“No problem” sums it up – markets are a little less liquid they claim, but recent experience would show that for PIMCO at least, there were no “fire sales” or “forced selling” after my recent departure, as stated by CEO Doug Hodge in a friendly WSJ article. Ah now I’ve caught your interest.

Well first of all let me state that the PIMCO example is not a good one to use to prove the current liquidity of mutual funds, ETFs, and even index funds. Hodge himself admitted to internal proprietary “liquidity” provisions, adding that it used derivatives for exposures “to support cash buffers and inflows” (sic). The fact is that derivatives on a systemic basis represent increasedleverage and therefore increased risk – presenting possible exit and liquidity problems in future months and years.

Mutual funds, hedge funds, and ETFs, are part of the “shadow banking system” where these modern “banks” are not required to maintain reserves or even emergency levels of cash. Since they in effect now are the market, a rush for liquidity on the part of the investing public, whether they be individuals in 401Ks or institutional pension funds and insurance companies, would find the “market” selling to itself with the Federal Reserve severely limited in its ability to provide assistance.

While Dodd Frank legislation has made actual banks less risky, their risks have really just been transferred to somewhere else in the system. With trading turnover having declined by 35% in the investment grade bond market as shown in Exhibit 1, and 55% in the High Yield market since 2005, financial regulators have ample cause to wonder if the phrase “run on the bank” could apply to modern day investment structures that are lightly regulated and less liquid than traditional banks.

Thus, current discussions involving “SIFI” designation – “Strategically Important Financial Institutions” are being hotly contested by those that may be just that. Not “too big to fail” but “too important to neglect” could be the market’s future mantra.

Liquidity Down The Drain

Down the street from PIMCO, I must openly acknowledge that helping to turn Janus into one of these “too important” companies is one of my objectives, as it is for CEO Dick Weil. But that day lies ahead of us. For now, regulators and thus large institutional asset managers are at least contemplating an inability to respond to potential outflows.