Stan Wong

Since the mid-August highs, the S&P is down about 3%. September plus midterm elections could cause volatility to persist for a while. He'd be a proponent of using cash to take advantage of stocks that have dipped in the last little while. Take a look at high-quality names that are only down because the market's down.

Good news is that, historically, the 6-12 months after midterm elections tend to be one of the strongest periods ever on average. Hopefully that's the case once again. He thinks it'll be driven by earnings, continued capex expenditure, continued AI investment, as well as reshoring and nearshoring.

Historically, you see about a 15% drawdown in years where there's a midterm election. It doesn't mean you'll see that drawdown every single year there's a midterm election. It's just the average.

So far this year we've seen a 9% drawdown. But he could see that the combination of September seasonality with midterms would add a bit more volatility this month. Hard to say. We're down 3% since mid-August. If markets head 5% or even 10% lower, he'd use cash to buy equities.

Technical damage is there, with 200-day MA starting to trend lower and the price below that. Needs time to repair. Complicated structure and leverage makes it hard to value underlying assets. 

This ETF can make some sense at this point. Yield is ~4.25%, though relatively flat the last year. You'll be rewarded for picking up bonds at this stage, you can take a chance and extend duration. Yields have, perhaps, gone too far; if they pull back, then bond prices may start moving higher.

Yields have, perhaps, gone too far; if they pull back, then bond prices may start moving higher. This ETF has bonds of a shorter duration. Yield is a bit lower at 3.1%.

Invests in companies with high-quality features including low debt, reliable earnings. That might translate into less volatility. All US names, and 122 of them. S&P has outperformed this ETF over the past 1 and 3 years, but not by a tremendous margin.

All government bonds. Challenged, with rates moving higher this past year. Bear market for bonds over the past 5 years. He's not quite ready to go out 20 years. Safer timeframe would be 7-10 years. Getting attractive, but hard to say where the bottom is.

Chart looks attractive, higher highs and higher lows for the past while. Getting close to 200-day MA, which could provide support. His concern is trade issues. In industrials, he'd prefer larger-cap companies with better risk/reward.

Very difficult. His sense is that we'll see an eventual easing of tensions, and things will normalize to a certain extent. But keep them in mind. Does a company have a lot of US exposure? Do they ship a lot to the US? Do they have business in the US?

DOL, for example, doesn't really have business in the US and so they're not really affected by tariffs.

Not that URI isn't a good company, but he owns CAT. Earnings growth is 30% going forward, while URI is closer to 20%. You pay a little bit more for CAT, but it taps right into secular growth areas of power generation and data centres and manufacturer reshoring. Continues to impress. He's adding to new portfolios.

Right at the 200-day MA, which is an opportunity. Almost a Top Pick today.

Not that URI isn't a good company, but he owns CAT. Earnings growth of CAT is 30% going forward, while URI is closer to 20%. You pay a little bit more for CAT, but it taps right into secular growth areas of power generation and data centres and manufacturer reshoring. 

Clearly on solid footing. There are concerns about the economy and any impact from tariffs. Many banks are trading at multiples above average, but there may be reasons for that. They have diversified revenue streams.

Broadly, banks have a place in your portfolio. As do strong, big US banks.

Seeing a 65+% growth rate through 2028, but a lot of that's in the first year or so. Trading down at the 200-day MA. The AI infrastructure story continues very strong. Makes a lot of sense for power generation. Still buying for new clients.

Since June, still seeing higher lows despite the pullback -- an important distinction.