Veteran emerging-markets investor Mark Mobius is keeping the bulk of his funds' holdings in cash as he waits out the trade-related uncertainty, which is likely to persist for up to six months.
"At this stage, cash is king. So 95% of my money in the funds are in cash," Mobius said in an interview on Bloomberg Television on Wednesday. "Right now, we've got to keep the cash and be ready to move when the time is right."
Mobius, who has been investing in developing markets for about three decades, said some emerging market countries such as India will do quite well in the current environment, "but we have to wait until all of this evens out and we see a settling down of this uncertainty."
While many Wall Street managers and strategists have turned defensive in their equity allocation, Mobius's high levels of cash holdings signal heightened risks from tariff tensions. Investor sentiment on economic prospects is the most negative in three decades, a Bank of America Corp survey showed earlier this month.
Investors will likely only be able to assess market opportunities once the trade negotiations take place over the next four to six months, Mobius said. He added he will not hold so much cash for "more than three to four months" and will start to deploy some of the funds depending on where the opportunities are.
"If the market comes down further, of course we will put more money in," said the co-founder of Mobius Capital Partners.
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Mobius said in an interview with newspaper Economic Times in 2023 that he oversees about US$300 million in assets under management.
Mobius expects India to benefit at the expense of China as Trump looks to reshape the global supply chains away from Asia's largest economy. "The US is very eager to make an agreement with India, because that will be the alternative to China," he said, adding that Indian stocks tied to software and electronics hardware are on his radar.
On the other hand, "I will become very bullish on China" if the government shows a sea-change in its attitude on trade and domestic consumption.
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Mobius also said he owns "a little bit with S&P 500 funds" to track the market and expects the gauge to rise from current levels by the end of the year as investor confidence returns to US investing.
"Trump doesn't want to see a big market crash, so he will be making adjustments and announcements, which will give a little bit more confidence for people in the market," he said.
