I Thought The 60/40 Portfolio Was Dead??

At least that’s what the financial media was saying in 2022 when the 60/40 was having its worst year in past 50 years, returning -17.8%.

But then the U.S. markets do what they do. They bounced back.
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In 2023 the 60/40 portfolio returned +17%.

In 2024 the 60/40 portfolio has returned +14% through 9/30.
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Over the past 50 years the annual growth rate of the 60/40 portfolio was 9.5%.

Since 1972, the max drawdown of a 60/40, peak to trough, was -28.5%. This occurred during the oil crisis of ’73-’74. If you bought at the peak in Jan’73, your money would be underwater until 3 years later, Jan’76. However, if you stayed the course, you were rewarded with +22% return for 1976.
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The graph below shows how rare it has been for both stocks and bonds to underperform that badly over the past 50 years. In fact, the return of the 60/40 portfolio in 2023 and 2024 are much closer to the historical average.
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Scatterplot of the return of stocks and bonds for different years.