celebrity writers

Abby Joseph Cohen

Chief Investment Strategist at Goldman Sachs

Apr 3, 2007

Track and read Abby Joseph Cohen's past and present market prognostication in our "Abby Cohen Discussion Forum"

Forbes says Abby Joseph Cohen ranked 19 among "The Most Powerful Women In 2005" but she failed to make Forbes' most 100 powerful women list in 2006. Fame and power are fleeting.

Recent Market Predictions:

May 25, 2006: Abby called for the S&P500 to reach 1400 by the end of 2006. this chart of the S&P500 shows Abby was correct as the S&P500 finished 2006 at 1418.20.
October 5, 2006: Abby called for the S&P500 to gain 8% in the next 12 months (to reach 1460 from the then current price.)
March 23, 2007: Calls for the S&P500 to reach 1550 by the end of the year.

Abby Joseph Cohen joined Goldman Sachs as a vice president in 1990. She was named a managing director in 1996. Cohen also serves as a trustee of Cornell University and the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Her career began as an economist at the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, D.C., after earning economics degrees from Cornell and George Washington University. Read Abby's latest market prognostication in our “Abby Joseph Cohen Discussion Forum”

Abby Joseph Cohen’s career:

Economist / analyst at T. Rowe Price Associates (1976-1982)
Investment strategist at Drexel Burnham Lambert (1982-1990)
Investment strategist at Goldman Sachs (1990-present).

Date of Birth: Feb. 29, 1952 Education:

A.B., economics and computer science, Cornell University, (1973)
M.S., advanced economics, George Washington University (1976)

Forbes Lists

The 100 Most Powerful Women for 2005
The 100 Most Powerful Women for 2006

Discuss Abby Joseph Cohen: Come join us in our Abby Joseph Cohen Discussion Forum to keep up on Abby’s predictions and results.

Free Charts and Other Stuff

Since beating the market is hard for most to do, I recommend a "Core and Explore" approach to investing. Core means place 80 to 99% of your money into a CORE, buy-and-hold, no load, mutual fund portfolio and then EXPLORE with the remainder. To build your core portfolio, I suggest a diversified basket of index funds.

I welcome suggestions for future articles at Kirk’s Market Thoughts.

Kirk Lindstrom: DISCLAIMER: Answers & my words are general in nature, are not meant as specific investment advice, and do not necessarily represent the opinion of anyone but Kirk. Individuals should consult with their own advisors for specific investment advice.

The copyright of the article Abby Joseph Cohen in Investment is owned by Kirk Lindstrom. Permission to republish Abby Joseph Cohen in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

Comments

Oct 5, 2006 9:26 AM

celtics33 :

Abbey and Brinker have been and still are in lock step...

Mar 23, 2007 8:06 AM

Im Smile :

Good to know Abby's on board (not really) :)

http://investment.suite101.com/discussion.cfm/3471/1476-1485#message_1476

Apr 24, 2007 10:55 AM

Regine Miller :

Well, since we can't climb at the same pace as in the last many months, or we would be at S&P 20,000 by year end, that means that we will have some kind of correction bringing us back to about 1400 or so within the next couple of months or so, then from there we go up to 1550 or so, Garzarelli says 1650. Otherwise, from this point 1480 we move slower than the SLOWOSKY family we are all familiar with.

Apr 24, 2007 12:35 PM

Jim Johnnes :

Does Abbey Joseph Cohen have any significant credibility after her extremely bad calls in 2000-2002? She remained incorrectly bullish throughout the whole bear market, as I recall. What has her record been since then? I recall that in 2001 she was WAY off, and the bear market correction significantly deepened for another year after she had said the end of the bear was imminent.

Unless she's proven herself improved from that underperformance, I'd put little stock in what she says. Her estimate of 1550 by year end sounds doable, assuming I understood her predictions correctly, but it doesn't sound like a profound prediction, given the recent movements in the market. I consider her opinion as interesting, but as nothing more than an "FYI."

Apr 24, 2007 4:42 PM

Jas Jain :

--
She gets paid to be bullish all the time with occasional caution to bolster credibility.

On my count I have advised people to AVOID Scams and be long T-Bills, T-Bonds, Gold and Swiss franc since July 1998. I turned bearish on Scams in fall of 1997. I thought that most tech Scams were already over-valued in 1997Q1. My best short play for the past 8.25 years has been DELL after pain for two years. On other shorts my record is patchy. My recent worst short is GOOG, which I admit was a stupid move.

I advise people not to short unless one is a professional speculator and experienced. I have already recovered 70% of my losses in GOOG at the worst point last year.

Jas

Apr 24, 2007 8:01 PM

Jim Johnnes :

On my count I have advised people to AVOID Scams and be long T-Bills, T-Bonds, Gold and Swiss franc since July 1998. 

I hope you're correct. I have a large percentage (about one-third) of my gross financial assets portfolio in T-bills and have felt left behind by this bull run. The 15% of my portfolio that is allocated to equity has given me great gains but the rest of my portfolio pales in comparison, invested in stable value investments.

I myself believe that the current growth in the economy is illusory, funded by deficit spending. Much of the liquidity coming from abroad and borrowed from the social security trust. This can continue only for as long as the nation's credit holds out, or as long as people are not worried about their soc. sec. benefits. Drastic cuts in social security and medicare benefits are also likely, with the most likely approach through creation of a means test. But there will be no cut in the social security tax. The soc. sec. tax should actually be considered a second income tax, with no guarantee of future benefits to those contributing. So, the federal marginal tax rate is actually something like 43%-44% for someone paying 28% at the margin, including the soc. sec. tax.

Given these fundamentals, the economy is being stoked by the money paid by our taxes and borrowed from other countries. Abbey Joseph Cohen and others either are not aware of, or don't seem to be bothered by this, as long as the stock market keeps rising for another one or two years, based upon projected growth in profits and stable interest rates.

Apr 25, 2007 7:39 PM

Jim Johnnes :

The S&P500 was trading at 1,433.73 when she was talking so 116 pts from here would be a 7.5% gain. Add in the dividends and we're looking at 8.5 to 9.5% total return from here, a reasonable 3 to 5% "risk premium" over 1 YR CDs and Treasuries.

Much depends on how one calculates a "risk premium". Whether it turns out to be 3% or 5% for this year can make a great deal of difference in the market outlook. I would agree that a 5% risk premium would be acceptable by historical standards and sufficient to keep investors interested in equities. My own opinion is that 4.75% is the lower threshhold acceptable risk premium over long term treasury bonds, but anything lower would spell trouble for the market going forward. This means that the S&P 500 needs to earn about 9.5% on average per year to keep investors' interested in equities. With the currently inverted yield curve, the required return has to be higher since a higher return can be earned in money markets than in a long term (10-year) treasury bond. Recently, T-bills were paying about 5.25%, bringing the required return to about 10% (4.75%+5.25%).

I don't believe that an expected 3% risk premium would be sufficient to keep investors in the equity market. For that small of a likely premium, I believe most investors would not take the risk to continue to invest in equities, but would liquidate (or simply stop adding to) equities, preferring to invest in lower risk investments like CDs, money markets, and Treasury bills. We have seen several posters who have expressed this belief and sentiment in these forums.

May 7, 2007 12:27 PM

Jas Jain :

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"because of the stronger-than-expected Q1 corporate earnings..."

Six months ago, when her target was 1550, the expected earnomgs growth for 2007Q1 was 8%. Then it was dropped to 3-4%. Now that earnings are up 8% YoY they have been "stronger-than-expected." You can count on Wall Street Fraudsters to do this sort of thing -- mislead the public.

Jas

Aug 10, 2007 6:24 PM

permabear :

Abby Joseph Cohen is going to eat her super bull predictions just like Brinker, Ken Fisher and others.

Mar 17, 2008 4:29 PM

Jas Jain :

--
See:

http://investment.suite101.com/discussion.cfm/53#message_832

10 Comments