Can markets climb the wall of worry?

Geopolitical events have replaced Covid concerns

Many investors started off the year wondering if we were on the cusp of an economic regime change.

The world appeared to be gradually moving into a phase of "living with Covid", albeit with different countries moving at different paces. Investor concerns were centered on sharply rising inflation, looming interest rate hikes and balancing this against slowing economic growth.  This has been a significant headwind for many growth-orientated stocks, and we saw the second largest spread of value outperformance versus growth spanning the past two decades. Uncertainty has become the predominant theme of 2022 and events surrounding the Russian invasion of Ukraine have created a new sou...