QAV America (free feed)

In this episode of QAV America, Cameron and Tony navigate the “completely bonkers” landscape of 2026, where a Supreme Court reversal on Trump’s previous tariffs and the looming shadow of AI bubbles have left investors guessing. The duo breaks down the hidden “gotchas” of American Depository Receipts (ADRs), specifically examining the tax hurdles and custody fees associated with South Korean plays like Shinhan Financial Group (SHG) and Korea Electric Power (KEP). The centerpiece of the episode is a “Pulled Pork” deep dive into Bread Financial (BFH)—a high-yielding, unloved credit card “stub” that has spent years amputating its legacy loyalty businesses to emerge as a pure-play lender. Despite the “Trump Slump” threat of capped interest rates and a “stinky” past involving a bankrupt spin-off, BFH boasts a massive QAV quality score and looks dirt cheap on a price-to-cash-flow basis. Episode Timestamps [00:00:00] Introduction: Value investing in the North American market.[00:00:50] SCOTUS vs. Tariffs: The impact on Learning Resources Inc. and the $260 billion repayment mystery.[00:02:15] The AI Bubble: Data center capital costs and the Mag Seven depreciation talk.[00:08:45] ADR Deep Dive: Navigating fees and taxes for Shinhan Financial Group (SHG).[00:13:50] Performance Check: Korea Electric Power (KEP) up 31% and Zepp Health Corp (ZEPP) up 665%.[00:15:30] Pulled Pork Scorecard: Win ratios and Ford Motor Company (F) resilience.[00:16:30] Portfolio Winners: Gains in Willis Lease Finance (WLFC), Inter & Co (INTR), and Euroseas (ESEA).[00:18:15] The Finance/Shipping Heavyweight List: Bladex (BLX), StealthGas (GASS), and Korea Telecom (KT).[00:20:45] Deep Dive: Bread Financial (BFH)—The Invisible Store Card engine. Transcription   Cameron: [00:00:00] Welcome back to QAV America Tony, for, uh, new listeners to Australians Value. Investors been talking about value investing on a podcast for years in Australia. Now we’re doing an American version where we talk about the North American market. And we can’t start talking about the North American market, Tony, without talking about Donald Trump and tariffs and SCOTUS and all that kinda stuff this week. So, um. Um, as we, we were talking a little bit about it on our Australian show that we just finished, but as everyone knows, uh, the Supreme Court overturned trump’s, uh, tariffs that he had implemented a year or so ago under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which the Supreme Court said, nah, you can’t do that. That doesn’t work. The company that took it. All the way up to the [00:01:00] Supreme Court was Learning Resources Inc. A relatively small family owned maker of educational toys, uh, that said it was going to increase their. Tariff costs 44 times and that there was no way they could survive and afford to cover that. They didn’t have the capital to front run the tariffs. They couldn’t relocate their manufacturing quickly. Like bigger companies might’ve been able to, and uh, Trump called them. Dirty sleaze bags or just sleaze bags and unpatriotic unpatriotic sleaze bags. How dare you tell me that? The illegal thing that I did was illegal. You’re sleaze bags, major sleaze bags. Yes. And as I said in the last show, when some. [00:02:00] When somebody who’s been found guilty of sexual assault calls you a slee bag, slee major sleighs bag, you know, well, you’ve got problems. You need to take a long, hard look in the mirror, sir. Um, anyway, so what that means, uh, how they’re going to pay back the $260 billion in tariffs that they collected in 2025, uh, uh, remains to be seen. No one knows what it means, and he’s went immediately hit. Every country in the world with a 15% global tariff. No one knows what that means. No one knows what’s going on. It’s just completely bonkers. Completely, completely bonkers. But, you know, you and I were talking at the end of the Australian show about what AI is gonna do, and it’s, there’s you, you talked a lot on the last show about. Um, which you can talk about again if you want, on this show about the, uh, depreciation of capital costs for the mag [00:03:00] seven. Do you wanna do your little talk about that again?[00:04:00] [00:05:00] [00:06:00] Yeah. And you know, a lot of people are calling out the fact that the amount of revenue that these businesses are gonna have to generate in order to pay back all of this money that they’re raising for building data centers. It’s hard to see how that’s gonna happen. A lot of people are calling it an AI bubble, and, uh, yeah, the counter argument to that is, well. It’s pretty certain that AI is gonna be something and somebody’s gonna make [00:07:00] something, some money out of it. Although it also, the counter argument to that is that it can completely collapse socioeconomics as we know it and everyone loses their jobs and that creates recessions, depressions, uh, that could trickle, that could, you know, we could never recover from The point you and I were making on the show before was that. With Trump and the tariffs and with AI bubbles and all of this kinda stuff, no one knows, no one has any idea what the future looks like right now. So all we can do as investors is just keep doing what has worked in the past, which as far as we’re concerned, is by a dollar for 50 cents. And, uh, just until things change, so. Yeah. Until things change. And then when things change, we’ll [00:08:00] reassess. Reevaluate. Yeah. But right now we just keep doing what we’ve always been doing, which has worked pretty well so far. Double market returns for as long as anyone’s been tracking value investing. Yeah. Well, we’ll see. Meanwhile, we’ll just keep doing what we’re doing. Um. Last week on the show, we were talking about Shinhan Financial Group, and that raised the issue of ADRs yet again. American [00:09:00] Depository Receipts. And I did do a shout out when I did my Reddit post on Shinhan. I invited people to share their views on ADRs with me. No one replied, so I spent some time in. Uh, so I did, um, spend some time in Gemini working through it, and I’m gonna try and summarize my understanding of it as quickly as possible. So there’s a couple of gotchas here as I understand it. One is that there are. Cus there, there, there are called custody fees that the depository bank charges pass through fees for servicing the A DR. These are typically about two to 5 cents per share [00:10:00] annually. So depending on the value of the share, you gotta keep that in mind. There’s also dividend processing when SHG, for example, pays a dividend, the depository bank takes a cut. Often one to 3% of the dividend amount for converting the currency and distributing the funds so you don’t get the full value of the dividend. Then you’ve got the tax issues. Uh, this is apparently where most US investors end up taking a bit of a haircut if they didn’t plan for it. In, in the South Korean case with FSHG, the statutory withholding tax on dividends for non-residents is 22%, which includes a 2% local inhabitant tax. Then you’ve got the US Korea Tax Treaty. Under the current treaty, US residents can typically have this reduced to 15%. However, you have to get your broker to apply the treaty rate at the source, which is apparently notoriously difficult for retail [00:11:00] investors. You can usually claim a foreign tax credit on your US tax return using something called a Form 1 1 1 6. But this only offsets your US tax liability. So if you hold SHG in an IRA or a 401k, you might not be able to reclaim the 15 to 22% at all because those accounts are tax exempt and aren’t recognized as such by Korean tax authorities. So you’re missing out on that dividend altogether in that case. Then you’ve got the currency and exchange issues that I mentioned last week. Even if, say, SSHG stock rises by 5%, if the one continues to weaken against the US D or A DR could be flat when you go Tony (2): sell it, the of [00:12:00] in the Although that hasn’t been the recently while the one weakens, that can create a double whammy where the local bank stop stock drops and the currency devalues Cameron: simultaneously. But again, it’s just a level of complexity that you have to factor in. Then you’ve got. The Korea discount that we talked about a lot on last week on the show last week. Then you’ve got the geopolitical tail risk, um, in, particularly in South Korea, which is, uh, I dunno if you know this, but it’s very close to North Korea and Tony (2): close to it, Cameron: that’s, they did a good job when they came up with the names of North and South. Yeah, Barry and Stan did a great job and they went, so there’s, you know, there’s this constant as assessment of risk about [00:13:00] the, the, uh, treaty between North and South Korea and what happens there. So, but that’s not really anything to do with the ADRs. That’s just another geopolitical risk with investing in South Korean companies. So, look, there, there are complications. Um. For US investors with ADRs and I, and I don’t know from a QAV perspective how that translates. Does it mean that we should just not look at ADRs in future when we’re building a portfolio? Should we factor them out because of this additional level of complexity or, you know, career electric power is done quite well. It’s um. Up, I think about 30% since we last talked about it. Hold on, let me, um, Tony (2): pull up my Paul pork Cameron: Hmm[00:14:00] hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Career. Mm. And I think with AI in your back pocket now to help you, uh, navigate the a DR complexities, it shouldn’t be that hard. Should be just gimme an email to write to my broker. Uh, tell me, you know, what tax forms I need to fill out. Career Electric Power is up 31% since we did a deep dive on it at the end of November. So little over two months, it’s up 31%. I

In this episode of QAV America, Cameron and Tony navigate a volatile week in the US markets, lead by Ford’s staggering $8.2 billion loss for 2025 and their strategic retreat from full electrification. The duo reviews the impressive performance of their “deep dive” portfolio, noting that many previously analyzed stocks have seen triple-digit or high double-digit gains. The centerpiece of the episode is a “Pulled Pork” deep dive into **Shinhan Financial Group ($SHG)**, a South Korean banking giant. Despite a litany of scandals involving cartel-like collusion, fraud, and political instability in Korea, the hosts weigh the risks against the “Value Up” government catalyst that may finally unlock the company’s depressed valuation.— Episode Timestamps **[00:00:00]* – Introduction and the state of the US market. **[00:00:48]* – **Ford ($F)**: Analysis of the $8.2 billion loss and the pivot away from EVs. **[00:04:41]* – Portfolio Review    **[00:12:15]* – Deep Dive (Pulled Pork): **Shinhan Financial Group ($SHG)* history and Korean banking. **[00:48:38]* – Tribute: Remembering Robert Duvall. Transcription   Cameron: [00:00:00] Welcome to QAV America, Tony. This is episode 40, uh, for brand new listeners. Welcome. This is a show where we talk about value investing in the US markets. You might notice from our accent. That we are not accents, that we are not Americans. We are Australian value investors that have been doing a podcast about value investing in Australia for many years. And these days we do also do one about the American market because why not? And, uh, it’s been an interesting week, Tony, in the American markets. Ford reported their worst quarterly earnings in four years on Tuesday, and a net loss of $8.2 billion for 2025. What’s $8.2 billion between friends, Tony? Tony: Is this part of the great ev write down? I’ve been reading about all the, uh, EV manufacturers are getting back into producing V [00:01:00] eight cars Cameron: Yeah. Drill, baby drill. Tony: Yeah, yeah, Cameron: Yes. Tony: of companies riding down their ev. Investments Cameron: is, Tony: off E investments. Cameron: This is their largest loss since the 2008 recession. At least 4.8 billion of it was due to the EV division. Tony: Yeah. Cameron: Article I’ve got says E uh, electric vehicle sales were battered and previous corporate plans were shattered. Oh, look at that. That’s nice. Battered and shattered Tony: Yeah. Cameron: across the industry this year following the. Tony: how I like my fish and chips. Cameron: Following the Trump administration’s push to slash a seven and half thousand federal EV tax credit that was signed into law by former President Biden in 2022. Ford was one of many automakers committed to an electrified future that was hit hard by the decision. In response, the company said that it will. Pivot from full electrification to partial [00:02:00] electrification, and in December announced a major set scale back of its electrical vehicle, pla electric vehicle plans, which included killing the electric pickup truck, F-150 Lightning. I think the customer has spoken. That’s the punchline. Ford, CEO. Jim Farley said in an earnings call on Tuesday, I think uh, Donald Trump has spoken more than the customer. Tony: Yeah, I Cameron: Mm-hmm. Tony: Well, aren’t there, isn’t there, hasn’t there been a wine back of tax credits as well for EV cars? So a way, the customer has spoken ’cause they’re not buying EVs unless they get a tax rebate for it. Cameron: Yeah, Tony: Yeah. Cameron: Uh, in the absence of a tax credit, Ford and other automakers such as GM are betting on two things to spur customer demand in the us affordability and autonomous driving. At the core of that plan is a $30,000 electric vehicle with eyes off driving that Flo Ford plans to unveil in 2028. Tony: oh my God, it’s like. We’ll pivot to EVs. [00:03:00] pivot back to Hemis. pivot to driverless cars. It’s Cameron: Well, they gotta do something Tony: it if it’s their own money, would they be doing that Cameron: well. Tony: money? Sure. 8 billion. Cameron: What’s 8 billion? Tony: Yeah. Cameron: While the American EV industry suffers Chinese electric vehicle giants enjoy government subsidies that give them at times dangerously good pricing power. Chinese EVs. Yeah. Dangerous to who? Chinese EVs go for unbelievably low prices. And while they’re not allowed to be imported into the United States, the low pricing has made it very tough for American EV makers to compete elsewhere in the world. Even long-term American Ally Canada decided last month to allow Chinese EV imports. Tony: Well, I’m glad that the America’s calling Canada a long term ally now and not 51st state or, or worse. Cameron: Gizmodo. I don’t think that’s how Donald Trump would refer to them, but Tony: Yeah. Cameron: bunch of Commies is probably how he’d [00:04:00] refer to them. Um, so I did a deep dive on Ford on episode six of this show back on the 21st of May, 2025. The share price is up 30.7% since then, so Tony: pivoting is good. Cameron: it’s done okay. Despite all of this that’s even taken into account. Uh, this new loss announcement, there were $10 80 when I talked about ’em. There are $14 12 at the moment, so yeah, it’s okay. Tony: Oh yeah. And for a large cap company, it’s pretty good. Cameron: Everyone told me I was crazy when I talked about that one back then. Tony: Too much Cameron: Yeah, 30% less than a year. Not too bad. Looking at the other companies that we’ve talked about over the last year on the show, um, Zim Integrated Shipping was the first we did back in March of 2025. It’s up 23% since then. I’ll do ’em in the [00:05:00] in episode order. Um, CX ChemX is up 122%. Dac. DACD, AOS Corporation, big Greek Shipping Company, up 31% Canadian, Imperial and Bank of Commerce. Speaking about their great ally, up 50%. NL Chile is up 6.3. Ford’s up 30 IHS holding up 54. Jackson Financial, up 37 Orx Corporation, up 73. Precis Precision Drilling up 82. POSCO Holdings up 35 Zep. Health Corporation up 682%. Sasol up 59. Bausch Health is down five. Seneca Foods up 25. Gray Media up six Titan Machinery down 0.1. Kimball Electronics down 15.9 Sno up 15 methane X up. 22 community health systems up 13 Cow Main foods [00:06:00] down. 12 dous, which was a XL up. 17 American Airlines has gone nowhere. Topgolf is up 18.8. Pg and e is up 15.9. KA career, electric Power, doing another Korean company. Today it’s up 28%. It’s air cap is up 14. Veil is up 29.1%. Z Davis is down 16. A MC is down 20. Zfa is up. Six is up. 6.6 Tony: Is that the bad money of our Cameron: VLRS, the bad bunny. Tony: Yeah. Cameron: Why is it a bad bunny? Tony: Well he went on the Super Bowl halftime Cameron: Oh, Tony: sung everything in in Cameron: oh God. I didn’t even make that connection. I’m so outta the loop on, uh, super Bowl halftime shows. I watched the Prince Super Bowl halftime show from 2007 last night. That was pretty good. A MTD is down a little bit. Tony: when it Cameron: It did. It’s [00:07:00] raining. And not only is he playing guitar and singing, but he has two dancing girls in stiletto heels. Dancing with like an inch of water on the platform. I’m, like I said, Chrissy, how is that not a health and safety risk? Anyway, the por the, uh, the deep dive stocks are doing pretty well. Um, let me, let me just also, uh, talk about the, uh, portfolio while I’m here. The actual QAV America portfolio. Uh, last week when we talked about it, it was up about a hundred percent. Um, as of today, it’s up 101.36% since inception, which is September 23 versus the s and p 500, which is up about 50% over the same period of time, 50 53, 54. So doing about double market. Um, [00:08:00] since then. Tony: And no gas strips to be seen. Cameron: Yeah, I wrote an article last week sort of comparing, uh, astrophysics to, uh, value investing and I said that we tend to invest in large planets companies with a lot of mass, a lot of gravity, gravity being cash flow masses, cash. Not gas giants that are all hype and speed and momentum and shiny and look pretty, but don’t actually have a functioning ecosystem yet. Uh, yeah, we don’t have any gas giants. Um, in the last, well, let’s see, year to date, uh, well that’s not a very good analogy. The last 12 months were sort of neck and neck with the s and p around about 20%. But, uh. You know, the last, we’ll say three months, we’re up about 25% versus the index up about one and a half. Actually, we’re 26 point a half versus one point a half. So it’s been a really good, it’s actually just since the [00:09:00] beginning of the year, since the beginning of January, which is, I know just a month and a bit now, six weeks, we’re up 20, 23% in six weeks versus the s and p 500 negative. 0.14%. So, uh, things are going well. And one of the companies that’s been doing well is in my news, I’ve, uh, did a news report this morning of some of our stocks, Latino’s, the other bad money in our portfolio, BLX. Reported record earnings for 2025 with significant growth in net income and portfolio alongside a strong fourth quarter performance. 2025 net income increased 10% year over year to 227 million. Fourth quarter net income of 56 million marking one of the strongest quarters in their history. So, uh, good on BLX. [00:10:00] Um, what else have I got? Oh, Renaissance r and r. They’re also in our portfolio, they’re up about 15%. Uh, they said that their, uh, reported earnings exceed analyst estimates indicating a positive operational performance. Um, 29.6 year on year growth, they reported. So, uh, yeah, that’s good. Jackson Financial has, has formed a long-term partnership with TPG, that includes a significant equity investment. They’re gonna make a $500 million common equity investment for roughly six and a half percent ownership. So Jackson

In this high-stakes episode, Cameron and Tony celebrate a “bonkers” run for the QAV America portfolio, which is currently outperforming the S&P 500 by nearly double. After reviewing news on Seneca Foods (SENEA) and the curious 15% share price drop for Regional Management (RM) following record earnings, the duo dives into the murky waters of Mammoth Energy Services (TUSK). What begins as a look at an energy services “roll-up” quickly transforms into a true-crime corporate thriller involving a $1.8 billion contract, a FEMA bribery scandal, and a forfeited 40-foot luxury catamaran. They analyze whether TUSK is a “mammoth in the making” or a “wild pig,” weighing its current status as a cash-heavy “stub” with zero debt against its history of “dirty stories” and its new pivot into aviation rentals and fiber optics. — Episode Timestamps [00:00:00] Intro: Market “conniptions” and the US sneezing on Australia.[00:00:50] Portfolio Performance: The dummy portfolio hits 103% since inception (Highlights: WLFC, BLX, ESCA, GASS).[00:05:40] Stock News: SENEA (Seneca Foods) Q3 results show improving margins.[00:06:20] Stock News: RM (Regional Management) beats expectations but the share price craters.[00:07:50] Deep Dive: TUSK (Mammoth Energy Services) Transcription   Cameron: [00:00:00] Welcome back to QAV America, Tony. This is episode 38 of QAV America. Been a turbulence week, weak in the American markets. Bitcoin is down, gold and silver are down. New Fed chairman nominee sell. America Trades are still going on. The president of the United States are suing the United States government for $10 billion. Nothing to see here. Jeffrey Epstein. Millions of files released. Oh wow. It’s a lot to keep up with. One of the good things about QAV is we don’t have to keep up with it. Tony Kynaston: correct and, and of course the Melania Trump, uh, premier. Cameron: Uh, and, uh, Jeffrey Epstein, not, not in it as, from what I can tell. I, I don’t understand. Anyway, Tony Kynaston: Bezos. You [00:01:00] think $40 million would give you a walk on cameo or you’d it in front of the blue rocket or something, wouldn’t you? Cameron: meanwhile, Elon Musk is merging SpaceX and X ai, uh, news is today, Tony Kynaston: Uhhuh. Cameron: I think SpaceX’s building is buying Twitter or taking over Twitter and x ai, which is part of that, uh, something, something I don’t understand. It’s all going on. Microsoft’s share price are down. Ai, the Mag seven share prices are down, but they’ve been down before. Tony Kynaston: guy? Cameron: Well, I’m glad you asked Tony. Our portfolio is doing Doing okay. Doing okay. Let me, let me bring it up and we can talk about it in some detail. I did have to sell, uh, a couple of stocks out of QAV Light, the new light portfolio yesterday. I’ll get into that in a second. But the [00:02:00] dummy portfolio that I’ve been running on in the US since September, 2023 is, has returned 98.41% since then. So it’s doubled in little over two years versus the s and p 500, which is up 57% over that same timeframe. So not quite doing double market, but pretty close to double market and. It’s really boomed since, um, well let’s see, as of 19th of November last year we were neck and neck. We’d been up, we’d come back. We were neck and neck with the s and p about November last year. So it’s broken away since then. Doing very well the last couple of months, two months, two and a half months, absolutely killing it. Um, [00:03:00] just to give you a sense, our rockstar Willis Lee’s finance company currently sitting at about 300% gain Innova, which is actually in my news items today. Uh, I’ll get to that in a minute. It’s up 188%. Euro, CS ESEA is up a hundred percent. Uh, BLX Foreign Trade, bank of Latin America up a hundred percent. Regional management are up 66%. Gas, stealth gas transport, shipping company up 60% UBS also in the news today, up 55%. So yeah, doing, doing quite well across the board. The QAV light portfolio, as I mentioned, I sold a couple of stocks this week. I just decided they’d hit their three point trend line and I’d given up, I dumped them. So that was, um, A MTD idea, dear that we talked about a little while ago. Calvin Cho’s Company, they [00:04:00] breached their three point trend line and spider net and, um, XL PR infrastructure, X-I-F-R-Z-A. Um, they also breached their three point trend line. So rules are rules. Tony Kynaston: yeah. Cameron: thing about QAV, we have rules tell us what to do. Sold those. And I have bought, uh, the stock that I’m gonna do a deep dive on today. Ec eco petrol sa out of Colombia. Tony Kynaston: Not, Cameron: am, Tony Kynaston: not eco petrol as in it’s green petrol. It’s Ecuadorian petrol, maybe Cameron: no, they’re very eco, very eco-friendly, very, oh, no one has ever been more eco-friendly than these guys, Tony. They’re the most eco-friendly company you’ve ever seen. Tony Kynaston: Or company. You Cameron: Well, they are Tony Kynaston: don’t Cameron: see. They are, Tony Kynaston: look at those wells over there. [00:05:00] Look over here. Plenty of windows over here. Cameron: listen. As Barry and Stan would say, um, if you don’t have oil, you don’t have energy. If you don’t have energy, you can’t, you know, you can’t drive tractors to plant trees, Tony Kynaston: Oh right. Cameron: you know, yeah, it’s, it’s oil is there to grow trees. Um, couple of news updates in Nova I mentioned they’ve come out with their Q4 figures revenue of 839.4 million, up 15.1%, year on year, adjusted EPS of 3.46 or $3 46, exceeding estimates by 9.1%. Record originations in small business lending for eighth consecutive [00:06:00] quarters, and pending acquisition of Grasshopper Bank. Aimed at expanding market access and simplifying regulation. Um, I watched a Bruce Lee documentary over the weekend Be Water, and of course they talked about his script that he wrote called Warrior and took to Hollywood about, uh, Kung Fu Master Walking the Earth. And they were like, nah, don’t like it. And then they came out with David Carradine and Kung Fu as Grasshopper. Tony Kynaston: I wonder how Cameron: They, Tony Kynaston: how, how many writers there are out there who submitted things to Hollywood got rejected, and then five years later, see it up in lights on the big screen. Cameron: well, the thing is with Bruce, uh, Bruce knew that the big concern was they, they didn’t want him in it, right? They, they, they didn’t think you could have a Chinese American starring [00:07:00] in a role in 19. 70, 71, whatever it was. Sad thing about the documentary is a, after he got frustrated with his inability to break through to anything in Hollywood, went to Hong Kong, made four movies in two years, and then like five days before enter the dragon was due to launch, uh, which was kind of a co-production with Hollywood and Raymond Chow. Uh, he died and, but then they show you the opening of it at the Groman’s Chinese Theater in la Just Bruce Lee everywhere. Massive. Like his dream he had finally done it. Had to go to Hong, back to Hong Kong. Cracked the whole Hollywood thing downtown. Groman’s Chinese Theater. La Bruce Lee is Stars Inn. And he wasn’t alive to see it. He died five days before, you know, he had [00:08:00] achieved his. And you know, you look at him today and he really did have such a huge influence on the, the, there was a girl at my Kung Fu studio last, oh no, she said she saw a Nip Man film. She came along, but you know, his, his influence on people studying martial arts and on martial arts in films and the perception, the portrayal of Asians in American TV and cinema. Anyway, how’d I get onto that? Grasshopper bank. Tony Kynaston: no idea. Cameron: Grasshopper Bank Kain of Kung fu, uh, UBS group also, uh, uh, again, announced their Q4 uh, earnings with projected increase in earnings per share, despite a decline in revenues year over year. Uh, earnings estimate is 25 cents per share, indicating an 8.7% increase year over year quarterly revenue expected to decline to 11.62 billion. Strong performance in global wealth management and investment banking is [00:09:00] anticipated. So little bit of a mixed bag there for UBS group. Um, so we, we talked a little bit on the Australian show this week, Tony, about gold and Bitcoin. I did have a laugh at Bitcoin’s expense. Bitcoin has doubled in value over the last five years. It went up and then it came back. Gold and silver and the process of coming back, but they’ve still, you know, had a really good run. But we’ve talked before a lot over the years about these things as a store of value. And I was having this discussion with somebody at Kung Fu the other night. He asked me about Bitcoin, you know, what do you think about Bitcoin? And I was like. You know, it’s a pump and dump. Pretty much. That’s my take on it. Um, but this whole idea of, uh, a store of value, you know, despite what you might think about the inherent properties of cryptocurrencies, uh, versus fear [00:10:00] currencies or the inherent value in gold, uh, something that can be used in jewelry or something that can be used in electronics or a store of value. The challenge that I have, I always try and point out to people as somebody who has learnt from you to try and think about investing rationally, is the question I have to ask myself before I can invest in anything is what is the value of one unit of this thing, whether it’s a share or a coin or a gram, and can I buy it at a discount to its value today? Um, and I can’t figure out how to come up with a value for a coin or a gram of gold. What is the inherent value? I mean, it’s essentially the price is the only thing that I have to measure it on. And so then the question is, well, how do I know if that price is high or [00:11:00] low? And I, I, there’s no, I have not found an

In this episode, Cameron and Tony navigate a turbulent week in the American markets, touching on the downturn of Bitcoin, gold, and the “Magnificent Seven” tech stocks. Despite the macro-volatility, they celebrate the continued outperformance of their US dummy portfolio, which has nearly doubled its value since September 2023. The conversation shifts to a critical look at “stores of value” like Bitcoin and gold, with Tony arguing that without an inherent way to calculate intrinsic value, these assets remain speculative “pump and dump” cycles. The centerpiece of the show is a deep dive into the Colombian oil giant, **Ecopetrol (EC)**. The duo explores its unique monopoly on Colombian pipelines and its strategic pivot into high-voltage electricity transmission, all while navigating the “magical realism” of Colombian politics, executive scandals involving “cost-plus” prostitution, and a president who hates the very oil industry his government owns. — ### Episode Timestamps * **[00:00:00]** – Market Turbulence: Bitcoin, Gold, and the Mag 7. * **[00:01:20]** – Corporate News: Elon Musk’s SpaceX and xAI merger. * **[00:01:50]** – Portfolio Update: US Dummy Portfolio vs. S&P 500. * **[00:03:15]** – Recent Sells: Exiting **AMTD** (AMTD IDEA) and **XIFR** (XLPR Infrastructure). * **[00:09:45]** – The Rationality of Gold and Bitcoin: Searching for intrinsic value. * **[00:15:30]** – Deep Dive: **Ecopetrol SA** (EC) – History and the “De Mares Concession”. Transcription   Cameron: [00:00:00] Welcome back to QAV America, Tony. This is episode 38 of QAV America. Been a turbulence week, weak in the American markets. Bitcoin is down, gold and silver are down. New Fed chairman nominee sell. America Trades are still going on. The president of the United States are suing the United States government for $10 billion. Nothing to see here. Jeffrey Epstein. Millions of files released. Oh wow. It’s a lot to keep up with. One of the good things about QAV is we don’t have to keep up with it. Tony Kynaston: correct and, and of course the Melania Trump, uh, premier. Cameron: Uh, and, uh, Jeffrey Epstein, not, not in it as, from what I can tell. I, I don’t understand. Anyway, Tony Kynaston: Bezos. You [00:01:00] think $40 million would give you a walk on cameo or you’d it in front of the blue rocket or something, wouldn’t you? Cameron: meanwhile, Elon Musk is merging SpaceX and X ai, uh, news is today, Tony Kynaston: Uhhuh. Cameron: I think SpaceX’s building is buying Twitter or taking over Twitter and x ai, which is part of that, uh, something, something I don’t understand. It’s all going on. Microsoft’s share price are down. Ai, the Mag seven share prices are down, but they’ve been down before. Tony Kynaston: guy? Cameron: Well, I’m glad you asked Tony. Our portfolio is doing Doing okay. Doing okay. Let me, let me bring it up and we can talk about it in some detail. I did have to sell, uh, a couple of stocks out of QAV Light, the new light portfolio yesterday. I’ll get into that in a second. But the [00:02:00] dummy portfolio that I’ve been running on in the US since September, 2023 is, has returned 98.41% since then. So it’s doubled in little over two years versus the s and p 500, which is up 57% over that same timeframe. So not quite doing double market, but pretty close to double market and. It’s really boomed since, um, well let’s see, as of 19th of November last year we were neck and neck. We’d been up, we’d come back. We were neck and neck with the s and p about November last year. So it’s broken away since then. Doing very well the last couple of months, two months, two and a half months, absolutely killing it. Um, [00:03:00] just to give you a sense, our rockstar Willis Lee’s finance company currently sitting at about 300% gain Innova, which is actually in my news items today. Uh, I’ll get to that in a minute. It’s up 188%. Euro, CS ESEA is up a hundred percent. Uh, BLX Foreign Trade, bank of Latin America up a hundred percent. Regional management are up 66%. Gas, stealth gas transport, shipping company up 60% UBS also in the news today, up 55%. So yeah, doing, doing quite well across the board. The QAV light portfolio, as I mentioned, I sold a couple of stocks this week. I just decided they’d hit their three point trend line and I’d given up, I dumped them. So that was, um, A MTD idea, dear that we talked about a little while ago. Calvin Cho’s Company, they [00:04:00] breached their three point trend line and spider net and, um, XL PR infrastructure, X-I-F-R-Z-A. Um, they also breached their three point trend line. So rules are rules. Tony Kynaston: yeah. Cameron: thing about QAV, we have rules tell us what to do. Sold those. And I have bought, uh, the stock that I’m gonna do a deep dive on today. Ec eco petrol sa out of Colombia. Tony Kynaston: Not, Cameron: am, Tony Kynaston: not eco petrol as in it’s green petrol. It’s Ecuadorian petrol, maybe Cameron: no, they’re very eco, very eco-friendly, very, oh, no one has ever been more eco-friendly than these guys, Tony. They’re the most eco-friendly company you’ve ever seen. Tony Kynaston: Or company. You Cameron: Well, they are Tony Kynaston: don’t Cameron: see. They are, Tony Kynaston: look at those wells over there. [00:05:00] Look over here. Plenty of windows over here. Cameron: listen. As Barry and Stan would say, um, if you don’t have oil, you don’t have energy. If you don’t have energy, you can’t, you know, you can’t drive tractors to plant trees, Tony Kynaston: Oh right. Cameron: you know, yeah, it’s, it’s oil is there to grow trees. Um, couple of news updates in Nova I mentioned they’ve come out with their Q4 figures revenue of 839.4 million, up 15.1%, year on year, adjusted EPS of 3.46 or $3 46, exceeding estimates by 9.1%. Record originations in small business lending for eighth consecutive [00:06:00] quarters, and pending acquisition of Grasshopper Bank. Aimed at expanding market access and simplifying regulation. Um, I watched a Bruce Lee documentary over the weekend Be Water, and of course they talked about his script that he wrote called Warrior and took to Hollywood about, uh, Kung Fu Master Walking the Earth. And they were like, nah, don’t like it. And then they came out with David Carradine and Kung Fu as Grasshopper. Tony Kynaston: I wonder how Cameron: They, Tony Kynaston: how, how many writers there are out there who submitted things to Hollywood got rejected, and then five years later, see it up in lights on the big screen. Cameron: well, the thing is with Bruce, uh, Bruce knew that the big concern was they, they didn’t want him in it, right? They, they, they didn’t think you could have a Chinese American starring [00:07:00] in a role in 19. 70, 71, whatever it was. Sad thing about the documentary is a, after he got frustrated with his inability to break through to anything in Hollywood, went to Hong Kong, made four movies in two years, and then like five days before enter the dragon was due to launch, uh, which was kind of a co-production with Hollywood and Raymond Chow. Uh, he died and, but then they show you the opening of it at the Groman’s Chinese Theater in la Just Bruce Lee everywhere. Massive. Like his dream he had finally done it. Had to go to Hong, back to Hong Kong. Cracked the whole Hollywood thing downtown. Groman’s Chinese Theater. La Bruce Lee is Stars Inn. And he wasn’t alive to see it. He died five days before, you know, he had [00:08:00] achieved his. And you know, you look at him today and he really did have such a huge influence on the, the, there was a girl at my Kung Fu studio last, oh no, she said she saw a Nip Man film. She came along, but you know, his, his influence on people studying martial arts and on martial arts in films and the perception, the portrayal of Asians in American TV and cinema. Anyway, how’d I get onto that? Grasshopper bank. Tony Kynaston: no idea. Cameron: Grasshopper Bank Kain of Kung fu, uh, UBS group also, uh, uh, again, announced their Q4 uh, earnings with projected increase in earnings per share, despite a decline in revenues year over year. Uh, earnings estimate is 25 cents per share, indicating an 8.7% increase year over year quarterly revenue expected to decline to 11.62 billion. Strong performance in global wealth management and investment banking is [00:09:00] anticipated. So little bit of a mixed bag there for UBS group. Um, so we, we talked a little bit on the Australian show this week, Tony, about gold and Bitcoin. I did have a laugh at Bitcoin’s expense. Bitcoin has doubled in value over the last five years. It went up and then it came back. Gold and silver and the process of coming back, but they’ve still, you know, had a really good run. But we’ve talked before a lot over the years about these things as a store of value. And I was having this discussion with somebody at Kung Fu the other night. He asked me about Bitcoin, you know, what do you think about Bitcoin? And I was like. You know, it’s a pump and dump. Pretty much. That’s my take on it. Um, but this whole idea of, uh, a store of value, you know, despite what you might think about the inherent properties of cryptocurrencies, uh, versus fear [00:10:00] currencies or the inherent value in gold, uh, something that can be used in jewelry or something that can be used in electronics or a store of value. The challenge that I have, I always try and point out to people as somebody who has learnt from you to try and think about investing rationally, is the question I have to ask myself before I can invest in anything is what is the value of one unit of this thing, whether it’s a share or a coin or a gram, and can I buy it at a discount to its value today? Um, and I can’t figure out how to come up with a value for a coin or a gram of gold. What is the inherent value?

In this episode of QAV America, Cameron and Tony navigate the extremes of global weather and market volatility. After discussing the impact of recent geopolitical “deals” on their US portfolios, they dive into a success story from the Bakken formation: **Chord Energy (CHRD)**. The conversation explores the “Shale 2.0” era, detailing how modern horizontal drilling and leaner capital structures have transformed former bankruptcy stories into cash-generating powerhouses. Tony provides a technical breakdown of Chord’s recent $11 billion acquisition of Enerplus and their shareholder-friendly policy of returning free cash flow through buybacks and dividends. — ### Episode Timestamps * **[00:01:45]** – Market Update: Trump’s “Art of the Deal” tariffs and impact on the US portfolio. * **[00:02:45]** – Portfolio Performance: Comparing the Main US portfolio (up 92% since inception) to the new Light portfolio. * **[00:03:55]** – Recent Trades: Selling **AMCX** (AMC Networks) and **GTN** (Gray Television); holding **VLRS** (Controladora Vuela Compañía de Aviación). * **[00:05:00]** – Deep Dive Intro: The “Williston Whale” and the history of North Dakota oil.   Transcription   Cameron: [00:00:00] Welcome back to QAV America, Tony, episode 37. It is 27th of January, 2026 in Australia. It’s, uh, 1935 in the United States. Uh, Tony Kynaston: Well, and also very cold. Apparently, I, my condolences to anybody has been affected by the freak cold snap over there where it’s not usually happening. Cameron: My regular co-host in my history shows Ray Harris, who’s in Virginia, sent me a photo out of his window earlier today. There’s a lot of snow outside the front of his house. Tony Kynaston: we’re sweltering Cameron: Very cold. Tony Kynaston: like Cameron: Yes. Tony Kynaston: fifth day of Cameron: Mm, Tony Kynaston: degrees Celsius. Cameron: warmest place on the planet. Apparently Australia is right now Tony Kynaston: What’s, Cameron: place in the planet. Tony Kynaston: Celsius and American terms. So there’d be 110 maybe. Cameron: Oh yeah. Bloody, [00:01:00] bloody hot, Tony. Bloody hot. Well, uh, look, before I get into my deep dive, my little walk down Wall Street today, Tony. Um, we had the Sell America trade going on last week when Donald Trump threatened to throw more tariffs on Europe, but we just made a deal. They said, I don’t care. He said, deal Shme. I’m the art of the deal. I just break the deal and throw more things in. But then he tared on that as he often does when they agreed to let him invade Greenland or whatever the hell he’s gonna do today. So the, the market had a bit of a conniption for a few days, did affect our US portfolio. Um, let me just bring that up so I can tell you. Well look, our portfolio, our, our main US portfolio that I’ve been running for a couple of years is doing great. Um, the new one that I started, the light [00:02:00] portfolio that doesn’t have its legs under it yet, and a lot of the stocks that I’m buying were very close to their sell lines anyway. They just etched above them. Um, became a buy. I’ve had to sell a couple, but, um. Oh, it looks like our US one has gone back a little bit too. Anyway, for the last 30 days, our US dummy portfolio main one is up 15% versus the s and p 500, up 0.29% in the last 30 days. So it’s still all right, uh, VV versus that. Tony Kynaston: of Cameron: Um, Tony Kynaston: in a month. Cameron: since inception. Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Cameron: Yeah. Since inception, which is, uh, September, 2023, our portfolio is up 92% versus the s and p up 56. So not quite double market, uh, but doing, doing pretty good like in the last 30 days, no last three months, [00:03:00] it’s up 21% versus the s and p up 2.3. So it’s particularly since the beginning of the year, it’s done quite well. The light portfolio though that I only started a month or so ago, I think late December, not doing as well. It’s down two and a half percent since I started it versus the s and p up 1%, and I have had to sell a couple of things recently. I sold. A MCX this week. A MC networks breached their three point trend line. And also a MTD idea that we talked about recently. Uh, no, hold on. I haven’t sold those. Um, they, they are a cell, but I’m holding onto them just because I’m being bloody minded about it. Uh. I told you last week, I’m giving, I’m giving all of these stocks a month to settle in before I sell ’em, because they’re so close to their sell lines. When I buy ’em, they go up a buck, they go down a buck, you know. But I did sell GTN Media last week, um, which I’d held onto for about a [00:04:00] month. And A MCX I’d held for about a month. So I was like, well, that’s it. Your grace period is over. Um, but VLRS. That I added last week is up a couple of points, which is, that’s good. And I’ve also added the stock that I’m gonna talk about today, which is ticket code, CHRD, cord Energy, AKA, the Williston Whale, a Symphony of Shale is the title of this episode that. Oh, Google Gemini came up with that for me. I said, come up with a clever, come up with a clever title. That’s what it came up with. The Williston whale, A symphony of shale. Now, I dunno a lot about, we’ve talked about shale from time to time on our podcast, particularly when we’re talking about crude oil and the markets and pricing. But I, I’m not sure that we’ve done a deep dive on a shale oil company before. Uh, and what I’ve learned in doing [00:05:00] this is. A lot of developments in shale oil technology, largely driven by this company in the last couple of years. So it’s a whole new era of shale oil and fracking that changes the, the dynamics in the economics of shale oil. In theory, we’ll see that plays out, but that’s the theory. So the Williston whale, uh, Williston is a city. In North Dakota, Tony, um, everything I know about North Dakota, I know from watching Deadwood. Um, uh, and I think Fargo, Tony Kynaston: Minneapolis, isn’t it? Cameron: um, Tony Kynaston: Minnesota, Cameron: uh, Tony Kynaston: Yep. Cameron: I dunno. Yeah. Could be. Sure. That’s all I know. That shows you how much I know. I don’t know anything. It was, uh, Williston was founded in 1887. Named [00:06:00] after Daniel Willis James, a merchant and capitalist by his friend, railroad Magnate James J. Hill. So it’s Willis Town. Tony Kynaston: financing. Then they should name a Cameron: No it wasn’t. Who’s the number one? Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Cameron: Well, we’ll name a town after then ’cause they’re up 300% in our US portfolio. Wasn’t named after what you’re talking about. Willis, either or Bruce Willis. So they, they were my first two guesses. It is the birthplace of Phil Jackson. 11 time NBA championship head coach of the Chicago Bulls. I think also the Lakers he went to after the Bulls, if I remember the Michael Jordan documentary, um, we often talk about Don’t bench Michael Jordan. And Phil Jackson never did bench Michael Jordan and that’s why he won a lot of NBA championships. So crude oil is, um, a buy on, uh, our. Uh, buy list this week for new listeners to [00:07:00] QAV. Uh, one of the things that we track each week is where certain commodities are, because particularly in Australia, a lot of the stocks in our buy list are mining stocks. And Tony has learnt over the years he’s been investing that if the underlying commodity of a stock becomes a buy or a sell based on its trend line. Stocks that are predicated on that or, or that commodity, whatever it is, their share price will tend to follow. There’ll be a lag, but tends to follow. So, um, if something beca, if a commodity becomes a buy, we then are able to buy the share price of it too, becomes a buy the, the, the stock. And if a. Stock with an underlying commodity and that commodity becomes a sell, we will often sell it. Um, crude and LNG have both been sell for us for quite a, quite a while. They both became buyers again this week. Whether or not that has anything to do with Venezuela, um, dunno, but[00:08:00] your theory that Donald Trump’s going to put, you know, tow Greenland down to Venezuela and join them together. Tony Kynaston: It’s a great Cameron: So he can go skiing now. He’s the president of Venezuela. He can go skiing in Greenland. Tony Kynaston: And surfing in Venezuela. Cameron: Who knows? Tony Kynaston: Yeah, Cameron: Got the best of both worlds. Uh, speaking of midnight oil, so you stand, imagine this, Tony, you’re standing in the middle. Uh oh. Midnight oil. We were just talking about Australian rock band. Midnight oil, not shale oil. I dunno which oil, midnight oil is, but uh, it’s black like midnight. The drummer of, uh, 1970s Australian. Well, they’ve been around since the seventies. Been on all the, the founding member and drummer Rob Hurst passed away this week. It’s very sad if you’re an Australian Rock fan and if you’re not, uh, if you dunno, midnight all you’re an American, jump on Spotify or Apple Music and have a listen to some of the greatest hits of Midnight Oil. You probably [00:09:00] know a couple of ’em because I think they got quite a bit of, uh, traction in the US over in the nineties and two thousands. Tony Kynaston: us talking about a shale oil company, I don’t think. Cameron: No, they were environmentally greeny, uh, com, uh, rock band, very political. So imagine this, you’re standing in the middle of a frozen North Dakota field beneath your feet. A drill bit has gone down. Then, oh, look at my broken knuckle. See that finger? I can’t. If you’re not on video, you’re missing this. The visual, my broken, my broken knuckle finger. This cannot go. I can’t straighten it out. The bit is doing a 90 degree turn and traveling four miles horizontally through. Tony Kynaston: field. Yeah, Cameron: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Saddam Hussein would’ve loved this. It’s, it’s going all the w

In this episode of QAV America, Cameron and Tony navigate the complex intersections of the 2026 US economy, where the AI boom is currently offsetting the drag of ongoing tariffs. The duo explores the shifting AI landscape, notably Apple’s decision to build the next Siri on Google Gemini rather than homegrown technology, leaving significant questions about the future of OpenAI. The heart of the show is a “Pulled Pork” deep dive into **AMTD Idea Group (AMTD)**, a company with a fascinating Australian origin story involving the Commonwealth Bank. Despite trading at an unbelievable discount to book value (P/B 0.04), AMTD remains a polarizing prospect due to its controversial leadership under Calvin Choi, a bizarre “Spider Net” ecosystem, and a recent shift from Big Four auditors to a small regional firm in Singapore. — ### Episode Timestamps * **[00:00:00]** – **The State of the US Economy**: How the AI boom is currently acting as a buffer against tariff-induced drags. * **[00:03:00]** – **AI Shakeups (#AAPL, #GOOGL, #MSFT)**: Apple pivots to Google Gemini for Siri, raising red flags for OpenAI’s longevity. * **[00:06:00]** – **Tanker Tycoons (#TEN)**: Discussion on the “Venezuela trade” and why shipping companies are currently “making out like bandits”. * **[00:08:00]** – **Portfolio Performance (#WLFC, #GASS, #KT, #KE)**: Reviewing the US portfolio’s 23.5% gain over the last 90 days. * **[00:10:00]** – **Deep Dive: AMTD Idea Group (#AMTD)**: Introduction to the “luxury suitcase at a thrift shop” investment case. * **[00:12:00]** – **The Australian Connection**: AMTD’s 2003 origins with Commonwealth Bank and CK Hutchinson. * **[00:15:00]** – **Calvin Choi and the “Spider Net”**: Exploring the visionary/controversial leadership and the self-reinforcing ecosystem. * **[00:19:00]** – **Regulatory Red Flags**: Details on Calvin Choi’s SFC ban and hidden beneficial interests. * **[00:23:00]** – **The HKD Meme Stock Ghost (#HKD)**: Recapping the 2022 explosion where AMTD Digital briefly became the 14th largest company in the world. * **[00:31:00]** – **The Paris Pivot and *L’Officiel***: AMTD’s move to France and its acquisition of the legendary fashion “Bible”. * **[00:34:00]** – **Auditor Alarms**: Why the company moved from Deloitte to a small Singaporean strip-mall auditor. * **[00:36:00]** – **The Numbers vs. The Trust**: A P/E of 2.11 and buying $1 of assets for 4 cents—if you believe the books. * **[00:51:00]** – **Final Verdict**: Trusting the QAV process vs. “holding your nose” on a controversial stock. Transcription   [00:00:00] Cameron: Yeah, I know. I keep noticing that and trying to pull my camera form. Welcome to QAV America, episode 36, Tony. Um, we just come out of our Australian show. One of the things that we did talk about though on that was article I saw in the New York Times this week about the state of the US economy. Uh, I think we’ve talked recently how the Trump tariffs don’t seem to have had the negative impact on the economy over the last year that we thought it might. But according to the New York Times. Uh, in the economists that they’re talking to, uh, the US economy is doing well despite the tariffs, um, not because of the tariffs. Um, they’re basically saying the AI boom is what’s keeping the economy going in the us and it’s offsetting the drag from the tariffs. [00:01:00] It’s quoting Gida Goana for Harvard Economist and former first deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund said the AI boomers basically offset the drag from the tariffs, but manufacturing is struggling, particularly small manufacturers are struggling. The job market is anemic. Um, tax deductions aren’t helping manufacturing is just not getting, uh, the wind under its sails that some people thought the tariffs might bring. But as we talked about in the last show, I mean, trying to bring manufacturing back to a country that’s been offshoring it for 40 years was never gonna be a, a short term or easy process, you know, may pay off. And we talked in the last show also about, you know, how difficult it is for businesses to make long-term commitments to major investments, to rebuild manufacturing capability when they don’t really know how long the tariffs are gonna be in place for, you know, if there’s, if, [00:02:00] if the midterms go ahead. And there’s a lot of talk in the mainstream media at the moment in the US about how the midterms may not go ahead because President Trump seems to be suggesting it from time to time. We don’t really need to have the midterms. And then his press secretary will come out and say, he’s only joking. Tony Kynaston: The prison of the Venezuela. I, I thought Yes. Right. Cameron: He is also that yes, he’s and the, and the, uh, new Nobel Prize winner Tony Kynaston: it. Cameron: or recipient, maybe not winner, recipient. Tony Kynaston: was a market for used Nobel Prizes, but good to know. Cameron: Uh, I believe he’s also, uh, gonna win the Oscar for best actor this year. Best director, uh, cinematographer. Um, Nobel Prize in chemistry, physics, biology. It’s like Pokemon. Gotta collect them all. So the US economy is [00:03:00] trickling along, but um, you know, very much driven by investment in ai, AI data centers. Uh, the people that have made a lot of money out of investments in the mag seven are putting some of that back into the economy spending on goods and services. But then a lot of talk about that being a bubble. I dunno if you saw this, if we talked about it last week, I can’t remember, but there was an announcement in the last week that Apple. Uh, gonna base the next version of Siri, not on homegrown technology and not on open AI’s technology, which seemed to be the direction they were moving on, but they’re gonna build it on Google Gemini, Tony Kynaston: competitor. Cameron: which puts a big question. Well, Google, they’ve, they’ve got like a weird relationship with Google. Google’s paid them billions of dollars a year for many, many years to have Google search featured prominently on the iPhone, even though they are the competitor with Android. But now they’re gonna, the, the next version of series is gonna be built on Gemini. Now it puts open AI’s [00:04:00] future, uh, with a big question mark over it. Uh, I, I assume that their lifeline was going to be being the default on iPhones. They’re not gonna be the default on Android phones now. They’re not gonna be the default AI on Apple phones either. So there’s a big question mark about how long they can continue to operate, um, how much money they can cont Sam can continue to raise. And if they. If they fall over, that could have a massive impact on the Mag seven AI bubble, Tony Kynaston: there’ll be a Cameron: or maybe not, who knows? Tony Kynaston: to put OpenAI on it. Cameron: Yeah. Well, Microsoft might end up buying open ai, Microsoft, or Meta would be the obvious two to end up buying. Maybe Nvidia will buy open AI and just bundle that into the NVIDIA software stack. Tony Kynaston: will stay with us over the weekend and he was, retired recently and planning a big caravan trip around Australia, which is. For our US listeners [00:05:00] is one of the goals of a lot of Australians to, to, to do when they retire. Cameron: Yeah. Tony Kynaston: Um, Cameron: Hmm. Tony Kynaston: and he has, he has all these, uh, bookings and destinations and timings in a spreadsheet. And, um, I forget now what question he was Googling and it came back based on your spreadsheet about the type of carava you own. I suggest this and like he’s going, how, how are you reading my spreadsheets? And we worked it out. And he’s got, uh, Microsoft copilot in his, um, Excel subscription. it’s going through his spreadsheets. Cameron: Right. Mm-hmm. Yeah, which is what I want. I wanted to know everything about me so it can give me better stuff. Google. Uh, so OpenAI also announced this week they’re gonna start rolling out ads in the free version of chat GPT in coming weeks. So this is, that’ll be interesting. Well, anyway, moving right along to my deep dive of the week, [00:06:00] Tony, this is a, this is a challenging one. It is at the top of my buy list this week, and I was so not confident about it that I didn’t add it to the portfolio this week. I’m like, yeah, I’m talking to Tony before I add this one, but, uh, it’s a crazy story, which I hadn’t heard of before, but I’ve spent way too much time reading about this company. And its travails, Tony Kynaston: that, did you get the link to the story I had on shipping companies? I sent it as Cameron: no. Tony Kynaston: So just a quick, just a quick one. Cameron: Oh Tony Kynaston: an Cameron: yeah. Tony Kynaston: I read, in the Wall Street Journal saying that, uh, the headline is tanker tycoons in the, all Brokers cashing in on the Venezuela trade. Uh, so I dunno if these are now. But there was, um, so the article mentions all traders Vitol, V-I-T-O-L, and tr giura, uh, diving back [00:07:00] into Venezuela after Maduro’s ster. And it does mention some of the other companies as well, like, uh, tk, I think you’ve, um, a pulled pork on TK or mentioned TK Anyway, I won’t read the article, but uh, people can Google it. But, um, yeah, so we’ve long had tankers and tanker companies on the US Blist, they are making out like bandits going into Venezuela and shifting oil to the US at the moment. Cameron: Ah, interesting. Um, I don’t, I’ve got, I, I still own a couple in our check in our bo uh, sorry, our US portfolio, um, TEN, Sarcos Energy Navigation. They’ve just had a huge jump. Let me see. Gas. Yeah, they’re up. So maybe that’s why our portfolio is actually doing really well. Um, I mentioned this last week, but like in the last, [00:08:00] um, well this month, last month, uh, the last 30 days, our US portfolio is up over 16% ver

Episode overview In this episode, Cameron and Tony range from bushfires in Australia to political pressure on the US Federal Reserve, before digging into portfolio performance and a detailed QAV-style teardown of Mexican ultra-low-cost airline Volaris (VLRS). They unpack why airlines keep showing up on the QAV America buy list, how VLRS built a Ryanair-style model aimed at converting long-haul bus travellers into flyers, and why the Pratt & Whitney GTF engine recall temporarily derailed the business. The discussion balances strong operating cash flow and a seasoned low-cost airline playbook against razor-thin margins, fuel price sensitivity, and the ever-present risks of airline investing. ⸻ Timestamps & topics  00:00 – Bushfires and resilience Victoria bushfires, large-scale horse evacuations, and the limits of government preparedness. 02:30 – US market tension: Powell vs Trump Political pressure on the Fed, central bank independence, and why markets care. 06:30 – Portfolio performance update QAV America portfolio vs S&P 500. 09:30 – Stock deep dive: Volaris (VLRS) 31:00 – Other recent picks and portfolio reflections Quick updates on recent selections and sector clustering across airlines, shipping, and power. Transcription [00:00:00] Cameron: Welcome back to QAV America, Tony. This is episode 35. We’re recording this on the 13th of January, 2026. Uh, how are you, Tony? Tony Kynaston: Good, good, good. As I said, um, in the Australian show, we’ve had a lot of bush fires Victoria, which is unfortunate. And some of those I guess, have indirectly affected me because I have, um. Brood mares and race horses in various farms, and had to be evacuated overnight quickly, which is logistically very difficult to move. I think in total like about 500 horses. Um, between various farms and it’s been amazing the way that everyone’s pitched in. And there’s just been convoys of horse floats taking horses and putting them on other farms. In one case, I think the sale yard in the near tele marine airport in Melbourne’s taken 150 and there’s housing them. So [00:01:00] it’s, it’s the worst part of nature and the best part of humanity, as someone said to see all this happen. Cameron: Although I’d like to see humanity stop the fires from happening in the first place, I think that would be a better, Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Cameron: you know? Hmm. Tony Kynaston: Well, I think they’ll Cameron: Hmm. Tony Kynaston: bushfires. It’s whether they’re uncontrolled is the issue. Cameron: Hmm. Yeah, as we were talking about on the last show, like, you know, we’ve known for a long time that things are getting hotter and that we’re gonna have more fires and what are we doing to not, or prevent them if we can, and if we can’t, you know, sort of minimize the impact and the damage and the destruction of them better than we are currently doing because. You know, they still seem to be hugely tragic events. So I was just reading about the LA Fires, which happened a year ago. The other day, I think it was the 12 month anniversary of that. They were talking about how many hundreds of thousands of people are still displaced in LA after all of that [00:02:00] happened. Um. Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Um, you’re right. I dunno about America, but in Australia it still seems to be a lot of finger pointing between councils and government departments and people who think we should be going back to First Nations and looking at what they do to manage bushfires, et cetera, et cetera. they Cameron: Hmm Tony Kynaston: occur. So Cameron: Hmm. Tony Kynaston: they’re not effective. Cameron: Well, speaking of effective solutions, um. Jerome Powell, apparently not very effective in rebuilding or renovating whatever he is doing to the Federal Reserves offices. And the Department of Justice has decided to open a criminal inquiry into Jerome Powell. Uh, we talked about this on the last show, what the implications of this might be. Yeah. My understanding is like the big issue of this is the perceived. Political nature of the investigation. [00:03:00] Obviously President Trump has been very critical of Jerome Powell, who of course is a Trump appointee originally, but in this administration, uh, second administration of Trump has been very critical of Powell. Powell has not been cutting interest rates as quickly or as often as President Trump would like, and there is this concern that if the. Perceived independence of the Federal Reserve as lessened that it could have implications for the market. Am I understanding that correctly? Tony Kynaston: Yes it is. Uh, well, yes, you are understanding it correctly. Um, and look, it’s. It is been a long time since we haven’t seen an independent reserve bank or fed chair or, um, the European equivalents to those, uh, in various countries. So it’s hard to say whether Trump’s right or the chairs of the Fed is right in terms of interest rates and what they should be set at. But generally he’s [00:04:00] accepted that if, um, if you have interest rates set by the government, they will. Because they’re beholden to the electoral cycle, manipulate them to suit themselves rather than necessarily the long-term benefit of the economy. Um, which kind of begs the question that why isn’t the whole country run by technocrats if they do a better job of running the economy than, um, elected officials? But anyway, that’s a different story. but, you know, well, I’d like to explore further, but, um, yeah, it’s, uh, it’s, it’s an interesting situation. Um. We see this in Australia from time to time and is often, uh, reported after the fact when, when things get announced, when. There’s enough time between the event and, and when it’s reported that, uh, the treasurer or the Prime Minister, they rang up and abused the head of the reserve bank for not doing the right thing that they Cameron: Not gonna do. Tony Kynaston: rates. so there’s always some kind of pressure going on between elected officials and the independent board. but the independent boards generally given [00:05:00] enough power to resist. It doesn’t mean they’re infallible. We saw a problem in Australia with interest rates. Um, when the RBA head here said there wouldn’t be interest rate rise for a couple of years, and then a few months later started to rise, interest raise interest rates, and that caused problems to people who’d acted on, his verbal, they predictions and took out mortgages, et cetera. So, um, they don’t always get it right. Uh, so it’s, it’s. Generally, I think the, the RBA or, or the Fed should be independent. I think that’s the, um, the best, uh, framework for, for setting interest rates to affect the economy. But I’m not saying they’re infallible. I’m not saying crops wrong. Um, you know, as, as we discussed before, we, I thought tariffs would lead to inflation and they haven’t yet. Whether they do or not, I’m not sure, but, um, you know, maybe, maybe the president’s right, interest rates should be cut. [00:06:00] It could just be a timing issue. I wouldn’t be surprised if the US does cut interest rates at some stage in 2026. Um, so maybe he gets his wish anyway, if he just let, leave things alone. But, um, that’s not his style, is it really? Cameron: Certainly now I’m pretty sure interest rates will be cut by someone. Hmm. Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Yeah, By the current guy or the next guy. Mm-hmm. Cameron: Well, that’s the big story in terms of the US market this week. Um, in terms of, uh, other stuff going on, you know, the, the whole, uh. Market’s been, um, still bubbling along over their little bit of an equity wobble, but um, I think things are still just chugging along, uh, in the US And I was saying to you just earlier, our portfolio has really been going quite strong over there recently.[00:07:00] Um. For the last 90 days, our dummy portfolio is up 16% versus 6% for the s and p 500. Uh, since inception, our portfolio is now up 77% versus 57%. For the benchmark. So a couple of weeks ago we were sort of running neck and neck, but we’ve, um, just really rocketed back up again. It’s been an interesting period. If I look at the last one year, uh, some of the stocks that have done really well for us are in Nova International. Year ago they were trading around about 98 bucks. They’re now trading up around 160. Tony Kynaston: Oh. Cameron: Uh, so it’s been a big year for them. Euroes, one of the shipping companies that we’ve held for quite some time, ESEA is their ticket. They were trading around 26 bucks. They are currently trading around [00:08:00] 55. They were up over 60, uh, late last year. They’ve come back a bit. So, um, yeah, there’s been some, some other good ones. Um, UBS Ag, they were trading around about 31 bucks a year ago. They’re up at nearly 48 bucks today. Um, this, I’m just looking at the charts here. There’s just lots of, lots of good stories right across our portfolio. One of the best ones though, in uh, last year, we haven’t held ’em for this long though, is career electric power that we, uh, talked about on the show a few months ago. Um, they were trading around about six bucks a year ago. They’re now up around 18 bucks, but, uh, yeah. Tony Kynaston: What’s caused Cameron: Hmm. Well, you remember we had this whole story about, uh, their inability to raise rates that were held back by the governments, and then all of a [00:09:00] sudden some of those, uh, holding the, that hold was taken off and they were able to adjust it and the, the numbers turned around. Anyway, the company that I’m gonna talk about this week, Tony, um, is another airline. You know, we’ve talked about a few sort of airline related businesses over the last. A couple of months. Um, about a month ago I talked about Air Cap a ER, uh, which is sort of a, an Irish company that owns and leases our commercial aircra

In the first QAV America episode of 2026, Cameron and Tony reset the framework for the year ahead. With geopolitical shocks rattling oil markets, bullish Wall Street forecasts predicting another US equity rally, and political noise everywhere, the hosts reiterate the core QAV philosophy: ignore predictions, stick to the rules, and let disciplined process do the work. The episode’s deep dive focuses on XPLR Infrastructure (XIFR), a former income darling left for dead after cutting its dividend. Cameron unpacks the wreckage, tracing XIFR’s origins as a NextEra Energy yieldco, the collapse of its “cheap capital forever” model when interest rates rose, and why the market may now be pricing the stock as if its long-dated contracted cash flows don’t exist. The discussion weighs political risk, debt complexity, asset quality, and valuation extremes, before explaining why XIFR sits at the top of the current US QAV buy list and is being added to the live QAV Light portfolio. ⸻ Timestamps & Topics (QAV episode) 00:00 – 03:00Geopolitics, crude oil volatility, and why QAV tracks commodities as signals rather than predictions. 03:00 – 06:30Wall Street forecasts for a 2026 rally. Why QAV ignores predictions and doubles down on rules-based discipline. 06:30 – 09:00“Year of sticking to the rules.” Behavioural discipline as the real edge in investing. 09:00 – 11:00Introducing the deep dive stock: XPLR Infrastructure (XIFR) and why it tops the US buy list. 11:00 – 16:30XIFR’s origin story as a NextEra Energy yieldco. The “infinite money glitch” and how cheap capital powered growth. 42:30 – 45:00Portfolio update, recent performance versus the S&P 500, and adding XIFR to the QAV Light portfolio. Transcription   Cameron: [00:00:00] Welcome back to QAV, American Edition. Tony, episode 34. Happy New Year. Our first episode of 2026. How are you? Tony Kynaston: I’m good. recuperative week between Christmas and New Year reading Cameron: We’ve just. Tony Kynaston: golf. Cameron: That’s lovely. I was on the beach. Nice to be back in the office though. A lot going on in the world. Obviously we’ll get into my deep dive of the week soon, but before we do that, obviously lot happening, uh, in the world. In the last few days, the president of the United States sent some guys into kidnap, the president of Venezuela and his wife. Uh. The most interesting part of that, or important part of that from our perspective, is what it means for the price of crude oil and what it does to the markets in general. We just talked about this on our [00:01:00] Australian show in some detail, but essentially to recap. No one really knows what this means for the price of crude oil. It could go up, it could go down, uh, it could do nothing could go sideways. But one of the things that I said on our last show is we do track for people that are new listeners. We do track, uh, about a dozen or so commodities. Because a lot of the stocks, particularly in our Australian portfolio, are commodity stocks that we pay attention to, and we like to know where the commodities are because that informs our buy and sell decisions for, uh, mining companies or companies involved in commodities in one way or the other. And crude oil has not been a buy for us for some time, but as I pointed out in our last show, it is getting close to the byline for us. I think the buy price for us for crude oil is about $65 a barrel, and it’s ran about 61 [00:02:00] 62 this morning, so, and moving up. So it could become a buy in the next week or two. We’ll just keep an eye and see where it goes. If it becomes a buy, it means there’s a lot of. Stocks and our buy lists, both in Australia and the US become buyers again. Um, but we just play it day by day. Keep an eye on it. Tony Kynaston: new listeners, um, if something, if a company is a minor or a, an oil producer or refiner or whatever, we use the underlying commodity as a buy and sell guide for us, because it doesn’t always have a one-to-one correlation. But I found over the years that the trends have a pretty correlation between the, where the underlying commodity goes and where the fortunes of the company, which exploit that underlying commodity go. Cameron: it’s a bit of a lagging indicator. Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Cameron: So yeah, the price. If the price for oil starts to go up, then oil stocks will probably go up a little bit later, though we can catch it a little bit early and vice versa. If the commodity starts to [00:03:00] drop, usually the share price will drop over time as well. Uh, the other story that we talked about is every Wall Street analyst surveyed by Bloomberg now predicts another stock rally in 2026 in the US markets. Again, from our perspective, that’s interesting, but we don’t really care one way or the other. If you know, we, we play the market as it happens. If it goes up, great. If it doesn’t, that’s okay for us too. We just stick to our rules. Nothing changes. I said in my newsletter this week, you know, at Kung fu Chrissy and I are saying 2026 is the year of the kicks. ’cause we’re focusing on our kicks this year, improving our kicks. I was trying to come up with a similar motto for QAV. 2026 is the year of the, and I just got back to sticking to our rules and doing what we normally do. It’s, it’s kind of boring. Tony Kynaston: if you like, if that helps. Cameron: I said QAV 2026 is the year of [00:04:00] sticking to the rules. No tricks just to make a room with six. No tricks. No tricks. We’ve got no tricks. Just our trick is discipline. Yeah, that’s the trick, right? Disciplined investing rules-based investing. That, and, and it is actually a, it is the ultimate trick because as we know, most investors, amateur and professional, really, really struggle to have discipline. It’s probably the biggest. And you know, buffet has said this, Munger said this. Ben Graham said this. Peter Lynch has said this. Uh, who wrote the, uh, what works on Wall Street? uh, mgl. Oh, Shaughnessy. Tony Kynaston: yeah. Cameron: It was one of the big things he called out in that book from his experience is that even the professionals, if their system stops working, they jump horse midstream and try and get on the new horse, and he’s like, no, you just. You [00:05:00] have your, you have your framework and you just do it day in, day out, month in, month out, year in, year out. Don’t change horses midstream. And you know, that’s what we do and, and it works. Tony Kynaston: aren’t we? Cameron: I am gonna send you that Dana Carvey chop and broccoli thing as soon as I get off the show. Chop a. Tony Kynaston: Well, is the year of no predicts. How about that? Cameron: Oh, that nearly works. No predicts. Hmm. Well, we don’t predict, and I think it was a, Tony Kynaston: they wouldn’t be working for Wall Street Banks. Cameron: that’s right. And, uh, I think it was Peter Lynch, his quote, uh, people who live by the crystal ball end up eating shattered glass or something to that effect. So it is a great quote. I like it. We don’t predict, we just [00:06:00] listen to the numbers and play things, uh, day by day. Tony Kynaston: will work Cameron: Yes rules. That tell us when to buy, what to buy, when to buy it, and then when to sell it and ignore everything else in between. Just follow the rules. Well, for new listeners, what I do on the show each week, uh, is take our buy list and take a stock off that buy list and talk about it. We do a deep dive or what we call a pulled pork. Dunno why we call it. I think Tony said years ago, I’m gonna pull apart this stock and I said it was like a pulled pork and it’s just stuck. But, uh, what I have been doing for the last year or so is just finding interesting companies to talk about. But what I’m doing more recently, ’cause we started the QAV Light Portfolios, which is like a demonstration portfolio where I add a stock every week and then people can [00:07:00] watch how we trade those. They can follow along or they can just use it as a. Proof point later on, we have complete transparency. So you see what we bought it, why we bought it, what happened to it when we sold it, why all of that kind of stuff. Uh, I add a stock each week and the one that I am gonna add this week is the one that’s at the top of our US buy list this week. It’s a company called, it’s a long. Tony Kynaston: it? Cameron: Yeah, well, it’s called XPLR infrastructure, but the ticket code is XIFR, so I’m calling it zr, but it’s Tony Kynaston: the letter X. Cameron: yes. Um, and like every week it’s an interesting story. For stocks to turn up on our buy list, uh, particularly to be at the top of our buy list. They’ve gotta be going through a bit of a traumatic period.[00:08:00] You know, for people that are new, we’re the kind of value investors that look for companies that are typically. Been around a while, uh, relatively stable in terms of their underlying business. They’re generating cash, but for whatever reason, we can pick ’em up at a discount to their valuation. They’re on sale. What was that quote you had from somebody in our last show? I. Tony Kynaston: something like the stock market is the only thing that goes on sale and everyone runs away. Cameron: Yeah, yeah. But not us. We’re looking for stuff that’s on sale and, you know, uh, if our system, if our checklist picks it up and says, you know what? This is worth paying attention to, then we pay attention to it. So this company. Tony Kynaston: on. Not, but not every list is going through a traumatic event. There’s plenty of stocks on the Australian buy list that are doing well, but they’re just unloved or unlooked looked and Cameron: But that’s it. Why are they unloved? Why are, [00:09:00] why are they not, uh, trading at a reasonable valuation? There’s gotta be a reason for it. Tony Kynaston: pork I did on th

Episode Overview In the final QAV America episode of 2025, Cameron and Tony reflect on a turbulent but revealing year for markets, value investing, and the QAV system. The conversation opens with a recap of US market conditions and the launch of QAV Light US, designed to give American listeners a live, transparent way to learn the QAV process through real weekly trades. Cameron then reviews the long-term performance of the US dummy portfolio, highlighting strong multi-year outperformance despite a difficult 2025 relative to the S&P 500. The episode’s deep dive focuses on AMC Networks (AMCX)—a former prestige-TV powerhouse now trading at distressed valuations. The discussion traces AMC’s origins in the Dolan family’s cable empire, its golden era producing Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and The Walking Dead, and the brutal impact of cord-cutting on its business model. Cameron and Tony unpack why AMC is bleeding on earnings but still generating real cash, why the market hates it, and why it nonetheless tops the QAV buy list. The episode closes with a broader discussion of cycles in investing, the importance of selling discipline, Tony’s emerging “Growth over PE” insight from Australian markets, and why patience with a rules-based system matters more than short-term performance. ⸻ ⏱️ Timestamps & Topics (QAV Episode) 00:00 – 02:30End-of-year reflections, weather whiplash, and why Australians don’t understand US winters. 02:30 – 05:30US market update, no Santa rally, and the launch of QAV Light US as a learning portfolio. 05:30 – 09:30US dummy portfolio performance review vs S&P 500. 09:30 – 14:30Why QAV is not “buy and hold forever” and why selling matters as much as buying. 14:30 – 19:00Tony’s emerging insight: Growth over PE as a potential performance driver. 19:00 – 26:00Global equity market wrap: US, Europe, Japan, Hong Kong, and market cycles. 26:00 – 29:30Introduction to this week’s QAV Light addition: AMC Networks (AMCX). 1:07:00 – EndQAV philosophy, cycles, patience, and closing thoughts for the year. Transcription   Cameron: Welcome to QAV America, Tony, the last QAV America of the Year. This is episode 33, 33. Uh, it’s, we’re recording this on December 30th, 2025. It’s hot where we are cold, where our listeners probably are. My boys were just in New York for Christmas with their mom. Got to see snow for the first time. Tony Kynaston: really? Cameron: I said to them, what did you think? They were like, yeah, it was fun for about an hour. And then we were like, God, this is terrible. Imagine living in this. I said, yeah, imagine having to deal with that three months of the year. It’s crazy, but they’re back in LA now. Tony Kynaston: fair, I never, like, I’ve been to New York a number of times and I never thought it handled snow. Well, you know, the colder cities where snow’s a regular [00:01:00] occurrence are set up for it, but New York’s kind of, maybe it’ll snow this year. Maybe not. So we’re not gonna bother about for it too much. Cameron: Well, it just had, I think its biggest dump in four years, the night before the boys left, so they were stuck on the tarmac for two and a half hours waiting to get out and all that kinda stuff. Uh, well, I don’t know. I’ve been to Utah in winter and it’s built around snow that time of year, but, and you know, I’m sure they’ve got a handle on it, but it’s still a nightmare having to shovel your driveway every day and defrost your car before you can go anywhere crazy. I always said to people, you know, there are places you can live where you don’t have to do this for three months of every year. You know, you can just move to a warmer climate, Tony Kynaston: Well Cameron: but I don’t. Tony Kynaston: do I play ice hockey and go ice skating and all my skiing Cameron: Go visit you go visit, you go visit a place for a week and then get out. Yeah. Okay. Tony Kynaston: exists [00:02:00] in the US and Mexico Cameron: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Tony Kynaston: what’s west coast Arizona Cameron: yes. I love Arizona. I want to get back to Arizona. It’s very hot, but, uh, so pretty, such a pretty place. So many pretty places in there. All the ro cactuses and all the red. what? Oh yeah. I don’t care about golf courses. Cactuses. I like, uh, Tony don’t have much news-wise to talk about. Um, in the US their market hasn’t had a Santa rally this week. Um, it’s been pretty quiet. There’s a just, things are still bubbling along over there, uncertainty about labor numbers, et cetera, et cetera. But the economy, generally speaking seems to be trundling along despite tariffs and all of the unknowns. But I did wanna mention [00:03:00] to you that in the last week, I finally launched our US light portfolio. So for listeners in the us, uh, what we’ve been doing in Australia for the last few years is we, we have our regular portfolio, a dummy portfolio that’s our stable portfolio that we built over the last six years. But not a lot of trading happens in it. It’s fairly well established. We don’t tend to sell much. And that’s, uh, good. But for people that just are discovering our show and are trying to figure out how to invest in the QAV style, it doesn’t give them anything to play with. So I launched a thing a few years ago called QAV Light in Australia where we. Have a much bigger portfolio of stocks that we trade in, and it means that I’m always sort of trading something every week and new listeners, as they’re learning the system can trade along with [00:04:00] us. We’re buying and selling things o on and off of our buy list, and people can sort of learn the system by following our trades in QAV light trading along with us if they want, or just watching our trades and getting a handle for how it works and you know, then. Because everything is transparent. They can look back at it six months or 12 months or two years later and see what our performance was like. And we have full transparency of what we bought, when we bought it, what we paid for it, when we sold it, why we sold it, the whole deal. And it’s a lot more fluid than our major portfolio is because it’s stabilized. Same thing’s happened with the us. I’ve been running the US portfolio for two years now. It’s pretty stable. We haven’t had to do a lot of trading. I have to sell something once every couple of months, but really it just sits there and ticks along, which is great. But again, for new American listeners, it doesn’t give them anything really to play along with. So I’ve started the first QAV Light [00:05:00] portfolio. It’s something you get to see if you have a subscription, you have to have a QAV light subscription in the US and you get to see the weekly trade. So every week. I will buy something off of our American buy list and add it to our light portfolio and then track that. And if any of the stocks that we hold on those portfolios trip up, one of our selling, uh, triggers, I will replace it with something else on our buy list. And people in the US can follow along. Again, they can copy our trades if they want, or they can just watch our trades and, you know, go back and have a look at it, uh, historically and see how the system works with real data and a real transaction. Um, transparency. So I launched that last week. I’ve added two stocks to it so far. Um, the first one was Gray Media, GTNI added last week, which has been on the top of the buy list for a long [00:06:00] time. Interestingly, it’s a television company that we’ve talked about. I did a deep dive on it. Um, a couple of months ago, and the one that I added today or yesterday is another TV business, and it’s the company that I’m gonna do my deep dive on today, which is a MC Networks or A MCX. So, um, that is interesting, and I, and I added it because it was the top of the buy list this week. GTN was the top of the buy list last week. A MCX is the top of the buy list this week and both TV businesses, which is interesting. And A MCX is, we’ll see when I do the deep dive on it is it’s not a healthy look at business, to be honest. Tony Kynaston: Yeah Cameron: You know, I’ve done some pulled porks over the last couple of months. I’m like, these businesses are making cash handover fist and they’re under value. This looks great. A MCX is not one of those. It’s bleeding, but it was at the top of our buy list, [00:07:00] so. There’s value in there somewhere. So we’ll see as we drill down into it. But it’s got a good story too. It’s got a long story, um, not as long as some of the businesses, but it goes back decades and has, uh, some involvement with, uh, Hugh Hefner, uh, which is always fun. So anyway, that’s, uh, we’ll get into that in a second. Um, before we do that, I thought I’d just do a quick overview, seeing as it’s the end of the calendar year, which is the end of the financial year too in the US looking at our major portfolio over there, what we call the US dummy portfolio. Again, it’s been running since I think September, 2023. Since then, uh, it is up 65.5% a little over two years. So roughly, you know, 30 odd [00:08:00] percent a year on average. Uh, that doesn’t include dividends. And the s and p 500, which we use as the benchmark, is up 55% over the same period of time, which is terrific performance. But as of today, we are doing quite a bit better than the benchmark over that period of time. Year to date, however, has not been great for us. The, our portfolio is down 11.7%. This calendar year versus the s and p up 17.4%, so has not been a good year for our portfolio. Generally speaking, we had a lot of gains in its first year and then has given up some of those this year. But, um, still overall doing very well to give people an idea, uh, of the stocks that we hold in that portfolio and what kind of performance we’ve had over the two odd [00:09:00] years we’ve been involved. Uh, u

Episode Overview In this episode of QAV America, Cameron and Tony open with reflections on the tragic Bondi attack and Australia’s long-standing gun laws before turning to the week’s U.S. stock market action. They discuss recent market jitters, AI-driven volatility in tech stocks, and the ongoing rotation into “value” names. Cameron then delivers a deep dive on Ziff Davis (ZD) — a little-known but highly profitable owner of the internet’s comparison-shopping and review infrastructure. The conversation explores ZD’s long history, its reinvention after the dot-com crash, its heavy reliance on SEO and affiliate monetisation, and the existential question hanging over the business: will AI replace human-driven product reviews? Rather than forecasting the future, the episode frames ZD through the QAV lens — cash flow, valuation, optionality, and downside protection — and examines why a business that looks structurally threatened may still offer attractive value today. ⸻ Timestamps & Topics 00:00 – Australia, violence, and contextReflections on the Bondi tragedy, Australia’s gun laws, and why mass shootings remain rare compared with the U.S. 01:40 – U.S. market news: jittery but selectiveU.S. indices drift lower as investors wait on jobs and inflation data; discussion of “value” rotations and why index definitions of value differ from QAV’s approach. 02:40 – AI stocks wobbleAI-linked stocks pull back sharply, with Broadcom (AVGO) highlighted as suffering its worst three-day decline since 2020. 03:30 – Commodities and energy signalsBasic materials outperform; copper strength linked to data centres and electrification; weakness in oil and LNG despite geopolitical tensions. 04:30 – QAV America portfolio performanceShort-term underperformance versus the S&P 500, but strong long-term outperformance since portfolio inception in September 2023. 05:00 – Winners, laggards, and watchlist highlightsReview of top portfolio performers and notable stocks previously covered but not purchased. 07:30 – Deep dive : Ziff Davis (ZD)Introduction to Ziff Davis (ZD) and its role as the hidden infrastructure behind tech reviews, VPN comparisons, speed tests, and product rankings. Transcription   [00:00:00] Cameron: Welcome to QAV America. Tony, episode 32. What do you know? Tk? Tony Kynaston: Well, it’s reached the shores of America and America’s new outlets, but it’s been an unfortunate. Well, worse than unfortunate time in Australia. So, um, a lot of, uh, reflection going on in Australia over the terrible things at Bondi Beach. I had lived in Sydney where I was living, uh, we would’ve been pretty close to it. Cameron: Yeah, very shocking. Um, I think it’s maybe the third mass shooting we’ve had in. Nearly 30 years. Tony Kynaston: Mm-hmm. Cameron: Does that sound about right? Tony Kynaston: Yeah. I can only think of poor Arthur and this one being that bad as being a couple of. know, sort of murder, suicide things, farms or whatever along the way. But this is the first, Cameron: Yeah. Tony Kynaston: uh, with, you know, weapons that shouldn’t have been licensed, I don’t think in the first place to people. Cameron: In public, Tony Kynaston: Mm-hmm. Cameron: you know, civilians, uh, all of that kind of stuff. The first one [00:01:00] like that, since 1996. That we’ve had every 30 years. So yes, very shocking, very sad, very tragic, very complicated. Very complex. Uh, but, um, yeah, it’s something that we’re, we’re used to reading about in the front cover of the New York Times, but not, uh, about Australia. So anyway, moving right along. Um. Let’s talk about stock market news in the United States over the last week, Tony. And then I will do a deep dive on Ziff Davis. ZD is the ticker Tony Kynaston: Would that be Cameron: as IZD. Yeah, ZD you’re right. And as I mentioned, there’s an Isaac Asimov, uh, leak to this, which you will enjoy ’cause they’re both big fans of Asimov. Tony Kynaston: Mm. Cameron: Well, the market’s been a little bit wobbly in the US again. Uh, finished the week with modest [00:02:00] losses s and p 500. The Dow and the NASDAQ are all trending. Lower traders over there are waiting for key economic reports on job and inflation. Um, stocks saw pressure as investors are moving into. Value area, Tony? Value. Tony Kynaston: Oh, we can, got someone to sell to. Cameron: Yeah. Although quite often what we’ve seen over the years is when they talk about value, it’s not the same way that we talk about value. Tony Kynaston: not. Cameron: Our definition of value is a little bit more specific. I think Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Cameron: the AI. Tony Kynaston: the indices normally talk about value as being the lowest deciles of the PE ratio range, but as we know, PD ratios aren’t a great guide to the value of a company Cameron: yeah. Tony Kynaston: mm. Cameron: We’re looking, we’re looking at their ability to outperform, uh, as businesses and getting a bit of discount. [00:03:00] What else? AI and tech sectors, uh, sort of jittery as a result of some of this stuff. Some AI linked names like Broadcom have had some big declines. It had its worst three day drop since 2020 was some of the AI investment narratives, uh, facing some scrutiny. Basic materials and financials have outperformed. Uh, in our Australian show, we were just talking a lot about copper. And, uh, you did a deep dive on one of the Australian copper miners. There is resources, obviously there’s, uh, gold is still doing well from a commodities perspective. Uh, prude oil and LNG are not doing well, and we aren’t really sure why. But movements around Russia, Ukraine, and Venezuela might have something to do with it. And we also we’re talking about the fact that all of the. Urgency around building data centers and the energy requirements for data centers. Uh, playing a big role in driving copper prices up. [00:04:00] Um, what else have I got? That’s basically it for the us I think, uh, general overall market news, it’s a bit jittery over there at the moment, but our, before our portfolio has had a good 30 days. Relative to the s and p 500, it’s up 3.2% in the last 30 days. Our portfolio in the us, that is versus 1.22% for the s and p 500, but year to date, we haven’t had a good year. Still, I think we’re down about 10, 11% versus the s and p up 14%. But, uh. All time. If I go back, since the beginning of our portfolio in the us, September, 2023, we’re up 64% versus the s and p 500, up 53% over that period of time. So we’re doing okay over that two plus [00:05:00] years. Um, big performers in our portfolio, uh. See, I’ll stack rank and by game still, Willis Lease Finance Company up 186% in Nova International, up 169% Euro Cs up 99% BLX. The Foreign Trade Bank of Latin America is up 84%. RM Regional Management is up 70%. UBS is up 38. Gas, stealth gas is up 37, 30 8%. Sarcos Energy Navigation. TEN is their ticket. They’re up 32%. KT is up 23%. Your initials in reverse. Jackson Financial is up. 17. Renaissance Air Holdings is up four, and our most recent acquisition career Electric Power is up one and a half percent since we added it a few weeks ago. And then I like to talk [00:06:00] about the companies that we’ve talked about but haven’t actually bought because our portfolio is full. Uh, it’s been some great performance, uh, from these companies. Obviously the top one Zep, the Chinese watch company, uh, is up 850% since we talked about ’em in July. Uh, ChemX is up 106% since we covered ’em back in March. Lot of around 40% Canadian imperial banks, up 46, uh, ORX corporations up 40. Precision Drilling is up 43 IHS is up 37. Sasol is up 26. Ford is up 26. People told me on Reddit that Ford was a dud, shouldn’t, shouldn’t even be looking it for, it’s up 26% since May. American Airlines is up 11% since we talked about ’em. Topgolf is up nine air cap that we talked about. The end of November is up [00:07:00] 8% since then. So all in all, uh, we’ve talked about 29 companies on the show since March 22 of them are up, seven are not the win ratio of 76% so far with those. So. They’re doing okay. The system is working as we would expect it to in the us Tony. So today I am going to talk about a little company called Ziff Davis. As I said, um, you know, you’d be familiar with Ziff Davis, I’m sure. I know you’re not necessarily a big tech head, but you, you’ve heard of Ziff Davis, I’m sure zd. Tony Kynaston: You’d lose that bet. I hadn’t heard of ’em until I started researching them today. Cameron: Really? Oh, okay. Well, you haven’t been in the tech industry like I have for the last 30 odd years. Tony Kynaston: no. Cameron: you are, Tony Kynaston: But wasn’t there once, but not, not for a long time.[00:08:00] Cameron: yeah. So if you, if, if you are trying to Google the best tech product, uh, best VPN because you care about your privacy, you’re probably gonna end up on a Z Davis. Um, which cameras should I buy? Ziff Davis. Which phone? Which anti forest package. If you’re ending up on a website, you’re probably ending up on one of the many, many properties owned by Ziff Davis. Tony Kynaston: I Cameron: They make about half a, yeah, I mean, I am your Ziff Davis. Yeah. What should I get then? I’ll ask Ziff Davis and then I’ll come back to you and tell him. Um, Tony Kynaston: so Cameron: a half a bill. Tony Kynaston: that Cameron: Hmm. Tony Kynaston: you are not your surplus to the chain. Now I can just, uh, yeah, speed things up. Cameron: Yeah, but then you, that would, that would require you going online and looking something up. So how old are you now? Tony Kynaston: That’s Cameron: 60. What? Yeah. Yeah. So people are over 60. Dunno how to dunno how to [00:09:00] internet like us young kids. 55. You miss the cut. Uh, they make about half a billion dollars a year by. Basically being the people that tell you what to buy

Overview In this episode, Cam and Tony dig into the strange, noisy twilight zone of the current US market: rate-cut expectations, mega-cap fatigue, and a broadening rally that’s finally throwing some love toward the small and mid-caps that QAV thrives on. They walk through the performance of the US portfolio, poke at the rotation narrative, and then Cam takes everyone deep into the iron-ore jungles of Brazil with a pulled-pork deep dive on Vale — “the FMG of Brazil”, complete with dam failures, lawsuits, ESG fallout, and fat cashflows. Along the way they contrast Brazil vs Australia, FMG vs Vale, talk iron ore cycles, passive-investing distortions, and the macro-agnostic stubbornness that keeps QAV on the rails. It’s part markets, part commodity history lesson, and part true-crime mining documentary.  — Timestamps & Topics 00:00 • Fed rate-cut probabilities and why QAV ignores macro04:00 • US portfolio performance vs S&P 500 06:00 • Small-cap underperformance creates QAV pickings 07:30 • Passive funds distorting large-cap flows 08:00 • US portfolio winners rundown14:00 • SEC leadership change and weakening shareholder power • (none)16:00 • Pulled pork intro: Vale (VALE), “the FMG of Brazil” • VALE, FMG Transcription   Cameron: Welcome back to QAV America Tony, episode 31. Big News in America. Tony the Fed is meeting rate cut widely Expected markets are pricing in a 90% chance that the Fed will cut rates by 25 basis points today. Tomorrow, we’ll see what happens. It’s driven a big rally across equities in the us. A Santa Claus year end rally, they’re saying, but we were just, we were just talking on our Australian show about our. Reserve bank that’s meeting today, that’s, uh, gonna decide what they’re doing about interest rates and it doesn’t really matter. A great deal to us can have an impact on the broader economy, but from a QAV perspective, we play the cards as they’re dealt. Interest rates go up, interest rates go down, doesn’t really affect our system. One jot does it. Tony Kynaston: No. I mean, it may cause us a bit of work if we have [00:01:00] to buy and sell something, but no, we don’t. Rely on macro themes at all, nor can I explain them most times and even more remotely can I predict them, so I don’t, don’t even try. Cameron: On the Australian show, I was just reading out results from some of our Australian listeners, uh, following our system. One guy was saying his portfolio’s up 90% this year. Another was saying it’s up 50, 55% this year. Great results across the board. Uh, and it’s a good year, uh, in the Australian market as well as in the US market. Our portfolios are doing well. But as we were talking about, it’s just the system just tells us what to do, uh, tells us what to buy, when to buy, what to sell, when to sell. And what I’ve learned to do in the years we’ve been doing the show is just follow the system. It removes all of the emotion from it, and it also means I don’t really need to follow what’s happening. [00:02:00] Macro economics or in the market, generally speaking. ’cause the system factors all of that in. It works in ups, boom cycles, it works in bear cycles, it works if interest rates are high, it works if interest rates are low. It really just tells us what to do and I, you know, I don’t really need to do much at all. As I was saying on the Australian show, if one of my alerts goes off and says I need to sell something, I sell it. I replace it and then I go back to what I was doing before and just ignore the noise, which is a great way to invest. Tony Kynaston: It’s the only way to invest, I think. And I, I just wanna add one more thing to that, and that is that, um, because of that, the, the, I guess the number one thing you can have as a trait to be an investor is persistence. It’s just if you know your system’s gonna work on all kinds of. Ups and downs in market situations, and it has for me over [00:03:00] decades. then rely on it. Don’t start second guessing it. Don’t start oh, it’s been a really good year because like, I’ve had a good year on the share market this year. And, and straight away my brain goes, oh, maybe it’s time to sell. What can we have two good years in a row? What about three? Can we have three good years in which it’s like, it’s like. They just fools errands trying to work out what’s gonna come Cameron: Yeah. Tony Kynaston: So you have a system and you stick to it, and if the market does turn down, you stick to it because you’ll ride it through and then you’ll catch it, at reasonably or low point and it’s way back up again. Cameron: Yeah. Well, speaking of portfolios, so looking at our US portfolio in stock, EDIA, it’s up around about 3% this month versus the s and p 500, up about 1.75%. Um. All time. Our portfolio is up around about [00:04:00] 58%, which all time for this US portfolio is from September, 2023. So just over a couple of years versus the s and p 500, up 54%. So we’re doing a little bit better then the market over that time and. It’s, there’s an interesting story I saw in Morningstar, Tony about rotation away from mega caps in the US towards value, small cap and core stocks. Um, this is dated 4th of December in Morningstar article says. As of November 28th, 2025, the US equity market was trading at a 3% discount to a composite of our fair value estimates. Of the over 700 stocks we cover the trade on US exchanges. Later on in the article, he says, small cap stocks outperformed in [00:05:00] November as the Morningstar US small cap index rose 2.48% comparatively Morningstar’s, US mid cap index rose 0.64%, and the US large cap index declined 0.05%. Small cap stocks remain the most undervalued trading at a 50. 15% discount to fair value compared with large cap and mid cap trading at 3% and 2% discounts respectively. But obviously the big, the, you know, we’ve talked on earlier episodes that, like the Mag seven has been like 70% of the markets growth for performance this year. So the fact that it’s coming off a bit, uh, doesn’t really discount the impact that it’s had on the market over the course of the year. But when I look at our buy list. Our US buy list each week. There’s still just plenty of opportunity at the small and mid-cap market space, which just seems to be getting ignored by the [00:06:00] general market for some reason. I dunno why we’re, we’re seeing so much, uh, opportunity of stocks that are coming up, showing up as undervalued, but you know, it’s a good time for us. Tony Kynaston: well, I think, you know, that it’s, it’s been a tale of two markets, perhaps three markets really in Australia and in the us. Mag seven have driven the growth. And, and I guess if you can cast that net a little wider into things like, um, data centers and power supplies to data centers, that kind of thing, have all been dragged up, in the, um, in the AI revolution. But. That if you exclude that from the market, it’s been reasonably flat or certainly it hasn’t been growing as quickly as all that. But what we also found in Australia, and I guess it’s the same in the us, is that with a lot of passive investing done these days, and even with big, even if it’s not passive investing, it’s if it’s big active fund managers because of their size, they still are buying into big [00:07:00] caps and um. That’s kind of opened the space a bit in the smaller cap market for, uh, stock pickers to come in and pick the eyes out of it and do really well because, um, you’re not, know, the, it’s, small caps go through cycles. They outperforming underperform, they’ve been underperforming recently. So, um, as people sort of, wake up to the fact that there’s not as much passive investment in the small cap universe, it, um, it’s, it’s doing better. Cameron: Yeah, well, like, uh, just running through some of the stocks in our portfolio, some of the best performers over the last couple of years. Willis Lease Finance, we talked about them again on the show last week. They do, uh. Plane engine leasing, I think, uh, they’re up 168% since we bought them in Nova International, ENVA. Uh, they’re a online financial services company. They’re up 120. [00:08:00] 7% Euro CS Limited, ESEA. They’re in the shipping business, dry bulk and container carrier stuff. They’re up 120% BLX, the Foreign Trade Bank of Latin America. Is what it says on the label. They’re up 82% since we bought them. Regional management, RM diversified consumer finance company, they’re up 57%. Sarcos Energy Navigation, TEN. They’re a Greek based. Crude oil shipping company, they’re up 40% since we bought them. The list goes on. So, you know, these are companies I’d certainly never heard of before we started doing the show. I I, I would gather most Americans and most American investors have never heard of these companies. They’re not well known Brad names. They’re your classic sort of, as we often say, classic Berkshire type companies. They’re just boring businesses that have [00:09:00] got. A line of business they’ve been in for decades. They’ve got good customer relationships, supplier relationships, they generate cash, and because they’re boring, we’re able to get ’em when they’re at a discount to their valuation, and then we just ride it out. Tony Kynaston: Yep. Cameron: Uh, regression to the mean, some of the stocks that we’ve talked about on the show, but don’t necessarily own the ones that I’ve done deep dives on over the last year, uh, that have done well. ChemX Corporation CX is the ticket code. Uh, they’re up 94% since I talked about ’em in March of 25. Canadian, Imperial Bank of Commerce, CM is up 40% since I talked about ‘ em in May. Ford Motor Company is up 22%. IHS holding is up 39%. Precision Drilling Corporation. PDS, we talked about them in June. They’re up 42% Zep. Of course, the Chinese smartwatch company is still up [

Overview In this episode of QAV America, Cameron and Tony take a tour through the strange split-brain mood of the US markets, where weak economic data is somehow bullish because investors are convinced the Fed will cut rates in December. They break down the odd macro setup, check in on the portfolio, and walk through fresh results from star performer **Willis Lease Finance (WLFC)** and a big buyback from **Enova (ENVA)**. From there, Cameron recaps the performance of the 27 US stocks they’ve analysed this year, before diving into a full deep-dive on **AerCap (AER)** — the world’s largest aircraft lessor. The conversation covers why airlines lease instead of own, how aircraft leasing actually works, why Ireland is the global nexus for the industry, the wild origin story of Guinness Peat Aviation, and the massive headache AerCap faced when Russia and Ukraine seized more than 150 of its aircraft in 2022. They wrap with QAV scoring, book-value checks, revenue and profit trends, and a broader conversation about how the leasing model fits into cyclical markets, AI, mobility, and long-term capital allocation. Everything from the Fed to kung-fu neural adaptation shows up along the way. — Timestamps & Topics 00:00 – Market mood & macro split-brain (no tickers) 02:00 – Portfolio news: Willis Lease Finance (WLFC) 03:40 – Enova International (ENVA) buyback 04:30 – Portfolio performance overview 06:00 – Recap of stocks covered this year 08:00 – Deep dive introduction: AerCap (AER) 40:00 – Final wrap & philosophical detour (AI, kung-fu, skills vs computation) Transcription   Cameron: [00:00:00] Welcome back to QAV America, Tony, episode 30. It’s the 2nd of December, 2025. How you doing? Tony Kynaston: Good summer in Australia. I’m Cameron: Summer in Australia? Uh, not in the United States though, and it’s the overall mood in the US markets. Tony, kind of weird, uh, to say the least bit of a split personality over there at the moment. I think on one side, investors seem to be getting increasingly confident that the Fed will cut rates in December. I think the future markets have the odds sitting at roughly 85%. Now, which is high enough that everyone’s basically planning their Christmas shopping around it. But the flip side is that the economic data, backing that up. It isn’t pretty. Um, you know, I know that there was sort of a break in gathering data while the government was shut down for a while. But manufacturing continues to slump. Inflation and [00:01:00] income growth are cooling off broad GDP expectations for next year of drifted down toward the 2% mark. So it’s sort of a bit of a soft landing fantasy mixed with a little fear that maybe things are wobbly over there. The market o. Tony Kynaston: cuts. That’s the looking The things are looking wobbly. We go through the looking glass like 10 years ago, 20 years ago. Those kinds of numbers were out and about. The market would be tanking. it’s doom and gloom. The economy’s busted. The inflation’s coming down and exports are going down. it’s like yippee. The fed’s gonna cut. We can Yeah. or Yeah. But it’s the, it’s the double-edged sword, right. Um. Yeah, the market’s not doing well, so interest rates are gonna get cut, but the market’s not doing the, the economy’s not doing great. Cameron: Hmm. put Tony Kynaston: called, people Cameron: And as we’ve talked about over the last year on this show, we know that most of the [00:02:00] returns in the Dow Jones are coming from six stocks or seven stocks. Um, so it’s very uneven. That said. Yeah, things are doing okay from our portfolio perspective, but, um, the market opened pretty strongly last week, but then by the beginning of this week, it seemed to have cooled off again. Crypto’s having one of its spasms, bond yields have jumped in terms of our portfolio specific stories though, Tony, some good news. Uh, Willis Lease Finance Company, WL. FC, which has been the rockstar in our portfolio, our US portfolio over the last couple of years. Um, it’s up 152% since we added it, but it was up at one point about over 300%. But they came out with their results this week. Uh, revenue came, [00:03:00] this is for the third quarter. Revenue came in at $183 million, which is up 25% year on year. Pre-tax income grew by the same percentage utilization of their engine and aircraft portfolio. So they lease out engines, mostly few aircraft, but mostly engines, uh, was up 86%. They lifted their dividend from 25 cents to 40 cents. They did note that margins of. Tightened a little, but overall, very solid results from them. And how did their shares do as a result? Uh, nothing much happened. Uh, just it went down. Um, so there you go. Great news. Let’s sell, as you know. Tony Kynaston: money. Let’s sell. want some more loss making companies to invest in? Cameron: Yeah. What, but what’s their AI story? That’s what we wanna know. Um, only other stock in our portfolio that had, [00:04:00] yeah, the only other stock in our portfolio that had any news that I could see was in Nova ENVA. They just announced a $400 million buyback, which we like to see. That’s all of the market news that I’ve got though this week, Tony. I’ve got, uh, I thought I’d just do a portfolio update while I’m at it though, uh, I’ll talk about some of the companies that we’ve talked about in recent weeks. So, the dummy portfolio that we run in the us uh, since I started it in late 22, September, no, sorry, 23. September, 2023 is up 53.3%. Uh, no, sorry, up 53.04% versus the s and p 500, up 53.3%, so we’re now returning. Pretty much exactly the same as the s and p 500. We’ve come from doing triple the s and p 500. At the end of last year, we were up 90% versus [00:05:00] 30%. We are back down this year to sort of neck and neck with the s and p. So it’s not been a good year for the stocks in our portfolio. They’ve all. Had fairly average years at least versus the index. But, you know, looking for it, looking at it over the long haul, I’m pretty happy with 53% return over a little over two years. Although if you could just buy an ETF and do the same, um, that’s, you know, be a lot easier to do that in some ways. But I do know that we will get back to our performance if history is any guide over the next couple of years, Tony Kynaston: case in Australia and for me over 30 Yeah. Yep. Cameron: And the, and the case from what we’ve learned from Buffet and Munger and all those guys over the years as well. For the month, uh, our US portfolio is down 3% versus the s and p, which is pretty much neutral for the last 30 days. Uh, of the companies that we’ve covered on the [00:06:00] show over the last six or seven months, there’s been some really great results there. I wish I had owned, uh, all of these stocks. I had the opportunity to put ’em in our portfolio. Remember Topgolf, Callaway we talked about a few weeks ago, we talked, we, we talked about them at the beginning of November’s 12th of November. They’re up 17% since then. There was up 20%. They’re down 4% today. So that was pretty good. I thought you’d like that. Um, community health systems are up 20% since we talked about ’em in October. Uh, lots of other great results in there too. Zep the. Chinese watch company is up 800% since we covered ’em in July. That’s still the highlight. Um, so out of, out of all of the stocks that we’ve covered, which is 27 on the show, I’ve done a deep dive on this year. 21 are up, six are not, six are down. [00:07:00] Um, the average growth out of all of them is about 43%, but it’s a 78% win loss ratio at the moment, so that’s pretty good. Tony Kynaston: kind of randomly too, aren’t you? From the Cameron: They’re on the buy list. But yeah, there’s usually about a hundred stocks on the buy list, and I don’t go from the top of the list as I normally would if I was getting add into portfolio. I select them based on them being a good story to talk about something interesting. And I have another interesting one this week, Tony. Tony Kynaston: uh, Cameron: I think you’ll find it interesting. No, but a company very similarly similar to WLFC, funnily enough, they’re called. Air cap. A-E-R-A-E-R is the ticket code for air cap. Air cap owns and leases out commercial aircraft, passenger jets, cargo planes, aircraft engines in helicopters. They don’t fly them. They rent them long term to airlines and other [00:08:00] operators similar to Willis Lease, but Air capa the. Um, the, the Walmart in this space, they’re the Costco, uh, WLFC are more of a, a family owned, uh, corner store. Uh, these guys are the giant supermarket of aircraft leasing. They will buy jets, lease them for eight to 12 years per contract. They manage a massive fleet. And then they do lease buybacks and sell them and juggle it. Assets. They also do engines, but they’re sort of a side quest for them. Willis Lease is a specialist boutique firm that focuses on engines, air cap, do everything. Um, Tony Kynaston: of way most operate these days, they would rather lease their planes than, than buy. Them outright. Better use of capital to lease. Cameron: don’t. ruin my narrative here. Tony. You’re [00:09:00] jumping ahead. You’re doing, you’re doing what Ray does. Cutting to the cutting. You, you, you’re doing the Reader’s Digest version of my very long story here, but yes, you’re right. Tony Kynaston: don’t wanna do what Ray does. I’m not gonna sit here, eat gummies when, when you. Cameron: Maybe you should. Uh, he apparently thinks it’s the best way to get through an hour with me is just to eat gummies. Um, yeah. Like, and that surprises me ’cause I, I know nothing about. Uh, these businesses, and we’ve talked about a number of companies that lease the shovels and, uh, what do you call it, the  picks and shovels. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, I think we talked about, well, we talked about

Episode Overview This week we dive into Korea Electric Power (KEP), a deep-value, government-linked Korean utility that has quietly swung from crisis-level losses to massive operating cash flow. We explore the company’s unusual history stretching back to a royal electrification project in the 1890s, its modern political entanglement with tariff controls, its nuclear-heavy energy mix, and why the market may be mispricing a regulated monopoly with a price-to-operating-cash-flow ratio of 1.5. We also cover the recent sell of VSAT on a 3PTL rule, the psychology of Reddit outrage at PCG, and the broader role utilities play in an AI-powered future where electricity becomes the new picks and shovels. Timestamps 00:00 – Opening chatter, Reddit outrage. 00:01:15 – VSAT sell rule triggered 00:02:00 – Introducing this week’s pulled pork: KEP 00:22:00 – Portfolio philosophy: buy deep value, sell by rules, ignore Reddit foam 00:23:00 – Final wrap-up and sign-off Transcription   Cameron: Welcome back to QAV America, Tony, episode 29. Uh, how are you? Tony Kynaston: well, thank you. Yep. All Cameron: I tell you what, the folks on Reddit on the value investing sub Reddit did not like my PCG uh, Paul Pork. Last week I did a summary of it for Reddit. Oh, the hate for PCG Tony Kynaston: bet. Cameron: was, so, it was great. They had, Tony Kynaston: did Cameron: mean, there’s so much hate. Tony Kynaston: with Love? Cameron: I did, I called it Leading With Love. Yeah, yeah. Uh, and manslaughter. I, um, Tony Kynaston: What? Oh, so PC G’s part of the hive mind on Pluribus. Now they come Cameron: yeah, it is, Tony Kynaston: love. Cameron: they’re leading with love. Yeah. That should be the tagline for that show. Um, but, uh, yeah, and it was just h hilarious to me how much anger and hate came out, and I was like, Hmm. Tony Kynaston: Well, I’m Cameron: Sounds like a good investment. Tony Kynaston: I. Cameron: Well, but they weren’t talking about the manslaughter. They were just talking [00:01:00] about it being a dog of a company Tony Kynaston: okay. Cameron: and somebody was going on about how they diluted their shareholders when they had to pay for the fires. And I’m like, and why do I care? Like I’m, I’m looking at it post dilution, not, Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Cameron: doesn’t affect me as an investor today, what happened in 2019, or whatever it was. Anyway. I did have to sell something outta the US portfolio. This week I sold Vsat. It was a three point trend line sell, and I replaced it with the company. I’m doing a pulled pork on today. Korean Electric Power, Korea Electric Power, KEP. Kepco. One of the few times I’ve been able to actually do a pulled pork on a stock that is now in our portfolio. Because I actually had to sell something. Don’t tell me what happened to the share price for Vsat today because you just broke the Ex-Girlfriend rule on our Australian show, and uh, I don’t want you to do it again. So, uh. The kept story. I know you’ve got furniture being delivered, so I’m gonna [00:02:00] run through this one quickly today. Uh, another power company. So last week we did PCG. This is another power company, obviously based in Korea. If you hadn’t guessed from the name another regulated monopoly like last week’s show, but this time they’re regulated monopolies in entire country, not just parts of California. Although we know California’s pretty big. And just a heads up, KEP report their financials in Juan, KRW. Bit like posco, the steel slash energy company that we covered a while ago on a, an earlier episode, episode 12, I think I did. Posco. And they’re also a competitor to KEP as it turns out. But we’ll get into this, but when you look at the numbers in stock, EDIA, they’re all in one, so you need to do the conversion. Uh, one USD is about 1,465 KRW, uh, what was that TV show in the eighties? Um, about a radio [00:03:00] station in the us That was it. Not, not, not the Korean one. WKRP, not KRW. Okay. The current share price at the time I’m doing this for KEP is about $16 74. They’re listed on the New York Stock Exchange, so, uh, they’re known in Korea as ion I believe. What they actually do is, well, they’re basically the power grid for South Korea. Um, essentially they transmit, generate, transmit, and distribute electricity to almost every type of customer, from households to Samsung fabs, to shipyards, to farms. The entire market is what they look after the National Grid. They handle virtually a hundred percent of transmission and distribution. They have about six generation subsidiaries across coal, gas, nuclear, wind, solar, you name it. [00:04:00] They produce about 60 to 70% of the electricity. There’s a handful of companies, including Costco, that uh, also generate electricity. Poco. When we did the pulled pork on them, I mentioned as a steel company, but it turns out steel mills are effectively power plants in disguise. Tony Kynaston: Okay. Cameron: making steel requires an immense amount of heat and energy. And when you blast iron ore and furnaces to make steel, you produce byproduct gases, waste gas, which instead of venting the gas, they capture it and burn it in their own onsite power plants to generate electricity. And they became so good at it that they started building standalone power plants and selling electricity back into the grid. And I think they might even be the second largest, uh, generator of electricity now. In Korea after Kepp. But uh, back, back to kep. [00:05:00] They also sell power related services. They run it and maintenance businesses around the grid. They have a whole bucket load of overseas projects, including they own a couple of coal mines in Australia or have interest in one boutique coal that they’ve had for. 15 years and they bought another one by Long Coal Mine. But they own a bunch of stuff all over the world related to energy. But, uh, you know, last week’s show, PCG, we had great. Well, not great. Fascinating stories about manslaughter and, uh, terrorist attacks and all sorts of stuff. Just a good story behind the founding of this company. Uh, not directly related to Kepp, but worth telling anyway. ’cause I’ve found it fascinating. The company started life in 1898 as the sole electric company. It was a [00:06:00] royal project by King Gaji who brought together trams and electric lights into the capitol. He ruled Korea for 43 years, from 1864 to 1907, first as the last King of Joon, and then is the first emperor of the Korean Empire from 1897 until he was forced to abdicate by the Japanese in 1907. And his wife, queen Min, who posthumously honored as the Empress.  Was even more powerful than he was apparently at the time of her death. She was this canny political player who was even more powerful than him, apparently, and was roundly hated in Korea by her, by his father, as well as the Japanese that were [00:07:00] ostensibly running the country at the time. And there was a conspiracy against her. One night agents were let into the palace by pro Japanese, Korean guards. Once inside, they beat and threatened the royal family and the occupants of the palace. As they were looking for her two women were killed mistaken for her. Um. Then they eventually located her, and I won’t give you the details, but it wasn’t nice what they did to her. She was assassinated by these Japanese agents and then her corpse was covered in oil and set fire to, so that’s how unpopular she was. She had Aly begun negotiations with the Russian Empire to align Korea with the Russians to play ’em off against the Japanese. Tony Kynaston: high. power prices. Cameron: No, I don’t think there was a lot of [00:08:00] power actually getting out to people at the time. Um. The king was first crowned in 1863 at the age of 12, and as I always say on my Roman Empire shows nothing works out better for a country than making a 12-year-old emperor. You can’t go wrong with that Tony Kynaston: Fox works well at your Cameron: Give, oh my God, nothing. Nothing could ever go wrong, giving complete power to, uh, a child. Never in history. Has that ever been a bad idea? So the Hung Song Electric Company, as it was known. Completed its first power plant in 1899. By the end of that year, they had launched their first streetcar service. They turned on the first electric lights in SO’S Jon, go Street, Jong yo Street, and then they continued to build a public lighting network and. Started offering electrical services to private homes. They even built a movie theater, which could be traveled [00:09:00] to by streetcar that went through downtown Seoul. And apparently it was, uh, a marketing ploy to promote the convenience of trains and attract tram passages over the 20th century. This basically morphed through nationalization and reorganization into Kepco. Modern corporation dates from 1961 and it’s always sort of been a political en enterprise. Really it’s all been about building a modern South Korea. It was run by Americans for decades until they were forced to sell it eventually to, uh, a Japanese company in the early part of the 20th century. But, uh, after World War ii, you know, America obviously was basically running South Korea for a very long time. After, well before the Korean War and during, and then after the Korean War. South Korean dictatorships were basically proxies for [00:10:00] the United States. Probably still are to a large degree, although no one would wanna say that publicly. Um, the Korean government invested a ton into it, even though it. But it floated on the Korean Stock Exchange in 1989 and then on the New York Stock Exchange in 1994. But it, it was like the Korean Development Bank and the National Pension Service. It was seen as one of the founding principles of the modern South Korea. Today the government owns just over 51% o

Episode Overview This episode dives into Pacific Gas & Electric (NYSE: PCG) and its strange mix of monopoly power, criminal convictions, billions in liabilities, climate exposure, and a CEO who says she’s “leading with love.” Cameron takes us through PG&E’s century-old origins, deadly infrastructure failures like the Camp Fire manslaughter convictions, the bizarre history of repeat explosions and corruption, and the unusual financial structure that keeps the company alive despite $58B in debt. Tony questions whether a guaranteed utility should even be privately owned, compares it to safer options like Berkshire Hathaway’s utilities, and wonders why we’d touch a business known for burning down half a state. Despite the horrors, PG&E lands on the QAV buy list due to cheap cashflow valuation, a protected regulated monopoly, and a massive turnaround driven by mandated wildfire-prevention spending and government-backed debt. Timestamps  00:00–02:00 US Portfolio performance update General markets02:00–03:30 MODG rises after last week’s pick MODG (TopGolf Callaway)03:30–04:30 Recent picks performance rundown 05:30–06:30 AU market outperforming “trash” theme Australian context06:30–41:00 Feature Deep Dive: Pacific Gas & Electric PCG41:00–47:00 After-hours: Stalker, House of Guinness, Slow Horses Transcription   Cameron: Welcome back to QAV America. Tony, I would ask how you’re doing, but I know because we just did our Australian podcast and you’re doing great. Let me answer that question for you. Tony Kynaston: I’m doing great. My portfolio is doing great. Everything’s great. Cameron: Everything’s great. Our US portfolio, Tony, I’m just bringing it up on the screen here all time. So it’s been running since, uh, September, 2023 is up 55% versus the benchmark I use the s and p 500, which is up 50%. So we’re doing 10% better than the benchmark, 55% over. A little more than two years. It’s not bad. Pretty happy with that. Tony Kynaston: I agree. Cameron: Pretty good. Tony Kynaston: We normally say it’s up 5% though, so usually you take one away from the other rather than make a percentage of a percentage. Cameron: [00:01:00] Okay. Tony Kynaston: better, but Cameron: But if we’re saying double market, then that’s a hundred percent. Isn’t that? How do you say that? If we’re saying double market. Tony Kynaston: Well, double market’s just double market. Cameron: It is double Tony Kynaston: market. Yeah. Cameron: twice as good. Okay. Um, some of the, uh. Tony Kynaston: raise that with me and said, are we better off saying we do five to 10% better than the market? ’cause in Australia, I guess in the US as well, the long term’s, about 10%. So, um, I said, yes, if the market does 10%, it’s right. But if it’s doing, if it’s up as in the America, America, it’s, um, it’s wrong. Cameron: Yeah. Right. Tony Kynaston: Mm-hmm. Cameron: Some of the, uh, just looking at the last, uh, let’s say the last 30 days in our portfolio, our portfolio is beating the index in the last 30 days. Uh, not by a huge amount, but by, well actually I guess judging by [00:02:00] the way you are rating it, s and p is up 0.13% in the last 30 days. Our portfolio is up 0.61%, so that’s five. Five times better. That’s what I was gonna say. Yeah. Uh, the, Tony Kynaston: I like the core skill of marketing. Okay. It’s great. Cameron: yeah. Uh, unfortunately stocked doesn’t tell me how the individual stocks have performed in a 30 day period. It just gives me it from the get go. But, uh, I did want to just look at our, uh. Performance of some of the other stocks that we’ve, uh, talked about over the, uh, last six months or so. We’ve been doing the show, see how they’re all doing. You’ll be happy to know that the company that we talked about last week, top Golf, Callaway Brands, [00:03:00] M-O-D-G-A-K-A, modern golfers up 3% since we talked about it. Tony Kynaston: fantastic. Cameron: Um, some of the others aren’t. Tony Kynaston: little putt, Cameron: Yeah, that was us. That was all our putt. Yeah, that was, that was all our putt. Yeah. Tony Kynaston: another Cameron: IS Tony Kynaston: that I can get excited about? Do you have a Cameron: uh, no, I’ve got some horrifying, horrible stories to talk about this week, but, uh, it should be fun. I wanna admit, I saw a video the other day yesterday of a golf robot that got a hole in one. Have you seen that? Tony Kynaston: No. Cameron: I thought that’s the next evolution. I know for your 60th birthday, we got you a robot, uh, caddy. Tony Kynaston: Catty. Cameron: Uh, we’re gonna get you a golf robot for your 70th birthday. You don’t have to do anything now. You just go out there, plays golf for you. It’ll be fantastic. You’ll love it. Uh, so American Airlines we talked about a couple of weeks ago, it’s down 10%. Um, American Axle is down 1%. Cal [00:04:00] Main Foods is down seven. Community health is stable. Methodex is down 10. Um, Titan Machinery is down 19. But outside of that, we’ve got quite a few winners. Uh, Chemex is up 77% Canadian. Imperial Bank is up 36. Zep Health Corporation, which somebody on Reddit said was a Chinese fake stock is up 705% since we talked about it. The average of all the companies that we’ve been covering in our deep dive segment since March, their average is a 37% return on them, uh, over the course of that period. So they’re not all winners. There’s, there’s about 30% are actually down now, the rest of winners, but the US market. Interesting and challenging this year. It’s funny, we just did, in our Australian show, we talked about an analyst from Macquarie Bank saying all the companies that are doing well in Australia are the [00:05:00] trash. It’s been a dash for trash, but our portfolio’s going great. Guns in Australia, and they’re all good value stocks generating a lot of cash. Tony Kynaston: Yeah, Cameron: the same sort of stocks that we’ve had in the US not doing as well in the us um, because the market over there, well, not as well as they’re doing here. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But the Australian portfolio is up about, what’d I say? It’s up 40, 37% this year or something. Tony Kynaston: I think you said? Yeah. Cameron: Oh yeah, no, that was in the last six months. 26% In the last six months. It’s up like 37% this calendar year. It’s crazy. But the company that I’m gonna talk about today, Tony is Pacific Gas and Electric Company. Did you watch the Electric Company in the seventies? Tony Kynaston: Yeah, Cameron: That was a great show, wasn’t it? Tony Kynaston: first went to. Cameron: Before it was like Sesame Street. We’d on here in Australia, we’d have Sesame Street and sometimes the electric company would be on [00:06:00] instead of it or after it. Um, I dunno what happened to that show, but I remember loving it as a kid. Dunno anything about it though. I don’t. Was it a Henson show? Don’t even know. Tony Kynaston: a Henson show. Yeah, Cameron: Was it? It was. Tony Kynaston: I think so. Yeah. Cameron: But this is not that, that, uh, electric company, this is, uh, their ticker code is PCG. They’re, they go by pg and e and, uh, wow. What a story. What a story. Tony Kynaston: Electricity is brought to you by the letters P, g and Cameron: C and g. Yeah. Oh man. This is, uh, one of the oldest and largest utility companies in the United States. They supply electricity and natural gas to roughly 5.2 million households or 16 million people across northern and central California. Their job is basically to keep the lights on and the gas flowing. They operate one of the, Tony Kynaston: can I interrupt there? Cameron: yeah. Tony Kynaston: So it’s one of the largest gas and electric companies that [00:07:00] supplies how many people? 16 million. Cameron: Yeah, that’s it. Tony Kynaston: That’s it. Are there a lot of fragmented utilities in America? Are there Cameron: I guess there must be, and there one, there’s like five or six big ones just in California alone, but the, the area that they cover is quite large and quite complex. It’s like northern and central California. So I don’t think it’s like, it’s not, uh, la it’s like sort of more regional parts of California. Um, they operate one of the most complex and climate exposed power grids in the world. 70,000 square miles of mountains, forests, farmland, and dense urban centers. But what makes them most unusual is they are the only major American power company. That has been criminally convicted of manslaughter, forced [00:08:00] through multiple bankruptcies and publicly blamed for catastrophic wildfires and wow. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg, the scandals that they have been through over the years. It’s, uh, man, you could make a whole Netflix series over these guys. Uh, and I’ll tell you about a couple of them just for the salacious fun of it. In 2018 and 2019 investigations by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, AKA Cal Fire found the company’s infrastructure primarily responsible for causing two separate devastating wildfires in California, including the 2018 campfire. The deadliest wildfire in California history caused 85 fatalities, displaced more than 50,000 people destroyed more than. 18,000 structures and caused an estimated 16 [00:09:00] and a half billion dollars in damage. And because California holds utilities financially responsible for any fires caused by their equipment, even if maintenance was properly done, there was a $30 billion liability. That the company was facing and they declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2019. They made a settlement offer of 13 and a half billion to the wildfire victims, and, uh, they pled guilty to 84 counts of involuntary manslaughter. Tony Kynaston: You were saying before about the US at the heart of the US as lawyers and at the heart of China as engineers, Cameron: Hmm. In China, they would’ve jus

Overview In this episode of QAV America, Cameron and Tony dig into the state of the U.S. market, exploring how AI investment is distorting capital flows, weakening job markets, and reshaping traditional sectors. They discuss how “the Great Freeze” in hiring and the surge in data-centre spending are reshaping the economy. Then Cameron serves up a Pulled Pork deep dive on MODG (Topgolf Callaway Brands)—a company blending golf, entertainment, and retail that’s now splitting itself apart to “unlock value.” Tony reflects on golf’s pandemic-era revival, the engineering of the Big Bertha, and why Callaway’s merger with Topgolf sent its share price into the rough. They unpack tariffs, impairments, and the business logic behind spinning off Topgolf, ending with a lively riff on humanoid robots, golf robots, and even robot jockeys. ⸻ Timestamps [00:00 – 02:00] Portfolio update – U.S. fund down ~2.5 % vs S&P neutral; long-term performance still ahead.[02:00 – 04:00] AI-driven GDP growth — Microsoft, Alphabet, Meta pouring US $370 B into data centres.[05:00 – 08:00] Labor market weakness — “The Great Freeze” as firms delay hiring for AI.[09:00 – 11:00] Humanoid robotics — Tesla Optimus, Xpeng Iron, and China’s robot surge.[11:00 – 12:00] Fed policy, tariffs, and inflation risk.[12:00 – 48:00] Pulled Pork: MODG – Topgolf Callaway Brands Transcription   Cameron: Welcome back to QAV America, Tony, episode 27. Tony Kynaston: Wow, that’s gone fast. Cameron: it’s been a couple of weeks since we did a US show. Didn’t have time to do one last week, but, I’ll just start with a bit of a portfolio update, get into some news, and then I’m gonna do a, a special deep dive pulled pork that I prepared just for you. Tony went way down the list to find this one for you. Tony Kynaston: forward to it. Cameron: The portfolio has not had a good 30 days. Our US portfolio, it’s down 6% in the last 30 days versus the s and p 500, which is pretty much neutral in the last 30 days. So it hasn’t been doing great too. Um, hold on. Did I say how long it’s down? That’s, let me see what, no. Down, down two and a half percent, not 6%. Two and a half percent in the last 30 days. Um. So it’s hasn’t been, uh, a great, uh, period for us still tariffs. I think that [00:01:00] just the general US economy is not boating well for our portfolio over there. But that said again, if you look at, uh, since inception, which is. Just a little bit over two years. September 23, we’re tracking at 53% return versus the s and p 551%. So we’re still beating the index over the last couple of years, but, uh, the year to date we’re down 18% versus the s and p 500, up 14%. So it has been a rough calendar year for our portfolio. For all the reasons I mentioned before, but some of the stocks are still, I mean, everything’s doing quite well. I mean, everything’s up, everything’s doing well, just not as well as it was doing. So Tony Kynaston: peak. Cameron: nothing to complain. Yeah, yeah. Like me, um, Tony Kynaston: Best days are ahead of you Can. Cameron: uh, [00:02:00] I keep telling myself that Tony, uh, listen. It been interesting a couple of weeks in the US market. Corporate earnings are surprisingly strong for the third quarter of 2025. Median earnings for the Russell 3000 Index rose about 11% compared to a year ago. Six of the 11 sectors in the s and p 500 reported positive earnings growth up from just two sectors. In the prior quarter. Big tech industrial energy have been leading consumer facing firms, however, showing more signs of strain according to the Financial Times investment in AI and data centers, though, as we know, is the big driver over there. Microsoft Alphabet meta are projecting total capital expenditures in 2025 of around US $370 billion for data center and infrastructure. And I was reading an analysis of this in Wide Magazine. They were [00:03:00] saying they’re funding it all from cash to these companies. ’cause they’re sitting on buffet levels of cash Tony Kynaston: Wow. Cameron: according to one estimate nearly. Tony Kynaston: Aren’t they just passing it? around to each other? He, Cameron: Well, in some cases, yeah, NVIDIA’s just handing it out and getting it back. According to one estimate, nearly all of us GDP growth in H 1 20 25 was accounted for by investment in data centers and software processing tech. Tony Kynaston: Wow. Cameron: Since chat, GPT launched in November 20, 22, 3 years ago, AI related stocks have accounted for 75% of s and p 500 returns and 80% of earnings growth according to JP Morgan. So that’s absolutely insane considering, you know, that’s, uh, half a dozen stocks, um, and open AI isn’t even listed. Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Cameron: Um, but you know, as we say, each [00:04:00] episode, uh, we are finding tons of value opportunities and, uh, there’s, there’s no, there’s no, um, trouble finding good quality companies that are generating cash that you can buy very, very cheap. Looking at, you know, price to operating cashflow, looking at their book price, which includes the one I’m gonna talk about today. Not that there aren’t challenges, but you know, plenty of stuff to buy. Tony Kynaston: Well, as we were just speaking about, if, if a lot of money’s going into the AI sector, the tech sector, there’s not many bids going into you run of the mill industrial company. And that’s, I think, creating value within the rest of the market. in here, in the, in, well more in the us Australia doesn’t really have an AI sector, but um, certainly if the hot sector is, is, uh, is taking inflows away from the general market. So the general market must be undervalued. Cameron: There’s this huge sucking sound Tony Kynaston: [00:05:00] Yeah, Cameron: as all the money gets pulled into this one zone and um, yeah, it means that everything else is cheap. Tony Kynaston: pockets. Cameron: The five pockets. Yeah. Back to the US economy, what is showing cracks is the labor market. And broader participation is weakening. In October one, private sector data tractor reported 9,100 jobs. Lost. Lost, and planned. Planned layoffs surged to 153,000. I just mentioned on our Australian show, I read, um, uh, some quotes from Jerome Powell in the last week or two where he was saying what they are seeing is a lot of companies saying they’re not. Planning on hiring people because they expect AI to be able to do those jobs, particularly people coming outta university. It’s being referred to as the great freeze by some economists over there. There’s a freeze on job hiring. We’re seeing it happening here as well, predominantly in the tech sector, but other, other professions as well. You know, with [00:06:00] these junior level clerical. You know where I got my first job was, you know, bank clerical stuff. I, you know, when I was 17, 18. A lot of those jobs are gonna just be replaced now by AI companies are expecting they will be able to replace them with an AI tool. Tony Kynaston: And that’s an important point you make there, the expectation, because I’ve seen similar parallels to this happen. In the past where it’s almost dere, you’ve gotta say, we are freezing hiring. If you’re not saying we’re freezing hiring, the analysts are on your, you know, like, like, uh, bees to a honey pot. Why? Why aren’t you freezing hiring? Everyone else is freezing hiring. So they freeze hiring and then, you know, a couple of quarters time they start hiring again because it, didn’t really apply to them. So it’ll be interesting to see. I’m not saying that. Companies won’t need as many staff because of, the impacts of ai. Um, but it’s almost becoming clearer to me now that, uh, at [00:07:00] least at this stage, right, I know there’s a lot more to come and a lot more upgrades to, um, to be released. But at this stage, it’s almost like what we’re seeing is an increase in the power of computing that’s brought about by ai. you know, so. We were talking before about, uh, being able to target ads better. It’s, there’s nothing revolutionary in the concept of targeting ads, but if it’s done cheaper and faster, then yeah, people will lose their jobs, in marketing departments or whatever. So I get that. Um. Whether it, it, you know, it’s, it’ll be interesting to watch if it is a great freeze and, and suddenly we have people not going to universities. That’ll be a big impact on society, I think. But, um, let’s just watch the space and see what happens. Cameron: Yeah. Why are you gonna spend well in Australia 2030 grand to get a university degree? In the us hundreds of thousands of dollars to get a university degree if there’s very high chance that there won’t be a job for you at the end of it. So then what do those [00:08:00] people do? What, what do they go and do instead of going to university? Tony Kynaston: Well, Cameron: Um, do they? Tony Kynaston: possibly Cameron: Yep. Tony Kynaston: the US but in Australia there’s definitely been a tr being a trend towards trades and the trend towards working in sectors like the mining industry. Might be different in the us but yeah, there’s, I think it’s quite legitimate now for someone leaving school to say, well, you know, I can go and make as much money if I get a trade and become a qualified plumber, electrician, contractor, build or whatever. Um, as opposed to spending three plus years at university, getting a degree, and then going into an entry level job. So been Cameron: Except. The next three to five years, humanoid robots are gonna hit the market all with superpowered AI brains, and a lot of those jobs aren’t gonna be there either. Elon just got his trillion dollar pay package approved and part of that is. Tony Kynaston: he’s taken that bet that it’s gonna happen. Cameron: Well, part of that is he has [00:09:00] to ship a million optimist robots in the next 10 years. Now a mi

Episode Overview In this episode of QAV America, Cameron and Tony dive into a deep analysis of American Airlines (AAL) — exploring its towering debt, its loyalty program goldmine, and its future prospects. They unpack how AAL’s Advantage points system, underpinned by a major new 10-year co-branded card deal with Citi, might serve as both ballast and buoy for a company flying through turbulence. Along the way, they riff on the airline industry’s cyclic nature, the debt-leverage paradox, and the Piotroski F-Score quirks that make AAL intriguing. Climate change, loyalty economics, Pratt & Whitney’s cursed engines, and the Buffett-era lessons on airline KPIs all make an appearance. After the financial deep-dive, the conversation drifts into lighter territory—Scorsese films, Gravity’s Rainbow, and Cameron’s bruising Kung Fu grading. ⸻ Timestamps & Key Topics 00:00 – 03:00 Market chatter: US–China trade mood, inflation data, and QAV portfolio updates03:00 – 06:00 Portfolio performance review: strong gains in Australian holdings vs. US pullback06:00 – 08:00 Introduction to this week’s pulled pork – AAL (American Airlines); early data glitch, initial impressions34:00 – 39:00 After-hours chat: Scorsese’s After Hours, King of Comedy, and the perils of late-night Pynchon, Wing Chun grading recap – Cameron’s ribs survive another day Transcription Cameron: Welcome back to QAV America, Tony, episode 26. It’s a beautiful day. Tony in America, east Ballroom being torn down. President Trump’s Tony Kynaston: it Cameron: gonna meet with President Xi. They’re gonna do the greatest deal. You won’t believe how great this deal is gonna be. It’s gonna be the greatest deal of all time. It’ll last about a week. Then it’ll fall apart and there’ll be more tariffs. Uh, but meantime, everything’s going great. Market’s up. US market was up yesterday, supposedly on the, uh, joy that, uh, all the beef is behind them. Rare earth minerals will be flowing back into the United States. Tony Kynaston: From Cameron: We’ll see. Tony Kynaston: From Australia but um think I think the market’s up potentially more so on the fact that the inflation figures came in okay on Friday And Cameron: Did they? Tony Kynaston: So Cameron: Oh, okay. Tony Kynaston: that’s probably driving the Cameron: Interest [00:01:00] rates are being cut, Tony Kynaston: Uh I think the the central bank meets this week I’m not sure what day potentially Cameron: right. Tony Kynaston: I’m not sure Cameron: Ooh. Okay. Well, uh, before we get into my pulled pork for the week, I just thought I’d give an update on our portfolio and how things are going. Our US portfolio, which has been running, oh, here’s my, uh, smoothie delivery system. Thank you, dear. Uh, Tony Kynaston: Black belt smoothie delivery system brown belt Cameron: right. Yeah, the, uh, delivery, the delivery, the portfolio that’s been running since September, 2023. Uh, so a little over two years is up 57.6%, uh, versus the s and p 500, up 54.7%. So we’re beating the index just by a little bit, but that’s okay. That’s good. Um, the [00:02:00] pork situation, the pulled pork that I’ve done, uh, over the course of the show, I haven’t had a look to see how they are doing. Uh, where is that list? Tony Kynaston: that you were you were talking Cameron: Hmm. Tony Kynaston: portfolio’s performance and um for this financial year which in Australia’s only four months in cause we are 30th Cameron: Hmm. Tony Kynaston: June end of year Cameron: Hmm. Tony Kynaston: financial Cameron: Hmm. Tony Kynaston: And and that’s pretty good Do you recall those numbers Cameron: Yeah. Uh, well, I do, the Australian portfolio is up like 25% this financial year. Our financial year is, uh, from the beginning of July through to whatever we are now, end of October. I. For the calendar year, current calendar year, uh, our Australian portfolio is up 31% versus the benchmark. The index here, which is up [00:03:00] 14%. So a little bit sort of double the Australian market. So it’s going well year to date. Our US portfolio not doing so good. It’s down 16% versus the s and p 500, up 16, 17%. But as I say, every week, that’s because our portfolio was up so much. Towards the end of last year before Trump took over the White House, that it had a lot of gains and it’s come back. It’s not like the portfolio’s done badly, it’s just come back a lot from massive gains. At the end of last year, it was like Tony Kynaston: Must Cameron: incredibly inflated. Tony Kynaston: lots of work stocks in there Cameron: Well, it was Willis Lease Finance Company, which was the big one. It was up 300%. It’s now only up 175% since we bought it. I dunno how woke Willis Lease Finance Company is, but there you go. Tony Kynaston: Well it was a black Cameron: Um, Tony Kynaston: stepfather wasn’t it Very woke Cameron: what you, what you’re talking about Willis Lease Finance Company. It’s what you’re going for there. Yeah. Um. [00:04:00] Some of the companies, so I’m gonna do a pulled pork on American Airlines this week, but some of the ones that we’ve done over the last four or five months, just a review of how they’re doing. Some good, some not so good. Zim. Is down 20% since we talked about it in March. Uh, Methanex we talked about at the end of September is down 12. Titan Machinery is down 14. That’s so most of the down ones in terms of the up ones. Zep Health Corporation we talked about in July is up 1444% since we talked about it. Ford Motor Company that everyone said was carrying too much debt when we talked about it in May is up 23% since then. Uh, let’s see. Chemex we talked about in March is up 65% Canadian. Imperial. Bank of Commerce we talked about in May is up 30% since then, some big numbers. Sasol is up 28% since we talked about it in July. Precision Drilling Corporation is up [00:05:00] 26% since we talked about it in June. IHS holding, we talked about in May it’s up 27%, but. A couple of weeks ago or a month ago, uh, a 3rd of October, I did a pulled pork on community health systems. Remember them? Hospital rollup up, up 47% since I talked about ’em at the beginning of this month. Tony. Tony Kynaston: They mustn’t be doing vaccinations or dispensing time and they’ll that network Cameron: 47% since then. That’s, uh, kind of crazy ’cause it was sort of, it was a good story, but I didn’t expect that. Um, Tony Kynaston: and I Cameron: no one expects, Tony Kynaston: the point to make is Cameron: Hmm, Tony Kynaston: a lot of those stocks aren’t in our portfolio We you just pick a stock to do deep dive on from our buy list but we only change the portfolio over if something’s a sale and Yeah So we Cameron: wish I had put all of those in them. Tony Kynaston: Yeah So what that’s I guess what I’m getting that’s what I’m getting at I guess is that there are plenty of opportunities outside [00:06:00] our portfolio to to buy Cameron: Plenty of opportunities and things are going great and um, you know, I’m often seeing, as I’ve said before, people on the in value investing subreddit saying they dunno what to buy. And I’m like, are you kidding me? Opportunity everywhere. If you Tony Kynaston: what you’re talking about Willis Lease financing Cameron: Willis, lease Finance company. There are opportunities everywhere when we look at the US market and apply your QAV process to it. Well, this week I was gonna do Shell because you used to work for Shell, your old employer. They are on the buy list, but crude oil is a Josephine for us. Um, it’s in a sell state, so I thought I won’t do that. So I looked around and as every week most of the buy list is full of finance companies or shipping companies. That’s been true for the last six months. Still true today, and I’m sick of talking about finance companies and lease and shipping companies. So I’m always looking for something different. And this week I [00:07:00] picked a a l, American Airlines, which was on the buy list. Now I’m gonna preface it by saying. After I did three hours of research on it, I checked its chart and realized it’s a Josephine, which for us means it’s above its cell line, but below its byline. It’s recovering from a bit of a dip. No, sorry, it’s not a Josephine, it’s not even a buy. It’s not above its byline at all. Um. But that’s because my script, uh, had a bug in it. My US script had a bug in terms of doing the charting analysis. So when I was doing this yesterday, the current price was about $13 78. Buy price is actually $15 87, so we wouldn’t buy it unless it went above that. But it’s an interesting story and I wanted to do it anyway to get your thoughts on it, assuming that it does become a buyer. ’cause it’s, it’s got a lot of problems, a lot of possible red flags and um, it’s also got a big point [00:08:00] system and I know that you used to run a points based company here for one of Australia’s largest retailers. So, you know, points. Tony Kynaston: didn’t run up but had a yeah had a Cameron: CFO. Oh, I thought you were the CEO of it. Tony Kynaston: No Cameron: Okay, well, still a good story, Tony Kynaston: yeah I still have a fair bit of experience with the with loyalty programs for sure Cameron: right? So I’m looking forward to getting your thoughts on this when I run through it. Basically, American Airlines is a domestic heavy network with a loyalty cash engine. Lot of possible red flags, though. It’s all about the prm, Tony, that’s what I’m gonna call this episode. It’s all about the prm, PRM passenger revenue per available seat mile. Tony Kynaston: Oh yes Cameron: And it turns out if you don’t have enough prm, you fall into the chasm. Which is, uh, Tony Kynaston: Hmm Cameron: it’s a little thing. Cost per available seat mile is your [00:09:00] PRM versus your chasm, your revenue versus your cost. Tony Kynaston: Well it’s interesting bec

**Episode Overview**In this episode of *QAV America* (Ep. 25), Cameron and Tony unpack a wild few weeks in the U.S. markets following Donald Trump’s latest tariff threats on China and the subsequent “birthday crash.” They discuss Australia’s surprising role in rare earths, portfolio moves including DAC and GTN, and new additions VSAT and RNR. The main feature is a deep dive into Cal-Maine Foods (ticker: CALM), America’s largest egg producer, exploring its scandal-ridden history, DOJ investigations, and surprising fundamentals. From “egg cartels” to F-scores, the duo balance analysis and absurdity, topping it off with film talk (Scorsese, Lynch) and kung fu bruises. — ### ⏱️ **Timestamps** **00:00** – Market chaos, Trump’s tariff tantrum, and rare earths politics**06:30** – Australia’s rare earth advantage and Gina Rinehart’s role**10:00** – Portfolio moves: selling DAC and GTN, buying VSAT and RNR **18:00** – Portfolio performance update and lessons from volatility**22:30** – *Pulled Pork:* Cal-Maine Foods (CALM) deep dive **52:00** – After Hours: Scorsese, *Taxi Driver*, Lynch’s *Elephant Man*, and kung fu chaos Transcription   Cameron: [00:00:00] to QAV America, Tony, episode 25. We’re recording this on the 21st of October, 2025. Well been a big couple of weeks in the US market. Tony, uh, Donald Trump. Crash the market again on my birthday, October 10th. It was his, uh, birthday present to me, which I appreciate. I’m wearing your birthday present to me. My fight club t-shirt, um, was good ’cause I had a broken nose and black eyes when you sent it to me. That was fun. Uh, but Donald Trump threatened massive increases in US tariffs on Chinese imports, following China’s announcement of stricter export controls on rare earth elements. And the market predictably crashed and then he said, uh, 10 days later, yesterday, today when meeting with our prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, our KAKA [00:01:00] Albo. For the Americans. That’s what we call our prime minister here. That’s the amount of deference you get as a Prime Minister in Australia. We call you Albo. He had a fantastic deal he’s gonna put together with China after a fantastic deal with Australia. I mean, I don’t know. I don’t know about you, but I think Albo was very happy. About the, uh, announcement of the rare earths deal from China, because it gave him a really good chance to have a really great meeting with President Trump. They had something that they both wanted to talk about, gave Trump a good positive news release. Our former Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, who’s the current, uh, ambassador, didn’t have as good a time with President Trump. He said, I don’t even know who you are and I don’t like you, but it’s all forgiven. He said, immediately afterwards. Tony Kynaston: Yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s, um, it’s hard not to like someone you don’t know, but I, I take. I take Cameron: I dunno. I, I, I saw, I, I had a look [00:02:00] at Kevin Rudd’s face and decided I didn’t look at him too. Tony Kynaston: he is. He’s Trump’s not alone is he. Cameron: No, no, no. Tony Kynaston: gotta say Australia saves the day again. we elbow’s ridden into the US with a mineral, a rare minerals agreement. You know, hold my beer. I got this. We got you want rare minerals. Let’s do a Cameron: yeah, Yeah. Tony Kynaston: yeah. Cameron: yeah. G Gina Reinhardt to the rescue. ’cause she controls a lot of what we have apparently. Uh, but just to put it in perspective. Australia is the fourth largest producer of rare earth minerals in the world at present on track to be number two, I believe. But China controls 70% of the global market and even an A larger share, 85 to 90% of the refining and processing capability globally. Tony Kynaston: which is important. Cameron: if we can dig it out the ground. We need to send it to China to get [00:03:00] processed probably. So you know they, Tony Kynaston: called Linus, which has got a plant to process rare earths minerals in, say the Philippines. I think somewhere in Southeast Asia. Cameron: Hmm, Tony Kynaston: easy. There’s been a few with the local government over it, but um, yeah, there is a fallback. Cameron: right. But anyway, the market recovered. Uh, it tar and, uh, everything’s back kind of to where it was pre the announcement. So the frothy market is back, and I did have to sell a couple of things though in that period, uh, out of our US portfolio, which is rare. So I had to sell DAC Dan aos, a Greek shipping company that I had owned. For quite a while and got to sell it at a profit too, but it broke our three point trend line sell trigger for new listeners. Uh, we try and hold [00:04:00] for as long as possible when we buy a company, but we do have a couple of sell triggers. One of them is a three point trend line sell. We’ll track it on a five year, month end. Graph and if it breaks through that support line, we’ll sell it. And this did, but I still managed to sell it at a 5% profit. Plus there were dividends over that period as well, which don’t get factored into stock edia. But, uh, neither does the s and p five hundreds dividends, so it all tracks. Okay. So we sold it at a 5% profit. I also had to sell GTN the TV guys. Tony Kynaston: really? Cameron: came back quite a bit and also became a three point trend line sell neutral result for us. Plus, there were dividends factored into that one as well. And I added two new companies to the portfolio, VSAT via sat, a global tech, a global communications company, has defense and advanced technologies. It’s up [00:05:00] 7% since I bought it. Which is pretty good. And Renaissance Air Holdings, RNRV, SATs on the Nasdaq, RNR is on nzi. Um, it’s a global provider of reinsurance and insurance companies. It’s down 5% since I bought it, so they kind of six seven is the kids say you don’t have kids, so you probably don’t know that, but six seven. Six seven. Yeah. God. Thank think yourself. Lucky you don’t have a 11-year-old boy right now ’cause that’s all you hear all day, every day. 6, 7, 6, 7. Tony Kynaston: okay? Cameron: and I probably should have done a pulled pork on one of those today, but I’m not. Because I wanna talk about eggs. But before we do that, um, I’m also gonna talk about our US portfolio, which is not having a good time. Quite honestly. It for the Cal, for the 12 month period, it is down. 17% versus the s and p [00:06:00] 500, which is up nearly 15% year to date. It’s down. Well, about the same actually. So it’s all started. It started when Trump took office. Whether or not that is coincidental, I don’t know, but uh, for the. All time since inception, which is September 20, 23, little over two years, our portfolio is up 56% versus the s and p up 51.5%. So we’ve. We were doing triple the SMP going back to late last year and now we’ve come back to even Stevens. So has not been a great year for our portfolio, but it’s still doing okay. Like all in all, all told we’re beating the index so over two years, which is fine, up up nearly 60% in two years. Like no rational investors gonna [00:07:00] complain about that, but I. It has not been a good year for our US portfolio. Not that anything is done particularly badly. I mean, I’ve had to sell a couple of things. Everything’s doing okay. It’s just come back from insanely good highs, as I say, every week, but I’ll say it again. Willis Lease Finance Group, which is our best performer, was up like 300% late last year. Now it’s only up 174%, so it’s lost a lot of gains, but still it’s up. 174%, uh, since I bought it in November, 2023. So two years up, 174%. I’m not complaining. It’s doing okay. But the company I’m gonna do a Paul pork on today, Tony is Palm, CALM. Keep calm and keep trading trade on. Tony Kynaston: what we need When the [00:08:00] portfolio comes back to the index isn’t it Cameron: keep calm. Keep calm. Great Ticker. I had to do it. I saw that I had to do it. The company is actually called Cal Maine, and they are the largest egg business in the us. The largest producer and distributor of fresh cell eggs in the United States. Guess you could say they’re an excellent company, Tony, an excellent stock. But I’m not sure if I’m gonna call this episode number one in the pecking order or the Bad Egg. ’cause they’ve had quite a few scandals. Tony Kynaston: Oh really Oh dear Cameron: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well. But, but before we get into that, couple of things I wanna point out. If anyone’s thinking about investing in them, we wouldn’t right now, because they are a Josephine No, actually, they’ve kind of rebounded from a Josephine. They were a Josephine. So from our perspective, a Josephine is a stock that is above a byline above our cell line. [00:09:00] But it closed or its price was less than the end of the previous month. It, it has come back from its peak, but it’s rebounded from that. So it’s still above, its. Bylines in its latest bylines, so it’s probably still okay. But there is a egg commodity. You know, we, we love to track underlying commodities and this has an egg commodity. There are, there is an an eggs US commodity that I found on trading economics.com eggs, us and eggs are currently a three point trend line cell. Tony Kynaston: That’s why the prices are down probably and calm Cameron: Yeah, well actually it’s, it’s a Schrodinger. Um, so for new listeners, what we call a Schrodinger is when it’s simultaneously above its byline, but below its cell line. So it is both things at the same time, like Schrodinger is cat. Uh, until you look at it and then you go, okay, well it’s below its cell line, so it’s a cell not that far below its cell [00:10:00] line, so it doesn’t have to recover much to get back above. Um, but it is so, uh. The way QAV works. If we have a stock that has an underlying commodity and that underlying commodity is in a, is not in

Cameron and Tony kick off episode 24 of QAV America by discussing the U.S. government shutdown drama and comparing it to Australia’s last major political standoff under Whitlam in 1975. The conversation then turns to portfolio performance: while the Australian portfolios continue to outperform dramatically, the U.S. one has cooled a little since the Trump administration’s return. They dig into long-term value investing principles and how cycles of underperformance are normal. Cameron presents this week’s Pulled Pork on American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings (AXL) — a classic, boring-but-profitable value stock that makes axles and driveline components for giants like GM, Stellantis, and Ford. They explore its fundamentals, merger news with Dowlais Group, and why its low valuation may make it attractive. The show wraps up with their trademark “after hours” chat: Tony’s social adventures, new music finds (Red Continent, Lyle Lovett, Sparks), Cameron’s film pick (Stalker by Tarkovsky), and their reflections on Asimov’s I, Robot, fascism, capitalism, and the short-termism of modern democracy. ⸻ ⏱️ Timestamps & Topics 00:00 — U.S. government shutdowns vs. Whitlam’s dismissal in Australia.03:00 — Portfolio performance: U.S. QAV fund up 62% since inception vs. S&P 500 up 51%.06:00 — Revisiting QAV philosophy: buying quality companies at a discount.07:00 — Historical perspective: patience through short-term underperformance.08:00 — Review of recent Pulled Porks10:00 — Portfolio holdings update11:00 — This week’s Pulled Pork: American Axle & Manufacturing (AXL) deep dive.30:00 — After Hours Transcription   [00:00:00] Cameron: Welcome back to QAV, the American Edition. Tony. I think this is episode 24. How are you doing? Tony Kynaston: I’m very well. Thank you. Nice and Cameron: I know that ’cause we, we just did our Australian edition. Yes. Very hot. Where I am. Very cool where you are. That’s Australia right now, depending on which part of the coast you’re in. Well, Tony, uh, talking about American news. Got a, they’ve got a, a shutdown. They’re funny. They have these shutdowns. We don’t really understand shutdowns. Last time we had a shutdown kind of thing in Australia. It was during the Whitlam government, wasn’t it? Tony Kynaston: November, 1975. Yep. Cameron: Yeah, it is. 50 years ago. The last time we had a government down, and it’s still talked about in Angry Voices to this very day. Tony Kynaston: We’ve had a couple of other examples, like a, ’cause they call it block supply here. So a government has to [00:01:00] be able to guarantee convince the Governor General, they can guarantee supply, which means that their budget will pass. So there’s been other cases where there’s been minority governments that can become topsy tur. Like the most recent case was in Tasmania when, uh. The minority government there had a vote of no confidence and the blocking of supply, and then they had to go to an election and they got reelected. Same problem. Yeah. Different time. Cameron: Well, the market, uh, you know, did stumble a little bit when they couldn’t, uh, prevent it, but yeah, thinner. Well, I don’t know. I mean, I have seen these sorts of things before. Not exactly with this level of urgency and animosity, I think, Tony Kynaston: always is that level of urgency and animosities happened what 11 times since Clinton or something’s been a lot it, [00:02:00] and it’s always brinkmanship. Cameron: yeah. Tony Kynaston: for the government workers who don’t get paid and they may not get paid under this current In the past they generally Cameron: Yeah, Tony Kynaston: they’ll get back pay. But that’s, there’s threats to withhold that. So we’ll see what happens. Cameron: I like other things that happen in the news, in the economy. We tend to ignore it and just stick to our knitting. Um, I do wanna. Talk about our portfolio performance, though our US portfolio, which for new listeners, we’ve been running well for new listeners. Uh, we’ve been doing a value investing podcast for six years in Australia. Tony’s been a value investor for 30 odd years. Oh, gangbusters. Absolutely. Our por, our Australian portfolios are all doing gangbusters, double market or better. Um, our US portfolio is doing okay. Not as well. It was, it was like three times market before the Trump administration came in. [00:03:00] It’s come back a little bit this year, but it’s only two years old and, you know, we work on five to 10 year timeframes for cycles to, uh, come and go. Um, I’ll start with the all time performance. So we started the US portfolio back. A little over two years ago, 19th of September, 2023. Since then, our portfolio is up 62% versus the s and p 500, up 51%. So we’re doing better than the s and p 500 over the long haul, but we’ve come back a long way. Um, a year ago we were up a hundred percent versus the s and p up 34%. So, uh, after the Trump administration came in, things started to go south for some of our stocks, but it’s not that bad. I mean, Willis Lease Finance Company, WLFC, which is our best performing stock, at one point it was up 300%. It’s [00:04:00] now up 189%. So it’s come back nearly half then, but still up 189% since we added it. I don’t know when, uh, let me see. Tony Kynaston: blame the Trump government on some of those. I mean, they wouldn’t have an impact on Willis Lee’s finance. It’s probably got more to do with interest rates than anything else. I would’ve thought, Cameron: I am not blaming them. I’m just saying it’s a fact. Since the Trump administration came into power went backwards, Tony Kynaston: well, it’s, but Cameron: we’ve. Tony Kynaston: is it just coincidence? Cameron: Who knows. That’s beyond my pay raise. My pay grade, Tony. Um, we bought Willis Lease Finance Company in November, 2023. It’s up 180% since then. So I’m not complaining it’s at all. But year to date, our US portfolio, uh, is down 13.44%. By the way, year to date, I’m talking. Um. Tony Kynaston: Calendar. Cameron: Uh, [00:05:00] calendar year. Yeah. So January 25, it’s down 13% this calendar year versus the s and p 500, up 14%. In the last month. Our portfolio is down 6% versus the s and p up 4%. So it’s not a good part of the cycle for us, but as we were just talking about in the Australian show, some of our Australian portfolios were underwater. Six months ago, now they’re doing double market ’cause they’ve exploded in the last few months. So it comes and goes. At the end of the day, the QAV philosophy is to buy. Shares and companies that seem to be generating a lot of cash when we can buy them at a discount to their intrinsic valuation for whatever reason, hold them as long as we possibly can. We have a couple of sell triggers that we will obey, but other than that, we hold them as long as we can wait for their share price to regress to the mean wait for the market to [00:06:00] pick up in one way or another. This is actually a healthy little business and. Six times outta 10. We hope that we buy the right ones and, uh, we outperform The market that seems to have worked for you over 30 years seems to have worked for other value investors over many, many decades, and in the years we’ve been doing the show, it seems to work well for us as well. Tony Kynaston: And we saw the same sort of thing happen with the Australian portfolio when we first set it up. And the first couple of years it, remember it in the first year, I think it outperformed about four times compared to the index. And then it went backwards and there were periods of underperformance. That’s, it does take a little while for a portfolio to beat itself down, usually. Um. it stutters and you have to sell things quicker than you’d like, and then start again. So, yeah, it’s, it’s the old, I mean, you talk to anybody about, um, investing and they say don’t base your decision on the one year return. at a longer term. So we have [00:07:00] a two year track record now. It’s still outperforming the market. But yeah, give it, it three to five before you sort of can see the real proof in the pudding. I think. Cameron: And since we started doing this show regularly in March of 2025, I’ve been doing a deep dive or a pulled pork, as we call it, on a stock every week. And most of those have been doing gangbusters since we talked about them. Uh, the one I always start with, Zep, which we did in July Z Double P, Zep Health Corporation, is now up nearly 1800% since we talked about it. Um, which is like, it’s not a Mag seven, no one’s heard of it. But, uh, doing gangbusters share price has gone from $2 98 when we talked about it to $56 today. They make, uh, like an iPhone competitor. Um, and they’ve just not an iPhone Apple Watch competitor, smartwatch, uh, company. Tony Kynaston: people who, Cameron: Yeah.[00:08:00] Tony Kynaston: fans like me would know that’s reference to Cameron: A Chinese Watch Tony Kynaston: really Cameron: this. Watch. Ready? Yeah. Tony Kynaston: Yeah. Cameron: Mother. Um. Yeah, but a lot of, uh, a lot of the other companies that we’ve talked about have done well as well. ChemX is up 59% cement company, Canadian Imperial Bank is up 28%. Orx up 24. Jackson Financial up 22 IHS holding 24 Ford Motor Company, which has a little bit to do with the company I’m talking about today. Up 18%. Gray media, up 28% Sasol. Up 24%. Couple have gone backwards. Titan Machinery’s gone back 14% since I talked about it. Um, it’s the most surprising one. Zim Integrated shipping, which we said was looking dodgy at the time when we talked about it’s gone back 24%. But, uh, you know, the rest have done pretty, pretty well. So, as I always say, you know, I [00:09:00] mentioned. In my last show that I was on the value investing subreddit the other day, and people are complaining about how there’s no value opportunities l

In this episode of QAV America, Cameron and Tony review the US portfolio’s performance in 2025, which—despite lagging this year—is still well ahead of the S&P 500 since inception. They reflect on past stock picks, before diving into this week’s “Pulled Pork”: Community Health Systems (NYSE: CYH). The discussion ranges from the messiness of America’s healthcare system to the company’s staggering debt load, CEO transition, scandals, and surprisingly strong cashflow. They weigh the risks (reimbursement uncertainty, capital raises, softening acuity mix) against the opportunities (deep undervaluation, strong operating cash generation, potential turnaround with new leadership). Along the way, they also touch on cultural differences in healthcare, Reddit debates about value investing, and how profit is often a “management decision,” while cashflow is the truer measure of resilience. ⸻ Timestamps • [00:02:00] Portfolio check-in – US portfolio performance vs. S&P 500. • [00:04:30] Revisiting past Pulled Pork picks  • [00:08:00] Pulled Pork: Community Health Systems (CYH) – Company overview, history, scandals, and current challenges.   Transcription   Cameron: [00:00:00] Welcome back to QAV America, Tony, episode 23. We’re recording this on the 30th of September, Australian time, 2025. Been a couple of weeks since we’ve talked about the United States. Tony, uh, I know that you’re an avid follower of the Wall Street Journal. Anything going on? Anything go happen in the United States in the last couple of weeks? I haven’t seen anything about the United States for a couple of weeks in the news. Nothing going on. Tony Kynaston: The contractor to service the UN elevators or escalators is up for That’s a bad end. I think Cameron: Well, the story there is that it was, uh, did you see that? Why the escalator stopped? Tony Kynaston: number of reasons why the escalators stopped, including a photographer pressed the stop button. Cameron: I read it was Trump’s photographer who was going backwards up at whose foot got caught in it and it jammed and stopped, and then the teleprompter was apparently run by the White House who screwed up the teleprompter. So it was, uh, [00:01:00] his own fails from his own team apparently, is what I read in the New York Times. The failing New York Times. Well, Tony, I thought I would, uh, that’s what he calls it, doesn’t he? I dunno if they’re failing or not. Um, probably large media. I wanted to, before we get into my Paul Pork this week, I just wanted to do a quick recap of how our US portfolio is doing and talk about what’s going on with some of the other companies that. We’ve covered over the last few months on this show how they’re doing. So let me bring up our US portfolio. As I’ve said many times before, it’s been an interesting year for our portfolio in the US It was. Doing three times the market by the end of last year, but then after Trump got elected, it has not had a good year.[00:02:00] So all time, our portfolio in the US has been running for just over two years now. I started at 20th of September, 2023. Over that period of time, it’s up 65% versus the s and p 500, which is up slightly less than. 50%, so it’s doing reasonably better than the s and p 500, but not double like we’re doing in the US and certainly not like triple like. By the end of 2024, a US portfolio was doing three times as good as the s and p 500. So it hasn’t had as good a year. 20, 25 year to date, it’s actually down 12% versus the s and p 500, up 13%. As we know, that’s how it goes. We go up, we go down, but generally we go up more than we go down over the long haul. Tony Kynaston: Great. just. Cameron: of the, uh. Tony Kynaston: can I jump in here? There was a, um, I know the show was [00:03:00] released in the US last week, which was a discussion of the QAV Bible and it mentioned that, um, long-term returns were 19.5% cagr, and that’s certainly the case back when we started QAV, but uh, it’s not the case now. So I just wanted to highlight that for people don’t wanna mislead them. That’s why we use the term double market. ’cause my returns are the markets or roughly twice the market still. Um, but the market’s moved since then, so, um, it’s, I just don’t wanna mislead people by putting, posting a number out there. Um, it’s more instructive to look at the long term, um, and to expect to get something like twice the index if you, um, successfully according to what I’ve been doing for a long time. Cameron: So I’m just, uh, looking up my list of Paul Porks that I’ve done over the last six months. Can’t remember who I did in episode 21. I. [00:04:00] Um, oh, MEOH. Yeah, right. I don’t have an update on MEOH, but for the rest, uh, like I was saying to you on our last Australian show, um, when I’m on the, some of the value investing forums in the us like the subreddits, that kinda stuff, a lot of people talking about how. They can’t find anything to buy. Value investing is dead. Uh, I saw, we saw an article from some guy saying that, uh, people saying they can’t find anything, all the value’s gone. And I’m like. What is your problem? Because I did a buy list, a US buy list at the end of last week, and there was like a 200 companies that were on the buy list, which means that, you know, they’re, that’s what our, our buy list is showing us as being undervalued at the moment. Well performing, well performing businesses that are undervalued, but just the list of companies that I’ve talked about on this show since March. Zim was the first one that I did on the 13th of March. It is [00:05:00] down 26% since I talked about it. Uh, but then in order of shows that we’ve done, so the next one was CX Chemex. It’s up 68%. Dan Aos, DAC is up 16% since we talked about it. Canadian Imperial Bank is up 23%. Chile is down 10%. Ford Motor Company is up. Eight IHS is up 37. JXN is up 16. Oryx Corporation is up 27. Precision Drilling is up 18. Costco’s up five Zep. Corporation, Zep Health is up 1511% since we talked about it on the 11th of July. Sasol is up 43%. Bausch Health Companies up 16 Seneca up 9% Gray media up 40%, and we talked about that on the 7th of August. There’s up 40% in less than eight weeks in seven weeks. An old television station, Titan [00:06:00] machinery’s up 11%. Kimball Electronics is up seven. Sno is down two since we talked about it at the beginning of this month. And then, um, M-E-O-H-I, I’m, oh, I can have a quick look on Yahoo Finance. Let’s see, how’s MEOH doing? Tony Kynaston: post out. to this Reddit sub value sub investors club, or whatever it’s Cameron: I do, I do, I do. And every I get just get abused for being an idiot. Um, em, me, O-M-E-O-H, um. Tony Kynaston: rich idiot, though, isn’t it A successful idiot. Cameron: MEOH uh, is up a couple of points since we talked about it. Um, actually it’s about the same, it was about $39 when we talked about, it’s still about $39 Methodex Corporation Co. So anyway, so there’s, I, I dunno what people’s problem is. I dunno what kind of value investing they’re doing that where they can’t find [00:07:00] value when we are finding value all over the place. So speaking of that, I thought I’d, um. Tony Kynaston: to interrupt, is that, um, you’re not even picking the top stock in the buy list. You are just picking out stocks, which are interesting that we don’t have Cameron: Yeah. Tony Kynaston: or just look worthy of a bit of investigation. So it’s kind of a random selection from the buyers that you’re picking. Cameron: Yeah. Yeah. I’m looking for something that’s, you know, different to what we, because as we keep saying every episode, there’s a lot of shipping companies, a lot of financial services companies, and I just don’t wanna talk about the same thing every week. Well. We’ve talked about a lot of dirty businesses, um, in this epi in this show over the last six months, Tony, and this time I’m gonna do dirty healthcare, not because I wanna highlight the company we’re talking about as dirty. Although they have had a very long list of scandals and fines and things like that, but just because the healthcare system [00:08:00] in the US is just a mess. Now, you know, obviously we’re Australian and we have a very different healthcare system, but I would not want to be a patient in the US for for-profit healthcare system. And that’s what I’m gonna talk about today is one of the companies over there, CY. H is the name of the company, community Health System. CHS. It’s known as, but the ticket code is CYH and I, you know, I often hear Americans in person and online. You know, I’m married to an American, spent quite a lot of time over there. They think they have the best healthcare in the world for some reason. You often hear American politicians, particularly Republicans, stand up and say, we have the best healthcare in the world. And, and, and I’m hate to break it to Americans, but that is just not the case. Compared with other rich countries, the US has worse population health and the most expensive popu, uh, health care [00:09:00] system in the world. Hold on. I just hit the wrong button here. Okay. Um, you know, just to give you an indication. Bottom line is despite far higher spending per capita, the US has worth, worth. Lemme start that again. Worse population health. In 2023, US life expend expectancy was 78.4 years versus 82.5. In peer nations, the lowest among the group, and every US state sits below the peer average. Life expectancy gap is big and stubborn. The US rebounded post pandemic, but still trails by 4.1 years in 2023, that gap predates COVID and reflects higher premature deaths from overdoses, violence, and chronic disease. Infant deaths are higher, maternal mortality is higher. Avoidable deaths trend the wrong way. Where the US does [00:10:00] shine, it ranks second on c

We discuss the latest U.S. economic slowdown, then pivot to a detailed portfolio update (US portfolio vs S&P 500). After a rapid recap of recent stock picks — from ZEPP to ZIM — we dive into a comprehensive analysis of Methanex (MEOH): its global footprint, methanol market dynamics, e-methanol shipping prospects, the Geismar 3 outage governance risk, and key valuation metrics. Timestamps • 00:03:00 – US Portfolio Update: +7.6% in 30 days vs S&P 500 +1.65%; since inception +70.4% vs S&P 500 +46%   • 00:06:00 – Deep Dive on Methanex (MEOH) Transcription   [00:00:00] Cameron: Welcome back to QAV America, Tony. This is episode 21. How are you? Tony Kynaston: I am well, thank you. Father’s Day celebrated Cameron: good. Tony Kynaston: Hope everyone out there did the same. Cameron: No, they’re Americans, Tony, they celebrate Father’s Day in a completely different time of year to us. Mm. Tony Kynaston: did. Anyway. I was gonna segue that into hope they all got their small packages, but, um, can’t Cameron: They’re small packages, Tony Kynaston: Day gifts from Australia, which have been held up. Cameron: Oh, that’s a reference to the fact that Australia Post has stopped shipping packages to the United States because of the de minimis ch rule changes. Uh, we were just talking on our Australian podcast about the, uh, state of the economy in the US second lot of weak jobs, job numbers has just come through, and as I pointed out in the last episode, all of the reasons that we’ve been [00:01:00] talking about. Over the last, uh, six months or so on this show, according to the failing New York Times, as the president likes to refer to it, analysts offered a variety of explanations for the slowdown the president’s tariffs on nearly all imports have driven up, driven up costs for companies and prices for consumers. Mr. Trump’s immigration crackdown has made it harder for many businesses to find workers while, while simultaneously reducing the need for them because they now have fewer customers. The federal government has cut jobs directly and canceled grants and contracts that have bled into the private sector. The uncertainty surrounding Mr. Trump’s ever shifting policies has made corporate executives more cautious about hiring and investing. So. You know, who would’ve guessed that, uh, putting Donald Trump back in the White House would lead to chaos and uncertainty? Tony? No, certainly not me. I, that was not on my bingo list. I thought, here’s a man who’s calm and [00:02:00] most stable genius I’ve ever seen. So it’s deeply surprising to me. What about you? Tony Kynaston: Yeah, surprising, surprising to all the Republicans, I would’ve thought. Who, uh, Um, yeah, but I, well first of all, I didn’t access the New York Times ’cause it’s a paywall and I’m not gonna sign up to the New York Times. with the Wall Street Journal, Cameron: What do they have to say? Tony Kynaston: probably the Cameron: Right? Tony Kynaston: Reprinted, uh, anyway. Cameron: uh, as I, I’m gonna do a pulled pork this week on an interesting company, meo. They’re a, uh, methanol, well, they’re the 800 pound gorilla in the methanol space, which is interesting ’cause I know or new before this. Nothing about methanol. But before I do that, I just want to. Give a portfolio, uh, performance update. Our US portfolio is up about 7.6% in the last 30 days versus the s and p 500, which is up [00:03:00] 1.65%. Uh, since inception, which is, uh, September, 2023, our US portfolio is up 70. 4% versus the s and p 500, up 46%. Year to date though we are still struggling. We’re down 7.2% year to date calendar, year to date versus 10.43 for the s and p because of some of Mr. Trump’s policies that tanked our portfolio at the beginning of the year, but over a one year timeframe. We are up 31% versus 20% for the s and p 500. So despite having a rough start to the year, uh, we’re still looking pretty. Um, I, I’ll also just, uh, mention the companies that I’ve done pulled Porks on over the last, uh, 20 episodes on this show. Um. Zap in order of best stories, [00:04:00] zap the smart Chinese smartwatch company that I covered on the 11th of July is now up 1511% since then. It’s just not slowing down. It is down 4% today. Um, but it’s just not slowing down. Gray media is up 40%. Titan machinery is up 11% since we talked about it. Precision Drilling is up 18%. Orx Corporation up 27 IHS holding up 37. Ford is up eight since we talked about it. Chemex is up, uh, 68%. Dan aos is up 16 Canadian. Imperial Bank of Commerce is up 23%. Jackson Financial, up 16%. Costco’s up five. Sasol is up 43% since I talked about it in July. I said they were a dirty, dirty, dirty business they were in and they’re up 43%. Bausch Health Companies is up [00:05:00] 16%. Seneca Foods is up nine. Kimball Electronics is up seven Sno that I talked about last week though is down 2% since last week. So there you go. Then there’s also Zim, uh, which is down 26% since we talked about it back in March and, and now Chile is down 10%, but the rest of them doing quite well. Well, with that out of the way, let me, let me talk to you a tale of Meow, Tony. Meow, MEOH. There’s the ticket code for Methanex. I’m calling it Meow though. We’re talking about the world’s biggest methanol producer. That’s who these guys are. Headquarters in Vancouver. Plants all over the map. Louisiana, Canada, Chile, New Zealand, Trinidad, and [00:06:00] Egypt. But I’m gonna preface this as I did last week by saying that the underlying commodity for Metanx, which is methanol, is a Josephine. So for new listeners, we chart underlying commodities on a three point trend line, looking at month end prices over a five year graph, and when a. Price has been in decline. We classify it as a Josephine. It could also be a cell, but this isn’t a cell. It’s not below its cell line. It’s above the cell line below the byline, so it’s a Josephine, so we wouldn’t, what that means is, regardless of the numbers, I’m gonna talk you through with Methanex today. We wouldn’t buy it. We’re not, we, we don’t have any room in our portfolio anyway, but if, if, if we did, we wouldn’t buy it until the underlying commodity gets back into a buy territory. Because we’ve learned from experience that prices tend to follow the underlying commodity price, which makes sense. Tony Kynaston: [00:07:00] methanol used for? Cam, Cameron: Tony, I’m glad you asked. Thank you for asking. Tony Tony Kynaston: you are Cameron: Methanol’s used for pretty much everything. It’s the Lego of the chemical world. It’s used in millions and millions of different things, including making crystal meth as we all learned from breaking bad. Um, it’s precursor to methyl a methyl lamine. Methyl lamine, I think is what they had to hijack trucks, uh, or trains in the desert, uh, in wherever they were. New, New Mexico, new something. Anyway, it methanol is the simplest alcohol, CH three. Ohh. It’s a clear liquid. It burns cleanly, mixes with almost anything mostly made from natural gas methane. Then you catalyze it into. Methanol. It’s used in plastics, paints, adhesives, resins. It’s blended into fuels, biodiesel, [00:08:00] gasoline, and the big future for it is something called e methanol, which is formed from CO2 and green hydrogen, and it’s a low carbon marine fuel. All those tankers moving. Well, you know, but based on President Trump’s tariffs, we won’t have to worry about shipping stuff around countries anymore ’cause it’ll all be made in America by, not by immigrants though, by good, good Americans, we’ll be working factories for $1 a day and happy. That they have a job that hasn’t been taken by a robot or AI yet. But basically this is the, it’s the Lego brick of the chemical world. Cheap, versatile, snaps into more complex stuff, and. Tony Kynaston: bare feet. Cameron: And Well, I was gonna say, light Legos. Don’t eat it because it’s highly, highly toxic and can kill you. So [00:09:00] don’t get it in your eyes. Don’t breathe it in, don’t get anywhere near it in its raw state, and that’s one of the problems as we’ll see. But methane X-M-E-O-H is the world’s largest methanol producer, as I said. They not only produce it, they run their own fleet of tankers, which is good bit of vertical integration, probably also why they want to have their, uh, own shipping product, fuel product, marine product, and it. It also means they can shift supply to whichever region is paying best, uh, at a fairly low cost. And these guys run a really efficient, low cost operations. One of the reasons why they’re on our buy list, they go back to a company called Ocelot Industries, which was like a oil and gas company. 1968 in Calgary, pivoted to methanol in the 1980s, became Methanex. And they’ve survived despite the government policies [00:10:00] around the world regarding methanol being pretty volatile, as is methanol over the last, uh, 50 years, which I’ll talk about. But first of all, I wanna talk a little bit about the methanol market. It’s global, it’s priced in USD. The big markets are China, Europe, south America, Korea. 22% of the market is in China. They use it for fuel blending and plastics feed stock. Dunno if you know this Tony, but a lot of plastic stuff gets made in China. They use a lot of methanol. Um. Europe and the US use it for chemical intermediates and some energy. South American Korea use it for a whole bunch of different things. The basic price drivers for the methanol market are natural gas costs, oil and NAPFA spreads the competition for fuel and regulat. Both in terms of what you can put in your [00:11:00] fuel and also rules around what can be used and when it can be used in like marine rules and those sorts of things. Bottom line is the prices swing hard. There’s a lot of inputs, a lot of variables, and it’s a fair