Market Commentary August 2018

“Leave me alone, for August’s sleepy charm is on me, and I will not break the spell”. So wrote legendary author and poet Edith Nesbit, but this sentiment is not so far from the general attitude seen on many trading desks. We are not, of course, referring to our own industrious colleagues. In the markets, rumblings of trade tariffs are rattling investor confidence, with equities regularly giving up their hard-won gains. It is very much the case for investors this year of one step forwards, two steps back.