Risk on! Much like the superhero Human Torch’s “Flame on!” battle cry, stock funds turned up the heat in the fourth quarter after investors’ hopes were doused in the third.
As worries about inflation began to subside in the quarter, the
S&P 500 index
surged 7.6%. Value stocks trounced growth again, with the
S&P 500 Value index
up 14% and
S&P 500 Growth
1.5%. Exposure to the winners was easily accessible for fund investors via the popular
iShares Core S&P 500
(ticker: IVV) and
SPDR Portfolio S&P 500 Value
(SPYV) exchange-traded funds. Still, for the entire year, the iShares S&P 500 ETF was down 18%, and the market got bumpy in December, falling 5.8% that month.