Opinions
Jerome Hass
Home Capital Group
HCG-T
TOP PICK
Feb 22, 2017
$26.260
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BUY
What is interesting about them is that they came through mortgage hell in 2008 with barely a ripple. It has also emerged from COVID-19 issues with barely a ripple. It is very cheap compared to its long term book value of $45. The fair market value is huge and the balance sheet is fine. He wishes they would institute a dividend that would give investors more comfortable that everything is fine. He thinks deferred mortgage payments will not be an issue for them. In a recovery, it will do very well.
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STRONG BUY
A few years ago, it was one of his beloved stocks until it got slammed by comments from the U.S. and OSC. It has since rebounded. Its fair market value is 154% higher than the current price. If it can break out from the current $45 price, this will enjoy a nice upside. They are also buying back a lot of shares, which he thinks is stupid; raise the dividend instead.
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DON'T BUY
If you want to own a lender, please own Canadian bank stocks instead. HCG and others don't have the same access to capital, so they can get caught in a liquidity squeeze. Borrowers pay a higher rate of interest. If housing market has a hiccup, HCG would be more exposed than the banks.
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*Short* A very crowded short, and he generally doesn’t like to participate in crowded trades, but makes an exception in this case. There are a lot of Shorts on this, because the US hedge funds use it as a proxy for the Canadian housing market. His view is actually quite neutral on the Canadian housing market. There is a lot of runoff in their portfolio, so just to stand still they have to get at least 14% growth in terms of their number of mortgages. This is because banks have gotten smarter at catering to new immigrants to Canada. Dividend yield of 3.91%. (Analysts’ price target is $29.73.)