[Full Transcript] Ben Axler Short Pitch – Kase Learning Shorting Conference

Full transcript of Ben Axler, Founder & Chief Investment Officer of Spruce Point Capital, from the 2018 from the 2018 Kase Learning Shortselling Conference.

Please note this transcript may contain mistakes – this was done by a human but its impossible to get every word correct and the audio was a bit unclear at times – enjoy

Q3 hedge fund letters, conference, scoops etc

He’s one of the best-known activist short-sellers out there at Spruce Point. He’s got a couple of great ideas to share with us, so welcome him.

Thank you, everybody. Thank you, Whitney, for inviting me back. I’d like to be up here to tell you that Whitney saved me, towards the end, best for last, but quite honestly, I’m probably only here because I have the simplest, stupidest idea to pitch and it’s short. I know it’s been a long day for you guys, so I want something that will resonate that’s very easy for everybody. The topic today is, what’s left assured after the precipitous October and November market collapse. A lot of the names we’ve published on have been very vocal, seeming dissipated 20/30 percent in a month. As I’m looking through the portfolio of things I’ve written about, what hasn’t gone down?

I think one theme that we’ve seen is that the market has rotated into more consumer-staple defensive names. Perhaps we’ve seeing recession coming down the pipeline or whatnot. Just because something is defensive and something’s cheap doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s a good buy and there’s value. We’re going to revisit a name that we’ve spoken a little bit about earlier this year, which is