Consensus is overwhelmingly long the S&P 500 and short 10yr Treasuries.
Before you dogpile in on that. Consider where we're at...
In her most recent speech, Fed head Janet Yellen expressed concern about the jobs market, while reiterating that the Fed is data dependent. In the past six months, the Fed pivoted from Hawkish (in December) to Dovish (March/April) to Hawkish (May). Market consensus now perceives Yellen and the Fed as flipping back to Dovish in June.
Meanwhile, Yellen’s favorite economic indicator (the “Labor Market Conditions Index”) just hit a 7-year low and credit growth had its biggest deceleration since 2010.
In other words, U.S. #GrowthSlowing.
So, what’s an investor to do?
The Fed is perpetuating volatility in macro markets, so stick with what’s worked all year, Long Bonds (TLT). Stating the obvious, that is the exact opposite of how Macro consensus is positioned. TLT has been our most vocal macro call for a while now and has served us well. It is up around 11% YTD versus 3% for the S&P 500.
