Wildfire Smoke Impact, Tech and AI After the Nasdaq Sell-off, Shakeup at GameStop 6/8/23

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Carl Quintanilla (0:30)

Market moving insight and analysis join Jim Cramer, David Faber and me, Carl Quintanilla, on the opening bell hour of CNBC Squawk on the Street.

Good Thursday morning. Welcome to Squawk on the Street. I'm Carl Quintanilla with Jim Cramer, David Faber at post nine of the New York Stock Exchange. Pre-market continues in a range, although rates did reverse lower, as jobless claims popped to the highest level in 20 months. A market also grappling with the fallout from these wildfires in Canada, more FAA ground stops today. In fact, a roadmap begins with the smoke warnings and the economic impact. Air quality alerts issued from much of the Eastern seaboard to as far west as Ohio and Kansas.

Millions urged to stay indoors, airline traffic slowed and outdoor events canceled.

David Faber (1:11)

Plus GameStop shares, they are tumbling ahead of the open. That retailer ousts its CEO and names Ryan Cohen as its executive chair. Oh, good. And Tesla, will it make it 10 straight daily gain days?

We shall see.

Carl Quintanilla (1:29)

Let's begin though with the Canada wildfire smoke that continues to blank of the Northeast and other parts of the United States. New York City experiencing the worst air quality in the world yesterday. Today, Philly surpasses it. Officials urging residents to limit outdoor activity, wear high quality masks if they must go outside. The FAA says reduced visibility will continue to impact air travel today and adding it'll need to take steps to manage the flow of traffic safely into New York City. DC, Philadelphia and Charlotte.

Jim, we're starting to talk about what this will mean for the overall economy, mobility and the consumer.

Jim Cramer (2:04)

Look, I think that this is one of those moments we haven't talked about it, but there's a series of notes about Amazon.

And when Amazon has these experiences, they do grow prime. Now we also know that Prime's talking about having a video tier with advertising. David, Prime has so much wind at its back. Amazon has so many analysts that are jumping out and talking about it, that I think they're the way to play the bad air quality.

David Faber (2:34)

That's interesting. I mean, the stock was actually down sharply yesterday. I think in part because of something I did talk about, this M science number that showed AWS was slowing.

We talked about it yesterday. We also talked about that Bernstein positive. No, we had the analysts join us yesterday. Later in the day, Mark Smuller from Bernstein talking about why he says.

Jim Cramer (2:53)

The hate letter.

David Faber (2:54)

The hate letter. But Jim, I wouldn't have thought you'd go right to Amazon as a sort of a positive play on the terrible.

Jim Cramer (3:03)

I'm worn down by analysts who have come out in the last 24 hours and say, listen, get on board, get bigger, go home Amazon.

And I've got to tell you, David, we have not heard exactly when we're going to see a bottom in Amazon Web Services. We know it's been going like this.

David Faber (3:21)

It has.

Jim Cramer (3:22)

When you go out positive on it, they're a little touchy, but I think that we're going to see a bottom.

David Faber (3:30)

Well, you feel like the, and I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I'm repeating some of the things you said, that the growth in AI and what that's going to mean for data center and for cloud providers, including, of course, Amazon and what it's going to be able to provide to its customers as a result of generative AI is going to be a significant engine for growth.

Jim Cramer (3:49)

Well, look, you're going to have Dave Costin on the 10 Now, Dave Costin is talking about rather remarkable acceleration in the economy that could come from AI.

Now, when you go back to, yes, the Oracle of everything AI, he talks about Alphabet, he talks about Meta, he talks about Microsoft. But one of the themes that I find behind it is that you're going to need a lot of data center space. That's really what they're doing, Amazon. So I think when you talk to Dave Costin, he's going to have to come out and say, look, what's good for AI is good for Amazon.