Letter to Clients: 1st Quarter 2022
January 2022
Dear Clients and Friends:
Happy New Year! We hope your holiday season was wonderful and you got to spend it with friends and family after the COVID separation of 2020.
In the last third of the year, DV Financial settled into our new office. Thanks to all who joined us for our Open House Celebration at the end of October. If you missed the Open House and want to see our new facility, just give us a call! We would be happy to show you around. Some of our furniture is finally arriving after being delayed in supply chain issues. Even if you were at the Open House, the rooms are not as empty as they were before!
New Year’s Resolutions
If you asked me to guess, I would have said that the First New Year’s Resolution was made around January 1st of the year 2. I would have been wrong. There is historical evidence[1] that the concept of New Year’s Resolutions is even older than that! Apparently, the Babylonians started the practice of setting annual goals about 4000 years ago (roughly 2000 B.C.) and Julius Caesar reintroduced the practice when he established January 1 as the beginning of year in 46 B.C.
While the tradition carries on today, few people follow through on their well-intended decisions. According to a recent CBS News poll[2], only 29% of Americans planned to make New Year’s Resolutions in 2022, down from 43% in 2021. Moreover, Statista reports[3] that only 4% of people who make resolutions accomplish all of them, 8% achieve most of them, and a paltry 16% complete any of them.
With such a low rate of success, why does the practice persist? The new year is a new opportunity. It is like turning the page. It is a new chapter or even a completely new book! You can’t change the past, but you can change the future.
It also reminds me of an oft mis-attributed quote (I have seen it attributed to everyone from Henry Ford to Tony Robbins), “If you always do what you have always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got”. Perhaps the reason so many fail at their New Year’s Resolutions is they know what they want to accomplish, but really don’t understand what it takes to make it happen.
There are lots of financial resolutions such as eliminating debt, saving and/or planning for retirement, optimizing insurance coverage, or implementing strategies to reduce taxes. If you have financial resolutions and want to be among the few who succeed in accomplishing them, let us help. We have the know-how and experience to guide you in making the proper changes which lead to the desired results.
Celebrating 2021 Performance, Looking Ahead to 2022
The year 2021 was a banner year for investors. The broad-based S&P 500 Index, which is made up of the 500 largest U.S. companies, finished the year up 26.9% (28.7% with reinvested dividends).
Table 1: Key Index Returns
The markets were driven by super easy monetary policy from the Federal Reserve which fueled demand leading to better than expected corporate profits. These profits, paired with low interest rates and low bond yields, offset worries about the lingering pandemic and higher than expected inflation.
Keep in mind that past performance is not an indicator of future results, but 2021 was one of 26 years since 1950[4] where the total return of the S&P 500 Index exceeded 20%. In the year that followed, the market advanced 20 times (77% of the time) where the average was a gain of 18.1%. In the down years following a gain greater than 20%, the average decline was 6.4%.
Looking ahead to 2022, there are more questions than answers. Is COVID once again going disrupt the economy? How will the market respond to rising interest rates? Will inflation cause decreased demand or boost profit margins? When will the labor market provide enough workers for businesses to operate at full capacity again? The only indisputable fact when projecting investment performance in 2022 is that nothing is indisputable.
We often tell clients that we do not know what the market will do today, this week, or even this month and that is okay. Predicting market movements in the short term is nearly impossible. However, we are extremely confident that we know the market direction in 20 years. The key is remaining consistent and not letting short term situations influence your long-term strategy.
By keeping our focus long, we can help you navigate the turbulent waters created by the storms of the media. The American economy is both strong and resilient. It has survived global military conflicts, pandemics, and economic strife of a variety of flavors. The problems society faces today will be overcome and the economy will continue to develop.
Without any doubt we face crises in our future and some of them will feel financially unpleasant. We discuss risk and consider the consequences of the inevitable downturns at the beginning of every client relationship and establish a unique Investment Policy Statement. When your situation and/or your tolerance for risk changes, we can make the necessary adjustments necessary to achieve your long-term financial objectives.
A Secret We Don’t Want You to Keep
In 2021 most of our firm’s growth came from great clients like yourself introducing us to people they know with financial questions and concerns, but do not know who to trust. We appreciate your confidence and promise to value of your testimonial by taking great care of the people you send our way.
Our team has grown and now we have the space for additional team growth as well. We will never reach “capacity” and will always be seeking new clients who need to develop a financial plan or wonder how current political, economic, and world events impact their financial security.
We remain committed to our core principle that we are investors and not traders. The long-term outlook has stood the test of time and we have no reason to believe the future will be different. We seek to capitalize through patience and discipline rather than guessing when to zig and when to zag.
If you have any questions or would like to discuss anything in this newsletter, please give our team a call. We are here for you. If you have concerns or want to discuss your situation, let us know. We are honored and humbled to serve as your financial advisors.
Sincerely on behalf of the DV Financial team,
Art Dinkin, CFP® Patrick Owens
This newsletter contains general information that may not be suitable for everyone. The information contained herein should not be construed as personalized investment advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results. There is no guarantee that the views and opinions expressed in this newsletter will come to pass. Investing in the stock market involves gains and losses and may not be suitable for all investors. Information presented herein is subject to change without notice and should not be considered as a solicitation to buy or sell any security.
Indices are unmanaged and investors cannot invest directly in an index. Unless otherwise noted, performance of indices do not account for any fees, commissions or other expenses that would be incurred. Returns do not include reinvested dividends.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) is a price-weighted average of 30 actively traded “blue chip” stocks, primarily industrials, but includes financials and other service-oriented companies. The components, which change from time to time, represent between 15% and 20% of the market value of NYSE stocks.
The Nasdaq Composite Index is a market-capitalization weighted index of the more than 3,000 common equities listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange. The types of securities in the index include American depositary receipts, common stocks, real estate investment trusts (REITs) and tracking stocks. The index includes all Nasdaq listed stocks that are not derivatives, preferred shares, funds, exchange-traded funds (ETFs) or debentures.
The Standard & Poor's 500 (S&P 500) is an unmanaged group of securities considered to be representative of the stock market in general. It is a market value weighted index with each stock's weight in the index proportionate to its market value.
The Russell 2000 Index is an unmanaged index that measures the performance of the small-cap segment of the U.S. equity universe.
The MSCI All Country World Index ex USA Investable Market Index (IMI) captures large, mid and small cap representation across 22 of 23 Developed Markets (DM) countries (excluding the United States) and 23 Emerging Markets (EM) countries*. With 6,062 constituents, the index covers approximately 99% of the global equity opportunity set outside the US.
The MSCI Emerging Markets Index is a float-adjusted market capitalization index that consists of indices in 21 emerging economies: Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, Czech Republic, Egypt, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Taiwan, Thailand, and Turkey.
Barclays Aggregate Bond Index includes U.S. government, corporate, and mortgage-backed securities with maturities of at least one year.
[1] https://www.history.com/news/the-history-of-new-years-resolutions
[2] https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/new-years-resolutions-americans-opinion-poll
[3] https://www.statista.com/statistics/953562/share-of-americans-who-stuck-to-their-new-year-s-resolutions/
[4] NYU Stern School of Business