Earlier quoted context omitted.
My $0.02, we're going to see bifurcation that the market hasn't fully priced in. Not a good time to be in broad ETFs. Highly likely: Coronavirus is going to be circulating until the end of 2021 (based on transmissibility & vaccine timeline). We'll have better therapeutics to blunt the symptoms. But steps required to (intermittently) re-suppress transmission (NYC is ~20% exposed? So at minimum 1-2 more spike repeats)…
Can you define what this bifurcation in ETFs look like? I can’t grasp how this situation will crumble the ETF market- aren’t ETFs in theory safer than stocks?
They accomplish this by bundling together like stocks, such that each's individual volatility balances out others.
This essentially allows you to buy "oil stocks" or "retail stocks" or "all large-cap US companies."
However, what goes into those buckets are any companies that meet the criteria. Hence why ETF fees are lower than actively managed mutual funds.
The downside is that you own all the companies in that bucket. If half of those companies can coronavirus-adapt and the other half cannot, is that the bucket you want to be holding?