market sentiment

Parrots and Canaries

© Can Stock Photo / bugphai

Once upon a time, canaries were used as a warning system for the buildup of toxic gases in coal mines. Death of the canary served as a warning to get out. These birds may be more popular now in the writings of market commentators than they ever were for mine safety.

A different bird might make a more useful metaphor. The Monty Python comedy troupe once performed a dialogue between a disgruntled customer and a pet shop owner. The customer was attempting to return a Norwegian Blue Parrot, which had apparently been dead when purchased.

The pet shop owner contends that the bird is resting, or stunned, or perhaps pining for the fjords. He attempts to distract the customer with praise for the bird’s beautiful plumage. The customer lets loose with an extensive string of euphemisms for death. “He has ceased to be! Bereft of life, kicked the bucket, shuffled off this mortal coil, run down the curtain, joined the choir invisible.”

The Norwegian blue may make a better analogy than the canary in the coal mine for financial markets.

Why? When the canary died, nobody debated it, or even suggested finishing out the shift down in the mine. But the death of the parrot was the subject of a long argument. That is what happens in the financial markets. For any product or security or market index you can find opinions on both sides at any time. BUY! SELL! BUY! SELL!

There are parts of the investment universe where certain commentary seems to us like someone saying “beautiful plumage” about a dead parrot. And, to be fair, there are other sectors which we believe are resting, or stunned, or perhaps pining for the fjords. Think of how a market optimist must have sounded in March of 2009 at the stock market bottom.

As contrarian investors, we typically hold some unpopular opinions. We believe profit potential lives where there are gaps between consensus perception and unfolding reality. So we do not really want everybody to agree with us—we cannot all be contrarians! We make no guarantees, but this is how we strive to do things here.

Clients, if you would like to talk about either “the canary in the coal mine” or “the parrot in the pet shop,” email us or call.

The opinions voiced in this material are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual.

All investing involves risk including loss of principal. No strategy assures success or protects against loss.

 

Simply Effective: Avoiding Stampedes

© Can Stock Photo / dgphotography

“Avoiding stampedes” may be the simplest and most straightforward of our three fundamental principles of investing. Let’s talk about what it means.

In our view, a stampede in the markets has two features: large volumes of money changing hands, and irrational pricing. Information, evidence and indications about money flows are readily available. The assessment of pricing is necessarily more subjective.

At the time, many believe that prices make sense—or they would not be where they are. Technology and internet stocks in early 2000, homes in 2007, and commodities in 2011 all fit that pattern. At the peak, some true believers thought there was significant room for further increases. Only with the benefit of hindsight is it obvious that things were out of whack.

These examples are all about stampedes into a sector. Money also stampedes out of things at times, as we know. Stocks during the last financial crisis and high yield energy bonds near the bottom in oil prices in early 2016 are prime examples.

You may recognize a pattern. The habit of avoiding stampedes is a contrarian approach to investing—going against the crowd. If everybody else is doing it, we probably don’t want to.

In fact, if everybody else is doing one thing, we may seek to do the opposite.
Behavioral economics lends support to our practice, in our opinion. Much work in that field purports to show that most people do the wrong thing at the wrong time, thereby hurting their returns. Doing better than average would seem to require doing the opposite of what most people do.

(Of course, no method or system or theory is guaranteed to work, or even to perform the same in the future as it has in the past. And putting a theory into practice may be difficult to do.)

In practice, being a contrarian can be lonely. The crowd at the diner is unlikely to endorse doing what nobody else seems to be doing. We don’t care—we are striving to make investment returns, not please the crowd.

Clients, if you would like to talk about this or anything else, please email us or call.

The opinions voiced in this material are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual. All performance referenced is historical and is no guarantee of future results.

All investing involves risk including loss of principal. No strategy assures success or protects against loss.

Bonds are subject to market and interest rate risk if sold prior to maturity. Bond values will decline as interest rates rise and bonds are subject to availability and change in price.

Fear and Greed

© Can Stock Photo / Andreus

Two of the primary emotions affecting the stock market, it is said, are fear and greed.

Facts and figures are prominent in our work of assessing and ranking various investment opportunities. But in the day to day action of any market, buyers and sellers and their motivations have an oversize impact.

In our view, fear has dominated most of the last eight years in the US stock market. Many investors sold out after the double drubbings beginning in 2000 and in 2007. Money flows from retail investors, reflecting withdrawals from the market in most recent years, seem to confirm it.

Anecdotally, we also noticed burgeoning interest in strategies that hoped to avoid exposure to the stock market yet still make money. Commodities, derivatives, factor investing, bonds at low interest rates and other fads drew in a lot of money. This, we believe, reflected fear of the stock market.

For much of the market rise since 2009, it was said to be ‘the most hated rally in history’ because so many people missed out.

Knowing Warren Buffett’s famous dictum, “Be greedy when others are fearful, and fearful when others are greedy,” we stayed the course through the downturn. None of us hated this rally, did we?

Now the market sits at all-time highs. This probably makes sense when earnings are high and rising, and interest rates remain fairly low. But we are on the lookout for signs that greed has become the dominant force in the market. When others become greedy, perhaps we need to become fearful.

We are also doing other things, as well. You may have noticed winning positions getting trimmed back, and potential new bargains (we hope!) being added to portfolios. Owning bargains is no guarantee against loss, but we believe it helps. We are also nibbling at other markets in other lands, ones that have lagged and may be at low levels.

Our new portfolio design, accommodating layers of cash and more moderate investments as well as our traditional research-driven core layer, is another way to attempt to mitigate future downside.

The markets go up and down. We cannot build wealth over the long haul without facing that, and living with it. If you would like to talk about your portfolio or situation in detail, please call or email us.

The opinions voiced in this material are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual.

Stock investing involves risk including loss of principal.

Bonds are subject to market and interest rate risk if sold prior to maturity. Bond values will decline as interest rates rise and bonds are subject to availability and change in price.

International investing involves special risks such as currency fluctuation and political instability and may not be suitable for all investors. These risks are often heightened for investments in emerging markets.