00:00I mean, I think what we're seeing, at least from an individual investor or retail perspective,
00:04is that there still is a lot of enthusiasm around the equity market in particular. We see that in
00:09retirement accounts when we're looking at it on a do-it-yourself basis. And of course, we have
00:13the anecdotes from the retail market more broadly. But I don't think that necessarily means that the
00:19general tone is speculative. I mean, when I talk to clients, there's still a sense of consternation,
00:26a sense of concern, whether it relates to AI, whether it relates to inflation,
00:31how the economy is actually trending. So I know we talk a lot about an AI bubble,
00:36but I'm not sure we necessarily see the speculative emotions that might go along with that, at least
00:43as it comes to the clients I speak with. So we got this inflation print here this morning,
00:49Marta. And I guess a lot of folks, I mean, I think the way you guys were, you were writing
00:52about it,
00:52is it a benign decline or a pressing concern? What is your takeaway after today's data?
00:59I mean, can we do any better than Tom Keen's boring? I mean, it really,
01:03really kind of split the difference between inflation concern and what could be a less severe
01:11scenario. It keeps September in play. I think we don't exactly know how that's going to play out
01:16at this point. But I think at least from kind of the range of outcomes perspective,
01:21it keeps us away from a guaranteed hike at this point. And I think maybe the market can take some
01:26relief from that. I should point out here, Paul, I say boring. Folks, it's showbiz. Okay, get over
01:31it. Marta knows. Eric Winograd knows. Dr. Sweeney knows. Our immense respect for how difficult this is,
01:40led, I would say, iconically by David Rosenberg. Yep. And the way he parses inflation. It's never
01:45boring. It just came out bingo on survey, a testament to all the economists. Yeah, they nailed
01:52it. Yeah. Marta, what are we thinking here? Economists have never felt so good. Yeah. Exactly.
01:56What are we thinking here in the bond market, Marta? Because we do have yields coming in,
02:00but they're still higher than we've seen. Yeah. I mean, I think the bond market is
02:05super fascinating when we take apart the pieces of what's driving the yield curve. I think it's
02:10a pretty interesting development that we've seen break evens relatively constrained, which would
02:15suggest that inflation expectations remain anchored, even though we've had so much consternation print
02:20to print. And then the move in the real yields and parsing out what is driving that. You look at
02:25the
02:25rising term premium, unevenly rising, but rising. You look at uncertainty around the future path of
02:32rates that we talk about September still being in play. And then you think about just kind of this
02:38general sense of fiscal concern and hyperscale our debt issuance. And it's just kind of a market
02:45where you wonder what could actually bring the yield curve down from here.
02:50So it's interesting, one of the questions just in the bond market is how much credit risk
02:54do you want to take? And I'm not sure there's a lot of incentive to do that.
02:58Yeah. When I talked to our fixed income team at Empower, I mean, the big takeaway, and this has been
03:03kind of a status quo position. But the big takeaway is that you want to be judicious in the credit
03:08exposure that you have. We know that spreads aren't necessarily a timing indicator, but they certainly
03:13mean that people are getting less return for risk. And so I think there is a real carefulness on that
03:20perspective, just making sure that you're not overextending yourself.
03:23There's still a lot of folks in cash, Marta. What's the conversation you have with them
03:28as you just think about markets and investing? Yeah. You know, I don't always represent the
03:33Wall Street view on cash. I certainly think that we want to be fully invested. There's a lot of
03:39value to putting your money to work. But I also think cash provides optionality. And optionality
03:43can be a really beautiful thing if you take advantage of it or put it to work at the right
03:47time. So when you do have a massive market sell-off and you have a little bit of cash on
03:51the
03:51sidelines, then you can engage in the market at better prices.
03:55So I, I'm not always insisting that people put all their cash to work, especially when we think
04:00about retirees and the need for liquidity and surprise expenses. There's been some research
04:05around that and the importance of just having the.
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