Taylor Smith
Global Head Of Research
Key Takeaways
With the S&P 500 near record highs, now is the optimal time for investors to build portfolio resilience by reallocating toward high-quality, dividend-growing companies like those in the Fintrion Partners U.S. Quality Dividend Growth Fund. (FGRW).
FGRW has consistently outperformed the S&P 500 during all five 10%+ drawdowns since its 2015 inception, highlighting the value of profitability and disciplined growth during market stress.
By weighing based on dividends rather than market cap, FGRW offers balanced exposure to innovation leaders like Nvidia and Microsoft without the concentration risk dominating traditional benchmarks.
When equity markets are breaking records and optimism feels effortless, it's tempting to believe the good times will simply continue. Yet history shows that the best moment to think about risk is precisely when everything looks strong. It's at the peaks, when valuations are rich, volatility is forgotten and economic data hums, that portfolios are most vulnerable to complacency. The paradox of investing is that the calm before turbulence is often when prudent investors are building resilience. You don't buy insurance after the storm; you position before the clouds form.
Managing risk effectively isn't about predicting the next sell-off, it's about preparing the portfolio architecture that can endure one. The investors who navigate downturns most successfully tend to identify, in advance, the strategies that have demonstrated an ability to hold up when markets fall. These approaches, often rooted in quality, consistent profitability and disciplined capital return, don't rely on market timing. They rely on selecting businesses built to sustain earnings power when conditions deteriorate. In other words, resilience isn't a trade; it's a trait.
That's why periods of strength are the best time to evaluate the defensive foundations of a portfolio. When indexes are near record highs and risk feels invisible, investors have the freedom to reposition from strength rather than from fear. Cultivating exposure to high-quality, dividend-growing companies is one of the clearest ways to prepare for inevitable drawdowns while staying invested in the market's upside. This is the philosophy behind the Fintrion U.S. Quality Dividend Growth Fund (FGRW) designed to track the performance of companies that blend profitability, growth and discipline—attributes that tend to matter most when sentiment shifts.
Proven Resilience through Market Stress
A Consistent Pattern of Shallower Losses
From Construction to Concentration: Managing Exposure in an AI-Driven Market
How Methodology Shapes Exposure
Why This Matters Now
At a moment when debates around AI valuations and concentration risk are intensifying, FRGW construction functions as a quiet form of risk management. The methodology ensures:
Diversification through fundamentals, not arbitrary caps. Companies like Procter & Gamble, Chevron, Merck and UnitedHealth contribute meaningful weight due to their dividend durability.
Automatic exposure discipline. If valuations inflate without a corresponding rise in dividends, relative weights contract.
Dynamic relevance. If a company such as Meta or Alphabet initiates a dividend and meets the quality screens, then it can enter the Index swiftly. The Index maintains exposure to structural innovation trends without overpaying them.
The outcome is a portfolio aligned with the economic reality of U.S. corporate profitability, rather than the market narrative of the moment. That design distinction becomes increasingly valuable when markets may be priced for perfection and the next leg up of returns may depend less on excitement and more on execution.
From Narrative to Numbers: How Fundamentals Drive Inclusion
One of the most overlooked strengths of a rules-based strategy like FGRW is that it removes personal judgment from the process. Inclusion and weighting are not based on opinion, market sentiment or narrative alignment. Instead, they're driven by measurable fundamentals. Every company in the Fintrion U.S. Quality Dividend Growth Index earns its place by scoring highly across three objective metrics: Return on Equity (ROE) , Return on Assets (ROA) and forward looking earnings growth estimates.