This post contains the usual returns by asset class for this past quarter (by representative ETF), as well as last twelve months, last five years, and since the financial crisis lows of 3/9/2009.  I also added a year-to-date version to show how Q2’s recovery did a fairly good job at offsetting most of the Q1 damage.  While there is still no predictive power in this data, I’ll continue to post this quarterly for those of you that are interested.  Charts shown in the link below, with each on a separate page, legend at the bottom, zoom to your liking):

2020Q2 Asset Class Performance

A few notes:

• Q2 was a hugely positive quarter, recovering a lot of the Q1 losses. US Small Caps (the worst performers in Q1) led the way in Q2 with a 26% return. US Large (+20%), Emerging Markets (+19%), and Foreign Developed (+17%) weren’t too far behind. REITs (+14%), Emerging Market Bonds (+10%), US “Junk” Bonds (+7%), and Commodities (+6%) were also strongly positive. Even the more conservative US Aggregate Bonds and US Short-Term Corporate Bonds were up 4% and 5% respectively, largely due to support from the Federal Reserve’s bond buying programs.
• While US Large Cap stocks briefly went positive for the year in late May, the other major equity asset classes have not fully recovered their Q1 losses. With the recent pullback, year-to-date, US Large Cap is down ~3%, with US Small Caps, Foreign Developed and Foreign Emerging Markets all still down 10-12%.
• US Bonds are now strongly positive year-to-date as interest rates have fallen and Federal Reserve support has offset credit quality concerns in the corporate sector. The Fed continues to buy both corporate bond ETFs and a diversified set of individual company bonds subject to their self-defined constraints.