Monday, June 18, 2018

Howard Marks Memo: Investing Without People

Link to Memo: Investing Without People
Over the last twelve months I’ve devoted three memos to discussing macro developments, market outlook, and recommendations for investor behavior.  These are important topics, but usually not the ones that interest me most; I prefer to discuss things that are likely to affect the functioning of markets for years to come.  Since little in the environment has changed from what I described in those three memos, I feel I now have the liberty to turn to some bigger-picture issues. 
This memo covers three ways in which securities markets seem to be moving toward reducing the role of people: (a) index investing and other forms of passive investing, (b) quantitative and algorithmic investing, and (c) artificial intelligence and machine learning.