In March 2009, just as the stock market bottomed, Grantham published 'Reinvesting When Terrifying,' arguing that investors should overcome paralysis and deploy capital despite apparent weakness, because valuations of 22+ years of historical cheapness statistically guarantee double-digit returns over the following seven years.

GMO's Benchmark Free portfolio is significantly underweight U.S. equities (versus their market weight) and overweight emerging markets by 2x, reflecting a contrarian bet against the 70-point S&P outperformance since 2010 and positioning for eventual mean reversion.