“The S&P is stuck in no man’s land”, Nomura’s Charlie McElligott writes, describing a situation that finds spot loitering right around the “flip” line for dealer gamma positioning, meandering between two large strikes.
Reinforcing this aimless roaming at gamma/delta neutral levels is relatively meager CTA positioning, with McElligott flagging “low gross exposure levels due to the recent signal chopping back and forth [and] somewhat distant buy-/sell- triggers in either direction”.
With spot straddling the gamma flip threshold and the next sell level for CTAs all the way down at 2,746 (while the closest buy level is up at 2,936), stocks are left to float in purgatory, which isn’t the worst thing considering recent events.
(Nomura)
So, what’s next? Where to from here for US equities?
For McElligott, the answer is “lower across the summer months”. Or at least that’s his “sense” right now.
He cites what he characterizes as the market’s “current pragmatism towards the virus in conjunction with the ‘feel-good’ of the rally leaving it exposed to the downside of a coming second-wave of cases”.
Obviously, easing lockdown protocols and reopening the economy will likely mean more infections and more deaths, something Donald Trump acknowledged in a series of somewhat tone-deaf remarks on Tuesday evening.
“Some states [are] rush[ing] back to ‘normalcy'”, McElligott writes, adding that if there is a second wave, there are “fewer Fed and fiscal bullets in the chamber next time around”.
As far as the virtuous dynamics that trigger systematic re-leveraging, the train (which wasn’t going that fast anyway, at least as it relates to the vol.-targeting crowd) is losing steam. It’s not (necessarily) a matter of the systematic universe de-leveraging, but rather what Charlie calls a “demand vacuum”, based on the technical setup required to trigger more buying.
“In order to make the allocation to equities grow again significantly, we would need to see 3m realized vol (~60) fall below 1m realized (~40)”, he says. In short, we need a serious bullish catalyst, and the balance of news this week seems to point in the opposite direction.
As far as seasonals go, Charlie reminds you they’re “weak-ish” or “mehh” for the summer.
“Gold and USTs trade strong, while May through September is bad for EEM and US equities themes [and] Duration Sensitives/Mo Longs tend to strongly outperform versus Cyclicals/Mo Shorts”, he notes, before delivering a crucial checklist of factors that helped drive the rebound off the March bear market lows.
The following is a fantastic summary, and speaks to my steadfast view that when you think about why equities were able to stage what, by most accounts, is the swiftest/sharpest bounce following an outright calamity on record, you absolutely have to take a holistic view, and avoid references to any one controlling factor or “proximate cause”, as it were. Here’s McElligott (visuals derived from Nomura’s QIS models):
- The ‘get constructive again’ starter kit established in March / early April: Massive monpol and fiscal pol response–CHECK / flatten the curve in US cases–CHECK / commencement of reopening on global and US state & local level–CHECK / positive phase 1 Remdesivir data, or comments from REGN yesterday saying COVID19 antibody could be ready by Fall–CHECK
- What this meant then too and occurring simultaneously was a set of further positive inputs into the “vol normalization” process, following the various “short vol” stop-outs in late March–by late April we’d seen the return of Overwriters into “expensive” vols, while too we saw the resumption of an upwardly-sloping front-end of the VIX curve as an “all-clear” signal for the return of systematic “Short Vol” & VIX roll-down strategies
- This then began to create mechanical covering of either legacy shorts (CTAs) or re-leveraging into longs from “vol control” / “tgt vol” space–and over the 1m stretch, at one point last week when the CTA signal had flipped back to “+100% Long,” we estimated ~$50B of CTA buying across US Eq futs on the month-long gradual / partial cover (from prior -100% position)…
- … while too our Vol Control model estimated ~ $15B bot over the past 2wks, as realized trailing vols reset gradually lower
Now, all of that is fading into the rearview as stocks drift into the summer.
That’s an issue, because with all the blood thus squeezed from the stone, the market could be bereft of tailwinds at a time when earnings revisions are likely to deteriorate further and macro realities begin to set in.
It’s important to note that here, “macro realities” means something different than, say, single-digit PMIs, which are basically just novelties for traders to marvel at. And it even means something different than horrendous unemployment data which, while truly tragic, has lost its ability to shock traders, even as it conveys despair on Main Street.
Rather, in this context “macro realities” means bankruptcies and credit events plastered all over the front page. Charlie describes it as follows:
An ugly forecast revision period for corporate EPS; data continues to come-in even worse than expected as consumer psychology remains altered; the corporate cashflow disruption and imminent bankruptcy realities become front page daily news (particularly anticipating bloodshed in the energy space); and 2nd order white collar layoffs in corporate America all contribute to another sentiment swoon.
Note that so far, that kind of dire news flow has been absent, even as everyone is fully apprised of the body blow the economy has suffered.
Commenting on this, Goldman notes that “the US paycheck protection program covers eight weeks of payroll and other costs for firms with up to 500 employees, which is too short if business remains impaired after May”. If one travels up the line, the bank frets that “support programs generally become even patchier, especially for high-yield or middle market firms that don’t benefit from the Fed’s and ECB’s corporate bond support programs”.
That’s not to say Goldman thinks Fed and fiscal support will be ineffective. In fact, the bank thinks the hit to personal and corporate incomes will be cushioned materially, almost the point of a complete offset, depending on what you’re measuring.
But the bank says it’ll be important to “carefully monitor trends in business financial distress and specifically bankruptcies”.
“So far, the deterioration in the US remains limited”, Goldman said Monday, before noting that while we’ve seen “an uptick in April”, it’s still “very early”.
(Goldman)
The good news, from McElligott, is that once the “summer fade” is in the books, there’s scope for a “risk-on pivot”.
“The analogs and seasonals show a much more constructive environment beginning late in September through December, which also corroborates with various… macro regime change analogs”, he writes, referencing a series of notes from early April that looked at recent extremes in factor and style performance in a historical context in order to help forecast returns. The figure depicts one of those exercises, although there were several (for more on the conditions that fed into the analysis behind the chart below, see here):
The bottom line, from McElligott’s point of view, is that there’s scope for a “strong risk environment” six months out, and possibly accelerating thereafter.
This “post-recession trade” would need an improvement in the macro (e.g., an inflection in PMIs later this year) and would obviously be delayed or derailed by any kind of dramatically bad outcome that finds the US and China escalating tensions and/or a worse-than-expected second wave of the virus.
And don’t forget: There’s an election in November. Or at least there’s one scheduled.
Who puts money into those kind of funds? I guess the “consultants” have continued to jam everyone into anything labelled as “alternative”. I wonder what the returns are looking like.
Not sure you’re conceptualizing of it in a wide enough context. Bridgewater (i.e., risk parity) is essentially just target-vol. And the CTA universe is massive.
To answer your question: Everyone. When you think about the systematic universe, it encompasses a wide range of strategies. This isn’t some kind of obscure little corner. There is massive AUM here.
Thanks. I’ll be curious to see how sticky the assets are as the year progresses.
Many others target risk volatility. I use it as part of my practice, with the constraint being how risk tolerant the client is, and what level of risk needs to be taken to achieve a client’s goal. However, the type of risk parity I engage in, is far more long term. The CTAs follow the “risk herd” with a much shorter time horizon than I do for my practice. Wall Street is day to day, hour to hour, I imagine the risk parity CTAs might have a slightly longer time horizon but not by much. The tricky thing is that any risk model will change to incorporate the lastest movement in the market. So when volatility increases, if you follow such models closely you will be looking to take your perceived risk lower or higher at the least opportune time. This process if you follow your models will increase the volatility in a feedback loop. The conclusion is that we are going to be seeing persistently higher volatility day to day for awhile until we get a change in the narrative. One can argue that the Fed is trying to reduce volatility by engaging in asset buying and yield targeting to low interest rates, even though this is really only an indirect reading of their stated mandates (maximize employment, minimize inflation and provide a stable banking system).
Listening to all the bank ads on TV it looks like they are all pushing the “don’t panic , we’re behind you and want to help” message. But, what we really needed was a “we realize it’s not your fault that you no longer have an income so we’re freezing everyone’s debt until this is over”. Also, we need the government (who can print and borrow money ad infinitum) to back up the banks and let them GIVE money to all the citizens based on their recent history of earning. In this way , no one actually loses their income and there is no panic about not meeting the mortgage or car loans that are frozen and there is money to pay the utilities and food bills. Also with no need to layoff people the government can back up all the medical insurance that people are losing daily. Businesses don’t have to go bankrupt. People don’t have to panic because they have no money to buy food to feed their families. We don’t have to rush to return to normal and can really let the virus spread die down to what we can handle. Instead of having to send a completely inadequate token check to all Americans with some idiots name on it (A lot of whom are still waiting) they just have to wire the money to the banks once a month.
Wow. That made so much sense.
Or the Fed could just buy mortgages, student loans, and consumer loans for durable goods and write them down –loan forgiveness would be far simpler than ongoing installment payments and the “shock and awe” akin to their various lending facilities and asset purchases rolled out would probably have an extraordinarily powerful effect on everyone’s mood –and maybe even inflation expectations. I really see no difference in terms of free riding, adverse selection and moral hazard problems that the corporate support and market stabilization programs the the Fed has been willing to overlook on the corporate side. Couple that with state and municipal bond purchases and then the Fed would hit the scale necessary to lift us out of this impending Depression. 15 T should just about do it.
Agreed. The government could really relieve, if not resolve, this situation with a consumer debt jubilee, UBI, or other similarly massive fiscal programs directed at households. But, in our current political reality, such meaningful “handouts” or “entitlements” to “takers” from “makers” (even though “paying for it” is a nonsensical construct as H-man has pointed out over and over) seem exceedingly improbable, with both political parties disincentivized to it by their corporate rulers, and I’d argue actually opposed to it ideologically. Neoliberal architect Larry Summers is back as the “advisor” to the Democrats for crying out loud, supposedly as an “answer” to fiscal conservatism from the GOP, and we are expecting real fiscal stimulus to meet this moment? Call me a cynic, but I just don’t believe any of these old dogs can learn that many new tricks, certainly not without a lot of pain first to force the issue.
In response to your closing paragraph- I am watching the news about RBG– who could become “the” election issue, not Covid-19.