By Jonathan Garber | FOX Business
Market surge heightens stakes in 2020
The stock market has been unstoppable under the influence
of President Trump.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average crossed 28,332.74 on
Monday, meaning it has rallied 10,000 points, or more than 54 percent, since
Trump’s election victory on November 8, 2016. The benchmark S&P 500 has
gained more than 46 percent.
“The rally has been driven by pro-growth measures,
de-escalation of trade tensions, huge liquidity injections by central banks and
a FOMO approach by investors worried about missing out on a remarkable U.S.
market outperformance that has set one record high after the other.” Mohamed
El-Arian, chief economic adviser at Allianz, told FOX Business.
The gains show why U.S. markets have become the envy of
the world under Trump, who has followed through on his promises of cutting
taxes and regulations and rewriting global trade deals in America's favor.
By comparison, global exchanges such as Hong Kong’s Hang
Seng and Britain’s FTSE have gained 20.4 percent and 6.4 percent, respectively,
since Trump’s election win, while China’s Shanghai Composite has lost 7.2
percent, according to Dow Jones Market Data Group. Of the major global averages,
only Japan’s Nikkei, up 44.1 percent, has come close to the gains of the U.S.
markets.
U.S. investors' holdings have benefited from Trump’s
pro-business agenda. He has lowered income tax rates for individuals, cut
corporate taxes and rolled back a number of regulations, including restrictions
on the country’s biggest banks.
Trump also negotiated the United States-Mexico-Canada
Agreement, which overhauls the Clinton-era North American Free Trade Agreement,
commonly known as NAFTA, and has embarked on a nearly 21-month-long trade war
against China, which he says has “been taking advantage” of the U.S. for years.
This week, Democrats in the House backed the USMCA after
months of negotiation, and an initial trade deal with China was reached. Both
deals are expected to provide a tailwind for a stock market, and an economy,
that have been on fire in the past four months.
The Dow Jones index, for instance, has gained 11.2
percent since bottoming out on Aug. 14.
David Kostin, chief US equity strategist at Goldman
Sachs, thinks the stock market’s recent success suggests “the pace of U.S.
economic growth will improve in the near future.”
His team points to Fed rate cuts along with the bottoming
of the inventory cycle as reasons, in addition to the easing of trade tensions
with China.
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