Gould Asset Management

08/19/2026

Some Exciting News from Gould!

Effective September 1, 2026, Gould partner and senior portfolio manager Johnny DeBiase will become President of Gould Asset Management. Founder and current President Don Gould will continue to serve as Chief Investment Officer and take on the newly created role of Chairman.

Read more about it here

August 13, 2026 I am very pleased to announce that effective September 1, 2026, Gould partner and senior portfolio manager Johnny DeBiase will become President of Gould Asset Management. As President, Johnny will oversee the company’s day-to-day business activities. I will continue to serve as Chi...

07/28/2026

Capital spending is investment that a business makes in its own operations, with the expectation of future returns on that investment. Traditionally, capital spending primarily took the form of tangible assets—a factory to manufacture more products for customers, a forklift to speed their delivery, or a computer to keep track of it all. But as the chart below well illustrates, in today’s information economy, business capital is increasingly allocated to intangibles—designing the next iPhone or Nvidia chip, developing Pfizer’s next blockbuster drug, or building the next version of Anthropic’s Claude AI model. A recent countertrend favors tangible assets, as the largest tech companies are now spending unprecedented sums—hundreds of billions of dollars annually—to build out AI infrastructure, including massive data centers.

07/26/2026

The “K-Shaped Economy” refers to a variety of measures showing financial divergence across the US population. Households with higher income and especially higher wealth see their relative position improve (the top leg of the K) while others experience stagnation or decline (the bottom leg of the K).
One likely cause of this divergence is the change in how business income is split between owners and workers, illustrated in the accompanying chart. Since the mid-1990s, owners have received a steadily rising share, while workers’ piece of the pie has correspondingly shrunk.
Three factors commonly cited to explain this change are: (1) technology and automation displacing labor and suppressing wages; (2) globalization, subjecting US workers to competition from low-wage economies like China, again suppressing wages here at home; and, (3) declining union membership across the workforce, increasing employers’ bargaining power.
From a purely financial standpoint, the biggest winners in this trend are investors, who are the primary holders of corporate shares and thus the recipients of the growing share of business income. However, the potential long-term social, political, and economic implications should be concerning to all.

07/24/2026

The accompanying chart shows that across US businesses with at least $100 million in annual revenue, private outnumber publicly-traded ones by about 6-to-1.
Even among the largest firms, private exceed public, as fast growers’ time to initial public offering (IPO) gets ever longer—from less than 2 years in the late ‘90s to over 16 years now. Private companies today include some of the most dynamic and rapidly growing American businesses, such as AI leaders Anthropic and OpenAI, Stripe (financial tech), Databricks (enterprise data management), Waymo (self-driving taxis), and Anduril (military drones, etc.). Recent These firms range in value from about $50 billion to nearly $1 trillion. Until its IPO in June, SpaceX was also on this list.
Newer investment vehicles enable a wider group of investors to participate in highflying private company stocks, but the exposure they provide across the private company universe is still uneven and relatively expensive.
The average investor may take comfort knowing that the 14% of companies on the public side collectively represent more than $70 trillion in market value, or roughly three-quarters of the estimated total value of public and private combined, so broad exposure to the US economy is easily accomplished through public equity investments. An important footnote—the ten largest firms make up just over one-third of the total value of the roughly 3500 US public companies.

07/22/2026

Global markets rebounded sharply in Q2 as strong corporate earnings and renewed enthusiasm for AI helped investors look past lingering concerns over inflation and interest rates.
Dive into our full second quarter Economic & Market Review here:

by The Gould Asset Management Team

07/20/2026

From the President's Desk: What is market value, really?
A stock's price is easy to see. Its value is another matter.
Read Don Gould's thoughts on the second quarter.

Market Value – What It Is and Isn’t Your monthly account statements from the custodian show the “market value” of each investment, which add up to your portfolio value. What do those numbers actually mean? Suppose you own 100 shares of Microsoft (symbol: MSFT). At the close of the New York S...

04/28/2026

As Trump Accounts gain attention, understanding how they actually work becomes increasingly important. Take a look beyond the headlines to focus on the details that matter most.

For parents and grandparents thinking generationally, the new Trump Accounts contain one of the most compelling wealth building opportunities we have seen in

04/23/2026

The price of oil can be highly volatile for at least two reasons. First, the supply of oil usually is relatively fixed in the short run. Second, demand for oil is what economists call “inelastic,” meaning that it takes a large change in price to meaningfully change the amount consumers use. If you mostly buy gasoline to get to work, a big jump in gas prices is not likely to reduce your consumption much.
When the pandemic dramatically slowed the world economy in 2020, oil’s price fell by more than 80%. In the first quarter of this year, Iran’s blocking of the Strait of Hormuz reduced the global oil supply by about 10% overnight. That was enough to push oil prices up more than 50%.
Fossil fuels account for about 86% of total global energy production, a number very little changed over the last 50 years. Ever rising energy demand has swallowed up both the rapid growth of renewable energy and continued increases in fossil fuel production.
Oil and gas make up about two-thirds of fossil fuel consumption, highlighting the global economy’s continued vulnerability to supply shocks like the one we are now experiencing.

(Source: FactSet, J.P. Morgan Asset Management. Guide to the Markets – US Data are as of March 31, 2026.)

04/21/2026

From geopolitical shocks to sticky inflation, Q1 2026 reminded investors how quickly the landscape can shift, pressuring markets and keeping policymakers on edge. Dive into our full first quarter Economic & Market analysis here:

by The Gould Asset Management Team

04/17/2026

A sudden geopolitical shock sent energy prices soaring and markets reeling, but the swift rebound reinforces the value of a long-term perspective and staying invested through uncertainty. Read more thoughts on Q1 in the latest from the President's desk!

We hope this note finds you well.