Category: Value Investing

II Annual azValor Investor’s Conference

Value investing asset managers industry in Spain is in a great moment. New players are joining the club, for example, the former Bestinver partner and CIO Francisco García Paramés started his new company at the end of last year. This week two event happened: the Spanish regulatory approved Cobas Fund‘s new funds and the II Annual azValor Investor’s Conference took place in Madrid. azValor was created by García Paramés former partners at Bestinver.

For the last 4 years, I have been following the CIO of azValor, his wisdom, humility and knowledge have made him a key player to follow in the world of investment in value investing.

If you master Spanish I highly recommend you to watch this conference here.

2017: a value year?

Great interview by Estrategias de Inversión. If you understand Spanish you must watch this interview to María Dolores Solana, Fund Manager at Santander Asset Management. She has been managing the fund Santander Small Caps for more than 10 years. See below the performance (source).

A few comments and quotes:

“I am starting to change the sectoral weight of the portfolio.”.

She is looking for value companies and not growth, most of them in Spain because the economy is right now at the bottom of the recovery that started two years ago. One example she says is the Banking sector. Most of the value investors in Spain have been out of these companies for too long. After last summer, for example, Bestinver started to invest in banks (Bankinter, Bankia and ING). Inflation is rising, economic improvement and banks will be back to his operational business soon.

I’m looking for cheap banks, below 1 book value, more with domestic exposure and potential for recovery or M&A.

Also, she is long on average in Media, why? In her opinion, companies need to gain market share and investing in advertising is a good way to do it.

“Investing in their own brand through advertising”.

 

“Another sector that has lagged but I see value and is in an initial phase of recovery is that of energy. The oil went from 80 to 50, it will not reach 80, but it can recover something. Therefore, I am increasing exposure to values linked to energy and oil.” (underline mine).

To sum up, she is looking for re-rating, companies that have been in the bottom of the recovery and now are going up in terms of profitability and operating incomes.