Common Cents

Last week…was another bummer week.

While the turmoil continues with a slew of uncertainties battering the biggest growth stock names, not everything is down as much as the media would have us believe. Growth stocks from small companies to Large took the greatest beating along with Technology. All these were down from around 3% to 3.6%. Value stocks, by contrast, from Large to Small were all down interestingly within .02% of each other but just around 1.85%.

US Equity REITS broke to the upside, gaining 1.13% standing out as the only positive Equity class and sharing that distinction with US Treasury TIPS, the only positive Fixed Income class for the week.

The wild one this year, Commodities, shaved off nearly 3.5% from its whopping 33.00% year-to-date return.

While Foreign stocks have mostly been mirroring US equity performance this year to date, last week the hammer fell softer across the pond with all but Emerging Markets slipping less than 1.5%. Emerging Markets moved down just over 3.0%.

In Fixed Income, both US Corporate and Treasuries were down close to .50% except for US Intermediate Term Corporates – down 1.0%. Foreign and Emerging Market bonds are down as much as most Equities YTD, slipping 1.4% and 1.6% respectively.

We are anticipating volatility may settle down over the next few weeks as investors digest mixed, but still as strong corporate earnings reports and Fed action becomes clearer. Keep in mind that while the economy faces real risks, the strong jobs market, continued strength in business revenues and retail sales are holding. Without these pillars to market performance along with other leading economic indicators, we’d be more concerned about prospects for 2022.