Two Value Stock Picks - And Two Pans - from Vahan Janjigian of Forbes Investors Advisory Institute

Forbes Investor Advisory Institute hosted a Financial Round Table discussion on June 30, 2007. Many of the comments were directed to the increasing globalization of both business, and financial markets.

From the Roundtable, hosted by Wally Forbes, here's an excerpt from Vahan Janjigian, Ph.D., CFA who is V.P. & Executive Director of Forbes Investors Advisory Institute. He has been the Editor of the Forbes Special Situation Survey since 1997. He is also Editor of the Forbes Growth Investor, and hosts the MoneyMasters program on Forbes.com.
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WALLY FORBES: Well Vahan, you may be a bear, but you're a good stock picker. So what do you like?

VAHAN JANJIGIAN: Before I tell you what I like, I'm going to tell you what I don't like. As I mentioned earlier, I don't like home building stocks - basically across the board. A couple of others that I also have been bearish on for quite awhile that are Starbucks (SBUX), and Whole Foods (WFMI). Both companies kind of relate to the price of gasoline. As gasoline prices go up, I think people have less money to spend on these types of “luxuries.”

People have to wonder whether it's worth spending $5 for a cup of coffee when they have to fill up their tank at $3.50 per gallon. Whole Foods is also having some problems right now with their attempted takeover of Wild Oats (OATS). But that's not the reason I’ve been bearish on the stock.

I really like a couple of stocks that we've recently added to our portfolios. One is BE Aerospace (BEAV). It’s about a $3.2 billion market cap. This is a company that makes cabin interiors for airplanes, and was recommended in our Forbes Growth Investor newsletter. It was recommended based primarily on quantitative reasons, including earnings momentum and price momentum.

A second stock is one that we recently recommended in the Forbes Special Situation Survey because we think it's tremendously undervalued. It is Ryder System (R), which is a truck leasing company. Our analysis indicates that it's significantly under-priced and has an intrinsic value of well above the current market price - about 20% above.

Comments

[LarryJeansweater]

Very insightful. He dislikes two high P/E stocks that are already down. His reasoning is about an 1/8th of an inch deep. So the last time gas prices spiked, comps slowed at SBUX and WFMI..right?

Both SBUX and WFMI's comps are slowing now but just pointing at a single headline factor is useless and unlikely to be correct.

If he liked SBUX and WFMI from their IPOs until April 2006 and then became bearish that would be great, but in all likelihood he has been wrong on these names for about 14 years and correct for one.