The market has four cycles: Early cycle, Mid cycle, Late cycle and recession. Currently I think we are late cycle heading towards recession unless their is an end to the war soon. The oil shocks are too large. During late cycle Energy, Utilities, and Consumer Staples are what perform the best historically. Energy(XLE) is up 31.89% YTD. We could see little more upside as war continues. However at a certain point there will be demand destruction. Utilities(XLU) is up 8.01% YTD. Consumer Staples (XLP) is up 4.87% YTD.
If you think recession is next Utilities and Healthcare is what historically performs the best. Bonds and cash alsp preform well in recession.
If you think Early cycle is next and not recession then small caps, technology and financials usually perform best. Early cycle requires low interest rates. Based on fed meetings I don't see any major cuts this year. The fed is usually behind the curve and the fed funds rate usually follows the two year. The two year is currently 3.846% The fed funds rate is 3.64% they are targeting 3.5 - 3.75%. Outside of the US there are talks of other countries raising their rates to fight inflation.
Based on historical data and current rates I think the best performing stocks in the short term will be Utilities and that will extend if the war drags on. If you are an investor and don't need the money anytime soon I would lean towards tech that has large moats and great balance sheets. Their valuations have come down and you want to buy low and sell high. They could go down a lot more, but if you dca in it should be very profitable once we go into early cycle because you will catch all the rotation back into tech.
Watch interest rates and that will help determine where we are going. Watching the dollar also helps. A strong dollar means utilities, defensive stocks, defensive contractors, and bonds do well. A weak dollar means multi-national tech/industrials, commodities(gold), emerging markets, consumer staples do well. The dollar weakened at a rapid pace earlier this year and those sectors performed well. Since the war started the dollar strengthened and reversed that trend.
We have been in a very low interest rate environment for so long that investors have seen great returns and only invested in tech. The sp500 is 28-33% tech and only 3-4% energy and 2-3% utilities. if we go into recession and sp500 sells off that means tech with the higher weighting gets hit hard. I recommend you look at macro events and position your portfolio accordingly if you want to beat the market.