Welcome and thoughts on the market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment

Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategies for Morgan Stanley. A lot of my

colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the

latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Monday

April 13th at 1030 a.m. Eastern so let's get after it. Over the past month I've

been more constructive on equity markets than the consensus.

On the premise that this recession would be one of the steepest on record, but the health

crisis nature of this economic downturn would invoke a monetary and fiscal policy response

like we've never seen before.

Furthermore, the sell-off in March created exceptionally attractive prices due to the forced liquidation

from levered investment strategies that is unlikely to be repeated.

Since then, policymakers have not disappointed with the Fed and Congress delivering unprecedented support in terms of the size, speed, and scope.

Specifically, the U.S. is likely to run close to a 20% fiscal deficit this year

which is more than double the size we've ever witnessed during peacetime.

Meanwhile the Fed has implicitly said they are prepared to do whatever it takes to make sure this recession does not turn into a depression.

Last Thursday, the Fed continued to make good on that promise by offering up to 2.3 trillion dollars in loan support support while moving further down the quality curve with

their secondary market purchases pushing into high yield. If it wasn't already clear

investors should have no doubt about the Fed's resolve to do whatever it takes.

As a result of last week's actions by the Fed and the market's reaction to it,

we are raising our year-end S&P 500 price target to 3,000 from 2,700, with a bold case of 3,250 and a bare case of 2,500.

Our target increases are purely a reflection of higher valuations resulting from a faster and

fuller normalization of the equity risk

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