Sam Burns, Chief Strategist at Mill Street Research, is a market strategist with over 25 years’ experience in financial markets and investment research.

In this interview, Sam argued a soft landing is in. He said he sees 50 basis-points of Fed rate cuts in 2024, no US recession, and a continuing movement of inflation back to the 2% target.

He explained why he thinks the market bears are wrong for worrying about the US federal debt, and he said he’d be more worried if the November presidential election led to a shift towards deficit-cutting and tightening fiscal conditions.

Sam continued his “myth-busting” by arguing that, contrary to what many believe, the S&P 500 is not being held up by a handful of tech mega-cap stocks. In fact, according to Sam, the US stock market and markets globally are steadily rising in a sustainable way.

Turning to commodities, Sam said gold is the only one which stands to benefit from the current macro environment. Specifically, he said declining real interest rates and central banks globally loading up on the yellow metal put it in a good position to continue to rally higher.

Sam also got into the theoretical weeds, telling us why he disagrees with Austrian economist Robert Murphy’s stance that deflation is not inherently bad for the economy.

Finally, Sam weighed in on our ‘$1m Resource Talks’ portfolio, telling us what single move he’d make to help us grow our wealth.

Timestamps:
00:00 recap
00:58 intro
03:27 Will the ECB or the BoE cut rates before the Fed?
04:54 When does Sam expect the Fed to cut rates, and by how much?
06:51 Is it just the magnificent 7 that are driving the market's gains?
08:48 Are you worried about fraud in the mega-cap tech stocks?
12:32 Is now the time to invest in small-cap stocks?
15:04 Why is this economical cycle different than historical cycles?
20:13 Do you buy in ill performing markets?
22:33 When do you buy?
25:59 Which commodities are a buy right now?
29:45 What is the correlation between the gold price and interest rates?
31:57 What is Sam’s take on the rising debt in the US?
39:30 Is the government borrowing too much?
41:51 What will happen with the US deficit after the elections?
45:51 What is Sam’s take on the rising consumer spending?
50:05 Does Sam see a recession happening in 2024 or 2025?
54:34 Would Sam be a long-term investor in Japan right now?
59:16 Is it a problem to have deflation in an economy?
01:05:10 What is Sam’s take on bitcoin and cryptocurrency?
01:11:09 What is Sam’s single buy for the million-dollar demo portfolio?
01:17:51 contact details