NEH

Replacement Candidates for David Merkel's Portfolio: From AA to ZZ

David, it's nice to hear you are in agreement. Actually, I have been in dry-bulk for a while, and bought NM because they bought a port terminal with grain silos in Uruguay. Its heavily asset-based, even if heavily leveraged, but I favor asset based equities. The Uruguay purchase, and they are keeping the previous owners on-board, is another key factor that really sets NM apart from the other dry-bulk shippers. BTW - I invest only in dry-bulk. Less risk of environmental disasters than tankers.


On Jul 07 10:04 AM David White wrote:

> NM is a good bet. It has excellent value. It has an extremely low
> PE and FPE. It also has an excellent Price to Book value ratio. Further
> it has both a new fleet in South America (for the river traffic mostly)
> which is supposed to begin adding 35% to EBITDA beginning in the
> 4th quarter of this year. It got pushed further downward in the recent
> market move in that direction, so it is an excellent buy now.

Replacement Candidates for David Merkel's Portfolio: From AA to ZZ

Why NM David? I know it's highly leveraged, but I think with patience it will shine. My one concern is how the relationship will work between NM and NMP, how the assets will shift and of course, the distribution of profits. That being said, I'm long NM and just think that in this market investors have to be more patient with their speculative holdings. Maybe I'm just willing to hold on longer than you are. I'd like to hear your thoughts.