At the halfway point of the year, one trend clearly evident among investors is the search for resilient trades.
“This year, and even so in the last couple of weeks, we’ve just seen this idea of investors building more resiliency into their portfolios,” Matt Bartolini, head of SPDR Americas Research at State Street Global Advisors, said on a recent CNBC “ETF Edge.”
“I think many investors heading into 2025 actually had very ‘un-resilient’ portfolios,” he added.
Will this trend stay in place after the U.S. stock market’s big comeback from the April lows?
At the first half’s closing low on April 8, the S&P 500 was down 15% year-to-date, according to CNBC data. At its closing high last Friday, the index was up 5% YTD.
That could lead investors to pile back into U.S. stocks. Bartolini noted that the trend of investing in international stocks over the past six months was a departure for many U.S. investors who previously concentrated on the U.S. market alone. He expects international diversification to stick around.
“We saw greater inflows into non-U.S. equities than their market share would indicate, and I think that trend will likely continue in the second half,” Bartolini said.
Geopolitical uncertainty, such as in the Middle East, has the potential to change the course of markets in ways that can’t be expected, and that is one more reason mitigating risk is on many investors’ minds right now.
“You shouldn’t react to intraday news,” said John Davi, CIO at Astoria Portfolio Advisors, on “ETF Edge.” “You should have thoughtful portfolio construction to plan for periods of uncertainty,” he said.
Davi said 2025’s first half was a period for the construction of a multi-asset, all-weather portfolio, including assets like gold and commodities. But where they go next is difficult to say given the recent Mideast conflict.
Commodities are usually safe trades during periods of uncertainty, said Davi, mentioning oil and gold.
Gold reached a record high this year, but has slipped over the past month even with the Israel-Iran conflict unsettling markets. Oil, meanwhile, sold off during the recent conflict in a way that few expected, and in contrast to typical oil price increases during conflicts in the Middle East.
Davi said while the recent dips in gold and oil were notable, there is not enough data to question whether the role these assets have played during times of volatility is changing. As the second half of the year begins, he said, “It’s too early to tell” how oil and gold will trend, and investors should not place too much emphasis on the recent trading headwinds for these assets.
Watch the video above to learn more about where Bartolini and Davi see the markets headed in the second half of 2025.
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