Since the Federal Reserve announced the resumption of quantitative easing (QE) in December, the central bank has expanded its balance sheet by over $200 billion.
The U.S. market story this year has been a tug-of-war between sticky inflation, slower growth, and resilient risk appetite. For fixed-income investors, that mix has produced more narrative movement than the 10-year Treasury itself.
While we are currently in a particularly grueling climb (including the war in Iran – a situation in which we will provide an update at the end of this piece), we cannot lose our long-term perspective. We want to take this piece as a summit in the middle of our hike; one where we can see a path through the trees and hills and clearly see four potential paths from here.
LPL Research examines the fixed income space as global bonds broaden yields and reduce U.S. concentration, offering diversified income and resilience via non‑U.S. developed and emerging markets.
For a long time institutions treated tax-aware investing like a retail conversation; helpful for individuals, interesting for private wealth, but not front and center for institutions.
The stock market selloff between February 28 and April 14 produced one of the more instructive market lessons in recent memory. It isn’t because of what the market did, but because of what investors did in response.
Every employee has heard calls to be more efficient: “Work smarter, not harder.” “Do more with less.” “Don't reinvent the wheel.” These platitudes are not only applicable at the micro level: the modern economy has continually become more efficient. Our use of energy tells the story clearly, and serves as a source of resilience during today’s supply disruptions.
GMO has posted a new 7-Year asset class forecast for 1Q 2026.
As always, I hope you’re having a good 2026 and that all is well with you, my readers, and your family and friends. Here’s my latest.
While Russ acknowledges that the ongoing conflict in the Middle East has contributed near-term volatility, he also notes that these rising tensions are occurring against the backdrop of a solid U.S. economy.
Geopolitical conflict is forcing the markets to think critically about critical minerals. More specifically, the importance of critical materials has shifted from industrial use to a vital component in national defense and energy security.
Yes, much of the blame lies with energy prices, which surged due to the war in Iran. Still, the March reading of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) serves as a reminder of the work to be done to damp inflation.
Despite compositional differences – public equities generally represent larger companies with more scale, liquidity, and financial flexibility than the typically smaller, private-equity-owned issuers that dominate the software loan market – the outcome is the same: Neither market has been able to fully retrace the year-to-date sell-off in a meaningful way.
The federal government is still on an unsustainable fiscal path with the national debt reaching $39 trillion in March and set to move higher in the years ahead as we keep running budget deficits. However, beneath the headlines both revenue and spending trends have shifted in a positive direction. It’s possible that investors are recognizing this and this may be helping buoy stock markets.
I was working in one of our regional offices this week when the network on our floor experienced a brief outage. People were clearly not prepared for a return to an analog world, and grew increasingly anxious as the minutes ticked by.
The history of the U.S. airline industry is really a history of consolidation driven by crisis. The pattern has been remarkably consistent. Historically, when an external shock has hit—a recession, a war, an energy spike—the weakest carriers have folded or been acquired, while the strongest have emerged leaner and more profitable.
Over the past few weeks, a rising tide of optimism has been gathering in the equity markets. This positive momentum reached a crescendo last week when Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi announced that, in line with the ceasefire in Lebanon, the Strait of Hormuz would reopen for commercial vessels after being closed for approximately seven weeks beginning in late February.
Clearly the path to peace is not as easy as it looked last Friday when the easing in Middle East tensions, the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz to commodity flows, and the sharp retreat in oil prices calmed fears on the most immediate macro threat to equities.
The Q1 2026 earnings season has officially started, and the early results suggest a market that is largely defying the geopolitical fog we’ve discussed.
Get ready each week with high-conviction insights that go beyond media headlines.
Oil shocks hitting economies with weak demand and strained balance sheets are especially damaging. Firms cannot fully pass on rising costs, so margins shrink, layoffs increase, and investment falls. Tightening monetary and credit conditions would cause inflation to fade faster but job losses, failures, and fragile household finances to be much worse.
Exchange-traded fund flows surpassed $500 billion in the first three and a half months of 2026 as the industry continues its rapid expansion with more than 300 new launches and record trading volumes.
Active ETFs are no longer a niche satellite play; they are becoming central pillars of modern portfolio construction.
Today we're going to look at the underlying data and find that while the world is not ending anytime soon, there are actually good reasons for the disparity in forecasts. So, it’s okay if you’re confused. The stock market just hit an all-time high, energy is volatile and will be a negative on global growth, to say the least.
Amplify’s path is unique in the ETF space and has carved out a small but powerful stronghold for itself. Its focus on thematic and income strategies lends Amplify resilience across different market types, and its commitment to innovation means it doesn’t tend to issue many “me too” products.
The BLS jobs report has become so distorted that it often tells us almost nothing reliable about the actual state of employment. I realize that is a serious claim, but let me back it up with the data. I want to show you what I believe is a simpler, more honest alternative.
April 15th was Tax Day. It’s a source of misery for many of us as we write a big check to the IRS. But did you know the IRS isn’t the source of your biggest tax bill? In fact, you don’t even get a bill. You just pay the tax every time you buy something.
The S&P 500 reached another all-time high this week, supported by easing concerns around geopolitical risk.
The S&P 500 closed Wednesday at a fresh all-time high of 7,022.95, surpassing the late-January peak and capping a remarkable round trip from the spring selloff.
Iran war-related headlines continue to cause volatility in the markets and oil prices to rise, but our experts remind readers that uncertain times might also present opportunities.
After a 9.1% drawdown, the S&P 500 surged 11% over the last 12 trading days to a new record high, breaking above the 7,000 level for the first time.
The most exciting innovations aren't always the ones that break new ground—sometimes they're the ones that finally make breakthrough ideas work. This quarter’s spotlight reveals how researchers are removing practical barriers to turn promising laboratory technologies into deployable solutions, from agricultural robotics to dissolving medical devices, transforming theoretical possibilities into tools that can reshape industries today.
One of the hottest themes in investing this year has been Space. Partly due to its tie-in with the broader Defense theme, and more recently, thanks to investor excitement over the upcoming SpaceX IPO, space investing as a thematic opportunity has been capturing attention and investor dollars.
Late last week, investors were hit with news of the worst inflation spike in nearly two years. But a closer look “under the hood” reveals that price pressures aren’t nearly as bad as some headlines suggest.
As transition activity increases, what was once seen as a step between portfolios is becoming part of the outcome itself. Execution is now more closely tied to how portfolios are reshaped, particularly as restructures grow larger, more frequent, and more complex.
On Wednesday, April 15, Sprott Asset Management expanded its lineup of exchange-traded funds with the debut of the Sprott Rare Earths Ex-China ETF (REXC). According to Sprott, REXC is the only ETF on the market that is offering a focus on rare earth companies outside China.
Headline economic indicators remain resilient as gross domestic product (GDP) continues to expand, the unemployment rate remains low and wage growth has held up better than expected. However, these figures reflect averages, not the lived experience of households.
Much of the conversation around private credit versus public high yield focuses on yield levels, default expectations and headline volatility. But we think what matters most is how each market lets investors measure, manage and reprice risk as conditions change.
The backlash against globalization, the slow death of the Washington Consensus, and the rapid rise of AI are fueling volatility that, if left unchecked, will lead to lower growth, higher inflation, and greater inequality. To move the economy onto a better path requires, first and foremost, abandoning our faith in outdated ideas.
For many, the statistics surrounding autism aren’t just numbers on a page — they are lived experiences. I am one of those people; I have an extended family member on the spectrum, and I’ve seen how people have slowly begun to better understand and support the neurodivergent community.
Late last year, the Federal Reserve ended its latest quantitative tightening (QT) program: the process by which it shrinks its balance sheet by selling securities or letting them mature without reinvestment.
Over the past year, LPL Research’s Strategic and Tactical Asset Allocation Committee (STAAC) has emphasized that tactical investing does not require constant activity. Instead, it requires preparation, patience, and the discipline to act only when the expected benefit of a change clearly outweighs the risks.
Focusing on tax planning year-round can significantly improve your financial situation. By reviewing your recently filed 1040 form, you can uncover valuable opportunities to optimize investments, maximize deductions and strategically plan for retirement, ensuring long-term financial health and tax efficiency.
Asia and emerging markets experienced extreme volatility in the first quarter of 2026 as markets surged in the first two months, supported by strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) and an easing of the global monetary environment.
The artificial intelligence theme is entering a more granular phase, with investors increasingly looking beyond foundational large language models (LLMs) toward the physical infrastructure required for scale.
The Middle East war has replaced tariff-driven inflation concerns with fears of rising energy prices feeding through the economy. On Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its March CPI report, when markets received their first ‘official’ glimpse of how the surge in energy prices has begun to impact the U.S. inflation setting.
“Diversification” has been the driving principle of investing and risk management for generations. But what does it mean to be “diversified?”
Rising oil prices and the historically inflationary aspects of war have changed expectations for Federal Reserve interest rate policy and have pulled Treasury yields higher.
In an investment world marked by ongoing macro uncertainty, more investors are seeking alternative strategies to navigate murky markets. One of the funds capturing this shift is the Fidelity Managed Futures ETF (FFUT). That fund secured the award for Best New Alternatives ETF in the 2026 ETF.com Awards.
In what should be a surprise to no one, energy has been one of the better performing sectors since the joint U.S.-Israel airstrikes on military targets in Iran on February 27, although it has given up some ground since a two-week cease fire was announced last week.
