Which Stocks Perform Best Amid High Inflation?
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Here's your Money Briefing for Friday, June 17th. I'm J.R. Whalen for The Wall Street Journal. With inflation at the highest level in 40 years and interest rates on the rise, your personal finances have taken a beating on several fronts, not just your household budget, but also the investments you hold in your stock portfolio.
As the cost of input goods for companies go up, this compresses margins and leads to lower profits for companies where they cannot pass along these costs to the customers.
But not all stocks trend lower when inflation is rising. So which ones tend to be better investments? George Mason University finance professor Derek Horstmeyer has researched stock performance during times of high inflation. We'll talk with him about his findings after the break.
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Many of those high-flying stocks you bought before inflation took hold and the Fed began raising interest rates have come in for a hard landing.
What is the episode about and why does inflation matter for stocks?
That might make you think there won't be any stock winners in this market, but today's guest says they're out there if you know where to look. Derek Horstmeyer is a professor of finance at George Mason University. He and his research team analyze stock market data from several recent periods when inflation doubled in less than 24 months. including February of last year to March of 2022, to find sectors that outperformed others during rising inflation. And he's here to talk about what he found. Hey, Derek, thanks for joining us. Oh, thank you for inviting me here. So, Derek, why is inflation such a strong influence on stock performance?
This is actually a really good question. Inflation affects our stock market for a multitude of reasons. First, as the cost of input goods for companies go up, this compresses margins and leads to lower profits for companies where they cannot pass along these costs to the customers. You can think of this happening in sectors of the economy where customers are very price sensitive, like consumer staple companies such as Walmart or Procter & Gamble. Second, as the costs of goods go up for the consumers, they have less disposable income to spend on things like going out to restaurants, trips abroad, or large new car purchases. This primarily drives down stock prices of companies in the consumer discretionary space, the travel space, and the large goods industries like car manufacturing and housing.
You know, Derek, another factor that's raised concerns about the economy is rising interest rates. The rise in rates has sparked volatility on Wall Street. When we hear that some industries are sensitive to interest rates, what does that mean?
The whole idea behind interest rate sensitivity is that as the Federal Reserve raises rates, this will naturally bring down the valuation of companies for a number of reasons, including the idea that borrowing costs to run a business are now higher. Some industries will fall more in value than others when interest rates go up.
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