Commerce Chenango hosts Economic Forecast Breakfast
NORWICH – Commerce Chenango held its annual Economic Forecast Breakfast on Tuesday morning at the Canasawacta Country Club, which featured an introduction by NBT Bank President and CEO John H. Watt, Jr. and keynote speaker NBT Bank Director of Wealth Management and Chief Investment Officer Kenneth Entenmann.
Watt provided a brief recap on NBT Bank’s year in review, noting the bank’s assets of $9.1 billion making NBT Bank the 88th largest bank in the country among 5,600 others. Watt also mentioned the bank has 1,800 employees, 500,000 customers, and 183,000 plan participants in its services line of business.
“It was a great year for NBT financially, a very strong bottom line performance at the end of 2017 with $86.6 million in net profit on a recurring basis, and that translated to a new record earnings per share of $1.97 last year, again, on a recurring basis,” said Watt.
Watt introduced keynote speaker Kenneth Entenmann, who presented to attendees an overview of the market and how the tax bill passed at the end of 2017 has affected and will affect business going forward.
“Last year we talked about ‘Trump-o-nomics’ and its three pillars: we were going to get tax reform, we were going to get regulatory reform, and we were going to get an infrastructure bill,” said Entenmann. “It took a little bit longer than everyone had hoped last year, but we’re two-for-three. We’ve gotten tax reform, we’ve gotten probably the most progress we’ve made on regulatory reform, and as a bank, we feel that in a big way.”
Entenmann continued to say that at last year’s Economic Forecast Breakfast, he shared with attendees that the United States corporate income tax was uncompetitive at 39 percent compared to a worldwide average of 28 percent. He said as a result, politicians were getting upset that companies were inverting and moving headquarters to other countries.
“We were uncompetitive. But now, that 39 [percent] is 21 [percent]. And that’s pretty powerful,” said Entenmann.
Entenmann touched on how in the month of February, the market lost nearly 10 percent in just two weeks. “That’s abnormal, that’s a big correction for a short period of time.
“But if you’re not leveraged, if you’re not buying exotic investments and you just have a well diversified portfolio, history tells us that patience is rewarded,” said Entenmann. “ In short, I want you to just stay in the game. We do expect volatility to increase, and it’s going to get nerve wracking.”
Entenmann concluded his presentation by noting that if one missed just the 20 best days of the stock market over the last 20 years, their return drops from 7.68 percent to 1.5 percent.
“If I miss just 30 best days of the 20 year period, I have a negative return in the marketplace. What do this tell you? Timing the market is extraordinarily difficult. It’s a fool’s errand. At NBT bank, we don’t do it.”
Entenmann said things are looking up economically in the country, but that market corrections – like over the two week period in February – are healthy and should be expected.
Commerce Chenango President and CEO Steve Craig thanked the Economic Forecast Breakfast gold sponsor NBT Bank and sponsor Preferred Mutual for being sustaining members of the chamber and community.
Watt provided a brief recap on NBT Bank’s year in review, noting the bank’s assets of $9.1 billion making NBT Bank the 88th largest bank in the country among 5,600 others. Watt also mentioned the bank has 1,800 employees, 500,000 customers, and 183,000 plan participants in its services line of business.
“It was a great year for NBT financially, a very strong bottom line performance at the end of 2017 with $86.6 million in net profit on a recurring basis, and that translated to a new record earnings per share of $1.97 last year, again, on a recurring basis,” said Watt.
Watt introduced keynote speaker Kenneth Entenmann, who presented to attendees an overview of the market and how the tax bill passed at the end of 2017 has affected and will affect business going forward.
“Last year we talked about ‘Trump-o-nomics’ and its three pillars: we were going to get tax reform, we were going to get regulatory reform, and we were going to get an infrastructure bill,” said Entenmann. “It took a little bit longer than everyone had hoped last year, but we’re two-for-three. We’ve gotten tax reform, we’ve gotten probably the most progress we’ve made on regulatory reform, and as a bank, we feel that in a big way.”
Entenmann continued to say that at last year’s Economic Forecast Breakfast, he shared with attendees that the United States corporate income tax was uncompetitive at 39 percent compared to a worldwide average of 28 percent. He said as a result, politicians were getting upset that companies were inverting and moving headquarters to other countries.
“We were uncompetitive. But now, that 39 [percent] is 21 [percent]. And that’s pretty powerful,” said Entenmann.
Entenmann touched on how in the month of February, the market lost nearly 10 percent in just two weeks. “That’s abnormal, that’s a big correction for a short period of time.
“But if you’re not leveraged, if you’re not buying exotic investments and you just have a well diversified portfolio, history tells us that patience is rewarded,” said Entenmann. “ In short, I want you to just stay in the game. We do expect volatility to increase, and it’s going to get nerve wracking.”
Entenmann concluded his presentation by noting that if one missed just the 20 best days of the stock market over the last 20 years, their return drops from 7.68 percent to 1.5 percent.
“If I miss just 30 best days of the 20 year period, I have a negative return in the marketplace. What do this tell you? Timing the market is extraordinarily difficult. It’s a fool’s errand. At NBT bank, we don’t do it.”
Entenmann said things are looking up economically in the country, but that market corrections – like over the two week period in February – are healthy and should be expected.
Commerce Chenango President and CEO Steve Craig thanked the Economic Forecast Breakfast gold sponsor NBT Bank and sponsor Preferred Mutual for being sustaining members of the chamber and community.
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