Northern Trust Asset Management is a global investment manager that helps investors navigate changing market environments in efforts to realize their long-term objectives.

Entrusted with $1.2 trillion in assets under management as of March 31, 2024, we understand that investing ultimately serves a greater purpose and believe investors should be compensated for the risks they take — in all market environments and any investment strategy. That’s why we combine robust capital markets research, expert portfolio construction and comprehensive risk management in an effort to craft innovative and efficient solutions that seek to deliver targeted investment outcomes.

As engaged contributors to our communities, we consider it a great privilege to serve our investors and our communities with integrity, respect and transparency.

Northern Trust Asset Management is composed of Northern Trust Investments, Inc., Northern Trust Global Investments Limited, Northern Trust Fund Managers (Ireland) Limited, Northern Trust Global Investments Japan, K.K., NT Global Advisors, Inc., 50 South Capital Advisors, LLC, Northern Trust Asset Management Australia Pty Ltd, and investment personnel of The Northern Trust Company of Hong Kong Limited and The Northern Trust Company. Note: This account is not managed or monitored by Northern Trust Asset Management, and any messages sent via Seeking Alpha will not receive a response. For inquiries or communication, please use Northern Trust Asset Management’s official channels.

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — Scotland will bid to make World Cup history Friday night when they face Morocco at Gillette Stadium. Never before has Scotland reached the knockout stages of a major tournament, but Steve Clarke’s side will progress to the last 32 with a victory over a Moroccan team many consider among the tournament’s most dangerous dark horses.

The Stakes for Scotland

Scotland’s first game was certainly their easiest on paper, against the 83rd-ranked Haiti. John McGinn scored the only goal of the game, taking Scotland to the top of the group. That result has set up arguably the most significant 90 minutes in the modern history of Scottish football, with a win Friday capable of securing a knockout-stage berth the nation has never previously achieved at a major tournament.

A Dangerous Opponent

Morocco enters this match as one of the most respected sides in the tournament, having reached the semifinals of the previous World Cup. Morocco, now eighth in the world, are dark horses for the tournament after reaching the semifinals four years ago. Even a point from this game would be a bonus for Clarke and his squad.

That assessment reflects the scale of the challenge facing Scotland, even with the considerable confidence the team carries after its opening win. Steve Clarke has been candid about embracing Scotland’s position as the underdog against a side widely regarded as one of the tournament’s most complete teams.

A Test Against a Familiar Foe From the Past

While Friday’s meeting represents new territory in terms of the stakes involved, it is not the first time these nations have crossed paths on the world stage, with both having figured in the same group during Scotland’s previous World Cup appearance. Scotland’s run through this group stage continues a pattern of facing storied opposition; their final group match will pit them against Brazil, another side they faced in their last World Cup group stage, back in 1998. Back then, Brazil won 2-1 to kick off their tournament.

Broadcast Details

Scotland’s World Cup opener against Haiti and blockbuster final group-stage clash against Brazil will be broadcast on the BBC, while their game against Morocco in Boston will be shown on ITV. The match kicks off at Gillette Stadium at 11 p.m. GMT on Friday.

Should Scotland progress from the group stage, the BBC will have three of the top four picks in the round of 16 and three of the top five picks in the round of 32, reflecting the broadcaster’s significant rights investment in following the team’s potential knockout-stage journey.

Betting Markets Lean Toward Morocco

Oddsmakers have installed Morocco as the favorite heading into the match, reflecting both the side’s pedigree and its run to the semifinals in the previous tournament. A bet of $100 would win $522 total if Scotland wins, while a bet of $138 would win $238 total if Morocco wins, underlining the gap in perceived favoritism between the two sides despite Scotland’s perfect start to the tournament.

Group C Standings Entering the Match

Scotland entered the match with a record of one win, no draws, no losses, and three points, while Morocco sat with no wins, one draw, no losses, and one point. The betting line for the match had Morocco as a 1.5-goal favorite, with the over/under set at 2.5 total goals.

A Squad Built Around Continuity

Scotland heads into the match with a roster constructed around continuity from their World Cup qualifying campaign and a clear identity established under Clarke’s management. The squad includes Scott McTominay, Ross Stewart, and Craig Gordon among the 26 players selected, giving the team a blend of Premier League and continental experience to call upon against a technically gifted Moroccan side.

Concerns Beyond the Pitch

Off the field, Scottish supporters have faced their own set of challenges navigating the logistics of following the team across the United States during this expanded, 48-team tournament. Reports have highlighted growing concerns among traveling fans over the cost of domestic transport between World Cup host cities, prompting Clarke himself to publicly caution supporters against taking on excessive debt simply to attend matches in person.

In a lighter footnote tied to the team’s presence in New England, Massachusetts officials moved to formally “legalize” haggis ahead of the tournament, a symbolic nod to the thousands of Scottish supporters expected to descend on the region for the match.

The Broader Context for Group C

Friday’s meeting in Boston represents the clash between the top two sides currently positioned in Group C, following each team’s opening result earlier in the tournament. With Brazil having played to a draw against Morocco in their own opener, and Haiti having pushed Scotland closer than many expected before ultimately falling 1-0, the group has already demonstrated a level of competitiveness that makes Friday’s result difficult to project with full confidence.

A victory for Scotland would not only deliver the country’s first-ever appearance in a major tournament knockout stage, but would also place significant pressure on both Morocco and Brazil heading into the final round of group matches. For Morocco, even a draw would keep the team’s own knockout-stage path firmly intact, given the side’s status as one of the pre-tournament dark horses to watch.

Regardless of Friday’s outcome, Scotland’s campaign will be decided in its final group match against Brazil in Miami on June 24 — a fixture that, depending on how Friday’s result unfolds, could end up determining not just Scotland’s fate, but the final composition of the entire group heading into the round of 32.

The United States and Australia meet Friday in a pivotal Group D matchup at the 2026 FIFA World Cup, with both teams entering off convincing opening-round victories and a place atop the group on the line at Seattle’s Lumen Field.

Kickoff Time and Venue

USA and Australia meet in the 2026 FIFA World Cup on Friday, June 19, 2026, at 12:00 p.m. Pacific Time, or 3 p.m. Eastern Time, from Seattle Stadium. The match is set for Friday, June 19, 2026, at 3 p.m. ET.

TV Channel

The USA vs. Australia game will air at 3 p.m. ET on FOX, and Telemundo. FOX will be broadcasting the USMNT vs. Australia World Cup game in English. A Spanish-language broadcast of the game will air on Telemundo.

In the U.S., Fox Sports lists FOX and FS1, which are available on fubo for English-language coverage, while Telemundo will stream every match live on Peacock and the Telemundo App for Spanish-language coverage.

Streaming Options

For viewers without traditional cable access, several streaming platforms carry FOX’s World Cup coverage. Streaming options include watching three days free on FOX One, or watching for free on Tubi and FOX Sports.

FOX One gives fans access to live games, pregame coverage, highlights, expert analysis, and unforgettable moments directly to their screen. Fans who are late to the game can set their DVR to catch up with highlights they missed, then jump into the action live, with options to bypass spoilers and hide the live score until fully caught up.

YouTube TV gets viewers all the channels needed to watch the 2026 World Cup, including FOX, FS1, Universo, and Telemundo. Subscribers can currently get a deal on YouTube TV for $67.99 per month for the first five months, then $82.99 per month thereafter, with a 10-day free trial. One thing to note is that YouTube TV livestreams tend to run a slight delay, which isn’t ideal for viewers trying to keep up with the live game down to the exact second.

FOX One is a relatively new streaming service from FOX that launched last summer. With a subscription, viewers can tune in to FOX News, FOX Sports, FOX Weather, FS1, FS2, FOX Business, FOX Deportes, the Big Ten Network, and local FOX stations all in one place, with both live programming and on-demand shows and movies. At launch, the base price for FOX One costs $19.99 a month, or subscribers can save with an annual subscription for $199.99.

The best place to catch the match is on the streaming service fubo, with new customers able to sign up for a free trial. Fubo offers a free trial for new subscribers, allowing them to stream ESPN, ABC, CBS, FOX, and more than 100 top channels of live TV and sports without cable.

How Both Teams Got Here

Both nations enter Friday’s match with significant momentum following dominant performances in their tournament openers. The USMNT arrives red-hot after Folarin Balogun’s two-goal performance in a 4-1 opening win over Paraguay, while Australia also rolled in its opener, knocking off Türkiye 2-0.

The United States men’s national team made a statement to open its 2026 FIFA World Cup campaign, routing Paraguay 4-1 last week behind two goals from Folarin Balogun. The U.S. struck less than seven minutes in, taking a 1-0 lead when Paraguay’s Damian Bobadilla redirected the ball into his own net. Fans inside the packed stadium in Inglewood, California, roared as the USMNT seized an early advantage.

An Injury Concern to Watch

One lingering question heading into kickoff involves the availability of one of the USMNT’s most important attacking players. Team USA’s star midfielder Christian Pulisic’s availability remains a question after he was substituted out of last week’s win. Former USMNT head coach Bob Bradley discussed Pulisic’s calf injury and whether he’ll be ready to face Australia, alongside the broader discussion of the USMNT’s 4-1 win over Paraguay.

Where the Match Fits Into the Day’s Slate

Friday’s USA-Australia match is part of a packed slate of World Cup action across the United States. Day 9 of the 2026 FIFA World Cup delivers four compelling group stage matches, led by the heavyweight Group D showdown between the United States and Australia in Seattle. Later, five-time world champion Brazil looks to right the ship against Haiti in Philadelphia after a disappointing 1-1 draw with Morocco to open the tournament. Scotland and Morocco also face off in Group C in Boston, and Türkiye and Paraguay close the night on the West Coast in a Group D must-win for both teams. All four matches air on FOX or FS1 and stream live on FOX One.

All times Eastern: USA vs. Australia at 3 p.m., Scotland vs. Morocco at 6 p.m., Brazil vs. Haiti at 9 p.m., and Türkiye vs. Paraguay at midnight.

Looking Ahead in Group D

Beyond Friday’s match, both nations have their final group-stage fixtures already mapped out. The United States will face Türkiye on June 25 at Los Angeles Stadium at 10 p.m. ET, while Australia will face Paraguay on June 25 at the San Francisco Bay Area Stadium, also at 10 p.m. ET.

The Bigger Picture for U.S. World Cup Coverage

Friday’s match is part of a much larger broadcast commitment FOX has made to covering the entire tournament across its network properties. All 104 tournament matches will air live across FOX and FS1, with every match streaming live and on-demand within FOX One’s new, innovative World Cup viewing experience and the FOX Sports App. Every match is available in 4K on FOX One and most major pay-TV providers.

What’s at Stake on the Field

Beyond the broadcast logistics, Friday’s match carries genuine tactical and strategic significance for both nations as they look to build on their strong starts to the tournament. The U.S. team is at its best attacking from wide positions, with manager Mauricio Pochettino placing Dest, normally a fullback, further up the field to take advantage of his dribbling and shooting abilities.

With both the United States and Australia sitting level on points after their respective opening wins, Friday’s result in Seattle is likely to go a long way toward determining which nation finishes atop Group D heading into the final round of group matches later this month.

Jeff Bezos has thrown his weight behind one of Cambridge’s most closely watched artificial intelligence ventures, joining a $400 million fundraising that values materials-discovery specialist CuspAI at $2.6 billion.

The Amazon founder is backing the company through Bezos Expeditions, the private investment vehicle he created in 2005 to manage his fortune and which has previously taken stakes in Twitter, Uber and Airbnb. According to the Financial Times, which first reported the deal, Bezos is investing alongside Kleiner Perkins, the Silicon Valley venture capital firm. The round more than quadruples the valuation CuspAI carried last September, when it was worth $520 million.

CuspAI was founded in 2024 by Chad Edwards, who had previously built a quantum computing unicorn, and Max Welling, a professor of machine learning at the University of Amsterdam. Its advisory bench is formidable: it counts among its counsel Yann LeCun and Geoffrey Hinton, the 2024 Nobel laureate often described as a godfather of modern AI, two of the most influential researchers in the field.

The company’s pitch is, in essence, a search engine for matter. Rather than relying on the slow, costly trial and error that has long defined materials science, CuspAI lets customers specify the properties they need, then uses its models to assemble candidate molecular and atomic structures and test them inside a digital simulation. The promise is a development cycle measured in months rather than decades.

That ambition is already drawing serious customers. ASML and Meta are among the businesses using the platform to hunt for new materials, and last month CuspAI said it had worked with Kemira, a Finnish chemicals group, on materials capable of stripping so-called “forever chemicals” from water. Kemira is now pressing ahead with 20 candidates, having sifted through 300 trillion possible structures over six months, a scale of exploration that would be unthinkable by conventional laboratory methods.

The raise lands amid a striking run of form for British AI. It follows substantial rounds for PhysicsX and for Ineffable Intelligence, the London venture that recently secured Europe’s largest-ever seed round. In the first quarter of this year, UK AI start-ups raised $5.8 billion between them, more than France, Germany and the Netherlands combined, a figure that lends fresh credibility to ministers’ claims that Britain can compete at the frontier.

Bezos himself has been making the case for the technology in unusually bullish terms. Speaking at a conference in Paris, he dismissed fears that AI would render workers obsolete. “I know there’s a lot of concern that many people have, including many smart people, that AI is going to make humans redundant and so on,” he said. “I totally disagree with this point of view. I think, in fact, AI is going to create a labour shortage.” It is a theme that runs through his wider portfolio of bets on applied AI, from scientific research to the engineering-focused venture Project Prometheus he has been quietly assembling.

For Cambridge, the deal is further evidence that the cluster’s reputation for deep science is translating into the kind of capital that keeps fast-growing companies on British soil, a concern that has shadowed the sector even as investment in homegrown AI infrastructure accelerates. For the broader economy, it is a reminder that the next generation of AI value may lie not in chatbots but in the unglamorous, high-stakes business of inventing the materials on which physical industries depend.

CuspAI declined to comment. Kleiner Perkins and Bezos Expeditions did not respond to a request for comment.

There are few sharper symbols of how brutally the British grocery market has reshaped itself over the past decade than this: Morrisons, once one of the proud “big four”, has been overtaken by Lidl in the league table of the nation’s largest supermarkets.

The Bradford-based grocer reported that group like-for-like sales rose 2.2 per cent in the three months to the end of April, a slowdown from the 2.8 per cent growth it posted in the opening quarter of the year. Total sales edged up 1.7 per cent to £4 billion over the period, lifted, the company said, by fresh food promotions tied to Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and Easter. Underlying earnings (Ebitda) for the first half climbed 5.7 per cent to £323 million.

Steady enough numbers in isolation. The problem for Morrisons is what was happening elsewhere on the shelf.

According to Worldpanel by Numerator, Lidl held 8.6 per cent of the UK grocery market in the 12 weeks to 17 May, nudging ahead of Morrisons on 8.3 per cent and claiming the title of Britain’s fifth-largest grocer. For a chain that controlled barely more than 1 per cent of the market at the turn of the millennium, it is a remarkable ascent, and one we have tracked closely as Lidl crossed the threshold.

Morrisons, predictably, is not minded to concede the point. The grocer argued that the Worldpanel figures “underestimate” its true position because they exclude convenience stores. A spokesman added that the chain had “maintained our share while not opening new supermarkets, unlike the discounters who continue to add significant new space”. There is data to support the pushback: separate figures from NIQ put Morrisons on 8.5 per cent for the same window, just ahead of Lidl’s 8.3 per cent. The trade bible The Grocer noted that the two are now running neck and neck, the precise ranking depending on whose tape measure you trust.

Either way, the direction of travel is unmistakable, and it lands at an awkward moment.

Rami Baitiéh, who has led the recovery effort since the end of 2023, struck a measured note. The grocer was operating in a “highly competitive market”, he said, and remained focused on delivering “the best value for customers”.

The competitive backdrop is only half the story. Morrisons has been labouring under a heavy debt load since the American private equity group Clayton Dubilier & Rice acquired it in 2021, a deal that piled £6.6 billion of borrowings onto its balance sheet. The strain still shows in the statutory accounts: the group booked a pre-tax loss of £381 million in its latest financial year, a modest improvement on the £414 million loss the year before.

There has been genuine progress on the debt itself. Net debt has fallen 46 per cent to £3.17 billion since 2022, helped along by redundancies and the sale of stores and petrol forecourts. The company now operates around 500 supermarkets alongside a clutch of convenience outlets. Baitiéh, who has described the recovery as a “marathon”, says he is seeing “green shoots every single day”.

One asset Morrisons appears determined to hold onto is its food production arm. It remains the only major UK supermarket group to own its entire food manufacturing supply chain, processing roughly a quarter of the fresh food sold in its aisles. The division, Myton Food Group, runs about 10 sites across the country turning out eggs, meat, chilled food, flowers, seafood, produce and baked goods.

Speculation over its future has rumbled on. The Telegraph reported earlier this year that Morrisons was weighing a sale of the unit as the conflict in Iran stoked inflation fears among British businesses. The Grocer countered that the company was “not in serious negotiations” to sell Myton. Baitiéh himself was unequivocal in January, calling the manufacturing operation the “DNA of Morrisons”, adding that “it’s going to stay”. Rather than offload it, the grocer has been courting rival supermarkets to take supply from Myton, turning a cost centre into a potential revenue stream.

Like much of the sector, Morrisons has been vocal about the burden of government-imposed costs, singling out a £75 million annual hit from the rise in employer national insurance contributions. It is a complaint echoed across the high street, with Tesco among those urging ministers to ease the pressure as input inflation and geopolitical uncertainty cloud the outlook.

Baitiéh said the supermarket continued to “monitor the impact of input inflation very closely and we remain committed to doing whatever we can to help keep prices down for customers”. He has previously argued that rising prices “particularly affect pensioners and other less affluent groups, which comprise a significant proportion of our Morrisons customer base”.

For all the pressure, the tone from the top was upbeat on prospects. The grocer had made an “encouraging start” to the third quarter, Baitiéh said, with “strong plans in place to make the most of the World Cup and Father’s Day”. Whether that is enough to halt the discounters’ march, or simply to slow it, will define the next chapter of a turnaround that is far from finished.

Amy Ingham

Amy is a newly qualified journalist specialising in business journalism at Business Matters with responsibility for news content for what is now the UK’s largest print and online source of current business news.

Rise follows a 1 per cent fall in April as fears over the Iran war caused Brits to curb their spending

UK retail sales rose in May, as shoppers returned to the high street during the heatwave and demonstrated a continued appetite for new electronic goods.

Retail sales volumes are estimated to have risen by 1.2 per cent in May, following a 1 per cent decline in April as concerns over the Iran war prompted Britons to rein in their spending, according to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics.

The rebound in May was supported by the third-warmest May on record, with non-food stores driving the upturn as shoppers sought products to cope with the heat.

Non-store retailers recorded a 6.1 per cent increase, the largest monthly gain since February 2025, as shoppers sought products to cope with the heat.

Retailers, in particular, attributed warm-weather promotions and sales of items such as outdoor furniture, paddling pools and fans to the upturn, as reported by City AM.

Department store volumes also grew 2.7 per cent in the three months to May, the largest three-monthly increase since September 2024, with analysts anticipating summer events, including Wimbledon and the World Cup, to keep shoppers coming back to the high street.

Erin Brookes, European retail and consumer lead at Alvarez & Marsal: “May’s retail sales figures offer hope that consumers are willing to spend again, with the warm weather and bank holiday weekends helping to drive demand across department stores, online retail and consumer electronics.

“Retailers will be willing this positive momentum to carry through the summer.”

Sales volumes amongst computer and telecoms retailers also climbed, as customers demonstrated continued demand for products launched in March, with some choosing to delay new purchases amid the uncertainty surrounding the Iran war.

Online sales volumes also leapt 3.3 per cent in the three months to May, while sales values rose 12.2 per cent compared to the previous year.

However, food stores experienced a 0.4 per cent drop in sales as grocery volumes “remain under pressure” from stretched households having to juggle soaring bills, housing costs and unpredictable fuel prices, with Ms Brookes observing many “are still prioritising saving”.

She said: “Beneath the headline growth, this remains a market shaped by selective demand rather than renewed confidence.

“Grocery volumes remain under pressure, and in non-food the strongest gains came where weather, timing and clear purpose aligned. Consumers are still value-conscious, deliberate and willing to shift, channel or delay spend in search of the right proposition and promotion.”

Despite the increase in non-food purchases, analysts highlighted that the market remains “shaped by selective demand rather than renewed confidence”, with the heatwave chiefly responsible for the uptick. Found said: “Consumers are still value-conscious, deliberate and willing to shift channel or delay spend in search of the right proposition and promotion.

“That leaves retailers trapped between political pressure and commercial reality. The government is pushing the sector to do more to support stretched households, but retailers are facing rising wages, energy, and operating costs of their own.

“Retailers know these moments tend to create pockets of demand rather than a broad uplift. The challenge remains in supporting affordability for customers, while protecting profitability.”

Nevertheless, some analysts pointed out that a potential resolution to the Middle East conflict, coupled with high-profile summer sporting events, could sustain elevated sales into June.

Oliver Vernon-Harcourt, head of retail at Deloitte, said: “Brighter times may lie ahead. With some resilience in households’ personal finances, the end of geopolitical tensions and World Cup fever kicking in, we could see spending continuing to improve. Consumers may start enjoying more seasonal splurges, including in the more discretionary categories.”

Diversification remains one of the most discussed concepts in financial markets, but its meaning has changed considerably.

A generation ago, portfolio diversification was often explained through a narrow mix of shares, sectors, and traditional asset allocation. Today, traders think about diversification in a more active way because markets can react to economic data, policy decisions, liquidity shifts, and global events at the same time.

That changes the work behind a portfolio. Diversification now asks for more than spreading exposure across different instruments. Traders also need to understand how markets behave under pressure, which assets move together, and where risk can quietly collect when conditions change.

Multi-asset platforms have become part of that change. They give traders one place to monitor opportunities, manage positions, and compare market behavior. Smart-ISA operates within this trend through a platform offering more than 150 assets across major financial markets, reflecting the growing demand for broader portfolio participation.

Diversification Has Expanded Beyond Traditional Asset Categories

The range of markets available to traders has shifted how portfolios are put together. Diversification was once largely associated with spreading capital across different sectors of the stock market. Sector allocation remains relevant, but portfolio construction now extends well beyond that approach.

Exposure is no longer examined only through company selection or sector choice. Market participants increasingly consider how different asset classes react under various economic conditions and how those reactions affect overall portfolio behavior, whether assets tend to move together or in opposite directions, and how that relationship can shift when broader conditions change.

Smart-ISA supports this broader approach through market coverage that includes forex, stocks, commodities, CFDs, and futures. The availability of several asset classes within one trading environment allows traders to explore opportunities across different parts of the financial system and build portfolios that reflect a wider range of market views.

The result is a more flexible approach to diversification, one that extends beyond traditional boundaries and incorporates a larger universe of financial instruments than earlier models of portfolio construction allowed for.

One Trading Environment Has Replaced Multiple Separate Systems

Managing positions across different markets once involved separate providers, different interfaces, and independent account structures. Monitoring activity across several asset classes could become time consuming, particularly when markets were moving quickly.

Multi-asset platforms have simplified that process by bringing portfolio activity into a single environment. Positions can be reviewed together, market developments can be monitored through one platform, and portfolio exposure can be assessed without switching between several systems.

Smart-ISA reflects this development through a trading platform that combines broad market coverage with charting tools, analytical resources, market insights, and risk management functionality. These resources support traders who follow several asset classes simultaneously and want a clearer view of portfolio activity.

The company’s account structure also reflects the increasing demand for integrated trading experiences. Educational sessions with senior analysts, market guidance, and platform resources help traders examine different markets without separating research from execution.

Cross Market Relationships Are Playing a Larger Role in Portfolio Decisions

Financial markets do not operate in isolation. Movements in one area frequently influence activity elsewhere, and understanding these relationships has become an important part of portfolio construction.

Interest rate expectations provide a clear example. A shift in monetary policy can affect currency markets, stock indices, commodities, and other instruments simultaneously. Inflation data may influence precious metals, energy markets, consumer-related equities, and exchange rates during the same trading cycle.

As portfolios become more diverse, the ability to monitor these relationships becomes increasingly valuable. Traders are paying greater attention to the links between asset classes because those relationships can influence both opportunity and risk, including cases where correlations that appeared stable begin to shift under market stress.

Smart-ISA supports traders through analytical tools and market resources that help place individual opportunities within a wider market context. This perspective becomes increasingly important when portfolio decisions depend on developments unfolding across several asset classes at once.

Diversification Is Becoming More Dynamic

Portfolio construction was often viewed as a relatively static exercise, with asset allocation decisions made periodically and adjusted infrequently. That model has given way to something more active.

Many traders now adjust exposure as economic conditions change, market leadership rotates, or new opportunities emerge across different asset classes. Diversification has become a process that evolves alongside market conditions rather than remaining fixed for extended periods. That shift has practical implications for how platforms need to be designed and what traders expect from them.

Smart-ISA fits into this environment by giving traders one place to follow several major asset classes, manage portfolio exposure, and access a broader view of market behavior. The platform’s multi-asset coverage and integrated tools support a more active approach to portfolio management, giving traders the resources to respond to market changes without switching between separate systems or providers. For traders who want to align portfolio exposure with how they read current market conditions, having the full picture of activity within one environment can make that process more efficient and less reliant on fragmented data.

Multi-asset platforms have helped drive this evolution by simplifying participation across several asset classes and providing traders with a more comprehensive view of the financial landscape.

The empty nest is filling back up.

Millions of young adults are delaying life on their own as high housing costs keep them living with mom and dad. In 2025, 25.2 million adults under 35 lived with a parent, according to new data from Realtor.com. That amounts to roughly one in three people in that age group.

The numbers point to a housing market that remains difficult to break into, even for young adults with jobs and college degrees, the outlet reported.

“The adults living with their parents today are largely employed, and many hold college degrees,” Hannah Jones, senior economist at Realtor.com, said in a statement. “What’s holding them back isn’t a lack of qualifications, but rather, at least in part, a lack of housing they can actually afford. This is a supply story, not an employment story.”

GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS ADD NEARLY $132K TO COST OF NEW HOME, BUILDERS SAY

In 2025, 25.2 million adults under 35 lived with a parent. (iStock)

That supply problem has been years in the making. The U.S. is short of roughly 4 million homes, with entry-level properties especially scarce. The gap has widened since construction slowed following the 2008 financial crisis, Realtor.com reported. 

About 70% of 25- to 34-year-olds living with their parents have jobs. In 2000, about one in nine employed adults in their late 20s lived at home. By 2025, that share had climbed to nearly one in seven.

For many young Americans, moving out has become increasingly expensive.

The national median home listing price is $430,000, up 34.4% from 2019, while the median asking rent has climbed to $1,673, up 17.9% over the same period, according to Realtor.com.

MEDIAN US HOME PRICE PROJECTED TO HIT $1 MILLION BY 2050 — RIGHT AS MILLENNIALS RETIRE

In 2000, about one in nine employed adults in their late 20s lived at home. By 2025, that share had climbed to nearly one in seven. (iStock)

The delayed move into independent living could eventually translate into a wave of future housing demand.

As affordability improves or more homes are built, millions of young adults who postponed renting or buying could enter the market, Realtor.com reported.

“Twenty-five million adults living with their parents represents a generation of latent demand the market hasn’t absorbed,” Jones said. “Every adult still in a childhood bedroom is a household not formed, a lease unsigned, a starter home unpurchased. The typical first-time buyer is now 40 — that’s not a coincidence, it’s the math of a market that hasn’t built enough.”

The delay can also have long-term financial consequences.

Each year spent living at home can delay a young adult’s ability to build housing equity, Realtor.com noted.

MIDWEST AND SOUTHERN STATES DOMINATE HOUSING REPORT CARDS: SEE HOW YOURS SCORED

As affordability improves or more homes are built, millions of young adults who postponed renting or buying could enter the market. (iStock)

GET FOX BUSINESS ON THE GO BY CLICKING HERE

The outlook is not getting easier. According to new projections from National Association of Realtors (NAR) chief economist Lawrence Yun, the national median home price is on track to hit $1 million by 2050 — just as millennials reach the traditional retirement age.

“Essentially, in about 25 years the national median home price will be a million dollars,” Yun said at a conference in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday. “It may be hard to envision that, but back in 1990, the national median price was $90,000.”

FOX Business’ Kristen Altus contributed to this report.