Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

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lomiras285
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Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by lomiras285 »

Stock prices are forward looking.

Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.

A change in price at a given time must be a revision of the future cash flow OR the discount factor that converts the future cash flow to the present value OR both.

But, in the end, we should be able to tell whether this way of thinking about stock prices is correct.

Take for example IBM.

It started trading in 1911. We have over 100 years of data about IBM's cash flow and stock price. From this, we can back out the discount rate.

From this we can answer two questions.

1/ was the market expectation of the future cash flow in line with the actual cash flow IBM reported over the years?

2/ was the discount rate within a range of expectations to justify the observed stock prices throughout it's history?

What do you all think?
Last edited by lomiras285 on Sat May 21, 2022 3:00 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by JoMoney »

Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by BuyAndHoldOn »

Do you mean conceptually, in general? --> Yes, stocks (or the pricing of assets) is supposed to reflect their cash flow / return stream (stocks have a higher degree of uncertainty; everything is an estimate).

But obviously not perfectly all of the time - look at the micro-bubbles bursting right now (Peleton, Carvana, even Netflix to some degree, etc.). And you mentioned discounting: Discount rates (generally US-interest rates) can change, both in nominal and in real terms. There are a lot of moving parts.

Stocks are volatile as traders (buyers and sellers) estimate what the value of the company prospects are, at any given time, under various economic circumstances, or are forced to buy or sell for other-than economic reasons (e.g., margin call / collateral liquidation).

IBM has been very highly valued at times; now, I believe not so much (disappointing revenue growth [even declines] the last several years). No one knows the future, but thankfully enough active participants try, to give us indexers a free lunch, of sorts :happy :greedy :beer

(I realize not all markets, even equity markets, are equally efficient and work super well for index investing. Large-cap US stocks are probably the best for index funds.)
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by Impatience »

It must be or the price would just jump around like crazy nonsense. Instead, the price at each moment is usually pretty close to the preceding price. So it is predictive of its own future value.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by incognito_man »

lomiras285 wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:40 pm Stock prices are forward looking.

Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.

A change in price at a given time must be a revision of the future cash flow OR the discount factor that converts the future cash flow to the present value OR both.

But, in the end, we should be able to tell whether this way of thinking about stock prices is correct.

Take for example IBM.

It started trading in 1911. We have over 100 years of data about IBM's cash flow and stock price. From this, we can back out the discount rate.

From this we can answer two questions.

1/ was the market expectation of the future cash flow in line with the actual cash flow IBM reported over the years?

2/ was the discount rate within a range of expectations to justify the observed stock prices throughout it's history?

What do you all think?
So weird...I had been noodling on this EXACT question the last few days myself but haven't sat down to work through the details. I'll be interested to see the direction this thread takes.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by JoMoney »

Some portfolio theories might suggest you can't look at a single stock to work this out, especially picking one in hindsight with the benefit of survivorship bias. You'd need to look at a portfolio of multiple stocks, or perhaps the whole market... but whatever discount rate is used, we already know that diversified stocks / "the market" beat bonds, and even using theorized equity risk premium models, stocks beat bonds on a "risk adjusted" basis (hence the Equity Premium Puzzle.)
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by mega317 »

JoMoney wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:44 pm
Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by JoMoney »

mega317 wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 3:32 pm
JoMoney wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:44 pm
Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.
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Did your (or my) kid get ahold of your account? What does this mean?
I meant it in a sarcastic mocking way. It's an emoji sequence popularized during the "meme stock" run up where people on sites like reddit "Wall Street Bets" attempted a short-squeeze on some stocks of companies in failing businesses that they believed had too many shares sold short, and by buying them up and holding on they could force the short-sellers (who have to eventually buy the shares to cover) to buy at high "too the moon!" prices.
The market price of some of these stocks did go way up, way beyond any rational explanation based on the businesses expected cash flows, so I was using it (partly) in jest mocking the idea that stocks are valued that way.
The emoji's can be read as "Apes Together Strong" (stock chart going up) "Diamond Hands" implying if the people who bought the stocks just hold on the price will just keep going up.

Members of reddits "Wall Street Bets" community will frequently refer to each other as "Apes", and the line "Apes Together Strong" is a quote from the 2011 movie "Rise of the Planet of the Apes"
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by lomiras285 »

JoMoney wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 3:29 pm Some portfolio theories might suggest you can't look at a single stock to work this out, especially picking one in hindsight with the benefit of survivorship bias. You'd need to look at a portfolio of multiple stocks, or perhaps the whole market... but whatever discount rate is used, we already know that diversified stocks / "the market" beat bonds, and even using theorized equity risk premium models, stocks beat bonds on a "risk adjusted" basis (hence the Equity Premium Puzzle.)
Can you please write a little more in detail, with BH audience in mind, about how the equity risk premium relates to the original post about checking if the cash flow, discount rate and price are dancing in tango? Thanks!
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by lomiras285 »

incognito_man wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 3:15 pm
lomiras285 wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:40 pm Stock prices are forward looking.

Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.

A change in price at a given time must be a revision of the future cash flow OR the discount factor that converts the future cash flow to the present value OR both.

But, in the end, we should be able to tell whether this way of thinking about stock prices is correct.

Take for example IBM.

It started trading in 1911. We have over 100 years of data about IBM's cash flow and stock price. From this, we can back out the discount rate.

From this we can answer two questions.

1/ was the market expectation of the future cash flow in line with the actual cash flow IBM reported over the years?

2/ was the discount rate within a range of expectations to justify the observed stock prices throughout it's history?

What do you all think?
So weird...I had been noodling on this EXACT question the last few days myself but haven't sat down to work through the details. I'll be interested to see the direction this thread takes.
A coincidence 🤣
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by CraigTester »

Pets.com was priced at a gazillion dollars in the dot.com era. Never made a penny of profit.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by secondopinion »

CraigTester wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 10:01 pm Pets.com was priced at a gazillion dollars in the dot.com era. Never made a penny of profit.
Sure it was priced that way; there is no such thing as “a gazillion dollars”. Hence, it is gone forevermore having a non-real market value.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by ivgrivchuck »

lomiras285 wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:40 pm Stock prices are forward looking.

Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.

A change in price at a given time must be a revision of the future cash flow OR the discount factor that converts the future cash flow to the present value OR both.

But, in the end, we should be able to tell whether this way of thinking about stock prices is correct.
Why wouldn't it be correct?

Estimating the cash flows far in the future is very difficult, highly uncertain and plays a big role in determining the fair value of the stock. So, individual stocks are highly volatile, as we know.

Discount factor (risk premium) also depends on the constantly changing market conditions (and future projections of those market conditions) and many other things, and can also have a big impact on the fair market value of the stock.

So the thinking is fine in theory, but extremely difficult to implement precisely in practice.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by lomiras285 »

ivgrivchuck wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 2:31 am
lomiras285 wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:40 pm Stock prices are forward looking.

Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.

A change in price at a given time must be a revision of the future cash flow OR the discount factor that converts the future cash flow to the present value OR both.

But, in the end, we should be able to tell whether this way of thinking about stock prices is correct.
Why wouldn't it be correct?

Estimating the cash flows far in the future is very difficult, highly uncertain and plays a big role in determining the fair value of the stock. So, individual stocks are highly volatile, as we know.

Discount factor (risk premium) also depends on the constantly changing market conditions (and future projections of those market conditions) and many other things, and can also have a big impact on the fair market value of the stock.

So the thinking is fine in theory, but extremely difficult to implement precisely in practice.
I am not saying it is not correct. Rather this way of thinking could be verified using companies that survived for a long period of time. Someone mentioned above that it introduces survivorship bias. This is correct. We cannot use this as a verification. But we can use it as a falsification.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by gougou »

Stock price represents the current supply and demand of the stock, nothing more and nothing less.

To believe stock price represents the discounted value of future cash flow, you’ll have to believe a lot of theories and that market participants are mostly rational.
The sillier the market’s behavior, the greater the opportunity for the business like investor.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by arcticpineapplecorp. »

lomiras285 wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 6:44 pm
incognito_man wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 3:15 pm
lomiras285 wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:40 pm Stock prices are forward looking.

Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.

A change in price at a given time must be a revision of the future cash flow OR the discount factor that converts the future cash flow to the present value OR both.

But, in the end, we should be able to tell whether this way of thinking about stock prices is correct.

Take for example IBM.

It started trading in 1911. We have over 100 years of data about IBM's cash flow and stock price. From this, we can back out the discount rate.

From this we can answer two questions.

1/ was the market expectation of the future cash flow in line with the actual cash flow IBM reported over the years?

2/ was the discount rate within a range of expectations to justify the observed stock prices throughout it's history?

What do you all think?
So weird...I had been noodling on this EXACT question the last few days myself but haven't sat down to work through the details. I'll be interested to see the direction this thread takes.
A coincidence 🤣
or is it the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon?
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by AerialWombat »

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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by Nowizard »

They are predictive of predicted future profitability, I suspect.

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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by incognito_man »

I think my question in my mind is slightly different. I was asking myself the following:

(1) Look back 30yrs from today
(2) Assume the market is efficient and every stock's P/E ratio at that time is the "correct" P/E ratio for all known information at that time.
(3) Propagate that P/E ratio forward 30 years for every company with the understanding that any changes to the actual P/E were due to unpredictable events in those 30 years.
(4) Factoring in dividends, and using the same P/E from 30 years ago, calculate the hypothetical return of each company.
(4) Using the current-day earnings + dividends, back-calculate what the price SHOULD have been 30 years ago.
(5) Compare
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by ivgrivchuck »

lomiras285 wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 10:06 am
ivgrivchuck wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 2:31 am
lomiras285 wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:40 pm Stock prices are forward looking.

Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.

A change in price at a given time must be a revision of the future cash flow OR the discount factor that converts the future cash flow to the present value OR both.

But, in the end, we should be able to tell whether this way of thinking about stock prices is correct.
Why wouldn't it be correct?

Estimating the cash flows far in the future is very difficult, highly uncertain and plays a big role in determining the fair value of the stock. So, individual stocks are highly volatile, as we know.

Discount factor (risk premium) also depends on the constantly changing market conditions (and future projections of those market conditions) and many other things, and can also have a big impact on the fair market value of the stock.

So the thinking is fine in theory, but extremely difficult to implement precisely in practice.
I am not saying it is not correct. Rather this way of thinking could be verified using companies that survived for a long period of time. Someone mentioned above that it introduces survivorship bias. This is correct. We cannot use this as a verification. But we can use it as a falsification.
At a specific point of time, each company has hundreds/thousands different kind of potential futures ahead of it. Market valuations are a weighted average of those futures. One of those futures becomes reality, if it was more positive than the average, stock price goes up, if it was more negative than average, stock price goes down.

If you examine a large number of companies in the past data, you'll find ones that did better than expected, you'll find ones that did worse than expected. You'll find time periods when market as a whole did better than expected, you'll find time periods when market as a whole did worse than expected.

I'm not sure what exactly you are proposing...
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by ivgrivchuck »

gougou wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 10:23 am To believe stock price represents the discounted value of future cash flow, you’ll have to believe a lot of theories and that market participants are mostly rational.
Well, if they aren't rational, you can calculate the true correct value of any company and beat all the other irrational market participants in the long run by investing only in the undervalued companies.

Many have tried, few have succeeded...
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by lomiras285 »

ivgrivchuck wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 4:05 pm
lomiras285 wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 10:06 am
ivgrivchuck wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 2:31 am
lomiras285 wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:40 pm Stock prices are forward looking.

Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.

A change in price at a given time must be a revision of the future cash flow OR the discount factor that converts the future cash flow to the present value OR both.

But, in the end, we should be able to tell whether this way of thinking about stock prices is correct.
Why wouldn't it be correct?

Estimating the cash flows far in the future is very difficult, highly uncertain and plays a big role in determining the fair value of the stock. So, individual stocks are highly volatile, as we know.

Discount factor (risk premium) also depends on the constantly changing market conditions (and future projections of those market conditions) and many other things, and can also have a big impact on the fair market value of the stock.

So the thinking is fine in theory, but extremely difficult to implement precisely in practice.
I am not saying it is not correct. Rather this way of thinking could be verified using companies that survived for a long period of time. Someone mentioned above that it introduces survivorship bias. This is correct. We cannot use this as a verification. But we can use it as a falsification.
At a specific point of time, each company has hundreds/thousands different kind of potential futures ahead of it. Market valuations are a weighted average of those futures. One of those futures becomes reality, if it was more positive than the average, stock price goes up, if it was more negative than average, stock price goes down.

If you examine a large number of companies in the past data, you'll find ones that did better than expected, you'll find ones that did worse than expected. You'll find time periods when market as a whole did better than expected, you'll find time periods when market as a whole did worse than expected.

I'm not sure what exactly you are proposing...
True but the expectation must be unbiased in that the average outcome of cash flows and discount rates over a long period of time (hence the IBM example above) must be almost equal to the expectation.

Thus we can backtest whether the market's expectation of cash flows and discount rates, e.g. in 1911 for IBM, was in line with the observed price in 1911, using data about cash flows and discount rates from 1911 to today.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by bertilak »

JoMoney wrote: Sat May 21, 2022 2:44 pm
Stock prices are present values of future cash flows.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by gougou »

ivgrivchuck wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 4:12 pm
gougou wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 10:23 am To believe stock price represents the discounted value of future cash flow, you’ll have to believe a lot of theories and that market participants are mostly rational.
Well, if they aren't rational, you can calculate the true correct value of any company and beat all the other irrational market participants in the long run by investing only in the undervalued companies.

Many have tried, few have succeeded...
The future is a probabilistic event, so the correct value of a stock is a random variable. You could get some expected value or a conservative estimation. But if those don’t give you enough margin of safety, you might still lose money or underperform the market.

I absolutely do not believe any of those growth stocks or meme stocks trade anywhere near their discounted future cashflow. A company that has no cashflow for the next 5+ years is simply too uncertain that nobody has any clue what its real value is. Such stocks trade on the mood of the market and the herd behavior of the crowd. If you think these people are rational…
The sillier the market’s behavior, the greater the opportunity for the business like investor.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by ivgrivchuck »

gougou wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 9:13 pm
ivgrivchuck wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 4:12 pm
gougou wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 10:23 am To believe stock price represents the discounted value of future cash flow, you’ll have to believe a lot of theories and that market participants are mostly rational.
Well, if they aren't rational, you can calculate the true correct value of any company and beat all the other irrational market participants in the long run by investing only in the undervalued companies.

Many have tried, few have succeeded...
The future is a probabilistic event, so the correct value of a stock is a random variable. You could get some expected value or a conservative estimation. But if those don’t give you enough margin of safety, you might still lose money or underperform the market.

I absolutely do not believe any of those growth stocks or meme stocks trade anywhere near their discounted future cashflow. A company that has no cashflow for the next 5+ years is simply too uncertain that nobody has any clue what its real value is. Such stocks trade on the mood of the market and the herd behavior of the crowd. If you think these people are rational…
It would be foolish to think that the market is 100% rational 100% of the time. There are clear examples that this is not the case, like:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_flash_crash

But it's fair to expect that market is mostly rational most of the time. There are exceptions like meme stocks, but trying to exclude these from the total market portfolio is likely going to be more trouble than what it's worth.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by typical.investor »

ivgrivchuck wrote: Mon May 23, 2022 2:21 am
gougou wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 9:13 pm
ivgrivchuck wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 4:12 pm
gougou wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 10:23 am To believe stock price represents the discounted value of future cash flow, you’ll have to believe a lot of theories and that market participants are mostly rational.
Well, if they aren't rational, you can calculate the true correct value of any company and beat all the other irrational market participants in the long run by investing only in the undervalued companies.

Many have tried, few have succeeded...
The future is a probabilistic event, so the correct value of a stock is a random variable. You could get some expected value or a conservative estimation. But if those don’t give you enough margin of safety, you might still lose money or underperform the market.

I absolutely do not believe any of those growth stocks or meme stocks trade anywhere near their discounted future cashflow. A company that has no cashflow for the next 5+ years is simply too uncertain that nobody has any clue what its real value is. Such stocks trade on the mood of the market and the herd behavior of the crowd. If you think these people are rational…
It would be foolish to think that the market is 100% rational 100% of the time. There are clear examples that this is not the case, like:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_flash_crash

But it's fair to expect that market is mostly rational most of the time. There are exceptions like meme stocks, but trying to exclude these from the total market portfolio is likely going to be more trouble than what it's worth.
Is trying to catch a Momentum premium not rationale?

It seems obvious that meme stocks are an attempt to do so.

Catching momentum is difficult I think.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by ivgrivchuck »

typical.investor wrote: Mon May 23, 2022 6:20 am Is trying to catch a Momentum premium not rationale?

It seems obvious that meme stocks are an attempt to do so.

Catching momentum is difficult I think.
There are small market inefficiencies here and there, that a rational investor can try to capture.

- Meme stocks can be shorted, but there is a risk that irrational behavior can continue for a long time
- One can try to capture momentum premium, by buying and selling stocks at the right time. However while momentum premium has existed in the past, there is no guarantee that it continues to exist in the future (it may be likely, but not guaranteed), and one can incur significant spread costs. So it is no panacea.
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Re: Are stock prices predictive of future profitability of a company?

Post by gougou »

typical.investor wrote: Mon May 23, 2022 6:20 am
ivgrivchuck wrote: Mon May 23, 2022 2:21 am
gougou wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 9:13 pm
ivgrivchuck wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 4:12 pm
gougou wrote: Sun May 22, 2022 10:23 am To believe stock price represents the discounted value of future cash flow, you’ll have to believe a lot of theories and that market participants are mostly rational.
Well, if they aren't rational, you can calculate the true correct value of any company and beat all the other irrational market participants in the long run by investing only in the undervalued companies.

Many have tried, few have succeeded...
The future is a probabilistic event, so the correct value of a stock is a random variable. You could get some expected value or a conservative estimation. But if those don’t give you enough margin of safety, you might still lose money or underperform the market.

I absolutely do not believe any of those growth stocks or meme stocks trade anywhere near their discounted future cashflow. A company that has no cashflow for the next 5+ years is simply too uncertain that nobody has any clue what its real value is. Such stocks trade on the mood of the market and the herd behavior of the crowd. If you think these people are rational…
It would be foolish to think that the market is 100% rational 100% of the time. There are clear examples that this is not the case, like:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_flash_crash

But it's fair to expect that market is mostly rational most of the time. There are exceptions like meme stocks, but trying to exclude these from the total market portfolio is likely going to be more trouble than what it's worth.
Is trying to catch a Momentum premium not rationale?

It seems obvious that meme stocks are an attempt to do so.

Catching momentum is difficult I think.
Nobody has any clue how much the meme stocks and growth stocks will be worth. They have no cash flow and they don’t trade on fundamentals. The aggregate trading game on such stocks are a negative sum game for most people, where only the brokerage, market-maker and maybe some quant trading firms making consistent profit. No one cares about the intrinsic value of the company, so the stock prices of meme stocks and most growth stocks definitely do not reflect the future profitability/cashflow of the companies.
The sillier the market’s behavior, the greater the opportunity for the business like investor.
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