After one of the worst months in stock market history, equities rebounded sharply in April, with the S&P 500 posting its largest monthly gain since January 1987 as it began to discount a phased-in reopening the economy, the massive monetary and fiscal policy response, and some encouraging COVID-19 treatment developments. The snap-back in the market is, however, fairly concentrated, with mega cap technology stocks being the prime beneficiaries. Most small capitalization companies and businesses with any exposure to “BOTL” (banks, oil, travel & leisure) continue to trade at prices significantly lower than pre-crisis levels.
The impact of COVID-19 continues to take its toll on the US economy. Since mid-March, over 30 million Americans have filed for unemployment. The continued economic shutdown has pressured more companies to lay off or furlough employees. The ramifications of strict stay-at-home orders from state officials has forced many companies to suspend financial guidance for 2020 as they reassess their businesses. As lockdown measures ease, government officials and economists are hopeful that a large portion of these temporary unemployed Americans will be able to quickly return to paid employment.
The Fed has responded by expanding its balance sheet, with estimates that it could exceed $12 trillion by the end of the year. Congress continues to fund the coronavirus support package in order to replenish money for the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) as well as ramp up testing for COVID-19.
Only time will tell whether the revival in the market is too optimistic and how severe any “second wave” of COVID-19 may be. In these unusual times, we remain hopeful that advancements in COVID-19 testing and treatments (and eventually a vaccine) will allow the economy to at least partially recover and operate in a greater capacity in the near-term. We continue to believe that strong companies with healthy balance sheets and positive free cash flows will be able to withstand these times of economic uncertainty.
Looking specifically at merger arbitrage for April, closed deals bolstered performance and other transactions made significant progress towards closing. These positive dynamics spurred investor confidence across the current pipeline of deals. While pending deal spreads remain wider than pre-COVID levels, they have narrowed from levels experienced in March. We are still encountering attractive opportunities to selectively deploy capital where there are clear paths to closing and we are highly confident of a deal’s success. While April was an expectedly quiet month for new deal activity, a number of new deals were announced in May, including Alexion’s acquisition of Portola Pharmaceuticals for $1.4 billion and A Menarini’s acquisition of Stemline Therapeutics for $700 million.
Column from Gabelli Funds, written by Michael Gabelli
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To access our proprietary value investment methodology, and dedicated merger arbitrage portfolio we offer the following UCITS Funds in each discipline:
GAMCO MERGER ARBITRAGE
GAMCO Merger Arbitrage UCITS Fund, launched in October 2011, is an open-end fund incorporated in Luxembourg and compliant with UCITS regulation. The team, dedicated strategy, and record dates back to 1985. The objective of the GAMCO Merger Arbitrage Fund is to achieve long-term capital growth by investing primarily in announced equity merger and acquisition transactions while maintaining a diversified portfolio. The Fund utilizes a highly specialized investment approach designed principally to profit from the successful completion of proposed mergers, takeovers, tender offers, leveraged buyouts and other types of corporate reorganizations. Analyzes and continuously monitors each pending transaction for potential risk, including: regulatory, terms, financing, and shareholder approval.
Merger investments are a highly liquid, non-market correlated, proven and consistent alternative to traditional fixed income and equity securities. Merger returns are dependent on deal spreads. Deal spreads are a function of time, deal risk premium, and interest rates. Returns are thus correlated to interest rate changes over the medium term and not the broader equity market. The prospect of rising rates would imply higher returns on mergers as spreads widen to compensate arbitrageurs. As bond markets decline (interest rates rise), merger returns should improve as capital allocation decisions adjust to the changes in the costs of capital.
Broad Market volatility can lead to widening of spreads in merger positions, coupled with our well-researched merger portfolios, offer the potential for enhanced IRRs through dynamic position sizing. Daily price volatility fluctuations coupled with less proprietary capital (the Volcker rule) in the U.S. have contributed to improving merger spreads and thus, overall returns. Thus our fund is well positioned as a cash substitute or fixed income alternative.
Our objectives are to compound and preserve wealth over time, while remaining non-correlated to the broad global markets. We created our first dedicated merger fund 32 years ago. Since then, our merger performance has grown client assets at an annualized rate of approximately 10.7% gross and 7.6% net since 1985. Today, we manage assets on behalf of institutional and high net worth clients globally in a variety of fund structures and mandates.
Class I USD – LU0687944552
Class I EUR – LU0687944396
Class A USD – LU0687943745
Class A EUR – LU0687943661
Class R USD – LU1453360825
Class R EUR – LU1453361476
GAMCO ALL CAP VALUE
The GAMCO All Cap Value UCITS Fund launched in May, 2015 utilizes Gabelli’s its proprietary PMV with a Catalyst™ investment methodology, which has been in place since 1977. The Fund seeks absolute returns through event driven value investing. Our methodology centers around fundamental, research-driven, value based investing with a focus on asset values, cash flows and identifiable catalysts to maximize returns independent of market direction. The fund draws on the experience of its global portfolio team and 35+ value research analysts.
GAMCO is an active, bottom-up, value investor, and seeks to achieve real capital appreciation (relative to inflation) over the long term regardless of market cycles. Our value-oriented stock selection process is based on the fundamental investment principles first articulated in 1934 by Graham and Dodd, the founders of modern security analysis, and further augmented by Mario Gabelli in 1977 with his introduction of the concepts of Private Market Value (PMV) with a Catalyst™ into equity analysis. PMV with a Catalyst™ is our unique research methodology that focuses on individual stock selection by identifying firms selling below intrinsic value with a reasonable probability of realizing their PMV’s which we define as the price a strategic or financial acquirer would be willing to pay for the entire enterprise. The fundamental valuation factors utilized to evaluate securities prior to inclusion/exclusion into the portfolio, our research driven approach views fundamental analysis as a three pronged approach: free cash flow (earnings before, interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, or EBITDA, minus the capital expenditures necessary to grow/maintain the business); earnings per share trends; and private market value (PMV), which encompasses on and off balance sheet assets and liabilities. Our team arrives at a PMV valuation by a rigorous assessment of fundamentals from publicly available information and judgement gained from meeting management, covering all size companies globally and our comprehensive, accumulated knowledge of a variety of sectors. We then identify businesses for the portfolio possessing the proper margin of safety and research variables from our deep research universe.
Class I USD – LU1216601648
Class I EUR – LU1216601564
Class A USD – LU1216600913
Class A EUR – LU1216600673
Class R USD – LU1453359900
Class R EUR – LU1453360155
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For Alicia Miguel Serrano