Certain stocks tend to perform well during geopolitical crises. The table at the end of this column lists 11 of these stocks. They were chosen because they turned a profit, on average, during three recent periods of upheaval: the current Iran conflict; the bombing of Iran last June; and the first days of Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
There are solid theoretical reasons why such stocks are intelligent bets during geopolitical crises. Chiefly, they are relatively immune when the stock market loses liquidity and investors rush to safety. By liquidity, I'm referring to market depth and breadth; when a stock's liquidity dries up, it becomes difficult to buy or sell it without significantly impacting its price. Market makers react by considerably widening their bid and offer prices - and in that event, certain stocks do better than others.
According to Robert Stambaugh of the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School and Lubos Pastor of the University of Chicago - who, 25 years ago, conducted groundbreaking research into stocks' sensitivity to liquidity changes - a stock with low sensitivity in one crisis will likely have low sensitivity in subsequent ones as well. This is why it's important to focus on stocks that have performed the best in past periods of low liquidity.
What happens when liquidity returns?
You will pay a long-term price with such stocks, however, according to the research, since they will tend to be mediocre performers when liquidity returns to the market. Then, the best performers will tend to be the stocks that suffered the most from scarce liquidity.
The table below lists stocks that gained, on average, during geopolitical upheaval. Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine is still ongoing, I included it in the table's calculations on the basis of performance over the first 12 days after the invasion started. I chose that length of time to match the duration of the bombing of Iran last June.
I excluded oil-and-gas stocks from the list, because their performance during these crises derived from oil's price rather than a change to the market's liquidity. I narrowed the list further by including only companies that are also recommended by at least two of the investment newsletters my performance-auditing firm tracks.
