Quarterly Commentary

2013

Q1 2013 • March 31, 2013 | PDF

Stock markets around the world busied themselves with climbing the wall of worry in the first quarter as investors shrugged off the sequester, brief fears of a U.S. government shutdown, poor Purchasing Managers' Index reports, further reductions in European growth forecasts, an increasingly bellicose North Korea...

2012

Q4 2012 • December 31, 2012 | PDF

From a global economic perspective, 2012 closed on a pessimistic note. As the countries of southern Europe continue to struggle with high unemployment, deteriorating bank balance sheets and burdensome public debt, the European Commission has slashed its growth outlook for the region...

Q3 2012 • September 30, 2012 | PDF

The third quarter of 2012 began amid negative headlines with the eurozone continuing to dominate the news and market sentiment. By late July, bond yields in Spain and Italy had climbed to worrisome levels, as investors doubted the impact of plans by eurozone finance ministers to commit...

Q2 2012 • June 30, 2012 | PDF

In contrast to the reasonably strong employment and Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) data in Q1, Q2 2012 has witnessed slowing growth to what can best be described as tepid. Jobs data has been solidly below 100,000 each of the last three months. The Q1 numbers benefited from extremely mild weather...

Q1 2012 • March 31, 2012 | PDF

While the economic news from foreign shores continues to invite concern, domestic economic releases have been mostly positive. Most notably, after consistently disappointing expectations since the onset of the financial crisis in 2008, employment data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics has beaten expectations...

2011

Q4 2011 • December 31, 2011 | PDF

The market volatility experienced during the summer months carried through to the fall, with equities seeing numerous days of declines and advances greater than 1%. Despite the spike in volatility, U.S. markets performed reasonably well in the quarter...

Q3 2011 • September 30, 2011 | PDF

The equity market rallied strongly into the end of the second quarter of 2011, and this trend initially continued into the current quarter. The S&P 500 quickly posted a 2.5% gain, going from 1,320 to 1,353, and then remained in a relatively calm and tight trading range...

Q2 2011 • June 30, 2011 | PDF

Following the run-up in equity prices in the first quarter, equity markets suffered as investors weighed the impact of a spate of natural disasters (the Japanese earthquake/tsunami, flooding in Australia, etc.), the turmoil of the Arab Spring, the anticipation of the end of the Federal Reserve's long-term asset purchases...

Q1 2011 • March 31, 2011 | PDF

For the three months ended March 31, 2011, the equity markets continued their upward progress with the S&P 500 Index providing investors with a total return of 5.92%. Whether investors were influenced by Federal Reserve policy or other factors can be debated...

2010

Q4 2010 • December 31, 2010 | PDF

In 2010 we saw a close race between Growth and Value, with Value out ahead in the first half of the year, and Growth coming back in the second half. During the fourth quarter, the Russell 1000 Growth Index continued its modest momentum, outperforming the Russell 1000 Value Index...

Q3 2010 • September 30, 2010 | PDF

Growth dominated Value in the third quarter as markets shook off the Q2 2010 downturn and concerns over sovereign debt risks in Europe and at home to post positive results in the last month of the quarter. While the S&P 500 Index provided investors with...

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