Category: M&A

Junk Sinks To The Bottom of The River

Junk Sinks To The Bottom of The River

Shares of junk companies such as American Airlines (AAL) and General Electric (GE) are back where they traded during the COVID doldrums. What was gained by bailing out these shit companies or the thousands of zombie companies that received COVID relief money? All of that wasted capital - trillions of dollars - that was printed … Continue reading Junk Sinks To The Bottom of The River →

Meta (Facebook) Should Acquire Intuit

Meta (Facebook) Should Acquire Intuit

Meta Platforms/Facebook (META) should acquire Intuit (INTU). Meta's Facebook unit has peddled its wares to small businesses for some years. To this end, META agreed to acquire Kustomer (provider of CRM tools to small businesses), in November 2020. That deal finally closed in February 2022. Acquiring Intuit would advance the execution of Meta's small business … Continue reading Meta (Facebook) Should Acquire Intuit →

Apple Health – What’s The Holdup?

Apple Health – What’s The Holdup?

Our criticism of Apple (AAPL) and its CEO Tim Cook typically focuses on the fact that Apple does not move swiftly enough as it relates to new market opportunities. Financial Services and Healthcare are two such examples. Back in 2018 we wrote a well-received article entitled Apple Is Well-Positioned to Lead A Consumer-Driven Healthcare Revolution. … Continue reading Apple Health – What’s The Holdup? →

Broadcom Agrees To Acquire VMware

Broadcom Agrees To Acquire VMware

Broadcom agrees to acquire VMware for $61 billion As we wrote previously, we believe this acquisition is a strategic blunder on the part of Broadcom (AVGO). Broadcom's acquisition of VMware (VMW) is essentially a "bet the company" type of acquisition given the amount of purchase consideration ($61 billion) and also given the fact that the … Continue reading Broadcom Agrees To Acquire VMware →

Bold Broadcom Pursues VMware

Bold Broadcom Pursues VMware

Last year Broadcom pursued an acquisition of SAS Institute (private) before SAS Co-founder and CEO Jim Goodnight withdrew. Now, the WSJ reports that Broadcom (AVGO) is working to acquire private cloud and infrastructure software provider VMware (VMW). While the SAS pursuit was bold and creative, the prospective VMW acquisition is bold, risky and lacks creativity. … Continue reading Bold Broadcom Pursues VMware →

The Fed Is To Blame, Not Private Equity

The Fed Is To Blame, Not Private Equity

The Justice Department's Antitrust chief Jonathan Kanter is misguided in his comments about the Private Equity industry. Mr. Kanter ought to look to the Federal Reserve for perverting markets through its actions over the past decade-plus, especially during the April 2020-March 2022 period. If Mr. Kanter wishes to place blame somewhere place it at the … Continue reading The Fed Is To Blame, Not Private Equity →

Focus On Quality Management Teams

Focus On Quality Management Teams

As equity valuations pull back and recession looms investors ought to take cover by investing in industry-leading companies led by quality management teams. The universe of such investment opportunities can't be identified by PE or cash flow multiples, dividend yields or the like. While valuation metrics are a decent filter (example: I would never pay … Continue reading Focus On Quality Management Teams →

Don’t Count On M&A To Bail You Out

Don’t Count On M&A To Bail You Out

CEOs and Institutional Investors should not count on strategic acquirers or PE firms to bail out underperforming stocks (or private company holdings for that matter). Not only is the cost of capital significantly higher for would-be acquirers, but target company revenue and profitability forecasts have substantially less visibility and therefore more risk today than they … Continue reading Don’t Count On M&A To Bail You Out →