09/11/2014 - Unintended Consequence of Financial Repression: Investments Shifting To Private Assets
“With returns on government bonds at historical rock-bottom prices, sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) are emerging as part of the trend that shifts confidence and capital from the Public to the Private sector .. we see both sovereign wealth funds as well as central bank reserves moving into the stock market markets and other higher-yielding assets like real estate at a rate that private investors have not even contemplated. The traditional talking-heads are completely lost ranting on and on about bubbles yet they cannot grasp that the retail speculative element is not yet in the marketplace .. The capital flows are in themselves being altered as government capital itself has been forced to look further afield to grow public pension money and to maintain some diversification in central bank currency reserves as the euro has reduced the number of currencies that can be used for diversification. The resulting tide of money flows is becoming starkly different as governments themselves are being forced into private investment that is interestingly creating a danger of distorting stock markets to escape the narrowing opportunities to achieve diversification in currencies and the collapse in interest rates that defeats pension funds as a whole. These two converging trends are causing prices to reflect political priorities rather than traditional financial reality.”
– Martin Armstrong
