It’s been a tough year so far for a traditional “60/40” portfolio, a portfolio of 60% stocks and 40% bonds. Using the S&P 500 Index and the Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate Bond Index (“Agg”) to represent stocks and bonds, the traditional 60/40 is down 14.0% as of market close on May 11 on a total return basis, which would trail only 2008 as the worst year on record if that’s where we ended the year, which is not our base case.

Historically, bonds have typically seen gains during periods of equity volatility, although not always. But low bond yields in 2020 and 2021 and steep bond losses due to risin

It’s been a very tough start to the year with both stocks and bonds down sharply. Adding to the “wall of worry” for investors are the highest levels of U.S. inflation in decades, an aggressive Federal Reserve (Fed), Chinese lockdowns, and continuing war in Europe. So perhaps it is no surprise that investor sentiment polls are showing signs of extreme pessimism. Extremes in sentiment tend to be contrarian indicators for the stock market over the short-to-medium-term, but have we really seen extreme pessimism yet? Below we look at some of the latest investor sentiment data and share our thoughts about the disparity between wha

“Sell in May and go away” is probably the most widely cited stock market cliché in history. Every year a barrage of Wall Street commentaries, media stories, and investor questions flood in about the popular stock market adage. In this week’s Weekly Market Commentary, we tackle this commonly cited seasonal pattern and why it might not play out this year, similar to recent years.

The Worst Six Months of The Year

“Sell in May and go away” is the seasonal stock market pattern in which the six months from May through October are historically weak for stocks, with many investors believing that

LPL Research reduced U.S. and global GDP forecasts due to Russian commodity disruptions, elevated inflation dynamics, and higher borrowing costs. Still, we expect the U.S. economy to grow 2.7-3.2% in 2022, supported by business investment and consumer services spending in the latter half of this year. Forecasts for GDP growth in developed economies excluding the U.S. and emerging markets were also  reduced this month to 2.5–3% and 3.8–4.3% respectively, bringing the LPL Research global GDP growth forecast down about one percentage point to 3–3.5%.

Tale Of Two Halves

This year, many aspects of the econ