Diary October 2018 – Travelling in Finland and portfolio update

Last month I told you about out visit to Stockholm and our amphibious bus ride there. Well in October it was time for some domestic travelling when we decided to head to Haapavesi near Oulu to see my grandmother.

The drive to Haapavesi takes about 5-6 hours from Porvoo and with breaks to get something to eat it’s closer to seven hours. I must admit that it’s pretty tiring to drive there but it was nice that we were able to arrive to Haapavesi before it got dark.

It seems that time has stood still in my grandmother’s place and almost nothing has changed there since our last visit. The view to the “backyard” can be nice on a sunny day though.

Usually we spend a couple weeks in Haapavesi during the summer too. It can get pretty boring there rather quickly, but an investor is never really bored when the stock market is open ? Thank god the internet works there too and there’s usually plenty of time to read interesting stuff. The sauna is also nice there which is a plus.

We saw “A Star is Born”, a movie starring Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga, during the last weekend of October. The movie is a love story between two musicians and contains lots of music from both Gaga and Cooper. Lady Gaga’s singing is of course brilliant but I was surprised by how good Cooper was at singing too. I’m assuming he did his own song performances.

I believe this was Bradley Coopers first movie that he has directed. The movie gets a recommendation from me so go check it out.

My Portfolio

October has been very volatile in the stock market. The gains for the year have been erased both in Helsinki and the U.S.

My portfolio is barely on the positive territory YTD as I’m writing this post. Revenio Group, a Finnish health care technology company, released its Q3 numbers that were a disappointment to the market. Revenue saw a healthy 14,8 % rise compared to the same quarter a year ago and operating profit was 34,4 % of revenue.

I think the disappointment came from the bottom line as operating profit was almost at the same level as it was one year ago. Operating profit grew by 2,6 %.

Revenio Group has been hiring more staff and this among other things increased costs related to the business.

Talenom, a new company in the portfolio

I purchased shares of Talenom, a Finnish accounting company, to the portfolio. Talenom is busy automating processes related to bookkeeping and the company is a probable winner in the digitalisation of Finnish accounting companies.

Talenom is a defensive investment since accounting must be made even during bad times in the economy.

As with any investment there are also risks involved. Talenom is seeking growth abroad, from Sweden, and there are no guarantees they will succeed. There is also a risk of multiple compression as Talenom is currently trading with a P/E of about 20.

Efecte – Sold out

“Efecte is a Finnish software company offering cloud-based service and identity management solutions, supported by professional services.”

I sold my small stake in Efecte during October. Efecte was a slightly speculative investment of mine and I decided to sell so that I could have a more solid investment to the portfolio. I invested the money from Efecte to Talenom.

Efecte could very well turn out to be a great investment and the company is still on my radar. I might get my shares back if things start to look better.