Trump's Policies
Fears of Europe’s decline due to Russian aggression and shifting US policy are overblown. President Trump’s tough stance on Ukraine is a strategic move to consolidate domestic support, not an abandonment of Europe, while Russia’s threat is exaggerated. As Europe responds with higher defense spending, stronger market integration, and greater political unity, investors should overweight European defense stocks and position for Europe’s broader market outperformance.
Trump will pull back from the trade war when stocks approach bear market territory. He will not withdraw from NATO. Favor European stocks on fiscal policy.
Our defensive strategy for 2025 is coming to fruition so we are re-initiating some of our defensive and risk-off trades. Tariff implementation, hurdles in the tax bill, and geopolitical shocks are materializing in the near term.
The tariffs on Canada and Mexico will come into effect as scheduled while the tariffs on China will be doubled. In the Middle East, Iranian response to any attack will threaten Middle Eastern oil supply. Meanwhile, Chinese fiscal support will surprise to the upside at the Two Sessions. But Trump's China policy will cause volatility. Now that the stock market is cracking, reinitiate defensive trades, such as long treasuries versus US stocks and long global defensives versus cyclicals.
Trump’s ceasefire talks are positive for Germany – and so was the German election result. But Trump’s tariffs will hit Germany soon. Investors should use near-term volatility to increase exposure to Germany.
US growth has slowed in recent weeks. This can be seen in the weaker data on retail sales, consumer confidence, services PMIs, and a swath of housing releases (notably starts, existing home sales, homebuilder confidence, and stock prices). It can also be seen in the decline in GDP tracking estimates. The Atlanta Fed's GDPNow model projects growth of 2.3% in Q1, down from a peak of 3.9% on February 3. The Citi US Economic Surprise Index has also dipped into negative territory.
The Trump administration posits that the world owes the US for the provision of its security. In this report, we perform a quantitative analysis to come up with a naïve estimate of the cost of that peace. More importantly (and more seriously), our qualitative assessment argues that save for a number of frontline countries that rely on the US defense umbrella, the vast majority of the world faces manageable security threats due to the complex multipolar global environment and a growing number of alternatives to the US security blanket.
