Welcome to Money As If, the personal finance newsletter for anyone who isn’t 12-years-old now:

Today’s non-kiddie menu:

— Jeanine

P.S. There won’t be a new Money As If issue next week as it’s Halloween, so I’m assuming everyone will be out trick-or-treating. We’ll be back on Nov. 7, though, so if you’ve been enjoying these weekly reads, go ahead and share that referral link, why dontcha?

Perhaps you’ve noticed, but the stock market just doesn’t seem to react to bad news in the way that it used to. It’s reliably un-rattled by bad job reports or corporate layoff announcements. It doesn’t seem too concerned by the ongoing government shutdown or emerging fears of a regional banking crisis.

And while it does sputter every now and then at the sound of heightened trade war threats (see: Wednesday), those dips tend to be short-lived.

Hell, it even likes today’s inflation data. As of writing this, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was surging to record levels, even though the Bureau of Labor Statistics confirmed prices across the board are on the rise.

(The log line here is that the data wasn’t as bad as everyone thought it would be and now the Federal Reserve can go ahead and cut rates again. Lord knows investors love a good rate cut.)

Day-to-day explanations aside, the market’s long-term resilience in the face of frequent recession indicators has pundits and analysts understandably throwing the “b”-word around.

Bubbles, as you may know, occur when stock prices raise based on optimism, speculation, and a subsequent herd mentality rather than companies’ actual financial performance. They burst when everyone realizes these prices (and overall company valuations) are unsustainable or, in fact, insane.

There’s a lot going on in the world right now and politics are definitely at play. It’s easier for investors to rally, for instance, when they feel the current presidential administration is pro-business and pro-wealthy. But, TBH, the biggest reason the market frequently appears out-of-lockstep with our economic reality is — you guessed it — AI.

“There is not a broad-based bubble but a hyper-concentrated event," says Jon Morgan co-founder of Venture Smarter, a consulting firm that supports startups and small businesses. “The results of the S&P 500 are so impacted by a few technology juggernauts that it clouds the underlying weakness in much of the economy.”

Whether this bubble grows, persists, or ultimately bursts is anyone’s guess.

“It all rests on whether the AI leaders can make the tremendous projections of growth that they are looking for over the next two years," Morgan says. “If earnings performance can catch up with stock prices, some kind of soft landing could result as the market could then grow into its valuation. A sharp crash most likely would be the result if even one of these players or two were unable to produce their projected results.”

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So I took a trip to the Woodbury Common Premium Outlets in Central Valley, New York last week, mostly because I had this strange, insatiable urge to buy an impractical pair of designer shoes. I’m not ready to talk about those shoes (or that experience) just yet, but I do want to point out that a pair of Guess Factory jeans set me back $83.

Outlet malls, as I’m sure you know, are where you go to theoretically get great deals on last year’s designer goods. It’s hard to say if I was coming out ahead against what these jeans originally cost, because I couldn’t find their original price online. (This year’s Guess bootleg jeans cost between $59 and $138, so 🤷‍♀️.)

I can, sadly, say that I would have saved more if I had done what I usually do and just shopped online as — oh, look — here are the exact same jeans for $63.74 ($76.74 once you add shipping).

Guess like everything else consumption-related in 2025, outlet malls simply aren’t what they used to be.

Nowadays, most financial takes are boilerplate. These aren't.

And, finally, today, in things I would buy if I could, you know, just buy things …

Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve always found Tiffany & Co. jewelry to be a bit … basic. Wearing their priced-for-mass(ish)-consumption pieces, though totally on trend in the ‘90s and early aughts, now feels like the shiny equivalent of carrying around a pumpkin spice latte. And their expensive pieces have always mostly just struck me as … expensive.

So I was surprised to feel genuine thirst for its Bird on a Rock fine jewelry collection and this platinum, diamond, and gold Lovebirds ring specifically. (I just love how big it is, you know?)

Of course, I do not and never will have the $35,000 required to buy it. But, hey, a bougie bird can dream.

Got questions, comments, receipts, tips, thirst traps, etc. you’d like to share? Send them to [email protected].

_{This article is for educational purposes only. We don’t recommend or advise individuals to buy, not buy, sell, or not sell particular investments or other assets, as everyone’s circumstances are different. Also, it’s your money and ultimately up to you to decide the best use for it.}