Your Best Move: Go BIG on the US

We're in the middle of a mini-series called “God Bless the USA,” and why, at Lord and Richards, we’re bullish about investing in the US and US companies. Though many people, from within and without, speak negatively about our country, I am incredibly grateful for it. I grew up in the home of a military family and praise God for my father, who served in the Air Force for 25 years and received a full retirement. Our country has problems and always will; that’s the nature of being humans who sometimes disagree. However, one of the great things about our country is we know how to come together to produce tremendous economic output.

We talked about our gross domestic product in a previous segment. Today, let’s shift gears and discuss the markets here and why I'm still optimistic. Are we going to see down markets? Absolutely. At Lord and Richards, we encourage our clients to prepare for down markets three to four years out of every decade. We can implement strategies in your portfolio like hedging and principal-protected tools that reduce or eliminate risk on the downside and link up primarily to US markets. While I’m not opposed to foreign markets, I suggest investing dominantly in the US for equities and bonds.

We’ve discussed gross domestic product; China is a distant but significant second to Europe. Let’s talk about the size of the US market and market capitalization. The US has an incredible $71 trillion in bond and equity markets at any given point. China doesn’t even come close with a mere $4.2 trillion in Chinese markets. People are outraged and concerned about China taking over the world and the US losing its status as the reserve currency, but there's no place stronger on Earth to invest, and we're only gaining strength. The next closest is Japan at $10.7 trillion and Spain at $2 trillion. The US dominates the market, even against the entire European Union combined.

As we’ve discussed in this series, the US wins in gross domestic product (rate of increase, per capita) and market weight. When combined, the US is the only one of the top 10 countries appearing in every single category. The UK is a close second, making the top 10 in GDP and market weight but not per capita. Luxembourg, a tiny but beautiful speck in Europe that I’ve enjoyed visiting, has some of the highest GDP per capita. It's nice to be rich, but their market weight and gross domestic product are minuscule compared to the US.

One of the key statistics in any society is population and whether it’s increasing or declining. I’ve reviewed projections of anticipated populations over the remainder of the century, relative to 2021, from a line-up of major countries, including the US, Germany, the UK, Japan, India, Russia, Brazil, and China. The US is one of the few countries expected to increase its population by 17%! India is expected to increase by 9% and the UK by 5%. Due to birth rate issues, China is anticipated to decrease in population by 46%.

Let’s look at working-age population projections in these countries for the remainder of the century. The US working-age population is expected to remain stable, while every other nation will likely decline. China, which we’re extremely competitive with, is anticipating a potential 61% decrease in the working-age population, making a massive impact on the economy's output.

Clients often ask me, “Colin, what about our crude oil production and energy independence?” Over the last several years, particularly in response to the war in Ukraine, US oil production has soared to 13.2 billion barrels per day, ranking at the top of the industry globally; we are as energy-independent as possible.

It’s wonderful to be in this kind of place as a country. We can supply our energy. Our workforce and our population is stable, if not growing. Our markets are larger than most in the world combined, and our gross domestic output is larger and growing rapidly. What an ideal time for us to go big on the US! I advise you to move toward US markets, not shrink away. Again, I always advise you to have safety nets in place so that you're not unduly impacted by the inevitable rise and fall of the market and can enjoy steady and consistent returns.

At Lord and Richards, we implement institutional risk management strategies used by the ultra-wealthy and institutions like pension funds, insurance companies, hospitals, foundations, educational institutions, and so on. We can gain access to those tools because of the tremendous leverage our combined client base brings. In addition, we have principal-protected strategies that are still linked to the market so that you can enjoy the benefits of our country’s success in your portfolio. I would love to talk to you about how you can do this and achieve financial independence. It simply starts with a phone call.