On Zephyr’s Adjusted for Risk Podcast, market strategist Ryan Nauman interviews Thomas Martin, board member, partner, and senior portfolio manager at Globalt Investments, about the current market environment and portfolio positioning. Martin highlights the war involving Iran and potential disruption at the Strait of Hormuz as the key macro risk, primarily through its impact on oil prices and inflation, with possible recession implications if elevated prices persist. He explains Globalt’s approach as balanced and benchmark-aware, currently modestly overweight the U.S., underweight international equities, and holding Treasuries over credit due to insufficient compensation for credit risk, while managing duration near the market. He discusses using gold and silver as uncertainty hedges, trimming after spikes, the challenges of high index concentration, the sustainability of tech-led leadership, valuation pressures from AI disruption risk, and why P/E ratios remain a useful shorthand despite limitations.

Zephyr helps Investment professionals shift through the noise. Learn more here.

Learn more about Globalt Investments here.

00:00 Welcome to the Podcast

01:03 Meet Tom Martin

03:02 Biggest Macro Risk Oil

07:49 Portfolio Positioning Today

11:26 Why Underweight International

14:12 Balancing Risk and Upside

17:10 Market Broadening Beyond Tech

20:16 Valuations and PE Debate

24:54 Beating a Concentrated Index

28:50 AI Hype vs Real Winners

31:07 Wrap Up and Where to Learn More

Connect with Ryan Nauman:

LinkedIn

X:

Let's go.

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Ryan Nauman Market Strategist Zephyr:

Hello everyone and welcome to

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zephyr's Adjusted for Risk Podcast.

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I am Ryan Amman, the market

strategist here at Zephyr.

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Investors are faced with

an interesting dilemma.

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On one hand, they are faced

with numerous concerns.

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On the other hand, markets have

continued to defy expectations.

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Over the past three

years and climb higher.

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Well, I have on an industry expert

who's gonna help us make sense of the

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current market environment, some of the

current trends he sees, and what it all

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means for our investors moving forward.

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But first, today's episode is sponsored

by the award winning Zephyr, which

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helps investment professionals

make more informed investment

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decisions on behalf of their clients.

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Alright, let's move on

to the start of the show.

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Enough from me, I've already

talked enough, I would

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like to welcome Tom Martin.

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Tom is the board member, partner and

senior portfolio manager at Global.

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Investments.

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Tom, thank you so much

for coming on the show.

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It's really an honor to have you on.

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You just got back from a long

vacation, so I really appreciate you

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coming back and jumping on the call.

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Can you please tell us a little bit more

about yourself and global and investments?

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Thomas Martin Board Member, Partner & Sr. Portfolio Manager Globalt Investments:

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Ryan thanks a lot for having me and by

extension alt on your program It is an

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honor to be here so as far as I go I

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And have held a number of positions but

most of which has been focused on the

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investment side and particularly with

actually selecting the stocks and or

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investments and putting together the

portfolios in one form or fashion and

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now I'm sitting on the investment policy

committee which is responsible for all

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the investment decisions at Galt and

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again that was on an equity side with

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began what we call our innovate ETF

Strategies which are whole portfolios

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that consist of stocks bonds cash real

estate alternatives all expressed with

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ETFs so they're a hundred percent liquid

and they are meant to be portfolios

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that can meet the need of a number of

different situations all the way from

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global macro to a retirement portfolio

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Ryan: Fantastic.

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That's great, Tom.

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Such an honor to have you on

with the, you know, just your

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background and stock picking.

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Really excited about this conversation.

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It's gonna be a good one.

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Let's talk about the.

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Yeah, I, I mentioned at the

opening investors, they're

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faced with a lot right now.

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A lot of geopolitical risk.

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We have, you know, other macro risk like

the fed uncertainty, monetary uncertainty.

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We have a new fed chairman, a lot of

uncertainties, cracks in the labor market.

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Some labor concerns there.

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What is a single macro?

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If there is just one, maybe there is

more single macro concern that you have.

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tom: since I went on vacation and came

back war broke out or war was declared or

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not declared but anyway Iran was invaded

and that is the thing It's not so much

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the war itself as it is the repercussions

of oil and Iran sits in a unique position

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as everyone by now knows at the strait

of Moose and crimping those oil flows 20

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of world oil and gas flows is major and

they have the capability to be able to

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continue to do that for a long time and

there's it's very difficult to change that

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position of advantage regardless of the

firepower that we have and so the price

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of oil which had been almost half of a

hundred right And we were in the Fifties

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and that was having a favorable impact

on inflation or a tailwind et cetera And

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inflation is one of the key macro factors

that everybody keeps an eye on and which

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is important whether you're a Federal

Reserve Board member or Whether you're

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just investing in stocks and bonds the

price of oil is very important and how

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long it stays elevated or whether it gets

further elevated from here is the single

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biggest issue and it's in incredibly

hard to To handicap because war is so

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much more uncertain than anything really

anything else so it's hard to do that I

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think what you're seeing in the markets is

that it is being discounted to a prudent

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degree but not to a hysterical degree

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Ryan: Yeah, I think that's a very

good point, and my thought is

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the longer this goes, initially

it was maybe a couple weeks.

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It looks like it's going to

transpire longer than maybe

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most expected a bigger impact.

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It's gonna have more uncertainty,

especially if oil remains above a

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hundred dollars a barrel for a prolonged

period and have a greater impact.

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But do you think.

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You know the last did some research

on this last time we had Gulf

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Wars, you know, a while ago.

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The oil environment has changed a lot.

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Now we are, the US is the greatest

producer, the biggest producer of oil.

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Back then it was Saudi

Arabia, Russia, and so on.

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Do you think that shelters us

a little bit, that you know,

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we are the biggest producer.

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We're not focusing on or

reliant on imports so much.

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tom: No it's a great question and it's

interesting and certainly oil since then

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has become a lesser impact on the global

economy There's just less usage of oil

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or more efficient usage of oil et cetera

And the supplies are are still pretty

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abundant and the US as you said ha we

have the capability to produce our own

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so we don't not really held hostage to

that standpoint however oil is a global

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commodity and its price is determined

at the margin globally And yes there are

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different prices There's Brent and WTI

et cetera and different and sweet and

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capabilities of manufacturing it into the

products that are needed for the various

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industries from gasoline to jet fuel

but so it matters I think to the United

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States but it's matters less than those

other countries that are very dependent on

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the energy that's transiting through the

strait of horror moves So we have a little

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bit of an advantage there but we still

end up paying that higher price and oil is

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in everything and so it takes a while for

price changes to work their way through

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And that's why your comment about how

long does this last is critical to that

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because the more that it works through

and to the price of goods and services it

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it will certainly impact those on a micro

basis and company by company industry by

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industry basis But it can have the effect

if it was a long term of even influencing

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whether there's a recession or not and

the degree of severity of that recession

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Ryan: Yeah, that's fantastic, Tom.

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So you talked a lot of PRI primarily

on oil, but the impacts of, and the

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concerns on the, on the macro level,

what's your view then on the investment

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landscape, currently more on investments,

whether it's equities, fixed income,

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what's your overall, overall view and

moving forward based on those concerns?

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tom: This is informed by our macro view

which goes into our global macro and

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the ETF allocated portfolios and we

believe that we're in the Make it so

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that you can sleep at night we're not

overly conservative but we're not overly

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aggressive We we want to participate in

the up markets but we want to be able to

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preserve asset value to the extent that

you can even when you get dislocations

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when everything goes down There's not a

lot you can do because There's no really

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benefit of diversification but we do we we

are diversified in the kinds of equities

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we own even in the United States it's not

just large cap it's not just technology

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we do have small cap and mid cap we're

sensitive to this the economic sectors and

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what they are traditionally used for what

their growth characteristics are their

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value characteristics are when people go

to them for safety et cetera and right

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now because of the level of uncertainty

that we have we're fairly close to the To

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the benchmark we're a little weight over

We're overweight in the US and underweight

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in international and as far as interest

rates go and bonds go we don't feel as

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though you're getting paid the kind of

premium that makes it worthwhile to invest

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in anything that has credit risk so we're

all in treasuries and we're willing to

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accept a little bit less yield because

it's not a lot less yield like you would

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if spreads were we're blowing out so in

in addition to that we're fairly close

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to a a market duration we are concerned

about rates potential to go up depending

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on inflation but we also see that as

not a tail risk but a lesser probability

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than them staying in the range that they

are the prospect for rates to go down is

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also a possibility So we want to be right

in there and then I think the biggest

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position that we've had that has addressed

the uncertainties of the markets has been

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gold and silver and we've been longer

term owners of those for years and had

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up until recently a significant Position

in those in our portfolios taking some

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of the allocation away from fixed income

and away from international equities And

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so that has really helped our clients

and our performance certainly over the

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last year but again as we're trying to

a strong eye on risk when those things

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spiked the way that they did we took

money off the table and were carefully

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looking at those fundamentals We still

think that they are important parts of

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the portfolio but we're willing to have

a much lesser exposure than we did have

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and For an opportunistic time to come back

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Ryan: Yeah, Tom, that's great.

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I covered a lot there.

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You know, gold, hot topic,

fantastic performance.

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I'm really sure that positive of that

contributed to, to some positive returns.

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What caught my attention there was.

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You kind of pulled back your

underweight international.

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International outperformed

over the past year.

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Is that more just because of the

uncertainty, global uncertainty

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there, or do you think the

valuations have increased?

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There's not, you know, we've, that

it's hit to use the word, but it's

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running outta gas that that trade

or what's your reason be behind

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pulling back on the international.

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tom: It let me just be clear we didn't

pull back We never went there And so

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we've been underweight international

for years and up until last year that

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really paid off it seemed as though every

year at the beginning of the year hope

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Springs Eternal and the market came to

international assets and they would have

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a good half year and then they would

they would underperform from there and if

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you look at the fundamentals underlying

some of those countries there've been

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a number of changes more recently but

prior to last year you could say that

160

the policies of those company countries

at a minimum were not really pro Growth

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not pro entrepreneur and they weren't

pro business and they elevated costs and

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they were taking out nuclear capacity

as far as energy goes et cetera and

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it it made it difficult just from a

capitalistic point of view to see Where

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that growth was going to come from And

the populations weren't really supportive

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of that either those are the underlying

fundamentals that kept us underweight

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and they kept us underweight in 2025 as

well n Those things have changed at the

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margin certainly when Russia invaded

Ukraine and the administration in the

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US said need to start spending your

own money and defending yourselves and

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preparing yourselves and by golly they

did allocate money And I think that's

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part of the reason that those markets

started to take off even though that

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spending was gonna be fairly concentrated

in the defense types of industries but

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it sparked some positivity there And

you started to see some grappling with

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the realities of Energy needs and energy

costs And I think that was galvanized

174

by what happened with energy costs just

as a result of the invasion of Ukraine

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Ryan: Yeah.

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tom: So at any rate we were not there

and the replacement of gold and silver

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those very high equity returns so

the money had to come from somewhere

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we're very fortunate and glad that

that we had that as a substitute

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Ryan: Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Fantastic Substitute Tom, so that's great.

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So we've talked some risk there.

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How do you balance and like I said,

markets for the past three years, it.

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Double digit returns.

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The past three years hasn't been done.

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I don't, I can't remember if it's

ever, or it's been a long time

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since we've had this fantastic run,

but there's been risks out there.

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How do you balance those risks?

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You know, like, and you just talked about

protecting the downside, but we don't

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want to give up that upside potential.

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How do you balance those two right now

in this current market environment?

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tom: Yeah stocks can be difficult and from

the standpoint Of what do you invest in

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at Warren Buffet who's the kind of the

most celebrated value investor ever I

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think things are I will say that they're

a little bit different from 30 years ago

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or 20 years ago when you had innovation

was Proceeding but proceeding at a slower

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pace than it is now And particularly just

with regard to technology and valuations

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of companies were tighter I'm gonna say

at the in the main and when you have

198

companies and technological changes

cultural changes that have when you start

199

with Facebook and Amazon and Google and

the Mag seven right and you have these

200

networking effects and communication

services effects and The ability to market

201

and to grow and to have a embedded user

base to a degree that you just didn't have

202

before who were the networked companies

before at and t right And the baby bells

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and they were utilities but now you you

have this this user base and this reach

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that is instant virtually instantaneous

and that spurs real spending and that

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can be targeted on a mic Grow level and

there's so many things that are being

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done that weren't done before and these

companies are huge and they they've been

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able to generate cash flow and to be

able to reinvest and put that capital

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spending back in place and that's what

drives this value So they're myths that

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you know unlike I'm gonna say it's I

wasn't around when Standard Oil was around

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and oil was such a big thing but it's

very different and it's very to handicap

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fast growth rates really extraordinary

growth Rates and how long they will be

212

sustainable and what a exit value is So

that's what's difficult for investors

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And then everybody this isn't a secret

so everybody gets into the same thing and

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the valuations get bid up until you have

some form of consolidation And I think

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that's to a certain degree part of what

we've seen since the end of last year

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Ryan: Yeah, Tom, that's perfect segue.

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Fantastic segue there.

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You know, it's been a tech AI driven

market for three years now, right?

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Valuations of climb, but now, like

you said, the end of last year, we've

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seen a little bit of a rotation.

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Broadening of market leadership

here, which I think is good.

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It's makes a healthier market.

223

Do you think the current macro environment

and the uncertainty will help with

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the broadening of the, the market?

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People getting more diversified,

you know, going more and you know.

226

Re getting outside of the ai sectors

like software that might be disrupted

227

by ai, do you think the macro

environment's going to continue to, or

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result in a broadening of the market?

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tom: As you said it it already has to a

certain degree to have that be sustainable

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and even more noticeable than it is it's

depending on what it's broadening out and

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so when you have a broadening out to small

cap that has underperformed a great deal

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and that attracts people but you still

have to have a macro environment that

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is really more cyclical and pro growth

for smaller type companies So the tax

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regime has to be right The dollar has to

be right interest rates have to be right

235

and there has to be continued consumer

spending cause these are companies that

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are delicate to a degree and so they're

risky and the macro environment that

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we're in now is because of the increased

uncertainty I think that gets drawn

238

into question as to where we're going

from here and then if you look at more

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mature type of companies also companies

that Have not performed well the value

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cohort that has performed very well this

year but like you said prior to that you

241

would've been left well behind if you'd

been invested in But consumer staples and

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healthcare those kinds of companies are

still experiencing at least in the Staples

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very slow unit growth and inability to get

pricing to stick they had it for a little

244

bit during COVID but then they have had

difficulty with that And those companies

245

are the ones where people go to when

they are scared about decelerating growth

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companies but a are they the kinds of

companies that are going to re-accelerate

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And not So the leaders that we've had

and the leadership that we have those

248

companies as we just discussed are they

have the underlying sort of structure

249

to be able to come back and in a bull

market like we've had even though they

250

take a breather If the market goes back

to that leadership you have to have a true

251

change in the macro that is sustainable

to see a true change in the leadership in

252

the market over a longer period of time

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Ryan: Yeah, Tom, that's fantastic.

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Let's talk about, you

know, the valuations too.

255

I think they've come down a

little bit, but a lot of time,

256

you know, the valuations that

l, the valuations they were.

257

In a way isolated to the ai, to

the growth tech, mega tech space.

258

But at the same time, those companies,

especially the mega tech, they were

259

producing really strong earnings.

260

So maybe some of those high valuations

were justified 'cause the firms were

261

producing strong earnings, or is

there still a dislocation you think,

262

between valuations and fundamentals?

263

I.

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tom: Where you see that happening is

when you have what has been high growth

265

Area like software for example or like

some of these technology companies

266

information related companies So they're

not necessarily software but that have

267

been able to better process and package

information I'm thinking about the ratings

268

agency type of companies right And these

are the ones that are are concerned are

269

being disrupted by this new technology

AI and the agents the ability to write

270

code without knowing how to write code

many of those companies I in fact I

271

would say most of them for now are still

producing Solid revenue growth solid

272

earnings they have moats and it's an

open question as to whether or not they

273

will be able to meet this challenge or

not but when you talk about valuation

274

why have these stocks gotten hit it's

not entirely unfair companies are our

275

valuations are a product of the growth

rate and the earnings current level of

276

earnings and the growth rate in those

earnings And you can only see out so far

277

So when those get called into question

and you have had high multiples for a

278

number of years a 30 Times multiple or 35

or 40 times multiple for a 20 30 grower

279

is great but when that growth may only

be 15 or there's some sort of existential

280

risk to the back end of the value of the

company those things get those valuations

281

get cut because you're either cutting the

earnings Growth rate or you're actually

282

cutting or customers So that's what we're

very focused on is what's happening with

283

that now and trying to make a judgment

as to whether that's justified or not

284

But valuation in and of itself typically

is not a reason for Selling and it's

285

a poor timing tool but when you have

it high and there's everything's being

286

called into question you know that that's

when you understand the valuation was

287

high and shouldn't be as high anymore

288

Ryan: Yeah.

289

Do you think we rely too much on

valuations, especially the PE ratio?

290

Some people say we should move past that.

291

Do you think we put too big of a

emphasis on PEs and valuations when we're

292

trying to make investment decisions?

293

tom: PEs are just a shortcut really for

a dividend discount model or modeling out

294

more granularly what you think a company

is able to do and it's an easy way to

295

compare Companies one to another the it's

tough for the human brain mine at least

296

to be able to compare companies on several

different metrics So we use PEs as a as a

297

way to as a shorthand for that but I don't

think that's ever going to go away because

298

as imperfect a tool as it is it's the one

that we have and we can understand the

299

nuances of it when think of the valuations

that are being placed on companies that

300

may not even have much in the way of

revenues let alone earnings a lot of

301

that has to do with just faith In the

future so when you think of it that way

302

I think we have moved a lot more towards

this in the future than we have we'll

303

value the future when it gets here Right

now that's been a risk that you can't

304

really afford to take You have to make

some sort of judgment about the future

305

and be willing to pay something for it

306

Ryan: Yeah.

307

Yeah, exactly.

308

There's no free lunches, Tom.

309

No free lunches in this space, so

you gotta, you gotta pay something

310

to get something in return also.

311

You know, concentration risk, you

know, like we talked about, the market

312

has broadened so concentration risk,

it's been somewhat muted a little

313

bit compared to say a year ago.

314

But as a portfolio manager in

equities who you use, I believe

315

the s and p 500 as a benchmark, how

hard is it to generate alpha during

316

periods of high concentration?

317

You know, if you.

318

During those years, when it's all the

Meg seven and technologies, 35% of

319

the index, how do you create Alpha in

such a, you know, highly concentrated,

320

you know, industry without having to

overweight those, those seven or 10 names?

321

tom: It's a great question and I think

A lot of that depends on the investment

322

approach and investment philosophy that

you have as to how you're going to pick

323

stocks in the first place and then how

you're going to put those together in a

324

portfolio and particularly if you do have

a benchmark which virtually everybody

325

does how you're going to relate those

factors to the risk in the portfolio

326

I feel fortunate to be managing to a

benchmark that I would choose anyway

327

I think the s and p 500 is the world's

best benchmark for the the world's best

328

companies in the United States and I've

watched it in my career as it has had

329

ebbs and flows in the concentration and

in the types of companies that are in it

330

but our philosophy what we use is is an

earnings and profit driven approach and

331

the sustainability of that going forward

and so I could own zero of the Mag seven

332

companies I'm free to do that but that

does butt up against some of our risk

333

parameters when we say how much risk do

we want to take regardless of what our

334

our thought process is And we want to

give ourselves enough room that we can

335

outperform but we also want to protect

ourselves from the inevitable things that

336

we don't know or get wrong come back to

bite us when weightings of individual

337

companies in the s and p get above 3 get

above 5 that's when you really have to

338

say how much of this do I want to have

and what are my alternatives I often

339

hear people say that there's a dearth

of Opportunities or alternatives out

340

there And that the 496 companies 4 94 90

341

Ryan: yep.

342

tom: 4 4 93 are underperforming that's

not true there's plenty of those 4 93 that

343

are outperforming those it's just that

they're smaller companies and a lot of

344

companies that you may not have heard of

or that are more difficult to be familiar

345

with But there's plenty of companies that

you can invest in So if you're choosing

346

not to invest in Nvidia which we like

and we want to be overweight but it's a

347

huge weight in the s and p 500 and do I

want to own have the opportunity to own

348

to take some of that money even though

I like it and put it in something else

349

that I hope we'll do a as well Hopefully

if not better in some of these smaller

350

companies So we're very careful in our

position sizing and our diversification

351

amongst the sectors and amongst the

companies that are in there and their

352

benchmark weights And fortunately

there's really only handful of companies

353

that have weights that are above that

three to 5 threshold that I was talking

354

Ryan: Yeah.

355

That's fantastic.

356

Great explanation there on, you know,

I've always kind of wanted like alpha

357

generating Alpha right now has gotta

be very difficult, you know, now we're

358

moving forward, broadening into the

market easier, but interesting there.

359

I love hearing from portfolio managers.

360

Point of view there.

361

Lastly, it's hard to have a conversation

about markets without talking about ai.

362

I feel like for a while.

363

It takes me back to, maybe I just have

post traumatic syndrome with a.com

364

era, but I feel like ai, a lot of the

returns have been driven by investors

365

buying that AI hype just, oh, it's ai.

366

Let's buy it, bid it up.

367

Is it time to start dis

distinguishing between AI hype?

368

In real long term winners being

a little bit more selective.

369

Take you know, a more niche or

focused approach to investing in ai.

370

And how can investors

distinguish between the two?

371

tom: Again it's an important point and

particularly in this day and age of

372

ETFs which is actually fairly long now

But you Know they weren't there when I

373

first started out but when people can

buy and sell baskets of stocks for a

374

penny or that's a lot different from when

you really had to trade the individual

375

stocks and even basket trading although

it was cheap at the time relative to

376

those times now it's super cheap and

there's a lot of different strategies

377

which are not stock picking strategies

I think that when you get more macro

378

driven more I would say less long-term

investor related type strategies more to

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how can I make money that that tends to

disconnect things a little bit And make

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it more difficult we still don't do that

even in our our global macro strategies

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and yes we use ETFs and we trade baskets

of stocks but because we were first and

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foremost and still are and individual

equity manager we know the companies that

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are in certainly in the US benchmarks I'm

not gonna say we know the ones that are

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in the international benchmarks but we

know them And I think that goes a long

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way towards being able to have a more

consistent investment approach and to

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stay there through the ups and downs if

you have the courage of your convictions

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Ryan: Tom, fantastic.

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Thank you so much for coming on the show.

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It was such an honor to have you

on Really great conversation.

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I really enjoyed it.

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I love.

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Picking the mind of a

top portfolio manager.

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Such an honor.

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Where can our audience get more

information about global investments?

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tom: The best was at our

website which is just global.com

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and so I'd encourage people to go there

there's information on our strategies

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They're both the equities and the ETF

strategies and things for individual

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investors and in for institutional

investors So hopefully that and then

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there's beyond that we certainly

would love to talk to anybody who's

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interested you can email us or call us

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Ryan: Awesome, Tom.

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Thank you so much.

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Fantastic conversation, great

insight and thank you everyone

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for listening to this episode is

Zephyr's adjusted for Risk podcast.

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You can watch all of our other episodes

on the Zephyr YouTube channel and Spotify.

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subscribe to those channels

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and give us follow on LinkedIn.

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Thank you very much and have

a great rest of your week.