By Mark Sipos, Director of LFG Tax Services The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017 is the signature tax legislation from Trump’s first term in office, and it cut income tax rates for many taxpayers. Some provisions — including the majority affecting individuals — are slated to expire at the end of 2025. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that extending the temporary TCJA provisions would cost $4.6 trillion over 10 years. For context, the federal debt currently rings in at more than $35 trillion, and the budget deficit is $711 billion. Below is an overview of anticipated changes for both businesses and individuals: Business Reduce the current 21% corporate tax rate to 20% or 15%, with the goal of generating growth. Eliminate the 15% corporate alternative minimum tax imposed by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Individuals Eliminate the estate tax (which currently applies only to estates worth more than $13.99 million). Repeal or raise the $10,000 cap on the deduction for state and local taxes. Create a deduction for auto loan interest. Eliminate income taxes on tips, overtime and Social Security benefits. Possible Offsets The House GOP document outlines numerous possibilities beyond just spending reductions to pay for these tax cuts. These include: Tariffs There is a proposed 10% across-the-board import tariff. President Trump, however, has discussed and imposed various tariff amounts, depending on t
By Chad Roope, CFA®, Chief Investment Officer We recognize that the market is currently experiencing turbulence and volatility not seen in several years. Given the strong returns we experienced in 2023 and 2024, the instability of the last week feels particularly unsettling for most of us. Given this volatility, we’ve made recent trades and rebalanced our clients’ portfolios. Despite the current uncertainty, we anticipate that 2025 will be a reasonably good year for stocks. Our belief is that we will finish the year with returns in the mid- to upper-single digits. Over the course of the year, however, we expect the markets to be much more volatile than what we have experienced over the past few years. Our belief that the economy is still fundamentally strong has three supporting points. The first is earnings, which are growing at a strong rate. In addition to good earnings, we're beginning to see the market broaden beyond just a few top tech stocks. Many other stocks are also trending higher as we enter 2025. Finally, while there’s a great deal of uncertainty in terms of policy, tariffs, trade deals, and other changes in Washington, we also think that these changes – and the volatility that comes with them – are creating opportunity. Within our clients’ investment accounts, we've recently rebalanced our strategies. Some of the things that did so well last year were slightly above our target weights, leadi