Podcasts about Morgan Stanley

El viernes 31 de julio de 2026, el Banco de la Reserva Federal de Nueva York ejecutó una operación por cuenta del Tesoro estadounidense a través de Goldman Sachs y Morgan Stanley. Compró yenes. No vendió dólares para hacerlo: vendió euros. Es la primera intervención directa de Washington sobre la divisa japonesa desde 2011, y aquella vez había un tsunami de por medio. Esta vez no hay catástrofe visible. Lo que hay es un dólar que llegó a rozar los 164 yenes, su nivel más alto desde 1986, un Tokio que quemó hasta 58.970 millones de dólares en un solo jueves y una intervención récord de 11,7 billones de yenes entre abril y mayo que no sirvió de nada. Pero el paciente no está en Tokio. Cuatro días antes, la Reserva Federal dejó los tipos sin tocar por séptimo mes consecutivo y el bono americano a treinta años se disparó hasta casi el 5,23%, máximo de diecinueve años. Japón es el mayor tenedor extranjero de deuda pública estadounidense, y cada yen que compra defendiendo su moneda sale de una cartera llena de bonos del Tesoro. En este episodio reconstruimos por qué la operación se diseñó en Camp David, por qué la contrapartida la puso la segunda moneda de reserva del mundo sin que su banco central dijera una palabra, y por qué esto ya ocurrió entre los mismos dos países en agosto de 1971, cuando Japón aguantó trece días antes de rendirse. Cuando leas que una divisa se ha estabilizado, la pregunta útil no es cuánto ha subido. Es quién puso el dinero, y en qué moneda se está cobrando la factura. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Home affordability isn't going back to what it was, and waiting for the "perfect" time to buy could leave you even further behind. Morgan Stanley's latest housing report says the housing market has reset into a new normal, and it closely mirrors what we've been telling buyers for years. In this episode, we break down why buying a home has become more challenging, what this housing market reset means for first-time home buyers, and how to determine whether now is the right time to buy based on your financial situation, not the headlines.If you're wondering whether you should buy a house now or wait, this video walks through the latest housing market trends, mortgage rates, inventory, affordability, and the long-term financial impact of homeownership. We explain why experts believe affordability is unlikely to return to pre-2020 levels, how higher mortgage rates have changed the market, and why waiting for a major correction may not deliver the opportunity many buyers are hoping for.Whether you're a first-time home buyer, planning to purchase your first house, or simply trying to understand today's real estate market, you'll learn the strategies that can help you make a smarter decision with confidence. Our goal isn't to convince you to buy a home. It's to give you the information you need to decide if homeownership makes sense for your life and your finances.Start Here

What is the one critical thing your employees care about deeply that you might be completely overlooking?This is Invested at Work: Off the Cuff. Unscripted and top-of-mind, where industry leaders share candid perspectives on the realities of scaling businesses, managing total compensation strategies and navigating the complexities of leadership.This week: Aaron Schumm, founder, CEO and chairman of Vestwell.To hear the full story of how Aaron is rebuilding workplace savings from the ground up, check out his full interview with host Rodney Bolden, available right now in your feed.For more conversations on the future of workplace financial benefits, make sure to follow or subscribe to Invested at Work. Share this episode with a colleague, and visit us at morganstanley.com/atwork to unlock the power of your organization's benefits.Visit Vestwell.com to learn more about workplace savings vehicles.Visit MorganStanley.com/atwork for more insights on workplace financial benefits.Invested at Work is brought to you by Morgan Stanley at Work, hosted by Rodney Bolden. Our executive producers are Fiona Kelsey and Lisa Boyce, and our associate producer is Ive Jones. Our production partner is Sequel Media Inc.#investedatworkpodcast #employeebenefits #workplacebenefits #sharemorganstanleyThis podcast episode is for informational/educational purposes only and is not investment, legal, or tax advice. Participants in this podcast are not compensated and are not affiliated with Morgan Stanley. The guest speaker (Aaron Schumm/Vestwell) is an external guest; the views expressed are solely his own and do not represent Morgan Stanley's views.Nothing in the episode should be construed as a recommendation or solicitation to buy/sell any security, adopt any investment strategy, or implement any particular plan design; listeners should consider their own circumstances and consult appropriate professionals.The discussion is general in nature and not intended to address any particular individual/entity's circumstances.Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC and its affiliates and Financial Advisors/Private Wealth Advisors do not provide tax or legal advice; tax laws are complex and subject to change; consult a tax advisor/attorney.Information contained herein is based on data from multiple sources considered to be reliable and Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC (“Morgan Stanley”) makes no representation as to the accuracy or completeness of data from sources outside of Morgan Stanley.When Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC, its affiliates and Morgan Stanley Financial Advisors and Private Wealth Advisors (collectively, “Morgan Stanley”) provide “investment advice” regarding a retirement or welfare benefit plan account, an individual retirement account or a Coverdell education savings account (“Retirement Account”), Morgan Stanley is a “fiduciary” as those terms are defined under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, as amended (“ERISA”), and/or the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 (the “Code”), as applicable. When Morgan Stanley provides investment education, takes orders on an unsolicited basis or otherwise does not provide “investment advice”, Morgan Stanley will not be considered a “fiduciary” under ERISA and/or the Code. For more information regarding Morgan Stanley's role with respect to a Retirement Account, please visit www.morganstanley.com/disclosures/dol. Tax laws are complex and subject to change. Morgan Stanley does not provide tax or legal advice. Individuals are encouraged to consult their tax and legal advisors (a) before establishing a Retirement Account, and (b) regarding any potential tax, ERISA and related consequences of any investments or other transactions made with respect to a Retirement Account.This episode discusses legislation and regulatory initiatives—such as the “savers match,” child savings accounts/“Trump accounts,” “Trump IRA,” ERISA-related provisions, and the “in-plan vs. out-of-plan” emergency savings framework—those references are provided for general informational purposes only and are not intended as legal, tax, or compliance advice.Any discussion of laws, regulations, proposed rules, or government programs reflects general commentary and may not reflect the most current legal or regulatory developments.Laws and regulations are complex, may be amended, and may be subject to different interpretations by regulators, courts, plan fiduciaries, and other parties; guidance and enforcement priorities may also change over time.Accordingly, listeners should not rely on the episode as a substitute for professional advice, and should consult their own qualified legal counsel, tax advisor, ERISA counsel, or other appropriate professional regarding their specific circumstances and any plan design, eligibility, or implementation questions (including questions related to ERISA provisions, leave/eligibility rules, and emergency savings design considerations).Any examples or observations about how a law or rule operates in practice (including commentary that certain approaches may be “unworkable” or difficult to implement) are general perspectives and may not apply to all employers, plans, providers, or jurisdictions.©2026 Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC. Member SIPC. CRC#5528084 07/2026

Our Strategist Michelle Weaver talks to Michael Zezas and Jessica Alsford, Co-Directors of the Morgan Stanley Institute, about how AI, energy resilience and industrial policy are changing investment decisions.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Michelle Weaver: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michelle Weaver, Morgan Stanley's U.S. Thematic and Equity Strategist.Michael Zezas: I'm Michael Zezas, co-director of the Morgan Stanley Institute and Deputy Global Head of Morgan Stanley Research.Jessica Alsford: And I'm Jessica Alsford, Morgan Stanley's Chief Sustainability Officer, and also co-director of the Morgan Stanley Institute.Michelle Weaver: Today: how AI, energy, geopolitics, and industrial investment are competing for scarce resources – and what that competition could mean for markets.It's Friday, July 31st at 10am in New York.Jessica Alsford: And 3 pm in London.Michelle Weaver: Mike and Jess, as co-directors, you speak with people across the firm to identify the biggest questions facing companies and investors, especially the important ones that may not have clear answers yet. And to understand how those questions are shaping client conversations. Mike, what's one of the questions that you think investors are wrestling with the most right now?Michael Zezas: So, one of the biggest questions is how several major investment cycles can happen at the same time. AI, energy infrastructure, manufacturing, and defense may all be competing for the same power, the same skilled labor, equipment, and capital. So, investors need to look beyond each theme in isolation and ask where constraints could delay projects, raise costs, or redirect spending, and which companies are best positioned to manage all of that.Michelle Weaver: Since the institute began, you've examined a number of topics, including AI, energy resilience, and geopolitical fragmentation, just to name a few. Jess, which topic has been the most compelling to you?Jessica Alsford: It's difficult to pick one because, to be honest, for me, it's really the way that AI, energy resilience, and geopolitics have all really become one story. If you think about the energy transition, which has been playing out for a number of years. But now we also have the AI build-out, and that depends on reliable and affordable power. And then geopolitical shocks, which are demonstrating the need for countries to have energy security.So, if you put all of this together and you can really see that there is a huge need to scale the global energy system, but using all types of power available to us, including renewables and nuclear.Michelle Weaver: Mike, how is that intersection that Jess spoke about between AI, energy, and geopolitics altering the way that companies are thinking about investing?Michael Zezas: So, geopolitical shocks, they're more norm than exception now. The situations in Iran, Ukraine, Venezuela, they all reflect an evolving international order where the U.S. is less interested than it used to be in preserving global security and trade standards.And that's a particular problem in a world where companies and governments spent much of the last 50 years optimizing to benefit from globalization. So basically, looking for the lowest cost way to produce things, sourcing materials and labor in the most efficient way possible, presuming that the frictions in international goods and services trade would just keep getting lower.That's obviously not the case now, and whether it's a good idea or not, the trend is toward governments leaning into industrial policy to prioritize supply chain security and protect whatever it sees as their national competitive advantages. And really that's correlated with higher trade barriers. So, that means that while companies are still focused on efficiency, they have to build resilience through more regional supply chains, greater redundancy, and investment in strategically important capacity. So, the practical message from our teams is to map critical dependencies, diversify where possible, and be realistic about the extra cost of resilience rather than assuming the old globalization model will simply return.Michelle Weaver:  One of the clearest constraints on the AI build-out is energy. Our thematic research team is estimating a nearly 40-gigawatt shortfall in power needed for data centers. For context, this is multiple New Yorks worth of power. Jess, how significant of a limiting factor is power becoming?Jessica Alsford: Power is definitely becoming a strategic constraint. If you think about grid connections, these can take years to set up. And so, access to power really is going to determine where facilities are built and how quickly they're able to come online. And it looks like there won't be one universal solution.You've got natural gas, nuclear, renewables, storage, microgrids. They're all going to need to play a role. And for companies, that means that they really are going to have to be planning power alongside the site and financing. For investors, it means focusing on reliability, affordability, and permitting, not just headline demand.Michelle Weaver: So, AI, energy, and geopolitics can no longer be considered in isolation. As countries and companies rethink where they source, build, and invest, where do you see the biggest opportunities emerging?Jessica Alsford: The opportunity is likely to be broader than any single sector, to be honest. and the institute has shown that capital really needs to be flowing towards more resilient supply chains as well as new productive capacity and also the infrastructure that supports both of these. And this covers power, grids, automation, logistics, as well as data. I'd also say that location matters, too. And companies need to be able to weigh political stability as well as skilled labor, reliable energy, and policy support. And investors should be looking for markets and businesses that can turn those advantages into durable returns.Michelle Weaver: The institute has also looked at founders as a source of economic information. Jess, what can their decisions reveal before those changes appear in traditional economic data?Jessica Alsford: So, founders are often making decisions at the leading edge of growth and capital formation, and so their behavior can provide an early read on both at-risk appetite and also financing conditions. If we take the current macro environment as an example of this, the institute has shown that many founders are adapting rather than simply waiting, and this means extending fundraising timelines, spawning investor conversations, and considering private credit, structured equity or tender offers. For companies, the takeaway really is to preserve financing flexibility. And for investors, it's to watch how those choices can reshape private market liquidity.Michelle Weaver: Mike, to bring this back to where we started, if power, labor, and capital are all becoming more constrained, what should investors be watching most closely?Michael Zezas: Yeah. I'd watch whether capital spending plans are being delayed or resized or redirected in some way, and I think importantly, what the reasons would be for any of those things happening.Is there a constraint around power or labor or equipment permitting or financing? Those details help distinguish whether you'd be looking at temporary setbacks or a structural shift. So, something that would signal that we've built too much capacity in AI or manufacturing relative to demand. And that's the type of thing that would be a real headwind to the economic outlook and potentially create problems in the credit markets.But to be clear, we don't see demand flagging anytime soon. And so, for investors, it's less about whether to be bullish or bearish on the outlook for the markets and the economy, and it's more about looking for companies that are durable beneficiaries of these trends. So those are ones with secure inputs, flexible balance sheets, and realistic return thresholds.Michelle Weaver:  Absolutely. As Mike said, we don't see demand slowing, and we're seeing a lot of encouraging data points around AI adoption. One analysis we did recently shows that around 25 percent of S&P companies are now quantifying the benefits they're seeing from AI adoption. And this diffusion story is only going to continue to grow.Mike, Jess, thanks for joining me.Michael Zezas: Thanks Michelle.Jessica Alsford: It's great speaking with you both.Michelle Weaver: And to our listeners, thanks for tuning in. If this is all piquing your interest, you can find the institute's articles, roundtables, and future work on Morgan Stanley's website. And as always, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please leave us a review and share the podcast with a friend or colleague.

Apex Fintech Solutions provides the tools and services that enable hundreds of clients to launch, scale, and support digital investing for tens of millions of end investors. The company provides essential infrastructure and a comprehensive ecosystem of cloud-based products to enable and streamline trading, wealth management, cost basis, tax reporting, and, through its subsidiary Apex Clearing™, custody and clearing LEARN MORE: https://apexfintechsolutions.com/?utm_source=Risk+Reversal&utm_medium=Podcast&utm_campaign=701PJ00000fnXhaYAE On today's show, Dan Nathan and Guy Adami break down a wild Thursday in the markets: Microsoft up 15% and Meta down 9% post-earnings, a huge bounce in semis and memory names, and software getting crushed. Guy makes the case that this price action looks more like a topping formation than a bottom. They dig into Fed Chair Kevin Warsh's post-meeting commentary and the bond market selloff it triggered, Bank of Japan intervention on the yen (and what it could mean for volatility), the dollar's potential breakout, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley's pullback from all-time highs, China's AI and chip progress and what it means for KWEB, and where gold goes next after holding the $4,000 level. Plus, Dan sits down with Tim McCourt, Senior Managing Director and Global Head of Equity, FX and Alternative Products at CME Group, to talk about the newly launched Single Stock Futures — how they work, why CME launched them now during earnings season, and how traders can use them alongside stocks, ETFs, and options for risk management. Show Notes AI Lowers Wages But Doesn't Cut Jobs (Apollo) Why the bond market is doubting Fed chairman Warsh (Axios) FactSet Insight (FactSet) —FOLLOW USYouTube: @RiskReversalMediaInstagram: @riskreversalmediaTwitter: @RiskReversalLinkedIn: RiskReversal Media The financial opinions expressed in Risk Reversal content are for information purposes only. The opinions expressed by the hosts and participants are not an attempt to influence specific trading behavior, investments, or strategies. Past performance does not necessarily predict future outcomes. No specific results or profits are assured when relying on Risk Reversal. Before making any investment or trade, evaluate its suitability for your circumstances and consider consulting your own financial or investment advisor. The financial products discussed in Risk Reversal carry a high level of risk and may not be appropriate for many investors. If you have uncertainties, it's advisable to seek professional advice. Remember that trading involves a risk to your capital, so only invest money that you can afford to lose. Derivatives are not suitable for all investors and involve the risk of losing more than the amount originally deposited and any profit you might have made. This communication is not a recommendation or offer to buy, sell or retain any specific investment or service.

Our Global Head of Thematic and Sustainability Research Stephen Byrd explains why the recent AI infrastructure selloff may reflect technical pressures, not weakening fundamentals.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Stephen Byrd: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Stephen Byrd, Morgan Stanley's Global Head of Thematic and Sustainability Research.Today: Are investors misreading the AI infrastructure selloff?It's Thursday, July 30th, at 10am in New York.The recent selloff in AI infrastructure stocks has raised a familiar question: Is the buildout running ahead of real demand? The market is pulling back and we think that reflects profit-taking, crowded positioning, and forced selling by investors. This is not about weaker fundamentals. But the selloff has brought to light three key concerns, which we think the market is overplaying.The first concern is how much enterprises are willing to pay for AI. The median enterprise employee currently generates less than $11 a month in token spending. That's the fee paid when an AI model processes a request and generates a response.We think there is room for that to increase. From the employer's perspective the economics are compelling. Across workplace applications, the cost to execute the economic task would be $2-$5. And that could save an enterprise $55. That to us suggests companies are likely to spend more, not less, on AI over time.The second debate centers on efficient models, including competitive models developed in China.  And here, policy responses both from the U.S. and China can have an impact as well. Some investors worry that better efficiency means less computing demand. But we see the opposite risk. This is a classic example of Jevons paradox: When something becomes cheaper or more efficient to use, people use more of it. In AI, lower costs can attract more users, encourage more frequent use, and make complicated applications more economical. The scale is striking. Industry leaders estimate that compute demand could double every six months, which would amount to more than a thousand-fold increase in compute over five years. Hyperscalers could quadruple available power capacity to roughly 120 gigawatts by 2028, from about 30 gigawatts in 2025.And that leads to the third debate – whether data centers can secure enough power to keep expanding. It's a valid concern. In the U.S., facilities under construction and contracted grid capacity cover about 30 gigawatts. That's less than half the 68 gigawatts of power that data centers are likely to need from 2026 through 2028. Grid connections can take five to seven years in some regions. Skilled electricians, welders, and pipefitters are in short supply. And local opposition is increasing as communities debate electricity bills, tax incentives, and who should pay for grid upgrades.These are real obstacles, but we view them as delays rather than dead ends. Onsite generation, fuel cells, energy storage, natural gas turbines, and the conversion of existing high-power sites could close the gap, at least partially.We believe much of the recent weakness in AI infrastructure has been driven by technical factors rather than a change in the underlying fundamentals. As AI becomes more capable and cheaper to use, demand for intelligence, compute, and power is likely to keep rising. The global market is fragmented as policy decisions in the U.S. and China shape how growth unfolds. But strong economics should support continued investment.Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review wherever you listen and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today.

Plus: Amazon reports higher revenue in the second quarter from its cloud-computing business. And a data-center developer working with Anthropic plans to borrow $15 billion for a new Texas campus, with backing from Google. Julie Chang hosts. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Lauren Hochfelder is Head of Global Real Assets at Morgan Stanley, where she oversees a team of 300 investment professionals across 13 countries, managing $80 billion across real estate, infrastructure, equity and credit. Lauren joined Morgan Stanley as an investment banking analyst directly out of Yale 26 years ago and has spent her entire career at the firm, helping build one of the industry's leading platforms.   Our conversation traces Lauren's journey from analyst to Global Head and the evolution of Morgan Stanley's real estate business before, during, and after the Global Financial Crisis. We cover the firm's thematic approach to investing behind structural demand tailwinds, combination of global perspectives and on-the-ground teams, operational improvements to assets, portfolio construction, and themes across industrial real estate and infrastructure, senior housing, and net lease properties. We also touch on riskier areas of real estate and Lauren's new role adding infrastructure to her real estate oversight.   Learn More Follow Ted on Twitter at @tseides or LinkedIn Subscribe to the mailing list Access Transcript with Premium Membership   Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant (⁠https://thepodcastconsultant.com⁠)  

With Josh Tomolak, Vice President of Independent Advisor Services, Diamond Consultants Louis Diamond and Josh Tomolak unpack today's IBD vs. RIA landscape, explaining what has changed, where each model excels, and how to determine which path best supports the business you want to build. In Summary The independent wealth management landscape has changed dramatically, making the decision between an independent broker dealer (IBD) and an RIA more nuanced than ever before. Louis Diamond welcomes Diamond Consultants' Vice President of Independent Advisor Services, Josh Tomolak, for a practical discussion of how the independent space has evolved, what truly differentiates the IBD and RIA models today, and how advisors can evaluate which path best aligns with the business they want to build. The Storyline Not long ago, the decision to become independent was relatively straightforward. Advisors either remained with a traditional firm or pursued independence through one of a limited number of models. Today, the conversation is far more complex. Independent broker dealers have significantly expanded their capabilities, offering stronger technology, larger transition packages, greater flexibility, and even pathways to RIA ownership. At the same time, the RIA ecosystem has matured into a sophisticated marketplace supported by multiple custodians, outsourced service providers, institutional capital, and enterprise platforms that rival many of the industry's largest firms. As these developments have unfolded, the traditional distinctions between an IBD and an RIA have become less obvious. Advisors evaluating their options are no longer simply asking whether they should become independent—they're asking which model best supports the clients they serve, the business they envision, and the lifestyle they want to create. In this Industry Update, Louis and Josh unpack the realities behind the IBD vs. RIA decision. They discuss where the two models overlap, where meaningful differences still exist, and why factors like service, technology, economics, operational responsibility, enterprise value, and long-term optionality often matter more than labels alone. Whether you're considering changing independent firms, launching your own RIA, or simply want a better understanding of how the independent landscape has evolved, this conversation provides an objective framework for evaluating today's choices—and preparing for tomorrow's opportunities. Topics Covered Independent Broker Dealer (IBD) vs. RIA models The evolution of supportive independence Technology investments across the independent space Transition support and advisor mobility Capital solutions and recruiting economics Business formation and enterprise value Launching an independent RIA Multi-custodial platforms and open architecture Minority investments and succession planning Future trends shaping advisor independence > Download a transcript of this episode… Listen and Learn Highlights for Advisors Why are already-independent advisors reconsidering their current model? (5:27) Josh explains why service, technology, economics, and growing optionality are causing advisors to reevaluate their existing affiliations. How have independent broker dealers and RIAs become more alike? (19:28) Louis and Josh discuss the growing convergence between the two models and why the distinction is becoming less obvious than many advisors assume. What really separates an IBD from an RIA? (25:04) A practical discussion of autonomy, compliance, flexibility, custody, economics, and advisor experience. What misconceptions keep advisors from launching an RIA? (36:29) Josh outlines the “Four Pillars” of launching an RIA and explains where advisors tend to either overestimate or underestimate the operational realities. Which advisors thrive most in each model? (33:12) The conversation explores why there isn't a universally “better” model—only one that's better aligned with an advisor's goals. What trends are quietly reshaping independence? (42:13) Minority investments, enterprise value, business formation, and changing revenue models may have an even greater impact than advisors realize today. Key Takeaways Independence has evolved from a destination into an ongoing strategic decision. Independent broker dealers have significantly improved technology, transition support, economics, and flexibility. The RIA ecosystem has matured into a highly sophisticated marketplace with broad outsourcing and support options. Choosing between an IBD and an RIA should begin with long-term business objectives—not industry perceptions. Building a valuable business depends more on business structure and scalability than simply growing assets. Advisors considering independence should evaluate models with an open mind rather than relying on outdated assumptions. The next decade will likely bring continued convergence between independent business models. https://youtu.be/jHDVso2TsmQ Quotable Moments “The question is no longer, ‘Do I want to go independent?' The question is, ‘What kind of independence makes the most sense for my clients, business, and goals?'” “Business formation is far more important than assets under management.” “The way you build your business will ultimately determine how valuable that business becomes.” “Everything in an RIA is going to cost you either your time or your money.” FAQs Is there still a meaningful difference between an IBD and an RIA? Yes. While the two models increasingly overlap, they differ in areas such as flexibility, compliance structure, operational responsibility, economics, and control. Why are more independent advisors changing firms today? Improved technology, stronger transition support, evolving economics, and better service models are prompting many advisors to reassess whether their current platform still fits their business. Is launching an RIA easier than it used to be? Yes. Supportive independence, outsourced service providers, and improved custodial resources have significantly reduced many of the historical barriers. Does every entrepreneurial advisor belong in the RIA model? No. The best fit depends on an advisor's appetite for ownership, customization, operational responsibility, and long-term vision. What matters more: assets under management or how the business is built? Josh argues that scalable business formation often has a greater impact on enterprise value than AUM alone. What's the biggest mistake advisors make when evaluating independence? Starting with assumptions instead of objectives. The most effective due diligence begins by defining the business you're trying to build, then identifying the model best suited to support it. Yes. While the two models increasingly overlap, they differ in areas such as flexibility, compliance structure, operational responsibility, economics, and control. Improved technology, stronger transition support, evolving economics, and better service models are prompting many advisors to reassess whether their current platform still fits their business. Yes. Supportive independence, outsourced service providers, and improved custodial resources have significantly reduced many of the historical barriers. No. The best fit depends on an advisor's appetite for ownership, customization, operational responsibility, and long-term vision. Josh argues that scalable business formation often has a greater impact on enterprise value than AUM alone. Starting with assumptions instead of objectives. The most effective due diligence begins by defining the business you're trying to build, then identifying the model best suited to support it. Related Resources IBD vs. RIA Comparison Guide IBD vs. RIA Revisited: Two Independent Pathways for Advisors to Consider NOTE: The views and opinions expressed by the guests on this podcast are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Diamond Consultants. Neither Diamond Consultants nor the guests on this podcast are compensated in any way for their participation. View the transcript of this episode… IBD vs. RIA: A Special Industry Update on Independence A conversation with Louis Diamond and Josh Tomolak, Vice President of Independent Advisor Services at Diamond Consultants.      Louis Diamond: Welcome to the latest episode of our podcast series for financial advisors. Today’s episode is IBD vs. RIA: A Special Industry Update on Independence. It’s a conversation with Josh Tomolak, our Vice President of Independent Advisor Services. I’m Louis Diamond, and this is the Diamond Podcast for Financial Advisors. Mindy Diamond: At Diamond Consultants, we help elite advisors identify the right environment for their businesses to thrive, whether that’s at a wirehouse, boutique, or independent firm. With nearly three decades of experience, we’ve guided thousands of advisors and represented more than a quarter of a trillion dollars in assets transitioned. And each year, one in four advisors managing a billion dollars or more who change firms are our clients. Our process is education driven and based on building relationships, starting as your strategic partner well before you’re even thinking of a move. To schedule a confidential conversation, call us at (908) 879-1002. Wondering why advisors change firms and where they’re headed? Are transition deals going up or down? Those very questions and more inspired us to create our annual advisor transition report. It’s the award-winning data-driven resource designed for advisors that connects the dots between the motivations around movement and the firm’s appetite for top talent. Arm yourself with the knowledge you need to make smart decisions. Download your copy at diamond-consultants.com/transitionreport. Louis Diamond: For a long time, going independent would suggest the destination. Today, it’s often the beginning of a different conversation. As the independent space has matured, advisors have more choices than ever before. Broker-dealers have expanded their capabilities. The RIA ecosystem has become increasingly sophisticated. Capital is more readily available and support models now exist that would’ve been difficult to imagine a decade ago. The result is that many advisors who are already independent are taking a fresh look at whether their current affiliation still aligns with what they’re trying to build. My guest is Josh Tomolak, Vice President of Independent Advisor Services here at Diamond Consultants and our resident expert on independence. Josh spends his days helping advisors evaluate independence in all its forms from independent broker dealers, the fully independent RIAs and everything in between. And his knowledge is critical because the distinction between these models is often blurred. Many broker dealers now offer pathways to greater autonomy while supported independence has made RIA ownership more accessible than ever before. So the question is no longer simply, “Do I want to go independent?” The question is, “What kind of independence makes the most sense for client, business, and goals?” Josh shares what he’s seeing across the landscape, the misconceptions that continue to shape advisor thinking and the factors that matter most when evaluating the next chapter of an independent business. There’s a lot to discuss, so let’s get to it. Josh, thanks for joining me today. Joshua Tomolak: Thanks for having me, Louis. It’s a real privilege to have come. This is a full circle moment for me going from being a student of your podcast, to working alongside you, to being a guest. So I appreciate you having me. Louis Diamond: Amazing. I’m excited for this one too, because you have a fresh and in the weeds perspective that a lot of our guests simply don’t have. So why don’t you start off, you spend your time helping advisors evaluate independence every day. So working with advisors who are already independent, for the most part. And to me, it feels like the independent space has really evolved dramatically over the last decade. I mean, this podcast is really the epicenter of that to prove that out, but give us a little background on your past roles in the space and then we can get into what you’re seeing right now. Joshua Tomolak: Yeah, I’d be happy to. So I took a very non-traditional path into wealth management. I spent a decade as a deep sea Navy diver, and upon completing my service there, I ended up working for TD Ameritrade. And in my role there, I spent about six years doing nothing but helping financial advisors explore the RIA space, whether that was to join or partner with an RIA, sell to an RIA, or in most cases, launch their own RIA. And one of the things that I ultimately came to terms with is it’s just not the right model for everybody. While I’m a huge advocate for it, we would often lose business to the major broker-dealers of the world. And at the time, I really didn’t understand why. In the last six years at Diamond Consultants has been a very interesting purview into what a lot of the broker-dealers have done and are doing to make themselves more RIA-ish and be very compelling to the right advisor. Louis Diamond: Perfect framing. Your background is incredibly germane to the folks you work with. So let’s start off with the softball here. What are you seeing right now? Joshua Tomolak: It’s not so different than the rest of the industry, the wirehouses, the regional firms, things of that nature, that if you took 10 firms, they’re all likely to go different directions, even if they were identical practices. That could be… A third would go from an independent broker-dealer to another independent broker-dealer. Certainly the supported RIA space is growing every day and has created a lot of very fun and unique solutions for advisors, very customized and curated. And then I think there’s still a lot of really great sophisticated teams and individual contributors that are making the decision to go hyper entrepreneurial and launch their own individual RIA. So the movement’s really all over the board from my perspective. Louis Diamond: It does feel like it’s no longer independence is an alternative option or it’s on the fringes. It’s very front and center whether for breakaways, which is a big topic on our podcast, but in general, the infrastructure has become much, much more sophisticated today than ever before. Advisors have way more tools in their toolbox to serve clients, whether in the private markets or through technology. And it’s no longer that if an advisor’s independent, they’re in the minor leagues where they don’t have the same ability to serve clients like they did if they’re at a big bank or a private bank or a wirehouse. Do you agree? Joshua Tomolak: I absolutely agree. And I’m reminded of a question I got one time from a great team that I worked with in New York. They asked me, “Are there really more options than ever before? Because all we see is one firm selling to another.” And I think that’s a really great point. There’s far less broker dealers on the street than there were even five years ago. But for every Commonwealth, for example, that sells to an LPL, up pops three or four really cool private equity-backed, sophisticated RIA platform firms that are built to service their own unique advisor base. Louis Diamond: I think that’s right. Sitting on the sidelines, sitting on top of everything going on in the industry, I feel like capital is always an interesting topic forever. If an advisor wanted to move within the independent world or break away from a big firm to go independent, the only way to get capital was to go to an independent broker dealer. So we still see that, but I feel like today between all these minority acquisition opportunities, we’re seeing firms acquire practices at time of transition, which is somewhat new. There’s debt solutions, recruiting deals are way up for firms that are paying forgivable loans. RIAs now would, in some cases, will pay a forgivable note. What are you seeing there as far as the availability of capital and just deals in general? Joshua Tomolak: It’s a great question and I didn’t want to take the low-hanging fruit, but capital’s been a huge innovation, I guess, in the last five years I’d say. Just to give you rough quotes, please don’t hold me to it, but traditional transition broker-dealer deals were five years ago, 40 to 60% of Trailing Twelve revenue today are somewhere between 90 and 120%, sometimes north of that for the right team. That’s really meaningful money for the team that is thinking about foregoing a wirehouse deal, for example. I’d also say a lot of these firms are getting hyper-creative in how they solve for capital. The minority investment piece that you mentioned is very interesting. We’re seeing a lot of privatized forgivable notes in the RIA space where third-party or private lenders are basically lending the money and the RIA is making the payments on that forgivable note as long as the advisor is affiliated with them. So there’s been a recognition among the RIA space to get away from the, “Oh, they just took a check” type of mantra, and to say, “Look, I understand there are capital needs. These people are taking a risk. We need to solve for that.” So we’ve seen a lot of that in the marketplace. Louis Diamond: Very interesting. I think another thing financially, and then we’ll keep the train moving, that I know I’ve seen, and maybe you can weigh in if you’ve seen the same, is the cost to an advisor or a business owner to join an independent BD or to join an RIA has come way down, probably in part because of Schwab going to zero on trading. That’s been a catalyst. But it feels like we used to say independent BDs were expensive relative to the RIA world. And in some cases, they certainly could be. And if you’re at scale, maybe you can pick up a point or two being in the RIA world versus a BD. But when you have some of these BDs that have a basis point admin fee or no admin fee at a certain size and the payouts I feel like are similar, maybe have gone up a little bit, but it’s more so like the administrator fees, the platform fees, the program fees. Anyone who’s not in that world, it’s like, “What are you talking about?” But basically the way that these broker-dealers make money, it seems like there’s been a pretty big differential in the exchange of value where advisors now get more services, better technology, get more money to join them and get it at a lower cost. Do you agree? Joshua Tomolak: I absolutely agree. I think that maybe that’s one of the larger changes that we’ve seen, and it’s probably one of the benefits from a lot of the industry consolidation on that independent broker-dealer side. The economies of scale of these folks have allowed them to increase their tech spend, increase their service capacities all while offering it to the advisors at a cheaper price. And when I was at TD Ameritrade, one of the biggest pitches was the idea of a 100% payout and you control the fixed expenses, your technology compliance, et cetera. But what’s changed is that broker-dealers are pretty darn comparable on the expenses. All of those admin fees and things you mentioned will still exist, but they’re on a much smaller scale. And I think the question a lot of advisors are asking is, “Am I getting congruent value from my broker-dealer for what I pay for?” And while that answer might’ve been no a couple years ago, today the answer is more often yes. Louis Diamond: Yeah, I would agree. A lot of times we work with advisors who are starting an RIA or affiliating with an RIA or going to a BD and they see how big the deals are in the independent BD world and the payouts are really high and the fees are relatively low. And honestly, it is a hard decision or calculus to make, like, “How does it make sense for me to turn down this extremely lucrative deal when my ongoing economics are going to be somewhat similar in the BD world versus in the RIA space?” I think it’s just an interesting dynamic and we’ll get more into that distinction. One of the stars of the show right here is we’ve seen a ton of advisor movement across the industry. Our annual advisor transition report said that in 2025, over 11,000 experienced advisors changed firms, which is a large number. A lot of those numbers are within the independent world. So advisors who are 1099 through a BD or through an RIA transitioning to another platform or organization or starting an RIA. So why do you think we’re seeing so many advisors reconsider their current firm or their platform or their broker-dealer today than in years past? Joshua Tomolak: It’s a jarring number. 11,000 is definitely a significant amount of advisor movements. To me, it comes down to a few things, but I will say that it’s almost always a conglomeration of pushes and pulls. Pushes being inherent frustrations with your status quo, pulls being the new sexy, shiny things that you see in the marketplace that could be really impactful for your business. To me, it typically comes down to one of three things, at least on the push front, that drives advisors to movement. Service being number one, technology being number two, and economics being number three. And if we were just going to unpack those, I think service being, “Can you call somebody that knows your business, that knows your name? Are you getting the correct answers? Are you being pushed through a phone tree? And even if you’re not doing it, is it taking up a meaningful amount of time of your staff’s free time?” On the technology front, there’s very significant tech spends happening in the industry right now. I think Raymond James and LPL reported, for example, they spent 500 million in 2025 on a tech spend. So advisors are going to the places that are making their life easier. People are looking for a mechanism to really scale their business without having to add staff and a lot of expenses to the bottom line. And technology is just the fastest, most efficient way to do that most times. And then economics, certainly a lot of advisors and teams have built phenomenal businesses and they’ve made a great living without really stressing out about the economics. And they eventually get to a point in their business where what they were giving up as a million dollar producer is far different than what they’re giving up as a $4 million producer. And back to the congruent value, it perhaps stops to make as much sense. Louis Diamond: Well said. I always say when the cost-to-value ratio is out of whack, that’s when advisors sit up and take notice. And not to name names of firms, but there definitely are firms that are more expensive. And even if you look at how much a wirehouse or a Ed Jones advisor paid their firm, it’s like, “What got me here is not necessarily what’s going to get me there.” And while the name on the business card, the resources were incredibly impactful, and I’m so grateful for what my firm, my broker-dealer did for me when I was just starting or when I was smaller. Now the business is bigger, I rely upon different resources or I don’t need the firm as much. So I’d rather plow the cost savings either into income for myself or invest it in areas that are most germane to my business. And it’s usually when that kind of light bulb moment goes off, that’s one of the major pushes that cause advisors to evaluate other options. So I agree with you, those are the major push factors, but then what are the pull factors? What are the major advancements or changes across the independent space that’s causing advisors to say, “Hey, okay, I might have some frustrations, but at the same time, I also need to find something that’s more than marginally better than the firm I’m at. Otherwise, why am I going to go through the hassle, take the risk, et cetera? So what are some of the pull factors that advisors are latching onto today? Joshua Tomolak: Sure. And I might say with one final push factor, there’s a straw that breaks the proverbial camel’s back when you’ve been told for however many years that this change or that change is coming down the pipeline and it never happens. And it translates well into the pull factors is do they do what they say they’re going to do? The talking points really for the pull factors are exactly the same. So the counterpoint to service is perhaps having a direct relationship with the chief compliance officer at a firm or having a dedicated service representative that knows their stuff inside and out and can get you the answer even if they don’t know it off the top of their head. Having the technology to rebalance a household in two clicks instead of two hours. In economics, I think it’s really a transparency of economics. We’ve both worked with some really significant firms that have looked at their P&Ls and said, “where the heck is the money going?” And we’ve looked at the same P&Ls and said, “I have no idea,” because it’s so convoluted. People are happy to pay for good service, good technology, good products, but they just want to know where the money’s coming from. So I think it’s a yin and yang. The same things that they’re the push are often the pull. Louis Diamond: Definitely. I’ll give you a couple other from my perspective. I’ll say first specific to the independent BD world, and then we’ll dive into the RIA, I think it’s a little bit different. But I think some other will say innovations or changes that are causing advisors to really perk up and listen and really make the case to themselves that life will be better at this new organization than the status quo or staying put. We’ve seen major advancements in transition support, whether it’s being able to do a transition without a shred of paper, being able to… I mean, we’ve seen some independent advisors move their entire book within two weeks, which never would’ve happened before. So the firms that I’d say are playing offense, the larger firms that are winning, they have insane headcount around transitions and are always investing in technology, whether now on the AI front or in general. And we’ve seen transitions, they’re never easy. So that’s not a comment to say it’s easy, but a lot of the friction, a lot of the manual work has been taken away, which is massive. You definitely mentioned the significant technology spend. I mean, just the innovations going on across the industry. There’s definitely some firms that are laggards on technology and others that are light years ahead, whether because their tech is more integrated or they’ve built out their platform to be more, we’ll say modular, to plug in different third-party softwares where an advisor can really customize and create their own tech stack. I think there’s been some changes on compliance. It used to be if you’re at an independent BD, you had to be the OSJ by yourself or you had to roll up under an OSJ. But now most BDs offer home office supervision, so a big friction or pain point is taken away. And then I’ll give you a bridge to talk about what we’re seeing on the RIA side. But we’ve also seen, I would say, a real blurring of the lines between what you would traditionally think of as an independent broker dealer versus what was an RIA. So whether it’s an internal pathway where it’s like, “Start off on our independent BD platform, get the big deal, get the support, but then you can ditch that and just use this as a custodian or you can sell the business to us when you want to retire and convert to W2.” So in that vein, transitioning internally to an RIA, give me the same points like, “What are the major advancements or changes you’re seeing on the RIA side today?” Joshua Tomolak: I love that you said that because it’s been one of the most interesting changes to watch. Independent broker dealers becoming more like RIAs, and to your point, being more flexible, having more optionality, a more curated experience in some cases. And in many cases becoming closer to independent broker dealers with some of these massive shops that we’ve seen be created over the last five years that now have hundreds, if not thousands of advisors. To your question on the internal RIA slide as we sometimes call it, this really didn’t exist many places a few years ago. And I think it’s been created as both originally a retention tool in many places for the advisors that were with a major independent broker dealer and they ultimately wanted to have their own ADV and their own RIA. And the firm didn’t want to lose all the assets to an independent custodian so they gave them the green light to… And it’s ultimately became a sales tool in many cases. Just to use a couple of examples across the industry, I mean, Raymond James has Raymond James Custody Services, which has attracted a lot of really sophisticated teams. I know Wells Fargo Finance done something similar and even the counterparts over at Cetera and Osaic are trying to do the same thing. So it’s a recognition in my view that we want to keep the best talent possible. And if these folks are ultimately going to go RIA anyway, it’s less about the money and more about the flexibility and control that it offers them. So what can we do to keep those folks on board? And rightfully so, a lot of senior management of these firms have said, “Let’s not lose these teams. It’s going to be a lower margin business for us, but at the rate that they’re growing, it’s going to pay off in the long run.” Louis Diamond: Well said. RIAs are now more mainstream. And some of these RIAs, they’re either resembling independent BDs or I would even go so far to say the valuations that are even publicly available on some RIAs is definitely having people take notice. I mean, Cerity Partners recently raised capital at an over $8 billion reported valuation. Crescent was well over a billion. Firms like Mariner, Creative Planning, Mercer, Wealth Enhancement Group, and there’s many that I’m missing, are all worth a couple billion dollars or more and growing. Do you think that’s had an impact on the legitimacy or the staying power of the RIA model? Joshua Tomolak: Oh, absolutely. There’s no doubt about it. I mean, those groups that you mentioned and many more are winning some of the biggest teams on the street. I mean, if you pull up a run-of-the-mill advisor hub article, for example, you’ll see as many of those RIAs win significant businesses as you will their broker-dealer counterparts, partially in my opinion, due to the massive valuations these firms are fetching. And it’s much more of a partnership in the sense that joining a Crescent or a Wealth Enhancement Group, as you mentioned, you’re a part of a boutique group of maybe a couple of hundred very sophisticated high-producing advisors all playing under the same banner, all rowing in the same direction, and that creates substantial growth. Louis Diamond: Exactly right. I think two other things to me that’s driving the legitimacy or the growth of the RIA segment, there’s so many different outsourcing solutions that have popped up, whether it’s more of a… We’ll say a bundled or a package outsourcing solution through firms like Dynasty and Sanctuary. LPL has done a ton with having a shared services outsourcing model. So you have those. But you also have, I mean, probably 10 different firms I could think of that can be an outsourced chief compliance officer. You have tons of marketing agencies that specialize in helping RIAs. You have all these FinTechs popping up to support the RIA space. Really, it’s like anything and everything can be outsourced now. And even the big Wall Street banks like UBS, Merrill, et cetera, they’re attempting to sell and distribute product into the RIA space. Venture funds, private equity funds, anyone you talk to is trying to get a piece of the RIA space, which means there’s more product and platform availability than ever before. And I think it’s massive because one, it’s a catalyst for teams who say, “I love everything about the RIA world. I just don’t want to do it on my own,” or, “I don’t know where to start.” But also it means that they can look their clients in the eye and say, “Hey, not only do I have the same stuff that I had for you at XYZ firm, I can actually do more for you.” And even if you look at what the custodians are doing on the lending side now, Schwab owning a bank is massive and being able to facilitate mortgages, securities-backed loans, things that didn’t really exist in the past. I think it’s a very exciting time for advisors either that are independent or are considering the independent space because you have all these choices and it’s really like, “Choose your own adventure. Give me your top five things you want.” I’m sure it exists and we can find it and make it happen. And I don’t think we’d have the same confidence in that statement 5, 7, 10 years ago. Joshua Tomolak: I couldn’t agree more. That’s such a huge development is the marketplace of third party vendors in any kind of capitalism environment. There’s problems that people encounter and there’s really smart people that are trying to make a lot of money that go to market to solve them. And we’ve seen a ton of that over the last few years. Louis Diamond: Exactly right. Yeah, it’s like also… If an advisor looks around and says, “Hey, this is what I want,” and it doesn’t exist, oftentimes that’s a light bulb moment to be like, “Okay, I’ll go build it. I’ll do it on my own.” Whether it was Stewart Partners when they launched a number of years ago or Hightower, Dynasty, et cetera. They were all started by people that said, “Hey, I see a big gap in the ecosystem. Let’s create a business and raise capital to go solve it and then deliver this service to other like-minded advisors or business owners.” Honestly, it’s a treat to be able to watch all this happen in real time. We probably should have laid the groundwork with this next question, but I think it’s an important one. What’s the difference between a independent broker-dealer and an RIA? Really basic foundational. It sounds like the lines are blurred. There’s probably a lot of similarities. Advisors are successful in both. It’s not like one’s better than the other. How would you explain the differences, if a client of ours asked, “What’s the difference between an independent broker-dealer and IBD versus an RIA”? Joshua Tomolak: Get into the core of it. Again, the lines are blurred, and I’ll stay very high level on the strategic differences, but I like to use this example. I drive a Toyota Tundra. Really like the truck, gets me from A to B. Now, if I were getting to a point where I wanted a new vehicle, if I were to go get another Toyota Tundra because I really like a lot of aspects of it, but I want the one with the bigger screen and the bigger tires and the power seats, and I have rolled down windows because I have a fear of drowning. But if I want a lot of the bells and whistles, but I want to keep the foundation, that’s what I align to a independent broker-dealer to independent broker-dealer. You like the foundation of everything all under one roof. You like a lot of the resources, but you have some meaningful frustrations and you want to see if another provider in the market can solve for those or you can upgrade. If I instead, Louis, decided that I wanted a sports car or a Jeep Wrangler or something, I would be looking at a different category altogether. That’s how I articulate the platform space. They provide the same services and support in many cases that an independent broker-dealer does, think of marketing and a tech stack and regulatory oversight and a fellowship in a community, but they’re built on an RIA TC registered chassis. They’re typically far more customized so you can shop the street to get a lot more of the things that you like, though you are walking away from maybe some of the things that you’ve liked in the independent broker-dealer model. So I guess that’s the highest level I might explain it, just a little bit more minutia in any broker-dealer is going to be a FINRA registered, FINRA member broker-dealer. So they’re subject to the FINRA rules, which basically means it’s the compliance interpretation of those rules that they have to follow. So LPL’s rules may be slightly different than Cetera’s than Ameriprise’s because it’s based on their interpretations of the rules. In the RIA space, everybody really operates on the fiduciary standard. So it’s just a different lens that from a compliance standpoint, business is looked at. And a lot of people would make the argument that it’s just easier to get things done when you’re looking at something from that lens. I might’ve gone too compliance nerd on you there, but I’d be curious what you think some of the major differences are. Louis Diamond: Yeah, I think that’s right. I mean, it sounds like if you’re in the RIA world in some capacity that you as the advisor or business owner are going to have a little bit more control and autonomy and flexibility. One, do you think that’s true? And what are the reasons why that is? Is it platform? Is it strictly just compliance is easier? What are the different ways that an RIA would have more or less flexibility than someone who’s with an independent BD? Joshua Tomolak: Yeah, I think it’s overwhelmingly true, but it certainly depends on your business. Within most RIA platforms, you’re going to be one of a couple dozen, maybe a couple hundred, where you’re going to have people within that firm that really know your business. So the experience in getting things done is much less about, “Can I do this,” or, “Can I not do this?” And it’s, “Louis, I understand you asked for this. We’re going to run into these issues, but let’s figure out how to get to yes.” So it’s far more curated by people that are not operating on black and white rules and can actually figure out how to get to yes for your business. The other thing I would say is that most significant RIA platforms have multiple custodial options. So many times you’ll see as few as two or as many as five. So if an advisor or a team is trying to bring on a new piece of business or do something creative, that might be something they can use a different custodial relationship to accomplish. It might be something that Goldman Sachs does really well but is in its infancy at Fidelity, or it might be international business that’s approved on Pershing’s platform but not Schwab’s platform. So the RIA partner that you’re with can really look at those custodians agnostically and say, “What’s the best home for this business? What’s the best way to get this done for Louis?” There’s a couple examples of where I see the flexibility in practice. Louis Diamond: Yeah, I think one more too would be the concept of being able to shop the street. I’ve heard it described as becoming a buy-side advocate for your clients versus being a professional seller. So meaning, if I’m affiliated with an RIA or I’m operating my own RIA, there’s no selling away like there is at a wirehouse or at certain BDs. So if I have a client who’s trying to get a $10 million loan for a new building that they’re breaking ground on, if I’m at UBS, Merrill, Morgan Stanley, captive to a BD, I can go to my firm and say, “Hey, this $10 million loan, here it is. What are the terms? What are the rates? Will you take on this business?” And the firm will say, “Yes. No. Yes, here are the terms. Here’s the caveats, et cetera.” But it’s a very closed market process and an advisor has to live and die by what their firm says. Versus in the RIA world, it’s, “Okay, I have relationships with nine different banks and I can go to these different banks and private credit funds and whoever and really create either an option process for my client or really just help them in a fully agnostic open way.” And we see the same thing when it comes to alternative investments. No one at a wirehouse, let’s say, is complaining that they don’t have enough alts that they can offer clients. Those firms have done an amazing job with really boiling the ocean and having tons and tons of options for private investments, hedge funds, et cetera. But if you’re in the RIA world, you can take it to the next level and say, “Hey, this $3 million startup company that my friend is starting, I’m going to help them raise capital,” or, “My client wants to get a syndicate of investors together to have a direct investment into a qualified opportunity zone fund that they’re starting. Let’s do it when we can advise on it.” So it really expands what an advisor is able to do on behalf of clients. Like to me, that’s the most interesting or exciting part of the RIA model. You can get some of that within the BD world, but to me, when an advisor’s business becomes more sophisticated as far as what their end client’s needs are, it tends to translate better to the RIA world than the BD world. Not to say there aren’t ultra-high net worth focused advisors at BDs, but because of that additional flexibility, autonomy, customization, et cetera, that speaks more RIA. So again, absolutely not down at all on the independent BDs because I think there’s a massive home for them. Josh, let me turn it back to you. I’m rambling now. Give me the pitch for an independent BD. What are the things that are misperceptions that people have? What are the advantages that an independent broker dealer like an LPL or a RayJ or a Cetera have over RIAs or over other models in general? Joshua Tomolak: Absolutely. And I’d say I’ve learned more over the last six years from some of your ramblings than most people learn in an MBA course, so keep doing what you’re doing. But it’s funny being in this position now, having spent so much time sort of selling against the IBD model within TD Ameritrade, but what I’ve learned is it’s a good home for everybody. And a lot of times the advisors that they’re entrepreneurial enough where they like having their name on the door, but they’re not so entrepreneurial where they want to build everything out themselves, that’s where the independent broker dealers absolutely kill it. Their economics have gotten to a point where they’re really competitive. They offer transition capital that isn’t even going to be comparable in the RIA space unless you’re selling a minority share of your business. And you mentioned LPL, or we could really list all of the major ones, there’s not a department that they don’t have. It could be as nuance as finding 403(b) payroll slots or it could be as mainstream as fixed income or setting up events. There are all kinds of really neat departments that these all under one roof independent broker dealers have invested in. And a lot of times they make an effort to make you very much aware of all of the support because most people don’t use it. So I would say for the advisors that are looking to get their improved Toyota Tundra, then you can get probably 70 or 80% of what you want within the independent broker-dealer world. And you can also keep 20 or 30% of the stuff, maybe more that you really liked at your previous firm. So I think that’s where it really shines. I sometimes call it an incremental change rather than a transformational change. But for many advisors, incremental is really good enough if you get to keep the familiarity of how you’ve been doing business for the last 20-some years, but you’re able to get net improvement on the things that were really bothering you. Louis Diamond: Well said. Something that I’ve seen that’s been… I guess this could be either pro or con depending upon the advisor, but with some broker dealers, letting an advisor co-brand with them or really having a real consumer-facing brand, whether it’s, “I’m a franchise owner with Ameriprise,” or, “I’m independent through Raymond James,” or, “Running my own practice through Wells Fargo FiNet,” or, “I’m independent with Northwestern Mutual.” There’s definitely some brand cache or brand familiarity with some of those firms that may or may not be the same if you’re in the RIA world. So I would agree there’s a lot to like about the independent BD world and there’s a fit for people that is absolutely better with independent BDs than on the RIA side. Even if some people would say RIA is better, we’re cleaner, I wouldn’t say that. To me, it’s all about what an advisor’s goals are and then matching that up with what these firms do. And there’s never a perfect option. I jokingly say, “If there was a perfect firm, we wouldn’t be in business.” Every firm has their advantages or disadvantages. And depending upon where an advisor’s coming from, their style of business, their pain points, that’ll match up really well with on firm or one type of firm or one model than the other. Let’s pivot a little bit to the RIA world. A lot of your comments have been more about advisors affiliating or joining RIAs, this whole supportive version of independence concept. But what about advisors who want to go and start their own RIA? Either they’re leaving a captive firm and taking the entrepreneurial route and starting their own firm, or they’re leaving an independent BD to go start their own RIA. What do you see as some of the biggest misconceptions that advisors have about that move? Joshua Tomolak: That’s probably my favorite topic because there are the most misconceptions I think in this space. Louis Diamond: I’d agree. Joshua Tomolak: And I would say there’s 9 out of 10 conversations that I have with advisors and teams, they start off with the launching an RIA in mind or at least RIA curious and they want to understand what’s out there. And probably less than half the time do these folks end up actually launching their own RIA, which is okay because the ones that do are massively successful and they know they’re dang sure that’s exactly what they want to do. I think it gets a little bit romanticized sometimes that they’ll say, “Oh, I’ll just give Schwab a call,” or, “I’ll just give the custodian a call,” as if they were shopping independent broker dealers. That’s fine. You can do that and they will help you, but there’s quite a bit more to think about. And it’s not, in my opinion, the same as evaluating independent broker dealers. If it’s all right, I was taught the four pillars of the RIA model. I can go through that with you really quickly. So the way to think about the RIA space is in four pieces. And shout out to a friend, Eli Suarez, that taught me this years ago. The first pillar… Thinking of four pillars on a bar stool, if you will. The first one being administration. And this is your compliance, this is setting up your ADV, your LLC, all of your business formation documents. The second piece being technology, what do you actually want to use? Because the benefits of the broker-dealer world and the supported independent world is they’ve already built it for you. They’ve already paid for it and scraped their knees building it. In this case, you have to. And for some people, that’s really exciting to source financial planning software and portfolio management software and your CRM and tax software, et cetera. For some people, it just sounds like a huge headache. The third pillar being custodians. I have them third because you want to make sure that the right custodian can integrate properly with the technology that you’ve sourced that you’re passionate about. And then ultimately transition. What does a transition really look like? What are my legal and regulatory requirements? How does this work? What are the timelines? Things of that nature. So I guess I would say in closing that if those four things are things that you really want to own, then you’re in a really good position to consider an RIA launch. What do you think, Louis? Louis Diamond: I think that’s a great framework to break it down. Not just be like, “Okay, I can tolerate that,” or, “My team can do it,” but I think you have to be pretty excited about rolling up your sleeves and customizing and doing it yourself because in our experience, there’s a nominal differential between the economics of running your own RIA versus affiliating with an RIA or going to an independent BD. All the extra work and responsibility, you’re not really going to make it up, at least on the front end, on a higher net payout. So it has to be more about what the model means to you and having a vision that you don’t think anyone else can accomplish other than yourself. And looking at that crazy ever-expanding Michael Kitces’ FinTech map and there’s 500 different logos on it and being like, “Yes, that’s what I want. I want to go through this. I want to pick the seven pieces of my tech stack that work for me,” rather than getting, “Here’s the tech stack, take a demo, you like it, you don’t like it, take it or leave it.” To me, the two biggest misconceptions people have about the RIA world is one, “I’m going to have to be a full-time chief compliance officer,” and just that compliance is this boogeyman, this terrible, scary thing. In some ways it is. But the reality is most, especially startup RIAs will fully outsource compliance to a firm or they’ll hire a compliance consultant or firms that are big enough even will hire a CCO or repurpose someone on their team to be CCO. But compliance is much more streamlined and simpler than BD compliance. And ultimately, it’s compliance that’s being built for your business rather than compliance that’s being built for a publicly traded multinational company that supports 20,000 financial advisors. So I think compliance is always a big misconception. It’s definitely what a lot of firms will pry upon when they’re saying like, “Oh, you’re going to own all the legal and regulatory requirements. You could, but it’s definitely not a requirement.” And then I think another one is folks sometimes underestimate and overestimate the operational burden and how much work it is to start an RIA. Sometimes people just… They’re perfect for the RIA world, that’s their goal, but they get stopped in their tracks. They don’t really know what to do. But what we’ve seen, we said it earlier with so many different outsourcing solutions and different service providers that have popped up, if you have the fire in your belly to go build something, it doesn’t mean you’re doing it by yourself. I mean, that’s what firms like ours do. The custodians are very helpful. On the flip side though, I have seen advisors chasing payouts say, “Hey, I’m just going to go start an RIA because I want to make another 1 to 3%,” or whatever it comes to and they drastically underestimate what it really takes to build a successful firm. Joshua Tomolak: Exactly right. I think that’s my favorite one, Louis, overestimating and estimating the operational burden there is you could have the same conversation with two teams and it can go the completely different direction. Louis Diamond: Josh, let’s wrap here. I got one more question for you that I think is an exciting one, but give me three key trends or storylines that most people don’t know about or aren’t talking about that you’re passionate about or that you’re sharing with advisors or counseling today. Joshua Tomolak: Sure. This is the free advice portion. And I’ll tell you what, Louis, if it’s all right with you, I’ll give you two and I would love to hear one from you as well. The first one I’ve seen in both the independent broker-dealer and RIA space is the minority investor concept. A lot of folks will talk about the idea of taking chips off a table and starting to partially monetize your business. I think that’s all important, but what I’ve found is that a lot of advisors really want their partner, whether it’s an RIA broker dealer to help them grow. And that could be with M&A opportunities, that could be with traditional recruitment of advisors, that could be building a business plan. But the minority investment part really helps accelerate that for a lot of businesses because all of a sudden, not only are you cashing out a small part of your business, but you’ve just created an ally with the parent entity, it is now much more likely to help you grow in that capacity because they’re insulated from it and they profit when you profit. So I think it’s easy to be shortsighted and say, “Well, my equity’s going to keep growing. Why would I sell you a piece of this?” But I counsel folks often to really think about what that long-term strategic partnership is and making somebody a real equity partner rather than just a vendor that provides you with technology and regulatory coverage. The other one I’d say is that… And this one’s really important to me, that business formation is far more important than your assets under management. Said a different way, the way you build your business is going to make your business far more valuable than the number of dollars underneath your name. And what I mean by that is, just to use an example, a sophisticated, well-built, centralized, scalable and repeatable business, whether it’s an RIA with a broker-dealer that is going to fetch a far higher M&A multiple than a OSJ that’s five times the size that just has a bunch of 1099 independent advisors underneath the umbrella. What we’ve seen in the M&A space is that if you’re going to shell out 50, 60, $80 million for somebody’s business, you want to know that you have this business for the long term. So I would certainly counsel people that have been around maybe far longer than me to take a look at how you’re building this and put together a business plan on what those next 10 years should look like and not necessarily fall into the trap where your only revenue source is the override that you receive from a firm and then you in turn pay to the advisors on your team. Louis Diamond: Well said. I really like that line. We’d probably do a whole episode on what are the tips and tricks for building a business with the end in mind? Like the Covey quote, “Begin with the end in mind.” Transitions are like… They’re a bear. I mean, there’s no way to sugarcoat it. Advisors, when they hear transition, if you ask them, “Don’t think about it, give me your reaction.” “Terrible, risky, a lot of work. I’ll never do it again. My friend did it and it was terrible. What if my clients don’t come?” It’s all these negative emotions. And in many cases, I don’t blame an advisor because it is a big act. But to me, if someone is weighing making a transition, whether a wholesale business model change going from being an employee to being independent, going from being an advisor at an independent BD to starting an RIA, or even going independent BD to independent BD, it’s an opportunity if you rise to the occasion to build with this next act with intentionality. So whether it’s restructuring compensation for your team, converting people from 1099 to W2, putting in place new workflows, changing how investments, instead of it being each individual advisor doing investments to more of a centralized model, cleaning up workflows, really investing in data, investing in AI. It’s something that I think, again, we can have a whole episode on it, but I think it’s a great one. Build the business the right way. And obviously, businesses that are larger, theoretically, sell for more, but we’ve certainly seen businesses that are half the size of a larger one sell for a similar amount or more because they did all the right things and the larger one did the things that really turn off a buyer or detract from a valuation. Let me give you one more and tell me if you agree, but I think we’re in this moment when Altruist, the upstart, a new kid on the block custodian, they launched a basically tokenization of cash in a way to automatically agentically source or sort cash to the highest yielding money market. And you’re like, “This is fricking wonky. Louis, why are you telling us this?” I think this is an important one just to keep a watchful eye on. I have no idea how this is going to shake out, but really the biggest way that independent BDs or even custodians like Schwab and Fidelity really make money, it’s not on their overrides from practices or the admin fee or the custody fee. It’s really on net interest margin. So how much the broker-dealer or the firm is making on client cash and brokerage accounts relative to what they’re paying out the client. It’s essentially like free margin to these firms. And this concept, I think, has massive potential for disruption for the business model. Again, I don’t know what it’s going to look like, whether it means platform fees that are instituted at all these firms, whether it means certain models would be more beneficial than others, whether it means nothing’s going to change, which is probably the right answer given this industry. But it’s something to keep a watchful eye on just if your firm institutes a new platform fee or there’s a fundamental way in which your firm can no longer make money. How are they going to make it up? Are they now going to be uncompetitive? They’re not going to have as much scale or profits to invest in the platform. Is it going to cause even more consolidation in the industry? So to me, that’s the one pretty under the radar, pretty wonky storyline that I don’t think enough people are talking about, but has the biggest possibility for disruption across their space than anything I’ve seen in a while. Joshua Tomolak: Sure. That’s the whole iceberg. Not a lot of people are talking about it. It’s not poking out of the ocean, but it’s going to be continuously brought up. I think it’s a question that a lot of advisors are going to have to ask these firms. And at the end of the day, the firms aren’t the bad guys. They have to make money too to provide a quality product. So where the money comes from matters. Louis Diamond: Exactly. Josh, this has been awesome. I learned a lot talking with you and just having your objective consulting hat on what I think are really the differences between IBD and RIA and some of the key trends and storylines to watch has been instrumental. I’ll also give a plug that on our website and we’ll link to it in the show notes, we have a really helpful one-page reference guide going through the differences between independent BDs or IBDs and RIAs. So feel free to click on it. We’ll make sure it gets in your inbox. Josh, thanks again for joining us today. Joshua Tomolak: Yeah, thanks for having me, Louis. It was a pleasure. Mindy Diamond: As a financial advisor, you hold yourself to the highest standards of integrity, honesty, and credibility. You are successful because you take your professional responsibilities seriously and are dedicated to your clients. But are you living your best business life? Are your goals aligned with your firms or could a better option exist? Should I stay or Should I Go? is a book written with you in mind. It’s a self-guided journey that walks you through the key steps that we take with our advisor clients. This strategic thought process and roadmap to professional self-discovery is designed to help you ask the right questions and think critically and objectively whether you’re considering change or not. Learn how to get your copy at diamond-consultants.com/thebook. IBD vs. RIA: A Special Industry Update on Independence A conversation with Louis Diamond and Josh Tomolak, Vice President of Independent Advisor Services at Diamond Consultants.      Louis Diamond: Welcome to the latest episode of our podcast series for financial advisors. Today’s episode is IBD vs. RIA: A Special Industry Update on Independence. It’s a conversation with Josh Tomolak, our Vice President of Independent Advisor Services. I’m Louis Diamond, and this is the Diamond Podcast for Financial Advisors. Mindy Diamond: At Diamond Consultants, we help elite advisors identify the right environment for their businesses to thrive, whether that’s at a wirehouse, boutique, or independent firm. With nearly three decades of experience, we’ve guided thousands of advisors and represented more than a quarter of a trillion dollars in assets transitioned. And each year, one in four advisors managing a billion dollars or more who change firms are our clients. Our process is education driven and based on building relationships, starting as your strategic partner well before you’re even thinking of a move. To schedule a confidential conversation, call us at (908) 879-1002. Wondering why advisors change firms and where they’re headed? Are transition deals going up or down? Those very questions and more inspired us to create our annual advisor transition report. It’s the award-winning data-driven resource designed for advisors that connects the dots between the motivations around movement and the firm’s appetite for top talent. Arm yourself with the knowledge you need to make smart decisions. Download your copy at diamond-consultants.com/transitionreport. Louis Diamond: For a long time, going independent would suggest the destination. Today, it’s often the beginning of a different conversation. As the independent space has matured, advisors have more choices than ever before. Broker-dealers have expanded their capabilities. The RIA ecosystem has become increasingly sophisticated. Capital is more readily available and support models now exist that would’ve been difficult to imagine a decade ago. The result is that many advisors who are already independent are taking a fresh look at whether their current affiliation still aligns with what they’re trying to build. My guest is Josh Tomolak, Vice President of Independent Advisor Services here at Diamond Consultants and our resident expert on independence. Josh spends his days helping advisors evaluate independence in all its forms from independent broker dealers, the fully independent RIAs and everything in between. And his knowledge is critical because the distinction between these models is often blurred. Many broker dealers now offer pathways to greater autonomy while supported independence has made RIA ownership more accessible than ever before. So the question is no longer simply, “Do I want to go independent?” The question is, “What kind of independence makes the most sense for client, business, and go

Will housing become more affordable, or is the market resetting at a higher barrier to entry?According to Morgan Stanley, you shouldn't wait for affordability to recover. Instead, you should consider buying when the right opportunity makes sense for your circumstances.In this live housing market update, we'll discuss why Morgan Stanley doesn't believe buyers should wait for affordability to improve and why this housing market reset may actually mean a higher barrier to entry. We'll also break down the latest housing data and answer your real estate and mortgage questions live.Start Here

How much runway does the world's energy market still have? Our Head of Commodity Research Martijn Rats joins our Global Head of Fixed Income Research Andrew Sheets to explain what's causing pressure beyond renewed tensions in the Middle East.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Andrew Sheets: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Global Head of Fixed Income Research at Morgan Stanley.Martijn Rats: And I'm Martijn Rats, Head of Commodity Research at Morgan Stanley.Andrew Sheets: Today – talking about the recent volatility and the direction ahead for oil.It's Wednesday, July 29th at 2pm in London.Martijn, it's great to talk to you again. We haven't talked for a little while on this program. But oil is once again back in the headlines and it's moving around.So maybe to just jump right into things, as you look at the lay of the land in global energy markets at the moment, what's been happening? What are you telling clients?Martijn Rats: Okay. Well, we've had a large amount of volatility, over the last couple of weeks. If you roll the clock back, sort of, to the beginning of June. In the beginning of June, it started to become clear that already some more oil was leaking out of the Strait of Hormuz than perhaps, many of us anticipated at the time.But that data has been confirmed since then. And then, of course, in the middle of June, we got the memorandum of understanding. And after that, roughly 100-150 million barrels a day or so that was behind the Strait of Hormuz got cleared. And that…Andrew Sheets: These were tankers that were stuck there during the conflict, all came out.Martijn Rats: Absolutely. Laden tankers that were there; had just basically turned into floating storage for a good couple of months. They all cleared out, and that actually created a bit of a glut, in the sense that all of a sudden, the refiners of this world had a lot of crude to absorb. And we saw many indications of physical looseness in the market, physical differentials, calendar spreads.All sorts of indicators pointed that physically there was a lot of oil, temporarily to be absorbed. And the spot price of Brent fell to $70. And that looked to be the new direction of travel. In principle, the world is not short of oil if you take the geopolitics out of it.So, for a while it, it looked bearish. But then a new set of disruptions came, and the military conflict restarted, and we've had 13 days of overnight bombing. And with that also the flow through the Strait of Hormuz diminished again. And we are back in the last, sort of, week, 10 days to very, very low levels. The same levels we had in March.The flow through the strait is not exactly zero. But it's sort of 2-3 million barrels a day, sort of, down 80 percent to 90 percent of what it was before the conflict. And with that, prices have rallied. But on top of that, last week it looked like the military activity could really scale up. And for a couple of days, the markets priced that in.But then we have other choke points to take into account now. Not only Hormuz, but the Bab el-Mandeb, the CPC terminal, the issues in global refining. Altogether, it's been a tremendously volatile period. So, we're on the whole leaning towards the constructive side because there are so many disruptions in the system. But it's a very hard one to call at the moment.Andrew Sheets: So Martijn, let's talk about those other disruptions besides just the Strait of Hormuz. Because yeah, it's not just the Strait of Hormuz anymore. We have issues in the Red Sea. You have ongoing issues with Russian energy infrastructure that's being attacked by Ukraine. Just what are these other factors that are out there? And how much do they matter relative to, you know, how many ships are passing through the Strait of Hormuz?Martijn Rats: Yeah. They matter a lot, and you can see that expressed in the price of refined product more than the price of crude. If you look at the main global benchmark for the price of diesel, which is arguably the ICE gas-oil contract, which are diesel barges delivered in Rotterdam or in the wider ARA area, it's trading at about $1,200 a ton, which is sort of $150-$160 per barrel.That's where you see the tightness. And so out of the total end user price, the refiners are capturing more at the moment than the crude suppliers. But what end users pay is not $85 per barrel for Brent crude oil, it's $1,200 a ton for diesel. And that is a very high price. Now, that is a result effectively of four major issues that the oil market has to deal with.One of them is Hormuz, as just discussed. But then we come to these other three. And these other three are the Bab el-Mandeb, which is the strait on the other side of the Arabian Peninsula that provides entry and exit to the Red Sea. That strait has gained in importance because Saudi Arabia has been redirecting about 4 million barrels a day of crude oil supply that was previously exported via Hormuz. Now through the East-West Pipeline to a terminal near a city called Yanbu, from where it is loaded and mostly sails down south through the Bab el-Mandab to refineries in Asia.The Bab el-Mandab is a strait that is effectively controlled by the Houthis, which is an Iran-aligned group that controls much of Yemen. And already in [20]24, earlier in [20]25, they've been very effective, controlling tanker traffic through that strait. And in the last sort of week or so, they have said that they will no longer allow Saudi tankers to sail out. And also, that group has executed drone attacks on Saudi oil infrastructure near the Jazan refinery, near the Yanbu terminal, and overnight also the Abqaiq facility, which is a large oil processing plant.So, this whole Red Sea situation puts at risk something like an incremental 3.5 million barrels a day of crude.Then we've had to deal with issues at the CPC terminal, which is again, also a very large oil export terminal. About 1.5-2 million barrels a day of crude is exported from CPC, which is a terminal near the Russian city of Novorossiysk.Ukraine has been executing drone attacks on tankers that have been trying to load from the CPC terminal. Much of last week, the CPC terminal was out. Over the last 24 hours, a few tankers have loaded again, but it's very unreliable. It's on again, off again. It's a very disrupted flow. In and of itself, a single terminal loading 1.5-2 million barrels a day is very, very large. So, we care.And then the third issue that the oil market has been dealing with, and this also comes back to this issue about these refined product prices, is very severe tightness in the global refining system. That is an issue of some refineries can't export because they're behind the Strait of Hormuz again.So, you can say, "Well, isn't that; that's sort of the same problem?" But nevertheless, it expresses it somewhere else. It's partly a problem of, sort of, the Chinese refinery system running very low. But it's recently mostly been driven by Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian refineries. And by now, something like 60 percent of the Russian refining system is out.And with that, exports of refined products have declined very significantly. There's a gasoline export ban. There's a diesel export ban from Russia. Russia used to be a very large diesel exporter. That is now down to practically zero. And with that, refined product markets have rallied severely on top of the price of crude.Andrew Sheets: And I think that's interesting [be]cause when we think about the economic impact of oil, while, you know, the price of oil per barrel is often the most kind of visible marker that we have – it's often the refined product that we actually use. You know, a truck is running on diesel. It's not running on crude oil.And, you know, that cost of diesel, of jet fuel, of gasoline, you know, that is the thing that can often really affect business margins. And the ability to operate and move product around. So, I mean, just give a sense like how much have those diesel prices gone up? And how much further could they rise if you're operating, you know, a trucking company in Europe?Martijn Rats: Yeah. Look, when supply is inherently scarce, we often ask the question – what is the demand destruction price, right? If you can't supply the stuff quick enough, the physical oil market, be it crude or refined product, must balance.There are a finite number of molecules in the system, and we can store them for a bit. We can take them out of storage. But when you take storage into account, molecules can't disappear out of nowhere. And they can't create it out of nowhere either. So, the system must balance. And if you can't supply it quick enough, the only way to balance sometimes is through demand destruction.And then we ask the question, what is the price that effectively causes that to happen? And if you look historically, that is often expressed in crude, something like $140-$150 a barrel. We've seen that before. But those were occasions where refining was not an issue. And then crude needs to do the heavy lifting to drive prices higher.What we're having at the moment is that refined products need to do it. And so, from experience earlier in the year, back in 2022, some other occasions, the price that destroys diesel demand is probably in the order of $1,400 a ton. In the diesel market, we use tons rather than barrels for historical reasons. Just to make it easy.But it's about $1,400 a ton, which is about sort of, you know, like $180-$190 per barrel. That really stops diesel demand in its track. At the moment, we're $1,230-$1,240, that sort of level. And so, we are getting close. There is probably a little bit more to go, like another 5 percent, 10 percent, that sort of thing, before you really hit some exceptionally high levels.But the diesel price, I would argue, is doing exactly that. It's searching for this demand destruction price. It's just if you then take that sort of $160 diesel that we have at the moment, how much do the refiners get versus how much do the crude producers get?At the moment, the refiners are getting $65- $70 out of that, leaving comparatively little for the crude supplier. But the refined product price is the channel by which the economy is impacted and ultimately also by which demand is eroded.Andrew Sheets: When we're talking about demand destruction, we're talking about at what price does a trucking company not operate, does not drive as much, you know, does not, you know... We're talking about less activity. And inherently that is, I think a risk to growth. But especially risk to growth in Europe where the starting point for growth is already pretty weak.Martijn Rats: Yes. So, we are watching as much, how the Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian refiners are playing out as we are watching, sort of, the Strait of Hormuz.Andrew Sheets: Martijn, the last thing I wanted to talk to you about is, you know, we've been talking about the Iran conflict since late February. And, you know, we're sitting here in late July. And it's clear that, you know, there was a small normalization in flows as you talked about. But we're back to a place where those flows are nowhere near normal.And I think the question on everybody's mind is how much longer can this go on before there's a much larger shock to energy prices?Now, again, you've mentioned we're already seeing some of that shock to diesel, but, you know, a much bigger disruption. What's your current thinking on how much runway the energy system still has?Martijn Rats: Yeah. It's an excellent question, and it's turned out to be fiendishly hard to answer. My gut feel based on how the data is behaving, based on what we know from history: If this lasts another, sort of, month or two, three, then it's hard to argue that by then the buffers in the system will not have been completely exhausted.The reason why I think oil analysts have lost a degree of confidence in forecasting this accurately is that there's a lot of unexplained oil that does require some explanation. If you look at the cumulative amount of supply loss from the Middle East since the start of this conflict, easily over 1.5 billion barrels. 1.5 billion barrels in 150 days is an enormous amount.And yet, the inventory draws that we can find in observable data, they are at best a third of that, maybe 0.5 billion barrels. And so, there's another billion barrels where you say, "Yeah, we had that last year, but we don't have this this year.”How did we solve that billion-barrel problem? And you can say, "Well, we were a bit oversupplied going into it," and a few other things. But you, sort of, have to conclude, and I think this is also, you know, talking to clients and investors, other market participants. I think this is sort of collectively we're discovering this is that this system of, like, unobservable inventories has to be way bigger.That is either inventories like in the supply chain, inventories at customers end, or in countries where we generally just have very little data anyway, like in China. And so, the system has been behaving as if already in [20]24 and [20]25 actually, we were putting a lot of oil into these, in storages that are hard to observe – because in that period we had the opposite problem.We were forecasting large inventory builds, and we couldn't find them all. And now we're forecasting large draws, and we haven't been able to find them all. And so, the system has been behaving as this; the unobservable part of the inventories are way larger.And… But at some point, they also run out. But because they're hard to observe, we don't know when. And I would guess if we're getting towards the end of the summer by August-September, and we're still in this situation? Yeah, then we're going into the winter. Like, you know, German households objectively have little storage of heating oil.Andrew Sheets: Mm-hmm.Martijn Rats: And they need to be rebuilt. And there are a few examples where we do know what customers are doing with their inventories, and they point to a picture where, yeah, by the end of the summer, like, we're running on fumes. And so, look, this – we've been able to patch this up. But it can't go on forever.Andrew Sheets: Well, Martijn, always a pleasure to, to catch up with you and talk energy markets.Martijn Rats: Nice to talk to you.Andrew Sheets: And thank you for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us.And please share with a friend or colleague today.

Crypto News: Sen. Gallego and Sen. Tillis are "finalizing language" for a CLARITY ACT counteroffer from the Democrats and plan to send it to the White House in the "next couple days". Morgan Stanley expands crypto lineup with Ether, Solana ETPs.

Morgan Stanley Chief US Equity Strategist Mike Wilson says investors are rotating out of some of the year's biggest winning technology trades. He says hyperscalers will stabilize and semiconductors stocks will correct. He speaks with Bloomberg's Nathan Hager. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Morgan Stanley launches an Ethereum ETF. Freedom Factory introduces a post quantum wallet. Privacy Pools adds Payroll functionality. And Base releases sybil resistance tools. Read more: https://ethdaily.io/999 ETH Daily sponsorships are now open. Reach over 10,000 Ethereum-native subscribers every weekday. Learn more at ethdaily.io/ads Disclaimer: Content is for informational purposes only, not endorsement or investment advice. The accuracy of information is not guaranteed.

Our Global Head of Macro Strategy Matthew Hornbach and Chief U.S. Economist Michael Gapen unpack what is likely to influence this week's interest rate decision by the Fed.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Matthew Hornbach: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Matthew Hornbach, Global Head of Macro Strategy. Michael Gapen: And I'm Michael Gapen, Morgan Stanley's Chief U.S. Economist. Matthew Hornbach: Today, will the Fed hold or hike? It's the question in the market right now. It's Tuesday, July 28th at 9:30am in New York. Will the Fed display patience, or has it run out of patience? That's the question hanging over the July FOMC meeting currently underway. We believe the former. We expect the Fed to keep the target range for the federal funds rate unchanged at 3.5 to 3.75 percent. The statement will probably also remain unchanged, reiterating the ample reserve policy, economic activity expanding at a solid pace despite elevated uncertainty. So, Mike, what's your assessment of the situation beyond that? Michael Gapen: Our assessment of the July FOMC meeting is actually the case for hikes is not as persuasive now as it was in June. And I think when we say that and when we come to the decision the Fed will stay on hold this week, we're basing it mainly on the data that has come in since the June FOMC meeting. And two important pieces on that front are employment growth moderated. So, in the June meeting, the three-month average payroll gain was running at about 188,000 per month. And I think it gave the sense that the labor market was really accelerating and there was downside risk to the unemployment rate. The subsequent employment data changed that view. Now it looks like there is much less of an acceleration in hiring and momentum has slowed. So, the labor market doesn't look quite as robust. Second, there was a lot of information, we think, a lot of signal about disinflation. So yes, recent volatility in the Middle East did push oil prices temporarily higher. We'll see where that goes. But underneath the hood, there was significant softness in goods inflation and services inflation, particularly related to housing. So, we do think that there was a lot of evidence that disinflation is here. So, with those two things in mind, we think there's less of a case to hike in July than there was in June. So, we think the right thing... Or what we think the Fed will do is to skip July, try and buy a little more time, get a little more information. If disinflation is indeed here, the Fed stays on hold. If not, and inflation stays firm, well, they can move to rate hikes later this year. But we think the case to hike in July is less compelling than it was in June. Matthew Hornbach: Well, they certainly will get a lot more information between the July meeting and the September meeting. If memory serves, at least two more rounds of all of the major economic data points… Michael Gapen: That's right. Matthew Hornbach: Payroll, CPI, and so on. Michael Gapen: That's right. The gap between the July FOMC meeting and the September FOMC meeting is the longest on the Fed's calendar. Of course, in part, that makes room for Jackson Hole in August, which if the Fed were moving to a tightening cycle, could be a venue to lay out the case for that. But you're right, they will see multiple employment and inflation reports before they meet again in September. Matthew Hornbach: If they really wanted to get ahead of that data and move at this meeting, what is the case for hiking rates in July? How would you think about that perspective? Michael Gapen: I think you could make a couple of cases to hike now. One is recent volatility and conflict in the Middle East has pushed oil prices higher. Maybe it convinces you – you're in a prolonged oil risk premium scenario, and inflation will not dissipate. Second, I think you could argue, well, it's a balance of risks argument. And we think risks have just shifted in the direction of inflation, where last year they were in the direction of a weaker labor market. We eased last year. Let's just reverse those risk management rate cuts this year. So, it's not about inflation in hand, it's about your view of risks around inflation. Another, I think, and to me, this is the most important one, is maybe Warsh wants a regime change in the reaction function. In other words, he emphasizes price stability and achieving the 2 percent target. Well, at some point, words are words and actions are actions. And maybe what he desires is a more hawkish reaction function and kind of a higher interest rate all else equal to guide inflation down to 2 percent more quickly. So, I think, Matt, if we're wrong this week, I think the main reason we're wrong is I'm thinking under an older reaction function, and Warsh is bringing a new one. And right now, we don't exactly know what his reaction function is. And he could reveal it this week as being in a direction where he really wants to concentrate on the inflation side of the mandate to the exclusion of nearly everything else. Matthew Hornbach: Well, I don't think that's lost on markets at all. And in fact, I think that the rise in yields we've seen in the bond market concentrated in the real yield component of the 10-year Treasury bond tells you a lot about how investors are thinking the Fed will react to higher energy prices. As energy prices have gone up, so have bond yields. The relationship between those two asset prices are very strong. And usually what that suggests is if the real yield is going up more than the break-even inflation rate is going up as energy prices rise, it's telling you that investors think the Fed will not look through the rise in energy prices. If you have the opposite happen, where your break-even inflation rate is going higher, more so than the real interest rate is going higher, that would suggest investors think the Fed will look through the energy price increase. That just hasn't been the case, and so I think investors are very much attuned to what they think is the right reaction function for the Fed. But I guess we'll see. Only time will tell. And I think in order to help us tell what the right reaction function is – we'll need some communication from the Fed. And maybe that's where I want to go next with you – is on communication. It does seem like there have been fewer FOMC participants speaking to the public since Chairman Warsh began his tenure as chairman. Is that your impression? How do you think about communication? And since we are in the midst of this FOMC meeting, the press conference… What do you think about press conferences going forward? Michael Gapen: I do think you're right. I haven't counted up the literal official FOMC communications. I do think there have likely been fewer speeches and/or interviews given recently. And whether or not that's a function of Kevin Warsh as the chairman or it's summer and things move a little slower, I don't know. I will say, though, that when participants have spoken, I think we're getting the same, say, normal communication that they brought in the past. So far, I don't read participants as unwilling to provide their view about the outlook for the economy and for monetary policy. On the press conference, boy, would that be a change. I've been of the view that you probably will not get what I'll call a major change to the SEPs or the press conferences in terms of their frequency until the task force on communications has run its course, where I think the deadline is ultimately later this year. So, I don't think the schedule of press conferences will change until 2027, if it changes at all. But if we don't have them… The way that I would look at that, Matt, is to say, if the Fed's speaking less, there will be a vacuum out there to some degree. So, if the Fed's giving its view on the outlook and monetary policy less frequently, something else will fill that narrative, whether it's markets or the private sector or whatever it is. Vacuums are going to get filled. The Fed's speaking less, somebody else will speak more. Maybe that drives volatility more. I guess it would depend on the situation, but I think pulling press conferences would be a major surprise. I don't think it's in market expectations, and my belief is it would probably lead to some increase in volatility over time.How would you read it? Matthew Hornbach: Absolutely. I think the void has already begun to be filled by investors and how they think about the Fed's reaction function, rightly or wrongly. Which is why I think we've seen real yields move in a very positively correlated way with energy prices. Investors are intuiting a certain reaction function to higher energy prices. Whether or not that is the correct view, only time will tell. If we do have a press conference at this upcoming meeting, which looks very likely, investors are going to pay attention to every nuance and every shift in the chairman's tone. How he chooses to address certain questions versus others—or whether he chooses to address them at all—will be important for market participants and how they invest in the bond and currency markets. With that, Mike, thanks again for taking the time to talk. I look forward to catching up with you again in late August around the Jackson Hole symposium. Michael Gapen: Great speaking with you, Matt. Thanks for having me on. Matthew Hornbach: And thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please leave us a review wherever you listen. And share the podcast with a friend or colleague today.

Morgan Stanley Investment Management's Global Head of ETFs Ally Wallace breaks down the firm's newly launched Ether and Solana ETFs from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Wallace explains why Morgan Stanley priced all three of its crypto products at 14 basis points — the cheapest on the market — and how its April Bitcoin ETF became the firm's most successful launch ever. And, she unpacks the staking component of the new proof-of-stake products, including Morgan Stanley's decision to pass back 100% of staking rewards to investors. - 00:00 Morgan Stanley Launches Ether and Solana ETFs 00:17 Launching Into a Subdued Crypto Market 00:57 Bitcoin ETF Pulls In $400M, MS's Best Launch Ever 01:27 Competing at 14 Basis Points, the Cheapest on the Market 02:15 The First Bank-Owned Asset Manager in the Space 02:33 Passing Back 100% of Staking Rewards 03:02 How the Staking Economics Work 03:52 Positioning Solana and ETH in Portfolios 04:46 Why Morgan Stanley Chose CoinDesk Benchmarks 05:28 Coinbase and BNY Mellon on Custody

"Stability is destabilizing." -Hyman MinskyBDCs are already cutting dividends. Blackstone, Blue Owl, and KKR are gating redemptions. The credit cycle signal is flashing — and almost nobody is watching it.There's a corner of the NYSE that nobody in crypto Twitter or macro Twitter is paying attention to. And it's insane to me — because if you want to know where the credit cycle is breaking, this is where you see it first.BDCs. Business development companies.They're sitting right there, publicly traded, yielding 12-13%. And almost nobody is watching them for the right reason.In this episode, Wasabi, Lux, Boomer, and Hal break down exactly what BDCs are, why they're the public window into a private credit market that's almost entirely dark, and why the signal is no longer hypothetical — the VanEck BDC Income ETF just cut its distribution in half, and Blackstone, Blue Owl, FS KKR, Apollo, Ares, and Morgan Stanley have all imposed redemption gates on their non-traded BDC vehicles. Investors trying to get their money out can't.This isn't a forecast. It's a current event.We walk through the full framework: what BDCs are, who borrows from them, why the structure forces transparency that private credit funds don't have, and how to use the dividend cut signal as a leading indicator for the broader credit cycle. One cut — note it. Two — pay attention. Three or more in the same quarter — deploy.This episode is free. Share it with someone who watches markets.SharePaid subscribers get:→ The daily market report — live BTC and ETH prices, macro color, fear & greed, and a straight read on what's actually moving→ Private Discord — talk through trades and theses directly with Hal and Lux. Not a community. Not a server with 10,000 people. A small room with the people who made this episode. And people like you.If you found this useful, the upgrade is worth it.subscribeDisclaimer on BCD's signal - while this podcast is fun this signal does not out perform buy and hold in back tests: The contrarian backtest completed. Here's the verdict:90 trades, 17.7% average return, 63% win rate. Sounds good right?But zero alpha. Every single trade has exactly 0% alpha vs buy-and-hold over the same period. That's because the "buy after cut" entry is just buying the stock — you'd get the same return just holding it through the dip.Here's the breakdown:• Big winners (2020Q1-Q2 trades): +80% to +161% — but that's just the COVID recovery. Buy-and-hold did the same.• Big losers (2019Q1, 2022Q1): -25% to -52% — you bought into a continuing decline• Win rate is decent (63-72%) but that's just BDCs being mean-reverting assets in generalThe honest answer: The contrarian angle feels right narratively, but the data says there's no edge. The dividend cut doesn't give you a better entry point than just buying the dip on price alone. You're not buying a "NAV discount opportunity" — you're buying a falling knife that sometimes recovers and sometimes doesn't.The 2008 story is a survivorship bias — we remember the BDCs that recovered, not the ones that didn't (OCSL -86% cut, NEWT with 13 cuts over 10 years).So both directions are dead: sell on cuts = no signal, buy on cuts = no alpha.

Our CIO and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist Mike Wilson explains why he thinks the bull market has entered a new phase, with more focus on quality.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Mike Wilson: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Morgan Stanley's CIO and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist. Today on the podcast I'll be discussing the transition from early- to mid-cycle and what that means for your portfolio.It's Monday, July 27th at 11:30 am in New York. So, let's get after it.Our broadening call for the market has been about moving beyond the narrow leadership of the mega-cap winners and into more economically sensitive areas. That made sense in the context of our rolling recovery thesis, a period when revenue growth returns to lean cost structures, and operating leverage emerges across many sectors of the economy.But now, I think that early-cycle phase of the rolling recovery is ending, and the market is starting to rotate toward quality. That's not bearish, but it is different and can affect portfolios at the stock level. As the cycle matures, investors stop rewarding low quality beta and start focusing more on free cash flow, balance sheet strength, margins, and earnings stability. The market is not abandoning the recovery. It is becoming more selective about the best way to own it. This setup reminds me of early-to-mid 2021. After the initial post-COVID rebound, leadership shifted away from lower-quality and more speculative areas and toward higher-quality companies. The S&P 500 kept rising, but the leadership changed. I think we're seeing something similar today. The S&P itself is already a quality-heavy benchmark, with high-quality cohorts representing roughly 42 percent of the index versus about 28 percent for low quality. That should help keep the index resilient, even as the market continues to digest this transition. Could we still see near-term volatility? Absolutely. If the war escalates further or the Fed surprises us with a rate hike this week, the market can continue to correct. I continue to think 7000 on the S&P 500 is important support if investors remain uneasy about the Fed transition or the geopolitical backdrop. However, the bigger message is that leadership is changing, not that the bull market is ending.One of the most important drivers of this shift is AI adoption. Earlier in the cycle, margin expansion was about classic operating leverage: sales recovering faster than costs. From here, margin expansion will depend more on companies using AI effectively, running leaner, and turning productivity into revenue growth as well. This is why quality matters. Companies with strong pricing power, strong balance sheets, or the ability to translate AI adoption into real growth are likely to be rewarded disproportionately.Companies where AI is material to the investment thesis and pricing power is neutral to strong are seeing forward net margin expectations improve nearly 400 basis points above the median stock. Our transcript work also shows that roughly 25 percent of S&P 500 companies cited measurable benefits from AI adoption in the second quarter, up from 14 percent a year ago. That's operating leverage with a new engine. This also feeds into the AI leadership rotation. I still think semis are likely to underperform hyperscalers from here, even if both can be under pressure during the next leg of consolidation. Semis are a classic early-cycle group, and they've already seen a peak rate of change in earnings revisions. The hyperscalers, by contrast, have high quality core businesses, exposure to the agentic application layer, and an underappreciated ability to take costs out through AI-driven efficiencies. In terms of the overall S&P 500, the two variables I'm watching most closely are interest rates and oil. The bond market is pricing a meaningful probability of a Fed hike, but my base case remains that the Fed stays on hold. A hike would be a hawkish surprise and a risky maneuver, but I think even that would delay rather than derail a positive finish to 2026 with earnings growth remaining strong. Oil is the other wildcard. A sustained rise in oil is not priced into equities, and just another reason to move one's portfolio up the quality ladder.Bottom line, the broadening is not over, but it is changing shape and leadership. We're moving from early-cycle beta toward mid-cycle quality as the market seeks not only growth, but companies that can convert that growth into durable free cash flow and margin expansion. The recent elevation of quality factors has been evolving for the past month and now it's time to fully embrace it. Thanks for tuning in; I hope you found it informative and useful. Let us know what you think by leaving us a review. And if you find Thoughts on the Market worthwhile, tell a friend or colleague to try it out!

Carl Quintanilla, Jim Cramer and David Faber explored a big week for earnings — led by tech giants Microsoft, Amazon, Apple and Meta. Hear Cramer's eye-opening comments about Nvidia shares. The anchors also discussed stocks on the rise, fueled by the slide in oil prices after the U.S. and Iran halted strikes over the weekend. Also in focus: Nvidia reportedly in talks to provide a $250 billion backstop for OpenAI as part of a data center project, Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas' note on SpaceX amid the stock's weakness, an update on Paramount's decision to delay its proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, the anchors react to the stock that soared 466% in its Chinese market debut.   Squawk on the Street Disclaimer Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Looking at clues from the past, our Global Head of Fixed Income Research Andrew Sheets examines how the recurring themes – from deregulation to volatility – are shaping markets and why every cycle still takes its own path.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Andrew Sheets: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Global Head of Fixed Income Research at Morgan Stanley. Today, what can Odysseus teach us about investing? It's Friday, July 24th at 2pm in London.Like many of you, this week I saw The Odyssey. The enduring appeal of this story more than 2,700 years after it was composed is a reminder that some themes are universal. Pride, resourcefulness, determination, self-control, or the lack thereof, mattered to both an ancient Greek dinner party and resonate with anybody investing today.But drawing lessons from the past is also tricky. We do not have that much financial history, and markets contain too many variables for the same combination to align twice. Some judgment, art, and dare we say storytelling is always involved in deciding which historical periods best describe the present. Those disclaimers aside, we've argued in our year ahead outlook that 1997 to 1998 and 2005 to 2006 are some of the most useful templates for the current backdrop.That remains our view. They suggest a cycle that has further to run, equities outperforming credit, and a preference to own volatility. Both of these periods were defined by a sharp rise in corporate activity. That is certainly what we're seeing today.We forecast U.S. capital expenditure to rise 23 percent in 2026, and 26 percent in 2027. AI is the biggest driver of this spending but build-outs in energy infrastructure are also playing a role. And increased corporate CapEx is certainly a global story, especially in Asia.Then there's M&A, which also rose significantly in these two past historical periods. As recently as early 2024, global M&A volumes were unusually depressed, some of the lowest levels in over 30 years, adjusted for economic size. But that's no longer the case. And more recently, M&A is currently running up 64 percent relative to a year ago.Important current macroeconomic data also looks somewhat similar to these past two periods. The current levels of U.S. core PCE inflation, the unemployment rate, and the 10-year yield are pretty close to the averages seen in 1997, 1998, 2005, and 2006.And the U.S. 2s10s yield curve, well, it broadly flattened then, and it has broadly been flattening today. A third similarity, maybe less obvious but no less important, is deregulation. Both 1997 and 1998 and 2005 to 2006 saw significant financial deregulation. And we're seeing that again now. From the Basel Endgame to NAIC risk weights to Solvency II changes to savings reforms in Europe, Korea, and elsewhere, the current trend appears to be on a firmly deregulatory path.Even more simply, 1997 and 1998 and 2005 to 2006 provide interesting narrative bookends to two ways that I often hear the current environment being described. The late '90s? Well, that was defined by rising excitement around a transformational new technology – then the internet – and the prospect of a more productive future. Sound familiar? And the mid-2000s? Well, that was defined by a very unequal economy and rising consumer stress – but growth that was still supported by a seemingly inexhaustible investment demand from a rising market force. Then that force was emerging markets. Today, it's AI. Again, somewhat familiar. If these periods serve as a guide, the cycle probably has further to run, and corporate aggression should favor equities over credit.But if we learn anything from the trials of Odysseus, the journey can throw up plenty of surprises along the way. Thank you, as always, for your time. If you find Thoughts on the Market useful, let us know by leaving a review wherever you listen. And also tell a friend or colleague about us today.

Looking back at what we were discussing a year ago germane to the mortgage industry is how we begin today's episode. Robbie then interviews Morgan Stanley's Matthew Hornbach on identifying the risks that investors and the mortgage industry may be underestimating as the economy transitions into its next phase. And we close with some stagflationary signals that may be emerging.Thank you to JazzX, the first true end-to-end AI platform built for mortgage. From application to close, JazzX is a new operating model that helps you scale growth, boost productivity, and transform how your team performs.The Chrisman Commentary is your go-to daily mortgage news podcast, where industry insights meet expert analysis. Hosted by Robbie Chrisman, this podcast delivers the latest updates on mortgage rates, capital markets, and the forces shaping the housing finance landscape. Whether you're a seasoned professional or just looking to stay informed, you'll get clear, concise breakdowns of market trends and economic shifts that impact the mortgage world.

Matt is joined by Sean Diffley, head of media and entertainment as well as cable and telecom research at Morgan Stanley to discuss a new system for stock picking called the MS Media Matrix, which ranks publicly traded entertainment companies based on audience and engagement, their interactivity, urgency of the content, pricing power, IP, and AI positioning, and then compares these strengths and weaknesses to the companies' relative share price. They discuss the importance of ownership within these companies, AI's role in content creation and the future of leisure time, and AI's impact on content consumption (02:56). Matt finishes the show with a prediction on what will be the second weekend drop of ‘The Odyssey' (30:33). Host: Matt Belloni Guest: Sean Diffley Producers: Craig Horlbeck, Jessie Lopez, and Stefano Sanchez Theme Song: Devon Renaldo This episode is brought to you by AMC+. Start your free trial today at join.amcplus.com This episode is brought to you by Accenture. https://Accenture.com/Spotify Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Despite growing political resistance, investment in data centers isn't slowing. Ariana Salvatore explains why supply constraints may actually accelerate AI capital spending.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Ariana Salvatore: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Ariana Salvatore, Head of Public Policy Research at Morgan Stanley. Today, I'll be talking about why we still expect robust AI capital spending in spite of some rising political pushback. It's Thursday, July 23rd at 10am in New York. It should be no surprise to our listeners that data center pushback, a topic that we've been following for some time, has been growing louder. But in 2026, it's accelerated meaningfully. Data we track suggests that an estimated $156 billion of projects were canceled or delayed in 2025. This year alone, in just the first quarter, we've seen almost that same exact number. The opposition is coming from several directions.Communities are raising concerns about rising electricity bills, environmental pressures related to water use, and the local quality of life effects of large-scale construction. But it's also coming from lawmakers across the aisle. State legislatures with both Democratic and Republican lawmakers have been advancing this type of policy.At the same time, we're forecasting a little less than a trillion dollars of AI CapEx this year alone, and we think it's an increasingly important component of the macroeconomic growth outlook.So how do we square that circle? First, and most importantly, we think this is primarily a supply-side risk rather than a demand-side one. We don't expect the backlash to materially reduce projections for compute demand. Instead, it could widen the gap between that demand and the industry's ability to bring new capacity online through things like permitting delays, grid interconnection constraints, and local opposition.Despite that more difficult political and infrastructure environment, our internet team, led by Brian Nowak, remain constructive on AI capital spending. Our broader thematic estimate for total AI CapEX, including the neo cloud providers, stands at approximately $870 billion in 2026, and we actually see risks skewed even higher from here.So why is spending still increasing as the environment for building data centers becomes more challenging? There are a few reasons.First, the AI ecosystem remains compute constrained. The urgency to invest has not diminished. In fact, growing social opposition and political uncertainty ahead of the 2028 presidential election may actually be encouraging hyperscalers to begin projects earlier, which our credit strategists outline as a potential scenario here. A pull forward of demand before the political and execution risk grows even louder.Second, the timelines associated with data center construction have become longer. From groundbreaking to operational launch, projects can now take as long as three years or even more. That gives companies a strong incentive to begin developing future capacity well in advance, even if the political pushback is strong.And third, the underlying demand signal is not slowing. Global weekly token usage, which our analysts view as an important proxy for compute demand, has increased since early January. It's rising and continues to do so throughout the course of this year. So, in short, the pushback is real, but it appears to be reshaping the build-out rather than stopping it. That's why our base case is for a conditional build-out. We think projects are likely to face greater scrutiny, we think projects are likely to face greater scrutiny, longer delays, and more requirements related to environmental impact and community benefits.But ultimately, we still think they cross the finish line. That could mean higher costs, it could mean longer development timelines, and greater geographic dispersion of projects away from the largest existing data center markets. It could also accelerate the shift toward on-site and behind-the-meter power generation. Fuel cells, turbines, and energy storage are becoming increasingly important as operators look for ways to reduce their reliance on these lengthy grid interconnection processes, and that can benefit companies that are able to bring those solutions to the forefront. Meanwhile, our U.S. equity strategy team maintains a relative preference for hyperscalers over semiconductors over the next several months. As you heard our CIO and Chief Equity Strategist Mike Wilson explain yesterday, that's because the team sees the hyperscalers as early in discounting the market's renewed focus on CapEx discipline. Putting it all together, we see the growing pushback against data centers as representing a genuine risk to the pace, cost, and geography of the AI infrastructure build-out. But again, this isn't just a demand story, it's a supply story. And somewhat paradoxically, the scarcity and the uncertainty created by these constraints could actually end up pulling capital spend forward rather than reducing it.Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review wherever you listen and share thoughts on the market with a friend or colleague today.

Dean Guida started Infragistics at 23 to build UX/UI tools for professional software developers. Thirty-seven years later, the company operates across six countries, its software is used by more than two million developers, and its customers span the entire S&P 500—including Fidelity, Morgan Stanley, Exxon, Intuit, and Bank of America. But AI can now generate functional software in minutes. So what prevents a company like Infragistics from becoming obsolete? I wanted to understand which parts of software AI will commoditize, where lasting competitive moats will still exist, and why Dean believes the idea that software is disappearing has been dramatically oversold. We also talk about how he built a multi-8-figure company without outside capital, why he might raise money if he started again today, and what founders need to build once grit alone is no longer enough to scale.   Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/3hogPdPFiX8     Let's Connect: Website | Instagram | YouTube | TikTok | Twitter | Facebook

Welcome to Episode 317 of Autism Parenting Secrets. Many parents spend so much time focused on therapies, interventions, schools, and immediate challenges that the long-term picture gets pushed aside. And often, financial planning can feel emotionally overwhelming because parents associate it with uncertainty, fear, or even giving up hope. Ann Hynek joins us today to discuss why thoughtful financial planning is really about gaining clarity, creating a roadmap, and making decisions that align with your family's goals and values. Ann is the founder of Hestia Wealth and Wellness and specializes in helping families navigating autism and developmental disabilities create long-term financial and life plans with greater confidence and less stress. The secret this week is…  Financial Clarity Reduces Overwhelm You'll Discover: Why financial planning should begin with clarity instead of numbers (4:16) Why many parents emotionally delay long-term planning (15:19) What thoughtful financial strategy actually looks like for families (20:29) Why slowing down often leads to better decisions and less stress (27:47) About Our Guest: Ann Hynek is the Founder of Hestia Wealth and Wellness, where she helps families navigating autism and developmental disabilities create thoughtful long-term financial and life plans. After a 15-year career leading marketing strategy at firms including BlackRock and Morgan Stanley, Ann's son's autism diagnosis inspired her to shift her focus toward helping families navigate the complex world of special needs planning with greater clarity and confidence. She specializes in areas such as ABLE accounts, special needs trusts, SSI/SSDI benefits, estate planning, and long-term transition planning. hestiawealthwellness.com Additional Resources: To learn more about personalized 1:1 support go to www.elevatehowyounavigate.com If you enjoyed this episode, share it with your friends.

In this episode, we kick things off by examining a major milestone in the autonomous trucking race as Pittsburgh-based Aurora Innovation ⁠launched its second-generation driverless hardware across ten commercial freight routes⁠ in the U.S. Sun Belt. Unlike its first-generation trucks, the new fleet is built to run with no passive observer at all, erasing what one Morgan Stanley analyst called "one of the last remaining asterisks around the technology." Engineered for a one-million-mile operating life and designed for volume production rather than pilot-scale trials, Aurora is leaning heavily on manufacturing partner Roush, which is targeting an annual production run-rate of one thousand trucks by year-end. Meanwhile, the nation's largest truckload carrier is declaring that a structural recovery is finally here. Knight-Swift Transportation ⁠reported second-quarter adjusted earnings per share of sixty-three cents, smashing consensus by twelve cents⁠ and coming in twenty-eight cents higher year-over-year. CEO Adam Miller credited aggressive regulatory enforcement by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and the Department of Transportation for forcing out non-compliant capacity and creating what the company called a "rapid progression in truckload market conditions." Contract rates climbed throughout the quarter, with revenue per loaded mile accelerating from low-single digits in April to eight percent in June, while Knight-Swift's tender rejection rate was twice the industry average. Finally, over on the rails, CSX is riding a powerful volume rebound to beat Wall Street expectations. The Jacksonville-based Class I railroad ⁠reported second-quarter revenue of three point nine four billion dollars, up ten point one percent year-over-year⁠, while earnings per share came in at fifty-four cents, beating analyst consensus estimates by four point two percent. Carload volumes improved by six point one percent, a dramatic swing from just zero point one percent growth a year ago, with intermodal traffic surging across CSX's eastern U.S. network. Free cash flow swung dramatically from negative one hundred fifteen million dollars in the second quarter of twenty twenty-five to positive six hundred eighty-seven million dollars this quarter. ⁠Follow the FreightWaves Today Podcast⁠ ⁠Other FreightWaves Shows⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matt Kilgroe — President & CEO, Cyndeo Wealth Partners Matt Kilgroe shares how Cyndeo Wealth Partners grew from a newly launched $1.2B RIA to a $3.5B enterprise, and why the next challenge isn't independence, but building a firm capable of reaching $25B.  In Summary Five years after launching Cyndeo Wealth Partners from UBS, Matt Kilgroe returns to the podcast to discuss what happens after independence. Rather than focusing on the transition itself, Louis and Matt explore the next phase of growth: scaling an advisory business, attracting talent, developing niche expertise, taking on outside capital, and building an enterprise designed to last. Along the way, Matt shares how Cyndeo expanded from $1.2B to $3.5B, why serving professional athletes required a different business model, and what led the firm to partner with Rise Growth Partners as it looks toward a $25B future.  The Storyline For many advisors, independence is viewed as the finish line. For Matt Kilgroe, it became the starting point. When Cyndeo Wealth Partners launched in 2020, the goal wasn't simply to leave the wirehouse behind. It was to build a business with the flexibility to grow in ways that simply weren't possible before. Five years later, that vision has evolved into something much larger. Cyndeo has nearly tripled in size, expanded its niche serving professional athletes and entertainers, recruited advisors, added specialized operational talent, and recently welcomed Rise Growth Partners as a minority investor to help accelerate its next phase of growth. The conversation explores what changes when firm leaders stop thinking like advisors managing successful practices and begin thinking like CEOs building enduring enterprises. The discussion spans succession planning, capital strategy, recruiting, organizational design, and the mindset required to scale from billions to tens of billions—all while remaining focused on clients and culture.  Topics Covered Building an enterprise beyond independence Scaling from $1.2B to $3.5B in assets Organic growth versus recruiting Serving professional athletes and entertainers Why fiduciary independence matters for niche client segments Building operational infrastructure for growth Partnering with Dynasty Financial Partners Minority capital and Rise Growth Partners Succession planning and employee ownership Thinking from $3.5B to $25B > Download a transcript of this episode… Listen and Learn Highlights for Advisors What did Matt learn after transitioning nearly 98% of his clients? (06:20) Why client relationships—not firm logos—proved to be the firm's greatest asset during one of the most challenging transitions imaginable. How did Cyndeo nearly triple in size in five years? (16:10) Matt discusses the combination of niche specialization, disciplined organic growth, recruiting, and operational investment that fueled the firm's expansion. Why has Cyndeo become a destination for professional athletes? (17:15) The conversation explores how deep industry expertise, fiduciary flexibility, and specialized service created a business that would have been difficult to build inside a wirehouse. Why bring on a minority capital partner when the business was already thriving? (24:15) Matt explains why succession planning, future recruiting, and long-term enterprise growth made outside capital the right decision. How should advisors think about ownership versus compensation? (35:40) A candid discussion about enterprise value, equity, and why many advisors underestimate the long-term economics of ownership. What does it actually take to scale toward $25B? (42:20) From hiring executive talent to expanding geographically, Matt shares how he's thinking about the next chapter of Cyndeo's evolution. Key Takeaways Independence creates opportunities that extend well beyond higher payouts, including enterprise value, recruiting flexibility, and ownership. Scaling a business requires investing in operational leadership, not just adding advisors. Specialized client niches demand expertise that goes well beyond investment management. Outside capital can accelerate growth when it's aligned with long-term strategy rather than an exit. Building an enduring enterprise requires thinking differently about succession, talent, governance, and equity. https://youtu.be/WRYJd9Lkt7o Quotable Moments “Don't rent your practice. Own it.” “You can't work in those niches and not be a fiduciary.” “We're not done.” “The road from $3B to $25B is going to really compound on your equity.”  FAQs Why did Cyndeo decide to take on a minority capital partner? To support its next phase of growth, strengthen succession planning, recruit additional talent, and benefit from the experience of leaders who have successfully scaled wealth management businesses before. How did Cyndeo grow from $1.2B to $3.5B? Through a combination of consistent organic growth, specialized client niches, advisor recruiting, and investments in operational infrastructure. Why is serving professional athletes or other niche client segments different from serving traditional wealth clients? Niche client segments often face unique financial decisions involving private investments, business opportunities, and career transitions that require specialized knowledge and a fiduciary framework. What advantages did independence create that weren't available inside a wirehouse? Matt points to greater flexibility around private investments, the ability to build specialized client experiences, reward employees with equity, and create an enterprise with lasting value. How should advisors think about building versus joining an independent firm? The discussion highlights the tradeoffs between creating your own firm and joining an established independent enterprise, emphasizing that ownership and long-term equity often matter more than headline payouts. What does Matt believe is required to build a $25B firm? A willingness to invest beyond advisors alone, adding executive leadership, expanding geographically, recruiting strategically, and maintaining a long-term enterprise mindset. To support its next phase of growth, strengthen succession planning, recruit additional talent, and benefit from the experience of leaders who have successfully scaled wealth management businesses before. Through a combination of consistent organic growth, specialized client niches, advisor recruiting, and investments in operational infrastructure. Niche client segments often face unique financial decisions involving private investments, business opportunities, and career transitions that require specialized knowledge and a fiduciary framework. Matt points to greater flexibility around private investments, the ability to build specialized client experiences, reward employees with equity, and create an enterprise with lasting value. The discussion highlights the tradeoffs between creating your own firm and joining an established independent enterprise, emphasizing that ownership and long-term equity often matter more than headline payouts. A willingness to invest beyond advisors alone, adding executive leadership, expanding geographically, recruiting strategically, and maintaining a long-term enterprise mindset. Related Resources Article: Your Practice Isn't Worth What You ThinkMost advisors misjudge their business's value, not because of the number, but because of the framework. Learn what really drives enterprise value. Rise and Reinvent: Joe Duran on Building and Rebuilding World-Class FirmsHe's built and rebuilt some of the industry's most successful firms and now he's helping others do the same. In this episode, Joe Duran, the founder of Rise Growth Partners, shares lessons from building, selling, and starting again, and how staying curious and adaptable fuels lasting success. Matt KilgroePresident/CEO Prior to launching Cyndeo Wealth Partners in 2020, Matt ran advisory teams at Merrill Lynch and UBS Financial for 29 years. Providing guidance, counsel, and strategy for families the firm serves is Matt's passion. In addition to his role as an advisor, Matt works in a leadership capacity for Cyndeo while also helping with business development. Matt has been recognized by Barron's as a Top 1000 or Top 1200 Advisor consistently since 2009. In 2020 Forbes named him to their “Best-In-State Wealth Advisor” list. A graduate of Eckerd College, Matt has served on the Board of Trustees at his alma mater since 2012. His three children are his pride and joy. Daughter Carrington owns Sunstate Yoga studio in St. Petersburg, son Kent is a financial advisor with Cyndeo, and daughter Jillian recently graduated Florida State University. An athlete in college, Matt continues to enjoy staying in shape, playing basketball, and bike riding. NOTE: The views and opinions expressed by the guests on this podcast are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Diamond Consultants. Neither Diamond Consultants nor the guests on this podcast are compensated in any way for their participation. View the transcript of this episode… True Alignment: Advising Business Owners on Wealth, Significance, and Value A conversation with Jason Diamond, Nick Hubert and Taylor Gentry – Founding Partners at Panoramic Capital Partners. Jason Diamond: Welcome to the latest episode of our podcast series for financial advisors. Today’s episode is True Alignment: Advising Business Owners on Wealth, Significance, and Value. It’s a conversation with Nick Hubert and Taylor Gentry, Founding Partners, Panoramic Capital Partners. I’m Jason Diamond and this is the Diamond Podcast for Financial Advisors. Mindy Diamond: At Diamond Consultants, we help elite advisors identify the right environment for their businesses to thrive, whether that’s at a wirehouse, boutique, or independent firm. With nearly three decades of experience, we’ve guided thousands of advisors and represented more than a quarter of a trillion dollars in assets transitioned. And each year, one in four advisors managing a billion dollars or more who change firms are our clients. Our process is education-driven and based on building relationships, starting as your strategic partner well before you’re even thinking of a move. To schedule a confidential conversation, call us at 908-879-1002. Wondering why advisors change firms and where they’re headed? Are transition deals going up or down? Those very questions and more inspired us to create our annual advisor transition report. It’s the award-winning, data-driven resource designed for advisors that connects the dots between the motivations around movement and the firm’s appetite for top talent. Arm yourself with the knowledge you need to make smart decisions. Download your copy at diamond-consultants.com/transitionreport. Jason Diamond: Advisory firms that work with business owner clients typically operate through a fairly traditional wealth management lens. The business may be the source of the wealth, but the advice itself often centers around investments, planning, and asset allocation, yet Panoramic Capital Partners approaches that equation differently. Nick Hubert and Taylor Gentry are the founding partners of the roughly $450 million RIA, serving about 150 families with a seven-person team. And while they come from very different professional backgrounds, Nick with more of a relationship and storytelling orientation, Taylor from the analytical and private equity side, they’ve built the firm around a shared philosophy tied to what they call personal significance, personal wealth, and personal value. A big part of that philosophy, or the north star as they put it, is applying some of the same accountability and long-term thinking frameworks commonly seen in private equity to the advisory relationship itself, not in a transactional sense, but in helping clients think more intentionally about decision-making, alignment, and outcomes over long periods of time. As a result, our conversation delves deeply into the private equity world, reframing how clients and advisors should consider this important tool as both a growth mechanism and a strategic part of their client’s plans. We talk about how that perspective also shapes not only how they think about serving business owners specifically, but also the role private equity should play in wealth management. Then we take a view of their long runway and how they and other younger advisors might see things differently about building firms today and why clarity of vision may matter more than sheer scale in the years ahead, and much, much more. It’s a narrative that is refreshing and informative, so let’s get to it. Taylor, Nick, thank you so much for joining. Walk us through your background. What brought you to the world of wealth management? Nick, let’s start with you. Nick Hubert: Sure. I think I got my first taste of the industry actually in a sophomore year of college internship, or I interned at Morgan Stanley here in Oregon. I studied finance and accounting at University of Oregon, and so I had this affinity for finance and markets and had that privilege of having that internship. So I had it early on in my career. Ultimately ended up setting my sights on doing investment banking and going that route and did that for a short period of time. Ended up not going very long due to a medical reason, so you don’t have to be that sorry for me. And ultimately started my career in business consulting before pretty quickly realizing that I want to get back to finance, back to investing these things that just felt like core competencies and that thing that you keep coming back to when you’re alone in the middle of the night thinking about stuff, it was always that. Just had this desire to work with smaller units than large corporations, which is great for wealth where you get to work with families and small businesses. And so it was just a natural alignment that took me back full-time to the space in 2016. Jason Diamond: I like the framing it through the size of the unit you’re working with and having more of an impact on the family. Taylor, what about you? Taylor Gentry: I’m a little more circuitous, if you will. Spent a couple of years in investment banking, so you can be sorry for me. Nick and I met in undergrad at the University of Oregon, had the opportunity to work in this investment group together where we were investing a portion of the university’s endowment. And like Nick, interned in wealth management and kind of walked away from it going, “Boy, that’s boring. I don’t really like that.” And so moved to New York, cut my teeth in banking for a couple years and we were working… So an investment bank for context, helping companies raise debt, raise equity, and with mergers and acquisitions, we’re working with huge companies. So the Mattels of the world, the largest toy company in the world. Like Nick, realized, “Hey, I’m going to work with smaller companies that we can get our arms around a little bit better and be more helpful with and have a bigger impact on.” So spent about 10 years with a private equity firm in the western half of the US and we invested in companies in what’s referred to as the lower middle market. So companies doing 50 to 300 million of revenue. And we would invest in those companies, grow those businesses and then look to sell them. Awesome experience, learned a ton, got a bunch of experience around how to invest in companies, how to grow businesses. Then had the opportunity to step into the CFO seat of a couple of different operating companies during that time. It was just a great learning ground, but also to see a whole bunch of different situations. Nick and I have always invested in things together. We’ve worked on things together and we’ve always wanted to work together full time. And a few years ago, the stars really just aligned to say, “Hey, what would it look like to create a differentiated offering in the wealth space where we can blend my background on companies, transactions, how to draw on scale and all those pieces and really marry that with the wealth management piece?” And Nick will get into that further, but it’s just a really unique way to partner with families and companies that are smaller which can have a really high impact experience with those families and really move them through their life journey, if you will. Jason Diamond: Yeah, there’s a lot to unpack there and we’ll get to some of the elements of how you run the business today. First of all, you can’t fool me by using a toy company as your example to make investment banking more interesting. I’m just kidding. Actually, my real takeaway there is you have a skillset that is incredibly relevant in the current wealth management ecosystem, especially in the model you’re currently in. So let’s talk about that a little. Tell us about your current chapter, which is Panoramic Capital Partners. Who do you serve? What types of clients? Give me some perspective on size as well. Nick Hubert: I'm going to take this first. Taylor can do the PE background side and give you a bunch of numbers. I’ll give you the story and see if we can piece it together that way. Jason Diamond: I get the impression you guys use that line a lot. Nick Hubert: Oh, no, that’s the first time. How’d it land? Jason, I spent eight years at our prior firm with our third founding partner, Andrew, and he was at that firm for 30 years. And so we’ve got this core DNA that we’ve always carried of serving high net worth families in a very holistic and deep planning-based capacity, which I think a lot of modern firms say that. And so that’s not necessarily that different, but it is a DNA that carries through. When we got struck with this vision of launching Panoramic and what inspired us to build the firm, it was as, Taylor outlined, around this idea of how do we partner with entrepreneurs and business owners more holistically across their entire entrepreneurial journey, not just around the exit as is so often where the gravity of the conversation sits. And so our firm vision and inspiration was all around that. And since launching in May of 2024, it has been about how do we bring that vision to life with a different business model. And to your point, there’s a bunch to unpack there, but that is ultimately the founding vision of what we are trying to build here overall and what inspires us every day to say, how do we, as Taylor mentioned, bring the combination of skillsets to bear in a way that allows us to be a better partner along the entirety of the journey as opposed to just towards the end when assets traditionally show up, so to speak? So that’s a story from a vision perspective. Taylor, I don’t know what you want to add to that. Taylor Gentry: As Nick outlined, it’s the ability to work with folks throughout the lifecycle. So in private equity, you invest in a company, you work with that management team for three to seven years and then you sell the business and move on to the next project or deal. And really, it’s the deal mechanic that is the value creation. Whereas, with what we are building here, we have the opportunity to really step along the journey with folks when they are in the early phases building what we talk about as the middle phase of allocating, and we’ll talk about this further, and then really the third phase of stewarding capital along the way. And it’s a life cycle or entrepreneurial journey that we’re able to be hand in hand with folks over decades opposed to measured in three to five year spans. Jason Diamond: So it sounds, and you’ve both kind of touched on this now, your different backgrounds, you view as very much a positive because it gives you, Taylor, the more in the weeds analytical perspective. Nick, you’re probably more the storyteller. Do you find that to be a benefit when you’re running your firm every day? And are there instances when it’s a negative? Is there ever a time when you say, Taylor, just maybe more for you, not coming from this world, you don’t speak the same language? Nick Hubert: Do you want me to drop off the call so Taylor can be honest and he can give you the scoop and then he can jump off and I’ll give you the scoop? Taylor Gentry: Jason, we talk about that a lot, honestly. I think it is atypical for someone with my background to step into the wealth space maybe more so. And we leverage that because we have the ability to work with folks on how do you drive value in the company, how do you set the business up for a potential sale exit or transition internally? But this business, historically, we’ve talked about it as almost like two tracks. You have Taylor on the quote unquote business consulting or the business work track and you have Nick on a wealth management track. It’s really not the case. And really, the power is the ability for these two pieces to come together and there isn’t a conversation we have with clients where those two perspectives and backgrounds or contexts aren’t married into one to create really truly holistic advice. And so Nick will probably tell you otherwise, but I haven’t seen an area yet where our two backgrounds has been a negative. It’s actually been immensely positive. And then on top of it, in terms of kind of building out the firm, Nick is more of a traction visionary and I’m more of the traction implementer. What’s amazing about it from our perspective is the partnership we have allows us to, A, recognize that, B, name it, and then C, leverage it in terms of being able to dole out duties and maximize our success together. Jason Diamond: Nick, anything you’d add? Nick Hubert: I think that’s all right. I mean, Jason, your question was from an operational perspective. I think a lot of Taylor’s view is from a client perspective, which is spot on that the overlap of that is really helpful for clients and I think what allows it to be a different experience for them. Internally, operationally, I think that where you could see friction there amongst partners with differences, and I think you do see that, and at the same time, Google was the one who did team research 15 years ago where they put out what you really want, is similarity and vision and differences in skillset when building a team. And so I think we’ve been intentional about that and it’s been really helpful for… Taylor and I functionally met in a quasi-professional setting back in 2011 and developed a friendship quickly, so we’ve got that deep level of friendship that underpins all of it. And same with Andrew and our time working together. So part of it is there’s just such a strength of relationship amongst us that we give space for each other’s differences and look for those as assets as opposed to negatives, but in some sense, beauty in the eye of the beholder as is the case with anything. Jason Diamond: Yep. I appreciate you adding that context. I’ll be honest that when I first encountered your firm, my reaction was your core value prop of serving business owners is not all that differentiated. And then I learned more about the way in which you serve business owners. Can you talk about that? Because a lot of advisors in general, but then I think more specifically, a lot of RIAs would say, “We service primarily business owners.” Tell me how do you do it in a way that’s different and meaningful? Nick Hubert: I’ll take a first stab at that and then Taylor can maybe add on with specific stories. The wealth space is an awesome business and it’s a place where it’s very difficult to differentiate. And so we think a lot about that through the lens of how do we grow this business well for the long period of time to create opportunities for clients and employees. And so we spent a lot of time thinking about that, not only for the sake of differentiation, but also how do we actually just continue to add value to clients? Because if we add value in a different way, growth will take care of itself. I’d say one way of cutting that is we revisit the mission is through this idea of, okay, if I want to be a partner along the journey, it’s about more than a single transaction, more than a single exit, whatever that might be, or a series of transactions as wealth is often created over a series of transactions. It’s this idea of how do we focus on wealth creation and driving business value as the engine of wealth creation for entrepreneurs and what we call personal significance, which is the life of the entrepreneur. And so there’s a next click down framing of our framework that we work through that lens. I think the most important piece for us has been how do we build a business model that actually brings that to life and that’s the trick because we can say that, and if we basically still just operate out of an AUM-based or an asset advisory fee-based business, the reality is my incentive is still towards getting assets out of the entrepreneurial environment, so to speak, into a place that I can manage them, which may or may not be the best thing for the entrepreneur based on where they are at. And so our current work continues to be around how do we build that business model. So layering in different ways of engaging, whether it’s a retainer fee or some other way of engaging so we can start earlier when assets aren’t there and actually encourage the entrepreneur, “No, keep reinvesting in your business. It’s your highest rate of return right now and it’s where the investment needs to go.” I don’t want to have a conflict in giving that advice. And so I think step two here has been building that business model from an actual engagement perspective to enable us to enact the vision. And then I think the third piece is how do we then build tools that are different than just evaluating pre-exit planning, and as is so often, the toolkit, but actually saying, okay, what are the value drivers of a business? And this is probably where Taylor has a lot more to add because it’s 101 of the PE model, but how do we take the mission and vision of an entrepreneur, what we call north stars, translate those into value drivers, ensure those tie to strategic initiatives in the business, ensure it ties to reporting, and ultimately, how capital is allocated between the business and other investments? So then that’s our toolkit that we continue to build out to deploy the mission through our business model with tools that back it up. So that’s how we frame it right now. Taylor, we can share stories about how that’s come to fruition to create different outcomes. Jason Diamond: Taylor, I’d love to hear that. Let me just add maybe my understanding, because this is what helped me, I think, to really understand how you defer, and Nick and Taylor, correct me if I’m wrong, it sounds like the typical advisor thinks about an entrepreneur, a business owner relationship as the next liquidity event in most cases. And you take the viewpoint that it’s a journey, in some instances, 30 years in the making. It’s not even about liquidity event might come that’s beside the point. Is that a fair summary? Taylor Gentry: Yeah. We talk about it as a growing business is a healthy business, a business that is creating incremental value and adding to the multiple in terms of how the business is valued in the marketplace is a healthy business. And so whether you are going to sell that business or retain that business into perpetuity, let’s make a really valuable business and grow a very healthy business. And that’s what we do with clients. Nick laid out the north star framework. And so how do we actually go about engaging with folks on a practical level? It does start with the north star framework. It’s got five steps to it as Nick outlined in terms of defining the north star, where we’re going, what we’re trying to do and that’s across those three pillars, personal significance, personal wealth and business value. And that personal significance has to be held at that same level. Otherwise, we find folks that are mid 50s, their business is crazy valuable, they’ve got a lot of dollars, but their family life isn’t where they want it to be because they didn’t take care of that along the way. So we lay out a place map that says, “Hey, these are the north stars that we are aligning on and coming back to every month when we work with these owners.” We then push that into, okay, what are we trying to do on the business side of the equation? Let’s lay out what is going to drive the value of the business from a multiple and enterprise value perspective. We push that into a set of strategic initiatives that is tactical, who owns what, when’s it getting done, and are we red, yellow or green on it? We then build out the performance reporting package with folks. And so that is a monthly reporting package that says what happened last month and what operational data are we looking at to be able to improve the business month over month and get a good feedback loop going into the company. And then the last piece is around capital allocation that Nick mentioned where if the business generates a million dollars, where’s that capital going? I think there’s a lot in there and it’s really deep, but if you zoom all the way back out, it’s take a private equity style playbook where private equity firms come and invest in a company. And what do they do after close? They put in place good financial reporting, good operational reporting, and then hold the team accountable to that reporting and those results on a monthly, quarterly, and annual basis. And so this is not rocket science or something that’s never been seen before. It’s just most business owners that have never experienced this private equity world don’t have access to it and don’t know how to go about doing it. It’s a relatively long process to get that installed with companies and with teams to really dig in and understand it, but it’s building out those packages to be able to say, “Okay, what happened last month? What changes do we need to make and what are we doing from a initiative perspective to drive the business forward?” So to Nick’s point, it was previously, this was all about liquidity planning or from a wealth management perspective, it’s about the exit. This is about how do we make a more valuable business along the way, and that’s going to be good for the entrepreneur as they move through the journey. Nick Hubert: When we were around the dinner table, the proverbial dinner table creating the vision of this firm, it was around this idea of the silver tsunami and everything that everybody reads in the headlines of this massive wave of transition, this generational transition of business ownership that we could help facilitate. So we launched with that thesis in some sense. In addition to this broader journey perspective, we have gotten to this place by following the market and listening to what entrepreneurs actually want through the big unlock was honestly in a deal process with one of our clients where we realized, “This is a great deal. This person’s going to put a ton of money in their pockets, secure their future,” and it’s completely the wrong outcome for the entrepreneur because it’s thinking all about the deal, not thinking about what this person didn’t want was an exit. They wanted a different relationship with their business, and that required, what do you actually want out of life, that personal significance piece? And it required, “Hey, if we can actually create a layer of team members and reporting that allows you to manage this like a board chair would do as opposed to a highly engaged CEO. That’s actually what you want. You don’t want out of this business. You want to still have this be a huge rock in your life.” And so we’ve ran through that door, said no to the deal with them and have been building the infrastructure around this, and that was the unlock and aha moment for us. There’s something bigger here and that’s what then inspired, in some sense, the broader build out of the toolkit, but I think puts more meat on the bone of actually saying no to a deal, which is not the classic wealth manager outcome to get to a way better outcome for the client and is ultimately still an awesome client for us as a firm and somebody that we can go build with for the next 20 years. I think just telling it through the lens of a story that’s different than what’s normal, so to speak, is a way to frame that up. Jason Diamond: It’s such a hyper focus on a fairly long-term and honestly nebulous potential outcome. You don’t have certainty. That, I think, is why most advisors would prefer the near-term liquidity. I mean, it’s not a secret, right? You can bill on assets, firms are incentivizing it and it’s a pretty direct recipe to net new asset growth, but it’s certainly a refreshing point of view. It resonates with me. I’m wondering if it’s resonated with clients and prospects. I guess what I’m asking is, do they feel that this is something different than the typical wealth management experience for this type of client? Nick Hubert: Yeah, Taylor, tell that story of the guy who said, “I’ve had this, but I felt alone.” I think that story of partnership, you tell pretty well. Taylor Gentry: Yeah. Jason, it was actually that same client, he had a investment banker, a wealth manager, attorney, and a CPA. CPA said, “The deal’s terrible, you shouldn’t do the deal.” Investment bankers obviously incentivized to do the deal. And so he’s saying, “You should do the deal.” That’s how he gets paid. He had a wealth manager who was silent and he had an attorney who just pushing paperwork. Jason Diamond: It’s like the start of a bad joke. Taylor Gentry: Yeah. No, seriously, it’s pretty remarkable. It’s like this guy did what he was supposed to do. He put the team of resources around himself. He got professionals in the seat. It’s that no one could connect the dots of all four of those people because they have the seat of those four people. And so it’s really resonated because there’s an ability to see a bigger picture and connect these dots and say, “Okay, this investment banker is saying X because of A, B and C.” And the CPA is saying it’s a bad deal and that it’s not a market deal. It’s 100% a market deal. This deal is right down the fairway in terms of what the market should value your company at and they just don’t understand how the transaction mechanics should work. And so it’s worked really well from that perspective of being able to be the quarterback or centralized point or personal CFO for folks in understanding where interests lie and also being able to think about what they are pursuing in a bit of a different lens. I think the second piece on that is where does it resonate for folks? I think that there is a gap in the marketplace that we are still working to close, and that gap is that business owners do not know what this monthly reporting package looks like. They do not know what really good reporting on their business looks like in terms of they have always run their… You’ve got a business owner. They’ve run their business for 10 or 20 years. They have a pulse on the business from their gut feel. That does not mean that the business has been optimized, is ready to go to the next level or is ready for a transaction and go through a transaction because they have not done the work on the backend to understand the moving pieces of the business at a granular level. This recording package, we oftentimes get this confusion around, well, I’ve got a temporary CFO or a controller or X, Y, Z. That is very different than what we’re talking about. Well, that is all accounting, close the books, have clean numbers. What we’re talking about is how do I marry operational data in the business, number of units ships, number of jobs completed, time on job, operational data to the financials in the business so I can then go make adjustments operationally on how to improve the business and continue taking steps forward. Jason Diamond: It’s very clear. Nick, anything you’d want to add to that? Nick Hubert: I’d say it’s easy to still cut that from a deal lens and say, look, when an investment partner comes to evaluate a business to sit in their seat for a moment, they’re going to look at the replicability of what that leader has done without that leader still in the seat. And if so many businesses are still reliant on that person and this gets talked about as processes, reporting systems, that ultimately results in a discount to the value of the business because although it can be viewed… For the leader, it’s like, it’s that control thing that entrepreneurs deal with. It’s what made them good. It’s what got you there. And so that transition is really hard. And that’s important from a deal lens because that does a direct impact to value. And to widen out the scope beyond the deal and to think about the entrepreneur’s life, this goes back to the dynamic that a lot of times entrepreneurs look for the exits because they’ve built something that it’s now owning them and what they’ve built is not resulting in the life that they want. And so how can we use this system to actually change that relationship, as I mentioned earlier, with the business so that they can run it more like an executive might and get out of the knife fight, so to speak, that often is how this can feel for a lot of folks, even for pretty large businesses. It can just feel like you’re a firefighter, you’re in a knife fight, whatever you want to use for that terminology. I think it’s as much about creating a different life outcome and different relationship and owning and leading a business as it is in driving deal value. Jason Diamond: Taylor, maybe I’ll ask this of you. Forgive the question, but private equity, I think in our space, has a little bit of a negative stigma at the moment. I don’t think that’s true across the board. I think people appreciate generally the need for capital and there are certainly benefits of private equity. But I’ll say as a whole, advisors are, let’s say, suspicious of private equity. You ever get that pushback? Does anybody ever view your experience or the way you position the story as a negative? Taylor Gentry: I think most people that we talk to don’t know what private equity is. They may have seen it in the headlines. They may have some sort of connotation around it. They won’t come out and say that they don’t like it. They don’t know why they don’t like it. The average American business owner, they don’t know what it is or what it means. So yes, you do have to fight that because of the headline piece around private equity, bad actor ABC, and that’s what gets the headlines. I think what private equity is really good at is taking a business that is not optimized or not running on systems and processes that it can run on. Again, it's not rocket science is not crazy hard. It’s just the private equity world has created ways to install systems and process that improve the value of the business by way of providing visibility to financials and operations in a way that the owner previously didn’t have. And so for us, we view it not by any means as the end all be all or the answer. There are clients we’ve worked with that have taken private equity capital and grown successfully, executed on some acquisitions and then exited again. There are clients that have evaluated those transactions and said, “Hey, not for me.” We are actually fairly agnostic to it. What we really spend a lot of our time on is what are we solving for? What’s the end game? How do we use this private equity transaction to get to where we’re trying to go and is it what we want at the end of the day? Because the reality is, if you’re going to stay on and run that business with private equity investment in, there’s a higher expectation on what you need to do Monday morning than when you owned it yourself and it was a little bit of your personal piggy bank too. Jason Diamond: I love it because you bring it back to the north star concept. Taylor Gentry: Yes, that’s exactly right. It’s what are we solving for and what game are we playing to be able to get to where we ultimately want to go? And for, as Nick mentioned that client that turned down the deal, it was a private equity investment. We got very clear with that, “Hey, here are going to be the expectations. You will have a monthly financial reporting call. You’re going to have quarterly board meetings.” These are things that need to happen in this business to be able to upgrade the management and cadence in this company. You don’t have to do it all tomorrow, but that is how you make a more valuable company, is installing some of these systems, process and cadence. And so we’re working with him now on doing that, just in a private context instead of in the private equity backed environment. Nick Hubert: I think there are three things embedded in this. I’d say number one, to Taylor’s point, this is a massive black box, in some ways by design. Wall Street’s had not a great reputation for a very long time of putting things behind the paywall, so to speak. And so we think a lot about our job as empowerment and education. Jason Diamond: Education, yep. Nick Hubert: Yeah. And so part of it is just, number one, how do we just demystify this thing and name things and take away the go to or bad? Because it can be that, but it should not be that from a core basis. That’s number one. Number two, a lot of entrepreneurs feel like they cannot get access to this ability to professionalize or level up or whatever these things are without bringing on that investment partner. And so part of our motivation is how do we actually bring this skillset in without needing to bring on an investment partner because oftentimes, that investment partner comes when you’re done, and so you don’t actually get to experience it. That’s number two. Number three is, Jason, part of your point earlier was like there’s still a trap here of potentially being able to get motivated primarily by the exit. And so again, that gets back to our business model, making sure our price Racing is right, all that good stuff. And it’s also the reality that a lot of businesses, if you just look at a very broad scope of American businesses, a lot of them don’t have value in the marketplace in a massively material way and/or won’t exit in a traditional way. And so the wealth creation journey then becomes much more of a conversation of, how do we manage the balance between investing in the company and distributing out of the company to invest elsewhere because we should actually be creating investment assets along the way because when you get to the exit, there’s no better power position at the moment of exit than already having financial security to some degree and giving you choice in the right deal, not the highest and best deal because you need to fill the piggy bank for retirement. Jason Diamond: I just want to be sure to ask because you did mention a couple times your pricing structure. How have you set it up so that you can be more agnostic about this as opposed to the typical… You want to talk about it for a minute? Nick Hubert: As it’s structured now, it starts with a retainer earlier on where we are working… As Taylor mentioned, we are going deep in the operational build of the business. We will do that on a monthly retainer. We’re engaging consistently. As assets get built up and if assets get built up, we start to chew that retainer down as assets go up. I think what we are ideally trying to figure out, and still honestly have not figured out yet, is how do we get to parity so that we don’t create an… I want to be able to work agnostically with a client to say- Jason Diamond: Yeah, I love it. Nick Hubert: … regardless of how I’m engaging with you, that’s the goal. So I’d say we haven’t cracked the code on exactly what that is yet, but mechanically, we’ve got the levers to pull to say how we price and move that retainer down is basically allowing to keep it at par, so to speak, for the client and allowing us to say, “I’m here to engage in making the best wealth creation outcome for you along the way, whether that’s investing in the business or investing outside the business.” Jason Diamond: I think that’s the right recipe. I agree. The levers can be fine-tuned, but to me, that’s the model you want to create where you can credibly look your prospects and clients in the eyes and tell them, “Our job is to serve you in the best way… We’re sitting on the same side of the table as you.” I want to turn this inward for a second. The home cooking concept. M&A, within the RIA independent space, is obviously a hot topic. Have you thought about it? Do you think it’s a critical part of a potential growth trajectory of a healthy, independent firm? I’m curious your perspective. I feel you, Taylor in particular, probably have a unique lens on this coming from the world you came from. Taylor Gentry: Yeah, Jason, I think if Nick and I wanted to put as much money as we possibly could in our pockets as fast as humanly possible. It’s a pretty easy recipe. It’s go get some private equity capital backer, roll up a few RIAs, get to a few billion of AUM and then sell it to the next private equity firm or roll it to the next private equity firm, do that a few times. We’d all make plenty of money and go on our way. We’ve been really intentional on this front, and again, I talk about this is what we want to do for the next 30 plus years. And really being intentional around building a business that has that enduring nature to it, decided to take private equity capital on, you are on a shot clock to some degree. Yes, you’re trying to build a best business, all of those pieces. You get cadence. You get capital. There’s a ton of value there, but you are on a shot clock that is not a shot clock we’re trying to get on at this stage. I’d say we opportunistically are looking at acquisitions. So we think about it, and Nick and I talk about it all the time, how much of our time should we be spending on acquisitions? And we think of it as 80/20 or even 90/10, 80% or 90% organic growth-focused, 10 to 20% acquisitions-focused. And so we’re actively evaluating those consistently and see deals on a monthly basis that we look at and evaluate, but it’s less of the focus today than it could be down the road. Jason Diamond: And Nick, do you think of that when you guys talk? Do you guys call that your true north? Do you think the same way you coach your clients and prospects to say, “For right now, it wouldn’t be the right move for us to take private equity capital and to do this acquisition rollup strategy because A, B and C are more important for us”? Nick Hubert: Yes. I think if we take our life north star for Taylor. I’m speaking for Taylor, but we’re close and so we share this of… To Taylor’s point, the life outcome of scaling that quickly with that type of capital backing is likely to create a life that I don’t actually want that’s not good for me, not good for my family, and honestly, not good for our clients at this point. And so that overrides in this case, even though the wealth, north star might say, “Hey, absolutely do that.” At some point something has to win. And so that is true. At the business side, as the north star is motivated by this mission of the entire entrepreneur journey, the worst thing I could do is shortcut my ability to be on that journey for a long period of time. One of our friends in this space says, “The best thing I can do for my clients is still be in the seat 30 years from now because I’ve lived a good life that enables that.” And I think that’s spot on for us, is everything, it’s so easy in today’s world to be consumed by short-termism and we are intentional in ensuring that we don’t succumb to that. While still recognizing to your point, I mean, you’re in this all day, Jason, right? There’s a massive opportunity in front of us to be thoughtful about how acquisitions fit into this. And I think we want to be open to that in a way that ensures we just don’t lose the core of the goodness of what we’re trying to build. Jason Diamond: I think that’s the right answer. The only wrong answer in my mind is we’re not open to this or we’re closed to it. To not at least be opportunistically aware of the dynamics in the market, I think is naive. But also, I’ll be honest, Nick, when I think about the concept of the north star, I have a hard time imagining, because we use a similar concept when we counsel advisors. What is your true north or your north star and your best business life, whatever you want to call it? To me, it does include absolutely the personal piece. I think it’s hard to define it only on the economic verticals because, I mean, I think about this for a transitioning advisor. Almost never is the conversation about crunch the spreadsheet and get us the biggest check possible. It’s, yeah, sure, transition capital is important, but it’s let’s also, we want a better work life and we want freedom to market and blah, blah, blah. To me, I think it’s a completely fair way. You two are looking at it at least for now and I assume you reserve the right to revise that opinion down the line. Nick Hubert: I think acquiring for size and scale is as often the headline is, yeah, we’re not into that at this point because I think… And yet, hey, if the right acquisition with the right people came along in that, we’d be extremely excited and would move very quickly to execute on that. So it’s a little bit of a both hand. Taylor Gentry: Yeah. Jason, I think it goes without saying, but my background on having done a bunch of transactions of businesses like this, it’s a natural fit for us to have this as a lever. And so we are looking at deals. We just haven’t prioritized it as the top priority. Jason Diamond: I think also where you are, 2024 was the launch of the business. It’s pretty common to see, all right, let’s nail this, let’s get our feet under us, client service model and then we’ll start to think about that down the line. A couple other things I want to ask you about running an independent firm. This is a pretty glowingly positive review, I think, of your ability to service clients, your ability to grow and to build and run the business that you want. Has there been anything negative that you haven’t enjoyed about running and operating this business, other than working with each other, of course? Nick Hubert: No, I was going to say, I’m like, can we get Taylor off the call again? Taylor Gentry: Jason, maybe I’ll take a first cut at it. I think for both Nick and I, it’s just the administrative components of running an independent business that we don’t enjoy candidly. I don’t think many people would. That said, you come full circle and it is a pretty glowingly positive review of running an independent business because we get to run it in the way that we see fit. And oh, by the way, we use the same things that we use with our clients. So the value drivers we’ve talked about, we have a value drivers worksheet. We refresh it every six months. Nick, Andrew, and I get together every six months and we’re 18 months into this thing and we’ve already got this cadence and system to it, if you will. So I personally really enjoy the running the business piece of it from a macro perspective. Yeah, I’m responsible for running our fee billing and running the math on all that and getting that done, for example. Jason Diamond: I think that’s actually a very thoughtful answer. And I appreciate you saying I enjoy running… I feel the same way, by the way. There’s some elements of running a business that I think are immensely fun. I think it gets painted with this brush of, “Ugh, running the business is the hassle and I want to work in the business.” Agreed, nobody likes invoicing and accounts receivable for the most part, but Nick, what are your thoughts on this? Nick Hubert: Yeah, I think mine is different a little bit coming from a different background where it’s easier for me to sit with the rose-colored glasses of the joy of the freedom that we have in this model. At the same time, when I’m counseling folks who are talking with folks or mentoring folks, younger people who are thinking about, “Okay, I want to go start my own thing,” I’m like, “Hey, it’s like I’m the same way. I want to look in the mirror and think I’m the boss or I’m one of the bosses and we get to go build this.” Then the reality is, at the end of the day, if there was something that you didn’t want to do that had to get done and you didn’t do it, you got to look in the mirror and be like, “Well, you’re the boss, you didn’t do it.” It’s the both sides of the coin that I think a positive, negative cut is one way to look at that because it can feel that way sometimes. And the reality is every job has 20 to 30% of it that you just don’t enjoy doing, and that’s totally true. Jason Diamond: It’s why they call it work. That’s why they pay you. Nick Hubert: They’d be pretty quick to point out that I’m the one of the partnership group that they’re going to have to chase for a smaller administrative item because, yeah, I honestly, just similarly speaking, don’t enjoy that. I want to go talk to clients. I want to go focus on building what we’re building. In finance speaks, it is a higher beta to just the all encompassing realities of running a business that is really hard to underscore without being in the seat. And yeah, there’s definitely 20 to 30% of that I would love to wave a magic wand and say, I don’t have to do anymore. Jason Diamond: Yeah, I appreciate that. Nick Hubert: You can’t have one without the other. It’s both sides. Jason Diamond: I think it’s getting easier and I think it’s getting more offloadable and some of it probably gets more… In some ways, more offloadable as you scale, but then you get a new set of problems, probably two, because you’re dealing with bigger… It’s a never ending. I think most business owners would agree with that. And you said it well, you take the good with the bad and overwhelmingly, most people we speak with in the independent space feel as you do, which is, are there things I would prefer to offload or that I would prefer not to do? Of course, but that’s almost just the price you pay for the freedom and for doing all the things you want to do. Two more questions that I want to be sure to ask about where this has been a great episode. One is AI. Need to know your thoughts. Is this coming for our jobs? Do you think your firm is positioned to capture either asset flows or also just to leverage this technology and use it to serve clients better? Just give me your thoughts. Nick Hubert: I think, in some sense, it would be irresponsible as people this early in our entrepreneurial journey and thinking about how do we optimize what we do for clients to not be engaging with AI in some way, shape or form, at least in an evaluative posture. So we are actively, in a bunch of different ways, whether it’s buy it off the shelf or build it, continuing to find ways to think about, not only how do we drive efficiency, because there’s an obvious surface level dynamic of if I can save time and spend more time with clients, that is a go to thing objectively. And there’s this deeper dynamic of if it can amplify what… Actually, back to your prior question, if it can amplify what I’m best at and enjoy and reduce what I don’t enjoy, that’s a massive win. And I think we’re on the surface of seeing that. That’s the opportunity we are motivated by that and pursuing that. And at the same time, I would say an operational principle that really is important to us, and you can almost call it a north star within the business is client security can never be put at risk for the sake of our own growth, our own efficiency, or anything else. There’s, I think, still a question mark as to how we think about trusting this. And so we are very cautious as we think about we will never try to move so quickly on any technology, whether it’s AI or otherwise that we risk our clients in some way, shape or form, because the reality is we are also in a context where AI is, when pulled, one of the least popular things happening in the world today for the average American. And so there’s no kudos here for being a leader. Jason Diamond: I totally agree. The first mover advantage here is slim to none. Nick Hubert: Yeah, you don’t want to be the one sticking your neck out on this in our industry. And yet there still objectively has a potential to be better for the clients. Navigating that I think is messy. Taylor Gentry: I think the only thing I’d add, which is pretty short, is the use of these tools has the ability to create a better deliverable for clients on a more consistent basis. And marrying that with exactly what Nick just outlined around the risk is really the magic piece here. And so I think, to the extent we can get it implemented effectively with the security, but also with, this is going to result in a lot better outcome for clients across the board, that’s a pretty attractive objective to go after and it’s pretty exciting to be in the industry with that now on the forefront in terms of ability to improve that experience over time. Jason Diamond: Yeah. No, that’s a good color to add. I want to end here with a potential HR violation, but you’ll forgive me. I’m not going to ask about age, but you are clearly both relatively young advisors. And this is a hot button issue in our industry, the idea that there are not a lot of talented, young next gen advisors at a time when a lot of gen one or older advisors are retiring out of the business. So what would you say… I think one of you made the comment earlier, it’s not necessarily the coolest industry to go into at 23 years old right out of school. I think more commonly people go into sales and trading, investment banking or some of the other finance verticals. What would you say to younger folks interested in wealth? And maybe I’d ask also, do you have any thoughts on how we solve this next gen talent crisis? And if you’re both secretly 90 years old, you can just do it. Taylor Gentry: You talking my internal age or my actual age? Jason Diamond: Why don’t you go first? Nick Hubert: Yeah, go ahead, Taylor. Taylor Gentry: I think there’s two threads here. The first is it’s not a sexy industry to go into and not as sexy as an investment banking, private equity shtick, if you will. I think from my perspective, it’s really important what you’re working on. The ability to be in a firm like what we are building with the diversity of work that is available is a little bit like the world’s your oyster and we’re designing it with that in mind. For Nick and I, the ability to work on many different situations throughout the day and throughout the week is actually why this business is so attractive and interesting and why we want to do it for 30 years. And so we’re building with that context. And so, in some ways, it’s almost like a plug for younger advisors, the ability to work in a firm like what we’re building where you’ve got this diversity of work that is not just trading stocks and bonds or just spreadsheeting or just financial planning. This is a much broader expression and experience than what I would call “traditional” wealth management. So I think that’s the key on that front. Then, on the talent development side of the equation, if you will, this AI thing is going to be a big question mark. And what I mean by that is there is significant training that will be required in, call it traditional wealth management or the firm we’re building with regard to folks’ ability to actually learn when you can plug it into AI and get an answer that you don’t have to critically question or think through. And so there’s going to be a significant learning curve for folks that we’re going to have to continue to train and educate on in order to produce talent that can be long-term sustainable and beneficial for clients more writ large. Jason Diamond: Nick. Nick Hubert: Well, first and foremost, we haven’t given our third partner enough here of time. I think we have a tremendous benefit of having a multi-generational team at the partnership level where he’s in his mid to late 50s and can bring that additional experience to bear and as is necessary, and as is important because investing is an experienced business and a lot of clients want that. And so the power of that matters. I think that actually speaks to firms being willing to think of partnership at that level that partnership is not reserved for just once you’ve been there for a long time. So I think it’s getting at like, how do you share ownership earlier, do it in a way that is actually giving people a stake in the outcome and allowing that elevation to happen. I think that’s number one. Number two, honestly, the existence of people like you and your team and that your family has built over the years, Jason, is awesome. And because of the ability for you to help people navigate and see how easy it is to actually run this business and build this business in some sense… And that’s in the broader spectrum of having seen. We work with so many different types of companies. We sometimes say our business is so much easier to run and it has come so far with technology and with people like you who are providers to us to allow it to be easier for us so to speak. That’s a big deal. I think that should be talked about more that there is a massive… What that allows is more time to, as Taylor mentioned, build what you actually want because you can outsource the compliance piece in a major way that allows you to not spend as much time on that as you used to. So I don’t think that gets talked about enough. And I think if you just zoom out and view this in the perspective of post-2020, there was this massive movement of entrepreneurship through acquisitions and people looking at this idea of how do I get the life I want by way of not having to be on a two-year clock to go to the next job to the next job. Have something that I can have a long-term impact on where I get to build something and have employees. This is the perfect space for that because it’s such an awesome business where you get to work so intimately with people and clients and their life outcomes. They’re, again, relatively speaking, easier businesses to run relative to what’s out there. I’m just baffled by the fact that it is not seen a larger wave of younger people coming out of these more “traditional” paths and seeing this as an awesome place when they’re willing to go buy an HVAC company. This is so much easier than that. So honestly, I think

In this episode, we kick things off by examining a major milestone in the autonomous trucking race as Pittsburgh-based Aurora Innovation launched its second-generation driverless hardware across ten commercial freight routes in the U.S. Sun Belt. Unlike its first-generation trucks, the new fleet is built to run with no passive observer at all, erasing what one Morgan Stanley analyst called "one of the last remaining asterisks around the technology." Engineered for a one-million-mile operating life and designed for volume production rather than pilot-scale trials, Aurora is leaning heavily on manufacturing partner Roush, which is targeting an annual production run-rate of one thousand trucks by year-end. Meanwhile, the nation's largest truckload carrier is declaring that a structural recovery is finally here. Knight-Swift Transportation reported second-quarter adjusted earnings per share of sixty-three cents, smashing consensus by twelve cents and coming in twenty-eight cents higher year-over-year. CEO Adam Miller credited aggressive regulatory enforcement by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and the Department of Transportation for forcing out non-compliant capacity and creating what the company called a "rapid progression in truckload market conditions." Contract rates climbed throughout the quarter, with revenue per loaded mile accelerating from low-single digits in April to eight percent in June, while Knight-Swift's tender rejection rate was twice the industry average. Finally, over on the rails, CSX is riding a powerful volume rebound to beat Wall Street expectations. The Jacksonville-based Class I railroad reported second-quarter revenue of three point nine four billion dollars, up ten point one percent year-over-year, while earnings per share came in at fifty-four cents, beating analyst consensus estimates by four point two percent. Carload volumes improved by six point one percent, a dramatic swing from just zero point one percent growth a year ago, with intermodal traffic surging across CSX's eastern U.S. network. Free cash flow swung dramatically from negative one hundred fifteen million dollars in the second quarter of twenty twenty-five to positive six hundred eighty-seven million dollars this quarter. Follow the FreightWaves Today Podcast Other FreightWaves Shows Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our CIO and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist Mike Wilson explains why market leadership is rotating beyond semiconductors and where investors may find opportunities despite near-term volatility.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript ----- Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Morgan Stanley's CIO and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist. Today on the podcast, I will explain why the recent volatility in markets makes sense. It's Wednesday, July 22nd at 2 p.m. in New York. So, let's get after it. The broadening trade is back and it's gaining steam. We established this thesis last week. Importantly, there's a key reason this broadening trade is likely to continue. One of the more crowded areas of the market—semiconductors—has lost its momentum. As I've also noted before, this is not a call that the AI cycle is over. However, stocks do trade on the rate of change in growth, and expectations often reach a place where they can no longer surprise on the upside. Earnings revisions tend to get too stretched, and capital starts looking for the next place where fundamentals are improving but positioning is still light. This is no different than what happened to other leadership groups earlier this year in areas like precious metals and energy stocks. Remember, I first made the call for market broadening in our November outlook. My view is that the economy had moved into a new expansion after the rolling recession ended in April 2025. Markets were starting to catch on before the Iran conflict interrupted that trend. Investors piled back into the AI trade—especially semis—as oil prices jumped and Fed expectations shifted more hawkish. Back in June, I noted that those earnings revisions were likely nearing their peak. Hyperscale stocks starting to lag was the first indication. Since semis ultimately depend on hyperscaler spending, that divergence usually doesn't last. It doesn't mean the buildout is ending. However, the spenders may be moving from blind enthusiasm to a more disciplined phase as a means of addressing the market's concerns about falling cash flows. We've seen this pattern before. Since ChatGPT launched, this ebbing and flowing between the hyperscaler and semiconductor stocks has happened three times. This is the fourth such adjustment, during which the hyperscaler stocks are likely to outperform the semis. Since a few weeks back, hyperscalers have outperformed semiconductors by almost 30 percent. Another consequence is that the major averages may trade lower in the near term. When a crowded, large-cap leadership group is unwinding, the index can look choppy even as the market underneath is improving. That's the key distinction. The index may struggle, but the broadening can still work. Over the next month, don't be surprised if the S&P 500 trades as low as 7000 before it makes a move to 8000 by year-end. Use this weakness to add to equity positions. I continue to like Consumer Discretionary Goods, Transports, and Biotech. Discretionary Goods remains one of the cleaner expressions of the broadening thesis. Wallet share is shifting from services back toward goods, goods pricing is improving, and earnings revisions are strengthening. Transports continue to show improving revisions as volumes stabilize and pricing gets better. Biotech is one of the more attractive lower-rate beneficiaries, especially if policy expectations are too hawkish, as I think they are. On that last point, the Fed backdrop matters. The June FOMC meeting told us forward guidance is going to be limited, and the inflation path is going to drive policy. The softer-than-expected inflation data last week should allow the Fed to stay on hold rather than hiking. It may take the bond market a few more data points to fully re-price this view. Bottom line, the broadening is in gear, but it may not feel comfortable because it's happening while the crowded momentum trade unwinds, a process that is likely unfinished. That's usually how rotations in market leadership work. Like spring, it's often: in like a lion and out like a lamb. Thanks for tuning in. I hope you found it informative and useful. Let us know what you think by leaving us a review. And if you find Thoughts on the Market worthwhile, tell a friend or colleague to try it out!

In the second part of our economic roundtable, Michael Gapen, Jens Eisenschmidt and Chetan Ahya join Seth Carpenter to discuss how central banks are balancing sticky inflation, resilient growth and regional policy trade-offs.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Seth Carpenter: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Seth Carpenter, Morgan Stanley's Global Chief Economist and Head of Macro Research. And once again today, I am joined by Morgan Stanley's chief regional economists: Michael Gapen, the Chief U.S. Economist, Jens Eisenschmidt, our Chief Europe Economist, and on the other side of the world, Chetna Ahya, our Chief Asia Economist. Yesterday, we talked about what's supporting growth around the world, especially AI spending in the U.S. and some government spending in Europe, and Asia's role in making all of this happen. Today, we're going to try to dig deeper and go into policy. It's Tuesday, July 21st at 10 am in New York Jens Eisenschmidt: And 4pm in Frankfurt. Chetan Ahya: And 10pm in Hong Kong. Seth Carpenter: Since the last time we did this in mid-April, I will say the debate around central banks has probably become more complicated. Global growth has held up, probably better than many people expected. And inflation, which picked up a lot, started to recede. But it has not gone away. And some of the forces helping to shape the economy, the AI spending, government spending, that possible upswing in manufacturing, that could keep demand strong, and it might keep pushing inflation higher. So, the question today is, if growth remains resilient, how much room really do central banks have to navigate? Mike, let me start with you because your call for the Fed here in the U.S. is out of consensus, or at least at odds with where the market is pricing things. We talked about the demand going from AI. You pointed out that imports are actually limiting how much domestic demand there is. So, what is the underlying story for inflation in the U.S.? And what does it mean for the Fed? Michael Gapen: So, our view is that inflation will come down in the U.S. So, we think disinflation will be driven by some payback in energy prices. Some payback from tariffs, which have pushed up goods prices over the last year. And some further diminishment in housing-related inflation, namely shelter. So, we think on a broad-based perspective, inflation has already peaked and will start moving lower. And we think we've seen evidence of this in recent inflation prints. A risk to that, though, is from the demand side of the economy and AI-related inflation in two parts. One, higher software prices, chipflation. So, the pass-through of some of the AI pricing components. Fortunately, here, they're about less than 1 percent of the consumer basket. So, we don't think that there's a great risk, a strong risk, a high risk of AI-related inflation in the consumer bundle. I think the real risk is that maybe we underestimate broad-based demand, animal spirits. And so, you might just see a broad-based increase in inflation from stronger demand. That'll be a little bit harder to see in real times. But our expectation is that inflation moves lower to about 3 percent, by the end of this year and closer to 2.5 percent next year. Seth Carpenter: All right. Thanks, Mike. And in fact, the most recent inflation report that we just got confirms your perspective that inflation should be coming down. And so, I guess the question then remains: What would it take for the Fed to hike this year if inflation has come down like we've seen? Michael Gapen: Well, I think that the answer there is that inflation wouldn't come down in line with our expectations. So, if the view is that energy prices, tariffs, and shelter inflation should provide plenty of offset and bring inflation down, I think the answer is you don't get payback. Explicitly, core goods prices stay elevated. Maybe we get ongoing disruptions in the Middle East that push energy prices higher and create second-round effects. So, I think inflation just lingering at elevated levels could mean the Fed gets brought in to raise rates in September or later this year. We think if they're patient enough, they'll see enough disinflation to keep them on the sidelines. But the risk is disinflation forecast is too optimistic, inflation stays firm, the Fed needs to raise rates. Seth Carpenter: All right, Jens, what about for you and the ECB? They've already raised interest rates once this year. I think you've got a forecast for them raising interest rates again in September. What could make you wrong about that forecast? What's going to make you convinced that you're right about that forecast? And is there a similar tension that the ECB is wrestling with that Mike talked about for the Fed? Jens Eisenschmidt: Yeah. I mean, starting with the last part of your question, I think no doubt, very similar tension. Just that, of course, it's less obvious. It's essentially a nuanced European version instead of the loud American version that we always stereotypically think the world looks like. So, essentially, we have here clearly not an AI boom. That, I mean, there's no question. And we have discussed that yesterday. Still, there is certainly the notion that the world demand is not really weak, and some of this will also arrive in Europe. And so, you have that tension between maybe there's more resilience than we had thought, and so inflation will not come down through to slack as much. And so, we might actually add something here in terms of monetary restrictiveness. Now, the other thing that is often forgotten, even though it's blatantly obvious, the starting point is just different. The ECB is running neutral monetary policy by all accounts. I mean, you could say 2 percent is neutral, and now they are 2.25. But, you know, there are ranges of uncertainty around any estimate. And the latest that they published runs – goes from 1.75 to 2;2.5. So basically, even if they were to increase rates to 2.5 in September, you could go with the microphone around the governing council, and you would probably find a lot of people saying, "Well, this is still a neutral policy." That's probably not the case for the U.S. So, I guess this matters here for that debate too. Seth Carpenter: All right. Yesterday we talked about lots of different things, but for Europe, we brought up fiscal policy. How do you think about fiscal policy and how it affects monetary policy? And so, I'm thinking about two channels. One, how much does the ECB care that if they keep pushing up interest rates, they're going to increase the debt service burden for countries that are already facing high debt costs? And second, is fiscal policy going to be the extra impetus for inflation that forces even more rate hikes from the ECB? Jens Eisenschmidt: I guess it depends on who you ask. Certainly, more concerned members in the governing council that would point to exactly that fiscal stimulus as a reason why interest rates have to be increased further from here. The other answer I would give is – probably for now at least, the view on fiscal policy is really model-based. You look at what type of increase in interest rate gets you essentially more fiscal restraint because there's an increase in interest rate bill and so less spending somewhere else. And that gets you basically less stimulus or less growth, I mean, very roughly speaking. I don't think it's a major concern for now. We haven't reached yet interest rates where this would start to play a role. I guess, again, Europe being fragmented as it is, with all the political risk that's around the corner. Think about the elections in France and Italy and Spain next year. That will very likely find itself expressed in spreads. And so, the higher the interest rates are, the larger the spreads could become. Seth Carpenter: So, for each of you, there's clearly a role for inflation. One of the risks we'll talk about maybe is inflation expectations and how maybe there's a big shift in what's going on with inflation. But Chetan, that brings me to you and Asia, because one economy where there unquestionably has been a fundamental shift in inflation and inflation expectation over the past several years is Japan. The Bank of Japan is on this normalization path where they're raising interest rates. Interest rates had been negative and then zero, and now they're gradually raising things up. Inflation has come back to Japan. Markets are looking at what the Bank of Japan is likely to do. Can you tell us a little bit about what our view is for the Bank of Japan this year and next? And what might make them hike interest rates faster than we think? And is there any risk that in fact they hike interest rates slower than we think? Chetan Ahya: Yeah, Seth. So, we are expecting BoJ to hike twice from here. The first rate hike is coming up in December of this year, and then another one coming up in June of next year. And then we think that, you know, the underlying inflation trend in Japan is not really that strong. So, while market pricing is for about three more rate hikes instead of two that we are building in our base case. And some of the macro investors are even talking about four more rate hikes. We think the underlying inflation trend warrants a caution and BoJ to go slowly than what the market is pricing in and what the macro investors are saying in. And the key part of our framework on thinking about Japan's inflation is that bulk of the explanation to inflation rise in Japan lies in currency moves. And secondarily, you can look at also the other drivers are more from supply side, which is higher energy prices or food prices. Whereas it's not driven so much by demand. To elaborate further on why it is not driven by demand, when you look at Japan's consumption trend, and if you index it to hundred at pre-COVID levels in September [20]19 then it's currently about 101; i.e., that it's just about 1 percent up over the last seven years. So that's a very tepid trend of consumption demand. And therefore, we don't think that BoJ needs to rush into hike in a more aggressive pace going forward. Seth Carpenter: So, there is this fundamental shift, but boy, it's not on a tear, and so the BoJ can take its time. You know, Chetan, it's hard to wrap up a conversation about the global economy without talking about China. I get the sense that there's not a lot going on with monetary policy, but we did just see a soft Q2 GDP print. So, against that backdrop, what should we be expecting in terms of policy? Is there any monetary policy coming? Or is there going to be some fiscal expansion? Or is China just sort of stuck in this lower gear? Chetan Ahya: Yeah, Seth. So, we were also surprised by the soft GDP print. But when you look into the data, actually, it was interestingly doing well on exports. And I mentioned earlier about how the global CapEx trend is helping Asia. It's definitely helping China too. But at the same time, China's domestic demand turned out to be quite weak. And particularly in the areas where we think that the policy response can be providing some help, i.e., infrastructure spend, was also very weak. And therefore, we are expecting that in the back half of the year, you will see the government taking up some fiscal expansion. Not new stimulus announcement, but whatever they had budgeted. They have enough room within that to utilize that budget and actually increase that fiscal spending towards infrastructure. We have about 2 trillion RMB worth of funds available for the government to go ahead and spend in the second half. And then lift that growth trend, which has dipped to 4.3 percent in second quarter to back to 4.6 percent in the back half of the year. Seth Carpenter: You know what? Maybe that's a great place for us to leave it. We've gone around the world again today, but this time focusing much more on policy. In the U.S., the Fed is facing this interesting situation. We think inflation is coming down. The last CPI print went in our favor. And so as a result, our forecast is that the Fed doesn't change policy at all this year. But it's going to come down to the data, and in particular, whether or not Mike and his team are right in terms of where inflation is going. In Europe, the ECB has already raised interest rates once this year. Jens and team are looking for another interest rate hike. The ECB really does seem more sensitive to inflation coming from the energy shock, but there are lots of other crosscurrents that they're paying attention to as well. And then the other major developed market central bank, the Bank of Japan, is on this normalization path. They are in the process of raising interest rates, but Chetan pointed out to us that the growth rate is such that they don't have to be in any sort of hurry, and they can take their time. So, with that, Mike, Jens, Chetan, thank you so much for helping us connect all of these dots. And to the listeners, thank you for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review wherever you listen. And share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or a colleague today.

AI investment is reshaping the global outlook. In part one of this economic roundtable, our panel explores where the momentum is strongest — and where investment still needs to catch up.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Seth Carpenter: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Seth Carpenter, Morgan Stanley's Global Chief Economist and Head of Macro Research. Michael Gapen: And I'm Michael Gapen, Chief U.S. Economist. Chetan Ahya: And I'm Chetan Ahya, Chief Asia Economist. Jens Eisenschmidt: And I'm Jens Eisenschmidt, Chief Europe Economist. Seth Carpenter: And today is going to be our third quarter economic roundtable taking a wide-angle view on the global economy and all the key forces shaping our outlook and the economy. Seth Carpenter: It's Monday, July 20th at 10am in New York Jens Eisenschmidt: And 4pm in Frankfurt. Chetan Ahya: And 10pm in Hong Kong. Seth Carpenter: Since our last roundtable in April, the global economy has continued to face all sorts of shocks, a mix of resilience and friction. Inflation pressures have not disappeared. Energy and geopolitical risks have come up, they've receded, they've come back, they've receded all over the place But there is one underlying source of momentum that we have to talk about. And that is the AI-driven CapEx cycle. Michael, let me turn to you because the U.S. is a real focal point of all of this. Tell me a little bit about where Morgan Stanley Research is thinking about hyperscaler CapEx. How big it is? And then for you, when you think about the U.S. economy, just how big of a driver is it for what we're looking for in the U.S.? Michael Gapen: Yeah, we continue to revise higher our estimates for hyperscaler and AI-related CapEx in the U.S. economy. We were thinking a little over a trillion for 2027. Now we're more like 1.2 - 1.3 trillion, maybe as high as 1.4 trillion in 2028. So, the level of hyperscaler spending continues to keep rising. The growth rate and its effect on the economy is likely to slow. But as you noted, it's still a major driver of momentum in the U.S. You would look at that headline number and think, "Wow, that's, you know, 3.5 percent or so of GDP. Must be a massive source of momentum for GDP growth." But roughly about 60 percent of that hyperscaler CapEx spending goes to items like computers and peripherals, equipment spending categories that have a very, very high import content. We still get a significant number that AI CapEx is probably contributing around 40 basis points to growth this year. Be a similar-sized amount perhaps next year.So, for an economy that's growing somewhere a little bit above 2 percent right now, maybe closer to 2.5 percent next year, that's a non-trivial amount. We just have to remember it's fueling growth around the world, just not here in the U.S. Seth Carpenter: Yeah, that's a really great point because I have seen some estimates where people say, "Well, if it wasn't for AI CapEx, the U.S. economy wouldn't have grown at all." And that's clearly wrong, as you point out. But U.S. imports are necessarily exports from somewhere else. And, Chetan, if I can pull you into the story then, U.S. firms are buying a lot of AI-related equipment from Asia. What does that mean in your part of the world? And in particular, I'm thinking about Korea, Taiwan, and maybe some other economies in Asia. What's the critical story there? Chetan Ahya: So, for Asia, this has definitely been a big boon. If you look at Asia's exports, they have been booming, and particularly for the ones which are exporting semiconductors to the U.S. They are seeing semiconductor exports growing by 90 percent. And when we go back in time and compare Asia's semiconductor exports, it's very tightly linked to the U.S. IT CapEx. And it's not surprising when Mike Gapen mentions about the imports going up. It's on the other side, helping Asia's exports quite meaningfully. So, so far, we've seen this benefiting Korea, number one, Taiwan, and also Japan. All these three are big beneficiaries of U.S. AI CapEx. And of course, also not just U.S., but the other countries which are doing any little amount of CapEx on AI front, that's also helping these three economies in the region. Seth Carpenter: You've been doing a lot of work, Chetan, recently about how much the story can actually broaden out, that the AI CapEx cycle has really contributed to Asian growth, but it doesn't tell the whole story that there's a broader industrial cycle. Can you give us a little bit of a flavor of that story? Chetan Ahya: That's right, Seth. So, we are actually highlighting that there is a CapEx and industrial super cycle that is underway in Asia, and there are four components to this story. AI and semiconductors CapEx, which we just briefly discussed. Number two is energy. Number three is defense. And number four is industrial supply chain onshoring related CapEx. I know that everybody still thinks that AI is the most important part of this story, but when I give you the numbers and the breakup of that... So, for Asia, AI and semiconductor companies CapEx is about $380 billion in 2026, but energy CapEx is going to be $900 billion. So, this is a far broader story than just AI for Asia. Seth Carpenter: Mike, let me come back to you and to the U.S. then. So, isn't the growth story also broader than that as well domestically? So, what's going on in terms of consumer spending in the U.S., and is there a broader CapEx story in the U.S. as well? Michael Gapen: I would say, is it broader than that? I think maybe you could argue also it's narrower than that. Here's what I mean by that. As I noted AI CapEx contributing about 40 basis points to growth, it's certainly underpinning equity valuations in the U.S. and underpinning strong wealth creation. So about [$]180 trillion in household net worth in the U.S. About [$]55 trillion of that has been created in just the last five years alone, underpinned in part by AI-related spending and optimism about future profitability. That's really supported spending by upper income households. So, I think it's both investment-led and consumer-led, but they're inextricably linked. So, the positive for the U.S. is that it's providing a lot of resilience. The negative component of that is it feels like momentum in the U.S. is narrowly driven. Jens Eisenschmidt: Let me maybe jump in here from Europe to provide some perspective from the other side. So, I think it's a fair summary to say that AI investment is not yet, or maybe will never get there, dominating the business cycle. What we do have instead is an unusually consumption-driven expansion. That has to do not so much with an extraordinary strength of consumption, but more of an absence of other factors. Now, prospectively looking forward, we think the fiscal expansion might help lifting us a little bit. And then it is really the debate how much AI investment can arrive in Europe. For now, I would say it's probably a factor of 20 that separates European investment plans from the plans we know that exist for the U.S. Seth Carpenter: Let me stick with you then in Europe because you brought up fiscal as one of the factors going on here and where it's going… You and your team recently wrote a blue paper talking about what the outlook is for fiscal policy in Europe, and in particular, we had this era of cheap debt. Interest rates in Europe were low, at times negative. It was super easy to borrow. Not as much happened then. There's been a shift towards more fiscal expansion at the same time that interest rates have gone up, causing the cost of debt to go up. Feels like there's a lot of push and pull going on. Can you unpack for us a little bit what was in that paper you wrote, what's going on with fiscal policy in Europe, especially in Germany? And what it might mean over time for Euro-area countries? Jens Eisenschmidt: Yeah, so I think fiscal policy in Europe really is looking at a regime shift. So, there is this very famous, probably in the U.S. even more so than here, notion that the Europeans have built a very comfortable welfare state. And that's true if you just look at the accounting from a GDP perspective. It's close to 50 percent that, you know, budgets are actually extended on welfare spending. And now you have three structural headwinds for any type of fiscal spend. So, one is aging related costs, you mentioned it already. Defense spending has to increase significantly, and the interest rate costs will also rise significantly. All of that means there will be very hard choices to be made. The one thing that actually could help here is growth. Growth is the one thing that's, for now at least, missing, at least in comparison to the U.S. It's probably half what we expect, what the U.S. colleagues think is in stake for the U.S., and a quarter or even less than that of what is there in Asia. So, growth is really the key, the solution, the answer to everything in Europe. More growth than just 1 percent, which is potential, would help solving that fiscal challenge. For now, it looks really, really like an uphill battle. Returning to Germany, it's the one country that has a very good fiscal starting position. They are pushing a lot but they're to some extent pushing a string. So, even with the German huge fiscal package, given that private sector investments so far are absent, doesn't get us a ton of growth. Seth Carpenter: Chetan, maybe I'll come back to you before we close part one of this roundtable. The AI CapEx cycle started with AI, broadened out further. How long do you expect this cycle to last? How durable can it be? And how might it compare to previous CapEx cycles? Chetan Ahya: Yeah, Seth. So, we think this will be a multi-year CapEx cycle. And when we are thinking about the duration of the cycle, there are two things that I would keep in mind. Number one is that most of the drivers that we just discussed – the CapEx on AI, energy, defense, and industrial supply chain onshoring related investments – these are all structural drivers. So, we think these are going to continue for some more time. At this point of time, we have the visibility for this cycle to be lasting for three-four more years. And then the second point of framework that I would keep in mind is that the corporate balance sheets are in a pretty good shape. So, when you are thinking about the leverage in the private sector, you can look at both households and the corporate sector balance sheet. But since the cycle is CapEx driven, we are looking at the corporate balance sheets, and they are in a pretty good shape. Across the region, corporate debt to GDP is below where it was in 2019. Seth Carpenter: Mike, let me, let me wrap up quickly with you. We talked about AI, AI CapEx. For now, that's a very strong demand story. When are we going to see a supply side of things coming from AI? Are you already seeing a big contribution to GDP and growth from productivity coming from AI? Michael Gapen: We are, but not outside of the high-tech sectors, and we're seeing limited, what I'll call labor market restructuring of tasks and occupations beyond high AI-exposed occupations. So right now, everything is still very isolated I think maybe as we get into 2029 and beyond, so as Chetan says, we probably have a three to four-year super cycle here around a build-out phase. Then we might see some of that broader-based diffusion to other non-tech sectors in the economy. Seth Carpenter: All right, Jens, for you, let's wrap up here. So, what is the state of play for the build-out in the CapEx cycle for AI in Europe? Jens Eisenschmidt: Yeah, it's very early stages. As I said before, we really; we connected to all the industry experts or analysts covering the sector and the total plans are a factor of 20 below what we see in the U.S. by just the seven hyperscalers. So, I would say very fragmented, very small, in general. Not only AI. I think the one thing I would be looking at for any type of sign of revival, sign of growth is investment. The second would be investment. And you can guess what the third would be… Investments in the core countries. That's really what we need to see, and we haven't seen much in Germany or France on this front. Seth Carpenter:That's a great place for us to stop today. We talked about the real side of the economy, AI, CapEx, trade. Tomorrow we're going to come back, and we'll talk about how that growth outlook affects inflation. And once you start talking about growth and inflation, you got to talk about policy, and that's where we'll be tomorrow. Mike, Jens, and Chetan, thank you for joining today. And for the listeners, thank you for listening. Be sure to tune in tomorrow for Part 2 of our conversation. And I have to say, if you enjoy this show, please leave us a review wherever you listen, and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or a colleague today.

Diane King Hall discusses 3M (MMM) by highlights its earnings beat fiscal year guidance raise, which investors rewarded with a rally to start Tuesday's trading session. The same can't be said for Adobe (ADBE) and Workday (WDAY) after Morgan Stanley hit both stocks with a downgrade. Diane also notes Redburn's downgrade on Shopify (SHOP).======== Schwab Network ========Empowering every investor and trader, every market day. Subscribe to the Market Minute newsletter - https://schwabnetwork.com/subscribeDownload the iOS app - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/schwab-network/id1460719185Download the Amazon Fire Tv App - https://www.amazon.com/TD-Ameritrade-Network/dp/B07KRD76C7Watch on Sling - https://watch.sling.com/1/asset/191928615bd8d47686f94682aefaa007/watchWatch on Vizio - https://www.vizio.com/en/watchfreeplus-exploreWatch on DistroTV - https://www.distro.tv/live/schwab-network/Follow us on X – https://twitter.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/schwab-network/ About Schwab Network - https://schwabnetwork.com/about

Workday (WDAY) is starting Tuesday's trading day on the wrong foot after Morgan Stanley downgraded the stock and lowered its price target. Charles Schwab's Ben Watson adds that the 20-day chart shows potential for significant downward pressure on shares. The one-year chart shows more hope as Ben outlines key levels for bulls to watch.======== Schwab Network ========Empowering every investor and trader, every market day. Subscribe to the Market Minute newsletter - https://schwabnetwork.com/subscribeDownload the iOS app - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/schwab-network/id1460719185Download the Amazon Fire Tv App - https://www.amazon.com/TD-Ameritrade-Network/dp/B07KRD76C7Watch on Sling - https://watch.sling.com/1/asset/191928615bd8d47686f94682aefaa007/watchWatch on Vizio - https://www.vizio.com/en/watchfreeplus-exploreWatch on DistroTV - https://www.distro.tv/live/schwab-network/Follow us on X – https://twitter.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/schwab-network/ About Schwab Network - https://schwabnetwork.com/about

The firm's head of practice strategy discusses the rise of mega-teams and how advisors can maximize growth. Host: Ray Sclafani. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Andy Burnham enters No 10 today as prime minister, the US continued trading fire with Iran over the weekend, and Morgan Stanley has become Wall Street's top bank for AI debt deals. Plus, Germany's chancellor Friedrich Merz is pitching his country to investors as “Europe's bedrock of stability”. Mentioned in this podcast:Andy Burnham urged to use flexibility in fiscal rules to boost investmentUS strikes Iran after American troops killed in JordanMerz pitches Germany as ‘Europe's bedrock of stability' to investorsMorgan Stanley becomes Wall Street's top bank for AI debt dealsWant to get in touch? Email us at podcasts@ft.comNote: The FT does not use generative AI to voice its podcasts The FT News Briefing is produced by Victoria Craig, Sonja Hutson, Saffeya Ahmed, Katya Kumkova, and Fiona Symon. Our editor is Marc Filippino. Our show is mixed by Sam Giovinco and Alex Higgins. Additional help from Gavin Kallmann, Michael Lello, Peter Barber and David da Silva. Our intern is Cole van Miltenburg. Our executive producer is Topher Forhecz. Flo Phillips is the FT's global head of audio. The show's theme music is by Metaphor Music.Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Cliff Nonnenmacher is a lifelong entrepreneur whose journey began at age 8, selling golf balls outside country clubs. By 19, he launched what's believed to be the first food delivery subcontractor for McDonald's in the U.S.—decades before Uber Eats. He later ran watersport concessions, owned a video store, and distributed the Fun Noodle nationally. At 21, Cliff took his self-built trading portfolio to Wall Street, landing a role at Morgan Stanley. In 2003, he transitioned into franchising and never looked back. Cliff has owned, operated, and scaled multiple franchise brands and helped develop others internationally. With over 25 years of experience in franchising, finance, and business, he now mentors aspiring entrepreneurs and franchise owners. Cliff is the founder and CEO of Franocity, is the host of Pursuit of Profit, the #1 podcast in franchising, and author of Beyond The Brand – The Entrepreneur's Guide to Fearless Franchising. He lives in Delray Beach, Florida, with his wife Nicole and their son Chase.

Hosts Steve, Adam, and Joey kick off by unpacking a wild two weeks in the markets, from Iran-driven oil and rate jitters to a sharp global tech and AI sell‑off tied to a new Chinese large language model. They balance the bad headlines with surprisingly strong earnings (think Taiwan Semi, BlackRock, Morgan Stanley), robust housing starts, rising auto sales, and eye‑opening stats like record-low jobless claims and 1,200 new U.S. millionaires created every day in 2025. Along the way, they dive into retirement readiness versus flashy car spending, explain “accredited investor” risks with products like Yrefy, and warn listeners not to let politics or “vibecession” pessimism derail long‑term investing.

“You're taking a 50-plus-year-old industry and flipping it on its head and saying, ‘We're going to redo this from the ground up.'” Aaron Schumm, founder, CEO and chairman of Vestwell, is shaking things up when it comes to modernizing workplace savings solutions. As inflation concerns rise and workforce demands shift, traditional benefits packages are no longer enough. In this episode, Aaron joins host Rodney Bolden to share how fintech innovation is allowing companies to build flexible, automated benefits frameworks that can help relieve employee financial stress, improve retention and scale seamlessly with organizational growth. At Vestwell, Aaron leads a fintech unicorn currently anchoring customizable benefits for over half a million businesses and two million individual savers. Having previously scaled the wealth management technology platform FolioDynamix, Aaron transitioned to the workplace benefits sector after recognizing systemic inefficiencies in how employee savings plans were administered. Visit Vestwell.com to learn more about workplace savings vehicles. Visit MorganStanley.com/atwork for more insights on workplace financial benefits. Invested at Work is brought to you by Morgan Stanley at Work, hosted by Rodney Bolden. Our executive producers are Fiona Kelsey and Lisa Boyce, and our associate producer is Ive Jones. Our production partner is Sequel Media Inc.This podcast episode is for informational/educational purposes only and is not investment, legal, or tax advice. Participants in this podcast are not compensated and are not affiliated with Morgan Stanley. The guest speaker (Aaron Schumm/Vestwell) is an external guest; the views expressed are solely his own and do not represent Morgan Stanley's views. Nothing in the episode should be construed as a recommendation or solicitation to buy/sell any security, adopt any investment strategy, or implement any particular plan design; listeners should consider their own circumstances and consult appropriate professionals. The discussion is general in nature and not intended to address any particular individual/entity's circumstances. Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC and its affiliates and Financial Advisors/Private Wealth Advisors do not provide tax or legal advice; tax laws are complex and subject to change; consult a tax advisor/attorney. Information contained herein is based on data from multiple sources considered to be reliable and Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC (“Morgan Stanley”) makes no representation as to the accuracy or completeness of data from sources outside of Morgan Stanley. 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Morgan Stanley does not provide tax or legal advice. Individuals are encouraged to consult their tax and legal advisors (a) before establishing a Retirement Account, and (b) regarding any potential tax, ERISA and related consequences of any investments or other transactions made with respect to a Retirement Account. This episode discusses legislation and regulatory initiatives—such as the “savers match,” child savings accounts/“Trump accounts,” “Trump IRA,” ERISA-related provisions, and the “in-plan vs. out-of-plan” emergency savings framework—those references are provided for general informational purposes only and are not intended as legal, tax, or compliance advice. 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We're talking about the buzziest --- and most controversial --- book of the summer: "Yesteryear" by Caro Claire Burke. It poses a question no one's brave enough to answer: are trad wives and career women fundamentally at odds? Or are they two sides of the same coin, minted by a bigger system that profits from their fight? As two Wall Street veterans recently profiled in Bloomberg for our new career as "finance influencers", we HAD to talk about the novel everyone is calling "rage bait", and we've got quite a lot to say. Fair warning: we spoil everything, INCLUDING the plot twist that has readers and critics alike up in arms. Why is a finance show covering a book about a trad wife influencer? The biggest names in this space, like Ballerina Farms and Nara Smith, are pulling in millions every year. The raw milk industry is a multi-billion dollar megalith expected to double in the next few years. And all of this is fueling a vertical of the creator economy that is growing in size (and scandals). What happens when a woman builds an empire by performing traditional acts of subservient domesticity on the most modern machine ever invented? We also turn the lens on ourselves, as moms, influencers, and educators --- where's the line between education and performance, and what responsibilities come along with influence?  Whether you loved this book, hated it, or refuse to read it on principle, we want to know what you think! Let us know in the comments...

Our analysts Andrew Sheets and Mark Schmidt unpack why U.S. healthcare feels so expensive and the potential impacts of rising hospital costs.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Andrew Sheets: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Global Head of Fixed Income Research at Morgan Stanley. Mark Schmidt: And I'm Mark Schmidt, Head of Municipal Strategy at Morgan Stanley. Andrew Sheets: And today on the program, a discussion into one of the biggest mysteries in one of the biggest sectors of the economy. We're talking about healthcare costs. It's Friday, July 17th at 2pm in London. Mark Schmidt: At 9am in New York. Andrew Sheets: So, we're talking today about healthcare, which represents roughly a fifth of the U.S. economy, the bulk of job creation over the last several years, and in my view, honestly, one of the biggest inflation paradoxes that we see in the market. On the one hand, the high cost of healthcare is taken as a given, and it's something that many Americans still struggle with financially. But if you look at the official inflation data in the U.S., healthcare costs have been lower than normal, and that's been true now for a number of years. So, what's going on? How do we tie this together? And Mark, you just wrote a report that tries to do exactly that. So, what did you hope to accomplish with this report? Mark Schmidt: You're absolutely right. It's hard to underline enough just how large healthcare is to the U.S. economy overall. Americans spend nearly $6 trillion on healthcare. That's more than the GDP of the entire country of Germany. And if we think about prices, Americans pay more. A knee replacement, for example, costs $25,000 in the United States. That same procedure costs just $6,000 in France. Common heart treatments that would cost $3,000 in Germany or $10,000 in Australia cost $34,000 in the U.S. It also matters for everyone's local community. Healthcare jobs have been growing twice as fast as the rate of job growth in the economy overall. And those are good jobs. They pay above average wages. For many Americans these days, the most secure path to the middle class is a career in healthcare. Now, this may seem a little bit arcane, but it probably hits close to your portfolio as well. Earlier in the year, when we took a look at how equity separately managed accounts invest, they typically have a core overweight to healthcare. And even though American prices may seem like an American issue, many of the largest and most profitable healthcare companies in the world are actually headquartered in Europe. So, whether you're sitting in New York or sitting in London, the price of American healthcare probably matters to you. But as you noted, Andrew, it does feel like a paradox because although Americans cite healthcare costs as one of their top concerns, and although healthcare spending is growing at 6 percent a year or more, the official inflation data says that healthcare prices are in check. And at one point earlier in the year, healthcare inflation, according to official data, even dipped below 3 percent. It just didn't make a lot of sense, and that's why we got together with our colleagues across equities, fixed income research, public policy, and economics to dig into what was actually going on. Andrew Sheets: So, Mark, let's dig right into that. I mean, it seems like a perfect encapsulation of the so-called Main Street versus Wall Street perception of the economy. So, what's going on? How does one kind of square those two numbers? Mark Schmidt: The easiest way to understand it is that you can't walk through a grocery store and figure out the price of a knee replacement. And that's true both for you and me. It's also true for the government. They have to survey hospitals and health insurance companies. The trouble is that the prices that health insurance companies pay hospitals, well, those are trade secrets. So, at any given point in time, even for the best government economists, it's not entirely clear what the price trends are. And that's why when you look at the official data, healthcare inflation typically has relatively lumpy jumps in the series. You could see several months of 0.1 or 0.2 percent official growth in healthcare inflation. Or as earlier this week, you could see certain categories jump to 0.4 or even 0.8. Andrew Sheets: Another element, Mark, that you talked about in the report is that people are also consuming more healthcare. So, talk a little bit about that. How that factors into this dynamic, and again, is that just going to be the new normal as the population ages and we tend to spend more on healthcare as we get older? Mark Schmidt: That's right. The good news is that we're living longer lives. The bad news is that means that we have more chronic healthcare conditions to deal with. The good news is that more procedures can be done in outpatient settings, and those, generally speaking, are cheaper. The bad news is that inpatient care, inpatient prices go up as the complexity of procedures that actually happen in a hospital setting increase significantly. When you balance it all out, it's a situation where, thankfully, the United States and most Americans have the means and the wealth to pay more for healthcare. The flip side of that is that they are paying more for healthcare, and that's why we think that the recent softness in healthcare inflation is actually too good to be true. Andrew Sheets: Something that jumped out at me from this report, Mark, was just how important hospitals are in this equation. And the experience of the patient and the experience of the hospital can be different economically. And that difference can also matter for how this shows up in official inflation and government statistics.So, you know, it would be helpful maybe just to walk the listener through. If I go into the hospital and I need knee surgery. You know, how does that look like from my perspective in terms of paying for it, assuming I have health insurance through my employer? How could that look like to the hospital? And how could that look like coming out the other end into the official government statistics? Mark Schmidt: Well, of course, Andrew, the first thing that you do when you break your leg is you call six hospitals and shop around for the cheapest price, right? Andrew Sheets: [Laughs] Of course. Mark Schmidt: So that's actually the problem because when you get care, you're not in a place to ask about the price. And frankly, even if you asked your doctor or nurse what the price is, they probably wouldn't know. Not only is it not their job to know the price, but all of those negotiations happen after the fact – with the prices that the insurance companies negotiate with the hospitals. After COVID, hospitals had a lot more costs to spread out among the people who were coming in the door, and so they raised prices across the board, not just for procedures that were related to respiratory illness. Naturally, insurance companies noticed that, and they started to push back. So long after you get a cast for your broken leg – and by the way, I wish you a speedy recovery – insurance companies end up going back and forth negotiating with your doctors for exactly how much they should pay you. And although these prices were loosely set well before you walked in the door, the exact way it gets billed and coded? Well, let's just say there's a lot of back and forth. For a well-run hospital, the cost of talking to and ultimately getting reimbursement from your insurance company, that alone could be 2 to 4 percent of revenue. And in especially complex cases, that whole negotiation can eat up 5 to 7 percent of the total bill. You're also right to flag that hospitals really are still the central point of the U.S. healthcare system. Americans spend $2 trillion in a hospital setting. And hospitals overwhelmingly coordinate care for both primary, specialty, and pharmacy services. Andrew Sheets: Mark, another issue I wanted to ask you about was the Affordable Care Act, Medicare, Medicaid, and how those programs fit into the story? Mark Schmidt: The One Big Beautiful Bill Act included a variety of measures to slow the overall growth rate of healthcare. Now, for all the reasons we just discussed, that's probably warranted. The Affordable Care Act is another wrinkle. Enhanced subsidies, which were already set to expire – did in fact expire at the end of last year. And as a result, more Americans are now uninsured. It remains to be seen how that impacts overall costs. In the United States, when you have a health emergency, a hospital is legally obligated to treat you because of a 1990s law called EMTALA. Even if you can't pay, the system eventually does. Historically, uncompensated care costs have been passed on to individuals and companies with insurance. For now, however, it remains to be seen whether these changes in law and in the overall number of people with insurance will cause healthcare prices to rise or fall. Andrew Sheets: And Mark, just for the broad-based implications of this, right? It's fair to say that in any health insurance system, there are some people who consume a lot more healthcare. They're unhealthy or they're unlucky. And there are some who consume a lot less. And, you know, this is something where that overall coverage question matters. Because if you have things that reduce the number of otherwise healthy people who are in those healthcare pools, it can raise the cost for everybody else. Those people who were in some ways subsidizing the higher consumers of healthcare are no longer there. Is that a fair way to frame it, do you think? And are there potential changes given some of these legislative actions that could lead to changes of what the pool looks like – and what overall costs could look like? Mark Schmidt: That's a great point. And healthcare is probably the only part of our economy where you would say, "Thank goodness I did not get my money's worth." As we think about it… Andrew Sheets: [Laughs] Very true. Very true. Mark Schmidt: As we think about it, most young and healthy people are going to be paying more for their health insurance than they receive in healthcare. Again, that's a good thing. Because American healthcare prices are so much higher than anywhere else in the world, paying in more than you get back? Well, that hits the wallet harder in America than it does in other countries. And that's why for many people – choice – choosing how much health insurance to have and how much to pay for it, really is central to keeping the American economy dynamic. The flip side, however, is that as Americans get older, more people have Medicare. Now, Medicare is pretty good if you have it. But the catch is that Medicare prices, according to most independent estimates, do not fully reimburse for the cost of care. So, as more seniors take up more beds in a hospital, that means that commercial prices, the prices for people who have private insurance through their employer, are likely to rise even faster. Andrew Sheets: So, Mark, I think a good place to close it out and kind of bring this all together is a really important conclusion of this report – is that hospitals have been absorbing a number of these rising costs of healthcare through lower margins for the hospital. And that has resulted in lower ultimate inflation because the inflation is measured out the other side, out ultimately what the hospital earns. And if you could just maybe talk a little bit more about that. To what extent have those margins been compressed? And what that might mean for things going forward? Mark Schmidt: That's right. We dug into the finances for hundreds of not-for-profit hospitals in the United States. They are facing higher costs and shrinking margins. Historically, hospitals have partially passed on expense increases of this magnitude. Now, in their conversations with insurance companies, the biggest benchmark setting of prices happens once every two to three years. So, we're not going to see hospital prices show up in the inflation data overnight. But when we look at hospitals across the country, their budget information and their guidance is consistent with firming prices. Andrew Sheets: Great. Thank you so much, Mark. I've really enjoyed the conversation. Mark Schmidt: Thanks for having me, Andrew. Andrew Sheets: And thank you for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please share it with a friend or colleague today. And rate and review us on wherever you listen. It helps more people find the show.

Traditional finance continues embracing crypto as Morgan Stanley's E*TRADE launches Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana trading for eligible retail clients, Citadel Securities invests $400 million in Crypto.com, and Visa unveils a new stablecoin platform designed for banks and fintech companies. Matt explains why competition to control digital dollar infrastructure is accelerating as more traditional financial firms enter the stablecoin market.The episode also covers Europe's growing list of MiCA-licensed crypto firms, Malaysia's investigation into a crypto-related network state project, Taiwan sentencing the operator behind the BitShine exchange to 22 years in prison, and a UK crypto fraud ring that impersonated police officers to steal more than £4 million. Matt wraps up with JPMorgan's improving outlook for Bitcoin, concerns over rising oil prices, and why he believes blockchain technology could eventually provide a more transparent and auditable election system.Happy Hodling, Everyone. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Credit markets are stepping in to fund the surging demand for AI. Our experts Lindsay Tyler and Anish Shah explore the opportunities and risks behind this record financing wave.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Lindsay Tyler: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Lindsay Tyler, TMT Credit Research Analyst at Morgan Stanley. Anish Shah: And I'm Anish Shah, Global Head of Debt Capital Markets at Morgan Stanley. Lindsay Tyler: Today, how issuers and investors are approaching the rapidly evolving world of AI financing. It's Thursday, July 16th at 10am in New York. As AI demand accelerates, credit markets are being asked to finance infrastructure on a scale that used to be associated with utilities, telecom, or energy. That raises a central question for issuers and investors: How much debt can the AI ecosystem absorb? And at what price? Anish, can you walk our listeners through the key products in your purview? Anish Shah: Certainly, in my nearly twenty years at Morgan Stanley, this is probably the most incredible time period I've ever seen in the credit markets. I've had the privilege of working across a number of different roles in capital markets and lending. And a couple of years ago, we integrated the debt underwriting business across both investment-grade and leverage finance franchises in recognition of how interconnected the whole credit ecosystem has become. In addition to our core activities helping clients raise capital for their strategic priorities, two of the big focus areas that we've had have been finding ways to harness the power of the private credit universe and also delivering best-in-class capabilities in funding this incredible growth in AI spend. Lindsay Tyler: AI financing has certainly been a theme we've also been focused on in research. Our equity research colleagues project that a handful of key players could add more than 30 gigawatts of capacity over a two-year timeframe, driving around [$]2 trillion of aggregate cash CapEx in that period. And to put that into context, a single gigawatt of data center capacity can require roughly $12 billion for the shell, and then often more than double that for chips and racks. So, from your vantage point, what inning are we in? And what gives you confidence that credit markets can continue funding this opportunity at scale? Anish Shah: I mean, Lindsay, the numbers certainly are staggering, as you note. And if you just observe the CapEx estimates for the hyperscalers and broadly for AI infrastructure, we're certainly in the early innings. Lindsay Tyler: Mm-hmm. Anish Shah: The largest tech companies have historically, as you know, raised very little debt. In fact, many of these companies have not even needed a credit facility. As CapEx projections were materially increased in the second half of last year, we saw the beginning of scaled capital raises. Hyperscaler issuance has quickly gone from less than one percent of the investment-grade market to more than 10 percent of the market. You know, as I look ahead, based on what we're seeing on the ground, we think that AI-related funding, whether it's for data center development or financing compute capacity, could top 15 percent of the total issuance across all credit products. This has been an unprecedented test for the capital markets, both in terms of the depth of capacity and the breadth of product. The teams have been on the forefront of deep investor dialogue and product innovation. This spans corporate investment grade, first of their kind financings in high-yield and leveraged loan markets, and new takes on asset-backed financing. And each of these areas has seen material issuance both in public and private markets. Lindsay Tyler: Great backdrop. Let's dig first into investment-grade corporate debt, an area you know well from your time previously leading the investment-grade team. Can you help frame the scale and the significance of this financing bucket and how AI-related debt is scaling within it? Anish Shah: Well, you know, as you know, the investment-grade bond market, specifically in dollars, is the deepest, most liquid pool of capital in the world. Volumes have grown materially over the last few years and are likely to eclipse $2 trillion in issuance this year. Hyperscalers are among the very best credits in the world, and they have the ability to come in and out of markets with relatively quick twitch, little to no pre-marketing, and in fairly large size. You know, $20 billion-plus deals used to be rare in the investment-grade market, now happen multiple times a quarter. This is why we've seen the predominance of AI-driven capital raising take place in the investment-grade market. For the most part, investors have digested that supply very well. While we've seen some modest widening credit spreads for hyperscalers and some of the other tech issuers, I'd say it's de minimis relative to their expected ROI. Lindsay, I've talked a lot about supply dynamics and issuance. What other factors are you and investors considering when assessing fair value for investment-grade rated technology bonds? Lindsay Tyler: Sure. It's prudent to really weigh a mix of technicals, fundamentals, and relative value. You know, as you discussed on the technical side, and related to my discussions with debt and equity investors, I've been focused on scale of buildouts, market capacity, digestibility across currencies, positioning along the curve, implications of equity issuance, and whether AI financing could crowd out other areas of TMT credit. But moving more to the fundamental side of things, you mentioned ROI, and for the players that are scaling compute capacity, there are a handful of key monetization and return questions that keep coming up. How quickly can these companies bring new capacity online? Once it's live, how does it translate into durable revenue and cash flow? Is that capacity supporting internal products, proprietary models, broader cloud offerings, or compute leased to third parties? And then how fungible is the capacity across those use cases if demand or returns shift? Further on the fundamental side, we've done some differentiated work around growing long-term commitments. We've seen that high-quality hyperscalers and a few of the semis companies are anchoring the AI ecosystem through leases, guarantees, other obligations. These commitments really extend beyond vanilla bond issuance. So, I encourage investors to look beyond the funded debt and really understand the accounting and the ratings implications here of some of those commitments. And this ties nicely into the next topic that I wanted to raise, which is project finance debt. I've noticed that, you know, a lot of the commitments that we're seeing from IG players support another layer of financing. Lease commitments can underpin project finance debt, an area of sizable issuance and innovation. The public high-yield market has emerged as a new funding source in this way for data center construction, with more than 30 billion priced across 15 deals, since fall 2025. Can you walk us through, Anish, the innovation behind these structures, and how are these high yield deals different than other ways to, kind of, raise project finance debt? Anish Shah: Yeah, it's incredibly interesting. I mean, the bulk of the issuance, as I noted has come in the investment grade market, but I would say the bulk of the innovation has come in the sub-investment grade market. You know, historically, for very capital-intensive sectors like energy and power or real estate, the project loan market was the most efficient source of initial funding. The developer would tap banks to underwrite a highly structured construction loan. Once the project is up and running, you could then refinance that loan with the predictable cash flows into a more institutional financing, like the investment grade bond market or the term loan B or securitization markets.That product may still be very viable in many sectors, but we felt early on that bank-provided construction loans would not meet the capacity needs of the AI investment cycle. The market really needed an institutional credit product that bypassed the need for construction loans. The key innovation came in the form of first-of-its-kind high-yield bonds that funded the development of a new data center complex. Given the relatively short construction period and the "offtake" supported by some of the highest quality credits in the world, we felt like this financing structure would be incredibly well-received in the high-yield market. The win here is that the developer accesses fixed rate long-term capital and maintains flexibility to call the bonds and refinance at a lower cost. Judging by how these financings have gone, there's a strong level of investor enthusiasm. I think that they've only scratched the surface, and I would expect that we see much more of this. And potentially even expand it to other products in the leverage finance markets given the tremendous level of investor demand. Lindsay Tyler: Yeah. It's certainly been exciting to follow many of those deals. Beyond the public space, we're also seeing a wave of innovation in private credit and asset-backed finance. Anish, how do companies decide whether capital is best raised in the public or the private markets? Anish Shah: Well, I'm glad you raised the whole avenue of private markets because it may be the most significant change in the credit markets over the last few years, broadening the scope of private credit from directly lending into leverage buyouts to now financing large investment-grade projects. There are great examples in the world of GPU and TPU financing, where we structure loans secured by the asset and the cash flows, or in data center development.Lindsay, from your perspective, what are investors focused on when these private structures intersect with public credits? Lindsay Tyler: Sure. Many of these asset-backed private financings have prompted investors to look more closely at any of the public companies involved, whether as issuers, tenants, customers, or support providers. This ties back to the point I raised earlier. Where does the risk reside, and who ultimately is on the hook? These financings have also sparked broader discussions around circularity, vendor financing, and technology obsolescence risk, even when amortizing structures are in place. I do think those are fair concerns to weigh, and they really speak to how quickly the AI financing trend is evolving and how much credit work there is to do. So, Anish, with that balance in mind, relatively strong demand, rapid innovation, but also some real credit questions, let's end with a quick lightning round. Anish Shah: Lindsay, let's do it. Lindsay Tyler: First, what is the biggest risk that could test investor appetite for AI-related debt? Anish Shah: I would say investors are acutely focused on construction delays. Don't underestimate the level of diligence being done by the breadth of capacity you're seeing in the markets. Investors are doing their homework, and we're spending a lot of time trying to mitigate any of their concerns with structural protections. Lindsay Tyler: Got it. Second, beyond data center shells and chips, what is the next potential AI financing opportunity? Anish Shah: It most certainly is energy and power. We're going to see a ton of capital being raised in utilities. It's going to be a little different than what the hyperscalers are doing, just given the nature of their balance sheets. You're going to see more junior capital. We've seen a wave of junior subordinated debt issuance out of the utilities. We're also seeing a lot of activity from our project finance and tax equity team, just given all things energy infrastructure. Lindsay Tyler: Great. And third, if we're sitting here a year from now, what do you think could be the biggest AI financing story we're talking about? Anish Shah: Well, we certainly underestimated the level of financing activity that we saw in the past year. I think when we look back a year from now, we will probably see that the AI labs were much more ready to finance on their own on a standalone basis. That's going to alleviate some of the pressures in the market, but I think it's going to create a whole new set of considerations and structural innovation. Lindsay Tyler: Well, it's certainly been remarkable to watch this financing theme take shape in real time, and the next chapter sounds like it could be even more interesting to follow. Anish, thanks for joining us and sharing your insights. Anish Shah: Great to join, Lindsay. Thanks. Lindsay Tyler: And thank you for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please leave us a review wherever you listen and share the podcast with a friend or colleague today.*****Anish Shah is a member of Morgan Stanley's Global Capital Markets Division and is not a member of Morgan Stanley's Research Department. Unless otherwise indicated, his views are his own and may differ from the views of the Morgan Stanley Research Department and from the views of others within Morgan Stanley.

AI has become a strategic policy priority as governments race to secure their technological future. Our Head of U.S. Public Policy Research Ariana Salvatore explores what's driving the shift and the implications for markets.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Ariana Salvatore, Head of U.S. Public Policy Research at Morgan Stanley.Today: Why sovereign AI is becoming a policy priority around the world.It's Wednesday, July 15th, at 10am in New York.The AI controls debate used to be focused on chips. Cutting edge semiconductors are essential to train large AI models, after all. But over the past year, the debate has moved well beyond that narrow focus. The policy conversation has broadened beyond things like which advanced semis can be sold to China.The bigger question now is who controls the full AI stack — chips, cloud infrastructure, frontier models, data centers, cybersecurity standards, and the energy systems that support all of it.That's what we mean when we talk about sovereign AI. At the simplest level, it's a country's ability to develop and deploy artificial intelligence using its own infrastructure, data, workforce, and technology ecosystem. But sovereign AI is also about reducing strategic dependence on foreign platforms and foreign-controlled supply chains.That echoes a trend toward multipolarity that we've been writing about since back in 2018. Countries around the world are prioritizing national security over economic efficiencies. We see that theme applying to AI as well.So, what does this all mean for markets?First, sovereign AI turns AI infrastructure into a matter of national industrial policy. Data centers, power availability, and grid reliability are just a few examples of components that are becoming strategic assets. That means governments are likely to play a larger role in deciding several aspects of the AI buildout. Where it's built? Who finances it? And which countries get access to the most advanced parts of the stack?Second, sovereign AI reinforces the shift toward derisking and a more fragmented international order. The U.S. is trying to promote the export of an American AI technology stack to allies and partners. At the same time, it's preserving national security guardrails around the most sensitive capabilities. Meanwhile, we see China trying to indigenize as much of the technology as possible, from chips to cloud to model deployment. Other countries are navigating between the two.Third, and importantly, sovereign AI is also an energy story. Who gets to build and benefit from AI increasingly depends on access to low-cost, reliable power. That makes energy availability a competitive advantage — and it also makes energy affordability a political constraint.That dovetails with one of our thematic predictions heading into this year: the politics of energy. We see rising power costs as a more visible political issue. That's led to backlash against data center development. There's more local opposition to new projects, and greater pressure on policymakers and utilities to make sure that existing ratepayers are not subsidizing AI-driven grid investment.We think that could push AI infrastructure in a few directions. One is toward a conditional build-out. Here, offsets like large-load tariffs and other cost-allocation mechanisms are designed to protect households and small businesses.Another direction is policy support for the lowest-cost sources of energy, even where that might create tension with emissions objectives. And the third direction is more off-grid or behind-the-meter power solutions. That would include things like fuel cells, storage, and other time to power strategies — so data center developers can secure electricity without intensifying local affordability concerns.The pursuit of sovereign AI comes with many questions around inflationary impacts: compute & power are both constrained, regulation remains uncertain, and there could be more limitations on things like tech transfers if the government sees a national security edge. So, to the extent that countries want to reduce their dependencies, it may cost more to get there. There are, however, companies that can benefit in this environment.But there's also a policy risk. We are left with a more reactive policy environment. Selective access in some areas, tighter controls in others, and ongoing uncertainty around how Washington will treat advanced chips, cloud infrastructure, and frontier model deployment. Now that uncertainty matters because it affects corporate planning, cross-border investment, and the shape of global AI alliances.So what does this all mean for investors?More and more, governments view AI capability as a source of economic power and geopolitical leverage. That means the AI race is moving from a question of who builds the best model to who controls the infrastructure, standards, supply chains, and energy systems that allow those models to scale.In our view, that means sovereign AI is one of the most important themes to watch in the next phase of the AI buildout.And we'll be coming back to this topic soon. In the coming weeks, Stephen Byrd and I will talk about sovereign AI in more depth, particularly around what it means for power demand, data center investment, energy affordability, and the broader infrastructure required to support the next stage of AI adoption.Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review wherever you listen and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today.

Carl Quintanilla, Jim Cramer and David Faber led off the show with a "Faber Report": Sources tell David that Stripe and Advent International have jointly offered $60.50 per share to acquire PayPal, whose shares surged on that news. The anchors reacted to what Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett told CNBC's Becky Quick exclusively about investing in Alphabet. Speaking of exclusives, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink joined the program for a wide-ranging interview -- discussing earnings, the investment climate and the AI boom. Also in focus: An unexpected decline in June producer prices, Morgan Stanley and Johnson & Johnson earnings, IBM shares coming off their worst day ever, SpaceX shares trading near their IPO price.   Squawk on the Street Disclaimer Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Former NEC Director Gary Cohn joins with his reaction to Fed Chairman Warsh's testimony and shares his outlook for the economy at large. Then, we break down why Apple shares are jumping today. Plus, we bring you the details of Morgan Stanley's latest earnings report. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Our CIO and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist Mike Wilson discusses where investors may find opportunity beyond the AI sector and risks that could slow market gains.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Morgan Stanley's CIO and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist. Today on the podcast I'll be discussing our broadening thesis and the near-term risks to monitor. It's Tuesday, July 14th at 11:30 am in New York. So, let's get after it. The broadening trade is now playing out. It's showing up in stock prices, relative performance and earnings revisions. It's also making investors question the sustainability of the most crowded areas of the market, and consider other near-term risks. I first made the broadening call late last year based on my view that the economy had entered a new expansion after completing the rolling recession in April of 2025. In a new expansion, earnings growth tends to be much better than expected because revenue growth returns to companies that have already become more cost efficient. That's classic operating leverage. The market began to anticipate that dynamic late last year, but then the Iran conflict interrupted the move. Oil surged, rate-cut expectations disappeared, and investors crowded back into the most obvious AI capex beneficiaries led by semiconductors and memory, in particular. Since mid May, that interruption has faded with oil prices falling sharply and the broadening trade has begun to work again. Importantly, the market is not abandoning AI. It is simply rotating within AI and beyond AI. And that distinction matters. Semiconductors have had a historic run, supported by earnings revisions. But even great stories get exhausted in the short term. When earnings revisions breadth is pressing against historical highs and the trade becomes one of the most crowded areas of the market, the bar for upside gets very high. At that point, the issue is not whether the story is good. The issue is whether the rate of change can keep improving. That is a very different question. The underperformance of the hyperscalers was probably the first warning sign. Semis depend on hyperscaler capex. So when the spenders start lagging the beneficiaries, that divergence usually resolves one way or another. And now we're starting to see it. Meta's decision to sell excess capacity to outside customers may not mean the AI capex cycle is over. But it does tell you the market is beginning to ask harder questions about the path and pace of that spending. Credit spreads and stock prices of these hyperscalers provide the feedback loop to managements that maybe they should curtail the pace of spend. We've had multiple corrections inside this AI cycle already. This looks like another one – not the end of the cycle, but a reset. That reset is what gives the rest of the market room to work. Our preferred ways to express the broadening remain Consumer Discretionary Goods, Transports, and Biotech. These are not the areas investors have been excited about. In fact, positioning and sentiment remain subdued. But that's exactly why I like them. The risks to the story in the short term are two-fold. First, uncertainty about the full re-opening of the strait remains high, with pivots on both sides. This is keeping oil prices volatile in the short term even if the primary trend remains lower. Second, interest rate volatility is picking up again with the entire curve shifting higher in both nominal and real terms. If this doesn't stabilize, it will have a negative impact on stocks both at the index level and even for stocks that should benefit from our broadening call. With the inflation data coming in today softer than expected, this should reduce some of the recent upward pressure on rates. However, the new Fed Chair and board remain resolute to make sure inflation doesn't rear its head again. In the end, dealing with this risk up front is a good thing in my view even if it means uncertainty for markets. Bottom line, equity markets have been consolidating and correcting for the past several months. This is the result of the peak rate of change in earnings revisions and a reaction function shift at the Fed to focus more on the inflation mandate than growth. With the recent rollover in semiconductors, heavy supply of equity and credit issuance, and a transition of leadership at the Fed, expect more volatility and corrective activity in stocks before the next leg of the bull market resumes. Don't chase momentum. Instead, add to risk on down days to areas that will benefit from a broadening in the economy and earnings growth. Thanks for tuning in; I hope you found it informative and useful. Let us know what you think by leaving us a review. And if you find Thoughts on the Market worthwhile, tell a friend or colleague to try it out!

Cheaper obesity medicines could unlock broader demand, while supply-chain bottlenecks and premium-drug innovation may also shape how the market evolves. Our analysts Terence Flynn and Thibault Boutherin break down the investor implications.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Terence Flynn: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Terence Flynn, Morgan Stanley's U.S. Pharma and Biotech Analyst. Thibault Boutherin: And I'm Thibault Boutherin, Morgan Stanley's Europe Pharmaceuticals Analyst. Terence Flynn: Today, how cheaper GLP-1 obesity medicines could reshape access, pricing, and supply chains; and what the first generic markets may signal for Europe and the U.S. It's Monday, July 13th at 10am in New York. Thibault Boutherin: And it's 3 pm in London. Terence Flynn: Around one billion people live with obesity worldwide, including over a 100 million in the U.S. Right now, the introduction of the first lower cost generics of semaglutide, a GLP-1 medicine, in some international markets, could have consequences on affordability and demand. Thibault, what are the first countries seeing the introduction of sema generics? What are the current dynamics, and why should global investors pay attention? Thibault Boutherin: Sure. So, so far generics are being introduced this year in three countries: in India, Canada and Brazil. And if we look at India, this is the first market where the generics are being introduced. The patent for semaglutide expired in March 2026, and 13 companies have launched 26 generics across different formulations: autoinjectors, vials, and pills, which price is lower than the branded drug. And because the India market was quite under-penetrated for GLP-1, we are seeing affordability driving volume expansion. In Canada, two generics have been launched so far. Four other generics are waiting for approval, and more are being filed. And finally, in Brazil, one generic was approved last month, and we are expecting these generics to be launched in Brazil in July. And 17 other generics are in different stage of regulatory review in Brazil, and we would expect more to enter the market by the end of this year. And the reason why we focus on these markets is because we believe they could provide a blueprint for what could happen later in the U.S. and in Europe; in particular for Canada, which shares some characteristics with Europe and the U.S. And the patent for semaglutide will expire in Europe in 2031 and in the U.S. from 2032. Terence Flynn: Great. Maybe on the India front, I know that's at the leading edge. What happened with patient demand when price came down? Thibault Boutherin: Sure. So, what we saw in India is a surge in volume when generics were launched, and the volume in April 2026 were already six times higher than the volume in February. And that expansion has been driven mostly by these generics launch, which captured 80 percent of semaglutide volume in April. And our India team expect that the GLP-1 market in India will actually expand in value from $125 million in [20]25 to more than $1 billion by 2030, despite lower prices as we see better, you know, greater volume and greater adoption of GLP-1s in India. Terence Flynn: The other thing, you know, you and I have discussed is the supply chain, and one of the questions is the ability of some of the generic manufacturers to scale semaglutide. So, maybe talk to us about the current capabilities. And could we see bottlenecks in the supply chain formation here? Thibault Boutherin: Yeah, sure. So, there are three key elements to watch on the supply chain. The first is the active pharmaceutical ingredient or API, and that's the semaglutide molecule itself. The second element is the device and the device components, and the third element is the fill and finish, which is basically putting all of these things together. On the API side, so semaglutide molecule, we believe there will be no bottleneck in supplying for generics as we see a handful of large Chinese companies, out of China, building multi-ton capacity for semaglutide. So, we believe there will be no shortage of API to supply the generic supply chain for injectables. On the device, these are the same device companies that are supplying the branded version of semaglutide, and other GLP-1s for the device that are also supplying the generic makers. And we are seeing meaningful investments being made, so we don't believe there will be a bottleneck here. Where we could see a bottleneck emerging is on the fill and finish side. Fill and finish requires highly controlled clean room space to minimize contamination. It requires regulatory approval, and it takes up to three years to build fill and finish capacity. And so, that's where if there is not more investment being made over the next few years, there could potentially [be] a bottleneck emerging for the generic companies. Terence, while semaglutide generics will definitely represent a challenge for the existing branded version of this GLP-1, there are some insights in these emerging dynamics that suggest that tirzepatide, the other GLP-1, could be less at risk. Can you touch a bit on some of these dynamics? Terence Flynn: Absolutely. So, just to remind listeners that semaglutide targets a pathway called GLP-1. Tirzepatide actually targets two pathways. The first is GLP-1, and the second is GIP. And there are some data comparing these molecules, both in Type 2 diabetes and obesity. And tirzepatide gives not only better efficacy but also improved tolerability. And so, what you're seeing in some of the ex-U.S. markets is segmentation, where there are some consumers that are willing to pay a premium price for tirzepatide. Our team in Brazil has done a lot of work on this front looking at this dynamic and, you know, we expect that to play out in many geographies. So, despite the entry of lower-cost generic versions, we think you will still see segmentation of the market between differentiated brand and the lower-cost generics. And that as a result, you will continue to see branded growth.In the U.S. right now, market share is about 60 percent in favor of tirzepatide. And so again, you're seeing a differentiation between these two molecules. Thibault Boutherin: And beyond the introduction of generics GLP-1s, there are other dynamics in the industry that are driving this market. And the introduction of oral drugs this year has been a big topic. Terence, what are your views on the role that orals could play on the market? Terence Flynn: Yes, as a lot of people are probably aware, the many of the existing GLP-1 medicines are injectable. And so those are delivered once a week with a needle. But there are now additional oral options of these GLP-1 medicines. They started off first for Type 2 diabetes, but they have now broadened into obesity as well, following some recent FDA approvals. And what we're seeing is that the introduction in the U.S. so far is expanding the market. So, the majority of people that are taking the oral versions of these medicines are new users to GLP-1s. So again, you're getting market expansion. When you think about the orals as well, one of the other questions is capacity. I know, Thibault, you were talking about the supply chain. There are similar questions for these oral medicines because not all of the oral medicines are the same. Some are easier to manufacture than others, and as a result, that's another variable to consider. So, some of these are what's called peptide-based orals, and some of these are non-peptide-based orals. And the non-peptide-based orals are much easier to scale, for a larger global market. And so that's definitely another variable that we're monitoring and that I think investors need to consider. Thibault Boutherin: And beyond the pill versions of these GLP-1s, we are seeing more innovation in the drug pipeline of the industry, which could be a key driver of differentiation against the competition from the generics. So, what are we seeing emerging today from diabetes and obesity pipelines, which could be exciting for the future of the category? Terence Flynn: So, as we see time and time again in pharmaceutical markets, the key players continue to innovate to try to improve profiles of the existing medications. So, there are, you know, kind of two areas. One would be efficacy; another would be safety tolerability. And so, there are a number of players that are working first to develop longer acting medication. So, as I mentioned, the existing injectable drugs are dosed once weekly. But there are a number of companies that are working to develop potentially monthly or less frequent injections. So, that's one area that we're monitoring closely. And then the second, and again, this plays into what I discussed on tirzepatide, is additional pathways that are involved here in diabetes and obesity, and a number of players are working to target additional pathways beyond GLP-1 and GIP. And so, some of the leading pathways that are being studied are something called amylin and glucagon, and there are a number of medications that are in the late-stage pipeline that are coming along, which have some pretty interesting data. And so that's another area that we're watching. And again, the goal there would be to either improve efficacy and/or improve tolerability versus the existing medications. Thibault Boutherin: Great. And maybe we can also take this opportunity to talk about some of the short-term drivers in the market that are not facing generic today, like the U.S. So, what could be, you know, the key drivers for growth of GLP-1s and the overall obesity and diabetes category over the next five years? Terence Flynn: Yeah, obviously the key one is seeing additional uptake of these medicines. I think right now we estimate, again, obesity in particular, there's about low double-digit percent uptake. And so obviously seeing increasing uptake of these medicines. The orals, as I mentioned, are already driving market expansion. And then the third is access. So obviously in any market, that's very important. In the U.S., I think about 50 percent of employers cover these medications right now. We expect that to increase in the years ahead as the data continues to build. But then this year starting very shortly, the patients in the Medicare program in the U.S., so those people over the age of 65, will be able to access these medicines for $50 per month. And so, we think that is another driver of growth – is this will broaden access to about an additional 18 million people, starting this summer. So, the next phase of the diabesity market comes down to execution, lower cost and scaled supply in the mass market, and innovation and differentiation to compete in the premium segment. Thibault, thanks so much for taking the time to talk. Thibault Boutherin: Great speaking with you, Terence. Terence Flynn: And thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please leave us a review wherever you listen and share the podcast with a friend or colleague today.

Preliminary hearings are taking place in the trial of Tyler Robinson. In light of this, we decided to examine Candace Owens's many claims and ask whether they are credible. And unlike some, we are going to try and use actual standards for intelligence analysis and measuring source credibility.-----SPONSOR: Lear CapitalGold and silver are at all-time highs as central banks, sovereign funds, and major institutions like Morgan Stanley shift capital out of the dollar and into precious metals. Lear Capital helps everyday Americans get into physical gold and silver with experienced reps, transparent pricing, and IRA-eligible options. With a qualified purchase, you can receive up to $20,000 in bonus gold or silver.Call Lear Capital at 800-707-4575 or visit https://www.Nick4Lear.com-----GET YOUR MERCH HERE: https://shop.nickjfreitas.com/BECOME A MEMBER OF THE IC: https://NickJFreitas.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/nickjfreitas/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NickFreitasVATwitter: https://twitter.com/NickJFreitasYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@NickjfreitasTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nickjfreitas3.000:00:00 - Intelligence Standards for Evaluating Political Claims 00:08:10 - Sponsor Message on Inflation and Gold Investing 00:09:56 - Examining Claims About Charlie Kirk's Marriage 00:13:46 - Reviewing Alleged Fort Huachuca Meeting Evidence 00:24:00 - Assessing Witness Credibility and Source Reliability 00:25:52 - Ballistics Evidence and Conspiracy Allegations 00:31:27 - French Government Assassination Claims Examined 00:40:34 - Egyptian Aircraft Allegations Reviewed Against Available Evidence 00:46:33 - Israeli Phone Data Claims Put Into Context 00:53:36 - Evaluating New Claims and Supporting Evidence 00:59:50 - Case Against Tyler Robinson Reviewed 01:03:39 - Surveillance Footage and Timeline Analysis 01:08:42 - Financial Motive Claims and Available Evidence 01:14:10 - Applying Intelligence Standards to Political Allegations 01:19:36 - Final Assessment of Evidence and Credibility

The USMCA review is underway, with implications beyond tariffs. Our Head of U.S. Public Policy Research Ariana Salvatore breaks down the key issues shaping the road ahead.Read more insights from Morgan Stanley.----- Transcript -----Ariana Salvatore: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Ariana Salvatore, Head of U.S. Public Policy at Morgan Stanley Research.Today, I'll be talking about the USMCA review – what happened on July 1st, what it means for North American trade, and how investors should be thinking about the road ahead. It's Friday, July 10th at 10am in New York. Last week, the six-year review deadline for the USMCA came and went. And as we'd anticipated, the U.S. declined to extend the agreement for another sixteen-year term. U.S. Trade Representative Greer stated that the U.S. did not agree to renew the USMCA in its current form, pointing to shortcomings and trade deficits with both Canada and Mexico, much of which echoed his testimony in front of Congress in December of last year. So, what happens next? This decision triggers an annual review process that could continue until the agreement's scheduled expiration in 2036. So, that means effectively the new deadline for negotiations is now July of 2027. And if we get to that point and see a similar outcome, this procedure repeats until the deal is terminated in 2036. Now, importantly, the agreement itself remains fully in force during this period. The current tariff regime, rules of origin, investment protections, and dispute settlement mechanisms are all unaffected for now. That's actually in line with the expectation that we laid out earlier this year. In short, we anticipated an outcome in which negotiations stall and the deal moves to annual reviews. We thought that was becoming more likely than an ambitious expansion of the agreement in its current form. That being said, there are some important implications of this outcome. First, we think North American trade is being reshaped by a transition from a rules-based framework – where tariff schedules and preferential access anchored trade decisions – toward a more discretionary, sector-specific approach tied to industrial policy objectives. That, of course, increases uncertainty around exemptions, sector treatment, and consequently investment decisions for corporates. Second, we think two bilateral deals may not be off the table. While it's still our base case that the trilateral framework remains intact, reporting seems to suggest that negotiations are progressing much more substantively with Mexico than with Canada. A third round of U.S.-Mexico negotiations is scheduled for the week of July 20th, while substantive text-based negotiations between Canada and the U.S. have not yet begun. That asymmetry could mean that bilateral issues between the U.S. and Mexico are resolved more easily, while outstanding frictions like Canada's dairy market quota system could prove to be an overhang in those bilateral talks. Third, the structural divergence between Mexico and Canada is accelerating, which is something my colleagues have highlighted in their recent work. If we think about Canada's manufacturing export base – autos, metals, machinery, energy, and transportation equipment – that actually overlaps with the areas that the U.S. government is increasingly defining as strategic. And therefore, necessitating more government involvement through, in things like Section 232 tariffs. Canada accounts for only a negligible share of U.S. imports across computers, semiconductors, communications equipment, and advanced electronics. Those are actually the sectors where Mexico has become deeply integrated, particularly through assembly and re-export activity linked to AI servers, electronics, and industrial hardware. Mexico now supplies roughly 35 percent of U.S. IT hardware imports and nearly 50 percent of U.S. server imports. And the North in particular has emerged as a vital interconnection hub between Latin America and the U.S. That's been driven by nearshoring trends, AI adoption, and multi-cloud strategies, as my colleagues Nik Lippmann and Fernando Sedano highlight. That means the scope and the objectives of the bilateral talks between the U.S. and Mexico and the U.S. and Canada may diverge even more from here. So where does that leave us? The USMCA is still intact, but the annual review process means North American trade policy is now a recurring negotiation, not yet a settled framework. And that will likely remain the case if policymakers agree next July to punt the issue yet another year. The primary risk, in our view, stems less from the possibility of a full USMCA collapse and more from the prolonged uncertainty around implementation details, sector-specific trade measures, and Section 232 tariffs. Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review wherever you listen and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today.

As Chief Investment Strategist at Hightower Advisors, Stephanie Link spends her days researching the market's winners. Today, she's breaking it all down for us. Stephanie explains why the economy keeps defying the doom-and-gloom headlines, which stocks she thinks will champion the next decade, and why she believes we're only in the third inning of the AI revolution. Nicole and Stephanie get tactical fast: the difference between the Mag 7 and the "S&P 493," which stocks are not worth the hype, and Stephanie's thesis that cybersecurity stocks will end up being bigger than AI. She names her favorite tickers across cybersecurity, data centers, robotics, and quantum computing, and explains whether it's too late to buy NVIDIA. Stephanie also gets real about the so-called "AI bubble," the circular spending debate freaking out investors, and why she bought SpaceX but capped it at just 2% of her portfolio. Plus: what her 19-year-old daughter is investing in, why "FAANG" just got a 2026 update, and the one boring, unsexy ETF Stephanie says every new investor should consider. Check out Nicole's financial literacy course ⁠The Money School⁠ Find a Financial Advisor or Financial Coach from Nicole's company ⁠Private Wealth Collective⁠ Watch video clips from the pod on ⁠Money Rehab's Instagram⁠ and ⁠Nicole Lapin's Instagram⁠  Read more about Stephanie's work Here's what Nicole covers with Stephanie: 00:00 Are You Ready for Some Money Rehab? 01:12 Stephanie Link Joins Money Rehab 01:41 Why the Market Keeps Defying the Doom and Gloom 04:07 CapEx, Decoded 06:58 The K-Shaped Economy: Why the Vibes Don't Match the Numbers 09:49 Inflation, Oil Prices, and the War's Ripple Effect 11:41 Mag 7 vs. the S&P 493: Which ETF Should You Buy? 16:16 Why Stephanie Says No to Leveraged ETFs 17:32 Cybersecurity Will Be Bigger Than AI 20:16 The Best Cybersecurity Stocks on Stephanie's List 23:15 How to Vet a CEO Before You Buy the Stock 25:16 Investing Lessons from Stephanie's 19-Year-Old Daughter 28:23 What Stephanie Won't Buy: Crypto, Staples, and Energy 32:20 Inside the AI "Food Chain": Powering the Data Center Boom 35:43 Robotics and Quantum Computing: The Next Big Themes 41:00 MicroStrategy vs. Palo Alto: What "On Sale" Really Means 43:07 FAANG Is Dead, Long Live MANGOES 43:47 Why Stephanie Bought SpaceX (and Kept It to 2%) 55:40 Is It Too Late to Buy NVIDIA? 59:06 Grading the Innings: AI, Cybersecurity, and Robotics 59:50 Hot Stocks: Micron, SanDisk, and the Chips Everyone's Chasing 1:02:27 Is There an AI Bubble? 1:03:16 The Circular Spending Debate 1:08:08 Stephanie Link's Tip You Can Take Straight to the Bank All investing involves the risk of loss, including loss of principal. This podcast is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or legal advice. Always do your own research and consult a licensed financial advisor before making any financial decisions or investments. Disclosures: Hightower invests in companies including Boeing Company, Dover Corp, General Electric, Quanta Services, Rockwell Automation, Union Pacific Corporation, Broadcom, International Business Machines Corporation, Marvell Technology Inc, ServiceNow Inc, Palo Alto Networks Inc, Snowflake Inc, Synopsys Inc, Bank of America, Capital One, Coinbase, Morgan Stanley, Truist Financial Corp, Amazon.com Inc, Meta, SpaceX, Alcoa Corp, Antofagasta PLC, Natera Inc, UnitedHealth Group Inc, iShares MSCI Brazil ETF, SLB Limited