Goldman Sachs encouraged its clients to invest in high-growth stocks, predicting that higher interest rates in 2018 will cause earnings growth to slow and therefore placing a premium valuation on such companies.
“The majority of the recent market rally has been driven by higher earnings rather than valuation expansion,” wrote Goldman Sachs chief U.S. equity strategist David Kostin. “Going forward, we expect growth to continue to drive S&P 500 stock returns. We expect that the prospect of 4 Fed rate hikes in 2018 will result in a forward P/E contraction.”
Kostin isolated firms allocating 90 percent of cash flow from operations to fund growth initiatives during the past three years into a “High Growth Investment” basket, including Netflix and chip maker Nvidia.
To insulate the effects of reductions in earnings multiples, Kostin recommended these high growth stocks to investors.
Fifty-five percent of S&P 500 companies have beaten earnings expectations in the second quarter, the highest share of companies since 2010. Kostin reiterated that Goldman expects the S&P 500 will end 2017 at 2400, slightly below where it is now.
While information technology and health care have led the charge, investors have been slow to reward companies beating expectations with 2018 revisions, hinting at the market’s belief in future pressure on multiples in the market.
Goldman: Buy Netflix, Nvidia and other growth stocks as higher rates stifle earnings