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“In America, the impossible is what we do best.” – Donald J. Trump
Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.
The presidential stock market performance scorecard starts all over again today, as Trump 2.0 begins. For Biden’s entire presidency, the Dow Jones Industrial average rallied 39.4%, about 18 percentage points less than the four years under Trump 1.0 and more than 100 percentage points less than the 149.4% during the eight years of the Obama administration. While the Dow’s performance under Biden was the weakest of the last three Presidents, it was still nothing to sneeze at, and it caps off a third straight period of strong gains under a Presidential term. The only other periods since 1900 where the DJIA rallied more than 30% under three straight presidents were FDR, Truman, and Eisenhower from 1933 to early 1961 and then Reagan, Bush I, and Clinton from 1981 through early 2001. The most recent period, though, was the only one that included two one-term Presidents.
Let these performance numbers serve as a reminder that as an investor you should never let your politics and investment decisions overlap. In late 2008/early 2009, many investors wanted out of the stock market because of Obama’s views towards business and the economy. Yet during his tenure, the Dow rallied nearly 150%. In late 2016/early 2017 another group of investors wanted out of the market because of all the chaos that came with Trump. Lot of good that did you if you moved to the sidelines. When Biden won the election in 2020, the cycle repeated itself, and now in 2025, it’s probably happening with some investors again.
The Dow’s performance under Biden may have been the weakest of the last three Presidents, but it was still enough to rank as one of the top ten performances of any president since 1900. Coolidge, Clinton, and FDR ranked as the top three all with gains of over 150% while the Presidents who encountered the worst stock market returns were Hoover, Bush II, and Nixon.
