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FCAU - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles


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http://www.theverge.com/2016/6/20/11978044/anton-yelchin-jeep-recall-confusing-design-gear-lever

 

Those gear levers are pretty tricky.  I think you have to hold the button and press up to go into park, otherwise it just shifts into neutral.  Then also engage the parking brake.  But he was on a steep incline, so how could he be in neutral and not notice the car rolling as he got out?  More than likely he just didn't engage the parking brake but used the gear lever just fine. 

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Why is mgmt saying nothing? Do they want exors debt to get downgraded? EXOR debt is based on public value of portfolio and FCA falling like concrete. MGMT needs to draw line in sand and say they will do everything and anything to salvage equity value. A spin of parts could be in excess of cap. the outside perception is of ambivalence. Why cant this trade 1-2.00. Things havent even got that bad yet. Why own this at all? Shouldnt we just buy after already goes down and is on way back up. Traditional valuation seems futile.

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Why is mgmt saying nothing? Do they want exors debt to get downgraded? EXOR debt is based on public value of portfolio and FCA falling like concrete. MGMT needs to draw line in sand and say they will do everything and anything to salvage equity value. A spin of parts could be in excess of cap. the outside perception is of ambivalence. Why cant this trade 1-2.00. Things havent even got that bad yet. Why own this at all? Shouldnt we just buy after already goes down and is on way back up. Traditional valuation seems futile.

 

Feel free to let us know when it's about to go up and we'll all buy.

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Why is mgmt saying nothing? Do they want exors debt to get downgraded? EXOR debt is based on public value of portfolio and FCA falling like concrete. MGMT needs to draw line in sand and say they will do everything and anything to salvage equity value. A spin of parts could be in excess of cap. the outside perception is of ambivalence. Why cant this trade 1-2.00. Things havent even got that bad yet. Why own this at all? Shouldnt we just buy after already goes down and is on way back up. Traditional valuation seems futile.

 

Management is focused on managing the business right and this is now small feat compared to almost anything else!

They are also focused on releasing shareholder value whenever it makes business sense (ferrari for example).

Management should let numbers/results speak for themselves and if that is not enough provide food for buybacks down the road at crazy low prices.

If you have a crystal ball on when to buy exactly please enlighten us - investing is never a straight road as far as I know.

PS: It would be so much easier to keep one's eyes riveted on business results instead of market daily "scores"...

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we have been focused on business results for the last two years and the stock goes straight down....

 

business results dont matter. when the company starts generating cash flow and debt goes down it will be something else. the way value gets realized is thru spins/sales.

 

Until the economics improve dramatically such that ROIC>WACC it will always be something with the business.

 

 

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Does anyone know if FCAU has a pension underfunding problem as GM?

 

we have been focused on business results for the last two years and the stock goes straight down....

 

business results dont matter. when the company starts generating cash flow and debt goes down it will be something else. the way value gets realized is thru spins/sales.

 

Until the economics improve dramatically such that ROIC>WACC it will always be something with the business.

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Auto's a re a cyclical industry and the standard approach is to buy when things look expensive and sell when things look cheap.  The stocks are cheap now, so the question is whether we have an extended up-cycle in autos and they can continue to do well or if we are near a cycle peak. 

 

A lot of investors are betting on the peak and selling now.  It remains to be seen if they are right.

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if you think the public markets are getting it wrong...why dont you arrange financing for LBO? Why isnt company doing it?

 

I mean, I don't know that anyone on this board has the resources to raise more than $20 billion for a buyout of a company this size so... that's one answer?

 

The answer on the other side is that Exor owns 1/3 of the company and likely wouldn't sell out to someone else at prevailing prices. The flip side, of course, is that Exor is also trying to digest Partner Re so even if Exor wanted to buy out remaining shareholders, it would be difficult for them to do.

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To especially whatdadil9: Do not take this as an investment advice!

 

But it's time to cheer up the mood on this thread  ;), I'm now pretty much all in on FCAU. I don't dare to buy more, although I believe the case is very strong.

 

Auto stocks go down, and then people rationalize it with whatever reasons. The explanations are such nonsense. Just as Graham said, most people justify value by market prices, not the other way it should be.

 

There is always the risk that I'm missing something major, but so are all the pundits. The only explanation I could accept is that U.S. car sales have started their decline. But we don't know that. At least I insist on several months in a row with strongly declining sales. For those who don't know, the first 6 months that just ended saw stronger auto sales than 2015. Sure, June in U.S. was slightly down, but e.g. in Canada it was +7%, and the year might set another record year. Not to mention Europe. We don't know the impact of Brexit yet, but I doubt it has any impact unless the economic woes become acute in Italy.

 

And that's not even the point: I believe car stocks sell on earnings, not (market's) sales volumes. As long as earnings go up, they should support stock prices. This is the way it has been the last 40 years.

 

FCA is gaining market share, has grown in U.S. +7 % yoy almost every month, and +15 % yoy in Europe. China and India are just starting up. Incentives on Chrysler 200s can't be that big, as their sales volume is already quite low. Alfa Romeo Giulia, Maserati Levante and Chrysler Pacifica have received great reviews and are ramping up. My guess is that margins are going to keep on expanding. No matter what the Japanese, GM and Ford will do, FCA's adj. EBIT might exceed 7 B EUR this year, that means double adj. NI (or 2.3-2.5 USD diluted EPS).

 

Poor me, I don't know about analyst consensus - or if it's EUR or USD, diluted or not, adj. or clean, but I believe it's around EPS = 1.4 USD. So I think FCA might beat estimates by mere +70 %, that's hardly insignificant. If auto stocks do follow earnings, do you know what that should do to FCA stock by spring next year? Sergio's plan continues to 2018 with EBIT = 9 B EUR.

 

A bit of history here: When Ford announced its surprise results for 1986, exceeding GM in profits for the first time since 1920s, the stock went up +100 % in 8 months, to P/E = 8.5. When GM exceeded Ford's profits again in 1989, GM's stock strongly outperformed Ford's. 

 

Of course now we have Tesla, that's making a loss, selling stock and falling chronically short on production targets. But that's ok. Then we have FCA, that is profitable, is delevering (latest in Q4), and constantly exceeds expectations. Hmm...

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if you think the public markets are getting it wrong...why dont you arrange financing for LBO? Why isnt company doing it?

 

I mean, I don't know that anyone on this board has the resources to raise more than $20 billion for a buyout of a company this size so... that's one answer?

 

The answer on the other side is that Exor owns 1/3 of the company and likely wouldn't sell out to someone else at prevailing prices. The flip side, of course, is that Exor is also trying to digest Partner Re so even if Exor wanted to buy out remaining shareholders, it would be difficult for them to do.

 

It's also hard to LBO something which is already levered up.

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Although I like Sergio, I think he should realize that nobody will bid price that he wants for FCAU. Big car co mergers don't work unless co is acquired supercheap from BK or forced seller. Sure, Sergio can rationalize that the merger would "work" by removing capacity & increasing scale, but both of these actually hit the acquirer's results: if you buy another company and then remove capacity, it's you who is having lower sales ( 1 + 1 = ~1.5 ); if you want to scale, you pretty much have to gut the acquired company lines and hope that customers will flock to your lines so you can scale them; or you can try to reuse across your and acquired lines - haha not easy. IMO it's completely rational that nobody wants to bid for FCAU. Well, perhaps Chinese will at some point if/when they have resources and want to get US/Euro market. But that's quite low probability (and likely greater fool) expectation.

 

So, FCAU has to make it work without being acquired. Let's hope that 2018 plan is solid.

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Bonkers-

 

Thanks for the cheer up call. I appreciate it but live in a world where very large Macro Managers are shorting Italy, Autos, etc. and have alot more capital to push things around. Its my understanding that most of the prominent 10+ bn managers are short autos and fiat in particular. You can catch a small glimpse of this on CIQ which shows which managers are short FCA common. Does not include swap obviously. lots of guys short this on swap too..

 

The problem I have is that over the course of the cycle you can normalize earnings. Makes X.00 EPS at the peak and for this long and makes/(loses) X.00 EPS for this long. You add the numbers together and divide by the number of years and you get NORMALIZED earnings. I dont think I or anyone else can accurately do this math and hence the car stocks trade on the direction of sales volumes and not earnings.....b/c when sales turn no one knows what earnings look like and for how long? I think the same issue is plaguing Airlines for that matter. Perhaps we need to go thru a recession or a downturn to desensitize folks. I dunno.

 

My issue is that I have ZERO idea how low this can go. If EPS is Zero or negative why can this thing trade sub > 1. Not like the Company will be paying dividends out of cash/re or buying back stock to juice earnings on the other side... Whats the rationale for staying?

 

A buddy of mine said all the auto companies would be better off distributing all cash when industry volumes are near peak as opposed to repurchasing or growing... It kind of makes sense when you take a step back and think about it. What if FCA wanted to expand capacity in LatAm and China when the world is in a global recession? Wouldnt material costs and all these things cost a whole lot less then?

 

FCA has debt today becauase they are halfway thru a 54bn eur plan that the market gives no credit for the growth investments. If we didnt spend that cash we would have three / four times the companies market cap in cash today!!!  Perhaps we could have spent half and just rationalized US Capacity... You get my point...

 

THe Company has spent an ENORMOUS amount of capital for earnings that the market doesnt believe will ever materialize...

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