Monthly Archives: July 2017

evaluating management: returns

July 18, 2017 By in evaluating companies, return on equity, return on equity vs. return on capital, Uncategorized Tags: , Leave a comment

One of the most straightforward ways of evaluating how a company management is doing is by looking at the returns it achieves on the money it invests on behalf of shareholders.  Like most things in finance, this starts out as a very simple task, but soon enough adds refinements that make the evaluation process look a lot more complex than it actually is.

We’ll start with return on equity.

initial equity

A new company forms and sells 1000 shares to investors at $10 each, for a total of $10,000.  It invests all of that money one January 1 of its first year.

During that year it earns $1000 in net income.

Its return on equity for year 1 is 10% ($1000/$10,000).  At this point it has no long-term debt, so its return on capital (capital = equity plus long-term debt) is also 10%.

equity grows

If the company pays no dividends, it now has $11,000 in equity (capital, too) at the beginning of year 2.  To maintain a 10% return on equity (and capital) it must earn $1,100 in year 2.

book value

The total amount of equity a company has to invest is also called “book value,” because it’s the value of the equity entry on the company’s financial records (books).

All other factors being equal, a company whose management achieves a high return on equity tends to trade at a premium to book value.  One that continually produces sub-par returns tends to trade at a discount.  The financial sector in particular, because it’s hard to figure out the tons of transactions that the big firms routinely execute, tends to trade on price to book.

 

Tomorrow, adding debt to the picture.

new CEO for Tiffany (TIF)

July 17, 2017 By in jewelry, Retail, Uncategorized Tags: , , , , Leave a comment

TIF has languished for a number of years, for several reasons:

–the waning of the important Japanese market

–the shift of Chinese jewelry buyers away from foreign firms and toward local creations

–the recession, which lowered spending on jewelry worldwide

–perhaps most important, a lack of success in providing new designs for regular customers.

The company’s greatest strength is its brand name.  It’s unique in being able simultaneously to appeal to ultra-wealthy customers spending $10,000+ a pop and to ordinary people looking for a $200 trinket to have wrapped in the iconic blue box.

Oddly, in the discussion of TIF’s merchandising as being “tired” that I’ve been reading, analysts and (especially) reporters have been referring to this ability to serve low-end customers while still retaining the aura of exclusiveness that attracts the wealthy as a weakness.  Hard to understand.

At the same time, what’s being missed is the hole that has long existed in the TIF merchandise lineup–items that appeal to customers wanting to spend $2,000-$10,000. This middle ground is dominated by firms like Bulgari, which coincidentally have little presence among TIF’s customers in either of its market segments.

That’s wha’s so intriguing about the appointment of Allessendro Bogliolo, a former Bulgari executive, as TIF’s new CEO–something no one’s mentioning.

the Saudi Aramco ipo

July 14, 2017 By in oil and natural gas, Saudi Aramco, Uncategorized Tags: , , , , Leave a comment

A while ago Saudi Arabia decided to list its government-owned oil and gas company, Aramco, both on its own national stock exchange as well on at least one foreign bourse.  The potential listing date is thought to be some time next year.  The Saudis are rumored to be thinking of selling 5% of the company for $100 billion–implying a $2 trillion valuation for the company as a whole.

Why the long delay?

It’s to whip a government bureaucracy into palatable enough shape for foreign investors, as well as local citizens, to want to buy shares.  It’s also to find a foreign stock exchange big enough, and willing enough, to act as host.  “Willing,” in this case, means among other considerations, being able to accept the corporate opacity that the Saudi government would surely like to surround the operations of its national treasure.

While world interest centers on trying to figure out what stock exchange is the most eager to compromise its governing principles in order to achieve a huge payday for its domestic brokerage firms (my answer:  all of them), I don’t think this is the most interesting question.

My query is why the offering.  I see two possibilities:

–the Saudi government hopes to achieve greater efficiency of operations by opening Aramco management to the scrutiny of the investing public

–the Saudi government wants/needs the $100 billion proceeds to fund its government spending.

I’m sure the reality is that both are key objectives.  The question, however, is which of the two is uppermost in Riyadh’s mind.

 

If it’s the former, then the stock is likely, I think, to be a perennial laggard.   And it will give a black eye to whatever foreign listing venue it chooses (London and New York are understood to be the frontrunners, although Hong Kong is also big enough to handle an offering of Aramco’s intended mammoth size).

If the latter, the stock may be worth taking a chance on.  After all, it does have a massive amount of extremely low-cost oil and gas reserves.  However, whatever the case, Aramco appears destined to miss the current market, in which companies like Snap and Blue Apron floated successfully,  and which would have been the ideal time for any issuer to come public.

Verizon (VZ) and Disney (DIS)

July 13, 2017 By in mergers and acquisitions, Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , Leave a comment

A short while ago, rumors began circulating on Wall Street that VZ is interested in acquiring DIS.

Yesterday, the CEO of VZ said the company has no interest.

some sense…

The rumors made a little sense, in my view, for two reasons:

–the cellphone market in the US is maturing.  The main competitors to VZ all appear to be acquiring content producers to make that the next battleground for attracting and keeping customers, and

–the Japanese firm Softbank, which controls Sprint, seems intent on disrupting the current service price structure in the same way is did years ago in its home country.

…but really?

On the other hand, it seems to me that DIS is too big a mouthful for VZ to swallow.

How so?

–DIS and VZ are both about the same size, each with total equity value of around $175 billion.  If we figure that VZ would have to offer (at least) a 20% premium to the current DIS stock price, the total bill would be north of $200 billion.

How would VZ finance a large deal like this?  VZ’s first instinct would be to use debt.  But it already has $115 billion in borrowings on the balance sheet, so an additional $200 billion might be hard to manage, even though DIS is relatively debt-free.

Equity?  …a combination of debt and equity?

An open question is whether shareholders in an entertainment company like DIS would be content to hold shares in a quasi-utility.  If not, VZ shares might come under enough pressure for both parties to want to tear up a potential agreement.

dismember DIS?

VZ might also think of selling off the pieces of DIS–like the theme parks–that it doesn’t want.  The issue here is that all the parts of DIS, except maybe ESPN, are increasingly closely interwoven through cross-promotion, theme park attractions and merchandise marketing.  So it’s not clear the company can be neatly sectioned off.

Also, as the history of DIS’s film efforts illustrates, the company is not only a repository of intellectual property.  It’s the product of the work of a cadre of highly creative entertainers.  Retaining key people after a takeover–particularly if it were an unfriendly one–would be a significant worry.

From what might be considered an office politics point of view, VZ’s top management must have to consider the possibility that after a short amount of time, they would be ushered out the door and the DIS management would take their place running the combined firm.  Would key DIS decision makers want to work for a communications utility?

my bottom line

All in all, an interesting rumor in the sense that it highlights the weakness of VZ’s competitive position, but otherwise hard to believe.

 

 

 

bonds …a threat to stocks?

July 12, 2017 By in Bond Environment, bond market, interest rates, stocks vs. bonds, Strategy, Uncategorized Tags: , , , Leave a comment

I read an odd article in the Wall Street Journal yesterday, an opinion piece that in the US bonds are a current threat to stocks.  Although not explicitly stated, the idea seems to be that the US is in the grip of cult-like devotion to stocks.  One day, however, after a series of Fed monetary policy tightening steps, the blinders we’re wearing will drop off.  We’ll suddenly see that higher yields have made bonds an attractive alternative to equities   …and there’ll be a severe correction in the stock market as we all reallocate our portfolios.

What I find odd about this picture:

–the dividend yield on the S&P 500 is just about 2%, which compares with the yield of 2.3% on a 10-year Treasury bond.  So Treasuries aren’t significantly more attractive than stocks today, especially since we know that rates are headed up–meaning bond prices are headed down.  Actually, bonds have been seriously overvalued against stocks for years, although they are less so today than in years past

–from 2009 onward, individual investors have steadily reallocated away from stocks to the perceived safety of bonds, thereby missing out on the bull market in stocks.  If anything there’s cult-like devotion to bonds, not stocks

–past periods of Fed interest rate hikes have been marked by falling bond prices and stock prices moving sideways.  So stocks have been the better bet while rates are moving upward.  Maybe this time will be different, but those last five words are among the scariest an investor can utter.

 

Still, there’s the kernel of an important idea in the article.

At some point, through some combination of stock market rises and bond market falls, bonds will no longer be heavily overvalued vs. stocks and become serious competition for investor savings.

Where is that point?  What is the yield level where holders of stocks will seriously consider reallocating to bonds?

I’m not sure.

Two thoughts, though:

–I think the typical total return on holding stocks will continue be around 8% annually.  For me, the return on bonds has got to be at least 4% before they have any appeal.  So the Fed has a lot of interest-rate boosting work to do before I’d feel any urge to reallocate

–movement in yield for the 10-year Treasury from 2.3% to 4.0% means that the price of today’s bonds will go down.  So, while there is a clear argument for holding cash during a period of interest rate hikes, I don’t see any for holding bonds–and particularly none for holding bonds on the idea that stocks might fall in price as rates rise

Of course, I’m an inveterate holder of stocks.  And this is an interesting question to ask yourself.  What yield on bonds would make them attractive to you?