The FOMC caught many by surprise last Wednesday, myself included, as stock prices exploded to the upside and closed with impressive gains. It appears that the FOMC struck a good medium between slightly reducing their bond buying and declaring their plan to keep rates low for quite some time.
My argument last week was that the threat of deflation would keep the Fed from acting. Obviously, it did not, though Mr. Bernanke did comment that “The committee is determined to avoid inflation that is too low, as well as inflation that is too high.”
No matter what happens in the last two weeks of the year, 2013 will clearly stand out as a buy-and-hold year with index funds as the star performers. The iShares Russell 2000 Index (IWM) is currently up 34.1% YTD, followed closely by the 33% gain in the PowerShares QQQ Trust (QQQ).
Both have done significantly better than the Spyder Trust (SPY), which is up 29.32%, and the 26.52% gain in the SPDR Dow Industrials (DIA). But will buy and hold work again in 2014?
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