All the best to Kelly welcome to closing bell right now. I'm Mike Santoli and for Scott Wopner

This make-a-break hour begins with Wall Street playing it cool after a slightly warm

inflation report the majority of stocks in slow retreat, but the big cap

index is very firm, a 1% comeback from early losses after the headline CPI came in a bit above

expectations, leaving the S&P 500 less than 1% away from its old record high.

That sits near the 4,800 mark.

With an hour left in the session, big growth names continued to bolster the index and have led the intrad a comeback from that early weakness to about the flat line while small caps and banks continue to struggle after their strong fourth quarter rallies.

The Treasury market took the

C. P. release in stride. Yields moderately lower across the board, even as

some Fed officials refused to ratify market expectations of rate cuts

coming soon.

That leads us to our talk of the tape.

Has the sluggish start for most stocks in 2024?

Lower the bar helpfully entering earning season or is it a warning that an economic soft landing featuring a friendlier Fed cannot be

taken for granted just yet. Let's get into all that with Liz Ann Saunders.

Charles Schwab, Chief Investment Strategist Lizanne, great to see you.

Hi Mike, nice to see you too.

So yeah, I guess the real simple story of how stocks have held up as well as they have for a while now is

inflation coming down faster than the economy has weekend.

How did today's data of last Friday's jobs numbers?

How do you feel that all works together in terms of setting expectations

for the markets in the economy this year?

...