1. The Knicks Are Winning—and So Are Small Caps: What Market Breadth Is Signaling Now
We are deep into the NBA playoffs, and as I take pen to paper my Knicks have vanquished the 76ers in the Eastern Conference Semi-Finals (this note might not land well in Orion’s Philadelphia office; the fact NY is led by three Villanova standouts hopefully buys me some grace). I love basketball, though I am not so sure I love the modern game where the 3-point shot has come to dominate, and don’t even get me started on the G.O.A.T debate – it is Michael Jordan. And speaking of Michael Jordan, we know that even the greatest of all time can’t win it all on his own (think Jordan and the Bulls without Scottie Pippen). Which brings us to the subject of this week’s note, the market’s remarkable run and the fact it isn’t just about the S&P 500 – and what that might mean for returns going forward. — Tim Holland
2. The Data Is Clear: Earnings Have Driven Stock Prices for Decades
Over 20+ years and multiple market cycles, earnings and stock prices have moved together with a 98% correlation, making earnings growth a reliable driver of long-term returns. Despite the market uncertainty and geopolitical noise of 2026, earnings expectations have remained strong, with consensus projections calling for 18.6% EPS growth this year and 16.1% in 2027. For long-term investors, that is the signal worth focusing on. — Lincoln Financial
3. Top Financial Advisors Focus on Only Two Types of Clients
One of the biggest practice management mistakes I see with financial advisors is when it comes to segmenting their clients. They segment their clients into three or four different groups different groups they create service levels for ABC and D clients. This is a make-work project and only leads to frustration. — Grant Hicks
4. The Hidden Market Signals Driving Stocks Right Now
While we often talk about “the market” it’s just a sum of the parts. The parts themselves carry useful information worthy of review. This week we will disaggregate “the market” and test the macro narrative against the micro evidence. The stock market hit new highs again this week as earnings rose, oil fell, and rates retreated. While we talk about “the market” each week, it’s been a bit since we have disaggregated it for discussion. For our own purposes we disaggregate “the market” into the following categories: geography, investment style, market cap (company size), and sectors. This week let’s do a brief survey of the disaggregated returns and draw some conclusions. — David Waddell
5. AI Is Coming Fast—Can Your Tech Stack Keep Up?
AI is already changing how people work. You can see it first in pretty practical ways. Advisors are using AI to get ready for meetings faster, summarize notes, draft follow-up, and cut down on some of the manual work that slows down the day. But from where I sit, the bigger question isn’t whether AI has arrived. It clearly has. The real question is whether a firm has the right foundation to use it well. That foundation isn’t just the AI tool itself. It’s the data behind it, the way that data is organized, the workflows it needs to support, and the controls around what the system can see and do. If a firm’s data is fragmented, its workflows are disconnected, or teams are still manually stitching information together across systems, AI isn’t going to solve that problem on its own. More often, it’s going to make the gaps easier to see. — Josh Hornsby
6. When Wealth Can Be Detrimental to Your Health
$25 million bought one family everything except a coherent approach to healthcare. A few years ago, I engaged a new client Richard, and his wife Annette, both 72. He was recently semi-retired after the sale of a successful business, owned multiple homes in Virginia and Florida, and had multiple trusts, sophisticated estate planning, and a strong investment portfolio. They hired me because my team had rescued Annette’s mom from bad financial decisions in the face of multiple chronic illnesses before she died. Our work had also rescued her portfolio, so Richard and Annette asked me to manage the legacy left in her estate. Their net worth: $25 million. — Tom West
7. AI Is Coming for Wealth Management—Will Advisors Be Ready? with Karl Roessner
Karl Roessner, CEO of Vestmark, makes the case that AI’s real promise in wealth management is not just faster workflows, but more time for the work advisors are actually built to do. From meeting prep and proposal generation to portfolio monitoring and client service, he sees agentic AI pushing firms toward a model where advisors can act more quickly, personalize more effectively, and spend less of the day buried in operational tasks. But Roessner is clear that speed cannot come at the expense of trust. As custom models, tax-aware UMAs, alternatives, and new wealthtech tools reshape the advisor experience, he argues that the winning platforms will be the ones that simplify—not crowd—the advisor’s screen. For firms trying to keep up with the next wave of wealthtech, the challenge is choosing technology that can evolve quickly while still feeling stable, scalable, and built around client outcomes. — Power Your Advice
8. How Wealthy Clients Access Cash Without Selling Stocks, Homes, or Other Assets
There are occasions when even wealth clients need some cash and they don’t want to sell assets to generate it. That stands to reason because smart clients don’t want to take on short-term gain for the longer-ranging pain of tax consequences. Plus, there’s an emotional component. For better worse, humans get emotionally tied to things such as houses, art collections and the like and thus don’t want to outright part with those assets, even when they need to raise capital. — Todd Shriber
9. The Firms That Win the Next Decade Won’t Add More Tech—They’ll Delete More Steps
Jon McNeill grew up in Kearney, Nebraska. Kearney is one of those places that matters to my family — one of a few pins on the map that shaped where we come from. Kearney, Washington, DC, and a few other places in between. It’s always interesting when small places punch above their weight in forming how you see the world. Growing up in Kearney, McNeill mowed over 100 commercial lawns before graduating from high school. He went on to become President of Tesla, COO of Lyft, board member at GM, Lululemon, and CrossFit. He built a career on one instinct: ruthlessly remove what doesn’t need to be there. His new book, The Algorithm, lays out five steps — Jud Mackrill
10. Rebalancing for a Fragmenting World: Why Broad Commodities Still Matter
Commodity markets are often framed through a familiar lens: global growth accelerates, demand rises, and prices follow. But the current environment is being shaped by something far less linear and possibly far more consequential. Today’s commodity cycle is increasingly defined by supply-side disruptions and geopolitical fragmentation, not synchronized demand strength. While energy markets remain central to the narrative, the more important developments are happening beneath the surface, in the inputs and linkages that tie the entire commodity ecosystem together. — Christopher Gannatti
11. Intel’s Stunning Comeback Is Signaling the Next $Trillion AI Opportunity
Intel Corp. (INTC) has been a dog for decades. Now, its stock is taking off like a rocket… up nearly 500% in the last year. On its latest earnings beat, its stock spiked 24% in a single day as data center builders "snap up any chips they can get." The company that's been the punchline of tech investing for two decades is now cool again! I must confess, I didn’t see that coming. Intel is surging because plain ol’ central processing units (CPUs) are suddenly the new artificial intelligence (AI) bottleneck. And that’s setting up a great investing opportunity… but not in Intel. — Stephen McBride
Bonus. The Best Advisors Don’t Chase Clients—They Choose Them
Most founders play a numbers game when searching for early-stage capital, firing out hundreds of pitches to investors they’ve barely researched. I did that myself when trying to get my first venture, CareerConcept, off the ground. I'll argue here that this is the wrong approach. The idea was to help students fund their university fees with a pre-determined percentage of their future income. It was novel and untested, which made it difficult to find someone to take a chance on us. I handwrote letters to all 250 people on the German rich list. I didn’t bother to read about what area they worked in. If they were on the list, I pitched them. And then, I waited... — Dr. David von Rosen-von Hoewel