Where to Invest $1 Million Right Now
Four wealth advisers point to promising investments around the world.
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More turbulence ahead.
That’s the message investors are getting from Wall Street experts as pressures on financial markets mount. On top of lofty stock valuations fueled by the hype over artificial intelligence, there’s the high-stakes tariff battle between the US and China, meltdowns in some parts of credit markets, softening job growth and a US government shutdown.
However, overall earnings have been strong, and the S&P 500 has largely powered past any obstacles. The index is up more than 30% since its April low and has gained about 14% for the year. Where jitters have shown up recently is in the price of gold. While still up some 50% for the year, the precious metal plunged by as much as 6.3% on Oct. 21, in the metal’s worst rout since 2013.
To look beyond the chaos and identify opportunities, Bloomberg asked four wealth advisers for their take on promising investment areas. Their ideas ranged from value plays in health care to global mining companies and luxury real estate.
When the experts were asked how they’d spend a $1 million windfall on a personal interest, the main focus was family. Some said they’d send the money to their children to help with high housing costs and a tough job market, while another said he would take his parents and extended family on a private jet journey to “bucket list” destinations like Angkor Wat and Machu Picchu.
Non-human family members got some love, too. One devoted cat owner would use the money to support initiatives targeting feline well-being and health.
Read more: How to Maximize a Roth IRA — And Retire Rich
Alexandre Tavazzi, head of CIO Office and macro research, Pictet Wealth Management
The Future is Metals
The idea: The infrastructure of the future is being built today, and it is metal-intensive. Megatrends like AI and the clean energy revolution are driving record demand for materials like copper and lithium. By investing in these raw materials, you gain access to the physical backbone of tomorrow’s economy. I particularly like asset-heavy companies in this space — companies that have significant physical assets, such as smelters, refineries, land and real estate. They are well-positioned at the heart of these secular trends and provide an inflation hedge as commodity prices rise.
The strategy:
If I had $1 million to deploy, I’d split it into three buckets. First, I would allocate about half to a diversified group of global mining companies with exposure to copper, aluminum, nickel and rare earths. These metals are the building blocks for grid upgrades, electric vehicles and battery storage. Next, I’d dedicate about 30% to direct commodity ETFs, focusing on copper, aluminum and an array of battery components. These instruments are resilient in an inflationary environment and provide a more direct play on metal prices. For the final 20%, I’d target public companies that provide the picks and shovels needed to build energy infrastructure: grid connections, power inverters and advanced storage systems.
Naturally, there are risks. We are living through a period of profound change, and we can’t rule out sharp swings in commodity prices, tariffs, geopolitical shifts and supply chain disruptions. But when you think about the sheer scale of infrastructure still to be built, the long-term case is compelling.
The big picture: The global push to electrify everything from cars to data centers is driving a structural bull market in raw materials. Meanwhile, persistent deficits and fiscal spending in major economies raise questions about what defines “risk-free” financial assets. That’s why I’m looking for real assets — those with an intrinsic value that is derived from their scarcity due to supply constraints. These kinds of assets are less vulnerable to political dynamics, including efforts to pressure central banks to keep borrowing costs low.
Chloe Duanshi, head of macro and investment strategy, Rockefeller Global Family Office
Look to Luxury Real Estate
The idea: There are a lot of interesting stories unfolding in the more niche, thematic corners of luxury real estate development, such as premium student housing and really high-end resorts. While the US consumer is under pressure and, cracks are showing up at the lower end of the market, the picture looks very different at the top of the spectrum. Spending by affluent households is far more stable across cycles, and that resilience is what investors place a premium on today.
The strategy:
We may be in the early innings of a cyclical recovery in US real estate development. Falling rates are part of the story, but the bigger driver is the supply vacuum created by several years of limited new construction. Between 2022 and 2024, new builds virtually froze when the Fed began to raise interest rates. The single most important reason why real estate is turning higher lies in the collision between scarce new supply coupled with steady — if not improving — demand. That mismatch is most intense in student housing and high-end hospitality.
From the demand side with student housing, flagship state schools with big sports teams have seen resilient enrollment and exceptional growth. But supply of student housing has lagged even as rents for these properties have risen 8% to 10% on an annual basis in recent years. We expect this imbalance to persist. In student housing, you have to really earn your way in, and enduring success requires capabilities impossible to replicate quickly, such as longstanding relationships with land sellers and intimate knowledge of local politics and entitlements. We’re most excited about high-end student housing, where affluent parents are willing to pay meaningful premiums for modern, amenity-rich buildings close to campus.
In hospitality, it’s the same dynamic in many ways, with resilient, price-insensitive demand. Experiences have become the new status symbol, and high-end resorts are the perfect spaces for that. On the supply side, the imbalance is really stark. Creating a new luxury resort is no small feat, since they are focused on the most coveted locations. Developers are often long-term owners and operators of these trophy assets. These assets generate steady income streams along with meaningful capital appreciation over time.
To invest, you need to partner with an uber-specialized operator who has been in this space for years, if not decades. Some asset managers deal with external capital, akin to private equity or private credit. Or there are instances when a specialized player has their proprietary capital but will take outside money from people like us as co-investments.
The big picture: Real estate investing is ultimately about marrying the macro with the micro: identifying shifts in macroeconomic conditions early and positioning proactively, while partnering with sector specialists who have on-the-ground insight to recognize and unlock value. Structural trends set the long-term trajectory of the asset class, but success often comes from navigating cyclical turns with precision and knowing when to lean into development for capital appreciation, and when to own and operate for income.
Ron Sanchez, chief investment officer, Fiduciary Trust Co. International
Focus on Health Care
The idea: There aren’t quick, cheap investment ideas or opportunities today given that we’re in the third year of double-digit price increases for the S&P 500. That said, in equities I see narrower and more select opportunities in health care.
The strategy:
Equity markets are expensive, with even traditionally defensive stocks such as utilities trading at elevated premiums. The notable exception is health care. For a host of reasons, including regulatory issues and drug price concerns, the sector has struggled. In general, investors want to look for assets trading at less than their historical premium. And while the S&P 500 is trading at a forward price-earnings multiple of 22.4, health care is trading at a forward PE of 17.3. Healthcare traded at a modest discount to the broad equity market for most of the past decade, but that discount has widened way out to about 40% since 2023.
From a risk management standpoint, the top two companies in the S&P 500, Nvidia and Microsoft, combine to make up nearly 15% of the index, so obviously there is a high correlation there. The entire health-care sector, meanwhile, is 9% of the index. With Nvidia, who knows what will happen, but there is a lot of risk associated with a single theme, and in the tech world things can become obsolete in five to 10 years. That is not a forecast for Nvidia, but there is an underlying risk for something that has grown to that size.
Health care is one of the most diversified sectors in the S&P 500, with everything from drug companies to biotech to equipment makers. Although there are near-term challenges, political as they may be, the demand and interest in health-care services and drugs is not particularly vulnerable and will not go out of favor. With aging populations here and abroad, demand for these services is as good as its been. There are growth opportunities, and some parts of the sector can be defensive.
The big picture: Valuations on a lot of assets in the public and private markets are at rich levels by historical standards. You can make a similar assessment outside of the traditional financial world to include crypto, gold, art and sports teams. There are also concerns about risk management, with worries about concentration and correlation in the S&P 500. Just 10 companies make up about 38% of the index. As the those companies go, so will the rest of the index go.
Nick Frelinghuysen, co-chief investment officer, equities, Chilton Trust
Head to Home Base
The idea: We think the home repair and remodel space will be really interesting over the next three years. We have exposure to the leading companies in this area, as well as in the paint and coatings industry. The common theme among them all is dominance in market share and mind share with professional contractors. One of the leading home repair and remodeling companies in particular has been very busy acquiring some of the large US professional contractor distribution businesses to gain share in this channel.
The strategy:
The reason we find this space so interesting is that we’ve been in a housing recession for years with affordability at all-time lows and probably have a shortage of between 3.5 million to 4 million homes in this country. If you look at existing home turnover, it’s roughly 4 million homes a year — a 30-year low. Typically, it would be somewhere between 5 million and 6 million a year. This is mainly a function of the Fed’s last interest rate hiking cycle and the “lock-in” effect of homeowners with low mortgage rates.
During this period, there hasn’t been a lot of sales volume and the stocks appear a little expensive after three years of flat to slightly negative volume growth. But we’ve seen this movie before. If mortgage rates go 100 to 150 basis points lower, we are likely to see an enormous unlock in terms of pent-up demand. Every time you see the 10-year Treasury yield flirt with 4%, you see an immediate uptick in mortgage refinancing and first-time homebuyer applications.
For us, these businesses are at cyclical lows in terms of earnings power. When we’ve come out of cycles like this and seen mortgage rates fall, these companies are kind of coiled springs in terms of the incremental margins they can earn simply if traffic or volume in stores goes from flat or slightly negative to even just 2% or 3%. These are businesses we’ve known for more than 20 years and have watched them compound annually at extremely attractive rates. Usually coming out of these cycles, they absolutely clean up in terms of market share gains and typically grow at two times the overall industry.
This might be a patient investment play where it doesn’t happen over the next six months. A lot of people aren’t focused on this area because so many investment dollars are flowing into the same 10 to 12 names and the same theme. But we will eventually exit this cycle because there are a lot of people who have been sidelined from being able to buy their first home or being able to move.
The big picture: If interest rates go lower, that could lead to a broadening out of what actually works in this stock market. What would be really helpful — since about a third of the consumer price index is housing and shelter — would be to see home prices start to flatten out or in some markets roll over a bit. Given the extraordinary run in home prices, that wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world in terms of taming inflation concerns.