Acumen Portfolio Performance YTD 2021

Commentary on Portfolio Performance – May 2021

Global equity indices largely ended up where they started the month after a rollercoaster ride. The Acumen and Trust portfolios however all continued their advance and kept within their volatility ranges. Ongoing vaccine rollout is allowing many economies to reopen, which in combination with sizeable fiscal support – particularly in the UK and US – is supporting a big bounce in economic activity. US equities’ gains were tempered by fears that central banks would start to tighten monetary policy sooner than expected after US inflation jumped to a 13-year high at 4.2%. However Europe’s vaccination rate improved markedly in the last month and the improving outlook has generally been positive for European assets and the Euro currency.

Core Eurozone yields continue to trend upwards as the economic recovery accelerates. This has further dented “risk free” bond prices but inflation expectations have given some support to inflation linked bonds and corporate bonds. Commodities continue to perform well in response to strong industrial and house building materials demand.