Quinlan看好美股：AI建设推动再工业化

Let me just start with the jobs data and sort of how you process what we saw yesterday, what it says to you about the health of this US economy. Well, it speaks to the underlying health of the economy, David, despite the miss. When you go beneath the surface, you see the fact that we had some seasonality with a local government World Cup. But what I looked at was very encouraging, the increase in jobs for construction and manufacturing health care.

So I spent a lot of time talking to our bank clients, commercial clients, and they're talking about adding labor, not shedding it. In some cases, using AI automation, but the job market remains, I think, pretty on solid footing. But are you at all concerned that even the job growth we're seeing, construction jobs, in my head when I read that, thought, oh, we're building houses again. That's great. And then we dig into it, and it's mostly AI data centers.

It seems like it's all the same circular AI world. I mean, the exposure there to me seems very high, but you're the you're the expert. You tell us. If you were if you're still bullish on this, you know, tell me I'm wrong. No. No. You're not wrong. And you're you're definitely you're you're on on track with that. You're seeing a huge con contribution to GDP, industrialization, the man the the materials demand from data centers.

But, also, you're seeing foreign companies come in here, increase their production of chemicals, automobiles, automobile parts. You're seeing other US companies build out the plant, whether it's a little bit, you know, factory additions. So it is day data center driven, but there's a lot more to this manufacturing build out, construction build out than just data centers. But it is overwhelmingly it'll alleviate, fade a little bit here in the 2728.

But we're when I sit, I see the reindustrialization, the manufacturing capacity coming back. And related to that, defense. Defense spending. We we need more missiles, ammunition, munitions, you name it. That's helped driving that growth as well. Joe, wanna get your perspective on the the the market that we're in, the moment that we're in, and in your latest note, which I mentioned a moment ago, it's kind of a refutation of the bear case on on The US economy and and US markets right now.

I'll read one line from it. Amid the gloom, something curious keeps happening. You write, The dire predictions of the worrywarts never happened. Disappointing and surprising market bears. What explains the the resilience here as as you see, and what what gives you grounds for for the optimism that you have about the the markets and the economy? Well, David, the background to that note was, like, every meeting I go into, it usually starts with a client saying, I'm really surprised about the consumer, the dollar, the federal budget deficit, the underlying strength of the economy.

So we wrote the piece kinda, you know, leaning against that narrative because when you look at the consumer, sure. It's k shaped. We know that higher income households are out there spending. The federal budget deficit, I've been debating that for, like, three decades with clients. That's an issue, but we we're having we can manage it. The weaker dollar obituary has been written how many times? I mean so there's all these kind of bricks of worries in the wall, right, so to speak, that we gotta work through.

And it does weigh on sentiment, and it can keep people out of the market when they should actually be leaning into the market. So not that we're not not that we don't have any problems. Right? We got big issues to deal with with our dollar, foreign demand, federal budget deficit. But the underlying capacity of this US economy to absorb the shocks, take the blows, reset is underappreciated still. And to me, that's a that's a lean into on any pullbacks to buy.

You also talk about a couple sectors, you're following. One that surprised me was US solar stocks rose on Friday after the president ordered this 15% new tariff and a price floor for polysilicon derivatives, which were not really on my list of things I needed to know this week. But, why is this relevant, and why are you seeing this movement in this energy sector, especially at a time where we're not hearing a lot about solar anymore, a lot about diversification of our energy sector despite the need and despite what's going on in The Gulf?

Well, I'll take it from the macro level. We need every source of energy in this country right now, whether it's fossil fuels or renewables. So the Gulf War back early in February, that kinda gave a new life to renewable sector in general, not just The United States, but even globally in Europe as well. Look at China. Yeah. China, they say, oh, bull burns a lot of coal. Well, that's true, but so do we. But they're also using a lot of renewables.

So I think it's all hands on deck when it comes to generating power, and that includes renewables. So I think that's been a hidden corner of the market that's done very well, but I think that trade is now becoming recognized. Joe, I'm not gonna put you a position where you have to talk about specific companies, but let me just ask you about AI broadly. I imagine when you walk into those rooms where you're dealing with some some bearish sentiment, there's probably some concern that you're hearing about AI's future, the path forward.

We've just been through the the part of earning season that dealt with these hyperscalers and their their attitude toward the the growth of of AI. What do you take away from that? How does that change or reshape the the AI narrative as as you see it? Well, the biggest thing, David, I'm looking at is that, okay. When we end the '27 and '28, when we kinda get back get beyond the data center build out, what picks up the slack?

And I think it will be picked up, whether it's transportation, the grid, defense spending. But the artificial intelligence, you know, we're looking at very carefully how are companies leveraging this new technology to drive margins. And you're hearing more and more companies speak to this every earnings, every quarter. Right? So we're seeing that happen. It's not gonna happen all at once. It's not a hockey stick. You know, you go sideways and then then straight up.

So it's happening. And we're the belief that by the time we get to '28, '29, 2030, you're looking at a different economy, a different workforce, increased productivity. So that keeps us very constructive on US equities overall. But there's gonna be job displacements. Right? We we know that. But I think when we release labor because of automation or technology, then we up skill it. And that means more income. That means higher paying jobs.

So I believe the AI were early innings with the build out, early innings with the adoption, and early innings when it comes to productivity. But I think it's coming down the track and so do a lot of investors.