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“On April Fools’ Day, believe nothing, trust no one, just like any other day.” – Unknown

Below is a snippet of commentary from today’s Morning Lineup. Start a two-week trial to Bespoke Premium to view the full report.  

Below is a review of asset class performance in Q1 using our ETF matrix.  For domestic index ETFs, it’s been a nasty run, although we’d note that seven of the eleven US sector ETFs finished the quarter higher.

Outside of the US, however, there was green nearly everywhere in Q1.  While the S&P 500 (SPY) was down 4.3%, the all-world ex-US ETF (CWI) gained 5.9% during the quarter, and country ETFs like Brazil (EWZ), China (MCHI), France (EWQ), Germany (EWG), Italy (EWI), Spain (EWP), and the UK (EWU) were all up 10%+.

Commodity ETFs outside of agriculture also posted solid Q1 gains.  Both gold (GLD) and silver (SLV) gained more than 15%, while natural gas (UNG) rose 28.6%.  Fixed-income ETFs posted solid Q1 returns as well.

Within US equities, the mega-caps accounted for nearly all of the S&P 500’s Q1 drop.  As shown below, the five largest stocks in the S&P all fell more than 10% in Q1, and the ten largest are down an average of 11.4% YTD.  The rest of the stocks in the S&P 500 are down an average of just 0.6% YTD.