Back in the day you could maybe out-analyze the crowd on the home-team utility or some Graham and Dodd net-net but no more. You must have some exposure to growth.
On the other hand if you are just trying to keep the loot you've already plundered you have a few more options.
But that's a story for another post.
From Barron's Wall Street's Best Minds column:
The Wall Street veteran interviews a wise colleague who argues that tech and biotech is where the action is.
For the past fifteen years I have written annually about a person I have come to call “The Smartest Man in Europe.” For new readers, he is a finance person in his 80’s who has built his reputation by identifying important trend changes early and putting serious money behind his conclusions. Descended from a mercantile family that operated canteens selling food and weather protection along the Silk Route, he was educated in Europe, trained in New York and returned home to take advantage of the wealth-creating opportunities resulting from the post-war recovery. Listening to conversations around the dinner table, he was encouraged to focus on the major events early, and his success is a product of this skill. That success is reflected in his homes and other comforts he enjoys. His art collection spans centuries, from Canaletto to Koons, but what keeps him vibrant is ideas.
Notable among the past events he was early to observe are the rise and fall of Japan, the opportunities in China after the death of Mao, the end of the command economy in Russia and the unrealistic valuations of technology at the end of the last century. We get together a few times a year, but this year our conversation was by telephone.
“The whole world is suffering from too much debt. As a result, growth almost everywhere is going to be slow. I know you believe the problem is insufficient demand, but the major industrialized countries already have considerable debt and do not want to add any more to it to stimulate the consumer. Japan is an exception. They already have the highest debt to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of any major country and they are willing to add more. China is an exception on the other side. They are in a position to take on more debt because their debt to GDP ratio is low. Without more fiscal stimulus, demand will be tepid and growth will be disappointing. This is the state of the world now, and it is likely to endure for some time. In the near term, I don’t see a calamity, just sluggish economies and many equity markets not doing much.
“It is not easy to make money these days. In the past, if you had the right asset allocation, you could do well for institutional investors. Now most asset classes are fully valued. The bond market is expensive, equities are not cheap anywhere, gold is dead; other commodities are in bear markets, the emerging markets are generally not attractive, China is dangerous, and Europe and Japan are reasonably fully priced. As I said last year, the only way to make serious money is by carefully investing in innovation. You can make a modest return in equities in the major markets – I agree with you that the U.S. market will end the year higher than it is now. But if you want to make real money investing, you will have to do it by picking stocks in technology and biotechnology, and I would emphasize the latter.
“Most people still don’t recognize the gigantic implications of this phenomenon. Major breakthroughs are going to be taking place in cancer, heart disease, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, multiple sclerosis and other diseases. Picking the right companies can produce impressive returns in a difficult overall market environment. Right now there are literally hundreds of small companies working on significant products. Many of them will fail, but a few will change the world the way Google and Facebook did. Most are located in California and Boston, but there are also some in Europe and Asia. The United States is dominant, however. You should spend your time trying to understand what these companies are doing. The returns for picking the winners could be huge. What’s more, the pace of innovation is quickening. The rewards for proper asset allocation will be very modest. I like Facebook (ticker: FB ); Salesforce.com ( CRM ); biotech ETFs; an industrial company, CS Industries ; Visa ( V ); Apple ( AAPL ) , of course; Alibaba ( BABA ); and Palo Alto Networks. I am out of Google.
“Think of all the tasks your smartphone can do for you. There is almost no question that comes to mind that cannot be answered with a Google search, from politics to sports to business to entertainment. I am convinced technology has made the world more productive, but it is hard to measure. The recent figures on productivity are negative, meaning there is less output per worker hour, but the benefits of information technology may be difficult to determine in traditional ways.
“There is also a question of the impact technology is having on the middle class. Millions of jobs have been eliminated through robotics and other forms of technology. The technical skills required to get and hold a good job are increasing all the time. Service jobs are growing, but manufacturing jobs are rising more slowly, and service jobs generally are lower-paying. Many kids completing college cannot find jobs in their chosen field and are forced to work at something temporary to pay the bills and student loan debts. This is a problem that is likely to get worse as more technology breakthroughs take place, so the social implications of this phenomenon are enormous. Advances in biotechnology also have the social costs, as more people live longer.
“In addition there is the problem of wasting time. Playing video games rather than reading books, and communicating with followers on Twitter, can keep a young person busy. The typical Facebook user is said to be spending twenty hours a month on that site. According to recent studies, the average college student only spends one hour a night studying alone, perhaps because of other distractions. These numbers could signal problems for American competitiveness going forward, so there is a downside to what is happening in technology....MORE
