Market volatility, Nvidia reset, and rising geopolitical risks 3/27/26

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I'm Morgan Brennan, and this is your morning call.

Good Friday morning. Welcome to CNBC's morning call.

We are going to kick off the hour with breaking news.

US stock futures briefly turning negative after spending most of the morning

solidly in the green here.

Headlines were tracking this morning.

One President Trump putting a 10-day pause on his strikes against Iranian power plants.

At the request, he says of the Iranian government to the Senate in the last three hours,

passing a Department of Homeland Security funding bill, sending it to the House now and taking

their first step to end the government shutdown, the partial government shutdown.

And three, breaking just moments ago, and perhaps putting some pressure on stock futures right

now, China launching a pair of trade probes against the US focused on supply chains and

renewable products. Experts call the move a direct mirror of Washington's ongoing section 301

investigations into China. They are focused on US moves and imports of Chinese goods potentially

here into the US. So, and of course, all of that ahead of this Trump she meeting that's now

expected in May. So with all of that, as I just mentioned, you see US stock futures turning

lower here this morning. We are on pace at least ahead of today for gain still for the week for

the Dow, but lower for the S&P and for the Nasdaq treasure yields. Though those are climbing higher

and continue that move. The US 10 year treasure yields 4.46 percent right now. Energy also moving

higher this morning with WTI crude up about 1.5 percent right around 96 bucks a barrel and

Brent just below 110 bucks a barrel. We're keeping an eye on big tech as well after Metta's more

than 7 percent slide yesterday, which pulled the Nasdaq down more than 2 percent. We got much

more on that trade coming up this hour as well as you can see Metta's up fractionally this morning.

But let's get to that breaking news, the Senate this morning taking the first step to end the 41

day long partial government shutdown or Emily Wilkins joins me now with more Emily.

Good morning, Morgan. Well, yeah, the Senate reached a breakthrough very, very early this morning.

Basically, what would happen is that they have agreed to go ahead and fund the Department of

Homeland Security. That includes TSA. That includes FEMA. That includes the Coast Guard. It just doesn't

include ICE and certain parts of customs and border patrol and it doesn't include those

ICE reforms that Democrats and Republicans have now spent almost six weeks trying to go through

and hash out. But of course, jobs not done yet. This might have gotten through the Senate,

but we're not exactly sure what's going to happen with the House. How Democrats there,

if they're going to wind up supplying some of the votes or if Republicans are going to have an

issue in that chamber with the fact that ICE is not funded. We expect to find that out later.

The House is actually supposed to take an unrelated vote around 10 o'clock this morning.

So they'll be moving with that. And Morgan, really, you know, this is something that Democrats

initially kind of were asking for for a while saying, hey, we will fund the rest of the Department

but not ICE and not customs and border patrol. Remember, those two agencies got a huge boost in

funding due to that Trump mega bill with all the tax provisions and other spending that was

past last year. So they've been able to do their job. They've been able to get a paycheck. And so

Democrats are now wondering whether or not Republicans will try to move additional funding for that

in a Republican-only package known as reconciliation. But there's a long way to go on that road.

That's going to take a probably weeks, if not months, to actually be able to accomplish.

If the House does move what the Senate passed last night, then we could see the shutdown

potentially over as soon as today. There's a lot of moving parts here, Emily, and to your point,

going back to the reconciliation chatter. Certainly some chatter as well that potentially you see

that defense supplemental that gets tucked into that as well. I've got a two for you here.

Two different things. The first, just to go back to this deal that we saw on DHS in the Senate

yesterday, how or overnight I should say, how is this different than what Republicans have been

proposing earlier in the week? And secondly, completely unrelated. I want to ask you about Senator

Elizabeth Warren's take down, or I guess, letter I should say to Kevin Worsh, the Fed Chair

nominee. Yeah, so I'll start, of course, with the DHS stuff, Morgan. I mean, look,

what the Senate was offering earlier this week was basically saying, hey, we can do fun part of

ice. We can get some reforms in there. But Democrats were concerned about that. Even that

partial ice funding could be used for enforcement and removal operations. That is the really

contentious part that people have concerns about. And to really break it down, Senate Majority

Leader John Thune was on the floor this morning, laying out exactly what this bill does. Give a

listen to what he said. The Democrats cared about TSA officers, if they cared about

Coast Guard employees, if they cared about the vital work of the Department of Homeland Security,

then they would be getting serious about closing a deal, not ceaselessly offering up the same

unchanging list of demands, like a broken record, or a particularly nightmare-ish version of

Groundhog Day. There's a lot of frustration there after weeks of negotiations. And then

Moria, when it comes to Senator Elizabeth Warren, she sent a scathing eight-page letter to Trump's

Fed Reserve nominee, Pick Kevin Worsh. Now, this letter did have a couple questions about Worsh's

policy, but let's be clear, it was a really strong criticism of a lot of his work when he was

previously at the Fed during the 2008 financial crisis. This comes, of course, as Democrats who

are on the banking committee, where Warren is the top dem, are beginning to meet with Worsh and

have conversations with him ahead of his yet to be scheduled nomination hearing. And it lays out

some of the concerns that he might face. But remember, Dems don't really need to be voting for Worsh

as long as he's got full Republican support. He'll be okay. And all the Republicans I've spoken

with so far are very, very happy with Worsh's pick and with the exception of Tillis, who even

even supports Worsh. But of course, the one roadblock is that investigation into Jay Powell that

will need to be done before his nomination moves forward. Yeah. Quite a busy Friday ahead of this

two-week recess by lawmakers, Emily Wilkins bringing us all the latest here to kick off a Friday

morning. Appreciate it joining us from Washington. Well, the global market reaction to all of this

news. Ben Boulos is standing by in London and he has the trade and what we've seen in Europe. Ben.

Hi, Jim Morgan. Yes, European equities did open a shade higher above the flat line an hour ago

than out trading firmly into the red investors on the one hand welcoming Donald Trump's decision

to push back his deadline for Iran to agree to a ceasefire deal while on the other the

digesting reports of more US troops being sent to the Middle East that really creating mixed

signals and a very muddied picture. So we are seeing a very clear risk off sentiment across

all of the main European benchmarks. You can see it's the Zedradax in Frankfurt that is leading

the losses down 1.4%. You'll notice the FTSE in London proving somewhat more resilient than

its peers of course because the falls that we've seen on equity markets are driven by the

rise that we've seen in the price of oil and of course the FTSE 100 and London slightly more

insulated from that because a lot of the big oil majors in Europe listed on the London exchange.

Most of the sectors on pan-European stock 600 are trading lower this Friday morning but despite

the red you're seeing on the board the step 600 on course to end the week higher than where it

started Morgan. All right Ben Boulos thank you and this of course as we get more hawkish positioning

from central banks including your Norway with a U-turn towards rate hikes just yesterday

have a great weekend Ben. We'll turning back to the Middle East and President Trump adding

10 days to his threat to obliterate Iranian energy infrastructure saying the move is at the

request of the Iranian government. So joining us now to talk about it Dan, Dan,

Iranian energy infrastructure power plants specifically but what else is on the table and

how is this playing out in real time right now? Well Morgan good morning to you how it's playing

out in real time is quite interesting right the reaction across the Gulf to President Trump's

10 day extension is a mix of both cautious relief here but also some skepticism. The United

States has the military advantage and the diplomatic leverage but the President seems to be buying

more time here as Iran pushes back and on the ground here as well Morgan regional leaders seem

to be getting more vocal as well GCC officials actually issued a red joint statement this week saying

any U.S. Iran agreement must address more than just the straight of Hormuz the U.E. Ambassador

to the United States even said we can't let Iran hold the global economy hostage and a simple

ceasefire isn't enough for its part the UAE here wants Iran's full range of threats to be addressed

seeking a deal that curbs Iran's ballistic missile and drone programs which of course

are the same tools used to strike Gulf infrastructure this month but Morgan who the United States is

talking with and if these talks are material remains to be seen either way the President is keeping

his options open here the Wall Street Journal also reporting today the Pentagon is not considering

setting up to 10,000 additional ground troops to the Middle East that's on top of the thousands

of Marines and power troopers already ordered to the region to give the President a military option

if the peace talks go south by his new deadline of April 6th Morgan okay Dan Murphy thank you for

joining me we've got a lot more to come here on morning call including the rate hike risk

that's getting real on Wall Street in video facing a critical level that could have ripple effects

across the entire market plus a big win for anthropic in its fight against the Pentagon we have a

very busy hour still ahead and that's an understatement stay tuned morning call be right back

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offer exclusive askin why welcome back to morning call the warring and ron creating fresh

debate on wall street on whether the fed will need to begin hiking rates again this year

you believe it that's what we're talking about here in large part due to the higher oil prices

rising risks around inflation the central banks michael bar bill jeferson lease a cook all

raising concerns after market clothes yesterday about sticky inflation in comments and according

to the cme fed watch tool expectations of a fed rate hike and next month's meeting is sitting at

26% this morning itself from just over 11% yesterday let's bring in Gina Martin Adams chief

market strategist at hb wealth and chris hodge chief u s economist at netics cib america's great

to have you both here Gina i'm going to kick this off with you because we've seen stocks move

lower as energy prices move higher and now is treasury yields move higher as well we're talking

about two year that that's flirting with four percent again yep and unfortunately that was

completely out of consensus expectations at the start of this year remember at the start of this

year we were talking about maybe four fed easis coming in 2026 that's clearly not been the case

when we look at market implied inflation expectations one year implied inflation expectations are

now above five percent for the first time since 2022 two and three year implied expectations are

also moving higher longer term the market is not anticipating this to be a sticky inflation

situation they do think it's supposed to be temporary but it's creating a lot of strain frankly

we think that this inflation ultimately will keep valuations suppressed for at least a very

short term here in 2026 chris want to get your thoughts on this it is a hike a real possibility

here depending on how we emerge from the fog of war and when that happens i don't think so

you know if there's one thing we know about higher oil prices as they are a drag on growth and

as Gina said we have longer run inflation expectations which are still well anchored

and i think the fed is going to view this as another exogenous shot that is pushing up short run

inflation expectations and you know i think we have a consumer that is a lot shakier than it was

in 2022 and i've marked down my growth forecast for 2026 and i think hiring is going to slow as well

i mean this does put the fed in the bind but i think i still have two cuts for this year and i

think it's a pretty high hurdle for the fed to be hiking at this point what's an investor to do

right now i mean we're seeing it a fade of the rally here pre-market and stock futures i mean when

you do get these pops when we do get them which has been a couple times this week give or take

do you continue to fade the rally and sit on your hands or do you do something else well i think

you stick to plan for a start sometimes the best thing to do is nothing and so from an investor

standpoint you stick to the allocation strategy that you have taken advantage of opportunities

to be opportunistic once we get below the 200-day moving average on the s and p 500 you

historically do experience periods of volatility we hit that level last week so you set an

expectation for volatility to emerge the good news is also once you're below the 200-day moving

average you can tend to find bottoms in the index itself so you opportunistically look for

opportunity look for ideas inside the index that have become oversold you look for global ideas

that have become oversold to potentially add to risk over the course of the rest of this month

and into into April i suspect but you've got to be relatively selective and frankly when you think

about setting your long-term plan we had already been guiding investors to really think about where

are we out of bounds coming into 2026 given how robust the equity market gains were in the three

years prior to 2026 a lot of clients had gotten a little over their skis in terms of equity

allocations so those presumably should have already been pulled back into this year and now you're

looking for opportunities to add two positions in the equity market because you're starting to see

some valuation compression emerge as a result of the strength. Chris I want to get your thoughts

on what we're seeing in the bond market right now you've seen treasury yields march higher I mean 10

year treasury this morning is 4.46% last I checked here as well and a lot of chatter that you could

see greater spending tied to this war or I guess I'll say fiscal questions that are factoring

into what we're seeing in the treasury market right now I want to get your thoughts on that and

where it goes from here. Yeah I think the war and any additional spending package that might be

passed by congress only further exacerbates the very weak debt trajectory overall you know and if

you looked at U.S. policymaking from you know fiscal monetary trade the U.S. is you know probably

perceived as a less dependable international partner so you know for investors start to back away

from buying American debt the players that you have left are the ones that can extract that

additional term premium. Okay Gina Martin Adams and Chris Hodge thank you both for joining me

have a good weekend. Thank you. We'll straight ahead. Why SpaceX is shaping up to be a real retail

winner ahead of his planned IPO but first let's get a check on shares of Carnival which reports

earnings before the open this morning they're down about 17% this year down about 20% since the

start of the Iran war and Carnival is expected to swing to a first quarter profit even as the

cruise industry has been hit by higher fuel prices as a result of operation epic fury you can

see shares are down about 1% right now pre-market morning call we're right back.

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Lowe's dot com slash terms subject to change welcome back to morning call flurry of

space headlines this morning it's been a busy week in general Reuters is reporting that Elon Musk

is looking to give retail investors as much as 30 percent of the company's highly anticipated IPO

at least three times the usual slice that's given to that crowd this is must reportedly looks to

buck IPO tradition by having investors come to SpaceX where they can visit manufacturing

facilities and possibly witness rocket launches instead of doing a road show and CNBC has learned

that American Airlines is in talks with SpaceX's Starlink and Amazon's Leo to potentially provide

in flight Wi-Fi this is a push to revamp in flight internet and entertainment and invest

into aircraft more broadly at American while also we're watching shares of mda space down 15

percent this week after NASA announced this week that it's canceling plans to deploy a space

station in lunar orbit and instead construct a $20 billion base on the moon's surface but for more

I'm joined by Mike Greenley he's CEO of mda space it's great to have you here there's so much to

talk about I think that's really the first place I need to start though and that is the NASA plans

around Artemis and around not only putting American boots back on the ground and other boots

back on the ground but building out this base your contract is actually not with NASA for your

piece of the lunar space station it's with Canada so let's just start right there in terms of the

changes we're seeing and what it means for mda yeah I think it's great that we're seeing this

focus on the lunar surface as NASA focuses everybody on getting to the moon you see all the

different programs adapting to make sure that everyone can work together and cause a surge to get

to the lunar surface to be able to live and work on the moon moving forward into the future

for us we have a contract to provide with the canyon space agency to provide robotics to the

Artemis program to the lunar activity those robotics so far have been focused on gateway as you

mentioned the new space station that was to orbit the moon which has been paused but that just

allows us to pivot now to the lunar surface so we're engaging with the community space agency and

the Canadian government to have a look at can we take those robotics and pivot them to applications

on the lunar surface robotics will be needed for a number of logistics purposes to load and unload

cargo to be able to operate rovers on the moon and so right now we're in a dialogue along with

everybody else on how to pivot the activities that we've been working on to contribute and focus

on living and working on the moon okay do you see that as a even bigger opportunity longer term for mda

then it could be for sure yeah if this starts to pick up momentum there'll be a range of different

types of vehicle types as I mentioned you know with rockets coming and going from the lunar

surface there's a loading and unloading activity that's going to need to be done so a wide range of

robotic applications moving forward to the moon we're also engaged in the pursuit of rovers

for the lunar surface which will be needed for both you know astronauts to drive around in

and to be able to move cargo around the lunar surface so we have a strong experience in rovers as

well and we'll be looking for additional opportunities there so it's really an exciting time

to have this much focus on getting back to living and working on the moon yeah and of course you

you you have a growing number of defense contracts as well you also have this direct-to-device

satellite contract with global star two there's been some speculation that global star could

be an m&a talks are going to be a takeover target so how to understand what that contract and

delivering those satellites means yeah we have two contracts for global star global star has a

constellation orbit today that provides direct-to-device services to their customers we have a contract

for 17 satellites to be able to extend that constellation we're in delivery of the satellites for

for that over the first half of this year and then we have a second contract for next-generation

satellites with them for over 50 satellites that we're providing to further extend their

direct-to-device capability in orbit we'll be delivering those satellites over the next year or so

and so that's a pretty exciting time but the direct-to-device market is it's getting hot it's a

a lot of different people are looking at the only direct-to-device networks to talk satellite to

and we have a strong product in our mdh or our digital satellite yeah and of course for our viewers

just a little bit of context here global star works with apple for its iphone devices among others

so we just talked about the SpaceX IPO that is sort of being seen in a major milestone moment

for the industry overall if and when we get it later this year you also just IPO'd here in the

US earlier this month so now a dual listing both in Canada here in the US why was that necessary

what is that enabled yeah for us it really just provides access to the us investor um you know

people in the United States in their investment portfolios some don't mind going through the

logistic hoops of finding their way to their Toronto stock exchange to buy in our stock some

people though and their funds they're they're limited to where they can buy so for us to get on

the New York Stock Exchange it opens up easy access to a broader range of investors deeper capital

pools people that are much more informed about the space sector uh which is the important to us

as we continue to expand and become more of a global company um so that's good it also gives us

a currency in our stock in the US exchange so that as we do acquisitions moving forward into the

future we can use uh not only cash to be able to acquire companies but cash and stock um to be

able to pick up companies in the United States as we grow okay my green leave mda space it's great

to have you on the show thank you thank you good to see more in thanks you too and of course stock

is down this week but it's still up double digits since the start of the year still on deck we've

got more price pains for consumers and net as netflix tells its customers to pay up if they want

to keep streaming with at the full story one morning call returns as america celebrates its

250th anniversary cnvc spotlights the companies that rose with the nation and continue to shape its

future i'm karen colberg CEO of king r3rd baking company which has been around since 1790 and

is america's oldest baking company king r3rd was founded over two hundred years ago

and i always like to think of wouldn't my country was like at that time there were 13 states

charge washington was our first president and our founding family at that point said we need

flower for people to bake flower was a cornerstone of the kitchen and having incredibly high

quality flower was important so that people could sustain their families when i think back over

two hundred fifty years it's our values that guide us they are foundational they are our commitment

to quality a commitment to our communities and its stewardship we became a hundred percent

employee owned in 2004 and it is very much of a defining aspect of who we are we re-branded

from king r3rd flower to king r3rd baking company in 2020 we knew that we needed to modernize

we knew that we needed to be setting up the company for the next fifty hundred two hundred

fifty years and we wanted the name to reflect that we can innovate beyond flower education

and teaching people how to bake is a core part of what has made us success and made our

company endure over centuries whether it was putting recipes in an ad years ago or in today's

world offering on demand baking classes so that people can learn how to bake when i think about

king r3rd growing alongside america i think about resilience i think about the importance of

knowing what you're about knowing what you're trying to accomplish and knowing who you are

i'm working brin and a welcome to morning call we're going to kick off the half hour here with

us stock futures those briefly turn negative and as you can see now dipping back into positive

territory that's after spending most of the morning solidly in the green we're actually on

on pace right now for gains for the Dow on the week

and losses for the Nasdaq and the S&P.

But take a look at what we've seen in the overnight action

here in just the last couple of hours

in the S&P specifically,

because we started to move higher

as we got talk of a DHS funding plan

moving through the Senate.

And then that continued here.

And we started to come off the peak

in pre-market futures trading right around the time.

We started to get headlines out of China

that it's launching its own trade probe.

And investigation into the US to mirror those three

of one tariffs ahead of the Trump sheet meeting

that's gonna happen here in May.

So continue to keep an eye here.

It's worth noting that US stock futures are flirting

with gains even as we see crude climbing

and US treasuries moving those yields moving higher.

So we're checking some of the morning's other top stories

as well breaking this morning.

The Senate approving, I just touched on it,

but approving that measure early this morning

to fund most of the Department of Homeland Security,

except for ICE, setting up a possible end

to the 42-day partial government shutdown.

The measure now heads to the House for a vote

this after the president said he would sign

an executive order to pay the TSA during this shutdown.

On the war in Iran,

as investors continue to digest all of those headlines

President Trump saying he is pausing his plan to tax

on the country's power plants by 10 days

until April 6th at the, quote,

request of the government of the Islamic Republic.

We had a legal win for anthropic meantime,

the US judge is temporarily blocking the Pentagon's move

to blacklist that company.

And this follows reports that the company

is considering going public as soon as October

with Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley

under consideration to underwrite that listing

which could be quite large.

All of this is rival OpenAI's US ad pilot program

crosses $100 million in annualized revenue just six weeks

after it was announced.

And Netflix raising prices on all of its plans

on the US across the board with ad supported tier

moving to $8.99 a month from $7.99 a month.

Standard plans are going to be up $2 to $19.99 a month.

And if we turn now to the Iran more

and dig a little more deeply,

the straightforward moves remains effectively blocked

to all but a few commercial ships,

even as President Trump extends the deadline

for Iran to reopen the critical waterway

or face strikes on its energy plants,

the president discussing his decision yesterday.

They said to show you the fact that we're real

and solid and we're there.

We're going to let you have eight boats of oil,

eight boats, eight big boats of oil.

This was two days ago.

And they'll sail up tomorrow.

That was three days ago.

Well, President Trump later amending that number to 10.

The war was massively or has massively disrupted shipping,

sending oil prices up more than 40% net gas.

Ship to Europe and Asia up by 70 to 90%.

It's also caused a surge in fertilizer prices

with those Gulf futures up about 35% since the war began.

We're also hearing about helium shortages.

Joining me now is Herbjorn Hansen, the chairman

and CEO of Nordic American Tankers,

which operates several of these ships

that transport energy products through the straight

of Hormuz and Herbjorn.

It's great to have you on the show.

Welcome.

I want to start right there with your assessment

and real time of what is happening in the straight of Hormuz

and what it means for Nordic.

I will tell you that we have been to 68 countries

in the recent past.

And when it comes to Hormuz,

we are familiar with these situations.

It is my firm judgment that Hormuz will be open

and we may discuss whether how long time it will take.

But there is such a strong pressure on Iran

and on all nations to open Hormuz.

And I'm confident that will happen.

And I would add, Morgan, that we are very conservative

in my group and we are a dividend company.

But again, I repeat, Hormuz will be open sooner than later.

The pressure is so great that that is in my judgment

that will happen. Thank you.

Yeah. Well, that is very great and very encouraging

to hear for that to actually happen, though.

What is it going to take?

And how confident do you need to be to start moving

any of your tanker ships that may be stranded in the region?

I have been through this before.

Many years ago during the 80s,

we had essentially the same situation.

And if you go further back, even back to the late 60s,

you know, the Suez Canal was closed.

So we are used to these situations.

And of course, nobody knows the future

that we need to exercise the best judgment we have.

We have 80,000 shareholders in your country

and shareholders worldwide.

That is why we have a certain knowledge

about what's happening in this industry

and what's happening worldwide.

What is happening in the insurance market right now,

especially as we do start to see some ships perhaps move

and we've also had reports that some countries

have paid for that right of passage to Iran in the meantime.

I have been in touch and I communicate actively

with the biggest insurance companies in the world.

And as far as our company is concerned,

we are well covered.

Our exposure on the insurance side is negligible.

We do business with the biggest oil companies in the world,

the so-called oil majors,

and they do business with us

because they know we are reliable.

And when it comes to insurance, everything is fixed.

We have a few ships in the area

and we are very slightly exposed

and it represents no problem for us.

What is all this doing to shipping rates right now?

Well, shipping rates, they are very, very strong.

And there is some people that describe it as a cause.

But there is a shortage of ships

and when there is a shortage of something,

then the prices go up.

And if we look around the world, as I mentioned,

we have ships all around the world.

And rates for our ships are very, very, very good.

And that enables us to pay dividend.

But I must stress also that we have a very conservative attitude.

And we are a strong company financially.

And that gives us comfort in these difficult times

and times that need reflection and judgment.

Sound judgment is the key what we are doing.

And the second key is we must do business with the good people.

You mentioned the fact that you have lived through

and we have seen these moments in history that are similar before.

Once the straight-of-form moose is opened back up,

how long does it actually take to work through that backlog

and to work through that shortage of ships that it's created?

It will not take a very long time.

The markets move, the stock markets move very fast.

And the ships that are tracked or in the Arabian Gulf

will be out within a fairly short period of time.

It is difficult to predict the future.

But I expect it.

We are talking about weeks rather than months.

That is my judgment based upon my experience of the past

in similar situations.

Here, Bjorn Hansen.

It's great to have you on the show.

Thank you for joining us of Nordic American Taker.

Thank you very much to all of you, early birds,

and all the best from Norway.

Great.

We look forward to getting updates.

More to come here on morning call, including Christina Parts and Eveless.

Laying out where Nvidia could be heading.

Next, if the stock breaks below a key threshold as we go to break,

let's get a check on memory chip stocks as well.

After slumping yesterday, again,

on Google's announcement of a breakthrough on data compression,

you see right now, still under a bit of pressure,

mostly this morning.

But of course, when Google makes an announcement like this,

you have to pay close attention.

This morning's action, coming after Micron fell for a 6th straight day yesterday,

down another 7% sand disc, falling 11% morning call will be right back.

Welcome back.

We're watching shares of Nvidia, which right now are up fractionally pre-market.

More than 18% off the all-time high, though.

And now experts are warning that the stock is facing a critical support level

that could ripple across the entire stock market.

Christina Parts and Eveless joins me now with more.

Christina.

Morgan, we know Nvidia is the largest company in the world right now,

and it's sitting on a critical level.

That level, the stock is actually testing that $170 support level.

If that breaks, technicians say downward pressure to 150 comes into play very fast.

Semiconductors are the biggest industry group in the S&P 500,

so a breakdown in Nvidia would actually have ripple effects across the entire index,

and which is why we bring up this name so often.

The retail trading picture is also adding some concern.

Nvidia has been the most traded name among retail investors for 38 straight sessions,

making up over 4% of retail trading just during that time frame.

But the tone is shifting a little bit.

JP Morgan and Vanda Research, flag Monday, has the first net selling day by retail in nine months.

Overall retail buying is now running about 70% below pre-conflict levels.

The slowest pace in about four months or so.

Vanda also points out that the last time retail flipped to net sellers on Nvidia was in July of last year.

Nvidia actually rallied nearly 20% over the next six weeks.

But the bull case is a little harder to make this time around.

Earnings haven't really moved the stock, despite being really good.

GTC that conference just a few weeks ago didn't move the stock.

The catalyst just keep on coming, and yet the stock just keeps stalling.

So that $170 level is the line to watch, and right now we are just inching closer and closer Morgan.

We'll be watching it.

In the meantime, we got news just a couple of hours ago here that China has started a trade probe against the US

and some of the actions that we've taken here in the US, including looking at US export controls on advanced technology.

I mean, we see it in focus here with lawmakers as well, but how to think about how Nvidia could potentially be back in the crosshairs.

Yeah, the concern from China is that there's these backdoor options on their chips, whereas Nvidia really likes to say that no, that's not a possibility.

However, just yesterday here in the United States, the Foreign Affairs Committee voted an entire panel voted unanimously to put forward this

chip security act that would require companies like AMD, like Nvidia, to start tracking where these chips are going.

Nvidia and a lot of these tech CEOs oppose this, so we don't know if it actually turned into law.

But Nvidia does offer this software where you would opt in is to check the health of the chips, and that's how they market it.

But at the same time, you could eventually use it as a location tractor.

But it's an opt-in program for software.

And if this continues and pushes in the United States, it's going to be leveraged for China to say we don't want to buy any Nvidia chips or anything,

because there's the backdoor options that allows the government to track where the chips are.

Instead, we're going to push our companies to use Huawei, which was what they're essentially already doing.

Okay, Christina Parts and Eveless, thank you.

On the other side of this break, we're bringing in our morning call crew, a lot of news this morning, to get through. Stay with us.

Welcome back.

Let's get to our morning call crew, crew members today, Jeff Kilberg, founder and CEO at KKM Financial, Barbara Durand, BD8, Capital Partners, Chief Investment Officer, and Rodgers Atkheim, director at the Ronald Reagan Institute.

We got a lot to get to, not a lot of time to do it.

I'm confident in us, though.

So let's start right where Christina Parts and Eveless left off, and Jeff, I'll start this with you.

And that is the key levels in video, and you could argue the technical damage we've seen across the market.

As the Mag 7 has continued to sell off here.

Well, Morgan, this has been the great rotation.

All of the Mag 7 is in correction period, but in video, here now trading at a forward fee of 20.

That's the lowest it's been in five years.

So as this has been the backbone, as it makes up seven and a half percent of the S&P 500, I think this is a great buying opportunity for it in video.

But it has been used as a cash machine.

We are seeing people book profits. That's why it's come off.

Yeah, it raises the question, Barb, on whether earnings expectations are too lofty for this year for the stock market.

When some of the biggest contributors to that over the last couple of years, including the Mag 7, specifically the Mag 7, are now reinvesting into AI infrastructure build out.

Yeah, Morgan, I think there is a bigger question here in terms of earnings expectations for all companies, given the Iranian war.

And the uncertainty of how long it's going to last in the impact, people are looking at the tertiary secondary effects right now.

And in video, certainly in the Mag 7, and I agree with the earlier guess that it is the source of profit taking.

Nvidia continues to just power higher in terms of its sales, its outlook, the longevity of its expectations.

And so I think the stock is cheap here, but it is a source of cash.

And for the first, you've seen this stock be the most actively traded by retail investors for some 37 days in a row.

And so people are going to be in there, but if the stock does come in, it goes lower.

You could see a lot of people sitting on the sidelines and waiting, but I think it will just make it that much more attractive.

Okay, you just mentioned the Iranian war.

So Roger, I'm going to go right there with you because we do have this pause by President Trump to April 6 now in terms of a possible strike on Iranian power plants and energy infrastructure.

But at the same time, we're continuing to send assets and amassed forces in the region.

I mean, reports overnight of another 10,000 headed to the region.

How do assess that going into a weekend?

Well, I think President Trump has basically set the deck for April to be the moment in the space for him to open up the straight of her moves,

either through leveraging that military strength and forcing a negotiated outcome with the 15 points.

Or if they don't submit to those 15 points, he has everything in place to take Carg Island and to open up the straights through military action.

And so I would look at April as to be the time where the President wants to operate.

We know they're at the 20 yard line. They need a few weeks more to carry this out.

And in the interim, as he's holding those energy targets at bay, central command and our military operators will continue to set up the conditions, prep the battlefield for that operation if it's required.

Okay, Jeff, fog of war, fog of markets.

It's interesting. I mean, we're seeing equities, you know, US equity futures right now have just turned lower and they're moving a little bit lower.

But in general, earlier this morning, we were seeing those actually move higher, even as crude was climbing and treasure yields were moving higher as well.

How to think about this relationship?

Well, Morgan, I think a lot of traders and investors have lost patience.

We're seeing the 10 year note probably going over 4.5% today.

We're seeing Crudeau above $95. That's a problem.

And I think what we saw with the pause yesterday from President Trump, we saw the S&P 500.

The futures actually react, jump about a half a percent.

All that is gone. So the efficacy of the pause from President Trump really is just more words.

So what the markets want are action. And what that action means, we need more of the three boats going through the straight of four moves.

Once we start that traffic pick back up, however it is, and I have full faith in our US military, I have our men and women securing that straight.

There's a lot of processes that need to go in there about mining and making it safe.

But at the end of the day, until traders and investors see Crudeau go back under $80, we're going to see inflationary concerns.

We're going to see continued price discovery in the S&P 500 futures.

And there's just a lot of pain in the market right now, but there is opportunity inside of this chaos.

Roger, I want to go back to you on this because we also got a breakthrough potentially overnight with the Senate moving forward on funding DHS.

We know that there's this $200 billion supplemental kicking around the possibility of reconciliation as well.

Are we potentially getting to a place where the gridlock in Washington begins to break through and start to move?

Well, it was quite significant what happened the Senate. I think the supplemental funding, the $200 billion, the White House requested, is really not a negotiation between nothing or $200 billion.

It's whether or not the US Congress should pay for what has already been spent, which is roughly $60 to $70 billion, or what the administration wants is up to that $200 number.

Look at that number. That is pretty much what it would take for the US military to continue these operations at this scale for another two to three weeks.

That's the space between $1670 and $200 billion.

We're having this whole conversation, Barb, as we have seen this dramatic move in the Treasury market.

And now, chatter about the possibility that forget rate cuts and forget a Fed on hold, but that hikes could be on the table.

Yeah, I think that's going to be the dialogue for a while longer, and particularly as it looks like the Iranian War will drag into April, maybe mid-April.

I mean, if you look at the OECD, what they did yesterday, their estimates for inflation were 2.8 percent in the beginning of the year.

They up to 4.2 percent, and certainly you're seeing inflation expectations rising around the street.

GDP, still a little bit decrease there. We'll see what the growth impacts.

But I think inflation is at the concern and the Fed, you're right to be concerned.

Okay, we'll keep an eye on all of it, including consumer sentiment. We get you mesh later today, too.

That's going to do it for our panel. Thank you to our morning call crew.

Thank you for watching Morning Call. We're going to kick it over to Squawk Box right now.

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