I truly believe that difficult situations can lead to our greatest strengths. We learn more about ourselves through adversity than we do when things are easy. I know Chase, and the entire class of 2020, will prove these maxims to be true in the future. Their lives have been altered in ways we can’t yet understand, but they will come out stronger in the end. For those heading off to college, the adversity isn’t over yet. Freshman year of college for them will look nothing like it has for prior students. More challenges await, but I know they can be overcome.

Many of you are likely wondering how the markets managed to bounce back so quickly, when our lives still haven’t even come close to getting back to normal. There is never a simple explanation for why the market does what it does. “The market” isn’t one person's decision on what should happen next, it’s a collection of millions of market participants, all with their own thoughts, opinions and goals. Rather than try to identify what caused the market rally, let’s look at some of the factors that likely had an impact.

To say that 2020 has been a strange year would be a wild understatement. Never before have we been finalizing tax returns and extension calculations in mid-July. With all the changes implemented this year in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, we wanted to provide a quick summary of what is due on July 15th, 2020

If you had asked me in January what epidemiologists study, I might’ve guessed insects (entomologist) or the history of words (etymologist), or maybe even the outer layer of skin (epidermis). I still struggle pronouncing it, but after spending a few months reading, watching and listening to experts in the field, I not only understand what they study, I can also relate to some of the struggles they face. There are more similarities than you might expect between the fields of financial planning and epidemiology, so I thought I’d explore a few lessons that apply to both.

The past few months have given us all time to step back and reflect on our lives. The forced changes to our regular routines allowed us to see things from a different perspective. I’ve been thinking a lot about what I learned through this time and wanted to share some of my reflections.

While the country is starting to open back up on a limited basis, we have a long way to go before we can put the COVID-19 pandemic behind us. The complete shutdown of the global economy is just now starting to show up in the economic data. Nobody knows what a recovery will look like, how long it will take, or how many setbacks we will face before we get there. The last few months have been so full of unusual events in the investment markets, now feels like a good time to reflect on what we learned in the markets over the last couple months, with the help of some graphics.