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Episode 63: Party Like it’s 1999 Thumbnail

Episode 63: Party Like it’s 1999

401(k) Coasting in Retirement Financial Planning Investment Management Investments Retirement Funding Wealth Management

Segment 1: 

HELLO Lower Alabama! Hello Gulf Coast! Welcome in. Welcome to Coasting in Retirement! That’s. Right. Thanks for joining us today, Josh Null here, and only Josh Null here, I am flying solo today! But don’t you worry. Just buckle your seat belt and hang tight, we’ve got this. ! I’ll try to do like Rush Limbaugh used to do and give you a great show with half my brains tied behind my back. We are back in Coastal College’s recording studio, beautiful downtown Fairhope, ready to put together another great show, and a brand-new show, for those of you tuning in!

Listeners: I am here to discuss financial topics relevant to those of you in or near retirement, living your best life along our part of the Gulf Coast. And for those of you listening looking for the straight skinny on how my industry of financial services works, well, you’ve found your show. We often provide a contrarian view on some of the propaganda produced by my industry. Here’s what we’ve got in store for you today: First segment – deep dive on our topic of the day. 2nd segment - at about 30 minutes past the hour - “Headlines of the Week”. Then at roughly 50 minutes past the hour, stick around for our 3rd segment, we call it” Josh’s Crystal Ball and Big Mouth”. So buckle up, we’ve got a lot to get to!

Quick background on me for those new to the show. Again, my name is Josh Null, I am a fee-based financial advisor, I hold my FINRA Series 65 securities license, and I am the owner of Gulf Coast Financial Advisors, that is a 100% locally owned, 100% independent investment management and financial planning firm with offices in Fairhope, Orange Beach, and Mobile! You can find more information on me and the team at Gulf Coast Financial Advisors by visiting our website gulfcoastfa.com, or feel free to give us a call at 251-327-2124. If you missed that contact info, get a pen and pad ready because we will repeat our contact info several times throughout the show! 

Quick public announcement before we get to our main topic. Regular listeners will recognize the names of our frequent show co-hosts, starting with the main co-host and breakout star of the show, Michelle Melton-Null, but there’s also regular contributors Jay Stubbs, JD Gardner, John Luke Tyner, and there’s even an appearance by show producer, my son, Payton Null. On top of featuring these incredible guests even more over the next handful of months, we are going to be expanding our guest expert pool, so stay tuned for tax experts, estate planning experts, real estate experts, you name it. Those of you in or near retirement tuning in have a wide range of questions around money and investing, and I’ve got the best network to supply the answers. I’m very excited about our guest list for the rest of the year, plus, I am making a pledge to our audience to avoid re-runs as much as possible, so keep tuning in! 

On to our main topic. I want to kick off this show with a little history lesson. Do we have any Prince fans in our audience? Maybe not. Probably more of a Tom Petty audience, which is fine, Michelle loves Tom Petty. And Phish, she is quite the Phish fan, she even got me listening to them. But I bring up Prince specifically because one of his biggest hits is a song called “1999” which you may recognize more by the chorus of “Let’s party like it’s 1999”. What most people forgot, or at least I did, is that Prince released that song way back in 1982, well before 1999. The song was written to somewhat mock a prediction made by Nostradamus that the world was going to end in 1999. I’ll give the listeners a hint - Nostradamus's crystal ball and big mouth was a little off on that prediction. But I digress. The point is, for those of you investors that remember 1999, investors took Prince’s advice literally and partied like no other time in stock market history.

The biggest driver of this party in 1999 was the Nasdaq composite index. It gained a whopping 85.6%! The other major indexes did fine as well, with the S&P 500 gaining 19.5% and the Dow Jones up about 25%. These gains were primarily driven by the "dot-com bubble" and high investor demand for tech stocks. There was “ravenous demand” from investors for technology stocks, including semiconductor, software, Internet, and telecommunications companies, fueled the market's rise. Performance was extraordinary, with some Nasdaq stocks leaping thousands of percentage points; I’ll give you all one startling example of a company still around to this day, Qualcomm. At the beginning of 1999, Qualcomm's closing price was about $2.57 per share. The stock closed the year at $55.13. That is a 2,619% increase. If you had bought 10,000 shares of Qualcomm at the beginning of 1999 for about $25,000, you could have sold those same shares for $550,000 at the end of the year. Oh, to have a time machine.  

Fast forward to today: there are many commentators and market analysts claiming that we are in the middle of another stock market bubble, this one fueled by sky-high market valuations of tech companies that are heavily investing in artificial intelligence, or AI for short. There’s a saying that history doesn’t repeat itself but it does rhyme, so over the next 2 episodes were going to do a deep dive on the current state of the stock market and if investors should be worried about a market crash similar to the dot.com crash of 25 years ago. 

Today I’m going to set up this discussion by giving you the similarities and differences between the stock market in 1999 versus 2025. Our next episode will feature John Luke Tyner of Aptus Capital Advisors, where we are going to not only discuss if the market is in bubble territory, but hold on to your hat, we’re going to discuss if bubbles even matter anymore. Yes, you heard me correctly. Heavy stuff. I can’t wait. 

In retrospect, probably the most famous quote regarding the 1999 Stock Market if from former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan, when he coined the term "Irrational Exuberance" about 3 years before the bubble burst. The late 1990s were the culmination of a multi-year bull market fueled by the rise of the internet. For you younger listeners, it’s probably hard to imagine a world without the internet, but I and many of our listeners are old enough to remember having to take classes on how to use the “World Wide Web”. My introduction was in college. And while my school had basic computers, I learned how to type on a typewriter. When’s the last time you saw one of those? 

So, are we in era of irrational exuberance again? Let’s walk down memory lane. In 1999, investors poured money into unproven internet startups with little to no revenue, driven by the belief that a massive paradigm shift was underway. That…sounds familiar. Many of these companies had exorbitant valuations based on potential future growth rather than current earnings. That…also sounds familiar. For context, I had just graduated college in 1998, so in 1999 I only had a little money to invest into the stock market. Money I totally lost on penny stocks, by the way, taking dumb advice from a friend named Paul. I do distinctly remember how “day-trader” was a badge of honor and something said in immense pride, sometimes arrogance, when asked what someone did for a living. I can tell you all that if 1999 and 2025 have anything in common, it’s the arrogance and condescending tone that day-trader used with me then and that crypto bro uses with me now. More on that later. For now, let’s look at specifics in 1999: 

  • Economic Context: The U.S. economy was strong, with low unemployment and a balanced federal budget. Inflation was relatively low, though it began to tick up at the end of the year. The Federal Reserve was concerned about overheating and began to raise interest rates, though they were still far below 2025 levels.
  • Market Performance: The market's performance was spectacular. The Nasdaq Composite, a bellwether for technology stocks, saw a mind-boggling annual return of 85.6% in 1999 alone. The S&P 500's total return in 1999 was 21.04% and the Dow Jones gained 25.2% 
  • Dominant Sectors: The market was highly concentrated in technology, but specifically in new, unproven "dot-com" companies. Many of the big winners were not yet profitable.

The stock market of 2025 has also been defined by a technological revolution, this time centered on artificial intelligence (AI) versus uses of the internet. Some analysts argue that the market's structure and the companies leading the charge are fundamentally different from 1999. Let’s look at market performance year to date. As of the end of August 2025, the S&P 500's Year-to-Date (YTD) return is approximately 10.2% to 10.99%, depending on how it’s measured. The Nasdaq Composite has a year-to-date (YTD) return of approximately 11.8% as of August 27, 2025 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) YTD return for 2025 is approximately 6.75% as of late August 2025. Those are all solid numbers but significantly below the 1999 gains. Why? 

  • Key Drivers: The main driver is the AI boom. Enthusiasm for AI has propelled the valuations of a small number of large, profitable technology companies. Unlike the dot-com era, the technology driving the market is more established, and the leading companies have substantial profits and business models.
  • Economic Context: The economic backdrop is more complex. While the U.S. economy has shown resilience, there are concerns about geopolitical risks, ongoing trade policy, and inflation. The Federal Reserve's interest rate hikes to combat inflation have pushed rates to a much higher level than in 1999, which has impacted borrowing costs and economic sentiment. There is a potential for a slowdown or even a mild recession in the latter half of 2025.
  • Market Performance: The market has experienced strong returns, but with significant volatility. The S&P 500 has continued to hit all-time highs, supported by strong earnings growth from the dominant tech firms.
  • Dominant Sectors: The market's performance is highly concentrated in a handful of "Magnificent Seven" or "Big Tech" stocks (e.g., Apple, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Alphabet). These companies are not speculative startups; they are profitable, cash-rich, and have established business moats.

 So, what do I think? I think that yes, we are in an AI bubble. I would argue that our capitalistic system and how the stock market is constructed means that we are often going from one bubble to the next. But as opposed to 1999, I think this bubble has the staying power to possibly last thru the end of this decade. Why do I say that? Because there is a central tenement to this show and to my company Gulf Coast Financial Advisors investing thesis, which regular listeners will already know: the overall stock market performance is more closely tied to money supply and monetary policy than most people realize. As our federal government has ran federal budget deficits consistently over the past 6 decades – yes, that’s over 60 years – there is just way, way more money in our system now versus 1999. Need hard proof? 

  • Around January 1999: The M2 money supply was approximately $4.4 trillion.
  • Around July 2025: The M2 money supply was approximately $22.1 trillion. 

What does more money mean? Simply put, money is like water, and it wants to flow somewhere. You can directly correlate the increase in money supply to the dramatic increase in the major stock market indexes over the past 50-60 years. Does that mean there won’t be a bubble crash sooner than I think? Of course not. All investing involves risk, and while it’s highly improbably that the US stock market would “lose everything”, it doesn’t mean that severe corrections can be devastating to investors. But what if the market does correct like it did in 1999? (pause) I’m going to melt the listeners’ brains. I’m not sure that it matters, in the long run. I’m not sure bubbles matter that much anymore, in the short run. There is so much money in circulation right now. And America is still the safest place to put it. Next week, I’m going to ask industry expert John Luke Tyner of Aptus Capital Investors if we are in a bubble, and if so…does it matter? Be sure to tune back in! 

Listeners, if you’ve liked what you’ve heard and want to set up a follow up conversation with the team at Gulf Coast Financial Advisors, it easy. You can call us at 251-327-2124 or find us on our website gulfcoastfa.com. One our site, click on the blue button in the upper right-hand corner to set up a meeting on my calendar. There are flexible meeting choices for your convenience – it can be as simple as a 15-minute introductory phone call, a 30-minute zoom, or my preference, an in-person meeting at any of our 3 office locations: Downtwon Fairhope, Orange Beach just down the road from the Wharf, or in Mobile off Dauphin St and I-65. Reach out to us - we would love to meet you! 

Alright folks, coming up next - There’s always a lot going on in the world! Particularly the world of finance, investments and money. Every week we scour the internet for financial articles relevant to those of you in or near retirement, then give you our honest opinion about these headlines. So join us after the break to hear me discuss this week’s relevant headlines in our “Headlines of the Week” segment. Stay tuned!

Segment 2 - News of the Week:

“Welcome back to Coasting in Retirement, your host Josh Null here! As we discussed before the break, every week we scour what Michelle calls the Interwebs for financial articles that pertain to those of you in or near retirement. Our job, or at least we tell ourselves it is, is to help you all understand how these headlines impact you, especially when it comes to your money! Note – if you want to read our referenced articles yourself, we also include the links in our show transcript, which you can find on our website gulfcoastfa.com under the podcast tab. Now without further adieu, here’s the Headlines of the Week! 

1. My first article is from a new site that I’m taking for a test drive, Mint Markets. If any of you listening are a voluminous news reader like I am, then you know it’s getting harder and harder to find non-paywalled site. Mint Markets appears to be paywall free, so far anyway. Their fresh off the press article is titled “US stock market valuations at historic highs seen before Great Depression, dot-com crash. Is a major correction coming?”. This article follows along with the basic discussion in our show opening, but it does take us to nerdville with some stats, such as the Shiller PE (CAPE) ratio. The Shiller PE ratio is a valuation metric used to assess whether a stock market (or individual stock) is overvalued or undervalued based on its long-term earnings. The Shiller PE (CAPE) ratio was around 37–38 in mid-2025, a level last seen at the peak of the dot-com bubble in 1999, which hit 44 before the crash. So what does all of this gobilty-gook mean? 

https://www.livemint.com/market/stock-market-news/us-stock-market-valuations-at-historic-highs-seen-before-great-depression-dot-com-crash-is-a-major-correction-coming-11756252606225.html 

2. Next up, a recent article from Yahoo Finance titled “What is the 10-year Treasury note, and how does it affect your finances?”. As we discussed in the show opening, most investors are not aware that the impact of money supply on the performance of their investments. I would argue that most people don’t understand the importance of the 10 year treasury either. It not only heavily influences mortgage rates, it’s a barometer of what investors are projecting in the future. 

https://finance.yahoo.com/personal-finance/mortgages/article/10-year-treasury-note-170612896.html

3. Let’s pivot to Morningstar for our next article, it’s titled “Have the Magnificent Seven Left Active Large-Cap Funds in the Dust for Good?”. Alphabet GOOG, Amazon.com AMZN, Apple AAPL, Meta Platforms META, Microsoft MSFT, Nvidia NVDA, and Tesla TSLA. An active large-cap mutual fund invests in the stocks of large, well-established companies (high market capitalization) and is managed by a professional fund manager who actively selects stocks with the goal of outperforming a market benchmark index. The fund manager researches and picks individual securities, changes the portfolio based on market conditions, and aims to generate higher returns than a passive or index fund. 

 https://www.morningstar.com/funds/have-magnificent-seven-left-active-large-cap-funds-dust-good

4. Last article for today, yet another new reference site called Schroders. It’s titled “Scared of investing when the stock market is at an all-time high? You shouldn’t be.” 

https://www.schroders.com/en/global/individual/insights/scared-of-investing-when-the-stock-market-is-at-an-all-time-high-you-shouldn-t-be/ 

Listeners, if you’ve liked what you’ve heard and want to discuss your own personal retirement dreams and goals, then us a call at 251-327-2124, or find us through our website gulfcoastfa.com. One our site, click on the blue button in the upper right-hand corner to set up a meeting on my calendar. We have several meeting choices for your convenience – it can be as simple as a 15-minute introductory phone call, all the way to an in-person meeting at any of our 3 office locations: Downtown Fairhope, Orange Beach, or Mobile, near the intersection of Dauphin St and I-65. Reach out to us - we would love to meet you! 

Alright folks, coming up next: Josh’s Crystal Ball and Big Mouth. What have been some of my predictions? Have I been right? Was I ever wrong? How wrong? What do I think is going to affect investors in the near future, or maybe the distant future? We talk about all of these things and poke a little fun at my big mouth. Stay tuned! 

Segment 3 – Josh’s Crystal Ball and Big Mouth: 

Welcome back! Your host Josh Null here, all by my lonesome today in studio. So, I am opinionated, I have strong opinions at times, I would say a radio show host that isn’t probably wouldn’t be very interesting to listen to. And I am paid in my profession to offer professional guidance and opinions to my clients, otherwise what use am I? Just replace me with AI. I like making predictions, and while I usually proved right, there are times I swing and I miss. Want to hear me eat a little crow? Then let’s get at with Josh’s Crystal Ball and Big Mouth.  

Well, listeners, I hope you enjoyed a little peek into how we form our opinions and make predictions. We invite you one last time, if you would like to have a no-pressure, no-obligation conversation about your investing goals and retirement dreams, you can call us at 251-327-2124, or find us through our website gulfcoastfa.com. One our site, click on the blue button in the upper right-hand corner to set up a meeting on my calendar. We have several meeting choices for your convenience – it can be as simple as a 15-minute introductory phone call, all the way to an in-person meeting at any of our 3 office locations. You can find GCFA offices in downtown Fairhope, or Orange Beach off Canal Road, or in Mobile off Dauphin St and I-65. Reach out to us - we would love to meet you! 

That’s our show for this week! I want to give a huge thank you to my lovely co-host, Michelle Lee Melton, thank you to our show sponsor, Providence Partners and Jay Stubbs, thank you to our two awesome radio stations, FM Talk 106.5 out of Mobile and WHEP 92.5 FM & 1310 AM out of Foley, many thanks to the provider of our show music, local band Sloth Racer, huge thank to the show producer, my son Payton Null, and as always my sincere appreciation for all of your out there that have been listening and joining us on this journey. We would love to be a part of your journey as well! Remember – votenappies.com! Until we talk again, have a wonderful and productive week. This has been Coasting in Retirement with Josh Null! 

GCFA Disclosure:

Gulf Coast Financial Advisors, LLC ("GCFA”) is a registered investment adviser offering advisory services in the State of Alabama and in such other jurisdictions where it is registered, filed the required notices, or is otherwise excluded or exempted from such registration and/or notice filing requirements. Registration does not indicate or imply that GCFA has attained a particular level of skill or ability, nor does it constitute an endorsement of the firm by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) or any state securities regulator.

The Coasting in Retirement radio program serves mainly to disseminate general information including those pertaining to GCFA’s advisory services, together with access to additional investment-related information, publications, materials and links. The publication of this radio show should not be construed by any client and/or prospective client as GCFA’s solicitation to effect, or attempt to effect transactions in securities, nor should it be interpreted as GCFA providing personalized investment advice, or any type of professional advice, for compensation, wherever this program is broadcast. Any subsequent, direct communication by GCFA with a prospective client will be conducted by a representative that is either registered or qualifies for an exemption or exclusion from registration in the state where the prospective client resides.

Certain information, news stories, headlines, data, charts, graphs, figures or statistics presented on this radio program may have been obtained from third-party sources that are believed to be generally reliable but which GCFA may not have independently verified. GCFA does not and cannot guarantee the timeliness, accuracy, or reliability of any such third-party information and undertakes no obligation to update or correct any information that may become obsolete, unreliable, or inaccurate. The radio program also contains the opinions, views, and perspectives expressed by Josh Null and any other GCFA representatives which are solely their own, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, or perspectives of GCFA as a firm. Such personal views and opinions should not be construed as endorsements or professional advice from GCFA. GCFA makes no representation or warranty regarding the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of any information on this radio program, and disclaims any liability for any direct or indirect loss or damage incurred from using or relying on such information.

GCFA, Aptus, Providence Benefits and Providence Partners are not affiliated, nor are any of their respective representatives.