September doom sets in as Wall Street turns to banks and gold miners for safety

Wall Street is officially spooked. September started with warning signs flashing across every major index, pushing investors straight into foreign banks and gold miners. This is about survival.

August ended with the S&P 500 breaching 6,500, and the Dow Jones notching fresh highs. But that meant nothing to those who’ve been here before. Historically, this month tanks the markets, and nobody’s betting against that now.

Data from Dow Jones shows that the Dow, S&P, and Nasdaq usually take their worst hit in September. So investors are bailing on U.S. stocks and heading overseas.

According to CNBC, money managers are diving deep into international equities in 2025. Demand’s climbing fast. One of the biggest moves came from Lazard Asset Management, whose global portfolios are loading up on European and Asian banks, gold miners, and chipmakers.

They’re backing away from the U.S. market, blaming stretched valuations, dollar weakness, and geopolitical messes, and building new positions through the Lazard International Dynamic Equity ETF, a $422 million fund that launched in May after converting from a mutual fund. It carries a 0.40% expense ratio and currently holds a five-star Morningstar rating.

Lazard bets on foreign banks and miners as U.S. tech gets dumped

Paul Moghtader, managing director at Lazard and the head of the firm’s Advantage Team, told CNBC that volatility in 2025 has gotten worse, not better.

“Markets are increasingly volatile and risky. We’re seeing risk injected from many different sources, and an international exposure is getting more attractive relative to U.S. for many reasons, including the valuation, more shareholder focus,” Paul said.

He said he breaks every stock down using four categories: valuation, growth, quality, and sentiment. They even factor in how a company’s beta relates to GDP growth, a macroeconomic layer that Paul said lets them weigh the risk or opportunity of every position inside a real-world backdrop.

The Lazard ETF, trading under the ticker IEQ, now includes stocks like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing, BNP Paribas, Novartis, Tencent Holdings, and Samsung Electronics. Canadian gold miners are also in, thanks to strong signals from Lazard’s in-house screening models.

The firm’s overweight on European banks, particularly BNP, which is the second-largest holding after Taiwan Semi. BNP now holds just over 2% of the entire fund. Paul pointed to BNP’s AXA Investment Managers acquisition, finalized on June 30, which made BNP the fifth-biggest asset manager in Europe.

Other top bank names in IEQ include Societe Generale, Barclays, Japan Post Bank, and State Bank of India. Societe Generale is up a massive 94% this year, helped by strong Q2 earnings and a rebound in retail operations.

Barclays is up 34%, and Japan Post Bank has gained 25%. Lazard’s strategy favors these names for their low valuations and above-average dividend yields, a sharp contrast to overvalued U.S. tech.

The ETF also includes a smaller position in Canadian gold miners. Around 1% of the portfolio is in Barrick Mining, Kinross Gold, and Torex Gold. Barrick is up 72% this year, and Kinross has exploded by 125%.

Paul said the team sees gold as protection against macro uncertainty, especially in a year like this, where both rates and currencies are unpredictable. The portfolio has been moving away from software entirely.

Lazard dumped names like AppLovin, Gartner, and Cadence Design Systems in August, citing the rise of AI. Paul said software development is becoming easier and cheaper with AI tools, making some companies less attractive from a value and growth standpoint.

In response, the firm has picked up shares in Amphenol, Erickson, Western Digital, and NetGear, betting instead on hardware and connectivity players.

Outside of Lazard’s moves, broader sector shifts are showing similar cracks. Europe’s banking sector hit its highest level since 2008 at the beginning of August. Names like Commerzbank are up over 100% year-to-date, thanks to strong earnings and renewed deal activity.

Meanwhile, media stocks are falling apart. They’ve dropped more than 8% over the last two months. AI concerns are tearing into European names, especially in advertising. WPP posted a 71% fall in pre-tax profit in the first half of the year and slashed its full-year outlook, making it the worst performer in the entire sector.ft.

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