Howard Marks: Lessons Learned from the Oil Crash

From a brand new memo by Howard Marks (Oaktree) – his takeaways from the latest boom/bust on everyone’s radar and how we’ve reacted to it:

In part the emotional reaction to negative developments is the product of surprise and disillusionment. Part of this may stem from investors’ inability to understand the “fault lines” that run through their portfolios. Investors knew changes in oil prices would affect oil companies, oil services companies, airlines and autos. But they may not have anticipated the effects on currencies, emerging markets and below-investment grade credit broadly. Among other things, they rarely understand that capital withdrawals and the resulting need for liquidity can lead to urgent selling of assets that are completely unrelated to oil. People often fail to perceive that these fault lines exist, and that contagion can reach as far as it does. And then, when that happens, investors turn out to be unprepared, both intellectually and emotionally.

Run, don’t walk, to read the whole thing:

The lessons of oil (Oaktree)