After U.S. stocks reached an all-time high following Tuesday’s U.S. election, one strategist said markets are pricing in the positive aspects of Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
On Wednesday morning, Bloomberg News reported that U.S. stocks hit all-time highs, with the S&P 500 Index gaining around two per cent, on track for its 48th record high close this year. The rally was based on the prospect that Trump would enact pro-growth policies that would broadly benefit U.S. companies.
Drew Pettit, a U.S. equity strategist at Citi Research, said in an interview with BNN Bloomberg Wednesday that the positive market reaction to a Trump victory was “expected,” due partly to the fact that the election was largely not contested. He added that when you look at the market reaction, “a lot of the Trump trades are leading today.”
“You might be seeing two per cent gains in the major U.S. indices, but the Russell 2000 and the S&P 600, they’re up 4.5 to five per cent today. We think that was probably the biggest broad market leverage trade. And obviously, it’s responding to the news with Trump taking the electoral college pretty clearly last night,” Pettit said.
However, he added that the market is currently pricing in “the good more than it’s pricing in the bad.” According to Pettit, deregulation and potential tax cuts are “huge tailwinds” for domestically oriented U.S. businesses.
“But on the flip side, when we really think about what’s happening in the market outside of equities today, interest rates are up. Longer run if rates stay higher, we think that really caps fair value on equity markets including small cap,” he said.
“Right now, it’s (the market reaction) logical, but I would say the market is pricing in more on the good side than it is on the negative.”