If the last six weeks in the market are any indication, the panic in the financial markets could be behind us. While getting another 25% or more out of stocks may require the economy and housing market to stop sliding, investors seem comfortable that we’ve stepped away from the precipice for now, and that apparently the drop below Dow 7,000 was panic-based. This move could be a dead cat bounce, or a suckers rally, or some other term used on Wall Street by people who incorrectly called the markets direction.
From the low hit in early March through the 17th of April, the Dow is up around 26%, the S&P 500 30%, and the Nasdaq 32%. These are remarkable numbers, but largely because we are down so much a partial move back marks for a large percentage gains. For the month of March the S&P 500 was up 8.76%, slightly better than our growth and aggressive growth portfolios (though we’re still beating the S&P 500 for the year).
One of the drivers of the market’s rebound has been financials. From the early March low, the Financials ETF (XLF) is up about 90%. The good news of course is that we bought said ETF in several of our Powerfund Portfolios. Unfortunately we did our trade five trading days before financials hit bottom, which really is pretty amazing timing - except financials got hit very hard in those first few post trade days in March when it looked like the world was coming to an end. We’re still up about 50% since we added the fund - 17% was the March return, the rest in early April.
Nakoma Absolute Return (NARFX) was the only loser in March (other than inverse ETFs) with a -0.77% return. Anybody with short positions had a tough time these last few weeks.
Healthcare stocks continue to lag this market. Health Care Select SPDR (XLV) was up 6%.
Janus Global Research (JARFX) had a good month with a 9.23% return. When a fund underperforms on the way down, you want to see it beat the market on the way up, like this one did.
If the last six weeks in the market are any indication, the panic in the financial markets could be behind us. While getting another 25% or more out of stocks may require the economy and housing market to stop sliding, investors seem comfortable that we’ve stepped away from the precipice for now, and that apparently the drop below Dow 7,000 was panic-based. This move could be a dead cat bounce, or a suckers rally, or some other term used on Wall Street by people who incorrectly called the markets direction.
From the low hit in early March through the 17th of April, the Dow is up around 26%, the S&P 500 30%, and the Nasdaq 32%. These are remarkable numbers, but largely because we are down so much a partial move back marks for a large percentage gains. For the month of March the S&P 500 was up 8.76%, slightly better than our growth and aggressive growth portfolios (though we’re still beating the S&P 500 for the year).
One of the drivers of the market’s rebound has been financials. From the early March low, the Financials ETF (XLF) is up about 90%. The good news of course is that we bought said ETF in several of our Powerfund Portfolios. Unfortunately we did our trade five trading days before financials hit bottom, which really is pretty amazing timing - except financials got hit very hard in those first few post trade days in March when it looked like the world was coming to an end. We’re still up about 50% since we added the fund - 17% was the March return, the rest in early April.
Nakoma Absolute Return (NARFX) was the only loser in March (other than inverse ETFs) with a -0.77% return. Anybody with short positions had a tough time these last few weeks.
Vanguard Pacific Stock ETF (VPL) was up 9.91% in March as some hard-hit foreign markets rebounded even more than the U.S. market. We increased our stake in this fund at the beginning of the March.
Bridgeway Blue-Chip 35 (BRLIX ) posted another good month with a 9.15% jump.
Healthcare stocks continue to lag this market. Health Care Select SPDR (XLV) was up 6%.
Technology stocks have been particularly strong recently. One possible explanation is that many tech companies – Intel, Microsoft, Cisco, etc – are sitting on mountains of cash and no debt, making them particularly attractive in a crisis where highly leveraged companies can fail. Imagine that…in this bear market the losers of the last bear market are the attractive stocks. Maybe in our next bear market we should load up on emerging markets and commodities stocks. For the month our Technology ETF (XLK) was up 11.17%.
The great biotech streak may be winding down, though we hesitate to bail out too early as Wall Street has a way of way overdoing a good thing. SPDR Biotech (XBI) was up an uneventful 4.04% in March.
Janus Global Research (JARFX) had a good month with a 9.23% return. When a fund underperforms on the way down, you want to see it beat the market on the way up, like this one did.
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The Conservative Portfolio jumped 3.70% in March.
If the last six weeks in the market are any indication, the panic in the financial markets could be behind us. While getting another 25% or more out of stocks may require the economy and housing market to stop sliding, investors seem comfortable that we’ve stepped away from the precipice for now, and that apparently the drop below Dow 7,000 was panic-based. This move could be a dead cat bounce, or a suckers rally, or some other term used on Wall Street by people who incorrectly called the markets direction.
From the low hit in early March through the 17th of April, the Dow is up around 26%, the S&P 500 30%, and the Nasdaq 32%. These are remarkable numbers, but largely because we are down so much a partial move back marks for a large percentage gains. For the month of March the S&P 500 was up 8.76%, slightly better than our growth and aggressive growth portfolios (though we’re still beating the S&P 500 for the year).
One of the drivers of the market’s rebound has been financials. From the early March low, the Financials ETF (XLF) is up about 90%. The good news of course is that we bought said ETF in several of our Powerfund Portfolios. Unfortunately we did our trade five trading days before financials hit bottom, which really is pretty amazing timing - except financials got hit very hard in those first few post trade days in March when it looked like the world was coming to an end. We’re still up about 50% since we added the fund - 17% was the March return, the rest in early April.
Nakoma Absolute Return (NARFX) was the only loser in March (other than inverse ETFs) with a -0.77% return. Anybody with short positions had a tough time these last few weeks.
Healthcare stocks continue to lag this market. Health Care Select SPDR (XLV) was up 6%.
Janus Global Research (JARFX) had a good month with a 9.23% return. When a fund underperforms on the way down, you want to see it beat the market on the way up, like this one did.
If the last six weeks in the market are any indication, the panic in the financial markets could be behind us. While getting another 25% or more out of stocks may require the economy and housing market to stop sliding, investors seem comfortable that we’ve stepped away from the precipice for now, and that apparently the drop below Dow 7,000 was panic-based. This move could be a dead cat bounce, or a suckers rally, or some other term used on Wall Street by people who incorrectly called the markets direction.
From the low hit in early March through the 17th of April, the Dow is up around 26%, the S&P 500 30%, and the Nasdaq 32%. These are remarkable numbers, but largely because we are down so much a partial move back marks for a large percentage gains. For the month of March the S&P 500 was up 8.76%, slightly better than our growth and aggressive growth portfolios (though we’re still beating the S&P 500 for the year).
One of the drivers of the market’s rebound has been financials. From the early March low, the Financials ETF (XLF) is up about 90%. The good news of course is that we bought said ETF in several of our Powerfund Portfolios. Unfortunately we did our trade five trading days before financials hit bottom, which really is pretty amazing timing - except financials got hit very hard in those first few post trade days in March when it looked like the world was coming to an end. We’re still up about 50% since we added the fund - 17% was the March return, the rest in early April.
Nakoma Absolute Return (NARFX) was the only loser in March (other than inverse ETFs) with a -0.77% return. Anybody with short positions had a tough time these last few weeks.
Vanguard Pacific Stock ETF (VPL) was up 9.91% in March as some hard-hit foreign markets rebounded even more than the U.S. market. We increased our stake in this fund at the beginning of the March.
Bridgeway Blue-Chip 35 (BRLIX ) posted another good month with a 9.15% jump.
Healthcare stocks continue to lag this market. Health Care Select SPDR (XLV) was up 6%.
Technology stocks have been particularly strong recently. One possible explanation is that many tech companies – Intel, Microsoft, Cisco, etc – are sitting on mountains of cash and no debt, making them particularly attractive in a crisis where highly leveraged companies can fail. Imagine that…in this bear market the losers of the last bear market are the attractive stocks. Maybe in our next bear market we should load up on emerging markets and commodities stocks. For the month our Technology ETF (XLK) was up 11.17%.
The great biotech streak may be winding down, though we hesitate to bail out too early as Wall Street has a way of way overdoing a good thing. SPDR Biotech (XBI) was up an uneventful 4.04% in March.
Janus Global Research (JARFX) had a good month with a 9.23% return. When a fund underperforms on the way down, you want to see it beat the market on the way up, like this one did.