Having watched the markets for the past 30 years, I have come to see them less as a science and more as a long-running drama, same cast of fears and hopes, just different plot twists depending on what you are looking for.
The current geopolitical tension? What about the day-to-day antics of Donald Trump? Honestly, they barely moves the needle for me. Not because I’m fully insulated (I’m not) but because volatility is part of the script. Things go up, things go down, sometimes for good reasons, sometimes for no reason at all.
I will admit that I did not expect a war to break out so early in the year. I was so wrong. Nobody likes losses even when they are temporary no matter how disciplined we claim to be. Years in the market have trained me to sit through discomfort without overreacting, to stay objective when emotions start getting expensive.
To a large extent, I’m almost immune to the daily noise. Well, the client calls, the anxious messages, the prospects who suddenly become very cautious just when prices are getting interesting. It is always the same pattern.
That said, I’m still bullish. I expect all my positions to finish the year higher than where they are now not because I can predict every twist in the story but because I’m positioned with the longer arc in mind.
Adapt to the trend, tweak where necessary, and carry on. After all, if every headline were truly “the big one,” we would have run out of markets a long time ago.