Net-nets and/or high cash/sh: Not quite sure where I am with these. I guess at best, mediocre to okay results. The percentage gains can be okay. These days, all the Graham net-nets that I see are of suffering dink companies, and I'm reluctant to commit any serious money to them. So given that my positions are VERY small, the dollar results, if/when I get them, are going to be very small too, regardless if they turn out to Graham-type gains (50%) or multi-baggers. These things often take a while to work out, and that reduces both my enthusiasm and annualized returns.
Very significantly, my record-keeping isn't good - some of these stocks die or I get tired of holding them - they fall off my list of holdings, and I forget about them. So I may very well have a very big survivor-bias component that I'm not considering in offsetting the gains on the stocks that I do see and hold.
All-in-all, for the money and time I put in, it's maybe not worth the trouble.
Anyway, I'll just plod on and take a few shares of CONN this morning. This retailer of electronics and home appliances is another suffering company where the stock price reflects its apparently poor - or dire - prospects. CONN may or may not be profitable this quarter (Or for the year. 10/31/09 is the latest info.), and it may or may not be a Ben Graham net-net, depending on how one views Dr. Graham's methods and examples (net-nets of only profitable companies?). CONN's been profitable in its six years of public history: Of course, that was then- the good times.
I calculate that CONN is selling less than 2/3 of net current assets, and so it qualifies for me, and I'm in.
ir.conns.com
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