Money Life with Chuck Jaffe

Scott Colyer, chief executive officer at Advisors Asset Management, says he is cautious right now, but the cyclicals, materials, energy and health care tend to be strong during periods when the Federal Reserve is bringing interest rates down. He suggests riding that trend, saying "You take your cue from the Fed, now is the time that you want risk-on. Kendall Dilley, portfolio manager at Vineyard Global Advisors, says he expects the stock market to have its average draw-down of 14 percent at some point this year, but he expects it to be a buying opportunity for long-term investors. Plus, Axel Merk, chief investment officer of the ASA Gold and Precious Metals, discusses the impact that Saba Capital Management is having on the fund and on shareholders, having entered the fund as an activist, moving to change the board as it pushes for a double-digit discount to be narrowed. Merk discusses the challenge of dealing with activist investors in a junior mining fund, the potential for the fund to be liquidated, the possible outcomes and the impact of the action on shareholders.

Cheryl Smith, economist/portfolio manager at Trillium Asset Management, sees the economic tide as running out, and that it will be taking the stock market with it, and while she does not think it will be a steep, sharp, protracted drop, she does say investors will want to prepare for it. She suggests keeping the portfolio simple, rather than going after alternative investments built to make money even when the market is down; she says investors will likely prefer buying U.S. multinational companies rather than investing in foreign stocks and says investors should be moving the portfolio now, so that it is well-positioned when trouble arrives post-election. Also on the show, Todd Rosenbluth, head of research at VettaFi, makes a young actively managed bond fund from Pimco his "ETF of the Week," Cassandra Happe discusses a WalletHub study showing that nearly early 3 in 4 Americans think tipping has gotten out of control, and money manager and financial historian Daniel Peris discusses his new book, "The Ownership Dividend: The Coming Paradigm Shift in the U.S. Stock Market."

Kim Blanton, writer at the Boston College Center for Retirement Research, calls the search for assisted living "an opaque experience" and notes -- through the story of her mother but also reporting from a hearing before the Senate Committee on Aging from January -- that most people focus more on the "living" part of the issues when they should be paying most attention to the assistance part of the plan. Nick Young, chief experience officer at Money Pickle joins Chuck on The Financial Crunch to discuss robo advisors compared to working with planning pros, Ted Rossman discusses a new BankRate.com survey showing that a growing number of taxpayers plan to boost savings rather than paying down debts with tax refunds this year, and Geoff Garbacz, principal at Quantitative Partners, brings his indicator-driven approach to the Market Call.

Sameer Samana, senior global market strategist at the Wells Fargo Investment Institute, says that the market's recent rally appears to have run out of steam, requiring "a little bit of a breather" before the market makes more real upward progress. He expects a 5 to 10 percent pullback, with Standard & Poor's 500 using the 5,000 level as its new support level and the uptrend only being threatened if the sell-off pushes it below 4,600. Jay Zagorsky, a professor who studies the gaming industry at Boston University's Questrom School of Business, says some $20 billion will be gambled on March Madness this year, with a record number of participants placing some type of wager thanks to rapid growth in legalized gaming. Matt Schulz, chief credit analyst at LendingTree, discusses his just-released new book, "Ask Questions, Save Money, Make More: How to Take Control of Your Financial Life," and Elliott Gue, editor of the Energy & Income Advisor newsletter is talking income-generating stocks in the Market Call.

Macro strategist Larry McDonald, creator of The Bear Traps Report, says that the current economic situation is "very 1980s like," a condition that requires different strategies than what most investors have used since the financial crisis of 2008. In a '1980s recession,' a very hot economy keeps inflation ripping and pushes oil prices high, and leaves the bottom 60 percent of the population struggling to keep up, and he says consumers are starting to show that tension now. The conditions should be good, McDonald says, for industrials and the oil and gas industries. Kyle Guske, investment analyst at New Constructs revisits SweetGreen, noting that the recent jump in the price simply has increased the peril facing investors, which is unexpected because the stock was in the Danger Zone before its IPO in 2021 and subsequently became a so-called zombie stock for being on the verge of running out of capital. Plus, Sophia Titley discusses Live and Invest Overseas' index on the world's top 10 retirement destinations for 2024, and Craig Giventer, managing director of portfolio strategies at GYL Financial Synergies, makes his debut talking stocks in the Market Call.

Kevin "Lex" Luthringhausen, chief content officer at Tradier Hub, says he has been stubbornly short the stock market expecting a mild pullback that hasn't been coming because the market is "insanely bullish" right now, having pushed stocks, gold and cryptocurrency into record territory. While Luthringhausen is confident that there will be a consolidation, he does not expect "a massive sell-off" until after the presidential election, when he foresees a potential 10 percent correction; in the interim, he is expecting a solid year with slight pullbacks but near constant upward pressure. Dan Omstead, global head of health care investments at Abrdn, says in 'The NAVigator segment' that health care's recent rally from several years of struggle represents the start of a positive trend that has the ability to run from here. Steve Coughran, author of "Reframing Rich: Creating a Better Relationship with Your Money, Yourself, and Others" talks in the Book Interview about getting the right money mindset to achieve and accept financial success, and Clayton LiaBraaten discusses a Truecaller survey showing that one in five Americans was the victim of a telephone scam in 2023, a problem that cost U.S. consumers more $24.5 billion.

Sam Stovall, chief market strategist for CFRA Research, says that he expects the stock market to surprise investors in 2024 "the way it did in 2023," producing the kind of double-digit gains that are typical of the second year of a bull market. Once the market gets into the third year of the current bull run -- in 2025, after the presidential election -- he expects a turn because "that's when bull markets tend to die an early death." Stovall notes that while he thinks the market could take a pause or minor correction before resuming its climb, he expects leadership to change from large caps -- which he says are trading at a 30 percent premium to the Standard & Poor's 500 average price/earnings ratio over the last 20 years -- to small and mid-cap stocks, which have been trading at a steep discount. Todd Rosenbluth, head of research at VettaFi, picks a specialized sector play -- the VictoryShares WestEnd U.S. Sector fund -- as his ETF of the Week, and Cullen Roche, chief investment officer at the Discipline Funds, talks exchange-traded funds in the Market Call.

Tony DeSpirito, global chief investment officer of fundamental equities at BlackRock -- lead portfolio manager of the BlackRock Equity Dividend fund -- says that the Federal Reserve will be more concerned with inflation than deflation for the next three to five years, keeping interest rates relatively high and creating more market volatility; he says that increased back and forth will make for good opportunities for active management to deliver market-beating results. DeSpirito is looking for some of that performance from health-care stocks, in Japan and by focusing on quality as an investment factor. Also on the show, Cam Miller, co-founder and chief revenue officer at Money Pickle, talks about the different ways that individuals compensate financial advisers and how it's important to match expectations and desires to the payment process. Plus, Todd Gervasini, founder and chief investment officer at Wakefield Asset Management, makes his debut talking stocks in the Market Call.

Craig Johnson, senior research analyst at Piper Sandler, says that the Dow Jones Industrial Average, Standard & poor's 500 and the Nasdaq Composite are all "trading at the very upper end of an 18-month trading range and this is not usually where you start a whole other leg higher," so he expects a correction back to about 4,600 on the S&P in the next six weeks. When that move is finished, Johnson expects the market to resume its upturn but then to settle into a "high-level trading range," which he says is typical of election years and that it amounts to a sideways move. In that environment, the market will recover from the correction, and then he notes that he thinks it will fizzle and go sideways. Also on the show, Wade Pfau, professor of retirement income at The American College of Financial Services, discusses the latest updated to his "Retirement Planning Guidebook," which center around "tax mapping" and how investors may want to rethink investment strategies in retirement with an eye on minimizing taxes using strategies most haven't considered before now. In the Market Call, Scott Davies, founder/chief investment officer at CDAM, talks about "fire and forget" investing.

Jeff Kolitch, portfolio manager for the Baron Real Estate and Baron Real Estate Income funds, says that the scary headlines about real estate -- and particularly commercial real estate -- have been an over-reaction and says investors want to be looking at real estate stocks now rather than waiting for "an all-clear signal" on the industry. "The best time to step in is when there's angst out there," Kolitch says, "and we like the set-up and think it's a great time to lean into real estate." Kyle Guske, investment analyst at New Constructs, reaffirms Rivian as a zombie stock that remains overvalued despite coming down by 30 percent in a recent drop-off, and he notes that the stock seems inexorably headed to losing everything. In the Market Call, Jason Browne, president of Alexis Investment Partners -- manager of the Alexis Practical Tactical ETF -- talks exchange-traded funds.