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Who’s Afraid of a Carbon Tax?

Unnaturally Negative Interest Rates

How Did South African Active Managers Perform in 2015?

What Is Driving the Mexican Peso?

Who Fuelled the Oil Bonds Bubble?

Who’s Afraid of a Carbon Tax?

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Tim Edwards

Managing Director, Index Investment Strategy

S&P Dow Jones Indices

As far as equity investors might experience them, the risks of a potential “carbon tax” are more easily fathomed than the rewards.  Emissions data are available for most large companies and – taking basic assumptions on the likely form of taxation – we can easily examine which market segments face the greater risks.

Estimating The Impact of a Carbon Tax

In comparing tax sensitivity, the key comparison becomes one of efficiency. This is provided by a “revenue footprint”­, which is calculated for each company as the total emissions per U.S. $1 million dollars of revenue.  This, combined with an appropriate benchmark, allows for a revenue footprint to be calculated for overall markets, or segments, based on the characteristics of each component.

To provide an estimate of the tax liability, we assume a hypothetical flat rate of tax equal to $25 per tonne of carbon dioxide – a reasonable estimate if we rely on what has been proposed or implemented elsewhere in the world.  Combining this with the revenue footprint for the main regions and sectors composing the S&P Global 1200, we arrive at an estimated tax liability (per $1M of revenues) as follows:

Tax Liability S&P Global 1200 segments

There is not a great deal of distinction between the different geographies.  Our Latin American benchmark faces the largest tax bill in proportion to revenues, followed by Australia and then the United States, but the bulk of major indices face a tax bill roughly in the range of 0.5% to 1.0% of revenues.

The variation among global sectors is far more dramatic, with several orders of magnitude separating the best, from the worst.  It is perhaps surprising that Energy is less at risk under this analysis than to both Utilities and Materials, although this highlights that it is the actual burning of fossil fuels, opposed to their extraction, that results in emissions.

Value Investors Could Be More At Risk Than Growth

This approach – of using a “revenue footprint” in combination with an estimate of likely taxation to measure risk – is not limited in application to sectors, or regions. Provided that the allocations are reasonably stable, a similar analysis may be conducted on any index, or portfolio. This allows us to make comparisons between, for example, growth and value investment styles.  Common sense suggests that the archetypical “value” company will be more carbon intensive: they are associated with significant fixed assets like factories and land, while growth archetypes are found in technology, capabilities, and intellectual property.

Indeed, based on a global classification of “growth” and “value” (as provided by the S&P Global BMI style indices), the results show a clear relationship between value/growth classification and potential tax risk.  Overall, value investments face likely tax bill that is around 50% higher as a proportion of revenues.

Tax Liability S&P Global 1200 G&V

Conclusions

We don’t know whether a global carbon tax is coming, or what form it will take even if it comes.  But without it, it will be hard for national governments to meet the commitments they have made, especially as “big business” is only a small part of the problem.  And while investing in different markets across the world might result in a lower sensitivity to a putative carbon tax, a closer examination, particularly of sector exposures and growth/value tilts, may prove more useful in assessing the risks.

For more details on how the revenue footprint is calculated for each company, and index, as well as further analysis of the relative and absolute landscape of corporate emissions, see our inaugural S&P Dow Jones Indices Carbon Emitter Scorecard.

 

The posts on this blog are opinions, not advice. Please read our Disclaimers.

Unnaturally Negative Interest Rates

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David Blitzer

Former Managing Director and Chairman of the Index Committee

S&P Dow Jones Indices

Negative interest rates – you pay for the privilege of keeping your money in the bank – are current monetary policy in Japan and some European countries.  Negative interest rates pose questions: Are they here? Why would anyone pay the bank to keep money?  Do they make economic sense? Why would a central bank set negative interest rates? Most importantly, should a central bank make negative interest rates its policy?   In what follows, we try to answer some of these.

Are they here? Yes, in Japan and in various European countries some short term interest rates are negative. The chart shows one month Libor for the yen, euros, British pounds and US dollars.  In most cases only short term interest rates are negative, longer term rates remain positive. Moreover, in most countries the negative interest rates apply to funds that commercial banks keep on deposit at the central banks; in only a few cases do businesses or consumers face negative interest rates on bank deposits. As shown on the chart, typical figures are measured in basis points.

Why would someone pay negative rates?  There are convenience and security factors that outweigh the interest cost when rates are very low.  Transactions using credit or debit cards, electronic funds transfers or checks are cheaper and easier than using cash.  If a business decides that short term cash should really be cash, not bank deposits, they will need a large vault to hold the cash and lots of security to keep holding it. All this costs money so paying 10, 20 or 30 basis points annually to a bank for providing payment services and security is worthwhile.  At some point hoarding does become preferable to a bank account,

Do negative interest rates make economic sense? Somewhat. Start with the natural, not negative, rate of interest.  When the economy is in a sweet spot with inflation and unemployment are at desirable levels and are not being pushed up or down, the rate of interest is the natural or steady state interest rate. If inflation were close to 2% and unemployment were between 4% and 5% — both roughly the Fed’s targets — and both are stable, then the Fed funds rate would be close to the natural rate of interest. Were an economy is in a slump, businesses weren’t borrowing or investing, people were saving instead of spending then the natural rate would be low or possibly negative. Similarly with a booming economy, businesses and consumers are borrowing and investing or buying and the natural rate is high. When the Fed funds rate is less than the natural rate, monetary policy stimulates the economy, and vice-versa.

Why would a central bank set negative interest rates?  In a slumping economy, the central bank needs to push its policy rate below the natural rate of interest for stimulative monetary policy.  If the natural rate is below zero, the central bank must push rates into negative territory. The expected result is to encourage banks to lend, businesses and consumers to invest or spend while weakening the currency to boost exports.

Most importantly, should a central bank make negative interest rates its policy?  The economic arguments supporting the expected result of negative interest rates appear sensible, but the things don’t always work out.  First, FX rates don’t always follow the program – lately the yen and the euro have strengthened against the dollar eliminating one part of the hoped-for stimulus. Second, negative interest rates may be perceived as a panic move, a last chance as the central bank runs out of options.  If that happens, businesses and consumers will hoard what they have instead of spending. Third, in many cases the negative interest rates apply only to banks’ excess reserves on deposit at the central bank, so there is no stimulus directly applied to businesses and consumers. Further, this leaves banks with a difficult choice: be pressured to makes loans that may not meet their credit standards or have their earnings squeezed. Either way this may not be the best policy for a central bank.

Negative interest rate might be reasonable short term stimulus, but they are likely to wear out their welcome quickly.

The posts on this blog are opinions, not advice. Please read our Disclaimers.

How Did South African Active Managers Perform in 2015?

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Daniel Ung

Former Director

Global Research & Design

In 2015, equity markets in South Africa were turbulent amid falling commodity prices and the depreciation of the South African rand.  Political uncertainty surrounding the appointment of the country’s finance minister and the lowering of the country’s debt rating by leading rating agencies also contributed to the lackluster performance of equities.  This may partly explain why the S&P South Africa Domestic Shareholder Weighted (DSW) Index underperformed the S&P Global 1200 by 29% in rand terms.

Volatility in the markets would normally be favorable for active managers, who could make use of their stock-picking skills to benefit from the perceived discrepancies in the market.  However, the SPIVA South Africa Year-End 2015 Scorecard shows that over 50% of active funds underperformed the domestic benchmark over a one-year period.  The level of underperformance continued to deteriorate over the three- and five-year periods (see Exhibit 1).  As for global equity funds, the performance of active funds against their benchmark was even more underwhelming, as 75% of active funds underperformed the benchmark over a one-year period.  This rose to over 96% over the five-year period.

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The posts on this blog are opinions, not advice. Please read our Disclaimers.

What Is Driving the Mexican Peso?

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Jaime Merino

Former Director, Asset Owners Channel

S&P Dow Jones Indices

A few weeks ago, Dennis Badlyans wrote about Mexico’s Fixed Income Markets and made a performance comparison of the different currencies of emerging markets, which illustrated how the Mexican peso has been the worst performer among its peers in 2016.  The question is, what is driving the depreciation of the currency?

The answer in the short term, or on a daily basis, could vary from announcements of monetary policy in the U.S. and in Mexico, announcements of relevant economic data in the U.S., such as non-farm payroll, GDP estimates, or any emerging market news that could make the U.S. dollar stronger against other currencies.

We could list a lot of examples trying to explain why the currency has fallen 14.1% over the past 12-month period ending March 31, 2016, or 32.1% in the previous two-year period, but Exhibit 1 shows how the price of oil has been one reason for this depreciation.  The graph shows the price of the next oil future to mature, WTI May 2016, and on the left axis shows the inverse of the U.S. dollar to Mexican peso currency (pesos per dollar).

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Doing a linear regression analysis of the log value using 252 of these two variables, where the variable “y” is the currency, we can see how dependent the currency is on movements in oil prices, with a correlation of 0.939 and an equation of y=0.284x – 1.698 (see Exhibit 2).

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Given that the currency is a component of the performance of the S&P/Valmer Mexico Government International 1+ Year UMS index, Exhibit 3 shows the monthly returns of the index, with the performance of the Mexican peso making a considerable contribution to its performance.

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The posts on this blog are opinions, not advice. Please read our Disclaimers.

Who Fuelled the Oil Bonds Bubble?

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Tim Edwards

Managing Director, Index Investment Strategy

S&P Dow Jones Indices

It has become popular to blame passive investors and index funds for the recent rise (and fall) in prices for U.S. high yield bonds.  The thesis – placing passive investors as the culprit – goes as follows:

  • There have been material, positive flows into passive bond funds, at the expense of active funds.
  • Passive bond funds typically track indices that are market-cap weighted, that is, with a higher weight in issuers that have a greater value of outstanding debt.
  • Such trends have rewarded the most-indebted companies with an “irrational” demand for their bonds.
  • Energy companies in particular have been able to ramp-up a debt-fuelled binge, the eventual popping of which we experienced earlier this year.

We cannot fault anyone for nodding in agreement; the reasoning is certainly seductive. And its variants have found support.  Certainly, large flows of capital into (and out of) an asset class have the ability to create, and pop, bubbles within that market segment.  But the argument – assigning importance to the relative popularity of passive funds – is fatally flawed.

Imagine, for a moment, that we could split the U.S. high yield bond market into two categories: those securities owned by the passive investors, and everything else, which is owned by the active investors.  Each passive investor – new or existing – is required to hold bonds issued by energy companies in proportion to their overall market capitalization, while we suppose that each active investor may individually choose their preferred allocation.

Now, here’s the logical trick: since the sum-total of active and passive investments matches the market, the proportion allocated to any market segment by active managers must, in aggregate, equal the allocation made by passive investors.  This is just arithmetic, based on the fact of both passive investors and the overall market having the same weights in each segment. To emphasize: 

The proportion of capital allocated by active investors, in aggregate, to high yield energy bonds was, is and forever shall be precisely in proportion to market capitalization.

At the point when a new passive investor entered the market (or an existing passive investor increased their allocation), he or she bought high yield energy bonds in the same proportion as the active investors, and maintained their allocations similarly.

Given this fact, one might be wondering, at this point: what it is that active investors in aggregate do exactly? Here’s the rub:

Active investors set prices.

The weighting of each security in a market-cap bond index depends on both the issuance amount and the price of the security.  If an energy company is viewed as a poor prospect to repay their debt, active investors – if they are paying attention – will only buy their bonds at a lower price, and will sell them if the price is unduly high.  In this way, active investors determine the market capitalization of any individual company’s bonds.

This applies to the primary (issuance) market, just as much as the secondary market.  It also applies to investors deciding whether or how much to invest in the U.S. high yield market in the first place, which similarly occupies a proportion of the overall U.S. bond market that is determined by the activities of active investors.

Thus understood, the “bubble” in high yield energy debt was not created by the simple issuing of debt by oil companies.  Nor was it created by passive investors, or a shift from active to passive bond funds.  Instead, as was the case with every bubble before and since, it arose through ACTIVE decisions to purchase securities – or market segments – whose price in hindsight seems unjustified.

The posts on this blog are opinions, not advice. Please read our Disclaimers.