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Learning Arbitrage

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I have a conceptual understanding of arbitrage and have started looking at it actively. The first time I looked at it seriously was before the reliance de-merger. However I was not too confident of the opportunity and as a result did not commit much capital to it.

I just came across these two posts by prof. Bakshi which talks of two such arbitrage opportunities

http://fundooprofessor.blogspot.com/2006/04/nothing-ventured-something-gained.html

http://fundooprofessor.blogspot.com/2006/04/creating-free-warrants-case-of-jsw.html

I think Prof bakshi has explained the two situations in a fair amount of detail and anyone wanting to learn about arbitrage opportunities should read these two posts.

I am looking for some books on arbitrage and till date have found a bit of an explaination on it in warren buffett’s letters to shareholders and in Benjamin graham’s books – ‘The intelligent investor’ and ‘Security analysis’. However I am still looking for some books which covers this topic in detail, especially risk arbitrage, M&A arbitrage etc.

If anyone of you know a good book on it please leave me a comment. I would really appreciate it.

Notes from Columbia Business School trip’s meeting with Warren buffett

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I always make it a point to read the transcripts/ notes of these meetings. A lot of it is the same stuff, but I am always able to find a few gems of wisdom in buffett’s replies to the Q&A. Some of the interesting comments are below

Link : http://investoblog.blogspot.com/

Question 3: What do you read?Everything. Annual reports, 10-K’s, 10-Q’s, biographies, history. When he’s in airplanes, he’ll read the instructions on the seat backs. Two books he recommended specifically are
Poor Charlie’s Almanack and Personal History, Kate Graham’s bio. He rarely ever reads fiction, feels like it would be taking up time he could be reading about business. He reads five newspapers a day, and plays bridge twelve hours a week.


Question 4: Please share your thoughts on your position in Remy International and the auto parts industry in general.“Boy, I thought airlines were tough.” They took the position in Remy three years ago.When your big customers are teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, it’s tough to get price increases. You can’t survive as a high-cost producer in this industry. You can’t pass through costs like you could in the old times.


Question 5: What investment lessons have you learned?He keeps making mistakes. Predicting the future is hard, and it will keep being hard. As long as his mistakes are in his analysis, that’s okay. When you buy a stock, you need to be able to get out a yellow legal pad and write down, in one page why it is cheap. For example, “I am buying the Coca Cola company for $14b for x, y, and z reasons and I think it is worth far, far more than that.”



He finds the game fun and always has. If you like it, keep practicing. It’s hugely important to buy stocks on your own. By doing that, you learn in a way that you can’t from reading books. Temperament and emotions are hugely important, and you need to experience that first-hand.

Common errors in DCF models

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Found this great article from Michael Mauboussin, Chief Investment Strategist of Legg Mason Capital Management (LMCM). It is a 12 page article on the common errors investors commit in using the DCF (Discounted cash flow) model.

Personally my approach to valuation (which is not original and mainly developed from reading) is to create a DCF model for three scenarios. I extend the current business condition and create an as-is scenario. So the assumption is that the current growth rates, margins, competitive situation etc will continue as is. The second scenario is an optimistic scenario where in I try to calculate the intrinsic value using the most optimisitic assumptions for growth rates, margins, competitive intensity etc. The third scenario is the pessimistic scenario with poor growth rates, high competitive intensity etc.

I try to associate probability against each scenario and try to calculate the expected value.

So expected value is = intrinsic value (as is) * probability for ‘as is’ + instrinsic value (optimistic scenario)* probability for optimisitic scenario + intrinsic value (pesimistic scenario) * probability for pessimistic scenario.

I also cross check the above expected value with ratio based valuations.

The above approach forces me to think harder on all my assumptions. Also when the annual results are declared for any company I have invested in, I go back to my excel spreadsheet and relook at the numbers, assumptions etc and calculate the new intrinsic value again. This gives me an idea on whether I should sell, buy more or hold.

I am not able to post my valuation / analysis spreadsheet on the blog. If any one is interested, please e-mail me on rohitc99@indiatimes.com

The warren buffett of India

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Chandrakant sampat is rightly called the warren buffett of india. See his profile here

I just read this
interview with him where he has given his thoughts on the market. It’s a must read

A few excerpts from the interview

A few months back, I was looking at a table of 100 Indian companies ranked by return on capital employed (RoCE). At some point, these stocks were quoting at eight-year lows, which is strange. Look at Siemens. It did an eight-year low and now it’s quoting at Rs 5,000. Tata Steel was down at Rs 40-50 and now, after adjusting for bonus, it’s Rs 700-800. Of this set of companies, if investors pick up something quoting at a 10-year low, it appreciates 10 times.
Pick up good companies with good managements when their share prices are at an eight-year or 10-year low. Alternatively, if you still want to do something, buy good companies that are 40 per cent lower than their 52-week high. I will buy only those companies that…

• Are in a business that even fools can understand

• Have very little debt
• Have free cash flows
• Don’t have much capital expenditure, which is nothing but deferred cost

So, the companies you say are growing, are they really growing? The answer is ‘no’. They have to keep all deferred costs aside, they can’t declare hefty dividends, as the future costs. So, that’s another lesson — buy stocks that have minimal capital expenditure.

I have put a few more articles and interviews with chandrakant sampat below

Indiainfoline interview

Businessline interview

Rediff interview

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