Hard to believe, but it’s now been 5 years (8/1/2021) since Harbour went independent! It’s been a wonderful ride as we continue to grow and improve, all because of your help. Thank you! To that end, one client sent us a note that reminded us why we are in this business. “You make my heart feel good.” So much of what we do is numbers, plans, performance, taxes, etc. But we work so hard to link wisdom and heart into how we provide these other services. I think both are equally important and… yes, ya’ll make our hearts feel good too! It’s what makes this business fun.
We also just took new pictures with Kaley for our team, check out our updated websitehttps://www.harbourwealthmanagement.com/. Ben Chrisman with Chrisman studios is an incredible artist, highly recommend if you want some quality work or personal photos. Kaley continues to learn rapidly under close mentorship from all of us, hard to believe she’s not even 6 months in her role! She’s already able to do majority of what Ansley and Martha were doing for us, so please don’t hesitate to ask her any administrative questions.
In June, our team had a work retreat to discuss what is working well and how we can improve on our services. We live in an era of rapid change with AI and try to differentiate between what is useful and what is trendy. Core to our work is competitive money management, quality financial advice with deep resources, effective communication, and (as much as possible) keeping things simple for you so you can live your life fully. Everything must be brushed against these principles. The results of our retreat were that we are looking to make some changes that help enhance resources (especially in tax), allow you to see a more comprehensive financial picture, and continue to use AI for research or automated tasks. More coming soon! Hopefully you’ve found our use of agendas prior to meetings useful, we’ll look to continually improve the content, and always appreciate any of your feedback!
Markets
Listened to SIC 2026 again with its all-star panel of speakers & as always gained valuable insights. The main topics of discussion were the war in Iran, the changing geo-political environment, concerns about inflation and speculation on how new Fed chair (Warsh) will manage, and the long term implications of AI and data center buildouts. We try to use this information to challenge our own thinking on portfolio management and potentially gain new actionable insights. Overall, given that we’ve been wary of higher inflation, bullish on ‘reasonably priced’ tech, and concerned about the impacts of private credit, we like our positioning.
Following are some highlights:
High valuations & concentration in SPY over 40% in top 10 holdings. We suggest equal weight for more diversification wherever possible.
Small cap finally showing some leadership, as they’ve been historically underpriced compared to large growth. This has especially helped our more aggressive portfolios.
Ben Hunt, one of the partners of our Perscient narrative subscription service, also spoke. One of ‘wins’ he’s been tracking quite some time has been private credit, which has led to our underweight of financials, which so far is the worst performance sector in ’26. Ben also been using the narrative engine to track the data center buildout, one of the biggest economic themes of our lifetimes. You’d be surprised to know that both corporations and government are planning almost 15% of US GDP into AI/data center buildouts. This will have tremendous economic implications worth following.
Louis Gave—spoke years ago about how energy (traditional and renewables) have been better diversification holdings than bonds last few years and certainly continue to do so in ’26. It was a critical insight leading into 2022 and one we continue to follow. Energy continues to be more reliable than bonds during geo-political disruptions.
Many talked about the industrial might of China, but we remain uncomfortable investing in that theme. However, emerging Asia outside of China has performed well this year even if the cost of energy has created some headwinds to that trade.
Iran-clearly pushing up inflation costs in ’26. However, there’s a strong incentive for another cease fire of some kind before the mid-term elections and surrounding countries are actively building infrastructure to reduce the importance of the Strait of Hormuz.
Warsh—Last week he held rates steady again and the bond market sold off, which can be a signal it doesn’t believe the Fed can move towards its 2% target anytime soon. We don’t either. Right now he’s in an interesting predicament. He attempted to speak tough on markets even as he recently ended a long-standing policy of offering forward guidance. Markets didn’t believe him, so it could put more pressure for a rate hike at the next meeting. Yet he’s calling the Iran inflationary pressure temporary, so it feels like he’s waiting on some kind of resolution. We’ll know more next month. Another off radar observation, the Fed restarted expanding its balance sheet again “reserve management purchases”, buying short term treasuries to help banking reserves after several years of tightening. This started under Powell, similar to his actions in 2019 before the Pandemic.
Gold—Most remain bullish on the metal. We still believe in secular long term trends, but it’s going through a pullback after its massive runup and it’s not as attractive with higher interest rates. That being the case, it’s still a good hedge against craziness of world (dedollarization, inflation, wars, uncertainty). Not as good as equities, but a reasonable supplement to fixed income and cash as a ‘store of value’. Especially in the face of the data center buildout and the Fed increasing its balance sheet again.
Personal stuff from the team:
Hoping everyone is enjoying vacations & can’t wait to hear about them! So far, we’ve been to Scotland again enjoying Matthew’s 21st birthday.
Matt gave a key-note speech in June at DIG South about his long essay, Businesses of Abundance—let us know if you’d like a copy. Here’s the seminar:https://youtu.be/4VFVqvB891w?si=c-utfNOB0PEZep8U.
| 
