I have a 40 year background in accounting and finance at a number of public and private companies in increasingly responsible positions and have been a CFO for the last 20 years. My background in preparing financial statements, reporting to the Securities and Exchange Commission and having been involved in a number of company sales and purchases are invaluable tools in reading and understanding public company financial statements and their valuations.
I always try to learn from my mistakes.
Extreme Networks-EXTR. I sold EXTR in July 2016 at $3.88 a share. Why did I sell when my valuation was $7.48? I was nervous about the market and thought they might disappoint on their next earnings report (which they did with annoying regularity). But mostly I think I was bored with it. I booked at 13% gain, but the stock is now trading at over $11 a share. Lesson–Patience.
Tremor Video-TRMR. I sold TRMR in late July 2017 at an average price of $2.26 for a 25% gain in a bit more than 3 months. My valuation on it was $4.40 Why did I sell? Well RocketFuel, which is an “adtech” stock just got taken over for $2.60 a share. I had just sold Rocket at an average price of $4.58 a share for a 140% gain and my valuation on it was $6.69. Since I sold TRMR it has soared to a high of $4.10 (Now about $3.60). I missed out on a 120% gain. I got nervous again that something was amiss with my valuation on these “adtech” stocks. Lesson–Patience.
MaxPoint Interactive-MXPT. I sold MXPT in the first week of August 2017 at $6.58 for a 60% gain in about 6 months. My valuation on it was $22.60. On August 28th, they got a buyout offer of $13.86 a share. I missed out on a 237% gain. Why? I was nervous about the RocketFuel buyout price compared to my valuation. Lesson–Patience.
My proprietary valuation formula which identifies undervalued tech and medical industry stocks results in a good number of buyouts.
These are the stocks that I owned that were bought out over the last 3 years. I had many others bought out over the 10 years of publishing the free Blog also (see Performance Record).
2017
YUME 90% gain
Shortel (SHOR) 24% gain
MRV Communications (MRVC) 5% Loss
Angies List (ANGI) 60% gain
Syneron Medical (ELOS) 46% gain
2016
Silicon Graphics (SGI) 70% gain
United Online (UNTD) 6% loss
Checkpoint Systems (CKP) 48% gain
2015
Telecommunications Systems (TSYS) 260% gain
CTI Industries (CTIG) 118% gain
Envivio (ENVI) 109% gain
Daegis (DAEG) 25% loss
(XRSC) 260% gain
I closed out my position in YUME today at $5.00 for a 90% gain in 6 months.
Fifth takeover this year-YUME, SHOR, MRVC, ELOS and ANGI.
PRIVATE SUBSCRIPTIONS
We stopped publishing our free weekly CSI Blog after 10 years of publishing at the end of 2015. We are following our 6 remaining open positions until the end.
In late 2015 we started offering a paid subscription service which is similar to the Blog, but we tell you exactly what stocks we bought and why—and sold every day, with a weekly summary of activity, open positions, how many shares we own and their valuations.
Here is the list of private subscription stocks I have bought and sold since December 2015.
2017-MaxPoint, 60% gain
2017-Tremor Video, 25% gain
2017-ShorTel, 24% gain on BUY-OUT
2017-MRV Communications, 6% loss on BUY-OUT
2017-Ceragon, 5% gain
2017-Angie’s List, 60% gain on BUY-OUT
2017-Syneron Med. 46% gain on BUY-OUT
2017-RocketFuel, 140% gain in 4 months
2017-Lantronix, 135% gain
2017-Undisclosed spinoff, 1% gain
2017-HLIT, 78%
2017-Ceragon, 48% gain
2016-Imation, 31% gain
2016-Mitel, 15% gain
2016-SGI, 70% gain on BUY-OUT.
2016-AVID, 55% gain (this was a trading position-in addition to our long-term BLOG holding)
2016-UVE, 36% gain.
2016-ATEC, 71% gain. (This was a trading position-in addition to our long-term BLOG holding)
2016-United Online, 6% loss BUY-OUT
If you are interested in becoming one of our private paid subscribers, please e-mail me at daveosowski@gmail.com.
We averaged a 46.3% gain on our 19 sold stocks (17 winners and 2 small losers) in our private portfolio since January 1, 2016.
CSI FREE BLOG
Of our closed out positions on the Blog, since inception, we have had 70 winners, 17 losers for an 80.5% win-rate with an average gain of 38%.
Since we have only 6 remaining stocks in our “portfolio” we will be discontinuing the portfolio performance metrics in 2017. We will continue to update on the remaining stock positions individually in 2017.
In August:
BLIN had to do another 1 for 5 reverse stock split. This is the second one in just over 2 years. An AMAZING destruction of value by this management group. Our new valuation is $7.01
PRSS announced Q2 earnings. Their “turnaround” continues. Our new valuation is $6.51 and they have $1.80 per share in cash. We are still hopeful on this one, but it is taking too long, which is always concerning.
SYNC announced Q2 earnings. Not bad but the full impact of the $100 million AT&T contract is delayed until next year. Our valuation rose to $5.32 from $4.49.
August 2017 Legacy Positions:
Share Current Lifetime Current Price to Prior
Stock Cost Price Gain Value Value Value
CCUR $4.58 $8.72 90% $11.49 76% $13.83
BLIN $19.76 $2.64 (87%) $7.01 38% $7.20
SYNC $2.56 $2.30 (10%) $5.32 43% $4.49
PRSS $4.01 $2.12 (47%) $6.49 28% $5.61
ATEC $7.06 $2.02 (71%) $7.42 17% $9.42
AVID $8.35 $4.41 (47%) $16.50 30% $17.34
Yesterday I closed out my position in Maxpoint for a 60% gain in 6 months. I have also started 2 new positions in the last month.
E-mail me at daveosowski@gmail.com if you are interested in subscribing.
I sold about 30% of a position today for a 69% gain in 6 month.
We stopped publishing our free weekly CSI Blog after 10 years of publishing at the end of 2015. We are following our 6 remaining open positions until the end.
In late 2015 we started offering a paid subscription service which is similar to the Blog, but we tell you exactly what stocks we bought and why—and sold every day, with a weekly summary of activity, open positions, how many shares we own and their valuations.
Here is the list of private subscription stocks I have bought and sold since December 2015.
2017-Tremor Video, 25% gain
2017-ShorTel, 24% gain on BUY-OUT
2017-MRV Communications, 6% loss on BUY-OUT
2017-Ceragon, 5% gain
2017-Angie’s List, 50% gain on BUY-OUT
2017-Syneron Med. 46% gain on BUY-OUT
2017-RocketFuel, 140% gain in 4 months
2017-Lantronix, 135% gain
2017-Undisclosed spinoff, 1% gain
2017-HLIT, 78%
2017-Ceragon, 48% gain
2016-Imation, 31% gain
2016-Mitel, 15% gain
2016-SGI, 70% gain on BUY-OUT.
2016-AVID, 55% gain (this was a trading position-in addition to our long-term BLOG holding)
2016-UVE, 36% gain.
2016-ATEC, 71% gain. (This was a trading position-in addition to our long-term BLOG holding)
2016-United Online, 6% loss BUY-OUT
If you are interested in becoming one of our private paid subscribers, please e-mail me at daveosowski@gmail.com.
We averaged a 45.5% gain on our 18 sold stocks (16 winners and 2 small loser) in our private portfolio since January 1, 2016.
