Charts Of The Week: December 8, 2025
Charts Of The Week: December 8, 2025
The Magnificent 7 Has A New Look – Broadcom’s Banner Year
Investors referring to the ‘Magnificent 7’ ought to update their rolodex. Broadcom has quietly become the seventh largest stock in the S&P 500, surpassing Tesla. Perhaps ‘Elite 8’ is a better title for these stocks. Broadcom has marched higher this year, registering the second-best year to date stock price gain amongst the largest stocks in …
Getting Big by Selling Slim – Eli Lilly’s Rise to $1 Trillion
Eli Lilly’s market cap eclipsed $1 trillion in Friday’s trading session (according to FactSet data). They became the first healthcare company to achieve this milestone. The simple explanation for how this company joined the four-comma club is ‘diversified growth’ as a product of research and development. The company has cultivated numerous blockbuster drugs culminating with …
Stocks Are to Lead Guitar as Bonds Are to Cowbell
High short-term yields and leftover anxiety from 2022 led to underinvestment in bonds in 2025. 2022 bond losses were unusual, but some bond volatility is not. 2025 returns were partially driven by yields being pulled down by rate cuts. We believe that process may have run its course for longer-term yields. Uncertainty still makes bonds …
Strengthening Portfolios with Less Understood Tools
Through generations of boom and bust in investing—granted all boom for those who think long term—there are terms and phrases that elicit positive and negative emotions. Perhaps the most famous and most widely cited is “this time is different” invoked during nearly every financial bubble or subsequent crisis. Don’t worry—I am not going to utter …
What Q3 Returns Told Us About What May Lie Ahead
The S&P 500 climbed 8.1% (including dividends) in the third quarter and made it five months in a row of gains to bring the index’s return to +14.8% for the year as of September 30. (Carson’s Chief Market Strategist Ryan Detrick shares insight on recent market strength in A Quarter for the History Books. Now …
Are Stocks in a Bubble?
“By many measures, for example, equity prices are fairly highly valued.” Jerome Powell, Tuesday, September 23, Speech to the Providence Chamber of Commerce That recent comment by Fed Chair Jerome Powell helped spark the recent three-day selloff in equities. No, it wasn’t just that comment alone, but those words did add some worry for investors. …
The Labor Market is Flashing a Big Red Sign
The August payroll report was expected to be soft, and it was worse. The bottom line is that the labor market is in trouble, but that cements expectations for a rate cut in September. The economy created just 22,000 jobs in August but take that with heaps of salt – the number is going to …
Market Concentration: Concern or Opportunity?
Stock market concentration has gathered an increasing number of headlines in recent years. Starting with Apple reaching a $1 trillion market capitalization in 2018, “The Four” eventually became the “Magnificent Seven” and all eyes were on these technology and communication giants. Transforming daily life and growing earnings at a rapid pace, these largest stocks have …
Here Comes the Worst Month of the Year
“Wake me up when September ends.” Green Day The S&P 500 moved back to new highs last week and gained in the month of August during a president’s second term for the first time since 1950, so that’s the good news. The bad news: summer is over and we aren’t out of the woods yet, …
10 Takeaways From Our Conversation With Cliff Asness
Ryan Detrick and I just celebrated recording our 150th episode of Facts vs Feelings. It’s been three years since we got started and we want to thank you all wholeheartedly for the amazing support. Our listens and views have been growing, and we’ve had a lot of fun along the way, including having some amazing …