Markets Happy Hour Podcast with Aoifinn Devitt

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A weekly discussion of markets, world politics and what it means for your investment portfolio. Banter. Not investment Advice.

  1. 1d ago

    Markets Happy Hour Podcast - October 8, 2026 - There’s No Limit

    In this week's Markets Happy Hour Podcast we pledge to go jargon free - after I was caught out using the jargon "K shaped recovery" on BBC business news on Wednesday morning. Lesson learned! This week, which comes to you from Amsterdam (with some bad conference room lighting) we discuss the heightened inflation expectations, which are still paired with strong spending - creating a bit of a disconnect. We ask about whether that suggests the classic "K shaped recovery" is unraveling - that the lower end consumer is getting some "legs" and starting to spend more. We are unconvinced of that - given the fact that food prices remain high across the board - and could "poison" the well of future inflation. Energy too remains at high levels, so can interest rates possibly not follow inflation upwards? Digging into equity markets, earnings are growing in the S&P at 27%, undoubtedly powered by AI and we ask about how in fact these margins can possibly be expanding with rising costs and a more discerning consumer. We wonder if this is short term - have the costs been artificially suppressed and has the consumer pulled expenditure forward? The start of the AI cycle really killed the trajectories of both value stocks and small cap stocks, and there has been no repeat of the rotation and mean reversion that has typically presented in these cases. A sector that has languished in equity markets and is acutely exposed to interest rates is real estate, and from residential housing bearing the weight of 7% mortgages to commercial property caught off-guard by rising rates, there seems to be few places to hide in real estate investing today - except, perhaps, in SF houses or data centers. For investment portfolios public equities remain the buoyancy that has kept the portfolios afloat as rising bond yields have eroded fixed income return and real estate remains stagnant. While we have heard some anecdotal evidence of private equity returns and distributions slowly, behind the scenes, improving, any portfolio that is underweight public equities will lag its benchmark. Whether this matters is another question - most investors target steady state absolute returns, but it does remain to be seen if shifts will take place in these targets as equities dominate the headlines and steal an increasing share of the pie.

  2. Oct 1

    Currency Architecture: How Global Clients Manage Multi-Currency Wealth | Markets Happy Hour Webinar

    Welcome to the first Markets Happy Hour webinar. Host Aoifinn Devitt welcomes Will Stephenson, co-founder of Fiber Pay, to discuss why currency planning is one of the most overlooked pieces of global wealth management. In this conversation, Aoifinn and Will cover: "Currency architecture" — mapping your income, spending, and investments across the currencies tied to where you live, work, and invest How to time and execute large currency transfers, including real estate purchases abroad Strategies for managing currency risk during the gap between signing and closing on property Why FX forecasts are harder to rely on than ever — and what that means for planning How inflation and interest rate trends compare across the US, UK, Europe, and emerging markets The US dollar's role as a safe haven and what's driving demand to convert dollars into other currencies right now Why clients should plan early rather than scrambling at the last minute Whether you're buying property abroad, funding a child's education overseas, or simply holding wealth in more than one currency, this episode offers a practical look at the planning questions that matter most. 🔔 Subscribe for more from the Markets Happy Hour series. #CurrencyExchange #WealthManagement #ForeignExchange #InternationalRealEstate #MarketsHappyHour #Moneta

  3. Sep 25

    Markets Happy Hour Podcast - The Economy that Never Sleeps - September 24, 2026

    This week’s Markets Happy Hour podcast comes to you from a secret garden in New York City, as I wrap up a full day of interviews and two media appearances – Bloomberg and Fox News. It is therefore quite abbreviated this week, as we get ready for our Live Markets Happy Hour Webinar with a special feature on currency architecture next week. This week we talk about the “Economy that Never Sleeps” from the “City that Never Sleeps. The inflation pressure from energy seems to be confusing the read that the Fed is trying to take from inflation, and as the ripple effect of last week’s interest rate hike are felt through markets, the reaction remains subdued – until now. It remains to be seen whether mortgage rates at 7% proves to be a critical milestone in terms of its deterrent effect on homebuilding, home sales and general consumer wellbeing Markets continue to narrow and the market cap weighted indices are diverging from equal weighted again. Tech earnings remain strong, but non-tech earnings are also cutting in a very decent showing. Meanwhile geopolitics are continuing to be unpredictable but not in a ways that are unsettling markets while AI battle lines continue to be drawn.

  4. Sep 17

    Markets Happy Hour Podcast September 17, 2026 - D Day for Doomers with special guest Helen Thomas

    In this week's Markets Happy Hour Podcast we were delighted to be joined by Helen Thomas, founder of BlondeMoney (in 2016) to bring together the worlds of political and financial risk. She is deeply versed in UK and global politics. We start with the big news of the week - which, despite the title of the podcast being D-Day for Doomers, is now yesterday’s rate hike by the Fed. While small (25 bps) the hike felt momentous because of the shift of the direction, the reality that inflation is not falling and the fact that the new Chair Kevin Warsh clearly went against the direction of travel that President Trump would have wanted. This shores up the Fed’s independence as an institution. On the other hand it is actually not that significant at all if we look back to the history of bond yields. Helen turns her gaze on the political landscape across Europe and how it is evolving, sharing insights on the forces that have driven some of the current fractures. We speak about what the EU Commission President has said we need to do in terms of “urgently reimagining” our partnerships, and the recent overtures by Canada to become a member of the EU is just one example of how the Middle Powers may start to forge their own – alternative – path

  5. Sep 10

    Markets Happy Hour Podcast September 10, 2026 - Featuring Joseph Little of HSBC Asset Management

    In this week’s Markets Happy Hour Podcast we are joined by HSBC Asset Management Global Investment Strategist and “market storyteller” Joe Little. A legendary force on Linked IN, we were delighted to feature his insights here for 30 minutes. We start with picking apart the prevailing narratives and counternarratives that continue to course through markets driven on the one hand by last week’s positive employment number in the US and ask whether these stats can be relied upon as much as ever. Narratives differ of course, with the rise of populist politics in the Germany framed as a reaction to a perceived “dark place”. We ask whether the resilience in markets – whether to the oil price, geopolitics or tariff newschatter – is due to a fundamental lower reliance on these things – a diversification of causal factors or a combination of an outsized The bond market has been getting a lot of attention as a “showdown” seems to be ongoing between Scott Bessent who has suggested that he “is the house” and can persist with the current bond market intervention. The bond market currently seems unconvinced by this suggestion and bond yield continue to gap out in global markets – most notable in the UK. Equity markets have been a bit choppier over the past few week or so and the strain of higher oil prices as well as the bond market movements have continued to introduce some uncertainty. The traditional relationship with higher bond yields would be that as bond yields rise, the equity market premium has to adjust in order to compensate for the higher risk run in equities. We turn as the last section of the podcast to Emerging Markets, which have been buoyed by strong sentiment, strong currencies and relative attractiveness of their bond yields as the dollar comes under pressure. Joe discusses the reasons for the higher bond yield and how this relates to the dollar outlook, and suggests that it is coherent. He further cites the evolution of many emerging market institutions from their crisis fighting mode into a newer state that is instilling confidence and trust – due to measures like raising rates to avert hyperinflation or maintaining independence and an even keel amid geopolitical uncertainty. This all underscores the case for diversification of portfolios, and careful rebalancing.

  6. Sep 4

    Markets Happy Hour Podcast - September 4, 2026 - Full Version - Mark Tinker

    In today's Markets Happy Hour Podcast we are joined by Mark Tinker, CIO of Tosca Fund Management in Hong Kong, and, more importantly for us here a prominent commentator and the author of two blogs - Market Thinking and This Is Not Investment Advice. In this extended (full) version of the Markets Happy Hour recording of earlier today we discuss cost-push v. demand-pull inflation and why only one can be controlled - what the REAL intention of of the Fed and Scott Bessent is, and how there is more alignment than might be assumed (hint it ties back to the hyperscalers and their ability to raise capital). We discuss the fragility of some of the AI models and the case for rotation into the second tier beyond the hyper-scalers and ask about the robustness of the current earnings wave. Just like other data is increasingly uncertain, the data we are seeing in earnings may be self-referential too - just like the AI financing boom we have been seeing. Our deeper dive version of this podcast debates the reason for the struggle of active managers in recent years as well as a thought experiment around AI financing and what is actually real using an example of the subscribers on Mark's blog.

  7. Sep 4

    Markets Happy Hour Podcast - September 4, 2026 - Back to School featuring Mark Tinker

    In today's Markets Happy Hour Podcast we are joined by Mark Tinker, CIO of Tosca Fund Management in Hong Kong, and, more importantly for us here a prominent commentator and the author of two blogs - Market Thinking and This Is Not Investment Advice. We have here an abbreviated version of our longer discussion which involved two deeper dives as set out below. This abbreviated version touches on cost-push v. demand-pull inflation and why only one can be controlled - what the REAL intention of of the Fed and Scott Bessent is, and how there is more alignment than might be assumed (hint it ties back to the hyperscalers and their ability to raise capital). We discuss the fragility of some of the AI models and the case for rotation into the second tier beyond the hyper-scalers and ask about the robustness of the current earnings wave. Just like other data is increasingly uncertain, the data we are seeing in earnings may be self-referential too - just like the AI financing boom we have been seeing. Our deeper dive version of this podcast is also listed in the same channel. In that we do a deeper dive into the struggle of active managers in recent years as well as a thought experiment around AI financing and what is actually real.

  8. Aug 27

    Markets Happy Hour Podcast - August 27, 2026 - Defying Expectations

    In this week's Markets Happy Hour Podcast I am delighted to be joined by Anastasia Amoroso, Managing Director and Chief Investment Strategist at Partners Group. Our conversation starts with a traditional vibe check on the narratives and counter-narratives driving market sentiment. She speaks about a multi - engine economy growing thanks to a stable consumer, soaring Capex, spending on areas such as defence. We move then to discuss Scott Bessent's Big Bet, which is clearly that his intervention in the bond market wills stem the rise at the long end of the yield curve. Anastasia notes the difference in focus of each of the Fed and the Treasury Secretary with a focus on different ends of the curve, and notes the reason for long term yields being as high as they are - higher growth expectations, the stickier inflation, but also the sell-off by other US Treasury bond holders. Discussing geopolitics she notes the amount of oil still flowing through the Strait of Hormuz and the fact that only a fraction of the trade between the US and Canada are actually affected by tariffs, and we mull over the workarounds that are likely to follow once the new realities of global trade filter through. Finally we focus on the innovation economy and the role of private equity in it - noting the uptick in flows into private equity so far this year and the role that private equity investors are likely to play in driving innovation within their portfolio companies. In conclusion we note the passing of music legend and philanthropist Dolly Parton and how she defied expectations, leaving you with her immortal words "Find out who you are, and do it on purpose" .

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A weekly discussion of markets, world politics and what it means for your investment portfolio. Banter. Not investment Advice.

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