Insights

Value stocks, or those with low relative prices, have outperformed higher-priced growth stocks in the US over the long term. Similarly, the stocks of smaller companies have fared better than the stocks of bigger ones in the US. But the performance of these stocks has varied at different points in history. As the global pandemic rocked markets in March 2020, large growth stocks outdid small value stocks by 19.6%, the greatest monthly margin on record. From March through September, the
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Historically bad to historically good Value investors who chose to stay the course through the last few years were finally rewarded for their discipline! Although it’s hard to believe, if we back up just a few months, the one-year period ending September 2020 was the worst return ever for small value stocks relative to larger, more growth companies, with small value underperforming by a whopping 52%. The three-year returns were also abysmal, with small value underperforming large growth by nearly
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KEY TAKEAWAYS Recent Dimensional research suggests that simply staying invested helps outpace inflation over the long term for a wide range of asset classes. The protection offered by inflation-indexed securities still appears to be the most effective for investors who are particularly sensitive to unexpected inflation. Our analysis of data from 1927–2020 covers periods with double-digit US inflation as well as periods with deflation. US consumer prices were up by 5.4% for the year ending June 2021, the largest annual
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There is no way to hide that prices are rising for the goods and services we use. A day doesn’t seem to pass without hearing of a new shortage, a supply disruption, or an increase in demand that is impacting the price we pay for something. From a shortage of semiconductors affecting the price of new and used cars to higher oil prices raising the cost of gas and backups at ports restricting supply, it is no wonder that inflation
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If you’re like most of us, it’s hard to not keep an eye on how the U.S. economy is recovering from everything that’s happened since the start of 2020. However, it’s also easy to fixate on the gloomier economic indicators and try to interpret them as potential warning signs for the recovery and our portfolios. A popular one as of late is federal government debt, which reached a record $28 trillion in March. You might hear pundits and colleagues suggesting
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