There is always a recession coming
During the Q4/18 sell-off, quite a few "guru" investors (e.g. David Tepper) evidently anticipated a longer and deeper downturn and therefore sold more stocks than just some redemptions might have required. In January, these fund managers were certainly caught by surprise when the markets rallied quickly close to their recent highs.
One notable exception was Seth Klarman, who wrote in his annual letter that,
"The recent selloff likely presented a buying opportunity – you can go years without seeing such valuations – but not across the board