Julian Robertson Stays Very Bearish, With Picks (GS, V, MA, PTY, PCN)

If you hadn’t gotten your full round of pre-weekend economic gloom, famed investor Julian Robertson of Tiger Management just gave an interview with CNBC’s Erin Burnett. He is cautious about what lies ahead.

If you do not recall, Robertson warned a year ago that the U.S. was headed for a "doozy of a recession."  He advised the Obama administration to tell the truth and say there are no quick fixes.  If this bailout/turnaround isn’t successful, then a 3- to 4-year economic problem will be much worse than what Japan went through in the 1980s.

Robertson is asking the government to set up a "good bank, bad bank" system,  He also noted that the market price for distressed bank assets has to be set by the market,otherwise the money is just tied up.  As far as comparing the USsituation to Sweden, he said Sweden’s economic problems were isolated. This slowdown is a worldwide.  He also believes that the US is now like Japan was in 1989,only worse… AND he sees a possible collapse if the course doesn’tchange quickly.  In Japan there was a disincentive to get rid of thebad loans because banks could carry them for less of a loss so theynever sold them (and that tied up capital).

He is also still very bearish on the stock market, and said he has sold his shares of Goldman Sachs Group (NYSE: GS).  He said he is not interested infinancials right now.  But in the sector he does favor credit cardtransaction companies such as Visa (NYSE: V) and MasterCard (NYSE: MA)because they take no credit risk.  He called these stocks "reasonably valued now."Other than that, he prefers high-multiple growth stocks but noted thatis very different stance than in most of his career.

Another issue Robertson noted was that many Wall Street workers are nowout of work and have nowhere to go, but he has seen nocorrection in New York housing prices.  He thinks that willchange.

Bill Gross of PIMCO and David Roche were also on with mostly supportingideas, although Mr. Roche said he was not worrying too much aboutnationalization because these nationalized banks can be resold in 2 to3 years.

Gross was a bit more positive and was able to mention his twoclosed end funds that buy the same sort of instruments that thegovernment will buy are yielding 11% to 13%. They are the PIMCO Corporate Opportunity Fund(NYSE: PTY) and PIMCO Corporate Income Fund (NYSE: PCN).  Needless to say, thoseare both up significantly today after Gross touted them on the show.

Lastly,  Roberson has an Armageddon trade which is a RATE CAPtrade.  He thinks there is going to be a push-back down theroad and the cost of long-term financing for the US government is goingto ultimately be much higher.  Gross gave the scenario for thepossibility of long-term rates being back up 6% to 7%…. and Robertsonsaid "that could be conservative" but would not elaborate on how muchhigher he thought the rates could go.

You can also see the start of that interview here on the CNBC site.

Jon C. Ogg
January 30, 2009