1,143% Outperformance, Tons of Stock Ideas and the Charity Challenge Update...Q1 Wrap-up

TMFDeej — Sun, 31 Mar 2013 18:01:37 GMT

CAPS calculates points totals for players by looking at "the total percentage return of all his picks subtracting out the S&P." At the beginning of the first quarter of 2013 I decided to begin tracking my quarterly performance here in CAPS and to donate a quarter to charity for every percentage point that I outperform the S&P 500 by. On January 4th, my CAPS points total stood at 5,200. At the close of the quar...

You know that you're a value investor at heart when...

TMFDeej — Sat, 30 Mar 2013 11:30:50 GMT

You know that you're a value and special situation investor at heart when...you take your kids to an arcade on your day off and you spend the entire time looking for ways to beat the system and get as many tickets as possible for as few tokens as possible. Who cares if the game is fun :) we can get ten times the tickets that we can on other games.

I had my two young sons ...

The Answer to the Question that Everyone has About Sandstorm Metals & Energy

TMFDeej — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 16:33:34 GMT

The million dollar question when it comes to Sandstorm Metals & Energy (STTYF) is when will the company start receiving revenue from the various investments it has made in mining and drilling projects. I have seen a number of what I believe are overly optimistic estimates on this subject o...

Two Interesting New Ideas from an Excellent Blogger

TMFDeej — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 14:21:44 GMT

I don't know if I've mentioned this blog here before, but I always keep an eye on Whopper Investments for cool investment ideas. He posted two particularly interesting ones this week that are very special situation-oriented.

The first is a post-BK OTC stock that's levering up and has warrants that enable you to play them in a Greenblatian way.

Another sign that the economy is improving - Car sales on a roll in March

TMFDeej — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 10:23:44 GMT

MSN - Car sales on a roll in March

"March sales could well be "significantly stronger than February's," said Jason Knapp, who tracks incentives at Autodata Corp., another big market research firm. The company's guess: Sales will be "up between 5% and 10% year-over-year, leaning towards the higher end of that ran...

Sandstorm Metals and Energy, a Key Catalyst Approaches

TMFDeej — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 14:34:19 GMT

Earlier this month I blogged about jockey investments. In the post I specifically talked about Nolan Watson and Sandstorm Metals & Energy (STTYF). As a brief refresher, Sandstorm is attempting to make money by loaning money to smaller energy and metals exploration companies in exchange f...

Today's Random Thoughts

TMFDeej — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 18:36:42 GMT

How's that for a title that will generate clicks and recs. On a Sunday during March Madness too. You can tell that I'm not doing this for the glory ;).

Here's a few random thoughts that I had while doing my regular reading on investing today:

Vodafone (VOD)

One of my favorite yield-plays recently went away when AIG called its exchange traded debt sporting a 7%+ yield. So, where is one to go to find that sort of yield instead. Well, the opportunities out there are getting scarce, but one company that I currently own preferred shares of makes a nice replacement candidate, Strategic Hotels & Resorts (BEE).

I've been meaning to write a blog post on Jockey Investing for a while now. Whether you know this specific term or not, probably everyone who invests for themselves knows what it is. The ultimate example of "Jockey Investing" would be the purchase of stock in Berkshire Hathaway in the 1960s and rising Warren Buffett's amazing compounding machine for the next several decades. In short, jockey investing is attempting to...

PSX Continues to Make Shareholder Friendly Moves

TMFDeej — Sun, 10 Mar 2013 17:08:55 GMT

My position in Philips 66 fondly reminds me of a Gramercy Capital moment in my own investing life, making a complete 180 on a company that I initially didn't like but that ultimately turned out to be a very successful investment. When I originally bought stock in ConocoPhillips (COP) I did so because I thought that the parent company would be better off after it shed its refining assets. However after researching PSX I slowly began to real...

Sum Zero Likes Dean Foods, but I'm Passing

TMFDeej — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 16:21:33 GMT

Let be begin by saying that I really like Sum Zero. No, I'm not a full fledged member. I suppose that's partly because I'm not a career hedge fund manager, but probably also partly because I'm too busy to every do a huge fancy write-up on any of my investment ideas. Regardless, I get Sum Zero's weekly market dispatch for the common folk and I enjoy it.
This week's issue contained an idea...

The Big Macro, Gambling and February's New Stock Picks

TMFDeej — Sun, 03 Mar 2013 11:29:38 GMT

Well, another month is in the books. My CAPS portfolio finally cooled off a little bit. It was bound to happen, I had been consistently, significantly outperforming the S&P 500 month after month for as long as the chart on our CAPS pages shows, September or so. Treading water versus the S&P for a period of time is nothing to be ashamed of and I still feel great about how my CAPS and real-money portfolios are positioned....

UAN contniues to perform amazingly...now if only Mr. Market would notice

TMFDeej — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 17:02:25 GMT

Since it is currently my largest personal equity holding at just under 7% of my portfolio, I figured that I'd provide an update to my friends here at CAPS on CVR Partner's (UAN) recently reported quarterly results.
I have to keep this short though because my...

Why Do Spinoffs Outperform?

TMFDeej — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 16:20:43 GMT

A significant number of my investments over the years have been in companies that have spun-off divisions or that have activist investors trying to coerce them to do so.
Taking a look at my current holdings, the following companies are somehow related to this strategy:
ADT
CBB
COV
Last week I started a post on how I am transforming my personal, real-money investment portfolio by selling larger cap names that don't seem to have any catalysts that will cause them to rise in the near future and looking to add more smaller cap names. Part one of the post (http://caps.fool.com/Blogs/reshaping-my-portfolio-two/799408) ...

Two MLPs with great stories that should cause their shares to outperform

TMFDeej — Sat, 23 Feb 2013 18:43:18 GMT

I know that I said that I would talk more about my recent real money moves, but I'm about to go out to dinner and am short on time, so I thought that I'd share these two interesting stocks tat I just found in Barron's instead. Both of them are great because they don't just have high yields or dividend growth because that's what the analysts are forecasting. They have real stories that should cause their shares to rise significantly over th...

Reshaping my portfolio, two sales and one buy

TMFDeej — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 15:15:57 GMT

In my recent post about analyzing my portfolio to sell the stocks that no longer have catalysts and tilt it more towards small caps and away from large caps (link), I alluded to two recent real money sales and one purchase stating that I would talk about them when I was allowed. Here's the details:
Sale Number One:
I've started usnig the "Watch List" in CAPS to follow companies that I have sold to see how they perform after I liquidated my position in them.

Anyhow, I just noticed that there is a few older stocks still left in there from when I used to use the watch list several years ago that I had forgotten all about. Here's a good one:

Improving My Portfolio Management

TMFDeej — Tue, 19 Feb 2013 17:06:59 GMT

Last week, I posted a detailed analysis of my real-world investment portfolio here in CAPS (link). When I initially began writing this post, it was more for entertainment purposes. I love talking about investing and this was a chance for me to do so with people who are interested in the same subject. However, I ended up learning wha...

Detailed Portfolio Analysis...How Are We Really Doing?

TMFDeej — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 16:59:18 GMT

CAPS is a really fun game, but I've never felt as though it was a completely accurate gague of how one's investments have done. When you eliminate shorting all of the pump and dump scams and leveraged ETFs and actually close positions when you would in real-life it comes close, but I wanted a more detailed analysis of my personal investment track record, so I went to my broker. Charles Schwab, was never one for fancy reports and port...

TMFDeej's Blog

1,143% Outperformance, Tons of Stock Ideas and the Charity Challenge Update...Q1 Wrap-up

You know that you're a value investor at heart when...

The Answer to the Question that Everyone has About Sandstorm Metals & Energy

Two Interesting New Ideas from an Excellent Blogger

Another sign that the economy is improving - Car sales on a roll in March

Sandstorm Metals and Energy, a Key Catalyst Approaches

Today's Random Thoughts

PSX Continues to Make Shareholder Friendly Moves

Sum Zero Likes Dean Foods, but I'm Passing

The Big Macro, Gambling and February's New Stock Picks

UAN contniues to perform amazingly...now if only Mr. Market would notice

Why Do Spinoffs Outperform?

Two MLPs with great stories that should cause their shares to outperform

Reshaping my portfolio, two sales and one buy

Improving My Portfolio Management

Detailed Portfolio Analysis...How Are We Really Doing?