Inflation rose 3.7% year-over-year in September, climbing from August's print of 3.4%. The headline figure for the Consumer Price Index (CPI) was also higher than economist estimates of 3.6%.

Meta Platforms Inc. leads the tech pack this week, reporting its third-quarter earnings a week ahead of most of its peers. Take that as a sign of confidence, perhaps.

Middle Eastern oil exports are approaching pre-war levels, but oil prices certainly aren’t. Brent remains above $100 a barrel, as the concern increasingly is not just how much oil is flowing today, but how much is left in reserve if supplies are disrupted again.

After years when yield was scarce and investors were pushed further out on the risk spectrum, income is investable again. High-quality bonds can once more provide meaningful cash flow, portfolio stability and a credible path to total return without requiring an aggressive call on interest rates or credit.

GMO has posted a new 7-Year asset class forecast for 3Q 2026.

US stocks have continued to climb, but the gains have been far from uniform. In most sectors, a majority of companies have trailed the index. For investors, we believe the divide between a resilient index and uneven stock-level outcomes makes selectivity and fundamental research more important.

Last week saw a further deterioration in the inflation outlook, while the Federal Reserve (Fed) appears increasingly reluctant to tighten again immediately. The September headline Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose 0.6% month/month (m/m) and 3.7% year/year (y/y), while core inflation increased 0.3% m/m and accelerated to 2.6% y/y from 2.4%.

The new policy regime the Fed has lost touch with the economy. It has eradicated a lot of market feedback by eliminating banks from trading federal funds. It has separated interest rates from money supply growth.

The boom is currently pushing interest rates up in two ways. First, the investment spending is boosting economic growth and straining the nation’s financing capacity. Second, the boom has been accompanied by a buoyant stock market, which is lifting household wealth and bolstering consumer spending.

As investors look beyond U.S. borders for fixed income diversification, Schwab Asset Management is entering the international bond ETF race with the Schwab International Bond ETF (SCIN). Expected to begin trading on the NYSE on October 21, 2026, SCIN pairs international investment-grade bond exposure with an ultra-low 0.06% net expense ratio.

The ETF industry has officially shattered last year’s record for annual product launches. A total of 1,159 new exchange-traded products have debuted year-to-date, eclipsing the full-year record of 1,143 funds set in 2025. With more than two months remaining in the year, the rapid pace highlights issuers’ relentless push to bring innovative strategies to market.

Being able to recognize one’s blind spots and knowing when to bring in another financial professional can be just as impactful. Identifying where those boundaries exist can help advisors continue to excel in their area of expertise while helping clients build financial plans that strengthen their future.

For the past two years, much of the conversation about artificial intelligence in wealth management has been hypothetical. Will advisors use AI? Will clients accept it? Will firms allow sensitive information to flow through large language models? Regulatory filings show that those questions are starting to be answered.

If you can channel energy into the best working relationship you could possibly have, that’s a good starting place. When it comes to cattiness and gossip, learn to walk away. Don’t do this in anger or as if you are better than they are. Instead, do it quietly and calmly.

A skeptical convert’s story transcends a snapshot and expands into a dynamic before-and-after. It speaks directly to the prospect who hasn’t been won over yet; the prospect searching your website or social channels for a good reason to stop their search.

In this webcast, we’ll explore how Buffer ETFs can complement traditional fixed-income allocations and help strengthen the defensive side of a portfolio.

Companies have postponed more than $5 billion in US and European debt sales this month as investors grow increasingly alarmed about rising interest rates, resurgent inflation, and potential cracks in the artificial-intelligence boom.

JPMorgan Asset Management has included Bitcoin in its long-term capital market assumptions for the first time, forecasting returns that could beat stocks, bonds and gold in a milestone for its Wall Street acceptance.

Elon Musk openly endorsed the prospect of combining SpaceX with Tesla Inc. in what would be the biggest-ever corporate merger, uniting assets from electric cars to AI data centers to rocket and satellite capabilities.

Last week’s surprisingly bad inflation figures pose a dilemma for the Federal Reserve. In recent speeches and interviews, Fed officials suggested they were in no hurry to raise interest rates again and that a pause might be appropriate. But holding the rate now looks harder to justify.

A week filled with hotter inflation readings brought growing concerns about the sustainability of the pace of AI spending. Despite rising inflation, bond yields ended the week lower. While the S&P 500 Index of large-cap stocks fell 1.95 percent for the week, the decline was largely driven by its heavy weighting to technology stocks, which faltered by 6.37 percent.

While don’t think of myself as being old, I can’t call myself young anymore. When I go to the gym, it takes me longer to stretch than to work out. People my age debate the best vitamin supplements, not the best burger joints. When I am asked for identification at the market, it isn’t to confirm I am old enough to buy beer; it’s to see whether I am eligible for a senior discount.

Corporate credit, monetary policy’s sleeping giant, is finally stirring. Cloud computing service provider CoreWeave Inc.’s bonds dropped this month, sending yields on its 2032 notes as high as 15%. Yields for junk and investment-grade debt reached the highest since 2025 and 2023, respectively.

Predicting the direction of interest rates is challenging enough when economic conditions are relatively stable. Add persistent inflation, a resilient economy, a cooling labor market, geopolitical uncertainty, and an expanding supply of Treasury debt, and the challenge becomes considerably greater.

Earnings now have become the central market focus this week. Bank results have been somewhat mixed, and the market will need confirmation that profits outside the largest technology companies are strengthening. I still do not believe the overall equity market is excessively valued, but investors should expect continued volatility between growth and value as expectations for AI spending shift.

The AI agent catalyst. Meta's September launch of Muse, a personal artificial intelligence (AI) agent designed to act on a user's behalf across digital workflows, crystallized the market's latest disruption narrative.

Fed rate hikes could climb further than markets expect, according to T. Rowe Price Capital Markets Strategist Tim Murray.

The US Treasury market is entering a new era. Financing government debt is becoming less about capital availability and more about the yield required to attract it.

Narratives are almost always wrong: clever stories that explain the past and say nothing about the future. One may be right. AI may become the dominant technology of the century and render much of the present economy obsolete.

This year, the software sector has been one of the worst-performing pockets of the leveraged loan market amid fears that AI would severely disrupt existing business models. The sector’s underperformance has also weighed on the leveraged loan asset class as a whole, given its more than 10% weight in the overall Morningstar LSTA US Leveraged Loan Index.

A full pantry feels safe. A full balance sheet can too. But abundance and preparedness aren't the same thing. Instead of adding something new, financial advisors should consider digging into a portfolio and pulling everything off the shelf for examination, with the intent of fully understanding what’s already in there.

The Mega Backdoor Roth may be one of the most powerful tools in a long-term 401(k) planning strategy. It can pair well with other high-earner tax strategies and belongs in any serious conversation about retirement tax diversification.

For many people, AI tools will be worth paying for. However, it is wise to decide, before any bills arrive, how much in very real money those tools are worth to you.

A vendor who sells you wiring and calls it electricity has understood one step of the problem and mistaken it for the whole. That is simply a vendor selling the only part they can deliver, and that arrives with an invoice attached.

The S&P 500 Index rose, erasing its early-session losses, as big banks and healthcare companies climbed. The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 Index rebounded to a slight gain after South Korean neocloud company Elice Inc. tanked in its trading debut, spurring concern about the sustainability of the global AI boom that continued to weigh on the sector.

High-grade investors, including T. Rowe Price Associates Inc. and Invesco, are looking at dipping into the least risky corner of junk debt after a broader selloff pushed valuations lower.

Chris Galipeau and Taylor Topousis discuss high-conviction insights that go beyond media headlines.

Cboe Global Markets Inc. launched pre-market trading in single-stock options, like those on ETFs tracking major stock indexes.

Fear of missing out has driven data-center developers to build as much computing capacity as possible, as swiftly as they can. But investors funding the projects are getting nervous. They’re suddenly worrying that spending on artificial-intelligence services won’t be enough to justify the trillions of dollars backing the buildout.

This must be one of the most hated US bull markets ever. It’s easily the most distrusted rally in the several decades that I’ve been following markets. I can’t remember when so many people were so skeptical of a rising market and so sure that it will soon end in tears.

The Nasdaq-VettaFi Asset Allocation Summit this week included insights from leaders at key asset managers discussing the major decisions that advisors are facing. With costs rising and many investors at or near retirement, fixed income and income ETFs, specifically, took up a big part of the conversation. Leaders from BlackRock, WisdomTree, and Fidelity Investments all shared their views on both the fixed income outlook and the use cases for fixed income ETFs right now.

The link between AI capex and earnings carried roughly half of this year’s profit growth, and that support fades once spending stops accelerating, even at a record level. The earnings bill doesn’t arrive when the spending stops. It arrives when the spending stops growing.

Third-quarter earnings season kicked off this week and expectations are high. Despite the headwinds of higher oil prices and interest rates, economic growth has remained resilient, while the AI investment boom continues to gain momentum. As a result, the S&P 500 is expected to deliver 29% year-over-year earnings growth, marking a third consecutive quarter of 25%+ gains.

Plenty of story-stocks and recent alpha generators are outside AI glamor companies. Absolute and relative strength have ticked up in real-economy sectors that were beaten up as investor dollars flowed to tech. Macro conditions, such as ebbing Treasury rates and the upcoming U.S. midterm elections, are wildcards. Still, traders and portfolio managers should listen up for commentary in perhaps unusual places this earnings season.

Artificial intelligence (AI) and the Federal Reserve rate hike have dominated headlines recently—and investors might be wondering how these things will affect them.

On July 24, China’s Ministry of Finance and State Taxation Administration announced that putting assets into an offshore trust, and earning income through one, are taxable events. The rate is 20%, and it applies not just when assets go in but also when they earn income and when the trust is wound down.

Fall is officially underway, heralding a season of change — and what a difference three months makes. The past quarter brought a dramatic Federal Reserve policy pivot and notable shifts in market sentiment and ETF trends. But within equities, the most striking reversal occurred inside the AI trade itself.

We believe the combination of AI, robotics, space technology, and quantum computing will be primary drivers of future economic growth.

Five of the nine indexes on our world markets watch list posted year-to-date gains through October 19, 2026.

This review is, in part, about Eswar Prasad’s latest book, “The Doom Loop: Why the World Economic Order Is Spiraling into Disorder.” But it will also cover a seemingly unrelated article, Robert Kagan’s March piece in The Atlantic magazine, “America vs. the World,” and his 2018 book, “The Jungle Grows Back.”