How to Understand The Small-Stock Rally
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How to Understand The Small-Stock Rally

Small-caps are drubbing large ones this year. What does it mean for what’s ahead?

By Mark Hulbert
Wed, Mar 10, 2021 5:05amGrey Clock 4 min

Small stocks so far this year have beaten their large-capitalisation brethren by a wider margin than they have in more than two decades, raising questions about what is driving the outperformance and what it means for the overall market ahead.

The year-to-date return for small-caps through the end of February was a remarkable 25 percentage points greater than that of large-caps (as measured by the 20% of stocks with the smallest market caps vs. the comparative quintile of the largest). While it isn’t unexpected for small-cap portfolios to beat large-caps over time—a long-term tendency that Wall Street analysts refer to as the “size effect”—what is unusual is the magnitude of the outperformance. It has averaged just 0.9 percentage point over all two-month periods since 1926, according to data from Dartmouth professor Ken French.

You have to go back to January and February of 2000, at the top of the internet-stock bubble on Wall Street, to find a two-month stretch in which the small-caps beat the large-caps by more. Their margin of outperformance over those two months was 41 percentage points.

Any parallel to the top of the internet-stock bubble is ominous, to be sure. But there are several idiosyncrasies to small-caps’ recent performance that stand in the way of drawing any straightforward analogies to the frenzy in small stocks that heralded the 2000 tech-stock crash.

Indeed, according to several researchers, small-caps’ recent strength may actually be something else in disguise—that is, it may have to do with factors other than just size, such as the battle between growth and value stocks.

That doesn’t mean there is nothing to worry about in this bull market, where valuations are stretched thin for many stocks. But it does mean that investors who are focused solely on the small-cap/large-cap divergence could be missing the bigger picture.

Here’s why.

1. Value versus growth

One distinction that is crucial for understanding the relative strength of small-caps this year has to do with where small- and large-cap stocks lie on the growth-versus-value spectrum. Small-cap stocks currently are far closer to the value end of the spectrum than large-caps, meaning they are trading for lower prices relative to their net worth.

A stock’s place on this spectrum is defined by its ratio of price to per-share book value, with the highest ratios at the growth extreme and the lowest at the value extreme. Consider the Russell Microcap Index, which contains the smallest 1,000 stocks in the broad-market Russell 3000 index. Its average price-to-book ratio was 2.5 as of the end of February, according to Russell Indexes. That compares with a 4.2 ratio for the Russell 1000 Index (which contains the largest 1,000 stocks) and a 5.7 ratio for the Russell Top 50 Mega-Cap Index (which contains the largest 50 stocks).

These are significant differences, according to Kent Daniel, a finance professor at Columbia University and a former co-chief investment officer at Goldman Sachs. He says that, on average, small-cap growth stocks tend to underperform the market, while small-cap value stocks tend to outperform. Since 1926, he says, the smallest-cap stocks closest to the growth end of the spectrum have lost 3.3% annualized, while the smallest most value-oriented stocks have gained 13.3% annualized.

This pattern has been especially strong in recent months, making it difficult to determine what accounts for small-caps’ relative strength this year. But Prof. Daniel says there is the distinct possibility that it is really a “value effect masquerading as a size effect.” If so, a bet on small-cap relative strength continuing is really a bet that value will outperform growth.

That bet may pay off in coming months, he says, and value could continue to outperform growth for many years. But he also says that value stocks have lagged behind growth stocks for at least a decade now, and while there have been numerous predictions of a value resurgence over that time, it hasn’t happened—at least not yet.

2. Sector bets

The benchmark indexes for small-caps and large-caps have different sector weightings, which also makes it difficult to gauge whether the recent relative strength of small-caps is actually due to company size.

Consider the information-technology sector. The ETF benchmarked to the largest 50 stocks currently has a 38.6% weighting to this sector, more than three times the 12.7% weighting of the Russell Microcap Index.

Conversely, the microcap index has more than 10 times the weighting of the largest-50-stock ETF to the industrials sector (11.7% versus 0.8%) and more than double the allocation to the financials sector (17.6% to 7.1%).

These differences are a big part of small-caps’ year-to-date performance, since industrials and financials have each outperformed the information-technology sector. It was just the opposite for calendar 2020, and sure enough, the smallest stocks lagged behind the largest last year.

Until there are small-cap and large-cap benchmarks with the same sector weightings—Prof. Daniel says he is unaware of any currently—it will be difficult to determine what is driving small stocks’ relative strength. If it is being caused by differences in sector weightings, however, it is likely to persist only if the sectors in which the small-caps are overweight continue outperforming.

3. Is the small-cap effect real?

This discussion also points to a more fundamental question that many researchers have been asking in recent years: Does the small-cap effect even exist, in and of itself? That is, do smaller firms really have higher returns than larger firms, on average, over long periods?

Andrea Frazzini, a principal at AQR Capital Management and an adjunct professor of finance at New York University, has concluded that it exists only among a very narrow group of stocks. He says that some of the relative strength of small-caps in recent months traces to speculative fervour for stocks outside that narrow group, making it risky to bet that it will continue.

According to his research, small-caps are a good bet to outperform the large-caps only if you limit your focus to companies with high financial quality. By financial quality he means firms that are profitable, have robust profit growth and a stable earnings stream and a high dividend-payout policy, among other characteristics. Many of the small companies that have performed the best so far this year don’t qualify.

Companies that have been bid higher in recent weeks through social-media investor campaigns—such as GameStop and AMC Entertainment—are two obvious examples, but they are hardly alone in not qualifying for Prof. Frazzini’s high-quality category. Nearly half of the 2,000 companies in the Russell 2000 small-stock index, for example, lost money in 2020.

Prof. Frazzini’s research therefore suggests that, if you want to bet on a continuation of recent small-cap relative strength, you should focus on small stocks that score high on various measures of financial strength, safety and quality. And don’t sweat the comparisons to that internet-stock frenzy of 20 years ago.



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The bequests benefit charities, distant relatives and even pets

By TALI ARBEL
Sun, Oct 6, 2024 4 min

Charities, distant relatives and even pets are benefiting from surprise inheritances. They can thank people without children.

Not having children is becoming more common, both among millennials and older people. A July Pew Research Center analysis found that 20% of U.S. adults age 50 and older hadn’t had children.

And many of these people don’t have wills. An AARP survey found half of childless people age 50-plus who live alone have a will, compared with 57% of others that age. Those without wills have less control over what happens to their money, which often ends up in the hands of people who don’t expect it.

This phenomenon of a surprise inheritance is common enough that it has a name: the laughing heir .

“All they do is get the money and go, ‘Ah ha ha, look at that,’ ” said Michael Ettinger , an estate lawyer in New York.

Kelley Gilpin McKeig, a 64-year-old healthcare-industry consultant in Ridgefield, Wash., received a phone call several years ago saying her cousin Nick Caldwell left behind money in a savings account. They hadn’t been in touch for 20 years.

“I thought it was a scam,” she said. “Nobody else in our family had heard that he had passed.”

She hunted down his death certificate and a news article and learned he had died about a year and a half before in a workplace accident.

Caldwell, who was in his 50s, had died without a will. His estate was split among cousins and an uncle. It took about two years for the money to be distributed because of the paperwork and court approval involved. Gilpin McKeig’s share was $2,300.

Afterward, she updated her will to make sure what she has doesn’t go to “just anybody down the line, or cousins I don’t care about.”

Who inherits

There are trillions of dollars at stake as baby boomers age.

Most people leave their money to spouses and children when they die. A 2021 analysis of Federal Reserve survey data found that 82% of heirs’ inheritances came from parents.

People with no children say they want to leave a greater share of their estates to charity, friends and extended family , according to research by two Yale law professors that surveyed 9,000 U.S. adults.

Rebecca Fornwalt, a 33-year-old writer, created a trust after landing a book deal. While her heirs are her parents, her backup heirs include her sister and about a half-dozen close friends. She set aside $15,000 for the care of each of her two dogs.

Susan Lassiter-Lyons , a financial coach in Florence, Ariz., said one childless client is leaving equal interests in her home to her two nephews. Another is leaving her home to a man she has been friends with for a long time.

“She broke his heart years ago and she feels guilted into leaving him property,” Lassiter-Lyons said.

A client who is a former escort estranged from her family is leaving her estate to two friends and to charity.

Lassiter-Lyons, who doesn’t have children, set up a trust for her two dogs should she and her wife die. The pet guardian, her wife’s sister, would live in their house while taking care of the dogs. When the dogs die, she inherits the house.

In the Yale study, people without descendants—children or grandchildren—intended to give 10% of their estates to charity, on average, more than triple the intended amount of those with descendants.

The Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles, which manages $1.3 billion of assets, a few years ago added an “heirless donors” section to its website that profiles donors and talks about building a legacy.

“Fifteen years ago, we never talked about child-free donors at all,” said Lew Groner , the foundation’s vice president for marketing.

In the absence of a will, heirs are determined by state law . Assets can wind up in the state’s hands. In New York, for example, $240 million in unclaimed funds over the past 10 years has arrived from estates of the deceased, not including real estate, according to the state comptroller’s office. In California, it is $54.3 million.

Hard questions

Financial advisers say a far bigger concern than who gets what is making sure there is enough money and support for a comfortable old age, because clients without children can’t call on them for help.

“I hope there is something left to leave,” said Stephanie Maxfield, a 43-year-old therapist in southern Colorado. “But if there isn’t, I think that’s OK, too.”

She said she would like to leave something to her partner’s nieces and nephews, as well as animal shelters and domestic-violence shelters. Her best friend is a beneficiary.

Choosing an estate executor and who would handle money and health decisions on your behalf can be difficult when you don’t have children, financial advisers say. Using a promised inheritance as a reward for taking care of you when you are older isn’t a good solution, said Jay Zigmont , an investment adviser focused on childless people.

“Unfortunately, it is relatively common to see family members who are in the will decide to opt for cheaper medical care (or similar decisions) in order to protect what they will be inheriting,” he said in an email.

Kirsten Tompkins, who is from Birmingham, U.K., and works in consulting, along with her husband divided their estate among their dozen nieces and nephews.

Choosing heirs was the easy part. What is hard is figuring out whom to ask for help as she and her husband get older, she said.

“A lot of us are at an age where we are playing that role for our parents,” the 50-year-old said, referring to tasks such as providing tech support and taking parents to medical appointments. “Who is going to do that for us?”