May 2015 Performance

I've been fairly busy as you can see that my postings have diminished to once a month. Hopefully, I can get back into the zone and start posting more often.

So despite the market volatility, things turned out ok for the month. May was a merger mania month and I did jump on a few deals, which contributed positively to my monthly performance. I picked up some Omnicare (Ticker: OCR) (~10% position) and Pall (Ticker: PLL) (~ 13% position) as pre-deal plays, which fortunately worked out. I’m still playing Hospira (Ticker: HSP) via short Puts, in which this deal should close in ~ 3 months as the regulatory approvals start rolling in (I still can’t see why Pfizer (Ticker: PFE) received a Second Request from the FTC).

I also pick up some Altera (Ticker: ALTR) (~ 5% position) today as a deal may finally happen. I have to admit, I’ve been eyeing Altera for a while and am a bit late to the game. So we’ll see what happens next week with Altera and Intel (Ticker: INTC).

I’m still holding tight to my long term positions in Apple (Ticker: AAPL), Visa (Ticker: V), MasterCard (Ticker: MA), Qiagen (Ticker: QGEN), Constellation Brands (Ticker: STZ) and Vertex Pharmaceuticals (Ticker: VRTX). As they say, it’s the sitting that makes you the money.

2015 Performance Year to Date = +16.92% with the running monthly returns as follows:

January +3.4%
February +7.03%

March -0.33%

April +0.39%

May +5.59%

April 2015 Performance

There was nothing eye opening to report in terms of performance for April. It was a blah, blah month… I did manage to squeeze out a small gain of 0.39% for the month. I’m trying not to force myself into any trades unless I see a good risk / reward opportunity. In this game, you really have to minimize any potential losses and not do anything stupid, which I sometimes (I mean many times) DO!?!

Ok, here's a briefing for April...

Constellation Brands (Ticker: STZ) reported nice earnings and I continue to hold on tight to this position. I’ve been in this position for ~ 2 years and continue to be my largest position. They are executing very well and will see much better margins once their manufacturing expansion in their beer biz is complete. The company will be initiating their first dividend starting this month, which was a bit sooner than I expected. This company is a really nice cash flow generator and I can easily see them raising the dividend and initiating a stock buyback in the future.

I did execute a few trades...

I took some small profits in Habit Restaurant (Ticker: HABT). I really like the Habit concept and believe they will be successful outside of their base in California. I sold based on valuation, it’s something you need to respect. Habit is currently trading at over 100 times earnings and growing at most around 40%. As they say, it’s priced for perfection and nothing stays perfect forever.

I’ve been continuing to build up my short Put position in Hospira (Ticker: HSP). I’m looking for this deal to close by August. It’s all about the antitrust approvals in getting this deal done. Recently, Pfizer (Ticker: PFE) pulled and refiled their filing with the antitrust regulators, which is actually a positive. This indicates that Pfizer could be close to some type of resolution with the regulators. I really like this risk / reward opportunity.

I just initiated a position in Omnicare (Ticker: OCR) as a pre deal play. I believe the odds of a deal occurring is high so we’ll probably hear something this month.

That’s pretty much sums things up for April…

2015 Performance Year to Date = +10.73% with the running monthly returns as follows:

January +3.4%
February +7.03%

March -0.33%

April +0.39%