kirkomi

-20% compared to the Swiss Benchmark (SLI) of +0.7% 8)

The recent drop in CACC share prices were (I believe) because of several groups of shareholders suing the company. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/harwood-feffer-llp-announces-investigation-200500605.html http://finance.yahoo.com/news/important-shareholder-alert-goldberg-law-234500227.html http://finance.yahoo.com/news/shareholder-notice-goldberg-law-pc-184300224.html http://finance.yahoo.com/news/glancy-prongay-murray-commences-investigation-213200434.html

So, I have looked at and rejected AXP before (maybe because I was stupid) but I ran the calculations again to day and it seems incredibly cheap. I will be happy if you guys can point out if I am being stupid again. This data is from morningstar. Metric 2005 2014 FCF $7.4B $9.7B Revenue $23B $34B Shares 1.25B 1B The company has grown at around 4% compounded (both FCF as well as Revenues are up 50% in 10 years). They have additionally returned some value via share-buybacks. Buying 20% of the company in 10 years. And they are paying a dividend (after tax) of around 1%. So, a back of the envelope kind of calculation means the company is expected to return the following to the shareholders 4% (growth) + 1% (dividend) + 2% (buybacks) = 7% Let us now look at what we are paying for it. Market Cap : + $72B 2014 Annual report figures: Cash: - $22B Customer Loans : - $69B Customer Deposits: + $44B Account receivable: - $44B Debt : + $58B = $39B That can't be right ... Is there a mistake somewhere ? Edit : So, I see my mistake a bit. The company is kind of taking money from the market as debt and giving it as loan to the loan-card holders. Given that this is the business model I can't really add and subtract like this. But then I need to think on how to value this. The company is paying 2.34% on its debt (2014 figure) and receiving ~ 8.3% in interest on the loans it has given to the customers. So, it is earning around 5% for the service (approximately $3.5B a year with $69B loan). If this stream does not grow *at all* and at 15% discount rate this part of the business is worth approximately 3.5 * 1/(1.15-1) = $23B. Looking at the income statement, the non-interest revenue - all expenses = $5B. Again, at 15% discount rate, this stub is worth = $33B And now, with $22B cash on balance sheet, I should be willing to pay ($23 + $33 + $22) B = $78B. Phew ... this seems closer to the market value.

Heico, Hunter-Douglas, GBL, Swatch, Grenkeleasing, Dolby, Loews, KSB, Peugeot.

Anybody knows at what prices he got into FCAU ? He started buying Q4-2014 so that suggests around ~$9/share. But, I might be wrong.

-10% :) Overweight PKX, that hurt. And then CHF keeps giving me the hurtburns. I measure myself in CHF but invest in the US. Lost 15% in one day when they removed the peg earlier in the year.

Can you please share these names ? I have been doing a lot of research lately but I do not find anything which is obviously cheap (except as I mentioned earler, NOV). I am also looking at SSW but I only made a small position because the customer concentration ( + Chinese) is stopping me from making a bigger investment. Rolls Royce -- Not cheap in an obvious way. Small position. AIQ -- Too much debt. I am not able to put a baseline price here. Small position. Altius -- Already 7% of my portfolio. Will go higher if it drops significantly, say to C$10.

Did not buy anything today either. Did not find anything obviously cheap except NOV.

You are jumping around quite a bit frommi. PKX -> SEC.TO -> QVAL.

I see. Thanks ! That makes sense.

Hello All, I am a part time investor, so pardon me for asking something which you might find stupid. I follows Geoff's blog and I came across the post today on BWC. http://gannonandhoangoninvesting.com/blog/2015/1/21/sold-town-sports-club-bought-babcock-wilcox-bwc Now, Geoff claims that BWC is a net-net. I fail to see that. Here is their most recent balance sheet (Nov 5, 2014). Current Assets: $1.37B Total Assets: $2.6B Current Liabilities: $711M LT Debt: $298M Total liability: $1.47B Market Cap: $2.8B The questions is: how is this a net-net ? I have read some of Geoff's analysis, so please take him seriously.

I can't find any new ideas. Would you mind sharing the names. I will like to do my due diligence. Regards.

Ok, so this is interesting. I was up 6% last year and I lost 15% of my portfolio today ... because of the EUR/CHF peg.

I think my biggest multi-year mistake is Tesco. I finally let it go at a 30% loss. But, it has taught me a valuable lesson. Don't buy a stock if you see a business model risk. I made similar mistakes with Best Buy and HP but did not learn my lessons there because I was able to exit them at small profits. The second lesson was the Sberbank investment. I conjectured that Ukraine will be a short term issue and the stock will pay off handsomely in a small time. I feel less comfortable after the drop in oil and the continuing instability in the region. I am still going to keep my Lukoil and CTC Media positions though.

Congratulations to all who have performed well (by their respective definitions). My performance is a measly 3.4% ! I am justifying it because of ALS, PKX, Liberty and SHLD -- my largest positions (>70%) have all performed quite badly this year. Maybe I get lucky next year.