Morningstar

Smart Investor: 5 Warren Buffett Stocks, Is the Relief Rally Premature, and 3 Surprise Winners

We wrap up our coverage of the markets and the week.

Photo collage illustration featuring a bear entering a fog cloud with arrows pointing up and down in the background.

Want to stay informed with market insights and investing ideas from Morningstar? Sign up for my weekly Smart Investor newsletter here.

This week’s highlights:

If you hadn’t checked your portfolio this year, you might think nothing had happened in the markets. With President Donald Trump’s latest retreat on tariffs, stocks staged a 5.3% rally this past week, led by technology and large company names. The past week’s gains mean stocks have completely round-tripped not only their big drop lower after Trump’s April 2 tariff announcement, but also the selloff that began in late February. As a result, stocks are actually now up about 1% so far in 2025. Not exactly a roaring bull market, but better than the near-bear market sparked by the trade wars.

The catalyst for this week’s move higher was the news that officials from the United States and China agreed to bring tariffs down for 90 days. But Sarah Hansen notes that these “lower” tariffs are still high, and significant risks to the economy remain.

One voice of caution on Wall Street is Lisa Shalett, Morgan Stanley’s chief investment officer. While she tells Hansen that she isn’t “fully bearish,” she sees multiple headwinds for stocks. Find out more about Shalett’s outlook here.

One narrative during the selloff was that small investors were hanging tight while pros were selling. Well, not quite. Morningstar’s mutual fund flow data shows a different story, with both stock and bond funds seeing investors pull money at a fast pace. But it wasn’t a total retreat. Investors shifted cash into alternative and commodity funds.

Still, there have been some winners in the markets, even before the rebound in US stocks, and they tended to be areas investors shunned before this year. Morningstar Indexes strategist Dan Lefkovitz highlights three unloved corners of the market that have outperformed.

Lastly, it’s been a busy couple weeks at Berkshire Hathaway, with Warren Buffett stepping back from running the famed company. This week, we saw the latest filings on Berkshire’s holdings, and Susan Dziubinski has highlighted five undervalued stocks from the company’s portfolio.

By the way, for the latest on whether Morningstar sees Berkshire Hathaway stock as a buy, a sell, or fairly valued, click here.

As always, be sure to visit our Markets page for our latest coverage and live stock market updates along with our full weekly calendar of key upcoming data and events.

Correction: A previous version of this article misspelled Warren Buffett's name in one instance.

The author or authors do not own shares in any securities mentioned in this article. Find out about Morningstar’s editorial policies.

Sponsor Center