The U.S. Is The Worst

JC Parets

February 5, 2023

"I only trade U.S. Stocks, JC"

"If you can't find a stock in America to buy you're not looking hard enough, JC"

"I live in America, JC"

"I don't know anything about those stocks in other countries, JC"

Trust me, I hear all these things.

Not so much from you guys, as it is my friends and colleagues in the business.

I feel like readers of Allstarcharts know better, and also we have a very global audience.

So the recency bias that oozes out of most American investors, who have gotten accustomed to the U.S. being the best place to be, forgot what it's like when that's not the case.

You're talking about a decade of outperformance, and depending on how you measure it, you can even argue that's it's been a decade and half of U.S. dominance.

But believe it or not, stocks traded before 2011.

The U.S. wasn't always the global leader in equities.

Growth stocks weren't always the best place to be, and America's obnoxious over-exposure to those stocks wasn't always a blessing.

Fast forward to today, while growth stocks are the biggest losers (excluding last month), and the U.S. is the worst place to be invested.

Since October 3rd, when everything turned in favor of International Equities, the difference in returns really stands out.

The S&P500 is up 13% and the Nasdaq is up 14%.

These are very respectable returns.

But during that time Emerging Markets are up 20% and Developed Markets outside North America are up 26%.

We'll be discussing what we're going to do about this on Monday Night's Live Conference Call.

Make sure to register here if you haven't already.

Meanwhile, here's one of the things we'll be discussing.

This is our International Hall of Famers - the 100 largest companies outside the U.S. that trade on U.S. exchanges just like any other U.S. stock. They're called ADRs.

Here's the list sorted by relative strength: