Investment returns will likely come down to a few big, unpredictable issues this year. We look at how they might upend market expectations.
After a year of outsized returns for both equity and fixed-income markets, expectations for 2020 returns have settled closer to their long-run averages: roughly 5% for stocks, and coupon-like returns of about 2% for investment-grade bonds and 5-6% for riskier bonds.
What could upend these market expectations? We see five potential disruptors.
1) Politics - Opaque outcome
The biggest "wild card" of 2020: the U.S. presidential election in November, the outcome of