Goodwill implications

In practical terms, this will mean that the PBV ratios of acquisitive companies will generally look lower (and more attractive from an investment standpoint) than nonacquisitive companies.

something very basic

In statistics, the coefficient of determination R² is used in the context of statistical models whose main purpose is the prediction of future outcomes on the basis of other related information. It is the proportion of variability in a data set that is accounted for by the statistical model. It provides a measure of how well future outcomes are likely to be predicted by the model.

процентные ставки и multiples

The effect of changes in the expected growth rate on equity multiples can also vary depending on the level of interest rates. The value of growth lies in the future, and as interest rates rise, the value of expected growth decreases. Consequently, surprises about expected growth rates have a bigger impact when interest rates are low than when they are high. We would expect to see much greater price reactions for a given earnings surprise, positive or negative, in a low-interest-rate environment than you would in a high-interest-rate environment. 

Aswath Damodaran "On valuation" 

so should i short Groupon then?

My problem with selling short has always been that I don’t control my time horizon; the person who has lent me the shares does. After all, even if you are right in your assessments of value, you will not make money until the market corrects its “mistakes” and that may take weeks, months or even years.

Aswath Damodaran on selling short the stock you perceive as overvalued 

Сегодня The Aleph Blog опубликовал выдержку из письма Уоррена Баффетта к акционерам 1992 года. Лучше всего процитировать полностью, выделив пару абзацев болдом.

Our equity-investing strategy remains little changed from what it was fifteen years ago, when we said in the 1977 annual report:  “We select our marketable equity securities in much the way we would evaluate a business for acquisition in its entirety.  We want the business to be one (a) that we can understand; (b) with favorable long-term prospects; (c) operated by honest and competent people; and (d) available at a very attractive price.”  We have seen cause to make only one change in this creed: Because of both market conditions and our size, we now substitute “an attractive price” for “a very attractive price.”
But how, you will ask, does one decide what’s “attractive”?  In answering this question, most analysts feel they must choose between two approaches customarily thought to be in opposition:  “value” and “growth.”  Indeed, many investment professionals see any mixing of the two terms as a form of intellectual cross-dressing.
We view that as fuzzy thinking (in which, it must be confessed, I myself engaged some years ago).  In our opinion, the two approaches are joined at the hip:  Growth is always a component in the calculation of value, constituting a variable whose importance can range from negligible to enormous and whose impact can be negative as well as positive.
In addition, we think the very term “value investing” is redundant.  What is “investing” if it is not the act of seeking value at least sufficient to justify the amount paid?  Consciously paying more for a stock than its calculated value – in the hope that it can soon be sold for a still-higher price – should be labeled speculation (which is neither illegal, immoral nor – in our view – financially fattening).
Whether appropriate or not, the term “value investing” is widely used.  Typically, it connotes the purchase of stocks having attributes such as a low ratio of price to book value, a low price-earnings ratio, or a high dividend yield.  Unfortunately, such characteristics, even if they appear in combination, are far from determinative as to whether an investor is indeed buying something for what it is worth and is therefore truly operating on the principle of obtaining value in his investments.  Correspondingly, opposite characteristics – a high ratio of price to book value, a high price-earnings ratio, and a low dividend yield – are in no way inconsistent with a “value” purchase.
Similarly, business growth, per se, tells us little about value.  It’s true that growth often has a positive impact on value, sometimes one of spectacular proportions.  But such an effect is far from certain.  For example, investors have regularly poured money into the domestic airline business to finance profitless (or worse) growth.  For these investors, it would have been far better if Orville had failed to get off the ground at Kitty Hawk: The more the industry has grown, the worse the disaster for owners.
Growth benefits investors only when the business in point can invest at incremental returns that are enticing – in other words, only when each dollar used to finance the growth creates over a dollar of long-term market value.  In the case of a low-return business requiring incremental funds, growth hurts the investor.
In The Theory of Investment Value, written over 50 years ago, John Burr Williams set forth the equation for value, which we condense here:  The value of any stock, bond or business today is determined by the cash inflows and outflows – discounted at an appropriate interest rate – that can be expected to occur during the remaining life of the asset.  Note that the formula is the same for stocks as for bonds.  Even so, there is an important, and difficult to deal with, difference between the two:  A bond has a coupon and maturity date that define future cash flows; but in the case of equities, the investment analyst must himself estimate the future “coupons.”  Furthermore, the quality of management affects the bond coupon only rarely – chiefly when management is so inept or dishonest that payment of interest is suspended.  In contrast, the ability of management can dramatically affect the equity “coupons.”
The investment shown by the discounted-flows-of-cash calculation to be the cheapest is the one that the investor should purchase – irrespective of whether the business grows or doesn’t, displays volatility or smoothness in its earnings, or carries a high price or low in relation to its current earnings and book value.  Moreover, though the value equation has usually shown equities to be cheaper than bonds, that result is not inevitable: When bonds are calculated to be the more attractive investment, they should be bought.
Leaving the question of price aside, the best business to own is one that over an extended period can employ large amounts of incremental capital at very high rates of return.  The worst business to own is one that must, or will, do the opposite – that is, consistently employ ever-greater amounts of capital at very low rates of return.  Unfortunately, the first type of business is very hard to find:  Most high-return businesses need relatively little capital.  Shareholders of such a business usually will benefit if it pays out most of its earnings in dividends or makes significant stock repurchases.
Though the mathematical calculations required to evaluate equities are not difficult, an analyst – even one who is experienced and intelligent – can easily go wrong in estimating future “coupons.”  At Berkshire, we attempt to deal with this problem in two ways.  First, we try to stick to businesses we believe we understand.  That means they must be relatively simple and stable in character.  If a business is complex or subject to constant change, we’re not smart enough to predict future cash flows.  Incidentally, that shortcoming doesn’t bother us.  What counts for most people in investing is not how much they know, but rather how realistically they define what they don’t know.  An investor needs to do very few things right as long as he or she avoids big mistakes.
Second, and equally important, we insist on a margin of safety in our purchase price.  If we calculate the value of a common stock to be only slightly higher than its price, we’re not interested in buying.  We believe this margin-of-safety principle, so strongly emphasized by Ben Graham, to be the cornerstone of investment success.

john hussman: two thoughts on valuation based on multiples

The use of forward P/E multiples is a valid shorthand for discounted cash flow valuation only when profit margins reflect a level that is actually likely to be sustained over several decades. 


P/E multiples subsume a whole set of assumptions regarding the entire future path of growth rates, profit margins, return on invested capital, and other factors. The common practice of valuing the stock market based on “forward operating earnings times arbitrary P/E multiple” in not only misguided – it’s an utterly disappointing display of Wall Street’s willingness to dumb-down the investment process.

Теоретическое основание коллапса фондового рынка в кризис 2008 года. Пост-фактум. Из трактата Valuation ряда господ из McKinsey:


 Real cost of equity rose only one percentage point during the crisis, from 6.8% in 2007 to 7.8% in 2008.


Всё просто.

искусство прикладной оценки

Aswath Damodaran on risk-free rates in current environment
Если немного вырвать из контекста: 

The risk free rate is a reflection of what people expect in the overall economy for the foreseeable future. Harking back to an equation that I have used before, note that the risk free rate is the sum of two market expectations: an expectation of inflation for the future and an expectation of real growth.

Risk free rate = Expected inflation + Expected real growth

Viewed through these lens, it is quite clear that a very low risk free rate is not generally compatible with a vibrant high growth economy. In fact, the biggest factor driving down ten-year bond rates this year from 3.29% to 2% has been the increasing pessimism about global economic health, pushing down both expected real growth and expected inflation. That is the basis for my argument that the Fed has become a side player in this game and that its push for lower risk free rates is actually at odds with its desire that the US return to healthy economic growth.