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This is a BNR podcast. Berserd XL. Interest, interest, and even more interest. You ca n't get your hands on it at this time of year. The Federal Reserve raised the policy interest rate for the first time in three years. Interest rates on the bond market have been moving for quite some time. And uh, there is also a lot to do in financial journalism, of course.
Why would you actually trade in bonds? And is there such a thing as a star bond investor? Wonderful question for Jochem Visser, presenter at BNER Beurs. And today our trade fair nurt XL. Welcome. Good afternoon. Uh, let's just get that last question over with first . Can you become a star at, uh, bond investing?
Yes, so that is absolutely possible. It sounds like utter nonsense, and it also sounds like something you'd buy for your grandma, so to speak. That is how it was explained in the Big Short as well. But, um, the star bond investor is Bill Gross. Uh, that is a peculiar guy with a very high, mousey voice who called the shots in this field for decades.
And I was reminded of it because someone asked me this week, Jochem, why would you actually trade in it? It has a fixed interest rate after all, and then you get money back. Beautiful, isn't it? But then I can tell you that there really were people who were damn good at it. And those are people like Bill Gros, the bond emperor as far as I'm concerned.
He has been called the bond king in English since around 2002, because a bond is a public obligation. Yes. And yes, it is from the notorious and well-known bond house Pimco, which truly crushed the bondx for decades, because there are indices for that too, just like for those stocks. And she managed more in client funds and bonds than anyone else on Earth for a long time.
And I also really miss his writing style, because he used to write monthly posts, his investment outlooks. And that was about his cat, his yoga sessions, John Travolta, the interest. And he really pulled out all the stops to explain it all. And certainly in times like these, when we are of course all watching the Federal Reserve and what is happening with interest rates on all government debt on earth, really, I do often think: "Gosh, what would the public think of that?" So yeah, we really should talk about that .
Okay . Uh well uh you could get in . Perhaps if you have an interest in yoga, that is also a plus in this case. Um, but why would you, why would you even start with that? Well, look at the things people with stocks always say, right? This will never be fun because you get your interest back in your money, and if you hold onto it, things can only go wrong after that .
And that is why, incidentally, bond traders are usually smarter and much more grumpy than stock traders. Because they have to be optimistic. That is the function of their entire business. certainly regarding corporate profits. However, this naturally does not alter the fact that you can simply sell your current bonds for a price.
And then you can buy others with a different render interest rate or a different profile or something like that, of course, right? And people actually did that sometimes in the 2000s, but it really required people like Bill Gro, the Warren Buffet of bonds, to say in the 70s: "Yes, but we can also switch highway lanes." That was actually the theory behind it: so I'll buy a bond with 6%, 7%, a different maturity, a different company, and so on.
And so then he comes in, uh, this is really such a little guy with, uh, he is the son of a steel salesman from Ohio and a hypercritical housewife he wrote about very often. And his first great deed was to go to Las Vegas, and there he learned card counting, you know, black, and to really fleece the casinos.
He was also often thrown out. Yes, because that is not allowed. That is not allowed. And then in the 70s he ends up in California, and then he's in the basements clipping his coupons with those bonds. You did that back then to collect those interest payments. And then he says: "Yes, we have to start trading in this, dear insurers and pension investors.
Then we'll earn more on those ultra-safe bonds everywhere." They all find that very scary at first. But yeah, [sniffs] he sets up a type of fund that supposedly invests safely and in bonds. But underlying, it moves a huge amount. Heyy. And you mention Warren Buffett. Everyone knows the name Warren Buffett.
Yeah, nobody knows the name Bill Gross. Well, you know him, of course. In the financial world, everyone knows Bill Gross. But that's right. Yeah, that what, how do you explain that difference? Well, the difference lies very much in the fact that, look, bonds just aren't traded by consumers. And the story of Warren Buffett, and certainly as a friendly financier, is just much, much clearer.
And the other thing is, of course, that the outperformance on bonds is much smaller than on stocks. So if you, like Warren Buffett, say you only earn 20% a year, just a little less since 1965 with his Birure Hatway—because that's his winning horse, right— that he averages so many percent achieved per year.
If that is less, uh, with bonds. Then it is, well, we did 2% better than the market instead of, well, 10% or something like that. And so that is *one* reason. And the other reason is simply, look, Bill Gross started in the 80s when interest rates were at a gigantic high point . Because back then we had inflation of 15%.
A Wassenaar Agreement had to be concluded in our country. Wage-wise things were going downhill. All a lot of hassle. Uh, Oasis was born in Manchester. Oh, here in my case. Because everyone was being laid off. You know, those were rough times and interest rates were so incredibly high that Bill Gross really had perfect timing and then it started and then interest rates started to fall, meaning all the bonds you bought the year before actually became worth more for 40 years.
And that is, of course, what you call a bull market and bonds because interest rates are just falling and that has yielded a whole lot. And the other thing is that his bond house just did everything it could to achieve high performance . And that is also true Very peculiar. Yes, because that Pimpco thing you were investing for clients' money.
Yes. But they thought bonds were safe. But they did all sorts of things with them. Did that always go completely smoothly? Well, look, the big central question here is: as a pension investor who goes into PIMCO bonds, let's say , do you really want them to do weird things for you? But they got entangled in derivatives very quickly; they became real experts in that and such.
And then they started doing really crazy things. Um, one of the most important, for example, is that instead of buying the direct bond, they started buying the future on the bond. Well, that happens on a certain date. Do you really have to buy that thing then ? Let's say until that time you have to hold collateral with your broker.
And then they said: "Yes, I can hold cash as collateral, but I can also just put part of it into some really weird little derivative where we get just a bit more out of it ." Oh yes, that's what I mean. What is the difference between cash and a corporate bond with a few percent? Yes, it's just as safe, right?
And so they did this for their clients. Well, those pension investors who thought: "We're doing well in bonds at Pimco." But actually, they were doing very weird things. And another really good one is that in the 80s, at a certain point, they just had a very complex derivatives structure. They pushed an entire market in one direction because they were getting so big, as Pimco.
And then they forced everyone who didn't quite get it to start donating bonds to Pimco for a much lower price. So these really became a sort of pirates, and that was also really a, well, a bond house. People were permanently agitated here. They were based in Newport Beach, California. Um, this was n't in New York, so to speak, so those traders couldn't go anywhere.
And Bill Gross, well, he had a very high-pitched little voice, but he was also really a taskmaster. Really a nasty guy like you had Underformance who by now, I know, can play golf very well . That's what I learned . We have to leave it at that. Thank you Joch Visser. Burzerd XL. Yeah.
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