Mike Wilson: A Shift in Recession Views

While there seemed to be a consensus that U.S. Equities will struggle through the first half of the year before finishing strong, views are now varying on the degree and timing of a potential recession.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Monday, January 23rd at 11am in New York. So let's get after it.

Coming into this year, the number one investor concern was that everyone seemed to have the same outlook for U.S. equities - a tough first half followed by a strong finish. Views varied on the degree of the drawdown expected and magnitude of the rebound, but a majority expected a U.S. recession to begin sooner rather than later. Fast forward just a few weeks and the consensus view has shifted materially, particularly as it relates to the recession view. More specifically, while more investors are starting to entertain a soft landing for the economy, many others have pushed out the timing of a recession to the second half of the year. This change is due in part to China's reopening gaining steam and the sharp decline in European natural gas prices.

While these are valid considerations for investors to modify their views, we think that price action has been the main influence. The rally this year has been led by low quality and heavily shorted stocks. It's also witnessed a strong move in cyclical stocks relative to defensive ones. This cyclical rotation in particular is convincing investors they are missing the bottom and they must reposition. Truth be told, it has been a powerful shift, but we also recognize that bear markets have a way of fooling everyone before they're done. The final stages of the bear are always the trickiest. In bear markets like last year, when just about everyone loses money, Investors lose confidence. They question their process as the price action and cross-currents in the data create a hall of mirrors. This hall of mirrors only increases the confusion. This is exactly the time one must trust their own work and ignore the noise. Suffice it to say we're not biting on this recent rally because our work in process is so convincingly bearish on earnings.

Importantly, our call on earnings is not predicated on the timing of a recession or even if one occurs this year. Our work continues to show further erosion with the gap between our model and the forward estimates as wide as it's ever been. Could our model be wrong? Of course, but given its track record, we don't think it will be wrong directionally, particularly given the collection of leading series and models we published that point to a similar outcome. This is simply a matter of timing and magnitude, and we think the timing is imminent. We find the shift in investor tone helpful for our call for new lows in the S&P 500, which will finish this bear market later this quarter or early in the second quarter.

Getting more specific, our forecasts are predicated on margin disappointment and the evidence in that regard is increasing. When costs are growing faster than sales, margins erode. This is very typical during any unexpected revenue slowdown. Recessions in particular lead to significant negative operating leverage for that very reason. In other words, sales fall off quickly and unexpectedly, while costs remain sticky in the short term. Inventory bloating, less productive headcount and other issues are the primary culprits. This is exactly what is happening in many industries already, and this is without a recession. It's also right in line with our forecast and the thesis that companies would regret adding costs so aggressively a year ago when sales and demand were running so far above trend.

Bottom line, after a very challenging 2022, many investors are still bearish fundamentally, but are questioning whether negative fundamentals have already been priced into stocks. Our view has not changed as we expect the path and earnings in the U.S. to disappoint the consensus, expectations and current valuations. In fact, we welcome the change in sentiment positioning over the past few weeks as a necessary development for the last stage of this bear market to play out. Bear markets are like a hall of mirrors designed to confuse investors and take their money. We advise staying focused on the fundamentals and ignoring the false signals and misleading reflections.

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