Market Insights

Benchmark Agnostic in an Era of Index Mania

It’s not that agnostics don’t care, they’re just indifferent. They neither place faith in nor disbelief with the subject at hand. That, in a nutshell, is our view of the makeup of the S&P 500, one of the benchmarks to which we compare the performance of our strategies. Specifically, it is the...

How M&A Can Impact Investors in Economic Slowdowns

Over ten years into the current bull market in equities, and likely closer to the end of the economic cycle than to the beginning, investors and corporate management teams are struggling to determine the best places to allocate capital. With concerns over slowing global economic growth, Brexit and...

Top 3 Blog Posts 2019

Happy New Year! 

We sincerely appreciate your continued interest and support of our market insights.  Below we recap our 3 most popular blog posts of 2019.  

As always, we welcome your comments or questions.

Thoughts on Risk Management and a Strong Sell Discipline

As portfolio managers, we are often asked how we think about risk management at both the portfolio level and the individual stock level. From a bottom-up stock analysis standpoint, we believe the way we view risk is quite different than most investors.

The Problem with High Dividend ETFs

Asset flows into exchange-traded funds (ETFs) over the past twenty years have been staggering, especially during the post-2008 period. In November of this year, U.S.-based exchange-traded funds surpassed a record $4 trillion in assets¹. The graph below illustrates the dramatic growth:

Statutory Data: A Trove of Valuable Bank Information

“First-level thinkers look for simple formulas and easy answers. Second-level thinkers know that success in investing is the antithesis of simple…Your thinking has to be better than that of others…you must find an edge they don’t have. You must think of something they haven’t thought of, see things...

Investing in Convertible Bonds with Attractive Risk/Reward Characteristics

“We are attracted to the downside protection that a convertible security’s bond feature offers, while also offering the ability to capture a significant portion of the upside in the issuer’s stock, given the convertible feature.”

At Prospector, we have had a long-standing attraction to convertible...

The Many Benefits of Analyzing Non-GAAP Data, Part 3 of 3

Over the past two weeks we have explored the concept of using other types of data (non-GAAP) to enhance our analysis on publicly-traded companies. This week, we focus on Consumer Companies. 

The Many Benefits of Analyzing Non-GAAP Data, Part 2 of 3

Last week, we began to explore the concept of using other types of data (non-GAAP) to enhance our analysis on publicly-traded companies. While the focus was on insurance companies, this week we are focusing on another industry we enjoy getting under the hood of: Banks. Next week, in the third and...

The Many Benefits of Analyzing Non-GAAP Data, Part 1 of 3

As an investor, if you had access to more detailed information other than the GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles), wouldn’t you use it? GAAP data provides a uniform set of rules and formats to facilitate analysis by investors and creditors, and in this regard, it has greatly helped...