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although we live in times of great uncertainty and financial catastrophes Howard marks says this presents a unique opportunity to investors one we haven't seen in four decades Howard marks really needs no introduction with more than 50 years of experience observing markets there is little for him in the way of surprise this extraordinary opportunity comes as a result of the current sea change what does the veteran businessman and analyst mean and how can we make the most of this in a bleak economic climate let's find out Howard marks the co-founder and co-chairman of Oak Tree Management has been through two major sea changes that he navigated in his career now a third is underway right now it is taking us from a low return world to what he says is a full return World a bargain Hunter's Delight if you look at the period from the end of the global financial crisis roughly 09 through the appearance of the pandemic and then in the 20 and 21 the FED took Extreme Measures to save the economy they worked at very low interest rates the lowest in history zero for much of that time in quantitative easing the buying of bonds to put liquidity in the economy these things produced what he calls an easy environment in the economy in the markets he had the longest economic recovery in history it was easy to make money we had low-cost Capital so it was easy to make a profit we had very few defaults in bankruptcy it was easy to stay in business easy to access Capital everything was easy at that time and in the last year of course with the appearance of the inflation and the increasing rates to try to Stamp Out the inflation things have gotten harder people today say when are we going back to normal like it was five six or seven years ago and the important thing to know is that wasn't normal that was the easiest the best of times and Howard marks believes we're not going back there we're now in an environment of more normal circumstances and we're going to roughly stay this way Howard marks says well did we go back I mean what do we go back to at all because when I sort of read that memo and I look at Sea changes it sounds like everything is new it's never really a reversion to where we were in the past that's what a sea change is it's a complete transformation not just a minor cyclical fluctuation so you know I think that the business world the economic world is not supposed to be easy it's not supposed to be easy to make money it's not supposed to be easy for companies with bad business model models to stay in business as it has been for the last 14 years Howard thinks we can go back to a period in which we have moderate interest rates moderate event availability and capital A moderate default rate and so forth all of which will feel less accommodative than the last 14 years but so much of the objects on the market right now is of course people trying to find out what the new rate is if you want to call it a neutral rate or whatever but when was the last time you could remember that we had a stable and persistent neutral rate that depends on your definition of stable time-wise but Howard marks thinks that the FED became activists with the arrival of Alan Greenspan in the mid 90s if there was a problem in the economy the FED would just squirt in some liquidity and solve it they frequently did including Y2K and other real and imaginary crises the arrival of the bursting of the TMT bubble for example so that's 25 years we haven't had a free market in money zero interest rates are really an emergency measure as the co-founder of Oak Tree Management put it someone gets a heart attack you give them a shot of adrenaline works right that doesn't mean you start your day with a shot of adrenaline every day for seven years it couldn't be better said we had rates at zero for seven years and by the time 16 17 and 18 rolled around people started to say well shouldn't rates be a little higher so that if we have a recession the FED can cut rates and become accommodative but if rates are at zero or a quarter or half you can't do that that's an important reason why rates should be positive if you want to fight inflation and kill off inflationary psychology you need a positive real fed funds raid the FED funds rate has to exceed the rate of inflation before that's the case but is there a historical precedent that the billionaire looks to that maybe gives a little guidance somewhat not really because Howard marks would rather quote Mark Twain history does not repeat but it Rhymes we haven't had much experience with inflation Howard marks lived through the last one which was in the 70s a most unpleasant decade but then the situation was different the sources of the inflation were different it reached the mid-teens Marx doesn't think we're going there this time but that the original reasons for the current bout of inflation is too much money chasing too few goods not good news money from the pandemic relief money people put in the bank in 2020 because they couldn't spend it and then a supply mechanism that was sputtering too much money chasing too few goods that will correct over time the extra money will get spent Supply will catch up Howard thinks the forces behind inflation will Abate so that puts us in a situation where the risk profile is going to be a lot different the 70 70 year old businessman started his career at a time when risk was a much different thing at least relative to what he saw over the last 15 years or so here what does that mean for the next generation of investors what are they facing when it comes to how they have to assess that risk Howard indicates that anybody who joined after 09 pretty much only saw Good Times except for a couple of bad months in 2020 in connection with the lockdowns but for his first 30 years in high-yield bonds 78 to 08 the average default rate was about four percent a year in the last four decades it was only two percent a year I think Force more more normal and you know defaults and bankruptcy should not be that scarce I think we'll be going back to a somewhat harsher environment but what do we make of the rally that we've been seeing lately in high yield the co-founder of Oak Tree Management thinks the current prices are roughly sustainable that is to say yields are not going to keep coming down he adds the rates are roughly where they can stay except that it's important to recognize that the debate today is being dominated by people who are optimistic by people who think that the recession won't be too bad won't be too long that the inflation will give way and that the FED will be able to turn accommodative soon Howard says the FED is going to want to be somewhat strict and hold that position well say throughout the year the FED would not want to be seen as being too optimistic so that makes sense right what's the current state of the market right now where do we stand the billionaire thinks that in many years in the stock market for example a significant degree of optimism is ruling the day today if you want to look at pessimism look at June look at September people were not so optimistic about this pivot so we've been going back and forth in the s p for example has been trading in a channel between 3 700 and 4 000 depending on whether the optimists or pessimists were in the ascendancy right now I think the optimists are in the ascendancy who knows how the events will bear them out this has happened before prior to 77 and 78 there was a sea change that was the Advent of high-yield bonds a bond rated below investment grade could not be issued Moody's defined a b-rated bond as follows fails to possess the characteristics of a desirable investment in other words bad idea after Milken and others arrived in 77-78 the new way of thinking was well it's not a great company but the promise rate of interest is enough to compensate for the risk and for the last 45 years Howard points out that we don't think of good idea a bad idea we think risk return risk return is it how risky it is the risk is the promise to return adequate to compensate for the risk and you know that's very important I was lucky to be asked about the former Ohio bond fund by Citibank in 78.
the people who started doing it earlier could find places that people were saying oh no we wouldn't touch that that's low grade yeah and where you could get a return without taking much risk you know that was kind of a free lunch yeah efficient markets tend to cause free lunches to go away but it was great to get there early once again timing is key how do you plan to thrive in rough Seasons like these let us know in the comment section below don't forget to like share and subscribe to our YouTube channel so you never miss out on any of our videos see you next time stay tuned
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