First Trust

We lost him so early, but what a joy to talk to Myron Scholes any number of times, including the tragedy of August of 1998.

Where's the leverage shadows here? I mean, I, I get it, all the major banks love what you're doing, First Trust, all that.

Where's the leverage shadow in this build-out, this certitude that all this is gonna work?

Well, Sh- Sheth, I, I think if, if you take a few steps back, Tom, and you ask, uh, the fundamental question, what's the point of investing? For a large number of people, it's not like a stock-picking contest that they wanna win.

I'll go ahead and put CIBR.

This is an ETF, the NASDAQ cybersecurity ETF by First Trust.

This is something that we have on SwingTrader right now.

again, this has been one where in in May this got back above its 200 day moving average line was really going on a nice tear.

A lot to talk about in markets.

Joining me today on the First Trust ROI podcast is Gibson Smith, founder and CEO of Smith Capital, who serves as a sub-advisor for several First Trust ETFs.

Gibson and I will discuss all of these issues and more on this episode of the First Trust ROI podcast.

Um, can you believe it's fall, I guess is my opening question for you.

Um, I don't know where the summer went, but, um, it seems like the year is flying by.

And there's been some change at the Fed as well with Kevin Warsh, uh, coming in as, as the new Fed chair.

Um, he seems like he's a bit different than Jerome Powell.

Uh, of course, Jerome Powell has stuck around at the Fed, and so our, our economic team at First Trust has said, uh, you know, that, that Warsh is kind of the chairman in name only because of the influence of Jerome Powell.

USRT pays a current dividend yield of 2.64%.

The next best performing is from First Trust, their S&P Real Estate Investment Trust Index Fund.

FRI is the symbol of Also, I believe now up 13% year to date with a dividend yield of 2.52.

Number three on the list is the State Street.

And on this podcast, our objective is to enable financial advisors to always be working on their business and on themselves.

On today's 100th episode, I'm joined once again by Chris Jepson, head of advisor consulting at First Trust Portfolios.

Chris was our very first podcast guest, so it seemed only fitting to have him back for this milestone conversation.

As one of the industry's most respected thought leaders, most in-demand speakers for substantial conferences, Chris continues to help advisors think differently about growth, client relationships, not to mention the future of the profession.

Also, the co-author of two recent white papers.

that we'll talk about a little bit later on.

And he also heads up the advisor consulting group at First Trust Portfolios.

So Chris, thanks for being here.

[laughs] You know, interest rates are going up, so they're like, "Okay, w- we're not sure the outcome" where the, the markets were pretty placated for the last six weeks or so.

David, you, uh, w- we just mentioned First Trust.

One of our September speakers was Strider Elass, a senior economist there.

Um- The, uh, First Trust put out a version of a speech given at Jackson Hole by the new Federal Reserve chairman, Kevin Warsh.

Uh, you thought this warranted the attention of the entire team.

What's your takeaway from this first major address by the new chairman of the Fed?

Well, a- as the piece First Trust put out commentary, basically it was like a breath of fresh air, right? It was somebody that was not doing the old, uh, Fed speak, as we kinda call it.

So it's going back almost to Alan Greenspan days.

Is the buffer space getting too crowded? Is there room for competition? I think especially after that acquisition from Goldman last year, buffer ETFs are definitely one of the fastest growing categories in the industry in terms of assets, in terms of flows, but it is a crowded arena.

It's been dominated by early movers like an innovator like First Trust.

I think there still is runway, though, for new entrants because we're still in the early innings of advisor adoption.

When you talk about mainstream RIA models, a lot of advisors are just now converting cash equivalent or core bond allocations into buffered equities as a way to stay invested while capping the downside risk.

The first share issued of that was called the first investment trust.

It looks a lot first.

We first look at it looks like first trust.

That's different issuer.

And that's totally true.

But we know that by and large, every... decade or so, there's roughly two downturns, right? You can see on this chart from First Trust, it shows how often bear markets happen, how often bull markets happen, how severe the bear markets are, and how robust the bull markets are.

Well, obviously, more time, more bull market, more upward growth is great.

But if you are a retiree, and you're naturally dialing down the risk of your portfolio, you're naturally moving into a more conservative asset allocation, what's likely going to happen is rather than you having to go through six or seven downturns over that 30-year time horizon, you're likely going to be exposed to maybe nine to 10 downturns over a 40-year time horizon.