Global Investing

Arzu Cevik, director at Thomson Reuters Strategic Research, writes:

“With Citi shares trading below $1, the first time since 1970 that a “penny stock” traded on the Dow Jones Industrial Average, it is widely expected that it will be removed from the index.

“The company was added to the Dow in 1997 when it was still known as Travelers, and the last company to be removed from the Dow was AIG last September (when its stock hovered above $1) and was replaced by Kraft Foods.

“It’s also expected that General Motors may be removed from the Dow. GM shares are trading slightly above $1 and there’s speculation it may be headed toward bankruptcy.

“There are other stocks in the Dow that are now a part of Wall Street’s Dollar Menu. In fact, there are currently five Dow stocks trading in the single digit range.

“Who will take their place in the Dow? Mostly likely, another company whose stock is faring better or relatively better in this recessionary environment.

Wealth managers at Citi Private Bank are telling their clients to stay neutral in their exposure to hedge funds at the moment, whether the strategy be event driven, equity long/short or macro. The main reason is that capital markets are still stressed and many hedge funds still need to deleverage.

The firm points out, however, that hedge funds had a good news-bad news kind of year in 2008. Based on the HFRX Global Hedge Fund Index, it was the worst performance on record. The index lost 23.3 percent. Its next worst performance was 2002 — and that was only a 1.5 percent decline.

Losses were widespread across all kinds of strategies. Only merger arbitrage and systematic macro gained anything. 

Value managers and contrarian analysts long derided as permanent bears have been poking their heads out of the woods to bring some early Christmas cheer to delegates assembled at the CFA Institute’s European Conference in Amstedam.

James Montier, global strategist at SocGen, who likes to swim with sharks in his spare time, opened the conference on Tuesday by saying that he was more optimistic about equities than he had been for a long time, with the UK and European markets approaching bargain basement prices.

But on day two, Matt King, managing director, credit products strategy at Citigroup, rained all over this parade. “I have a message for equity investors,” he said. “It’s worse than you think!”