My colleague Sam Millette, manager, fixed income on Commonwealth’s Investment Management and Research team, has helped me put together this month’s Economic Risk Factor Update. Thanks for the assist, Sam!

August was another great month for the financial markets. Here in the U.S., the markets continued to hit new highs, with the Dow up by 1.5 percent, the S&P up by more than 3 percent, and the Nasdaq up by more than 4 percent. Abroad, developed markets also did well, going up by 1.76 percent. Emerging markets bounced back significantly at month-end with a gain of 2.65 percent.

August was another very good month for the financial markets. In the U.S., both the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 showed material gains, while developed markets also did well. On the medical front, the virus continued its spread. There are signs that the rising medical risks are starting to appear in the data, with consumer confidence dropping significantly in August.

One of the key indicators I follow is consumer confidence. With more than two-thirds of the economy based on consumer spending, confidence is the key determinant of growth, even more so than jobs. Yes, jobs are important—you can’t spend money if you’re not making it. But to spend the extra money that kicks growth up another notch, you need to have the job and feel confident enough to spend.

Yesterday, in response to advisor requests, my post summarized some of my high-level thoughts about the state of the economy. To recap my take briefly, the economic risks of the pandemic are largely in the past. The economy is growing, and markets are strong. Given this environment, the risks of governmental action (notably the infrastructure spending bills) and the Fed’s policy accommodations are now bigger worries than the pandemic. In the face of these risks, can our economic growth continue? My base case is that we’re getting closer and closer to normal. So, today, I want to address how we can invest in a growing economy that faces risks of inflation, higher interest rates, and government policy changes.

Recently, I’ve received several requests for a high-level overview of the economy. As a blog post, this analysis is necessarily short on details, but I hope it provides a big-picture look at what I see happening in the current economic and market environment.

As I wrote in yesterday’s post, we seem to have moved past the pandemic in many ways, but I realized it has been some time since I did an update on what that means. So here we are. Things are bad from a medical perspective, and the big question is whether medical conditions will continue to worsen to the point they affect the economy and markets. Right now, that does not look likely. I will be keeping an eye on the situation, however, and do another update when the answer becomes clearer.

This week, I am at the first Commonwealth conference (or, indeed, any conference) since March 2020. We are being very cautious—events are outdoors, and everyone was tested on arrival. But it is the first real large face-to-face event since then.

I originally shared this post back in 2014, but I think you will find it still offers some valuable lessons for today. — Brad

I thought it would be fun to share a couple of videos that offer some entertaining—and surprisingly accurate—lessons in economics. Even better, they do so à la rap!

I'll be on vacation for the rest of the week, so I'll be re-running a couple of my favorite posts. This one is from 2019, but I think the message holds true today. Enjoy! — Brad

I get a lot out of meeting with advisors and clients. It is always good to hear what people are thinking, listen to their concerns, and spend time understanding where real people who live outside of the investment bubble that I inhabit are coming from. The past week spent traveling was a great opportunity to do just that. But sometimes you get more than you expect.