David Einhorn to speak as the priciest market in decades gets even pricier postelection

Hedge fund investor David Einhorn’s cautious stance all yr made his efficiency endure as he navigated what he believes is the priciest inventory market of his profession at Greenlight Capital.

Einhorn’s hedge fund returned simply 9% in 2024 by way of the tip of the third quarter, internet of charges and bills. That compares with the S&P 500′s greater than 20% achieve throughout the identical interval.

The high-profile investor mentioned he is neither calling the market a bubble nor being outright bearish, however sky-high costs brought on him to be conservatively positioned.

“The market is not simply making all-time highs. It’s, by many measures, the most costly inventory market that we now have seen because the founding of Greenlight,” Einhorn mentioned within the newest investor letter final month. Einhorn based Greenlight in 1996.

Einhorn is talking at CNBC’s Delivering Alpha Investor Summit on Wednesday in New York Metropolis. Will probably be the primary likelihood for traders to listen to from Einhorn postelection and whether or not his views on fairness valuations and inflation have modified with the Trump and Republican insurance policies on the best way.

After a consumers’ strike on the finish of 2023, Einhorn got here again available in the market looking alternatives, buying medium-sized positions in names like software program agency Alight and drugmaker Viatris. Traders might be to listen to if he is nonetheless discovering any values.

Final month, he made a bullish case for Peloton, saying the shares are considerably undervalued.

These new inventory picks did not essentially create a ton of alpha, nevertheless. Greenlight was harm this yr by its low internet publicity to the market and a scarcity of investments within the red-hot Magnificent 7 names.

“We’re prone to proceed to underperform a rising market, as we now have all yr, however we do not want to place ourselves to lose cash ought to the market proceed to rise,” he mentioned within the letter. “We predict Paul Tudor Jones is true when he says that managing the final third of a fantastic bull or bear market transfer is commonly the hardest.”

In the meantime, he spent most of this yr calling for a reacceleration in inflation, making gold a really massive place in his portfolio. This wager has fared comparatively nicely at the same time as inflation has moderated with spot gold hitting a report excessive in late October, up 27% this yr.

Einhorn, a 55-year-old Cornell grad, based Greenlight Capital practically three many years in the past and went on to provide a whopping 26% annualized return for the subsequent decade, far outpacing the broader market and lots of friends. He then thrived in the course of the monetary disaster, predicting the autumn of Lehman Brothers. His stellar observe report made him some of the adopted hedge fund managers on Wall Avenue. Lately, he is discovered some success buying worth shares which have buyback methods in place.