Ditch the index. Leave it behind. Indices are arbitrary, they have their path to follow you have yours. Let’s face it, you know where you want to go, the index doesn’t. Calibrated thinking places your goals as your index—your barometer. By charting your path, balancing your investment risk, and untethering yourself from an arbitrary index, you will have bought yourself freedom: freedom to turn off the noise.
At Calibrate Wealth, we start with Why — the why you do this in the first place. Restated: we calibrate your plan by starting at the end and looking back to where you are. Next, we help you define your path. We make your path safe and direct; we continually review, readjust, and repeat.
At Calibrate, we put the focus on things we can control. We start with your input, risk. And risk is, after all, what you add when you invest. In contrast, returns are the hoped-for output from your investment. Calibrated investing begins with the risk input and works forward. We balance risk between asset classes and between market outcomes. We accept the future as being uncertain, and build investment strategies with that understanding. We build your strategy designed to accommodate all types of market climates, not just one for the “good times.”
When I walk my dog, I’m struck by how obsessive he is about his actions. He will spend, what seems to me, like a ridiculous amount of time searching for the perfect spot to relieve himself—re-positioning himself countless times as if the future of the free world depends upon the outcome. For him, this process is vital to is existence—to me, it is a waste of time. The animal brain is dominated by what it chooses to focus on. Maybe in that regard I’m not so much different from my dog.
What a difference a year makes. But I don’t need to tell you this. Anyone who’s gone through the last few years knows this to be true. Since, 2018 we’ve seen our share of whipsaw action in financial markets—from Christmas Eve stock market collapse in 2018, to Covid crash in 2020 followed by the Covid market explosion in the second half of 2020, to the meme stock insanity of 2021, and finally the bear market of 2022.
Last week we closed the door on the first half of 2022, and from a market perspective the end couldn’t come soon enough. Here is a rundown of the performance of major assets:
S&P 500 -19.45%
Among stock market analysts, opinion is becoming nearly unanimous that the market has not yet found a bottom. Since the S&P 500 began to decline at the beginning of the year we have seen four substantial bounces, averaging 9%, the most recent one being the rally from 5/12-6/2. Each of these bounces have resulted in the S&P 500 revisiting its prior low or making new lows. This price action is frequently referred to as a bear market rally.
