This publication presents manager performance for 37 asset classes and substrategies, showing the median, mean, and key percentiles of return. Relevant indexes for each asset class are also included to provide market context.
Most global assets experienced broad-based declines in January. Global equities suffered their worst month since March 2020; emerging markets held up better than developed counterparts but remain a significant laggard over the trailing 12-month period. Value and large caps outperformed growth and small-cap equivalents, respectively. Fixed income assets declined as nominal interest rates rose and…
The global economy continued its road to recovery in 2021, as the most severe economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic gradually receded. There were fresh waves of infection during the year, but the public health actions taken to counter them were less economically damaging. In the meantime, fiscal and monetary policy remained at extremely accommodative levels, supporting strong risk-asset performance.
Global capital markets remained volatile during fourth quarter 2021 but ended in strong positive territory for the quarter and year. While hedge funds generally produced positive absolute performance, many growth-oriented long/short equity managers experienced significant drawdowns during the quarter.
Even as broad equity indexes remain close to their all-time highs, the proportion of stocks in their own ‘bear market’ has recently increased, particularly among speculative growth stocks.
Risk assets surged in fourth quarter, capping off a year of impressive gains.
This week, the Federal Reserve, the Bank of England, and to a lesser extent the European Central Bank all acted to tighten monetary policies. These tightenings came as inflationary pressures have surged in many countries and as other central banks have looked to rein in simulative policies. But, when combined with above-trend growth expectations next year and central banks’ likely cautious tightening approach, we suspect financial conditions will likely remain accommodative and supportive of risk assets.
A compilation of our investment views for 2022.
Global equities have returned more to investors than high-quality global bonds in nearly three quarters of the last 30 years. The margin of outperformance during those years has been considerable, averaging 12.5 percentage points. That high historical success rate, along with our view that healthy economic activity will support both positive earnings growth and risk appetite, leads us to expect that equities will yet again outperform high-quality bonds.
China’s equity markets have lagged global equities sharply thus far in 2021 in the face of a regulatory crackdown. We expect Chinese equities, particularly China onshore A-shares, to outperform global equities in 2022.