News & Investment Updates From Midtown Financial Advisors

Every market seems to develop a group of stocks everyone generally agrees on. For the last several years, that group had seven members and a nickname.

Owning them worked. Not owning them cost you. And the longer that went on, the more it started to look like a rule instead of a stretch of very good performance.

This year, the group has been quiet and the market has gone up anyway.

Recognizing a change like that in advance sounds easier than it is. You would have needed to know when the old leadership was ending. Then what would replace it. Then when the new leadership was established enough to act on. We would rather require evidence than depend on getting that sequence right.

This month’s Note digs into the changing leadership in U.S. equities, the cost of waiting for confirmation, and why a systematic invest process does not need to be the first to recognize a new trend.

But first, here’s a summary of the global asset classes utilized in our portfolios and their exposures for September.

Patience is easiest to admire in hindsight and hardest to practice when everyone else appears to be making money.

That pressure seems particularly strong when a highly anticipated company enters the public markets. Early gains create urgency. Headlines reinforce the excitement. Waiting can begin to feel less like discipline and more like an opportunity slipping away — and this summer, no debut generated more of that feeling than SpaceX.

What makes these moments difficult is that the discomfort is real. Nobody enjoys standing still while others appear to be moving. But the feeling of falling behind and the fact of falling behind are two very different things, and markets have a long history of rewarding investors who can tell them apart.

This month’s Note examines the excitement surrounding initial public offerings (IPOs), how the fear of missing out can influence investment decisions, and why a disciplined, repeatable investing process asks a different question than the crowd.

But first, here’s a summary of the global asset classes utilized in our portfolios and their exposures for August.