Welcome to a slightly delayed and abbreviated June 2023 edition of The Broadcast!

It was interesting watching the U.S. Markets while I was in Germany the last 10 days of June...the time difference was obviously a challenge but I was able to follow the end of month rally and was able to get some work done between all the sightseeing and visiting relatives...not to mention enjoying the cuisine!

Anecdotally, I heard a lot of concern about inflation and complaints of staffing shortages during my time in the beautiful Pfalz region of Germany. The conversations I had there were all too familiar and reminiscent of our challenges in 2022.

Without further ado...

The Bottom Line Upfront

Buoyed by encouraging inflation data, all major stock indices were positive for the month.

Major Index Returns June 2023

In particular, the tech heavy (i.e. A.I.) is off to it's best start (+38% total return) in 40 years!

Major Index Returns YTD 2023

What's Happening Now?

The first half of 2023 the U.S. markets had to navigate major bank failures, debt ceiling circus, continued worries about inflation, interest rates hikes and geopolitical trouble from Russia and China. Like my Rocky Balboa analogy a few months ago, the markets shrugged these off and pressed forward.

While we can't easily predict how bad any geopolitical issues may get, I find the continued improving inflation news, positive earnings surprises and tech rebound to be great signs for a strong second half of 2023.

The Takeaway

One of the biggest takeaways so far this year, is that diversification does work. For example, it would have been easy to abandon or otherwise underweight tech allocations in light of their dismal 2022 returns. While doing so may have eased some of the pain in 2022, it would have come at a huge cost to your returns in 2023.

I hope you enjoyed this shortened version of The Broadcast, if you have any questions or feedback please reply to this email and let me know.

Until next time, I wish you all a happy upcoming 4th of July!

Steve