Bryn Talkington counted the midterm election cycles back to 1962 and said the S&P 500 has had a peak-to-trough decline in every one of them, so she expects one this time too.
Scott Wapner spent the first half hour putting the bear case to his panel — Citadel Securities' Scott Rubner saying the highs for September are already in, RBC warning that a 5 to 10% pullback has become more likely, Brent crude at 101 and the ten-year Treasury yield at 485 — and then argued the bull side himself, because the earnings are still there.
"Do we really think heading into the midterm election, yields and oil are going to stay uncomfortably high where they are right now? I would say most of us don't. But guess what. That's asymmetric risk."
The four investors on the desk run money rather than talk about it: Joe Terranova oversees the index behind a rules-based Virtus ETF and disclosed selling his own Costco stake on air, Karen Firestone co-founded a firm managing family and endowment money, Bryn Talkington runs a Dallas private-wealth partnership, and Steve Weiss said out loud that he is short some QQQ and VOO right now.
I listened to the full segment so you can skip it. 43 minutes of audio, 15 minutes of reading.
Here are the 9 takeaways that matter.
🎙️ Host: Scott Wapner, who anchors CNBC's Halftime Report and runs its Investment Committee panel
👥 Also on: Joe Terranova, Senior Managing Director and Chief Market Strategist at Virtus Investment Partners; Karen Firestone, Co-Founder of Aureus Asset Management; Bryn Talkington, Founder and Managing Partner of Requisite Capital Management; Steve Weiss, Founder, Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer of Short Hills Capital Partners; Dominic Chu, CNBC markets correspondent, presenting ETF Edge; Michael Bucella, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Neoclassic Capital; Oliver Renick, CNBC's Options Reporter, live from the Cboe floor in Chicago
📰 Published: 9 September 2026 on CNBC
🟣 Apple Podcasts | 🔗 CNBC | ⏱️ 43 min | ✅ Time saved: 28 min
Key Takeaways
Two separate research desks told clients the same day that a September pullback has become the base case
Citadel Securities' Scott Rubner calls it his highest-conviction view; RBC put a "garden variety" 5 to 10% decline on the table
Terranova's worry is not that oil and yields are high, it is that almost nobody is positioned for them to stay high
Firestone expects the Fed to sound more hawkish than it has all year, with oil where it is
She said the Treasury market has been signaling a 5% ten-year for months
Talkington found a peak-to-trough decline in every midterm cycle back to 1962, and a rally after almost all of them
Her figure: the market is positive between November and February about 95% of the time
Weiss says the risk-reward has changed but selling long-held winners to act on it is a tax bill, not a strategy
He is short some QQQ and VOO and is sitting on cash rather than deploying it
Terranova sold Costco on a time stop rather than a price stop — 60 days, down 5 to 6%, out
Bitcoin's rally started as a short squeeze and then got spot buying behind it, but the rest of crypto is levered up to October 2025 levels
Apple options were priced for a move more than three times the stock's typical day, which is AI-event pricing, not phone-event pricing
1. The Correction Case
Wapner opened the hour with the two things moving the tape — crude and the long end of the Treasury curve — and then read out the research that had turned his own question into the show's premise.
Brent was at 101 and WTI above 96, which Wapner called significant in itself; the ten-year note yield was "basically at 485," and he tied the move to more detail arriving on the Treasury buyback
Rubner's call was the sharpest of the day. "He says the highs are in for the month," Wapner said, and listed the calendar Rubner is working from: the corporate buyback blackout window opening on the 12th, option expiry on the 18th, quarter-end on the 30th — "These are all historically very large risk transfer events."
RBC published something close to the same view: "They say the risks of a garden variety pull back of 5 to 10% have grown for many of the same reasons they throw in geopolitics," Wapner said
Wapner added the geopolitical piece in his own voice, pointing to the rising crude price and the hostilities under way in the Middle East
2. Terranova's Asymmetry
Joe Terranova's answer was not a market call so much as a description of how he decides whose research to act on, followed by the one scenario he thinks the market is not carrying.
He said the value of the seat is hearing everyone and working out who is currently right: "So when you have the good fortune to sit on this platform, you listen to what many different people say and you understand who has the hot hand. And Scott has the hot hand. He's been very accurate in his notes."
Terranova said he had told Wapner the day before that he had no view on the next 50 S&P handles in either direction, and that he did not want to build a bias out of September seasonality
He listed the headwinds he does accept: the buyback blackout, rising oil, rising yields, and the CPI report still to come
The asymmetry is the part he wanted on the record: "Do we really think heading into the midterm election, yields and oil are going to stay uncomfortably high where they are right now? I would say most of us don't. But guess what. That's asymmetric risk. That in reality is really going to catch everyone offsides if in fact they do stay elevated."
His reasoning is that skepticism about current pricing is so widespread that the consensus is already leaning the other way
His practical instruction was not to stop buying but to size down: "I think you do it very, very lightly"
3. Firestone's Hawkish Fed
Wapner turned to Karen Firestone by noting she had spent weeks telling the panel not to rule out a Fed rate increase, with the market pricing roughly a 60% chance and many people still convinced it will not happen.
Firestone framed the summer as unusually good and therefore unusually exposed. "Well, we had a summer that was quite blissful in terms of looking at earnings that were fantastic," she said, with estimates for this year and next going up week after week
"So if stocks are somewhat priced to perfection and we have this risk which has grown, which we have expected for rates to go higher, whether it's this September meeting or the next meeting, there are going to be hawkish noises coming out of the Fed. They are going to be much more hawkish than they have been, particularly with oil prices where they are."
She flagged the consumer as the weak link: "The consumer seems stretched." The retailers' reports did not show the gains that were expected, she said, even after the tariff rebates they received
On where the rebate money went: "Where did that money go? Why didn't it translate into profits for them."
On rates, she said the bond market has already made the call: "And the Treasury market has been showing us for months now that it expects the ten year to get to 5%."
Her conclusion was that a September correction would be ordinary rather than surprising, and that it typically follows exactly this setup — a stretch of rising prices and untroubled earnings
4. Wapner's Earnings Counter
Wapner then argued the opposite side himself, putting the bull case to the panel as a question rather than leaving it unsaid.
"Why aren't people running for the calendar hills. Because earnings are too good to do that," he said, laying out the case: the Middle East resolves at some point, oil comes down at some point, yields come down at some point, and earnings are what is left underneath
The sell-side number he cited: "Barclays goes to 7950 today following earnings"
He pointed to the flow data as evidence the money agrees: "BofA's client flow trends sixth biggest inflow week in history since 2008. That's for the second straight week." Clients were net buyers of equities
He credited the Mag-7 resurgence, which he said started after the tech earnings, as the reason people have stayed bullish
On the momentum factor, Wapner walked through a JPMorgan note covering its round trip — a run-up, a collapse around what he called the situational awareness blow-up, a quick recovery and then another unraveling. JPMorgan's read: "it's reassuring that despite big falls in the momentum factor, key equity indices are holding near their highs"
Wapner's own gloss on the distance left to travel: "How far are we from an all time high in the S&P? Two and a third percent."
The bank's conclusion is that the momentum unwind looks complete, so the downside risk to the wider market should be easing
5. Every Midterm Since 1962
Bryn Talkington agreed with the longer-term bull case and then produced the historical pattern she trades around, opening with a joke at the expense of the quantitative research Wapner had been reading out.
"I may not be Scott Rubner at Citadel and have all those GPUs at my fingertips, but I do have history," she said
Her count runs back to 1962 and covers roughly 16 midterm cycles, and she said every one of them contained a peak-to-trough decline
"So if history is any guide, we will have a drawdown again during midterms," she said. "Why? It doesn't really matter."
The other half of the pattern is the recovery: "But then on the other side of that, going back to like the price targets for year end after those midterms, the majority of the time, like 95% of the time between November and February, the market's positive."
That combination is why her instruction is mechanical rather than tactical — she said a historical drawdown of this kind is "a great time," as she put it, to dollar cost average into new positions
She also said earnings are largely behind the market now, with Oracle and Adobe the exceptions still to come, and that the earnings backdrop remains "very anchored in technology stocks"
Her advice to holders was to sit still: "So I think just like buckle up, don't turn temporary, you know, volatility and make permanent losses on that just like ride through it because this will pass. But I do think we have a drawdown like we've had every single midterm since 1962."
6. Weiss Won't Deploy Cash
Steve Weiss joined the panel partway through the block and was asked directly whether he agreed the risk-reward had changed.
"I see the risk reward has changed. But that doesn't mean you should sell long standing positions and pay taxes on them, even capital gains as opposed to ordinary tax," he said. "I think you hold on to your quality investments."
His position on new money matched Terranova's, and he said the two had made the point together before — that "now's not the time to deploy new capital unless something is really on sale"
He described his own work over the weekend: "I did some work over the weekend looking at the correlation between high energy prices, low approval ratings for the administration, and really didn't find much." His conclusion was that sustained high energy prices lead to more tightening, which takes the market down, so the question that matters is whether this is a spike
On what is actually holding the market near its highs: "Well first of all it's AI. If you look at it even today it's the AI trade. So if that goes away then the bottom falls out. But that's not going away."
Weiss disclosed being short some QQQ and VOO and holding cash he has not put to work, and named the risk in that position: the president says "we're close to a deal," the market believes it, and the shorts get carried out
He does not expect that, because he cannot find anyone who sees a path to cheaper oil: "I'm not worried about that because I just don't see an off-ramp for lower oil prices, and that's consistent for everybody I talked to." He said the same answer comes back from foreign military and geopolitical contacts
7. The Costco Time Stop
Wapner opened the Trade Tracker segment by needling Terranova for selling Costco on valuation right after defending Apple's. Terranova conceded the point — "I can't do that. You got me on that one" — and then gave the real reason.
"There's two reasons to put a stop in. Number one price. Number two time we're at 60 days," he said. He had bought the stock personally on July 7th at 965: "I was down somewhere between 5 and 6% on the position, so I time stopped myself out."
The rules-based side of his work had already exited. In the ETF built on his index, Costco was bought in July 2021 at 429 and sold in April 2026 at 1014
He said he bought the stock back personally because he wanted to keep consumer exposure alongside Walmart, which he has owned for years, and that he should have followed his own rules instead
On which characteristic broke first: "In the case of Costco, it was more momentum to a lesser extent. The three year growth rate on revenue had moderated to 6%."
On valuation, he said the problem was worse six months ago than it is now: "So I think valuation for both Walmart and Costco was an absolute concern six months ago." He put the peak multiple in the low 50s against what he considers a comfortable historical range of the upper 20s to low 30s, and said the multiple has since pulled back
Wapner's parting shot went unanswered: "Scarcity, but their operating margins are pretty narrow for a company with that multiple"
Terranova's read-through was broader than one holding: "And by the way, Walmart is not trading well either"
8. Bitcoin's Short Squeeze
Dominic Chu took over for ETF Edge with Michael Bucella of Neoclassic Capital, and the question was whether bitcoin's run says anything about the rest of crypto.
Chu's setup: "Bitcoin is on a tear up 22% in just the last three weeks alone. Right now we're just hovering right around the 80,000 mark"
Bucella said the move began as forced buying rather than conviction: "So we've seen Bitcoin surge primarily in a short covering." He dated the initial spike to 19 August, when the Treasury announced it would buy a substantial amount of long-duration Treasurys
What has made it healthier since, in his reading, is that spot buying followed the liquidation of shorts, open interest has grown on the options side with call skew — people paying up for upside — and futures volume has come off
The warning is about everything else: "So ex Bitcoin we're approaching leverage levels last seen in October 2025 just before we had a very large liquidation and a pretty substantial move lower in the market."
He described leverage moving down the risk stack: Ethereum has been a large outperformer, Hyperliquid has outperformed, and both have grown their fundamentals alongside the price
The more speculative end sits around Robinhood's chain and the names attached to it — its derivatives exchange Lighter, plus Uniswap and Morpho — where he said the growth of the last few weeks has come with enormous leverage
He also pointed to a meme-coin launch pad whose volumes have taken off as an indication of animal spirits
His close was a caution rather than a call: "I'm not saying that this move isn't sustainable. I'm just saying you should proceed with caution. Don't fall into this feeling of I've missed a move. Let me pile in now."
"Again, Bitcoin looks relatively strong. The rest of the market starting to look a little more risky"
9. Apple's 3x Options Bet
Five minutes before Apple's iPhone event — John Ternus's first as chief executive — Wapner went to Oliver Renick at the Cboe floor in Chicago for what the options market had priced in.
"Apple's defining characteristic this summer was its inverse correlation to the AI trade. But options today look priced for something very different," Renick said
He noted that Apple's implied volatility has been very low compared with the rest of technology and the Nasdaq 100 — which made the day's pricing stand out
"Market makers are pricing in more than 1.5% swing in Apple stock by the closing bell, about more than three times the typical move," he said
His read on what that implies: "That looks a lot more appropriate for a big AI event, as opposed to just a phone company updating its phones."
On the volume: "$200 million in options have traded today," with the heaviest activity on the call side and the most popular contract the 320 strike call
Bonus Insights
Wapner's framing of Rubner's record was that of a reader, not a client — he said he has highlighted the Citadel Securities strategist's notes over the last month and called them "Excellent"
Terranova's rule about stops is that price is only one of the two, and the second one has no opinion about the company: at 60 days, a position that has not worked gets sold whatever the story is
Firestone's description of the summer as blissful was the setup for her point that priced-to-perfection is a condition, not a compliment
Talkington's caveat on her own historical work is that the cause of a midterm drawdown does not matter to her: the pattern is what she trades, not the explanation
Bucella's phrase for how to hold crypto here was "treading cautiously but optimistically," which is a different posture from the leverage he described building underneath the altcoins
The bottom line came from the opening debate rather than from the hour as a whole: all four investors agreed the risk-reward has moved against them, and not one of them said to sell anything — Terranova said buy "very, very lightly," Weiss said hold quality and keep the cash, Talkington said dollar cost average into the drawdown, and Firestone said to expect a September correction that would be entirely ordinary.
Products, Companies & Tools Mentioned
Costco and Walmart (Terranova time-stopped out of his personal Costco position after 60 days and down 5 to 6%; he still owns Walmart, which he said is "not trading well either")
Apple (Its iPhone event, John Ternus's first as chief executive, was five minutes away when the panel handed to the options desk)
Citadel Securities (Scott Rubner's notes were the show's premise; Talkington's joke about "all those GPUs" was aimed at exactly that kind of research)
Invesco QQQ and Vanguard's VOO (Weiss disclosed being short some of both while holding cash he has not deployed)
Oracle and Adobe (Talkington's exceptions to her claim that earnings season is behind the market)
Virtus Investment Partners (Terranova's firm; the rules-based ETF built on his index bought Costco in July 2021 at 429 and sold it in April 2026 at 1014)
Neoclassic Capital (Michael Bucella's firm, and the source of the argument that bitcoin's rally is healthier than the altcoin market underneath it)
Ethereum and Hyperliquid (Named by Bucella as outperformers whose fundamentals grew alongside the price, rather than pure leverage plays)
Robinhood, Lighter, Uniswap and Morpho (The cluster Bucella said is carrying enormous leverage after a few weeks of very fast growth)
Requisite Capital Management, Aureus Asset Management and Short Hills Capital Partners (The firms Talkington, Firestone and Weiss run, which is why their allocation calls are disclosures rather than opinions)
Books & Resources Mentioned
What's the RUB? – Scott Rubner, Citadel Securities (The note series Wapner said he has highlighted over the last month; the current call is that September's highs are already in)
Sell-side notes read on air from RBC, Barclays, Bank of America and JPMorgan (In order: a 5 to 10% pullback risk, a raised S&P target, the client flow data Wapner called the sixth biggest inflow week since 2008, and the momentum-unwind analysis)
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