Following up - MFRM

News is out that shares of Steinhoff are collapsing amid 'accounting irregularities' and the CEO's resignation. Steinhoff is the South Africa-based retail empire that acquired MFRM in 2016. MFRM's troubling trends (and profitable short-sell investment) were well documented on these pages - a quintessential debt-fueled retail roll-up disaster. It may be the end of the line for Steinhoff (equity holders at least), especially given the writing on the wall for retailers in general as Amazon takes over the world.

12/1/17 Links

I always learn something new when I read Mauboussin

Warren Buffett’s favorite books

I haven’t read Tobias Carlisle’s books, but plan to do so

The yield curve is becoming extremely flat

A couple of interesting discussions around bitcoin

New Constructs interesting questions for Morningstar

Goldman: current return levels cannot persist

Add more Fama to your portfolio

The truth behind AMZN’s reported earnings

Cohodes changes his tune on OSTK

Itron (ITRI): new idea up on Seeking Alpha

I've got a new idea posted over on Seeking Alpha.

Please take a look and let me know what you think.

A few links and new idea in the works

It has been awhile since I’ve been able to write here, but I wanted to share a few earnings quality links I came across lately. I’m also working on a new short sell idea, which I hope to be able to share soon.

Decent sites that are also working to cut through the accounting fog

The growing difference between GAAP and reported earnings is really important, and largely ignored

Another good discussion of this topic, with Valeant as a specific example

Warren Buffett wrote about this last year

Interesting take at the end of this one, looking at specific sectors getting particularly aggressive at the top of the cycle