OUR APPROACH
OUR APPROACH
Insights
April 9, 2026
Market Highlights
The market in March was dominated by geopolitical risk. While earnings forecasts and economic fundamentals remained stable, surging energy prices, rising Treasury yields and reduced expectations for Federal Reserve rate cuts sent the market lower. The S&P 500 and the Dow, down -5.1% and -5.4% respectively, suffered their worst monthly losses since 2022. Markets rallied on March 31 on reports of a possible ceasefire, but the uptick did not offset the month’s losses.
While the markets quickly repriced lower in March, adjusting to the increased geopolitical uncertainty, we remind you that long term risk is driven by fundamentals and short term geopolitical volatility is not the same as long term risk. The current disconnect between short term volatility and long term fundamentals underpins our continued discipline to remaining long term investors.
Of the asset classes we follow, the best performing one for the month was Commodities (Bloomberg Commodity Index) with a 11.1% return. The worst performing was Emerging Market Stocks (MSCI Emerging Markets) with a -13.3% return.
S&P groups similar companies into 11 sectors; when we look into the S&P 500's performance, we find that just one of the sectors was up for the month. Ten sectors were down and of them, 7 were down by more than 5%.
The best performing sector was Energy with a 10.3% return. The biggest contributor to this outperformance was Exxon Mobil Corp., which is the largest stock in the sector and had a return of 11.3%. The second best performing sector was Utilities with a -3.4% return. The biggest contributor to this outperformance was Entergy Corp., the eighth largest stock in the sector, with a return of 4.9%.
Industrials posted the worst return at -8.5%. The biggest contributor to this underperformance was GE Aerospace, which is the second largest stock in the sector and had a return of -17.1%. The second worst performing sector was Health Care with a -8.3% return. The biggest contributor to this underperformance was Eli Lilly & Co., which is the largest stock in the sector and had a return of -12.6%.
Reminders
Tax day is April, 15th. This is also the deadline to make your 2025 retirement contributions.
Thoughts from the Team
Given the recent volatility, we thought it timely to share the chart below with you. The chart shows the growth of an initial investment of $100,000 over the course of the last 25 years. The dark blue line shows how that $100,000 would have grown, with no additions, if invested in an S&P Total Return Growth Index. The subsequent colors represent the growth of that same $100,000 and how the growth is effected by missing some of the best days in the market.
While it is improbable that someone’s timing would be so poor as to miss these exact best performing days, the chart still acts a reminder to stay invested throughout volatility. We do not attempt to time the market because while we do not know what the worst days in the market will be, we also cannot predict the best days and missing these days can prove detrimental to long term growth.
It seems as though Spring may have finally sprung and we hope you get the chance to get outside and enjoy daffodils!
Be Well,
Disclaimers
The information contained herein, including summary/prices/quotes/statistics have been obtained from sources we believe to be reliable, but we do not guarantee its accuracy or completeness. Due to various factors, including changing market conditions and/or applicable laws, the content may no longer be reflective of current opinions or positions. Any comparison to a benchmark is for comparative purposes only and actual account composition may differ. Investments cannot be made directly into an index. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Past results are not indicative of future returns. This material is provided for informational purposes only and is not intended as and may not be relied on in any manner as, legal, tax or investment advice, a recommendation, or as an offer to sell, a solicitation of an offer to purchase or a recommendation of any interest in any fund or security. This material does not intend to address the financial objectives, situation or specific needs of any individual investor.
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