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Tuesday, December 31, 2013

Marc Faber's Predictions for 2014

Since 2010, we had a massive outperformance of the US vis-a-vis emerging economies. The US cyclically adjusted earnings P/E ratios are relatively high, which would indicate low returns for the next 7 to 10 years. In other words, in the opinion of Jeremy Grantham returns of less than 2% are negative in real terms for each of the next 7 years. Conversely, in emerging economies we had bear markets. In some markets, adjusted for the depreciation for currencies like the Brazilian real, the Indian rupee, and so forth, we had declines of 30% to 50% from the highs. So the question for the investor is, ‘Do I buy the US that is still currently momentum driven but it won’t be driven forever, or do I gradually move into emerging economies?’ I think it’s too early to move into emerging economies, and I think it’s too late to buy US stocks. They (US stocks) may go up another 10%, maybe even 20%, but the risks have increased significantly and I don’t think equity investors in the US, aside from a short-term trading opportunity, will reap very high returns in the future. Now, compared to equities in emerging economies and equities in the US, what is really incredibly depressed are mining companies. My preference has always been to own physical gold, but I have to say that at this level the mining companies are relatively good values.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Friday, December 27, 2013

Gold shares could go up 30 percent in 2014

Given all the money printing that is going on globally . . . and given that the total credit as a percentage of the advanced economies is now 30% higher than in Year 2007 before the crisis hit, I think Gold is good insurance. I think Gold shares are very inexpensive. So a basket of Gold shares I think next year could easily appreciate 30 percent.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Singapore, Hong Kong better now than 15 years ago

The difference between the wealth and income inequality in Singapore and Hong Kong, and that in the US, is that most people in these two cities (the so-called 90%) enjoy better living conditions than 15 years ago and their net worth has appreciated, whereas in the US this is not the case.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Marc Faber is Sounding Like a Reluctant Bull

Amid all the steady-as-she-goes predictions for the S&P 500 SPX -0.01% Marc Faber is predicting U.S. markets could rise another 20% from here.

But unless you have the temerity to get in then get out quick, it’s already too late to profit.

“They may go up another 10%, maybe even 20%, but the risks have increased significantly and I don’t think equity investors in the U.S., aside from a short-term trading opportunity, will reap very high returns in the future,” said Marc Faber, outlining his expectations for 2014 in an interview with King World News on Monday. Since 2010, said Faber, U.S. markets have massively outperformed compared to emerging economies.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Monday, December 23, 2013

Gold Shares could go up 30 percent in 2014


Given all the money printing that is going on globally . . . and given that the total credit as a percentage of the advanced economies is now 30% higher than in Year 2007 before the crisis hit, I think Gold is good insurance.
I think Gold shares are very inexpensive. So a basket of Gold shares I think next year could easily appreciate 30 percent.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Opportunities in individual smaller cap stocks in India



We are down in India from the early 2008 high by 40 percent in US dollar terms, in other words adjusted for the currency movements. We are not down 40 percent in rupee terms, but in dollar terms. I think that people pay too much attention to GDP growth figure etc and should rather focus more on individual companies. 

The problem in Emerging economies is that a lot of money has flowed in and it has boosted the valuation of essentially very liquid stocks or big market cap stocks whereas smaller cap stocks are reasonably priced. 

So I think there is an opportunity in India, whether the index will go up a lot or not that I do not know, but for the active investor that does not buy the index, I see an opportunity.






Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Friday, December 20, 2013

There is Value in Precious Metals Mining Companies

Faber said that the nomination of Janet Yellen to head the Federal Reserve could lead to an even bigger bubble.

"With all this collection of dovish professors at the Fed, that actually the asset-purchased programs could be increased—not tapered, increased," he said. "There's no great value in equities with very few exceptions, but it can become even more overvalued."

The Nasdaq was overvalued in the summer of 1999 but continued climbing until March 2000, Faber noted.

"The fact that the market goes up doesn't necessarily make it good value," he said.

Faber said that he saw value in mining companies, particularly precious metals. - in cnbc.com

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Opportunities in individual smaller cap stocks in India


We are down in India from the early 2008 high by 40 percent in US dollar terms, in other words adjusted for the currency movements. We are not down 40 percent in rupee terms, but in dollar terms. I think that people pay too much attention to GDP growth figure etc and should rather focus more on individual companies.
The problem in Emerging economies is that a lot of money has flowed in and it has boosted the valuation of essentially very liquid stocks or big market cap stocks whereas smaller cap stocks are reasonably priced.
So I think there is an opportunity in India, whether the index will go up a lot or not that I do not know, but for the active investor that does not buy the index, I see an opportunity.


Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Wednesday, December 18, 2013

Cosmetic Taper is possible

Now there has been talk about tapering for the last 6-8 months, but in my view if they taper, it will be a very cosmetic gesture and on any sign of further economic weakness, or if asset markets decline again like the stock market drops 10-20 percent they will actually increase the asset purchases. My sense is that the Federal Reserve will continue to buy assets in order to try to support the asset markets.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Money flowing from Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand into India stocks

We had an under-performance of India compared to other emerging economies until recently. And we have this pool of international liquidity that is driven by asset allocators, so they look at India - they see a relative poor performance and they see some marginal improvement in the macroeconomic environment of India. So money is flowing out of countries like Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand into India.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

From Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand to India

Money is flowing out of countries like Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand into India. We had an under-performance of India compared to other emerging economies until recently. And we have this pool of international liquidity that is driven by asset allocators, so they look at India - they see a relative poor performance and they see some marginal improvement in the macroeconomic environment of India. - See more at: http://www.marcfabersblog.com/#sthash.9hVSD1BH.dpuf

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

There is Value in Precious Metals Mining Companies

Faber said that the nomination of Janet Yellen to head the Federal Reserve could lead to an even bigger bubble. "With all this collection of dovish professors at the Fed, that actually the asset-purchased programs could be increased—not tapered, increased," he said. "There's no great value in equities with very few exceptions, but it can become even more overvalued." The Nasdaq was overvalued in the summer of 1999 but continued climbing until March 2000, Faber noted. "The fact that the market goes up doesn't necessarily make it good value," he said. Faber said that he saw value in mining companies, particularly precious metals. - Marc Faber via a recent CNBC interview:

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Monday, December 16, 2013

A Colossal Bubble in the High End Sector

Known as a market bear, Faber also said bubbles are forming in some areas. "I see a bubble in everything that relates to the financial sector," he said. "We have a bubble in bonds. We have a bubble in low-quality bonds. We have a bubble in equities. If you look at the financial sector as a percentage of the global economy, it's very large. We have a huge debt bubble, and it's only getting bigger. It's not getting any smaller. "Everything that is in the financial sector is the bubble, and it's been pumped up by central banks." Faber also called "a colossal bubble" in the high-end sector, adding, "Think diamonds and the prestige art and luxury." While the luxury sector has been strong, costs have also been going up and competition has increased, Faber said. "The outlook is relatively favorable, but tastes may change."

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Market has adjusted to Taper

The market has already adjusted, because they introduced QE3, QE4 in the summer of 2012. At the time the 10-year Treasury note yield was 1.43 percent. We are now at 2.8 percent on the 10-year. In other words, they have both assets at the end of November over a trillion dollars already this year and yet interest rates have gone up; in other words it seems that the Federal Reserve has lost control of the bond market. They can keep short-term rates indefinitely at essentially very low rate, but there will be of course some economic damages arising from zero interest rate policies.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Bill Gross vs Marc Faber on Taxation


The November 2013 Investment Outlook published by PIMCO caught my attention with an essay by Bill Gross. Gross wrote remorsefully,

    “Having benefited enormously via the leveraging of capital since the beginning of my career and having shared a decreasing percentage of my income thanks to Presidents Reagan and Bush 43 via lower government taxes, I now find my intellectual leanings shifting to the plight of labor........... .... ... .. .”

I suppose that, by “the plight of labor”, Gross is referring both to the decline of median household income in real terms over the last ten years or so, and to the collapse of labor’s share of US national income since 2000. Personally, I am also concerned about the slump in the labor force participation rate.

Having written about rising wealth and income inequality for the last ten years or so, I have a lot of sympathy with Bill Gross’s views. However, I am far from certain that the inequality was caused by lower tax rates on carried interest and capital gains.

As an example, it is not only the “1%” who have increased their share of national income considerably over the last 30 years, but also the top 10% of income recipients. Moreover even if capital gains are excluded, the top income recipients have increased their share of national income meaningfully. I simply cannot believe that the top decile of income earners would all have benefited from low taxes on carried interest. (This may be different for the “0.01%”.)

Therefore, other — possibly more important — factors than favorable taxes on carried interest and on capital gains may have led to the growing income inequality, such as education (rising cost), outsourcing of production to low labor-cost countries, low interest rates (substitution of labor with machines), rising debts, increasing entitlements, immigration of low-skilled workers, etc. I shall return to Gross’s essay further below. However, I should first like to address some of the problems associated with taxation.

Therefore, other — possibly more important — factors than favorable taxes on carried interest and on capital gains may have led to the growing income inequality, such as education (rising cost), outsourcing of production to low labor-cost countries, low interest rates (substitution of labor with machines), rising debts, increasing entitlements, immigration of low-skilled workers, etc. I shall return to Gross’s essay further below. However, I should first like to address some of the problems associated with taxation.

Everyone will agree that taxes should be fair, but what is fair is hard to determine. Your friend inherits a high income-producing property that allows him a lifestyle of leisure and pleasure, whereas you earn your living on the factory floor through hard work. Assuming your incomes are equal, is it fair that your fortunate friend’s tax rate is the same as yours, or should it be higher or lower?

On the surface, someone could argue that, since you work for your income, you should be taxed at a lower rate than your friend, who does not work for his income. Someone else might argue that, on the contrary, your friend should be taxed at a lower rate since his parents have already paid taxes on the income that allowed them to purchase the property. (This question also relates to taxes on dividends.)

In my humble opinion, the probably fairest tax is a flat tax on incomes (no deductibles such as the interest payments on debts, children allowances, or investment tax credits, and no subsidies for any interest groups) which is levied on all income earners and corporations, churches, missions, charities, pension funds, government officials (and governmental organisations), etc. at a maximum rate of between 10% and 15% per annum (no exceptions).

Naturally, the approximately 49% of taxpayers who pay no federal income tax, as well as the entire industry of lawyers, accountants, and auditors who make a living from a complex tax regime, would object to a flat tax. In terms of indirect taxes, the fairest tax is a value added tax levied on all transactions at a maximum rate of 5%. Regarding property and capital gain taxes, the fairest taxes are most likely no taxes.

I am aware that some readers will consider such a system of taxation to be radical. But I can assure them that, while not perfect, this system would be far fairer and more equitable than the tax system we currently have in most Western democracies, which is so complex and incomprehensible for ordinary people that it requires an army of costly and time-consuming lawyers, accountants, and auditors to calculate the taxes that are owed.

This simplified tax system would also eliminate more than 90% of the IRS’s more than 100,000 employees who have the power to arbitrarily harass people and small business owners, since most of these agents themselves do not have a full understanding of all the tax laws and regulations. Complex tax laws also hurt small business owners far more than large corporations.

It is easy to see that the more tax laws there are, the more corruption there will be.




 Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Thursday, December 12, 2013

Cosmetic Taper is possible

Now there has been talk about tapering for the last 6-8 months, but in my view if they taper, it will be a very cosmetic gesture and on any sign of further economic weakness, or if asset markets decline again like the stock market drops 10-20 percent they will actually increase the asset purchases. My sense is that the Federal Reserve will continue to buy assets in order to try to support the asset markets.

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Monday, December 9, 2013

After excesses follows a financial crisis


As a distant but interested observer of history and investment markets I am fascinated how major events that arose from longer-term trends are often explained by short-term causes. The First World War is explained as a consequence of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian-Hungarian throne; the Depression in the 1930s as a result of the tight monetary policies of the Fed; the Second World War as having been caused by Hitler; and the Vietnam War as a result of the communist threat.

Similarly, the disinflation that followed after 1980 is attributed to Paul Volcker’s tight monetary policies. The 1987 stock market crash is blamed on portfolio insurance. And the Asian Crisis and the stock market crash of 1997 are attributed to foreigners attacking the Thai Baht (Thailand’s currency). A closer analysis of all these events, however, shows that their causes were far more complex and that there was always some “inevitability” at play.

Simply put, a financial crisis doesn’t happen accidentally, but follows after a prolonged period of excesses…




Take the 1987 stock market crash. By the summer of 1987, the stock market had become extremely overbought and a correction was due regardless of how bright the future looked. Between the August 1987 high and the October 1987 low, the Dow Jones declined by 41%. As we all know, the Dow rose for another 20 years, to reach a high of 14,198 in October of 2007.

These swings remind us that we can have huge corrections within longer term trends. The Asian Crisis of 1997-98 is also interesting because it occurred long after Asian macroeconomic fundamentals had begun to deteriorate. Not surprisingly, the eternally optimistic Asian analysts, fund managers , and strategists remained positive about the Asian markets right up until disaster struck in 1997.

But even to the most casual observer it should have been obvious that something wasn’t quite right. The Nikkei Index and the Taiwan stock market had peaked out in 1990 and thereafter trended down or sidewards, while most other stock markets in Asia topped out in 1994. In fact, the Thailand SET Index was already down by 60% from its 1994 high when the Asian financial crisis sent the Thai Baht tumbling by 50% within a few months. That waked the perpetually over-confident bullish analyst and media crowd from their slumber of complacency.

I agree with the late Charles Kindleberger, who commented that “financial crises are associated with the peaks of business cycles”, and that financial crisis “is the culmination of a period of expansion and leads to downturn”. However, I also side with J.R. Hicks, who maintained that “really catastrophic depression” is likely to occur “when there is profound monetary instability — when the rot in the monetary system goes very deep”.

Simply put, a financial crisis doesn’t happen accidentally, but follows after a prolonged period of excesses (expansionary monetary policies and/or fiscal policies leading to excessive credit growth and excessive speculation). The problem lies in timing the onset of the crisis. Usually, as was the case in Asia in the 1990s, macroeconomic conditions deteriorate long before the onset of the crisis. However, expansionary monetary policies and excessive debt growth can extend the life of the business expansion for a very long time.

In the case of Asia, macroeconomic conditions began to deteriorate in 1988 when Asian countries’ trade and current account surpluses turned down. They then went negative in 1990. The economic expansion, however, continued — financed largely by excessive foreign borrowings. As a result, by the late 1990s, dead ahead of the 1997-98 crisis, the Asian bears were being totally discredited by the bullish crowd and their views were largely ignored.

While Asians were not quite so gullible as to believe that “the overall level of debt makes no difference … one person’s liability is another person’s asset” (as Paul Krugman has said), they advanced numerous other arguments in favour of Asia’s continuous economic expansion and to explain why Asia would never experience the kind of “tequila crisis” Mexico had encountered at the end of 1994, when the Mexican Peso collapsed by more than 50% within a few months.

In 1994, the Fed increased the Fed Fund Rate from 3% to nearly 6%. This led to a rout in the bond market. Ten-Year Treasury Note yields rose from less than 5.5% at the end of 1993 to over 8% in November 1994. In turn, the emerging market bond and stock markets collapsed. In 1994, it became obvious that the emerging economies were cooling down and that the world was headed towards a major economic slowdown, or even a recession.

But when President Clinton decided to bail out Mexico, over Congress’s opposition but with the support of Republican leaders Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole, and tapped an obscure Treasury fund to lend Mexico more than$20 billion, the markets stabilized. Loans made by the US Treasury, the International Monetary Fund and the Bank for International Settlements totalled almost $50 billion.

However, the bailout attracted criticism. Former co-chairman of Goldman Sachs, US Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin used funds to bail out Mexican bonds of which Goldman Sachs was an underwriter and in which it owned positions valued at about $5 billion.

At this point I am not interested in discussing the merits or failures of the Mexican bailout of 1994. (Regular readers will know my critical stance on any form of bailout.) However, the consequences of the bailout were that bonds and equities soared. In particular, after 1994, emerging market bonds and loans performed superbly — that is, until the Asian Crisis in 1997. Clearly, the cost to the global economy was in the form of moral hazard because investors were emboldened by the bailout and piled into emerging market credits of even lower quality.

…because of the bailout of Mexico, Asia’s expansion was prolonged through the availability of foreign credits.

Above, I mentioned that, by 1994, it had become obvious that the emerging economies were cooling down and that the world was headed towards a meaningful economic slowdown or even a recession. But the bailout of Mexico prolonged the economic expansion in emerging economies by making available foreign capital with which to finance their trade and current account deficits. At the same time, it led to a far more serious crisis in Asia in 1997 and in Russia and the U.S. (LTCM) in 1998.

So, the lesson I learned from the Asian Crisis was that it was devastating because, given the natural business cycle, Asia should already have turned down in 1994. But because of the bailout of Mexico, Asia’s expansion was prolonged through the availability of foreign credits.

This debt financing in foreign currencies created a colossal mismatch of assets and liabilities. Assets that served as collateral for loans were in local currencies, whereas liabilities were denominated in foreign currencies. This mismatch exacerbated the Asian Crisis when the currencies began to weaken, because it induced local businesses to convert local currencies into dollars as fast as they could for the purpose of hedging their foreign exchange risks.

In turn, the weakening of the Asian currencies reduced the value of the collateral, because local assets fall in value not only in local currency terms but even more so in US dollar terms. This led locals and foreigners to liquidate their foreign loans, bonds and local equities. So, whereas the Indonesian stock market declined by “only” 65% between its 1997 high and 1998 low, it fell by 92% in US dollar terms because of the collapse of their currency, the Rupiah.

As an aside, the US enjoys a huge advantage by having the ability to borrow in US dollars against US dollar assets, which doesn’t lead to a mismatch of assets and liabilities. So, maybe Krugman’s economic painkillers, which provided only temporary relief of the symptoms of economic illness, worked for a while in the case of Mexico, but they created a huge problem for Asia in 1997.

Similarly, the housing bubble that Krugman advocated in 2001 relieved temporarily some of the symptoms of the economic malaise but then led to the vicious 2008 crisis. Therefore, it would appear that, more often than not, bailouts create larger problems down the road, and that the authorities should use them only very rarely and with great caution.

Regards,

Marc Faber   via   http://dailyreckoning.com/that-financial-crisis-was-no-accident
Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

No idea what Bitcoin is worth




I have no idea whether a bitcoin is worth $10,000, a million dollars, or $50. Its a symptom of excess liquidity goes into bitcoins, it can go into paintings, farmland, diamonds, all at different times. It shows that there is a lot of liquidity that just flushes into one speculative sector of the market to another one. Farmland is up 10 times over the last 10 years. And Bitcoins are up now and who knows what next will go up.
Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Financial Crisis Don't Happen Accidentally, They Are Inevitable


Authored by Marc Faber, originally posted at The Daily Reckoning blog,

As a distant but interested observer of history and investment markets I am fascinated how major events that arose from longer-term trends are often explained by short-term causes. The First World War is explained as a consequence of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian-Hungarian throne; the Depression in the 1930s as a result of the tight monetary policies of the Fed; the Second World War as having been caused by Hitler; and the Vietnam War as a result of the communist threat.

Similarly, the disinflation that followed after 1980 is attributed to Paul Volcker’s tight monetary policies. The 1987 stock market crash is blamed on portfolio insurance. And the Asian Crisis and the stock market crash of 1997 are attributed to foreigners attacking the Thai Baht (Thailand’s currency). A closer analysis of all these events, however, shows that their causes were far more complex and that there was always some “inevitability” at play.

Take the 1987 stock market crash. By the summer of 1987, the stock market had become extremely overbought and a correction was due regardless of how bright the future looked. Between the August 1987 high and the October 1987 low, the Dow Jones declined by 41%. As we all know, the Dow rose for another 20 years, to reach a high of 14,198 in October of 2007.

These swings remind us that we can have huge corrections within longer term trends. The Asian Crisis of 1997-98 is also interesting because it occurred long after Asian macroeconomic fundamentals had begun to deteriorate. Not surprisingly, the eternally optimistic Asian analysts, fund managers , and strategists remained positive about the Asian markets right up until disaster struck in 1997.

But even to the most casual observer it should have been obvious that something wasn’t quite right. The Nikkei Index and the Taiwan stock market had peaked out in 1990 and thereafter trended down or sidewards, while most other stock markets in Asia topped out in 1994. In fact, the Thailand SET Index was already down by 60% from its 1994 high when the Asian financial crisis sent the Thai Baht tumbling by 50% within a few months. That waked the perpetually over-confident bullish analyst and media crowd from their slumber of complacency.

I agree with the late Charles Kindleberger, who commented that “financial crises are associated with the peaks of business cycles”, and that financial crisis “is the culmination of a period of expansion and leads to downturn”. However, I also side with J.R. Hicks, who maintained that “really catastrophic depression” is likely to occur “when there is profound monetary instability — when the rot in the monetary system goes very deep”.

Simply put, a financial crisis doesn’t happen accidentally, but follows after a prolonged period of excesses (expansionary monetary policies and/or fiscal policies leading to excessive credit growth and excessive speculation). The problem lies in timing the onset of the crisis. Usually, as was the case in Asia in the 1990s, macroeconomic conditions deteriorate long before the onset of the crisis. However, expansionary monetary policies and excessive debt growth can extend the life of the business expansion for a very long time.

In the case of Asia, macroeconomic conditions began to deteriorate in 1988 when Asian countries’ trade and current account surpluses turned down. They then went negative in 1990. The economic expansion, however, continued — financed largely by excessive foreign borrowings. As a result, by the late 1990s, dead ahead of the 1997-98 crisis, the Asian bears were being totally discredited by the bullish crowd and their views were largely ignored.

While Asians were not quite so gullible as to believe that “the overall level of debt makes no difference … one person’s liability is another person’s asset” (as Paul Krugman has said), they advanced numerous other arguments in favour of Asia’s continuous economic expansion and to explain why Asia would never experience the kind of “tequila crisis” Mexico had encountered at the end of 1994, when the Mexican Peso collapsed by more than 50% within a few months.

In 1994, the Fed increased the Fed Fund Rate from 3% to nearly 6%. This led to a rout in the bond market. Ten-Year Treasury Note yields rose from less than 5.5% at the end of 1993 to over 8% in November 1994. In turn, the emerging market bond and stock markets collapsed. In 1994, it became obvious that the emerging economies were cooling down and that the world was headed towards a major economic slowdown, or even a recession.

But when President Clinton decided to bail out Mexico, over Congress’s opposition but with the support of Republican leaders Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole, and tapped an obscure Treasury fund to lend Mexico more than$20 billion, the markets stabilized. Loans made by the US Treasury, the International Monetary Fund and the Bank for International Settlements totalled almost $50 billion.

However, the bailout attracted criticism. Former co-chairman of Goldman Sachs, US Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin used funds to bail out Mexican bonds of which Goldman Sachs was an underwriter and in which it owned positions valued at about $5 billion.

At this point I am not interested in discussing the merits or failures of the Mexican bailout of 1994. (Regular readers will know my critical stance on any form of bailout.) However, the consequences of the bailout were that bonds and equities soared. In particular, after 1994, emerging market bonds and loans performed superbly — that is, until the Asian Crisis in 1997. Clearly, the cost to the global economy was in the form of moral hazard because investors were emboldened by the bailout and piled into emerging market credits of even lower quality.

Above, I mentioned that, by 1994, it had become obvious that the emerging economies were cooling down and that the world was headed towards a meaningful economic slowdown or even a recession. But the bailout of Mexico prolonged the economic expansion in emerging economies by making available foreign capital with which to finance their trade and current account deficits. At the same time, it led to a far more serious crisis in Asia in 1997 and in Russia and the U.S. (LTCM) in 1998.

So, the lesson I learned from the Asian Crisis was that it was devastating because, given the natural business cycle, Asia should already have turned down in 1994. But because of the bailout of Mexico, Asia’s expansion was prolonged through the availability of foreign credits.

This debt financing in foreign currencies created a colossal mismatch of assets and liabilities. Assets that served as collateral for loans were in local currencies, whereas liabilities were denominated in foreign currencies. This mismatch exacerbated the Asian Crisis when the currencies began to weaken, because it induced local businesses to convert local currencies into dollars as fast as they could for the purpose of hedging their foreign exchange risks.

In turn, the weakening of the Asian currencies reduced the value of the collateral, because local assets fall in value not only in local currency terms but even more so in US dollar terms. This led locals and foreigners to liquidate their foreign loans, bonds and local equities. So, whereas the Indonesian stock market declined by “only” 65% between its 1997 high and 1998 low, it fell by 92% in US dollar terms because of the collapse of their currency, the Rupiah.

As an aside, the US enjoys a huge advantage by having the ability to borrow in US dollars against US dollar assets, which doesn’t lead to a mismatch of assets and liabilities. So, maybe Krugman’s economic painkillers, which provided only temporary relief of the symptoms of economic illness, worked for a while in the case of Mexico, but they created a huge problem for Asia in 1997.

Similarly, the housing bubble that Krugman advocated in 2001 relieved temporarily some of the symptoms of the economic malaise but then led to the vicious 2008 crisis. Therefore, it would appear that, more often than not, bailouts create larger problems down the road, and that the authorities should use them only very rarely and with great caution.




 Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

Thursday, December 5, 2013

Marc Faber December 2013 Market Commentary



December 2013 Market Commentary

Many investment professionals complain that the investment environment has become extremely difficult. However, I am showing that with a disciplined approach and integrity, and by avoiding chasing short-term performance through speculative investments in momentum stocks, a successful fund management business can be built. In particular, I am focusing on Selling Disciplines. If there is great value in buying distressed assets, there must be value in selling highly priced assets as well.

According to Mark Hulbert, “The current Shiller P/E is 24.4, which puts the [US] market in the 9th decile. On the assumption that the future is like the past, the market’s expected real return over the next decade is just 0.9% annualized.” Hulbert then explains that the stock market bulls argue that the “alternatives” such as bonds are hardly any better because it would take only a small increase in interest rates to produce losses in real terms over the next decade. But, according to Hulbert, “this argument doesn’t really support the conclusion the bulls draw. Just because the alternatives are awful doesn’t mean the stock market is a good place in which to invest your money. T-Bills are not an unattractive option...”

High valuations, excessive debts, and extremely bullish sentiment do not necessary imply that a US stock market collapse is imminent. This especially not in an environment of unlimited money printing but if we believe in Selling Disciplines then the combination of high valuations and extremely positive sentiment strongly argues for reducing one’s exposure to US equities. As Tennessee Williams said, “there is a time for departure even when there’s no certain place to go.”


For the full monthly market commentary, you may get a paid subscription at
http://new.gloomboomdoom.com/public/pSTD.cfm?pageSPS_ID=7100

Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

After excesses what follows is a financial crisis

As a distant but interested observer of history and investment markets I am fascinated how major events that arose from longer-term trends are often explained by short-term causes. The First World War is explained as a consequence of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian-Hungarian throne; the Depression in the 1930s as a result of the tight monetary policies of the Fed; the Second World War as having been caused by Hitler; and the Vietnam War as a result of the communist threat.

Similarly, the disinflation that followed after 1980 is attributed to Paul Volcker’s tight monetary policies. The 1987 stock market crash is blamed on portfolio insurance. And the Asian Crisis and the stock market crash of 1997 are attributed to foreigners attacking the Thai Baht (Thailand’s currency). A closer analysis of all these events, however, shows that their causes were far more complex and that there was always some “inevitability” at play.

Simply put, a financial crisis doesn’t happen accidentally, but follows after a prolonged period of excesses…




Take the 1987 stock market crash. By the summer of 1987, the stock market had become extremely overbought and a correction was due regardless of how bright the future looked. Between the August 1987 high and the October 1987 low, the Dow Jones declined by 41%. As we all know, the Dow rose for another 20 years, to reach a high of 14,198 in October of 2007.

These swings remind us that we can have huge corrections within longer term trends. The Asian Crisis of 1997-98 is also interesting because it occurred long after Asian macroeconomic fundamentals had begun to deteriorate. Not surprisingly, the eternally optimistic Asian analysts, fund managers , and strategists remained positive about the Asian markets right up until disaster struck in 1997.

But even to the most casual observer it should have been obvious that something wasn’t quite right. The Nikkei Index and the Taiwan stock market had peaked out in 1990 and thereafter trended down or sidewards, while most other stock markets in Asia topped out in 1994. In fact, the Thailand SET Index was already down by 60% from its 1994 high when the Asian financial crisis sent the Thai Baht tumbling by 50% within a few months. That waked the perpetually over-confident bullish analyst and media crowd from their slumber of complacency.

I agree with the late Charles Kindleberger, who commented that “financial crises are associated with the peaks of business cycles”, and that financial crisis “is the culmination of a period of expansion and leads to downturn”. However, I also side with J.R. Hicks, who maintained that “really catastrophic depression” is likely to occur “when there is profound monetary instability — when the rot in the monetary system goes very deep”.

Simply put, a financial crisis doesn’t happen accidentally, but follows after a prolonged period of excesses (expansionary monetary policies and/or fiscal policies leading to excessive credit growth and excessive speculation). The problem lies in timing the onset of the crisis. Usually, as was the case in Asia in the 1990s, macroeconomic conditions deteriorate long before the onset of the crisis. However, expansionary monetary policies and excessive debt growth can extend the life of the business expansion for a very long time.

In the case of Asia, macroeconomic conditions began to deteriorate in 1988 when Asian countries’ trade and current account surpluses turned down. They then went negative in 1990. The economic expansion, however, continued — financed largely by excessive foreign borrowings. As a result, by the late 1990s, dead ahead of the 1997-98 crisis, the Asian bears were being totally discredited by the bullish crowd and their views were largely ignored.

While Asians were not quite so gullible as to believe that “the overall level of debt makes no difference … one person’s liability is another person’s asset” (as Paul Krugman has said), they advanced numerous other arguments in favour of Asia’s continuous economic expansion and to explain why Asia would never experience the kind of “tequila crisis” Mexico had encountered at the end of 1994, when the Mexican Peso collapsed by more than 50% within a few months.

In 1994, the Fed increased the Fed Fund Rate from 3% to nearly 6%. This led to a rout in the bond market. Ten-Year Treasury Note yields rose from less than 5.5% at the end of 1993 to over 8% in November 1994. In turn, the emerging market bond and stock markets collapsed. In 1994, it became obvious that the emerging economies were cooling down and that the world was headed towards a major economic slowdown, or even a recession.

But when President Clinton decided to bail out Mexico, over Congress’s opposition but with the support of Republican leaders Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole, and tapped an obscure Treasury fund to lend Mexico more than$20 billion, the markets stabilized. Loans made by the US Treasury, the International Monetary Fund and the Bank for International Settlements totalled almost $50 billion.

However, the bailout attracted criticism. Former co-chairman of Goldman Sachs, US Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin used funds to bail out Mexican bonds of which Goldman Sachs was an underwriter and in which it owned positions valued at about $5 billion.

At this point I am not interested in discussing the merits or failures of the Mexican bailout of 1994. (Regular readers will know my critical stance on any form of bailout.) However, the consequences of the bailout were that bonds and equities soared. In particular, after 1994, emerging market bonds and loans performed superbly — that is, until the Asian Crisis in 1997. Clearly, the cost to the global economy was in the form of moral hazard because investors were emboldened by the bailout and piled into emerging market credits of even lower quality.

…because of the bailout of Mexico, Asia’s expansion was prolonged through the availability of foreign credits.

Above, I mentioned that, by 1994, it had become obvious that the emerging economies were cooling down and that the world was headed towards a meaningful economic slowdown or even a recession. But the bailout of Mexico prolonged the economic expansion in emerging economies by making available foreign capital with which to finance their trade and current account deficits. At the same time, it led to a far more serious crisis in Asia in 1997 and in Russia and the U.S. (LTCM) in 1998.

So, the lesson I learned from the Asian Crisis was that it was devastating because, given the natural business cycle, Asia should already have turned down in 1994. But because of the bailout of Mexico, Asia’s expansion was prolonged through the availability of foreign credits.

This debt financing in foreign currencies created a colossal mismatch of assets and liabilities. Assets that served as collateral for loans were in local currencies, whereas liabilities were denominated in foreign currencies. This mismatch exacerbated the Asian Crisis when the currencies began to weaken, because it induced local businesses to convert local currencies into dollars as fast as they could for the purpose of hedging their foreign exchange risks.

In turn, the weakening of the Asian currencies reduced the value of the collateral, because local assets fall in value not only in local currency terms but even more so in US dollar terms. This led locals and foreigners to liquidate their foreign loans, bonds and local equities. So, whereas the Indonesian stock market declined by “only” 65% between its 1997 high and 1998 low, it fell by 92% in US dollar terms because of the collapse of their currency, the Rupiah.

As an aside, the US enjoys a huge advantage by having the ability to borrow in US dollars against US dollar assets, which doesn’t lead to a mismatch of assets and liabilities. So, maybe Krugman’s economic painkillers, which provided only temporary relief of the symptoms of economic illness, worked for a while in the case of Mexico, but they created a huge problem for Asia in 1997.

Similarly, the housing bubble that Krugman advocated in 2001 relieved temporarily some of the symptoms of the economic malaise but then led to the vicious 2008 crisis. Therefore, it would appear that, more often than not, bailouts create larger problems down the road, and that the authorities should use them only very rarely and with great caution.

Regards,
Marc Faber   via   http://dailyreckoning.com/that-financial-crisis-was-no-accident


 Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

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Contrarian Investor Dr.Marc Faber is an international investor known for his uncanny predictions of the stock market and futures markets around the world.

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