Carson Block of @muddywatersre writing in the FT lays the blame of stonk gyrations like GameStop (sub $20 on 12 Jan, up 18-fold in 10 trading days) squarely on low rates and passive investing.
This is Hogwash, Blatherskite, Buncombe, and Taradiddle.
It was 1 stock out of tens of thousands in the world which moved that way and has become a meme unto itself of fantabulous stock and social movement.
Carson talks briefly about low rates and government bailouts, which theoretically should affect the others.
But then he falls into the trap that many others who do not understand passive investing do.
This is NOT how passive investing works.
To be clear: if a passive fund owns $1bn of stock of an index which has a Sum (Stock Float Shares x Price) of $1trn, that fund will own 1/1000 of the float shares of each stock.
If the price of 1 stock rises 23-fold in 11 days, passive investors will do...
exactly nothing.
If the rise in that 1 stock leads to the index float market cap moving to $1.02trln, then if the fund receives an extra $100mm, it will go buy exactly $100mm/1.02trln of the float of each stock in the index (i.e. just under 1bp - of EACH stock - Apple, AMZN, and GME).
He then pays homage to the work done by Michael Green of Logica Funds, which is indeed quite important in explaining the over-arching issues of the impact of passive fund flows on markets, but he adds this point, which is of dubious value.
Yes passive funds "have to buy more" the same way that if the price of a meal at your favorite restaurant goes up, you have to spend more $ for it (duh). But if you still go the same number of times per year, it does not change what percentage of their annual covers you consume.
The price you pay goes up, but there is zero incremental squeeze. Your 1x/quarter is still 1x/quarter.
The way that works for passive flows for most major indices around the world is as below:
Stocks of differing prices and float shares outstanding combine to make up a total, and you own a percentage of the total, therefore you own the same percentage of float of each stock as in the green section on the right.
IF Stock 1 rises 23-fold in 11 days the weight of that stock in the index is highly likely to go up, and let's say there are $10mm of new inflows. More of the $10mm will go to Stock 1 (the same way more of your disposable income might go to your favorite restaurant for 1 meal/yr)
but in the grand scheme of things, you will still buy the same percent of float of Stock 1 as you will of other stocks.
If you go to the restaurant once a year, you will not consume more of their capacity (float) compared to other restaurants just because they raised prices.
You will buy the same portion of float of Stock 1 as you buy of all the other stocks when incremental flow comes in.
And if Stock 1 rises 23-fold and no inflows come in, the portfolio weight increases...
BUT THERE IS NO ADDITIONAL BUYING JUST BECAUSE IT WENT UP.
There are a few more problems.
I can assure Carson that lower contributions to 401Ks does not mean passive funds have to sell. That's not the way the arithmetic works.
To be sure, if there is a giant macro hit to the economy, some people may sell stocks, ETFs, funds, etc
but that has not been different than prior macro risk-off situations. Markets go up and markets go down.
His penultimate paragraph is odd.
Yes, one should not ignore societal impacts of bubbles. But the rest of the first para there does not necessarily follow.
Passive funds introduce distortions, but if the three major players became 300 with the same assets because fund size was capped by law, that would... mean nothing?
As to "markets' contributions to instability" it is not clear to what instability markets contribute. Their own?
As to the impact of rates on all this... I can pretty much guarantee that the fact of near-zero rates did not CAUSE Gamestop to rise 23-fold in 11 trading days.
One could argue that the far-outlying events become more dramatic under zero-interest rate environments, but we have
a very small sample set and who is to say if rates were 2% we would not be seeing the same events. Prove it.
I get the urge to use a widely observed phenomenon to raise one's voice.
If it's rates, talk about broader impact.
If passive is the problem, do it right.
If markets are too rich, say so, but all the factors noted existed before GME went above $20 less than 1mo ago.
If less expert policymakers need expert input, it needs to be better than that.
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broken EVERY SINGLE trade agreement which was in place between the US and other countries, before him or which he, himself, signed, including USMCA which was "maybe the greatest deal ever done."
Donald Trump has, for decades, been a fan of tariffs. He ran on it. He put tariffs
on allies. He put tariffs on Australia, which has zero tariffs on the US and with which the US runs a trade surplus. He demands tariff cuts from Japan which runs lower average tariffs on US goods than the US used to run on its imports. He put tariffs on penguins.
Just getting around to the USTR Section 301 hearings on the Proposed Action in Section 301 Investigation of China's Targeting of the Maritime, Logistics, and Shipbuilding Sectors for Dominance.
Like the USTR report released in Jan, it is something of a disaster. 500+ pgs of it.
There are people who support (politicians, labour unions, ports, dockworkers, steel companies, etc).
They almost all use the same talking points from the USTR report which were... wrong. They were factually incorrect in the USTR report and they were the same, or worse in the
hearings. The common trope is that shipbuilding 50 years ago was such that the US was the dominant global shipbuilder, and shipbuilders once employed X number of people. This was destroyed by CCP policies to achieve dominance in shipbuilding, and those policies started in 2006.
because people trade using a dollar denominated price. It is based on where the end profit is allocated to as savings.
If a European company buys 1mm bbl of oil from Aramco, first EUCo uses Euro to buy USD. Gives to Aramco who gives it to Shipper (who EUCo has also paid USD)
And a couple weeks later, EUCo takes delivery in, say, Hamburg. They pay euros to unload it, spend euros to operate their refinery, spend euros to transport diesel to a factory using a backup diesel generator. That company buys the diesel in euros, then burns it, making power
@BlankBl23041510 @Citrini7 1) I don't think the market believes they will last as set. 2) There are many paths. 3) One path is simply a LOT lower consumption. 4) Over even a medium-term, if the system put in place has permanence of intention, it leads to capital controls (i.e. lower real yields)
@BlankBl23041510 @Citrini7 but basically, if you have partial or full capital controls and lower real yields, that's simply financial repression by the state - financed by low returns on capital and less choice.
To get from A to B, there are a finite number of outlets and offsets.
@Citrini7 Americans consume less (because they save more). They produce more to consume what they cut off from the outside world. Jobs which were related to consumption become jobs related to production. All fine. The savings finance the part of the govt deficit no longer financed by
@Citrini7 Ask yourself what you think a reserve currency is.
Is it the fact of a stock of financial assets in a currency?
Or is it a propensity to have a flow?
If the trade deficit (flow) immediately goes to zero, the stock remains unchanged.
Other flows shift. Americans net save.
@Citrini7 Americans consume less (because they save more). They produce more to consume what they cut off from the outside world. Jobs which were related to consumption become jobs related to production. All fine. The savings finance the part of the govt deficit no longer financed by
@Citrini7 foreign flows, but until the budget deficit falls to the level of the current trade deficit, there’s an excess which has to be funded by someone (as a flow). If that is funded by foreigners, you still have the same ‘reserve currency’ ownership of stock AND new inflows ‘problem.’