Emotions and Markets

The Next Four Years

This is not a political statement. This is a note where we share our personal feelings.

Like many of you, we have mixed feelings about politics and the election. Our feelings would be mixed regardless of the outcome.

Discussing our thoughts is the most productive way to move forward. It is also the best way for us to refine our process and figure out how to navigate the markets, which is our ultimate goal.

Our first feeling is one of DREAD.

To be honest, we don't like Donald Trump. His bombastic and antagonistic personality is the type we actively avoid in our personal lives, and it is also not what we would like to see in the office of the President.

We do, however, see how this type of personality could be useful in that position, especially given the types of folks we have had in that office over the last few decades.

We don't like him, but we can see how these unsavory personality traits would be useful.

Our bigger issue is that Trump is a narcissist. He cares about himself and his ego above everything else.

In real life, a couple of ten-minute conversations with him would feel like a lifetime. That would be an inconvenience but not a problem.

With him as President, though, you have to ask yourself at one point if he is making decisions for himself rather than the country.

Interestingly, we DO think the country is important to him—VERY important. We believe it is a close second to himself.

This is similar to many politicians. Perhaps the biggest difference with Trump is simply the magnitude.

Ultimately, our "dread" is less about the outcome of what is going to happen as a result of his unpleasant personality and more about having to sit through four more years of the constant noise—his rants and the media attacking him.

We are NOT looking forward to that at all.

Our second emotion is RELIEF.

While we dislike Trump as a person, we agree with many of his policies.

His first term was chaotic. We do not think he thought he would win and – as a result – wasn't prepared.

Being President and running the government is also a very different job than anything else he had ever done. It was always going to take time to figure it out.

Additionally, we think some of his appointees were not "team" players. They saw Trump as a threat to be managed instead of working to fulfill his vision and the voters' support.

Despite this terrible setup, we think the first term had very good policy results.

The economy grew nicely, investment and innovation prospered, and (importantly) global security improved significantly.

We question some of the methods to get us to the results, but the results were pretty good.

Our view is that a second Trump term will do better.

He now has a much better understanding of how everything works. He will also put in place a team that will work with him rather than against him.

The previous four years have felt like a slowly closing vice regarding economic policy and global security. It got worse slowly every day, and there wasn't much chance it was going to get better.

Like a ball rolling down a hill into a ditch, it didn't feel like it could ever roll back up.

This isn't to say that all the results will be great. The implementation method of some of these policies is tricky, and there are no easy fixes.

After a day of reflection, though, it feels like the ball has been moved off the hill and – at least for now – put on flat ground.

That brings me back to my final and most powerful emotion – HOPE.

Our readers may have heard me say this before, but I am one of the most optimistic people you will ever meet.

In order for me to survive my difficult childhood and thrive, optimism was a biological imperative. Without it, not only would I not have seen success, but I most likely would be dead or in prison.

OPTIMISM is the lifeblood of America.

If Kamala Harris had won, I would have been very optimistic about America's future. Even though it would have felt to me that we would continue to slide down several paths that I did not think were right, I was confident we would figure it out.

The worst outcome was still going to be pretty damn good.

That is an uncommon way to look at the world, but it is how I look at America. I believe in that concept fully and have seen nothing in my five decades that would lead me to doubt that outlook.

That same view exists with Trump.

My personal preference would be that we were governed differently from a personality perspective, but ultimately, I think the final outcome is not going to just be good for America. It is going to be GREAT.

I also recognize that “relief” and “hope” are the opposite of what many are feeling out there.

It is easy for our minds to go to the most negative potential outcomes. Remember that our bodies are biologically programmed to react to negative stimulus eight times more powerfully than positive stimulus. Evolution has made us pessimists.

There are many dire predictions about what will happen now with a Trump administration combined with Republican control of Congress. I don’t believe they will happen.

The most important reason I don’t believe them is because I believe in American and Americans. There are reasons these dire predictions have not played out in the past. One of those reasons is the very opposition presented by those that are worried the most.

We are the most optimistic about the next four years that we have been in a good long time. We hope we are right.

We all have an opportunity here to move forward together and continue to build “the shining city upon a hill” that is America. Enrique Abeyta