AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators

seekingalpha2021-06-18

Summary I stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC. For investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock. A century-old cautionary tale for ...

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ywtsteven
2021-06-21
ywtsteven
👍
paulinechuaa
2021-06-20
paulinechuaa
Good
Mm101
2021-06-20
Mm101
B
- Mm101:
  B
- Mm101:
  Uu
- Mm101:
  Buy
- Mm101:
  Now
- Mm101回复Mm101:
  Dont
danjean
2021-06-20
danjean
Risky
Dngl
2021-06-19
Dngl
Lol
Ngxiaoyi
2021-06-19
Ngxiaoyi
NEVer SELLING

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}\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nAMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-18 11:35 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators\">网页链接</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","isBrief":false,"type":0,"news_type":1,"symbol":"AMC","symbol_name":"AMC院线","start_time":0,"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators","article_id":"1131310015","we_media_id":null,"thumbnails":[],"rights":null,"url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1131310015","pubTimestamp":1623987347,"sourceInfo":null,"weMediaInfo":null,"summary":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pul","collect":0,"end_time":0,"defaultTopTitle":"seekingalpha.com","property":[],"viewcount":null,"language":"en","relate_stocks":{"AMC":"AMC院线"},"translate_title":"AMC：投资者和投机者的危险信号","themeId":null,"isJumpTheme":false,"ttsUrl":null,"symbols_score_info":{"AMC":0.9},"content_text":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.\nSell before the other speculators do.\n\nRgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n\nMy time frame for reference is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n\nDepreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.\nInterest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.\n\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n\nPretty clever, no? No:\n\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n\nUh oh. What now?\n\n“On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller & Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","kind":null,"is_publish_news":true,"is_publish_highlight":true,"is_publish_live":false,"is_publish_wemedia":null,"editions":null,"column":"","sentiment":"0","news_tag":"","news_rank":0,"symbols":[],"gpt_button":1},"commentList":[{"id":164765645,"gmtCreate":1624236709087,"gmtModify":1634009171337,"author":{"id":"3583131949757913","authorId":"3583131949757913","name":"ywtsteven","avatar":"https://static.laohu8.com/default-avatar.jpg","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"authorIdStr":"3583131949757913","idStr":"3583131949757913"},"htmlText":"👍","listText":"👍","text":"👍","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://laohu8.com/post/164765645","repostId":1131310015,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1131310015","pubTimestamp":1623987347,"share":"https://www.laohu8.com/m/news/1131310015?lang=&edition=full","pubTime":"2021-06-18 11:35","market":"us","language":"en","title":"AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1131310015","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pul","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>I stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.</li>\n <li>For investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.</li>\n <li>A century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.</li>\n <li>Sell before the other speculators do.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/dabb985556b9f549dd561bf919495d08\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"513\">RgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n</blockquote>\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/3f5311cb0ff00c046d122c2c84fc3aea\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"168\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nMy time frame for reference&nbsp;is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/9b8a5ce8ad10adb3336126cdb0a5e598\" tg-width=\"537\" tg-height=\"497\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n<ul>\n <li>Depreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.</li>\n <li>Interest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.</li>\n</ul>\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n</blockquote>\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n<blockquote>\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n</blockquote>\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n<blockquote>\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n</blockquote>\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n<blockquote>\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n</blockquote>\nPretty clever, no? No:\n<blockquote>\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n</blockquote>\nUh oh. What now?\n<blockquote>\n “On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller &amp; Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n</blockquote>\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; line-height:1.5; color:#999; background:transparent; }\n.wrapper{ overflow:hidden;word-break:break-all;padding:10px; }\nh1,h2{ font-weight:normal; line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:.6em; }\nh3,h4,h5,h6{ line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:1em; }\nh1{ font-size:24px; }\nh2{ font-size:20px; }\nh3{ font-size:18px; }\nh4{ font-size:16px; }\nh5{ font-size:14px; }\nh6{ font-size:12px; }\np,ul,ol,blockquote,dl,table{ margin:1.2em 0; }\nul,ol{ margin-left:2em; }\nul{ list-style:disc; }\nol{ list-style:decimal; }\nli,li p{ margin:10px 0;}\nimg{ max-width:100%;display:block;margin:0 auto 1em; }\nblockquote{ color:#B5B2B1; border-left:3px solid #aaa; padding:1em; }\nstrong,b{font-weight:bold;}\nem,i{font-style:italic;}\ntable{ width:100%;border-collapse:collapse;border-spacing:1px;margin:1em 0;font-size:.9em; }\nth,td{ padding:5px;text-align:left;border:1px solid #aaa; }\nth{ font-weight:bold;background:#5d5d5d; }\n.symbol-link{font-weight:bold;}\n/* header{ border-bottom:1px solid #494756; } */\n.title{ margin:0 0 8px;line-height:1.3;color:#ddd; }\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nAMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-18 11:35 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"AMC":"AMC院线"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1131310015","content_text":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.\nSell before the other speculators do.\n\nRgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n\nMy time frame for reference is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n\nDepreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.\nInterest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.\n\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n\nPretty clever, no? No:\n\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n\nUh oh. What now?\n\n“On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller & Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":164624358,"gmtCreate":1624202394274,"gmtModify":1634009528531,"author":{"id":"3580645142381164","authorId":"3580645142381164","name":"paulinechuaa","avatar":"https://static.laohu8.com/default-avatar.jpg","vip":1,"crmLevel":7,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"authorIdStr":"3580645142381164","idStr":"3580645142381164"},"htmlText":"Good","listText":"Good","text":"Good","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://laohu8.com/post/164624358","repostId":1131310015,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1131310015","pubTimestamp":1623987347,"share":"https://www.laohu8.com/m/news/1131310015?lang=&edition=full","pubTime":"2021-06-18 11:35","market":"us","language":"en","title":"AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1131310015","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pul","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>I stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.</li>\n <li>For investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.</li>\n <li>A century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.</li>\n <li>Sell before the other speculators do.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/dabb985556b9f549dd561bf919495d08\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"513\">RgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n</blockquote>\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/3f5311cb0ff00c046d122c2c84fc3aea\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"168\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nMy time frame for reference&nbsp;is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/9b8a5ce8ad10adb3336126cdb0a5e598\" tg-width=\"537\" tg-height=\"497\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n<ul>\n <li>Depreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.</li>\n <li>Interest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.</li>\n</ul>\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n</blockquote>\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n<blockquote>\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n</blockquote>\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n<blockquote>\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n</blockquote>\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n<blockquote>\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n</blockquote>\nPretty clever, no? No:\n<blockquote>\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n</blockquote>\nUh oh. What now?\n<blockquote>\n “On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller &amp; Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n</blockquote>\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; line-height:1.5; color:#999; background:transparent; }\n.wrapper{ overflow:hidden;word-break:break-all;padding:10px; }\nh1,h2{ font-weight:normal; line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:.6em; }\nh3,h4,h5,h6{ line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:1em; }\nh1{ font-size:24px; }\nh2{ font-size:20px; }\nh3{ font-size:18px; }\nh4{ font-size:16px; }\nh5{ font-size:14px; }\nh6{ font-size:12px; }\np,ul,ol,blockquote,dl,table{ margin:1.2em 0; }\nul,ol{ margin-left:2em; }\nul{ list-style:disc; }\nol{ list-style:decimal; }\nli,li p{ margin:10px 0;}\nimg{ max-width:100%;display:block;margin:0 auto 1em; }\nblockquote{ color:#B5B2B1; border-left:3px solid #aaa; padding:1em; }\nstrong,b{font-weight:bold;}\nem,i{font-style:italic;}\ntable{ width:100%;border-collapse:collapse;border-spacing:1px;margin:1em 0;font-size:.9em; }\nth,td{ padding:5px;text-align:left;border:1px solid #aaa; }\nth{ font-weight:bold;background:#5d5d5d; }\n.symbol-link{font-weight:bold;}\n/* header{ border-bottom:1px solid #494756; } */\n.title{ margin:0 0 8px;line-height:1.3;color:#ddd; }\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nAMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-18 11:35 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"AMC":"AMC院线"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1131310015","content_text":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.\nSell before the other speculators do.\n\nRgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n\nMy time frame for reference is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n\nDepreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.\nInterest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.\n\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n\nPretty clever, no? No:\n\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n\nUh oh. What now?\n\n“On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller & Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":165759612,"gmtCreate":1624158782136,"gmtModify":1634010071766,"author":{"id":"3565081661382277","authorId":"3565081661382277","name":"Mm101","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/01758aa877d9e5a9767d24de3a4e2ff1","vip":1,"crmLevel":4,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"authorIdStr":"3565081661382277","idStr":"3565081661382277"},"htmlText":"B","listText":"B","text":"B","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":2,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":1,"commentSize":12,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://laohu8.com/post/165759612","repostId":1131310015,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1131310015","pubTimestamp":1623987347,"share":"https://www.laohu8.com/m/news/1131310015?lang=&edition=full","pubTime":"2021-06-18 11:35","market":"us","language":"en","title":"AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1131310015","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pul","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>I stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.</li>\n <li>For investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.</li>\n <li>A century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.</li>\n <li>Sell before the other speculators do.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/dabb985556b9f549dd561bf919495d08\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"513\">RgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n</blockquote>\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/3f5311cb0ff00c046d122c2c84fc3aea\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"168\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nMy time frame for reference&nbsp;is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/9b8a5ce8ad10adb3336126cdb0a5e598\" tg-width=\"537\" tg-height=\"497\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n<ul>\n <li>Depreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.</li>\n <li>Interest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.</li>\n</ul>\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n</blockquote>\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n<blockquote>\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n</blockquote>\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n<blockquote>\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n</blockquote>\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n<blockquote>\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n</blockquote>\nPretty clever, no? No:\n<blockquote>\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n</blockquote>\nUh oh. What now?\n<blockquote>\n “On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller &amp; Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n</blockquote>\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; line-height:1.5; color:#999; background:transparent; }\n.wrapper{ overflow:hidden;word-break:break-all;padding:10px; }\nh1,h2{ font-weight:normal; line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:.6em; }\nh3,h4,h5,h6{ line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:1em; }\nh1{ font-size:24px; }\nh2{ font-size:20px; }\nh3{ font-size:18px; }\nh4{ font-size:16px; }\nh5{ font-size:14px; }\nh6{ font-size:12px; }\np,ul,ol,blockquote,dl,table{ margin:1.2em 0; }\nul,ol{ margin-left:2em; }\nul{ list-style:disc; }\nol{ list-style:decimal; }\nli,li p{ margin:10px 0;}\nimg{ max-width:100%;display:block;margin:0 auto 1em; }\nblockquote{ color:#B5B2B1; border-left:3px solid #aaa; padding:1em; }\nstrong,b{font-weight:bold;}\nem,i{font-style:italic;}\ntable{ width:100%;border-collapse:collapse;border-spacing:1px;margin:1em 0;font-size:.9em; }\nth,td{ padding:5px;text-align:left;border:1px solid #aaa; }\nth{ font-weight:bold;background:#5d5d5d; }\n.symbol-link{font-weight:bold;}\n/* header{ border-bottom:1px solid #494756; } */\n.title{ margin:0 0 8px;line-height:1.3;color:#ddd; }\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nAMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-18 11:35 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"AMC":"AMC院线"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1131310015","content_text":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.\nSell before the other speculators do.\n\nRgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n\nMy time frame for reference is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n\nDepreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.\nInterest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.\n\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n\nPretty clever, no? No:\n\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n\nUh oh. What now?\n\n“On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller & Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"comments":[{"id":4904117,"gmtCreate":1624158793444,"gmtModify":1635307456467,"authorId":3565081661382277,"author":{"id":3565081661382277,"idStr":"3565081661382277","authorId":3565081661382277,"name":"Mm101","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/01758aa877d9e5a9767d24de3a4e2ff1","vip":1,"crmLevel":4,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":165759612,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"B","text":"B","html":"B"},{"id":4904122,"gmtCreate":1624158803086,"gmtModify":1635307455851,"authorId":3565081661382277,"author":{"id":3565081661382277,"idStr":"3565081661382277","authorId":3565081661382277,"name":"Mm101","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/01758aa877d9e5a9767d24de3a4e2ff1","vip":1,"crmLevel":4,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":165759612,"type":1,"supId":4904117,"prevId":0,"content":"Uu","text":"Uu","html":"Uu"},{"id":4904143,"gmtCreate":1624158858594,"gmtModify":1635307453518,"authorId":3565081661382277,"author":{"id":3565081661382277,"idStr":"3565081661382277","authorId":3565081661382277,"name":"Mm101","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/01758aa877d9e5a9767d24de3a4e2ff1","vip":1,"crmLevel":4,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":165759612,"type":1,"supId":0,"prevId":0,"content":"Buy","text":"Buy","html":"Buy"},{"id":4904146,"gmtCreate":1624158868482,"gmtModify":1635307453151,"authorId":3565081661382277,"author":{"id":3565081661382277,"idStr":"3565081661382277","authorId":3565081661382277,"name":"Mm101","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/01758aa877d9e5a9767d24de3a4e2ff1","vip":1,"crmLevel":4,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":0,"objectId":165759612,"type":1,"supId":4904143,"prevId":0,"content":"Now","text":"Now","html":"Now"},{"id":4904150,"gmtCreate":1624158876158,"gmtModify":1635307452660,"authorId":3565081661382277,"author":{"id":3565081661382277,"idStr":"3565081661382277","authorId":3565081661382277,"name":"Mm101","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/01758aa877d9e5a9767d24de3a4e2ff1","vip":1,"crmLevel":4,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"repliedAuthorId":3565081661382277,"repliedAuthor":{"id":3565081661382277,"idStr":"3565081661382277","authorId":3565081661382277,"name":"Mm101","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/01758aa877d9e5a9767d24de3a4e2ff1","vip":1,"crmLevel":4,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"individualDisplayBadges":[]},"objectId":165759612,"type":1,"supId":4904143,"prevId":4904146,"content":"Dont","text":"Dont","html":"Dont"}],"langContent":"EN"},{"id":165675811,"gmtCreate":1624142829733,"gmtModify":1631893026422,"author":{"id":"3581912003252887","authorId":"3581912003252887","name":"danjean","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/160d790e4320d5f36bc3f38e2ebec589","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"authorIdStr":"3581912003252887","idStr":"3581912003252887"},"htmlText":"Risky&nbsp;","listText":"Risky&nbsp;","text":"Risky","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://laohu8.com/post/165675811","repostId":1131310015,"repostType":4,"repost":{"id":"1131310015","pubTimestamp":1623987347,"share":"https://www.laohu8.com/m/news/1131310015?lang=&edition=full","pubTime":"2021-06-18 11:35","market":"us","language":"en","title":"AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1131310015","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pul","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>I stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.</li>\n <li>For investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.</li>\n <li>A century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.</li>\n <li>Sell before the other speculators do.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/dabb985556b9f549dd561bf919495d08\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"513\">RgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n</blockquote>\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/3f5311cb0ff00c046d122c2c84fc3aea\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"168\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nMy time frame for reference&nbsp;is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/9b8a5ce8ad10adb3336126cdb0a5e598\" tg-width=\"537\" tg-height=\"497\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n<ul>\n <li>Depreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.</li>\n <li>Interest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.</li>\n</ul>\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n</blockquote>\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n<blockquote>\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n</blockquote>\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n<blockquote>\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n</blockquote>\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n<blockquote>\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n</blockquote>\nPretty clever, no? No:\n<blockquote>\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n</blockquote>\nUh oh. What now?\n<blockquote>\n “On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller &amp; Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n</blockquote>\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; line-height:1.5; color:#999; background:transparent; }\n.wrapper{ overflow:hidden;word-break:break-all;padding:10px; }\nh1,h2{ font-weight:normal; line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:.6em; }\nh3,h4,h5,h6{ line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:1em; }\nh1{ font-size:24px; }\nh2{ font-size:20px; }\nh3{ font-size:18px; }\nh4{ font-size:16px; }\nh5{ font-size:14px; }\nh6{ font-size:12px; }\np,ul,ol,blockquote,dl,table{ margin:1.2em 0; }\nul,ol{ margin-left:2em; }\nul{ list-style:disc; }\nol{ list-style:decimal; }\nli,li p{ margin:10px 0;}\nimg{ max-width:100%;display:block;margin:0 auto 1em; }\nblockquote{ color:#B5B2B1; border-left:3px solid #aaa; padding:1em; }\nstrong,b{font-weight:bold;}\nem,i{font-style:italic;}\ntable{ width:100%;border-collapse:collapse;border-spacing:1px;margin:1em 0;font-size:.9em; }\nth,td{ padding:5px;text-align:left;border:1px solid #aaa; }\nth{ font-weight:bold;background:#5d5d5d; }\n.symbol-link{font-weight:bold;}\n/* header{ border-bottom:1px solid #494756; } */\n.title{ margin:0 0 8px;line-height:1.3;color:#ddd; }\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nAMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-18 11:35 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"AMC":"AMC院线"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1131310015","content_text":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.\nSell before the other speculators do.\n\nRgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n\nMy time frame for reference is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n\nDepreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.\nInterest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.\n\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n\nPretty clever, no? No:\n\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n\nUh oh. What now?\n\n“On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller & Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":162767590,"gmtCreate":1624076356710,"gmtModify":1634010985229,"author":{"id":"3579411687909792","authorId":"3579411687909792","name":"Dngl","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/a3b4baa34d4fd68e2024c10f5dffd33e","vip":1,"crmLevel":4,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"authorIdStr":"3579411687909792","idStr":"3579411687909792"},"htmlText":"Lol","listText":"Lol","text":"Lol","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://laohu8.com/post/162767590","repostId":1131310015,"repostType":2,"repost":{"id":"1131310015","pubTimestamp":1623987347,"share":"https://www.laohu8.com/m/news/1131310015?lang=&edition=full","pubTime":"2021-06-18 11:35","market":"us","language":"en","title":"AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1131310015","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pul","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>I stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.</li>\n <li>For investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.</li>\n <li>A century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.</li>\n <li>Sell before the other speculators do.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/dabb985556b9f549dd561bf919495d08\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"513\">RgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n</blockquote>\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/3f5311cb0ff00c046d122c2c84fc3aea\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"168\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nMy time frame for reference&nbsp;is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/9b8a5ce8ad10adb3336126cdb0a5e598\" tg-width=\"537\" tg-height=\"497\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n<ul>\n <li>Depreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.</li>\n <li>Interest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.</li>\n</ul>\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n</blockquote>\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n<blockquote>\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n</blockquote>\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n<blockquote>\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n</blockquote>\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n<blockquote>\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n</blockquote>\nPretty clever, no? No:\n<blockquote>\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n</blockquote>\nUh oh. What now?\n<blockquote>\n “On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller &amp; Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n</blockquote>\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; line-height:1.5; color:#999; background:transparent; }\n.wrapper{ overflow:hidden;word-break:break-all;padding:10px; }\nh1,h2{ font-weight:normal; line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:.6em; }\nh3,h4,h5,h6{ line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:1em; }\nh1{ font-size:24px; }\nh2{ font-size:20px; }\nh3{ font-size:18px; }\nh4{ font-size:16px; }\nh5{ font-size:14px; }\nh6{ font-size:12px; }\np,ul,ol,blockquote,dl,table{ margin:1.2em 0; }\nul,ol{ margin-left:2em; }\nul{ list-style:disc; }\nol{ list-style:decimal; }\nli,li p{ margin:10px 0;}\nimg{ max-width:100%;display:block;margin:0 auto 1em; }\nblockquote{ color:#B5B2B1; border-left:3px solid #aaa; padding:1em; }\nstrong,b{font-weight:bold;}\nem,i{font-style:italic;}\ntable{ width:100%;border-collapse:collapse;border-spacing:1px;margin:1em 0;font-size:.9em; }\nth,td{ padding:5px;text-align:left;border:1px solid #aaa; }\nth{ font-weight:bold;background:#5d5d5d; }\n.symbol-link{font-weight:bold;}\n/* header{ border-bottom:1px solid #494756; } */\n.title{ margin:0 0 8px;line-height:1.3;color:#ddd; }\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nAMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-18 11:35 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"AMC":"AMC院线"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1131310015","content_text":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.\nSell before the other speculators do.\n\nRgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n\nMy time frame for reference is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n\nDepreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.\nInterest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.\n\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n\nPretty clever, no? No:\n\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n\nUh oh. What now?\n\n“On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller & Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","news_type":1},"isVote":1,"likeStatus":false,"favoriteStatus":false,"reportStatus":false,"tweetType":1,"langContent":"EN"},{"id":162417778,"gmtCreate":1624071301694,"gmtModify":1631890127289,"author":{"id":"3577608788016616","authorId":"3577608788016616","name":"Ngxiaoyi","avatar":"https://static.tigerbbs.com/1345e06af3a703384bf1fba0fb4fb630","vip":1,"crmLevel":2,"crmLevelSwitch":0,"authorIdStr":"3577608788016616","idStr":"3577608788016616"},"htmlText":"NEVer SELLING","listText":"NEVer SELLING","text":"NEVer SELLING","images":[],"top":1,"highlighted":1,"essential":1,"paper":1,"likeSize":0,"commentSize":0,"repostSize":0,"link":"https://laohu8.com/post/162417778","repostId":1131310015,"repostType":2,"repost":{"id":"1131310015","pubTimestamp":1623987347,"share":"https://www.laohu8.com/m/news/1131310015?lang=&edition=full","pubTime":"2021-06-18 11:35","market":"us","language":"en","title":"AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators","url":"https://stock-news.laohu8.com/highlight/detail?id=1131310015","media":"seekingalpha","summary":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pul","content":"Summary\n<ul>\n <li>I stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.</li>\n <li>For investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.</li>\n <li>A century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.</li>\n <li>Sell before the other speculators do.</li>\n</ul>\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/dabb985556b9f549dd561bf919495d08\" tg-width=\"768\" tg-height=\"513\">RgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n</blockquote>\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/3f5311cb0ff00c046d122c2c84fc3aea\" tg-width=\"640\" tg-height=\"168\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nMy time frame for reference&nbsp;is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n<img src=\"https://static.tigerbbs.com/9b8a5ce8ad10adb3336126cdb0a5e598\" tg-width=\"537\" tg-height=\"497\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer\">\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n<ul>\n <li>Depreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.</li>\n <li>Interest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.</li>\n</ul>\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n<blockquote>\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n</blockquote>\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n<blockquote>\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n</blockquote>\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n<blockquote>\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n</blockquote>\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n<blockquote>\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n</blockquote>\nPretty clever, no? No:\n<blockquote>\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n</blockquote>\nUh oh. What now?\n<blockquote>\n “On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller &amp; Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n</blockquote>\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. Before the other speculating holders do so first.","collect":0,"html":"<!DOCTYPE html>\n<html>\n<head>\n<meta http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html; charset=utf-8\" />\n<meta name=\"viewport\" content=\"width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0,minimum-scale=1.0,maximum-scale=1.0,user-scalable=no\"/>\n<meta name=\"format-detection\" content=\"telephone=no,email=no,address=no\" />\n<title>AMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators</title>\n<style type=\"text/css\">\na,abbr,acronym,address,applet,article,aside,audio,b,big,blockquote,body,canvas,caption,center,cite,code,dd,del,details,dfn,div,dl,dt,\nem,embed,fieldset,figcaption,figure,footer,form,h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6,header,hgroup,html,i,iframe,img,ins,kbd,label,legend,li,mark,menu,nav,\nobject,ol,output,p,pre,q,ruby,s,samp,section,small,span,strike,strong,sub,summary,sup,table,tbody,td,tfoot,th,thead,time,tr,tt,u,ul,var,video{ font:inherit;margin:0;padding:0;vertical-align:baseline;border:0 }\nbody{ font-size:16px; line-height:1.5; color:#999; background:transparent; }\n.wrapper{ overflow:hidden;word-break:break-all;padding:10px; }\nh1,h2{ font-weight:normal; line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:.6em; }\nh3,h4,h5,h6{ line-height:1.35; margin-bottom:1em; }\nh1{ font-size:24px; }\nh2{ font-size:20px; }\nh3{ font-size:18px; }\nh4{ font-size:16px; }\nh5{ font-size:14px; }\nh6{ font-size:12px; }\np,ul,ol,blockquote,dl,table{ margin:1.2em 0; }\nul,ol{ margin-left:2em; }\nul{ list-style:disc; }\nol{ list-style:decimal; }\nli,li p{ margin:10px 0;}\nimg{ max-width:100%;display:block;margin:0 auto 1em; }\nblockquote{ color:#B5B2B1; border-left:3px solid #aaa; padding:1em; }\nstrong,b{font-weight:bold;}\nem,i{font-style:italic;}\ntable{ width:100%;border-collapse:collapse;border-spacing:1px;margin:1em 0;font-size:.9em; }\nth,td{ padding:5px;text-align:left;border:1px solid #aaa; }\nth{ font-weight:bold;background:#5d5d5d; }\n.symbol-link{font-weight:bold;}\n/* header{ border-bottom:1px solid #494756; } */\n.title{ margin:0 0 8px;line-height:1.3;color:#ddd; }\n.meta {color:#5e5c6d;font-size:13px;margin:0 0 .5em; }\na{text-decoration:none; color:#2a4b87;}\n.meta .head { display: inline-block; overflow: hidden}\n.head .h-thumb { width: 30px; height: 30px; margin: 0; padding: 0; border-radius: 50%; float: left;}\n.head .h-content { margin: 0; padding: 0 0 0 9px; float: left;}\n.head .h-name {font-size: 13px; color: #eee; margin: 0;}\n.head .h-time {font-size: 11px; color: #7E829C; margin: 0;line-height: 11px;}\n.small {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.9); -webkit-transform: scale(0.9); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.smaller {font-size: 12.5px; display: inline-block; transform: scale(0.8); -webkit-transform: scale(0.8); transform-origin: left; -webkit-transform-origin: left;}\n.bt-text {font-size: 12px;margin: 1.5em 0 0 0}\n.bt-text p {margin: 0}\n</style>\n</head>\n<body>\n<div class=\"wrapper\">\n<header>\n<h2 class=\"title\">\nAMC: Danger Signals For Investors And Speculators\n</h2>\n\n<h4 class=\"meta\">\n\n\n2021-06-18 11:35 GMT+8&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<a href=https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators>seekingalpha</a>\n\n\n</h4>\n\n</header>\n<article>\n<div>\nSummary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for ...\n\n<a href=\"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators\">Web Link</a>\n\n</div>\n\n\n</article>\n</div>\n</body>\n</html>\n","type":0,"thumbnail":"","relate_stocks":{"AMC":"AMC院线"},"source_url":"https://seekingalpha.com/article/4435360-amc-stock-danger-signals-for-investors-and-speculators","is_english":true,"share_image_url":"https://static.laohu8.com/e9f99090a1c2ed51c021029395664489","article_id":"1131310015","content_text":"Summary\n\nI stand on the shoulder of giants to guide you on AMC.\nFor investors, the gravitational pull of no earning prospects provides little support to the stock.\nA century-old cautionary tale for speculators counting on a short squeeze.\nSell before the other speculators do.\n\nRgStudio/E+ via Getty Images\nWhat are we to make of the meme stock phenomena? I tookone stab at itwith AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc.(NYSE:AMC)a few weeks ago. I’m back for more, after reading two interesting pieces. As Isaac Newton said in 1676, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Now I’m no Isaac Newton. For one, I’m far better looking. But like Zeke – a nickname Isaac’s friends probably never used – I too stand on the shoulders of giants. In this case the shoulders of Jason Zweig, a wonderful financial markets writer forThe Wall Street Journal, and John Brooks, author of “Business Adventures”, a book recommended by Bill Gates. I will quote liberally from both in this article, then draw the line for you to AMC.\nInvestor vs. trader vs. speculator\nJason Zweig graphically distinguished between these three types of stock buyers in hisJune 11, 2021Wall Street Journalcolumn:\n\n “\n Whenever you buy any financial asset because you have a hunch or just for kicks, or because somebody famous is hyping the heck out of it, or everybody else seems to be buying it too, you aren’t investing.You’re definitely a trader: someone who has just bought an asset. And you may be a speculator: someone who thinks other people will pay more for it than you did.”“An investor relies on internal sources of return: earnings, income, growth in the value of assets. A speculator counts on external sources of return: primarily whether somebody else will pay more, regardless of fundamental value.”\n\nSo why has AMC’s stock price been on a tear? I have one informal data source, namely the 300+ comments on my June 4 AMC article. Earnings, income, growth in the value of assetsnevercame up. What did come up was “short squeeze” and stock charts. So I expect Mr. Zweig would describe AMC’s stock as driven by traders and speculators.\nMr. Zweig also made me realize that my AMC article left out an earnings forecast. I gave lots of data on historic trends, which only implied a future direction. I correct that omission here.\nA 2022 AMC earnings forecast\nI start with the key assumptions:\n\nMy time frame for reference is 2017 to 2019. Earlier data is less relevant because AMC made a big acquisition in 2016, and 2020 and 2021 data is even less relevant because of COVID.\nThe national box officeis the major assumption.My June 4 articleshows that movie attendance has been declining since 2002. What will box office be next year? The steady growth in streaming, both in subscribers and content, certainly is a headwind. And COVID logically should increase the shift from offsite (theater) entertainment to home entertainment, as it has for shopping and working. Holding movie attendance near its ’19 level would be a minor miracle. A 10%, or even a 20%, decline is far more likely. As you can see in the table above, I make 2022 AMC EPS forecasts using all three box office assumptions.\nAMC market share.I assume a share increase from AMC’s ’17-’19 level because some competing theaters must have dropped out because of COVID financial pressures.\nAdmissions gross margin.This is the profit from ticket sales less the cost of licensing movies from their producers. I hold AMC steady with ’17-’19, but I can also imagine that movie producers seek better terms because AMC has to bid against a growing pool of streaming services desperate for content.\nFood expenses as a percent of sales.I carry forward the shockingly low number. AMC, and presumably its peers, take their food and beverage costs andmultiply them by 7 in their pricing to us moviegoers.Smuggle in your own Jujifruits and save a bundle. My best financial advice for the year.\nFood and beverage sales as a percent of ticket prices.I assume that AMC’s trend of modest increases continues.\nOperating expensesare the cost of the theater personnel, utilities, etc. I assume the gradual uptrend in the operating expense ratio continues, for two reasons. One, these operating expenses are largely fixed, and revenues will be under pressure. Second, it seems logical that the current labor shortage will pressure pay levels for low-end theater jobs.\nWe’re now ready for my earnings and cash flow models:\n\nThe ’22 forecasts are set by the assumptions above through the “gross profit” line. My overhead expense forecast assumes that AMC is working hard to limit expenses through its challenging times:\n\nDepreciation/amortizationis a combination of accounting expenses for real estate and acquisitions. Write-downs taken during the pandemic should have reduced these expenses.\nInterest expenseshould decline as AMC pays down some debt with the equity it has been raising.\n\nThe gravitational pull of earnings\nWe arrive at the bottom line. The best-case scenario I can see for 2022 EPS is roughly breakeven. More likely is a modest loss. Cash flow should be somewhat worse, because the cash capital spending needed by AMC to keep its theaters attractive to a shrinking audience should exceed its non-cash depreciation/amortization expenses. If capital spending is much lower than I forecast, it is probably because AMC management is conceding that it is in a death spiral and wants to milk what cash it can.\nThe bottom line - no support for investors.AMC’s book value is negative. It appears incapable of earning any material money post-COVID. Its business is in long-term decline due to technology changes, and its new competitors are monster companies – Netflix, Disney, Comcast, etc. – with huge resources. An investor can only look at AMC’s current $55 stock price and with a shudder say, in the immortal words ofTrading Places, “Sell Mortimer, sell!”\nThe speculative play - a short squeeze: A historical cautionary tale\nMillennials did not invent the short squeeze. It has been around almost as long financial markets have existed. The bookBusiness Adventuresby John Brooks,published way back in 1969, tells a vivid tale of a short squeeze even farther back, in the early 1920s. Literally a century ago. I’m going to quote from the book to suggest how the story ends for speculations with no investor support. So pour yourself some illegal hooch (we’re heading to the Prohibition Era) and read on. This is the story of Clarence Saunders, the founder of Piggly Wiggly Stores, the first supermarket; the Amazon of his day.\nShorts went after Clarence’s stock in 1922, driving it from $50 to below $40. Saunders vowed revenge with a short squeeze. Here are excerpts of Mr. Brooks’ recounting of the story:\n\n “\n Saunders…bought 33,000 shares of Piggly Wiggly, mostly from short sellers; within a week he had brought the total to 105,000 – more than half of the 200,000 shares outstanding. The effectiveness of Saunders’ buying campaign was readily apparent; by late January of 1923 it had driven he price up over $60…”\n\nThe sole short squeezer of yore has been replaced by herds of “apes” today, and the apes have been far better in driving up prices. By the way, believe it or not, a group of apes is apparently called a “shrewdness”. A group of apes is shrewd – interesting.\n\n “\n He had made himself a bundle and had demonstrated how a poor Southern boy could teach the city slickers a lesson.”\n\nToday we have apes sticking it to hedge funds.\n\n “\n One of the great hazards in the Corner was always that even though a player might defeat his opponents, he would discover that he had won a Pyrrhic victory. Once the short sellers had been squeezed dry, the cornerer might find that the reams of stock he had accumulated in the process were a dead weight around his neck; by pushing it all back into the market, he would drive its price down to zero.”\n\nSomething to think about. What was Saunders to do?\n\n “[\n Saunders’] solution was to sell his $55 shares on the installment plan. In his February advertisements, he stipulated that the public could buy shares only by paying $25 down and the balance in three $10 installments.”\n\nPretty clever, no? No:\n\n “\n At the end of the third day, the total number of shares subscribed for was still under 25,000, and the sales that were made were canceled. Saunders had to admit that the drive had been a failure.”\n\nUh oh. What now?\n\n“On August 22nd, the New York auction firm of Adrian H. Muller & Son…knocked down 1,500 shares of Piggly Wiggly at $1 a share…The following spring Saunders went through formal bankruptcy proceedings.”\n\nOuch.\nBuyers beware\nAs Jason Zweig noted above, speculators depend upon finding a buyer at a higher price. Today’s holders of AMC stock certainly have made life painful for many short sellers. But are there really enough new buyers to take out current shareholders above AMC’s present $28 billion market cap? Especially with the gravity of no earnings constantly weighing on the stock?\nAMC shareholders, don’t win Clarence Saunders’ Pyrrhic victory. Take your $55 a share and run. Fast. 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