Don't cry和股市杯具
http://read.bbwc.cn/fbp0da.html人生就像一個茶几,上面擺的,除了洗具,就是杯具;股市也像一個茶几,現在看來,洗具還是洗具,杯具還是杯具。對於投資者而言,人生最大的杯具,並不是碰到了一個滿是杯具的茶几,而是在彬琅滿目的全球股市裡,滿懷信心,卻挑上了一個看上去很美的杯具,悲嘆之餘,又發現茶几上那些貌似殘缺的器皿,卻都是不斷升值的青花瓷洗具。不必唏噓,這個滑稽的故事正發生在你我身邊。
昨日午後,路過金融街時,我就發現,一股陰冷之氣瀰漫在街邊露天茶座周圍,或是用餐、或是小憩的人們少了許多往日的生氣,滿臉似有菜色,神情頗顯恍惚,言語略露憤懣。或許,你也在周邊朋友的身上發現了類似跡象,這都是股市杯具鬧的。最近幾日,中國股市一片蕭瑟,此前火得發燙的自貿區、民營銀行、互聯網金融概念,還沒來得及深入人心,就驟然趨冷,諸多一路狂飆的強勢股甚至從高點回調了超過30%;更令許多投資者鬱悶的是,這邊中國股市不敵晚來風急,那邊美國股市卻在頻報意外之喜。蘋果淨利潤難看又怎樣?債務危機沸沸揚揚又怎樣?就業數據黯淡無光又怎樣?末日博士們唱空又怎樣?美國股市用連創新高的絕對強勢做出了有力的回應。
這種「一半是火焰,一半是海水」的全球股市格局不免讓很多投資者格外心碎。心碎需要安慰,這個時候,不妨來聽一首名叫《Don't cry》的歌。當漂亮的吉他前奏響起,歌者用略帶疲憊、有些沙啞的嗓音唱出第一句:「Talk to me softly,There's something in your eyes(輕輕地告訴我,你的眼中藏著千言萬語)」,被猜中心事的你是不是立刻就有種欲語哽咽的衝動?就在你眼淚懸眶的剎那,他又溫柔地唱道:「Don't hang your head in sorrow,And please don't cry,I know how you feel inside,I've been there before(不要因為悲傷而垂頭喪氣,請不要哭泣,我能理解你的內心,因為我也曾感同身受)」,你一定有感覺,內心深處最柔軟的地方,就這麼被毫無阻攔地觸碰到了,而股市杯具帶來的那些煩躁、不安和傷痛,在溫柔的歌聲撫慰中,也變得不那麼痛徹心扉、沉重不堪了。
《Don't cry》是一首極有魅力的歌,它柔情似水的嗓音底下掩藏著撕心裂肺的情感,正因為如此,它一度在美國Billboard排行榜上停留了147周,廣為傳唱。有意思的是,唱這首歌的,叫槍花樂隊(Guns n' Roses),一個成立於1985年、殿堂級的、正兒八經的硬搖滾(Hard Rock)樂隊。這是一個令人驚訝的音樂現象,能唱出傳世柔情歌曲的,往往不是那些漂亮的、天天你儂我儂的娘炮帥哥(為避免傷及某些樂隊的粉絲,這裡就不點名了),而是那些狂野的、常常厲聲咆哮的重金屬或硬搖滾爺們。這個現象和股市茶几有著異曲同工之妙,就像外表粗糲的硬搖滾最是鐵漢柔情一樣,看上去經濟表現並不咋樣的美國卻有全球最靚麗的股市風景。那麼,在參悟股市玄妙之前,我們不妨來思考一下,為何硬搖滾最是鐵漢柔情?
為何硬搖滾最是鐵漢柔情?因為對於歌手而言,重要的不是外表華麗,而是內心柔軟。好看的外形的確是歌手能夠成名的先天優勢,但外形靚麗本身也是一個「陷阱」,它讓成功來得如此隨意,進而可能帶來莫名的自負和無謂的虛妄,並讓歌手缺乏直面現實、體味人生和審視內心的足夠體驗。而硬搖滾樂隊雖然外形粗獷,大多內心卻很敏感,而且他們會將全部精力投入到挖掘時代內涵上,這使得他們更容易做出經得起歲月考驗的音樂。同樣,對於股市而言,重要的不是概念漂亮,而是「內芯」堅強。股市的「內芯」,並不是宏觀經濟,而是微觀企業,再絢爛的宏觀概念也只能帶來一時的資本狂歡,能夠促成股市長期繁榮的,只有微觀企業可持續的茁壯成長。美國股市2012年以來漲得好,恰說明美國經濟復甦有令人豔羨的微觀基礎,企業向好,股市自然水漲船高。
為何硬搖滾最是鐵漢柔情?因為對於樂隊而言,習慣了吶喊,才不會有偽裝。很多娘炮樂隊,幾乎永遠在唱著軟玉溫香的歌,聽得多了也就像是無病呻吟,而硬搖滾樂隊長時間地製造著各種硬核音樂,用聲嘶力竭的吶喊去表達自己對社會的思考,一旦他們少有地安靜下來,往往能將疲憊後的真實唱得入骨般酥麻。同樣,對於股市而言,習慣了風險,才不會經常有危險。股市長期活在花樣翻新的各種利好裡,反而不如時不時地直面各類風險暴露帶來的各種挑戰,畢竟風險只有被充分暴露,才有希望被徹底出清,才不會變成懸在頭頂、永遠壓制趨勢行情的達摩克利斯之劍。
為何硬搖滾最是鐵漢柔情?因為對於音樂而言,為感動去打動,聽者只會無動於衷。生活粗糲,我們大多數人已經習慣了哀而不痛,悲而不傷,所以為痛而哀、為傷而悲的做作音樂,並不會打動我們的內心,而硬搖滾樂隊們偶然為之的柔情歌曲,卻經常由於那份「不刻意」的溫柔而命中我們的審美要害。同樣,對於股市而言,為上漲而求漲,很難良性發展。股市究其根本並不是為了成全少數人財富夢想而存在的賭場,而是為滿足企業融資需要而產生的市場,當投資者乃至上市公司對股市的功能認識產生根本性偏差,為上漲而求漲的市場很難健康成長,狡詐、貪婪和非理性的摻雜,只會醞釀暴漲暴跌的行情。
為何硬搖滾最是鐵漢柔情?因為就嗓音而言,真正溫柔的是「磁性」,而不是「雌性」。一些娘炮歌手,聲音乍一聽甜美可人,聽久了就感到油膩無趣;而許多硬搖滾樂隊的煙酒嗓子乍聽粗獷,細聽卻覺得充滿磁性。嗓音是音樂好壞的試金石,經濟則是股市漲跌的晴雨表。只不過,和很多人理解的不同,全球股市過去百餘年的運行歷史表明,股市晴雨表並不是經濟「增速」,而是經濟「增質」,就股市而言,經濟增長快慢並不重要,重要的是經濟增長過程是否伴隨著資源配置優化、市場結構改善、微觀企業成長和家庭福利改善。從這一點看,只要堅持追求經濟增質的提升,中國股市就有希望迎來長週期繁榮的現實拐點。
回到現在,不論在股市茶几上如何選擇,不管短期是成功還是失敗,相信一曲《Don't cry》都能給你帶來內心的平靜和平靜後的思考。正由於這點,我始終相信,搖滾,真的能夠拯救世界!
撰文/程實(經濟學者,微信公眾號shihuashijing,新著《盜夢空間與亞當斯密:電影與經濟的思想共鳴》已上架)
Equity Analysts: "In A Bull Market, You Don't Need Them. In A Bear Market, They'll Kill You"
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GS(14)@2012-07-07 15:52:41http://www.zerohedge.com/news/eq ... ket-theyll-kill-you
From bull market gods and goddesses of the 1980s and 1990s, stock analysts now preside over a much more modest kingdom. Nic Colas, of ConvergEx notes that the world has moved on to new golden calves, from currencies (with great leverage) to exchange traded funds (with generally less volatility) to macro analysts (the current Zeuses and Heras). This even extends to the world of the retail investor – there are far more Google searches in the U.S. for "Storage auctions" (246,000/month) than for "stock research" (just 33,000/month), and the rate of decline resembles a fast-decaying radioactive particle. Yet the rebirth of the business is already underway. Analysts now focus on developing useful proprietary datasets, exclusive expert resources, channel-checking contacts, and deeper management relationships. The public’s attention to active money management and stock picking will always be linked to overall market performance, but when the next bull market arrives those analysts who remain – and innovate - will be well-positioned to climb back to the top of the food chain.
Nic Colas, ConvergEx: Death (and Rebirth) of a Stock Analyst
Suppose for a moment that you are a money manager with just one client, whose investment more than covers your day-to-day expenses at your customary 2% management fee. The catch to this happy arrangement is that this investor wants a 10% absolute return and will pull his capital if you do not achieve it. On the plus side, he will keep the money with you for as long as you achieve this bogey. Drawdowns don’t matter; just make 10%. Oh, and the performance fee is 50% of anything over that target.
One more catch – you can only use one external resource in your investment process. Our mystery client wants you focused. Your choices are:
Unlimited access to one major broker’s sell side research and investment conferences.
Top-customer status at one expert network of your choice.
All the quantitative research resources you would like. The catch here is that you can only hire a few programmers to exploit this content.
Unlimited access to a top-tier macro research firm, with resources deep in every major central bank around the world.
In the current investment environment, the last choice is the lay-up answer. With asset price correlations near 90% for a wide range of investment choices, the on-off switch to market direction sits in Washington, Frankfurt, Beijing, and other centers of political and central bank power. The other choices would give you little insight here. Even those brokerages with excellent macro research and alumni in high places don’t seem to be able to call the twists and turns of macro policy.
That little case study is just one reason for the declining interest in single-stock research, especially in the United States. There is, of course, the range-bound equity market of the last +10 years as well. There is an old saying about analysts among the grey hairs of Wall Street: “In a bull market, you don’t need them. In a bear market, they’ll kill you.” And in a flat market, it seems, both apply. A few datapoints to highlight the decline of stock research in American capital markets:
Most surveys of institutional investors – mutual fund and hedge fund managers, mostly – find that these major clients of Wall Street firms pay their brokers for management access far more than the insights of their analysts. The most commonly surveyed percent of commissions for access to conferences and 1:1 meetings is 60%. The buy-sell-hold recommendations, written reports and visits from analysts are collectively worth more like 20% of the commission pool.
Retail investors have a similar level of ennui at the moment when it comes to equity research. If you look at Google Adwords search count data for the term “Stock Research” you’ll find that the average month only registers about 33,000 searches for the term. Thanks to several reality TV shows, the term “Storage auction” – the business of buying abandoned storage lockers to resell their contents at a profit – gets 246,000 searches per month. At the crudest level of comparison, this means the average American thinks wading through bedbug infested storage lockers is preferable to sorting out the winners and losers in their portfolios.
Google Trends data shows the rate of decline in the search for “Stock research,” and the decline since 2006 looks like some fast-decaying radioactive isotope. Interest in the term saw a 50% reduction from 2006 to 2008, and a further reduction of like amount since then. That essentially means that searches for the term now sit 75% lower than just six years ago. By contrast, the search term “ETF” is exactly where it was in 2006, which may sound like a pyrrhic victory save the tough investment environment of the last five years.
It is, however, too soon to put the stock research business in the same receptacle as buggy whips, road atlases and the yellow pages. First of all, brokerage firm analysts are the single most efficient billboards available for those companies’ thought leadership in a given sector. An analyst that “Shows well” to the firm’s investment clients and corporate customers is still a valuable franchise. How else do you think all those management meetings come to be in the first place?
Even outside the narrow confines of brokerage research, enterprising independent analysts are remaking the single stock research game along a new set of parameters. And some that aren’t so new, but have fallen into disrepair. Some examples here:
Quantitative data sets and surveys. When I first started as a stock analyst at First Boston in 1991, my mentor was a 20 year veteran named John McGinty who covered the machinery sector. Every quarter he would call all the Caterpillar dealer around the world – there were about 350 at the time, I believe – and ask how business was going. Sales trends, inventory levels, and the like. He published the findings, which were always well received since no one else did the work.
The world has moved on a bit since those surveys. Many U.S. listed companies take a dim view of analysts calling their store locations – even those that are franchised - or trying to wheedle information about of mid level executives. And the Securities & Exchange Commission looks on such leaks with an equally discouraging eye.
Against those forces of containment you have the expansive push of technology. Credit cards companies now have purchase data for hundreds of millions of consumers. The Internet makes certain business models – think online booking of airplane tickets – entirely transparent to anyone who can ping travel websites every hour and look up the average seat cost for every flight.
When you dovetail this newfangled way to collect information with an increasingly computer-based trading architecture in the U.S., the future of stock research and analysis comes into sharp focus. While quantitative investors and high frequency trading operations currently have remarkably short-duration investment holding periods, there’s really nothing in their platforms that limits them to 15-second periods of stock ownership. As more data about consumer spending and behavior goes online or into corporate data centers, that information will be sold to Wall Street. It’s already happening.
Narrow industry focus/select distribution. At ConvergEx we have a robust business promoting select research providers to institutional clients, and in this particular area the single-stock analyst is still welcomed – on their merits – into the investment workflows of hedge funds and long-only shops. Prospective clients want to see a small client list (less than 20 is ideal), a definable edge (usually in health care or technology) and a strong compliance process. Connect those three dots, and stock research is still alive and well on Wall Street. The downside: those are three hard-to-connect dots.
Novel sourcing. Imagine that you have a lead on a great investment opportunity in West Africa - a new group of highly experienced mining professionals for the region has identified a promising new diamond field. How do you tell if the managers are on the up-and-up? You hire a team of ex-CIA and British intelligence officers to check it out. In less than a week they can ping their resources in the region and given you a written report detailing everyone involved in the venture. Where they went to school, any history of corruption, the whole ball of wax. This won’t assure success, of course, but it does limit the possibility of fraud.
In short, stock research will make a comeback, and that return journey will likely come from two directions. The first will be technological. Any product that can systematically deliver quantitative business information in real-time to the increasing legions of automated trading systems and algorithmic investors will grow. The second path is more cyclical in nature. I can’t but think old-school stock research, with sector analysts, is ultimately tied to the fortunes of the equity market. When those recover, interest in stock picking will as well. And for analysts and stock market investors, that inflection point cannot come too soon.
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GS(14)@2012-07-07 15:52:59http://lckwcm.blogspot.hk/2012/07/blog-post_9190.html
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7月4日,週三。美國國慶休市,萬眾期待的6月份就業報告週五發表。 4、5兩月非農業職位增長遠遜預期,數字公佈後美股即散,惟這次情況可能有別。老畢並非對美國勞工市場改善抱有期望,而是今時今日股市升跌全看央行行止,除非數字好到市場相信經濟可自行複元穩步復甦,否則投資者寧可數據壞透,也不樂見似好非好似壞非壞的報告。 數據唔怕爛 數據愈爛股市愈彈,雖是有乖常理的「邏輯」,但只須看看中美兩國公佈最新製造業數字後的市場反應,便知經濟愈弊央行愈有機會救市這種市場預期,足以令本應大跌的股市變為大升。中國6月份官方PMI跌至七個月低位,險守50水平(50.2),恆指不跌反升;美國ISM指數上月跌穿50(49.7),非但反映製造業陷入衰退,當中兩項重要元素更出現雙位數跌幅(新訂單下降12.3%,貨品價格急挫10.5%),意味需求不振之餘,通縮踪影亦若隱若現。然而,與港股一樣,美股在數字公佈後不跌反漲。 宏觀當道專家難做 市場對中美數據差勁報以「掌聲」,背後包含著投資者對人民銀行最快本月下調存款準備金率、歐洲央行減息以至聯儲局推出延續扭曲操作(OT)以外寬鬆措施的期盼,惟美國加入環球「放水」行動,數據爛透乃必不可少的條件。在這種市場「邏輯」驅使下,週五公佈的美國6月份職位增長倘再次遠遜預期,股市不跌反升甚至大幅上揚,我不會感到意外。 講開央行,紐約梅倫銀行旗下資產管理分支ConvergEx「思想家」Nicholas Colas做了一個實驗,不妨照板煮碗跟讀者玩玩。 假設閣下是一位基金經理,客戶只有一人,但按行規一年徵收資產值2%管理費,租金人工燈油火蠟樣樣搞掂,應付日常開支綽綽有餘,七除八扣後還有錢落袋有肉可食。然而,這位尊貴客戶有一苛刻要求:必須交出年賺一成的絕對回報,否則講多無謂馬上撤資。不過,在決絕的背面,閣下若能替此君年復年地至少賺10%,他非但不會舍你而去,還心甘情願按五五之比跟閣下分享目標以外的任何利潤。如此安排,夠公平了吧? 且慢。尚有一附帶條件:為免閣下貪多務得不夠專心,在以下四項研究資源中,你只能選擇一項,舉手不回,必須慎重考慮。 ①無限量獲得一家主要投行的研究報告,大小投資會議亦必為閣下預留一席。 ②接通閣下的「心水」專家網絡,一個電話一通電郵,有問必答言無不盡。 ③量化研究(quantitative research)所需資源應有盡有。 ④隨時與一家在全球主要央行廣佈線眼的宏觀研究機構深入溝通,對方知無不言。 四個選擇表過,作為基金經理,你揀哪個? Nicholas Colas的實驗對象,幾乎清一色選擇④。 《信報》讀者的答案,老畢相信亦一般無異。今時今日,莫說同一類型資產,即使看似互不相干的市場,相關性高達八九成亦絕不稀奇。在資產價格同上同落的世界,頂尖投行、一流專家以至各行各業包羅萬有的數據寶庫,對市場方向的拿捏皆不可靠;真正決定市場何時risk on何時risk off的,只有貝南奇、周小川、德拉吉、金默文等中央銀行香主舵主。在上述四個選擇中,①、②、③皆不能為基金經理帶來任何優勢,只有④才能助你運籌帷幄,決胜千裡。 Ray Dalio在金融海嘯後紅到發紫,不是沒有原因的。 散戶對個股心淡 Colas實驗針對的雖是對沖基金、互惠基金等機構投資者,惟在資產價格高度相關的今天,散戶對個股的興趣也大不如前。 Google Trends數據顯示,以stock research作搜尋關鍵詞的案例,2006至08年減少五成,08年至今再降五成。換句話說,與2006年即六年前比較,今天散戶對個股相關信息的興趣(以搜尋案例為基礎)劇降75%! 當然,這只是一種籠統粗略的參考,未必十分準確。再說,相關案例僅反映美國散戶對股票的興趣,從本港財經台「講股」節目俯拾皆是可見,香江散戶「炒股唔炒市」者大有人在(賺蝕乃另一回事),港美兩地不一定可以相提並論。 然而,縱使以個股為例,閣下認為決定股價表現的是企業以至板塊基本因素,還是在risk on/risk off操控鍵上有啟動權的央行決策者?以中煤能源(1898)【圖】和中國神華(1088)兩隻煤(黴?)股為例,過去五個交易日俱升逾一成,但這是行業前景改善,抑或市場憧憬環球央行快有「放水」行動,板塊/個股跌得愈殘彈得愈勁有以致之? 華爾街有句老話:牛市用不著他們,熊市給他們害死(In a bull market, you don't need them. In a bear market, they'll kill you.)。這種「地球生物」,大家猜猜是什麼?溫馨提示:他們之中的星級人馬已登上更高台階,向政府推銷治港理念。