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16 September 2025
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After a stellar 2025 to date for equities, warning signs - from speculative froth to stretched valuations - suggest the market’s calm may be masking deeper fragilities. Strategic rebalancing feels increasingly timely.
The Magnificent Seven stocks have driven indices to new highs, yet could face headwinds in the coming year. Challenges include their stretched valuations, inherent cyclicality, and high correlation to each other.
We are at a moment in the cycle for both bonds and stocks where investors are afraid to commit in case prices fall further, but they will not care about buying 200 points too soon when the market is 500 points higher.
The VIX as a measure of risk has a place in equity markets in interpreting market sentiment, but it is overly simplistic to think it can represent volatility in equities as a whole. Just what is it?
Most S&P500 companies are doing well with recent reported earnings above expectations. In the tech sector, the Big Five (Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook, Alphabet) have also diversified their income sources.
The popular 'cyclically-adjusted' Shiller PE ratio is historically high and this is often quoted as a sign the market is overvalued, but consider the impact of the current low interest rates.
Each generation believes its economic challenges were uniquely tough - but what does the data say? A closer look reveals a more nuanced, complex story behind the generational hardship debate.
Australia could unlock smarter investment and greater equity by reforming housing tax concessions. Rethinking exemptions on the family home could benefit most Australians, especially renters and owners of modest homes.
This goes through the different options including shares, property and business ownership and declares a winner, as well as outlining the mindset needed to earn enough to never have to work again.
Everyone has a theory as to why housing in Australia is so expensive. There are a lot of different factors at play, from skewed migration patterns to banking trends and housing's status as a national obsession.
The creator of the 4% rule for retirement withdrawals, Bill Bengen, has written a new book outlining fresh strategies to outlive your money, including holding fewer stocks in early retirement before increasing allocations.
This AI cycle feels less like a revolution and more like a rerun. Just like fibre in 2000, shale in 2014, and cannabis in 2019, the technology or product is real but the capital cycle will be brutal. Investors beware.