En julio, la bolsa estadounidense mostró una fuerza destacable, al mantener el S&P 500 su trayectoria alcista, asegurando su quinto mes consecutivo en positivo y consiguiendo su mayor racha de ganancias mensuales desde agosto de 2021. Adicionalmente, el Dow Jones Industrial Average presenció su mayor alza en dos meses desde noviembre de 2022 y, en el mismo mes, batió un récord impresionante de trece sesiones consecutivas de ganancias diarias. Para no ser menos, también fue excelente el comportamiento del Nasdaq Composite, al registrar su quinto mes consecutivo de crecimiento y su mejor racha en cinco meses desde septiembre de 2020.
En conjunto, las ganancias de julio fueron la guinda del pastel de lo que ya está siendo un año fuerte para la renta variable. Esta rentabilidad sobresaliente estuvo respaldada por los alentadores datos económicos y la publicación de resultados de fuertes ganancias, solidificando más la confianza de los inversores.
El 26 de julio, la Reserva Federal anunció una subida de 25 puntos básicos al final de su reunión mensual, elevando los tpos de interés al rango de 5,25%- 5,5%. Esta subida lleva al índice de referencia en costes de financiación a su nivel más elevado en más de 22 años. Jerome Powell, presidente de la Fed, destacó que el banco central está buscando pruebas de que la inflación “va a estar baja de forma duradera” y de que tomará sus decisiones “reunión tras reunión, basándose en en la totalidad de datos disponibles”. Powell enfatizó que las condiciones económicas actuales probablemente requieran que la política monetaria sea más restrictiva durante más tiempo hasta que el Comité de Mercado Abierto (FOMC) tenga la confianza de que la inflación ha caído de forma sostenible hasta su objetivo del 2%. La siguiente reunión del FOMC se celebrará el 19 y el 20 de septiembre.
Las small caps ayudaron a guiar el rally durante el mes, con el índice Russell 2000 Value registrando su mejor racha de dos meses desde noviembre de 2022. Seguimos viendo abundantes oportunidades en acciones de pequeña y mediana capitalización, dada la convincente valoración del Russell 2000 Value, que cotiza actualmente a un PER de tan solo 10 a 12 veces. Esto contrasta fuertemente con la media del mercado, que cotiza cerca de un PER 20, lo que representa una de las mayores deltas que jamás hayamos presenciado.
El M&A fue impulsado por operaciones que experimentaron un progreso significativo para conseguir la luz verde del regulador. Microsoft venció al intento de bloqueo por parte de la Comisión de Comercio Federal (FTC) de su adquisición del creador de videojuegos Activision por 73.000 millones de dólares, y la CMA de Reino Unido revirtió su actuación y está trabajando con Microsoft para encontrar una estructura de adquisición que satisfaga sus preocupaciones en torno a la competencia. El diferencial del precio de 95 dólares por acción ofrecido en el acuerdo se estrechó considerablemente y las empresas alargaron su acuerdo de fusión e incrementaron de forma efectiva el precio de venta al permitir a Activision pagar un dividendo de 0,99 dólares por acción antes del cierre de la operación. VMware y Broadcom aseguraron la aprobación por parte de la Comisión Europea y la aprobación provisional de la CMA de Reino Unido para su operación de 85.000 millones de dólares, aunque todavía necesitan la aprobación de EE.UU. y China. L3Harris Technologies consiguió el visto bueno de la FTC para adquirir el fabricante de motores espaciales Aerojet Rocketdyne por 58 dólares la acción (5.000 millones) y el acuerdo se cerró el 28 de julio. Nos anima ver que las empresas defienden con éxito los méritos de sus transacciones a pesar de las objeciones reguladoras.
En julio se vio la continuación del entorno risk-on y el mercado de bonos convertibles se movió al alza, llevando a los retornos en el año al terreno del doble dígito. El rally estuvo impulsado por algunos resultados de beneficios positivos junto con las expectativas de un soft landing en EE.UU., al moderarse la inflación. Los convertibles equilibrados lideraron las ganancias en el que fue otro mes positivo en términos generales. La rentabilidad del fondo estuvo en línea con el mercado global en el mes, con algunas de nuestras posiciones sensibles a la renta variable liderando las alzas en nuestra cartera. Todavía vemos oportunidades para una cartera de convertibles equilibrada. Aunque el mercado mantuvo su postura risk-on en julio, los inversores tienen razón al preocuparse por el regreso de algunos a sus máximos previos. Los convertibles ofrecen una forma ajustada al riesgo de participar en este mercado.
La emisión de nuevos convertibles se estancó este mes, porque muchas compañías se centraron en la publicación de resultados. Seguimos en camino para un año de emisiones mejor que 2022. Las emisiones de este año en general han sido atractivas, con cupones más elevados, primas más bajas y retornos más asimétricos que los disponibles en el mercado secundario. Hemos seguido viendo que las empresas recompran convertibles en una transacción que es acumulativa para las ganancias y positiva para el crédito.
Tribuna de Michael Gabelli, director general de Gabelli & Partners.
To access our proprietary value investment methodology, and dedicated merger arbitrage portfolio we offer the following UCITS Funds in each discipline:
GAMCO MERGER ARBITRAGE
GAMCO Merger Arbitrage UCITS Fund, launched in October 2011, is an open-end fund incorporated in Luxembourg and compliant with UCITS regulation. The team, dedicated strategy, and record dates back to 1985. The objective of the GAMCO Merger Arbitrage Fund is to achieve long-term capital growth by investing primarily in announced equity merger and acquisition transactions while maintaining a diversified portfolio. The Fund utilizes a highly specialized investment approach designed principally to profit from the successful completion of proposed mergers, takeovers, tender offers, leveraged buyouts and other types of corporate reorganizations. Analyzes and continuously monitors each pending transaction for potential risk, including: regulatory, terms, financing, and shareholder approval.
Merger investments are a highly liquid, non-market correlated, proven and consistent alternative to traditional fixed income and equity securities. Merger returns are dependent on deal spreads. Deal spreads are a function of time, deal risk premium, and interest rates. Returns are thus correlated to interest rate changes over the medium term and not the broader equity market. The prospect of rising rates would imply higher returns on mergers as spreads widen to compensate arbitrageurs. As bond markets decline (interest rates rise), merger returns should improve as capital allocation decisions adjust to the changes in the costs of capital.
Broad Market volatility can lead to widening of spreads in merger positions, coupled with our well-researched merger portfolios, offer the potential for enhanced IRRs through dynamic position sizing. Daily price volatility fluctuations coupled with less proprietary capital (the Volcker rule) in the U.S. have contributed to improving merger spreads and thus, overall returns. Thus our fund is well positioned as a cash substitute or fixed income alternative.
Our objectives are to compound and preserve wealth over time, while remaining non-correlated to the broad global markets. We created our first dedicated merger fund 32 years ago. Since then, our merger performance has grown client assets at an annualized rate of approximately 10.7% gross and 7.6% net since 1985. Today, we manage assets on behalf of institutional and high net worth clients globally in a variety of fund structures and mandates.
Class I USD – LU0687944552
Class I EUR – LU0687944396
Class A USD – LU0687943745
Class A EUR – LU0687943661
Class R USD – LU1453360825
Class R EUR – LU1453361476
GAMCO ALL CAP VALUE
The GAMCO All Cap Value UCITS Fund launched in May, 2015 utilizes Gabelli’s its proprietary PMV with a Catalyst™ investment methodology, which has been in place since 1977. The Fund seeks absolute returns through event driven value investing. Our methodology centers around fundamental, research-driven, value based investing with a focus on asset values, cash flows and identifiable catalysts to maximize returns independent of market direction. The fund draws on the experience of its global portfolio team and 35+ value research analysts.
GAMCO is an active, bottom-up, value investor, and seeks to achieve real capital appreciation (relative to inflation) over the long term regardless of market cycles. Our value-oriented stock selection process is based on the fundamental investment principles first articulated in 1934 by Graham and Dodd, the founders of modern security analysis, and further augmented by Mario Gabelli in 1977 with his introduction of the concepts of Private Market Value (PMV) with a Catalyst™ into equity analysis. PMV with a Catalyst™ is our unique research methodology that focuses on individual stock selection by identifying firms selling below intrinsic value with a reasonable probability of realizing their PMV’s which we define as the price a strategic or financial acquirer would be willing to pay for the entire enterprise. The fundamental valuation factors utilized to evaluate securities prior to inclusion/exclusion into the portfolio, our research driven approach views fundamental analysis as a three pronged approach: free cash flow (earnings before, interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, or EBITDA, minus the capital expenditures necessary to grow/maintain the business); earnings per share trends; and private market value (PMV), which encompasses on and off balance sheet assets and liabilities. Our team arrives at a PMV valuation by a rigorous assessment of fundamentals from publicly available information and judgement gained from meeting management, covering all size companies globally and our comprehensive, accumulated knowledge of a variety of sectors. We then identify businesses for the portfolio possessing the proper margin of safety and research variables from our deep research universe.
Class I USD – LU1216601648
Class I EUR – LU1216601564
Class A USD – LU1216600913
Class A EUR – LU1216600673
Class R USD – LU1453359900
Class R EUR – LU1453360155
GAMCO CONVERTIBLE SECURITIES
GAMCO Convertible Securities’ objective is to seek to provide current income as well as long term capital appreciation through a total return strategy by investing in a diversified portfolio of global convertible securities.
The Fund leverages the firm’s history of investing in dedicated convertible security portfolios since 1979.
The fund invests in convertible securities, as well as other instruments that have economic characteristics similar to such securities, across global markets (but the fund will not invest in contingent convertible notes). The fund may invest in securities of any market capitalization or credit quality, including up to 100% in below investment grade or unrated securities, and may from time to time invest a significant amount of its assets in securities of smaller companies. Convertible securities may include any suitable convertible instruments such as convertible bonds, convertible notes or convertible preference shares.
By actively managing the fund and investing in convertible securities, the investment manager seeks the opportunity to participate in the capital appreciation of underlying stocks, while at the same time relying on the fixed income aspect of the convertible securities to provide current income and reduced price volatility, which can limit the risk of loss in a down equity market.
Class I USD LU2264533006
Class I EUR LU2264532966
Class A USD LU2264532701
Class A EUR LU2264532610
Class R USD LU2264533345
Class R EUR LU2264533261
Class F USD LU2264533691
Class F EUR LU2264533428
Disclaimer:
The information and any opinions have been obtained from or are based on sources believed to be reliable but accuracy cannot be guaranteed. No responsibility can be accepted for any consequential loss arising from the use of this information. The information is expressed at its date and is issued only to and directed only at those individuals who are permitted to receive such information in accordance with the applicable statutes. In some countries the distribution of this publication may be restricted. It is your responsibility to find out what those restrictions are and observe them.
Some of the statements in this presentation may contain or be based on forward looking statements, forecasts, estimates, projections, targets, or prognosis (“forward looking statements”), which reflect the manager’s current view of future events, economic developments and financial performance. Such forward looking statements are typically indicated by the use of words which express an estimate, expectation, belief, target or forecast. Such forward looking statements are based on an assessment of historical economic data, on the experience and current plans of the investment manager and/or certain advisors of the manager, and on the indicated sources. These forward looking statements contain no representation or warranty of whatever kind that such future events will occur or that they will occur as described herein, or that such results will be achieved by the fund or the investments of the fund, as the occurrence of these events and the results of the fund are subject to various risks and uncertainties. The actual portfolio, and thus results, of the fund may differ substantially from those assumed in the forward looking statements. The manager and its affiliates will not undertake to update or review the forward looking statements contained in this presentation, whether as result of new information or any future event or otherwise.
