Friday, November 25, 2016

Magic Formula Tracking Portfolio 11/27/15

Monthly MFI Tracking Portfolio

Another month/year has flown by. And so it is time to look at another monthly tracking portfolio as we reach the end of September 2016.  As my faithful readers know, I have been tracking the Magic Formula Stocks as described by Joel Greenblatt in The Little Book That Beats the Stock Market since January 2006.  Every month I take the top 50 stocks over $100m market cap from his website and track how that portfolio of stocks fares versus the Russell 3000 for the next 12 months.  It has been an uphill struggle as the tracking portfolios have under-performed, driven in part by Chinese reverse merger fiascos, for-profit education stocks and home health care stocks all being proverbial albatrosses.

Onward

 Fearless readers will recall we had a 29 month "losing streak"..  Then we had a 13 month winning streak. This month, MFI (wait for it) won by 50 basis points.. T8 of the past 19 had lost, but concurrent with the Trump rally, MFI stocks saw a resurgence this past month. Now all open MFI tracking portfolios are leading, in total by an average of 5 points.  Here are the 50 stocks in descending performance order:


Stock  Initial Price   End Price  Percent Change  52 week low   Mkt Cap 
CPLA              46.22           88.55 91.6%               39.06            570
AGX              38.74           66.30 71.1%               28.03            583
ONE                3.07             5.15 67.8%                 1.85            147
IDCC              51.94           80.90 55.8%               41.01         1,876
BBY              30.06           46.58 55.0%               25.31       10,851
QCOM              47.23           68.29 44.6%               42.24       73,975
BBSI              42.48           58.85 38.5%               22.55            311
ICON                7.06             9.69 37.3%                 4.67            341
APOL                6.91             9.48 37.2%                 6.31            746
PETS              16.32           22.32 36.7%               15.73            345
CLCT              15.22           20.78 36.5%               13.67            146
TWX              68.63           93.20 35.8%               55.53       56,033
MCFT              10.24           13.50 31.8%               10.25            254
STRA              57.85           74.56 28.9%               42.39            638
AMAG              26.95           34.15 26.7%               17.92            935
HPQ              12.12           15.18 25.2%                 8.91       22,572
TIVO                9.22           11.34 23.0%               10.26            903
IQNT              18.81           22.97 22.1%               14.56            653
IILG              15.12           18.40 21.7%               10.61            897
DLX              57.92           69.85 20.6%               49.46         2,907
CA              27.28           31.78 16.5%               25.18       12,247
FLR              47.51           54.82 15.4%               39.48         6,872
KORS              42.52           48.91 15.0%               34.83         7,969
CSCO              26.40           30.09 14.0%               22.46     138,840
DEPO              19.13           20.39 6.6%               12.25         1,157
VNCE                4.25             4.35 2.4%                 3.45            156
ENTA              31.96           32.69 2.3%               20.39            598
KING              17.67           18.00 1.9%               12.00         5,574
MSGN              19.95           19.90 -0.3%               14.73         1,491
NSR              25.23           25.00 -0.9%               20.00         1,346
AAPL            115.25         111.79 -3.0%               89.47     657,233
PPC              18.81           18.18 -3.4%               17.15         5,447
UNTD              11.41           11.00 -3.6%                 9.50            169
VEC              24.56           23.10 -5.9%               12.50            259
TDC              29.80           27.35 -8.2%               21.98         3,990
GHC            533.52         485.80 -8.9%             425.14         3,149
UTHR            154.26         134.55 -12.8%               97.52         7,404
BKE              30.40           25.65 -15.6%               19.95         1,589
OUTR              62.66           52.00 -17.0%               24.81         1,118
VDSI              18.58           15.25 -17.9%               12.35            739
RPXC              13.96           10.69 -23.4%                 8.60            788
VIAB              49.42           37.64 -23.8%               30.11       20,362
GME              34.33           25.82 -24.8%               20.10         3,795
CALM              54.63           40.35 -26.1%               35.65         2,714
PBI              20.15           14.86 -26.2%               14.22         4,170
GILD            105.78           75.44 -28.7%               71.39     156,492
PDLI                3.70             2.54 -31.3%                 2.51            649
LCI              36.98           22.90 -38.1%               16.75         1,345
GPRO              20.28             9.89 -51.2%                 8.62         3,083
NLNK              38.42           12.97 -66.2%                 9.23         1,253


Definitely a few trends here. The For Profit Education space finally ended its death spiral. CPLA, STRA and APOL were all decent. Quite a few buyouts, ONE, KING, OUTR, UNTD and TIVO.  I have mentioned that a "Dogs of MFI" approach has shown some promise.  PDLI, GILD, PBI, GME and VIAB are still on the list.  It would take some courage to buy any of those - but I guess that is why they are called dogs. 

Here is a listing of every portfolio I have tracked:


Date MFI R3K Lead
1/6/2006 16.0% 10.9% 1
2/17/2006 21.2% 14.6% 1
3/29/2006 13.0% 9.6% 1
4/7/2006 10.3% 12.1% 0
5/12/2006 20.4% 18.6% 1
5/31/2006 29.2% 23.3% 1
6/30/2006 22.4% 20.0% 1
7/31/2006 19.7% 17.3% 1
8/31/2006 13.0% 13.3% 0
9/28/2006 12.7% 14.6% 0
10/27/2006 10.3% 12.0% 0
11/29/2006 -0.3% 4.8% 0
12/28/2006 -6.9% 3.4% 0
1/26/2007 -10.2% -6.6% 0
2/27/2007 -3.7% -1.0% 0
3/26/2007 -9.8% -5.5% 0
4/27/2007 -10.9% -5.0% 0
5/29/2007 -11.5% -6.3% 0
7/3/2007 -30.0% -15.6% 0
7/30/2007 -19.9% -11.5% 0
8/30/2007 -12.5% -8.7% 0
9/27/2007 -19.0% -18.2% 0
11/2/2007 -40.4% -34.3% 0
11/28/2007 -40.1% -38.3% 0
12/28/2007 -36.3% -40.0% 1
1/25/2008 -36.4% -35.9% 0
2/26/2008 -51.7% -41.5% 0
3/24/2008 -40.9% -36.8% 0
4/25/2008 -25.6% -31.0% 1
5/28/2008 -22.2% -33.6% 1
7/2/2008 -11.7% -25.3% 1
7/29/2008 -10.5% -20.9% 1
8/29/2008 -13.8% -17.9% 1
9/26/2008 -4.3% -10.0% 1
10/31/2008 18.7% 13.9% 1
11/26/2008 50.9% 27.7% 1
12/26/2008 48.9% 32.3% 1
1/23/2009 59.3% 36.4% 1
2/27/2009 92.8% 55.6% 1
3/27/2009 85.8% 48.1% 1
4/24/2009 69.7% 45.8% 1
5/29/2009 31.8% 22.8% 1
6/29/2009 21.3% 24.0% 0
7/29/2009 19.5% 15.9% 1
8/28/2009 7.4% 8.8% 0
9/25/2009 12.6% 12.4% 1
10/30/2009 22.7% 18.3% 1
11/27/2009 24.3% 13.6% 1
12/31/2009 23.7% 18.1% 1
1/22/2010 19.0% 20.6% 0
2/26/2010 18.6% 23.6% 0
3/25/2010 10.0% 15.4% 0
4/23/2010 7.1% 11.4% 0
5/28/2010 19.3% 25.4% 0
6/29/2010 16.7% 25.7% 0
7/29/2010 5.4% 20.1% 0
9/2/2010 7.3% 10.1% 0
9/24/2010 -4.3% 0.3% 0
10/29/2010 -2.9% 10.4% 0
11/26/2010 -8.5% 1.4% 0
1/3/2011 -11.4% 0.1% 0
1/28/2011 -7.6% 4.9% 0
2/25/2011 -5.5% 5.0% 0
3/24/2011 -4.4% 7.4% 0
4/21/2011 -16.0% 3.2% 0
5/27/2011 -12.0% -0.4% 0
6/24/2011 -9.5% 5.0% 0
7/29/2011 -4.3% 8.1% 0
8/26/2011 12.0% 21.6% 0
9/30/2011 23.5% 29.6% 0
10/28/2011 0.4% 11.5% 0
11/25/2011 13.9% 24.0% 0
12/29/2011 9.9% 15.9% 0
1/27/2012 7.4% 16.6% 0
2/24/2012 7.8% 13.3% 0
3/23/2012 9.1% 15.2% 0
4/27/2012 10.5% 15.3% 0
5/25/2012 26.5% 27.5% 0
6/22/2012 26.1% 24.6% 1
7/27/2012 30.4% 25.7% 1
8/24/2012 26.0% 19.8% 1
9/28/2012 39.3% 22.1% 1
10/26/2012 48.3% 28.9% 1
11/23/2012 45.7% 32.1% 1
12/31/2012 52.3% 33.0% 1
1/25/2013 39.5% 22.0% 1
2/22/2013 46.5% 26.4% 1
3/28/2013 40.1% 21.2% 1
4/26/2013 35.0% 20.5% 1
5/24/2013 20.4% 19.2% 1
6/28/2013 26.9% 24.1% 1
7/29/2013 17.8% 19.0% 0
8/30/2013 17.5% 24.6% 0
9/27/2013 12.9% 17.7% 0
10/25/2013 11.8% 15.4% 0
11/29/2013 12.3% 15.6% 0
12/31/2013 12.7% 11.9% 1
1/31/2014 14.2% 13.0% 1
2/28/2014 15.4% 13.9% 1
3/28/2014 6.1% 12.3% 0
4/25/2014 8.6% 15.8% 0
5/30/2014 5.9% 11.7% 0
6/27/2014 2.5% 9.2% 0
7/25/2014 3.3% 8.7% 0
8/29/2014 -2.2% 1.0% 0
9/26/2014 -0.6% -0.9% 1
10/31/2014 4.3% 4.4% 0
11/28/2014 -2.9% 2.9% 0
12/31/2014 -9.3% 0.3% 0
1/30/2015 -12.4% -2.8% 0
2/27/2015 -19.0% -7.3% 0
3/27/2015 -17.1% -1.9% 0
4/24/2015 -15.4% -0.8% 0
5/29/2015 -14.1% 0.1% 0
6/26/2015 -8.7% 0.4% 0
7/30/2015 3.96% 4.02% 0
8/28/2015 5.6% 10.2% 0
9/25/2015 6.5% 13.8% 0
10/30/2015 2.0% 4.0% 0
11/27/2015 8.9% 8.4% 1
12/31/2015 13.0% 11.2% 1
1/29/2016 21.9% 17.9% 1
2/26/2016 22.3% 17.1% 1
3/24/2016 22.2% 11.8% 1
4/22/2016 10.8% 8.1% 1
5/27/2016 14.2% 7.6% 1
6/30/2016 14.4% 7.4% 1
7/29/2016 8.6% 3.3% 1
8/26/2016 7.8% 3.2% 1
9/30/2016 7.5% 2.9% 1
10/28/2016 10.3% 5.3% 1

Subsets

I also have tracked 2 subsets of the larger portfolios:  (1) dividend stocks (those with a yield per Yahoo of at least 2.6%) and (2) new stocks (those new to the tracking portfolios in past 12 months.  I have added a third one , which I call "dogs".  It is like the dogs of the Dow in that you take the worst five performing stocks from the prior year that renew or all those that dropped more that 29%. The dividend portfolio was good, up about 12.5%.   The Dogs portfolio was bad, down 2.4%.  The New approach was bad, down 5.6% (with fad stock GPRO down 50%).  Finally, I like to track cash as it is more "honest" than percentages as if you go up by 25% and then down by 25%, that is a different result than up by 5% then down by 5%.  So I track what you would have today if you had spread $100,000 over the first twelve portfolios evenly.


Category Value
Total      194,650
Total Russell 3K      214,331
New      170,607
Dogs      238,042
Dividend      417,593

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