Via Bloomberg (emphasis our own):
One of Wall Street’s biggest bears is leaving Morgan Stanley after a year and a half on the job.
Abhijit Chakrabortti resigned yesterday as the New York- based bank’s chief global and U.S. equity strategist, spokeswoman Carissa Ramirez said. No reason was given for the departure, which came 17 months after he moved from JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chakrabortti couldn’t be reached for comment.
His 2008 prediction for the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index was the most accurate on Wall Street and still missed by 622 points. Chakrabortti predicted the benchmark gauge would finish last year at 1,525, a projection that proved too high after $1 trillion of bank losses sent stocks to their worst year since the Great Depression. He said U.S. banks were fairly valued in November before they fell an average 38 percent.
In the two years before coming to Morgan Stanley, Chakrabortti, 41, was the most bearish forecaster among strategists tracked by Bloomberg. He predicted the S&P 500 would drop 9.9 percent in 2006 and gain 1.5 percent in 2007. The index climbed 14 percent and 3.5 percent, making his call the most prescient of 2007.
Related links:
Montier: ‘Analysts are rubbish’ - FT Alphaville
Analysts unveil the mystery of profit forecasts – FT Alphaville