2025 Summer Leadership Series –  Key Investment Narratives for 2025–2026  

In the fifth installment of Connect Money’s 2025 Leadership Series, industry leaders examined key market narratives that will shape the investment landscape through year-end and into 2026. Experts weighed in on macroeconomic drivers, shifting interest rate expectations, sector rotation risks, and capital flows, offering perspectives on where opportunities and challenges are likely to emerge over the next 12 months. 

Read further for insights from Jordan Lang, President, McCourt Partners; Michael Underhill, Founder and CIO, Capital Innovations; Ganesh Sakshi, CFO, Mountain V Oil & Gas; Jake Heidkamp, Principal, Co-President, FactRight; and Mike Hurley, Chief Market Strategist, NexPoint. 

Are there any major market narratives you think could flip in the second half of the year — for example, the ‘AI trade’ or the soft landing?  

Jordan Lang

Jordan Lang, President, McCourt Partners: I think the narrative around California real estate could begin to shift. For the past few years, there’s been a lot of pessimism, driven by entitlement risk, CEQA-related delays, and overall affordability challenges. Now, we’re starting to see early signs of renewed interest from institutional capital, particularly among well-capitalized developers who are taking a long-term view on land entitlement. 

Some of the recent CEQA reform efforts suggest the state is becoming more serious about addressing the housing shortage. It’s still a very difficult environment to navigate, and most investors remain cautious, but if policy momentum continues and capital sees a viable path to entitlements, we could see sentiment improve faster than expected in the months ahead. 

Michael Underhill, Founder and CIO, Capital Innovations: The “AI trade” could face a reset — not a collapse, but a rotation. From broad enthusiasm to targeted monetization. As for soft landing? The narrative is fragile. One misstep in fiscal, monetary, or geopolitical execution and it becomes a bumpy glide path. We’re positioning for resilience, not perfection. 

Michael Underhill

When you look out over the next 6–12 months, what keeps you up at night — and what gives you the most confidence?   

Ganesh Sakshi

Ganesh Sakshi, CFO, Mountain V Oil & Gas: What keeps us up? Policy volatility. Energy remains highly politicized—between elections, ESG backlash, and uncertain permitting rules, we face a whipsaw of regulatory signals. But what gives us confidence is the real economy: global energy demand is rising, U.S. LNG is scaling, and the world is rediscovering the value of reliable hydrocarbons. We’re bullish on natural gas and Appalachia in particular. Investors are waking up to the fact that clean, domestic, dispatchable energy is essential—not optional. That alignment of physics, policy, and capital flows gives us strong conviction.  

Jake Heidkamp, Principal, Co-President, FactRight: On the concern side, elevated interest rate environment impacts on refinancing commercial real estate, specifically 2021 and 2022 vintage deals, we’ve seen a cottage industry of “gap/bridge” financing funds come into the space to address this issue. Secondly elevating default activity in the private credit landscape and that the tremendous growth in the space and a lack of seasoning for many of the issuers/originators. 

Jake Heidkamp

On the positive side, the continued shortage of housing units in the U.S. in aggregate continues to be a tailwind for residential sectors including build-to-rent, multifamily and manufactured housing, all data we are seeing points to a continuation of the gap from demand. However, I’m not sure that implications from immigration and enforcement efforts may be properly understood as far as potential reduction on the demand side. 

Mike Hurley

Mike Hurley, Chief Market Strategist, NexPoint: The market action we are currently enjoying is what gives us the most confidence over the next 6-12 months, and even longer. April saw a textbook ‘v-bottom’ in US equities, as defined by a ‘selling panic’ followed by a ‘buying panic’ within close proximity to each other – a fingerprint which has occurred many times throughout history. 

Several months later we continue to see the rally broadening, as measured by both the participation by small & mid-cap shares, as well as traditional breadth measurements, such as the Advance-Decline Line and Percentage of Stocks trading above their 200-day Average. 

Finally, we believe the market’s leadership is also quite encouraging, with the technology, financial & industrial sectors leading the way higher – a very pro-cyclical message, and one being told by the market itself. 

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