I read this thread by samsamsam about "
World Chocolate Deficit - May lead to fatties rioting".... while it is fun making jokes about fatties and whatnot; what really hit me is the potential money making opportunity that this may present in the future.
What do i mean?
If there is truly going to be an increasing scarcity of cocoa... this will drive up the price of cocoa on the commodities futures index; also, that means those companies making candies and chocolate, will pass on the price to consumers.
Cocoa scarcity will mean, candy/chocolate companies that are well-capitalized will out-muscle their weaker competitors; i will expect merger and acquisition shooting up in this sector of the agribusiness. Since all these companies will be competing for a dwindling resource(cocoa), the strongest companies will either absorb or starved the weaker companies out of existence. Which means that the stronger companies will gobble up more market share, pass on the cost to their consumers, and use cocoa scarcity + increasing demand for candies and chocolate, to help drive up their stock prices.......
I sincerely doubt their profit margin will be squeezed... certainly not with these gourmandizing creatures around:
On a more serious note: cocoa is used for multiple other things, besides candies for the likes of Lindy West....
The ETF for cocoa, that follows the commodity futures price is: NIB. Which is an iPath DJ-UBS Cocoa SubTR ETN [i do not like the 'CHOC' etf at all]
A couple of candy/chocolate stocks are: TR (Toostie rolls), HSY(hershey), RMCF(rocky mountain chocolate factory), LNCE(snyder's-lance).
I AM NOT BUYING ANY OF THESE STOCKS NOW, SIMPLY BECAUSE: The cocoa scarcity news may have been over-hyped. But, i will definitely keep my eyes
on cocoa news going forward.... One major thing i will look for is M & A activity in the candy/chocolate agribusiness sector... i will also look for massive consolidation and return of bullishness in the cocoa futures chart.
Because an unrelenting scarcity of cocoa = long term, multi-year upswings for cocoa future prices... right now though, NIB is diving downward after the euphoric upswing from Ebola scare...
For me, this is not yet the time to buy... but to wait and watch.... watch and wait... to see if (1) any of the stories about cocoa scarcity is actually true, (2) look for other indicators, such as bullish price actions in the cocoa future chart, (3) if there is M & A activities in the cocoa agribusiness sector.
regards,
Nemencine
p.s. As an aside, because i don't want to create an entirely new post about this: For those interested in special situation investments like spinoffs. Here is a good site:
http://www.stockspinoffs.com/upcoming-spinoffs/ and the morningstar website:
http://www.morningstar.com/topics/spin-offs.htm