Since early April, we have been living according to Donald Trump's tariff announcements. They began on April 2 with the announcement of reciprocal tariffs on all countries. The US president then suspended them a week later, on April 9, while maintaining a universal rate of 10%. Except for China, where the escalation has led to 145% surcharges on Chinese products and 125% on US products. Added to this are tariffs on automobiles, steel, and aluminum, the exemption for Chinese computers and smartphones (still taxed but at 20%), and ongoing investigations into semiconductors, the pharmaceutical sector, and critical minerals.

This economic chaos has been reflected by violent reversals and movements in the financial markets, which investors are not used to seeing. Since the beginning of the month, we have seen several sessions where all US assets fell in unison: equities, Treasuries and the dollar. This is contrary to the traditional playbook. Usually, when the mood on the markets turns negative, investors move out of risky assets, such as equities, and reposition themselves in assets considered safe: the dollar and US debt. So most of the time, when equity indices fall, we see a rally in the dollar and Treasuries. Even when the US lost its triple-A credit rating – the highest possible rating for debt – on August 5, 2011, this pattern prevailed.

However, we have not been seeing this since early April. Now, there are sessions where all US assets are falling together. This has led some observers to draw parallels between the current situation and Japan's "triple yasu." This expression refers to the 1990s, a period marked by sessions where the yen, the Nikkei, and Japanese government bonds all fell simultaneously. At the time, this dynamic was seen as symbolic of Japan's decline on the world stage.

Indeed, after World War II, Japan experienced three decades of strong growth. This frenetic growth led to a real estate and financial bubble, which burst in the 1990s, bringing an end to the "Japanese miracle." This was followed by decades of weak growth, with the Nikkei taking 35 years to exceed its 1989 peak.

Are the United States at the same point now? We will not draw any hasty conclusions here, although what is certain is that investors have lived for some 15 years with the idea that one should never bet against the United States. And the mere fact that this assumption is now being questioned is not insignificant. The risk for the US is that it could break the virtuous circle of capital inflows from international investors, which has led to more investment and ultimately more growth. This, in turn, has reinforced investors' confidence in the US.

The result of this beautiful mechanism was that everyone was structurally overexposed to the United States. So if all US assets are falling at the same time, it is because investors are now seeking to reduce their exposure to the United States and reallocate their assets to other geographical areas. But after fifteen years of massive inflows, such a rebalancing cannot happen overnight. Selling the United States may be becoming the new fashionable trade.