SRI 16% Portfolio Performance

As we shared in our Mid-Year Outlook, the first half of 2025 was marked by a reversal in the “US exceptionalism” trade, with global investors trimming concentrated exposures to US assets – and the “Liberation Day” market shock adding fuel to this fire.

In the weeks after Liberation Day, global stocks rebounded sharply as growth fears surrounding US trade policy eased, and ended the first half up 10.6%. Meanwhile, gold continued to shine, and global bonds remained resilient as geopolitical tensions and policy uncertainties fueled demand for these assets.

Through these shifting dynamics, our flagship General Investing portfolios powered by StashAway have continued to deliver steady returns. They returned between 5.4% to 10.8% (or 9.3% on average) in USD terms in H1, outperforming traditional equity-bond benchmarks.

Within equities, the rotation away from “US exceptionalism” toward opportunities elsewhere was a defining theme in H1. Our allocations to these markets were the biggest contributors to performance in our higher-risk, equity-focused portfolios. For example, the ETF tracking world equities ex-US contributed up to 2.5 percentage points to total returns.

Gold continued to perform strongly in H1, rising 24% over the period and 40% over the past 12 months. This strong performance contributed around 0.8 to 2.6 percentage points to our GI portfolios’ returns, underscoring gold’s role as both a portfolio diversifier and a source of returns during periods of elevated macro uncertainty.

In fixed income, steady yields from ultra-short-duration, attractive income from high yield, price gains from longer-duration global bonds, and a weaker dollar benefiting non-US exposure all supported performance. All of this highlights the importance of diversification even within fixed income.

For a deep dive into the details, here’s our full commentary.