Les grands investisseurs le sont-ils par chance ou compétence

Je ne sais pas si vous avez eu la chance de lire la dernière lettre mensuelle de Bill Gross mais celle-là mérite d’être lue. Contrairement à d’habitude, l’investisseur y fait plus une introspection sur lui même et les grands investisseurs de son époque comme Warren Buffet, Graham (un peu moins de son époque), Soros et Fuss. Il y ouvre une question que j’ai moi même ouverte au début de graphseo bourse sur ces grands investisseurs fondamentalistes de notre époque que nous tenons en haute estime. Bill Gross s’interroge d’une manière très juste si ce n’est pas l’époque qui fait le grand investisseur et pas le grand investisseur qui fait l’époque. Il y prend conscience qu’investir lors des années 70 à 2000 était la meilleure de tous les temps, et que les grands investisseurs de l’époque le sont devenus peut être plus par chance que par réelle compétence…

C’est intéressant de lire cette introspection et du coup de mener la sienne.

Vous pouvez lire la lettre de Bill Gross en entier ici.

So time and longevity must be a critical consideration in any objective confirmation of “greatness” in this business. 10 years, 20 years, 30 years? How many coins do you have to flip before a string of heads begins to suggest that it must be a two-headed coin, loaded with some philosophical/commonsensical bias that places the long-term odds clearly in a firm’s or an individual’s favor? I must tell you, after 40 rather successful years, I still don’t know if I or PIMCO qualifies. I don’t know if anyone, including investing’s most esteemed “oracle” Warren Buffett, does, and here’s why.

Investing and the success at it are predominately viewed on a cyclical or even a secular basis, yet even that longer term time frame may be too short. Whether a tops-down or bottoms-up investor in bonds, stocks, or private equity, the standard analysis tends to judge an investor or his firm on the basis of how the bullish or bearish aspects of the cycle were managed. Go to cash at the right time? Buy growth stocks at the bottom? Extend duration when yields were peaking? Buy value stocks at the right price? Whatever. If the numbers exhibit rather consistent alpha with lower than average risk and attractive information ratios then the Investing Hall of Fame may be just around the corner. Clearly the ability of the investor to adapt to the market’s “four seasons” should be proof enough that there was something more than luck involved? And if those four seasons span a number of bull/ bear cycles or even several decades, then a confirmation or coronation should take place shortly thereafter! First a market maven, then a wizard, and finally a King. Oh, to be a King.

But let me admit something. There is not a Bond King or a Stock King or an Investor Sovereign alive that can claim title to a throne. All of us, even the old guys like Buffett, Soros, Fuss, yeah – me too, have cut our teeth during perhaps a most advantageous period of time, the most attractive epoch, that an investor could experience. Since the early 1970s when the dollar was released from gold and credit began its incredible, liquefying, total return journey to the present day, an investor that took marginal risk, levered it wisely and was conveniently sheltered from periodic bouts of deleveraging or asset withdrawals could, and in some cases, was rewarded with the crown of “greatness.” Perhaps, however, it was the epoch that made the man as opposed to the man that made the epoch.