Markets 2022: These 3 charts show just how bad assets performed

There was no protection for investors in the first half of the year.

There was a perfect storm of runaway inflation, slowing global growth, war, an energy crisis, and a food crisis that slammed the markets.

Jim Reid, a member of the research team atDeutsche Bank, commented on the story in a note to clients this morning. The S&P 500 has seen its worst H1 performance in 60 years. It has fallen for two quarters for the first time since the financial crisis.

Worst performance in 60 years is what it looks like. Go to the numbers.

Your portfolio is performing better if you have long safe-haven dollars and crude. The US benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) is up 39% on the year, and the dollar is far superior to the world's currency. It's good to win.

It's been a first-half to forget if you're heavily invested in any of the above.

Only one of the S&P 500 sectors is in positive territory for the year.

The group that was hardest hit was the crypto bulls. The first half of the year saw a steep fall in the price of the digital currency. Over the first six months of the year, that wasn't the worst-performing virtual coin.

The 10-year Treasury is down 9.4% on the year, and it was an ugly first half for bondholders. This is the first time in 48 years that both stocks and bonds have fallen in the same period.

The first half of the year will be described here.

• As Deutsche Bank's Reid said above, you would have had to get in a time machine and travel back to George Washington's America, to 1788, to glimpse a worse first-half for holders of the country's sovereign bonds. Charlie Bilello, founder of Compound Capital Advisors, has an even more grim assessment. He runs the numbers, and sees the bond market on track to have its worst year ever.
• The S&P's first-half performance is the sixth worst in history. It did even worse—far worse (-37%)—in 2008, the height of the global financial crisis, Bilello calculates.
• What was the worst-performing S&P stock of the first half? That achievement goes to Netflix. The streaming service is down 70.4%, year-to-date. Etsty, Align Technology, PayPal and Bath & Body Works round out the worst five of 2022.
• And which stocks make the top-five? They're all in the oil and gas sector with Occidental Petroleum leading the way, up 104.7% this year.

Looking ahead

The bear markets last about 16 months. It would suggest investors are stuck in the first half of an uncertain stretch as the odds on a recession continue to increase.

We are halfway through the bear market.