Salient to Investors: Jonathan Golub at UBS recommends overweighting consumer-discretionary stocks. Golub said consumer strength will have a positive impact on a host of industries, whereas businesses remain hesitant to put cash to work. Golub is neutral on industrial and tech stocks. The consumer-discretionary index is the top performer among the S&P 500’s
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: US balanced funds received record inflows of $35.2 billion from January to April, the most in any four months, showing easing individuals’ reluctance to join the record-breaking rally in the S&P 500 Index. Inflows into hybrid funds reached records in February 1994 in the middle of a 417 percent gain
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Bruce Stout at Aberdeen Asset Mgmt says: Optimism is too high for stocks and bond yields are too low His fund’s fixed-income holdings are at the lowest level in 25 years. The main problem is trying to get yield in a world where there is no yield, but
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Cyril Castelli at Rcube SAS says the decline is just a correction presents a buying opportunity: valuations are attractive, it is a much better liquidity environment and there is potentially a large run-up in euro-zone equities. The Stoxx 600 is at 13.6 times estimated earnings, the highest since January
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Mark Matthews at Bank Julius Baer said the bull market will resume because of compelling fundamentals. Eisuke Sakakibara said Japanese equities had risen too much, too fast, especially financial stocks, and needed a correction before resuming their climb. J. Kyle Bass at Hayman Advisors said selling from JGB investors has overwhelmed
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Jeffrey Kleintop at LPL Financial said US companies announced $275 billion of repurchases this quarter, the highest in more than 5 years. 79 percent of buyback orders at Goldman Sachs corporate trading desk were active yesterday, the most in 2013. Jim Welsh at Forward Mgmt said the overall buy-the-dip
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Hedge funds continue to be an overpriced, middling asset class. Goldman Sachs found that hedge funds returned an average of 5 percent in 2013 versus a 15 percent gain in the S&P 500, while only 5 percent of the funds beat the S&P and more than 1
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Wu Kan at Dazhong Insurance said investors are avoiding stocks related to traditional manufacturing industries, while the selloff in Japan has spread risk-off sentiment across the region. The Shanghai Composite is at 9.3 times 12-month estimated earnings versus a 7-yr average of 15.7 times. Ken Peng at BNP Paribas said the
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Barry Knapp at Barclays predicts the Fed will maintain its current rate of asset purchases into 2014, as the labor market is again the Fed’s focus. Knapp said an improving labor market rather than accelerating inflation made the Fed end its last 3 easings – May 1983, February 1994, Feb-to-August, 2004. In
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Craig Erlam at Alpari says if the markets believes Bernanke indication the Fed will scale back in three months then we could see a bigger sell-off, but if they believe this is just a threat with no follow through expected for six months then this is a buying
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