Division One Finance’s Total Return Index & Retirement Index proves strong yet again, outperforming the S&P 500 in the month of April. Q1 was a strong quarter for the index and Q2 is off to a great start. Outperformance is one of the perks of sticking to the fundamentals, investing in strong businesses that have value and never following analysts on Wall Street.

The concept for the index was developed back in 2018 and was finally completed in 2022. The current index consists of 200 companies, all hand picked using a quantitative and fundamental model that is unique to the Division One Finance Total Return & Retirement Index. Some day we hope to have the index be a consideration for 401K and other retirement plans We feel as if other indexes don’t give individuals what we give them… a chance to compound interest and retire early as a result of consistently competitive returns.

Thus far the index has shown tremendous strength during downturns in the market, proving value investing is very much still alive and fundamentals still matter. Many investors who believe fundamentals don’t play a role in today’s market are among the average TipRanks investors. They are overweight tech in a peak economy, lacking investments in energy and other key sectors, highly speculative and ended the month of April down -14.6% as a result.

The key question now becomes how does the index perform in the face of rising rates, which thus far it has handled very well. Over 50% of the companies in Division One’s Total Return Index still have earnings to report this quarter, so it will be an interesting series of trading days to come. Tomorrow the Fed kicks off another two day meeting to discuss raising rates to deter further inflation.

The team at Division One Finance remains confident that we have chosen the right firms to weather the storm. Although the index is not yet publicly available we have begun to roll out access to smaller groups of individuals and continue to teach the fundamentals that drive the index to our Stock Market Academy students. As of today we will deliver a monthly report to the public, detailing the performance and our outlook for the market. Those interested can join myself (D’ron Forbes) and the rest of the Division One Finance team as we host spaces on Clubhouse via the Stock Market Academy, discussing the market daily.