Larry Kudlow, President Trump’s top economic adviser, nailed it this morning (to regular readers this should sound familiar):

“The economy’s everything when it comes to markets and confidence, and I think that markets frankly look through all these various political issues”

Jesse Livermoore — the greatest trader (when he was on his game) who ever lived — once said:

“Not even a world war can keep the stock market from being a bull market when conditions are bullish, or a bear market when conditions are bearish. And all a man needs to know to make money is to appraise conditions.”

He also said:

“In a bull market your game is to buy and hold until you believe that the bull market is near its end. To do this you must study general conditions and not tips or special factors affecting individual stocks.”

So, the above dictates that we stay the course for the moment, being that present general conditions remain positive. Now, make no mistake — as we’ve expressed here ad nauseam — a trade war is THE present risk to those favorable general conditions. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that general conditions cannot hold up if the two major players go the distance. 


Clearly, the Fed agrees.


From their July 31-Aug 1 meeting minutes released this morning:

“…all participants pointed to ongoing trade disagreements and proposed trade measures as an important source of uncertainty and risks. Participants observed that if a large-scale and prolonged dispute over trade policies developed, there would likely be adverse effects on business sentiment, investment spending, and employment.”