For those of you unfortunate enough to have not been following $$$MR. MARKET$$$ in a timely manner...you missed this: Posted: 18 Nov 2003 07:49 pm Post subject: URBN ==> The $$$MR. MARKET$$$ end of soccer season pick -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Iâve got hos Iâve got hos In different area codes (area) Area codes (codes) Hos In different area codes (area) Area codes (codes) You know that Ludacris may be onto something here. If youâre gonna have hos in different area codes, wouldnât it be proper for all those hos to be dressing mighty right? Today I bought URBN (Urban Outfitters) at 35.95. I will sell it in 4 to 6 weeks at 41.65. Here is why I like URBN: URBN stock is up 320% over the last 52 weeks. Itâs r^2 for the same period is a steady 0.82. Itâs r^2 for the last 6 months is a remarkable 0.92. Great great price momentum! Now letâs turn to the ANALysts. Presently there are 12 analyst ratings on URBN, only six of which are "buys" and one of which is an outright "sell." Thus, there is upgrade potential, if and when URBN shatters their earnings numbers again. $$$MR. MARKET$$$ believes this will be a merry merry Christmas, too. URBN primarily operates retail specialty stores under the the Urban Outfitters, Anthropologie and Free People names. Urban Outfitters has street prep and retro styles from the 80âs (I love the 80âs). Anthropologie sells sweaters but they canât spell Anthropology correctly. Urban Outfitters is geared toward co-eds and those recently out of college, while Anthropologie targets affluent customers in their 30s (for the most part, focus on family, home and career). Anthropologie tailors its merchandise and inviting store environment to sophisticated and contemporary women aged 30 to 45. I guess thatâs opposed to fat drunk and stupid men, like $$$MR. MARKET$$$, in the same age range. How do I know about this Urban Outfitters? The company opened its first store in Philadelphia in 1970, near the University of Pennsylvania. Letâs go Quakers! Stores are located in large metropolitan areas, selected university communities, and enclosed malls, and accommodate a customer propensity not only to shop but to congregate with peers. URBN's strategy is to provide unified store environments that establish emotional bonds with the customer. I really think they are trying to establish a bond with the customerâs wallet. Guess what? Itâs working. URBN 3rd quarter earnings were well above analysts expectations ($0.35 vs. 0.2 including a 17% comp store increase. Net sales advanced by +29% to $142.3 million, fueled by a +23% increase in the number of stores in operation, a +17% rise in total company same-store sales, and a +48% jump in direct-to-consumer sales. The November comps are already exceeding their plan. All indications are that this is going to be a HUGE HUGE HUGE X-mas season for retailers. Expensive restaurants are getting booked, holiday parties are up. People have money to spendâ¦Yippeee! The stock market was crying because Wal-Mart recently missed their numbers. I got news for you. Wal-Mart missed their numbers because people arenât buying cheap stuff now. They are shopping in the specialty boutiques. This trend will continue. URBN stores are set up to look like individual shops..not franchises. The seven Urban Outfitter mall stores are kicking major league butt. Expect to see more of these, as a result. The company initially chose to ignore malls for urban areas near universities and other schools. The reason: Its target customers weren't your typical mall rats. It's since changed its tune. That's in part because it's easier to open stores in malls than elsewhere. URBN should expect to drive 22% store growth into 2005 as the Anthro and Urban stores have not come near their market saturation point yet. URBN has seen its earnings grow 20% or more for nine straight quarters. Nine! Anthropologie and Urban also sell home accessories - rugs, candles and other knickknacks. Makes a great party gift! This protects against the cyclical nature of clothes, as home goods tend to be less dependent on fashion preferences. Home furnishings range from furniture, rugs, lighting and antiques to table top items, bedding and gifts. Lava lampsâ¦hey man did you steal my Pink Floyd album? Urban opened three locations last quarter, now they have 98. They will keep growing well into the 300âs and the new stores will boost operating margins. It plans to open about 13 to 15 new stores in the remainder of FY 04. New stores will boost operating margins as excited buyers foolishly overpay at these new stores so they can walk out with those big bags that say âAnthropologieâ on them. Anthropologie is rocking with a 12% same-store gain. URBN tries to make the shopping environment fun with novelty items and toys to play with. It entertains the customer and keeps them in the store longer. Trust me, the only thing that would keep $$$MR. MARKET$$$ in one of these stores is beer and nude models. Donât forget about those X-mas catalogs. Circulation of the Anthropologie catalog rose to 2.3 million from 1.8 million in the past quarter. Ok OKâ¦I do like looking at the catalog models a littleâ¦.ok..a lot. Alright⦠enough of the marketing mumbo jumbo. Letâs look at some hardcore financials. Revenues have grown at a rate of 25% per year for the last 5 years. This is not a carnival, URBN is here to stay. $$$MR. MARKET$$$ expects them to do 160 million next quarter which should translate to quarterly earnings of $0.42/share. At the high P/E this specialty retailer commands, that would yield a stock price of $43.09, which exceeds my sell target. Donât get excited yetâ¦..$$$MR. MARKET$$$ thinks FY 2005 should generate earnings of $1.60/share which will propel the stock price to $59.20/share. URBN has no long term debt. Theyâve been able to grow their business with internal cash flows, the cheapest source of rocket fuel. Return on assets has grown to 11.6% while ROE is a very solid 14.8% The boss is being modest and is keeping his cards close to the vest. "Our Retail brands and Direct businesses produced truly outstanding results in the third quarter," said Richard A. Hayne, Chairman and President. "Sales were strong in all regions where we operate stores; and Direct sales, particularly over the internet, continued their meteoric growth. Most gratifying, however, was delivering 16.5% operating margins. This is the highest quarterly rate in the last seven years." SO what does this all mean? It boils down to a giant bet. $$$MR. MARKET$$$ has the feel that X-mas will be really big for specialty retailers. People are spending money again and itâs only one month until Christmas. Soon they will spend all their monies. Gimmeee monies. _________________ ============================= I am HUGE! Bring me your finest meats and cheeses. - $$$MR. MARKET$$$
Man, all those posts and you still have no clue. Do you trade or just pretend to? A monkey can randomly pick stocks right to buy and hold for a measly 15%. I'm gonna name a few stocks right now that you could have went long in the same time frame for a good gain and this is simply from trading them every day. CVC, BP, ANF, F, CIT, LF, IGL I can keep going but I really do not care to remember all of the big movers I noticed back in December ready for a nice pop. I did make a nice options play on one of those stocks and I never mentioned it on this site cause why would I really? It was almost a sure thing and it wasnt based on some pathetic overpublished "investing" strategy.
You know MM is the best stock picker on the planet. It says so on his website, www.mrmarketishuge.com. And as for my trading, I am one of the biggest hitters at Shill Securities.
Actually I think most of them are very serious. Unlike here or on the IBD forums where he got a rude reception, the members on his website are there because they want to follow his picks. Some of them have their own selection systems, and they all tend to be pretty supportive. Honestly, I think his picks are well thought out, albeit for a longer term investor. His latest is WHC, a spin off of Wackenhut that operates private prisons. Before that he picked CFC, BEL and URBN. The latter three are all IBD 100 stocks.
I read through the mm site. Quite a number of posters on the mm site will use stops and make their own decisions rather than blindly follow mm. Others don't understand the concept of time in a position, not caring if it takes two years to see 15% as long as they see 15% eventually. That's why they're holding issues like DHI, which mm trumpeted here would be sold at by the end of Dec. for a 15% gain, but is instead flat two weeks after the target sell date, after taking them downward for a while. According to the site's poll, most come from Yahoo message boards. The ones I feel badly about are the posts that lament when a mm pick they took on is down, they're in it, they're losing, they post their angst. But they're all grown boys and girls. The real point of mm's site is that he likes to bathe in the adoration of those who post kudos to him, but consider the source of the kudos. In contrast to that, a reason mm gets the razz rather than kudos on ET is because here 15% is apparantly not considered a crowning achievement. He ought to read something like Tony Oz's "The Stock Operator" to get an idea of what ET'ers may be considering as respectable returns. Speaking of reading, I just finished Peter Lynch's "One Up on Wall Street" and though Mr. Lynch also was a Wharton MBA, I got that he didn't seem to feel Wharton was all that. As for his returns, he certainly did better than 15%, and without being boorish or craving public adoration. Imagine that. He also bones up a lot on his losses and how he made tons of mistakes. What a difference.