It’s still a holiday here in the States, so we’ll be brief. But as the new year dawns, we look back on the old, and once again ponder what was hot and what was not–all in a hopeless search for clues about the future. To wit, we present total returns for last year, courtesy of data from Vestek Systems via Aronson+Johnson+Ortiz. Forecasts may be cloudy, but the past is always crystal.
On that score, mid-cap stocks were hot again last year in the U.S., as were REITs–the latter once again defying the common wisdom that real estate equities are due for a correction. But it all pales next to the absolute sizzling year that just unfolded for stocks in emerging markets. Fixed-income performance, meanwhile, is looking ever-more plodding, although even 90-day T-bills beat the great-great grandfather of indices, the Dow Jones Industrials.
Enough of the past. On to the future. Happy New Year!
S&P 500 CAP WEIGHTED 4.92%
S&P MIDCAP CAP WEIGHTED 12.54
S&P SMALLCAP CAP WEIGHTED 7.67
S&P 500/CITIGROUP GROWTH 1.14
S&P 500/CITIGROUP VALUE 8.74
S&P REIT INDEX 11.30
RUSSELL 1000 INDEX (large cap) 6.27
RUSSELL MIDCAP INDEX 12.65
RUSSELL 2000 INDEX (small cap) 4.52
RUSSELL MICROCAP INDEX 2.56
RUSSELL 1000 GROWTH INDEX 5.26
RUSSELL 1000 VALUE INDEX 7.05
RUSSELL MIDCAP GROWTH INDEX 12.10
RUSSELL MIDCAP VALUE INDEX 12.64
RUSSELL 2000 GROWTH INDEX 4.12
RUSSELL 2000 VALUE INDEX 4.68
DOW JONES INDUSTRIALS 1.72
NASDAQ COMPOSITE (PRC CHG) 1.37
MSCI WORLD EX US 14.89
MSCI WORLD EX US GROWTH 14.55
MSCI WORLD EX US VALUE 15.11
MSCI EAFE 13.97
MSCI EMERGING MARKETS 34.07
VESTEK 90-DAY T-BILL INDEX 3.04
VESTEK LONG TREASURY INDEX 5.70
VESTEK BROAD BOND INDEX 2.61
Source: Aronson+Johnson+Ortiz