March 2022 Monthly Index Returns

What a quiet month and quarter (not!) with continued global supply chain issues that started during the global pandemic, inflation hitting 40 year highs, and a Russian invasion of Ukraine.

In equities:

All US equity indexes were positive for the month with US REITs climbing the most at 6.7%.
On the international front, returns were mixed: developed equities were slightly positive (0.6%) while international small cap was flat, and emerging markets fell -2.3%.
All equity returns were negative for Q1 2022 with small growth (-12.6%) falling the most and large value (-0.7%) falling the least.
The S&P 500 had its first negative returning quarter (-4.6%) in two years. In Q1 2020, the S&P 500 fell -19.6% when the global pandemic really started in force.

In fixed income:

Like January and February (with the exception of ST TIPS in February), all non-cash FI indexes experienced negative returns for March.
10+ Yr Treasuries were negatively impacted the most (-4.8%) while ST TIPS fell the least (-0.7%).
It should be no surprise, then, that all non-cash FI indexes also had negative returns for Q1.
To put the quarter in perspective, we have data for the Bloomberg US Agg going back to 1/3/1980, over 4 decades ago. Since that time, it has experienced 169 quarterly return periods. Its Q1 2022 return of -5.9% places it third worst...ever. The only other two quarters with worse returns were Q1 1980 (-8.7%) and Q3 1980 (-6.6%). To put it in perspective, inflation was 13.91% in January 1980 and unemployment was 6.3%.

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As an additional note, please keep in mind that these reflect historical performance of the current models, not necessarily how accounts were invested in the past.