Monday, September 29, 2008

Bookkeeping: Buying more James River Coal (JRCC) and Mosaic (MOS)

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Apparently we are going to return to the stone ages... or at least pre 1840s (or whenever coal became "cool")

Or more realistically hedge funds across America are blowing up and blowing out stock at any price. Mosaic has now given back a year of gains. At some point these fertilizer companies are going to take themselves private and/or a Rio Tinto or Vale would be smart to pick them up.

We continue to layer in - I can't believe 1 week ago I closed 2 coal positions and sold out 99% of JRCC at $36. How quickly things change. Again JRCC is not our favorite but we decided to simply consolidate the "coal" position into 1 stock

JRCC we bought in the $20s
MOS in the $68s

Only 68 more points down for Mosaic before it gets to zero. I think down from 6x earnings to 5, do we hear 4? Looking at their balance sheet last quarter they had $2 Billion in cash/equivalents versus $1.6B in debt - so net $400M. Their cash flow was $1 Billion in 1 quarter alone. With realized prices higher this past quarter than the previous they should generate even more than the $1 B in cash last quarter. This will allow them to reduce their debt significantly and be somewhere around $1.5B cash net of debt. And add at least $1B every quarter after for quite a long time. With a $30B market cap starting in 2009 they should be able to generate $5B in cash a year which in theory means they can buy back 1/6th of the company every year, and by 2015 be private ;)

Added a bit to Potash (POT) as well since I know CEO Doyle is buying back shares and there is one entity worldwide with cash in a creditless world - governments.

The only thing worse than masses of humanity peeved at losing 30,40,50,60% of their investing net worth, is a hungry populace who has lost 30,40,50,60% of their investing net worth. Potash prices have simply not budged one iota in the past 4 months - oh well, darn the logic.

JRCC up to a 3.9% stake
MOS up to a 3.6% stake
POT up to a 2.0% stake

Tomorrow when they are all down 10-20% we'll add another batch. Or I could buy some of these bulletproof (too big to fail) banks at 18-21x earnings I suppose

Long all names mentioned in fund and personal account

9 comments:

yayankee said...

I believe that you will be a hero ( buying at the perceived low) or a goat (if the market tanks). My opinion is you are taking a BIG risk by buying equities at this moment. This bailout is very risky and is not the answer, not even close. Don't you feel you should be much more defensive that you are?

Fertilizer prices are headed down, both UREA and DAP are weaker.

http://www.fertilizerworks.com/fertreport/archives/pdf/2008/TheMarket-092608.pdf

TraderMark said...

"Don't you feel you should be much more defensive that you are? "

I believe if you ranked all equity mutual funds by highest % cash to lowest.... I'd be in the top 3? 2? 1?

I've been running nearly 50% cash here of late. Not sure how that is not defensive.

You are thinking like an independent trader. So you have to switch mindsets

In mutual fund world, 5% cash is considered a defensive stake.

TraderMark said...

forgot to add

these are still smaller stakes than I used to hold top positions. In the old days I would put 6-7% into my top positions. Now 3-4% is considered a top heavy position. So it's all relative.

I think cash is down to about 43% right now. Market drops another 5% tomorrow I'll put another 5-7% to work, and keep working it until the market drops 90%.

;)

NL Thinker said...

what in your vision would it look like if the markets "tank". i have thought about that scenario (obviously) but don't even know what that could mean? the stock market shutting down, freezing, no trading, or equities going down to virtually no value?
Please enlighten me ;)

TraderMark said...

Great question

It is hard to paint a scenario that has never happened before.

There are lock limits so the market has triggers where it shuts down (not sure what they are anymore since it has not happened in so long) but I think maybe 10% down the market stops for a period. And then it if goes lower they shut it down for the day.

Without credit the world is in big trouble. Hence the need to get credit flowing is the big issue. Just the past few weeks of lack of credit is going to be talked about in many of the earnings reports coming down the pike and the lack of visibility (even if credit calms down) is going to cause major consternation because now people can see it can 'go away' in the blink of an eye.

Without confidence you have nothing - the banking system is all confidence. If at any 1 time people want their money back in a levered system, well there is not enough money for everyone. The US has the most levered financial system (by a magnitude of two) versus any other country.

shaxmatist said...

*JRCC up to a 3.9% stake
MOS up to a 3.6% stake
POT up to a 2.0% stake*

Brave my friend, very brave...
I will not be coming back to met coal for a while, due to the slowdown of steel consumption in China, but Mosaic is interesting...

TraderMark said...

JRCC is not really a met coal play

as for buying anything, the market is not discriminatory - buy anything and judging from my watch lists - you can be down 10-20% in a jiffy.

I cannot believe the lowest short exposure in 7 months was "the day".

Life!

shaxmatist said...

*JRCC is not really a met coal play*

The latest on thermal coal is not very encouraging either:

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2008-09/28/content_7067528.htm

Willy said...

Seems like Heebner is calling for exactly opposite of what you are:


http://www.kiplinger.com//columns/fundwatch/archive/2008/fundwatch0922.htm

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