Unless the R2000 rallies (very) strongly today, ’25 will mark a fifth consecutive year of small-cap underperformance even as the R2000 has risen for three straight years. Which means a little levity may be in order as we look ahead to ’26 for what hopefully will finally be the year for a small-cap resurgence! While the first cartoon below was originally published in 2018 during Trump’s first term, we used it again in 2025 since there may have been no more signature event in the markets than “Liberation Day”, followed by a sharp market correction and recovery.