This has been a year filled with bad economic news, including high inflation, surging gas prices and a dive in stock values. However, four months into the year at least, financial advisors on a global level remained confident that the S&P 500 would end up positive this year.

That's according to a survey taken by Boston-based Natixis in March and April.

Natixis has been surveying advisors globally for about 10 years to gauge their temperature about the markets. In its most recent survey, which was conducted in April, the firm spoke with 2.700 global advisors with about 270 based in the U.S. 

"The biggest surprise for me was the high level of optimism, but it was the same as what we saw two years ago,” said Dave Goodsell, executive director at the Natixis Center for Investor Insight. “Advisors know that they have the tools to manage their investments and their clients.”

The survey found that most believe that the S&P 500 will see a gain of more than four percent. Meanwhile, they are anticipating growth in double digits when it comes to new and next-generation clients. 

The stock market has suffered selloffs since the survey was conducted, but Goodsell speculated that the confidence seen in the study could still be there, although perhaps tempered a bit.

“The odds are that continued market losses and the threat of recessions would moderate their expectations, but I don’t think it would totally reverse sentiment—especially since it was pretty bleak when we went in field,” he said.

Only 24% of advisors surveyed were worried about valuation and only 9% were worried about the Covid pandemic.

Goodsell speculated that advisors saw the economy crash significantly in the early months of the pandemic in 2020, but then saw an almost equal recovery soon after and they are using that as an example of what could happen this year.

Advisors are turning more toward model portfolios, with around 93% saying that they are using them.

More than half, or 54% of those surveyed, said they use their own model, while 26% are using a firm model and 20% are using a model created by a third party. 

Around 72% of advisors said the primary question they receive from clients is about the impact inflation will have on their portfolio. Meanwhile, around 56% reported that they want to know how to minimize tax liability and fees on their investments.