Some of his famous calls – that many investors quoted back then as a reason why the market was close to a crash – include:
2010 – Have cash, wait for stocks to fall
2010 - It buys you the right to buy the U.S. market - if the S&P drops from 1,220 today to 900 - which is what we think is the fair value (S&P 500 finished that year at 1,257 +12.8%)
2011 – Grantham sees most global equities as ranging from “unattractive” to “very unattractive” – valuing the S&P 500 at “no more than 950.” (S&P 500 finished that year at 1257 (-0.1%)
2012-Jeremy Grantham warns 2013 will be a Dangerous Year for stocks (S&P 500 finished that year at 1426 +13.4%)
2013 - Much of everything else is once again brutally overpriced
2013 - The S&P 500 is 75% overvalued (S&P 500 finished that year at 1848 +29%)
2014 - Big stock bubble will end badly in 2016…
2014 - …And then around the election or soon after, the market bubble will burst, as bubbles always do, and will revert to its trend value, around half of its peak or worse, depending on what new ammunition the Fed can dig up. At that point, he claimed that an S&P 500 level of 2,250 would be “100% overvalued.” Six years since then (the 100% overvalued call) the S&P 500 is at 4,077 (now +81% above 2,250). (S&P 500 finished that year at 2058 +11% & at the end of 2016 it was 2238)
2015 - GMO founder Grantham says markets ‘ripe for major decline’ in 2016 (S&P 500 finished 2015 at 2043 -0.7% & 2016 at 2238 +9.5%. And it's now (April 2021) at 4,077 or +99% above that level – and that’s NOT including dividends that investors would also have received!