Thoughts From The Divide: The Anti-Trump Trade (And Other Graceful Exits)
February 26, 2026
This is the final Thoughts From The Divide. It arrives as markets transition — not collapsing or accelerating, just quietly rewriting the narrative that drove
Do chemical stocks like DOW and CE as a trade work here for a rotation trade from Tech? They are soooo hated.
The underperformance of the chemicals group is unsurprising given ISM manufacturing has been below the 50 expansion/contraction line for 34 of the last 36 months. The group has acted better recently driven by expectations One Triple B’s corporate tax incentives and the fading impact of the three adverse aggregate demand shocks, immigration, reduced government spending growth and tariffs, will lead to stronger ex-AI capital spending. That view is reasonable, but it seems unlikely 4Q results over the next couple of weeks will show any evidence of a recovery in manufacturing. In short, getting long chemicals doesn’t have much to do with stalling earnings momentum in tech, but it does seem reasonably probable the non-AI manufacturing sector will strengthen in ’26. One potential favorable signal would be a positive stock price reactions to soft earnings. DOW reports on the 29th, Celanese doesn’t report until Feb 17th. The charts look better but no real view on the individual companies. Barry
On page 19 the remaining of the text for “ Brazilian real rates are‘….. is covered by the second chart. Can upload a newer version of the document thax
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