20 November 2008

Trying my hardest with a bullish hat on

Getting tired of my own bearishness. Therefore, in the midst of the deepest bearishness, will try my hardest to find the bullish scenario instead.
So what would such a scenario look like?

One could be a massive injection of funds to the worlds Emerging markets via the IMF, the world Bank, EU etc, enough to bail out all the hard currency loans and guarantee each countries banking system. Not including Asia or Latinamerica, how much would it cost? 1Trn Usd? 2 Trn Usd? Just to cover the hard currency loans. Guaranteeing each countries banking sector would be a different cup of tea.
Anyway, the two main remaining surplus countries, Japan and China, would have to foot the majority of these funds. Such a scenario would nevertheless make me bullish from here.
Add to that a global, coordinated fiscal stimulus program including tax cuts and infrastructure works and I would be bullish as an equityhouse.
While Im at it, add government funded restructuring programs to phase out and speed up the necessary transformation of old, overestablished industries, making them leaner and meaner, ie more efficient and costeffective. Preferrably enviromental friendly as well.
The autoindustry would be a good start. No bailouts, no subsidies, rather tax cut incentives, driving the development in the right direction. Bailouts and subsidies risk driving the development towards protectionism instead. This should be avoided at all costs. Just say NO to the D-word.

Other bullish thoughts with the bull hat on;
*Harder and harder to find a bull these days. It is very mainstream to be bearish. Not that everybody and their mother is bearish yet, but were getting closer. No bus or taxidrivers telling me were going down in a bucket,,,,yet.
*Stocks at extremely low valuations, and tons of cash on the sidelines. Companies with good cashflow and dividendyields are also amongst the victims. Stocks hit by forced selling likewise.
*Balticdry index down 93% on the year, getting close to that zero.
*Commodities severely hit.
*Very steep yield curves in the western world, coming soon to a country near you, globally.
*New all time high for the CBOE VIX index, hitting 81% vol. Extremely high volatilities in all assetclasses. These high implied volatilities are basically preventing hedgers from getting efficient insurance via options, forcing them to sell the underlying asset instead. These sell offs are often "capitulation like". How much more to go? Good question, thank you. Getting implied volatilities higher from here will take something extra though. Once we get lower asset volatilites, this will lure "investors" in again.

There, I did it. Some bullish scenario and thoughts to chew on.
Hoping for the best but preparing for the worst.

While this scenario is a distinct possibility I will stay bearish til it starts showing. Right now the global coordination capacity seems too weak to me. At the same time the protectionism tendency has reared its ugly head. I fear that this tendency will get stronger as the economic developments worsen and the focus increasingly is directed to the domestic arena.
More bearishness to come in my next piece.

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