00:00Robin Gru, she's the CEO of Man Group, the world's largest publicly listed hedge fund manager,
00:05more than $200 billion multi-asset, multi-strap platform that gives her a wide lens
00:10into what's going on in the world and how best to invest it. Robin, great to have you back.
00:14Thank you for having me. All right, so I'm going to start with the macro,
00:17because based on what you do, based on what Man Group does, you probably have that nice
00:22sort of bird's eye view of what's going on out there in the world. I would assume in one sec,
00:26this is good for business. In one sec, it is. But what is, it's a fascinating time.
00:33You know, you can, these are difficult times. The macro picture of what should be happening,
00:39what should be reflecting, the data is telling us, somehow isn't sort of reflecting itself. You're
00:44not seeing supply chain shock in the way that you might have expected. The S&P continues to go from
00:51strength to strength. Prices are really going up. You know this and I know this. You fill up your
00:56car with gas. It's more expensive than it used to be. And yet, you have this optimism in the market.
01:02So it's a really interesting time and it presents opportunities.
01:06But talk about that dislocation, right? Because what's going on in the ground for a lot of people
01:10is a lot different than what's going on if you're an investor or a trader, a professional trader.
01:15That's right. And it's, that dislocation is real. I mean, every conversation I'm having right now
01:20with the biggest allocators all over the world, with economists, with bank analysts, with anybody
01:25you want to talk to, because we do talk. We're all sort of circling the same stuff. Data is saying,
01:31listen, if this Iran conflict goes on longer, the feeling that the pain of this could be felt.
01:38You saw what happened with central banks last week. Everybody's a little bit on pause.
01:42The inflationary numbers feel a little bit less good. You are starting to see growth dampening.
01:49You're seeing literally manufacturers stopping production in certain items. You're seeing
01:54airlines saying, hang on a second, we might be needing to cancel flights. And at the same time,
01:59you have this big tech story, which is dominating, particularly the US markets. So in that, there's
02:07some really interesting data points. And it is a bit of a dislocation. It does feel slightly
02:12dislocated. Is this a temporary thing? Or as this thing goes on longer, is it going to be felt
02:18for longer? Because this isn't just about gas or oil. It isn't about just one item. It's the helium.
02:26It's fertilizers. It's a bunch of supply issues that matter to agriculture. It matters. You can see
02:32the pain in Europe right now. Much more manifest than you can see it in the US. Also an interesting
02:39time.
02:39So once you think that at any point works its way into US markets, because you take a look at
02:46the S&P
02:47500 in a vacuum, higher by 10% in April, you have no idea what's going on with oil or
02:53what's going on
02:53in the Treasury market. And I just wonder, you know, how long that can persist if we have, you know,
02:58American big tech performing the way it has. Does that necessarily need to sort of come back
03:03together?
03:04You know what? I'd love to know the answer to that question. That would be terrific.
03:08I was hoping you'd tell me.
03:08And if I had it, I would tell you, I promise. So let me do it a slightly different way.
03:15We, all of us, have more data available to us, more ticks, more reporting, more capable analysis
03:24than we've ever had before. And yet we have perhaps the same levels of inefficiency in markets
03:29right now. So as I sit down with CIOs across the world, we have this conversation, not dissimilar
03:35to the conversation we're having now, which is, well, what do we do? Do we try and time the market?
03:40I'd never known that worked so well. Or do you try and build resilience? A little like countries
03:45are trying to build resilience now. And whether it's setting up a sovereign wealth fund in Canada,
03:50or whether it's that fiscal stimulation in defence, you're seeing a desire to move towards
03:55resilience. And you see that at the country level, but you also see it at the portfolio.
03:59level. How do we build portfolios and capabilities that are uncorrelated, that are diverse, that
04:05have a long-term view, but have the ability to be dynamic and tactical to take advantage
04:09of some of the dislocations that we could see coming down the path?
04:13I am curious. You mentioned the Canadian sovereign wealth fund. Do you anticipate we're going
04:16to see more nations, the ones that don't have sovereign wealth funds, fall in that direction?
04:19It's a great question. I think that Canada has done something quite interesting. And the difference
04:23with that particular sovereign wealth fund, as opposed to others you might see, is an absolute
04:27focus on supporting infrastructure within Canada. So you're seeing a version of that in fiscal
04:33stimulation, defence locally. You're seeing a version of that with UAE, trying to find less
04:40dependence upon other providers. So I think you are going to see a bit of difference in the
04:47way that people are trying to tackle that same outward objective, which is, how do we work
04:54in an economy where we do have global interdependencies, you can see it in the supply chain, and yet we
04:59want to feel less pain in the event that these things start to be pressured? Same thing with
05:05portfolios. How do you build a resilient portfolio? How do you take advantage of the discorrelation
05:11and correlation in products, especially when things like equities and bonds are sort of doing similar
05:16stuff right now? And by the way, with stimulation, with this opportunity comes opportunities beyond
05:22the shores of the United States. And that's interesting.
05:26And I am curious, you know, you talk about building resiliency, you talk about, you know,
05:30being able to take advantage of the dislocations. Are those one in the same thing? Or talk us through
05:36that a little bit more.
05:36A little bit the same thing. I think the danger is to think about this in too binary a way.
05:41I think
05:43none of us are able to really understand how long this war is going to go on for. By the
05:48way,
05:48we do have another one as well going on that hasn't been spoken about for some time, really,
05:52doesn't get top billing anymore with Russia and Ukraine. You do have issues that are around how
05:58other countries are feeling growth and GDP sort of smoothing out. You do have fiscal issues. You do have
06:06government debt. And you are seeing emerging markets who actually have a different conservative,
06:11more conservative approach to debt fiscally, actually operating through that perhaps more
06:15effectively. So dislocations are one thing. You do see opportunities. If you take particular asset
06:22classes, what you're seeing is not just volatility, but dispersion within those asset classes.
06:25And that's where I think there is an ability to take advantage.
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