Yes Merchant is one of the rare exceptions. The basic problem with institutional investors in Australia is they are not in control of their buy or sell decisions. They are investing other people’s money and if those people panic and want their money back then the institutional investors have to sell even if they believe strongly in the companies they hold. In Australia institutional investors tend to amplify the cycle rather than act as a base in the bad times.
What we need is a pool of smart money able to hold through the investment cycle. The irony is Australia has this in spades (the big super funds), but they are more obsessed with sponsoring sporting teams rather than building Australia’s future. To quote Donald Horne -
”Australia is a lucky country run mainly by second rate people who share its luck. It lives on other people's ideas, and, although its ordinary people are adaptable, most of its leaders (in all fields) so lack curiosity about the events that surround them that they are often taken by surprise.”
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