Investing through the mess in US

FOR investors, the most important task in the weeks ahead will be trying to adapt their strategy to a world in which the US political system has shut down much of the federal government and is threatening to default on US debt.

The first rule of such a strategy is not to allow how you feel about politics overrule how you think about investing. Easier said than done, of course, but investors need to overcome the urge to make rash decisions just because they cannot stand the antics of one side or the other. Beyond this, it makes sense, in the fog of a Washington crisis, to survey the investment environment just before we went into the fog, make some assessment of how this crisis could end, and then consider an appropriate strategy during the crisis.

On the first task, some important data releases due while the government is shut down, like last week's employment report, will very likely be postponed in the absence of a quick reopening. However, our expectations, which are based at least in part on private sector numbers or previously-released government numbers, show an economy growing at a moderate pace. Furthermore, with the global economy exhibiting quite balanced growth (according to last week's PMI data), and third-quarter S&P 500 earnings expected to set a record high, prospects for stocks looked quite promising entering the fourth quarter. And then the government shutdown ...