Broker-Dealers Price/Book ; Do They Suggest Cheapness

Much ink has been spilled on the matter in the last few weeks by pundits suggesting they provide unusual value. Maybe. But than maybe not. Few times in the last year were many skeptics willing to go on the limb to suggest the stocks were expensive at 2 to 2.5 x book value or more. Yet, the shorting opportunity presented itself with lightning speed, and any value investor worth his salt knew the ROE's were not only unsustainable, but also hard to imagine achievable without unusual and substantial risks. What can be imputed from the current valuation? Under normal circumstances, one would say that for a stock like BSC at BV, the market is assuming that the company can barely earn its cost of capital for the next few years; And for the years beyond that its easier to guess that the answer is a solid NO. But the current circumstances are far from normal. CDS spreads (at the recent peak) suggested the broker/dealer paper was being priced near junk, yet there was Bill Gross buying GS paper in the heat of the moment. The reality is, no one knows what the true cost of capital is, since it is (and will be for the foreseeable future) a moving target. No one knows how much of the liabilities are priced off of LIBOR, or Fed Funds, or Treasuries or anything else for that matter. Off balance sheet entities?? SIV's are the old SPV's, accounting creations that allow you to use even more leverage without telling anyone. Earnings power you say??? Even broker/dealer scholar Brad Hintz (Bernstein analyst covering broker/dealers and former CFO of Lehman) who ought to know more about the business than any analyst out only very infrequently get his earnings estimates within 20% of reported numbers. Why bother trying??? By all accounts, the stocks offer dead cat bounces, sold heavily on rallies 10% off the lows. At worst they are discounting a cyclical global decline in financial stocks that will lead to a multi-year de-leveraging, comparable to the GSEs, Japan Inc, mega cap US banks like C, JPM, and their hedge fund brothers.

First Marblehead; Why is everyone selling???

Perhaps the stock is still expensive. It is certainly closer to our price target (circa $20) set late 2006 and no longer carries the moniker (provided by us) of the most expensive stock in the financial sector. Meantime, that loud sucking sound called liquidity seems louder than the boo-yah of the cheer-leading section populated by the usual suspects. Perhaps they are selling and not telling, or perhaps the logic of the business model and valuation no longer seems so air tight. My sense is that the stock will see a 20 handle rather quickly, and selling into strength in the mid thirties is a virtual lock bet. We will revise our target price (probably lower) following the next liquidity crunch. Previously short listed short stocks that have regained their status after initial swoon are BER, PHLY, and CB.