Gratitude Overflowing | Road to Recovery

Generosity: As a firm, Compass Ion Advisors seeks to model the core values we see in our clients every day, with a sincere emphasis on giving. This year especially, we have redoubled our efforts to support charitable organizations across the region.

Tomorrow is Giving Tuesday, a tradition that only began in 2012 by a non-profit of the same name. Yet it feels like a tradition that has been with us for much longer. It has quickly emerged as a global movement to encourage people to “give, collaborate and celebrate generosity.”

The Big Ideas Behind GivingTuesday from the Organization Itself:

In an era of global crisis and disconnection, we need new rituals to connect us. As the world’s largest giving movement, we believe we can go further, faster.

GivingTuesday strives to build a world in which the catalytic power of generosity is at the heart of the society we build together, unlocking dignity, opportunity and equity around the globe. We believe that generosity leads to greater civic participation and other pro-social behaviors.

Our mission is to build a more just and generous world.

Our firm and our employees have made many donations to many organizations this year through the matching gift program at Compass Ion Advisors and the firm’s commitment to share a significant share of annual profits with charities. The organizations we’ve supported include World Central Kitchen, PAR Recycle Works, Sunday Breakfast Mission, Covenant Mercies and many other civic, religious, healthcare, and environmental groups, among others.

If you would like to make a gift, setup a Donor Advised Fund, get some ideas about organizations to support or talk about how we can better plan for your philanthropic goals, we would welcome this conversation and hope you reach out.

Congratulations to Luke and Steve: On behalf of the ownership team at Compass Ion Advisors, we are proud to share with all of our clients and friends that Luke Porter and Steve Elliker are a part of the newest class of CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ practitioners. The CFP® designation is one of the most prestigious designations in the industry and exemplifies the high degree of financial planning sophistication, integrity, and client service that we expect from our team. We are excited for Luke and Steve and look forward to the value they can bring to our clients and the firm moving forward. Please join us in congratulating these two on such an important career achievement!

A Healthy Dose of Realism and a Splash of Optimism from Oxford Economics: We recommend a healthy dose of realism to go along with a splash of vaccine optimism. While the 2021 spring and summer will no doubt be brighter once the US reaches herd immunity via a broad-based diffusion of a Covid-19 vaccine, the economic situation today is distressing. The surge in new daily coronavirus cases around 180,000 and hospitalizations approaching 90,000 once again threaten to overwhelm hospitals and lead to the unfortunate loss of lives across the country. Against this backdrop, economic dynamism is fading with mobility cooling, employment slowing, and demand faltering. More than ever, we should be conscious that aggregate economic figures tell only a partial story. Real GDP will likely grow around 1.0% (or, 4.0% annualized) in Q4, after a 7.4% rebound in Q3, but the average measure will conceal weak momentum going into 2021. And, while a double dip in Q1-2021 seemed farfetched for many just a few weeks ago, it is a sad but real possibility today.

Backward-looking Economic Data are Starting to Turn as Recovery Tracker Slides: We haven’t checked in on the US Recovery Tracker in a while and thought it might help to visually show this economic fade over five of the last six weeks.

Markets March on and Dow Hits 30,000

You might ask, how in the world could we rise so far so fast?

What’s happened since then:

• Trillions of dollars in support from governments and, more importantly, central banks led to a sustained boost in confidence.
• The economic recovery has proved surprisingly resilient in certain sectors, with US home sales rising to a 14-year peak in October, while retail sales are higher than ever.
• Multiple Covid-19 vaccines appear to be both safe and effective, laying the groundwork for distribution in the coming months.

On Tuesday, a post-election bump took place in the market after President-elect Joe Biden named key members of his Cabinet—including news that former Federal Reserve Chair, Janet Yellen, would be tapped as Treasury Secretary—was enough to push the Dow past 30,000. (Remember, the market loves what it perceives as predictability.)

But the big question is whether Wall Street, in fixing its sights on the second half of 2021, is ignoring the potential for bumps in the road in the coming months. Vaccine distribution is a notoriously tricky business that will involve an unprecedented degree of global coordination. In the meantime, the coronavirus situation is only getting worse. We all hope for better days, but this could be a tough winter until the vaccine is in full swing and the temperatures rise again. As always, we stand ready to guide you through the process with our emphasis on your long-term financial wellbeing.