Market Trends & Outlook

Capping a brutal year for income investors, both the equity and fixed-income markets lost ground in December. The Core Large Cap Equity category returned -7.8% while the Core Fixed Income category delivered a -0.8% return. Concerns about inflation and the impact of the Federal Reserve’s tightening policy on future economic growth continued to serve as headwinds for both equities and bonds.

In case you missed last week's blog, I'll start with the same theme. There's been significant damage to asset prices in 2022. Last year was one of the most difficult environments for investors in almost every asset class. Here's the updated 60/40 portfolio yearly scorecard going back in time via a recent report from Private Equity leader, KKR:

In case you missed last week's blog, I'll start with the same theme. There's been significant damage to asset prices in 2022. Last year was one of the most difficult environments for investors in almost every asset class. Here's the updated 60/40 portfolio yearly scorecard going back in time via a recent report from Private Equity leader, KKR:

Managing your portfolio has more to do with gardening than you might imagine. Over the last decade, behavioral finance studied investor psychology and identified the repeated behaviors investors make throughout market cycles. As you can probably surmise, investors tend to develop many “bad” behaviors, which are the biggest reason for underperformance over time.

With inflation easing to 7.1% in November and a Fed interest rate decision on deck, Joe Tigay of Equity Armor Investments provides updates on developments in the S&P500 and the VIX in this brief video.

With inflation easing to 7.1% in November and a Fed interest rate decision on deck, Joe Tigay of Equity Armor Investments provides updates on developments in the S&P500 and the VIX in this brief video.

Will a dollar decline be good for stocks? It is an interesting question, given that during 2022 there was a significant non-correlation between the dollar and the stock market. The strong dollar rally was something I suggested could be a problem for stocks, given what happened in 2020. It was a running debate with Michael Brush, who writes for MarketWatch.

Will a dollar decline be good for stocks? It is an interesting question, given that during 2022 there was a significant non-correlation between the dollar and the stock market. The strong dollar rally was something I suggested could be a problem for stocks, given what happened in 2020. It was a running debate with Michael Brush, who writes for MarketWatch.