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“When it is darkest there is always light ahead.” – Roald Amundsen

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While New York City elected a democratic socialist to be its next mayor last night, today is the first anniversary of the 2024 Presidential Election.  Below is a look at the S&P 500’s percentage change over the last year compared to its change in the year after President Trump’s first election victory in 2016.  While the two paths diverge in the middle part of the chart because of the “tariff tantrum” seen earlier this year, the full-year performance for the S&P following the 2016 and 2024 Elections is now very similar.  We’ll be looking at stock market performance during the Presidential Election Cycle in more detail in today’s Chart of the Day, so keep an eye out for that if you have an interest.

Below is our asset class performance matrix showing total returns across a range of ETFs in the year after the 2024 Election versus the year after the 2016 Election.

While large-cap domestic equity ETFs posted strong gains in the first year after Trump’s 2016 and 2024 wins, there are a lot of areas that have done a lot worse this time around.

The biggest disparities show up in small and mid-cap ETFs.  In the year after the 2016 Election, we saw similar 20%+ gains across the market-cap spectrum.  This time around, small-caps and mid-caps have been left in the dust, while large-caps have surged.

As an example, the S&P 500 Growth ETF (IVW) is up 27.8% since last year’s Election, while the Smallcap 600 Growth ETF (IJT) is up just 0.55%.

Looking at sector ETFs, Technology (XLK) and Consumer Discretionary (XLY) were up similar amounts, but Health Care (XLV), Materials (XLB), and Real Estate (XLRE) have been much weaker in the last year compared to the year after the 2016 Election.

Outside of the US, we’ve seen most country ETFs post huge gains since the 2024 Election, while their returns were much more muted in the year after the 2016 Election.

Finally, gold (GLD) and silver (SLV) have been two of the best performing ETFs in the entire matrix since Trump’s 2024 victory, but they were down in the year after his first victory.