November Performance

November was one of those months where everything worked out, which makes me a bit nervous. Apple (Ticker: AAPL), Constellation Brands (Ticker: STZ), Visa (Ticker: V) and Vertex Pharmaceuticals (Ticker: VRTX) all made a positive contribution to the November performance. In addition, Scientific Games (Ticker: SGMS) closed on its acquisition of Bally Technologies in November, which also helped a bit. I continue to aggressively play the merger arb game as the spreads on many deals continue to look attractive.

Moving into December, I am involved in the following special situation plays: (1) Multimedia Games (Ticker: MGAM) – long common and short Puts, (2) Safeway (Ticker: SWY) – short Puts, (3) Lorillard (Ticker: LO) – long common and (4) Prosena (Ticker: RNA)– short Puts. I anticipate Multimedia Games and Safeway to close in December. Prosena should close early next year and Lorillard hopefully closes by the middle of next year. Currently doing some work on Baker Hughes (Ticker: BHI) as this is starting to look interesting with the recent collapse in the oil prices.

That’s it for now…

Performance Year to Date = +29.50% with the running monthly returns as follows:

January -0.67%
February +6.50%
March -2.69%
April -1.51%
May +7.30%
June +2.59%
July -1.46%
August +4.57%
September +2.02%
October +5.12%
November +7.73%

October Performance

October was certainly a wild month and I didn’t expect the market to take off like this at month end. This month turned out well as several of my large holdings contributed positively to my performance. VISA (Ticker: V), MasterCard (Ticker: MA), Apple (Ticker: AAPL) and Constellation Brands (Ticker: STZ) moved up nicely on positive earnings. I also made a little bit in trading some merger arb plays such as Covidien (Ticker: COV), Multi Media Games (Ticker: MGAM) and Montage Technology (Ticker: MONT). The merger arb plays I am playing right now are Safeway (Ticker: SWY) (sold Puts), Lorillard (Ticker: LO) (long common) and Bally Technologies (Ticker: BYI) (long common).

This has been a difficult year to generate positive returns. I’ve had several merger arb / special situation plays that didn’t work out, but fortunately the damage was not severe as I positioned these holdings to a smaller position as compared to the previous years where I would have gone in big. I’ve learned my lesson where one or two blowups can ruin your year.

Performance Year to Date = +21.77% with the running monthly returns as follows:

January -0.67%
February +6.50%
March -2.69%
April -1.51%
May +7.30%
June +2.59%
July -1.46%
August +4.57%
September +2.02%
October + 5.12%