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Crisis expert :
Multi- billionaire
Ray Dalio
founded the hedge fund Bridgewater, which has now shorted 21 shares in European companies
Photo: Brian Snyder / REUTERS
The US hedge fund Bridgewater, led by star investor
Ray Dalio
(72), has positioned itself in a big way for falling stock markets.
The hedge fund has launched bets on falling prices in European stocks with a volume of at least $ 6.7 billion, said the data provider Breakout Point on Thursday evening.
No other asset manager speculates nearly as aggressively in this direction.
Most recently, Bridgewater had bet massively on a bear market in early 2018 and 2020.
From the asset manager's mandatory publications, it can be concluded that he has currently "shorted" shares in 21 European companies, Breakout Point said.
In what is known as short selling, investors borrow shares in order to sell them immediately.
They are betting that they can stock up on the papers more cheaply by the return date.
They pocket the difference as profit.
According to the "Handelsblatt", the following German companies are on the list of values for which Bridgewater expects a price decline: Allianz, BASF, Bayer, Deutsche Börse, Infineon, Munich Re and Vonovia.
The largest short position is Allianz with 388 million euros.
As Breakout Point further reports, the hedge fund is also betting against the French insurer Axa and against banks such as Santander, BBVA, ING and Intesa Sanpaolo.
The largest volume would be bets on a setback for the shares of the chip supplier ASML, the energy group Total Energies and the pharmaceutical company Sanofi.
Bet or hedge?
According to European regulations, investors must declare if they make short sales of more than 0.5 percent of a company's total capital.
The actual size of Bridgewater's bets could be even larger.
However, it could also be that the hedge fund wants to hedge against downside risks.
Bridgewater Associates was founded in 1975 by Dalio.
With more than $140 billion in assets under management, the company is one of the largest hedge funds in the world.
Between 1991 and 2021, he achieved an average return of 10.4 percent per year.
According to
"
Forbes
"
list 2022, Dalio's net worth is around $22 billion.
Dalio recently predicted dark times for the West in an interview with "SPIEGEL".
In his opinion, the US has not only passed the peak of its time as a dominant economic power, but is even on the brink of war with China and Russia.
Even stagflation can no longer be avoided.
The stock markets are currently under massive pressure.
The central banks are raising their interest rates in the fight against inflation, most recently the Swiss National Bank (SNB) surprisingly on Thursday.
As a result, the leading German index, the Dax, fell more than 3 percent below the 13,000 point mark.
The Eurozone leading index EuroStoxx 50 lost more than 2 percent.
Given the brisk pace of monetary tightening, investors see the risk of a recession rising.
Bridgewater had therefore already bet on a sell-off in corporate bonds in the USA and Europe at the beginning of June.
mg/Reuters
