We continue to explore the themes that are driving markets in 2025. The impact of changing policies in the US and elsewhere is clearly causing investors to reconsider how they will forecast the economy and markets going forward. We are lucky to be joined by Brian Wesbury of First Trust, consistently one of the top forecasters on Wall Street, to discuss the important issues facing investors today

If anything has characterized 2025 it has been the influence of geopolitics on the markets. In this episode, Rich Excell, CFA, CMT is joined by Reva Goujon, a geopolitical strategist and the Director of Corporate Advisory at Rhodium Group. Reva has two decades of experience working with C-suites and government agencies on how to deconstruct risks, assess future scenarios, and make informed decisions.

Elizabeth Henderson, CFA, Head of Fixed Income at AAM, and Anthony Woodside, CFA, Head of Investment Strategy at LGIM America, delve into the evolving landscape of credit markets. They discuss how tighter credit spreads may reshape risk-return scenarios and the Federal Reserve's influence on investor behavior. Insights on government policy's impact on sectors like clean energy, the implications of tariffs on inflation, and labor market dynamics present a comprehensive view of the fixed income environment as we approach 2025.

The first of a multiple part series, we are exploring the investment themes of 2025. With so much concern on inflation, we thought the best place to start is in commodities. We were lucky to be joined by Bloomberg Intelligence Commodity Strategist Mike McGlone, a fellow CFA charterholder and friend of the program. We covered the gamut from soybeans to Solana, gold to gas. 

Michael Kantrowitz, the #1 Strategist at Piper Sandler, shares his expert insights on the US equity market backdrop. He discusses the implications of expensive valuations and tight credit spreads on investment strategies. Kantrowitz highlights the importance of macroeconomic factors and their influence on stock performance, revealing how small caps may finally outperform. The conversation also covers the HOPE framework, forecasting economic shifts as we approach 2025, and emphasizes analyzing sectors through macroeconomic indicators.

Rich Excell CFA, CMT is joined by Barry Knapp, Managing Partner of Ironsides Macro to discuss what is being priced into the bond market and the stock market, where they agree and where the discuss agree. Barry covered TGA, RRP, Active Treasury Issuance, Negative Swaps Spreads, Inverted Yield Curves and QT. Most importantly, he made all of those terms understandable for those that don't follow the inner-workings of the bond market as closely as he does. 

Fred Goodwin aka Mr. Risk, a senior macro strategist at State Street, is a guest of Rich Excell CFA, CMT.  They have a wide-ranging discussion from leptokurtotic distributions to Chinese stimulus policy to the Rule of 100. When it is all said and done, does it all come down to TINA (There Is No Alternative) again?  Have a listen to find out

Maybe you noticed, or maybe you didn't, but a month ago, the PJM auction results were announced and the cost for energy capacity in the largest region in the US saw prices up 800% yay!  This was enough of a shock that we reached out to the Electirc Power Supply Association (EPSA) to ask them to explain what is going on. Rich Excell CFA, CMT was joined by Todd Snitchler, the President and CEO of EPSA, to walk us through the supply and demand dynamics in the energy market now

Rich Excell CFA, CMT is joined by renowned economic Lyric Hughes Hale of EconVue who is an expert on Asia economies and geopolitics. Lyric last joined Rich to talk about China after the last National Party Congress. Now she is on to discuss the seminal elections in India, what we need to know as investors, and what we might expect from the politicians.    Lyric mentions an article written by her team. This is a link to that article: https://plus.econvue.com/p/indias-dynamic-growth-story

Rich Excell CFA, CMT is joined by Lotta Moberg PhD, CFA, a partner at ViviFi Ventures and Paul Chesek, the Chief Growth Officer at GreenCheck to discuss the recent trends in cannabis & how the rescheduling of cannabis may change the landscape for investors going forward.