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Key Wealth Matters, a podcast series hosted by the experts of the Key Wealth Institute, explores the biggest news of today to determine how these headlines can impact wealth plans, financial strategies, markets, and investments.
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_____________________________________________________
We gather data and information from specialized sources and financial databases including but not limited to Bloomberg Finance L.P., Bureau of Economic Analysis, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Chicago Board of Exchange (CBOE) Volatility Index (VIX), Dow Jones / Dow Jones Newsplus, FactSet, Federal Reserve and corresponding 12 district banks / Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), ICE BofA (Bank of America) MOVE Index, Morningstar / Morningstar.com, Standard & Poor’s and Wall Street Journal / WSJ.com.
Key Wealth, Key Private Client, Key Private Bank, Key Family Wealth, and KeyBank Institutional Advisors are brand names used by KeyBank National Association (KeyBank). Key Wealth and Key Private Client are also brand names used by Key Investment Services LLC (KIS), member FINRA/SIPC and SEC-registered investment advisor.
The Key Wealth Institute is comprised of financial professionals representing KeyBank National Association (KeyBank) and certain affiliates, such as Key Investment Services LLC (KIS) and KeyCorp Insurance Agency USA Inc. (KIA).
Any opinions, projections, or recommendations contained herein are subject to change without notice, are those of the individual author(s), and may not necessarily represent the views of KeyBank or any of its subsidiaries or affiliates.
This material presented is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be an offer, recommendation, or solicitation to purchase or sell any security or product or to employ a specific investment or tax planning strategy.
KeyBank, nor its subsidiaries or affiliates, represent, warrant or guarantee that this material is accurate, complete or suitable for any purpose or any investor and it should not be used as a basis for investment or tax planning decisions. It is not to be relied upon or used in substitution for the exercise of independent judgment. It should not be construed as individual tax, legal or financial advice.
The summaries, prices, quotes and/or statistics contained herein have been obtained from sources believed to be reliable but are not necessarily complete and cannot be guaranteed. They are provided for informational purposes only and are not intended to replace any confirmations or statements. Past performance does not guarantee future results.
Brokerage and certain investment advisory services are offered through Key Investment Services LLC (KIS), member FINRA/SIPC and SEC-registered investment advisor. Insurance products are offered through KeyCorp Insurance Agency USA, Inc. (KIA) and underwritten by third party insurance carriers not affiliated with KIS. KIS and KIA are affiliates under the common control of KeyCorp. To learn more about KIS’s investment business, as well as our relationship with you, please review our KIS Disclosure page. Check the background of KIS on FINRA's BrokerCheck.
Non-Deposit products are:
NOT FDIC INSURED • NOT BANK GUARANTEED • MAY LOSE VALUE • NOT A DEPOSIT • NOT INSURED BY ANY FEDERAL OR STATE GOVERNMENT AGENCY
©2026 KeyCorp®. All rights reserved.
Brian Pietrangelo [00:00:00]
Welcome to the Key Wealth Matters weekly podcast, where we casually ramble on about important topics, including the markets, the economy, human ingenuity, and almost anything under the sun, giving you the keys to open doors in the world of investing. Today is Friday, July 24th, 2026. I'm Brian Pietrangelo, and welcome to the podcast. And over the next few days, we celebrate a couple different groups of people. In case you didn't know, today is the celebration of Amelia Earhart Day. Obviously, the day celebrates Amelia Earhart, who was the legendary aviator that celebrates her pioneering flights, her advocacy for women in aviation, and her enduring spirit of adventure and innovation. We often talk about human ingenuity on the podcast, and this is clearly an example of one. And second, coming up on Monday of this next week, we've got National Korean War Veterans Armistice Day. It's not as often talked about relative to other wars, but the solemn day does commemorate the ceasefire that ended the active war in the Korean War, recognizing the immense sacrifices of the American troops. In addition, before my dad passed away recently, he actually was a Korean War veteran. So a little bit of a shout out to the Korean War veterans that are all out there. Take some time to support veterans organizations. And with that, I would like to introduce our panel of investing experts here to share their insights on this week's market activity and more. George Mateyo, Chief Investment Officer, Rajeev Sharma, Head of Fixed Income, and Steve Hoedt, Head of Equities. As a reminder, a lot of great content is available on key.com/wealthinsights, including our updates from our Wealth Institute on many different subjects and especially our Key Questions article series addressing a relevant topic for investors. In addition, if you have any questions or need more information, please reach out to your financial advisor. Taking a look at this week's market and economic activity, we have an extraordinarily light economic release calendar for the week. We only have one update for you and that is the initial unemployment claims for the week ending July 18th and that came in at 187,000 claims and this was the lowest read that we've seen since 1969. As we have mentioned very often on this call, the initial unemployment claims has remained very stable between 200 and 260,000 for roughly two and a half years, which is a great sign and an indicator that part of the employment market remains very stable. Other activity this week includes some escalation in the Iran war with a spiking of oil around $100 a barrel. So we'll talk to George about that specifically. And we've also got the Federal Open Market Committee meeting next week coming up. We'll talk to Rajeev and the team about it as well. So George, let's start with you with our update as you usually provide with us and some other comments on your mind. George?
George Mateyo [00:02:57]
So back in the headlines, of course, is the situation in Iran and unfortunately the headlines aren't all that encouraging of late. You know, I think it's fair to say that the so-called ceasefire MOU is officially over now. I don't know if the administration's called it as such, but I think it's fair to say that five months into this conflict and 100 days now until the midterms, by the way, things have really shifted. Just to recap and give our listeners a sense of where we are as of 9 o'clock on Friday morning, it's fair to say that hostilities have really intensified. I think the positions between the two parties have hardened. And probably more worrisome of all is the fact that the conflict has seemingly broadened. More notably in the last two days or so, I think the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels down in Yemen have opposed a blockade or have tried to impose a blockade of their own around the Red Sea. And that's going to be pretty notable in the sense that if our listeners remember when we talked about the Hormuz Strait initially, we talked about the fact that it was responsible for roughly 20% of the world's oil supply flowing in and out of that channel. Now, if the Red Sea is also at risk, that probably cuts off another 13% to 15% of global oil as well. So we're talking about roughly a third of the oil supply being subject to some type of blockade, which is probably the direct cause around why the price of oil has spiked up close to $100 a barrel again. I think it is fair to say that's going to have a big impact. We've seen that manifest itself not only in oil prices, but we've seen other commodity prices moving higher. Of course, the price we all pay for gas in our cars is moving higher. And interest rates are reflecting that as well. We saw some progress just last month around inflation, but now that progress has seemingly been wiped away. Where we go from here is anybody's guess. It doesn't seem like either party is really backing down. The rhetoric will likely intensify, and we'll probably see hostilities intensify as well. We'll have to see. Again, it's hard to say exactly how this plays out from here, given the fact that this is a very fraught and tense geopolitical situation. I still think both parties have a lot of incentives to try and walk this back. Their ratings remain fractured politically, from what I've been able to gather. At some point they probably have to acknowledge the significant amount of infrastructure damage and military damage that has already occurred. Here at home, Republicans are motivated to try and get a deal sometime before the midterms. So I think it's fair to say this is going to remain a very tense situation, at least in the near term. I think the other thing the markets are now having to deal with is the fact that infrastructure spending around artificial intelligence has also been a contributor to inflation. And we've seen that creep into market concerns about how much spending is too much. One thing we've been talking about more specifically in the last six to nine months is the fact that this shift in spending has really been pronounced. Many of these companies funding the buildout of AI infrastructure have been able to do so from their own cash balances, but now they're increasingly relying on debt and equity financing to pay these bills. That was really on display this past week, Steve, when we had a couple of marquee companies reporting earnings. I'd love to get your thoughts on both the oil situation and AI infrastructure spending and how that's manifesting itself in stock prices.
Steve Hoedt [00:06:50]
Yeah, we'll take them one at a time. The oil situation is very concerning from the standpoint that when we went into this back in late February, we were entering with relatively full global inventory levels. What you've seen over the last five-plus months is that the reason oil prices never had some kind of super spike was because inventories were there to absorb the shocks. In particular, the inventory that China had played a huge role in providing a global buffer to the oil shock. We've not really had an opportunity to rebuild inventories since the ceasefire. It normalized flows, but only at levels below where they were when the Strait of Hormuz was completely open. We really don't know as a global economy how things are going to function if we get to tank-bottom inventory levels. So that is a very large concern at this point in time. You're seeing it manifest itself in higher distillate prices and crack spreads. A crack spread is the amount of money that a refiner makes when they take a barrel of oil and turn it into diesel fuel, gasoline, and other products. You're looking at refining margins right now at over $70 a barrel. These are levels that we haven't seen literally ever, basically. And they're persisting at these high levels. That tells you how tight the market is. So I think we really need to be concerned here if this continues to be an issue for the foreseeable future. Unfortunately, I think this on-again, off-again conflict is likely the state of play for at least the next half a year or so. Whether the elections play into that or not, I don't know, but it's hard to see these parties getting together. On the hyperscaler side, the thing that flashed at me in bright red this week was the numbers out of Google. For the first time in recent memory, they posted negative free cash flow. When you look at the market reaction to them printing a negative free cash flow figure and talking about their spending plans, people are really starting to question how these hyperscalers are going to make money on AI. And I think that's a valid concern. The same thing applies when you look at the market's reaction to Tesla. Obviously Tesla and SpaceX have huge spending plans designed to make AI part of their future, and again the market reacted very negatively. The one AI winner for the week, as I look at my screen this morning at pre-market trading, is Intel, where investors still see the infrastructure play from the semiconductor side as something that has legs. You can look around and see plenty of carnage on the memory side over the last month or so, however, and these moves can be pretty fleeting. I think the market is discerning winners and losers with this technology now and is looking at potential returns with a far more skeptical eye. From our perspective, that's not a bad thing. We've been talking about it for months.
George Mateyo [00:10:42]
Indeed we have, Steve. Indeed we have. I think it's fair to say that the AI trade has definitely shifted, and it's now moving closer to where we expected it would eventually go. One of our themes has been to invest with the AI adopters—the long-term beneficiaries of AI—rather than just the pure builders. This is true of almost every major technology cycle. There is so much excitement around the technology itself and the process of building it that people can lose sight of the fact that eventually the market has to determine who actually benefits economically. Just because you build something doesn't mean people will come. And even if they do come, it doesn't mean they'll necessarily pay for it. So there are still a lot of unknowns. That doesn't diminish our bullishness around AI overall and what it could do for productivity. But in the meantime, it is clearly having some impact on inflation. Whether or not it ultimately has a meaningful impact on the labor market is still open for debate. I think it's fair to state that the Federal Reserve has clearly shifted its thinking and really isn't focused as much on the labor market anymore. This week alone, for example, we saw another update around jobless claims, which we often discuss on this podcast. Those claims declined to roughly a sixty-year low, which is astounding. It demonstrates that the labor market has not really experienced any meaningful disruption. So if I were the Fed, I'd probably be tempted to hold rates steady while maintaining an eye toward possible future tightening. With the Fed meeting coming next week, and I believe it's the second meeting under Kevin Warsh's leadership, what do you think the Fed is thinking right now, Rajeev, with respect to inflation and future interest-rate decisions?
Rajeev Sharma [00:12:08]
Well, it seems like anytime we have an FOMC meeting, regardless of whether the consensus expects a hold or a policy change, it's always an important meeting. We have that meeting next week, and we'll get the rate decision announced at 2:00 p.m. on July 29. The overwhelming consensus is that they won't do anything and will hold rates unchanged. You were right about the softer-than-expected June CPI print. I think that got a lot of people excited that perhaps additional rate hikes could be pushed further out into the calendar year. But I think there is going to be much more scrutiny on Kevin Warsh's press conference and what he says about inflation. He's already said that one CPI report does not dictate Fed action. They need more data—not just inflation data, but labor-market data as well. Right now, the odds of the next rate hike appear to center around September. This meeting is shaping up to be one of the least predictable meetings, not because of the policy decision itself, but because of the tone. Is it going to be a hawkish tone? That's what the consensus seems to be pointing toward. We saw that Kevin Warsh's first meeting was somewhat hawkish. There is also a clear reluctance to provide any real guidance. He has pretty much abandoned forward guidance as a policy tool. You've got eighteen non-chair FOMC members reportedly divided regarding where rates should go this year, and Warsh could ultimately be the deciding vote. So I expect the tone to be hawkish even if rates are held steady. Both the policy statement and the press conference will likely carry that tone. Warsh has repeatedly stated that the Fed has no tolerance for persistently elevated inflation. We're still not at the Fed's 2% inflation goal, and until we get there I don't think the Fed can do much other than keep rates higher for longer. We also had the June FOMC minutes showing a divided committee. I think it will be very important to watch the number of dissents in the rate decision announcement. But the real issue will be the language in the statement. If they begin reinserting any tightening-bias language, I think the markets will scrutinize that very carefully. Then there is Warsh's press conference. That is going to be his major opportunity to provide a signal regarding where the Fed may go next. If Warsh explicitly says September is a live meeting, then markets will increasingly view September as a potential rate-hike meeting. But if you look at the bond market taking all of this in, it's been a fairly broad-based selloff across the fixed-income universe this week. The resurgence in oil prices has reignited inflation concerns. Stronger-than-expected labor data has added to those concerns, along with mounting expectations for additional Fed tightening. We also had 30-year Treasury auctions this week, and the 30-year Treasury yield has remained above 5% for twelve consecutive sessions. That's the longest streak above 5% since 2007. All of this is keeping upward pressure on yields, and I anticipate that pressure will continue. The 10-year Treasury yield is currently around 4.5%, up roughly 13 basis points on the week. Investors are beginning to discuss 5% as a possible target for the 10-year yield, which is something we haven't talked about in a very long time. There's a lot going on in the market. The yield curve steepened modestly, but the major takeaway is that yields continue to face upward pressure. Credit spreads widened slightly this week, but there remains substantial demand for corporate credit, and that continues to support credit markets.
Brian Pietrangelo [00:15:43]
One of the other things I'm looking at personally is that a month from now, almost to the day, we'll have the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium. It's not an official Fed meeting, but I'm interested to see what happens because the Fed Chair usually gets time on the agenda on Friday. With Kevin Warsh's position against forward guidance, I'm not sure exactly what he's going to say. To your point, the next truly important meeting comes in September. Any thoughts on that?
Rajeev Sharma [00:16:05]
That's a very good point. Fed Chair Warsh has come out several times and said that he doesn't believe in forward guidance. He doesn't believe in the dot plots either. I think that's going to be a major issue for markets because markets have become accustomed to forward guidance. They're used to looking to Jackson Hole and other Fed communications for signals about future policy. Warsh is running a different kind of Federal Reserve. I think what you're going to see is Kevin Warsh pull away from providing forward guidance, which could create some near-term volatility in the bond market. As a result, every single economic data release becomes increasingly important. Every inflation report, every labor-market report, every economic indicator will need to be interpreted by investors trying to determine what the Fed might do next without the benefit of explicit guidance. I think that's going to contribute to increased volatility in the bond market.
Brian Pietrangelo [00:16:50]
Great, Rajeev. And George, as always, we'll finish with you. Any final remarks for our listeners and investors?
George Mateyo [00:16:58]
Stay patient. Stay disciplined, Brian. I think it's going to be a bumpy summer. We've talked about a lot of challenges today, but we still believe diversification is a winning strategy. That means examining your portfolio exposures and making sure you're not overly concentrated in any one area. To some extent, real assets have provided a measure of support during these volatile periods. They haven't necessarily offset all of the volatility, but certain real-asset exposures can provide some cushion and help dampen portfolio fluctuations during major geopolitical events.
Brian Pietrangelo [00:17:31]
Well, thank you for the conversation today. George, Rajeev, and Steve, we appreciate your insights. And thanks to our listeners for joining us today. Be sure to subscribe to the Key Wealth Matters podcast through your favorite podcast app. As always, past performance is no guarantee of future results, and we know your financial situation is personal to you. So reach out to your relationship manager, portfolio strategist, or financial advisor for more information. We'll catch up with you next week to see how the world and the markets have changed and provide those keys to help you navigate your financial journey.
Disclosure [00:22:00]
We gather data and information from specialized sources and financial databases including but not limited to Bloomberg Finance L.P., Bureau of Economic Analysis, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Chicago Board of Exchange (CBOE) Volatility Index (VIX), Dow Jones / Dow Jones Newsplus, FactSet, Federal Reserve and corresponding 12 district banks / Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), ICE BofA (Bank of America) MOVE Index, Morningstar / Morningstar.com, Standard & Poor’s and Wall Street Journal / WSJ.com.
Key Wealth, Key Private Client, Key Private Bank, Key Family Wealth, and KeyBank Institutional Advisors are brand names used by KeyBank National Association (KeyBank). Key Wealth and Key Private Client are also brand names used by Key Investment Services LLC (KIS), member FINRA/SIPC and SEC-registered investment advisor.
The Key Wealth Institute is comprised of financial professionals representing KeyBank National Association (KeyBank) and certain affiliates, such as Key Investment Services LLC (KIS) and KeyCorp Insurance Agency USA Inc. (KIA).
Any opinions, projections, or recommendations contained herein are subject to change without notice, are those of the individual author(s), and may not necessarily represent the views of KeyBank or any of its subsidiaries or affiliates.
This material presented is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be an offer, recommendation, or solicitation to purchase or sell any security or product or to employ a specific investment or tax planning strategy.
KeyBank, nor its subsidiaries or affiliates, represent, warrant or guarantee that this material is accurate, complete or suitable for any purpose or any investor and it should not be used as a basis for investment or tax planning decisions. It is not to be relied upon or used in substitution for the exercise of independent judgment. It should not be construed as individual tax, legal or financial advice.
The summaries, prices, quotes and/or statistics contained herein have been obtained from sources believed to be reliable but are not necessarily complete and cannot be guaranteed. They are provided for informational purposes only and are not intended to replace any confirmations or statements. Past performance does not guarantee future results.
Brokerage and certain investment advisory services are offered through Key Investment Services LLC (KIS), member FINRA/SIPC and SEC-registered investment advisor. Insurance products are offered through KeyCorp Insurance Agency USA, Inc. (KIA) and underwritten by third party insurance carriers not affiliated with KIS. KIS and KIA are affiliates under the common control of KeyCorp. To learn more about KIS’s investment business, as well as our relationship with you, please review our KIS Disclosure page. Check the background of KIS on FINRA's BrokerCheck.
Non-Deposit products are:
NOT FDIC INSURED • NOT BANK GUARANTEED • MAY LOSE VALUE • NOT A DEPOSIT • NOT INSURED BY ANY FEDERAL OR STATE GOVERNMENT AGENCY