Overview
Given our complex, dynamic world, we can never really have a complete picture of the
economy. That said, the government shutdown left investors with unusually incomplete
information, and the past few weeks have felt like a “paint-by-numbers” exercise. Each
new economic report, Federal Reserve comment, and corporate earnings call added
another stroke to an ill-defined picture. U.S. large-cap stocks, as measured by the S&P
500 index, ended November essentially flat, up 0.2%. The Russell 2000 index of U.S.
small-cap stocks gained 1.0% over the month. U.S. intermediate-term bonds, as proxied
by the Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate Bond Index, ended November up 0.6%.