Episode 11: Audinate, Volpara, Dicker Data, locality Planning and listener mailbag

I recently came across a fascinating, if slightly uncomfortable, piece of research titled Long-Term Shareholder Returns: Evidence from 64,000 Global Stocks (you can read it here). It examines thirty years of market history and reveals an awkward truth: almost all the wealth created by equities comes from a vanishingly small number of companies. Of the 64,000 stocks studied, just 2.4% […]

Kiwi breast imaging software specialist Volpara (ASX:VHT) has confirmed it is on track to meet its target for NZ$17.1 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR) for the 2020 financial year. That compares with an ARR of NZ$6.6 million in the previous year, with the recent acquisition of MRS Systems expected to contribute around NZ$6.7 million to the total. At the […]

Paradigm-shifting innovation always has its skeptics. It’s almost a rite of passage. Virtually all of our modern technological marvels — the things we today take for granted — were initially met with plenty of Fear, Uncertainty & Doubt (FUD). Steam power, electricity, radio, the internet are all great examples, but one less discussed tech revolution deserves special mention — simply because it seems so laughable […]

Consisting of over 2100 individual companies, the Australian share market has a few interesting features. One of the first things a curious investor might notice is the significance of the major banks. There are only 21 businesses on the ASX classified (loosely) as banks, but the ‘Big 4’ — CBA, NAB, ANZ and Westpac — are the clear standouts. Combined, […]

In a 2014 interview, Lloyd Blankfein, then CEO of Goldman Sachs and part-time Bond villain lookalike, was asked a simple question: How far into the future can you see? Now, given Goldman’s reputation for spotting market trends before most, you’d expect a confident answer.  Instead, Blankfein deadpanned: “I don’t think I could see four inches into the future.” Not exactly […]

If you’re a technophile, there’s a fast expanding array of things to get excited about. Synthetic biology, robotics, materials science, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, quantum computing & (more recently) superconductivity are some of the more promising domains where very real progress is being made. Once in a species breakthroughs no longer feel as far fetched as they used to. And progress […]

A lot of investors seem to be pivoting their investment strategies in light of the coronavirus crisis. Mine, for better or worse, remains essentially unchanged: Seek to acquire a range of quality companies with a view to holding them for many years.  Aim to hold between 10-15 companies that do not have highly correlated risks. A quality company is one […]

The ultimate destination for any successful enterprise is to become a dividend machine. If a company never reaches a stage where it can sustain a regular flow of cash to its owners, should it choose to do so, then it represents a total failure from a capital investment standpoint. A company may create jobs and provide products that customers desire, […]