Hedge Political Headline Risk in Stocks in 2025

No, headlines don’t control your returns (even in 2025)

Every time a budget fight blows up on a Sunday night or a tariff rumor hits at 11:07 a.m., my phone lights up like it’s 2008 again. It’s not. And while 2025 has been loud (budget brinkmanship, tariff chatter with both China and the EU, agency rules ping-ponging between drafts and lawsuits ) the core truth hasn’t changed: long-run equity returns still come from earnings, cash flows, and the cost of capital. Headlines shove prices around in minutes; policies change cash flows over years. Different beasts.

Quick reality check from actual market history, not vibes:

• 2016: On election night, S&P 500 futures hit the -5% limit in after-hours trading. By the close the next day (Nov 9, 2016), the S&P 500 finished up about +1.1%. Overnight panic. Daylight fundamentals.
• 2020: The week of the U.S. election (Nov 2-6, 2020), as split-government probabilities rose, the S&P 500 rallied roughly +7.3% for the week. Headlines were chaotic; expected policy path (gridlock → steadier taxes/regulation) eased the equity risk premium.
• 2024: Plenty of overnight spikes around debates and court headlines, yet full-year 2024 finished strong for large caps, driven mostly by mega-cap earnings growth and falling discount rates late in the year. The tape eventually followed cash flows.

So, what actually moves the needle? A tweet, leak, or committee “trial balloon” hits your quotes immediately (that’s noise). But a signed law, a final rule with compliance dates, or a tariff actually collected at the port, those alter after-tax cash flows and sometimes the discount rate. One is weather; the other is climate. And yes, there’s some gray area (agency rules get stayed, tariffs get exemptions, Congress rewrites stuff midstream ) which is why knee-jerk trading based on headlines is a rough hobby and a worse strategy.

This quarter (Q4 2025 ) we’re seeing headline spikes come in bunches. Pre-market gaps on budget whispers, mid-day reversals on tariff trial balloons, afternoon rallies on a court injunction that may or may not stick through appeal. It’s noisy, and honestly a little exhausting. I caught myself almost hedging a position off a single rumor last week and then remembered, right, we have rules for this, use them.

Here’s the deal, and I’ll keep it blunt: your edge is not predicting political outcomes, your edge is pre-committing to how you’ll hedge headline risk. If you want the “how-to-hedge-political-headline-risk-in-stocks” version in one breath, you define triggers, sizes, and expiries before the tape gets jumpy, because once the VIX pops and spreads widen, you pay up and you panic. Been there, paid that premium. Twice.

What you’ll get from this section and the playbook that follows:

• Noise vs. policy: How to separate tweets and leaks (price impact now) from laws and regs (cash-flow impact over time) and why that changes your hedge choice.
• Election-year reality checks: 2016 and 2020 had big overnight moves, yet fundamentals reasserted quickly, we’ll map those timelines to actual risk management decisions.
• Q4 2025 cadence: Why headline bursts are frequent right now and what that means for sizing, timing, and not over-hedging every rumor.
• Pre-commitment mechanics: The simple rules that beat predictions: when to buy puts, when to use collars, when to cut gross, and when to do nothing on purpose.

Prices react to headlines; portfolios compound on cash flows. Don’t confuse volatility with value.

I’m not saying ignore Washington, I’m saying translate it. We’ll focus on the policies that change earnings paths and the cost of capital, and we’ll treat everything else like weather: check it, carry an umbrella when your rules say so, and stop rewriting your forecast every time the wind gusts. And if I misremember the exact basis-point move on some 2020 Thursday, fine, we’ll pull the chart, but the pattern is the point.

What ‘political headline risk’ actually is (and how it hits your stocks)

What “political headline risk” actually is (and how it hits your stocks)

Strip the noise, keep the channels. Policy hits P&L through a handful of pipes. If you can label the pipe, you can map the earnings impact and the multiple impact. Miss the pipe, you end up hedging vibes. The big six:

• Taxes: changes to statutory rates, minimums, expensing rules, and international/BEAT/GILTI mechanics. A one-point swing in effective tax rate is ~1% to after-tax EPS. Sounds small until it stacks.
• Tariffs/trade: import costs, export access, and supply-chain rerouting. The USTR’s May 2024 action took EV tariffs to 100% on China, and raised rates on solar and semiconductors, that’s still biting this year in pricing and mix.
• Regulation/antitrust: conduct remedies, structural splits, app store rules, data use. It alters margin structure and TAM, sometimes overnight.
• Government purchasing: the federal checkbook. Defense, healthcare, infrastructure. Changes in toplines flow straight into order books.
• Subsidies/credits: IRA clean-energy credits, manufacturing credits, 45X/48C, R&D amortization fixes. They change hurdle rates and where plants get built.
• Sanctions/export controls: where you can sell and what you can ship. For chips and industrial tools, that’s customer eligibility, not just pricing.

Now, where this matters right now in 2025. Call it a sector heat map.

• Tech (mega-cap, platforms): antitrust. The 2024 liability finding against Google in search set up 2025’s remedy phase; API access terms and distribution defaults are the dollars. Expect ripple headlines around app store fees and self-preferencing. These don’t alter cloud demand tomorrow, but they can shave a couple hundred bps off take-rates if remedies bite. Reminder: about 40% of S&P 500 sales came from outside the U.S. in 2023 (S&P Global), so when remedies or privacy rules hit the EU first, U.S. numbers still move.
• Healthcare: drug pricing + PBMs. CMS’ first 10 negotiated drugs accounted for $50.5B of 2022 Part D gross spend (~20%) per CMS. Those prices are scheduled to apply in 2026, but every court filing and rule tweak this year is moving expected 2026-2028 cash flows, especially for names with 1-2 drugs carrying 25%+ of EBIT. PBM spread-pricing scrutiny adds a second swing factor for managed care and distributors.
• Defense: budgets. FY2024 enacted near $886B; FY2025 topline debate sits in the high 880s-low 890s by most Hill drafts this fall. For primes, that’s backlog visibility; for subsystems, it’s mix and long-cycle margins. Watch supplementals tied to munitions, they arrive as headline bursts with real revenue behind them.
• Energy: permitting + ESG rules. Midstream and LNG live and die on the calendar. The average NEPA environmental impact statement historically took about 4.5 years (CEQ, 2020 baseline). Reforms target two years, but 2025 still feels like 3-4 for complex projects. That lag is cost of capital. Scope 3 disclosure fights also change who can buy your paper.
• Semis/Industrials: trade. Controls on advanced-node tools and chips to China, plus those 2024 tariff hikes on solar/semi inputs, are still redistributing volumes this year. Packaging and trailing-edge fabs in Southeast Asia benefit; capex timing for U.S. fabs leans on 45X processing (subsidy channel) and any state-level matches.

And here’s the piece that stings portfolios in Q4: gap risk. Single-name overnight moves are outpacing the index by a mile, index futures drift -0.5%, your stock opens -6% on a court docket you weren’t watching. Dispersion is high this year; correlations fade every time policy hits a narrow pipe. That’s why the same macro hedge keeps missing: the shock isn’t broad, it’s surgical.

Quick aside, yes, I’ve been that person refreshing PACER at 11:58pm. Not fun. But it beats waking up to a -800bps open because a judge advanced a remedy you assumed was months away. Same idea, restated: the dates matter more than the vibe.

Headline cadence to actually calendar (so you size and time instead of guessing):

• Agency rule releases: HHS (drug pricing negotiation mechanics), FTC/DOJ (merger guidelines, platform rules), SEC (climate disclosure litigation outcomes). Windows are announced; comment periods give you a clock.
• Court decisions: antitrust remedies in search/app ecosystems; IRA drug-pricing challenges; export-control enforcement cases. Dockets publish oral-argument dates, treat them like earnings.
• Budget deadlines: continuing resolutions and appropriations marks in November/December. Defense, HHS, Energy titles move stocks on passage or punts.
• Geopolitics: sanctions tranches and export-licensing updates. Commerce BIS notices do hit at odd hours, mark prior meeting calendars to bracket likely weeks.

Translate policy into pipes, map pipes to tickers, and mark the dates. Prices twitch on headlines; your compounding still comes from cash flows. But if you respect the cadence, you can avoid paying for volatility you didn’t need, and pay up for protection exactly when you do.

First-line defenses: sizing, cash, and old-school diversification

Before options and fancy overlays, fix the basics. Nine times out of ten, that gut-wrenching drawdown you remember wasn’t about a headline; it was a position-sizing mistake that got exposed by a headline. The S&P 500’s average intra-year drawdown has been roughly 14% across 1980-2023 (J.P. Morgan Asset Management’s long-run study). That’s your weather pattern. If your portfolio is swinging 2-3x that because one or two names/industries are outsized, that’s not weather, that’s construction.

Right-size what can bite you

• Cap single-name risk. A simple rule that has saved my bacon more than once: keep individual positions under 2-3% (5% max for the very high-conviction, cash-generative stalwarts). If policy risk is concentrated, think drug pricing in managed care, antitrust in mega-cap platforms, tariffs for hardware supply chains, be stricter. No single-name above 2% when the docket is hot.
• Sector caps. Keep sectors at 15-20% each unless you can articulate the policy channel and your stop-loss mechanic. Healthcare and Comm Services both learned this the hard way in prior headline cycles. I still remember 2015-2016 when a couple of “couldn’t miss” specialty pharma names taught everyone what plan-level policy can do.

Hold a cash/short-duration sleeve for optionality

• Cash is not lazy; it’s a call option on dislocation. Keep 5-10% in cash or laddered bills. A 4-13 week Treasury ladder keeps you close to par and liquid. When spreads gap, you want to be the one writing checks, not praying your broker’s margin engine behaves.
• Short-duration as the shock absorber. The Bloomberg U.S. Long Treasury Index ripped about +21% in Q1 2020 as 10-year yields collapsed, but it also posted a double-digit loss in 2022 as rates reset. If you don’t want that duration whipsaw, stick to bills/1-3 year. Remember the 60/40 “worst year since the 1930s” headline, Bloomberg’s generic 60/40 proxy was down ~17% in 2022, largely a duration story.

Rebalance into pain, not headlines

• Use rules. Bands of 5% around targets or quarterly cadence works. Vanguard (2019) showed that band rebalancing kept risk near targets from 1926-2018 without meaningfully cutting returns. In practice: when cyclicals get hit on a policy scare, you add back to the band rather than reacting to cable news.
• Automate the nudge. Even a simple 60/40 to 65/35 max band forces “buy low, sell high” behavior when screens are red. Not glamorous. Very effective.

Balance sectors and factors on purpose

• Pair cyclicals with defensives. Industrials/Financials against Staples/Utilities/Healthcare (the parts with stable pricing). Into Q4 budget drama, I like having defense contractors sized, but balanced with quality defensives so one committee hearing doesn’t swing monthly P&L.
• Lean quality/profitability. Across multiple stress windows (e.g., 2020 shock, 2022 tightening), quality factor baskets tended to show smaller drawdowns than broad beta. The point isn’t to chase factor du jour; it’s to avoid owning a portfolio that only works if the policy path is perfect. It won’t be.

Diversify where the policy risk lives

• Geography and currency. If the risk is domestic, e.g., US drug pricing language or tech antitrust, offset with non-US exposure where the policy channel is weaker. MSCI ACWI ex USA often moves on dollar and global growth, not DC tape bombs. I keep 20-40% non-US in global mandates for that reason.
• Treasuries as the core shock absorber. Bills and intermediate Treasuries still do the job for most headline hits. Gold/commodities can help, but only if it’s already in your IPS and you can tolerate streaky behavior, gold was roughly flat in 2022 while both stocks and core bonds fell, helpful, but it lagged when real yields surged later.

Quick reality check: you won’t guess every winner. You don’t have to. Get the sizes right, hold dry powder, pair exposures that offset, and let the math of rebalancing do some lifting.

One more thing because it’s October and we’re heading into holiday liquidity: widen your patience. Spreads can gap on a Friday afternoon headline. If you’ve got the cash sleeve and your sizes are sane, you can rebalance into that. If you don’t, you’re negotiating with your own cortisol. I’ve done both. Only one of those is a repeatable process.

Options that don’t blow up your P&L

Keep it risk-defined, repeatable, and boring on purpose. When clients say “no surprises,” I hear: use index or sector ETF protection, not hail-mary tickets. For broad tape risk tied to policy noise, protective puts on SPY or QQQ are my base case. If the headline risk is concentrated (drug pricing, defense budgets, energy permits), I’ll shift the hedge to the sector ETF closest to the policy node: XLV for health care, ITA for aerospace/defense, XLE for energy. Why? Basis risk drops, cost usually drops with it.

Pure puts are clean but can be pricey, so I often turn them into put spreads. Same expiry, buy the strike at your pain threshold, sell a lower strike where you’d rebalance anyway. Don’t set strikes on vibes, set them on where you actually change risk. Quick rule of thumb I use in practice:

• Define your “start hedging” level (say, -5% from spot) as the long put strike.
• Define your “I’ll add risk there” level (say, -10%) as the short put strike.
• Tenor: 1-3 months. That spans typical policy cycles without you paying the weekly rumor mill tax. And yes, avoid 0DTE for hedges, Cboe reported in 2024 that 0DTE trades were roughly 45-50% of SPX options volume, great for traders, terrible for portfolio insurance.

Collars deserve more love in sideways/choppy tape. Sell covered calls to help fund the protective puts. Upside is capped, sure, but if you’re hedging policy risk, your base case isn’t runaway upside anyway. Keep call strikes at levels where you’re genuinely fine trimming. If you find yourself “hoping” it won’t get called away, that strike is wrong. Been there, wrote the call, kicked myself.

Tenor really matters. I like monthlys out 45-90 days, refreshed on a schedule tied to event clusters (FOMC + jobs + CPI, or election milestones). Rolling too often is just paying spreads and slippage. Also, small housekeeping: try to roll on liquid days and avoid late Friday headline windows. I know, easier said than done in October.

How much to buy? Size by hedge ratio using portfolio beta and sector weights, not notional dollars alone. A 60/40 with a 0.65 equity beta doesn’t need 100% notional SPY puts. If 30% of your equity sleeve is health care, you might hedge 30% of the equity exposure with XLV and the rest with SPY. Deltas matter too: a 1-2 month 5-10% OTM put will often run a -0.15 to -0.35 delta depending on vol; you can back into contract count from there. If that sounded too in-the-weeds, that’s fair, I’m circling back: keep it simple, target the risk you actually own.

One more practical note because I underlined cost earlier: put spreads and collars keep the burn-rate known and usually sustainable across quarters. In real money terms, that predictability is gold. And if the explanation is getting a bit much, yes, options get complex fast. The philosophy is simpler: pay a known premium to define your downside during noisy policy windows, resize when your exposures change, and don’t chase every rumor with same-day options. That’s trading, not hedging.

Bottom line: broad index or sector-targeted puts, funded when possible with calls; 1-3 month tenors; strikes set by your action levels; and hedge ratios anchored to beta and weights. Boring wins here.

Event playbook for 2025: debates, votes, tariffs, courts

Here’s the simple framework I actually use on the desk. Build a calendar first, then assign tasks at T-10/T-5/T-1 trading days. You can trade events with structure, or pre-hedge and intentionally do nothing. Both are fine, if you write it down and stick to it.

Set the 2025 event calendar (working list):

• Budget & funding: Continuing resolution expirations and omnibus votes (Q4 is live, holiday-week votes often pop up). If a CR slips into December, liquidity gets patchy, plan sizing.
• Tax negotiations: TCJA individual provisions sunset end-2025; headline risk around rate brackets, SALT, and small-biz pass-through rules. Votes could slide into late Q4 or early 2026, still market-moving this quarter on leaks.
• Tariffs: Implementation checkpoints from the 2024 USTR actions, Chinese EV tariff moved to 100% in 2024, solar cells to 50%, certain semis to 50% (2024 policy). Review/exclusion windows reopen periodically; watch USTR dockets.
• Courts: Supreme Court opinions cluster into late June each year; agency rule challenges (antitrust, EPA, HHS drug pricing) hit on rolling schedules, your risk is the decision week, not the filing week.

One stat to keep in your back pocket: Cboe said in 2024 that roughly 50% of SPX options volume on many days was 0DTE. That’s great for fills, not great for edge. Same-day is crowded; don’t kid yourself.

T-10 / T-5 / T-1 checklist

1. T-10: Lighten concentration (trim single-name overweights), reduce gross 10-20% if the event is binary-ish; price limited-risk hedges while vol is still reasonable. Sector-target if it’s policy-specific (drug pricing → XLV/IBB; tariffs → XLI/SMH/ITB depending on exposure).
2. T-5: Add put spreads or collars at 1-2 month tenors; top up calendars if vol term-structure is steep. Rehearse exits: time-based (next open after event) or price-based (e.g., +75% on the put spread). No mid-headline improvising, ever.
3. T-1: Cut gross another 5-10% only if your tape-read confirms stress. For final hedges, prefer verticals, calendars, or butterflies. Do not load naked straddles into binary catalysts; you’ll overpay for wings, then get theta’d to death if it’s a nothing-burger.

Same-day options rule: If you must trade 0DTE on the event, cap loss ex-ante (e.g., 0.3-0.5% of NAV hard stop per strategy) and use defined-risk structures. I’ve watched too many people “average” a headline and turn a hedge into a day-trade gone wrong.

Positioning examples

• Budget vote risk (fiscal cliff chatter): SPY or ES vertical put spread 1-2 months out; ratio depends on your beta. If you’re heavy in cyclicals, overlay with XLI or XLF puts, not just SPY.
• Tariff window: Semiconductor suppliers → use SMH calendars (own near-month, sell far-week if event date aligns), or a broken-wing butterfly around expected gap zones. Keep risk defined.
• Drug pricing rulings: For biotech-heavy books, cheapen IBB puts by selling 20-25 delta calls against low-beta healthcare (XLV) exposure you already own.

Yes, this gets complex fast. Two safety rails: pre-commit your exits and size small. Time-based exit means close hedges within one session post-event unless your stop hasn’t hit. Price-based exit means take gains on a pre-set multiple and recycle only if the next calendar date warrants it. Q4 liquidity can vanish around holidays; spreads widen, slippage grows, budget that in.

Write the plan, trade the plan. Limited-risk structures for binary events, sector-targeted hedges for policy risk, and a hard rule: no improvising mid-headline.

Taxes and mechanics: hedge smart without a tax mess

Hedges are supposed to reduce risk, not hand you a surprise bill in April. The tax code doesn’t care about your intent; it looks at form, timing, and exact instrument. Quick hits you actually need when you’re putting on Q4 political headline hedges while liquidity thins and spreads get cranky around holidays.

• Wash sale rules (IRC §1091): If you realize a loss and buy a “substantially identical” security within 30 days before or after, that loss is disallowed and added to the new position’s basis. That 30-day clock is hard, and yes, options count. Example: sell SPY at a loss and buy deep ITM SPY calls two days later, likely a wash sale. Also watch ETF-to-ETF substitutions; swapping from SPY to IVV in a loss window can be risky because they track the same index. This isn’t me fear-mongering, it’s just where auditors like to look.
• Straddle rules (IRC §1092): Hold offsetting positions and the IRS can defer your losses and make you capitalize carrying costs (interest, financing) under §263(g). Classic trap: long stock + long put (protective put) + short call (collar) can be a straddle. If one side loses and the other gains, the loss may be deferred to the extent of unrecognized gain on the offsetting side. Also your margin interest may not be currently deductible, gets tacked onto basis instead. In a choppy tape like we’re seeing this year around policy headlines, that deferral pops up a lot because you’re ping-ponging between gains and losses.
• Constructive sales (IRC §1259): If you own appreciated stock and put on an offset that eliminates substantially all upside and downside, think a deep in-the-money collar or a forward, you can be treated as if you sold the stock today and owe tax on the gain now. There are narrow exceptions and some structuring nuance, but if your collar feels like a synthetic forward, it’s a red flag. I’m oversimplifying a bit; this is one to run past a tax pro before you click “send.”
• Index options/futures and §1256: Certain broad-based index options and futures are §1256 contracts, marked to market on 12/31 with 60/40 tax character (60% long-term, 40% short-term) regardless of your actual holding period. That 60/40 split is a real benefit when you’re hedging with SPX options or equity index futures, but check the instrument: SPX options typically qualify; SPY options generally do not (they’re equity options taxed as securities). VIX futures are §1256; single-stock futures are §1256; single-name options are not. And a nice bonus, wash sale rules generally don’t apply to §1256 contracts.
• Inverse ETFs vs. options: Inverse ETFs reset daily, which creates path risk, the longer you hold in a choppy market (which we’ve had plenty of this fall), the more drift you can see versus a clean short or put. Tax-wise, inverse ETFs can throw off ordinary income and capital gains distributions late in the year, great, just what you wanted in December. Options give you defined risk and clearer tax character (short-term for equity/ETF options unless §1256 applies), but straddle rules can bite if you’re hedging a concentrated stock position. Document the choice in your IPS: why the instrument, expected hold, and how you’ll avoid wash sale and straddle traps.

Two practical guardrails I use with clients, yes, learned the hard way. First, calendar discipline: don’t harvest losses and re-establish in the same or “near-identical” thing for 31 days; if you must keep exposure, rotate to a less correlated proxy (not perfect, but it avoids the obvious wash-sale landmine). Second, instrument segregation: use §1256 where it fits (SPX, NDX, ES, VIX) for event hedges you’ll likely roll by year-end; keep single-name hedges short-dated and be mindful of collars that get too tight.

One more thing while we’re all staring at election-week vol screens: Q4 liquidity gaps can make you roll at the worst time, which is exactly when straddle loss deferral stings because the “winning” leg hasn’t been closed. Write it down in the plan, what you’ll close first, when you’ll realize gains, and how you’ll avoid turning a risk hedge into a calendar-year tax surprise. Boring? Yep. But cheaper than explaining a constructive sale on a December phone call. Been there, not fun.

Tax takeaway: 30 days matters (wash sales), offsets matter (straddles), and collars can backdoor a sale (§1259). When in doubt, pick §1256-eligible hedges for index risk and document everything in the IPS.

Make it boring: my repeatable checklist and the bigger picture

I keep this as a one-pager in the IPS, yes, coffee-stained, yes, it works. The point is to turn headline chaos into a calendar and a budget, not a bet. And I’ll say it again because I need to hear it too: the goal isn’t to be right about the story, it’s to stay invested and solvent while the story changes.

• Quarterly:
  • Refresh the event calendar: hard dates for CPI/PCE, jobs, FOMC, Treasury refundings, big index rebalances, sector-weighted earnings weeks, and any election windows (state and federal). I mark the exact Wednesday CPI time and options expiries that sit on top of it.
  • Map sector exposures: list top 10 positions and factor tilts (rates, dollar, oil beta). If Financials creep over ~20% or single-name exposure over 5% each, I flag it.
  • Pre-select hedges and sizes: choose instruments before emotions show up. Index: SPX/ES or NDX/NQ options (use §1256 for 60/40 tax treatment, 60% long-term, 40% short-term). Rates: TY/ZN puts if duration risk is high. Vol: small VIX call spreads. Size the total premium at-risk to around 1-1.5% of portfolio per quarter, max.
• Monthly:
  • Price hedges, rebalance, audit spend: roll quotes on predefined strikes (usually 20-30 delta puts or 5-10 delta call spreads for tail). Compare paid premium vs. realized benefit: I track a simple payoff ratio (hedge P&L divided by premium) and want ≥0.7 over rolling 12 months. If the ratio slides for two straight months, I cut size by 25% until the process earns its keep.
  • Tax hygiene check: wash-sale 30-day windows, straddle offsets, and any collars that might wander toward §1259, especially into year-end when Q4 liquidity can bite.
• Weekly:
  • Tighten or loosen hedges as events near: if CPI/FOMC is inside 5 trading days and vol-of-vol is perking up, I shift from vanilla puts to put spreads or calendars to reduce theta burn.
  • Reduce single-name gap risk: for names with earnings inside 10 days, I either cap with short calls above target or substitute with index exposure for that week. I literally set a Monday 9:10am reminder: “Gap risk: trim?”
• Post-event:
  • Remove temporary hedges within 24-48 hours if the catalyst is gone. Don’t babysit zombies.
  • Redeploy to core: move freed capital back to your highest-quality cash flow engines (the stuff you actually want to own into next year). Document what worked and what was luck.

Two quick reality checks I keep taped to the monitor. First, political noise is permanent. Vol spikes are not. In 2020, VIX prints surged above 30 around election week and then normalized in the weeks after; same pattern showed up, to a lesser degree, around midterm windows. I don’t have the exact figure in front of me, but SPX 1-month realized vol in quiet months can sit near around 7%, and then double when the calendar is loaded. Point is, the calendar drives the timing of hedges, not the headlines themselves.

Second, taxes and carry matter. §1256 index options are marked-to-market at year-end with 60/40 treatment, which has been materially better than pure short-term treatment for many U.S. investors. That’s not trivia; it’s edge.

Bigger picture: wealth comes from compounding quality cash flows. Hedges exist to protect the compounding machine, not your ego, not your Twitter takes. When spreads are fair and the calendar is loud, buy some insurance. When it’s quiet, let the positions do the work, rebalance, and move on. You won’t nail every headline, none of us do, but if you’re still in the game after they pass, the boring checklist did its job.

@article{hedge-political-headline-risk-in-stocks-in-2025,
    title   = {Hedge Political Headline Risk in Stocks in 2025},
    author  = {Beeri Sparks},
    year    = {2025},
    journal = {Bankpointe},
    url     = {https://bankpointe.com/articles/hedge-political-headline-risk/}
}