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Six Weeks. New Highs.
Hoxton Blog • Six Weeks. New Highs.
Six weeks ago, the S&P 500 was down nearly 10% for the year, and the headlines were apocalyptic. Today, the index sits at a record high. The NASDAQ is up 11.4% year-to-date. Corporate profits are growing at the fastest pace in five years. And a peace deal with Iran is on the table.
If you spent March worrying, you were not alone. If you sold, you missed it. And the data this week makes the same point it has made in every cycle since 1950: the investors who do best are not the ones who time the noise. They are the ones who stay in the game.
Here is what happened, what it means, and why the boring strategy is, once again, the winning one.
1. The Six Weeks That Just Happened
On 6 March, oil surged more than 20% in two trading days as the Iran conflict escalated. By 8 April, the NASDAQ was deep in correction territory, and the S&P 500 had given back its 2026 gains. Then a ceasefire was announced. Markets turned on a dime.
Year-to-date (YTD) Total Return of the S&P 500, Sow Jones Industrial Average, and NASDAQ Composite
Look at where the lines are now: NASDAQ +11.4%, S&P 500 +8.0%, Dow +4.4%. Look at where they were six weeks ago. The recovery did not wait for the headlines to feel safe. It started before anyone called the bottom, and it carried on while most commentators were still warning about what could go wrong next.
This is how markets actually work. Not in the orderly, predictable way the news cycle implies, but in jumps and lurches that punish the impatient and reward the patient.
2. The Chart Every Long-Term Investor Should Frame
There have been seven prior episodes since 1986 when oil surged 20%+ over two trading days. The market has lived this story before.
S&P 500 1-Year Forward Return Following 2-Day Oil Surges of 20%+
“In six of seven oil shocks since 1986, the S&P 500 was higher one year later. The average return was 24%.”
The single negative case was September 2008, when oil was the side story to the worst banking crisis in eighty years. Strip that out, and every other oil shock — the 1991 Gulf War, the 1998 Asian crisis, the COVID collapse of 2020 — was followed by strong, broad equity gains.
What this chart cannot tell you is whether 2026 will follow the pattern. What it can tell you is that the impulse to sell during an oil shock has been, statistically, one of the most expensive instincts in modern investing.
Two months on, the S&P 500 is already up 9.3% from the 6 March surge. That is not the end of a recovery. It is, on the historical evidence, often closer to the start of one.
3. The Story Underneath the Headlines
While the news cycle has been dominated by Iran and oil, something quieter has been happening: corporate America has just delivered its best earnings quarter in half a decade.
When Q1 reporting began in April, analysts expected S&P 500 earnings to grow about 13%. With roughly two-thirds of companies now reported, actual growth is running at 27.1%. That is more than double the forecast and the strongest quarter since the post-pandemic recovery in 2021.
The texture matters as much as the headline:
- 84% of companies have beaten earnings forecasts, the highest beat rate since 2021.
- Profit margins have hit 13.4%, the highest level since 2009.
- Seven sectors are reporting double-digit growth: Communication Services +53%, Information Technology +50%, Consumer Discretionary +39%.
This is not a story about a few mega-cap technology companies carrying everyone else. It is broad, it is durable, and it is happening during a war and an oil shock. The companies in your portfolio are not waiting for ideal conditions. They are compounding through imperfect ones, which is exactly when the gap opens up between owners and traders.
4. A Fed Transition Without the Drama
Jerome Powell's term as Federal Reserve Chair ends on 15 May. Kevin Warsh, his successor, cleared the Senate Banking Committee and is expected to be confirmed in a full Senate vote next week.
Markets have known this was coming for months. They have priced it. Warsh served on the Fed during the 2008 crisis. He is a known quantity. Whatever your views on politics, the institutional machinery is functioning, and the transition is happening calmly.
There have been eleven Federal Reserve Chairs since 1951. Markets have compounded through every one of them. Long-term investors do not need a view on the twelfth.
5. The Week at a Glance
| Headline | Why It Matters to a Long-Term Investor |
|---|---|
| Iran peace memo | The biggest market overhang of 2026 is starting to lift. Lower oil → lower inflation → cuts back on the table. |
| Earnings: 27% growth | The strongest quarter of corporate profits in five years. The companies you own are doing the work. |
| Oil drops below $100 | Brent fell sharply on deal hopes. The pressure point on global inflation is easing. |
| New Fed Chair | Kevin Warsh on track to take over on 15 May. Orderly, expected, already priced in. |
| S&P 500 at records | Up 8% YTD despite a war, an oil shock, and a Fed transition. This is what resilience looks like. |
6. The Boring Truth That Built Most of the World's Wealth
Every great fortune in public markets has been built the same way. Not by predicting the next headline. Not by trading around volatility. By owning quality businesses, reinvesting the dividends, and letting time do its work.
The numbers below are what patience actually delivers in the S&P 500:
• Hold for one day: average return ~0%
• Hold for one year: average return ~9%
• Hold for ten years: average return ~116%
• Hold for twenty years: average return ~322%
Average S&P 500 Returns Over Various Holding Periods
These figures span every war, every recession, every oil shock, every political crisis, and every Fed transition since 1950. The cost of those returns is tolerating periods that feel like 6 March. The reward is the compounding that builds generational wealth.
The investors who do best in this game are not the cleverest. They are the most patient.
Our Message This Week
A war is moving toward a ceasefire. Earnings are at their strongest in half a decade. Markets are at record highs. Six weeks ago, almost none of this looked likely.
That is the lesson, not the news. The future never looks safe at the moment of opportunity, and it rarely looks dangerous at the top. The only reliable strategy is the unglamorous one: own quality, stay invested, ignore the noise, give it time.
“The big money is not in the buying and selling, but in the waiting.” ~ Charlie Munger
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