Okay - A prediction - or maybe some homework.
In a perfect world you buy a stock and it goes up. You sell the stock to someone and it goes up again. They sell the stock and again it goes up. In this “staircase” model, no one loses, it is just a function of time.
Now when a stock goes down, two things could have happened. First, the person bought at a lower price and they have lost value but not principal. However, for the price to have gone up, someone must have bought at that price - they are losing money. There are winners and losers. Now, if you have the ability to hang on to the stock and not be forced to sell, IF the stock goes back up, you could regain those losses and maybe even make money, or at least minimize the losses. But if you are drawing on that money, say to fund your retirement, they are definite losses.
So here is the homework. When these people sell at a loss, who is buying? I see two possible choices. Before we look into them, these people have to have spare money. Buying on margin in this situation can be a dangerous gamble. So we assume the people (or companies) are well funded. I think this leaves two entities. First the companies themselves, buying back their own stock. Second will be large capital investment companies, or wealthy individuals who can afford to take a loss, or use it as a write off. Thus I see wealth being consolidated from the general population (mostly 401Ks) back to a smaller group of individuals and companies. Watch who buys.
That and giving them a potential tax break, will actually do just the opposite of the proposed result of the tariffs. It will not bring jobs back to the US, it will hurt many people’s retirement funding (the immediate sacrifice) yet continue to expand the national debt, resulting in even more pain for our children and our grandchildren…..
Two sides of the same coin.