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Market Wrap
For the week ended April 26, 2024, stocks finally made their way higher. Early in the week, there was some buying simply because the S&P 500 was coming off a 6-day losing streak, which is rare and often leads to subsequent gains. On Tuesday, investors got optimistic about some signs that the US economy may be slowing, which reignited hopes for Federal Reserve rate cuts. But the rest of the week was all about the economy and Tech-related earnings. Meta reported Wednesday evening and announced they would be investing more into AI, meaning higher expenses and lower earnings. Wall Street didn't like that, but they also didn't care for Thursday morning's report showing the US economy grew far less than expected in the first quarter AND prices were much higher than expected. While the selloff was initially rough, stocks made up much of their losses by the end of the day. But then a true deus ex machina moment on Thursday evening when both Microsoft and Alphabet reported strong earnings. This lifted spirits on Friday, helped by a report that showed the monthly Personal Consumption Expenditures price index higher by 0.3%, in-line with forecasts. Despite some bumps along the way, it was a relatively benign week for bonds, although they did head lower, sending the 10-year US treasury yield higher to 4.67% according to MarketWatch.
Performance Summary
As shown in the table, Emerging Markets continued its hot streak, again beating out its Developed Market counterparts. Within the US, despite higher interest rates, it was the Tech-heavy Nasdaq that won again, particularly on Friday thanks to the aforementioned earnings reports from Microsoft and Alphabet. From a factor perspective, Momentum and Quality again outperformed the global All Country World Index (ACWI).
In The News
An opinion piece on why the stock market rally should broaden out this year.
Think twice about taking the IRS up on the offer to skip beneficiary IRA distributions.
If you're wondering why there is so much confusion about what the Federal Reserve will do and when, this will help.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/fed-forecasting-method-looks-increasingly-124255699.html
Disclosures
Past performance may not be indicative of future results. Different types of investments involve varying degrees of risk. Therefore, it should not be assumed that future performance of any specific investment or investment strategy will be profitable or equal the corresponding indicated performance level(s). Moreover, you should not assume that any of the above content serves as the receipt of, or as a substitute for, personalized investment advice from Metric Financial.
All data and performance information sourced from Morningstar and MarketWatch, unless otherwise indicated.
USA is the MSCI USA index, Non-US Developed is the MSCI EAFE index, Emerging Markets is the MSCI Emerging Markets index, and All Country World is the MSCI ACWI index. One cannot invest in an index. Because the factor indexes have varying inception dates, some of the returns provided are back-tested and do not represent actual performance. Inception dates are as follows:
Momentum = MSCI ACWI Momentum NR USD Index (Inception: 11/30/95)
Value = MSCI ACWI Enhanced Value NR USD Index (Inception: 5/29/15)
Quality = MSCI ACWI Quality NR USD Index (Inception: 5/29/92)
Low Volatility = MSCI ACWI Minimum Volatility (USD) NR USD Index (Inception: 5/28/93)
Size = MSCI ACWI Risk Weighted NR USD Index (Inception: 4/6/11)
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All written content is for information purposes only. Opinions expressed herein are solely those of Metric, unless otherwise specifically cited. Material presented is believed to be from reliable sources and no representations are made by our firm as to another parties’ informational accuracy or completeness. All information or ideas provided should be discussed in detail with an advisor, accountant or legal counsel prior to implementation.
Returns for global market and US indexes. As of 4/26/24. Source: Morningstar.