If Harris manages to win, then energy stocks will probably drop.
Almost guaranteed to, given democrat policies.
This will be bad for the investor who spooks easily. They will start selling their energy stocks to "get what they can, as fast as they can, before it's gone". This is a bonanza for long term investors. Because when stocks are low, that's when you buy them. Realizing that democrat policies will implode eventually (probably a short version of "eventually"), and then we'll be rich on those stocks we bought so cheaply.
We are both long term and short term investors. "Short term" as in "Day Trader". You can't get much shorter term than that. So in the short term, you make money on falling stocks by shorting them in Day Trading. And in the long term you make money on rising stocks by investing in them (holding them). You just need to know which strategy to use at what time.
Even a fool should be able to realize that energy stocks are going to dump under the democrats. They hate oil and gas and want everything electric. But things will change. Either after republicans get in in the future, or when the country turns against the dems in control for destroying the energy capabilities of our country. Either way will send energy stocks skyrocketing.
So "energy stocks will go down" does not mean "sell them". Unless of course you are shorting them. It means "prepare to buy them at low prices in a little while".
And now, a diversion into "Shorting stocks" ...
Everybody knows "Buy low, Sell high". But you can also reverse the order and "Sell high, Buy low". Which is what shorting is. With "Buy low, Sell high", you buy it, own it, sell it later (thus no longer own it), and bank the profits from the sale. With "Sell high, Buy low" you
borrow it, sell it, buy it back when the price is low, then return what you borrowed, and bank the profits from the difference between what you sold it for and what you later re-bought it for. You are wanting the price to drop in this scenario. The one gotcha here is that in order to
borrow the stocks you're planning on trading, you need to have enough money in your account to have
bought them instead. So should your plan fail, the entity that lent you the stocks can get their money back. You are also dealing in number of shares, not cash value. You borrow ten shares and you have to return ten shares. It doesn't matter how much those ten shares cost at any given time. So if you borrow those ten shares and then their price goes UP ... oops! You have to re-buy them at the new higher price so that you can return them (there is a time limit for return that you have to meet when shorting). Shorting stocks is not for the faint of heart or the ignorant. But you can make a ton of money doing it if you're good at it.
The reason whey normal people are often times adverse to stock shorting is because large investment companies can manipulate the stock market. They're not supposed to by law, but they most certainly do. Say a large company decides to dump all their Exxon stock. They sell it off massively. This causes many investors to think,
"OMG, company XXX is selling off all their Exxon stocks, They must know something that I don't know!" So Mr. individual investor dumps his Exxon stocks too. Causing the price to plunge further. Then, after causing all this havoc, that large company goes back and BUYS a ton of Exxon stock while it's dirt cheap. This reverses the previous swing, and Mr. investor tries to follow along and buy, buy, buy Exxon. The price shoots up. Now company XXX has made a massive profit simply by introducing volatility into the market. Nothing really changed during this time. Other than company XXX taking advantage of the huge amount of Exxon shares that they control to manipulate the market.
And another diversion into "Day trading" ...
Now, Mr. day trader has learned how to analyse stock charts and identify the fingerprints of market manipulation and other things that create market volatility. And he rides on the coattails of company XXX and shorts the same stocks that they are. Other factors create volatility besides market manipulation. As a day trader you might invest in Jockey straps for male chinchilla athletes. It doesn't matter how stupid of short lived the product may be. You're only going to own stock in it for a few hours or maybe a day. You're betting on the volatility of it based on your analysis - either up or down - to take advantage of a price fluctuation. You can Buy low, Sell high or you can Sell high, Buy low depending on the short term trend that you are predicting. In practice, only about 30% of day trades go the way you want them too. And that's if you are an excellent day trader. But you structure things in such a way that if you win, you win big. And if you lose, you lose small. So when 7 of your 10 trades go south and you lose $100 each (total $700 loss), but 3 of your 10 trades go as predicted and you win $300 each (total $900 win) - you had a good day. You made money. Don't agonize that you were wrong in your predictions most of the time. Doesn't matter - you came out ahead overall, and that is the goal. You use techniques called "Stoppers" to limit your losses so you don't lose big on your failed predictions.