The Value of Deleveraging – A Paradox

February 8, 2011

Future economic historians may refer to the period beginning in 2009 and continuing for some years into the future as the era of deleveraging, at least for everyone except the U.S. government. I have often voiced the opinion on this site that companies that are in compliance with the times by voluntarily paying down debt […]

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Windstream releases useful merger financial statements, is still cheap

January 19, 2011

As my loyal readers will know, I have been following Windstream (WIN), a phone company focusing on rural areas, for some time. Over the last couple of years, it has made a number of acquisitions in order to facilitate its strategy of expanding high speed internet and business services in order to offset losses of […]

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The Quest for the Holy Stock Screener

January 11, 2011

Many of you may have no doubt noticed that my approach to investing is largely quantitative, concerned with free cash flow yields, interest coverage ratios, the gap between depreciation and capital expenditure, net working capital position, and other financial vital statistics. This should not be surprising; I take the position that corporations are machines that […]

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100th Poststravaganza – An examination of previous recommendations

January 10, 2011

So, my loyal readers who have been keeping count will know that this to be my 100th post. I thought I would celebrate this exciting occasion with a review of how some of my recommendations have worked out. I know hindsight makes everything look more certain than it was, but it is definitely a useful […]

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Supervalu: Speculating in a grocery store with indigestion

December 22, 2010

I find very often that I seem to be the one who is interested in the investments I’m interested in. Certainly that is true of the River Rock and Mohegan casino bonds, where I seem to be the only person on the Internet who has even considered their investing attributes. So, when I find people […]

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A review of James Montier’s Behavioural Investing, pub. by Wiley

December 12, 2010

Behavioural Investing by James Montier is a weighty book with much to tell us about an aspect of investing that has long been overlooked. Behavioral investing, of course, is basically determining why market participants do not act in a manner consistent with the fancy equations of the financial economists, as they frequently don’t. Of course, […]

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They won’t buy Seagate, but I won’t sell it

November 30, 2010

It appears that Seagate (STX) will not be taken over after all, as it has rebuffed its buyers for not meeting their price. The stock price seems to have taken this development in stride, dropoping only 3.25% today. However, the market’s incurable impatience had already caused the price to drift down from the $15 level […]

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Where is the Money? The Short Case for Netsuite

November 23, 2010

Netsuite is a company that produces an integrated suite of business applications for medium sized businesses. Within this core area they also produce industry-specific applications, and also a platform that allows for customer-driven development. The company was born in 1998 and seems to have brought some of that era’s valuation with it, as the company […]

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Good News: China’s a Bubble

November 19, 2010

Hugh Hendry, the hedge fund manager and inflation skeptic whose views I have always found informative and interesting, sat on a panel at a conference last February called the Russia Forum. I finally found footage of the full panel. On the whole, he was his usual opinionated self, but he did shed some light on […]

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Why I sold Qwest

November 10, 2010

As you may have noticed, the stock market has been doing very well over the last few months, and even my staid old telecoms have been caught in the updraft despite (or perhaps because of) the high dividend payouts. As the entire market now seems to be looking for yields now that cash and most […]

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