What do you think of RUTH (Ruth's Chris)?

[FinanceDude]

Nords, thanks for the well thought out reply! I do post on fund alarm a bit, and have started to post here but I found them a bit friendlier. I.e. when I poster my portfolio here it got ripped apart while everyone at Fund Alarm loved it, all I have to say is proof is in the pudding as am handily beating the EFA and SPX to the tune of 20% over the past 7 months, when I started.

But from your post I get the feeling like stocks just aren't worth it, and I should stick to my trust buy and hold funds. To put this in perspective, I've got 100k between Vanguard and Firstrade, and 2k to gamble, either poker, or RUTH, and I was just curious what you thought about this individual stock, since I'm obviously too lazy to do the work myself. I just fired up M star today and saw it as one of their small growth picks, and I thought it might be fun to add a little spice to my portfolio. Indexing/ active management isn't sexy, but it's certainly the way to get rich, what I wanted was a fun way to treat myself, and add some spice.

In the end, it's your money, and you can do what you want. I gave your my opinion, which you obviously missed............I'm not a fan right now of Red Lobster, Applebees, Ruth's or anyone else now. Cheesecake Factory was a good play awhile back but their price is a little frothy for me...........

If we have a correction/ little recession, one of the FIRST things people dial back on is going out to eat.............Ruth's is hardly a recession-proof business.........

As far as so and so saying this is their "growth pick of the year" or whatever, I usually run away from such advice...........

 

[megacorp-firee]

tsk tsk .... where are all of the buy and hold indexers here?

If gambliing is what you want, go to Vegas and put it all on a hard 8..... pays better than red or black....

imo Ruth Chris has EXCELLENT quality steaks and the service is tremendous ... dang now I'm hungry again ... and it's hours to dinner ....

 

[Culture]

I think Ruth's Chris is overpriced and can only succeed in areas where everyone pays on expense account. The one in Sugar Land, Texas (One of the wealthiest counties in the county) went out of business b/c there is no business traffic in this bedroom community.

 

[saluki9]

I think Ruth's Chris is overpriced and can only succeed in areas where everyone pays on expense account. The one in Sugar Land, Texas (One of the wealthiest counties in the county) went out of business b/c there is no business traffic in this bedroom community.

Yup! I bet 75% of the $$$ spend at RCs is expense account money. I'd be more concerned about business spending than consumer spending.

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Hah. I walked by it once, looked at the menu prices and kept going. For the price of dinner for two, I could buy an entire tenderloin at costco, cut into 10-12 very thick steaks in about 5 minutes, and eat well for a couple of weeks.

As far as stock picking...most people I've seen have as many bad ideas as good ones. But quickly forget about the bad ones.

 

[skyline]

...all I have to say is proof is in the pudding as am handily beating the EFA and SPX to the tune of 20% over the past 7 months, when I started...

[removed original unnecessarily inflamatory response. All I'll say instead is that I wish I could be this young again...I'm jealous]

 

[free4now]

This thread inspired me to take a look at HOTT and ELON, the last two individual stocks I owned before I converted entirely to indexes (and, ahem, BRK). I'm happy to see that the indexes beat them since I divested.

I think everyone who has aspirations of being a good investor has to go through the stock picking phase, and the earlier you can get it over with the better.

 

[chinaco]

I can't afford to buy their stock... Because I ate there and have no money left.

I have not followed their stock. I was not even aware they were a public company.


I did take a look. Here is my take. invest in mutual funds. If you want to invest in individual securities, take some finance course at the university and read, read, read.

Join the American Association of Individual Investors, Follow a know approach in a disciplined way (for example CANSLIM).

Aside from just getting lucky (not unlike gambling and taking much risk)... what do you think you can earn by investing in individual securities over the long-term? Pick a % of total return (pre-tax)... Do you think you can beat the market? That is what you are setting out to do.

I believe you can beat the market as an individual... but only by a small % (on a risk adjusted basis)... That is unless you get very lucky and know when to fold your cards and stop!

Good luck!

 

[Niko]

Example, I started buying WHI around $5.25. I think it is easily worth $10 when they work through their credit issues and I have little fear of them completely imploding. I kept buying down to a bit under $5. When teh stock slumped down to $4.65 or so, I was full up, so I bought the longest dated $5 strike call options I could get. We will see how this works out over time, but the Q1 results they put out suggest that they are already working through their credit issues and the PR bank scene is just waiting for a wave of consolidation.

Out of idle curiousity, Brewer, I looked up WHI. I saw a 102:100 split 3.5 years ago. For the equity ignorant (such as myself) can you explain what purpose is served by a 102:100 split?

 

[brewer12345]

Out of idle curiousity, Brewer, I looked up WHI. I saw a 102:100 split 3.5 years ago. For the equity ignorant (such as myself) can you explain what purpose is served by a 102:100 split?

Search me. Sounds more liike a 2% stock dividend. Never looked back that far on the split history since I tend to think splits are meaningless.

Could also have been some kind of maneuver. PPD did a 100:1 and then a 1:100 split instantaneously taht allowed them to force everyone with less than 100 shares to sell their stock to the company.