wisdom Posted November 21, 2013 Share Posted November 21, 2013 http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/21/us-sears-results-ceo-idUSBRE9AK0U120131121 To shutter more stores, another big payment to the pension plan in 2014, opportunistic with their debt renewal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wisdom Posted November 21, 2013 Share Posted November 21, 2013 http://searsholdings.com/invest/docs/Q3_2013_Webcast.pdf presentation Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BTShine Posted November 21, 2013 Share Posted November 21, 2013 How do we know (if there's any way to know) that the investments into SYWR are a going to generate a good return? I estimate this investment using about $500 million a year, and other than "trust Eddie, he's generally going to make smart investments" I'm not sure how to analyze the returns they are seeing. Any advice or thoughts from others on the board? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wisdom Posted November 21, 2013 Share Posted November 21, 2013 I would be lying if i thought there was any other way other than trusting Eddie to pull the plug if he sees that it isn't paying off. That is the risk - this is why this investment is so dependent on the largest shareholder making good decisions. Edit: margin of safety buys you time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PLynchJr Posted November 21, 2013 Share Posted November 21, 2013 Shop Your Way is the biggest reason I don't own Sears. Does anyone really think this will work? That it is not a complete waste of money? Does anyone actually regularly use it or like it as a consumer? Seriously. I'm a Sears customer on occassion and a Shop Your Way member (not really by choice) and it does not influence me to shop at Sears one bit. As a matter of fact it makes me dislike Sears more with the constant email spam. "Member-Centric Integrated Retailer". Bleh. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CorpRaider Posted November 21, 2013 Share Posted November 21, 2013 Why doesn't he even mention Seritage or Ubiquity? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
heth247 Posted November 21, 2013 Share Posted November 21, 2013 Why doesn't he even mention Seritage or Ubiquity? Did he ever mention them before? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
heth247 Posted November 21, 2013 Share Posted November 21, 2013 I would be lying if i thought there was any other way other than trusting Eddie to pull the plug if he sees that it isn't paying off. That is the risk - this is why this investment is so dependent on the largest shareholder making good decisions. Edit: margin of safety buys you time. Agree. Over the time, I have become to realize that the margin of safety of SHLD investment does not really come from how much we can claim as a common holder in a bankruptcy court, but from how much margin of error and time Eddie has in transforming the business. Every time they sell a store, it adds a bit to the cushion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BTShine Posted November 22, 2013 Share Posted November 22, 2013 Shop Your Way is the biggest reason I don't own Sears. Does anyone really think this will work? That it is not a complete waste of money? Does anyone actually regularly use it or like it as a consumer? Seriously. I'm a Sears customer on occassion and a Shop Your Way member (not really by choice) and it does not influence me to shop at Sears one bit. As a matter of fact it makes me dislike Sears more with the constant email spam. "Member-Centric Integrated Retailer". Bleh. I agree that as a consumer these 'membership programs' , etc. are annoying...but, as a value investor I tend to try thinking more logically vs. the typical consumer. When I look at my family and friends, all being successful people and capable of being logical, etc., I see them make what I'd consider illogical decisions based upon rewards programs, etc. (Delta Skymiles for example). These people are college educated (most with post-graduate degrees, etc.) and they all still love the rewards programs. My point is that members of C of B&F might be too rational for these programs...we might not be the target consumer for SHLD's SYW Rewards, Delta Skymiles, etc, etc, etc. We pride ourselves with making decisions that are not emotional, which is atypical in comparison to most consumers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dcollon Posted November 22, 2013 Share Posted November 22, 2013 Small comment about SHLD at the end of the article. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-22/sternlicht-says-summers-is-wrong-on-need-for-more-lending.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DCG Posted November 22, 2013 Share Posted November 22, 2013 I would be lying if i thought there was any other way other than trusting Eddie to pull the plug if he sees that it isn't paying off. [/size] [/size]Has Eddie really done anything since taking over this company that would make people trust his business decisions? He's continued to repeatedly prove that has has no idea how to run a large retailer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hellsten Posted November 23, 2013 Share Posted November 23, 2013 I would be lying if i thought there was any other way other than trusting Eddie to pull the plug if he sees that it isn't paying off. [/size] [/size]Has Eddie really done anything since taking over this company that would make people trust his business decisions? He's continued to repeatedly prove that has has no idea how to run a large retailer. AFAIK, he allocates capital based on the expected return on investment, not what Wall Street or anyone else thinks he should be doing. SHLD was at $15 in 2003, now the stock is at $61. People are probably just angry at him because they paid over $100 for the stock in 2006 and expected him to be the next Warren Buffett. His ROI on Shop Your Way is negative as far as I can tell, so you could say he has no idea of how to run a large retailer. Maybe he's making it smaller? Maybe he's investing for the future like Bezos? I believe SHLD should be valued similarly to Amazon and Twitter. SHLD is a startup that's currently losing money, but once they start monetizing all the eyeballs they will turn the corner :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mephistopheles Posted November 23, 2013 Share Posted November 23, 2013 I would be lying if i thought there was any other way other than trusting Eddie to pull the plug if he sees that it isn't paying off. [/size] [/size]Has Eddie really done anything since taking over this company that would make people trust his business decisions? He's continued to repeatedly prove that has has no idea how to run a large retailer. AFAIK, he allocates capital based on the expected return on investment, not what Wall Street or anyone else thinks he should be doing. SHLD was at $15 in 2003, now the stock is at $61. People are probably just angry at him because they paid over $100 for the stock in 2006 and expected him to be the next Warren Buffett. His ROI on Shop Your Way is negative as far as I can tell, so you could say he has no idea of how to run a large retailer. Maybe he's making it smaller? Maybe he's investing for the future like Bezos? I believe SHLD should be valued similarly to Amazon and Twitter. SHLD is a startup that's currently losing money, but once they start monetizing all the eyeballs they will turn the corner :P So you believe that SYW will become a dominant retailer like AMZN? Retailing is hard, and losers tend to stay losers. Seeing Eddie spend $400-500 million a year building an online retailer is troublesome for me. Speeding up the pace of real estate sales doesn't mean much if the money is being redirected back into the retail side. Or maybe they need to do it in order to keep the ship from sinking, so that online can stand on its two feet after which they will close down a significant # of stores. Who knows? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hellsten Posted November 23, 2013 Share Posted November 23, 2013 I would be lying if i thought there was any other way other than trusting Eddie to pull the plug if he sees that it isn't paying off. [/size] [/size]Has Eddie really done anything since taking over this company that would make people trust his business decisions? He's continued to repeatedly prove that has has no idea how to run a large retailer. AFAIK, he allocates capital based on the expected return on investment, not what Wall Street or anyone else thinks he should be doing. SHLD was at $15 in 2003, now the stock is at $61. People are probably just angry at him because they paid over $100 for the stock in 2006 and expected him to be the next Warren Buffett. His ROI on Shop Your Way is negative as far as I can tell, so you could say he has no idea of how to run a large retailer. Maybe he's making it smaller? Maybe he's investing for the future like Bezos? I believe SHLD should be valued similarly to Amazon and Twitter. SHLD is a startup that's currently losing money, but once they start monetizing all the eyeballs they will turn the corner :P So you believe that SYW will become a dominant retailer like AMZN? Retailing is hard, and losers tend to stay losers. Seeing Eddie spend $400-500 million a year building an online retailer is troublesome for me. Speeding up the pace of real estate sales doesn't mean much if the money is being redirected back into the retail side. Or maybe they need to do it in order to keep the ship from sinking, so that online can stand on its two feet after which they will close down a significant # of stores. Who knows? No, I don't think they will become a dominant retailer. When I said SHLD is a startup similar to Twitter or Amazon, I was just being the devil's advocate and inverting the market's view of SHLD. I don't think Eddie is just trying to save face by investing in SYW regardless of the ROI, which is what Amazon and Twitter are doing with many of their projects, so I still trust he's doing the right business decisions. Note to my self: I should become better at growth investing. The key seems to be that when I first find a unique and really good service or product and a great CEO, I should consider buying the stock and holding on forever. It would have worked with e.g. Amazon and Apple, but I'm sure this is partly selection and survival bias. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tombgrt Posted November 23, 2013 Share Posted November 23, 2013 Note to my self: I should become better at growth investing. The key seems to be that when I first find a unique and really good service or product and a great CEO, I should consider buying the stock and holding on forever. It would have worked with e.g. Amazon and Apple, but I'm sure this is partly selection and survival bias. Partly? ;) Do the test right now. Pick 5 stocks that you believe will turn out to be tomorrow's Amazon/Starbucks/Apple. If you get only one right in 10/20 years, you should have easily beaten the market with that basket. GL! :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hellsten Posted November 23, 2013 Share Posted November 23, 2013 Note to my self: I should become better at growth investing. The key seems to be that when I first find a unique and really good service or product and a great CEO, I should consider buying the stock and holding on forever. It would have worked with e.g. Amazon and Apple, but I'm sure this is partly selection and survival bias. Partly? ;) Do the test right now. Pick 5 stocks that you believe will turn out to be tomorrow's Amazon/Starbucks/Apple. If you get only one right in 10/20 years, you should have easily beaten the market with that basket. GL! :D I expect to find maybe 1-2 companies every 5 year using this advanced growth investing technique that I recently sold to Goldman Sachs ;) It's almost christmas so I'm going to give you one stock tip… Alibaba is the only company I can think of that has a good service/product and that I recently started using. I expect the rest of the world to start shopping there soon. Alibaba/Aliexpress have both a great service and CEO. I've bought some stuff through them and the service is great. I should have bought Yahoo to get Alibaba at a discount before the IPO, but Marissa Mayer's charm has pushed Yahoo's stock to new heights. With around 760 million product listings as of March 2013, Taobao Marketplace is one of the world’s top 20 most visited websites according to Alexa. For the year ended March 31, 2013, the combined gross merchandise volume (GMV) of Taobao Marketplace and Tmall.com exceeded RMB1 trillion. http://news.alibaba.com/specials/aboutalibaba/aligroup/index.html RMB1 trillion = $164 billion. In 2012, two of Alibaba’s portals together handled 1.1 trillion yuan ($170 billion) in sales, more than competitors eBay and Amazon.com combined. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alibaba_Group You can even buy uranium through Alibaba. Bezos hasn't figure that out yet. It's really a great service! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke 532 Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 Eddie Lampert considers sale of Sears Canada http://nypost.com/2013/11/24/sears-ceo-considering-sale-of-company/ Somebody has been raising a LOT of cash recently, and this would add another large chunk. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
merkhet Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 I wish this was from a more reputable source than the NY Post, but if true, it would be an interesting move. This would provide almost $1 billion in additional cash, which brings up the question of what Eddie will do with all that extra liquidity... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kraven Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 It would be interesting if he bought JC Penney and rebranded all the stores as JC Sears-Mart. I think they could also buy TUES as an outlet for all the inventory that doesn't sell at the flagship brand. Could be a winner. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke 532 Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 SHLD said the NY Post article is just a rumor, not looking to sell Sears Canada. NY Post is notorious for this kind of stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hellsten Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 It would be interesting if he bought JC Penney and rebranded all the stores as JC Sears-Mart. I think they could also buy TUES as an outlet for all the inventory that doesn't sell at the flagship brand. Could be a winner. Sears Penney Mart sounds better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
merkhet Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 SHLD said the NY Post article is just a rumor, not looking to sell Sears Canada. NY Post is notorious for this kind of stuff. Where did you see them comment on the NY Post article? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke 532 Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 SHLD said the NY Post article is just a rumor, not looking to sell Sears Canada. NY Post is notorious for this kind of stuff. Where did you see them comment on the NY Post article? TD Ameritrade mentioned it on their Trade Architect platform under "Symbol News." No link provided. They could be wrong. Trade Architect is free for people with an account so I put a whopping $5 in an account with them just to get their news alerts for free. :) In my experience they have gotten news out a few minutes before major outlets enough times to justify me watching their news feed. But perhaps this time they are wrong. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest wellmont Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 sears may be denying it but I believe it's true. that if they got the right offer they would sell it. the market tends to like the possibility. on a broader scale eddie looks like he has shifted strategy at shld to more rapid monetization. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke 532 Posted November 25, 2013 Share Posted November 25, 2013 sears may be denying it but I believe it's true. that if they got the right offer they would sell it. the market tends to like the possibility. on a broader scale eddie looks like he has shifted strategy at shld to more rapid monetization. And he has been selling every other holding in ESL other than SHLD at a very rapid pace this year. He wants (needs?) cash very badly for something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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