Experts reveal where they believe the returns are as slower growth is predicted for 2006.
Jeffrey Gundlach was trying to enjoy his first week as chief investment officer of TCW Group Inc., his long-time employer in Los Angeles, but the crystal ball that came with his new post just didn't seem to be working right. Its vision of 2006 simply didn't warrant the type of optimistic forecast you'd expect from the CIO of a $116-billion (AUM) money-management firm, he apologized.
"We're looking at an endgame for the U.S. economic cycle," Gundlach
says. "We're already past the average length of an economic expansion,
and the Federal Reserve Bank began hiking short-term rates in June
2004." With a nine- to 12-month lag between Fed action and impact on
the economy, the effects of the central bank's measured tightening
ought to constrict growth by next year.
Furthermore, the yield curve is currently flat (meaning there is little
difference between short- and long-term interest rates), which is a
late-cycle characteristic. "In fact, a flat yield curve is a pretty
good indicator of an upcoming recession," Gundlach says. "The last time
it was flat to inverted was 2000."
What could derail the heretofore chugging economy? A punishing double-whammy: Energy costs torpedoing household budgets, plus higher interest rates that finally quash the home equity cash-out-refinancing craze that has been so stimulative in the last few years. Weak consumer confidence readings by the Conference Board for September and October could be an omen of what's in store for next year.
"With the stock market having to fight these headwinds from the
consumer economy, I sadly have to say to people, as I take the reins as
CIO, that we're not terribly positive on financial assets for the next
few quarters. We think it will be a tough environment to make money,"
Gundlach says.
But it takes two to make a market, after all. "On the other side are
people saying growth may slow but not to an extreme, because companies
are well financed and they've been watching the bottom line," says
economist Quincy Krosby, the chief investment strategist at The
Hartford. This camp argues that as productivity levels come off their
highs, corporations may ramp up spending on technology and boost the
economy just as consumers are cooling their jets. Estimates of 2006 GDP
from this faction of the market typically range from 2.5% to 4%.
The Market's Obsessions
How the coming year ultimately plays out appears likely to turn on the sometimes cruel relationship between inflation, the Fed and long-term interest rates, with energy prices playing the role of spoiler and Hurricane Katrina the wildcard. Consider: The Fed's job is taming inflation, which recently surged due to leaping energy costs. But the fallout from Katrina is muddying the government's statistics.
The good news for the marketplace is that the Fed is looking beyond the published data. "To determine whether the higher cost of energy is transitory," Krosby says, "the Fed is holding discussions with CEOs and CFOs across the country to get a sense of what people on the ground are seeing past the Katrina affect."
Fed rhetoric makes it clear that short-term interest rates will march
north, but by how much? Most money managers expect a minimum 4.5% Fed
funds rate by the time Chairman Alan Greenspan gets his gold watch,
although PIMCO's fixed-income uber star, Bill Gross, sees the Fed
starting to lower rates some time later next year. The fact that the
Fed will have a new helmsman February 1 (former Princeton economics
professor Ben Bernanke, if confirmed by the Senate) probably increases
the odds of continued rate hikes.
"Most new chairmen want to show the world their inflation-fighting
credentials," says Krosby. "They can be quick to pull the trigger
(raise interest rates)." And the market doesn't like huge budget
deficits, she adds. "That is very inflationary and provides additional
ammunition for rate increases."
Still, if the Fed stops sooner than expected, that could be a catalyst
for the markets. Remember 1994-'95? "The Fed was tightening and the
market bottomed about four months before the last rate increase," says
Kent Gasaway, a portfolio manager at Buffalo Funds in Mission, Kan.
"The market didn't seem to believe then, just like it doesn't now [in
late October], that the Fed can get it right and actually slow the
economy on the margin. But that's exactly what happened, and the market
doubled over the next three years," Gasaway says.
The final piece to the puzzle is stubbornly low long-term interest
rates. They reflect the bond market's expectation for inflation over
the long haul. But when they're only slightly higher than their
short-term counterparts, as they have been, it means bond investors
aren't demanding much compensation for the risk of future
inflation-presumably because they don't foresee any. That presents "a
conundrum," in Greenspan's words.
"The conundrum is that the Fed sees inflation as a problem and thinks
interest rates need to go higher, but the bond traders of the world
have been disagreeing," says Stephen Wood, a portfolio strategist at
Russell Investment Group, the investment services firm in Tacoma, Wash.
"They can both be wrong, but they can't both be right," says Wood,
adding that Russell forecasts "rather significant global economic
deceleration heading into 2006."
One variable that could lift long-term yields is the U.S. Treasury's
plans to start issuing 30-year paper again. (Treasury yanked the long
bond in November 2001, when Washington ran a surplus for one fleeting
moment.) Some investors claim that long-term yields have stayed
inexplicably low because of a market imbalance. Institutions have
increasingly demanded long-dated maturities, but supply has been
limited.
"Reintroducing 30-year issuance will add supply to the market,"
although the amount of bonds planned for issue is relatively small,
says Marc Seidner, director of active core strategies at Standish
Mellon Asset Management in Boston. "On the margin, at least, the
additional supply should take some pressure off of the long end of the
yield curve and cause it to steepen."
Asset Class Prospects
Against this backdrop, what's a financial advisor to do? Begin by
recognizing that cash is no longer a four-letter word. "You can
actually get an okay rate of return on short-term Treasuries now-maybe
5% by early '06 if the Fed keeps raising rates," says Gundlach.
If long rates rise, as many experts predict, asset valuations across
the board will tumble. At least that's what financial theory asserts.
"The starting point for pricing global financial assets is the rate on
the ten-year Treasury note," says Gundlach. "When the risk-free rate
goes up, risky assets have to get cheaper."
Bonds really suffer, of course. Two sectors that have performed well in
recent years, high-yield and emerging markets, may be especially
vulnerable, says Morningstar Fund Analyst Gareth Lyons. The premium
that investors currently earn for taking the credit risk of junk debt
is near its historic low, while the bond markets in developing
countries "can grow skittish quickly," he cautions, citing the
potential for political upheaval and exacerbated sensitivity to rising
U.S. interest rates.
These sectors might also decline if investors begin showing disdain for
riskier assets and favoring higher-quality investments, a shift that
sometimes occurs in periods of actual or anticipated economic
sluggishness. In the domestic equity markets, Russell Investment Group
says value's multiyear winning streak over growth may end, if it hasn't
already. "We saw a rotation in market leadership in the second quarter
of 2005 when growth began to outperform value," Wood says.
Looking ahead, growth is very cheap to value right now, he contends.
"The relative price-to-share ratio of the Russell 1000 Value Index to
Russell 1000 Growth Index is currently at one of its highest points
since the inception of the indexes in 1979, 0.69. That's a strong
signal growth will outperform," Wood says.
Not everyone agrees, though. "The price-to-earnings multiple of growth
is currently 50% greater than that of value, and that is just about the
long-term average," observes Jonathan Golub, U.S. equity strategist and
a managing director of JP Morgan Funds in New York. "To us, it looks
neutral on a valuation basis, or maybe favoring value."
Whatever your view, take a closer look at funds' holdings before
acting, Morningstar's Lyons suggests. "The big story is that the line
between growth and value has blurred in both domestic and international
portfolios," he says. "We're seeing names like Vodaphone, Nokia, Coke
and Microsoft pop up in value portfolios. These are stocks many value
managers avoided like the plague five or six years ago."