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The business of value investing – Six essential elements to buying companies like Warren Buffett- Charlie Tian 2009
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Effective Business Valuation
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In effective business valuation the ultimate considerations were based on a few variables: operating history, future cash flow generation, competitive threats, and the price of the business. Any sensible business valuation hinges on a few critical points. For instance, when looking at oil companies, two variables dominate the analysis: the company’s production level and the price of oil over the long run. These two variables alone represent the critical valuation metrics of oil companies. While no two businesses can ever be valued in identical fashion, when it comes to valuing any business, a large portion of the valuation will hinge on a small handful of variables. Absolutely not. Serious investment requires a keen knowledge of all the information. One of the wonderful aspects of investing is that you are constantly learning something new each day. One business’s negligible data could be another’s relevant information. Back to our oil analogy, in addition to the oil price and production level, you would also pay attention to production costs. This is helpful as you begin comparing different oil companies. When the price of oil is artificially high, it would appear that all oil companies are extremely profitable, thus making management look very competent to shareholders. Excessively high profits based on the price of oil are beyond the control of management. What management can control, however, are production costs. And when oil prices decline, oil companies with the right blend of rising production levels and stable production costs will benefit while the undisciplined companies hurt. Business valuation is not that hard if you train yourself to look at the important things over and over. When the topic of business valuation is discussed in investing circles, lots of words are thrown around, such as intrinsic value, margin of safety, free cash flow, discount rate, and so on. These are all very important concepts that are at the core of valuing a business. Before getting started in valuing any business, it’s important to have a true understanding of these terms and concepts.
Warren Buffett calls margin of safety the “the three most important words in all of investing”. The concept of a margin of safety is the supreme foundation of any business valuation. The margin of safety eliminates catastrophic investment risks. When many investors are first thinking about what gains an investment offers, the investor focused on a margin of safety first thinks about the likelihood of permanent loss an investment offers. The idea of a margin of safety stems from the reality that no investor, not even Buffett, can determine the exact intrinsic value of any business. Because a company’s intrinsic value is derived from an investor’s calculated set of assumptions, intrinsic value is merely an approximation. Sure, an investor as skilled as Buffett probably would have a better approximation of intrinsic value than most, but then again he’ s been investing a lot longer than most of us. Nonetheless, his assessment of intrinsic value is still an approximation. When you invest with a margin of safety, you’re investing in such a way that your success is not dependent on exact accuracy future forecasts. This is why the margin - of - safety concept is of paramount importance to the valuation process. It gives the investor a degree of protection from the market’s uncertainties. There is no formula that determines how wide a margin of safety you need. Obviously the wider the better, and many value investors like a 50 percent margin of safety to feel really comfortable with making an investment. And anything less than 25 percent is not significant. Remember, the point of a margin of safety is to account for the fact that you are making estimates about the future results of the business and any temporary uncertainties in the marketplace. Ultimately, the business will dictate the degree of a margin of safety. A 30 percent margin of safety in Wal-Mart is likely better than a 50 percent margin of safety in the Cheesecake Factory because you can estimate with a higher degree of certainty the future cash flows of a large, stable business that dominates its industry like Wal-Mart versus a discretionary restaurant like the Cheesecake Factory that competes with thousands of restaurants each day. The margin of safety is like an investor’s insurance policy. The wider the coverage of that policy, the more protection you have. Investing with a margin of safety does not eliminate investment loss. Investing with a margin of safety, however, does reduce the likelihood of losing significant sums of money in any particular investment. Investing with a margin of safety of your choice means that your first goal when looking to invest is to focus on return of and not return on capital. Once we’ve determined a floor price based on a fundamental valuation approach, then investing at or below that floor price ensures that your return of capital is not at a high risk of loss. The most common type of margin of safety occurs when a company’s tangible assets far exceed its market value. Graham was famous for seeking out net - net values, or securities selling for less than two - thirds of current assets, less all liabilities. That’s the ultimate margin of safety. In a situation like this, if the company were to liquidate, the odds are very good that the equity investors would get their capital back. But as more investors have entered the game, these special situations have become exceedingly more difficult to find. Many investors have a hard time grasping the concept of a margin of safety because it requires them to truly separate the value of the business from the price of the stock.
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It is of crucial important that an investor knows: How and when will the stock price reach intrinsic value.
The concept of a margin of safety will be more meaningful and understandable once you have understand intrinsic value. Keep in mind that a margin of safety is affected by the intrinsic value of the business. When the intrinsic value changes, so does your margin of safety, and you’ll need to determine whether to keep holding the investment or dispose of it. Any further attempt at investing intelligently becomes useless and potentially disastrous if you do not incorporate the concept of a margin of safety. Intrinsic values, discounted cash flow assumptions, and other fundamental tools are ineffective if you forget the concept of a margin of safety. To have a satisfactory margin of safety, you first must determine a company’s intrinsic value, because a margin of safety occurs only when a business can be acquired at a significant discount to its intrinsic value. The wider the gap, the stronger the margin of safety. Warren Buffett likes to invest with a 50 percent margin of safety. The key focus is to look for opportunities with the widest degrees of margin of safety. Intrinsic value is a term that is often cited by value investors. It’s a very important concept because all investment decisions should be based on the current market value of the business — the number of shares outstanding multiplied by the current stock price - relative to the true intrinsic value of the business. The reliance on cash flows instead of profits is critical in determining intrinsic value. At the end of the day, it’s all about the cash that the business generates. Cash is real and tangible and cannot be manipulated as profits can.