Memani Says the Soft Landing Is Arriving
Watch on YouTube ↗  |  February 17, 2026 at 15:06 UTC  |  2:34  |  Bloomberg Markets
Speakers
Memani — Investment Strategist / CIO

Summary

  • The long-awaited "soft landing" has arrived, characterized by stabilizing inflation, decent growth, and a rollback of tariff pressures.
  • A significant sector rotation is underway: capital is moving away from high-multiple sectors where terminal value is questioned (Software) toward fundamentally driven, low-multiple sectors (Banking, Cyclicals).
  • Assets are not priced for a massive economic reacceleration, but rather for stabilization, which favors undervalued cyclical assets over growth tech.
Trade Ideas
Ticker Direction Speaker Thesis Time
LONG Memani "It is really going to be more about the sectors of the economy, like banking, for example, where you have substantial tailwinds, you know, deregulation, capital relief." While tech faces valuation compression, banks are trading at low multiples. The combination of a stable economy ("soft landing") and specific policy catalysts (deregulation) creates a setup for multiple expansion in the financial sector. LONG US BANKS as a beneficiary of the rotation into value/fundamentals. Re-acceleration of inflation forcing higher rates, or a recession (hard landing) increasing credit defaults.
LONG Memani "If you look at cyclicals, they aren't as... high multiple as they should be... stabilization of the economy probably helps those types of assets." Cyclicals have been priced for a recession that isn't happening. As the market accepts the "soft landing" reality, the discount applied to these sectors will vanish, leading to repricing higher. LONG CYCLICAL STOCKS to capture the valuation gap as economic fear subsides. Economic growth stalling (recession) would hurt cyclicals most. 2:04
NEUTRAL Memani "The valuations and the multiples were too high... This is no longer a high multiples sector." The business models aren't broken ("revenue is [not] going to be zero"), but the investment thesis has changed. Investors are no longer willing to pay premium multiples for future growth, leading to a structural de-rating of the sector. NEUTRAL / WATCH. The sector is undergoing a valuation reset; upside is capped until multiples normalize. If growth slows further, multiples could compress even more aggressively.