Motley Fool Hidden Gems Investing - Humble Pie & Stocks We’re Thankful For

Episode Date: November 23, 2018

It’s our Thanksgiving Special! Analysts Matt Argersinger, Andy Cross, Jeff Fischer, Emily Flippen, Ron Gross, and Jason Moser share why they are thankful for stocks like Berkshire-Hathaway, Twilio, Starbucks, Disney and more. Plus, we highlight why investors might want to avoid turkey stocks like GoPro, GameStop, Mattel and others.  And since no Thanksgiving is complete without dessert, we dig into a few slices of humble pie. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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It's the Motley Fool Money Radio Show. I'm Chris Hill. Joining me in studio this week, senior analysts Jason Moser, Matt Argesinger, and Jeff Fischer. Good to see you, as always, gentlemen. It is our Thanksgiving special. We are going to give thanks for a few stocks. We're going to call out a few turkeys. But as longtime listeners know, our Thanksgiving special means one thing and one thing only. Trigger happy, Broido. Steve Broido, our man behind the glass, with our one special effect that we use every year. It's a good one, though. I mean, it works.

It's good. It works. But I'll just remind Steve that it's a long show. And, you know, pace yourself. Let's start with a serving of humble pie, and we'll just go around the table. Matty, I'll start with you. What is, it can be a stock, it can be a business story, something that you were wrong about in 2018? There were many things I was wrong about. But one stock that comes to mind in particular is JD.com. It was probably my favorite idea coming into the year. I think I mentioned it at least a couple of times on this show, it's kind of my favorite way to play the growth of e-commerce in China. Well, it's down more than 50% as of this time. Yeah, there it is. Now, granted,

there's a chance all of this is just kind of a massive bout of pessimism around Chinese technology stocks right now. That's what I'm hoping for. But the market is usually right. And the market right now is saying this company has serious problems and risks. I think it It certainly does. The company has spent billions on expanding its logistics network across China. But Alibaba and other competitors have certainly also made their own investments in it as well. And of course, I couldn't predict that CEO and founder Richard Liu would find himself accused of a really heinous crime a few months ago, for which he may still answer for. So, I think I probably bought in too much to the entrepreneurial story and the market opportunity

and not enough to the business and competitive environment for JD. Jason Moser? Yeah, sure. I think Facebook, I would like to call out as being the one where I really am actually happy to see the market holding Facebook's feet to the fire, so to speak. I did not think that would happen, and here we are today. The stock year-to-date is down close to 30%. But really, I think where I was even more wrong, because I was wrong on Facebook there, I was really more wrong on leadership there, with Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg. And for a long time, I had touted them as really a reason to invest in

the business. It seemed like quarter in and quarter out. They said the right things. They presented great numbers. They had this terrific long-term view and held these metrics out there. We just thought, hey, they really are doing things how we like to see. And then, fast forward to today, and it really seems like the bottom has just fallen out of the executive suite there. And perhaps this is a situation where you believe half of what you see and none of what you hear. But even then, it still doesn't look all that great. So, my trust in them is actually at about a zero right now. And I don't know they do anything to get that back. Now, I never would have invested in Facebook anyway, but there's no way I'm touching

that stock now, not even at these levels, Chris. Well, it's interesting because when you look at all of the businesses that we talk about on this show, and a lot of times the challenges facing any given business are in the marketplace, it's a product that they're struggling with, Matty, something like that. When it's trust in leadership, I mean, that's what's so amazing about the media coverage around Facebook these days. Yeah, and I think when you look at that duo there, I think that Mark Zuckerberg needs Sheryl Sandberg more than the other way around. I actually wouldn't be surprised to see at some point, perhaps Sheryl Sandberg steps down to go pursue other interests, because

I think she only needs so much of this headache. And again, I think you buy into Facebook today, probably you do OK from there. I'm holding my nose saying that. It's not an investment I'm interested in. But again, I think with your statement there, yeah, poor leadership really closes the door for me. Jeff Fischer, you want to dig into some humble pie? Certainly. And while we're on the topic of food, the stock I'm talking about is Shake Shack. Now, it's up about 13% this year, but I started the year short shares in Motley Fool Pro, meaning we were betting on the stock to fall, and we ended up covering the shares or closing

our short at a much higher price than the stock is at right now. So, we've been wrong however you want to count it. I think the stock is extremely expensive. I think it still is. But the shares have gone up as sales have grown, as they've added new stores, even though traffic is waning a bit, and same-store sales were down recently. But it's a good lesson in humility, especially when selling short. And any listeners who sell short know how difficult it is, because timing is not on your side, costs are not on your side, etc. So, this one is one we got wrong across the board. So, I remember when you shorted it, talking with you about it, and one of the

things you had pointed out to me was that, within the framework of the overall portfolio, it represented a very, very small percentage of the portfolio. But I am curious, did you actually go eat at a Shake Shack before you decided to short it? I did. And unfortunately, I didn't like it. If I liked it, maybe I wouldn't have shorted it. O' We can't work in a cow sound effect here? I mean, come on, Steve. Look, man, we're already spending the whole special effects budget on this one sound. You want to just double the budget? How about I pay for it? You don't do the books around here,

Jason Moser. Let's get to a stock that you're thankful for. Flipping the script a little bit. Matty, what do you got? How could I not be thankful for MercadoLibre? I mean, a year where international stocks, especially emerging market stocks, they haven't really been crushed, they've been obliterated. So, when Amazon's marching on your turf, when Brazil really has fallen into political turmoil and suffered through a nationwide trucking strike over the summer, when Argentina almost defaulted on its sovereign debt again, and when Venezuela, well, you know what's happening there. MercadoLibre is actually up 10% as of this taping, and its results continue to be outstanding. Not only is it still the leader

by far in e-commerce in Latin America, it's actually building its own answer to PayPal and having a lot of success doing that as well. So, I've been thankful for MercadoLibre for the past eight years, as long as I've owned it, and I think I'm going to be thankful again this year. Jason? Yeah, sure. Last year, I told you I was very thankful for the war on cash basket. I still am. I was a proud owner of all of those stocks. So, I'm going to stick with the basket theme here. My healthcare and wealth care basket this year, these four stocks, IDEXX Laboratories, Teladoc, UnitedHealthcare, and Massimo, again, same concept, equal weighting

all the way across all four companies. The basket to date from February 9th, 2018 inception, the basket is up 30.2% versus the market's 3%. And that's incorporating all of this volatility from Monday when we're taping here. So, to me, this was just a great way to get exposure to a massive market opportunity in healthcare that spans not only people, because obviously that's the bigger part of the market, but also with IDEXX Laboratories and our pets, too. I have three dogs at home, as you know, and they take a nice chunk out of my pocketbook every year as well. So, it's nice to know I'm getting a little bit of a return there and owning shares of that one. So, you've done a couple of these

basket stocks. I'm curious how you settled on four stocks. Was that just something where you thought, you know what, this is going to be easy for me to follow? It's not a hard and fast rule, but really, it's between four and six. And so, with the healthcare basket, these were the four that really made the cut, as with the long cash basket. But I've been known to throw a basket out there with five or six every now and then. Jeff Fischer, what are you thankful for? I think we need an Easter special where it's just Jason's baskets. I like that.

So, I'm thankful. Last year, I was thankful for Paycom, Steve told me right as we walked in. And it's up 35% in the last year. So, Paycom has been great. Maybe this year's one will do as well. I'm thankful for Twilio this year. The stock has more than tripled from $25 to about $80 lately. It's a revenue model that makes money as businesses using apps communicate with their parties that they need to communicate with, users and whatnot. And it's a usage-based revenue model. So, the more we use this technology, the more Twilio gets paid, which has been instrumental in turning the company profitable this year, non-GAAP profitable, the last two quarters. And it has plenty of room to keep growing.

It has an $8 billion market cap now, up from about $2 billion as the year started. But it's addressing a market that's much larger than that. So, Twilio, T-W-L-O, also has great management, founder management, who owns a lot of shares. By the way, and speaking of the usage model, that's actually how we pay for the special effect. The more Steve uses it, the more we're paying. Coming up, a new feature in our annual tradition. Stay right here. You're listening to Motley Fool Money.

You didn't have to love me like you did, but you did, but you did love. And I thank you. Thank you for being a friend. Travel down the road and back again. Your heart is true. You're a pal and a confidant. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. Chris Hill here in studio with Jason Moser, Jeff Fischer, and Matt Argersinger. It's our Thanksgiving special.

Time to get to the turkey stocks, guys. It is the stock to avoid. We've done a little looking back at 2018, but let's look forward and just go around the table. Jeff Fischer, I'll start with you. What is a stock that you think is really in the turkey category? So, have any of you ever shopped at a Dillard's department store? I thought it was, like, 12. A long time ago. Yeah, they're not really in this Washington, D.C. area. But Dillard's, ticker is DDS, their retail department store, competing with every other retailer out there. Revenue peaked in the year 2000, actually, at $8.6 billion.

2000 what? Oh, my goodness. Just 2000? $8.6 billion, now it's $6.5 billion, just slowly, steadily declining. interest expenses of $55 million on their debt, which net debt is about $700 million, eats up about 20% of their operating income. And now their margins are under pressure as well, as the competition just keeps growing. So, the stock trades at about 12 times expected earnings, 14 times free cash flow. Could maybe be taken private at some point. There's a

lot of family ownership involved, but still, I think overall, it's a turkey to avoid. Jason Moser? Yeah. So, Mattel is one that, I mean, they just cannot seem to stay out of their own way. And in a time where consumer spending is actually on the rise, and seemingly this company should be making a killing, I mean, they're getting killed instead. And I mean, the Toys R Us bankruptcy has been a catalyst in bringing not only Mattel down, I mean, of course, Hasbro has been subject to that as well. But I mean, really, they're still night and day stories. And with Hasbro, I'm quite confident they'll be able to recover.

Mattel, not so sure there. They continue just to maintain a very less-than-compelling portfolio of brands. And that really is what it's all about, right? With Barbie and Hot Wheels, they don't maintain the same resonance with kids these days, and fewer ties with owners of that IP, like Disney and whatnot. I mean, let that deal go, that was just a killer. And honestly, the balance sheet now is turning into one massive liability. The stock is cheap for a reason. I would steer very clear. Matty, you got one? Well, I hate piling on here, and I didn't plan this with Jason, but Facebook.

Uh-oh! OK, OK. The user base is massive. They've got Instagram. They're going to keep making billions, at least in the short-term. And yes, I think the stock, by most measures, is cheap. But beyond the leadership problems that Jason talked about earlier, keep this in mind. I think Google, Facebook, Amazon, I think all three are going to face rising scrutiny in the years ahead. I just think they're so big and so impactful. But ask yourself this, which of the three, by the nature of its business model, is required to make your experience as a user worse in order to make money? What's the one that's going to continue to stuff

your news feed or message feeds with stuff you don't care about and aren't looking for? I'm not sure Facebook is the next cigarettes, but man, we could probably all be a little healthier using less of it. That was a pretty stunning comment. comment from Mark Benioff, the CEO of Salesforce, basically saying, Facebook is like cigarettes. But let me just push back a little bit, because earlier in the show, Jason said, Facebook, it is down from its highs. It's kind of a cheap stock by a lot of measures. Cigarettes, not good for you, but you do pretty well as an investor over the last, oh, I don't know, 20, 30, 50 years if you invested in cigarettes.

Like I said, I think Facebook has continued to make a lot of money. I know Jeff likes it a lot. but I could never own it. My attitude on it is evolving, just like you two. The management missteps have been significant and disheartening, and that's key to a thesis. So, we're still reviewing it. So, we've been doing our Thanksgiving special for years now, and producer Mac Greer came up with a new wrinkle for this year's show, which is something that we're calling Not at the table. Because, let's face it, to the extent that people are a little nervous about Thanksgiving, some of that centers around, I'm going to be sitting down with extended

family, maybe in-laws, that sort of thing. Oh, and what if politics comes up at the table? What if that crazy uncle just brings his, you know, you know. Exactly. And then it's just like, oh, can we just, can you two go outside? Can you go on the front porch if you're going to have that? Just not at the table. Can we not do this at the table? So, Jeff Fisher, in terms of business and investing, what's something? because, as Jason said, we're taping this before Thanksgiving. What's something that you're just hoping really doesn't come up at the table this year? And I know it will, though. I wonder if this will surprise you guys, but it is this question.

Hey, Jeff, so what do you think of the market? There it is. I like it. My answer is the same every time, basically. Well, we're investing in individual companies, the market will do what it will in the short-term, but over the long-term, great companies grow value. And that's what I say. But I'll usually throw in some, oh, it's at 17 times trailing earnings, so that's a little above average. You'll throw in math to confuse them? The S&P is at 15.6 times 2019 estimates, so here, have some turkey.

So, it's right around its long-term average. But, yeah, I'd much rather talk about winning companies and what makes for a great individual investment rather than the market as a whole. I'm not trying to get you in trouble with anyone in your family. Having said that, I'm curious if you've ever just made up a company name or a ticker symbol just to get someone off your back? Because a lot of times, people are just looking for a ticker. I haven't yet, but I think I'll try that this year. Jason Moser, something you're hoping really doesn't come up at the table?

I feel like the solution is, you just get a business card on the back of it. You just get that little investing philosophy. If someone asks you about the market, you just silently hand that over. Just a cut-and-paste response. You're going to answer it probably 20 times, right? I mean, for me, it's interest rates. I mean, stop already, please. I'm crying out loud. They need to go up. They are going up. It's not if, it's when. Does it matter if it's three or four times next year? No. I mean, the fact of the matter is that rising interest rates in this environment is a sign of a healthy economy. It needs to happen. I mean, at least get these savings account CDs to a point where you have a choice. But

don't ask me about if the Fed's going to raise next, because I don't care. It doesn't matter. Does that come up a lot at your Thanksgiving table? Well, thankfully, this Thanksgiving is just going to be me and my immediate family, and by immediate, my wife and two kids. Yeah, you'd be amazed. I can see your daughters asking, hey, Dad, when are rates going up? They'll play golf or whatever, and maybe it's like, hey, so what about those interest rates? And you know why?

It's because that's what the financial media is throwing out there every single day. And I'll tell you what, when the next financial crisis hits, trust me, it's coming, you won't have the same sort of interest rate strategy to work with. You just need to get those things up sooner rather than later. there's a greater than zero chance I'm going to contact your lovely wife and just say, look, there's $20 in it for your daughters if they just drop this question on Jason. Do it. Maddie, something you're hoping doesn't come up at the table?

Well, when I was thinking about this topic, I immediately thought about last year and several extended family gatherings where at least one family member at each time came up to me and said, you know, you should really think about investing in Bitcoin. And, you know, my question all the time was like, well, tell me why I should do that. you know, why should I put all the money in Bitcoin? And of course, the answer was always, well, you know, because it's going up, you idiot, or something like that. Well, well, well, how did that work out for everyone? I'm joking. I think Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are very interesting. I'm just still struggling in my personally to grasp the fundamental case

for them. But I am 100% confident in this. I think crypto will not be a topic at the Thanksgiving table this year. I think everyone's probably moved on to like cannabis or something like that. So at least I can avoid that. You sure you don't want to be the one to bring this up? Like, hey, it was last year you were bringing up crypto, do you want to talk about that? I thought about it, you know. It is pretty interesting, though. Randall Stephenson, the head of AT&T, he was just interviewed for a video for The Wall Street Journal, and he was talking about blockchain as being the thing he's the most interested in, but no mention of crypto. Alright, Jeff

Fischer, Jason Moser, Matt Argersinger, guys, happy Thanksgiving. Thanks for being here. Happy Thanksgiving, Chris, thanks. Coming up, our Thanksgiving special rolls on. We've got a brand new crew of analysts coming in. So stay right here. You're listening to Motley Fool Money. And I thank you, thank you. When I felt I had enough, you never turned away.

You were right there. And I thank you, thank you. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. I'm Chris Hill and joining me in studio, as promised, A brand new crew of senior analysts. Wow. Ron Gross. Bring it in.

Emily Flippen. Andy Cross. Thanks for being here. Thanks, Chris. Happy Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving. We're going to start once again with a serving of humble pie. Ron Gross, what's something in the world of stock investing or business that you were wrong about in 2018?

Ron likes pie. So, Chris, let me take you back to a simpler yet chaotic time. The year was 2009 when Charlie Travers said to me, how about intuitive surgical, Ron Gross? And what did I say, Chris? I said, no, Charlie, it's 15 times EBITDA and $60 per share. That's outrageous! We cannot invest in that, Charlie Travers. 15 times EBITDA! Well, fast forward to today, and the stock is $486 a share, a 700% increase from those days.

At the time, it was a four-time recommendation from David Gardner. It is now a six-time recommendation from David Gardner. And I value-invested myself right out of the investment. Is that the one more so than others that you beat yourself up about? No. No, there are others. There are many others. Emily Flippen, what's something you were wrong about in 2018?

Well, I can take a big slice of humble pie for this one, but I'll admit that I'm still holding out a little bit of hope. It's Fitbit. I bought Fitbit up when it was trading at $14 or $15 a share. I was aware of a Fitbit. I really bought into the product, and I really believed in the data, but man, did they just not deliver. I will admit, I'm still holding on to my shares, I'm still holding on to my actual Fitbit, although I'm not wearing it right now, if that says anything. That's telling right there. There you go. They had a good quarter this last report. Oh, good is relative, isn't it? Well, yeah. It wasn't horrible. That is jamming with faint praise.

But how much hope do you hold out for a really strong holiday quarter for Fitbit? They had a good smartwatch, that one smartwatch. I'm not getting my hopes up, but I like to be pleasantly surprised. So, not getting my hopes up, but I won't be mad. They went from having no smartwatch to being the No. 2 player. That's pretty good. That is true. They took over a lot of other players in this space. So, good for them. Andy Cross. Williams-Sonoma is a retailer that many of us know and not enough of a shop at, apparently. The last quarter, this is a business, it's a retail business, so it's facing all

of the pressures in 2018. The stocks actually performed very well in 2018, was beating the market up in those last quarter. But that's when the humble pie settles in, because it was just the guidance for the coming quarter, Chris, probably not as excited. And the thing that continues to hit so many of these businesses are the risks of the tariff costs and what that's going to do to the profitability. So, while Williams-Sonoma continues to make investments to juice the business against a very competitive retail environment, including from the likes of Amazon, Humble Pie settled in this quarter and hit the stock for a good drop. It's a little surprising with Williams-Sonoma when you consider that, I would say,

better than most retailers, they did a good job with the omnichannel approach of, yes, we've got the stores, but we've also got the catalogs, we've got online. They did a good job of managing all of those channels. And I'm wondering if maybe they're starting to price themselves out, because they sell expensive stuff, but they're not really thought of as a premium retailer in the same way that maybe Nordstrom is when it comes to apparel. Well, I think you're right, Chris. They've done very good on the omni-channel level. And their e-commerce business is now 55% of their total sales, and that's at an all-time high and the e-commerce is growing twice as fast as the regular business. They do have

that store footprint that is very costly, and they continue to make investments in logistics, which is very costly, because they have to compete like the Amazon. So, it's a story that's going to grow sales in the low single digits and profitability hopefully higher than that, but it's just not quite the exciting growth story. Ron, it's not priced for the growth story, either. Well, on the upside, eventually they'll be able to capture all the Bed Bath & Beyond customers once that company decides to hang it up. Let's switch gears, move to stocks that we are thankful for. Ron? I got to go with the first stock I ever bought my children in 2002, which was Disney.

The company is up 700% over the past 16 years. Both children still own it. Even with some stumbles here and there, from an ESPN perspective, largely. The stock's really only 3% off its all-time high, still getting it done. That's going to pay for a nice chunk of college for both kids, and I'm very thankful for that. 2019 is shaping up to be a pivotal year for Disney, when you think about the rollout of that Disney Plus app. Disney Plus app, Fox assets coming online. But the actual Plus app, the sports one, is better than expected. I didn't hold out a lot of hope there, but so far so good, and we'll see how the rest of it falls in place.

Emily, a stock that you're thankful for? I'm also going to go back to 2002, bring us all back there. This company has been reporting corporate social responsibility reports since 2002, which is long before it was very popular to do so. So, my stock I'm thankful for is Starbucks. I think the company has done so many great things in their business. I mean, even beyond just what a great investment it's been, it's a company that I think anybody can hold in their portfolio and feel proud about. So, that's a stock that I personally really enjoy. Andy?

I'm going Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway, Charlie Munger. It's one of my largest personal positions. I'm so thankful just for the education that Warren Buffett over 50-plus years really has brought to investors and business people, politicians. He's extremely wise. So, he's collected an amazing group of businesses there, investments plus operating companies, plus insurance companies and the likes. But the contributions he's made to investors and business people around the world, not just making shareholders wealthy, but truly making other people wealthy as well. From the education perspective, Berkshire Hathaway and Warren Buffett, I'm very thankful for. Yeah, it's pretty amazing when you consider that Buffett essentially has

the unofficial title of economic reassurer-in-chief for our country, and has certainly over the past decade, Ron. And I hesitate to name who a potential replacement would be for that. For all the talk of, well, who's going to be the next CEO at Berkshire Hathaway? I'm not concerned about that. I'm more concerned about, who's going to be the next unofficial spokesman for rational business thought in this country? You need the combination of folksy and long-term type thinker, and nobody really pops into mind. Our Thanksgiving special rolls on right after this, so put down the leftovers, stay with us. You're listening to Motley Fool Money.

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and The Motley Fool may have formal recommendations for or against, so don't buy or sell stocks based solely on what you hear. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. I'm Chris Hill. Joining me in studio, Andy Cross, Emily Flippen, and Ron Gross. All right, we look back. Let's look forward. Ron, turkey stocks, aka one stock to avoid. What do you got for us? This stock always reminds me of Fitbit. Sorry. Oh, wow! Is it Fitbit? No, it's not. It's GoPro. Went public in 2014 at $24 a share, hovering around $5 right now.

I really enjoy CEO Nick Woodman when he's on Shark Tank. Have you guys ever seen him there? But it's kind of ironic, because a lot of the times the criticism that the entrepreneurs on Shark Tank give to the people presenting is that, you have a product, you don't have a company. And ironically, I feel the same way about GoPro. They're not profitable, they haven't been profitable, their cash flow negative, which is not positive for those keeping score. Balance sheet is getting worse. They've hired bankers to look into a partnership or a sale. It hasn't borne any fruit yet. They've had to slash their workforce. They keep coming out with the next iteration of their same product. I think we're on iteration No. 7 now.

It's a company that just can't seem to go anywhere because it's a product, it's not a company. Do the contestants on Shark Tank ever throw that back in Woodman's face? No, he's not a regular, I don't think. He just makes guest appearances. You know, it's funny, that's a company that tried to really build up the whole ecosystem, and it just has really struggled to do that and get out from the product challenges they're having. So, I was bullish on them a few years ago, and they certainly haven't lived up to that hype. Emily Flippen, you got a stock to avoid? I have many stocks to avoid, but this one is one that I am especially personal about.

It's GameStop. I was a big believer for a long time. I think GameStop, sitting on a bunch of stuff that, if they had good, thoughtful management, they could do something with, but recent turnover in the CEO position, I think the CEO left after three months after taking the position. I mean, it's just, the company has turned into a bit of a laughing stock. But I will say that I would not buy it now, but I am hopeful that maybe if somebody comes along and takes a position, that that is the only way they're saving this company. Isn't that among the most troubling situations when we talk about management turnover? Certainly, the ideal situation is long-time

successful CEO announces his or her retirement, and there's a clear path to leadership. A CEO taking the job, and three months later, turn around. I mean, don't we have to assume that that person walked in, found out a bunch of stuff about the business that they didn't realize when they took the job and said, this ain't worth it? It's brutal. And I think Emily's right, it's ripe for an activist investor. I just don't know exactly where the value is there that can be wrung out of it. They sold off all the value. They have great refurbishment factories. They're the only company that can refurbish things like old phones or old consoles. I mean, that within

itself is such a value. So, what they did was, they acquired Cricket with the concept of, hey, maybe we can become the phone repair people. And they sold Cricket, and they had a great mobile game developer, which they're selling. I mean, I feel like management's almost just trying to sell off the assets, not be the one responsible. Andy? There's a GameStop across from the shopping center where I live, across from a Starbucks, and I wish they would just put another Starbucks inside. There's not enough Starbucks, that's true. I'm going with JD.com. The huge Chinese e-commerce business has really struggled.

The stock has really struggled. It's down almost 50% this year. And this last quarter really just kind of continued to show the challenges that they are having and we're seen from a lot of Chinese companies, which is, the growth is, while still growing at fast rates, not as fast as people expected. Their sales growth was up 25%, even though their service revenues were up about 50%. Their annual accounts, they serve more than 305 million Chinese consumers. That's huge, and that was up 14% over the year. But generally, overall, really, what's hanging over there is just the accusations from the founder and largest individual shareholder, Richard Liu, for sexual impropriety allegations here in

the U.S. And that just continues to hang over. And as a person who's looking for businesses that you want to be able to invest in for many, many years, when you have just that situation, it's just not something that I think I want to back at this point. I'll just add one more stock in here. And this is one that we've talked about for years. But one of the things I was reminded of earlier this fall with Sears was the fact that stocks will pop when the announcement is, hey, we found someone to lend us money. And I would just say to anyone out there who looks at Sears and sees that, oh, Sears is up 20% today, Eddie Lampert, he's got connections, he can always find someone to lend that company

some money. And to your point, Emily, when you were talking about GameStop, it reminded me of Sears. We've seen that over the past decade, where Sears had these assets, a lot of them were real estate, but they had the Kenmore brand and the Craftsman tools, and they just started selling them off. I think you want to be very careful now, just generally, especially today, with the cost of debt increasing, you want to be very careful about the amount of debt your companies carry on the balance sheet. So, as an analyst perspective, from an investing perspective, watch out companies, like you said, like Sears, that are very highly levered, because that can turn very quickly.

Because what never gets added in that announcement, Andy, is, we borrowed this money, and here's what we're paying in interest. Yeah. And then their sales and earnings start to decline, and that just compounds itself, and that's a very scary situation. And the amount of debt out there for corporate America is extremely high these days. We're going to go to our man behind the glass, Steve Broido, because, Steve, I have to believe, of the investor that you are, you've got a stock out there for the dozens of listeners that you would say, you know what, just stay away from this thing. I would stay away from my entire portfolio. It's been a really rough couple of weeks,

and I'm sure you guys are feeling it as well. A rough couple of weeks, but I mean, come on, Steve, we're long-term investors here. Our final segment, brand new this year in 2018. People can drop us an email at radio at fool.com to see if, by popular demand, this is working and we bring it back in 2019. But the thing that we like to call, not at the table, this Thanksgiving, can we just not? And again, it's politics most often that people don't want to talk about at the table. Take that conversation outside. But Ron, when it comes to business and investing, what is something that you just don't want to talk about this Thanksgiving? You stole a little of my thunder,

but cranberry sauce will be a-flying if somebody brings up Sears and wants to talk about that stock. We've talked about it ad nauseum on this show. Finally, they filed for bankruptcy in October. But no, it's not over yet. The question is, will they reemerge from bankruptcy? My answer is, I just don't care. I don't want to talk about it anymore. Eddie Lambert has done a terrible job trying to wring out the value from, as you said, the stores, the assets that were perhaps worth something at one time. Are they going to secure the financing needed? Are they going to close the proper number of stores? Will they be able to live to fight another day? If they do, I think it's just putting off the inevitable of once again them

having to file, but next time it will be for liquidation, not re-emerging. We've been friends a long time, so please be honest with me. Are you mad that I brought up Sears? I was a little bit mad. Emily Flippen, what's something you're really hoping doesn't come up at the Thanksgiving table this year? I think I'd prefer to have politics come up over somebody asking me about GE again. It's inevitably going to happen. And I kind of agree with Ron, I just don't care anymore. You know, GE, let's talk about selling off assets. Wow! I mean, really a trend for this is, you know, we're seeing

companies selling off great assets, assets that were performing well because of market sentiment trying to save the company. And now, what do we have left at GE? You've got a penny dividend. Yeah, a penny dividend, an aviation unit that's the only good asset left in the business, and a bunch of failing power units. So, we'll see what happens, but please don't ask me about it again. Just across the board, because you three make your living analyzing companies, is it just standard, whether it's the Thanksgiving table or just in social settings, you're at a barbecue or something like that, when you're chatting with someone and they find out what

you do for a living, does it immediately move into the person saying, oh, you're a stock analyst? Oh, well, what do you think about blank? For sure. And therein lies the curse of this business. As Jeff said earlier in the show, everybody always wants to know what you think of the market or what you think of a stock. The worst is when the market is on fire, like during the internet bubble of the late 90s, where everyone thinks they're a complete genius, even though they don't know what they're doing, and they think you're an idiot, because you can't make the same amount of money that they're making in a company that doesn't actually have profits.

Andy Cross, what's something you're really hoping doesn't come up at the table? The one thing that I don't want to come up at the table, but I think will, and outside of the market and the stock talk, is I'm a proud graduate of the University of Michigan. My wife is a proud former resident of the state of Ohio. There's a little game every year called Michigan-Ohio State. This year, it has even more meaning to it. I've instructed my family not to bring up the Michigan-Ohio State game. So, I think, overall, the non-investing, non-financial topic that could cause the most cranberry flying at the Cross household is the Michigan-Ohio State game.

Wolverine or three-and-a-half-point favorites. So, wait, are you concerned about people piling up up on you, or are you concerned about this causing a rift in your marriage? A rift in my marriage. It already does. I mean, it already has the whole year started to cause a rift in my marriage. So, stocks are showing a lot of volatility now, and we'll certainly have a lot of conversation at my table about stocks and investing. What I'm really hoping does not come up is the Michigan-Ohio state game. Do we think cannabis is coming up at Thanksgiving this year? It seems to be the newest hot top.

I was going to say, if it was Bitcoin last year, like, hey, this is getting a lot of headlines, what do you think about this? Yeah, it's probably cannabis, isn't it? I would imagine, you're right, it's the new Bitcoin, and it's the new hot thing. And especially with the midterms that just came up, and everyone kind of legalizing it one after the other. We'll see what happens. I think so, also. And then, I also, just considering that there are a lot of people who have made a lot of money in the investments and a lot of stocks, and they're showing, especially a lot of the high-growth stocks that are starting to peel back. So, we'll definitely have questions about, what do you

think about stock XYZ? Let's go back to our man behind the glass, Steve Broido. Steve, is there something you're hoping to avoid at the Thanksgiving table in terms of topics? Gout. Gout? I was trying to avoid gout. Topic or trying to avoid it, yes. Trying to avoid it, trying to avoid talking about it, just gout in general. Let's just

steer clear. Maybe, Steve, I don't want to get overly personal, but have you considered maybe you just take your own plate and go into a separate room, because if you don't want to talk about gout and you certainly don't want to talk about stocks, maybe just a table by yourself. Sounds delicious. Table for one for Mr. Broido. And a lot of kale. Ron Gross, Andy Cross, Emily Flippen, thanks so much for being here.

Happy Thanksgiving. Thanks, Chris. Happy Thanksgiving, everybody. That's going to do it for this week's Motley Fool Money. Our engineer is Steve Broido. Our producer is Matt Greer. I'm Chris Hill. Thanks for listening.

We'll see you next week.