Why Preferred Stocks Are Attractive Yet Undercovered

Published February 9, 2021

Global Chief Investment Officer

Last week’s Behind the Markets podcast featured a discussion with alternative investment manager Moelis Asset Management and its subsidiary Gracie Asset Management. Their investments are focused on opportunities in the credit space, but our conversation focused on the hybrid and preferred stock asset classes as unique opportunities in today’s low interest rate environment.

Some highlights of our discussion—and background information on the asset classes—include the following.

Preferreds: Distinct Market and Structure

Broad and Deep Universe: over $1 trillion in preferred stock outstanding, the highest level in history
Issuers are primarily regulated, large-capitalization financial institutions in the U.S. and Europe
Preferreds provide an investor with the ability to capture both debt- and equity-like characteristics as well as create asymmetric exposures (both long and short) to rates, credit spreads and curve shape with limited need for macro overlays and hedges.
Since 2008, banks and brokerage firms have relied on preferred securities to replenish capital that was depleted during the financial crisis. In Europe, the contingent convertible security (CoCo for short) increased from 2% of global capital securities to almost 25% in the past nine years.

The Preferred Market Is Deeply Underserved

One topic we talked about is why Gracie and Moelis believe the preferred market is underserved by alternative and even traditional managers. Preferreds require specialized knowledge, given the complex and evolving nature of the market. Moreover, there is a coverage gap resulting from the hybrid debt and equity characteristics: many issuers are investment-grade companies with yields that are similar to the high-yield category.

The End of 60/40

Investors are grappling with the ineffectiveness of fixed income to provide complementary returns for portfolios that are highly correlated with equities.
The typical 60/40 portfolios have traditionally benefitted from declining rates and negative correlation between bond and stock allocations.
Preferreds have exhibited low correlations to U.S. Treasuries, a difficult relationship to find in fixed income.
Preferreds also provide a relatively high degree of income with less risk and moderate correlation to equities.

For those wanting to learn more about the preferred market, this was a very educational discussion; you can listen to the full conversation below.

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About the contributor

Jeremy Schwartz, CFA

Global Chief Investment Officer

Jeremy Schwartz has served as Global Chief Investment Officer since November 2021 and leads WisdomTree’s investment strategy team in the construction of WisdomTree’s equity Indexes, quantitative active strategies and multi-asset Model Portfolios. Jeremy joined WisdomTree in May 2005 as a Senior Analyst, adding Deputy Director of Research to his responsibilities in February 2007. He served as Director of Research from October 2008 to October 2018 and as Global Head of Research from November 2018 to November 2021. Before joining WisdomTree, he was a head research assistant for Professor Jeremy Siegel and, in 2022, became his co-author on the sixth edition of the book Stocks for the Long Run. Jeremy is also co-author of the Financial Analysts Journal paper “What Happened to the Original Stocks in the S&P 500?” He received his B.S. in economics from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and hosts the Behind the Markets podcast. Jeremy is a member of the CFA Society of Philadelphia.

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