It looks like our assessment of the impact of the Trump tariffs last week was timely. The tariff tit-for-tat had gasoline poured on it when President Trump announced that he would impose a 100 per cent tariff on all products from China, in response to China’s curbs last week on rare-earth minerals.

This tariff will take effect on November 1 and be imposed “over and above” other tariffs on Chinese exports, which are already 30 per cent and higher in some cases. And, it will be accompanied by the United States (U.S.) placing export controls on critical software. Trump has also signalled that his meeting in two weeks at an international economic conference in South Korea with President Xi of China may not happen.

We are now entering the sixth month of trade tariffs and it seems like a good time to assess their impact.

First some context. Where U.S. trade policy will land, and how trading partners will respond, is still a moving target. Over the past nine months, the U.S. administration has increased tariffs against virtually all trading partners and the levies continue to evolve week by week.

For now, it appears that the full impact of tariffs have yet to be felt. We continue to watch and monitor, and make adjustments as necessary. Should have you have any concerns, let’s set up a quick meeting and we’ll discuss it with you directly. There are no taxes or tariffs on our discussions!

There is no doubting that artificial intelligence (AI) has been a significant driver of stock market growth for several years, particularly in the United States (U.S.). Leading artificial intelligence companies would largely be considered as technology companies, although other sectors and industries benefit from this trend. Someone has to generate all the power to run the computers, after all.

The ongoing housing shortage and rising rents are making it difficult for Canadians, especially young Canadians, to buy or rent a home of their own. This situation gets a little better if young people are willing to split a two-bedroom with a partner or roommate. But even then, renter households are still spending nearly half of their pre-tax income on rent alone in these cities.

Often, we’re asked for our perspective on investment-related concepts from the popular press.

This week, we talk about walled gardens and structures in the investment industry that can keep you trapped in suboptimal investment products.

Every time you turn around, you’ll hear another investor or industry analyst say something like, “This time, it’s different.”

Saying this is about as useful as a wooden frying pan, because economic conditions are never exactly the same. Take today, for instance. There has never been a time in history when the U.S. was imposing massive tariffs on its trading partners and other countries, war was being waged in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, and China, India, and Russia were cozying up diplomatically and economically.

One of the things we try to do with each weekly (only you, dear reader, know if we are successful) is to eliminate some of the jargon that plagues our industry and acts as a barrier to understanding financial concepts. If more people did this, maybe there wouldn’t be so many people who think that tariffs are paid by foreign governments. But we digress.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman thinks the artificial intelligence (AI) market is in a bubble.

In his opinion, we are in a phase where investors are overexcited about AI and that is when bubbles happen. Altman appears to compare this situation with the infamous dot-com bubble of the early 2000s, which ended in a stock market crash that resulted from massive investor enthusiasm for internet-based companies during the late 1990s.

Remember the story about Goldilocks and the three bears? Ultimately, she found a bowl of porridge that was not too hot, not too cold, but “just right.” And, on the face of it, it may be what investors see as fitting for where the United States (U.S.) stock markets (and other major global markets) are currently, despite President Trump’s increasingly aggressive use of executive power when it comes to tariffs.

In 2008, I was in a car, travelling to a conference in Calgary with a colleague. We were listening to some rock-and-roll station. They really are the same in every city in Canada, aren’t they? Anyway, the disc jockey (radio announcer for the younger readers) was talking about how the Canadian dollar had just passed “par” with the U.S. dollar, so it would be a great time to invest.

A word of caution: I don’t recommend taking advice from rock-and-roll radio DJs