Barton Biggs sees little reason to be bearish

Barton Biggs, who trimmed bullish bets in September before U.S. stocks posted the biggest monthly gain since 1991, said that while he doesn't want to be fully invested in equities, “it's hard to get really bearish.” “Except for Europe, the rest of the world economy is doing pretty well,” the hedge-fund manager said today during an interview on Bloomberg Radio's “Surveillance” with Tom Keene and Ken Prewitt. “There's too much bearishness, and equities -- particularly U.S. equities and emerging-market equities -- are very cheap relative to fixed income, Treasury bonds, high yield, other financial assets.” His Traxis Global Equity Macro Fund's net long position, a gauge of bullish versus bearish investments, is about 60 percent, Biggs said. During a Nov. 21 interview, Biggs said he cut the figure to less than 40 percent and might reduce it another 15 percentage points. The money manager's optimism on U.S. stocks has shifted along with the market. He raised the Traxis Global fund's long equity position to 65 percent after slashing it to 40 percent in September, he said in an Oct. 17 interview. Biggs then boosted the figure to 80 percent, he said two weeks later. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index dropped five straight months through September before surging 11 percent in October. --Bloomberg News--