Jay Corson

California’s latest budget agreement is a striking example of the tough trade-offs leaders face when fiscal pressures collide with competing priorities. Governor Gavin Newsom and state lawmakers have unveiled a $321 billion spending plan for the coming fiscal year, marking the third consecutive year of deficits—a clear sign of the ongoing fiscal challenges facing the state. Key highlights include: • $750 million in tax credits for Hollywood: The agreement prioritizes economic incentives for the film industry, aiming to keep California competitive in a rapidly evolving sector. • No new corporate tax hikes: Despite calls for greater revenue from large businesses, the budget avoids higher levies on corporations. • Rollback of free health care for undocumented adults: Last year, California made history by offering comprehensive health coverage to all residents, regardless of immigration status. However, due to higher-than-expected demand and rising health care costs, the state is now scaling back this benefit. Why this matters: This budget underscores the difficult choices governments must make between supporting progressive social programs and advancing pro-business policies. For those of us tracking immigration policy, tax legislation, and government finance, it’s a reminder of how quickly priorities can shift when budgets tighten. #CaliforniaBudget2024 #GavinNewsom #StateSpendingPlan #FiscalResponsibility #LegislativeUpdates

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California just left hundreds of millions of dollars on the table. Not because of waste, fraud, or budget cuts, but because our leaders have been unable to reauthorize a program they mostly agree on. This spring, the state’s quarterly cap-and-trade auction fell flat. More than 7 million pollution permits went unsold, and the ones that did sell traded at the floor price, dragging revenues down 30-40% from previous quarters. If current trends hold, we could lose another half a billion dollars in the next auction alone. The next cap-and-trade auction is set for August 20, two days after the legislature reconvenes from a summer recess that begins on July 18. That gives the legislature one week to make progress on this and provide a clear signal to the market reinforcing the state’s commitment to the program. Cap-and-trade isn’t new. It’s a market-based system that limits greenhouse gas emissions and allows companies to buy and trade credits under a statewide emissions cap. It’s also one of California’s most effective and fiscally productive climate programs, generating billions in revenue since its inception. It has bipartisan roots, supported by leaders like Governor Schwarzenegger and Reagan’s Secretary of State George Schultz. So why the holdup? Everyone, from Governor Newsom to the Assembly and the Senate, agrees the program should be reauthorized through 2045. But the process has been slowed by debates over how to spend the revenue it generates, which flows into the state’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF). That’s a debate worth having. But it’s also a debate we can have after we stabilize the market. The longer we wait to formalize the program’s reauthorization, the more we weaken the certainty that markets rely on. Fewer buyers show up, prices fall, and revenue disappears. This has already happened. In Q4 2024, cap-and-trade brought in $990 million. By Q2 2025, that number had dropped to $595 million. That’s a staggering decline, just as California faces a $12 billion budget shortfall and an urgent need to invest in clean energy solutions like electric vehicles, clean energy and infrastructure, and activities to reduce electricity rates. Without reauthorization we’re not saving anyone money, we’re just failing to collect the funds to invest in clean energy, adaptation, housing, and transit. It’s time to get cap-and-trade reauthorization done. The clock is ticking.

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The ground shook in the RIA world this week. One of the largest acquisitions in recent time occurred, with ~$31B AUM (as well as another $3.8B AUA) Cleveland-based MAI Capital Management acquiring $27B AUM Evoke Advisors to form a nearly ~$60B AUM RIA. Why is this acquisition such a big deal? UHNW RIA M&A appears to be on the rise. And it appears that RIAs are seeing the benefits of joining a platform that has scale. Scale has proven to matter in alternative asset management — the industry is witnessing in realtime how the evolution from funds to firms has transformed how alternative asset managers do business and who they do business with. So too is scale a major feature of the current landscape of wealth management. The $1T RIA is no longer a pipe dream. And it’s the $1B+ AUM firms that are projected to grow significantly in the coming years, according to data from Constellation Wealth Capital. As continued consolidation occurs in the private wealth market, wealth management firms that grow bigger have to balance customization with scale in order to deliver private markets solutions to their clients. Private markets capabilities have gone from nice-to-have to need-to-have for wealth management platforms. And wealth management platforms have taken notice. Cresset’s recent purchase of $124B AUA Monticello Associates follows Merchant's stake in Stone Temple Partners LLC, Pathstone’s acquisition of Hall Capital Partners LLC, Hightower Advisors’s purchase of NEPC, LLC, and Cerity Partners’s merger with Agility. Will this change how private markets funds are distributed ... and will they go from sold to bought? That remains to be seen, but the wealth management industry's focus on UHNW RIA M&A could impact how alternative asset managers structure and productize for certain parts of the wealth channel. Read on for more👇 This week's Alt Goes Mainstream's AGM Alts Weekly, brought to you by Juniper Square, covers: 🗂️ AGM Index, an index that tracks the leading publicly traded alternative asset managers. 📊 Chart of the Week presented by MSCI Private Assets on buyout holdings facing leverage challenges. 🗞️ AGM News of the Week, this week covering: 📌 Financial Times' Eric Platt, Emma Dunkley, Alexandra Heal on wealthy Americans pouring record sums into private credit funds. 💻 Who is hiring: Senior-level positions from companies Blackstone, KKR, Apollo Global Management, Inc., Ares Management Corporation, Blue Owl Capital, Franklin Templeton, iCapital, Goldman Sachs, Partners Group, Ultimus Fund Solutions, Cerity Partners, JPMorganChase, SageSpring Wealth Partners, MSCI Inc. Subscribe👇 to see the latest trends & navigate this rapidly changing landscape as alts go mainstream. https://lnkd.in/e2HiX7q8

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Equity markets seem content to accentuate the positive, even as better-than-forecast labor market data effectively rules out a July rate cut. The Labor Department’s employment report for June showed total nonfarm payrolls rising by +147,000 last month, ahead of consensus expectations of +110,000, while job creation totals for April and May were revised upward by a combined +16,000. June’s job numbers reflect ongoing resilience, with an average monthly gain of +146,000 over the past 12 months. Unemployment dipped to 4.1%, from 4.3% in May, and wage growth cooled slightly, to +3.7%, a tick down from +3.8% in May and below the +3.9% consensus. We had anticipated payrolls would beat expectations in June, a view that came to fruition as gains in healthcare, state government and restaurants outweighed losses in federal government jobs. Further evidence of healthy labor markets came via last week’s release of the latest Job Openings and Labor Market Survey (JOLTS). Job openings totaled 7.8 million at the end of May, well above the 7.3 million consensus forecast and April’s 7.4 million tally. A notable downside among last week’s economic headlines was the ISM manufacturing index, which came in at 49.0 in June, the fourth consecutive month of contraction for the manufacturing sector of the economy. Manufacturing activity has expanded in only two of the past 32 months, based on ISM data. (Index readings below 50 signal contraction.) On balance, stable job creation, the absence of concerning wage inflation and the Federal Reserve’s continued wariness about the potential negative impacts of U.S. tariffs have lowered the odds of a rate cut at this month’s Fed meeting. For more economic and investment analysis, subscribe to my weekly market commentary: https://lnkd.in/gSduisBi When markets rise despite concerning developments, it’s often said investors are “climbing a wall of worry”. Do you expect the S&P 500 will continue to perform this way in the third quarter?

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Tariffs Are Back. The Ports Are Choking. And the Inland Empire Just Moved North. Everyone’s watching Southern California’s industrial market tighten. Trump-era tariffs are back. Imports are slowing. Construction costs are rising. Vacancy is creeping up at the ports. New development is pausing mid-process in LA and Long Beach. That’s the headline. But the deeper shift is happening where fewer are looking. While capital and media stare at coastal drag, inland markets are stepping into a structural advantage. Bakersfield is absorbing demand. Fresno’s older parks now look irreplaceable. Sacramento is hitting $1/SF rents in buildings you couldn’t rebuild for $250/SF. This isn’t a short-term supply chain adjustment. It’s a re-mapping of gravity. The tariffs are doing more than chilling Southern California—they’re driving a quiet repricing of every existing industrial asset in Central California. They’re making older product more valuable. They’re freezing new supply. They’re shifting logistics patterns inland. And they’re widening the moat around well-located, existing assets in secondary cities. In markets like Modesto, Fresno, and Bakersfield, you don’t need rising rents to generate alpha. You just need to own what can’t be replaced. Here’s the inversion: What the market sees as uncertainty, we see as protection. What the market sees as cost, we see as moat. What the market sees as a slowdown, we see as scarcity pricing in real time. At Graceada, we’re not just acquiring square footage. We’re acquiring optionality, scarcity, and yield that can't be replicated under today's cost structure. We’re betting on Main Street, not just as a story—but as a system of durable supply and repositionable space. While others study the storm, we’re buying the shelter.

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U.S. automakers are huge importers … looking at GM, Ford, and Stellantis combined, car imports total 2.2 million cars (or about 28% of all autos that crossed U.S. border from foreign nations last year) 

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EFFECTS OF LONG-TERM GROWTH TRENDS ON U.S. FISCAL DEBT-TO-GDP RATIO The CBO (Congressional Budget Office) is a frequently cited source in the U.S. when new laws are debated. Interestingly, CBO typically bases its baseline projection on an unchanged long-term productivity growth rate, regardless of specific legislative changes, assuming an economic real growth rate of around 1.8% annually. However, the Trump administration is actively pursuing a series of ambitious, growth-promoting initiatives that could significantly elevate the long-term growth trend. Tax relief for businesses and workforce participation, streamlining complex regulations, and massive investments in AI, robotics, and energy projects—supported by simple legislation, rapid approvals, and immediate tax write-offs—could spark an acceleration wave and substantially alter the long-term growth trajectory. Add to this the attraction of foreign investors building new factories and millionaires relocating to the U.S. via "golden visas," and we might be on the brink of a growth boom. This could potentially reduce the debt-to-GDP burden even without major spending cuts. Below are three scenarios from the CBO model, where they have actually calculated this. Even a very moderate increase in the annual growth trend by 0.5 percentage points per year effectively addresses the issue. Sources: CBO and Deutsche Bank.

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Strive, Inc. has completed the merger between Strive Enterprises, Inc. and Asset Entities Inc. The combined company will continue to trade on Nasdaq under the ticker $ASST and begin its Bitcoin accumulation strategy. Time to accelerate.

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The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission just erased the line between stablecoins and money market funds. Yesterday, the SEC’s Division of Trading and Markets issued guidance that broker-dealers may apply a 2 percent haircut to qualifying stablecoin holdings for net capital purposes. That is identical to the treatment of government money market funds. Until now, many firms applied 100 percent haircuts, effectively assigning stablecoins zero balance sheet value. For traditional broker-dealers, tokenized securities settlement has become commercially viable today. Read the full SEC guidance here: https://lnkd.in/eiY_dqSD

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R&D Tax Breaks Set to Expand - Tuberville’s Bold Proposal On May 9, 2025, Senator Tommy Tuberville introduced the American Innovation and Jobs Act, aiming to revamp the R&D tax landscape for small businesses and startups. This bill proposes: 🟢 Restoring immediate full deductions for R&D expenses, reversing the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act's requirement to amortize these costs over several years. 🟢 Doubling the refundable R&D tax credit cap from $250,000 to $500,000 immediately, with plans to increase it to $750,000 over the next decade. 🟢 Expanding eligibility by raising the gross receipts threshold from $5 million to $15 million and extending the claim period from 5 to 8 years after generating at least $25,000 in revenue. As someone who has navigated the complexities of R&D tax credits, these changes could significantly ease the financial burden on innovative startups. The ability to fully deduct R&D expenses annually would provide immediate tax relief, encouraging more investment in innovation. This bipartisan effort, co-sponsored by over 30 senators, reflects a growing consensus on the importance of supporting domestic innovation. By enhancing these tax incentives, the U.S. aims to maintain its competitive edge in technology and innovation. What are your thoughts on these proposed changes? How might they impact your business or the broader innovation landscape? #TaxPolicy #Innovation #SmallBusiness #RDtaxcredit #AmericanInnovation #Startups #TaxReform

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Another Reason .com Rocks One key reason the .com TLD continues to dominate is that many ccTLD and gTLD operators have overly complex, outdated, and investor-unfriendly terms and conditions. If a TLD/ccTLD/gTLD aspires to be among the best, it should take notes from the one that consistently leads the way (".com").

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