LONDON (Reuters) – Fund managers are “super bearish” with average allocations to cash at the highest since 2001 and allocation to global stocks at an all-time low, according to Bank of America’s (BofA) monthly survey of global fund managers for September.
The results come even as MSCI’s gauge of stocks around the world has rallied 3% so far in September, though after a bruising first half the index is still down 16% this year.
The survey also marks a return to doom and gloom after August’s iteration found investors were bearish but no longer “apocalyptically” so.
BofA, which polled 212 investors overseeing $616 billion in assets from Sept. 2-8, said 72% of those surveyed said they expected a weaker economy next year, and the most crowded trade was long U.S. dollar.
The U.S. currency is typically seen as a safe haven in times of economic difficulty.
In contrast, investors were staying away from equities which typically rise in good times, and the survey found investors had a record underweight position in stocks.
They found the net percentage of investors who said they were overweight stocks was -52% compared to -26% the previous month, a lower level than during the financial crisis.
(Reporting by Alun John, editing by Danilo Masoni and David Evans)
