Posts tagged ‘cash flows’
Hunting for Tennis Balls and Dead Cats
When it comes to gravity, people understand what goes up, must come down. But the reverse is not always true for stocks. What goes down, does not necessarily need to come back up. Since the 2008-09 financial crisis there have been a large group of multi-billion dollar behemoth stocks that have defied gravity, but over the last few months, many of these highfliers have come back to earth. Despite the pause in some of these major technology, consumer, and internet stocks, the overall stock market appears relatively calm. In fact, the Dow Jones Industrials index is currently sitting at all-time record highs and the S&P 500 index is hovering around -1% from its peak. But below the surface, there is a large undercurrent resulting in an enormous rotation out of pricier momentum and growth stocks into more defensive and yield-heavy sectors of the market, like utilities and real estate.
To expose this concealed trend I have highlighted a group of 20 stocks below, valued at close to half a trillion dollars. Over the last 12 months, this selective group of technology, consumer, and internet stocks have lost over -$200,000,000,000 from their peak values. Here’s a look at the highlighted stocks:
With respect to all the punished stocks, the dilemma for investors amidst this depreciating price carnage is how to profitably hunt for the bouncing tennis balls while avoiding the dead cat bounces. By hunting bouncing tennis balls, I am referring to the identification of those companies that have crashed from indiscriminate selling, even though the companies’ positive business fundamentals remain fully intact. The so-called dead cats reflect those overpriced companies that lack the earnings power or trajectory to support a rebounding stock price. Like a cat falling from a high-rise building, there may exist a possibility of a small rebound, but for many severely broken momentum stocks, minor bounces are often short-lived.
For long-term investors, much of the recent rotation is healthy. Some of the froth I’ve been writing about in the biotech, internet, and technology has been mitigated. As a result, in many instances, outrageous or rich stock valuations have now become fairly priced or attractive.
Profiting from Collapses
Many investors do not realize that some of the greatest stocks of all-time have suffered multiple -50% drops before subsequently doubling, tripling, quadrupling or better. History provides many rebounding tennis ball examples, but let’s take a brief look at the Apple Inc. (AAPL) chart from 1980 – 2005 to drive home the point:
As you can see, there were at least five occasions when the stock got chopped in half (or worse) over the selected timeframe and another five occasions when the stock doubled (or better), including a +935% explosion in the 1997–2000 period, and a +503% advance from 2002–2005 when shares reached $45. The numbers get kookier when you consider Apple’s share price eventually reached $700 and closed early last week above $600.
These feast and famine patterns can be discovered for virtually all of the greatest all-time stocks. The massive volatility explains why it’s so difficult to stick with theses long-term winners. A more recent example of a tennis ball bounce would be Facebook Inc (FB). The -58% % plummet from its $42 IPO peak has been well-documented, and despite the more recent -21% pullback, the stock is still up +223% from its $18 lows.
On the flip side, an example of a dead cat bounce would include Cisco Systems Inc (CSCO). After the bursting of the 2000 technology bubble, Cisco has never fully recovered from its $82 peak value. There have been many fits and starts, including some periods of 50% declines and 100% gains, but due to excessive valuations in the late 1990s and changing competitive trends, Cisco still sits at $23 today (see chart below).
It is important to remember that just because a stock goes down -50% in value doesn’t mean that it’s going to double or triple in value in the future. Price momentum can drive a stock in the short run, but in the long run, the important variables to track closely are cash flows and earnings (see It’s the Earnings, Stupid) . The level and direction of these factors ultimately correlate best with the ultimate fair value of stock prices. Therefore, if you are fishing in the growth or momentum stock pond, make sure to do your homework after a stock price collapses. It’s imperative that you carefully hunt down rebounding tennis balls and avoid the dead cat bounces.
Wade W. Slome, CFA, CFP®
Plan. Invest. Prosper.
DISCLOSURE: Sidoxia Capital Management (SCM) and some of its clients hold long positions in certain exchange traded funds (ETFs), AMZN, long NFLX bond, short NFLX stock, short LULU, and long CSCO (in a non-discretionary account), but at the time of publishing SCM had no direct position in TWTR, GRPN, YELP, ATHN, AVP, P, LNKD, BBY, ZNGA, WDAY, WFM, N, SSYS, JDSU, COH, CRM, FB or any other security referenced in this article. No information accessed through the Investing Caffeine (IC) website constitutes investment, financial, legal, tax or other advice nor is to be relied on in making an investment or other decision. Please read disclosure language on IC Contact page.
How to Make Money in Stocks Using Cash Flows
There you are in front of your computer screen, and lo and behold you notice one of your top 10 positions is down -11% (let’s call it ticker: ABC). With sweaty palms and blood rushing from your head, you manage to click with trembling hands on the ticker symbol that will imminently deliver the dreadful news. A competitor (ticker: XYZ) just pre-announced negative quarterly earnings results, and an investment bank, Silverman Sax, has decided to downgrade ABC on fears of a negative spill-over effect. What do you do now? Sell immediately on the cockroach theory – seeing one piece of bad news may mean there are many more dreadful pieces of information lurking behind the scenes? Or, should you back up the truck to take advantage of a massive buying opportunity?
Thank goodness to our good friend, cash flow, which can help supply answers to these crucial questions. Without an ability to value the shares of stock, any decision to buy or sell will be purely based on gut-based emotions. Many Wall Street analysts follow this lemming based analysis when whipping around their ratings (see The Yuppie Bounce & the Lemming Leap). As I talk about in my book, How I Managed $20,000,000,000.00 by Age 32, I strongly believe successful investing requires a healthy balance between the art and the science. Using instinct to tap into critical experience acknowledges the importance of the artistic aspects of investing. Unfortunately, I know few (actually zero) investors that have successfully invested over the long-run by solely relying on their gut.
A winning investment strategy, I argue, includes a systematic, disciplined approach with objective quantitative measures to help guide decision making. For me, the science I depend on includes a substantial reliance on cash flow analysis (See Cash Flow Components Here). What I also like to call this tool is my cash register. Any business you look at will have cash coming into the register, and cash going out of it. Based on the capital needs, cash availability, and growth projects, money will furthermore be flowing in and out of the cash register. By studying these cash flow components, we gain a much clearer lens into the vitality of a business and can quickly identify the choke points.
ACCOUNTING GAMES
The other financial statements definitely shed additional light on the fitness of a company as well, but the income statement, in particular, is subject to a lot more potential manipulation. Since the management teams have more discretion in how GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles) is applied to the income statement, multiple levers can be pulled by the executives to make results look shinier than reality. For example, simply extending the useful life of an asset (e.g., a factory, building, computer, etc.) will have no impact on a company’s cash flow, yet it will instantaneously and magically raise a companies’ earnings out of thin air…voila!
“Stuffing the channel” is another manipulation strategy that can accelerate revenue recognition for a company. For example, let’s assume Company X ships goods to a distributor, Company Y, for the exclusive purpose of recognizing sales. Company X wins because they just increased their sales, Company Y wins because they have more inventory on hand (even if there is no immediate plan for the distributor to pay for that inventory), and the investor gets “hoodwinked” because they are presented artificially inflated sales and income results.
JOINT STRATEGY
These are but just a few examples of why it’s important to use the cash flow statement in conjunction with the income statement to get a truer picture of a company’s valuation and “quality of earnings.” If you don’t believe me, then check out the work done by reputable academics (Konan Chan, Narasimhan Jegadeesh, Louis Chan, and Josef Lakonishok) that show negative differentials between accounting earnings and cash flow are significantly predictive of future stock price performance (Read more).
So the next time a holding craters (or sky-rockets), take an accounting on the state of the company’s cash flows before making any rash decisions to buy or sell. By doing a thorough cash flow analysis, you’ll be well on your way to racking up gains into your cash register.
Wade W. Slome, CFA, CFP®
Plan. Invest. Prosper.