Merritt Dawsley’s Global Stock Market Compass for 2025

The stock market in 2025 is defined by contrasts: U.S. indices hover near record territory with low double-digit gains year to date, while many international markets and the MSCI World Index lag or trade sideways. Global growth is projected to be positive but slower than the pre-2008 era, and inflation is easing but not fully back to target.

Within this environment, market strategist Merritt Dawsley uses an “equity market compass” to interpret the global stock market 2025: a structured way to read earnings, interest rates, valuations and regional themes rather than treating the stock market as random noise.

1. Who Is Merritt Dawsley? The Analyst Behind the Compass

Before looking at the stock market 2025, it helps to understand the background behind this equity-market view.

Merritt Dawsley has a classic yet demanding training path in finance:

He graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, majoring in Finance and Economics, where he built a foundation in corporate finance, financial modeling and macroeconomics.
He then completed an MBA at Harvard Business School, specializing in Investment Management, systematically mastering global financial strategy, portfolio construction and risk budgeting.
Professionally, he has obtained several internationally recognized certifications, including Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) and Chartered Market Technician (CMT), reflecting both fundamental and technical expertise.
In addition, he earned a securities trading certificate from the New York Institute of Finance, giving him hands-on training in market microstructure, order execution and trading strategy.

This combination—Wharton finance and economics, Harvard MBA in investment management, dual CFA/CMT designations, plus practical trading credentials—gives Dawsley a rare blend of top-down macro insight and bottom-up stock selection skills. It also shapes how he builds his global stock market analysis for 2025.

2. The Macro Canvas Behind Stock Market 2025

2.1 Growth and Inflation: Slow but Not Stalled

According to the IMF’s early-year World Economic Outlook, global GDP growth is projected around 3.3% in both 2025 and 2026, below the 2000–2019 average of 3.7%. Inflation is expected to keep moderating, down toward 4.2% globally in 2025 and 3.5% in 2026, with advanced economies normalizing faster than emerging markets.

For Dawsley, this backdrop explains much of the stock market 2025 behavior:

Economic growth is not booming but resilient, justifying positive but not euphoric equity expectations.
Disinflation supports valuations, yet policy rates remain relatively high, making funding costs and equity risk premia critical in any equity market analysis.

2.2 U.S. vs. Global Stocks: A Split Screen

The S&P 500 has delivered low double-digit returns year to date in 2025, depending on whether one measures price only or total return. By contrast, the MSCI World Index—a broad gauge of developed markets—shows a slight negative return so far this year.

Research from major institutions such as J.P. Morgan and State Street suggests:

The U.S. stock market 2025 remains supported by technology and other growth sectors, strong AI-related earnings, and companies that locked in cheap financing earlier in the cycle.
Non-U.S. markets offer more attractive headline valuations, but carry higher macro and policy risks, leading to performance dispersion.

Dawsley sees this split as central to any global stock market 2025 discussion: investors are caught between richly valued U.S. leaders and cheaper but riskier international opportunities.

3. Inside Merritt Dawsley’s Equity Market Compass

Dawsley’s equity market analysis relies on four core coordinates:

Earnings power and revisions
Valuations and rate sensitivity
Market concentration and breadth
Regional and sector rotation

3.1 Earnings Power: The First Anchor

His starting point for stock market 2025 work is earnings:

Consensus forecasts for S&P 500 earnings per share (EPS) in 2025 cluster in the $270 range, with some houses projecting continued growth into 2026–2027.
Equity strategists at major firms are setting 12-month S&P 500 targets in the 6,500–7,800 range, implicitly assuming further earnings expansion and still-elevated valuation multiples.

From Dawsley’s perspective:

The stock market 2025 is priced for ongoing but uneven earnings growth.
Any serious equity market analysis must stress-test portfolios against downside scenarios where EPS disappoints, especially outside megacap tech.

3.2 Valuations and Interest Rates

The second coordinate is valuation:

U.S. equities trade at high multiples relative to history, especially in technology and AI-adjacent sectors.
International equities, in Europe and parts of Asia, appear cheaper on forward P/E and price-to-book, though they carry higher macro sensitivity.

Dawsley links valuation directly to rate expectations:

If central banks successfully engineer a soft landing with gradual rate cuts, higher valuations can persist longer than many models assume.
If inflation or policy surprises force renewed tightening, the stock market 2025 could see multiple compression even if earnings hold up.

In his equity market compass, valuation is not a timing tool, but a risk gauge: the higher the multiple, the more sensitive that segment of the stock market is to policy and growth shocks.

3.3 Concentration and Market Breadth

A defining theme of the last several years has been extreme concentration in a handful of megacap technology and communication services stocks.

By late 2025:

The S&P 500’s performance remains heavily tied to large, growth-oriented names, especially AI-linked leaders.
Some reports highlight rotation toward foreign equities and defensive value as investors rebalance after large tech gains.

Dawsley uses breadth indicators as a key signal in his stock market 2025 analysis:

When only a narrow group of stocks holds up an index, he marks the environment as fragile, even if price levels look strong.
When leadership broadens to cyclicals, small caps and international stocks, he views the equity market as more resilient, with healthier internal dynamics.

4. Regional Maps: U.S., International and Emerging Markets

4.1 United States: High Quality, High Expectations

For the U.S. stock market 2025, Dawsley’s compass points to:

Solid but slowing earnings growth, with tech, communication services and select consumer names leading.
Valuations that assume successful disinflation and policy support, leaving less margin for policy error.
A market still vulnerable to single-stock shocks from highly valued AI and semiconductor names that dominate index weights.

His equity market analysis in the U.S. emphasizes quality balance sheets, consistent cash flows and sensible multiples, rather than chasing every AI-branded story.

4.2 Developed Markets ex-U.S.: Valuation vs. Risk

In Europe, Japan and other developed markets, Dawsley’s stock market 2025 view is more nuanced:

Many non-U.S. markets trade at discounts to U.S. valuations.
However, they face slower growth, policy uncertainty and higher exposure to global trade and commodity cycles.

His equity compass suggests that:

Investors should treat these as selective stock-picking arenas, not monolithic “value trades”.
The equity risk premium may be attractive, but only when paired with careful macro and currency analysis.

4.3 Emerging Markets: Dispersion, Not a Single Story

For emerging markets, including Latin America, Dawsley applies the same discipline he uses for FX: he focuses on dispersion rather than averages.

In his global stock market 2025 notes, he highlights:

Large gaps between countries with reforming, investment-friendly policies and those facing recurring fiscal or political shocks.
The importance of commodity exposure, demographics and domestic capital-market depth when assessing EM equities.

Emerging markets, in his compass, are high-beta equity plays that require robust risk management and a strong understanding of local drivers.

5. How His Training Shapes His Stock Market 2025 View

Merritt Dawsley’s academic and professional training is not just a résumé; it influences how he reads the stock market 2025.

From Wharton’s finance and economics curriculum, he carries a strong focus on capital structure, discount rates and macro cycles—the backbone of his top-down equity market analysis.
From Harvard Business School’s investment management focus, he brings portfolio construction, factor investing and scenario analysis, which inform his multi-region stock allocations.
The CFA charter anchors his understanding of fundamentals, valuation and ethics, while the CMT designation sharpens his ability to interpret trend, momentum and sentiment on price charts.
The New York Institute of Finance trading certificate keeps him close to execution details—liquidity, spreads and order-book behavior—that can make or break a stock-market strategy during volatile sessions.

This blend is why his global stock market 2025 compass gives equal weight to earnings models, valuation metrics, chart structures and real-world trading realities.

6. Practical Themes for Investors in the Stock Market 2025

While Dawsley does not give individualized advice, his stock market 2025 work suggests several broad themes:

Expect dispersion, not uniform rallies
Global research from major banks and asset managers points to wider dispersion across stocks, sectors and regions in 2025. Stock picking and sector allocation matter more than in a plain beta bull market.
Balance U.S. leadership and valuation risk
The U.S. remains the earnings engine of global equities, but with demanding valuations and high concentration. His equity market analysis suggests combining U.S. exposure with carefully chosen international positions rather than going “all-in” on one side.
Use scenarios, not single targets
Instead of anchoring on a single S&P 500 year-end number, Dawsley prefers probability-weighted ranges tied to different earnings and policy paths—a discipline he encourages for any stock market 2025 plan.
Elevate risk management to a primary objective
With volatility spikes still appearing around AI earnings, macro data and geopolitical events, his compass puts drawdown control, liquidity awareness and position sizing on the same level as return targets.