Brighton Jones Q2 2026 Investment Update

Looking at the trailing one-year returns from Q3-2025 through Q2-2026, it is worth pausing on what investors actually had to live through to earn those results. Read more here.

Our second quarter investment update offers a snapshot of how investments have performed, addresses common client questions, and examines the key themes shaping today’s news and tomorrow’s investment landscape. Periodic Table of Asset Class Returns About this chart: This chart illustrates the performance of core public market segments for the prior four quarters and for the trailing one-year period. Each segment is represented by a different color and ranked from highest to lowest return for each period.

This information is provided for illustrative purposes only and does not represent the performance of any Brighton Jones client portfolio. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Key takeaways: Looking at the trailing one-year returns from Q3-2025 through Q2-2026, it is worth pausing on what investors actually had to live through to earn those results.

Positive returns rarely come in a straight line, and this stretch was no exception. Investors entered the period still recovering from the Liberation Day tariff selloff of April 2025, which had sent the U.S. stock market down nearly 20% and produced no shortage of unsettling headlines. Then, in late February of this year, joint U.S. and Israeli military strikes on Iran and the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz introduced a fresh wave of uncertainty.

Brent crude roughly doubled, climbing from $61 per barrel at the start of the year to nearly $120 at its peak. The 10-year Treasury yield rose from around 4.0% to nearly 4.5%, inflation accelerated to 4.2%, its highest level in three years, and gold fell sharply from January’s record high, posting its worst quarter in more than a decade. And yet, despite that backdrop, every asset class shown on this chart delivered a positive return over the past twelve months.

International equity gained approximately 27%, U.S. equity gained nearly 24%, and credit-oriented bond sectors delivered healthy premiums over cash. Perhaps most surprising of all, U.S. stocks posted their best quarter since the post-pandemic rebound of 2020, and it arrived in the middle of a war, an oil shock, and renewed talk of Fed rate hikes rather than cuts. That is often how investing works in real life.

The path can feel uncomfortable in the moment, even when the longer-term outcome ends up being favorable. The investors best served over the past year were the ones who didn’t let the headlines make their decisions. Data Disclosures: Treasury Money Market: Fidelity Treasury Money Market.

Short-Term Bond Index: Vanguard Short-Term Bond Index. Total Bond Market Index: Vanguard Total Bond Market Index. Inflation-Protected Treasuries: Vanguard Inflation-Protected Securities.

Multisector Bond Strategy: PIMCO Income. Floating Rate Bonds: Fidelity Floating Rate. High Yield Bonds: PIMCO High Yield.

Preferred Securities: Nuveen Preferred Securities. U.S. Stocks: DFA US Core Equity I. Foreign Stocks: DFA World ex US Core Equity. Global Real Estate: DFA Global Real Estate.

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