Insights

Favorable economic conditions and strong earnings momentum could underpin a broadening rally and continued strength in U.S. equities.

After a decade of lagging growth stocks, value investing is seeing a resurgence. But as traditional value metrics used for a century have struggled to remain relevant, we recognize that successful value investors must evolve with the changing market environment. It’s time to reassess how to take advantage of this opportunity through a new lens.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell spoke at a forum in Washington this week, cautioning that persistent inflation and a strong U.S. economy will likely delay any Fed rate cuts until later this year.

Highlights from the week of April 5 – April 11, 2024

The story of the fixed income markets over the past six months is broadly one of spreads tightening across the board as funds flow back into bonds.

Both U.S. equities and bonds fell on hot inflation, but late in the week, bonds recovered somewhat as geopolitical tensions heightened.

Cash has a place in portfolios, but bonds are a better choice for locking in yields, boosting return potential and providing diversification benefits.

March’s inflation print showed that the disinflation trend remains quite bumpy.

Mixed economic data and less urgent rate cut talk from the Fed drove U.S. equities and bonds down for the week.

Strong economic data continues to come out of the U.S. Last week, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released data showing that the labor market added 303,000 nonfarm payroll jobs in March, far exceeding expectations of 214,000.