Snyder House adviser reports strong 2024 returns, shifts to small- and mid-cap stocks

Jason Staley of Snyder House gave a financial update to the Franklin Park Borough Council, saying the borough—mployee pension plans ended 2024 with positive returns and started 2025 higher. "The police plan is up around $200,000 in the first month of the year. The general employees plan up around $95,000 to start the year," Staley said.

Staley told council members that much of 2024 nd 2023—xperience shows returns can be concentrated in short periods and that a steady investment plan matters. "I think staying invested in markets and having a plan has been very, very good," he said.

Staley described tactical changes Snyder House made after the November election, reducing emerging-market exposure by roughly half and redirecting those allocations into small- and mid-cap U.S. stocks. "Upon the election of President Trump and Vice President Vance, we went and slashed our emerging market exposure by 50% and moved it into small and mid cap stocks," he said, adding that in the general employees plan emerging markets were lowered from about 5% to 2.5% and in the police plan by roughly 3.5 percentage points.

He argued the portfolio tilt reflects valuation and policy expectations: domestic, smaller companies have cheaper valuations and stand to benefit if corporate tax or regulatory changes support domestic business. Staley also described "second-order" opportunities tied to artificial intelligence: companies that build grid and infrastructure components rather than the headline AI software firms. "We're really big on kind of second order winners of artificial intelligence. And so we own infrastructure assets," he said, noting those holdings include manufacturers of bolts and wires and utilities.

Staley warned markets remain unpredictable and pointed to energy and grid constraints when discussing AI's power needs. He cited a presentation he heard showing an AI chip requiring roughly the same energy as "four refrigerators" and said AI-related workloads can require far more energy than typical internet searches.

Council members asked clarifying questions about the shifts in emerging-market weight and about timing for interest-rate cuts and how that might affect small-and mid-cap performance. Staley repeated that the tactical reductions in emerging-market exposure and increased U.S. small-/mid-cap allocations were implemented and said performance had been favorable so far in early 2025.

The presentation was delivered as an informational update; no formal action or vote on plan policy was recorded.

Ending: Council members asked follow-up questions about detailed year-end accounting and promised to include a restated year-end report in a future meeting agenda.