Friday, December 14, 2007

Why I bought yet more Select Comfort

This might be a mistake. Yesterday, when I wrote the post on Select Comfort's problems, I got angry. The market is completely hammering this company and it has gotten out of hand. Every DCF model I use suggests the market is pricing in zero growth—forever! Now if we were talking about First Marblehead, I suppose I could see how that might happen. The student loan business depends on a complex web of legal, political, financial, and societal conditions. If any one of these change, the business could cease to be profitable. But Select Comfort sells mattresses. People will always need them.

Right at this moment, people aren't buying mattresses. Or to be more accurate, people aren't buying mattresses unless they are really cheap or have Tempur-Pedic on the label. I think that's for exactly the same reason that houses in Bel-Aire are selling at record prices, but aren't selling at all in other parts of Los Angeles unless the price is rock bottom. Rich people haven't been hurt by inflation, housing prices, and risky loans the way the rest of us have, so they can buy premium products. I blame Select Comfort's management for not adjusting to the current reality, but I don't think they can screw this up so badly that sales won't come back in a year or two.

While we are on the topic, management has screwed up lately, but the results of the past year ought to shake them up and get them focused on the right things. From the business update this week, I think it has. To me, it was outstanding news that they refused to give guidance for the rest of this year or next. Wall Street hates that, but if management can't be sure what is going to happen, they really ought to stay quiet. Hopefully they have permanently stepped off of the beat-the-numbers game.

My purchase at $6.50 today increased my share count by a third, but only increased my cost basis by a sixth. I intend to aggressively sell call options on my shares in order to create a synthetic dividend. Maybe this isn't rational, but I think the market is mis-valuing Select Comfort and I want to capture some of that difference. I guess another way to put it is that the market is pricing Select Comfort as if it will screw everything up from now on and I think the odds are low that will happen. So I'm adding to my position. But I'm not so sure the market is wrong that I'm willing to take on more downside risk without getting paid.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.