U.S. Consumer Strategy: When will I be loved? Resurgence of tech & spiking freight keep Consumer subdued - Webinar Transcript

Research evidence excerpt

U.S. Consumer Strategy: When will I be loved? Resurgence of tech & spiking freight keep Consumer subdued - Webinar Transcript

30 July 2026

U.S. Consumer Strategy and Quantitative Research

U.S. Consumer Strategy: When will I be loved? Resurgence

of tech & spiking freight keep Consumer subdued - Webinar

Transcript

We recently published a note (U.S. Consumer Strategy: When will I be loved? Resurgence Alexia Howard

+1 917 344 8453 of tech & spiking freight keep Consumer performance subdued) and held a corresponding

alexia.howard@bernsteinsg.com webinar to discuss the primary takeaways (replay available here).

Callum Elliott, CFA, ACA U.S. Consumer stocks across both Discretionary and Staples sectors have

+44 20 7676 7183 underperformed the market over the past quarter. This may be because the tech callum.elliott@bernsteinsg.com

sector, which was flattish in the first quarter, picked up strongly over the past 3 months,

and Consumer stocks became a source of funds for this rally. So now we have the U.S. Danilo Gargiulo

+1 917 344 8475 Consumer Discretionary space sitting at the lowest crowding level that we have seen in

danilo.gargiulo@bernsteinsg.com over 25 years, which could make for some interesting investment opportunities.

Zhihan Ma, CFA Fundamentally, and with a disconcerting feeling of déjà vu, we worry that the recent

+1 917 344 8303

zhihan.ma@bernsteinsg.com spike in U.S. trucking rates could pressure anything with a physical supply chain in

the U.S.: While larger companies are likely to enjoy some protection from forward contracts

Cristian Rios for the next 6 - 9 months, we may find that smaller players have to absorb the blows from

+1 917 344 8615 rising freight prices in the nearer term. Fortunately, this likely means that Hotels, Resorts