March 2023 Monthly Index Returns

In stocks (equities):

It was a fairly volatile month for equities, with US large cap growth stocks adding +6.8% while US small cap value stocks declined -7.2%.
Growth outperformed value in both US large and small cap, though US small cap indexes were all negative (as represented by the Russell indexes). While we do not have access to Russell index sector returns, it is expected the weight in the Financials sector within value indexes was a major reason for the difference in growth vs. value returns for the month (i.e. stress within bank stocks in general given defaults of Signature Valley Bank, Signature Bank). As of month end, the Financials sector weight was 14% higher in the R1000 Value vs. R1000 Growth, and 19.7% higher in the Russell 2000 Value vs. Growth.
In developed non-US markets, there was also a disparity between large cap (MSCI EAFE was up 2.5% in March) and small cap (MSCI EAFE Small Cap declined -02%). Emerging Markets were the best performing non-US equity market, moving up 3%.
Global REITS dropped -2.7%, though the difference between US and non-US markets was pretty tight.

In bonds (fixed income):

There was tremendous volatility in fixed income markets as well in March with the 10 yr Treasury starting the month at 3.92% and dropping all the way to 3.48% to close the month. In fact, the volatility within the month was even greater as the 10 yr closed as high as 4.02% but closed as low as 3.38% intra-month.
Across the maturity bucket spectrum, Treasuries outperformed their Corporate and Muni counterparts, with longer duration bonds beating shorter duration bonds as yields fell across the longer end of the yield curve.
1-5 Yr Inflation Linked Treasuries beat our 1-5 yr Treasuries by 10 bps.
As we saw a flight to quality in fixed income during the month, high yield bonds were the worst performing non-cash bond benchmark we cover, though it was still positive at 1.1%.

Please let us know if you have any questions by emailing Support@xyinvestmentsolutions.com

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.