Brian Belski Returns!

**Michael Batnick** (0:00)
We're on the record now.

**Brian Belski** (0:00)
We're on the record now? Okay, we're on the record.

**Michael Batnick** (0:02)
So, Brian, the last time we were here was November. Feels like a long time ago.

**Brian Belski** (0:09)
It was three days after I launched Heumilus.

**Downtown Josh Brown** (0:12)
Come on.

**Brian Belski** (0:13)
Yeah, man. You guys did a special live thing with me at noon on...

**Michael Batnick** (0:17)
Well, you can't have as long of a career as you've had without being right a few times. You gotta get something right, and you have.

**Brian Belski** (0:25)
You gotta get something right. You gotta get a lot of stuff wrong.

**Michael Batnick** (0:28)
So check this out. So Belski Calls reiterated his 2025 S&P target of $7,000, but whatever, more importantly, pushes back on the AI bubble label. On Mag-7, increasingly uncorrelated in earnings reactions among the group.
You saw a dispersion there. You expected the performance to broaden out beyond mega cap into AI into value, dividend growth in small and mid.

**Downtown Josh Brown** (0:53)
Great call, Brian.

**Michael Batnick** (0:54)
And you saw a regional bank M&A as mid-sized banks.
So whatever, you favored a barbell. Sean said he actually f***ing nailed it. Yeah.

**Brian Belski** (1:04)
Oh, Sean, Mr. M&A, okay.

**Downtown Josh Brown** (1:06)
You f***ing nailed it, which is important.

**Michael Batnick** (1:08)
You really did. That was good stuff.

**Brian Belski** (1:10)
Thank you. Thank you.

**Michael Batnick** (1:11)
It's good stuff.

**Downtown Josh Brown** (1:12)
Do you want to thank anyone?

**Brian Belski** (1:15)
You know, every time I say something on... There's still, and I try my best now when I'm on the show. I don't say thanks for having us. I don't say that anymore, because I got so much crap from Wapner.

**Michael Batnick** (1:26)
Want to boil us?

**Brian Belski** (1:27)
Well, because he said thanks for having me.

**Michael Batnick** (1:29)
Yeah.

**Brian Belski** (1:30)
Well, no, but I am a collective of all this fantastic team that I have. So I always say thanks for having us.

**Downtown Josh Brown** (1:36)
Oh, thanks for having us. Like, thanks for having our point of view on... I know you mean...

**Michael Batnick** (1:39)
It sounds weird. Am I... But you're a nice guy. You don't mean to be a douche when you say it.

**Brian Belski** (1:43)
No, no, no. I don't mean to be a douche. I don't mean to be a douche. So, you know...

**Michael Batnick** (1:48)
Despite the tan.

**Brian Belski** (1:51)
Dude, I had to... I went to Minnesota. I went to Minnesota the Friday of Memorial Day weekend, and I'm like...
I had to change the life, and I moved downtown in 2019, so then I... In 2020, I was there for the George Floyd stuff. And then that really shook Minneapolis. And it was fun to live downtown Minneapolis before that, and then even the last six or eight months, things have changed there, man.

**Michael Batnick** (2:16)
Are they getting better?

**Brian Belski** (2:17)
No.

**Michael Batnick** (2:18)
So I was there in 2023, I think, when the Giants beat the Vikings in the playoffs, and it was... I stayed downtown.

**Brian Belski** (2:24)
Honestly. I came in here and said, you're welcome for Kat as a Minnesota sportsman.

**Michael Batnick** (2:31)
It was very depressing.

**Brian Belski** (2:32)
It's depressing.

**Michael Batnick** (2:33)
It was tough.

**Brian Belski** (2:34)
So I think I gotta do something.

**Downtown Josh Brown** (2:35)
Well, Minneapolis sort of became like ground zero for the culture wars.

**Brian Belski** (2:40)
Yep.

**Downtown Josh Brown** (2:40)
Like both sides are growing increasingly, I don't want to say violent, but like aggressive. You have people...

**Michael Batnick** (2:47)
Another word for violent.

**Downtown Josh Brown** (2:48)
You have like citizen journalists exposing the daycare centers. You have like all the protesters are still out in the streets. It's just an unexpected place to be the ground zero for the culture wars.

**Brian Belski** (3:02)
But that's what's happening.
So I grew up there and I love history. We'll hopefully be able to talk about one of the books I'm reading right now later in the broadcast here. But Minnesota has always been a place for kind of off the wall politics like Eugene McCarthy. You guys are two... I thought Jesse Ventura. Jesse Ventura was a pro wrestler and became governor.
And so they've always been kind of goofy on the political side. But it's gone way too far and there's a lot of people leaving Minnesota. I mean, part of that was I didn't... I love my twins. I go to the twins games. I'm not feeling great walking back to my condo from twins games. So I'm like, I'm going to spend more time in Florida. Plus, it's a thousand degrees. It's a thousand degrees everywhere. It's hot here in New York. It's 105 in Minnesota. Where would you rather be, Naples, Florida, 100 degrees or Minneapolis, 100 degrees?