Investment

September General Market Comments

by Pierre Mouton

September General Market Comments

“Supernature” – Cerrone, 1977

The S&P 500 broke to new highs in September and is up 20.8% year to date. It has delivered a 16.2% annualized total return over the last 5 years, 13.5% over the last 10 years and 14.3% over the last 15 years. It is a “Supernature”, to paraphrase Marc Cerrone in his 1977 disco smash. In fact, the “Supernature” are more to be found in the constituents of the index: its top 6 market caps (Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Meta, Amazon and Nvidia) are only 34 years old and weigh as much as $ 2.5 trillion, on average. “And they grew up in the way that we’d never seen before” to quote Cerrone again.

Thanks to a strong month (+2.0%, the best September return since 1997), the S&P does it again this year and, with a +20.8% return so far in 2024, outpaces all major equity indices. Beyond this performance, September has recorded many wild moves in financial markets; as the Fed eased, as expected, long term yields fell (-12 bps for the US and -18 bps for Germany), Gold soared again (+5.2%), the dollar weakened (-0.9% versus the euro and -2.1% versus the Yen), while Chinese equities skyrocketed following the announcement by Chinese authorities of a massive stimulus plan (the CSI300 rose 21.0%). This has propped up most commodities, but, very strangely, not Oil, which collapsed 7.3% and is now down 4.9% for the year. Who could have predicted that extremely serious tensions in the Middle-East, coupled with a monster stimulus plan tinkered by China, would have seen Oil fall by this magnitude?

September’s over and we now enter a statistically favourable period for equities. Will investors keep their loot snug in their arms, or maintain, or even increase, risk?

 

 

 

 

 

Past performance is not indicative of future results. The views, strategies and financial instruments described in this document may not be suitable for all investors. Opinions expressed are current opinions as of date(s) appearing in this material only. References to market or composite indices, benchmarks or other measures of relative market performance over a specified period of time are provided for your information only. NS PARTNERS SA provides no warranty and makes no representation of any kind whatsoever regarding the accuracy and completeness of any data, including financial market data or other financial instruments referred to in this general comment. This document does not constitute an offer or solicitation to any person in any jurisdiction in which such offer or solicitation is not authorized or to any person to whom it would be unlawful to make such offer or solicitation. Any reference in this document to specific securities and issuers are for illustrative purposes only, and should not be interpreted as recommendations to purchase or sell those securities. References in this document to investment funds that have not been registered with the FINMA cannot be distributed in or from Switzerland except to certain categories of eligible investors. Some of the entities of the NS Partners Group or its clients may hold a position in the financial instruments of any issuer discussed herein, or act as advisor to any such issuer. Additional information is available on request. © NS Partners Group

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October General Market Comments

by Pierre Mouton
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Antonio Mira joined NS Partners in 2006 as Group Chief Financial Officer. He heads the corporate functions and is involved in coordinating and implementing the decisions of the Executive Committee.
An experienced bank auditor, Antonio started his career in 1995 with Arthur Andersen, where he worked for some 7 years before joining Ernst & Young in 2002 as a Senior Manager.
Antonio is a Swiss chartered accountant and a Business graduate of Lausanne University (HEC).

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Prior to joining NS Partners, he served as a Trader, Head of Manager research and Portfolio Manager in the USA and Switzerland for a single hedge fund (1998-2004) and for Optimal (2004-2008), Grupo Santander’s fund-of-hedge funds operations.

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