WSJ says Ray Dalio's hedge fund has bet more than $1 billion on a global stock sell-off by March - a report he's since denied

• Ray Dalio's hedge fund has placed a bet north of $1 billion that global stocks will fall by March, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
• The position is made up of put options that could pay out to Bridgewater Associates if the S&P 500, the Euro Stoxx 50, or both drop in value, The Journal found.
• Put options are contracts that grant investors the right to sell stocks at a predetermined price by a specific date.
• In a LinkedIn response, Dalio claimed his comments to WSJ were mischaracterized, and said he's not wagering against global stocks.
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Ray Dalio's hedge fund has placed a wager of more than $1 billion that stocks around the world will decline by March, according to a Wall Street Journal report citing people familiar with the matter.

Bridgewater Associates has built up a position of put options, with the help of banks such as Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, that could generate returns if the S&P 500, the Euro Stoxx 50, or both fall during the period, The Journal found.

Put options are contracts that grant investors the right to sell stocks at a predetermined price by a specific date.

According to the initial Journal report, Bridgewater's put options will expire in March, and the firm shelled out about $1.5 billion for the contracts, which are linked to about $100 billion worth of the two stock indexes.

Around mid-day, Dalio published a refutation of the report on LinkedIn.

"It's wrong," he said about the Journal's story. "I want to make clear that we don't have any such net bet that the stock market will fall."

Prior to Dalio's response, the Journal said it was unclear why Bridgewater had built up the position, though it cited multiple clients who said it could be the firm hedging against its exposure to the equity market.

The magnitude of the bet has raised the price of some options, The Journal found. The number of S&P 500 put options outstanding has also increased to a four-year high, according to data from Trade Alert cited by the newspaper.

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The news also comes as markets have charged to all-time highs in recent weeks amid negotiations in the US-China trade war and lingering worries of a global slowdown.

Further, Wall Street titans such as Leon Cooperman and Paul Tudor Jones have issued warnings over the past few months that an Elizabeth Warren presidency could tank stocks.

Bridgewater told The Journal initially that its investments change frequently and are often used as hedges for other trades and that it "would be a mistake" to read too much into one position. The firm added that it didn't have positions meant to hedge or bet on political developments in the US.

The Journal pointed out that March is an important time for the Democratic primary because most of the party's delegates will be awarded by the end of the month.

Dalio, a billionaire investment guru, has expressed concern about the global economy several times in the past few months. In October, he said that the world economy was in a "great sag" and that central banks might not be able to combat it because of historically low interest rates.

The veteran investor also wrote in a LinkedIn post in early November that the "world has gone mad" and that the state of financial markets is unsustainable."