Stocks Slide After Nasdaq 17K, Conoco-Marathon $17B Deal, Airline Stocks' Turbulence 5/29/24

Jim Cramer (0:00)

It's Jim Cramer here. You're listening to the opening bell of CNBC's Squawk on the Street. Don't miss a minute of the action.

Carl Quintanilla (0:07)

Good Wednesday morning. Welcome to Squawk on the Street. I'm Carl Quintanilla with Jim Cramer, David Faber at Post 9 of the New York Stock Exchange. Got some risk off today as yields are higher all around the world. Germany, Japan, US 10-year 456 Got some M&A as a story today and some decent guides. Hire in specialty retail, we'll get to that. Our roadmap begins with Nvidia, Apple, and Tech's record rally, the chip maker looking to rally again at the open, closing the market cap gap with Apple.

David Faber (0:32)

Plus in deal news, ConocoPhillips buying Marathon Oil. It's a more than 17 billion all stock transaction. It bolsters the Conoco share of shale assets.

We also have retail in focus. Abercrombie posting its strongest first quarter ever, sales jumped 22%. We've also got Dix and Kava both raising guidance.

Carl Quintanilla (0:52)

Let's begin with the markets. So one day after the NASDAQ did close above 17K for the first time, Jim took more than 900 days to get past that thousand point threshold.

Jim Cramer (1:02)

And it wasn't done right. It's done with one giant stock and a couple of other, I'd say acolytes. And then after that, everything is kind of in the balance and not great. Look, I thought yesterday was a really bad day because it continued other than Fridays.

What is this period where we're seeing some serious well-overs? And they're getting to, particularly to enterprise software, to cybersecurity. I keep wondering, David, you talked about enterprise software after Workday reported in not great quarter, that yesterday you mentioned the possibility of what could be a dog fight with Alphabit HubSpot versus Salesforce, and I have Salesforce on tonight, and all I'm saying is that enterprise software is the weak part of this economy, maybe even the economy.

David Faber (1:50)

Of the economy or of the market, which?

Jim Cramer (1:52)

Well, it reflects badly, the economy, because I don't hear many other people say, listen, we're getting a lot of pushback from our clients. I mean, look, you're certainly not getting it from Dix, from Abercrombie. No. From Kava, from Chewy. These are all much better than expected. It's not the consumer.

And then I look at, I don't know if you guys are focused on the Bank of Ozark.

David Faber (2:17)

But Bank of Ozark doesn't typically come up in my daily research.

Carl Quintanilla (2:22)

You have to move today, right?

Jim Cramer (2:24)

I think that you should change your focus.

David Faber (2:27)

Well, I have you guys. I know Carl is singularly focused on the Bank of Ozark.

Jim Cramer (2:33)

Bank of Ozark, symbol O-Z-K.

This is a city piece that I thought was unbelievable. It's been instrumental in the development of high-dollar commercial real estate projects throughout the US. Including the largest individual loan here we got is a multi-use project in Atlanta. Echo Street West, the people in Atlanta are probably well familiar with that. They also have a life science construction lending in general. They did one, well, they did one a couple of minutes ago.

David Faber (2:58)

What's the point?

What's the point? I didn't have it on my scorecard. We get to Bank of the Ozarks in the first three minutes of the show. So what, why?

Jim Cramer (3:08)

This city piece, it's a cell.

And it raises the concern that this is where the ground zero for office development. Or as my partner Ben Stoto said this morning, Bank of Ozark with a big tower in New York, a big office in Atlanta, and Bank of Ozark, I mean, huh?

David Faber (3:33)

But how does that connect to enterprise software?

Jim Cramer (3:36)

No, I'm saying that the only other weak area that I find.

David Faber (3:38)

Oh, it was an addition of weak areas.

Jim Cramer (3:40)

It was commercial real estate and enterprise software.

Carl Quintanilla (3:43)

Although yesterday we had the upgrade of Huntington on sort of similar stories, being around cities like Columbus, Ohio that are growing fast.

Jim Cramer (3:50)

I love that. And when I've had the company on many times, and I've tried to reach with that story too.

I've said, listen, you've got the great reshoring. And they said, well, don't forget, we also have net interest margin. You know, conservative bankers.

David Faber (4:04)

All right, I want to get back to enterprise software. Because you're introducing there a much bigger theme.

This idea really that you think that there are starting to be cutbacks by corporate America in terms of, or at least, I don't know, spending worries, price conscious.