At the beginning of 2017, few money managers and analysts were forecasting that the financial markets would exceed, or even repeat, their strong returns from 2016. The reasons for pessimism included headwinds from global monetary tightening, political turmoil in the US, implementation of Brexit, conflicts in the Middle East, North Korea’s nuclear missile development and saber rattling, and other factors. Global markets, however, largely proved the experts wrong (yet again), with major equity indices in the US, developed ex-US, and emerging markets posting strong returns for the year.
