By Akemi Kondo Dalvi, CPA/PFS, CFP

What a year 2025 has been so far! We started the year with the economy contracting in the first quarter by -0.5% GDP (gross domestic product). Given President Trump’s announcement of future tariffs, businesses purchased mass quantities of overseas products, expanding their inventory to bulk up supply prior to tariff implementation. However, imported goods do not support GDP figures given the indicator is a measure of domestically produced goods.

The first-quarter contraction was offset by a very choppy second quarter. The market was digesting tariff updates, policy changes by our current administration, and global uncertainty overseas. However, by the end of July, corporate earnings came in strong with the S&P 500 Index surging to 10 new highs before pu

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