Bad reasons to be satisfied with Meta

Meta/Facebook did pretty good on the market recently. How come?

First, Tik Tok has been banned by a lot of enterprises/governments. Everybody already knew that this chinese company could be a threat, just like all other chinese companies (but I guess that some people will soon say that a new chinese company is "different" and deserves our attention). 

Anyway, about Tik Tok, all of a sudden, a lot of people woke up. Like 5 years later. I don't know what happened but it was positive for Meta/Facebook.

Then, Facebook announced that tens of thousands of employees would be fired. Which would reduce the spendings of the company.

So, as much as you may love Meta, do you really consider it positive that your not-growing-anymore-stock is doing well because a competitor has problems or because it sacked thousands of people?

Margin interest rate

I just saw that the interest rate on my margin was 8%! 

Who wants to borrow money and invest with a margin with such high interest? 

Given the fact that the market has an average annual performance of 9-10%, it makes absolutely no sense to use margin at this time. 

I've decided to reimburse entirely my margin. You should do the same. 

It's time to invest only the money you own. Otherwise, your chances to get poorer are high. 

MTY Food Group (MTY)

 I've been a shareholder of MTY in the past. Sold my shares. Bought back some shares. Sold them again.

I'm not a shareholder anymore. But things look good with the company except for the fact that they carry a heavy debt that represent a high percentage of the value of the company. 

Given the high interest rates, I'd stay away from a company with a large debt. But MTY has steady revenues and a wide offer for consumers. They own so much brands that it's virtually impossible that all of them go bad. They have a very solid business model. 

What are your thoughts on MTY? 

I don't believe

I don't believe in god. I don't believe in Bill Ackman. I don't believe in Justin Trudeau. I don't believe in U2. I don't believe in seller's honesty. I don't believe in the good nature of human beings. I don't believe in the intelligence of human beings. I don't believe in kinoa. I don't believe in the aphrodisiac nature of parts of dead animals. I don't believe in the hidden joy of anal penetration. 

I don't believe in the concept of a "screaming buy".

Which leads me to the fact that I don't believe in excitation about stocks anymore. There's no such thing as a hidden gem or a boner stock. 

When someone's too excited about a stock, I look elsewhere because I'm not looking for excitation. I just want to get rich as quick as possible, leave my job and travel the world in a small boat made of trunks.  

Back with Grainger (GWW)

In 2011, I bought Grainger (GWW), a great stock that went down with the market during the summer. I did what I rarely managed to do: spot and buy a great company that went down a lot with the market for no reason. A few months later, Grainger was up like 25% and I sold it. I don't exactly remember why. I think that growth didn't look as good for the future. Or maybe I found some shitty penny stock to replace it (it was my "penny stock" period). 

Recently, I took another look at the stock and I realized that it went from about 200$ in february 2012 (when I sold it) to about 600$ these days. 

I could have tripled my money over these last 11 years but no, I tried to find something else more exciting.

What's crazy is that Grainger is still not that expensive even if it's track record has been great. The only thing that's changed is the debt level which is higher than before, but not so worrying. Of course, interest rates are way higher than before now. So, that's a bit of a concern but everything else looks great in my opinion.

Anyway, It's another of those cases of companies that looked good 10 years ago and that should never have been sold. Like Mastercard. Like O'Reilly. Like some of the shares of Constellation Software that I sold many years ago. 

I came back to all of them and I paid more than what I initially paid.  

When it's a very good company, don't sell it except if things look very bad. By very bad, I mean something illegal or some serious shit. Not a momentary stop of growth. 

When something's rotten...

When Valeant changed it's name to Bausch Health company and changed it's CEO, some people thought that this company would have a rebirth. 

But what these superficial people forgot is that a rebirth may be possible, but only for a company that's not been managed for years by a crook, that doesn't carry a very high debt, that didn't overpaid by far for many products and that didn't raised the price of some of it's products by so much that it lost all respect by millions of people all around the world. 

Change the CEO and change the name and all that shit remains.

I remember writing on some forum (probably Seeking Alpha) that this company was going nowhere even if the new CEO seemed to clean the place.

Then, a random guy told me that I lacked judgment by thinking that Bausch Health was now a totally different company. 

Actually, I don't know how things are going at this company. It's surely cleaner than it was because of all the exposure of the recent years. But I prefer to buy a house that's been well kept than a house where all the drains were broken and there was shit everywhere in the basement. Even with the best plumber, there will remain stains and smell of shit in the basement. 

Bausch Health stock price:

January 5h 2023: 9,72$

January 2022: 31$

January 2021: 34$

January 2020: 35$

January 2019: 32$

Picks for 2023

I'm a little late since it's already 2023. But what are your top 5 picks for 2023? 

Please, submit only stocks that you own. Because if you believe in some stocks, why the fuck wouldn't you own them? I want believers, no gamblers. 

Also, please submit your picks before january 10th. If you're stupid enough to submit some picks on may 16th or some random late date, I will write a specific post to bully you.  

Here are my picks:

1- Constellation Software (CSU.TO)

2- Mastercard (MA)

3- Keysight Technologies (KEYS)

4- O'Reilly (ORLY)

5- United Health (UNH)