Investments: Macro-perspectives

TOP DOWN OR BOTTOM UP ANALYSIS? The usual practice as recommended by the CFA Institute is a top-down approach to analyzing equities. First is a look at macro-economic conditions (usually local, increasingly global) to get a sense of the state of the world. Second is to look at industry-level information. Third is company level (technical and fundamental analysis). This is the approach we follow.

US GDP Growth (total production of goods and services). Long-term US GDP growth rate of about 3% (pretty spectacular for a large mature economy). Last 5 years about 2%, going forward? India GDP measurement underwent a dramatic revision in 2015 to bring more in line with peers.

I am told that there little difference in state-level risk-premia ! For my education !! I am told that there little difference in state-level risk-premia !

Look at GDP per capita (tied to population growth). Japan has a declining GDP and a declining population but is better than US per capita! Somewhat the same story in Germany. Story for India, historically at 6.8% versus China (10.2%), the disparity is not so evident in GDP growth.

US unemployment rates. Unemployment rate is a lagging indicator. Seems to spike during recessions (shaded), not a smooth response to slowing growth. Productive resources become idle and fairly quickly. So recessions do matter, despite the long-term trend of growth.

US Inflation (CPI).

India Inflation Rate % per year) Monsoon Failure; First Oil Shock High Food Inflation – Supply side Bottlenecks Base year revised to 1982 BoP Crisis 2nd Oil Shock Base year revised to 2001 Massive Anti-inflationary measures Base year revised to 2012

Other considerations. Hedonic adjustments take out the value of quality improvements to goods and services to more “accurately” capture a price change. Compounded by a heavier weighting attached to items dropping in price as people will substitute? Together understate inflation. Some efforts at using median or mean CPI, trimmed to eliminate outliers. PCE (personal consumption expenditure deflator). Updated more frequently than Core CPI, very popular with the Fed. Housing prices are measured as rent equivalents. In the 2000’s as people bought houses, rents were low so measuring housing costs as rent equivalents kept inflation numbers down. Today, the reverse is true perhaps even distorting upwards !!!

Deflation. The good kind=> supply side, prices fall due to oversupply, cost –cutting and productivity increases. The bad kind=> demand side, consumer spending and confidence decline, business investment suffers (Japan in the 2000s) Stagflation: slowing growth, higher inflation, high unemployment.

INTEREST RATES, DEMAND AND SUPPLY There are many interest rates, prime rates, treasury rates, mortgage rates, some are long-term some are short term, generally tend to move together locally and now globally. For now, focus on how policy affects these. Supply of funds: savers will increase if real interest rates are higher, i.e. benefits to deferring consumption into the future. Implication of central bank liquidity and low rates on propensity of people to save. Demand for funds from business - will borrow if real interest rates are lower. Government : will affect both: higher budget deficits increase the demand for funds and therefore interest rates. Fed policy offsets these by increasing money supply which adjusts nominal rates. Inflation increases if demand levels are beyond the productive capacity of the economy. Demand shocks are: reduced taxes, export demand, budget deficits. Supply shocks are: oil prices, commodity prices both reduce productive capacity.

US Monetary policy (easy to implement/reverse, takes time). Increases (decrease) in growth of money supply. Adjust short-term rates via open market transactions in T-bonds. The US Fed has historically embarked on a gradual program of increasing (decreasing) rates. Evidence of the 1975, 1982, 1991, suggests this worked well, typically preceding business expansions (contractions) by 8 (20) months. In fact, it worked so well that growth/employment targets get ambitious, triggering possible inflation. So Fed became pro-active, raising rates to slow economy to head off inflation. 11 cuts in 2001-2002, from 6.5%. After Sep 11, Fed provided more liquidity via repos. Effective overnight rates were close to 0. Since then 12 hikes in the mid 2000s. Since the global financial crisis, rates have been kept low. The first hike of the current cycle started December 2015. Market participants are not convinced that the US economy can handle more of these.

Fiscal policy (hard to implement/reverse, works quickly). Tax relief (is all the rage in the US now). Deficit spending, keeps long-term interest rates high. Supply side –policies Both above policies are demand-side to push economy to achieve full employment equilibrium. In contrast, supply side policies address the economy’s productive capacity and devise incentive schemes to encourage growth.

Interest rate evolution in India

Business Cycles Seven years of plenty and seven years of lean! Its death has been proclaimed several times, most recently in the late 1990’s. (post WW-II boom caused the Commerce department to rename the Business Cycle Digest to the Business Conditions digest) Has been more subdued in the last 20 years (10% of the time in recessions versus 40% of the time in the previous 90 years due to a) decreasing variability of output: agriculture => manufacture => services. b) inventory control, c) globalization, d) better monetary and fiscal control, e) financial and banking deregulation.

India business cycle in recent years.

Why cyclical downturns even if periodicity not predictable? Exogenous (rising oil prices in 9 out of last 10 post-war, 9-11) Animal spirits (Keynes, insufficient demand, market failure as business investment swings from optimism to pessimism, jobs and incomes fall amplifying the above, unemployment rises, need government). Excessive supply, overinvestment, mismatch with savings. Policy mistakes (Fed actions first allow economies to overheat and then apply the brakes too hard).

Macroeconomic Indicators (NBER). Leading, lagged and coincident. Common convention that GDP decreases in 2 consecutive quarters implies recession! Generally, leading indicators appear to increase 3-4 months prior to a recovery and decrease 7-8 months prior to a downturn. Sceptics claim ‘stock prices forecast 9 of the last 5 recessions.” Diffusion indexes focus on the number of indicators that are up (or down) rather than the magnitude.

VALUATION CHARTS FROM FINANCIAL MARKETS.

INDUSTRY ANALYSIS. Can do a life-cycle analysis of the industry to isolate likelihood of dividend payments: Growth phase = no dividends Consolidation = growing dividends Maturity phase = steady/constant dividends

INDUSTRY ANALYSIS. Sectors and the economy (again each time a little different) Most correlated with expansions and contractions Capital goods (factory machinery, aircraft) Consumer cyclical (auto, housing) Technology (computers, telecom) Transportation (airlines, shipping)   Best time to buy: growth has slowed and rates falling. Worst time to buy: as fast growing economy Slows. b) Sectors that do well at end of expansions Basic materials (steel, aluminium) Energy (oil, natural gas) c) Sectors that do well when the economy slows Financial services, Utilities d) Sectors best when heading into a recession Consumer staples (food, toothpaste) Healthcare (drugs, hospitals) Longer term: focus on whether earnings estimates are likely to be cut, maintained, or will go but up. Shorter term: are earnings surprises priced in?