Investors Will Emerge From ‘Fog of War’ in Unfamiliar Terrain
The coronavirus shock brings with it a growing list of uncertainties that may transform the financial landscape.
Uncharted territory.
Photographer: Bryan R. Smith/AFP/Getty Images
In a well-known Scottish joke, a visitor to a village stops and asks a resident how to get to a large city. The resident looks up and says, “Oh, if I were going there I certainly wouldn’t start from here.”
This simple joke illustrates the complexity that faces many institutional and individual investors as soon as they emerge from the current “fog of war” in which they are managing their investments and retirements through the fastest stock market correction in history. It encompasses the trifecta of the initial conditions, the journey and the destination, all of which influence the extent to which the coronavirus-driven financial disruptions will spill over into the broader economy.