Fresh Snow and a Fresh New High
OF COURSE WE ARE OPEN TODAY!
Anyway, it all happened in the blink of an eye… after a 5.8% decline that took the S&P 500 to a low for the year of 1,741.89 on February 3rd, the index rallied to a closing high on February 27th and took the action on through to the final day of last week (and the month) to finish at 1859.*
Much like snow in Washington D.C., the party in the equity markets just does not seem to stop.
Friday marked an all-time high for the S&P 500 and for the month of February we saw a return of about 4.5% bringing it to a positive year-to-date return. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is still about 1.5% away from another all-time high.*
Oh, and a close over 1850 took us above some all-important blah blah blah technical level that some bobble heads on TV were talking about. Just in time to celebrate – wait for it – the five year anniversary of the March 9th 2009 low of about 676 on the S&P 500.
676 to 1859 on the S&P 500… it seems like just yesterday people were LITERALLY calling and saying to me “seriously – this thing could go to zero…” When you factor in dividends, that’s damn near a triple.
Speaking of triples, I’d be remiss if I did not mention the complete SWEEP of Clemson University by my beloved University of South Carolina Gamecocks baseball team this past weekend. Oh the STING of being within ONE PITCH of the winning out in the final game of the series… only to lose by three runs.
We are currently at 1,817 days in this S&P 500 bull market, which is the 7th longest since 1928.
Our favorite sectors for the past five years pretty much remain unchanged. Since the beginning of 2009, we have liked the Tech, Consumer Discretionary (CD) and Industrial sectors, which are reflected in the ETF portfolio we manage. We added Health Care to that list last summer. During the little up and down blip that started around the middle of January through the end of last week, only the Industrial sector had a negative return (around -1.3%) while the Tech was up almost +.90%, CD up +1.1% and Health Care up 4.1%… all rounded of course. Since I’m measuring it as a blip, this basically means the S&P was flat during that time. (My definition of “blip”: the S&P 500 goes down and then comes back to break even at zero. Blip is not a technical term.)
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Interestingly and not well chronicled here, the emerging markets have been making up a lot of lost ground since late January alongside the small-cap indices. We are keeping our eye on them especially since alongside Tech, CD, Industrials and Health Care, we have been big fans of small-cap and mid-cap indices since late 2008.
Ukraine is the last thing I’ll mention before I’m off to prep my shovel, broom and sand/salt mix. It’s a horrible situation from a humanitarian perspective but they simply are not a player in the global economy. There may be some volatility but it will only cause an economic problem if there is an escalation.
Oh, and what’s the broom for you ask? Snow on the car of course… and to celebrate the SWEEP by the Gamecocks! Ok, I’ll stop – no one probably reads this far anyway.
*Data and charts from Yahoo Finance, FactSet and Barron’s.
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David B. Armstrong, CFA
President & Co-Founder
Dave got into the industry when he discovered his passion for finance in his mid-20’s. He’s a combat veteran and served as an officer in the United States Marines Corps on both active duty and in the reserves, retiring at the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. While serving on active duty, Dave was unable to spend money on deployments, so he became a self-taught investor. Along with a few bucks cash as a bouncer, his investing performance grew to be good....
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Please remember that past performance is no guarantee of future results. Different types of investments involve varying degrees of risk, and there can be no assurance that the future performance of any specific investment, investment strategy, or product (including the investments and/or investment strategies recommended or undertaken by Monument Capital Management, LLC [“Monument”]), or any non-investment related content, made reference to directly or indirectly in this blog will be profitable, equal any corresponding indicated historical performance level(s), be suitable for your portfolio or individual situation, or prove successful. Due to various factors, including changing market conditions and/or applicable laws, the content may no longer be reflective of current opinions or positions. Moreover, you should not assume that any discussion or information contained in this blog serves as the receipt of, or as a substitute for, personalized investment advice from Monument. To the extent that a reader has any questions regarding the applicability of any specific issue discussed above to his/her individual situation, he/she is encouraged to consult with the professional advisor of his/her choosing. No amount of prior experience or success should be construed that a certain level of results or satisfaction will be achieved if Monument is engaged, or continues to be engaged, to provide investment advisory services. Monument is neither a law firm nor a certified public accounting firm and no portion of the blog content should be construed as legal or accounting advice.
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