Main Street Investor

After nearly six straight months of nothing but stocks going up, investors are facing the first real adversity since April. Many high-flying names have dropped significantly. Investors—and every major financial media outlet—are questioning whether the AI craze is over. The lower end of the consumer market is struggling, and many consumer-oriented names are under pressure. Unemployment is rising, and the Fed remains stuck in limbo on monetary policy. As a result, the market is in correction mode while assessing the risks. Is now the time to pound the table on booming growth, or should investors be cautious and seek safety? I’ll share my thoughts and explain what I’m doing in today’s market. AI-Related Stocks Pausing The biggest trade over the last six months has been AI-related stocks. Everything from AI infrastructure, chips, and energy has seen explosive growth recently. Those names are finally taking a breather and appear to be correcting. Some of these stocks are down 30–50% from...

Introduction  In my last publication, I said I was amazed at the resiliency the market had shown through the summer. We saw an all-time V-shaped rally off the April lows, and the market has just continued to climb higher. As we embark on autumn, this market has reminded me of a very important lesson that investors should pay close attention to: trades often last much longer than anyone expects. This is true on both sides. In other words, just when it seems stocks can’t go any higher, they do—and just when it seems they can’t go any lower, they do. Peter Lynch expertly identified this concept in One Up on Wall Street , pointing out that investors often sell their winning stocks too soon and hold their losing stocks too long. In recent publications, I’ve characterized this market as resilient. We’ve now moved beyond resiliency—we are in the fear-of-missing-out (FOMO) stage. This phase of a bull market is exciting, but it can also be dangerous. If you’ve been a long-term investor, or ...

  Summer Lull It’s been a while since I’ve checked in. July and August are the “depressive months” for teachers (mostly kidding). While I’ve been devoting more attention to my full-time duties, I’ve stayed as in tune with the market as ever. By mid-summer, I was astonished by the resiliency of this bull market. It has digested uncertainty after uncertainty and continued to push forward. It’s as if it’s immune to policy, geopolitical, and economic turbulence — and there’s been plenty of that. Federal Reserve leaders once again gathered in Jackson Hole, Wyoming — the annual summer get-together for top central bankers — to discuss future economic policy. (I should’ve been a central banker rather than a teacher.) It seems rate cuts are on the horizon. Markets were thrilled with this signal on Friday, but have since pulled back. I have no clue what the near-term macroeconomic picture will look like. Truly, nothing would surprise me in the next several months. My focus remains on identif...

I launched Main Street Investor during the sharp sell-off back in April. If you recall, I urged investors not to get scared out of the market during that downturn. If you kept a level head, you likely had much to gain. Now that we’re approaching all-time highs, I want to share my thoughts on investing in this kind of climate. As I said in Navigating Market Turmoil , investors often get spooked into poor decisions during downturns. Just as important, though, is avoiding recklessness when markets are going well. I believe the risk now lies more in the latter. I’m not here to call market tops or bottoms, but I hope to provide guidance on how to think both strategically and tactically across different market conditions. Incredible Market Resilience I’ve been astounded by the market’s ability to keep pushing upward despite serious challenges. Back in April, when pundits were calling for the end of American exceptionalism, the main threat was Trump’s trade war. While that was a major co...

Until now, I’ve used this blog primarily to share thoughts on market trends and macroeconomic developments. While it is important to understand current market conditions and have a general sense of macroeconomics, I generally find little interest in covering these topics. I am, at heart, a bottom-up investor. In other words, a bulk of what I do is analyze individual companies and invest through that perspective, rather than through a macroeconomic perspective. Today, I’m offering a first look into how I evaluate a company for potential investment. As always, this is not financial advice. I’m not recommending that you buy any stock. Instead, consider this case study a window into my investment process. Why Regeneron? Regeneron is a stock I’m currently watching closely. I already hold a position in my personal portfolio, and I may increase it significantly. That said, it’s currently one of my losing positions—down about 20%. Still, I believe the future could be bright. Th...

It’s been about two months since I published   Navigating Market Turmoil . In that post, I urged investors to remain calm despite rising concerns over the end of free trade and American exceptionalism. At the time, tariffs and unpredictable economic policies had understandably rattled investors. Still, I cautioned against selling strong positions out of fear. That advice has held up. Since then, the S&P 500 has climbed roughly 16%, and many individual stocks have seen significant rebounds. The portfolio I manage has recovered 30% and is now approaching all-time highs. I share this not to boast, but to reinforce a key point: as I said before, investors must be greedy—or at least not fearful—when markets are down. The political maneuvering we’ve witnessed has had real consequences, and the market was right to price in those risks. But as I noted in  Navigating Market Turmoil , these issues were either going to resolve themselves or escalate to a point where hedging wouldn’t ...