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Bob Rodriguez: Stock Market ‘Delusional’; Hard Landing Ahead

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Bob Rodriguez, legendary investor and former 25-year CEO of First Pacific Advisors, is famed for forecasting the dot-com bust and the financial crisis of 2008-2009. 

But in 2016, the same year he retired from FPA, he parted ways with the direct ownership of equities. The stock market today lives in a “delusional world,” he says.

What’s in his portfolio now? And is he still predicting a worse financial crisis than the horrific meltdown of 15 years ago?

The celebrated investor tells all in an interview with ThinkAdvisor.

For the past seven years or so, instead of investing in equities, Rodriguez has been focusing mainly on hard assets and to some extent, short-term bonds.

“The odds of a healthy stock market do not seem high to me. There isn’t any question in my mind that bonds provide a far better risk-return element than the stock market as I look over the next 12-14 months,” he argues in the interview. 

But “beyond two years,” he adds, “most equities and bonds will prove to have poor returns.”

Is a recession en route?

“I fully expect a hard landing with a worse economic and fiscal outcome than in 2007-2009,” he opines.

Based in Lake Tahoe, Nevada, Rodriguez was in New York last month presenting a paper at an American Numismatic Society conference, of which he was co-sponsor.

An ANS Life Fellow, his Resolute Americana Collection of rare colonial and early U.S. coins and medals is extensive, dating from the start of the colonial period to the earliest days of the Mint.

At the conference, he discussed his epic four-and-a-half-year coin project, which he calls “the most expensive and intensive scientific investigation ever conducted in numismatics.”

At the Argonne National Laboratory, with its cutting-edge technology, Rodriguez and his colleague Tony Lopez researched an extraordinarily rare coin: a 1792 silver disme (dime), which Rodriguez owns.

Once the research was complete, there and previously at other labs, Rodriguez concluded that the coin was used to design the significant 1793 half-cent, one of the first coins struck by the U.S. Mint.

The Argonne research captured images from the interior of the disme that used to be on its surface but were no longer visible.

What was revealed, in part, was an “L” and a “J,” standing for Liberty and Justice. The coin, decorated with hearts, also had earmarks of a love token representing the U.S. Mint’s second chief coiner’s marriage proposal to his first wife.

In the interview, Rodriguez looks back at America three centuries ago through a numismatic lens and forward to what he predicts will be the state of the country’s economy and securities markets a year from now and beyond.

ThinkAdvisor interviewed him by phone on Sept. 27.

His advice to financial advisors for the next decade is to “focus on purchasing power.”

His expectation is that hard assets — “the most under-owned commodities” — will maintain some form of buying power.

Here are excerpts from our interview:

THINKADVISOR: You exited direct ownership of equities in 2016. What have you been investing in?

BOB RODRIGUEZ: I’ve prepared my estate for a period of economic and financial markets’ disruption. I don’t see how you abuse the borrowing authority, as this country has done, and not have some negative consequences.

What’s in your portfolio?

In 2013, my full allocation for hard assets was less than 7%. I waited and watched and didn’t like what I saw going on.

So since that period of time, I’ve shifted my allocation to about 70% hard assets of various types.

Such as?

Gold is an element. It would be an area that people would consider. The nature of gold has shifted since February-March of 2022. A second thing would probably be selected types of real estate.

Gold is weak in the United States; but in virtually every other currency, it’s setting new highs. One of the strongest markets for gold happens to be in China.

In August, you said that “gold … will continue to get worse and that previous data will be revised lower [but that] gold will get higher after hitting a new high next year.” Still predicting that?

Yes. 

You have a notable collection of very rare coins. How did you get into numismatics?

In July 2013, after I bought a silver half-deem [aka half-disme or half-dime], the first coin I acquired, I wondered what it sold for when I left the field [childhood hobby] in 1960 when I was 12.

So I found my Red Book [U.S. Coin Guide] that I used as a child, and I literally almost fell off my chair: My bookmark was exactly at the page of what would be my first acquisition!

I spent about eight months looking at this area of coins. I didn’t know anything about them. But after barely one year in the field, I was doing research papers on them.

What are the similarities in the way you researched companies as a money manager and how you research rare coins?

In my former field, I would be attracted to companies that were having problems, and I looked at their issues in a different way than other people did.

As a contrarian, there are many similarities of [researching coins] to researching in the investment field.

Did that apply to your 1792 coin project?

Yes, that’s very much the way I looked at this coin. It’s been described as scratched, marked-up and graffitied. That’s what people looked at. 

But when I looked at the [etches], they started to talk to me. They didn’t look random.

This silver coin — a deem — is extraordinarily historical. Its design was that of one of the first two coins of our country.

What went into your research?

The search was to find what I call my Rosetta Stone. We found it using X-ray microdiffraction at the Argonne National Laboratory, which is sponsored by the Department of Energy and administered by the University of Chicago.

We had three physicists conducting experiments that have never been done anywhere in the world.

How long did your project take?

Four-and-a-half years. It was the most expensive and intensive scientific investigation ever conducted in the field of numismatics.

The value of the four coins needed for the project was $2 million.

What was the cost of all that research?

I have no idea, but there were at least 2,000-3,000 hours of research, including the time at [multiple labs].

This was a detective hunt, and a lot of fun.

I would easily put the value of my time equal to that of a mechanic, say $150-$200 an hour [laughs]!

What did the research reveal?

By going down into the interior of the coin, we recovered images of what was once on the surface that can no longer be seen.

As a result of recovering those images, I believe we’ve proven that the etch marks were on a design surface.

What was one of the themes that you recovered?

From what appeared to be images of hearts and “E loves M,” we noted a love-token theme.  We assumed that “E” stood for Eckfeldt. Adam Eckfeldt was the second chief coiner of the U.S. Mint, and  “M” could be his wife, Maria.

We searched the Philadelphia archives and found that Adam Eckfeldt and Maria Hahn married on April 8, 1792, within days of the establishment of the Mint [on April 2].

Now here’s a big change of subject: Are you still predicting the big financial crash you’ve been forecasting since 2009?

Absolutely. The last 13 years have been the most insane period of monetary and fiscal policy ever. We added nearly $9 trillion to the debt on a base of $21 trillion. It’s absolutely out of control.

In my interview at the Morningstar Conference in 2009, I got wild-eyed and crazy and stated that after 2017, we would face a crisis of equal or greater magnitude than the 2007-2009 crisis and that by 2020-2022, we would face debt in this country of something on the order of $20 trillion-$23 trillion.

Are you now forecasting a stock market crash anytime soon?

The odds of a healthy stock market do not seem high to me. There isn’t any question in my mind that bonds provide a far better risk-return element than the stock market, as I look over the next 12-14 months.

If I go out beyond two years, then I think most equities and most bonds will prove to have poor returns.

“The equity market continues to live in a delusional world,” you recently said. Please elaborate.

It’s still looking like a delusional world, and [the market] has been more concentrated in terms of more of the returns coming from fewer and fewer stocks.

It has elements of the “nifty-fifties” of the early 1970s, when 50 stocks dominated the market.

In the last year to 18 months, eight to 10 stocks have dominated the performance numbers. That isn’t healthy. 

I’m fully expecting that the economic data is going to get decidedly worse. I think previous data will get revised downward.

This is not a healthy combination of inputs. 

What do you think of the Congressional Budget Office’s forecast? In March 2020, I said that by the end of the decade, we would be facing total debt of at least $50 trillion, that the Fed balance sheet would be probably on the order of $20 trillion. Well, now you have the CBO’s 10-year forecast for the debt of the United States for 2023 at $53 trillion. They have a deficit every single year of approximately $2 trillion. They have never gotten a forecast right. So I think they’re optimistic.

Why is spending so high?

The U.S. is becoming an over-extended empire. I’m attacking both parties: the irresponsible Democrats, profligate spendthrifts because all they want to do is spend on social [services], and the conservative, fiscally responsible Republicans, who want to spend on expanding defense.

The dollar amount of spending — huge liabilities — is about equal.

A pox on both houses!

“Biden’s strong economy only exists in his dreamworld,” you opined this summer, on Aug. 29. Still believe that?

President Dementia [President Joe Biden] lives in a dreamworld. I know I will offend people with that. But I don’t know what data these people are looking at. The data is deteriorating.

My record of forecasting is far better than the Federal Reserve’s or any of those boobs back in Washington.

If this is a strong economy, then I’d hate to see what a weak one looks like!

“I fully expect a hard landing with a worse economic and fiscal outcome than in 2007-2009,” you said recently. Do you have the same thoughts now?

Absolutely. I’m looking at a system that is highly leveraged. You have a Fed that has increased interest rates at the most aggressive rate of change since 1981.

Another measure is that the debt service of the U.S., which was running at approximately $350 billion a year 15-18 months ago, is now north of $900 billion.

Larger and larger amounts of debt service are going to consume a greater proportion of the federal budget at the same time that debt is escalating.

The savings rates have gone through the floorboards. They’re now back to pre-COVID-19 levels.

Delinquencies on credit cards are escalating. Bankruptcies are moving to levels similar to 2007-2009. The private sector is getting hit!

One of the last elements of strength in the system was housing, and that has [also] gone through the floorboards now with debt service.

 What securities do you have in your portfolio at present?

Treasury securities of two years or less. When the worsening economic data unfolds at greater magnitude over the next 12-18 months, I would think that the 10-year could have a decent run. It could be easily 100 basis points lower, if not more.

However, with what’s going on with the totally out-of-control U.S. budget, would I lend long-term money to a profligate, irresponsible, uncontrolled borrower? I probably wouldn’t.

So people have to make the decision about what is likely to unfold over the course of the next two to 10 years.

Are you holding any securities from First Pacific Advisors, your former firm?

I’m still an owner of FPA New Income Fund. It effectively has a duration of less than two years — very short.

Broadly, what’s your advice to financial advisors about the economy and markets?

The greatest thing to focus on in the next decade is purchasing power. Let’s say that if bond yields average 5% — I think we’re there right now — could inflation average 7% over the next 10 years?

[If so], then you would have a penalty on purchasing power from equities.

What’s good to invest in for preserving purchasing power?

What are the most under-owned commodities? Hard assets. So I would fully expect that hard assts of various forms have a greater probability of maintaining some form of purchasing power.

Have you made any new numismatic acquisitions lately?

[During the Coinage of the Americas conference last month,] I acquired the Journal of the House of Representatives’ first session of the Second Congress in 1792. It’s on the original plain paper. Very rare.

This is when they established the first Mint of the U.S., specifying what our coinage should look like. 

That document seemed like a very nice addition to my Resolute Americana Collection, which is one of the finest collections of the very rare 1792 mint pattern coins [struck to evaluate a design, not circulate] of the United States that’s ever been assembled.

Pictured: Bob Rodriguez


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