CAPE Archives - Page 2 of 2 - the patient investor

May 21, 2014

Is the market over-priced?

In my last post I concluded that the same factors driving rising inequality — new technologies and access to cheap labor through increased globalization — may also be driving a sustainable increase in corporate profits. While we may be understandably wary of “this time is different”, consider the following:

The rise of China as a trading partner over the last two decades.

US Imports from China

Corporate profits at 11% of GNP suggest a new paradigm when compared to the historic (normal) range of 5% to 7%.

Corporate Profits/GNP

The decline in employee compensation as a percentage of corporate value added mirrors the rise in corporate profits.

Employee Compensation/Value Added

And Robert Shiller’s CAPE, normally used to argue that the market is currently overpriced. If we stood in 1994 and looked at the range of CAPE values for the past century, we would no doubt have concluded that a CAPE value greater than 20 indicates the market is overpriced. In the last two decades, the CAPE only briefly dipped below 20 at the height of the global financial crisis. Now pundits argue that a CAPE value greater than 25 indicates the market is overpriced. Something has definitely changed.

Shiller CAPE

Whether the change is sustainable, only time will tell. But one thing is clear. Of the 466 corporations who have so far reported earnings for the first quarter 2014, 77% have either beaten (68%) or met (9%) their estimates. Corporate profits are not in imminent danger of collapse.

May 7, 2014

Is the market overpriced?

David Leonhardt published this graph from Robert Shiller in his piece in the NY Times:

Shiller CAPE

I have one major issue with this: stock values are based on FUTURE earnings, not PAST earnings. The two are only related if earnings for the past 10 years are indicative of earnings for the next 10 years. I suspect that the next 10 years will present a whole new rash of unforeseen problems, but will be nothing like the last 10 years — any more than the period 2001 to 2010 resembles 1991 to 2000 (or 1981 to 1990).

January 26, 2014

Beware of the CAPE

I have just read John Mauldin’s warning that the market is overvalued:

Not only does today’s CAPE of 25.4x suggest a seriously overvalued market, but the rapid multiple expansion of the last few years coupled with sluggish earnings growth suggests that this market is also seriously overbought, as I pointed out last week and as we are seeing play out this week.

CAPE

Robert Shiller’s CAPE ratio compares the current index price to a 10-year simple moving average of inflation-adjusted earnings in order to smooth out earnings and provide a long-term indication as to whether the market is under- or over-valued. But ratios are far from infallible. One of the first things fundamental investors/traders learn is: do not buy a stock simply because the Price-to-Earnings (PE) ratio is low, and never short a stock simply because the PE ratio is high. The reason is fairly obvious. In the first case, current earnings may be expected to fall and, with high PE ratios, earnings are likely to grow.

Let’s examine CAPE more closely. First, we have experienced the worst recession in almost a century; so does a moving average of the last 10 years adequately reflect sustainable long-term earnings? In the chart below I removed the highest and lowest quarter’s earnings in the last 10 years [dark green]. Note the visible difference losses reported in Q/E December 2008 make to the long-term average.

Price Earnings Ratio

The chart also highlights the fact that Shiller’s CAPE is relatively low compared to the last 15 years, where the average is close to 30. The normal PE of 18.4, calculated on the last 12-month’s earnings*, is also low compared to an average of 28 for the last 15 years.

*Reporting for the December quarter is not yet completed and unreported earnings are based on S&P estimates.

As novice investors learn, it is dangerous to base buy or sell signals on a PE ratio, whether it is CAPE or regular PE based on 12-months earnings. Using CAPE, we would have sold stocks in 1996 and again in 2003, missing two of the biggest bull markets in history. And we would have most likely bought in 2008, when CAPE made a new 10-year low, right before the collapse of Lehmann Brothers.

I submit that CAPE or PE ratios are not an end in themselves, but merely a useful tool for highlighting expectations of future earnings. At present both ratios are rising, suggesting that earnings prospects are improving.