Each quarter we like to share our insights and observations about the state of the market.
The equity markets started off strong in the third quarter driven by the optimism that the Federal Reserve had orchestrated a soft landing for the economy, and the era of policy tightening will soon be over. The major market indexes reached year-to-date highs in July, however, a mixture of negative news, and most importantly, the […]
U.S. equities ended the first half of 2023 higher with most of the gains made in the last month of the second quarter. The S&P 500 Index ended the quarter at a 14-month high and most major market indexes also posted solid gains, led by the tech-heavy NASDAQ, which saw its best half of the […]
The first quarter of 2023 faced a rapidly changing economic and political landscape. Following 2022, which was an unusual year when both equity and fixed income investments declined by double digits, there was a clear hope for some break from the negative news cycle. In January, the S&P 500 and NASDAQ indexes rallied by 6% […]
With inflation reaching a four decades’ high and the war in the center of Europe sparking selloffs across all the markets, both the S&P 500 and Barclays U.S. Aggregate Bond Indexes fell over -10% for the first time in history. For most of the year, any rare sparks of hope were few and far between […]
The third quarter of 2022 started off with a great deal of optimism. Inflation appeared to begin flattening out with July’s CPI (Consumer Price Index) showing some moderation in price pressure. Additionally, the 2-year Treasury, a good bellwether of future interest rate hikes, stabilized and investors’ confidence began to grow. The market took off from […]
Equity markets declined significantly in the second quarter and exhibited heightened volatility in reaction to an increasingly gloomy outlook. It was only several months ago that the world economy was on track for a strong, albeit uneven, recovery from the pandemic. However, supply chain disruptions, the war in Ukraine, and shutdowns in China have dealt […]
From the opening days of 2022, investors were taken on a wild ride during the first quarter that featured wide swings in stock, bond, and commodity markets around the world. Broad market volatility began to pick up in the first few days of 2022 as inflation readings hit multi-decade highs, prompting Federal Reserve officials to […]
The year of 2021 was wild, full of surprises and yet a historic one for the markets. Stocks overcame numerous headwinds, including a contested presidential election, an assault of the U.S. Capitol, historically high inflation, supply chain disruptions, the still raging global pandemic and the resurgence in COVID cases due to the new variants.
Equity returns for the last year and a half have been in a constant steady growth mode since the steep decline caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. The positive momentum continued in the beginning of the third quarter of 2021, with the broad market indexes reaching a series of all-time highs in July and August, powered by the resiliency of economic recovery and accommodative monetary policy of the Federal Reserve.
After an already strong start to the year, U.S. equity markets continued to post solid returns in the second quarter, thanks to the ongoing global vaccine rollout combined with fiscal support from the government. The S&P 500, a benchmark for large capitalization domestic companies, gained 8.6% for the quarter and was up 15.3% at the halfway point of the year.
The first quarter of 2021 was a turning point in both the pandemic in the United States and the economic damage it has caused. Stocks have not lost any of their luster from the end of last year. Despite a few episodes of heightened volatility, the equity markets marched steadily higher in the first quarter of 2021, with all the major indexes posting solid returns from high single to double digits.
The year of 2020 is mercifully behind us. It was a truly extraordinary year for the entire world and even more so for financial markets. The year started with the impeachment of an American President, followed by a pandemic that infected millions all over the world, a global recession which this pandemic caused, a bear market reminiscent of the financial crisis of 2008 and a level of social unrest that overshadowed the late 1960s – all of that unfolding against the backdrop of a presidential election, contentious to the point where fears of civil conflict were openly discussed.
