Friday 30 January 2015

Analysis of Abercrombie


Abercrombie, an American fashion retail company

Company: Abercrombie & Fitch

ISIN US0028962076 | WKN 903016

Business: An American fashion retail company. The run three fashion retail brands with accessories for men, women and kids and those are: Abercrombie & Fitch, Abercrombie kids and Hollister.

Active: Currently having 997 stores (836 in the US), a few in Canada, Europe and the rest of the world which means they have made cuts since the last analysis.

P/E: 37.6

Wednesday 28 January 2015

Buying stocks on credit


Easy credit, a German credit provider

Lately I have seen a disturbing trend among some financial bloggers in Sweden, they take credit on their stocks to buy more stocks. To me this is a very clear no go and especially at moments when many stock markets are on all time highs.

Yes, even when the stock markets are on all time highs there will always be companies that are cheap but when the stock market drops by 30% then all the companies drop by 30%. That means that the stocks that you used to take the credit on will drop by 30% and so does the company that you bought with that credit.

The stock market is dangerous in the short run and wonderful in the long run. A credit is often the opposite... wonderful in the short run but devastating in the long run.

Back in 2009 in the middle of the crisis then I understand if people took a credit to buy stocks but I doubt that many people did that. I also doubt many banks would have offered credit on stocks so the only thing to use for the credit leverage would have been land, houses or apartments.
To risk your house for buying stocks in the middle of a crisis then you need an unusual way of thinking which, in my book, falls under the contrarian way of thinking.

Personally I am also sitting with debt on my shoulders which one can, and to a certain extent also should, say that I use as leverage for buying stocks for as long as I have those debts. I would love to pay them all off but due to the conditions of them as well as the reason for how they were created it makes little sense to pay them off directly and for that reason I will keep them as leverage for the time being.

I would never recommend anyone to take credits for buying stocks but if one must do so then please do it when the stock markets have crashed and not when it they are on an all time high as they are now!

As a small side note... Until I get a better feeling for the time needed for my economy studies I have decided to bring down the publication rate to one new publication every two days.

Monday 26 January 2015

Analysis of IBM 2015


IBM, an American IT service company

Company: IBM

ISIN US4592001014 | WKN 851399

Business: An American IT service company. They are currently standing on five larger pillar: Global Technology Services (IT infrastructure and business process services), Global Business Services (Consulting and Application Management Services), Software (middleware and operating systems software), Service & Technology (business solutions requiring advanced computing power and storage capabilities) and Global Financing (invests in financing assets, leverages with debt and manages the associated risks).

Active: World wide making sales in over 170 countries.

P/E: 13.2

Sunday 25 January 2015

IBM annual report 2014


IBM, annual, report, 2014, front page

Grrrr... once again I have been waiting in the hope that a nicer report will drop out but by the look of things that is taking too long and in the meantime I get impatient. Based on the press release from last week I will now make the summary of the full year for IBM in 2014. The stock market was not so excited about the report and the share price dropped with around -3% on the day of release. Needless to say the share price is already back up again and then some...

Saturday 24 January 2015

Analysis of Dürr 2015


Dürr, a German automobile supplier

Company: Dürr

ISIN DE0005565204 | WKN 556520

Business: A German automobile supplier. They are divided into five divisions: Paint and Final Assembly Systems (paint shops and for assembly lines), Application Technology (paint, glue and sealing technologies), Measuring and Process Systems (balancing, testing and cleaning of machines), Clean Technology Systems (air purification and energy efficient systems) and Woodworking Machinery and Systems (machinery and plants for woodworking).

Active: They are currently active in 28 countries world wide so they have entered 5 new markets since the last analysis.

P/E: 19.0

Friday 23 January 2015

Kernel operating report Q2 2015


Kernel, front page, operating report, Q2, 2015

Today Kernel arrived with their half year operating report. The share price directly dropped by almost -4% and I have to admit that I directly became annoyed when I started reading the report. What was then in it?

Thursday 22 January 2015

Analysis of Intel 2015


Intel, an American processor and chip producer

Company: Intel

ISIN US4581401001 | WKN 855681

Business: An American hardware producer (mainly processor). They are divided into six segments: PC Client Group (which is the processor part), Data Center Group (which is server, workstations and storage platforms), Internet of Things (platforms designed for embedded market segments), Mobile and Communications Group (which include tablet, smartphone etc.), Software and Services (mainly being McAfee) and the final one is All Other (which mainly has to do with non-volatile memory solutions).

Active: Products are sold world wide.

P/E: 15.4

Wednesday 21 January 2015

Intel annual report 2014


Annual, report, Intel, 2014, front page

Intel arrived last week with their press release for the annual results. I read it and then I decided to wait until the fancy annual report arrived whcih i thought would come a couple of days later. Still it is not out and since I have with some matters little patience I decided to once again report based on the press release. The market started to hang their lips due to the report and upon release the share price dropped by around -4% but the very next day it was traded at the same price as before the report release.

Tuesday 20 January 2015

School starts today


Lund University, Sweden

Today at 10h00 my economy lectures will start and I guess I must be online then to see what is going on. I still do not know how large the impact will be time wise for me but I will still try to keep up some kind of publications on the blog... the last time I reported concerning this matter you can read here in back to the school bench again.

At the very minimum I will publish the stocks I buy (& sell which I still have not done yet) and the monthly summary. Everything else will be based on available time.

I was chocked to discover how much the University study books costs! One book that they wanted me to buy costed around 220 €! Crazy! I looked around a little and managed to find some older versions and additionally they were used books so I got away with paying 82 € for all the four books that I needed. Lucky me!

I really find it an outrage that the professors arrive with a lecture plan using books that costs so much money. Back in the days 220 € was the equivalent of one months rent for my little 26 m2 apartment that I lived in and to my knowledge the students in Sweden have around 850 € per month to life on today (around 250€ is given and 600 € as a student loan). To then pay 400-500 € for some silly books is simply not ok.

Either way I hope that I will be able to use my classical approach of attending all lectures and making good lecture notes. I always bought the books but I never opened then when it came to study for the exams. I always read my notes a couple of times and that was enough to pass the exams with a minimum amount of effort and time consumed. Sure on also did not get the top grades but that has never been a target for me. To learn was always my interest and to learn by heart only to pass an excellent exam I could not care less about.

In Germany pupils usually get a school tüte. This school paper bag is made into a cone and contains all the material that the pupil needs for school plus a lot of sweets as motivation for the child. I guess no one will give me a tüte... :(

Monday 19 January 2015

Analysis of Doro 2015


Doro, a Swedish telecom company

Company: Doro

ISIN SE0000215493 | WKN A0JM5W

Business: A Swedish telecom company. Doro is the leader in the senior telecare business. They are producing mobile phones, normal phones as well as additional communications tools for the elderly market. From what I understood they are planning to produce (everything is outsourced though) their own tablet now also...

Active: In 30 countries on five continents.

P/E: 14.7

Sunday 18 January 2015

Analysis of Ariston 2015


Ariston, a German real estate company

Company: Ariston

ISIN DE000A0F5XM5 | WKN A0F5XM

Business: A German real estate company. They are active in four directions: 1. Income from property management 2. Investment income of daughter companies, 3. Income from sale of properties and 4. Income from opportunistic real estate investments.

Active: In Germany with 137000 m2 on six locations in eight real estates.

P/E: -1.5 (also P/E5 is negative)

Saturday 17 January 2015

Dividend from ABF: January 2015



The first dividend for the year was given to me by me with ABF in between. ABF is my favourite company due to the luck I had in the moment of finding it and buying it.

I currently hold 100 shares in ABF and we decided to pay out 0.243 GBP per share which gave me 24.30 GBP wich gets converted to 31.09 € (around 12% higher than last year). The amount was in full paid into my stock broker account.

To find out more about ABF please visit analysis of ABF 2014 and the Stock Dividends page has now been updated if you want to follow my dividend progress.

Friday 16 January 2015

Analysis of Apple 2015


Apple, an American technology and design company

Company: Apple

ISIN US0378331005 | WKN 865985

Business: An American technology and design company. They have products that they market very well. Their products are, in order of revenue: iPhone (around 100 billion USD), iPad (around 40 billion USD), Mac, iTunes and iPod. In 2015 their new product is an already presented Watch.

Active: World Wide

P/E: 17.0

Thursday 15 January 2015

Your ten biggest investments today?


a woman blowing dream bubbles, Berlin, Germany

Writing a blog is very much like a diary with the possibility of some outside interaction in the form of comments. The comments from readers as either agreement or disagreement are what makes a blog come alive and the best of all are discussions between readers.

Just like a commentator wrote yesterday in the Stock Portfolio page that "ETFs are essentially boring as hell...". The very same goes for writing a diary and therefore I hope to receive some feedback and discussions.

What I would find interesting to find out would for instance be: How many stepped heavily into the oil and gas industry? Did anyone jump into Russia? Taken a closer look at the companies in Greece lately, at least they have survived a couple of years now? Who bought companies in India during the autumn?

To visualise all that I guess the easiest way is to ask one very simple question:

Which are your ten currently biggest investments?

Wednesday 14 January 2015

Analysis of Balaton 2015


Balaton, a German investment company

Company: Balaton

ISIN DE0005508204 | WKN 550820

Business: A German investment company. They keep it very simple and only say that their core business is to invest in publicly and non publicly traded companies. Here you can however find the list of the companies that they currently have holdings in.

Active: Main focus is in Germany.

P/E: 2.5

Comment: I have a hate/love relationship to this company. Since a long time I have wanted to buy them but since they made the same mistake as me when it comes to stepping into China I have still not invested in them. They bought three China companies and in two of them the managers have gone missing with the money and the third one is... who knows... to my knowledge they have still not written off those companies as losses... and neither have I...

Tuesday 13 January 2015

Analysis of Kone


Kone, a Finnish elevator and escalator company

Company: Kone

ISIN FI0009013403 | WKN A0ET4X

Business: A Finnish elevator and escalator company. They are standing on two pillar: New Equipment Business (sales of elevator, escalators and autowalks and control systems) and Services (design, construction, maintenance and modernization).

Active: Distribution in 60 countries world wide with 400,000 customers and over 950,000 units with service agreements.

P/E: 27.5

Comment: The Swedish investment company Industrivärden (analysis of Industrivärden 2014) used to own shares in Kone but now I no longer see them on the shareholder list.

Monday 12 January 2015

PIF C: January 2015

PIF C, DAX, versus, January, 2015, development

This quarter the PIF C did once again impress me with an increase of almost 8% and ending up with being in total 2% plus in comparison to DAX that increased with around 5% and is still in total -1%.

The PIF C is made up of the ten DAX companies that have the lowest P/E and P/B as well as the highest ROE value which I find to be a parameter of more and more importance.

For the previous report please click on PIF C: October 2014.

Sunday 11 January 2015

Shuffle of companies in Google docs


Shuffle, Companies, lists

As I have mentioned before there are companies that I have excluded from the Stocks of Interest list due to me simply feeling uncomfortable of adding them there. I have now decided to change this and I have moved all the companies from the big list that are either in green colour or yellow to the stocks of interest list.

This then also means that several of the companies will have older analytical data and those that were analysed back in 2013 will be once again looked at to see if they have a right to remain on the Stocks of Interest list or if they will be kicked back to the big list.

So for the next one to one and a half month I expect the Stocks of Interest list to be slightly crowded and if it, after all the fresh new analysis, will still be crowded then I will change the boarders for being on the list.

Saturday 10 January 2015

PIF B: January 2015

PIF B, versus, DAX, 2nd year, development

The race is even and both DAX as well as PIF B (composed of the ten DAX companies with the lowest P/E and P/B values) increased with around 5% during the quarter and are now only -1% in comparison to the creation in May 2014.

My hopes are now again increasing for that the PIF B will start to perform better than DAX and if not then I am looking forward to the next drop to see how the performance will be then. The last time it was a big disappointment.

For the previous report please click on PIF B: October 2014.


Friday 9 January 2015

Stock bought January 2015: Adidas


Adidas, a German sports brand company

As I mentioned in the report concerning Stocks of Interest: January 2015 I found Adidas to be of interest due to that they have since the World Cup ended been traded at a reasonable P/E value for a sports brands company.

They very recently arrived with a statement (in October) of share buy-back program concerning 1.5 billion € which at this share price would be around 10% of the shares. I like when companies buy back their shares since it is a tax free gain for me.

There was also a statement concerning how many German national team football jerseys they had sold which was up above 3 million pieces (sale price is around 80 €) due to the fourth star needed now after Germany's win and I believe many people will keep buying those jerseys up until at least the European Cup next summer. So the impact during the world cup was small and to the disappointment of the shareholders but this due to the German victory there came a nice follow-up.

This time I forced myself to take a closer look on the management and especially the CEO, Herbert Hainer, to see if I could dig up something bad. I did not find something really bad but there were a couple of things...

Thursday 8 January 2015

PIF A: January 2015

PIF A, Personalized Index Fund, DAX, 2nd year

PIF A that contains all the stocks on DAX with adjusted weighing is still not beating DAX but during the last quarter it has made an impressive comeback and have jumped up over 7% to being -3.2%. DAX have in the same quarter increased by around 4.5% and are now at -1.5%. So the round was still won by DAX but PIF A is hopefully coming very strongly!

For the previous report please see PIF A: October 2014.

Wednesday 7 January 2015

Analysis of Splendid Medien


Splendid Medien, a German media company

Company: Splendid Medien

ISIN DE0007279507 | WKN 727950

Business: A German media company that stands on two pillars: the Content Segment (which covers licensing of film rights, film exploitation in cinema and home entertainment with DVDs etc.) and the second is the Services Segment (specialising in digitisation/new media and dubbing).

Active: German speaking countries as well as the Benelux region

P/E: 5.6

Tuesday 6 January 2015

Analysis of Surteco


Surteco, a German plastic and paper surface company

Company: Surteco

ISIN DE0005176903 | WKN 517690

Business: A German surface technology company. They are working with two pillars and those are: Paper (trips, flat foils, decorative printings, release papers and impregnated products) and secondly Plastics (manufacture and sell edging systems, technical extrusions, roller-shutter systems, plinth-strip systems).

Active: Production in 21 countries on four continents and are having sales offices in additionally 16 countries.

P/E: 17.0

Monday 5 January 2015

Stocks of Interest: January 2015

January, 2015, Stocks of Interest

The new year has started and some new investments need to be made from the December salary. I have currently three half filled positions which are Talanx, Tessenderlo and the Russian ETF. I was hoping to have filled my Tessenderlo ownership last month but I ended up buying into Russia instead which turned out to be too early as always with me.

Saturday 3 January 2015

Summary of December 2014


Summary, December, 2014

The holidays have been extremely relaxing for me this year since I stayed in Berlin with my girlfriend. I also decreased the amount of publications on the blog and went down to almost one every two days instead of one new publication each day. I managed to read some books but still less then what I would have liked to do. As a preparation for my studies this spring I have started to read a corporate finance book. I hate books that are so heavy that if one reads it in bed and falls asleep it really hurts when the book hits the nose.