What was the Czech Investment Conference 2019 like?

The Czech Investment Conference is a unique event in the Czech Republic, which aims to prepare an attractive program for participants with stock tips with a view to a one-year or multi-year horizon. The aim is to introduce specific stock titles to the students and to avoid general lessons and techniques. Demonstrate techniques and methods on real examples so that we can see them in practice. Ideally, to give an estimate for the future and dare to predict further investment years for the selected stock.

I participated in the first day of the conference, which consisted of lectures with stock tips. I was pleasantly surprised that the lecturers opened their topic and went to specific numbers of selected stocks, showed market research, financial results, pointed out the risks of the company, compared with competitors and shared their predictions of market movements. I liked the concreteness and depth. The Czech investment conference was organized by Lenka Rož Schánová and Daniel Gladiš. This was the 6th year of this conference.

Many investment conferences slide to the generality and phrases that one is able to read from books. According to my previous experience, conferences have two main added values. It can be content and it can be networking and establishing / deepening relationships. At the Czech Investment Conference, I felt for myself mainly the content that gave the event real value.

Below, I have selected some interesting ideas that appealed to me, either as something new or what I considered good as a reminder.

The road to success over 10,000 hours

We all probably know the lesson of 10,000 hours, thanks to which we become really good, excellent in concrete activities. When we calculate our studies, including university years, we get to the number of 10,000 hours. As investors, we should be aware that we need a similar amount of time to begin to understand the financial processes of the market.

We need to learn not only from our own mistakes, but also from the mistakes of others. That’s why we read investors’ CVs, that’s why we go to conferences, that’s why we study the historical market.

Standing on the shoulders of giants

Warren Buffett is probably respected and acknowledged by all value investors. But then it is interesting to realize how many of us follow his investment steps. It’s a paradox, but while we know, on the one hand, that Buffett’s investment style is “correct and successful,” as individual investors we slip into decisions that run counter to his principles.

I liked the mention of the Standing on the shoulders of giants approach . We can consider Warren Buffett as Giants and other successful investors may also belong there. The choice depends on each of us.

Because I am well aware that I am more of an entrepreneur than an investor, I also had to accept that I would not embark on the path of a full-time investor. This means that I will not be able to do such analyzes as I have seen with many investors. Therefore, I prefer to choose my own Giants and I will follow and choose from their investment tips, methods and specific steps.

3 key factors to consider when choosing stocks

There are many indicators that need to be followed when choosing an investment stock. However, we should not forget the following three factors that can save our time in in-depth analysis.

• Is society growing over time?
• What is the management of the company? How has it been in recent years?
• How does a company allocate capital? What are her main expenses?

Investment tips from the conference

Instead of sharing all the companies and specific investment tips from the conference, which I would not consider fair with regard to all participants and lecturers, I would like to choose one stock that interested me and I will briefly describe it. The reason is that this is an area that I hear more and more often from various sources.

Lithium investment – LIVENT company

Ondřej Klečka, portfolio manager, Meridon Funds, presented his tip on LIVENT shares (ticker: LTHM ) at the conference . He believes that the company is better off than the market currently positions.

At the time of the conference, the LTHM share price was $ 8.1. According to Ondřej, we are approaching a turning point and the share price can be expected to rise in the coming months.

And below are some ideas from the presentation.

Demand is also determined by EU and Chinese regulations.

Inefficient pricing is caused by large overproduction. Therefore, the price of lithium has been falling since 2018. It is also a certain risk of this investment. The companies are struggling to resist and are predicted to continue reducing their mining plans, which were determined before 2018 with very positive expectations. This, of course, moves the price of their shares down, but companies prefer to maintain a positive cash flow.

High correlation between the price of lithium and shares of mining companies.

The TOP 7 companies (miners) control 90% of the entire lithium market. Livent currently belongs to the TOP 6.

Livent was formed from the Lithium Division of FMC Corporation.

In contrast, Livent has a 100% lithium-based business.

It mines in Chile and Canada. They do not have the most ideal conditions for mining, but in turn they have geographical diversification. They do not have the cheapest product.

Investment outlook for Livent: Buy half now, buy back in the spring of 2020, when the outlook will be clearer.

Among the speeches, it was mentioned that those interested can also look at the commodity nickel , which has certain signals to become The next big thing .

Czech investment conference and other steps of the investor

The awaiting investment conference took place on November 11-12 in Prague at the Pyramida Hotel. It was the 6th year of this event and you could hear among the lecturers:

There is no video recording of the event, you can view the photo gallery . The next year of the conference will most likely be again in November 2020, follow the official website of the Czech Investment Conference .

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