{"id":356,"date":"2009-06-02T09:22:00","date_gmt":"2009-06-02T09:22:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/blog\/?p=356"},"modified":"2009-06-02T09:22:00","modified_gmt":"2009-06-02T09:22:00","slug":"la-travesia-del-desierto-i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/la-travesia-del-desierto-i\/","title":{"rendered":"The Journey Through the Desert (I)."},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><a onblur=\"try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}\" href=\"http:\/\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/_VIxOq4VLwLE\/SgQs8_Dm_oI\/AAAAAAAAA0s\/F3kTSZjgeE4\/s1600-h\/Distrust_by_Rilrae.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 400px;\" src=\"http:\/\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/_VIxOq4VLwLE\/SgQs8_Dm_oI\/AAAAAAAAA0s\/F3kTSZjgeE4\/s400\/Distrust_by_Rilrae.jpg\" alt=\"\" id=\"BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5333437284943855234\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a>The word which, in our view, would best sum up the whole of last year \u2013 and, more specifically, the second half of 2008 \u2013 is <span style=\"font-weight: bold;\">Mistrust<\/span>. A lack of confidence in the banking system which is creating a liquidity trap (<span style=\"font-style: italic;\">Liquidity Trap<\/span>) which is set to have very significant and dramatic consequences for the real economy, society and everyday life. The consequences of mistrust lead to a freeze in the flow of money, and as a result, investors are gripped by terrible doubts:<span style=\"font-weight: bold;\"> Who are we going to lend our money to so that they can put it to work, whilst ensuring we have sufficient guarantees that they will be able to repay it on time and without the dreaded credit event (<\/span><span style=\"font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;\">Credit Event<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: bold;\">)? <\/span>Secondly:<span style=\"font-weight: bold;\"> For how much money, profit or interest are we going to lend it? <\/span>And finally: <span style=\"font-weight: bold;\">For how long is it sensible to lend our money to the lucky chosen one so that they can put it to work?<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The answers to these questions are, of course, difficult and complex. But above all, we must always bear in mind that they must be tailored to the circumstances of each investor or wealth holder. And within each of these, there will be portions of assets that should be allocated in one way or another. Thus, a portfolio should always be allocated across a range of investments tailored to the needs, objectives, preferences, etc. of each individual. What is certain is that, at present, it is prudent to adapt the \u2018Vital Balance Sheets\u2019 to investment returns whose risk-return ratio has changed drastically, whilst not losing sight of the possibility of hyperinflation. <a style=\"font-weight: bold;\" href=\"http:\/\/freshfamilyoffice.blogspot.com\/2009\/04\/solo-se-que-no-se-nada.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">despite the doubts<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a onblur=\"try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}\" href=\"http:\/\/2.bp.blogspot.com\/_VIxOq4VLwLE\/SgQs3aziOkI\/AAAAAAAAA0k\/M4boHEvfs6g\/s1600-h\/Distrust1024.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 610px; height: 349px;\" src=\"http:\/\/2.bp.blogspot.com\/_VIxOq4VLwLE\/SgQs3aziOkI\/AAAAAAAAA0k\/M4boHEvfs6g\/s400\/Distrust1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" id=\"BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5333437189313411650\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a>Speaking of fixed-income investments, the <span style=\"font-style: italic;\">flight to quality<\/span> in 2008, or the flight to safety in terms of the quality and creditworthiness of investments, led to a fall in the returns on the (a priori) safest investments, such as the sovereign debt of developed countries and large, highly creditworthy companies. The simple reason is that when many people want to buy the same thing, its price rises, thereby reducing its yield. Now, almost halfway through 2009, following the mistrust generated by the fact that most companies are facing serious difficulties due to their inability to refinance their debts with financial institutions, many are once again lending their money almost indiscriminately by buying corporate debt issued by these firms. Demand for corporate fixed-income securities has soared over the last couple of months, particularly in recent weeks. And <span style=\"font-weight: bold;\">The lack of criteria in the selection process is leading to companies with very different capabilities when it comes to tackling their emissions being priced at very similar levels.<\/span> Every day we see how large asset management firms and their respective <span style=\"font-style: italic;\">advisers<\/span>, are recommending programmes that we might call <span style=\"font-style: italic;\">blue-chip companies <\/span>and which are selected on the basis of criteria as outdated and dangerous as credit ratings or grandiose names. With a few honourable exceptions, issues are selected by financial institutions as suitable for their clients\u2019 investment portfolios, based on nothing more than a very superficial analysis: news, credit default swaps, ratings and little else. And there are very few <span style=\"font-style: italic;\">advisers<\/span> who take the trouble and the time to study the balance sheets of the issuing companies in order to ascertain their financial capacity, and thus be able to repay the debt without the dreaded <span style=\"font-style: italic;\">credit event<\/span>. Furthermore, if that selection takes the form of a fixed-income investment fund, we will find that it contains a wide variety of intrinsic risks and lacks any reliable criteria in the analysis used. <span style=\"font-weight: bold;\">The result of all this is that, nowadays, bonds from issuers with very different financial situations are trading at the same price<\/span>. And that distortion has been caused by the abuse of indiscriminate demand in a very difficult environment for safeguarding financial assets.<\/p>\n<p>(To be continued\u2026)<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>La palabra que a nuestro juicio definir\u00eda mejor todo el pasado a\u00f1o, y m\u00e1s concretamente el segundo semestre del 2008, es Desconfianza. Una desconfianza en el sistema bancario que est\u00e1 generando una trampa de liquidez (Liquidity Trap) que va a tener consecuencias muy notables y dram\u00e1ticas en la econom\u00eda real, social, de calle. Las consecuencias [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sin-categorizar"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clusterfamilyoffice.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}