Views on Recovery | 29 May 2020

It was a week of prognostications for restart as caution builds around how anything less than a total recovery in economic activity can be beneficial for us. The concern is concentrated on the potential lingering effects of an economic decline and the urgency to get back to at least 96% of the pre-crisis activity levels.

From the private markets, liquidity is expected to dry up with fewer IPOs and M&A during a recession that possibly could be tougher than 2008. Public valuations have typically offered the first visible signs of the recession impact and a call to revisit the valuation fundamentals to frame it.

Even with business stoppage and permanent impairments looming on operating earnings, the lack of opportunities could force investors into equities. There’s less income and protection from fixed income so this may distort the savings rate going forward. With the Fed managing the curve, the sharply falling yields lead to an anticipation of a mild rise in rates – so stocks appear to be the only choice. Valuation matters.

Much of the engagement between advisors and clients have been more about sitting back and figuring out how to stay invested. Where the Fed support is providing an uncomfortable rally, advisors are staying within their targets and drift tolerances and ensuring that the investment risk is matching what was set forth within the client’s investment policy.

The message is to maintain simplicity. If you’re searching for alternatives or uncorrelated risk, find it with the ETF space that offers some level of liquidity. Work it into the time horizon as continued high volatility will challenge many to stay the course. The pricing of the markets is caught between a partial return to normal and the all clear sign with history being inept for guidance.

To understand recovery, we can agree that it’s not a normal recession.The start of the recovery seems more like operating with a crank handle rather than a push button.

Are your currently working with SMAs ?

The Portformer team would like to speak with interested advisors who use the Schwab Managed Account Marketplace and Client Proposal generator tool and are looking into alternatives after Schwab discontinues the service this month. Portformer is evaluating the development of a proposal tool that utilizes our underlying portfolio technology to import an existing client portfolio to determine suitable replacements and opportunities for tax loss harvesting.

We’d like to understand from advisors:

• The growing demand for this type of tool or service.
• How the tool was providing value and determine additional product specifications, if required.
• Evaluate the SMA review and proposal creation experience.

Should you have any interest or would like to learn more, please reply to this email, reach out to us via Portformer chatbox or directly to Sean Kruzel at sean.kruzel@portformer.com.

Alternative data for your COVID-19 Resource Center

We have reviewed these sources this week which highlight the sociological, environmental and economic impact to the U.S. and global systems:

• The Mathematics of COVID-19– Excellent primer on how the epidemiological models assessing COVID-19 actually operate.
• The Impact of COVID-19: Analysis and Visualization– Derived data and visualizations that show the comparison of SARS and COVID-19.
• Economics 2020: Social Distancing – Data that highlighs the progress and impact of social distancing on national level.
• COVID Exit Strategy – A site that has real-time updates of data metrics across states tracking the economy reopening. COVID-19-Alternative-Housing data – SF – Here are real-time updates of health, housing and testing data occurring within San Francisco.

Our advisor community is constantly sharing ideas and requests for alternative data and trends to enhance their research process so your suggestions are always welcome.

Posts

Here are the posts most read on Portformer.com this week

• Week in Review – 5/15/2020 | Imminent ETF Shakeup
• Week in Review – 5/1/2020 | Sell in May and Go Away ?
• Portformer Performance During Market Correction

Question of the week ?

How are you expanding your dialogue with clients around tax impact and extended deadlines during this period ?

Please share with us via our chatbox at Portformer or reply to this email. Your responses will remain confidential.

What we’re reading:

Here is a snapshot of the best articles compiled and read by our team this week:

• Valuation Amid COVID-19: Go Back to Basics – Investment professional highlights on a crisis provides the best lessons and clarity on asset valuations.
• How to Arbitrage your US Taxes for Difficult Times – Investment Panels – Economics in Orbit– Summaries of panel discussion from the latest virt- ual Investment Conference hosted by Maudlin Economics.
• This Mutual Fund to ETF Conversion will be Important Test of Active Management – The emergence of the non-transparent ETFs and flows will be establishing importance of active management going forward. Highlighting the Top Firms Winning Business from the Richest Investors – The top RIAs are winning business from the richest investors and how they are doing it. What is Quality ? – FAJ article that supports quality is not a widely-accepted portfolio factor due to the lack of clarity and definition. Pandemic 1918 Compared to Today’s Pandemic – Seeking Alpha article that makes comparison to the pandemic of 1918 and the qualitative impact compared to the current one – they share in the suddenness. Navigating Uncertain Waters– Franklin Templeton white paper on navigating macro shifts.
• Index Investor – Navigating Dynamics of the New Cold War – Macroeconomic and banking specialist offers a summary of macro economy forecasts including a feature article assessing the emergence of the New Cold War.
• US Pension Fund are Warned they Will Run out of Money in 2028 – FT article where pension Funds are warned that they will run out of money by 2028 – 7 funds are profiled.

If you have any difficulty accessing these articles and papers or we can help with specific topics, please reach us through our chat window or directly at john.dibenedetto@portformer.com.

Portformer for Slack users

We’re interested in speaking more with investors and advisors who are utilizing Slack, Microsoft Teams or other collaboration tools in their workspace.  Our team loves Slack as we operate faster, so I’ve adapted our API to serve Portformer Alternatives right in Slack.  If you or your team would like to be part of the Beta Release of Portformer on Slack, email me to be added to the list.

Firms are uncovering new ways to build engagement and goodwill with their clients and their families. If you’re looking for new ideas, whether for clients or prospects, let us share our inventory through a quick, scheduled 15 min – Zoom call.

For more real-time content updates and links, please follow us on social media at Twitter @Portformer and LinkedIn at Portformer.

Stay safe,

John DiBenedetto and the Portformer™ Team