Trends come and go, but some don’t leave before impacting your investments first. The problem is parsing through all the trends and figuring out which will or will not impact your portfolio. Of course, long-term investing is founded on principles that go beyond merely chasing the latest trend. But that doesn’t mean ignoring trends completely. At Carnegie, we believe in striking a balance by remaining aware of trends, but not being shackled to them. With that in mind, here are five megatrends and the impact we expect them to have on the market.

Special purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs, have exploded in popularity this year, but most investors are still not familiar with these entities, sometimes called blank-check companies. 

Are we headed into a time of inflation? Many people and economists are debating this issue right now. In the “real world,” we’ve seen inflation in interesting areas such as Pokémon and NBA Top Shots trading “cards,” which had seen a spike up in prices earlier in the year. Housing prices are certainly rising. Plus, inflation is finding its way into commodities such as food inputs like soybeans, corn and more. Certainly, gas prices are higher at the pump than a year ago. And does it mean inflation is coming because of crazy high auction prices for things such as Jack Dorsey selling his first tweet ever as an NFT (non fungible token) for over $2.9 million?

On a monitor across from my desk, two screens share constantly updating market news from earnings reports to headlines. On my phone, Twitter flashes the latest evaluations and thoughts from, well, thought-leaders. Bloomberg provides analytics, data and even more financial news. The flow of information is good and valuable. Everyone can access this information. It’s a far cry from years ago, when we had to wait to receive faxes of earnings reports. Now financial information is certainly becoming more “democratized”. But these volumes of information are a challenge for individuals to process, even if those individuals are professionals.

At Carnegie, the word “counsel” in our name speaks to the expertise we bring to investment management. But how does the Carnegie approach work in practice? How do we synthesize information together as a team to help portfolio managers digest it and make decisions for our clients’ portfolios?