Jon Quast

Before I give some answers, I do want to temper expectations because I think that maybe behind the question is the thought that what if AI is a bubble and what if the AI bubble pops?

I just want to be clear that if the AI bubble does pop, if it is a bubble and it does pop, you're talking some of the largest cap stocks out there are going to go down.

The whole market is going to go down.

And that's normal.

Even when we diversify our portfolio, there can be non-correlated things that do go down below for what we purchased them at.

So I don't want to say that these stocks would be immune to a stock market correction or a crash if...

AI goes south.

But I think that when we talk about diversity here, it really depends on what our goals are.

So if you're just looking for a solid diversification, there are solid options out there, right, that are just kind of, they're not going to go up a ton, but they're probably not going to go down a ton either.

I would look at things like Pepsi, McDonald's, just kind of these bellwether things that perform reasonably well in and out of cycles.

But there's not a lot of growth there.

But I wanted to bring some more growthy ideas that don't have an AI component.

And two of these, I would consider them more hidden gems.

The first one I want to talk about is shoe company Deckers.

And this would be a good one to keep an eye on for someone looking for non-AI diversification.

There's multiple reasons why I think that Deckers is kind of a cool company.

First, it has grown a lot in recent years, but growth continues to be good.

So up 7% in the most recent quarter.

That's not outstanding, but it's not bad either for a company that's already grown so much in recent years.

Its gross profit margin is about 60%.