Stock Pros See Forecasts as ‘Necessary Evil’ in Policy Chaos Era

As President Donald Trump awaited his second inauguration in January, David J. Kostin, Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s chief US equity strategist, had a clear view of what that would mean for stocks: another year of solid gains.

He forecast the S&P 500 Index would rise 11% to 6,500 by 2025’s end.

It didn’t take long for his outlook to unravel. China’s DeepSeek technology burst the artificial intelligence bubble, recession warnings rang out as Trump unveiled the harshest tariffs in 90 years and the S&P 500 slumped toward a bear market. A week later, Trump reversed and unleashed the ...