The first quarter of Trump’s second presidency has confirmed many people’s worst fears – and more. Markets are struggling to make sense of the mercurial leader of the free world and are in retreat, giving up the post -election Trump Bump gains. Market corrections are part and parcel of investing. They are uncomfortable to navigate but, as long as we avoid the urge to panic, seldom cause lasting harm to portfolios. Usually they are triggered by a ‘Black Swan’ event – something unexpected. Covid is a good example. This time it has been triggered by someone who told us what he’d do – the problem is few people believed he could be quite so reckless!
In this session we’ll be trying to look beyond Trump’s aggressive rhetoric to make sense of what the world will look like once the dust settles. Standing a bit further back to put things into perspective is a good discipline to adopt when investing and that’s what we’ll be doing.
We’ll move on to reflect on the Spring statement, paying particular attention to the OBR’s reaction. We’ll look at the implications for the domestic economy, focusing on inflation and growth.