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Pimco founder and bond industry legend Bill Gross is done with his previous life running huge investment firms and making market headlines. But that doesn’t mean he’s done as an investor.
Instead, the one-time “bond king” is putting money to work for his own sake rather than running what was once the world’s largest fixed income fund.
In an interview with CNBC’s Brian Sullivan, Gross offered a buffet of investing choices: real estate trust Annaly Capital, investment manager Invesco and specialty pharma firm Allergan to name three. Annaly and Invesco have both fared poorly this year, while Allergan is up more than 30%.
How well they do, though, is not of life-or-death importance to Gross, whose net worth is still estimated at $1.5 billion despite a messy, expensive and headline-grabbing divorce from wife, Sue.
Commenting on what he’s been up to since retiring in February from Janus Capital, where he managed its underperforming unconstrained fund, Gross said, “I’ve been at the beach or the golf course.”
“If I had to do it again, I wouldn’t have left Pimco,” Gross said during the interview, which aired live on “Power Lunch.” “But in leaving Pimco I would have gone straight to the golf course. I think I tried to prove too much.” Gross founded Pimco in 1971 and managed its total return fund, which once boasted more than $270 billion in assets.
On more macro-focused matters, Gross estimates the U.S. economy has slowed to about 1.5% growth but is not yet headed for recession.
“The thing is that fiscal stimulus that we had with the trillion-dollar deficit and the tax cuts so on, to my way of thinking they’re basically played out,” he said. “They need another trillion to do the same type of magic.”
On politics, Gross is betting President Donald Trump won’t be re-elected in 2020 — “I hope not,” he said — with the loss likely coming at the hands of Massachusetts Democrat Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
He also said the Federal Reserve can, and should, cut rates again at its meeting at the end of October.
