标普500逼近历史高位，美伊局势缓和提振市场

We don't think that we are over diversified in the ETF frenzy, really, because if you look at the general portfolio construction considerations out there, this is still a highly correlated market. Think about the relationship that stocks are supposed to have with bonds. Uh, they just haven't existed. They've been positively correlated for some time. And so one of the things I think is really important, really, even beyond ETFs, is to think about what are some characteristics and portfolios that will benefit clients that are not just tied to, again, what's happening with corporate earnings, which we think are so great.

But that level of let's call it portfolio symmetry is a little bit higher than what we'd like to see. So again, finding a variety of categories that will do things besides just go up and down with the uh, the pace of the S&P we think is critical. So again, not overly, uh, diversified within ETFs. You have to look for other things besides ETFs really get that done. So Eric I know within equities you guys are overweight U.S. and emerging markets.

Talk to us about emerging markets how you view the opportunities there. Yeah Paul it is certainly a index set that is really skewed to I. And certainly if you look at South Korea, the effect of memory in particular is that's something that we're certainly cognizant of is sort of being overly concentrated in that broader AI ecosystem trade, if you will. And again, I love Tom's characterization. This isn't a parlor game conversation whatsoever, but the idea that, you know, this is a still a a demographically very strong set of indices, you think about population growth, you think about even the improvement we've had in corporate governance across a number of M countries, that's we think is still a positive thing to have exposure to within a portfolio.

Again, people are fairly, I'd say, as a very predestined to have a lot of U.S. equity exposure. If you live in the US, we have a lot of global clients. So seeing some of that non-U.S. exposure, we think of healthy and not just concentrated in the AI ecosystem. There's some fancy mathematics, Eric Friedman, some dynamics here of a yield on a money market fund versus money flowing into equities. And, you know, I don't want to make this a math project and I but explain how Northern Trust sees yield in the short paper, where funds flow into equities to buttress a bull market.

Yeah, it's a really important rate of change really a stock and a flow, uh, set of relationships, Tom. And really the thing that we've been focused on, if you look at the idea of parking capital and cash, which again, over time is a wasting asset, it does not protect you against inflation. Certainly agree that the prince you all been talking about over the next couple of days will be important, not just CPI, but PPI as well.

And so what we've been emphasizing with clients is really moving away from just parking in like three and six month paper, whether it's treasuries or even commercial paper. We think there's a material pick up, especially for our taxable clients in immunize the spread right now Tom and Paul is something like three and a half to 360 who live in California. The Tri-State area gets close to like 325. So having an opportunity to pick up some tax equivalent yield and Moody's and not just be so focused on sitting in cash, we think that's a great opportunity for investors to sharpen their pencils on.

Eric, we had a question earlier from Macquarie. Um, and his business is infrastructure. And he was talking of infrastructure. Uh, how do you guys think about that? You know, Paul, is he really under own category? We think of it as contracted revenue with an inflation kicker. That's, uh, sounds like our marketing, the the Macquarie book, if you will. But but the idea is that, you know, when we get involved in a infrastructure relationship, you're getting a couple things weren't getting some current carry, which is a positive thing.

Uh, not really the main driver of why we own it, but certainly we enjoy being paid while we wait. You also have some exposure to, uh, what's happening within those individual companies, whether you have an equity interest or a debt interest. We actually prefer equity interests because there are some opportunities for, again, that that cross platform, uh, transmission, if you will, of things like tolls and things like utility transfers that we think are, again, really enhanced.

And so we like the combination of both inflation protection with some yield but also some upside participation in the equity interests.