Nintai Investments average portfolio has done quite well against the market indexes over the year-to-date as well as 1 year and 3 years. Our outperformance has a great amount to do with our returns in Q4 2018 (-2.78% for Nintai Investment portfolios versus -14.33% for S&P 500TR) and Q1 2020 (-12.25% for Nintai Investment portfolios versus -21.08% for S&P 500TR). By keeping an eye out for the downside, we have found returns will do fine over the long-term.
 
Use All Tools Available to Us Now
Fifty years ago, very few investors (individual or professional) had ever heard of behavioral finance. There has been an explosion in the last decade in our understanding about how the human mind thinks about investing, making and losing money, decision making during stressful times, etc. Almost none of it leads us to be better investors. In fact, the field of behavioral finance is largely about avoiding emotional responses and biases in our decision making. Spending a small amount of time understanding the topic and building steps into your investment decision making process can pay large dividends over the long term.   
 
Contrarian Thinking is Even Rarer Today
In 2009 index funds made up roughly 25% of all mutual fund assets. That’s now nearly 50% according to Morningstar. This growth of indexing has taken the art form of stock selection out of the hands of personal and professional investors and simply allowing computers and algorithms to make stock selections. At Nintai Investments, this has created an increasingly large gap between stocks that meet the needs of index funds and those that fall through the cracks. We think – over the long term – it’s never been (other than the 30’s and 40s of the last century) a better time to be an active manager in the value investment field. As jumbo cap companies take up an increasing amount of investment dollars (simply because they must be owned in most index funds), we find there are many small cap gems that are passed over and are diamonds in the rough ready to b scooped up. At Nintai, we strongly believe our performance reflects this type of thinking and success.    
 
Conclusions
 
At the time of writing this article (August 2020), the S&P 500 was on the verge of setting a new high on a near weekly basis. At the same time, roughly 175,000 Americans have died of the corona virus, there has been roughly 5.7 million cases nationwide, and roughly 1,000 additional patients die per day. In the race for a cure, citizens seem to be blissfully ignorant of how long it takes to develop a vaccine, how effective that vaccine will be, and whether we will be looking at a second wave of infections combined with the standard influenza later this fall and winter. In July, the unemployment rate declined by 0.9 percentage point to 10.2 percent, and the number of unemployed persons fell by 1.4 million to 16.3 million. Despite declines over the past 3 months, these measures are up by 6.7 percentage points and 10.6 million - respectively - since February. Huge swaths of the US economy - retail, restaurants, airlines, etc. - continue to face ominous reports that many of their brethren are simply not coming back (In New York City, it is estimated nearly one out of every three restaurants will not reopen their doors). 
 
With all of this going on, it’s hard to get your arms around the enormous gains made in the markets. Are investors simply ignorant, dumb or simply wildly optimistic? It’s hard to know because every bubble or pricey market is unique. There are so many variables it’s hard to build a model that takes everything into account. All that said, we try to keep our thinking straightforward and simple as possible. At Nintai, we think risks far outweigh rewards - this includes earnings growth, interest rates, debt levels, and general economic trends such as our politico-economic relations with China and the EU. We will continue to do what we do best by locating the highest quality companies that have been overlooked by the indexing world and trading at cheap prices relative to our estimated intrinsic value. We will also look for companies with rock solid financials with characteristics such as no debt, high free cash flow margins, and outstanding return on capital. Finally, we will continue to hold lots of dry powder until opportunities come along. We will work hard to avoid any unforced errors and not be rattled by bad news. In the final analysis, when markets are seemingly out of touch with the economy, its best to review your current holdings, work hard on your watch list and be patient. Anything else would be doing yourself and your investors a grave disservice.   

[1] “The Power of Dividends: Past, Present, and Future”, Hartford Funds 2020 Insights. The report can be found here.
​

“By then I knew one thing for certain: the Detroit-based auto industry was a debt- enfeebled house of cards that had been a Wall Street playpen of deal making and LBOs for years…it needed nothing so much as a cold bath of free market house cleaning, along with a drastic rollback of the preposterous $100,000 per year cost of UAW jobs.”
                                                                            -      David Stockman[1] 

I’ve been involved in some way in the capitalistic system of the United States since I was 9 years old and delivered 112 newspapers on a route which I biked 6 days a week and collected exactly $21.60 in wages and somewhere between $20 - $30 in tips each week. It was a great experience in learning the core concepts of capitalism - seeing the conflict between management and labor (I couldn’t see why we weren’t paid more on Saturdays as the newspapers weighed exactly 1.8 times more than the other 5 days and it took twice as long to deliver that day’s papers), the importance of customer service and quality (delivering on time and in the location requested by customers meant better tips), and the power of a duopoly (there were only two newspapers in our town - the Concord Monitor and the Manchester Union Leader). My parents didn’t earn a lot of money in those days and sometimes borrowed from my tip jar to help pay the bills. They then scrupulously payed back the exact amount borrowed. I also learned that when Polonius said “neither a borrower or lender be” what he really meant was if you need to be one - be a lender. 
 
Over time, my understanding of the capitalistic system became richer, deeper, and more profound as I helped found a small private-equity firm after earning my undergraduate degree and partnering with two friends who had both money and political connections. By the time I started Nintai Partners I had a pretty good understanding of the nature of competition, profit & loss, the power and danger of leverage, and the strength associated with free cash flow. As I transferred this knowledge from being the CEO of a boutique consulting firm to starting Nintai Investments LLC (a small registered investment advisory firm), I felt I had a very broad – and yet focused – knowledge on the type of company that I believe makes a powerful long-term investment prospect. I operated in this capitalistic system making 
enough profits to help live a life filled with adventure, experience, and more than enough benefits to live quite happily.  
 
My trip down memory lane isn’t the first sign of me losing my mind (at least I don’t think so!). Rather, I bring all this up as I’ve been giving a lot of thought of where my industry - which has been so good to me and so many others - is headed and what changes have taken place over the past 20 - 25 years. As I’ve moved full time into a role as a CEO of an investment advisory firm as well as chief investment officer, I’ve given a lot of thought about my experiences and what they taught me for being a quality investment manager. 
 
In my article last week (“Quality in Investing – Part 2”, August 1 2020. It can be found here.), I ended my discussion about finding quality not just in your portfolio holding but also in your financial advisor. Since my first day as an investment manager I’ve held one tenet as the bedrock of my business values - I have a fiduciary responsibility to my investment partners. This simply means that my actions must take into account my clients first, and Nintai Investments’ needs second. Fiduciary responsibility can be a flexible concept. Some see how much (0.75% or 2%) you charge your clients while others see how (% of assets or 2/20) you charge them as the litmus test for fiduciary responsibility. Others see quality management as investing your own money as you do your clients’ (or as Warren Buffett said, “eating your own cooking” as Nintai does). There are many, many ways to achieve what appears to be a fair and equitable model. At Nintai, we think there are a set of core values that make up good fiduciary guidance and policy. I thought I’d share these with you today. 
 
Our Fees 
One of the questions you have to ask from the onset of opening your doors - and going forward until you close those doors - is the amount you will charge your investment partners for your services. The industry’s view on this has changed dramatically since the onset of “Bogles Folly” - Vanguard’s first index fund. Passive indexing means just that - there is no active component to managing client funds. An index fund simply follows its respective index (the S&P 500 TR, the Russell 2000, etc.) and rebalances once a year. The fees to manage such a fund are miniscule - in today’s world sometimes being less than 0.1% of AUM. It’s really only since around 2000 and the great “Tech Bubble” that saw fees began their dramatic descent. For instance, from 1979 - 1999 the average weighted expense ratio (with sales loads) increased from 1.50% to 1.52%[2].  Since 2000, index funds have hammered the active fund management industry. The average annual management fee for actively managed funds from 2000 – 2019 has dropped 1.52% to 0.74%. Actively managed fund fees have been cut in half in the last 20 years. Overall, you’d think this would be a great trend for those invested in actively managed funds. But not so fast! During the period from 2000 - 2019, the total amount of revenues paid by investors (front end, back end, 12b-1, management fees, etc.) to mutual funds skyrocketed from roughly $45B in 2000 to nearly $107B in 2019. So much for cutting costs in half! In his classic book “The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism”, Jack Bogle writes that during 1997 – 2002 alone, the total revenues paid by investors to investment banking and brokerage firms exceeded $1 trillion, and payments to mutual funds exceeded $275 billion[3].    
 
The arithmetic is simple in calculation and staggering in its impact. Let’s assume an investor starts out by investing $1M in a vanilla mutual fund that earns 6% annually. Let’s also assume a very helpful family member pays the small 0.1% management fee as an incentive to save. That $1M – with no fees – over 25 years would earn $330,000. Added to your initial $100,000 investment you’d have $430,000. Let assume life went another direction and no generous relative showed up and you invested your $100,000 in a fund that charged 2% (that’s not unreasonable for an active managed fund when you include all-in costs such as trading, differences in bid-ask, etc.). Paying those fees you’d earn $170,000. Added to your initial $100,000 investment you’d end up with $270,000. That’s quite a difference from $430,000. A 40% difference actually. So a 2% difference in fees can eat up 40% of your returns[4]. That’s a lot of vacations, anniversary gifts, or heavens forbid medical care if you need it. Where are the customers’ yachts indeed? Where does all this money come from and where does it go? It’s pretty simple. Customers pay the fees and mutual fund executives and fund managers see the profits. As many of us know, paying all these fees doesn’t assure quality or outperformance. Amazingly, even after all these costs the vast majority of managers underperform a simple index fund. In investment management, you rarely get what you pay for when it comes to long-term returns. 
 
At Nintai Investments, we charge 0.75% of all assets under management. We have an internal policy that should an individual’s personal investment account underperform its proxy (generally the Russell 2000 or S&P 500TR), for two straight years we reduce our management fee to 0.50%. After three years of underperformance we reduce the fee to 0.25%. If longer, it’s likely the Board will suggest we look for a career outside investment management! 
 
Our Returns
We’ve all seen the disclaimer (usually in a ridiculously small font) that “past results are no guarantee of future returns” or something of the like. It’s probably one of the most accurate statements you’ll read in all your interactions with Wall Street. Because it is true. As an investment manager myself I have no idea what my returns will be in 1 year, 3 years, or 5 years. I certainly hope they will outperform the greater markets. But in reality I have no idea. Being honest about that to both your investors and yourself must be a bedrock intellectual foundation throughout your investment career. Bad things happen to both parties when a manager loses sight of this. Scenarios from simple pig-headed investment strategies to Bernie Madoff debacles are the inevitable by-product of those who are convinced they know more - and that they will always outperform - the markets in general. 
 
Another critical trait in the investment returns of the great investors is the recognition that if you can avoid the truly horrific downturns (particularly those that permanently impair capital) the upside will take care of itself. At Nintai Investments, we spend an extraordinary amount of time looking for companies that meet our quality criteria (see our two-part series “Quality in Investing” published earlier in July/August 2020) that help us avoid significant drawdowns. If we can find companies with fortress-like balance sheets, strong free cash flow, deep competitive moats and trading at reasonable prices, then we are comfortable (but it is not guaranteed!) that the company can generate adequate returns over the next 10 - 20 years.   
 
Nintai’s clients have been fortunate in that we have - on average - had investment partner portfolios beat the S&P 500TR by roughly 16% since inception and the Russell 2000 (a closer proxy) by 24% since inception. As we are required to say (and understand all too clearly), past performance is no guarantee of future returns. 
 
Our Communication
For decades, the practice of many money managers was to issue an annual letter (or God forbid a quarterly letter!) that briefly outlined fund performance (usually skimpy in numbers or so complicated they were impossible to understand, but no happy medium).  The manager would then spend a vast amount of the report pontificating on where the economy was going, what tax laws were going to change, and finishing with some inexecrable use of industry jargon like “synthetic options triple witching”. Overall, it was a report useful mostly for starting a wood fire or when you run short of vital bathroom supplies. 
 
At Nintai we take a different approach. We like to provide our investment partners with content we’d like to receive ourselves if we were in their shoes. This includes investment cases and valuation spreadsheets on each of our portfolio holdings, quarterly reports which explain – in plain terms – how their portfolios performed, what went right, and more importantly, what went wrong. We want our investment partners to feel just that – partners in making investment decisions. If an investment manager can’t describe why they own a holding, how much that holding is worth, or discuss the major characteristics of the holding (products, services, competition, markets, etc.) then they really aren’t managing anything, other than collecting their fees.   
 
Our Ethics
When individuals discuss ethics, they generally are referring to the investment managers personal ethics – do they have any sanctions or settlements in their past, have they stolen from their clients, etc. At Nintai, we believe that’s important. But equally important is the ethics of both the company and management outside the business. We believe strongly ethics means a positive and active engagement by management in their community, supporting people, organizations (even animals) in need, or helping those who simply need a hand up. It also means the company actively supports charitable giving. We live and work in a system - and country - that has provided us with enormous opportunity. Our corporate ethics requires us to help those who don’t have the same advantages or opportunities. So while we pledge to provide ethical management in our investment business, we also pledge to be ethical in our compensation to support staff, to our vendors who do the hundreds of things that make our business run, and to regulators who have provided us with voluntary guidance and assistance. Next time you think of the ethics of an investment manager, remember they don’t operate in a bubble, or only work with you. Make sure they provide a global view of doing the right thing. It makes all of us better workers, citizens, and human beings on an increasingly integrated planet.    
 
Conclusions
 
I’ve given a lot of thought to the David Stockman quote at the beginning of this article. Here was a man who had everything in the world and yet as a senior partner at a private equity company participated in the very process he so aggrievedly writes about. He is right about nearly everything he discusses without understanding the irony that he helped create and engage in this very activity and helped design the system. His work at Blackstone – and later Heartland – is a record of all the characteristics one should avoid in an investment manager. The fee structure of Heartland Industrial Partners assured the winning hands were weighted heavily against the investor. His returns were abysmal leading to Steve Schwarzman (CEO of Blackstone) cutting him off from investment deals . His record was even worse at Heartland leading to a $340M loss in in its Collins & Aikman investment. His ethics certainly took a hit when federal prosecutors indicted Stockman and the SEC brought civil charges. Both were related to “a scheme to defraud Collins & Aikman's investors, banks and creditors by manipulating C&A's reported revenues and earnings.” In fairness, it should be noted the federal prosecutors dropped their charges in 2009. 
 
When one is looking for quality in an investment manager, I feel strongly the individual should have traits more in alignment with Nintai’s than Mr. Stockman’s. Fees and returns should prove the manager has both the skills and emotions to be a successful long-term investor. Communications between the investor and manager should be clear and concise discussing returns and other issues in a manner where the investor comes away satisfied they know everything necessary to explain their portfolio. Finally, the manager and his/her organization should have a deeply ethical framework in their personal and professional actions and decision making. Finding such a manager might be difficult, but certainly possible. There are many outstanding investors and investment teams who meet these criteria. Choosing one will be one of the best investment decisions you will ever make.  
 
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[1] “The Great Deformation: The Corruption of Capitalism in America”, David Stockman, PublicAffairs, Perseus Books Group, 2013

[2] Securities and Exchange Commission, Division of Investment Management, “ Report on Mutual Fund Fees and Expenses”, December 2000

[3] “The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism”, John C. Bogle, Yale University Press, 2006, page 11

[4] A special thanks to Vanguard for the basis of this example.

Low quality investment opportunities are actually quite easy to stumble on. Having a company implode from over indebtedness, corporate fraud, or simple gross incompetence is remarkably common in today’s “go-go” easy money markets. Finding quality - outstanding management, pristine balance sheets, deep competitive moats, and high customer satisfaction - is actually quite difficult.  
 
At Nintai Investments, we utilize roughly 16 measures that help us create a list of quality companies based financial, operational, strategic, market-based, and competitive characteristics. This leaves us with 41 of 3,671 (1.12%) total United States publicly traded companies, 305 of 17,602 (0.23%) total Asian publicly traded companies, and 88 of 8300 (0.49%) total European publicly traded companies. As one can see pretty quickly, the amount of companies that identify as quality is less than 1% world-wide. 
 
Last week I reviewed what we defined as poor quality at Nintai Investments. One might think that high-quality companies simply feature the opposite traits of poor-quality companies, but that’s not entirely accurate. A quality company has characteristics unique to their category - in much the same way as poor-quality have their own. As Tolstoy wrote, “All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way”. 
 
The kind of qualities we look for in at Nintai Investments fall into four key buckets. These include:
 
Excellence in Management: We look for management that have a vested interest in how the company performs (by purchasing shares in the open market, not stock option grants), provide a history of outstanding management candidates (similar to GE’s top 3 candidates for CEO - when one was chosen and the other two were considered outstanding managers in their own right and are expected to leave the company as CEO of another firm), deeply understand they work for both shareholders and their respective community, and finally achieve outstanding results in both operational measures (ROE, ROA) and strategic measures (ROIC, FCF margins). Most important than all of these, we look for management with a clear moral compass. This presents itself in forbidding financial transactions that profit management (such as renting a building they own directly or through corporate ownership), not using off-balance sheet gimmicks (such as special investment vehicles - SIVs), forbidding any type of family interactions with the business (such as placing family members on the Board), and the use of stock options as a transfer of wealth from corporate coffers to management’s pocket book. We feel strongly the fish rots from the head and it won’t be long before that rot works its way downwards.    
 
Create Deep External Facing and Inward looking Moats: In both good times and bad, we look for managers who can create exceptional defensive moats that can keep competitors at bay as well as drive significant value for their customers creating a moat that keeps them from seeking out replacement products and services. Sometimes managers can spend blood and capital digging a defensive moat but they spend little time listening to their customers’ needs. This type of one-way thinking can create significant weaknesses in looking for new offensive opportunities in existing customers, markets, or adjacent markets. An inward looking moat means management has developed the means to make their products and services essential to their customers’ strategy and operations. This type of in-depth value - for lack of a better term “the tape worm approach” - demands a nearly constant improvement in quality, scope of offering, and new products/services on a daily basis. It’s hard to find management and corporate structures that have the drive to approach each work day as means to radically improve their value to their clients. A great example of this is Veeva’s constant evolution of products and services in the biotechnology industry. In the past 5 years the company has launched 116 new offerings and made over 1200 changes to existing offerings. That’s a launch or change nearly every 2 days.        
 
Creates a Rock Solid Financial Castle: At Nintai Investments, we look for investment opportunities that can survive the most violent shock to its foundations. This can include a sudden elimination of access to any capital (the type of shock that overcame the financial markets in 2007 - 2009), a rapid increase/decrease in the Federal Reserves’ prime rate, or the LTCM failure demanding government intervention to stave off financial disaster. All of these led to some form of catastrophic market failure.  We look for a company that is reliant upon no one or no institution for survival or financial bailout in a time of market crisis. This requires a balance sheet with little to no debt (or the ability to pay 100% of liabilities with 1 year of free cash flow), high free cash flow yield, and outstanding returns on capital, equity, and assets. This demands we focus on cash rather than earnings because we believe in Alfred Rappaports’s “profits are an opinion, cash is a fact”. We recognize its is very difficult to sniff out financial shenanigans if management is intent on cheating and the consequences be damned. But we think keeping a hawk eye on cash gives us the best chance to avoid partnering with an unethical management team. 
 
A Singular Focus on Market Domination: We look for companies that seek to wholly dominate a market so large that the runway for growth is roughly 15 – 20 years. We want to know with some assurance the company will be in the same markets (or adjacent ones) dominating them with high market share, outstanding returns, and great gross and net margins for an extended period of time. Obviously it is difficult to find a company that operates in a monopoly or duopoly environment at a discount to our estimated intrinsic value, but it is possible in the micro to small-cap markets. Examples of this include iRadimed (IRMD), Computer Modelling Group (CMDXF), and Veeva (VEEV). Finding these hidden gems – which requires an awful lot of research and industry knowledge - can successfully drive investment returns for decades. We’ve often stated that two companies - Factset Research (FDS) and Manhattan Associates (MANH) - drove nearly 80% of the Nintai Partner’s internal investment fund’s outperformance. We still believe a combination of these gems with some larger companies that meet our criteria can provide outperformance with less risk. 
 
A Final Note
 
I would be remiss to say that successful investing isn’t about just quality companies. We firmly believe your financial investment advisors core intellectual (and emotional) models matter equally. These models should include acting on facts rather than emotions (in both bull and bear markets), always being intellectually open to new ideas, new industries, and new companies, being humble about your success and even more humble about failures, and reveling in diagnosing and discussing investment screw-ups. I’ve found over the years the latter is one of the greatest distinctions between Nintai and our competitors. While we have the same animal spirits as others in this field and are driven by our competition, we actually enjoy writing about our mistakes. Perhaps enjoy is too strong a word (after all we hate losing our investment partners’ hard earned capital), but we find discussing these occasional debacles helps ground our egos and forces us to better understand what happened, why it happened, and how to prevent it from happening again. So while quality investments drive returns, an investment manager should have qualities of excellence as well. 
 
We look forward to hearing your thoughts and comments. 
 
DISCLOSURE: Nintai Investments LLC has positions in iRadimed, Computer Modelling Group, Veeva, and Manhattan Associates in either or both business investment accounts or individual investment partner accounts.       
​

During the dog days of summer, we usually move everything outside, work on the deck, and suck up the summer sun. We take the down time to evaluate roughly one-half to two-thirds of our portfolio holdings. This includes taking apart the business case, looking at the competitive markets, diving into new products and services, and completing a truly deep dive on the company financials. We do this for two reasons – one is we want be assured each and every portfolio holding can still be considered very high quality. Second, we want to look back at our projections (strategic, operational, and financial) and be assured our assumptions are valid, valuations have not decreased (hopefully increased!), and the share price has not gotten too far ahead of our estimated intrinsic value. 
 
For some of our investment partners, these revised investment cases and valuation spreadsheets are like Christmas in July and August. For others, they go the pile to read after a relaxing summer vacation. We’re fine with either. We simply want our partners to have as much knowledge as we would like if we were in their shoes. 
 
I thought I’d break this in to two separate articles. The first part is reviewing what we would consider obstacles in defining quality for a possible investment. This isn’t a complete list. It isn’t even a full description of each item on this list. But I wanted to make it as simple as possible for investors to understand why poor quality can impair your returns. The second part is describing what we consider quality at Nintai Investments. Some readers will say “Oh God. I’ve heard all this before”. If you are a long term reader of my writing then you probably have. As Aristotle said “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit”. Nintai Investments (and its predecessor Nintai Partners) would have achieved very little as a company or an investment manager if we didn’t constantly hammer away on the concept of value. Looking through my last 100 articles, the second most common word was “quality” – coming up a total of 232 times. (“Value” was the number one word cited 431 times).  
 
Obstacles 
In some ways it’s much easier to identify what’s NOT quality than defining what IS quality. Some attributes that make up a non-quality company are the following.
 
Excess Goodwill: In almost any acquisition, the agreement between acquiree and acquirer involves a certain amount of negotiating that leads to overpayment. At Nintai Investments we recognize that’s part of the animal spirits that make up the capitalistic system. Having said that, I can remember a management team that completed $23.6B in acquisitions from 1998-2002. Over the period of 2003 – 2006 the company wrote off $23.2B of those acquisitions (a whopping 99%!). Management claimed this was a victimless crime – acquisitions were made nearly entirely in stock so who was harmed? Let me just say that when management can’t see the damage from the the evaporation of over 65% of total assets on the balance sheet, then they certainly don’t represent quality in our books.

Excessive Stock-Based Compensation: A cousin of the goodwill excess, is the gross overuse of stock-based compensation. Again, many claim this is a victimless crime until the payments are expensed under the cash flow statements. This snaps many heads around. For many companies, this type of executive compensation is simply a transfer of wealth as the company announces billions in stock buybacks while simply seeing those very stocks slide out the side door as enormous pay packages for executives. When you see a company announce a $500M stock buy back and total shares outstanding either remain flat (or worse increases) then it’s a good chance this is not an excellent company. 

WACC Exceeds ROIC: Don’t get hung up on the acronyms in this section. This simply means the company’s return on capital is less than its cost of capital. Let’s use a simple example to highlight this problem. Imagine you see that steak is on sale by 8% this week at the supermarket. Excited at the thought of eating steak all week, you whip out your credit card and purchase $100 worth of beautiful Delmonicos. You smile at the 8% in savings. Yet consider the other end of the transaction. The rate you pay your credit card is 24%. So while you’ve saved that 8%, the cost of that return is 24%. The formula is simple: 8% - 24% = -16%. Your return on invested capital has been far exceeded by your weighted average cost of capital. This type of disastrous financial model is sometimes explained away by the famous (or infamous) line – “don’t worry we’ll make it up on volume”. Any company that shares similarities to this example is certainly not a quality company. 
 
Customer Churn/Turnover is in the Double Digits: A company that relies on constant turnover and finding new customers is highly likely to be a low-margin business with no moat. Some businesses are notorious for churn which further drives down margins. Take for example wireless phone companies. You constantly hear of dissatisfied customers, switching from Sprint, to Verizon Wireless, to US Cellular, to AT&T Wireless. It’s a never-ending movement seeking the Shangra-La of coverage with constant rebate offers, and fine print that can only be found on the seventh level of Hell.   

The Company’s Product Is A Nice-to-Have: The road to personal wealth is littered with the wreck of thousands of businesses that were the “new hot thing” until they weren’t. You’ve probable owned one of these in either your personal or professional lives. These are products or services you swear you can’t survive without until the next recession hits and you have to choose between keeping the lights on or having that $59/month answering service. The one that provides an $8/hour operator with the most gorgeous Scots accent and gives your company that “international” flavor. Pretty cool when you are rolling in dough, but the first to go in tough times. The company’s price falls 85% before filing for bankruptcy late Friday night when it’s impossible to save even the smallest part of your investment. 

Capital is Essential to Business Operations: The first trading under the buttonwood tree on Wall Street was designed to meet the needs that all capital markets provide – creating access to capital. Well run markets and companies will dip their toes (hell…even their entire lower waist) to obtain capital to increase production, complete an acquisition, or extend operations overseas. This financing can be in either debt or equity in structure. The trouble begins when debt (or issuance of equity) becomes necessary simply to keep the doors open. When a holding maxes out its credit line or raises $2B in convertible debt to “explore strategic solutions”, this certainly isn’t a quality company.            

Conclusions
 
There are many ways to make money on Wall Street. Since its first trades in the 18th century, the New York Stock Exchange has seen hundreds – if not thousands – of techniques used to make money in the buying and selling of equities. Since then we’ve had an explosion in the number of exchanges along with the types of things to trade ranging from corn futures to collaterized mortgage securities. At Nintai Investments, we’ve tried to keep our investment model simple and limited in its adoption of risk. We don’t trade derivatives in any way, shape or form, we don’t short, we don’t trade debt, and we avoid anything but the highest quality in companies. This article has briefly discussed what is not quality. The next article will discuss the qualities we look for in an investment - and more importantly – why its critical to our long term success as investment managers. Please feel free to send in any comments or questions and we will try to reply as soon as possible. We hope everyone finds a way to stay cool. 
 
 

To Our Investment Partners:

Enclosed you will find the first batch of revised investment cases and valuation spreadsheets of Nintai Investment portfolio holding companies. These are for the first half of 2020. Some of these you may own, some you may not. We have included all of them, so that you might get a better sense of understanding of our methodology and selection process. 

An issue too large to ignore is the COVID-19 pandemic. Dependent on where you or your portfolio companies reside, you might see little impact to significant disruption. Worldwide there have been 13.8M confirmed cases through July 15 2020. Roughly 7.74M individuals have recovered with 591,000 confirmed deaths. Here in the United States where Nintai Investments is headquartered, there have been 3.53M confirmed cases along with 178,000 confirmed deaths. Basic math shows the US has been hit particularly hard. Regardless of your political persuasion, these numbers show that American business has taken a very real hit. 

So what does this mean for your portfolios and impact on returns? A couple of things. First, the type of holding we seek at Nintai Investments has the financial and business acumen to withstand very hard shots to the system. Company’s have little or no leverage so there is little pressure for debt servicing. Second, competitive moats are very broad and deep assuring both strength against competitors and continued demand from customers. Additionally, valuations are as likely to go up as come down. We see this playing out in Q2 2020. Finally, prices are far more stable and will likely recover more quickly. Again, we see this playing out in Q2 2020. 

Some of the companies in our portfolio are taking longer to report their returns or it is taking longer to generate reports because we can’t talk to customers or vendors. An example is FANUC, located in India where the country has been swamped by over 1M COVID cases. We also have not been able to chat with over 50% of the customers and vendors that assist us in better understanding the company’s results. Consequently several reports will be delayed. On a more personal note, two individuals we’ve known for decades and who have been both tremendous sources of data and teachers, we lost to COVID-19. Things like that put it all in perspective. We will miss Sanjay and Billy tremendously and send our love and prayers to their families and loved ones. 

Enclosed you will find three of the first investment cases and valuation spreadsheets - Biogen, F5, and Check Point. Fanuc has been delayed due to company issues and the loss of Sanjay. Next week’s batch  - Biosyent, SEI Investments, Guidewire, and Novo Nordisk will be delivered on Friday, July 24 2020. Please don’t hesitate to contact me with any questions. My best wishes. 

Tom
   

A moat wasn’t always used to just protect against enemy attack. During a siege the moat made it equally difficult for the defenders to sortie from the castle. It’s no different in business. A moat can also make it difficult for the customer leave and hire a competitor. Finding such a company - either as a vendor or potential investment - requires a Goldilocks company.
 
In 1864, Ulysses Grant became commander of all Union forces. Choosing to lead while attaching himself to the Army of the Potomac, several senior officers started warning him about how gifted Robert E. Lee – commander of the opposing Confederate Army of Northern Virginia – was and how he could do things no other general could conceive. After hearing these claims just a little too much, Grant finally burst out saying “Let’s stop worrying about what Lee does, and worry about what we are going to do to beat him”. In the end of course, Grant forced Lee to the point he lost the ability to maintain the initiative and ended the war a year later at Appomattox Court House. 
 
I bring up this story because I think many investors sometimes get the wrong end of the intellectual stick when it comes to the concept of moats. The idea of a competitive moat comes from Warren Buffett and has - like the concept of Mr. Market - been invaluable to investors to understanding core concepts in value investing. The idea is simple: much like a Middle Age castle that dug a moat to protect against attack, so a company will build a moat to protect its products and services from competition.  In a recent article I discussed that sometimes the best measures of diagnosing a moat are outside of the standard measures of return on capital, return on equity, gross/net margins, etc. In the article, I discussed how utilizing data from a holdings customers and other such data not found in more traditional research can make a huge difference in finding compounding machines. I used Veeva (VEEV) and Adobe (ADBE) as working examples. 
 
In this article, I thought I’d invert the concept of moats and take a look at the concept from a more distinct - and often overlooked - view that can greatly impact one’s valuation and decision to include in the portfolio.   
 
Rethinking the Moat Concept
 
Many people think of moats from this competitive perspective. With an eye towards competition, the company will try to utilize internal development, R&D, acquisitions (large & small) and constant quality improvements to stay ahead of their competition. At Nintai Investments, we think about moats somewhat differently. We think moats can be perceived as keeping competitors at bay as well as keeping customers even closer. Rather than just keeping competitors out, we like to think that a good moat will also keep customers in, with a portfolio holding continually broadening the moat to keep the customer purchasing ever greater products and services. By inverting the standard moat approach, I think an investor can identify some of the strongest companies in the market. Not only can evaluate how growth might slow, you also identify where growth will come over the next decade or two.   
 
Components for Keeping the Customer
 
As you invert the moat model, it’s important to realize you are now looking at the relationship between your portfolio holding and their customers, not their competitors. Looking outwards, one views the moat and ascertains the risks associated with other companies that might assault it with new products, price reductions, increased quality, patent challenges etc. These all have the ability to impede future growth. Looking inward, we are more interested in seeing how your portfolio company has created ties with its customers that make it both difficult to move to a competitor and increase revenue through increased sales. The former (moat as competitive deterrent) is about reacting defensively to outside forces. The latter (moat as binding portfolio holding with its customers) is about reacting offensively and creating new opportunities for growth and profits. 
 
It’s critically important that investors see this distinction and be able to evaluate the moat from both perspectives. One requires significant knowledge of competitors, market trends, and technology innovation. The other requires extremely deep understanding of customer strategy and operations, organizational structure, vendor contracting practices, etc. The ability to see both views will give you more knowledge about your portfolio holding than most analysts have on Wall Street. I should point out the ability to achieve success with so much research requires individual investors (and small investment shops) to run a relatively focused portfolio. 
 
A Working Example
 
To get a better understanding of this dual approach I thought I’d use one of the same companies discussed in my last article (and Nintai Investment portfolio holding) Veeva (VEEV). Veeva operates two major businesses. The first - Veeva Commercial Cloud - is a vertically integrated customer relationship management (CRM) services. Cloud is designed to create real time collaboration between different components of a life science company’s sales, marketing, and promotion components of a product team. It also has a regulatory component which is critical to making sure the customer doesn’t run afoul of anti-kickback laws and statutes. The company currently has 80% market share (and growing) with extraordinarily high retention rates. The second offering - Veeva Vault - grew out of Life Science’s needs for assistance outside of their CRM efforts. Vault provides products for the remaining business units in Life Sciences - regulatory and compliance, manufacturing quality (CGMP or current good manufacturing practices regulations), safety (OSHA requirements), and R&D (clinical discovery and development). 
 
The Moat as Defensive Weapon
 
 As Veeva looks outwards, they want their moat to protect against individual competitor’s products and services, technological innovation, and market innovations. As Veeva’s platform is built on Salesforce (CRM) technology and the Veeva team is former CRM team members, Salesforce is not seen as a direct competitor at this time (it may be later, but not for now). Currently, Veeva’s major competitors are companies such as Open Text (OTEX), IQVIA (IQV), Oracle (ORCL), Kapture, and PharmaCODE (Softdent), etc. There isn’t a company (perhaps other than Oracle) that competes against Veeva in all of its offerings. 
 
Veeva spends $227M in research and development or roughly 21% of total revenue. This is a substantial percentage compared to its competitors and demonstrates the intensity in which it confronts competitors. This spending has dug a significant moat around both its offerings in biopharma and has allowed for a head start in several industries with similar characteristics. These include cosmetics, food manufacturers, and other regulated production and marketing processes. 
 
As a defensive tool, Veeva’s moat works in several ways in keeping its competitors at bay. These include technological advances, new (and trademarked) products and services, and increased functionality. 
 
Technological Advances
Veeva continues to utilize technology as a differentiator in its battle with competitors. Examples of this include Veeva CRM Approved Notes (May 2019) and Veeva CRM’s Autosync (August 2019). Veeva CRM Approved Notes is designed to make it easier for sales representatives to utilize free text (not like drop down boxes where the user is limited to pre-set answers). Veeva Approved Messaging will add support for messaging applications such as WeChat and WhatsApp to open up new digital channels for compliant engagement. Ultimately, this will allow users to apply artificial intelligence (AI). Veeva Autosync makes it possible for all information - regardless of device - to be consistent. Activity, customer, and product data will automatically synchronize and always be available from any Apple and Windows phone, tablet, and laptop. This is a huge step in meeting intra-company interoperability. 
 
New and Trademarked Products
A key competitive advantage is the ability to protect your product with a patent or trademark. Patents are the number one source of moats for biopharmaceuticals allowing exclusivity for 12 – 20 years for each new product. Veeva currently has 25 approved patents. Each of these makes up a facet of its competitive moat. These patents range from “System and method for creating a new account in CRM” 
(patent #: 10467629 November 9 2015) to “System and method for controlling electronic communications”, (patent #: 10169480 January 1 2019). These patents protect major components of Veeva’s products. 
 
Increased Functionality  
To stay ahead of competitors, it is critical for a company to continually add functionality to its existing systems as it builds out entirely new offerings. In Veeva’s case, an example of this is their rolling out of several new functionalities to its CRM product. At its Barcelona Users Summit in 2019, the company rolled out new functionality that allows its customers greater flexibility for improved collaboration and productivity. This increased functionality increased Veeva’s lead in the biopharma space and widened its competitive moat against new competitive efforts. 
 
All three of these are designed to separate Veeva from its competitors and create a wide competitive moat. A quick look at the numbers show the efforts are paying off. Patient churn (those not reupping current services) is less than 1.2%. Return on invested capital of 65% far exceeds its weighted average cost of capital of 5.6%. Free cash margins are roughly 40%. All of these numbers reflect a company with a strong competitive advantage.  
 
The Moat as Offensive Weapon
 
But this rally only tells half the story. A deep moat also makes it hard for a customer to jump ship and join a competitor. The moat should be as powerful holding customers in as it is keeping customers out. It’s easy to forget this. Sometimes companies are so focused on customers they fail to satisfy their customers. Inverted, it can be equally true - companies so focused on their customers can some time lose sight of where their competitors are headed. If I had my druthers, I would certainly pick the former over the latter. 
 
When analyzing a moat as a tool for looking inward, there are three factors you should look for - deep subject matter/customer knowledge, customized applications, and the ability to bring whatever resources are necessary to the table.    
 
Deep Subject Matter/Customer Knowledge
Veeva has extraordinary depth of knowledge in the life sciences and pharmaceutical industries. For over 13 years the company has worked exclusively in the space. Its customers have been clients for a decade or more. They have deep ties with both C-Suite and operational leaders and an intimate understanding of their needs. Having branched into nearly every part of the business, Veeva staff can create fully integrated products that seamlessly fit into their clients’ model. They can listen to some the more esoteric parts of the business and be able to find how that might integrate this into another business segment and increase both components’ value. In short, they are truly subject matter experts. 
 
Customized Applications
Such a deep understanding of each client’s needs means Veeva can create products to meet industry needs or customize these to individual company needs. For instance, a company with a deep focus on R&D in oncology immunotherapy will have very 
 
different product needs than a large biopharma with several large blockbuster drugs and a strategy to build growth with smaller snap on acquisitions. The demand to focus on large CRM systems will be much less in the former than the latter. Conversely, the latter will need an extremely robust CRM component to track sales, marketing, and promotion for its large product teams in the field. 
 
Ability to Bring Resources to the Table    
Finding a vendor that can be flexible and nimble in its thought processes and also have the resources to fund multiple options can be very difficult. That vendor must reside – in Stephen Hawking’s phrase – where the environment must be “just right”. This Goldilocks company must be nimble enough to keep up with industry innovations, individual customization, and complex technology problem solving. The company must have enough cash flow to pay for ongoing customer-driven R&D, while utilizing additional dollars to identify and create products for new industries. This takes a company with a rock solid balance sheet and high free cash flow margins. 
 
Conclusions
 
Finding a company where the moat is just as effective at keeping competitors out as keeping customers in is a difficult proposition. It requires a tremendous amount of legwork as only some of he data is publicly available. As a biopharma company, finding a vendor that meets the criteria outlined as equally hard for an investor. I’ve written before that the research criteria I use on GuruFocus gets me a list of roughly 150 companies that might be a company like the ones I’ve described. I say “might” because meeting search criteria can answer general questions about margins, free cash flow, or cash on the balance sheet. It doesn’t tell us how good their relationships are with management, or how innovative they are, or the flexibility in their thinking to meet individual company needs. These latter characteristics are essential to finding the 10 baggers that all investors seek and why they are so hard to find.
 
As always I look forward to your thoughts and comments. 
 
DISCLOSURE: Nintai Investments LLC owns shares of Veeva and Adobe in client accounts.   

“We define an economic – or competitive – moat as the ability of a portfolio company to create a product or service that is essential to their customer’s strategy or operations. An example of this might be a platform that is essential to capture, analyze and report customer usage data. There are companies like this – Veeva being an example – that are essential to life sciences drug development, promotion, and sales. This in turn generates extraordinary return on capital. Over time, you end up with a holding that is an essential part of their customer’s business that generates extraordinary profits. What’s not to like?”

                                                                                   -        Nintai Investments LLC 

What Makes A Quality Investment?
Over the course of my investment career, I’ve invested in roughly 250 companies. Holding times have ranged from 6 months to 12 years. All of them have met certain criteria which I’ve written about over the years - high returns on capital, equity, assets, high free cash flow margins, and low to no debt. But there are intangible qualities to each of these companies that might create competitive advantages that can’t be simply quantified though a set of ratios.  
 
Importance to Strategy and Operations
A key characteristic we look for at Nintai Investments is a company that produces products or services that are essential in assisting their customers carry out their strategies and operations. This might include everything from creative work (slogans, product jingoes) to building parts essential to making the product operate at peak efficiency. Simply put, their customers wouldn’t be nearly as successful without your portfolio company’s products and services.   
 
Replacement Difficulty
Another sign of quality is the difficulty of a customer in finding a replacement for that specific portfolio holding. An example of this is Fastenal (FAST). The company maintains thousands of vending machines and local shops that supply parts nearly instantaneously keeping manufacturing floor downtime to a minimum. Most companies simply don’t have the scope of product to meet those needs. 
 
Embedded Strength
Any company with a deep and wide moat should have relationship deeply embedded with their costumer’s senior management team. This means a strong web of corporate relationships, a deep sense of trust that the company can meet its promises and deliver product on time, and a long history of quality. These types of intangibles make it hard for any competitor to make inroads in terms of relationships with the customer.    
 
Industrial Expertise
Finally, the portfolio holding should have both a wide and deep knowledge of the industry of their customers. The company should be able to brain storm with middle to senior executives on problem solving potential issues from customer needs to plant operations. This type of knowledge allows a portfolio holding to not only build on existing product lines but develop new solutions unheard or unthought of previously.
 
A Working Example
 
A working example of how Nintai Investments evaluates both existing and potential investment holdings was the purchase of Veeva (VEEV) and Adobe (ADBE) during the market drops in December 2018. Both companies have Pfizer (PFE) as customers and we decided to evaluate the two holdings versus three different vendors who also work with Pfizer - Microsoft (MSFT), ICON Plc (a contract research organization or CRO), and Omnicom (an advertising agency). In Figure 1 is the summary report of the five companies and their respective ratings. 
 
This graphic is typical of the type of work that we generate during research at Nintai Investments LLC. It helps us understand where the strength – and weaknesses – lie with both a potential investment as well as other major vendors at key customers. The goal of course is to isolate the possible weaknesses in our investment case as well as test our knowledge of both a typical customer along with its market. We will generally test these graphics (and the associated ratings) with individuals in the customer we are evaluating (in this case Pfizer) as well as individuals we might know at the competitors listed.   

​In May 2018, Nintai Investments LLC completed an in-depth survey with Pfizer’s middle and senior level executives to discuss the importance the company perceived in two of our portfolio holdings - Veeva (VEEV) and Adobe (ADBE). We then matched these with three other vendors working with Pfizer. The intention of the research was to measure the strength of the intangible qualities of the companies’ moats. In other words, did Veeva and Adobe have stronger (or said differently - “deeper”) roots into their customer Pfizer. 
 
What We Found
 
Over time, Nintai Investments has spent an inordinate amount of time trying to better understand what makes a moat deeper, wider, and increasingly difficult to overcome. What we’ve come to think (and this in no way makes it true) is the previously mentioned intangibles - only found in deep industry and corporate knowledge - are the key components that drive long-term moat duration. Here’s why: 
      
Depth of Relationship Increases Returns
As a portfolio holding company offers an increasing number of products and services, the company should increase returns over time (see “New Markets are Less Capital Intensive” for more thoughts on this). Done successfully, these products and services embed the portfolio company deeper and deeper into their customers’ operations. For instance, Veeva began by offering customer relationship management software for sales and promotion. The company spread its products and services into research site operations, clinical data management, clinical operations, regulatory requirements, etc. As the number of offerings increase, their strength is magnified by their integrative capabilities. At this point, Veeva is so deeply embedded in life sciences it would be extraordinarily difficult to displace them.  
 
Industrial Knowledge Provides A Huge Edge
When a company like Veeva focuses on one particular market (in this case life sciences) and learns what makes the industry really tick (for instance reimbursement is more important that physician prescribing for some drug classes), a company can begin to really dominate a market and provide a great growth story. For instance, Veeva currently dominates Life Sciences CRM and has seen earnings growth of 50% and free cash flow growth of 60% over the past 5 years. Omnicom has no clear dominance in any market and has seen roughly 8% and 5% growth respectively over the same time period. Which company has a potentially greater growth story? Obviously nothing is written in stone, but my money currently is on Veeva.    
 
New Markets are Less Capital Intensive
When an investor looks at a Veeva or Adobe, it becomes apparent their strategy is to move into adjacent industries where capital outlays are limited by the existence of current products and similarities between industries. For instance, Veeva’s move into cosmetics makes sense in the fact the industry faces very similar operations as life sciences - design and testing of human-usage products, federal regulatory requirements, product safety, etc. The ability to remain asset and capital light in its research and development, product manufacturing, etc. continues to push margins and returns on capital higher. 
 
Conclusions
 
Finding an investment with high quality characteristics is both a numbers driven and industry/company specific process. Running a screen that gives you a list of companies with high returns on capital and equity, no debt, and high free cash flow margins is only 15 - 20% of the research process. The ability to define why and how a company achieves those numbers and how it can maintain them for the next two decades requires an enormous amount of contacts, industry journal reading, and interviews (both potential investment management, customers, industry leaders, etc.). At Nintai Investments, we believe we have enough knowledge in perhaps 50 - 75 companies and 2 - 3 industries to invest in over the next decade. Understanding the quality of those companies - both numbers wise and in a broader business sense can give you an edge that not many players on Wall Street can compete with over a 10 year period. 
 
As always, I look forward to your thoughts and comments. 
 
DISCOSURES: Nintai Investments owns positions in Veeva and Adobe in individual privately managed accounts. 
    

“The greater the fear, the greater the chance that correlations between different asset classes will begin to merge closer to 1. Overtime, this makes the investment universe less and less protected against risk. Theoretically, the correlation between corporate debt with a BBB rating issued by a company with a $10B in debt, $50M in cash, and negative free cash flow should be drastically different than corporate debt issued by a company with an AA credit rating, no debt, and high free cash margins. Yet in October 2008, we found over 50 cases where such disparate corporate debt traded at a nearly perfect 1.0 correlative factor. Go figure."           
                                                                             -     Simon R. Bellows

Asset correlation is a measure of how investments move in relation to one another and when those movements happen. When assets move in the same direction at the same time, they are considered to be highly correlated. When one asset tends to move up when the another goes down, the two assets are considered to be negatively correlated. Fidelity describes correlation from 100% to -100%. In their “The Pros Guide to Diversification” they state:

“Correlation is a number from -100% to 100% that is computed using historical returns. A correlation of 50% between two stocks, for example, means that in the past when the return on one stock was going up, then about 50% of the time they return on the other stock was going up, too. A correlation of -70% tells you that historically, 70% of the time they were moving in opposite directions—one stock was going up, and the other was going down. A correlation of 0 means that the returns of assets are completely uncorrelated. If two assets are considered to be non-correlated, the price movement of one asset has no effect on the price movement of the other asset. 

In a great article by Mark Maggiulli of Marker[1], he pointed out the difference between correlation of returns between assets during the credit asset market crash in 2008 - 2009 and the market crash in February - March 2020 brought on by the coronavirus. In the former crash (see Figure 1), the red lines show a positive correlation between the higher risk assets such as US stocks, international stocks, REITs, and emerging markets equities. Conversely, the blue lines show a negative correlation between lower risk assets (such as 20 year treasuries) versus the entire higher risk category of equites. In the coronavirus crash of 2020, it’s easy to see the nearly complete panic setting in as nearly every asset correlation showed a positive correlation with every other asset class (see Figure 2). 

​Figure 1: +/- Correlation Between Risky and Non-Risky Assets: Credit Asset Market Crash 2008-2009 Source: Marker.com

​Figure 2: + Correlation Between Risky and Non-Risky Assets: Corona Virus Market Crash 2020 Source: Marker.com

​What This Means
Two clear differences between the credit asset market crash in 2008 - 2009 and the coronavirus crash in February - March 2020 was both the speed in which the crashes took place and the drastic differences in correlations between “risky” and “safe” asset classes. 

Time and Correlation in the Credit Asset Market Crash
In the credit asset market collapse, the bear market took a series of cascading events that brought the market to its final lows. Events such as Bear Stearns’ collapse, Lehman Brothers’ bankruptcy, the AIG/Freddie and Fannie bail outs - all led to a slow draw down in the markets followed by a relatively classic recession. The only difference was the length and duration of the recovery with some industries disappearing entirely. However, unemployment peaked at roughly 10.5% or less than half of the Great Depression from 1929 - 1940. During this crash and ensuing recession, Figure 1 shows that there was both positive and negative correlations between asset classes. There was a positive correlation between risky assets (meaning domestic and US-stocks moved in a similar fashion (usually down!) but there was a negative correlation between higher risk (stocks, real estate, etc.) and lower risk assets (bonds, treasuries, etc.) As stocks went down, bonds remained flat or increased in value.
      
Time and Correlation in the Coronavirus Market Crash
The coronavirus crash was like nothing I’ve seen in my investing career. Compared to the credit asset market crash, the coronavirus crash exploded onto the world stage in roughly 60 days. By March 18th, the S&P 500 was down 27% YTD, the German DAX was down 38%, and the Japanese Nikkei was down 29%. These drops mostly happened in just 45 days or less. The credit markets came under enormous strain and even US Treasuries were sold in droves. In a mere month, the entire global economy seemed to have suffered a massive cardiac event. Combine this with a global pandemic that went from roughly 100 cases in January 2020 to over 4,000,000 by May 2020, with over 300,000 confirmed deaths worldwide and nearly 90,000 in the US by May 2020. Unemployment in the US jumped by roughly 30,000,000 cases in just 6 weeks reaching unemployment rates we haven’t seen since the Great Depression. The speed and scope of the crash was like nothing we’ve seen in nearly 90 years. Equally important - as Figure 2 shows - there was absolutely no place to hide (save cash) as nearly every asset cash’s correlation factor went to 1.    
 
Looking Forward
You often hear that investors get caught fighting the current war with the last war’s weapons. That was certainly the case in this year’s crash. While investors worried about asset prices, debt levels, and valuations (which all mattered), no one could possibly have guessed a global pandemic would close down the entire global economy and suddenly having us face a global depression. As always, I think there are several key takeaways from such debacles in the market place. 

Cash Will Always Be King. All Hail the King
During downturns like we saw in February, March, and April, cash is the only asset with liquidity, value, and stability that can save investors from truly awful losses. At Nintai Investments LLC, our average investment partner portfolio had somewhere between 15 – 30% of assets under management in cash. We didn’t have any special crystal ball which foresaw with a market crash or a global pandemic. Rather we saw nearly every asset class was (and still is) overvalued. This could mean only one thing – during a crash nearly every asset would be equally correlated to its neighbor – US stocks to emerging market stocks to global debt. Nearly every overpriced asset would see a dramatic drop in value – with the exception of cash.   

Panic Leads to Matching Correlation……..
When a real panic sets in – and a pandemic that effects 400,000,000 people, killing 313,000, and shuts down nearly the entire global economy – can create such a scenario, then you will see investors selling nearly every investment they can lay their hands on. Whether it be municipal bond mutual funds to triple leveraged oil futures funds, outright panic impacts everything from the credit markets, to the real estate market, to precious metals and other commodities. Figure 2 shows that the latest crash – combined with the economic cardio infarction – brings nearly every asset class into perfect correlative alignment.   

And Matching Correlations Provide no Hiding Place
I’ll be the first to admit that I’m very old fashioned when it comes to creating portfolios. I don’t like to try any type of new sexy “triple negative/positive absolute return exceptional fund” that nearly (but not always of course) states that you won’t lose money in such a fund. I’ve found that the more words in the name of a mutual fund the lesser chance an investor a.) understands the funds strategy or b.) it remotely hits its target returns over time. At Nintai Investments we tend to purchase only two 
things - publicly traded equities and a money market sweep account that holds assets as close to cash as possible. Very rarely do these two have positive correlations. Generally stocks either go up or down and the money market fund goes nowhere. In this model a generous percentage of our client AUM does nothing – it remains as an anchor preventing exorbitant losses (and exorbitant gains). This yin and yang of correlative values has allowed my portfolios at Nintai Partners and Nintai Investments to reap significant gains in market crashes. The past few months have been no different. If I lose several points to the upside while saving double digit losses on the downside, I am very comfortable with this model.     
 
Conclusions
The past quarter gave investors that rare insight when assets across the spectrum all near perfect correlation with each other. When this happens it mean one (or more) of several things. First, all assets are equally overvalued and the markets recognize them as such. Second, investors have reached a stage of complete and utter panic where they sell all assets regardless of type, their portfolio role, or their valuation. At Nintai Investments, we believe the sudden correlation of so many assets was a mix of both reasons. Investors have been part of a bull market that – with several exceptions – has seen markets (both equities and bonds) rise for nearly 10 straight years. In addition, in a very short three month period, the entire global economy collapsed under the weight of a novel coronavirus. Finally, many investors were fighting the last war looking for issues related to credit issues or real estate. 

​A rather simple lesson to learn from this recent crash has been to keep your portfolio design and selection as simple as possible. This doesn’t mean use only three index funds or two asset classes. But rather create a model that can easily adjust for rapid changes in the marketplace and the outside geopolitical and economic conditions. It might be as simple as moving 2% of your AUM into cash for every point above the markets’ fair value as calculated by Morningstar. Whatever you choose, make sure to keep it simple and that it allows you to sleep at night. 
 
As always, I look forward to your thoughts and comments 
DISCLOSURES: None

​[1] “How the Coronavirus Crash Is Different From the 2008 Financial Crisis”, Marker.com Mark Maggiulli, March 31, 2020. The article can be found here.

"Over the years, I've often been asked for investment advice, and in the process of answering I've learned a good deal about human behavior. My regular recommendation has been a low-cost S&P 500 index fund. To their credit, my friends who possess only modest means have usually followed my suggestion. I believe, however, that none of the mega-rich individuals, institutions or pension funds has followed that same advice when I've given it to them."
 
                                                          -   Warren Buffett, 2016 Berkshire Annual Report
 
For decades there has been a raging debate about the index fund versus the actively managed model. Which model achieves best returns? Which model achieves the best risk/reward? Does low cost and low turnover beat out the efficient market theory? This debate will likely rage for another century with no consensus being reached.
 
I’ve found the debate to be a waste of time and print. I think the answer - like most of life’s thorny issues - is a hybrid solution. Value investing is no different. I firmly believe that successful investing requires purchasing an asset for an adequate discount to its estimated fair value. I also think that discount must contain an adequate margin of safety. But I also demand that companies be of the highest quality - no short/long term debt, high return on equity, return on assets, and return on equity (meaning greater that 15-20%). I also look for free cash margins of 25% or greater. Finally, I look for - what my business partner once called “the tapeworm effect” - where the portfolio company’s products and services are deeply embedded in the infrastructure making it nearly impossible to swap out to a competitor. This blend of depressed prices merged with high quality has worked well for me. My investment partners have seen significant outperformance – particularly since the Covid-19 crash.
 
The Returns Speak for Themselves
 
This crash has reopened the debate about active versus indexing. In the last 60 days alone there have been over 100 articles in major print financial journals about the war between active and indexing. As I mentioned, we think this is a rather stale argument. Seen below is a graphic representing the average return for Nintai Investment’s customers versus several key bogies. Note that all of these represent indexed funds. Losses would be greater for actively managed funds.  

Without a doubt you can see a significant difference between the indexed funds and Nintai Investments LLC returns. (I should note the disparity between the two is consistent with Nintai Partner’s corporate fund returns). It’s not a pretty picture for even for index fund managers. Whether you accept that index or active managers get better returns in the short or long term, the bottom line is both groups lost abysmally in the first quarter of 2020.
 
In the same period, you can see Nintai Investment’s average portfolio return was
–9.20%. While not anything to write home about, it’s roughly half of the S&P 500 and nearly 60% better than the Russell 2000 (Nintai’s preferred proxy due to portfolio size). This isn’t to boast about Nintai’s portfolio (though we are very pleased for our investment partners). Rather we think this demonstrates the thin gruel passed off in the argument about value versus growth. As Warren Buffett said “you can’t separate them”.
 
Growth, Value, and Price: Why Limit Yourself
 
We think outperformance in both Nintai Partner’s internal fund as well as Nintai Investment’s short-term record demonstrate that growth, valuation, and quality are the most potent combination. (We love to joke about being G-VaP ((pronounced gee-vap)) investors) We think G-VaP gives investors the best chance at long-term outperformance of both active and value indexing. Here’s why.
 
Growth
An asset can’t grow in price long-term without…..growth. It may increase due to inflation or investor passions, but nearly always tumbles back. Gold is an example of this. There is a limited amount of gold in the world with a certain amount of small additions extracted from mines around the world. But it has no earnings, no free cash flow, essentially……no growth. Compared to a Cognex (CGNX) which has grown free cash flow 25% annually over the last 10 years, gold has a long way to go.  
 
Valuation
When an investor overpays for an asset, it becomes increasingly hard to see outperformance in the long-term. One only has to think of buying technology stocks in late-1999, funds invested in triple leveraged mortgage-backed securities in 2007, or Bitcoin in December 2017. Timing isn’t everything, but pricing means an awful lot. Developing a valuation model (or stealing one) is an essential tool to identify when to buy and how much you should pay.
 
Quality  
On Wall Street there is a hundred ways to skin a cat. But the real money isn’t made in upcycles, it’s made in the down cycles. Let’s assume you were unfortunately gullible (and greedy) in December 2019 and you bought Acme Rubber Band Company at $100 per share. During Q1 the stock dropped 80% to $20 per share. Bad luck! But there is even worse mathematics at play. You will now need a 500% increase to get back to even. These types of losses rarely happen to companies of extremely high quality (like those defined earlier - no debt, high free cash flow, and customer-based tapeworm relationships with their customers. Those 80% losses can permanently impair your (or your investment partner’s) hard earned dollars.  
 
Conclusions
 
Many value investors practice one or two the value triangle (growth, valuation, and quality) I’ve outlined in this article. For instance, traditional value investors might seek low growth and low valuation, but unfortunately also get poor quality. Building a
 
portfolio of companies with all three attributes is difficult, but possible. Just take a look at this latest crash in Q1 2020. A company like Abiomed (ABMD) dropped from $450 per share to a low of roughly $130 per share on March 20 2020. Has the company’s value dropped by roughly 65% in a little over one year? In the last 12 months free cash flow has grown 35%, earnings have grown 12%, and revenue has grown 14.7%. Compared to ten year numbers, nearly every category has decreased. It is still a company that has no debt, $492M in cash/short-term instruments, 25% ROE, 22.5% ROA, 39.5% ROIC, and 30.5% FCF margins. It has 97% retention with customers over the past 5 years. Does such a company merit such a drop in share price? We don’t think so.    
 
Companies – with all three attributes present at one time – comes along rarely – but more often than you think. Particularly after such a market crackup, it worth rummaging around and seeing what’s out there (hint: 7 of Nintai’s core holdings trade below 70% of their estimated intrinsic value as of April 27, 2020). You might be surprised how quickly you can start building your own G-VaP portfolio.
 
As always I look forward to your thoughts and comments.
 
DISCLOSURE: Nintai Investments LLC owns Cognex in both investment partner portfolios and Nintai Investment’s own portfolio. Nintai Investments LLC holds Abiomed in some investment partner portfolios.    
 
 

"The huge volatility of the market broke down all but the most fundamental relationships between markets and securities.  The usual day-to-day world where investors cared about subtleties like corporate earnings or analysts’ forecasts dissolved as the energy of the market was turned up.  All stocks moved together; if it was a stock, it was sold like it was plasma physics: as matter becomes hotter, it becomes less differentiated.  The forces that bond atoms together in the form of molecules are overwhelmed, so that rather than having a myriad of different substances, we have the elemental building blocks of the atoms.  Turn up the heat even more and the atoms themselves are melded into plasma, positively charged ions and negatively charged free electrons; matter in its most uniform and non-differentiated state, no longer hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms, just a seething white-hot blur of matter.”
                                         -          Richard Bookstaber, “A Demon of Our Own Design”
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During times of crisis, it’s often said that multiple correlations all converge at 1 as panic settles in – REIT owners, preferred stock owners, and even bond owners all look at their assets through identical lenses. As fear grows increasingly into panic, investors begin to see the heat rise even further into that “seething white-hot blur of matter” that Bookstaber discusses. Soon all assets – bonds, stocks, even derivatives – begin to narrow their correlation until it that trade near 1.

Morningstar just published a great article on why correlations tighten until they hit 1 during market corrections[1].  It’s important to remember that not every downturn in the markets drives correlations to near equal status. During the 1998 Asian currency crisis, all the categories of US diversified stock funds losses ranged from 1.7% to 22.6%. Not even close to a tight correlation. However, the coronavirus has induced a level of panic in the markets that selling (and buying) have pushed correlations the closest to 1 since the great recession.

So what makes this latest crash so intriguing? First, when Morningstar looked at all nine categories of UD diversified stock funds, the range in average losses was incredibly narrow and small – ranging from 10.8% and 11.6% starting from Feb. 19 - the S&P 500 high - and Feb. 27. Historically, this is a remarkably small range. What makes the small range so interesting, is the data show it to exist in nearly every respective type of fund. The most interesting to us at Nintai - and likely everyone at GuruFocus - is the difference between growth and value. It’s been a near given mantra that value will outperform growth during downdrafts in the market. So how did value do against the market in the initial period of collapse from February 19 -  February 27?
It turns out during the virus-induced crash, there was very little difference between value and growth performance. During the period, value funds on average posted losses of 11.25% versus an 11.11% average drop for growth funds. The second category that Morningstar looked at was the difference between small-caps and large-caps. Again the difference was minimal between the two – small-caps posted a negative return of 10.94% versus a large-cap return of a negative 11.30%.    
      
Of course, the S&P 5000 has dropped roughly 32% since its peak in February. Have the numbers changed any as the losses have increased? The initial review of the data suggest not. Value funds have lost roughly 31.6% since market highs while growth funds have lost roughly 33.2% during the same time. At its most basic, this market crash - driven by a virus of unknown nature, pathology, and treatment - has driven correlations to 1 from the onset of the disease/crash to its current state.     

What Does All This Mean?
All of this has left us with some heady questions between the cause of the crash, the impact of the disease, and potential length and depth of the market crash. Here are some of the theories we are working on to think ahead for the next emergency similar to this one.

1. Stock Prices Were Inflated
I’m not sure of many on Wall Street that wouldn’t have argued that stocks were due for a tumble some point. Record high P/E ratios, a 10 year bull market, and slowing growth all gave off the feeling that the bull market was nearing its end. At Nintai we had reached nearly 30% cash in some portfolios being unable to find anything that met our criteria or margin of safety. With the rebound in prices over the past few days, most buying opportunities have passed by already.   

Greater Fear (As per VIX) Leads to More 1-Based Correlation
During the crash of February and March 2019, the VIX reached its highest level since the Great Recession. When the VIX reaches such stratospheric levels (66.2 in December 2008 and 65.65 on March 27 2020) nearly every asset is correlated. In other words, there are very few places to hide when the vast majority of investors are convinced the markets will drop.

Non-Controllable Events Lead to More 1-Based Correlation
Fear can be generated by fear or uncertainty or both. In some economic situations fear can be driven by poor earnings results or missed expectations. Uncertainty can be caused by a simply non-measurable event – meaning there is no way to quantify both the odds of it happening and the scope of the event. Fear and uncertainty can be a deadly mix on wall street. When they say “Wall Street has to climb the wall of worry”, they aren’t kidding.    
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Conclusions
Over the course of the last month, several key learnings have come back to haunt investors. The first is that fear - real gut wrenching, visceral fear - forces a wide range of investors to act in a similar way. This can be value versus growth, small-cap versus large-cap, low-yield versus high-yield. When investors panic, the phrase “no place to hide” really means that many seemingly different asset classes suddenly all begin correlate to each other. Stocks, bonds, energy, utilities, REITs, etc. all begin to drop in similar ways and in similar amounts. In other words - the dreadful 1-factor correlation. The second learning is that crashes like we’ve seen over the past month are by far easiest ways to differentiate your returns (for both good and bad) against the general markets and individual investors. At Nintai Investments, we’ve seen our outperformance with the Russell 2000 jump from roughly 2 - 5% at the beginning of February to 20 – 25% by the end of March 2020[2]. Which brings us to the third finding. To give yourself a chance at outperformance, you really need to invest differently than the indexes and other investors. Whether it be 30% cash, 20% in microcaps, or investments in only 4 of the 11 S&P 500 industry categories (all characteristics of Nintai Investment portfolios), investors should find their niche and make it their own. Great value investors find their niche - purchase shares at a considerable discount to fair value – and hang on for the journey. The ability to differentiate your investment from the dreaded bear market 1 correlation will in the end decide how successful you are in the long term.      
As always I look forward to your thoughts and comments.
DISCLOSURES: None

[1] “Correlations Going to 1: Amid Market Collapse, U.S. Stock Fund Fs Show Little Differentiation”, David Carey, Tom Lauricella, Mar 6, 2020
[2] Past investment performance does not ensure future returns