Morgan Stanley skriver i en analyse, at coronakrisen ikke kun udtrykker en katastrofe, men en hel ny økonomi, der helt nye investeringsmuligheder. Mange investorer er for fokuseret på lave renter og lav vækst og på, at “det går opad igen” for alt det gamle. De store muligheder for investorerne ligger i at gå imod den eksisterende trend og satse på en tid med højere vækst og en højere rente. Det betyder, at investorerne må lægge vægt på small cap, finans, virksomheder med basis-forbrugsgoder, industrivirksomheder og energivirksomheder. Investorerne skal være mere konstruktive.
Uddrag fra Morgan Stanley:
A More Constructive Outlook
First, client reaction to our more constructive view on the economy and financial markets has evolved from outright dismissal, back in April, toward acceptance that the worst is behind us. However, there’s still quite a bit of skepticism about the shape of the recovery and apprehension to embrace the typical pattern coming out of a recession.
More specifically, the consensus views this recession as being more akin to a natural disaster than the end of an economic cycle. Part of this stems from the belief that prior to Covid-19, the economy was in great shape and absent of any major excesses that could make it vulnerable to shocks.
Some even believe the economy was still mid cycle and had years to run on the expansion. Had Covid-19 not appeared, we would still be firmly in the midst of the longest expansion on record. I disagree with that premise wholeheartedly and believe the U.S. economic cycle was very much showing its age at the end of last year, making it vulnerable to any shock, much less a global pandemic.
What this means from an investment perspective is that many clients are still embracing a late cycle playbook, as they view the current recession as more of an inconvenient interruption in an ongoing expansion. In short, they think the recession we are experiencing is not a true end of the cycle. Therefore, they remain overweight high quality large cap growth and defensive stocks while still shying away from small caps and economically sensitive stocks that tend to do better at the beginning of a new economic expansion.
This view also ties in very nicely with another area of pushback we received to our outlook: that long term interest rates can move higher in the face of quantitative easing and other forms of extraordinary central bank intervention. If there is a market with a stronger consensus view than lower for longer interest rates, I’m not sure what it is.
Of course, after 10 years of extraordinary monetary policy and intervention, it’s no wonder that investors are unwilling to fight this very well-established and powerful trend in long term rates. However, it’s my contention that this lower trend in interest rates has led to overcrowding by investors in certain types of stocks that do better when rates are low.
In my view, there lies the opportunity. Investing is not just about trying to forecast economic and earnings growth, but it’s also about understanding what’s already priced. Many of the great investments of the past decade are still crowded because the fundamental and interest rate trends that have made these investments great are now well understood and accepted.
That means the bigger opportunities are in investments that would benefit from a change in these base assumptions about the cycle, and interest rates in particular.
The bottom line is that Covid-19 fears are still present in every conversation with clients. But consensus still seems to expect a slower recovery and ultimately a return to a low growth, low rate world where the market will pay a high premium for large cap growth and high quality stocks.
A new economic cycle argues against such an outcome, which means the real opportunity for investors is to go against the trends and look for stocks that are more economically sensitive and positively geared to higher growth and higher interest rates. That means small caps, financials, consumer durables, materials, industrials, and even energy stocks.
