January 2026 | Happy New Year & Don’t Bet the Ranch
Happy New Year from your team at Perennial Wealth Advisors!
I'll start our first newsletter of 2026 by restating some of the core beliefs that guide our planning and investment approach, and then offer a few comments about the economic/financial backdrop.
GENERAL PRINCIPLES
We are long-term, goal-focused, plan-driven investors. Our core investment policy is to pursue your goals by investing in broadly diversified portfolios of quality equities.
We believe that the economy cannot be consistently forecast, nor the markets consistently timed. Moreover, we find no predictable pattern in the way markets react to—or choose to ignore—economic developments.
We conclude from these beliefs that the only way to be reasonably confident of capturing the full premium return of equities is to ride out their frequent, sometimes significant, but historically always temporary declines.
We do not react to, much less try to anticipate, economic and/or market events. As long as your long-term goals remain unchanged, so will our plan for their achievement. And as long as our plan remains constant, so (except for timely rebalancing) will your portfolio.
We believe that long-term compounding of quality equities is the most important force guiding us toward the achievement of your goals. And we're obedient to the late Charlie Munger's dictum, “The first law of compounding is to never interrupt it unnecessarily.”
CURRENT COMMENTARY
In 2025, the broad equity market completed its third straight year of double-digit returns, driven by a strong economy and significantly increased corporate earnings. The S&P 500 ended the year up 16.4%.
The consensus of analysts' forecasts is for even stronger earnings gains approaching 15% in each of 2026 and 2027 (source: Yardeni Research).
Somewhat remarkably, profit margins have continued to expand—to 13.1% in the third quarter of 2025, the highest in 15 years (source FactSet). One would have thought that inflation in companies' costs colliding with a straitened consumer's resistance to price increases would have been a significant headwind here. So far, at least, one would have been quite wrong.
The single important weak spot has been the employment picture, which has continued to soften. But even this has its significant bright side: strong economic growth and a flattish employment situation mean that per capita productivity has been rising strongly. Unemployment may have recently hit the mid-4s%, but the other 95%-plus of the workforce is putting out significantly increased products/services per hour; that allows companies to raise wages without triggering inflation.
After multiple rate cuts, Federal Reserve monetary policy is meaningfully looser than it was a year ago, even with sticky CPI inflation still pushing three percent. It seems more than reasonable to expect the lagged effects of all this easing to begin showing up in 2026.
It would not surprise us in the least if much or most of the above salutary data come as news to you—except, of course, the part about the softening labor market, which journalism has trumpeted to the skies. In our opinion, there's good information in this for us. To wit, the economic/financial “news” we get tends to skew overwhelmingly negative by conscious design.
The fact remains that a very strongly rising equity market may (and indeed should) have taken these data into account—and maybe then some. Thus, the burning question all year long was “Are we in an AI bubble?” This replaced the previous year's burning question “When and by how much will the Fed cut rates?” Which in turn replaced 2023's “Will there be a recession?”
There was no recession, but that's beside the point. Which is that the universal burning question is usually if not always the wrong question, and a distraction to the well diversified long-term investor—like us.
There can be no question that the broad equity market is more heavily concentrated in a few huge tech stocks—which can't all be going to win the AI race—than it's ever been in our investing lifetimes. And that this concentration has the Index selling at a price/earnings multiple in the neighborhood of its historic peaks.
Our response to this is twofold: (a) Valuation is not, never was and never will be an effective market timing tool. And (b) your imminent portfolio rebalancing will address this issue forcefully.
All of this suggests to us that the next significant market shock—and there always is one; they come along with almost the frequency of the crosstown bus—will probably come out of deep left field (in the jargon, an unknown unknown, as opposed to a known unknown like valuation or the national debt). And like all the shocks past, and all those yet to come, it will have very little to do with us, other than as a potential bargain-hunting exercise.
We are following a plan that has always “worked” in the very long run, in that it has ultimately achieved the goals of investors like us. We do not accept that “this time is different” regardless of what “this” may be at any given moment. And thus, we don't adjust our strategy to accommodate the fads or fears of that moment. We don't go to cash during market panics, and we don't bet the ranch on “new era” miracles. We trust the process, and stay the course.
FRIENDLY REMINDERS
Backdoor Roth IRA Contributions – If you happen to be a high earner who has passed the phaseout limits excluding you from being able to contribute to a Roth IRA, you might be eligible to complete a “backdoor” contribution. Please reach out if you think this might apply to you.
IRAs – April 15th is the deadline to contribute to a traditional or Roth IRA for 2025. For 2026, contribution limits have been raised to $7,500, and those over 50 can add a catch-up contribution to max out at $8,500.
401(k) Catch-Up Contribution – A higher catch-up contribution limit has been added for employees aged 60-63. This limit is $11,250 as opposed to the limit of $8,000 for those 50 and over.
We wish you all a very blessed 2026. We're always here to address your questions and concerns.
Sincerely,
Brock Hedgecoke, CFP®
Financial Advisor