Investors / stance tracking
What Benn Eifert is saying
Co-founder & CIO, QVR Advisors
8 dated public stances tracked since 2020-01-18, most recently 2022-06-27. Each line carries the date and the venue it came from; quotation marks mean verbatim. Methodology.
The stances below are c8alpha's editorial distillation of Benn Eifert's public commentary — television, podcasts, and interviews — compiled by automated transcript analysis and dated to the episode they came from. They may lag the speaker's current view and may contain extraction errors. Text in quotation marks is verbatim from the episode; everything else is our paraphrase. Benn Eifert is not affiliated with c8alpha and has not endorsed this page. Nothing here is investment advice.
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8
tracked stances
3
themes
2
side flips
2022-06-27
last heard
Returns 90d -3.6% (n=6) · 180d -3.2% (n=6) · 1y +0.1% (n=6)
Raw direction-aware returns on public statements — long calls credited when the price rose, shorts when it fell, shorts capped at −100% — in a rising market this mostly measures who was long, not who has skill. Returns run from the stance date; calls are rarely closed publicly, so fixed 90-day / 180-day / 1-year horizons are used. A horizon shows only once it has fully matured, and only at 5+ scored stances.
View flips
Where the tracked view on a theme reversed between appearances — bullish to bearish or back. Dates are the episodes on each side of the turn.
SPX — bullish2020-01-18 → bearish2021-04-10
SPX — bearish2021-04-10 → bullish2021-04-10
Most-argued themes
| Theme | Stances | Lean | Mix | Last |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SPX | 5 | 2 bullish / 1 bearish / 2 neutral | 2022-06-27 | |
| Em Equities | 1 | 1 bullish | 2021-04-10 | |
| VOL | 1 | 1 bullish | 2020-03-30 |
Tracked stances
bullish / bearish is a view they argued; owns / short is a position they said they hold.
2022-06-27
SPX
neutral
Benn Eifert · video
Systematic covered-call and cash-secured-put selling programs have materially shrunk since 2020, removing the chronic gamma oversupply that suppressed risk premium for years — front-end S&P gamma now has a healthy risk premium and the right position is on the…
“the right way to be positioned now is on the other side of those flows and dislocation”
Keeping it Simple on the Road | Ep. 3: 2020 From A Position of Strength
2022-06-27
long SPX / short SPX
spread
Benn Eifert · video
At VIX ~30, outright SPX puts require volatility to triple to generate meaningful payoff and are therefore not cost-effective as portfolio hedges — put spreads cancel out the expensive vega while still delivering directional downside protection
“I just can't look at a 30 vol and be like yeah I think that's going to triple”
Keeping it Simple on the Road | Ep. 3: 2020 From A Position of Strength
2021-04-10
SPX
bearish
Benn Eifert · video
Overleveraged hedge funds and systematic programs that had been selling tail risk and suppressing deep OTM put prices blew up in March 2020 and exited, removing a structural source of supply, while institutional demand for protection has ticked up — creating…
“in this environment there are attractive opportunities for asymmetric risk reward that are negatively correlated with equities in the tail”
Dr. Benn Eifert - Bad Ideas (S3E3)
2021-04-10
Em Equities
bullish
Benn Eifert · video
Long-term productivity convergence in major EM economies — India, China, Brazil — is an inevitable structural trend that will raise living standards over a multi-decade cycle, making it the single best long-duration bet.
“if I could only make one long-term investment for the rest of my life it would probably be tier one emerging market equities”
90d +1.0% · 180d -4.5% · 1y -15.0%
Benn Eifert - Volatility Investing (S2E2)
2021-04-10
SPX
bullish
Benn Eifert · video
30-delta S&P puts 2-3 months out represent the least crowded segment of the option-selling spectrum — still attractively priced relative to risk, unlike the one-month near-money structures being crushed by pension fund overwriting flows.
“unlevered cash secured modestly downside put selling 30 delta puts is probably the laggard and still the best place to look”
90d +6.1% · 180d +7.3% · 1y +8.3%
Benn Eifert - Volatility Investing (S2E2)
2020-03-30
SPX
neutral
Benn Eifert · video
After the vol spike, forward-looking volatility risk premia are now materially higher, making notionally unlevered put selling on equity indices a better risk-reward than raw equity longs — it provides carry and a downside buffer while giving up some V-shaped…
“replacing some equity longs with notionally unlevered put selling to give yourself a buffer to the downside”
EPISODE 32: Benn Eifert, Founder and CIO of QVR Advisors
2020-03-30
VOL
bullish
Benn Eifert · video
Banks are not intermediating markets due to Dodd-Frank constraints, so the crisis of broken financial plumbing keeps short-term realized vol elevated and the VIX curve steeply inverted — resolution requires the belly/back of the curve to rise to meet the…
“go back to Vicks 30 in a couple of weeks I would say absolutely not”
90d -26.8% · 180d -47.9% · 1y -76.5%
EPISODE 32: Benn Eifert, Founder and CIO of QVR Advisors
2020-01-18
SPX
bullish
Benn Eifert · video
Massive structural, price-insensitive selling by pension funds doing call overwriting and put underwriting has deeply depressed premiums on short-dated near-the-money S&P options, creating a buying opportunity that most natural option buyers have exited
“there's really massive massive selling of short-term near the money options like on the S&P”
90d -13.0% · 180d -2.1% · 1y +16.4%
MH62 - Feature Interview Dr. Benn Eifert
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