The end of March 2022 marked the two-year anniversary of the stock market bottom and the end of the shortest bear market on record. Since then the U.S. stock markets have quickly reached new highs, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) closing north of 33,000 as of late April 2022 (on March 16, 2020, the DJIA closed at 20,188).
During the past two years, investors witnessed the mega-cap DJIA, the large-cap S&P 500, the tech-laden NASDAQ and the smaller-cap Russell 2000 rise sharply since March of 2020 as expectations of improving fundamentals took hold. Adding to the excitement were expectations that the economy might deliver rapid growth (from pandemic-induced depressed levels) that aimed to catch up with the rising stock markets. So, how were you positioned?