How Stock Market Sectors Depend on the Business Cycle

For patient investors with time horizons of years and decades, the primary drivers of portfolio returns are not day-to-day market fluctuations but the business cycle and other longer-term trends. One reason that questions around inflation, the Fed, and geopolitics have resulted in market swings is that they shed light on where we might be in the cycle. Additionally, the business cycle impacts not only the broader stock market and interest rates, but individual sectors as well. What can long-term investors do to maintain perspective and stay on track to achieving their investment objectives?