Limited Partnership Funds
Inside this month’s commentary:
1. Is 2017 shaping up to be a repeat of 2015 for Canadian equities (recall the TSX delivered negative returns in 2015)? See inside for our view.
2. Interest rates and inflation: BNN Weekly interview with Robert Kaplan, President of the Dallas Federal Reserve
3. Canadian bank stocks – the bedrock of retail investor portfolios: Who is left to buy?
4. Annualized returns when investors buy the index at peaks vs troughs
Are you confused yet? Lots of investors are. After 100 days in office Trump is certainly more confusing than ever before. Reflation or no reflation? Policy change or no policy change? Markets certainly assume and hope something will get done on healthcare and, more importantly, taxes, but that’s a roll of the dice. Nevertheless, animal spirits rule as record amounts of money flows into passive index ETFs.
The Forge First portfolios are not positioned to “bet” one way or another on Trump getting something done or not. For us, “Trump” is another unknown in a roster of global uncertainties which could roil already highly valued equity markets.
During the month of April, the Forge First funds experienced only minor losses. Please continue reading for a macro overview and discussion of the funds’ current positioning and performance.
Inside this month’s commentary:
1. Q1 2017 Market Wrap: http://www.bnn.ca/weekly-with-andrew-mccreath/andrew-mccreath-s-market-wrap~1091187
2. Factors that will drive portfolio positioning
3. Portfolio changes and attribution
Having a background in the music business, I have a keen ability to keep track of “records”. However, during the month of February, my mind was blown away by the number of records being achieved on Bay and Wall Streets. Up until and including Feb 28th we had 50 straight trading days where the S&P 500 had not moved 1% or more, up or down; and then indices broke out on March 1st (after Donald Trump’s speech). If one looks back historically to when we have had long streaks (50 days +) of subdued returns (< 1%) with an upside breakout as we experienced on March 1st, it gets pretty interesting. In other words, if history is a guide, markets may experience a high degree of volatility in the near future.
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