Larry Bellehumeur

Four Long-Term Winners Selling at Deep Discounts

231796, I did notice that I was a bit light, as I was referring more to their recent P/E ratio. Your numbers only make my case sounds better, so I'll stick with yours! One concern for MMM seems to be their perceived over-exposure to the thin LCD coating (don't know the correct term, I apologize) market. However, most people have either bought one of these, or with the sunset of Analog Service, many will move towards LCD style TVs. I think this is a stable business, so i am not sure what everyone is so afraid of (likely the same reason for the downfall in Corning as of late)

Thanks for your post...
Larry

Four Long-Term Winners Selling at Deep Discounts

231796, I did notice that I was a bit light, as I was referring more to their recent P/E ratio. Your numbers only make my case sounds better, so I'll stick with yours! One concern for MMM seems to be their perceived over-exposure to the thin LCD coating (don't know the correct term, I apologize) market. However, most people have either bought one of these, or with the sunset of Analog Service, many will move towards LCD style TVs. I think this is a stable business, so i am not sure what everyone is so afraid of (likely the same reason for the downfall in Corning as of late)

Thanks for your post...
Larry

Four Long-Term Winners Selling at Deep Discounts

Thanks everyone for your great comments...

User 138602, I know EnCana quite well actually (they are one of my largest customers, as I sell communications equipment to them). I like them at this price, but suspect that they will fall another 10% or so during the "shoulder" season (time between the heat of the summer and the cold of the winter). They are much more Natural Gas focused, so they tend to trade a bit with that commodity. Their recent venture into Refining, and their Oil Sands efforts have them minutely affected by the cost of Crude. I would recommend picking them up before they split into two separate companies (Oil / Refining and Natural Gas).

They are extremely prudent, and should be very shareholder friendly in the future. I suspect that you won't see booming results any time soon, though, San Fran. An alternate play in the CDN Large cap Oil and Gas space would be Canadian Natural Resources (CNQ). They are about to launch their Oil Sands efforts later in 2008.....They are also a large customer of mine. As for CNR (Railroad), they are very exposed to "North and South" trade. This means that their main shipments are from Canada to destinations in the US. In a way, you can think of them as a proxy for the US Economy, as they tend to ship items like Auto parts and Retail sales to the US. If you are looking for more exposure to Commodities (such as Grain, Potash and Coal), you might want to look at CP Rail (CPR) trading in Toronto, as it is more of an "East-West" play (they ship a lot of items to China/India). As for TransCanada, they are a good play, but not a huge growth play. Great for yield, and they may have among the most steady earnings on the planet, as most of their revenue is regulated.

Disclosure -- Long on TRP, None on CNR, CNQ or CP.

As for GE, it definitely is a bit of a contrarian play at this stage, Humble, that is for sure. However, I'm thinking that the Financial part of their company will right the ship soon enough, and in the meantime, their Industrial sector should keep them moving....

Love the comments, everyone....

Larry

Four Long-Term Winners Selling at Deep Discounts

Thanks for your comments...

Owen -- I do agree that THI's traditional PE might be somewhat difficult to maintain. However, its strong franchise, strong defensiveness and strong margins do deserve to be valued more than most, even if its growth rate is not "market-shattering". It differs from our friends at Starbucks in two important ways. Tim's tends to be "less trendy" and tends to get more Blue-collar workers in its base. They tend to be more consistent in their buying, even in bad times. As well, while their coffee is not dirt cheap, their offering tends to be a lot less than the $5 Mocha lattes from Starbucks, making it less of a discretionary buy.

One negative is also their relative newness to the market, having been spun out of Wendy's, so you don't get the long-term horizons to look back on.

Michael -- sometimes the market does really give you gifts, as long as you are patient. Really tough to lose money in the market when you buy good companies at good prices, and show value. Thanks for reading!