Category: Finance

There are some situations in the investment world that result in considerable confusion and risk.

In particular, I am still trying to process the action that has surrounded KCG Holdings (NYSE: KCG) last week. The position appreciated considerably, but there is obviously not going to be any resolution to the matter unless if I wake up one day and a definitive merger agreement has been signed. If the initial proposal and subsequent due diligence cycle does not come to fruition, then there will likely not be any press to that effect and the stock price will drop.

There is a very real reason to hold on (the suggested merger price was lower than my estimate of its fair value), and a very real reason to not hold on (there will be no formal merger agreement). Also, there is no information at all whether this merger would succeed or not, nor any indications on timing.

So the solution was obvious. Sell half.

David Merkel is one of my favourite finance authors and he concisely writes about it in an April 2009 blog post and a subsequent November 2016 post.

This is a perfect situation where doing half applies. The psychological advantage is that I don’t have to cry if there is a better price given to the company, nor do I have to cry if they trade lower (since I know where their fair value rests).

If the market perceives less risk, prices rise.

This is counter-intuitive, but an example should illustrate.

If risk-free rates are 1% and something is trading at a guaranteed yield at 2%, that something will trade at double the price of the risk-free product (all other variables being equal).

If that guarantee is less than 100%, then risk will cause the price of that instrument to decline.

Thus, it can be assumed that higher prices means that the market is pricing in less risk that a specific investment will fail to achieve their projected return on equity (or debt, whatever the case is).

The S&P 500 is up 6.4% year-to-date, despite all expectations. I’m willing to wager that most fund managers are underperforming this index and are starting to feel political pressure for their underperformance (“you’re in bonds???”). The way that psychology tells you to compensate for underperformance is to increase risk (i.e. equities) and join the party because it is the only way to “break even”.

The mentality shift that we are starting to see is startling – no longer is holding cash and being cautious is part of the game, rather, we are starting to see a more aggressive leaning towards risk-taking. Valuations? Who cares about valuation when you’re being left behind like a renter in the Toronto real estate market!

While I am not suggesting that you go out and purchase shares of Snap (Nasdaq: SNAP), be cautioned that I believe we are going to be entering a mania phase that will be punctuated with volatility that will be higher than what we have seen over the past year. Volatility means both up and down.

The federal reserve will try to dampen this process, but they will probably be too slow to react.

To outperform in the markets, despite what literature says about timing, market timing is everything. You want to be in cash when the markets are cratering, and you want to be fully invested when the markets are rising. While it sounds easy, it most certainly is not.

During periods of heightened volatility, an investor pays dearly for liquidity. Stocks and bonds that trade at reasonable valuations and seem like a “lock” suddenly are sold and taken out in the back and shot like cattle with mad cow disease. When the markets are like this, it is the time to be deploying cash instead of trying to shift things around in the portfolio to raise it.

The core reason for my outsized performance gains is not necessarily by doing well (yes, this helps), but rather being able to side-step market crashes when they occur. Sometimes my alarm clocks strikes and there is no need to wake up (I was ridiculously cash-heavy in 2014 and 2015), but better safe than sorry.

This is not a prediction for a market crash, but rather that I’m paying extra judicious caution when it comes to the portfolio. When you have Drudge and Trump bragging about the gains the stock market has seen since his election, coupled with friends asking you about investing, it makes me extra paranoid.

Most retail investors use covered call options as a cash generation device. The algorithm generally goes like this: “I’m going to sell a call option at a strike price that I would have sold the shares at anyway – if the stock does not get up to the strike price, I would have held onto the shares, and if the stock goes above the strike I will be cashed out anyhow, so why not make a few pennies selling the call option?”

Unfortunately, such thinking is more damaging than not as investors are usually selling such options at an implied volatility that is lower than what the option should be priced at. Most of this is evident in illiquid option markets (such as the options that trade on most of Canadian issuers on the Montreal Exchange).

The reason selling low-priced covered calls is hurtful is because of the “lottery” aspect of stocks (statistically speaking, this is referred to as the “fat tails” of a price distribution curve) – stocks sometimes do not move in continuous prices, although these jumps do not occur frequently. For example, when selling a call option, you are giving up most of the takeover premium that you would potentially receive. Another example is jumps during quarterly earnings reports. The other significant disadvantage of using covered calls is giving up liquidity – in most retail cases, selling a covered call obligates one to hold the capital in the common shares until expiration, or unwinding the position (which requires paying a spread on less liquid options).

So when somebody is willing to sell you 8 weeks of time on a call option at a strike price that is about 5% away from the money for about 0.8% of the market value of the common shares, they’re probably letting things go for cheaper than they realize. This option is still likely to expire worthless, but the potential upside is far, far better than the price paid simply because it can rocket higher than the 0.8% of premium paid. So I spent a few bucks (far, far less than 1% of the portfolio) on hitting somebody’s low asking price.

Covered calls do have their usage in portfolios, but they typically are constrained to high volatility situations when the action to sell calls seems to be a difficult decision.

The irreverent (but not irrelevant!) Nelson has linked to me in the past, so I will link to his post on something non-finance related and repeat the theme here.

I’m compiling the year-end (as today was the last trading day in the markets for 2016) and doing some year-end reflections, in addition to some projections of what we will be seeing in 2017.

In the meantime, I invite readers here to “ask me anything” via the comments below, and I will endeavor to answer in a timely fashion.

Happy New Year.