Grant Engelbart
Bond Observations from the First Half
As Barry wrote about yesterday, bonds have had a volatile year so far, and the payoff for the volatility we have seen is a barely positive return for the year for the aggregate bond market, including interest. Rates have moved higher across the yield curve, credit spreads have widened slightly, and bonds fell alongside equities …
Grant Engelbart
July 1, 2026
What Is a Trillion Dollars?
I have heard the phrase “trillion dollars” more in the past couple of weeks than maybe ever before — so much so that it can be tempting to even shrug off as insignificant, but a trillion is anything but. This Wall Street journal video did a great job explaining the scale of one trillion dollars. …
Grant Engelbart
June 16, 2026
Valuations: Staying Relative
“Are we in a bubble?” The question echoed over the sounds of Memorial Day weekend. As markets continue to make new highs – in some ways in extraordinary fashion – many investors are likely asking this same question. How long do you ride a wave until it crashes ashore? The short answer is there is …
Grant Engelbart
May 28, 2026
Factors in Focus
I believe one of the most powerful and overlooked tools in portfolio construction is the use of factor investing. Factors are characteristics of stocks that help to describe their risk and return, offering another way to classify stocks, similar to sectors and industries. Factors can also replicate some of the things an active manager can …
Grant Engelbart
May 7, 2026
Small Cap Surprise
Small Cap stocks have staged a strong rebound starting late in 2025 in both absolute and relative (to large caps) terms. Many investors are likely not aware that small cap stocks have not only outperformed large cap stocks over the past year, but done so by more than 10%! There are a few reasons this …
Grant Engelbart
April 29, 2026
ETF Update: Privates, Share Class, and Notes!
Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) continue to gather significant assets, generally at the expense of traditional open-end mutual funds (albeit not completely). In the first quarter alone, ETFs have taken in some $425 billion in net flows, while traditional open-end mutual funds have seen $92 billion in investors assets leave, according to Morningstar. Beneath the surface of …
Grant Engelbart
April 15, 2026
What is Tracking Error and Why Should We Care?
Jargon alert! Tracking error is thrown around by investment professionals as often as “basis points”, “synthetic”, and “private credit” without a full realization of what the term means. Tracking “error” is an important concept that is only an “error” in certain situations and can be a good thing in other situations. Bear with me – …
Grant Engelbart
March 27, 2026
Shifting Sectors under the Surface
Rising market volatility tends to lead to changes under the surface of markets, even if the headline index performance remains fairly range-bound. This is especially true today, as volatility has been steadily rising since the beginning of the year, and market leadership continues to shift. Much of the prior year’s leadership has sold off, while …
Grant Engelbart
March 24, 2026
Back to the Real World
A resounding, and sometimes frustrating, feature of markets is that leadership change is inevitable over any period of time studied. The “A.I. Trade” has been prevalent for the past couple of years, absent some blips here and there (DeepSeek, Liberation Day, etc). In some ways, the A.I. trade has started turning upon itself – previous …
Grant Engelbart
March 5, 2026
Is it Still (Crypto) Winter?
Like any good Midwesterner, the weather is top of mind most of the time, especially in the depths of winter. Like the stock market, there is no such thing as experiencing average temperature – just a combination of above-average and below-average. Right now, many of us are experiencing above-average temperatures and likely our first ‘false …
Grant Engelbart
February 11, 2026