Spekulatius

Typically, if someone tells you that an investment is a no-brainer, it means you should forget about it. This reaction is correct probably 90% of the time, because there are no investment no-brainers. The only thing there is are investors not using their brain. #punchlinecompleted

^ I very much agree with SD‘s post above for once. +1. If one had an infinite balance sheet, you could buy up the entire SPY and guarantee a 2% payout increasing with inflation with infinite duration at its current valuation and it should be AAA rated. One could argue that it this securitized bond were default, the US would probably default as well. It’s a Gedankenexperiment, but imo a helpful one.

I think 20x for a high caliber company like this with a conservative balance sheet is fairly reasonably, especially if we're talking about 1% targets on the 30 year. I dont think there's much growth here though and from previous looks at it, probably not a ton of G&A left to trim. Why do people continue to put up LT bonds as an alternative? Makes no sense to me. The alternative is SPY (probably 5% FCF yield) or just other value stocks. For example, look at GRA, in a somewhat similar business. Their main business is sell catalyst to refineries and Polyethylene and polypropylene plants. IP Rich business, high profit margins (25% EBITDA margin and higher ) which i think has pricing power. GRA trades at 10x EBITDA (roughly). No position yet, but closely.

I don’t think Culp is likely commit accounting fraud, but he will have to rely on his own accountants and actuaries to calculate the extend of GE insurance liabilities, as he is certainly no expert in this field. I actually think they most of it had been cleaned up prior to his arrival, but there is always the risk that these liabilities get worse and the assets are not enough to cover them, especially when interest rates go down again. Any insurance company with very long tail assets is very suspect to me (look at how BHF is trading) and only time will tell how this works out. In any case, I believe that interest rates going to zero and staying their for a long time may ruin many insurance companies income statements for years to come.

Style drift in content would be easy to see. So far no dice, based on what I can tell. They basically have a lock on conservative viewers in their channels, it would be stupid to impair this. It’s a business, straight and simple. My concerns are mornin terms of conservative with respect to capital allocation. I like the business, not the content :o. Their focus on live events, lock on conservative viewers, tax deferr Ende, high cash conversion ration (due to little capitalization of content) and the extra goodies in assets that may be monetizable. Also 2020 should be a monster year in terms of political advertising due to the election cycle. I think it is one of the best position cable channels out there.

Added a third lot today like others. It’s about a 1.5% position for me. I normally don’t touch stocks with that high of a leverage, but BERY I feel should be Ok, given their history, as well as the high baseline success rate of rollups in the packaging sector. The volume declines that are a concern seem to be caused by customer volume declines, not customer losses, so while a concern, it’s the better of the two cases. apparently they try to acquire new customers. The saving from purchasing should be less with ROC, because that business had already a significant size (relative to BERY legacy), so the volume discounts should be less than with acquisitions. I think in this case, Th synergy needs to come from operation, which is a bit harder than just saving money purchasing via volume discounts. Even without synergies, as long as they don’t screw up RPC, they should be Ok.

I believe IBKR‘s high rating here are skewed by having an active investor and money manager audience. For most average investors IBKR would be a poor choice. I think folks overestimate the addressable market for this firm. I like them for what they are, but I wouldn’t recommend them to my wife even ( her accounts are with Fidelity). I accruals think that Robinhood May be a good example if shared economics- yes they sell order flow, but for a small investor, does this matter?

Does anyone have an idea about the extend of the environmental liabilities for Chemour?

You can already get Charter's video via AppleTV or Roku app. Long term I see traditional set-top box completely going way, replaced by an app with cloud DVR capability similar to youtube TV offering. This will reduce capex and ongoing customer support charges for video a lot. I agree with others that video is becoming less and less important as a service offering to cable companies not just because there is no margin in it for them but even as a churn reducing mechanism. Core offering for cable is HSD with MVNO add-on being helpful in reducing the churn as it enables the customer to have all the data needs (fixed and mobile) serviced by one company. The setup box was a significant part of the Capex and directly related to video. Broadband only needs a router and those are much cheaper, more reliable can often be self installed. I believe it is correct that the cable company will probably resell streaming subscription (probably at a small discount due to wholesale negotiated prices to individual a membership ). Those are self install and the hardware is pretty cheap and simple and in any way not their responsibility.

Same idea than Burford short - pick a company with troublesome accounting and probably a shareholder base with weak conviction and pick a time with poor market sentiment Now add a twist and pick a high profile “ investigator”, even though he appears to bring nothing to the table than name recognition and start a short attack: Ca-shing!

I own some NUVR, which has much lower debt levels and better metrics and demographics in their service areas overall. However, make no mistake, these are still organically shrinking business. At NUVR it is just disguised by acquisitions. I think the gains in this sector have been made. FWIW, the subsidies from rural telecom/broadband act are guaranteed for 10 years. I don’t think they are likely to go away. basically the government pays for their Capex, provided they meet certain service goals. It’s a sweet deal.

In wonder what the profit from their own line business looks like. They have no edge there. They have a strategy to invest in the best 50 stores and maybe a 100 more - but they have a total 680 stores. What will happen to them? Also, doesn’t the strategy to invest in the best 50/150 stores encumber the best real estate too? The real estate in the other stores may not be worth much, after expenses to close them are accounted for. Maybe it is now the time to make a bold move. Keep Bloomingdales and a few flagship stores, close the rest. It’s not an easy decision to make for management. If they make a big mistake they are toast. FWIW, I do agree that paying down the near term maturities is the right move. Cutting th dividend may be another one and eventually will happen, imo.

If you like real estate, just buy real estate. you can buy it at 40% discount to NAV - MAC, TCO, VNO, SLG....no need to mess around with retail.

Same here. Got some GRIF at the close. Also added to FOX, BNTGY, WMB,WAB and a starter in DD (rebought).

LOL. The merger rationale should interesting, but In guess they can just take the 2006 separation document and negate everything. I believe that CBS would have been much better off on their own. Viacom brings on a lot of ballast that is going to be hard. I guess one thing they could create soap opera or film about their recent corporate history. It would be waste if colorful people like Redstonr and Moones wouldn’t be put on screen. Tarantino would do a great job at this.

You can just go with another lender, depending on how much you sunk into mortgage application. They very likely will have different appraiser hopefully coming up with a better valuation. Appraisals are just a few hundred $, I think.

wow that's great. Must be a really nice cabin at $315 per night vs all the other cabins on Air BNB at less than half of that. Some here say needs to be taken with a grain of salt, sort of like claims on stock portfolio performance ::)

I did the same thing a while ago. I actually asks my appraiser for a low appraisal and used that to get my taxes lowered. However, I didn’t have loan to value issues either.

Another “crappola” spin-off. What is the thesis now, since the initial thesis of a software subscription business seems to busted? Or is this thesis still intact in your opinion? Was the thesis ever that this was a software subscription business? Maybe your opinion of CVET is shared by others, which makes my thesis more plausible that the business fundamentals will be strong for a long time while being hard to understand in the present, and potentially a source of excess returns. But that's what makes a market. Yes, I believe that was the thesis. But this software business is small and the company is loaded with debt. early indication are that the business doesn’t generate much cash. If you are just interested in the distribution business, you can buy PDCO, which although it is not a pure play on animal health, trades at a very undemanding valuation.

Using about every cliche about the Millennial generation there is. My sample size is small, but from the handful of millennials I als I know from work, no fits this description. As for the student loan bailout, it’s inevitable, imo. Once the millennial generation puts their mark on the political landscape, it’s only a matter of time. Ah, Greg was a grumpy, 65-year old senior when he came out of his mother's womb, so I would take that all with a grain of salt...especially on the $9 avocado toast...it's more like $15 everywhere! That being said, the stats don't lie, and they do show that Millennials are struggling on a broad basis. So maybe not your immediate peer group, but certainly the age category. And truth is that is natural since they come out of school with debt, carry mortgage debt, credit card debt and auto loans as they build their young careers. But the sheer weight is enormous for this age category compared to Boomers, Gen X & Y, etc at the same age. Cheers! No question the issue with student loan debt is real. The peer group I am referring to are all engineers, so they have a decent paying job, which goes a long way towards solving the problem.

They guided down from above numbers. Still seems cheap: Their EV value is ~$6B consisting of $2B in equity and $4B in debt. EBITDA this year is $1-1.5B. I don’t know what their environmental liabilities will be, bit note that in their worst year 2016, they paid $330M, which would be less than 1/3 of their. EBITDA. The current valuation implies that they would pay out $330M every year, at which CC would trade at 8x EBITDA, which is still fairly cheap. Business wise, I note that fluorochemicals has EBITDA margins north of 25% and TiO2 even higher than that. TiO2 needs a lot of Capex though. To me $2B in market cap is too cheap. CC almost trades like and equity stub, but it doesn’t seem distressed. I also think they have a point that Dupont lowballed the environment liabilities at spinoff. Make no mistake, this is a “crappola” spin-off, where DuPont wanted to get rid of some unwanted liabilities and business, but those business seem to be of a quite high quality. especially fluorochemicals isn’t that economically sensitive, I think. Might be a candidate to buy leap calls.

So what will the impact of an Argentine sovereign default on the Peterson case, if any?

Using about every cliche about the Millennial generation there is. My sample size is small, but from the handful of millennials I als I know from work, no fits this description. As for the student loan bailout, it’s inevitable, imo. Once the millennial generation puts their mark on the political landscape, it’s only a matter of time.

Another “crappola” spin-off. What is the thesis now, since the initial thesis of a software subscription business seems to busted? Or is this thesis still intact in your opinion?

Bought back some WAB. Price seems under pressure after the secondary (GE liquidating shares they received as a merger consideration). Starter in BNTGY (Brenntag). Small adds to BRK and WMB.