'The optimistic viewpoint is certainly alive and well' in the markets: Expert

Alfred Eskandar, Salt Financial President & Chief Operating Officer joins Yahoo Finance's Kristin Myers to break down the latest market action, as stocks slide despite positive vaccine news.

Video Transcript

KRISTIN MYERS: We're joined now by Alfred Eskandar. He's the Salt Financial President and Chief Operating Officer. Alfred, always good to chat with you. So we're seeing the markets right now letting off a bit of steam. I'm wondering how much you're seeing today's market moves really as a buying opportunity through to the end of this year for what we can anticipate to essentially be much better market performance in the next six months or into next year.

ALFRED ESKANDAR: Well, good to be back, by the way. And there's definitely a lot of reasons to be exposed to equities now and into the near future. Obviously November was a huge month for certain sectors, energy being one of them.

But you had records in the Dow and the Russell. And certainly value's been on fire as of late as well. So the optomistic viewpoint is certainly alive and well. I think the markets reacted well to the Biden victory. And going into the last month of the year, we see the volatility came down tremendously and continuing to stay at roughly this level, which I believe is at 22 today.

KRISTIN MYERS: I'm wondering-- Alfred, you and I have talked about this before, about essentially this disconnect that we've been seeing for the last several months between market performance and what we're seeing at least when it comes to the pandemic. So while we've had the Dow on pace right now for the best month in over 30 years, we also have been hitting record highs when it comes to the coronavirus pandemic and the daily case counts that we're seeing.

So there seems to be, especially with that Dow 30,000, it almost feels like there's this optimism and this euphoria in the markets. I'm wondering how long you think it's going to be lasting and if you are anticipating some kind of a pullback. And how big would that pullback be next year-- January, February, spring of next year?

ALFRED ESKANDAR: Well, market timing [AUDIO OUT] difficult thing to do. And very, very few people do it well. So I'm certainly not going to take a swing at it. But what I can tell you is in early November when we saw the big spike to 40, it was because of COVID. It was because of surging cases not just here in the States, but really across the world.

And conversely you also see the VIX coming down to the levels where it is today, by nearly half, also because of positive news on the vaccine. So the market is very, very sensitive to what's happening with COVID. Obviously had this happened 10 years ago to this level, the economy would be in far, far worse shape.

We transition into an economy where we're really relying on technology for productivity and for getting our stuff done. And as a result, the economy did not get as damaged as it would have if we hadn't had these capabilities. So I think the market [AUDIO OUT] it's been priced in.

And looking into the next year with the new administration, the stimulus package will finally get done. Enough with this political theater that's been going back and forth. And it'll be a nice little boost, a necessary boost for the economy to get back on track.

KRISTIN MYERS: Alfred, I'm running out of time with you. And it's Cyber Monday so I do want to ask you at least one question about retail and what to expect. Obviously Black Friday was a bit of a flop-- everyone just staying inside, not going shopping. I don't know. Personally, I don't know how optimistic I am about Cyber Monday doing very well.

I'm wondering what you're anticipating for the holiday season and for some of these retailers, their performance to be, given that we are still in the midst of a pandemic. More than 6 million people continuing to file for unemployment. The pandemic continues to surge. What are your anticipations over the next couple of weeks?

ALFRED ESKANDAR: Well, I can tell you from shopping habits of my teenage daughter and wife, there seems to be no end to the number of packages showing up on my front porch. But I do think it's going to be a bit muted. There's still some uncertainty in the employment numbers.

But consumer sentiment remains high. People's savings' rate is high. And there's a lot of pent up demand. I think there's a little shock of retail therapy coming our way. And I don't see Christmas being disappointing.

KRISTIN MYERS: All right, time to leave that there. Alfred Eskandar, Salt Financial President and Chief Operating Officer coming to us with some beautiful bottles of wine in the background making us all incredibly jealous over here at Yahoo Finance. Thanks so much for joining us today.