Craven House Capital presents an almost unbelievable special situation. Selling at only 64% of its net assets, it is issuing new shares for almost 5 times the current share price, benefiting shareholders.
Sino Grandness grew profits by 100% last year, a long running trend, yet trades at a P/E ratio of just 6.7. There is of course a catch, but in my opinion the upside here far outweighs the downside. This is a chance to buy a wonderful company at a bargain price.
With stock markets reaching all time highs it is natural for investors to feel a bit uneasy about putting more money into shares. Special Opportunities Fund (NYSE:SPE) is a closed ended fund which can protect investors from a downturn whilst still having upside, unlike cash.
Kentz is a specialist construction company for the oil and gas industry. It earns returns on equity of 25%, has net cash equal to a quarter of their market cap ($181m) and trades at a PE ratio of 9, the lowest it has been since 2009. This is a fantastic long term investment with a large margin of safety at today’s prices.
The next installment of my Weekend Stock Picks looks at the insurer Amlin, a stock I have held for the last couple of years and which has a good dividend yield and is one of the strongest insurers in the industry.
I’ve decided to start a new series every Friday, entitled Weekend stock pick. The idea is that I will post…
Sagicor Financial (LSE:SFI) is currently trading at a large discount to book value and yields a great 6.9% dividend. It has a price earnings multiple of only 3.5 on continuing operations. So what’s the catch
Danieli is trading below its net cash position and on a forward P/E ratio of only 7.9. The management is honest and competent and the company has been profitable for over 10 years. So why don’t I think this is a good investment?
There was once a time when a moat was one of the best defenses of a castle. It slowed down attacking troops or bottle-necked them into a narrow route of attack. However times change, and nowadays with the advent of both artillery and aircraft a moat has little use. Such is the way with competitive “moats” in business; what was once insurmountable suddenly becomes insignificant. I was reminded at the weekend of one of my favorite shops growing up – Argos ($HOME.L), a UK catalogue retailer, and began thinking about its once great moat. Unlike most catalogue retailers, Argos had physical stores where you would buy their products, rather than ordering over the phone. You would also pick up a catalogue to take home and browse through at your leisure when looking for gift ideas or something you needed. Most houses contained an Argos catalogue and back in the day, if you suddenly realized you needed something, whether it was while cooking, seeing an advert on TV etc, you would usually go first to the catalogue and check out how much it was. But that moat didn’t last forever and here are two big things in the future that I think will destroy lots of company moats in a similar way.
A student once asked Warren Buffett how best to prepare for an investing career. Buffett thought for a few seconds and then reached for the stack of papers he had brought with him.
“Read 500 pages like this every day,” said Buffett. “That’s how knowledge works. It builds up, like compound interest. All of you can do it, but I guarantee not many of you will do it.”
So here are some of my picks from my reading over the last couple of weeks for you to browse this weekend and make up some of your daily 500 pages.