Chris DeMuth Jr., a co-founder and managing partner of hedge fund Rangeley Capital, joins the show this week. Chris kicks things off by explaining what event-driven investing is, how he uses it, and how the concept of "counterparty selection" is involved. He also breaks down what demutualization and remutualization are and how there are numerous opportunities in the banking sector today to deploy these strategies. According to Chris, many small-cap community banks out there are attractive in terms of valuation versus large caps.
Next, Chris describes the U.S. Treasury Department's "inept, corrupt, and profligate" Emergency Capital Investment Program ("ECIP"). He gives two in-depth examples of ECIP bank stocks that were trading for far less than they were worth - Bay Community Bancorp and Ponce Financial. And he discusses why investors who got in early enough will profit from them greatly.
Lastly, Chris names three stocks that he's excited about right now and details the specifics of each one. The first is a tax-efficient real estate and financial-services conglomerate trading at a discount to its asset value. The second is a Russian-owned mining company operating in Venezuela that should soon benefit from litigation against the Venezuelan government. And the final one is a hospice provider with a lot of potential for a private-equity shake-up and then subsequent acquisition by a larger health care company. Plus, you won't want to miss Chris' answer to the final question, where he explains how you can gain an edge as an investor simply by researching topics you're genuinely interested in.
0:00 Event-driven investing & cheap community banks
13:09 ECIP banks, CBOBA, PDLB
26:52 Three stocks Chris loves