It was several years ago when Jeremy Grantham quietly turned from stock bull to vocal permabear, and while his market notes turned breathlessly alarmist (if only to those who were long his multi-billion fund GMO), such as this from June 2020 “Stock-market legend who called 3 financial bubbles says this one is the ‘Real McCoy,’ this is ‘crazy stuff’”, it wasn’t until early 2021 that Grantham’s warnings of an imminent crash became especially shrill… and wrong. Recall, back in January 2021, Grantham wrote that “Bursting Of This “Great, Epic Bubble” Will Be “Most Important Investing Event Of Your Lives”, while was followed by warnings of a “Spectacular” Crash In “The Next Few Months.”
Needless to say, no crash followed as the Fed and other central banks went all in on stabilizing the market, resulting in an epic year for risk assets which closed 2021 at all time highs, while GMO suffered not only steep losses but also substantial redemptions, a humiliating outcome for Grantham who had previously called the bursting of both the dot com and housing bubbles, but failed to account for just how determined the Fed is to avoid another bubble bursting.