07 – Current temptation, future frustration

The seventh part of the Series “Current temptation, future frustration“. This series is based on the companies which are currently darling of the market and many trying to catch such opportunities but it has a probability to become a reason for future frustration. It can wipe out the majority of gains in wealth. I am trying to put some of the number-crunching facts by which we can identify ongoing issues in the companies and can save our wealth.

I am starting this article with one of the company which is engaged in the textile business has a 52 weeks low price of Rs.11.6 and LTP is Rs.38.8, the 52-week high price of Rs.47.8. This company has rewarded ~4.12x of return in a year.

Let’s start looking at the numbers.

We can see that the company has a high volatile OP Margin% and also having losses at a net level in few years.

When we look at the balance sheet then it seems that the company has an issue with higher debt and continues dilution of capital. We can see that though the company has diluted capital, the solvency ratio has worsened.

We can see that the company has huge related party transactions. Also, the major deposit given to the related parties.

Also, we can see that the company has negative CFO and FCF in the last three years which indicates that profits are not getting converted into cash profit.

Disclosure – Companies mentioned in the article are just for an example & educational purpose. It is not a buy/sell/ hold recommendation.

This series contains learning from books –

Financial Shenanigans

Quality of Earnings

The Financial Numbers Game

Creative Cash Flow Reporting

06 – Current temptation, future frustration

The sixth part of the Series “Current temptation, future frustration“. This series is based on the companies which are currently darling of the market and many trying to catch such opportunities but it has a probability to become a reason for future frustration. It can wipe out the majority of gains in wealth. I am trying to put some of the number-crunching facts by which we can identify ongoing issues in the companies and can save our wealth.

I am starting this article with one of the company which is engaged in power generation has a 52 weeks low price of Rs.5.49 and LTP is Rs.45.25. This company has rewarded ~8.24x of return in a year.

Let’s start looking at the numbers.

We can see that the company does have ~Rs.36 lakh of revenue and generating losses due to higher expenses. It can be possible if the business is at a nascent stage. But major expense is depreciation so have to check why huge depreciation charge.

When we look at the balance sheet then it seems that the company has repaid the entire debt and not issue any share capital. But when looking at the loans and advances then it has higher loans and advances & other assets.

The company has Rs.30 cr of loans and advances in FY20 which keeps raising y-o-y. There is no detailed description available for loans.

When we compare payable and receivable with the revenue then both are much higher than revenue. This means the company has to higher pending payment to pay and receive.

In the above image, we can see that the company has bad debts of Rs.5.76 cr in FY16 which was 35% of total debtors. And the company does not have any revenue in that year.

The company has Rs.35 cr of other payables which has advanced for sale of assets. This indicates that the company has made a commitment to sell assets to other parties and taken advances from that party, but still, the company has not sold out that assets. This item helps the company to improve CFO but actually, this is a clear artificial boosting of CFO.

Disclosure – Companies mentioned in the article are just for an example & educational purpose. It is not a buy/sell/ hold recommendation.

This series contains learning from books –

Financial Shenanigans

Quality of Earnings

The Financial Numbers Game

Creative Cash Flow Reporting

I am grateful to Mr.Meihol Jhaveri (Founder of Gatisofttech) for development of Lucky Idiot website.

WHY YOU SHOULD VISIT CEMETERIES – Survivorship Bias

In life, we focus more on winning, surviving rather than failure. This illusion kills our ability to calculate the probability of surviving, success. We cannot see that probability of success can be very small. We always taught about success and not taught about failure. This is known as a survivorship bias.

Many authors write a book but a few will achieve success. Thomas Edison failed many times before inventing of the bulb but today, we only remember with their success, survivor.

“I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot … and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. That is why I succeed.” ~ Michael Jordan

Investment – Similarly, very few have achieved success in the investment world but we overestimate the probability of success and ignore to look that many have spoiled their life. We focus on successful companies which have created a lot of wealth. When we visit any seminar or marketing people or media, they only talk about the successful companies which have created wealth but never talk about companies which have eroded wealth. Wealth creators are very few compared to wealth eroded. But we ignore the probability of losing and never try to learn from others mistakes. We all come to the stock market for becoming a next Mr Buffett but does not focus on developing ability and insights as similar to Mr Buffett & Mr Munger.

There are ~7000+ companies got listed on Indian bourse from that ~4294 companies are down almost 80%+ (many companies got unlisted or close) whereas we know that few companies which have generated wealth over a period. So ~60% of wealth destroyers are there compared to hardly ~3% wealth creators (maximum- if we see actual wealth creators for long term then that is ~1% only).

We can see that there are huge wealth destroyers companies available compared to few wealth creators. So that while investing don’t try to catch every opportunity available but prepare investment philosophy suitable to us, swing bat only when the suitable opportunity arrives. We need to prepare investment philosophy, process, circle of competence and investment style so that we can swing bat when things fall under our zone.

This entire series will be review with various examples from books which are “Thinking, Fast and Slow” and “The Art of Thinking Clearly“.

05 – Current temptation, future frustration

The fifth part of Series “Current temptation, future frustration“. This series is based on the companies which are currently darling of the market and many trying to catch such opportunities but it has a probability to become a reason for future frustration. It can wipe out the majority of gains in wealth. I am trying to put some of the number-crunching facts by which we can identify ongoing issues in the companies and can save our wealth.

I am starting this series with one of the company which is engaged in import and export agent, representative, contractor, selling agent, the broker on wholesale cash and carry basis for metals, minerals, iron and steel products, pipes, household items, general merchandise etc, has a 52 weeks low price of Rs.4.60 and LTP is Rs.31.65. This company has rewarded ~6.88x of return in a year.

Let’s start looking at the numbers.

When we look at the balance sheet then it seems that the company does not have any issue. It has reduced all debt, also it has huge investments.

Wonderful… The company still available below investment value after 6x price raise.

Let’s go further detail.

If we look at the income then the company does not have any income available. Also, the company is traded at ~530x Mcap/sales.

So this company does not have any business. Only investment of the company is good then this situation seems similar to Bluechip stamp investment made by Sage Mr.Buffett.

Let’s check the investment.

The company has ~30% of investment into liquid assets and all others into unquoted & related party investments. 

So the company keeps giving loans to related parties. 

The company does not have enough plan assets to fund gratuity.

This entire series is based on past available data and ignored the future development in companies and the stock market always looks at the future.

Disclosure – Companies mentioned in the article are just for an example & educational purpose. It is not a buy/sell/ hold recommendation.

This series contains learning from books –

Financial Shenanigans

Quality of Earnings

The Financial Numbers Game

Creative Cash Flow Reporting