Beyond the Noise: Five Principles You Should Know When Investing

Recent times have given investors plenty to talk about.

If 2025 was marked by the tariff war and uncertainty about the future of international trade, 2026 has been no different: the conflict with Iran sent geopolitical tensions and oil prices soaring, triggering declines of close to 8% in the S&P 500 and 10% in the EuroStoxx in just three weeks in March. At the same time, we have seen historic IPOs, with SpaceX grabbing headlines and Anthropic and OpenAI on the way, fuelling enthusiasm around artificial intelligence.

It is a reminder that markets constantly react to new information: sometimes with fear, sometimes with euphoria.

And yet, portfolios have held up

Despite all these bumps in the road—first tariffs, then war—the overall outcome has been reasonably good. The main stock market indices ended June up around 8% for the year, emerging markets stood out with even stronger gains, and fixed income also delivered positive returns. In fact, we have just reported excellent returns for our portfolios as of the end of June 2026, marking their best first half of the year in five years, precisely against a backdrop of war, an oil crisis and sharp swings in interest-rate expectations.

Those who sold at the worst point in March missed a double-digit recovery in just a few weeks. Those who stuck to their plan captured it without doing anything.

It is yet another demonstration that headlines and returns do not always go hand in hand, and that the greatest risk for a long-term investor is often not volatility itself, but their own reaction to it.

The five principles that do not change

While headlines change from one week to the next, the principles of good investing remain remarkably stable and are relatively simple to understand:

• Set clear goals: knowing why you are investing and when you will need the money is the starting point for any plan.
• Build an emergency fund: before thinking about investing, it is essential to have a liquid and stable financial safety net. This fund is there to cover unexpected expenses (repairs, medical costs, temporary loss of income) without having to take on debt or, worse still, sell your long-term investments when markets are falling. If you do not have an emergency fund, you should not consider investing yet; it is the foundation that will allow you to stay the course and sleep soundly when volatility arrives.
• Keep your portfolio(s) diversified and aligned with your goals and personal circumstances: the right combination of equities and fixed income depends on your risk profile and investment horizon, not on the news of the day. Once you have your emergency fund in place, separate your financial life into meaningful goals if necessary: this will give purpose to the way you invest and help you navigate market ups and downs more effectively.
• Keep costs low: every euro you do not pay in fees remains invested and continues working for your future. It is also one of the few factors investors can fully control.
• Stay disciplined: once you have designed your plan, stick to it through both market rises and falls. Review it once a year or only when your circumstances genuinely change.

Copiar

A note of caution

That said, resilience should not be confused with invulnerability. Markets are trading close to all-time highs, this year’s gains have been extraordinarily concentrated in a handful of sectors linked to artificial intelligence, and it has been some time since we experienced a prolonged correction. Recent scares have been resolved within weeks rather than months or years, which can create a false sense that the market “always bounces back quickly”.

We are not saying this to cause alarm, but to help investors prepare.

There is another principle that does not change.

Corrections are a normal and inevitable part of investing: historically, they occur on average every one or two years, and deeper bear markets can take years to recover from. When the next one arrives, it will not be an anomaly, but rather the usual price investors pay for earning long-term returns. The best way to deal with it is not to try to anticipate it, but to have already built a portfolio with a level of risk you can sustain even during difficult periods.

If a 20% fall in your portfolio would keep you awake at night, the time to adjust your risk profile is now, while markets are calm, not in the middle of the storm.

Looking beyond today’s headlines

History shows that successful investing is rarely about predicting what will happen tomorrow. It is almost always about keeping your goals in sight and maintaining a disciplined approach in the face of market conditions that are, by their very nature, constantly changing.

That is why at inbestMe we build globally diversified, indexed and low-cost portfolios tailored to your risk profile: so you do not have to get the timing right, but simply stay invested.

None of us can control geopolitical events or short-term market movements. But we can control how we respond to them, how much we pay in fees and how much risk we take.

Thank you for continuing to place your trust in inbestMe. Whatever the headlines may bring, we will continue to support you throughout your journey as an investor.