Super Stocks [Paperback]

If you've read a few of Fisher's regular columns in Forbes, you know that he 1) is primarily a value-oriented investor, 2) applies numerous, diverse tools in formulating his opinions, and 3) is quite self-confident. I think most people would objectively agree that a combination of all three of these qualities is key to being a successful long-term investor. Super Stocks, which I read a decade ago and still refer to today, effectively captures and displays Fisher's approach. Fisher does an admirable job of describing his investment philosophy, then providing a detailed walk-through of how he implements it - that type of focus is lacking in so many other investment books. Beyond that, Super Stocks introduced me to several investment resources that I was not aware of and Fisher even closes the loop by providing advice on selling out of winners. Two primary concepts that have stuck with me over the years and still weigh heavily on my thinking today are the idea of what margins a company with a low PSR SHOULD produce on its sales and the opportunities presented by product/earnings glitches. In both cases, it allows me to look past a company's current difficulties and determine what the magnitude and probability of upside is going forward. Though my core approach is as a buy and hold, small cap growth investor, I can attest to the numerous profitable stocks I have uncovered thanks to the tools this book gave me. So, don't let any preconceived notions of the author get in the way of your enhancement of your investing skills. Buy the book, learn from it, and I honestly believe you'll pay yourself back many times over.

I was first introduced to Fisher's concept of Super Stocks about 10 years ago. The idea behind the concept is buying stocks with a low Price-to-Sales Ratio (PSR), typically 1.0 or less. Simply having a low PSR is not sufficient to be a Super Stock. The valuation tool is combined with fundamental analysis (e.g. growth, margin analysis, balance sheet analysis, etc.) of companies to identify stocks with favorable characteristics that will make them Super Stocks. Fisher also introduces a complementery tool Price-to-Research Ratio (PRR) which is a measure of the company's reinvestment rate into growth.

Fisher spends a lot of time discussing how to make money off the "Glitch". Basically, he believes that many Super Stocks are stocks that have been hit by a "Glitch". A "Glitch" is a temporary setback experienced by a company that makes the out of favor (e.g. product life cycle delay, revenue short-fall, etc.) This attitude is indicative of his value-orientation in investing. In other words, his fundamental analysis may find a great stock, but he will wait for a pull-back from a "Glitch" to a more appropriate PSR before investing.

Overall, the concept of PSR is not so different from other valuation measures for "low-priced" stocks such as Price-to-Earnings or Price-to-Book. However, it doesn't hurt to have another tool in the kit.

On a more interesting side-note, Wall Street analysts have definitely not read this book. It is amusing to note that analysts in the hey-day of the Internet boom touted stocks with PSRs in excess of 10x. A careful fundamental analysis would have resulted in concluding that the growth, margins, and balance sheets of these companies did not justify such high valuations. Nothing in the business models indicated superior performance on any dimension. Even if a business model was found to be superior, prudence would have dictated waiting for a "Glitch".

I strongly recommend this book for your consumption: this book is extremely valuable for both its investing intelligence and its unique nature. No other book that I know of provides such a complete, and reasonable evaluation of revenue analysis, value opportunities via temporary profit margin squeezes, and screening for these opportunities via Price-to-Sales Ratios (PSRs.)

The heart of the book is that many investor's extreme focus on short-term bottom-line (P/E and earnings growth percentage movements) results can create extremely undervalued purchasing points in a great company with a temporary problem (determining this 'temporary' part is where his discussions about qualitative and margin anaylsis comes in.) Because revenue percentage movements tend to be both much more stable than earning percentage movements, and much less appreciated, PSR scanning may be the beginning of the most accurate type of mid-/long-term undervalued selection. (A good free scanner that has PSRs can be found here: http://moneycentral.msn.com/investor/finder/customstocks.asp)

Even if you reject the PSR method, this book's focus on profit margins and revenues can help you focus on what goes into the companies earning's movements. Not all earning growths are the same: you need both revenue growth for sustained earnings growth (you can only cut so much for so long,) and you need a healthy profit margin so that you can finance this revenue growth without large dept or share dilution. I would recommend being skeptical of a company that has growing sales but a sustained falling profit margin, I would be even more skeptical of earnings growth that isn't closely followed by revenue growth (almost disregarding it if it was a profit margin squeeze.) I think balance is key in this area.

The book also has good qualitative insights, has good appendixes, and is fairily concise to boot.

Some on this review page have objected to this book by claiming the author is arrogant. Nothing stood out to me in this book, however in "Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits and Other Writings" by his father Phil Fisher (probably the best qualitative fundamentals book by the way) he wrote in the preface about how his greater success comes from being a harder worker, being more driven, etc that was tasteless in my opinion (especially since Phil was then on his deathbed and it had a bit of a 'tribute' nature to it.) He's not that bad for what it's worth; I was surprised at how modest he seemed when he explained about how he turned a company around (when asked by the board he was on to act as a temporary CEO): he stuck to the point the appendix was making (i.e. that market research is much more important than expensive product R&D.) Anyhow, you're buying access to the author's ideas, not his friendship.

When part of me is secretly happy that this book seems to be out of print, my greed should be your hint. The Fisher's know what they're talking about, and Ken presents un-rehashed information.