The first half of 2026 has delivered impressive returns for investors, but one of the biggest stories isn’t how much the market has gained. It’s who is leading the rally.
Much of the past several years has been defined by a handful of mega-cap technology companies driving the majority of market gains. While those companies remain important, 2026 is beginning to tell a different story.
Value stocks have significantly outperformed growth stocks this year, while small-cap and mid-cap companies have posted particularly strong returns. Rather than relying on only a few companies to lift major indexes, participation has expanded across a much broader portion of the market.
Chris and Noah explain that this type of market rotation is generally viewed as a positive development. Broader participation often creates a healthier foundation for long-term market advances and reinforces the importance of maintaining diversified portfolios instead of concentrating investments in a single sector.
Corporate earnings remain one of the primary drivers behind the market’s strength.
The hosts discuss how many companies continue producing earnings well above expectations, particularly within the semiconductor industry and businesses supporting artificial intelligence infrastructure. Massive capital spending by cloud providers continues flowing into chip manufacturers, memory producers, and other technology suppliers.
At the same time, they acknowledge that expectations have become increasingly difficult to exceed. As investors demand continued earnings growth, even strong quarterly results can disappoint if they fall short of elevated forecasts.
This creates an environment where earnings quality may matter more than ever. Companies will need to continue demonstrating sustainable growth rather than simply meeting lofty expectations.
Inflation remained another major topic throughout the episode.
Recent CPI data showed encouraging progress, with inflation continuing to moderate toward the Federal Reserve’s long-term objective. Lower energy prices have helped improve recent readings, although Chris and Noah caution that monthly data should always be viewed as part of a larger trend rather than in isolation.
As inflation gradually eases, expectations surrounding future interest rate decisions continue to shift. Markets quickly adjust to each new economic report, making it important for investors to avoid reacting emotionally to short-term headlines.
Instead, the discussion emphasizes focusing on the broader economic picture rather than any single monthly data release.
One of the more interesting observations from the episode is the disconnect between consumer confidence and financial markets.
Despite stocks trading near record highs, consumer sentiment remains surprisingly weak. Chris and Noah suggest that constant exposure to negative headlines and social media may contribute to this disconnect.
Economic fundamentals such as employment, earnings, and corporate profitability have generally remained resilient, yet many consumers continue feeling pessimistic about the economy.
This difference highlights an important investing lesson. Market performance is ultimately driven by business fundamentals over time, not necessarily by daily headlines or public sentiment.
The conversation also turns toward the long-term outlook for Social Security.
Chris explains that current projections suggest the Social Security trust fund could eventually face funding challenges if no legislative changes occur. Importantly, this would not mean benefits disappear entirely, but rather that benefit levels could be reduced if Congress fails to act.
Noah shares that he personally does not build his retirement assumptions around Social Security alone, instead treating any future benefits as supplemental rather than foundational.
Rather than creating fear, the discussion reinforces the importance of building retirement plans that rely on diversified savings, disciplined investing, and multiple income sources instead of depending entirely on government benefits.
The episode concludes with a look toward future innovation.
Artificial intelligence remains one of the most important long-term investment themes, but Chris and Noah also discuss fusion energy as another technology that could eventually transform the global economy. While practical applications may still be years away, continued investment and technological breakthroughs illustrate how innovation continues creating new opportunities across industries.
Whether discussing AI infrastructure, energy, or broader market leadership, one consistent message emerges: markets continue evolving, and investors who maintain a long-term perspective are often best positioned to benefit.
While Big Tech remains an important part of today’s market, 2026 is increasingly becoming a story of broader participation.
Value stocks, small-cap companies, and a wider range of industries are contributing to market gains alongside continued earnings growth and moderating inflation. Although questions remain around interest rates, Social Security, and global events, Chris Needs and Noah Brooks emphasize that disciplined investing, diversification, and focusing on long-term fundamentals remain the most reliable strategies for navigating changing market conditions.
Hey, welcome back to The Market Enthusiast.
I’m Noah Brooks, and obviously this is Chris Needs. Hello. Hello. so do you still have all your digits? I have all my fingers. Survived the two hundred and fiftieth. Okay, good, good deal. Did you light off any fireworks? Lit off a few. We had a few, as my son liked to call it, Nolan specials we lit off the uncles and grandparents. They set set some off at their house. So we had a good time.
anything big or just the little guys? There’s some pretty good ones. I’m surprised at how powerful they allow fireworks to be at this point. I remember as a kid you had to go to like Ohio or West Virginia to get the good ones. Yeah, you can buy them here in Pennsylvania now. And now I’m like, I don’t know. I they don’t go as high, but I feel like the explosions are just as big, so they happen way closer to you when you’re buying them yourselves. Yeah. And it’s just like my my uncle was saying them down
In the lower part of his yard, we were sitting up on like his patio, which is above there. And I feel like they’re going off like right in front of our face. And they were big ones too. So hey, good show. Yeah. Our neighbor Bo does a massive I mean, this guy spends some Buku Bucks in a neighborhood. And we had about maybe sixty-five people that that joined him. There was a picnic beforehand. We have this this new dog. shout out to Bernie, Bernie Doodle. Bernie.
We have this new dog, so he’s only, you know, like ten weeks old. So he was at the picnic and he was getting along and we didn’t know what to do with him for the fireworks. Aelish was like, screw it, bring him, he’ll be fine. You know, last Was he fine? Well, as soon as they started going off, he’s I was holding him. As soon as they started going off, he started freaking out. So I kinda ran and we were in front of this guy, Sean’s house, and he ran up with me. He let me in his house.
And so we sat in the in the front area of and then Bernie peed in his house. Yeah, well did he really yeah I he’s a ten week he’s a ten week old dog, so of course he did. Of course he did. No good deed. Yeah, right. Exactly. I know. I a big shout out to Sean and Cheryl. Thank you so much. so here we are, you know, mid-year. We we obviously we talked about it last time. We had a great first half of the year. we’re down just a little bit since since we came in July 2nd.
markets up about 10.5%, NASDAQ’s up 13 mid caps, up 15 small caps are up over 21. Developed International up around six and emerging markets up 20%. You know, so all in all, man, this is really shaping up at least the first half of the year has been phenomenal. And the second half, you know, there’s a lot of opportunities out there.
In terms of value and growth, value is the big winner this year, up almost nineteen percent. And even though technology is up maybe twenty seven ish, growth, you know, the entire growth index is really only up less than five percent for the year. Values and dividends are just trouncing growth at the moment. Yeah. Lag seven aren’t really doing anything right now, year to date. It’s been mostly the other four ninety three.
really pulling their fair share finally and and that’s a good thing for the market. That’s rotation. that that is healthy. You know, we’re talking about how much the hyperscalers have invested and it’s been a ton of money. A couple of them have gone free cash flow negative. Yeah. Or the Oracle. they’re maybe not in the Mag 7, but they’re a hyperscaler. And
You know, all that money, all that CapEx investment is going right to the semiconductor companies, which aren’t all it’s not just NVIDIA. You know, there’s AMD, there’s Broadcom, all the majors out there. And then you get down, you know, downstream all the component companies that are getting really good valuations, memory. Obviously, everyone knows the story there and what’s going on with the South Korean stock market with SK Heinex and Samsung and the crazy returns they’re gang. They’re technically an emerging market. I don’t think of
South Korea’s emerging market, but they are in MSCI’s indexing. It it depends on which emerging market provider exactly. Right. So some of have South Korea as developed. Some of them ha you know, as you just pointed out, MS IC has it as emerging. I don’t really think of it as an emerging economy. Yeah, nor do I. I mean, you look at the cities there, it’s like, holy cow, that’s beautiful. Well, but to a point, hey, we just had SK Heinex have the largest ever foreign listing here in the United States.
raised over twenty six billion dollars. Yeah. As they’re super volatile right now with every every you know it’s up ten percent, down ten percent every other day, depending on what memory is doing. Yeah. Well last time I checked, South Korean cospi index, I think it is, was up close to like ninety percent for the year. And you know, depending on which index provider you you are using, you either have a little bit of South Korea or a lot of bit of South Korea.
And so it really makes a a big determination on your emerging markets this year. but to your point earlier that we were talking about, you know, has a lot of technology as earnings weighted. Yeah. And the estimated earnings this year coming from tech companies on the emerging markets, MSCI indexing, 83% coming from tech companies. That’s wild, you know. I think normally we would say, a high.
exposure to tech companies is generally a developed market thing. And the US, we have all the hyperscalers best tech companies in the world. And ours is only fifty two percent. And we know their earnings have been exceptional. Yeah. but yeah, so from that perspective, we’re way less weighted to tech compared to emerging markets. And then if you go to Europe, if you’re going off the the stock six hundred, only six percent is coming from tech earnings growth. So
By that by that data point, you would think if there’s a tech slowdown or earnings slowdown in in semis and chips, that the place to be maybe Europe. Yeah. I mean, that’s where you’re gonna get your diversification benefits from if you have clients or if you’re a money allocator and you say, All right, there’s there’s something funny going on under the surface here, maybe a certain company’s reporting poorly, you know.
And you say I don’t want that AI exposure, but I have to stay in the market for my client who wants a sixty forty portfolio, you would probably be looking to move to more of a Europe centric fund where they have much less tech, much less growth, and they’re more of a value centric area. Yeah. It’s it seems interesting that Europe and I consider them to be fully developed, right? As obviously all the index providers do. And y you know, they have such a low weighting to technology and
Of course, they do have a few big tech companies like ASML and and certainly a lot of defense contractors which verge on technology, but their regulatory institutions are such that they just have this stranglehold on competition. They want everybody to be fair, and they don’t really have the big tech weighting in their indexes that that we do. And it kind of goes, you know, obviously technology has been
on fire for the last ten or fifteen years, really since the beginning of two thousand and and thirteen, technology has been the the place to be. And you think to yourself, you know, Europe has a lot of opportunities. They have a lot of smart people. Why are they so behind on on the the technology allocation and technology companies? It just seems like it’s regulations. Yeah. I I think the the brightest brain seemed to go to areas where
They’re appreciated. So Silicon Valley, you know, over the years, you know, a lot of the amazing founders have essentially f got gotten to that area, you know, for better or for worse. California certainly loved that tax-wise, but yeah, yeah, they they just really have not stuck in and gone through the entire process in Europe. And yeah, I it seems like it’s a regulatory issue that has led to that.
But, you know, with the amount of regulation they have, you would think there would have been some local outperformers that stuck around. You know, we think of like maybe the old traditional ones, SAP maybe, names like that. ASML, kind of like a fabricator of chips, right? Semiconductor company. but that’s kind of an industrial. That’s not a true tech company for sat light. Don’t forget Nokia. yeah, there we go.
They were a thing a long time ago. They were. I mean they were they were really lost their moat pretty quickly. yeah. yeah. I remember the old Nokia flip phones back in the day and the the little guys. I mean, they at that time they were getting smaller and smaller and smaller, and now we’re going the the opposite direction. So I don’t know if Nokia is I don’t know, do they still make phones? You ever see anybody with a Nokia phone? Not lately. Not lately, huh? Not lately. No. but to the to your point about the earnings,
You know, we looked at earnings for the first quarter and obviously they they were blowout earnings up almost 30%. I think it was 28.7% earnings growth. At the beginning of the year or the end of last year, the expectation was really like mid double digits, 13, 14 percent. And trounced those numbers, doubled that. And now we’re looking at, I mean, we were not really in earnings season yet, although it’s it’s gonna be starting here. We had some big banks report this week. They’ve done phenomenal.
JP Morgan had some blowout numbers, a little bit of question going forward if they’re gonna be able to maintain that. But the earnings that they’ve actually announced have been really good. Expectations are for about 25% earnings growth, you know, quarter over quarter. And you just think to yourself, you know, how much longer can you have those 20% earnings growth? And how is the market gonna react?
when it’s not 20 or 25, and you know, in the technology case, it’s 30, 40, 50, 60, 70 percent earnings growth. And I it goes back for me, I think about back in the day in the in the 2000s, where you having eventually they stopped beating estimates, right? The estimates kept raising and raising and raising. And so now, you know, even if you get twenty five or thirty-five percent earnings growth, if the expectation was for 40, well
That stock’s gonna get murdered. Yeah. we saw yesterday IBM. Now they didn’t beat expectations. They come in, came in lower than expected. And they essentially said that the CapEx spending is has moved away from software into the hardware side. And we see that with the names like Sandisk and Microsoft. You don’t need consultants when the technology can do it for you. Yeah, right. Interesting. Yeah. So earnings going forward, I mean, we’re I feel like we’re a little bit out of
crossroads where if expectations continue to be really high, at some point I don’t know that companies are going to be able to maintain the those beats. Yeah. Yeah. Earnings going parabolic, it seems, profit margins going parabolic, essentially, you know, it not going truly parabolic, but you look on a chart, it’s curving upwards. Yeah. And, you know, that’s a function of several things. You know, these
A lot of my going to these super high margin semiconductor and semi related companies. But in the end, eventually it has to slow down. Right. And we have to be aware of that. We have to look for where peak earnings could be. I don’t think it’s this quarter or next quarter. But like you said, when your year over year comp is forty percent and you’re getting, you know, a P valuation over a hundred, yeah, you’ve got to perform, you’ve got to c continue to show there’s growth there.
Or else the market will start to pull dollars from you and allocate elsewhere, bringing down your PE. And, you know, whether, you know, I’m interested to see in the next two, five years to see how much productivity can be maintained and boosted, ’cause I don’t think we’re anywhere near AI truly affecting across the board productivity, but the potential is there. And if we could truly ha be in a different regime for profit margin levels, like we’ve
sort of been the last couple quarters, that’d be really interesting to see overall valuations where you should get multiple expansion when you’re going to a different regime of higher profit margins. Yeah. you speaking of PE and expansion, I mean right now the current PE on the SP 500 is about twenty two and a half, which is a little elevated. Next year’s, you know, the full year 2027 is less than nineteen.
Thanks to earnings. Thanks to earnings, right. And so I think the market continues to be positive and making progress unless somehow earnings, you know, d do not materialize to those expectations. And going back to the internet bubble, I mean, that’s really what killed the internet bubble. It was at some point it was like, wow, these companies aren’t really making that much money. And yeah, they’re gonna be the wave of the future, but we need earnings now. Yeah.
We’re we’re talking about how those super high profit margin semiconductor and semi-relay companies have taken all that free cash flow from the hyperscalers who are going trending towards free cash flow negative. That can’t go on forever. They can’t infinitely go free cash flow negative. The market wouldn’t allow that. Eventually, an Oracle or some other name would get punished so bad, you know, being so free cash flow negative that
No, the winners start getting impacted by and like you said, that’s how you end up with a a bus scenario. Yeah. And some of that has to do with interest rates, right? They’ve been relatively stable this year in general, even though we had rates spike up a little bit during the Iran war. Hey, is that is that still going on? Yep. I kid, I kid, right? Obviously we we know over the last you know, six or seven days, yeah, few few weeks or so, we’re kinda back at it with with Iran.
The memorandum of understanding seems to be being a little bit misinterpreted. Interpreted. Yeah. Yeah. Apparently there’s wiggle room there on both sides, right? Yeah, it’s unfortunate because we just got a really awesome CPI number. It’s like they waited until right after the month ahead, so to take a little pressure off the Fed a little bit with the new chairman in there. Yeah. Well, oil prices were trending down.
Came down pretty quick, surprisingly. Normally they take longer to come down. They were well over $100 a barrel you know, when when the conflict started. And f as of last week, I think on Monday or Tuesday, they were at 70, sitting at 84 when we walked into here today. Friday and Monday oil was up pretty big, up a little bit yesterday. And so some of the the wholesale inflation numbers that we got today.
were really good. but I think that they were impacted by you know falling energy prices across the board. We got CPI yesterday, which was actually very good as well. Even when you strip out energy and volatile food, the numbers were really outstanding. we got essentially flat month over month. 3.6 was the headline number when you strip out.
and go to the core strip out food and energy, it was two point six, which is a lot closer to the Fed’s preferred number of two, even though we haven’t seen that for a long, long time, really since since COVID. but things seem to be moving in the right direction from an inflationary standpoint. Now, as you pointed out earlier today, it was kind of a just a reversal of the May’s number, which is a little bit higher than expectations. So I think obviously time will tell and and all of these data points
You know, it’s it’s they’re time sensitive just because they’re they’re just spots on the calendar where they begin and stop. So but take it with a grain of salt both ways. Right. So if May was high and and June was lower than expected, you could average those out and say it’s not really moving that much. And again, it’s with with these data points, what I was gonna try to say was like it’s only good for about an hour or two. And then it’s okay, well, what’s next month gonna look like? As of two days ago.
Chances for a July Fed hike, which we don’t think’s going to happen, was up to like forty percent. Now I wish, you know, if I would play in those prediction markets, I would have put a lot of money on no rates are not going to be hiked in July and made the sixty cents or whatever they do on those things. But now they went all the way down to as of yesterday, I didn’t check today. It was down to like a five percent chance or or
below 10% chance on the FOMC the Fed watch to for for next month. Yeah. For for this or July. one of those things that has come down in price, I mean genuinely come down in price, not that the the increase in price has slowed, are egg prices. Have you noticed that? I did because you know what my pregnant wife is now addicted to dippy eggs. Okay. So she’s making them and she’s like, wow that was the best meal ever. I’m like, it’s eggs.
It’s just eggs flipped over. You like what you like? Okay. Yeah. No, I love dippy eggs. I’m not a scrambled egg guy. She normally is, so I just don’t eat breakfast. Cause she didn’t she wasn’t good at making them. Sorry, Lexa Not. yeah. She wasn’t good at making them. I would have to make them myself and I’m always running crazy in the morning between playing basketball, showering, running off to work. I don’t stop much. I gotcha. so one of the I I guess everybody’s talking about it, right? The Department of Justice had an inquiry and they actually came to a settlement.
with group of traders and egg producers. and they suggested, well, not suggested, I mean they came to a settlement that the prices were being manipulated. Collusion. Yeah, a little little bit of collusion, kind of like the memory markets in the 90s and early, early 2000s. but so when you look at it, one of the things that happened was the the bird flu. And over a period of time, I think it was about 18 months, they had to kill.
Roughly 200 million hens. And so there’s no question that the the bird flu, the avian flu, had a big portion of driving up those prices. but whether you go from one and a half per dozen to eight a dozen is a whole nother story. Well, I I And I think that they didn’t come down after numbers recovered a little bit. I don’t know what the growth time is, maybe six months, nine months. I know that they’re down dramatically. how much did you pay for?
For eighteen? I thought it was a dollar fifty nine. Now I may not have been looking at the right little sticker or another. I don’t know what store you’re shopping at. I haven’t seen a dollar fifty nine on eggs in a long, long time. Although I do buy the foofy eggs. The I don’t check the receipts, so I might have had the wrong sticker. I was like one fifty nine for eighteen. Okay. But so they did come to an agreement, a settlement, with some traders and some egg producers.
And the price has been essentially dropping for a long time since that DOJ inquiry has happened. so when you take core CPI, which I I don’t know how many eggs are consumed in the United States, but the price is coming down. It’s one of those things that does impact grocery costs, right? I mean, we know it because they got so high and everybody was complaining about it. I don’t hear anybody cheering that they’re really cheap, but at the same time, it does have an impact.
You know, just like like energy. I’m a big chicken cutlet guy. You gotta use eggs to get the bat get every flour and the breading on there. Yeah, I know absolutely. So inflation is moderating, and I think that’s really, really good for the overall market, certainly for the economy and the consumer. the consumer is not necessarily in a great way, and there might be a little bit of a disconnect because everybody feels.
Like prices are continuing to go up when they’re actually moderating a little bit. And you see that in the consumer sentiment sentiment numbers. Consumer sentiment is one of the lowest points that it’s been in the last 10 years, really since COVID, in the global financial crisis. And yet the overall market is at, you know, just a just a little bit away from all percent or less. Few few points away from all time highs.
So to me, that that disconnect really says something about individuals, how they’re looking at things and maybe how they’re spending a little bit, but it’s not a disconnect with with the market and with earnings. Our animal spirits friends called it vibe session. Meaning, yeah, like everybody’s miserable. And we kind of talked about that, I think, last time, talking about social media being a poison. Maybe we were talking about it privately. But, you know.
Just all the most negative things are out there on social media. And I think that has a a lot to do with the vibe session and and the the bad customer or consumer sentiment numbers. Because yeah, things things aren’t that bad if you truly think about it. Everybody is in a good ways, you know, we have seen some numbers tick up on defaults and things like that and delinquencies, but it’s nothing crazy. Layoffs aren’t
you know, moving up our our initial claims and continuing claims are in check and a lot of times, most times have been below the expectation. Yeah.
I put a mark there because we went black. I saw, yeah. And I don’t know what’s going on. I don’t know if Kayla is still there. It might be our camera. Do you think our camera went
Well I hope not. I’m calling Kayla. We’re still recording. Hey, our camera went black.
So I’m still recording, but I marked it.
Kayla Rentschler (23:50)
I can hear you through the studio, so I hung up on you. Yeah, I’m not seeing your camera. If you want to go into your settings and see if
settings too, but I don’t know that I can do anything from my end.
It still says it’s record like it still says it’s recording for 24 minutes. So I believe the recording I cannot see you. Yeah, so it is still recording, which is good. I won’t have to piece it together, which is ideal, but for some reason it’s not showing your video. So are you able to see like, you know, where it would say the camera selection? I wouldn’t. I would keep it going. It there has to be something related to your
Noah Brooks (24:38)
But can you see us? I the the red thing is still going.
What if I just stop it?
Kayla Rentschler (25:03)
Like when you so do you see at the bottom where it says stop mark audio video? If you click the little down carrot at video, it should show you which camera it’s using. And it has also video settings there. If you click on that okay. Click on video settings.
Noah Brooks (25:18)
Says Lumina.
Just got spinny wheel.
Kayla Rentschler (25:36)
I turned my camera off for right now.
It does say Lumina, but it’s spinning. So what I would do, it sounds like it’s more so your device. So I would just do a quick restart on the laptop. I’m gonna keep it rolling because then I’ll just cut out the middle.
Noah Brooks (26:03)
So don’t hit stop. You don’t want me to stop.
Kayla Rentschler (26:06)
I would not stop the recording. I’m in here. I’ll wait for you. If you just wanna restart your computer and make sure when you log in, it lets you pick like the Lumina Scarlet Scarlet. Okay. Sounds good. I’ll be here.
Noah Brooks (26:14)
Okay. I’ll I’m gonna we’ll restart it right now.
Kayla Rentschler (28:24)
Good. Okay. I don’t know what happened and I don’t I don’t know.
Noah Brooks (28:25)
put the word out, we back up. Who knows what it’s from?
I don’t know either. That’s it just Elba in that Baltimore drug show.
about prison.
The wire. The wire, yeah.
Kayla Rentschler (28:51)
So
you’re still recording. I don’t know where your video cut out. Do you have an idea of that?
Noah Brooks (28:56)
Well, did the video cut out? mean…
Kayla Rentschler (29:02)
I think so. I can’t check until it’s done recording. So at this point I would just start where you left off unless you don’t know where you left off.
Noah Brooks (29:12)
Well, I know where we stopped talking. We have an idea. We have an idea. It’s a framework of an idea, but we have one two weeks. It’ll be done in two weeks.
Kayla Rentschler (29:14)
Okay.
All right, then then I’m gonna see myself out. Continue
on and let me know when you’re done.
Noah Brooks (29:25)
Okay, make the same face you’re making before I don’t I don’t know. Sure, I can. I can do that. Yeah. I don’t don’t. Goodbye. I don’t I don’t know how to do that. Alright, so I’m gonna mark it again as a starting point.
Kayla Rentschler (29:27)
Okay.
All right, goodbye.
Noah Brooks (29:49)
Yeah, it’s just, it’s a big disconnect between consumer sentiment and what’s going on in the rest of the world. And, to your point about, you know, you didn’t say death scrolling, but you said just negative news. I mean, people are, are out there death scrolling. Yeah. algorithms are feeding you whatever draws your reaction draws your eye and keeps you flipping through there. So yeah, if, if you’re getting the most emotionally charged stuff, keeping you on there, you’re going to be more negative.
If you’re looking at politics these days, and I’m not going to go into a big diatribe on this, but if you’re looking at politics, you’re probably one of those people that thinks the end of the world is is coming down, you know, is right around the corner. You know, you think about like Social Security. my God, everybody’s going to run out of Social Security. that reminds me there was a bipartisan bill put forward to have an evaluation of Social Security.
Social security is not in great shape. I think everybody knows it from their death scrolling, right? Um, but the social security trust fund is actually scheduled to run out of money and don’t confuse that with stop paying benefits, but it’s, it’s scheduled to run out of money. And I think, uh, 20, four 20, 32, 232. we brought it in. But what happens at that point, if, if social security actually does, um, run out of money,
It’s not that benefits stop. It’s that benefits would get reduced. And I think they would be reduced to about 83 % of what’s going on. Now I can assure you that whoever’s in charge in 2032 when this happens is not going to like the impact from the voters. And so there’s this bipartisan commission right now that is taking a look at it. I think they’re calling it the promise act.
protecting retirement opportunities and maintaining income, something, something like that. cause realistically it’s, you know, it’s, it’s six years away until it runs out of money and whoever’s, whoever’s in is going to get voted out. I don’t care if it’s midterms or general, they are going to get voted out. And so it really needs to be looked at. Well, and I guess this goes without saying, but you know, I don’t know that anybody can count on social security, especially the younger generation.
your generation, I’m obviously a little bit older than you. But I don’t know, when you think about social security, do you think that it’s going to be there in what they’re telling you it’s going to be there when you retire? I’m hoping for this universal basic income that you’ve talked about, because I don’t think social security is going to be there at all. I would not into my own financial plan. I’m not putting social security in there. So I’m not retiring for another 30 years. So I’m not I’m not counting on anything from that. Now.
it. This whole thing, we’ve talked before and short, like, I don’t expect anyone in here to remember or have been listening, we say but it’s like, they’ve screwed it from the beginning, it, you can only invest in treasuries, in the trust. And it’s like, come on, how are you supposed to go? You’re, you’re investing for 30 or 40 years of someone’s working life, and you have them in fixed income from the beginning, not just fixed income, one single government’s debt.
just it was it was cursed from the beginning. Maybe it was a way to fund the government and that was a secret little Trojan horse they did in there to make sure they always had flows. I don’t know. But it reminds me of something that just happened and I got all charged up. Our school district raised our taxes and they forecasted for the next 10 years are going to raise taxes at the max allowable by law. And it’s just like, why is that necessary? they need a new roof and new HVAC. Well, yeah, when you
if in most schools can only invest in mostly 90 95 % or more fixed income similar to Social Security. Well, that means you know a roof is going to go bad in 30 or 40 years means you have to start saving 20,000 a year from day one and keep doing that every single year because you’re not going to get a huge appreciation on those assets. And you can’t just suddenly fund a roof in one year’s amount when you still have operating expenses.
It’s the same thing with social security. It’s too late to fix it, unfortunately. I don’t know that it’s too late to fix it. I mean, it’s going to require some major changes. maybe that is it could have been in much better shape if they actually ran it appropriately from the beginning or even 30 years ago made the changes necessary. Yeah. I mean, the last time we had any major change in social security, I think was 1983, right? Where they raised retirement age from 65 to 67.
increased the payroll taxes and that obviously was a long time ago and something needs to happen now. A lot of people do depend on social security. I don’t know what the stat is on how many people only have social security. I’m sure there’s, a significant number of retirees out there. but the bottom line is, you know, I don’t know that people can think about it as in absolute terms as something that’s always going to be there. If they do nothing,
which we know, we know tends to be, the, the, the mo for our elected officials, at least it seems like recently, if they do nothing, you know, it’s going to drop and eventually it’s going to go down and down and down. I don’t know if it gets the 50 % of what the number is, but they’re going to have to raise retirement age. They’re going to have to raise the payroll tax. They’re going to have to raise the income limits on what social security, is, is peg two or the upper end.
is peg two. And I mean, it really needs a fix. But you know what they have been working on? What daylight savings that Yeah, that’s where I thought you’re gonna go bipartisan bill what what could be of utmost importance daylight savings time. That’s where I you’re gonna go with that. I just I just wish you know, we’ve we’ve already got got stakes in Intel and whatever open AI wants the government to take a 5 % stake in all these things. Let’s just make it 5050.
equities, US equities, S &P 500, Russell 1000, whatever, and 50 % fixed income. Because you know what, I looked at a chart, and it shows for real purchasing power, your chances in cash, money market fixed income over time, and you 100 % of the time, creep towards 100 % of the time underperform when versus real purchasing power, when you’re in only fixed income.
6040 is actually the quickest to get to 0 % underperformance quickly followed by 100 % equities. so should have been done decades ago. And we already have stakes in companies now. Why don’t we just have the Social Security Trust manage some allocation of 5050 6040 4060 % US equities keep it at home here because it’s funding our retirements essentially. And
US Treasuries. mean, I’m not opposed to the idea. I think one of the reasons why that with no voting power in the Social Security Trust, I think one of the reasons that that hasn’t happened is because no one wants to be in charge when the market goes down. Right? I mean, you think about March of 2009. Market from top to bottom, I think was 57%. And then you’re looking at the math. And now, with investors and investor psychology,
you know, the worst thing you could possibly do, especially with an index is sell at the bottom. And I would be, I mean, I would take that, that binary bet that politicians would get out of the market, right at the very worst time. So I suspect that that’s why they haven’t done it. But some come on, there’s a few politicians who are really good at timing. boy. boy.
really good. Which ones? Oh, I don’t know. So moving on from that one. Yeah, I mean, something needs to be done. And one of the things that you could do would be invested differently. And maybe it’s not even in equities, although, you know, 10 % the S &P 500 would probably do a world difference to those numbers when they when they got down to zero in the trust fund. But you might be able to buy corporate bonds.
you might be able to buy, hey, we should talk about private equity and social security, right? Oh, Maybe a little little Bitcoin. Bitcoin’s back up to around 65. Yeah. Great. Great. The crypto guys would love it if they had social security started buying Bitcoin. They would. I bet you some people thought Trump was going to do that with how he was talking originally. But since since we’re talking about politicians here,
Unfortunately, Lindsey Graham did just pass. Coincidentally, kind of strange as soon basically as soon as he got back from abroad visiting Ukraine. You know, he’s always been a warhawk. But yeah, interesting. You know, all the different ways people can be poisoned and whatnot delayed things. I don’t know. Very interesting to see. And then obviously, we know Mitch McConnell has been hospitalized with a turtle. Yeah, he’s been MIA. And what rumors about him, right? What happened with him? His wife?
his wife was the transportation secretary transportation. I thought it was like of labor or something. She she hightailed it out to China while he was in the hospital. And she said the senator’s health does not warrant me to be there. like, what what lady leaves her husband in the hospital bed? He just sitting in there alone all day every day. He had visitors. Sure he did too. Scott James had a nice 17 minute call with them apparently.
But yeah, just very interesting to see. There was another guy, a US representative from New Jersey, Tom Keene, who disappeared for I think three or four months, four months, missed 100 votes. came back. He said he was diagnosed, I guess, with clinical depression. And apparently he’s back now. But it raises a bigger question for our elected officials is, you know, should they have to disclose major health issues?
Here in Pennsylvania, our senator, John Fetterman, the guy who only wears shorts, a little bit strange. know, today you could wear shorts, but in the winter, I don’t know, that seems a little bit faster. He had a stroke while he was running for Senate here in Pennsylvania. He still managed to win. I don’t think he’s 100 percent back. I don’t know if he was ever 100 percent here. But yeah, I mean, it it.
It really raises a bigger question is, you know, two things. One should elected officials have to disclose major health problems? Where does that? Where do you draw the line on? You know, HIPAA violations, stuff like that. And then when you look at the average age of our elected officials, especially in the Senate. And you know, the last few years in the White House, you know that to me is a little bit scary.
I mean, we have mandatory stop flying for commercial pilots. It used to be 60. I believe it’s now 65. But Mitch McConnell is 84 Lindsey Graham 71, which doesn’t seem that old to me. But there are people well into their 90s that are voting for us, you know, as our proxies, I don’t think we need to get to level of HIPAA violations, but there has to be a constant
bipartisan committee like there to maybe even of doctors, not even, you know, a committee, maybe someone overseeing the doctors saying like, yeah, Mitch McConnell, he’s been like, he’s gone for like last three years ever since he had that on air thing where he just paused. Yeah, he just paused. There has to be something because you can’t have a POA or you know, there was the auto pen thing in the last administration. It’s like you can’t have
other people making decisions when the person obviously who should have that power was voted upon. So you know, the POA thing or people making decisions in lieu of them being healthy is the concerning part that I can’t come along with. what you’re saying essentially is that we should cap senators at age 70. Yeah, even lower. About some term limits out there too. love it. I’m okay with that. I think
I think the president should get two five year terms and I think senators should get three four year terms. And I think the every two years for the house of representatives is crazy because they go from winning an election in the next day they’re fundraising because they know in another, you know, 18 months there’s, there’s another primary, something’s gotta give. I don’t think you and I are going to solve it here today, but definitely something’s gotta give. So
That’s my story. I’m sticking to your to your point about age, we should have age limits as well. It’s like not to be ageist. But what happened with Biden is exactly why you would why would happen with Biden, you know, just totally started glitching out, glitching out mid race with months left. And then, you know, Carla ascended him after the fact. Well, a lot of people are saying, well, I went to voted for her, I would have voted for x and x. Yeah. So it’s just like
when you the frequency of things that can happen to pass a certain age and how the Democrat process works, I feel like there’s too many things that can go wrong when you have a bunch of Trump’s what? 80 now, like just too many things can go wrong. There has to be common sense limits. No question about it. Who’s going to introduce those limits? The old people? Yeah, the people voting themselves. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So moving on, one of the things you know, that our senior citizens may not be able to wrap their head around is
technology. I’m not saying that I do. I’m I am not a technocrat. I think I understand it as good as anything. But in the field of energy, there’s been a few breakthroughs around fusion. Is infusion like what happens inside the sun? How are they recreating that? Well, right. So the two ways that we’ve been generating energy
Besides, besides solar is burning something or splitting atoms, right? So regular nuclear reactors split atoms. Fusion works a little bit differently and I am not, I’m not an expert on it, but it works a little bit differently. Basically it’s smashing atoms together and Germany just used one or two of their decommissioned nuclear power plants to start.
what would be the first fusion reactor. I don’t, it’s definitely not producing any energy at the moment. but they’re putting a few billion dollars or euros into it. And it’s one of these things that could really be a game changer if they’re able to come to it. this week was one of the, melts down, we just go into a black hole. no biggie. Yeah. I mean, you don’t have to worry about dying from it because you’re instantly poofed, I guess. Not a hundred percent sure. That was the fears with the large Adrian collider.
Right. CERN, right? mean, they thought that, you know, if they ran that and it hit two atoms together at light speed, you know, we could go into black hole as long as well. We’re not in a black hole right now, right? Who knows the multiverse. We’re not in a parallel dimension, but there was another, fusion company. I think it’s called general fusion. Great name guys. that just came public, in the last few days back by
You guessed it, Jeff Bezos from Amazon fame. And it’s interesting. I mean, it could be one of these things that, and I’m not expecting in a few years, but 10, 15, 20 years from now, I mean, it could be a major disruptor in the world of energy. you know, think about a horse and buggy and the car coming along. If we don’t have to pump up dinosaur bones from the, you know, 10,000 feet down,
and put them in a furnace and burn it to to power turbines. We could smash atoms just like the stars, right the sun. And all those businesses would be what is it called out of business? Yeah, right. So interesting stuff. want to burn coal? Hey, they’re still cleaning that coal. No, I bet it’s really clean by now. Absolutely beautiful clean coal, beautiful clean coal.
So that’s that’s what I have for this week. Fusion, I think, is probably the biggest game changer that’s coming down the pipeline. Quantum computing, obviously, big, big thing coming. But we’re not there yet. And we’re certainly not there in fusion. But it’s going to be a game changer, Chris. I can feel it. I I can feel it. I agree. What else do we have? I think just my closing thoughts are we’ve had a really stable growth environment in terms of earnings. And would be nice if we could stop.
know, getting into scuffles with Iran and we could get inflation down and oil down. We can maybe get some rate cuts priced in for 2027 again, because you know what, we’d start getting some multiple expansion again, we’d love some better, even higher price earnings multiples. And that’s what I’m hoping for. There you go. I don’t know that I want higher PEs. I will that’s just a natural reaction multiple expansion and the profit margins being so high.
I think earnings have done the work so far this year. Let’s get some help from the other side of the equation. I’d like to see the market rally on better earnings and that they’re so good that PEs drop. Wow. Like we’ve been the last last six months or so. Yeah, absolutely. All right, everybody. Thank you so much for listening. We’ll catch you next time on the market enthusiasts.
Have questions about how this impacts your investment strategy? Reach out to your advisor or email us at marketenthusiast@goodlifefa.com.
The opinions voiced in this podcast are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual. To determine which strategies or investments may be suitable for you consult the appropriate qualified professional prior to making a decision. Economic forecast set forth may not develop as predicted and there can be no guarantee that strategies promoted will be successful. All performance referenced is historical and is no guarantee of future results. All indices are unmanaged and may not be invested into directly.
Markets at New Highs, Consumers Feeling Low: Explaining the Disconnect
The first half of 2026 has delivered impressive returns for investors, but one of the biggest stories isn’t how much the market has gained. It’s who is leading the rally.
In Episode 65 of The Market Enthusiast, Noah Brooks and Chris Needs examine why stocks continue reaching new highs while consumer confidence remains surprisingly weak. They also explore strong corporate earnings, inflation, interest rates, Social Security, and emerging technologies that could shape investing for years to come.
Table of Contents
A Healthier Market Rally Is Taking Shape
Much of the past several years has been defined by a handful of mega-cap technology companies driving the majority of market gains. While those companies remain important, 2026 is beginning to tell a different story.
Value stocks have significantly outperformed growth stocks this year, while small-cap and mid-cap companies have posted particularly strong returns. Rather than relying on only a few companies to lift major indexes, participation has expanded across a much broader portion of the market.
Chris and Noah explain that this type of market rotation is generally viewed as a positive development. Broader participation often creates a healthier foundation for long-term market advances and reinforces the importance of maintaining diversified portfolios instead of concentrating investments in a single sector.
Strong Earnings Continue Supporting Stocks
Corporate earnings remain one of the primary drivers behind the market’s strength.
The hosts discuss how many companies continue producing earnings well above expectations, particularly within the semiconductor industry and businesses supporting artificial intelligence infrastructure. Massive capital spending by cloud providers continues flowing into chip manufacturers, memory producers, and other technology suppliers.
At the same time, they acknowledge that expectations have become increasingly difficult to exceed. As investors demand continued earnings growth, even strong quarterly results can disappoint if they fall short of elevated forecasts.
This creates an environment where earnings quality may matter more than ever. Companies will need to continue demonstrating sustainable growth rather than simply meeting lofty expectations.
Inflation Continues Moving in the Right Direction
Inflation remained another major topic throughout the episode.
Recent CPI data showed encouraging progress, with inflation continuing to moderate toward the Federal Reserve’s long-term objective. Lower energy prices have helped improve recent readings, although Chris and Noah caution that monthly data should always be viewed as part of a larger trend rather than in isolation.
As inflation gradually eases, expectations surrounding future interest rate decisions continue to shift. Markets quickly adjust to each new economic report, making it important for investors to avoid reacting emotionally to short-term headlines.
Instead, the discussion emphasizes focusing on the broader economic picture rather than any single monthly data release.
Consumer Sentiment Doesn’t Match the Market
One of the more interesting observations from the episode is the disconnect between consumer confidence and financial markets.
Despite stocks trading near record highs, consumer sentiment remains surprisingly weak. Chris and Noah suggest that constant exposure to negative headlines and social media may contribute to this disconnect.
Economic fundamentals such as employment, earnings, and corporate profitability have generally remained resilient, yet many consumers continue feeling pessimistic about the economy.
This difference highlights an important investing lesson. Market performance is ultimately driven by business fundamentals over time, not necessarily by daily headlines or public sentiment.
Why Social Security Still Deserves Attention
The conversation also turns toward the long-term outlook for Social Security.
Chris explains that current projections suggest the Social Security trust fund could eventually face funding challenges if no legislative changes occur. Importantly, this would not mean benefits disappear entirely, but rather that benefit levels could be reduced if Congress fails to act.
Noah shares that he personally does not build his retirement assumptions around Social Security alone, instead treating any future benefits as supplemental rather than foundational.
Rather than creating fear, the discussion reinforces the importance of building retirement plans that rely on diversified savings, disciplined investing, and multiple income sources instead of depending entirely on government benefits.
Looking Beyond Today’s Headlines
The episode concludes with a look toward future innovation.
Artificial intelligence remains one of the most important long-term investment themes, but Chris and Noah also discuss fusion energy as another technology that could eventually transform the global economy. While practical applications may still be years away, continued investment and technological breakthroughs illustrate how innovation continues creating new opportunities across industries.
Whether discussing AI infrastructure, energy, or broader market leadership, one consistent message emerges: markets continue evolving, and investors who maintain a long-term perspective are often best positioned to benefit.
The Bottom Line
While Big Tech remains an important part of today’s market, 2026 is increasingly becoming a story of broader participation.
Value stocks, small-cap companies, and a wider range of industries are contributing to market gains alongside continued earnings growth and moderating inflation. Although questions remain around interest rates, Social Security, and global events, Chris Needs and Noah Brooks emphasize that disciplined investing, diversification, and focusing on long-term fundamentals remain the most reliable strategies for navigating changing market conditions.
Listen to the Full Episode
Full Episode Transcript
Hey, welcome back to The Market Enthusiast.
I’m Noah Brooks, and obviously this is Chris Needs. Hello. Hello. so do you still have all your digits? I have all my fingers. Survived the two hundred and fiftieth. Okay, good, good deal. Did you light off any fireworks? Lit off a few. We had a few, as my son liked to call it, Nolan specials we lit off the uncles and grandparents. They set set some off at their house. So we had a good time.
anything big or just the little guys? There’s some pretty good ones. I’m surprised at how powerful they allow fireworks to be at this point. I remember as a kid you had to go to like Ohio or West Virginia to get the good ones. Yeah, you can buy them here in Pennsylvania now. And now I’m like, I don’t know. I they don’t go as high, but I feel like the explosions are just as big, so they happen way closer to you when you’re buying them yourselves. Yeah. And it’s just like my my uncle was saying them down
In the lower part of his yard, we were sitting up on like his patio, which is above there. And I feel like they’re going off like right in front of our face. And they were big ones too. So hey, good show. Yeah. Our neighbor Bo does a massive I mean, this guy spends some Buku Bucks in a neighborhood. And we had about maybe sixty-five people that that joined him. There was a picnic beforehand. We have this this new dog. shout out to Bernie, Bernie Doodle. Bernie.
We have this new dog, so he’s only, you know, like ten weeks old. So he was at the picnic and he was getting along and we didn’t know what to do with him for the fireworks. Aelish was like, screw it, bring him, he’ll be fine. You know, last Was he fine? Well, as soon as they started going off, he’s I was holding him. As soon as they started going off, he started freaking out. So I kinda ran and we were in front of this guy, Sean’s house, and he ran up with me. He let me in his house.
And so we sat in the in the front area of and then Bernie peed in his house. Yeah, well did he really yeah I he’s a ten week he’s a ten week old dog, so of course he did. Of course he did. No good deed. Yeah, right. Exactly. I know. I a big shout out to Sean and Cheryl. Thank you so much. so here we are, you know, mid-year. We we obviously we talked about it last time. We had a great first half of the year. we’re down just a little bit since since we came in July 2nd.
markets up about 10.5%, NASDAQ’s up 13 mid caps, up 15 small caps are up over 21. Developed International up around six and emerging markets up 20%. You know, so all in all, man, this is really shaping up at least the first half of the year has been phenomenal. And the second half, you know, there’s a lot of opportunities out there.
In terms of value and growth, value is the big winner this year, up almost nineteen percent. And even though technology is up maybe twenty seven ish, growth, you know, the entire growth index is really only up less than five percent for the year. Values and dividends are just trouncing growth at the moment. Yeah. Lag seven aren’t really doing anything right now, year to date. It’s been mostly the other four ninety three.
really pulling their fair share finally and and that’s a good thing for the market. That’s rotation. that that is healthy. You know, we’re talking about how much the hyperscalers have invested and it’s been a ton of money. A couple of them have gone free cash flow negative. Yeah. Or the Oracle. they’re maybe not in the Mag 7, but they’re a hyperscaler. And
You know, all that money, all that CapEx investment is going right to the semiconductor companies, which aren’t all it’s not just NVIDIA. You know, there’s AMD, there’s Broadcom, all the majors out there. And then you get down, you know, downstream all the component companies that are getting really good valuations, memory. Obviously, everyone knows the story there and what’s going on with the South Korean stock market with SK Heinex and Samsung and the crazy returns they’re gang. They’re technically an emerging market. I don’t think of
South Korea’s emerging market, but they are in MSCI’s indexing. It it depends on which emerging market provider exactly. Right. So some of have South Korea as developed. Some of them ha you know, as you just pointed out, MS IC has it as emerging. I don’t really think of it as an emerging economy. Yeah, nor do I. I mean, you look at the cities there, it’s like, holy cow, that’s beautiful. Well, but to a point, hey, we just had SK Heinex have the largest ever foreign listing here in the United States.
raised over twenty six billion dollars. Yeah. As they’re super volatile right now with every every you know it’s up ten percent, down ten percent every other day, depending on what memory is doing. Yeah. Well last time I checked, South Korean cospi index, I think it is, was up close to like ninety percent for the year. And you know, depending on which index provider you you are using, you either have a little bit of South Korea or a lot of bit of South Korea.
And so it really makes a a big determination on your emerging markets this year. but to your point earlier that we were talking about, you know, has a lot of technology as earnings weighted. Yeah. And the estimated earnings this year coming from tech companies on the emerging markets, MSCI indexing, 83% coming from tech companies. That’s wild, you know. I think normally we would say, a high.
exposure to tech companies is generally a developed market thing. And the US, we have all the hyperscalers best tech companies in the world. And ours is only fifty two percent. And we know their earnings have been exceptional. Yeah. but yeah, so from that perspective, we’re way less weighted to tech compared to emerging markets. And then if you go to Europe, if you’re going off the the stock six hundred, only six percent is coming from tech earnings growth. So
By that by that data point, you would think if there’s a tech slowdown or earnings slowdown in in semis and chips, that the place to be maybe Europe. Yeah. I mean, that’s where you’re gonna get your diversification benefits from if you have clients or if you’re a money allocator and you say, All right, there’s there’s something funny going on under the surface here, maybe a certain company’s reporting poorly, you know.
And you say I don’t want that AI exposure, but I have to stay in the market for my client who wants a sixty forty portfolio, you would probably be looking to move to more of a Europe centric fund where they have much less tech, much less growth, and they’re more of a value centric area. Yeah. It’s it seems interesting that Europe and I consider them to be fully developed, right? As obviously all the index providers do. And y you know, they have such a low weighting to technology and
Of course, they do have a few big tech companies like ASML and and certainly a lot of defense contractors which verge on technology, but their regulatory institutions are such that they just have this stranglehold on competition. They want everybody to be fair, and they don’t really have the big tech weighting in their indexes that that we do. And it kind of goes, you know, obviously technology has been
on fire for the last ten or fifteen years, really since the beginning of two thousand and and thirteen, technology has been the the place to be. And you think to yourself, you know, Europe has a lot of opportunities. They have a lot of smart people. Why are they so behind on on the the technology allocation and technology companies? It just seems like it’s regulations. Yeah. I I think the the brightest brain seemed to go to areas where
They’re appreciated. So Silicon Valley, you know, over the years, you know, a lot of the amazing founders have essentially f got gotten to that area, you know, for better or for worse. California certainly loved that tax-wise, but yeah, yeah, they they just really have not stuck in and gone through the entire process in Europe. And yeah, I it seems like it’s a regulatory issue that has led to that.
But, you know, with the amount of regulation they have, you would think there would have been some local outperformers that stuck around. You know, we think of like maybe the old traditional ones, SAP maybe, names like that. ASML, kind of like a fabricator of chips, right? Semiconductor company. but that’s kind of an industrial. That’s not a true tech company for sat light. Don’t forget Nokia. yeah, there we go.
They were a thing a long time ago. They were. I mean they were they were really lost their moat pretty quickly. yeah. yeah. I remember the old Nokia flip phones back in the day and the the little guys. I mean, they at that time they were getting smaller and smaller and smaller, and now we’re going the the opposite direction. So I don’t know if Nokia is I don’t know, do they still make phones? You ever see anybody with a Nokia phone? Not lately. Not lately, huh? Not lately. No. but to the to your point about the earnings,
You know, we looked at earnings for the first quarter and obviously they they were blowout earnings up almost 30%. I think it was 28.7% earnings growth. At the beginning of the year or the end of last year, the expectation was really like mid double digits, 13, 14 percent. And trounced those numbers, doubled that. And now we’re looking at, I mean, we were not really in earnings season yet, although it’s it’s gonna be starting here. We had some big banks report this week. They’ve done phenomenal.
JP Morgan had some blowout numbers, a little bit of question going forward if they’re gonna be able to maintain that. But the earnings that they’ve actually announced have been really good. Expectations are for about 25% earnings growth, you know, quarter over quarter. And you just think to yourself, you know, how much longer can you have those 20% earnings growth? And how is the market gonna react?
when it’s not 20 or 25, and you know, in the technology case, it’s 30, 40, 50, 60, 70 percent earnings growth. And I it goes back for me, I think about back in the day in the in the 2000s, where you having eventually they stopped beating estimates, right? The estimates kept raising and raising and raising. And so now, you know, even if you get twenty five or thirty-five percent earnings growth, if the expectation was for 40, well
That stock’s gonna get murdered. Yeah. we saw yesterday IBM. Now they didn’t beat expectations. They come in, came in lower than expected. And they essentially said that the CapEx spending is has moved away from software into the hardware side. And we see that with the names like Sandisk and Microsoft. You don’t need consultants when the technology can do it for you. Yeah, right. Interesting. Yeah. So earnings going forward, I mean, we’re I feel like we’re a little bit out of
crossroads where if expectations continue to be really high, at some point I don’t know that companies are going to be able to maintain the those beats. Yeah. Yeah. Earnings going parabolic, it seems, profit margins going parabolic, essentially, you know, it not going truly parabolic, but you look on a chart, it’s curving upwards. Yeah. And, you know, that’s a function of several things. You know, these
A lot of my going to these super high margin semiconductor and semi related companies. But in the end, eventually it has to slow down. Right. And we have to be aware of that. We have to look for where peak earnings could be. I don’t think it’s this quarter or next quarter. But like you said, when your year over year comp is forty percent and you’re getting, you know, a P valuation over a hundred, yeah, you’ve got to perform, you’ve got to c continue to show there’s growth there.
Or else the market will start to pull dollars from you and allocate elsewhere, bringing down your PE. And, you know, whether, you know, I’m interested to see in the next two, five years to see how much productivity can be maintained and boosted, ’cause I don’t think we’re anywhere near AI truly affecting across the board productivity, but the potential is there. And if we could truly ha be in a different regime for profit margin levels, like we’ve
sort of been the last couple quarters, that’d be really interesting to see overall valuations where you should get multiple expansion when you’re going to a different regime of higher profit margins. Yeah. you speaking of PE and expansion, I mean right now the current PE on the SP 500 is about twenty two and a half, which is a little elevated. Next year’s, you know, the full year 2027 is less than nineteen.
Thanks to earnings. Thanks to earnings, right. And so I think the market continues to be positive and making progress unless somehow earnings, you know, d do not materialize to those expectations. And going back to the internet bubble, I mean, that’s really what killed the internet bubble. It was at some point it was like, wow, these companies aren’t really making that much money. And yeah, they’re gonna be the wave of the future, but we need earnings now. Yeah.
We’re we’re talking about how those super high profit margin semiconductor and semi-relay companies have taken all that free cash flow from the hyperscalers who are going trending towards free cash flow negative. That can’t go on forever. They can’t infinitely go free cash flow negative. The market wouldn’t allow that. Eventually, an Oracle or some other name would get punished so bad, you know, being so free cash flow negative that
No, the winners start getting impacted by and like you said, that’s how you end up with a a bus scenario. Yeah. And some of that has to do with interest rates, right? They’ve been relatively stable this year in general, even though we had rates spike up a little bit during the Iran war. Hey, is that is that still going on? Yep. I kid, I kid, right? Obviously we we know over the last you know, six or seven days, yeah, few few weeks or so, we’re kinda back at it with with Iran.
The memorandum of understanding seems to be being a little bit misinterpreted. Interpreted. Yeah. Yeah. Apparently there’s wiggle room there on both sides, right? Yeah, it’s unfortunate because we just got a really awesome CPI number. It’s like they waited until right after the month ahead, so to take a little pressure off the Fed a little bit with the new chairman in there. Yeah. Well, oil prices were trending down.
Came down pretty quick, surprisingly. Normally they take longer to come down. They were well over $100 a barrel you know, when when the conflict started. And f as of last week, I think on Monday or Tuesday, they were at 70, sitting at 84 when we walked into here today. Friday and Monday oil was up pretty big, up a little bit yesterday. And so some of the the wholesale inflation numbers that we got today.
were really good. but I think that they were impacted by you know falling energy prices across the board. We got CPI yesterday, which was actually very good as well. Even when you strip out energy and volatile food, the numbers were really outstanding. we got essentially flat month over month. 3.6 was the headline number when you strip out.
and go to the core strip out food and energy, it was two point six, which is a lot closer to the Fed’s preferred number of two, even though we haven’t seen that for a long, long time, really since since COVID. but things seem to be moving in the right direction from an inflationary standpoint. Now, as you pointed out earlier today, it was kind of a just a reversal of the May’s number, which is a little bit higher than expectations. So I think obviously time will tell and and all of these data points
You know, it’s it’s they’re time sensitive just because they’re they’re just spots on the calendar where they begin and stop. So but take it with a grain of salt both ways. Right. So if May was high and and June was lower than expected, you could average those out and say it’s not really moving that much. And again, it’s with with these data points, what I was gonna try to say was like it’s only good for about an hour or two. And then it’s okay, well, what’s next month gonna look like? As of two days ago.
Chances for a July Fed hike, which we don’t think’s going to happen, was up to like forty percent. Now I wish, you know, if I would play in those prediction markets, I would have put a lot of money on no rates are not going to be hiked in July and made the sixty cents or whatever they do on those things. But now they went all the way down to as of yesterday, I didn’t check today. It was down to like a five percent chance or or
below 10% chance on the FOMC the Fed watch to for for next month. Yeah. For for this or July. one of those things that has come down in price, I mean genuinely come down in price, not that the the increase in price has slowed, are egg prices. Have you noticed that? I did because you know what my pregnant wife is now addicted to dippy eggs. Okay. So she’s making them and she’s like, wow that was the best meal ever. I’m like, it’s eggs.
It’s just eggs flipped over. You like what you like? Okay. Yeah. No, I love dippy eggs. I’m not a scrambled egg guy. She normally is, so I just don’t eat breakfast. Cause she didn’t she wasn’t good at making them. Sorry, Lexa Not. yeah. She wasn’t good at making them. I would have to make them myself and I’m always running crazy in the morning between playing basketball, showering, running off to work. I don’t stop much. I gotcha. so one of the I I guess everybody’s talking about it, right? The Department of Justice had an inquiry and they actually came to a settlement.
with group of traders and egg producers. and they suggested, well, not suggested, I mean they came to a settlement that the prices were being manipulated. Collusion. Yeah, a little little bit of collusion, kind of like the memory markets in the 90s and early, early 2000s. but so when you look at it, one of the things that happened was the the bird flu. And over a period of time, I think it was about 18 months, they had to kill.
Roughly 200 million hens. And so there’s no question that the the bird flu, the avian flu, had a big portion of driving up those prices. but whether you go from one and a half per dozen to eight a dozen is a whole nother story. Well, I I And I think that they didn’t come down after numbers recovered a little bit. I don’t know what the growth time is, maybe six months, nine months. I know that they’re down dramatically. how much did you pay for?
For eighteen? I thought it was a dollar fifty nine. Now I may not have been looking at the right little sticker or another. I don’t know what store you’re shopping at. I haven’t seen a dollar fifty nine on eggs in a long, long time. Although I do buy the foofy eggs. The I don’t check the receipts, so I might have had the wrong sticker. I was like one fifty nine for eighteen. Okay. But so they did come to an agreement, a settlement, with some traders and some egg producers.
And the price has been essentially dropping for a long time since that DOJ inquiry has happened. so when you take core CPI, which I I don’t know how many eggs are consumed in the United States, but the price is coming down. It’s one of those things that does impact grocery costs, right? I mean, we know it because they got so high and everybody was complaining about it. I don’t hear anybody cheering that they’re really cheap, but at the same time, it does have an impact.
You know, just like like energy. I’m a big chicken cutlet guy. You gotta use eggs to get the bat get every flour and the breading on there. Yeah, I know absolutely. So inflation is moderating, and I think that’s really, really good for the overall market, certainly for the economy and the consumer. the consumer is not necessarily in a great way, and there might be a little bit of a disconnect because everybody feels.
Like prices are continuing to go up when they’re actually moderating a little bit. And you see that in the consumer sentiment sentiment numbers. Consumer sentiment is one of the lowest points that it’s been in the last 10 years, really since COVID, in the global financial crisis. And yet the overall market is at, you know, just a just a little bit away from all percent or less. Few few points away from all time highs.
So to me, that that disconnect really says something about individuals, how they’re looking at things and maybe how they’re spending a little bit, but it’s not a disconnect with with the market and with earnings. Our animal spirits friends called it vibe session. Meaning, yeah, like everybody’s miserable. And we kind of talked about that, I think, last time, talking about social media being a poison. Maybe we were talking about it privately. But, you know.
Just all the most negative things are out there on social media. And I think that has a a lot to do with the vibe session and and the the bad customer or consumer sentiment numbers. Because yeah, things things aren’t that bad if you truly think about it. Everybody is in a good ways, you know, we have seen some numbers tick up on defaults and things like that and delinquencies, but it’s nothing crazy. Layoffs aren’t
you know, moving up our our initial claims and continuing claims are in check and a lot of times, most times have been below the expectation. Yeah.
I put a mark there because we went black. I saw, yeah. And I don’t know what’s going on. I don’t know if Kayla is still there. It might be our camera. Do you think our camera went
Well I hope not. I’m calling Kayla. We’re still recording. Hey, our camera went black.
So I’m still recording, but I marked it.
Kayla Rentschler (23:50)
I can hear you through the studio, so I hung up on you. Yeah, I’m not seeing your camera. If you want to go into your settings and see if
settings too, but I don’t know that I can do anything from my end.
It still says it’s record like it still says it’s recording for 24 minutes. So I believe the recording I cannot see you. Yeah, so it is still recording, which is good. I won’t have to piece it together, which is ideal, but for some reason it’s not showing your video. So are you able to see like, you know, where it would say the camera selection? I wouldn’t. I would keep it going. It there has to be something related to your
Noah Brooks (24:38)
But can you see us? I the the red thing is still going.
What if I just stop it?
Kayla Rentschler (25:03)
Like when you so do you see at the bottom where it says stop mark audio video? If you click the little down carrot at video, it should show you which camera it’s using. And it has also video settings there. If you click on that okay. Click on video settings.
Noah Brooks (25:18)
Says Lumina.
Just got spinny wheel.
Kayla Rentschler (25:36)
I turned my camera off for right now.
It does say Lumina, but it’s spinning. So what I would do, it sounds like it’s more so your device. So I would just do a quick restart on the laptop. I’m gonna keep it rolling because then I’ll just cut out the middle.
Noah Brooks (26:03)
So don’t hit stop. You don’t want me to stop.
Kayla Rentschler (26:06)
I would not stop the recording. I’m in here. I’ll wait for you. If you just wanna restart your computer and make sure when you log in, it lets you pick like the Lumina Scarlet Scarlet. Okay. Sounds good. I’ll be here.
Noah Brooks (26:14)
Okay. I’ll I’m gonna we’ll restart it right now.
Kayla Rentschler (28:24)
Good. Okay. I don’t know what happened and I don’t I don’t know.
Noah Brooks (28:25)
put the word out, we back up. Who knows what it’s from?
I don’t know either. That’s it just Elba in that Baltimore drug show.
about prison.
The wire. The wire, yeah.
Kayla Rentschler (28:51)
So
you’re still recording. I don’t know where your video cut out. Do you have an idea of that?
Noah Brooks (28:56)
Well, did the video cut out? mean…
Kayla Rentschler (29:02)
I think so. I can’t check until it’s done recording. So at this point I would just start where you left off unless you don’t know where you left off.
Noah Brooks (29:12)
Well, I know where we stopped talking. We have an idea. We have an idea. It’s a framework of an idea, but we have one two weeks. It’ll be done in two weeks.
Kayla Rentschler (29:14)
Okay.
All right, then then I’m gonna see myself out. Continue
on and let me know when you’re done.
Noah Brooks (29:25)
Okay, make the same face you’re making before I don’t I don’t know. Sure, I can. I can do that. Yeah. I don’t don’t. Goodbye. I don’t I don’t know how to do that. Alright, so I’m gonna mark it again as a starting point.
Kayla Rentschler (29:27)
Okay.
All right, goodbye.
Noah Brooks (29:49)
Yeah, it’s just, it’s a big disconnect between consumer sentiment and what’s going on in the rest of the world. And, to your point about, you know, you didn’t say death scrolling, but you said just negative news. I mean, people are, are out there death scrolling. Yeah. algorithms are feeding you whatever draws your reaction draws your eye and keeps you flipping through there. So yeah, if, if you’re getting the most emotionally charged stuff, keeping you on there, you’re going to be more negative.
If you’re looking at politics these days, and I’m not going to go into a big diatribe on this, but if you’re looking at politics, you’re probably one of those people that thinks the end of the world is is coming down, you know, is right around the corner. You know, you think about like Social Security. my God, everybody’s going to run out of Social Security. that reminds me there was a bipartisan bill put forward to have an evaluation of Social Security.
Social security is not in great shape. I think everybody knows it from their death scrolling, right? Um, but the social security trust fund is actually scheduled to run out of money and don’t confuse that with stop paying benefits, but it’s, it’s scheduled to run out of money. And I think, uh, 20, four 20, 32, 232. we brought it in. But what happens at that point, if, if social security actually does, um, run out of money,
It’s not that benefits stop. It’s that benefits would get reduced. And I think they would be reduced to about 83 % of what’s going on. Now I can assure you that whoever’s in charge in 2032 when this happens is not going to like the impact from the voters. And so there’s this bipartisan commission right now that is taking a look at it. I think they’re calling it the promise act.
protecting retirement opportunities and maintaining income, something, something like that. cause realistically it’s, you know, it’s, it’s six years away until it runs out of money and whoever’s, whoever’s in is going to get voted out. I don’t care if it’s midterms or general, they are going to get voted out. And so it really needs to be looked at. Well, and I guess this goes without saying, but you know, I don’t know that anybody can count on social security, especially the younger generation.
your generation, I’m obviously a little bit older than you. But I don’t know, when you think about social security, do you think that it’s going to be there in what they’re telling you it’s going to be there when you retire? I’m hoping for this universal basic income that you’ve talked about, because I don’t think social security is going to be there at all. I would not into my own financial plan. I’m not putting social security in there. So I’m not retiring for another 30 years. So I’m not I’m not counting on anything from that. Now.
it. This whole thing, we’ve talked before and short, like, I don’t expect anyone in here to remember or have been listening, we say but it’s like, they’ve screwed it from the beginning, it, you can only invest in treasuries, in the trust. And it’s like, come on, how are you supposed to go? You’re, you’re investing for 30 or 40 years of someone’s working life, and you have them in fixed income from the beginning, not just fixed income, one single government’s debt.
just it was it was cursed from the beginning. Maybe it was a way to fund the government and that was a secret little Trojan horse they did in there to make sure they always had flows. I don’t know. But it reminds me of something that just happened and I got all charged up. Our school district raised our taxes and they forecasted for the next 10 years are going to raise taxes at the max allowable by law. And it’s just like, why is that necessary? they need a new roof and new HVAC. Well, yeah, when you
if in most schools can only invest in mostly 90 95 % or more fixed income similar to Social Security. Well, that means you know a roof is going to go bad in 30 or 40 years means you have to start saving 20,000 a year from day one and keep doing that every single year because you’re not going to get a huge appreciation on those assets. And you can’t just suddenly fund a roof in one year’s amount when you still have operating expenses.
It’s the same thing with social security. It’s too late to fix it, unfortunately. I don’t know that it’s too late to fix it. I mean, it’s going to require some major changes. maybe that is it could have been in much better shape if they actually ran it appropriately from the beginning or even 30 years ago made the changes necessary. Yeah. I mean, the last time we had any major change in social security, I think was 1983, right? Where they raised retirement age from 65 to 67.
increased the payroll taxes and that obviously was a long time ago and something needs to happen now. A lot of people do depend on social security. I don’t know what the stat is on how many people only have social security. I’m sure there’s, a significant number of retirees out there. but the bottom line is, you know, I don’t know that people can think about it as in absolute terms as something that’s always going to be there. If they do nothing,
which we know, we know tends to be, the, the, the mo for our elected officials, at least it seems like recently, if they do nothing, you know, it’s going to drop and eventually it’s going to go down and down and down. I don’t know if it gets the 50 % of what the number is, but they’re going to have to raise retirement age. They’re going to have to raise the payroll tax. They’re going to have to raise the income limits on what social security, is, is peg two or the upper end.
is peg two. And I mean, it really needs a fix. But you know what they have been working on? What daylight savings that Yeah, that’s where I thought you’re gonna go bipartisan bill what what could be of utmost importance daylight savings time. That’s where I you’re gonna go with that. I just I just wish you know, we’ve we’ve already got got stakes in Intel and whatever open AI wants the government to take a 5 % stake in all these things. Let’s just make it 5050.
equities, US equities, S &P 500, Russell 1000, whatever, and 50 % fixed income. Because you know what, I looked at a chart, and it shows for real purchasing power, your chances in cash, money market fixed income over time, and you 100 % of the time, creep towards 100 % of the time underperform when versus real purchasing power, when you’re in only fixed income.
6040 is actually the quickest to get to 0 % underperformance quickly followed by 100 % equities. so should have been done decades ago. And we already have stakes in companies now. Why don’t we just have the Social Security Trust manage some allocation of 5050 6040 4060 % US equities keep it at home here because it’s funding our retirements essentially. And
US Treasuries. mean, I’m not opposed to the idea. I think one of the reasons why that with no voting power in the Social Security Trust, I think one of the reasons that that hasn’t happened is because no one wants to be in charge when the market goes down. Right? I mean, you think about March of 2009. Market from top to bottom, I think was 57%. And then you’re looking at the math. And now, with investors and investor psychology,
you know, the worst thing you could possibly do, especially with an index is sell at the bottom. And I would be, I mean, I would take that, that binary bet that politicians would get out of the market, right at the very worst time. So I suspect that that’s why they haven’t done it. But some come on, there’s a few politicians who are really good at timing. boy. boy.
really good. Which ones? Oh, I don’t know. So moving on from that one. Yeah, I mean, something needs to be done. And one of the things that you could do would be invested differently. And maybe it’s not even in equities, although, you know, 10 % the S &P 500 would probably do a world difference to those numbers when they when they got down to zero in the trust fund. But you might be able to buy corporate bonds.
you might be able to buy, hey, we should talk about private equity and social security, right? Oh, Maybe a little little Bitcoin. Bitcoin’s back up to around 65. Yeah. Great. Great. The crypto guys would love it if they had social security started buying Bitcoin. They would. I bet you some people thought Trump was going to do that with how he was talking originally. But since since we’re talking about politicians here,
Unfortunately, Lindsey Graham did just pass. Coincidentally, kind of strange as soon basically as soon as he got back from abroad visiting Ukraine. You know, he’s always been a warhawk. But yeah, interesting. You know, all the different ways people can be poisoned and whatnot delayed things. I don’t know. Very interesting to see. And then obviously, we know Mitch McConnell has been hospitalized with a turtle. Yeah, he’s been MIA. And what rumors about him, right? What happened with him? His wife?
his wife was the transportation secretary transportation. I thought it was like of labor or something. She she hightailed it out to China while he was in the hospital. And she said the senator’s health does not warrant me to be there. like, what what lady leaves her husband in the hospital bed? He just sitting in there alone all day every day. He had visitors. Sure he did too. Scott James had a nice 17 minute call with them apparently.
But yeah, just very interesting to see. There was another guy, a US representative from New Jersey, Tom Keene, who disappeared for I think three or four months, four months, missed 100 votes. came back. He said he was diagnosed, I guess, with clinical depression. And apparently he’s back now. But it raises a bigger question for our elected officials is, you know, should they have to disclose major health issues?
Here in Pennsylvania, our senator, John Fetterman, the guy who only wears shorts, a little bit strange. know, today you could wear shorts, but in the winter, I don’t know, that seems a little bit faster. He had a stroke while he was running for Senate here in Pennsylvania. He still managed to win. I don’t think he’s 100 percent back. I don’t know if he was ever 100 percent here. But yeah, I mean, it it.
It really raises a bigger question is, you know, two things. One should elected officials have to disclose major health problems? Where does that? Where do you draw the line on? You know, HIPAA violations, stuff like that. And then when you look at the average age of our elected officials, especially in the Senate. And you know, the last few years in the White House, you know that to me is a little bit scary.
I mean, we have mandatory stop flying for commercial pilots. It used to be 60. I believe it’s now 65. But Mitch McConnell is 84 Lindsey Graham 71, which doesn’t seem that old to me. But there are people well into their 90s that are voting for us, you know, as our proxies, I don’t think we need to get to level of HIPAA violations, but there has to be a constant
bipartisan committee like there to maybe even of doctors, not even, you know, a committee, maybe someone overseeing the doctors saying like, yeah, Mitch McConnell, he’s been like, he’s gone for like last three years ever since he had that on air thing where he just paused. Yeah, he just paused. There has to be something because you can’t have a POA or you know, there was the auto pen thing in the last administration. It’s like you can’t have
other people making decisions when the person obviously who should have that power was voted upon. So you know, the POA thing or people making decisions in lieu of them being healthy is the concerning part that I can’t come along with. what you’re saying essentially is that we should cap senators at age 70. Yeah, even lower. About some term limits out there too. love it. I’m okay with that. I think
I think the president should get two five year terms and I think senators should get three four year terms. And I think the every two years for the house of representatives is crazy because they go from winning an election in the next day they’re fundraising because they know in another, you know, 18 months there’s, there’s another primary, something’s gotta give. I don’t think you and I are going to solve it here today, but definitely something’s gotta give. So
That’s my story. I’m sticking to your to your point about age, we should have age limits as well. It’s like not to be ageist. But what happened with Biden is exactly why you would why would happen with Biden, you know, just totally started glitching out, glitching out mid race with months left. And then, you know, Carla ascended him after the fact. Well, a lot of people are saying, well, I went to voted for her, I would have voted for x and x. Yeah. So it’s just like
when you the frequency of things that can happen to pass a certain age and how the Democrat process works, I feel like there’s too many things that can go wrong when you have a bunch of Trump’s what? 80 now, like just too many things can go wrong. There has to be common sense limits. No question about it. Who’s going to introduce those limits? The old people? Yeah, the people voting themselves. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So moving on, one of the things you know, that our senior citizens may not be able to wrap their head around is
technology. I’m not saying that I do. I’m I am not a technocrat. I think I understand it as good as anything. But in the field of energy, there’s been a few breakthroughs around fusion. Is infusion like what happens inside the sun? How are they recreating that? Well, right. So the two ways that we’ve been generating energy
Besides, besides solar is burning something or splitting atoms, right? So regular nuclear reactors split atoms. Fusion works a little bit differently and I am not, I’m not an expert on it, but it works a little bit differently. Basically it’s smashing atoms together and Germany just used one or two of their decommissioned nuclear power plants to start.
what would be the first fusion reactor. I don’t, it’s definitely not producing any energy at the moment. but they’re putting a few billion dollars or euros into it. And it’s one of these things that could really be a game changer if they’re able to come to it. this week was one of the, melts down, we just go into a black hole. no biggie. Yeah. I mean, you don’t have to worry about dying from it because you’re instantly poofed, I guess. Not a hundred percent sure. That was the fears with the large Adrian collider.
Right. CERN, right? mean, they thought that, you know, if they ran that and it hit two atoms together at light speed, you know, we could go into black hole as long as well. We’re not in a black hole right now, right? Who knows the multiverse. We’re not in a parallel dimension, but there was another, fusion company. I think it’s called general fusion. Great name guys. that just came public, in the last few days back by
You guessed it, Jeff Bezos from Amazon fame. And it’s interesting. I mean, it could be one of these things that, and I’m not expecting in a few years, but 10, 15, 20 years from now, I mean, it could be a major disruptor in the world of energy. you know, think about a horse and buggy and the car coming along. If we don’t have to pump up dinosaur bones from the, you know, 10,000 feet down,
and put them in a furnace and burn it to to power turbines. We could smash atoms just like the stars, right the sun. And all those businesses would be what is it called out of business? Yeah, right. So interesting stuff. want to burn coal? Hey, they’re still cleaning that coal. No, I bet it’s really clean by now. Absolutely beautiful clean coal, beautiful clean coal.
So that’s that’s what I have for this week. Fusion, I think, is probably the biggest game changer that’s coming down the pipeline. Quantum computing, obviously, big, big thing coming. But we’re not there yet. And we’re certainly not there in fusion. But it’s going to be a game changer, Chris. I can feel it. I I can feel it. I agree. What else do we have? I think just my closing thoughts are we’ve had a really stable growth environment in terms of earnings. And would be nice if we could stop.
know, getting into scuffles with Iran and we could get inflation down and oil down. We can maybe get some rate cuts priced in for 2027 again, because you know what, we’d start getting some multiple expansion again, we’d love some better, even higher price earnings multiples. And that’s what I’m hoping for. There you go. I don’t know that I want higher PEs. I will that’s just a natural reaction multiple expansion and the profit margins being so high.
I think earnings have done the work so far this year. Let’s get some help from the other side of the equation. I’d like to see the market rally on better earnings and that they’re so good that PEs drop. Wow. Like we’ve been the last last six months or so. Yeah, absolutely. All right, everybody. Thank you so much for listening. We’ll catch you next time on the market enthusiasts.
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The opinions voiced in this podcast are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual. To determine which strategies or investments may be suitable for you consult the appropriate qualified professional prior to making a decision. Economic forecast set forth may not develop as predicted and there can be no guarantee that strategies promoted will be successful. All performance referenced is historical and is no guarantee of future results. All indices are unmanaged and may not be invested into directly.
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