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Author Archives: scuttleblurb

[ESRX – Express Scripts] Post-ANTM Thoughts

(2,410 words) [ESRX] After more than a year of acrimonious public squabbling, it appears ANTM will be terminating its relationship with ESRX: The Company’s current long-term PBM contract with Anthem expires on December 31, 2019, and Anthem is currently engaged in a Request for Proposal (RFP) process for a PBM service provider following the end of its […]

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Quick Blurbs [Alliance Data, American Express, Bank of America, Interactive Brokers, CarMax, Supervalu]

[IBKR – Interactive Brokers] Partly due to an exceptionally low volatility trading environment, which has made it difficult to earn profits and which Petterfy says may continue “indefinitely,” the company is winding down its options market making operations. While the company will use the excess capital from market making to further support its brokerage operations, the […]
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[GAIA – Gaia] Interesting Company, Less Interesting Price

The ~$100mn float may render this jockey bet too illiquid for some of you hedge fund MoUs.  GAIA is a speculative enterprise with a questionable business moat run and 38%-owned by competent CEO/ascetic, Jirka Rysavy, who after spending years building and then paring away various businesses inside (as it is now called) GAIA, is left steering […]

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[LYV – Live Nation Entertainment] Some of It’s Magic, Some of It’s Tragic

Live Nation’s business model is unique, contextually rich, and complicated.  While I think this is a decent business – to see this you have to consider all its parts, some of which are mediocre on a standalone basis, as an interlocking whole – I don’t think the purported “platform” is as interesting as I initially […]

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[RYAAY – Ryanair] Low Cost Flywheel

“One thing we have looked at is maybe putting a coin slot on the toilet door…Pay-per-pee.  If someone wanted to pay £5 to go to the toilet, I’d carry them myself.  I would wipe their bums for a fiver.” Michael O’Leary, CEO of Ryanair In a letter to one of GEICO’s officers dated July 22, […]

[LEN – Lennar] Valuation Update

LEN’s y/y home delivery growth has decelerated significantly over the last several years (from mid-teens in fy14 to 9.5% LTM), but in chorus with other builders, the company is singing an optimistic refrain post-Trump. “Since November we have seen a combination of renewed optimism, wage and job growth, and consumer confidence. As a result, our homebuilding […]

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[AMZN – Amazon, GOOG – Alphabet] Trillion Dollar Baby

When paired with a (truly) stable capital base, “behavior” is cited by many, including myself, as the supreme edge – trumping information (in theory, equally accessible to all) and analysis (smart people abound) – since, when investing over a long time-frame, what matters more than the singular decision to buy a stock is how we behave through […]

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[MRC – MRC Global, CF – CF Industries] Closer to Entry

[MRC – MRC Global] Among a fragmented base of competitors, MRC is the largest distributor of pipes (15% of revenue), valves (38%), fittings and flanges (45%) (PVF) to the oil and gas sector, with over 3/4 of its revenue coming from North America.  The company pools orders across its 17k customers (the largest customer is […]
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