The beginning of the year was positive for major equity markets around the world. During January we witnessed a rotation into value companies and lagging regions that, although expected since last year, had not yet materialized.

With this, the main American indexes, S&P 500 and Nasdaq, were outperformed on this occasion by the Dow Jones 30, whose return for the period was 4.70%, as well as by the ACWI global markets index, whose return was 3.73%.

The Communication Services sector also stood out, driven in part by a very good report from Netflix, as well as the Health Care and Financial sectors; while Technology lagged being the only S&P 500 sector with a negative return during January.

The fall in Nvidia's shares on January 27 also caused a stir among investors. After it became known that Chinese technology company Deep Seek achieved an artificial intelligence model with capabilities similar to American models and at a fraction of the cost, the microchip producer suffered a 17% drop in its shares, wiping out around $600 billion of value for its shareholders and marking the highest intraday loss of value in history for any company. Going forward we will have more clarity as we learn the actual costs and capabilities of the Chinese company's new R1 model.

Finally, Donald Trump was sworn in as the 47th President of the United States on January 20. For the time being, the universal 25% tariffs on Mexico and Canada have been postponed for a month and conditioned on help from both countries to curb illegal immigration and fentanyl trafficking into the United States. And while the threat exists, the likelihood of these tariffs going into effect is low due to the economic detriment this would cause to the region. Nevertheless, we cannot rule out future tariffs on specific products or industries that are in the U.S. national and economic interest.