MARIA-01
Troops Are Moving Forward With Mosul Attack Force; Salesforce Backs Away
from Twitter; Warren Buffett is Out-Earned by Amazon's Bezos; Ecuador
Denies Internet Access to Assange; Trump Shines On Trade - Part 1>
Cheryl Casone >
Media; Trade; Government; Business; Military>
MARIA BARTIROMO, FBN ANCHOR: Good Wednesday morning, everybody. Welcome. I'm Maria Bartiromo. We are coming to you live this morning from the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas. It is Wednesday, October 19th. Here are your top stories, 06:00 a.m. on the East Coast.
The stage is set. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton facing off tonight in the final Presidential Debate. It comes as new Fox News polls show Clinton maintaining her lead. Both sides of the aisle going on the attack.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: You're going to look back at this election and say this is by far the most important vote you've ever cast for anyone at any time.
BARACK OBAMA (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'd invite Mr. Trump to stop whining and go try to make his case to get votes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: We're taking a closer look this morning at the key issues for tonight's showdown, plus a series of blockbuster videos to show you. One video shows how the Democrats allegedly hired agitators to attend Trump rallies and incite violence. Now, heads are rolling within the Democratic Party this morning. Republicans are fighting back.
Samsung's exploding phone crisis may be headed to court now. How much it could cost the smartphone maker coming up.
Hurry up and wait. Tesla now saying it will take more than a year for you to get a Model 3 in your driveway. That could be good news for the auto maker. We will tell you why.
And eyeing acquisitions. A new Wall State Journal report details a list of Salesforce's targets. Twitter, of course, was not one of them. They walked away from that deal. We've got the details on what they are looking for in terms of deals.
Markets this morning look like this. Futures indicating the markets will open lower. It's just a fractional (ph) move. The Dow Jones Industrial average, S&P 500, and the NASDAQ showing some fractional pressure this morning. Earnings season rolls on. Morgan Stanley set to report ahead of the opening of trading this morning, and we will bring you the numbers as soon as they hit the tape.
Check out the action in Europe this morning. Stocks holding near the flat line. All the major averages throughout the Euro zone down, just about a fraction to about a quarter of a percent lower. And in Asia overnight, mixed performances.
New data out of China's economic growth story. The GDP at China, for China, rather, holding steady at 6.7 percent. Six point seven percent strength in consumer spending offsetting trade weakness. Compare that to the 1.4 percent we saw in the U.S. a couple of weeks ago.
Well, move over, Warren Buffett. The Oracle of Omaha is losing his spot as the second richest American. We will tell you who is moving on up.
All those stories coming up this morning. And joining me to talk about it, Fox Business Network's Dagen McDowell, former Massachusetts Senator and Fox News contributor Scott Brown, and the host of Wall Street Week, Anthony Scaramucci. Great to be with you guys here in Vegas.
ANTHONY SCARAMUCCI; HOST OF WALL STREET WEEK: Good morning. Good to be sitting -- good to be here.
DAGEN MCDOWELL, FOX BUSINESS: How much to jump in the pool?
(LAUGHTER)
SCARAMUCCI: I may do it before the show's over. It is . . .
BARTIROMO: For charity?
SCARAMUCCI: . . . it so early here that it's late, Maria. Let's just put it that way.
BARTIROMO: I know, I know. But when we were walking over to the set, there were people like just going home.
SCARAMUCCI: Yes, exactly.
BROWN: They're still drinking (inaudible).
BARTIROMO: After all, it's 03:00 a.m.
SCARAMUCCI: Right, exactly.
BROWN: Incredible.
BARTIROMO: We've got a big show ahead. It is -- we are here. This is it. It's tonight. Coming up this morning, former Democratic presidential candidate and former New Mexico governor, Bill Richardson, will be joining us.
Former senior adviser to Prime Minister David Cameron and now a Trump supporter, Steve Hilton will be with us. And outside adviser to President Obama and 32 Advisors CEO, Robert Wolf with us as well. A big show ahead, as we have the analysis pre-debate.
We've got less than three weeks until Election Day. Now the candidates are gearing up for one final showdown tonight. And our own Blake Burman is live in Vegas with a preview of the big show tonight. Blake.
BLAKE BURMAN, FOX BUSINESS NETWORK: Hi, there, Maria. Yes, hi there. Good morning to you. Just about a mile down the street here from the -- on the Vegas Strip, on the campus of UNLV, the Thomas & Mack Center, the site, as you put it, of tonight's final showdown.
And Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump taking two very different approaches coming into this night. Clinton has been off the campaign trail, behind closed doors as she has been doing debate prep. And her campaign defends it in a couple ways. They say she will be ready to answer any and all questions tonight involving potentially questions about the quid pro quo allegations within the State Department.
They also say, look, these debates get huge numbers, and Clinton is going to be prepared for tonight. They also say that at the start of the debate, since then her polling numbers have increased. Thus, all of this debate prep.
Trump, on the other hand, has been out on the campaign trail repeatedly. Yesterday he made a couple stops in Colorado, and he cast Clinton's strategy in a little bit of a different light. Take a listen here.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Sort of funny. She's been doing this for 30 years now and she has to do debate prep for five days.
(APPLAUSE)
You know what the debate prep is? It's resting. It's lying down, going to sleep.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURMAN: Speaking of Trump, he will have a unique visitor in the audience tonight. Malik Obama, that being the half-brother of President Obama will be in attendance. And Trump does certainly have a big gap here to close, at least in terms of polling. The latest Fox News polling shows in a four- way race, he trails Hillary Clinton by some six points, 45 to 39. Heads up, it is seven points, so any way that you split this, Maria, he's got some work to do.
I will send it back to you, over there at the MGM Grand.
BARTIROMO: He sure does. I mean, tonight is really -- this is it. He's got to do well tonight.
Senator Brown, let's talk about that. What's your take on tonight? What are you expecting, and how can -- can he actually do it?
BROWN: What am I expecting versus what do I actually want to happen?
BARTIROMO: Yes. Tell me both.
SCOTT BROWN, FORMER U.S. SENATOR, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Providing we can get through what happened last week, you know, very similar to the debate where the first 15 minutes we're talking about everything but people -- the things that people care about, obviously our debt, deficit, foreign policy, immigration. I'm hoping they actually focus on the issues.
We know, if you take what Donald Trump's done, OK, put it over here. You take what Hillary Clinton's done and put it over here. But then, you -- if you actually look at policy, he wants to lower taxes, strengthen our border, deal with ISIS, you know, deal with immigration. And she's the complete opposite, sanctuary cities and the like. That's what I'm hoping people focus on, and that's what I hope they focus on tonight.
BARTIROMO: Yes, I mean, it -- you know he has a good plan, Dagen. I mean, because the plan would move the needle, I think, on economic growth, but he has a hard time communicating it.
MCDOWELL: He gets off track, . . .
BARTIROMO: Right.
MCDOWELL: . . . I think. It's -- particularly in the first debate. It was a lack of practice, because he was trying to wing it in the way that he did during the debates during the primaries, which is very much his personality.
But he's got to focus and get on message of -- and I've said this repeatedly. Who makes better decisions with your money? Does the government make better decisions? Because Hillary Clinton wants to take more of your money and spend it for you. Or do you make better decisions with your money?
It's that kind of messaging, which I know his team is working on. The question is, is he listening and how does he execute on that tonight?
BARTIROMO: Anthony, you've spoken to him. Have you seen this?
SCARAMUCCI: Yes. And so we shared some wiki read (ph) things yesterday, just going over some of these outrageous things that they're doing. I mean, you know, you're going to show videos later about inciting riots. They're lying to each other. They're taking out Catholics. I mean, it's just -- it's obscene.
But I do give her credit for her strategy, Maria, because her staying off the campaign and getting away from a television camera has proven to be very successful for her.
BARTIROMO: Yes.
SCARAMUCCI: It was very successful for her in New York in 2000, and every time she ran for the Senate. She gets away from the camera and stops speaking. It seems to work for her.
BARTIROMO: Yes. In fact, the Clinton campaign out with a new one-minute ad using sound of Hillary Clinton from the second presidential debate. Here's a snippet. I want to get everybody's reaction.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CLINTON: This is not an ordinary time and this is not an ordinary election. I want to send a message to every boy and girl and, indeed, to the entire world, that America already is great, but we are great because we are good.
We are going to lift each other up. I want us to heal our country and bring it together.
We have to start getting the economy to work for everyone, not just those at the top.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: This ad will air in battle ground states, such as Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio. What's your take on this ad? What do you think, Scott?
BROWN: I think it's white noise, very similar to all the other ads. People have kind of tuned out right now. Sure, it's a great ad. It's a nice, you know, touchy feely, you know, we've got to join together.
BARTIROMO: It's a positive ad. It's a positive tone.
BROWN: But with all due respect, if you look at the messenger, people don't like her. They don't trust her. We see what, as Anthony referenced just a minute ago, the operatives going in and disrupting. They're not, you know, this unifying, amazing, loving force. They're actually dividers, and I think it'll be very similar to another four years of President Obama, who I think is one of the greatest dividers in our country's history.
BARTIROMO: It's the question that a lot of people are talking about this morning. How much of tonight does he need to be an attack dog and talk about what she's done wrong? And how much does he need to show a positive tone, like she's showing?
MCDOWELL: I don't know if he can show so much of a positive tone in the debate because the -- he's there to challenge her, to challenge her on ideas, to challenge her on her record, both as a politician and as an individual. So he can't -- it's very hard. That's why I have -- ads are effective.
Because you watch a lot of these Hillary Clinton ads, you're kicking back, watching the Real Housewives of Orange County, and so ad comes on and it's a bunch of kids, and you're like, "Man, those kids are cute." And there's, like, Hillary Clinton for President, I approve this message.
BARTIROMO: Right, right.
MCDOWELL: And that is -- that is effective. And she's been doing that all along, and that's where his -- no offense, Anthony. Lack of fundraising . . .
SCARAMUCCI: Breaking news, that you're watching the Real Housewives of Orange County. Breaking news.
MCDOWELL: How is that breaking news? I'm a redneck. Of course, I watch the Real Housewives.
(LAUGHTER)
BARTIROMO: Wait a minute. There's another video that we have to talk about, and this is this new Project Veritas video, revealing Democratic Party operatives bragging about inciting violence at Trump events. You remember the Trump rallies where we saw all of that violence? Well, watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BOB CREAMER FOUNDER OF DEMOCRACY PARTNERS: (Inaudible.) we have events (ph).
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK.
CREAMER: And we have whole (inaudible) across the country that does that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is it always around (ph).
SCOTT FOVAL, FIELD DIRECTOR, AMERICANS UNITED FOR CHANGE: Initiate the conflicts by having leading conversations with people who are naturally psychotic.
One other thing. We have mentally ill people . . .
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
FOVAL: . . . that we pay to (bleep). Make no mistake. Over the last 20 years, I've paid off a few homeless guys to do some crazy stuff.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BARTIROMO: OK. I was outraged by this. I don't know how you guys feel about this, but let's put aside the fact that this is really dirty, dirty politics. You're actually putting people in harm's way. Go wear a Planned Parenthood t-shirt and just start fighting, and the media will cover it.
BROWN: Of course. And it's -- well, politics is a blood sport. I've said that before on your show. But this actually goes -- you know, crosses that kind of natural line of things you're not supposed to do. And it's clear now, it's something that Trump's said for a while, that it's rigged. That's part of the rigged system that he's talking about. You have people, operatives, going in and inciting.
We've kind of known about it. We've understood it. And it's sad, but -- are we just talking about it, or is everybody talking about it? Once again, it's just Fox, it's just a certain amount of groups that are talking about it. The mainstream media is, like, ah, it's alright. It's not a big deal. It's -- but if it was the Republicans doing this, if the Republican -- if a Republican blew up a Democratic headquarters, President Obama would be there giving a speech about it.
SCARAMUCCI: There's an idea, Maria, I mean, at the end of the day, there's an ideological bigotry in the country coming from the left. That's the great irony of it, OK. They're sanctimonious about their values, and then they do things like this that are so egregiously unethical, and classically un-American, Maria. That is an un-American approach to the election.
And so it may not damage them, however, because it's a little . . .
BARTIROMO: (Inaudible.)
SCARAMUCCI: Well, because it's a little bit too late. And we're the only people covering it.
BARTIROMO: It's all over Twitter.
SCARAMUCCI: You know, you're covering it, Sean's covering it, . . .
BARTIROMO: It's all over Twitter.
SCARAMUCCI: . . . Bill O'Reilly's covering it. But at the end of the day, you can't find it on these other networks.
BARTIROMO: You're right.
MCDOWELL: You can find it on people's social media.
BARTIROMO: Social media.
MCDOWELL: You can find it on people's Facebook pages. You can certainly find it on Twitter.
But the thread through this is the -- that -- what we've really seen in the last few months is the left's disdain for people of faith, the left's disdain for people who are connected to Trump, whose -- Trump's message resonates with them. And it's that kind of elitism and just, kind of, looking down their nose at the American people . . .
SCARAMUCCI: Irredeemable.
MCDOWELL: . . . that is resonating with me.
BARTIROMO: That's deplorable.
SCARAMUCCI: It's deplorable.
MCDOWELL: The biggest question is, will people get out and vote. What is the voter enthusiasm going to be like?
SCARAMUCCI: It's huge. I think it's huge.
BARTIROMO: But do you remember that Chicago rally that Trump had to cancel . . .
BROWN: Yes.
BARTIROMO: . . . because there was so much violence.
SCARAMUCCI: Paid protesters.
BARTIROMO: They were bragging that, ha, ha, we shut it down.
BROWN: Yes, it's -- Anthony, you nailed it. It's un-American. They crossed that line, Maria. And I think there is a tremendous amount of -- I've already voted, and the absentee ballots are off the charts just in New Hampshire. Everywhere I go, even around here.
You know, I was at dinner last night, and I was with a family, a mixed marriage family. The man said he's voting for Trump, and he was attacked relentlessly by his -- the other members of the family. But he stood his ground.
And the talking points that these people had, to the point where I was eating. I didn't want to get involved. I walked over. I said, "Ma'am, with all due respect, you're wrong on A, B, C, and D." And I explained why. And so . . .
BARTIROMO: Wow.
BROWN: . . . hopefully they have changed their mind a little bit.
BARTIROMO: OK. We're going to take a short break. Fox Business is taking live to the third President Debate tonight, moderated by Fox News's Chris Wallace. Our special prime time coverage begins tonight at 6:00 p.m. Eastern. Join me for that special programming tonight.
And then catch our post-debate analysis right here tomorrow morning. From Vegas, back in a minute.
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BARTIROMO: Welcome back. And then there were none. All the buzz about a Twitter acquisition coming to a dead stop after reports said that Salesforce and other companies actually backed down, walked away from a deal. Twitter trolls were partly to blame, they said. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that months before Salesforce was even considering a bid to acquire Twitter, the company's mergers and acquisitions target list excluded the company.
I want to bring in Recon Capital's Chief Investment Officer, Kevin Kelly, right now, in New York. Kevin, good to see you. Thanks for joining us.
KEVIN KELLY, CHIEF INVESTMENT OFFICER, RECON CAPITAL: Thanks for having me. I'm actually missing out. I love Vegas.
BARTIROMO: What do -- well, we are missing you as well here, actually, Kevin.
What do you think about this whole Twitter story? I mean, does Twitter -- will Twitter get acquired, or are they going to just have to figure this out alone and grow organically?
KELLY: I thought for a long time Twitter should have been acquired. One of the reasons why is because they have a lack of direction, right? People didn't really see what was happening and how they were going to drive more revenue, improve the user experience. And it has remained that way.
Now, one of the reasons why Twitter wasn't on this leaked e-mail in their deck of acquisitions is because they were trying to digest the LinkedIn deal. The LinkedIn deal was a $26 billion deal for Salesforce, and they were really going after it and competing against Microsoft.
But make no mistake, Salesforce has always been a serial acquirer, and they typically use their stock as currency. So that's one of the reasons why they lost out on LinkedIn, because they were doing a cash and stock deal, while Microsoft came in and just bought it all out for stock.
So this really isn't surprising that they would -- that Twitter wasn't on here, because it's a really expensive company to digest. People were talking about the valuation being around $20 billion, and more expensive than LinkedIn. And so there was more value elsewhere than for Salesforce.
So it's a pretty interesting leaked e-mail that's showing the inner workings of how companies are acquired. But there wasn't any real news, because a lot of this stuff -- a lot of the companies that were in here were talked about being on the sales block. So this isn't really a big story in regards to leaked information that wasn't already out there.
BARTIROMO: Do they even have a plan to monetize the business? I mean, there's no advertising on Twitter. What do you guys think?
MCDOWELL: You were spot on about why potentially Salesforce walked away.
SCARAMUCCI: Yes. There's just too much trolling activity on Twitter to the point where, like, everyone that's anonymous is bashing the skull of these big follow (ph) live (ph) -- people that are being followed. I think it's a disaster to them long-term.
It's very hard for an advertiser to put stuff on Twitter when they see that sort of nonsense, first (ph).
MCDOWELL: What's the -- put it this way. What is the value of the scores of people who spend their days calling me four-letter words? Right? What is the advertising value of that? What do you want to sell to them? T- shirts? Because they bash me for, you know -- I mean, they bash me from the right and the left sometimes, so you can't -- that's why it's hard to monetize the (inaudible).
SCARAMUCCI: (Inaudible) they talk about you, you should take it as a form of compliment. That's what I love about it.
MCDOWELL: (Inaudible.)
BARTIROMO: But they're watching. I mean . . .
(CROSS-TALK)
BROWN: Do you think the FCC ought to get involved at all, and do a little investigation and see if any of this is actually coming out of Twitter? A lot of the -- hey, this person, this group's looking at us. This group's looking at us.
MCDOWELL: Wait a minute. Are you really advocating government interventionism (inaudible) this investigation? That is really conservative of you.
BROWN: No, I -- (inaudible) I'm asking the boss over here.
SCARAMUCCI: This guy's bringing up a point, that a lot of this rumor mill starts on Twitter or social media that is basically unfounded in the marketplace. So.
BARTIROMO: Yes.
BROWN: It's an evaluation that Twitter is just too high. Is there a number that in fact they get purchased at, do you think?
SCARAMUCCI: I don't -- me, personally, I think Twitter is going to have a very hard time unless they change the business model. They've got to make it longer format, more than 140 characters.
BARTIROMO: Yes.
SCARAMUCCI: And if you're going to be a troll on Twitter, I think they're going to have almost like a troll inspector that cuts (inaudible).
BARTIROMO: Real quick on Morgan Stanley. They're going to be reporting earnings this morning. (Inaudible) ahead of the open.
SCARAMUCCI: So this is the interesting thing. Morgan Stanley will probably have an 11 percent revenue growth in the quarter . . .
BARTIROMO: Wow.
SCARAMUCCI: . . . which will be very good. They had a weak third quarter last year, but the most important thing about this, Maria, and the reason why Goldman's earnings were so strong, is the Volcker Rule is actually helping these banks. Imagine that. Because there's no liquidity, there's -- spreads are wider, and they're making it up on transaction costs.
BARTIROMO: Wow. We'll see what the numbers show.
Kevin, good to see you. We'll see you back at the ranch.
KELLY: Great. Thanks a lot.
BARTIROMO: Kevin Kelly in New York there. We're going to take a short break. A lot more to come as we preview the big debate tonight, live from Las Vegas, right here. Stay with us.
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BARTIROMO: Welcome back to the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada, this morning. We are live, coming to you from Vegas ahead of the final and third presidential debate.
Ecuador temporarily cutting off internet access to Julian Assange at its London Embassy, over fears that he was using it to interfere in the U.S. election. Cheryl Casone with the details there. Cheryl.
CHERYL CASONE, FOX BUSINESS: Yes. Hey, good morning, Maria. Well, yes, this move by Ecuador came after the latest batch of John Podesta e-mails were released to WikiLeaks.
Earlier this week the site released hundreds of e-mails from the Clinton campaign advisor. After taking the WikiLeaks founder off-line, Ecuador confirmed they cut off this access and released a statement saying it, quote, "respects the principle of non-intervention in the internal affairs of the state," end quote.
Well, Ecuador's Foreign Minister has come out in public support of Hillary Clinton's campaign before that. And the country did grant asylum to Assange back in 2012 over fears that he could face espionage charges in the United States. He also faces sexual assault charges in Sweden.
Well, Tesla is set to make a serious, big announcement today. The company planned to reveal the new product on Monday, but said that it needed a few more days of refinement, whatever it is. It comes after some bad news for anybody with their eye on the new Model 3. If you haven't preordered one yet, it's not going to ship until around mid-2018.
Tesla already racked up more than 400,000 preorders for the $35,000 electric sedan. The first Model 3s are slated to roll out in late 2017.
And finally, is Warren Buffett no longer the second richest guy in America? Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos passed the Oracle of Omaha on this year's Forbes 400 list of the richest people in the United States. A run-up in Amazon stock pushed Bezos just past Buffett, with a net worth of $70.7 billion. Buffett has just $64.9 billion, Maria. And Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates remains number one. He's got a whopping $81 billion. What to do with all of that cash?
Back to you.
BARTIROMO: Incredible. I mean, Amazon is just a monster. It's just amazing what it's done for investors there, obviously, Jeff Bezos.
I want to get back to your first story, Cheryl. Scott, Ecuador cutting off Julian Assange's internet access, they did so because they got a call from John Kerry. Do we know that for sure?
BROWN: I'm not sure, but if he did, that's his first success when it comes to his diplomatic relations (ph) with -- the Iran deal was terrible. But Ecuador is -- as you know, people may not know. They actually get aid from us. And we have many -- in Massachusetts, for example, there are murderers right now who -- we know they're in Ecuador. And Ecuador will not honor its extradition treaty and bring those people back.
But a phone call to John Kerry to shut down the internet, oh, my God, we'll do that in a second.
BARTIROMO: Well, we give them all this aid, right?
BROWN: Yes. Of course, . . .
BARTIROMO: So I mean, if you get a call . . .
BROWN: . . . there is this quid pro quo, and it's outrageous that John Kerry would, once again, and -- try to interfere, as Anthony referenced before, with the American . . .
SCARAMUCCI: Well, that's the question for the American people. Do you want the American government interfering with the government's power to interfere with the election?
BROWN: (Inaudible.)
SCARAMUCCI: Again -- again, it's about being outside the boundary lines, to make something happen that they want to happen, Maria.
BARTIROMO: Wow.
Still to come, U.S. troops joining in the fight to retake Mosul from the clutches of ISIS. More on what it means for the War on Terror. And then some relief for Yahoo after its massive data breach. The good news that is sending the stock higher this morning. We'll check it out, get you ready for the opening of trading. Back in a moment.
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BARTIROMO: Welcome back. Good Wednesday morning, everybody. I'm Maria Bartiromo. We are coming to you live this morning from the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas. It is Wednesday, October 19th. Here are your top stories at 6:30 a.m. on the east coast.