Recently we took our (Mitch’s) family to visit Disneyland in Anaheim, which was celebrating its 60th birthday in spectacular fashion.  As we watched the fantastic light show and parade at the end of the day it struck me at how much better Disney has become at leveraging it’s success by creating brands around the characters instead of just having characters.  For example, instead of just a Snow White ride, we now have access to a whole group of rides in “Cars Land” (which are all awesome BTW). Disney brands invoke warm memories of movies, characters, and even the theme parks themselves.

Similarly, in current times we have become better at branding our economic crisis du jour.  50 years ago market responses to news might have been referred to as “sell-offs” or corrections.  In the recent past we have had the “Flash Crash” (2010), “Eurogedden” (2011), and many others including the most recent “Brexit Crisis” which culminated with the news that the UK would be leaving the European Union.   However, instead of being designed to invoke warm feelings and memories, these brands are intended to drive fear and panic of the potential terrible things to follow.

In the case of Brexit, our view at EFinancial Alliance is that this too shall pass, and we believe that as long as the economic structures preserve healthy incentives then growth will ultimately continue. Although we don’t know what tomorrow’s news cycle will bring, we already see that most of the “Brexit” sell-off in the S&P 500 has been erased.  Specifically, in year-to-date performance we see the following:

Even with “Brexit”, the S&P 500 is up 3.8% on the year for 2016.

US Aggregate Bond index is up over 5%

The International market index as measured by MSCI EAFE is down 4%, but well off it’s Brexit-induced lows of over 11% and is the only major asset class not up YTD.

So as we look forward we can truly look past “Brexit” to what’s next with confidence that corporate earnings and growth drive value and returns for us as investors, and that the proven strength of free markets and sound financial planning are principles that endure.

Welcome to new EFinancial Alliance team members Mike Estes and Diane Mayfield

Please join us in welcoming Mike Estes (Director, Client Services) and Diane Mayfield (Admin Support) to the team to help us continue to strive to provide excellent service to both private wealth management clients as well as corporate retirement plan clients.  We are blessed to have such high-caliber individuals supporting our firm and our client community.

Mitch & Destin