Stack Financial's Jonson sees a bubble with 'a trifecta of bear-market risks'
Zach Jonson, senior portfolio manager at Stack Financial Management, says the stock market is facing a trifecta of bear-market risks that could lead to "one of the great bear markets of our lifetime," with losses surpassing 40 percent and lasting for as long as 18 months when it finally bursts. Despite that, he says there are ways to "invest through it," and that's precisely what he is doing, because despite bubble conditions, there are pockets of value and there could still be a lot of market upside until the inevitable pop of this balloon. But the talk starts today with an interview recorded at Wednesday's Active Investment Company Alliance Fall Round Table in New York City, with David Tepper of Tepper Capital Management revisiting past selections of some classic funds he has held for years and their prospects for the future, plus his outlook on the potential dangers of private credit, what he is worried about if the economy turns and more. Charles Rotblut, vice president of the American Association of Individual Investors, discusses the latest AAII Sentiment Survey, which showed that bearish sentiment was actually decreasing as the market pulled back from record highs, and how high levels of bearish sentiment — which the market has seen for the last year — are part of what lets Wall Street climb the proverbial "Wall of Worry." In the Market Call, Daniel Dusina, director of investments at Blue Chip Partners, talks about how he goes about finding "unappreciated quality" at a time when the market itself has appreciated to near record levels.
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Seafarer's Foster: We're still in 'the bottom of the first' on tariff impacts
Andrew Foster, founder and chief investment officer at Seafarer Capital Partners — manager of the Seafarer Growth and Income Fund — says that it's the "bottom of the first or, maybe, bottom of the second inning with respect to how tariffs will play out," but he notes that emerging markets companies have pushed higher prices back on U.S. consumers, which means the story has a lot of twists and turns left to navigate. Foster also says that domestic investors want to use emerging markets -- and foreign currencies -- to diversify portfolios against what lies ahead, noting that over-exposure to the dollar may lead to greater volatility and risk ahead. Todd Rosenbluth, head of research at VettaFi, heads to the utilities sector and a long-time established fund for his ETF of the Week. The second half of today's show is interviews from Wednesday's Fall Round Table for the Active Investment Company Alliance, which Chuck attended and spoke at in New York City. The conversation starts with Ryan Paylor, portfolio manager at Thomas J. Herzfeld Advisors, which recently converted a closed-end fund from a focus on companies located in the Caribbean Basin — it was ticker Symbol CUBA — to one focused on collateralized loan obligations. Paylor explains the thinking behind the move and how shareholders reacted to such a drastic makeover. Then, long-time activist investor Phil Goldstein of Bulldog Investors discusses the state of shareholder activism and why there seems to be so much less of it than there was just a few years back. Some of the change is good news for consumers — better fund management — while other reasons make it harder for activist moves to succeed.
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TradeStation's Russell: A.I. boom has masked emerging economic weakness
David Russell, global head of market strategy at TradeStation, says that as artificial intelligence become less of an economic focus, the market will wake up to potential weakness on Main Street, where "recessionary patterns" are already visible. He is expecting "one of the weaker holiday seasons in a while," and says that a lot of signs that have been viewed as bullish have become much more questionable. He would not be surprised to see the market test October lows — roughly 6,550 on the Standard & Poor's 500 — before year's end.   Nate Miles, head of retirement at Allspring Global Investments, discusses the firm's 2025 Retirement Study, which showed that only six in 10 retirees and near-retirees feel financially secure, a significant decline from just a year ago. The study also showed that investors — who have embraced target-date funds and life-cycle funds as a primary savings option — are looking for more personally tailored investment and retirement-spending solutions.   In the Market Call, absolute-value manager Brian Frank of the Frank Value Fund — who has a history of holding cash when the stock market is highly valued — says that a market flirting with record highs is not discouraging him, as he is fully invested, noting that he is not struggling to find individual stocks that are underpriced and that have a likely catalyst to unlock growth.
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Merrill's Quinlan: Market's 'heck of a ride' will keep going 'up and to the right'
Joe Quinlan, head of market strategy for Merrill Lynch and Bank of America Private Bank, says that the U.S. consumer higher-income households "are in great shape heading into 2026," and so long as the Boomers continue spending, the economy and stock market can roll along. Quinlan says that the economy can avoid a recession if the Federal Reserve can avoid policy mistakes, if the U.S. stays out of a difficult trade war and if the extraneous factors mostly stay at bay. Given what the market has weathered in 2025, Quinlan says there is reason to believe the rally can continue, even if results are muted a bit compared to the equity returns of the last three years. Chris Vermeulen, chief market strategist at The Technical Traders, says that investors should not be fighting current trends, but they should be getting cautious in a market where there's not a lot of upside left this year. He expects January to be a telling month for whether the rally can carry deep into 2026, and says that investors looking for bigger gains can still get in on the gold rally, which Vermeulen says still has 25 to 30 percent upside from current levels.  Sandra Block, contributing editor at Kiplinger talks about what she learned about dental care for retirees as she made her own transition toward retirement earlier this year, and the choices consumers face as they weigh Medicare options. And Mark Hamrick discusses a recent BankRate.com survey which found that about half of working American adults expect to be reliant on Social Security benefits to handle necessary expenses when they retire, but more than three-quarters of that working population worries that their promised benefits won't be paid when they reach retirement age.
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BlackRock's Chaudhuri: It's not a market downturn, just 'a regular cleaning period'
Gargi Chaudhuri, chief investment and portfolio strategist for the Americas at BlackRock, says the market's recent action represents "a fairly healthy pullback," the kind of periodic "cleansing" that markets go through, and that the recent action is less based on whether earnings can continue to drive valuations higher than it is on nervousness over the Federal Reserve's next move. Chaudhuri says that the current focus on whether the Fed will cut rates again in December is misplaced, because continued earnings growth, gross domestic product numbers and the fundamentals of the stock and bond markets will do more to determine how long the bull market lasts. That long view also coincides with BlackRock's latest "People and Money Survey," which Chaudhuri noted showed that staying invested long-term and riding out markets rewards investors more than trying to time markets. David Trainer, founder/president at New Constructs, says that agentive artificial intelligence has advanced to where it can provide investors with a real edge when it comes to choosing superior stocks and funds, and he warns that people who don't adopt AI for at least a part of their portfolio will be dooming themselves to below-average returns. He also explains how these forms of AI are different from the ones that are known for giving bad answers to personal-finance questions, which Chuck discussed on the show last week with Robert Farrington of The College Investor. Plus, Peter Krull, director of sustainable investing at Earth Equity Advisors, returns to the show after his recent appearance in the Market Call to discuss his new book, "The Sustainable Investor: Responsible, Impactful, and Values-Driven Investing Strategies and Practices for Financial Professionals." Krull discusses past, current and future forms of "responsible investing."
Money Life with Chuck Jaffe is leading the way in business and financial radio. The Money Life Podcast is a daily personal finance talk show, Monday through Friday sorting through the financial clutter every day to bring you the information you need to lead the MoneyLife.
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