Who Will Be The Winners And Losers Of The Next Debt Crisis?

Forbes

4 days ago

KENDALL, FL - MARCH 07: A member of the congregation prepares her credit cards to be cut up by a ... More saw as she tries to dig herself out of credit card debt during a sermon by Kevin Cross about faith-based financial management at the Miami Vineyard Community Church on March 7, 2009 in Kendall, Florida. Cross preaches to people about the biblical principles of money management with his idea of steps that should be taken for handling finances to glorify and honor God. With the economic hard times that have fallen upon many people, churches around the country are trying new programs such as Cross's Margin and Meaning events, to guide people out of their debt and get back on their feet financially. (Photo by)
Although I devoted last week's note to book recommendations, I want to start this week's missive by also highlighting a few classic works, notably Charles Dickens' 'Little Dorrit' and Honoré de Balzac's 'Lost Illusions' and 'Pére Goriot'. All three books, published in the middle of the 19th century, in the shadow of the debt burdens that resulted from the Napoleonic Wars, speak to the pernicious aspects of debt – debtors prisons, debt collection and the surrender of properties caused by over-indebtedness.
They have come to mind because markets are beginning to price in a potentially very dramatic change in fortunes – which, if it occurs, will be historic and far reaching. There are at least three noteworthy elements to this.
The first is that the difference between interest rates for companies, relative to 'safe' government bonds, have fallen to historic lows. In more technical terms, corporate bond spreads (corporate yields less the US 10 year bond yield for example) and spreads for riskier high yield bonds in the US, are now well below long-term average levels. While this is a function of strong risk appetite and demand for fixed income, it is also a recognition by markets that debt levels for corporations (on average) are at very manageable levels, while those for governments are not.
Second, the spread between emerging market debt (countries and companies) and Treasuries has also compressed, to multi-decade lows. Again, this is an indication of appetite for yield from investors, but also a re-evaluation of the riskiness of emerging market debt (compared to countries like the US). Emerging markets collectively (China skews the data) have a debt to GDP ratio of 75% according to the April edition of the IMF Fiscal Monitor, which is the highest it has ever been.
The only saving grace is that emerging economies have lower debt levels than the developed world, though the threshold to debt sustainability is much lower for emerging economies (less deep markets, harder to gather taxes). What is more interesting is that within the emerging markets universe there is a decent number of large emerging economies that have relatively low levels of debt – Indonesia and Mexico for example.
Then third, rising stock markets and property markets, not to mention business creation, have created massive wealth. Remarkably, world wealth stands at over USD 500 trn, with nearly half of this in the USA where the wealth of the average adult is USD 620,000, according to the recent UBS wealth report. The USA is also home to about 60% of the world's ultra-high net worth individuals, those with net wealth of over USD 50 mn. Surpassing this group, there are close to 3,000 individuals globally with wealth between USD 1bn and USD 50bn (collectively they are worth nearly USD 13 trn).
The point of sketching out varying levels of debt and wealth is that in the next five or more years, there will be a seismic transfer of power, influence and wealth between those who have 'healthy' balance sheets, and those who are encumbered with debt…as Dickens and Balzac have so skillfully demonstrated.
To give a few examples. The UK is notoriously fiscally constrained and cannot alone raise the capital to fund its ambitious AI Opportunity plan. As such, it will likely enter in partnerships with sovereign wealth type investment funds (Caisse des Dêpots, the Canadian fund, has just announced a CA$ 3.5bn investment in a nuclear energy plant in Suffolk).
The same is true in the US. In a recent research note, Morgan Stanley estimates that the US will need to invest USD 3.5 trillion in AI infrastructure up to 2028 (new energy sources and data centres), and that at least half of that capital will come from the large technology firms in the US. In the context of America's fiscal constraints, cash rich technology firms will become more powerful, and critical to national
If the US has a debt crisis, and Treasury yields balloon out beyond 8%, an easy political remedy would be to co-opt (under threat of a punitive wealth tax) America's wealthy to buy government debt. Equally, sovereign wealth funds of low debt countries like Norway, will have a unique opportunity to buy strategic assets across Europe in the event of a debt crunch.
My prediction is that France, the UK and perhaps the US will spend the next fifteen years in the 'Debtor's Prison', while lower debt countries like Germany, Poland and the Netherlands and Norway will enjoy a strategic opportunity. In a world where democracy is under pressure, and in some cases inequality is rising, large cash rich companies will control more strategic assets, and the wealthy will find that governments need to court them rather than tax them.
The one country where this may not be the case is China, which is vastly indebted. Having studied the way some European economies become heavily indebted in the aftermath of the euro-zone crisis, the Communist party will throw entrepreneurs, the wealthy and corporates into the Debtors Prison, and let them pay their way out.
Have a great week ahead,
Mike