Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
Why I never invest in bank shares
Silicon Valley Bank and Credit Suisse collapses prove my point 20 March 2023 By Terry Smith , Financial Times
Having spent the first decade of my career working in a bank and then becoming a top-rated bank analyst*, I find that people often express surprise that I never invest in bank shares.
But I think it is precisely because I understand banks that I never invest in their shares. The recent events surrounding the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (“SVB”) and Credit Suisse reinforce this stance. Why?
Firstly, I never invest in anything that requires leverage to make an adequate return. Banks have a very small amount of equity to support their balance sheet. Here are the actual numbers for NatWest Group for 2022. To make it easier to understand I have reduced them to percentages:
Equity 36,496 5% Loan Capital 58,585 8% Deposits 470,759 65% Other 154,213 22%
Total Liabilities 720,053 100%
Source : Bloomberg
NatWest has £5 of shareholder’s equity to fund £100 of assets - it has gearing or leverage of 20 times. If 10 per cent of the £52 of loans in every £100 of assets prove to be bad then the whole of the shareholders’ equity is more than wiped out.
Frankly, long before that happens, depositors are likely to spot the problem and panic and cause a run on the bank, as we saw with SVB. Nor are these circumstances unimaginable. Author Nassim Taleb in his book The Black Swan points out that in the 1982 Latin American debt crisis the large American banks lost all of their cumulative past earnings.
In contrast, the average company in the S&P 500 Index (which includes banks which distort the numbers) has $26 billion of assets and $8.5 billion of equity - they are on average geared 3 times. Falls in asset value are not their main risk but their assets would have to fall by more than two thirds in value to impact the value of their equity. Next, despite this massive leverage and the risk which accompanies it, returns from the banking sector are inadequate. The average Return on Equity (“ROE”) in the S&P Banks Sector over the past five years is just 10.9 per cent. This compares with the ROE on the S&P Consumer Staples Sector over the same period of 17.9 per cent. These poor fundamental returns unsurprisingly translate into poor share price performance. The Total Return on the S&P Banks Sector over the past five years was -15.1 percent per year, whereas Consumer Staples returned +12.1 percent annually. So much for the theory that you need to take more risk to get higher returns.
Finally, surely there must be some good banks to invest in which are better than the average? That brings me onto another problem: systemic risk. Even if the bank you are invested in is well run it can still be damaged or destroyed by a general panic in the sector.
There is an anecdote which illustrates this. In the early 1980s doubts first set in about the future of Hong Kong with the looming handover of control to China and a crisis soon developed in the property sector which provided the collateral for much bank lending. In the midst of this, there was a local bank which had an awning open over its front window to keep the sun out. It was by a bus stop and as heavy rain shower developed, the bus queue moved to take shelter under the awning. In the febrile atmosphere passers-by thought this was the beginning of a bank run and as a result one soon developed.
That’s banking for you. Banks can be brought down by the actions of their peers. Look at what happened to some US regional banks in the wake of the SVB disaster. Lord Mervyn King, the former Bank of England Governor, encapsulated this when he observed that it made no sense to start a run on bank but once one has started you should join in.
That encompasses my long-standing reasons for avoiding bank shares but another has emerged in recent years - Fintech. What are the essential functions of a bank? To take deposits, make loans and effect payments. All of these essential roles are now being supplanted by so-called fintechs. Bank loans are being replaced by peer-to-peer lending platforms and credit funds. You don’t need a bank for payments or deposits. You can get your salary paid straight into your Mastercard or Visa account and they are far better at payment processing for which you can also use your Apple or Android phone.
Technology is supplanting traditional banking. Have you noticed that your local bank branch has become a Pizza Express, in which role, by the way, it makes more money. Not only that but the banks are often handicapped by legacy systems which do not trouble new entrants and at least until recently fintech start-ups enjoyed a seemingly endless supply of funding with little or no requirement to show a profit. As Paul Volcker, the infamous former Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank, said the only innovation of any consequence by the banking sector in the 20 years running up to the Global Financial Crisis was the ATM, and we don’t even need those any more.
Terry Smith is chief executive of Fundsmith LLP. *He was the number 1-rated banking analyst in the Reuters and Institutional Investor surveys 1984-89
#2208
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
Este señor growth se benefició de los tipos cero, a ver como lo hace a futuro...
#2209
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
Que interesante! Pero todo eso de que los bancos ya no hacen falta y que los van sustituir Google, Apple y Microsoft hace años que lo vengo oyendo, y de momento parece que no ha habido avances al respecto no? La verdad es que a mí el sector bancario nunca me ha gustado mucho, y si ahora lo dice Terry, pues como más razón, jeje. Salu2
#2210
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
En marzo han vendido su posición en Adobe. En las últimas declaraciones de Terry decía que se arrepentía de haberla comprado porque su situación con la compra de Figma demostraba que no tenía la posición dominante que creía que tenía. Han empezado a comprar otra compañía, que revelarán cuando acaben de consolidar la posición. Esperemos que acierte esta vez
#2211
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
Estoy de acuerdo con Terry Smith. Los bancos están poco capitalizados por mucho que digan tanto los bancos centrales como los gobiernos de turnos. Es que no pueden decir otra cosa para no crear pánico financiero. Ahora bien, tampoco creo que veamos corralitos por ahora ni en Europa ni en USA. Dependerá de si hay un buen control de riesgos. Y esto ya sería otro tema para hablar con mas detenimiento
#2212
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
Evolución de Partícipes y Patrimonio, según los informes de la CNMV.
#2214
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
Fundsmith inicia posición en Procter & Gamble (ya la tuvo hasta 2017). Más valores defensivos para el fondo de Terry Smith de la mano de esta compañía de marcas tan renombradas como Gillette, Fairy, Oral B, Braun...
#2215
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
Cuando se comiencen a regular a las fintechs, entonces esa ventaja que han tenido se acabará.
Esto sucede siempre. Las nuevas empresas gozan de menos leyes y arbitran ese hueco hasta que las comienzan a regular.
Lo anterior no quita que habrá mayor competencia.
Se habla mucho de depositar confianza, pero nadie dice qué interés te pagan
#2216
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
LÓreal, décima posición del fondo se dio un castañazo de más del 20% ayer. No ha cumplido previsiones y ha rebajado expectativas. Al fondo le habrá afectado en un -1,5%.
#2217
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
-1,98% exactamente. Desde luego no fue un buen día para las compañías 'cosméticas' de Fundsmith. La castaña de Estee Lauder también fue de órdago.
#2218
Re: Fundsmith Equity Fund: El fondo de Terry Smith
