Trends Watch: Market Volatility

EisnerAmper’s Trends Watch is a weekly entry to our Alternative Investments Intelligence blog, featuring the views and insights of executives from alternative investment firms. If you’re interested in being featured, please contact Elana Margulies-Snyderman.  

This week, Elana talks with Stefan Heieck, Founder, CEO and CIO, Heieck Verwaltungs GmbH & Co.

What is your outlook for alternative investments?

The year 2020 has been a big trading year. If you have not been trading this year, then you have been losing out on making money during the various market swings. Those alternative investment funds moving 80-100% net long into the February selloff have not recovered.  Money has been made in bear markets as investors try to buy into the falling markets.

Where do you see the greatest opportunities and why?

We have seen the greatest opportunities trading amid the market volatility during the course of 2020 with the news of a COVID-19 vaccine and, potentially, a new stimulus bill. The vaccine is part of a war that will continue to lead the global markets to constant volatility going into 2021.

Where do you see the greatest challenges and why?

The greatest challenges to investing we see are the overcrowding with ETFs. In my opinion, ETFs today are the equivalent to what collateralized debt obligations were in 2008: ETFs consume slowly then puke with daily liquidity. The crowded positioning in ETFs from index to theme funds will reverse when investors start to discount lower growth rates for pandemic stay-at-home winners from Amazon to Zalando and Wix.

What keeps you up at night?

My girlfriend and a great book.

The views and opinions expressed above are of the interviewee only, and do not/are not intended to reflect the views of EisnerAmper.