Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.
— Niels Bohr
2018 had turned the page and we are already completed approximately 0.27% of 2019. I don’t know about you but I feel like I am behind. So to procrastinate some more, here are my (silly) predictions for 2019.
- Trump will remain president with P = 0.60. 2019 will no doubt be a tough year for Trump as the Mueller report will likely become public, but I am betting that Republicans will continue to support him and even though the impeachment in the house is quite likely, the removal from office is not so certain.
- The market (SP500) will continue to be volatile with the VIX staying well above its historic average (~11) for most of the year with P = 0.70. If we are to believe the model, there is about 90% chance that SPX will be between 3,200 and 2,000 by the end of April or about 45% chance that it will be below its current level and above 2,000. I am more pessimistic and I will give it P = 0.60 that it will be below the current level of 2,500 by April.
- The UK will not exit the EU (no Brexit) with P = 0.60. This is purely based on my conversation with someone who lives in the EU and spends a lot of time analyzing European economies.
- I recently bought some cryptocurrency (a tiny amount of BTC and ETH) so I can keep myself informed and also because everyone was aggressively selling. I am pretty bullish on
crypto longer term, but less certain about the current crop of offerings, although BTC proved to be very resilient. My prediction for 2019 is that BTC will not recover and will stay under its highs with P = 0.90. - We will not find a cure for any cancers with P = 0.80, which is a reversal from my last year’s prediction, and the one I am hoping to lose. I like where the cancer therapies are going, but our understanding of the mechanism is still quite weak, the methods we use to evaluate their effectiveness are quite poor (but getting better), and I am not holding my breath for data mining technologies (also known as AI) making any breakthroughs in this space.
- I selfishly hope that 2019 will be the year of Bayes. I would like to see more universities offering Bayesian courses at undergraduate and graduate levels (this one from Aki @ Aalto looks amazing, for example), more companies getting started using sound probabilistic approaches, and FDA and EMA moving closer to embracing the Bayesian paradigm (we are rooting for you, Frank). I have no idea how to measure this, so no specific predictions here.