Bill Baruch, Founder, Blue Line Capital United Rentals URI-N BUY Oct 14, 2024

Initiated a dividend, and the chart shows that the market likes this. A very worthwhile hold.

Traded off on recession worries, where projects on the books would be deferred, but this is temporary. Solid investment, less than 9x earnings, inexpensive. Consistent grower. Initiated first-ever dividend, shows confidence in future cashflow.

URI had a better-than-expected 2023 outlook and started its first dividend. Brokers have raised target prices. 
There have been some recessionary and demand concerns, and the sector has been very weak in the past two weeks, but at 8X earnings things look fine to us here. 
Outlook is supported by strong demand due to significant federal spending programs and large industrial projects. 
Amid slowing economic growth, URI is poised to sustain double-digit gains in 2023. 
Annual 2022 equipment revenue expansion of 23% was the highest in the past decade. 
In the quarter, General Rental gains of 19% outpaced Specialty's 18%, as large rental companies continue to significantly outperform the market. Adjusted Ebitda margin in 4Q expanded 280 bps to 50%, highest since 3Q18. 
Ample free cash flow supports a long-awaited dividend and share buybacks for a total 2023 outlay of $1.4 billion. 
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Quality company. Suffered a while ago due to worries of recession. Cyclical, as people only rent when they have a lot of confidence in projects. Recovered because people are seeing the end of the hiking cycle, economy continues to be strong. Low multiple with high growth rates, a great combination.

Now at 15x earnings, still 20% discount to market. When a stock price rises, ideally you want the multiple to stay the same. It would mean organic growth matches price appreciation, both moving forward at the same time. With a dramatic move in price, ask yourself if you still want to hold? 

Economically sensitive. Be careful. Don't want to own it into a recession. Deep recession would hurt. Market seems on solid economic ground, so he's holding. If it gets too big in the portfolio, he'll trim. Still likes it. 

Look at the background. Companies like this live on government spending. US government's passing all kinds of bills to support the economy, like CHIPS and Infrastructure, to the tune of $2T. URI will get a big piece of this money.

Growth rates for earnings are roughly double those of CAT, yet the valuations are very similar. More bang for your buck. In his US small-cap portfolio. Still likes it here.

Is up 5% in the past 3 months. It benefits from infrastructure spending.

It jumped over 10% today, so buy on a pullback.

A competitor reported softer results which took some of the wind out of the sails of the shares and in general, a lot of these more economically sensitive names have seen these larger drawdowns on no real news. Fear of higher rates is likely having an impact as investors become concerned on its impact on economic activity and homebuilding. At 14.4X forward earnings, we think URI looks fine here. We always like having 'more' information especially when earnings are so close so might wait for that even before adding but overall don't see much fundamentally that has changed here.  
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