The Cat is Out of the Bag – Part 1 (Wilhelmsen)

Wilhelm Wilhelmsen and Arise Windpower both presented investors with shocks in their Q3 reports. The underlying results were solid as expected but provisions and write-downs shaved off significant amounts of their equity from their balance sheets.

In the case of Wilhelmsen, WWASA made provisions of 200 million USD for the anti-trust case, and the holding company, WWI & WWIB, another 50 million USD in impairment. It was known the company would be fined, but based on the settlements in Japan and South Africa I had estimated the global fines to amount to approximately 100 million USD, so it is fair to say I was surprised by the amount. Even though it isn’t the final verdict, it must be in that neighborhood since the company has been silent on a specific amount until now. The cases surfaced about 4 years ago so it has been a long wait that has contributed to uncertainty among investors.

It is important to note that the fine does not threaten the survival of the company at all. Their cash position and their easily liquidated share position in Hyundai Glovis (worth about USD 800 million, WWI owns 73% of this) insures that the liquitidy position is very solid. The decision to keep paying the biannual dividend also indicates that the company views their financial position as solid. What the provision means is that 13% of their equity was shaved off, compared to the 5% that I had estimated.

No market reaction

The market reaction has been non-existent. In fact, the stock trades 5% higher compared to one month ago (it is down 5% today, but this is set off by the 5% increase yesterday ahead of the report). That begs the question if the market, unlike me, expected the size of the fine to be as large as the company made provisions for today. That could be the case. It could also be the case that the market judges the provisions to be overly pessimistic.

But there is also a third option, which is embodied in the following quote by Franklin D. Roosevelt:

”We have nothing to fear but fear itself”

He said this in a famous speech in 1933 following the crash in 1929 and the subsequent uptake in the economy which had started to play out. It was true then and it is also true as a general concept for investing. Whenever there is uncertainty about a specific outcome investors tend to overreact. And for private investors with no bosses to report to (and therefore no way to get fired!), this provides a road to overperformance in a ”low hanging fruit” sort of way – provided, of course, the survival of the ongoing business of the particular company is not in question.

Historically cheap valuation

The long term potential in the case is very much intact. In fact it seems to me almost mindblowingly cheap considering that the company’s earnings power is strong compared to the market cap (P/E 4-5, excluding today’s one-off provisions) and has been for many years in spite of tough conditions with increased competition and the fact that the high margin high & heavy market (agriculture, mining equipment) is experiencing hardships, evidenced by reports by Caterpillar and John Deere (25% downturn). One ought to ask oneself what happens to the already healthy profit margins once that segment turns around… The other major segment – transportation of cars by sea – is almost certainly bright considering the growing middle class in China and India (and Africe further down the line) as well as the future replacement of gasoline driven cars towards more electricity/hybrid driven ones.

On a price-to-book valuation WWIB is priced at 0,49 and WWASA at 0,60. There is no reason why a dividend paying healthy business is priced at these levels and I continue to believe the price is based on irrational fear. If you think otherwise, please give me a holler!

Reaction to Arise Windpower’s write-downs

On Friday I will take a look at another company, Arise Windpower, where an almost identical scenario has played out following their report on Nov. 6th. Since I am writing about this company to subscribers at inrater.com (I write about Swedish and Danish companies on there) I cannot go into too much detail, but I will lay out my general outlook.