Is a Lost Decade in the Offing for Bonds?

Here’s what’s interesting: looking at the 3-year annual returns, the S&P 500 is still outperforming the Nasdaq 100 or QQQs, which is likely a surprise to many given the outperformance of the so-called “Magnificent 7” (or top 7 stocks in the S&P 500 when ranked by market cap) this year.

The 5-year return for the Russell 2000 (IWM) is now low-single-digits. If the 10-year iShares Russell 2000 ETF (NYSE:IWM) return gets to mid-single-digits, which is probably an unlikely occurrence, a significant shift in portfolios would be warranted, particularly if the larger-caps continue to outperform in the interim periods.

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The 10 and 15-year returns for the Russell 2000 and S&P MIDCAP 400 ETF Trust remain well below their larger-cap brethren.

In the late 1990’s – from 1995 to 1999 the SP 500’s annual return for that 5-year period was greater than 28% per year. That’s a truly remarkable annual return. The Russell 2000’s annual return during that time period was a little over 16% per year. (The IWM wasn’t created until August of 1999.)

In secular bull markets for the SP 500, I believe we are still in the middle of the latest secular bull market, which started either in 2009 – 2010 or in 2013, (depending on what you consider your starting point for the new bull) when the SP 500 finally made a new and permanent all-time-high in May 2013, there can be asset classes that lag the main US stock market indices in a material way, and deserve some part of client assets as the bull market continues.

Watch annual returns, and in particular, note which asset classes lag the major US indices.

In terms of international, and because of China’s bad behavior, which originally started with the whole Jack Ma and Ant Financial fiasco, all of the VWO and EEM ETFs (significant Chinese company percentage) were sold a few years back, and replaced with the EMXC (emerging markets ex-China), but in the last 12 months it’s become apparent China is working side deals with countries like Brazil and others in an attempt (it’s my own opinion) to circumvent dollar strength and improve the position of the Chinese yuan.

That’s a significant pull, and probably not very realistic on China’s part. However, the point is that China still exerts a significant influence on emerging markets, but it’s hard to quantify. I’ve often wondered why they own them (emerging markets) at all. However, given the 10 and 15-year returns of the VWO and EEM, at some point, the asset class is likely to rally – if even for a year – and generate some alpha relative to the SP 500.

What’s worrisome today is that – as someone who lived through 2000 to 2009 – the worst decade for stock returns since the 1930s, where the SP 500 returned (cumulatively) just 12.5% for the decade or an annual return of just over 1% per year, and that only because of the rally after the March ’09 lows, will bonds and Treasury returns have a similar decade?

A return of Treasury market volatility and a potential 5% yield on the United States 10-Year Treasury would leave the US stock market behaving like spawning salmon, i.e., swimming upstream. This article a few weeks ago was an attempt to flush out a scenario where treasuries and most bond market asset classes have a lost decade of returns, but I’m not sure it was all that effective.

Take all of this with substantial skepticism. None of this constitutes advice, and past performance is no guarantee of future results. All earnings data is sourced from IBES data by Refinitiv, and return data from Morningstar. All readers should gauge their own response to market volatility and adjust portfolios accordingly.

Written By: Brian Gilmartin