SMT Scharf: A hidden champion in a crisis
SMT Scharf is the world market leader for underground monorail systems. The company is based in Hamm, Germany. It keeps appearing in my return on invested capital screener. The screener is based on Bruce Greenwalds Book (Value Investing: From Graham to Buffett and Beyond) and some minor tweaks which he addresses in a couple interviews. This post address ROIC, CROIC (sometimes called FCFOIC). And it was my first non-software company I researched. I take much time to analyse this company, primarily because it is not my circle of competence. It is very dangerous to be outside of the circle. To be clear, I took nearly 10 month to think about SMT Scharf. My investment style is much like building a startup. I have 100s if not 1000s ideas per year, about products I could build and ship. But real potential have only 1 idea every 2 years!If I begin to invest my time and energy, the whole startup story has to be defined and the major risks pointed out - I want to kill the startup a...