Monthly Archives: December 2020

Panic Journal Season 2 – Year End edition: “This time was different”

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While I am writing this, the first vaccine shots have been being provided in Germany already yesterday. Despite a relatively strict lock down including a curfew from 9pm in my home town Munich, in general the mood seems to a certain extent upbeat compared to a few weeks/months ago. Time to do a “2020 Covid-19 recap” with another installment of the “Panic Journal”. 

Recap: This time was different

At first, like many “Westerners”, I thought that Covid-19 was not our problem. Like SARS in 2002/2003, MERS in 2012, Ebola 2014-2016, Zika 2015 or the Avian Influenza , this again looked like a “Third World problem”, where the Third World includes China. The first documented cases in Germany at car supplier Webasto seemed to have confirmed this: The infected persons were identified quickly, isolated and all recovered pretty fast. Webasto actually issued a press release in early March that all infected employees were healthy and eager to go  back to work. So “Business as usual” with this “Exotic virus scare”.

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Some links

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Eddie Elfenbein with his 2021 Buy list consisting of 25 US large caps stocks

Scotland is now at 90% renewable electricity

Bill Gates with a great update & overview on Covid-19 vaccines and treatments and what to expect in 2021

Very interesting deep look into the value of music back catalogues (FT)

A good reminder: Why waiting for a crash to get into stocks never works

Forager likes troubled UK retailer Bohoo

More on the massive Russian hack that was detected only when they hacked a Cybersecurity company

 

My 21 (+6) Investments for 2021

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Following an annual tradition once a year I’ll try to review my current portfolio by writing short summaries/update for each individual position. This year, only 11 of the 20 companies from last year are still in the portfolio and I have 16 new positions which is a (Covid-19 driven) record in turnover. 6 of the 27 shares are part of a “basket trade” on a recovery in tourism.

The summaries of the previous years can be found here:

My 20 investments for 2020
My 22(+1) Investments for 2019
My 21 investments for 2018
My 27 investments for 2017
My 27 investments for 2016
My 28 investments for 2015
My 24 investments for 2014
My 22 investments for 2013

1. TFF Group (7,2%)

tff1
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Some links

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An interesting but very scary story on the massive Russian hack that has been detected only recently

Ben Evans on what is next after the smart phone

9 lessons from Cycling (around the world) applied to investing

FTAlphaville on AIM listed company ThinkSmart

Deep thoughts on the future of the Container (ship) industry

Great paper on the recent SPAC mania and on who is holding the bag at the end

Softbank backed Compass is rolling up the US real estate brokerage industry 

FEMSA – Is “the most interesting company in MExico” Interesting enough ?

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Background:

Whenever I hear a new name from different quality sources I am highly motivated to look at a stock even if it is outside my usual area of competence. FEMSA is such an example. I have seen FEMSA already in two funds of the “TGV Langfrist” family, it is the second largest position at Profitlich/Schmidlin and finally Swen Lorenz featured FEMSA in his latest weekly dispatch.

He mentions another (very good) FEMSA write-up which calls FEMSA “The most interesting company of Mexico” which is a very detailed write-up and highly recommended.

I try to summarize FEMSA in two bullet points:

  • FEMSA is a family owned conglomerate, consisting of an (economic) 15% stake in Heineken, a 47% stake in Coca Cola FEMSA (fully consolidated due to majority in votes) and an operating business consisting mostly of Mexican convenience stores called OXXO plus some other LatAm assets that is named the “Commercio” segment
  • Especially OXXO is a growing, high ROCE business which justifies a significant valuation multiple
  • It is expected that FEMSA monetizes its Heineken stake soon plus the big story is, that based on an existing OXXO prepaid debit card there is the option for OXXO to become the “Super App” of Mexico like WeChat/Tencent in China or Grab and GoJek in SE Asia

The stock chart of the ADR looks unimpressive, basically flat over the last 8 years in EUR terms after a huge rebound from the GFC:

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10 Years of Value & Opportunity – 10 Highlights, 10 LESSONS & 10 Books

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Again, time flies. Exactly 10 (!!) years ago on December 15th, 2010, I started this blog. 

FJ-10-anniversary-logo-cropped-236x179

As every year a very special “Thank You” goes  to all readers, especially those who actively contribute either by comments or mails. I need to keep on mentioning that the interaction with readers is really driving the motivation to continue the blog in this format.

In this post I will reflect mostly on writing the blog, highlights and lessons over the last 10 years plus my 10 all time favorite book reviews. There will be a 10 Year investment/performance review in the beginning of January 2021. 

Some numbers: 

10 year stat        
Year Visits % Germany Posts Comments
2011 93,811 na 411 694
2012 178,485 49.82% 266 1,368
2013 325,240 43.14% 168 1,243
2014 430,794 32.26% 121 1,068
2015 459,992 25.94% 110 1,105
2016 521,197 28.52% 113 1,645
2017 635,741 28.79% 114 1,580
2018 452,267 28.57% 92 784
2019 325,169 31.56% 84 563
2020 YTD 483,824 39.03% 107 1,211
         
Total 3,906,520   1,586 11,261

All in all, I managed to post ~1600 posts over these 10 years which created close to 4 mn visits. The drop of visits (and comments)  in 2018 & 2019 was clearly the result of posting less due to a lack of time from my side.

So why I am still doing this ?

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Some links

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Incredible story how 7 UK oil traders made 660 mn USD when the oil price went negative in April

Investment outlook from Broyhill Asset Management on the “return of Value”

Fred Liu (Hayden Capital) is up 200% this year and likes Afterpay from Australia

Fascinating deep dive into the API economy (Twilio)

Investment advice from 100 years ago (Spoiler: Still highly relevant)

Swen Lorenz from Undervalued Shares likes FEMSA

December update on mostly US spin-off situations

Book Review: “Billion Dollar Loser – The Epic Rise and SPectacular Fall of Adam Neumann and WeWork”

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billion

As my long term readers know, I love books about failed companies and WeWork is clearly one of the most spectacular failures in the recent times.

The book focuses initially mostly on the founder Adam Neumann, who grew up in Israel and didn’t achieve much there before going to the US. There he started a first business trying to sell baby clothing which was not too successful. He then met his co-founder Miguel McKelvey in the elevator of the building where both were working. Co-founder Miguel was intrigued by the fact that Neumann used to walk around barefoot and talked to everyone.

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Some links

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Prof. Damodaran tries to value AirBnB plus a very nice write-up on Booking.com vs. AirBnB

A sceptical look at the S-1 of DoorDash

A long and interesting look behind the scenes of Short sellers and their financial backers

The 30 best performing US stocks of the past 30 years

Great write up on Greek Yoghurt company Kri Kri from Smallcapseurope

Paul Graham (YCombinator) essay on how to be successful in YC interviews and how founders become billionaires

The WSJ estimates that 19-36% of business trips will be “Lost forever”

 

All German Shares Part 35 – Nr. 776-800

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Finally !!! This post will cover the remainder of the German stock universe. These remaining “newish” companies only yielded two watch list candidates Overall, I need now to slim down the watch list significantly to maybe 25-30 companies that I want to keep on my radar screen, but that will take some time.

As for the next country series (as time allows): My next target will be Switzerland. First, it is a smaller market with only around 240 local stocks according to the SIX, Secondly, I have currently  3 Swiss stocks in my portfolio (Zur Rose, Richemont, Dufry), so I have some hope that there are more interesting stocks on the Swiss market.

So enjoy the last batch of German stocks !!!!

776. Centogene AG

Centogene is a “rare disease” reseacrh company that seems to be a mixture of German/Dutch locations. The company went public on the Nasdaq in November 2019 at USD 14/ Share but lost around -30% since then. The market cap seems to be around 250 mn USD. Unfortunately not my area of competence, “pass”.

777. Cyan AG

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