The following charts show the 2012 delegate sentiment reading on the left-hand scale, and percentage performance of the related index over the following 12 months on the right.
Expert Investor Europe‘s bespoke sentiment readings can range from 100 (all investors are positive on the asset class), to zero (positive and negative views are equally balanced), to -100 (all investors are negative on the asset class).
Last year’s delegates were rightly bullish on global equities but failed to predict that western stockmarkets would outperform those in the developing world. In particular, many investors missed out on a rally of almost 20% in the Nikkei 225 Index.
Strongly-bearish forecasts on developed market government bonds did not materialise, as investors held onto their safe-haven assets in 2012. Delegates were right to be bullish on investment grade corporate debt, but were caught out by the strong rallies in riskier high yield securities and emerging market sovereign bonds.
Delegates were spot-on in relation to gold. A sentiment reading of -30 indicates that two-thirds of the 2012 Pan-European Congress attendees were bearish on the precious metal. It fell in value by 7.5%.
