read "garage" on the prompter when it was really "garbage."

Bryn pins $200 on NVDA

Judge at least twice said at the beginning of Wednesday's (7/2) Halftime that Lori Calvasina thinks the rebound feels "full."

Joe Terranova said "I don't like that we have lost the momentum factor," he also doesn't like higher yields. Joe said Q3 could be "susceptible" to being sideways or lower.

Bryn Talkington said the "growthy growth stocks" including HOOD, PLTR, SPOT, "need to stop going higher," because "there's been so much ebullition (we think; sounded like 'ebulation') there." (This writer is long SPOT, which was NOT ebullient on Tuesday.)

In another tedious AAPL-innovation conversation that Judge started, Steve Weiss said it would be a "great move" for AAPL to "lease" whatever it's doing in AI. Weiss said he'd rather be in other Mag 7 stocks.

Judge mentioned a report about AAPL planning a foldable phone. Bryn scoffed that it's nothing more than the company deciding to "copy Samsung," and a "nothing burger."

But Joe suggested you can buy AAPL for a trade; it'll get to 220, 225 "easily."

Weiss said he'd be happy if AAPL bought "Perplexity," which Judge indicated everyone seems to be suggesting. Weiss said foldable phones are "unwieldy."

Bryn suggested 250/260-360 as the range for TSLA, then mentioned 260-350 and said the high end of that range is a "peak" and a place to sell calls until there's "new revenue stream clarity."

Judge asked the panel what's the best Mag 7 name for the next 6 months. Joe said NVDA, which Judge questioned 2-3 times. Joe said "You don't like my answer." Judge said, "I don't care what your answer is," even though he obviously did. Weiss said META even though he basically thinks all of them are overvalued, other than Alphabet, which he says has a "fundamental issue" of search. Bryn said "all roads lead to Nvidia" and pinned a $200 on the stock.

Weiss touted NFLX, as he always does, and this time thinks DIS belongs in the same "vertical," though NFLX is the pure play. (This writer is long NFLX.)

Kevin Simpson said that on Monday, he sold upside calls in SPOT and HWM that expire on 7/11.

Kevin said there's a "high probability" that HOOD replaces Juniper in the S&P within days.

Financial stocks apparently have a lot to do with ‘engagement’

Judge on Wednesday's (7/2) Halftime Report said Mizuho made WMT a top pick.

Joe Terranova questioned whether the report mentions "tariffs" and said until there's "clarity" on that issue, the stock will "move sideways."

Steve Weiss made this emphatic case for how AI will allow WMT to have less staff and will result in people placing orders on phones and driving up to pick up the orders. (Honestly we already thought that was happening at run of the mill grocery stores.) Weiss indicated that such trends would reduce theft.

Joe agreed the technology is "phenomenal" but said it's still all about tariff clarity. Weiss didn't seem to think it's as important as Joe thinks and asked if there's any company that can better wring the kind of "cost concessions" out of suppliers like WMT. Joe said AMZN. Weiss said they're equally positioned in that regard.

The panel touted big banks (Zzzzzzzz), though Kevin Simpson trimmed GS for portfolio management. Joe said to watch regionals (Double Zzzzzzzzz) for signals.

Weiss said UNH still has issues but has "actually worked since I went back in." Weiss predicts a "kitchen-sink quarter" after which things can get going.

Bryn said she bought IONQ and sold half after it ran up. Bryn noted it's "early days" for the stock and it wouldn't surprise her if it was $20 or $60.

Kevin said a 245 target on JBL is "too low." Judge then hectored Joe about making a comment on SPGI and chuckled about Joe stressing "engagement." Joe, trying to keep things serious (to the point he made sure to mention State Street well after talking about successful banks), said CTAS needs "further corrective behavior." Weiss said the tax bill will drive CAT, though it has to get through the tariffs. Joe said RCL has done a "balance sheet turnaround." (By the time Santoli came on, the show had turned into a Laff-a-lympics; Judge could barely keep a straight face and said "we're havin' a day.")

Hailey Hunter reported from the John Deere Classic PGA event in Silvis, Illinois. #CNBCstilltiedtoGolfChannel #SpinCo #Versant

Josh’s 401(k) doubling the S&P

Tuesday's (7/1) Halftime Report was a pretty low-key exercise in which Santoli said a "mechanical kinda torque" was affecting Tuesday's market.

Josh Brown pointed to dollar weakness and said, "I looked at my own 401(k) yesterday ... I'm doing double the performance of the S&P in my retirement account, and the reason why is 40% allocation to international stocks."

Jim Lebenthal said the 10-year at 4.27 is "fine" and "makes me feel good."

Judge said Krinsky was actually talking about an "unwind" of momentum on Tuesday.

Josh was the one on Tuesday who pointed out that UBER is classified as an "industrial."

Judge haggled with Josh over AAPL's innovation (Zzzzzzzz) after Kovach's report. Jim said he's thinking about trimming AAPL because it's "too darn expensive."

Stephanie Link bought DHI and said rate cuts will make homebuilders "fly."

Josh said HLT is on his best-stocks list and the sector's on fire. Joe suggested MAR is similar.

Contessa Brewer reported on a boost in Macao gaming activity that's lifting Macao-related stocks. Jim stressed that there's "very little respect" given to WYNN's growth in the U.S., and it's not getting credit for whatever it's doing in Dubai.

Among BTIG top picks, Joe said he's a backer of COF but waffled a bit on APP and suggested EXPE will keep underperforming. Stephanie Link would not be chasing SNOW.

Josh said SBUX has the "right CEO" who will "figure it out." (If not, maybe DIS will call.) (Or maybe DIS will call anyway.)

Josh and Joe both picked AMZN for Final Trades.

Karen Finerman's How She Does It podcast is apparently returning for a new season.

Judge: ‘Small caps have done garbage’

Judge opened Monday's (6/30) Halftime Report telling Steve Weiss, "You've fully kinda (snicker) capitulated."

Weiss said ... and you knew it was coming ... "I've been fully invested for a while." (Translation: He was always capitulated, he just often tried to make it sound like he wasn't.)

Weiss said this is an "interesting market" fueled by a "new cohort of investors."

Weiss explained this year's market gains as, "I think I underestimated their tolerance for, for chaos, lack of direction, uh, and, uh, and risk." He predicted a "reprieve" on the tariff front, but "I'm still cautious about this quarter's earnings."

Joe Terranova offered, "I think at some point, in the 2nd half of the year, we'll have a correction, and I think you buy that correction."

Judge rattled off some stats from Oppenheimer suggesting the market breadth is "not nearly as strong" as it was in November 2024. Joe said there was a "head fake" in the Russell in November and that health care stocks back then appeared to be going places but really didn't. Judge said the point is, "The higher stocks continue to go higher." Joe said, "Momentum's leading."

Joe said we "probably" get a rate cut on Sept. 18.

Jim Lebenthal thinks a case can be made for small caps (snicker), citing a market broadening, "if the economy holds in there."

Judge said "Nah ... that just becomes a repetitive thing. You've been saying that a year- if the economy holds up, small caps are gonna do well. Well you know what? The economy's held up pretty damn well, and small caps have done garbage. ... So you need something more, obviously."

Jim suggested that might be rate cuts, which Jim thinks should be happening in July.

On Fast Money, back from a break, Karen Finerman pronounced Q2 "mind-boggling" and "really kind of insane." Karen admitted, "I don't know what to do about next quarter."

Then what is it when Iger’s successor is announced?

Phil LeBeau joined Monday's (6/30) Halftime Report suggesting that if you believe in autonomous/robotaxis, TSLA might be a good investment. (While there have been some recent headlines in this space, we get the feeling that we're hearing 17 reports on CNBC for every single incremental robotaxi development.)

Joe Terranova said there are "clearly fundamental challenges" with TSLA. But Joe said that "on a 12-month basis," TSLA is outperforming the rest of the Mag 7.

Steve Weiss said PLTR is "the ultimate cult stock."

Jim Lebenthal said C is below tangible book (snicker), which is something he doesn't "understand." (All this page understands is that C apparently always trades below tangible book.)

Jim sold MP, saying as a trade-war trade, it's "played out."

Jefferies is giving 4 reasons for upgrading DIS (we can't handle more than 3). Judge said one of the reasons is "limited risk of a parks shutdown" (sic); Judge moments later corrected himself to say parks "slowdown," not "shutdown."

Jim as always said the market is "underestimating" Disney+. Jim also mentioned one of his favorite talking points, Hulu. Weiss said NFLX will do "quite well" and while DIS may do well, he sees no reason to replace NFLX with DIS. Jim actually said the DIS chart suggests a potential breakout, and if so, it's "Katie bar the door" (snicker).

Weiss had a coughing fit during Santoli's moment, which had the panel nearly doubled over in laughter.

Belski likes NKE; Stephanie says she’d sell it

Brian Belski, having upgraded his S&P target just this week, was on the Halftime Report panel Friday (6/27) but this time didn't have to deal with a skeptical Weiss (see below).

Judge told Belski, "Maybe people like you represent the FOMO trade."

Belski said he doesn't think so; "We've been there the entire time." Judge clarified, "It doesn't have to be meant as a negative; um, it's just sort of is what it is."

Bryn Talkington said the indexes are "quite benign" this year; the FOMO is kind of limited to "this basket of stocks." (Later, Bryn said she sold RBLX, saying the stock has become "dislocated" from the business growth.)

Judge cut to Donald Trump's White House remarks; viewers heard another jab at Jay Powell. Then the president was asked about Iran, and Judge cut back to the show ... only to cut back to the White House for more a couple minutes later. Someone asked a question about Americans' concern about the 2020 election.

Back on Halftime, Kevin Simpson gushed about HOOD as not a "meme" stock but "an infrastructure for the wealth generation" (snicker) for "multiple decades" (snicker) ahead.

Belski talked up NKE in his "value portfolio." He said Friday brought a "quintessential (snicker) type of value bottom."

Judge said "Let's be clear though, nothing's happened yet, right" and that Belski can't right now claim "any bit of victory" on a NKE turnaround.

Belski concedes "it's still early," but investors want to be early.

Stephanie Link though said NKE is facing "at least a 2-year turnaround" and she'd sell it Friday. Judge said "that's a statement in and of itself" (sic last 4 words redundant).

Judge said DIS actually got a 140 target. Belski said it's in "a couple portfolios" but he's "minimized" the positions because his shop prefers NFLX and SPOT. (This writer is long NFLX and SPOT.) Judge joked about how many portfolios Brian has got.

Sully explains how current AI works (as Brad Gerstner gushes that it’s only the first batter of the first inning)

On Thursday's (6/26) Power Lunch, Sully was describing a recent experience with AI: "They lift a lot of our stuff, by the way ... Somebody sent me an AI answer recently which was quoting me back to me. Literally the AI model took our- something I tweeted and sent it back to this guy as me. It was the weirdest thing. I should get paid for that."

Funny how the show’s permabears are somehow always ‘fully invested’

It didn't take long on Thursday's (6/26) Halftime Report for Judge, to his credit, to start jabbing Permabear Jenny Harrington about what it's like these days not being bullish.

Judge said Jenny "has not been a buyer into this move, certainly from a sentiment standpoint. Um, not nearly as bullish on this market as others have been."

Judge then asked Jenny if it's time to "change" that view.

Jenny said, "Well, let's define buyer ... I was a buyer ... Am I a buyer that I believe the market should continue to run at the pace that it's run at since it bounced off the April lows? No, I will- I don't buy that argument."

Judge said, "Well you qualified it though at the 'pace' ... Why does it have to go at that pace?"

Jenny explained, "I'm coming from the perspective of a dividend/income investor."

Jenny went on to say, "A long time ago, there was this cool book out called, um, Tree Ring- I think it's called Tree Ring Capital. And it talked about the way the Japanese invest. And the Japanese invest differently than the U.S. ... where they kind of look for everything that can go wrong, and then spend a little bit of their time on what can go right."

Judge said he "literally just wrote" on his page, "Waiting for things to go wrong rather than what actually could go right."

Jenny said, "Ah! Ah! There is a difference. It's not waiting for things to go wrong. It's thinking about things that can go wrong."

But Judge said "you get consumed" thinking about anything that can go wrong.

Jenny said if that were the case, all 3 of her strategies wouldn't be ... here comes the magic words ... "fully invested." (Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!)

Jenny said she doesn't think the market can do 16-17% this year.

Judge said "the S&P is up 27% from the April bottom. The Nasdaq is up 36% since April. ... That's the story." Shannon Saccocia said that info should "make you a little bit more cautious."

Josh Brown recalled what happened in April and said "the cardboard cutout thing (snicker) was thrown out the window." Josh said, "My 4 biggest positions all made record highs today. Not 52-week highs. Record highs."

Jenny though said a market at "23 times" has "pulled forward" all the gains and "presumes the very best situation."

Judge told Jenny, "There's been uncertainty around everything forever."

Rob Sechan suggested "value" could return, but for now, don't get off your "surfboards."

Weiss was correct about
Middle East tension

At the top of Thursday's (6/26) Halftime Report, Josh Brown said something that will make Joe Terranova (who wasn't on Thursday's show) happy: "When you look at the momentum factor, it is far and away the best performing factor, nothing's even close — up 16% year to date."

Rob Sechan said there's a lot of "catch up" going on, even in "low quality" names, and it will continue short term. Rob also brought up "intermediate term," one of Steve Weiss' favorite terms. (But Weiss, who wasn't on Thursday's show, was talking about it 2 months ago, so we think Rob's new intermediate term is probably not the same as Weiss' old intermediate term.)

Judge brought up the dollar. Rob brought up Arsenio Hall.

Josh said bitcoin is now "a central part of the ecosystem."

Josh said CRCL is "almost approaching the valuation of Coinbase," but "Coinbase makes more money from Circle than Circle does."

Josh explained how HIMS got crushed this week but said it still has "millions of users" and so "maybe" the selloff was overdone.

Judge noted that Jenny Harrington owns JBLU. Jenny said "value traps" came up at a recent conference, the message being, don't be "too quick to deem something a value trap." (Actually, most people are way too slow at that. #seeCLF) Jenny said she still owns it "because we don't think it should be sold here." Josh questioned why JBLU doesn't do a reverse split because nobody can own it under $5.

CPNG has made Josh's best-stocks list.

On Friday June 13, the day after Israel struck Iran, Steve Weiss said, "Look I've been in the business almost 35 years. We've seen a number of flare-ups in the Middle East. Every single one of those being a buying opportunity." That day, the S&P 500 traded below 6,000 but seems ever since like it can't wait to go higher.

If he lowered his target but didn’t change his investments, what’s the point of the target?

The big revelation on Wednesday's (6/25) Halftime Report was that Brian Belski has raised his S&P target back to 6,700 (remember, he dropped it shortly after cardboard-tariff-sign-day, around the market's bottom, although on Wednesday he claimed he "made no changes to our portfolios or allocations," so he still had a great quarter of investing, which should make anyone wonder what the point of his target is that was being so heavily discussed Wednesday).

Judge said Brian is "playing this game." Belski wasn't on the show but dialed in and told Judge he's "humbled" to be on even though he thinks Judge doesn't want to hear that and sort of gave a too-long spiel about all the things he wanted to hear 3 weeks ago about the market (including either more companies giving guidance or fewer companies not giving guidance, we're not sure which) that would prompt the upgrade he somehow gave to his S&P target. He threw in "oh by the way" 3 (yes, 3) times.

While Brian spoke, a screen graphic showed his arguments as "performance is broadening," and "The death of 'American Exceptionalism' was widely exaggerated and too vehemently (snicker) applauded to hold any merit or duration in our view."

Judge suggested that Brian's S&P upgrade may be "premature" if the guidance and other things aren't as good as Brian expects. Brian said he travels "around the world" and talks to institutional clients who are "massively overexposed" to China and Europe; he expects an ongoing trend of "normalization" regarding the 10-year (3.50 to 4.50) and that he wants to get ahead of stronger guidance and that financials will "crush" it in the upcoming earnings.

Steve "Intermediate term" Weiss said "it's kind of interesting to talk about guidance when, uh, we've been in a quiet period for about 2 weeks and companies haven't even been able to anybody about guidance," and that Brian's forecast assumes an "awful lot of trade deals in the next week" or some other tariff delay.

Weiss also said he doesn't agree with Belski's statement "that it was vehemently applauded that American exceptionalism is dead; I think that byline, that headline rather, lasted for all of 2 minutes." Weiss told Belski, "You came to your conclusion first, then looked for a way to support it," and the support is "built on a house of cards, or uncertainty" and that Brian doesn't have the "ammunition" to make the market bet he's making.

Brian said "what we do is research," that his team "scours through earnings releases" and even though we're in a quiet period, "not all companies report on a calendar basis." Belski said "house of cards" is "too strong," and he's not going to comment on politics. Brian defended his "proven" record and told Weiss, "You can punch holes in it as much as you want; it doesn't do anybody any good. I appreciate your side of the story."

Joe Terranova asked Brian about 3rd quarter debt issuance. Belski said free cash flow is outpacing debt to equity, "straight up" vs. "straight down." Belski said his call isn't "encumbered" by the Fed cutting rates. During Brian's call, both Weiss and Judge said they're "humbled" to talk to him.

Weiss is basically doing what Belski’s doing, backfilling the thesis he wants to see as Judge knocks down every argument

In the wake of Steve Weiss' debate with Brian Belski on Wednesday's (6/25) Halftime Report (see above), Weiss said airfares have "doubled and tripled."

Judge told Weiss the economy is good and that "bulls like Belski" may "have the last laugh ... quite frankly."

Weiss said "what we don't talk about" (snicker) is the loss of immigrant labor and its impact on wages.

Judge said, "So wages go up, and then the consumer hangs in, and people spend more. I don't know what to tell ya."

Weiss specified he's talking about "a certain segment of the economy" that will "feed through."

Weiss said if wages go up, the Fed won't cut.

Judge said if they don't have to cut, "then so be it."

Weiss said the Fed's in a "very tough spot" (snicker) and that he doesn't see the market's 70% probability of 2 cuts this year as a "great bet."

Stock history that lost us somewhere along the way ...

On Wednesday's (6/25) Halftime Report, after the A Block, Judge said QXO is down 85% from its 52-week high and asked Steve Weiss why Weiss still owns the stock.

Weiss said he's not down 85%. Judge said "the stock is obviously making a statement." Weiss said "it's not."

Weiss went on to explain, "Brad Jacobs announced that he was buying the company and it was at 5 bucks," and "fools" bid it up to "200 and change." But Brad didn't buy it at that level, rather, "he did a pipe," and priced it at "$9 and 14 cents" and Weiss was "1 of 7" in that transaction. And we were looking at the stock's chart after Weiss said this, and his numbers (other than the "200 and change") didn't really make any sense, but whatever.

Weiss said Brad has been a "money-raising machine" and has "had no problem raising capital."

Joe’s opening remarks apparently needed clarification

Joe Terranova opened Wednesday's (6/25) Halftime Report saying, "It's a Mag 7 story right now."

Judge claimed it's not all about tech, that industrials are at a high. Kari Firestone, who had a quiet show, said financials are strong and that a "theme" is that the market is favoring stocks not subject so much to tariffs.

Jason Snipe said "you gotta respect the tape" (at least he didn't say "the pain trade is higher"); he thinks you need to "ride the wave."

"Most of my book is, is in big-cap tech," Steve Weiss revealed, saying that when valuations get stretched, "they eventually grow into that valuation."

In the 20th minute, Joe wanted to "clarify" his remarks "at the beginning of the show," when he said it's all about technology, he was only talking about Wednesday.

Joe: Don’t reach for NEM

On Wednesday's (6/25) Halftime Report, Judge and Santoli actually agreed that Wednesday's market was "kinda lame" (snicker).

Sully delivered a report that it's "unlikely" that Shell would be buying all of BP, but it's possible Shell might buy a part of it.

Jason Snipe said "the macro is less cloudy" for names such as BX and KKR. Steve Weiss said he doesn't own private equity names, which has been a "complete miss" for him.

Jason said there's a "lot of momentum" in NOW. Joe Terranova and Judge got tangled up over the word "still" (snicker) while discussing TJX. Weiss said he keeps watching LULU's slide and said "I'd like to buy it," but the competition is a big issue.

Judge said Piper is touting CHTR in Q3. Kari Firestone said she likes the stock. Joe sounded highly lukewarm on NEM and suggested not "reaching for it." That call was kind of interesting, because Halftime hasn't talked about gold too much.

Jason made a decent case for COST. Joe said NU comes with volatility. Joe said EXPE lost momentum. Judge pointed out that BKNG is up 10% this year while EXPE is down 10%. Joe said EXPE has had a "very uneven course" since 2022.

Jason and Joe both picked AMD for Final Trade. (This writer is long AMD.)

Jay Powell apparently doesn’t know the requirements to be Fed chair

The beginning of Tuesday's (6/24) Halftime Report was preempted by Federal Reserve Chair Jay Powell's testimony to a House committee.

We were barely paying attention when we heard U.S. Rep. Juan Vargas, D-Calif., who said he is 64 years old, ask Mr. Powell (who is 72, but that number was not mentioned, only that Mr. Powell is older than Mr. Vargas) if Donald Trump can appoint himself chair of the Federal Reserve.

Mr. Powell responded, "It's a question, but not for me. ... I don't know."

Then Rep. Vargas asked, "You're the Fed chair, what is (sic) the requirements to be the Fed chair?"

Powell answered, "Confirmed by the- nominated by the president, confirmed by the Senate. I think- I think you probably have to be a U.S. citizen probably, but I don't- not sure ..."

Well, we don't know those requirements either.

But we're not the Fed chair.

Attempting a little sleuthing ... (sigh) We knew this wouldn't be easy ... we tried finding a simple answer on some sort of official, Fed-related website.

It seems like a big priority is to already be on the Fed's Board of Governors. But the position requires Senate confirmation, which is probably a bigger deal, so perhaps there could theoretically be a scenario where a president appoints a Chair who is not on the Board of Governors, and the Senate could theoretically approve it. (We have no idea.)

But let's say the president does this the typical way. To get on the Board of Governors, it does seem like the biggest requirement is merely Senate approval. And we did see on some official-looking document, "U.S. citizen." Otherwise, the guidelines indicate someone who has demonstrated some elevated knowledge of at least parts of the financial system, is not in the same district/territory as someone else, and not working for a bank. (That's the Cliffs Notes version.)

People may be surprised to know that the Supreme Court has a similar lack of requirements. The dude at 7-Eleven could theoretically be setting legal precedents, provided 50 or 51 senators go along.

Joe predicts cut by Sept. 18 (a/k/a Santoli apparently is actually seeing 1999 parallels)

Once Tuesday's (6/24) Halftime Report producers opted to cut off Jay Powell's testimony, Judge and Stephanie Link harped on the implication from the Fed chief that if not for tariffs, the Fed would be cutting rates.

Joe Terranova said "resiliency" is the term he'll use over and over again. Joe predicted, "I think they'll be cutting by September 18th."

Kari Firestone said there's a "runway" for Megacap Tech to lead the market higher.

Josh Brown pointed out COIN is the best stock in the S&P financial sector this year.

Judge noted UBER's gain Tuesday. Joe pointed out that UBER is classified as an "industrial," something that fascinates panelists on this show. Switching to semis, Joe said AMD is "breaking out." Judge said a "bunch" of semis are breaking out.

Josh pointed out how UBER has occasionally sold off whenever there's a robotaxi headline, and it's probably good that Tesla's finally getting going on it.

Joe called HEI "remarkably strong"; it might be the first time we've heard that stock mentioned on the show. Same for HWM; Joe is "very proud of what it's done."

Joe said he's got a "double" in EQT, "so I can sit and wait with this," a comment that really doesn't make any sense. If it's a strong investment, then anyone should buy it now. If it's a weak investment, Joe and others should sell.

Josh said DIS is on his "best stocks in the market" list; he said it's a "big surprise" that 7 entertainment stocks are on that list. Josh said the Street is giving DIS a lot more credit now for Disney+ subscribers. Josh said if it broke through 120, that would be a "pretty massive breakout."

Santoli said the market wants to "finish the AI bubble," but Judge doesn't "understand" how today's market could be likened to 1999. Santoli conceded the current market doesn't have the same "speculative nuttiness," but he pointed to interest in CRCL.

On Tuesday's Fast Money, Guy Adami was heard to say that Tim Seymour said weeks ago, "The pain trade (snicker) (means the market's going up) is gonna be higher." But Guy wondered "at what point" do valuations "matter."

‘These kinds of conflicts
don’t end bull markets’

Monday's (6/23) Halftime Report might've been better off stationing Judge in the D.C. bureau. But even with its constant geopolitical headline interruptions, Judge's crew put together a strong, crisp show with some instant analysis about the Middle East conflict's impact on financial markets.

"It was the right thing to do," Steve Weiss concluded of U.S. strikes on Iran.

Weiss shrugged that the market "only knows one direction basically, and that's up." (As we wait for Weiss and Judge to define the "intermediate term" that Weiss was fearing so much a month ago.)

Joe Terranova opened saying you “can’t ignore the resiliency” of the market and pointed out the EIS hitting an all-time high on Monday.

Amy Raskin pointed out, "The longer we don't talk about tariffs, the better it is for the markets."

Bryn Talkington mentioned the "posterboard" on April 2 that "caught everybody by surprise" and suggested that particular event may have been it for black-swan events in 2025.

Weiss said he's "predominantly" in large-cap tech but noted a lot of stocks aren't up.

Bryn said that she's actually been making more money selling TSLA calls than just owning the stock. Joe tried to explain why TSLA may or may not be in the JOET. Judge said it's a "matter of days," but the rebalancing doesn't happen until the end of July.

Weiss said robotaxis aren't going to be profitable for a while and again pointed out how with Uber, drivers handle the car maintenance. Weiss credited Bryn's success with TSLA but called it "the most overhyped stock on a long-term basis I've ever come across."

Judge spent the 2nd half of the show dealing with news reports about "credible" Iranian threats. Joe said this is a "headline-driven market" with a "lot of algorithms" and at least in terms of crude oil, he wouldn't be doing much right now.

Santoli declared, "These kinds of conflicts don't- don't end bull markets."

Weiss said "Qatar has been the home away from home for the heads of Ha- Hamas and other terrorist organizations."

Sully is an expert on this topic and was quite animated discussing the situation on Power Lunch.

Rate-cutting has ‘optics’

Judge on Friday's (6/20) Halftime Report announced that Jay Powell's remarks "were deemed to be more hawkish than not." (By the way, we give Judge credit for reporting for duty, as we anticipated many CNBCers would make it a 4-day weekend.)

Josh Brown said that to eclipse the old highs, the market needs "a little bit of time to breathe" because "historically, it doesn't really happen right away" after a recovery rally; rather, once it gets near the highs, it tends to "stall out a little bit."

Permabull Stephanie Link said "one yellow flag" is the "weekly jobless claims" that are "going higher."

Steve Liesman said he thinks Jay Powell is "a guy that wants to reduce rates." But Steve questioned the "optics" of cutting rates "in a month when inflation goes up." (And we didn't know that there were any optics involved in moving interest rates or inflation.)

Jenny Harrington pointed out that the 10-year is around 4.35%, just like it was a year ago, and asserted that the front end of the curve is less important to markets. Jenny said the budget deficit is "totally out of control."

Judge promised Tom Lee on Closing Bell was going to say buy the dip and that the pullbacks will be "shallow."

NFLX’s valuation

Judge reported on Friday's (6/20) Halftime Report that Dan Ives has decided IBM is "still underowned."

Jenny Harrington said 2-3 years ago, "where Steph and I were the only 2 who owned it, we got into a major pissing (yikes) match with a short seller who thought we were idiots."

"Yes we did," Stephanie confirmed.

"You have to look ahead," Jenny concluded.

(Honestly, we don't recall this debate or short seller, but IBM seems like a strange stock to short. It never has a super-fast tumble, just very lengthy downtrends that move incrementally. And then it occasionally has a burst higher.) (This writer has no position in IBM.)

Meanwhile, Josh Brown bought more TOST. Jenny called KMX a "fantastic buy."

Josh flagged RKT as a breakout stock, saying it could have a "ton of demand" if there's just a refinancing boom.

Josh talked up APH as a data-center play.

Jason Snipe said NFLX has "lots of room to run internationally." (This writer is long NFLX.) Josh said you never hear the term "streaming wars" anymore because the war's been won. Josh suggested "big YouTube creators" could be another growth avenue for NFLX. Jenny talked up DIS but of course said NFLX is "not a compelling valuation." Josh said NFLX and DIS both have streaming services, "and then the similarities end."

Uh oh — Waymo report sounds like that PANW 5%-vs.50-60%-of-billings-are-from-federal-government fiasco

On Wednesday's (6/18) Halftime Report, CNBC's Dee Bosa reported on Waymo deploying in New York.

Dee also said Wells Fargo produced a note predicting that by 2030, Waymo's U.S. "footprint" will grow from 10% to 57%, and Waymo will have "taken 10% of the rideshare market."

But moments later, Dee said, "To think that they could take up 60% of the total addressable market by 2030, that really puts it in perspective."

But the Wells Fargo note apparently said Waymo will only have 10% of the rideshare market.

So they're either getting 10% ... or 60% ...

Neither Judge, nor Dee, offered any clarification.

What’s the status of that federal order to work on reopening Alcatraz?

In yet another Wednesday pre-Fed show that's out of date within about 45 minutes, Judge on Wednesday's (6/18) Halftime Report said Tom Lee "says stocks are gonna rally post-FOMC."

Joe Terranova opened the remarks claiming that entering Q3, "You have this looming battle between resiliency and complacency." Judge cut in that we could have "both." Joe said, "I'm in the resiliency camp." Joe suggested we're getting out of buyback season and that there are "looming tariffs" (snicker).

Joe suggested that if Jay Powell "really has a hawkish (snicker) position," he doesn't see that as good for markets, "and I can't see why he would move towards a dovish position."

Judge though said "I don't know why he would remain, uh, hawkish," citing "jobless claims" and "data points."

Bill Baruch said of Powell, "I think he has a reason to go dovish." But Bill cited the all-time contra-indicator "Michigan consumer" inflation survey (Zzzzzzzzz) (snicker).

Kevin Simpson said he could make a case for cutting rates this week, though he knows that won't happen.

Steve Weiss was remote in a brick room, he said he was in the offices of one of his portfolio companies involved in robotics. Judge cracked that it looks like "the hole in Alcatraz."

Weiss said he thinks it's "status quo" for the Fed. He said the market has "pure momentum."

Steve Liesman said, "You, Scott, just engineered a perfect stagflationary conversation," which is "almost precisely" the conversation the Fed is having. Weiss moments later claimed he's been talking about stagflation for "a couple months."

(We're not quite sure what kind of conversation Judge "engineered," but whatever.)

Later, Weiss revealed he actually is in San Francisco, prompting another Alcatraz joke from Judge.

Jeffrey Gundlach actually did not mention ‘Mr. Magoo’ on Closing Bell

Steve Kovach on Wednesday's (6/18) Halftime Report reported that Sam Altman is claiming META is poaching OpenAI workers with supposedly $100 million bonuses. (Zzzzzzzz)

Steve Weiss said it "costs a fortune" for AI engineers but sounded skeptical about META paying $100 million bonuses; "it makes no economic sense whatsoever."

Judge though said these companies have "never been shy" about paying huge amounts for these engineers who are the "lifeblood" of these operations.

Kevin Simpson bought CAT, saying industrials have topped his expectations this year. Kevin bought JBL on Friday after making it his Final Trade last Thursday; he said "it's up $20 since then." Kevin cautioned, "It's up a lot, so be careful." (Doesn't that mean it's a great MOMENTUM stock??????)

Bill Baruch bought TMUS after regretting selling it earlier. Kevin sold a covered call on TMUS.

Joe "Momentum" Terranova suggested the JOET's purchase of ZTS could be a "swing and a miss."

Joe said RCL is the cruise line you want to own.

Joe said "EQT has remarkable strength right now" because "there appears to be this awakening in natural gas." (If we had a dollar for every time we've heard on CNBC that natural gas is just getting going ...)

Bill said he does expect bitcoin to at some point surpass $110,000. But he's not sure it will "perform well" if the Middle East war "heats up." Weiss said "I'm in it for the momentum, I think the momentum reaccelerates" from "specific legislation."

‘Right now, I think it’s a buying opportunity’

Tuesday's (6/17) Fast Money began with CNBC's Eamon Javers at the Nasdaq, leading an excellent session on the state of the Israel-Iran conflict and potential U.S. involvement.

Steve Grasso said, "Right now, I think it's a buying opportunity. World War III? Not a buying opportunity."

Karen Finerman stated, "It seems contained right now, in that, there's not a lot of great moves that Iran can make right now."

At the moment, that seems true. Eamon noted that goals or end games are unclear. If — a big "if" — Iran is unable to defend itself, perhaps there could be talk of an international force entering the country. And then the country that is currently at war with Ukraine is bound to have some kind of reaction.

Steve Grasso continued to make the argument that other companies will lessen their spending on NVDA, and "I'm looking for the stock to be back below a hundred ... maybe in a year." Karen, though, said she thinks "there's still runway for Nvidia."

What happened to the tariffs on film (or is it ‘TV’ or ‘series’ too) productions?

At the top of Tuesday's (6/17) Halftime Report, Judge was trying to talk about fund manager surveys (Zzzzzzzzzz).

Shannon Saccocia said we've seen "that expected tariff rate continue to come down."

Josh Brown referred to the president a couple months ago holding a "piece of cardboard" showing tariffs. Josh pointed out the importance of the Mag 7/AI theme, specifically NVDA, in keeping the market going.

Brian Belski said, "We're very lucky to remain bullish through all of this," not mentioning how he cut his S&P target right around the bottom. (See below a couple months ago.) Brian said stocks will be "significantly" higher a year from now, and he'd be inclined to buy AAPL.

Judge brought up the dollar and tried, and failed, to convince Stephanie Link that there might be any problems with this market.

Judge asked Steve Liesman a "simple question," whether, if not for tariffs/trade war, the Fed would be cutting Wednesday. "No doubt in my mind," Steve said.

Megan Cassella reported on a post from Donald Trump about the whereabouts of Iran's Supreme Leader.

Josh was again talking up LYV, saying it's been "rallying for 3 years straight."

Belski bought NKE at 56. Judge said SPOT hit a record high. Belski said of SPOT, "I love this company," and he's owned it for 7 years. (This writer is long SPOT.)

Referring to AXON and RTX, Josh said aerospace and defense stocks have a median 17% return this year.

Josh, who got all day to talk about his best stocks in the market, said he'd be "very alert in the oil names right now for the next leg of this rally."

Joe calls Brad ‘phenomenal’ in how Brad describes the universe of ... something or other

On Monday's (6/16) Halftime Report, Jim Lebenthal predicted new highs "pretty soon" and said once we get there, "FOMO" kicks in.

Joe Terranova offered, "We continue to show the resiliency in this market" and he thinks we're headed to a new all-time S&P high. Judge said that when he asked about the 10-year yield on Friday, he was getting "a different answer from 5 different people."

Kari Firestone though said the market has "certain constraints," citing concerns about earnings growth.

Joe said, "I watched Thursday's show. Brad Gerstner was phenomenal in just simplistically describing the universe that we're living in here surrounding this innovation."

Kari selling, Jim buying ADBE

Kari Firestone revealed on Monday's (6/16) Halftime Report that she sold ADBE, one of the more interesting stocks in the market (this writer has no position in ADBE); "They're having trouble in their major business, Photoshop."

Jim Lebenthal, though, bought more ADBE, saying he's been adding over the years. Jim said the earnings were a beat on top and bottom lines.

Judge, skeptical, asked for a 1-year chart, prompting Joe "Momentum" Terranova to say "down 23%."

Jim explained that Kari's a "growth investor" while he's a CLF-all-the-way guy "value-oriented guy." Jim claimed ADBE is "meeting" the "competitive threat."

Joe said, "They have to somehow revive that revenue growth" and warned that there's a "massive earthquake coming" in tech from OpenAI. (Yes, as far as we can tell, it's an "earthquake" that reposts 5-year-old Wikipedia page material when you ask it a question.)

Jim sold CASY, calling it a "heroic stock," and saying he only sold it because he needed funds for ADBE.

UNH bottomed May 15; apparently Judge thinks a 20% gain since then is pocket change

Judge spent part of Monday's (6/16) Halftime Report discussing winners and losers in panelists' portfolios.

Joe "Momentum" Terranova said it's a "valuable exercise" to evaluate everyone's winners and losers, and what's evident is that "momentum is one of the strongest factors" in the 2025 market, which generally means a "healthy market."

Hmmm ... OK ... Going out on a limb here, if a bunch of stocks have "momentum," then it's probably a good market.

Joe bought the EIS. Joe also bought SU and ENB, saying the U.S. refiner is "eating the tariff."

Joe doesn't see a "green light ahead" for INCY but he's "staying with" BSX.

Jim Lebenthal claimed that CSCO is like "Oracle 3 years ago."

Dom Chu's guest on ETF Edge was actually Dan Ives, who said it's the "2nd inning" (snicker) of the AI revolution. Brad Gerstner says it's only the leadoff batter of the whole game.

Kari Firestone owns UNH; Judge wondered why. Kari said she actually "bought some more right at the bottom," which was actually an excellent move. Judge somehow said, "The stock looks like it's at the bottom."

Jim's Final Trade was DIS; Jim said it's "actually breaking out."

‘Every single one of those being a buying opportunity’

Steve Weiss opened Friday's (6/13) Halftime Report saying something that we couldn't possibly agree with MORE. (In fact, we were agreeing with almost everything we heard on Friday's show.)

"Look I've been in the business almost 35 years. We've seen a number of flare-ups in the Middle East. Every single one of those being a buying opportunity," Weiss said.

Indeed. This page has heard the "if there's a closure of the Strait of Hormuz" thing for probably 30 years running. We also don't get this tiresome notion of "Nobody's going to short oil going into a weekend like this." If anything, it's probably as good a time as any. (This page has no position regarding oil's price and is definitely not in the business of making commodities recommendations.)

Weiss said if he were trading oil, he'd sell the pop. Judge noted the oil market had been trading all week "as if the market quote-unquote knew something was gonna happen."

Weiss concluded, "It's business as usual." Sarat Sethi agreed with Weiss that the impact should fade quickly, even though Judge questioned whether Strait of Hormuz issues could spike oil to $100.

Rob Sechan though warned of a ripple problem, suggesting Middle East tension could "throw a wrench" into the economy and markets because of what may happen with oil prices. (How many times has that actually happened.)

Bill Baruch dialed in saying that this week, he'd been "exiting call spreads in crude oil, exiting call spreads in gold." He said "it's important to capitalize on these moves" and the market tends to forget what happened last week. (Hear, hear.) Despite his moves, Bill said gold is "building up for 5,000."

Judge brought up Brad Gerstner's giddiness about his renamed Trump Accounts possibly getting approval about the stock market. Weiss again stressed he's "fully invested" and said that despite Brad's optimism, Weiss said "the CEOs that I talk to" (snicker) aren't as optimistic.

It was in the 19th minute that Rob Sechan met the show's daily quota of someone saying "The pain trade is higher" (snicker). (That means he thinks the S&P is going up.)

Rob said "Valuation is a terrible, terrible timing tool." Yet again, we couldn't agree more.

Weiss said NFLX "weakened a little when the Hulu news started coming out, uh, and that made no sense." Weiss called it a "permahold, it's a permanent compounder." (This writer is long NFLX.)

Rob and Weiss both backed ABBV, though Weiss said he's maybe "the only one who hasn't owned it over the last 5 years." Weiss said he bought back UNH. Honestly, this page doesn't know where UNH is going, but it feels like all of Weiss' (and others') buys in this name in the last 6 months or so seem like attempts at bottom-picking. (This writer has no position in UNH.)

Judge said IBM has been on "a tear." Rob said it's up 71% since he added it last year. Judge said SU and LLY were both on winning streaks.

Judge asked Rob about PNGAY's "4-day win streak." Rob said, "You kinda poked me on this one when I added it on the show." We didn't recall it in the slightest.

Grandpa Weiss referred to reports of consumers putting more grocery bills on credit cards.

Rob said he's going to be patient with ADBE, a stock discussed the previous afternoon on Fast Money.

Josh, next to Malcolm at Post 9, says PANW is one of the best stocks in the market

We didn't know if we were being put on — or if it was just a crazy coincidence.

Late in Thursday's (6/12) Halftime Report, Josh Brown actually talked up PANW as one of the best stocks in the market — while Malcolm Ethridge sat to Josh's left.

(If you don't know why that's significant, see below.)

We didn't hear anything from Josh about the billing percentage from the federal government.

Whether the CEO will issue a statement on Friday, we guess we'll find out.

How in the world does ‘AI’ come up with all this information??

Brad Gerstner, star guest of Thursday's (6/12) Halftime Report, actually was heard to say, "The AI supercycle is larger than the internet itself."

And we wonder exactly what AI Brad is using. Because in terms of the printed word, it seems like AI is just ... scraping words that someone else actually wrote.

We typed in some familiar terms (tip: people on the Halftime Report) to ChatGPT, and it took a fair amount of time for the "AI" to post for us the Barrons.com, Wikipedia and office website descriptions of a couple folks on the Halftime Report. (At least it didn't take credit for writing those profiles from scratch.)

Brad said we might even only be in "maybe the first batter in the first inning" of the AI wave. (Which articles will AI be scraping from in the 8th and 9th innings?)

Brad said Henry Blodget "got ridiculed and laughed off of Wall Street" for his AMZN $400 call in 2000, but "Amazon is up 87 times today from where it was when he made that call."

‘Is the strategy Navarro?’

Brad Gerstner was the star guest of Thursday's (6/12) Halftime Report, taking part early in a discussion about the markets, and later in a discussion about his White House event with Donald Trump.

Brad claimed that it "looks like we have a deal with China." (Heard that one before.) Brad said, "So I feel very comfortable, um, where we're going to land the plane on tariffs."

Malcolm Ethridge said Brad made a great case for long-term holds, but that March and April weren't that long ago and a lot of people thought about getting out of the market and it's not a bad idea to be "derisking some" and "do yourself some justice."

Kevin Simpson said "the risk is still to the upside." He's expecting "more of a range-bound market."

Judge told Brad that the Wall Street Journal editorial team says Donald Trump has no trade "strategy." Brad stressed that there's a difference between a "strategy" and "tactics" (bringing memories of the McCain-Obama debate of 2008) and that the show is often about tactics.

Brad said Donald Trump's tactics are apparent from the book, but "the strategy is what scared the market earlier in the year," as the markets had to wonder, "Is the strategy Navarro?" And Brad said that if the market believed now that Navarro was the strategy, it would be down 20%.

(OK, we don't agree with Brad on everything, but if he — like others on the show recently — keeps noting the Navarro element of the White House, we might just elect Brad to office.)

Instead, Brad said the markets decided the strategy is "the Bessent consensus" (snicker). Brad said it looks to him like "the president's got trillions of dollars of incremental investments in the United States" and that we're "re-onshoring some critical industries" (though he didn't actually name them).

Brad said the poster that the president held up in April at the White House showing all the tariffs on countries "terrified the markets."

Josh Brown said the "revelation" to the markets was that the only negative was the trade war. Josh drew an analogy to kids playing street hockey and having to pause and move the nets when a car comes through.

Josh said, "Quite frankly, the- the Liberation Day to, the- the TACO didn't last that long." Josh said "These ARR businesses are absolutely smokin'."

Brad added, "We're still below the 5-year average on software multiples."

Brad said, contrary to what Malcolm Ethridge was saying, that investors should be "leaning in" to the markets as opposed to hedging.

Malcolm said his "one concern" with the market was that Q1 earnings may have been a "pull forward" on tariff fears.

Josh said some companies are pricing in the impact of a trade war, but the biggest companies haven't been hit hard.

Josh said the "push and pull" about rates and labor market will probably continue this year.

What’s ‘surreal’ about it?

Judge actually asked Brad Gerstner on Thursday's (6/12) Halftime Report if it was "surreal" (sic) (snicker) to be at the White House on Monday. (That was so the president could tout the "Trump Accounts" that used to be known as "Invest America.")

Brad said it was an "incredible moment for America." CNBC's screen graphic still called it "Gerstner's Invest America."

Judge wondered if the plan, however close to the goal line, will still get across the finish line in Congress. Brad insisted it has "broad support" and predicted it would "remain in the reconciliation bill."

Meanwhile, Malcolm Ethridge said he finally bought AAPL because it reached "peak pessimism."

Josh Brown bought JOBY and ACHR and called them "super speculative." Kevin Simpson said he got stopped out of TPL.

On Fast Money, ADBE came up; Tim Seymour said "at some point," it will catch a bid. Dan Nathan called it a "no-touch." Steve Grasso said it bounced technically in April and the technicals "look great," but it's still in a declining trend for 2025, so he'd wait for it to gain another $10 to the upside before buying. (This writer has no position in ADBE.) (It was Steve's birthday, as well as his twins'.)

The M&A cycle is just around the corner ...

Early on Wednesday's (6/11) Halftime Report, Grandpa Steve Weiss stated, "Earnings aren't gonna be good."

Weiss shrugged at the China tariff news; "There's nothing new coming out of it" and CEOs have "no clarity." But Weiss is "pretty fully invested."

Joe Terranova didn't opine on whether earnings will be good but said if they're not, that'll be a problem.

Joe said the China news was "priced in already." Joe noted the VIX is at 16. Joe said there's a "broadening out" going on.

Weiss wondered if we might see NVDA "trade down again." Joe said semi activity seems like it's "beginning to moderate somewhat."

Shannon Saccocia said there's going to continue to be a "wait-and-see approach" to AAPL. Joe said TSLA and AAPL are "struggling" and that the "totality" of the Mag 7 doesn't have the same dominance as in 2023/2024.

Joe yet again explained how the JOET "strategy" has to be "rules-based" unless he changes the "SEC prospectus," which would be a "big process." (It doesn't stop him from buying whatever he wants for his personal account.)

Shannon said the markets are "anticipating" tariffs moving lower. Jason Snipe said "part of" the catalyst ahead would be the Fed.

Shannon said energy's starting to look more attractive. Jason said financials are a "nice opportunity" and said something we've been hearing for years from various people on this program, the M&A cycle is "due" to come back. Moments later, Joe said he sees no reason to be selling GS. Jason brought up the "M&A cycle" again.

Weiss said he bought CAT and XLI for the reason of, "What if I'm wrong."

Weiss may have been wearing Adidas Stan Smith sneakers.

Dom Chu was enlisted for ETF Edge, but the mike wasn't working, so Dom was doing a Shields & Yarnell routine before guest host Frank Holland cut away to commercial. (Judge was surely traveling back from California.)

Todd Lewis previewed the U.S. Open (the golf tournament, not the September tennis gala) from Oakmont. (Obviously, it's being televised this weekend on NBC.) (SpinCo supposedly is going to blur or eliminate the partnerships between CNBC and NBC so that content can be licensed to more entities.)

Weiss said he bought more QXO and made it his Final Trade.

Karen: Not sure whether CMCSA or DIS is ‘making the right choice’

It took nearly all the way through Tuesday's (6/11) Fast Money to get the most interesting commentary of the day — Karen Finerman on DIS and Iger's CNBC interview and which company is making the smart move in regard to Hulu.

"It is so interesting that, uh, Comcast is doing a different model, right?," Karen said, struggling for the right terminology. "I guess we're 'divested,' sort of, 'spinning off,' call it. But not with the linear TV. Right. And so what- what do they see versus what Disney sees and who- who's making the right choice? I don't know. I mean, the landscape's changing so quickly, it's hard to know. But it was a really good interview, though. I mean, he seems very optimistic."

Guy Adami didn't address Comcast/Versant/whatever and said to "buy strength" in DIS.

Mel said David Faber is on the "Mount Rushmore of CNBC talent." Guy said Mel is "on that Rushmore too."

CNBC San Francisco set isn’t big enough for more than 3 people
(a/k/a ‘absolutely massive excitement’ in portfolio management business)

It says something about the impact of AAPL's WorldWide Developers Conference when a business television program the day after the event is even less exciting than the one that aired a day earlier an hour before the event even started.

But one thing viewers learned from Tuesday's (6/10) Halftime Report was that CNBC's San Francisco "office" is so small (about the size of Joe's pandemic office with numbers on the walls) that no more than 3 persons can be seated at the table on camera. (That explains why Dee Bosa and Steve Kovach delivered reports from seemingly another set but with the same Bay Area background.)

When the show began and Judge was introducing the topics, a woman (we think Dee but can't be sure) was heard on open mike saying "I don't hear Scott."

Early in the show, Judge mentioned that Steve put on social media that AAPL held a "WorldWide Meh Developers Conference," which Judge said was "cold."

Steve clarified that he was "linking to uh, the Cramer's Investing Club takeaway uh when I- when I tweeted that." But Steve said, "That's what the Street is saying this morning too."

Erik Woodring of Morgan Stanley, who has a 235 on AAPL, said "we didn't get much" about progress toward the exciting goals from 2024's WWDC.

Malcolm Ethridge, who was in D.C., said he thinks we're nearing "peak pessimism" in AAPL and he's close to buying but hasn't yet. He suggested 172 is probably the "floor" for bad news. He ended up making AAPL his Final Trade.

Alex Kantrowitz joined Judge and Brenda Vingiello at the San Francisco office for what was kind of a generic conversation about the state of Megacap Tech. Judge opened telling Brenda that it seems like taking out the old highs is a matter of "when not if." Brenda conceded there's been a big "resurgence," but growth needs to "stay intact."

Malcolm Ethridge said he's "growing a little bit more skeptical of this market at 22 times on the S&P."

Malcolm Ethridge said he doesn't like any stocks now such as MCD that get 50-60% of billings from the federal government are tied to the consumer, but he said the area for growth for MCD would be its plan to "add additional franchisees and open additional stores from here," for all those who figured there couldn't possibly be anyplace in America without a McDonald's at the end of the block.

Judge said DIS got a Loop upgrade; Brenda said the Hulu deal was "a lot lower cost" than had been speculated.

Brenda said the Musk-Trump split is actually the "best thing for both parties."

Alex Harmsen, the co-founder of PortfolioPilot, was Judge's star guest. He's so excited about his line of work that when Judge asked about reaching 30,000 users and $30 billion in assets, he said, "It's been exciting, uh, absolute, uh, you know massive excitement." He said AI supplies "optimization" opportunities.

Preserving ‘mental capital’

Judge was in Cupertino for Monday's (6/9) Halftime Report, a sleepy preview show in which most of the commentary could've been recorded months earlier. (It must've been cold, because Judge was in both a thick vest and a jacket.)

Panelists were not in Cupertino. Rob Sechan, back in NewEdge offices, said it's hard to be "too pessimistic" on AAPL but conceded that the WWDC "may be a sell the news, uh, moment."

Joe Terranova, broadcasting from that pandemic room with the numbers on the walls, said AAPL is "bcoming more value tech than anything else, and it's not that exciting." Judge questioned the terminology of "value tech" when "it trades at 26 times."

Stephanie Link actually said, "What a difference a year makes."

Dan Ives, who was on Judge's Cupertino set and whose jacket got a mention by Judge, said he's still confident that "the consumer AI revolution (snicker) runs through Cupertino." Dan suggested a $4 trillion market cap.

Alex Kantrowitz joined Judge and Steve Kovach in Cupertino and said people are talking about this as an "AI gap year for Apple."

Judge tried asking Joe about the Trump-Musk war; Joe's mike wasn't working, so viewers got a bit of a Shields & Yarnell routine; then Joe's audio returned, and it sounded like Joe was in a cavern. Joe stressed how he can't change the rules for the JOET, but if he could "tweak" the strategy, he would write off some names that require "mental capital."

Stephanie Link jumped aboard UBER, which she noted is "7% below its highs," always a favorite Halftime metric. Joe said "obviously I support" Stephanie's arguments in favor of the company.

Judge said there's been speculation about some names getting in to the S&P 500, but it hasn't happened. Joe said that not getting in "stalls" the positive momentum of APP. But he asserted that the fundamentals are strong with IBKR.

Jenny doesn’t think the stock market is ‘running’

Judge on Friday's (6/6) Halftime Report seemed determined to dismiss Permabear (except in all those great non-tech stocks with low P.E. ratios that are out there for real stock-pickers) Jenny Harrington's typically not-so-optimistic outlook on the stock market, only to have Jenny pivot to a semantical debate.

Judge opened the show telling Jenny, "This market continues to run."

Jenny immediately objected, "I don't- I mean, I don't really see it as running, do you? What are we up now, 1½%, 2% on the whole year? That's running?"

"Why don't you judge it from the low," Judge suggested, adding that maybe Jenny is "trying to make yourself feel better," but isn't that "kind of missing the story."

"I don't think it can go a lot higher from here," Jenny bluntly stated, citing "serious headwinds."

Rob Sechan said he "very rarely" disagrees with Jenny, but "the pain trade is still higher" (translation: That means he thinks the market is going up) and "there are still tons of haters out there." Rob even said "one of the biggest bulls is Mike Wilson."

Rob suggested the market's in a range of 6,150 to 5,400, but it would take something "pretty powerful" to go back to 5,400.

Josh Brown said some things should provide "faith" that we won't "revisit" the lows this year. Josh said Megacap Tech CEOs reaffirmed AI spending and that we haven't had a bad jobs report.

Josh also said "the Robinhood crowd" is "buying every dip" and that HOOD is at a new high. Kevin Simpson noted that HOOD could be had for 31-32 during the April lows.

Jenny said she was at a REIT conference last weekend, and "overall," expectations were for zero rate cuts this year.

Judge asked in disbelief, "You came back from a REIT convention and that is, is shaping your view of the overall market?" Jenny answered "no," that it's only shaping her view of "where I think rates are going." (And we didn't realize that REIT CEOs are better than the markets/Steve Liesman at knowing what rate moves we're going to get.)

Jenny owns DOCU and said she's "up 80%" in 2 years and said the earnings are "fine" despite the stock's big selloff, which Jenny called a "huge opportunity."

Rob said he sold LULU last August for a "tax loss," and now, "the stock seems to have broken down." Jenny of course asserted that DOCU is a better stock than LULU.

‘We are above that sort of thing’

Fairly early into Friday's (6/6) Halftime Report, Judge turned to Eamon Javers at the White House; Eamon said Donald Trump "intends to sell or give away" the red Tesla he bought at the "peak of his hype cycle around Elon Musk."

Eamon said "a number of the TV networks" have "live cameras" pointed at the car on White House grounds, waiting for it to be moved, adding, "We are above that sort of thing, so we don't have that."

Kevin Simpson said he trimmed TSLA a day earlier. "They're not in as good a position today as they were 48 hours ago," Kevin said. He said he wrote covered calls at 270 for a $25 premium; they expire next Friday.

Josh Brown said he wasn't on Thursday's show because he was at a funeral. Josh said the TSLA shareholder base "literally doesn't care about anything," and it's a "nothing matters stock."

Stephanie Link dialed in to say she bought more AVGO.

Jenny Harrington bought LYB (Zzzzzzzz). Rob Sechan sold COP but added JEF.

Kevin Simpson bought MRK and sold CRM.

Josh Brown talked up DE.

Judge said RBLX is up in 8 of the last 9 weeks.

Jeremy Siegel on Closing Bell told Judge, "One of the oldest expressions on Wall Street is, 'Make the trend your friend.' And the trend is upward."

‘I do think it’s 2019’

The first half of Thursday's (6/5) Halftime Report was preempted by presidential remarks — and boy, was that story only getting started.

When Halftime panelists finally got a chance at Post 9, Brian Belski offered that we're getting "some clarity out of China" but still need some kind of resolution.

Bill Baruch said there was some "levitation" this week in anticipation of talks with China, but we need "more facts." Bill said there's a "tremendous amount of resistance" from 6,014 to 6,050 in the S&P 500.

Jim Lebenthal said the market's up because Trump and Xi are talking. Either referring to tariff negotiations or the congressional tax bill (we're not sure, and it wasn't clear), Stephanie Link said "this whole thing is so tiresome."

Belski said he's overweight tech but not overweight the Mag 7. Belski said "tech is here to stay" (snicker).

Bill said, "I do think it's 2019. I've been saying this, that we're gonna have a really strong 2nd half of the year."

Belski bought OKLO and CHKP, the latter being "half the multiple of CrowdStrike." (This writer is long CRWD.)

Bill cut his CRWD position in half, saying he bought last year during the outage fallout and hadn't touched it since, but there was some "shrinkage" in the earnings report and there's also "DOJ news."

As the shortened Halftime tried to gain momentum, Eamon Javers reported that after Donald Trump's remarks, Elon issued "blistering criticism" of ... um ... Republican leadership, tweeting/Xing that "Without me, Trump would have lost the election." Judge called it an "incredible, developing story."

Jim hung a 120 on DIS for his Final Trade.

On Fast Money, which was its 2nd recent production with a studio audience, Eamon Javers admitted he was "kinda out of words" to describe the Trump-Musk feud. (Except Eamon went on to report what had happened, so he obviously wasn't out of words.) There was a lot of news on this show, and not as much time spent with the gallery as in February.

‘Their belief — You can deficit-spend your way out of it’

Joe Terranova led off Wednesday's (6/4) Halftime Report with the 2nd straight day of suggesting Q3 will be the problem; "there is difficulty ahead" because the economy is "going to cool" and he's more concerned about "rapidly" slowing growth, not inflation. (Maybe that jibes with Weiss' contention (which both Weiss and Judge have seemingly forgotten about) that it's the "intermediate term" that's gonna be so awful.)

Jim Lebenthal was trying to argue with a straight face that the CBO isn't accounting for all the growth that can reduce the deficit mushroom cloud because the CBO doesn't do "dynamic scoring."

Judge cut in to say that Megan Cassella reported that the CBO said tariffs will "cut the deficit" by $2.8 trillion over 10 years, but Judge said "that is assuming of course that the tariffs are in place for 10 years."

Jim admitted, "I don't know if the tariffs will last."

Judge pointed out that even if that happens, the debt "trajectory" still isn't good. Jim stated, "The way you get out of this is not austerity. You grow your way out of it."

That's curious enough, but then Judge must've been eyeing Burger King for lunch because he really dropped the Whopper: "That's clearly their belief — is that you can deficit-spend your way out of it."

(So why not double or triple the deficit in the big beautiful bill, so we can spend our way out of it all that much faster?)

And can Jim point to any instance in the last 50 years in which the economy has "grown" its way ahead of the deficit? Has the government ever thought about spending less money?

Meanwhile, Sarat Sethi said in the short term to "expect a lot of volatility." Bryn Talkington said the bond market will serve as "judge and jury" about the country's fiscal path.

Bryn again suggested the market's in a range of 5,750 to "a little bit over 6,000," but "the pain is on the upside." (Which is a fancy way of saying it's going higher.) Bryn said she thinks there is "trade fatigue."

"I think it's a stock-picker's market," Jim said, acknowledging buys in CSCO and QCOM, both stocks that, with a certain exception of a few years for CSCO, Jim has been touting for his entire tenure on the show (but skip NFLX and TSLA; the multiple's too high!).

Joe has made interesting points about casinos, but gains can be had

In a discussion of stock streaks, Judge said UBER and WYNN are on 5-day losing streaks, but Judge is "Ubered-out," so he said they'd talk about WYNN.

Jim Lebenthal said WYNN is "stuck between 80 and a hundred." Jim predicted that when the breakout happens, it'll be to the "upside."

Joe Terranova observed that WYNN is "down 15% in the last 5 years." Joe added moments later, "Down 20% last 10 years." Jim said "I haven't owned it for 20 years."

Joe is right — but he failed to mention, as did Jim, that the stock during those 5-year and 10-year periods has had numerous bursts to the upside. It's had a lot of 6-month spans where it went straight up.

Judge said EQIX is up 6 days in a row, and so is WDAY, both owned by Sarat Sethi. Sarat said WDAY is a "great company" that's "coming off a bottom."

Judge noted ZTS, a Joe holding, is up. Joe noted VEEV is making a 52-week high.

‘Really good’ vs. ‘overwhelmingly great’

Judge on Wednesday's (6/4) Halftime Report brought up CRWD near the end of the A Block (this writer is long CRWD); "If we talk about it 10,000 times on the way up and everybody loves it, we're gonna talk about it on the way down."

Judge asked Joe Terranova, "What's the deal here?"

Joe suggested that a stock on that kind of ride has to have a report that "blows away" expectations. Joe said it was a "really good report" but not an "overwhelmingly great report." Judge wondered if positioning and valuation were "full," why does there have to be something wrong with the report. No one mentioned, as did Guy Adami the night before on Fast Money, that 450 appears to be support in the stock.

Later on, Steve Kovach reported a filing on government questions about the CRWD outage a year ago.

Joe at one point started to rehash his convoluted parsing of a day earlier about which subsectors of tech have momentum and how semis are doing (at least we didn't have another defining moment of defensive tech). (Zzzzzzzzzzzz.)

Bryn Talkington said she doesn't see a "catalyst" to get AAPL shares moving.

Bryn said V, aside from the usual "high margins, no capex," is "out of the crosshairs of the tariffs."

Santoli was at Post 9, but at first, his mike situation was a little screwed up and he sounded a bit like he was talking in a cavern.

Judge brought in NBC Sports reporer Kira K. Dixon from the RBC Canadian Open to discuss recent controversies involving Rory McIlroy.

Judge said Bernstein initiated SPOT as a buy with an 825 target. (This writer is long SPOT.) Judge said it's up "515% in 3 years." Joe said it's a "clear winner as it relates to momentum" and that the JOET bought it on Halloween and is up 85%. Joe said he doesn't like LYV as much as SPOT and that LYV has been in a "sideways pattern."

Kind of hard to outgrow anything when the borrowing never ends

The deficit surfaced in the A Block on Tuesday's (6/3) Halftime Report, and Stephanie Link suggested we could "outgrow our way out of a lot of things."

Hmmmm ... We've kind of been hearing that since the '80s. We're wondering where all the outgrowth has been while the spending keeps piling up. And which sectors (besides government spending) are experiencing great growth? Cleveland Cliffs? If it's Apple, then you get folks like Weiss claiming that's the upper part of the economy while most people are living "paycheck to paycheck" and getting killed by inflation. And if it's Dollar Tree that's got the growth, then it's because "strapped consumers are all trading down."

Stephanie said it's the country's "children" who will have to deal with the national debt. Um, by now, we're actually up to the great-grandkids.

Judge said he's talked to "a number of people" who are watching the bond market and are "fixated" on the deficit, which isn't a "new" thing, but there seems to be "no wherewithal to do anything about it." Judge explained, "It's a kick-the-can-down-the-road, until the can gets run over by a truck."

Sounds like Joe is endorsing Q4

Joe Terranova at the top of Tuesday's (6/3) Halftime Report said momentum and technicals are "way too strong" for the market to "roll over." (Which is another way of saying, it works until it doesn't.)

Joe in his opening statement mentioned "Netfix" (sic) (snicker) but quickly corrected himself. (This writer is long NFLX.)

Joe said, "Literally the pain trade is probably to the upside," which is fancy terminology for saying the market's going higher.

"The bias is absolutely to the upside," agreed Jason Snipe, but Jason noted "lack of guidance" and "pausing" of guidance in earnings, and he predicted a "range" this summer.

Joe said if there's going to be "consternation" in the 2025 "journey" (snicker) (not the rock band), he thinks it's "ultimately (sic) (not really the correct term) gonna be in the 3rd quarter."

Joe struggles to define his new niche category, ‘defensive’ tech

Judge on Tuesday's (6/3) Halftime Report said data are actually showing that tech is near a "record underweight" by big funds.

Joe Terranova suggested there's a "pivot" in the works from "defensive" tech toward semis. Judge asked for a definition of "defensive technology." Joe suggested INTU (Zzzzzzz) and IBM (Zzzzzzzz) but also said Megacap Tech is "its own class."

So apparently the market's making a "pivot" to something in tech, which Joe is parsing right and left.

Moments later, Joe kinda suggested NVDA and AVGO are "defensive semiconductor plays."

Stephanie Link has been trimming CRWD and putting it into PANW. (Uh oh. PANW is the company that either gets 5% or 50-60% of its billings from the federal government.) (This writer is long CRWD.) Joe said there's "very strong momentum" in cybersecurity.

(On Fast Money, Guy Adami said the "450 level" should be support for CRWD and the only thing not to like is the valuation. Tim Seymour said "I think there's more to this trade," but you'll have to let it "wait.")

Jason Snipe bought SNOW around 180 ahead of earnings, which was a good move.

Joe said he thinks NFLX (he didn't pronounce it "Netfix" this time) has higher to go, and he'd put SPOT "literally in the same category."

In a treat, CNBC's Pippa Stevens joined the Post 9 desk to discuss her report on META/AI/nuclear power.

Joe said UBER is now throwing off free cash flow and the company is "investment grade." Jason Snipe said UBER's got the "platform" that you want to have in rideshare.

In a discussion of CMG, Judge took issue with Joe saying "I believe in the company." Judge flatly stated, "You either own it or you don't." Moments later, Joe praised RCL as a "great turnaround story." Judge asked if Joe believes in that company. "Not as much as I believe in Chipotle," Joe said.

Judge announced that Malcolm Ethridge would be on Closing Bell; we didn't see it so we don't know if they discussed PANW billings.

‘I think the lows are in’

It took about 20 minutes to get to the headline on Monday's (6/2) Halftime Report, but to guest host Courtney Reagan's credit, she got it.

Joe Terranova had suggested that Steve Weiss may think the lows are not necessarily in, and Joe suggested it's possible they're not in.

Bryn Talkington, though, said "I think the lows are in." Bryn said April 2 was an "exogenous event" and that the numbers presented that day "made no sense."

Jim Lebenthal opened the show by listing all the world's hot spots and the conceding there's still "trade policy uncertainty" (Zzzzzzzz).

Weiss said "I agree with everything Jim said," citing "heightened issues across the globe," and Weiss even tossed in Poland.

Weiss wondered who could be "sanguine" about this market, with "valuation levels that are where they were a year ago" when we didn't have all this "nonsense." (No, just an incumbent president on the ballot who couldn't put two sentences together in a debate ... and the fellow who actually won.)

Jim said he agrees with a lot of Steve's "negativity," but Jim noted, "Companies have not been laying people off."

Joe said we've recently been in a range from 5,830 to 5,968. "You have momentum right now as a very strong factor," Joe said. But later, for those keeping score, Bryn suggested the S&P is in a range of 5,750 to 6,000, and we're in "middle ground" because we couldn't "punch through" the top.

Bryn said "May was the best year (sic) for the S&P in 35 years." Bryn said the jobs market will "remain strong" and, "We keep talking about all these tariffs, et cetera, but really we haven't seen a lot of- a lot of implementation."

Weiss said, "I actually think that the trade discussions are incredibly important, because that's what's chilling the capex market."

Weiss again in the 17th minute was bringing up his multiple of last year and demanding to know who could be bullish. Joe said "different people are looking at different things," and there's things now that inspire "confidence," but some people "change their mind." Joe said what he sees is "momentum is powering the market higher" and that it's "probably troublesome" to a lot of people.

It was probably a good day to unload CLF, but nobody asked

On Monday's (6/2) Halftime Report, which was guest-hosted by Courtney Reagan, Joe Terranova said AVGO and the semis are a "mean reversion trade" and he's "skeptical somewhat" about it continuing. More interestingly, Joe said he was "a little disappointed" in the response to NVDA's earnings with "not much follow-through."

Steve Weiss said he trimmed NFLX, but he talked it up and sees "nothing wrong" with it, but it's "irresponsible" to keep an outsized position and he said it's only a "question of portfolio management" as to how much he owns. (This writer is long NFLX.)

Joe said he agrees with Oppenheimer's downgrade of regional banks (Zzzzzzzzzzzzzz) (Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz). Joe said growth is a bigger concern than inflation. Jim Lebenthal said he was "caught a little bit surprised" by Joe's skepticism of regional banks. But Jim said there are plenty of big banks to invest in and no need to dabble in regional banks.

Bryn Talkington likened V to COST as attractive stocks despite what people consider high valuations.

Joe cautioned "be careful" in thinking that OPEC's extra supply will keep pressuring oil lower. Joe said positioning in energy stocks is "pretty light."

Joe and Weiss discussed what Saudi/OPEC announcements/moves mean for the oil market, the conversation was a little too deep into the weeds for this page to get excited about it.

Joe said if CRWD misses on earnings Tuesday, it's a buy. (This writer is long CRWD.)

On Fast Money, Steve Eisman sat in with the gang; Mel announced that Steve has a "podcast wardrobe." Steve kind of shrugged that he's a little concerned about tariffs but not much else. Steve said that "every couple of years," Jamie Dimon likes to "get on his soapbox and start uttering na- nattering nabobs of negativism." Steve said that term was written by William Safire to describe Spiro Agnew. (It was also used often by Louis Rukeyser, who liked to scold bears, on "Wall $treet Week.")

Mel actually asked Julie Biel, "What keeps you up at night about the markets?" (Julie did NOT say, "Weiss' MULTIPLE from last year!!!!!")

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