In poetic fashion, every January the calendar turns, the trees go dormant, and America’s Team goes down before reaching the NFC Championship. In 2023, however, it seems increasingly likely that they won’t be alone. This year, inflation is going down like a Cowboys team in the divisional round.
Fear and greed are powerful motivators – some say the most powerful. In his book, World War Z, Max Brooks argues that fear is simply the other side of greed: the fear of missing out. Or, as our acronym-loving generation call it now: FOMO. Is Brooks right? Is our motivation always fear or the fear of missing out? Are these our most “primal” emotions? Often. Maybe even almost always. But always? Not necessarily. To illustrate, I’d like to talk about zombies. The corporate kind.
In Disney’s newest show Loki, we are introduced to variants. Variants are people who deviate from their predetermined roles in the unfolding of history. When these so-called variants arise, they are promptly dispensed with by the Time Variance Authority (TVA). Loki is one such variant, and according to the TVA he’s a threat to the unfolding of the “sacred timeline.”
“You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.” Hotel California, The Eagles
Last week it was reported that 45 people were killed while leaving a Jewish festival at Mount Meron. The annual religious festival attracts around 100,000 people. Its history dates to the Jewish resistance to Rome in the 1st century. Typical of the festival is dancing, singing, and bone fires. However, this year what began with joy and celebration quickly turned to tragedy. Although the massive crowds came a few at a time, most began leaving all at once.
The resulting crush – and the tragedy that accompanied it – was preventable. Inadequate facilities – specifically the size of the exits – were known to be a problem. But the pull of the festivities brought large numbers of people anyway. While incredibly tragic, the crush is a helpful illustration of what happens at the end of a stock market bubble. Irrational exuberance leads to the inevitable crush as everyone tries to leave the party at the same time. Today’s stock market is like investing in Hotel California. Checking out is easy – it’s leaving that’s difficult.
“The price you pay determines your future returns” is an old adage in financial literature. This is a simple way of saying that when you buy at high prices, your future returns are lower. Conversely, when you buy at low prices, your future returns are higher. Buy low, sell high. It all sounds right, but is it true? Or is this phrase just an antiquated relic of times past when money did not grow on government balance sheets, and asset prices didn’t always go up? That is a fair question, but it is not a simple one.
The absence of moral hazard is desirable because it encourages good behavior and fosters a healthy and prosperous society. Sadly, moral hazard has flooded our financial system as of late. And the responsibility for this perverse capital system lies at the feet of the dukes of moral hazard: The Federal Reserve.
In the real world there are no free lunches. There is only your lunch, or someone else’s. This assumes you don’t count the Federal Reserve’s all-you-can-eat buffet, where you get your money for nothin’ and your checks for free.
Fragile economies are incredibly vulnerable to external shocks. When an economy has very little savings, massive amounts of debt, and asset price bubbles everywhere, it doesn’t take much to plunge into a recession. The Coronavirus, as it turns out, isn’t just especially dangerous to fragile people. It’s especially dangerous to our fragile economy as well.
We too live in a “pretending age”, where in-depth evaluations of important subjects are rare. Often, shallow analysis is passed off as game-changing discoveries instead of the fodder they are for title gazers. Such is the case with the recent obituaries published for the 60/40 portfolio. When it comes to investing, there is perhaps no issue more important than asset allocation. It is, in fact, the greatest determinant for portfolio returns over time. So with that in mind, let’s discuss the death of depth in the death of the 60/40 portfolio.