📖Jeremy Grantham

Expand Knowledge Gradually

🌱 Beginner★★★★☆

Expand expertise gradually, one area at a time.

💬

Expand your circle of competence gradually over time. Each new area of expertise adds potential opportunities, but only if mastered thoroughly.

— GMO Quarterly Letters,2017

🏠 Everyday Analogy

Market cycles resemble seasons: planting, growth, harvest, and winter. Using one strategy in every season leads to repeated mistakes.

📖 Core Interpretation

Jeremy Grantham sees markets as cyclical rather than linear. Understanding cycle position improves risk-taking decisions more than trying to call exact tops and bottoms.
💎 Key Insight:Steady learning expands opportunity without increasing risk.

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❓ Why It Matters

Ignoring cycles repeats the same mistakes: excessive optimism at peaks and excessive pessimism near troughs. Context matters for position sizing.

🎯 How to Practice

Monitor credit, valuation, earnings, and sentiment signals; reduce aggressiveness in euphoric phases and preserve flexibility in fearful phases.

⚠️ Common Pitfalls

Treating short rebounds as full cycle turns
Extrapolating peak conditions indefinitely
Becoming maximally defensive near valuation troughs

📚 Case Studies

1
Asian Financial Crisis Aftermath (1998)
Grantham applied a value lens to battered Asian and other emerging markets following the 1997–98 crisis, arguing currencies and equities were deeply undervalued versus fundamentals.
✨ Outcome:Positions were volatile short term but generated strong multi‑year returns as economies stabilized and valuations normalized.
2
Brazil and Russia Commodity Slump (2015)
During the commodity price collapse, emerging markets, especially Brazil and Russia, traded at steep discounts. Grantham highlighted mean reversion and demographic tailwinds supporting long‑term value in these markets.
✨ Outcome:Near‑term underperformance was followed by solid rebounds as commodities and risk appetite recovered over subsequent years.

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