wearmanyhats

It might come as a bit of shock to some of you that my day job is a part-time reflexologist.  It is one of the myriad of hats I wear, along with mother, small business owner, investor, wife, church member, etc.   Sometmes, in between clients, I can be found sitting in a small internet cafe, doing a dozen things on the net.  One day, the woman who worked in the flower shop came in muttering about the price of balloons.  They had gone up, you see, and no one was prepared for the price hikes.

“So why are they up?” I asked.

“It’s the firggin’ helium,” she said.  “They need it in the hospitals, too, you know, and the supplier says it’s going through the roof.”

Ever mindful of Peter Lynch’s habit of watching things around our world and using them to make money, I surfed over and researched Airgas (ARG).  Convinced that it had an exceptional  P/E, excellent numbers, and a chart to die for, I grabbed a bunch at $46, then watched it blizt on a sudden move to $59.  Seventy-seven days after buying, I sold out at $59, a bit nervous about its sudden streak upward.  But I was ecstatic over the run and gave the balloon lady a hug.

But I have never forgotten ARG and have watched it like a hawk ever since.  Now I think it might be ready to start gliding upward again.  Why?  Well, consider that all during the downward drag of the dow in the past recent months, ARG really didn’t suffer much of a decline.  It dilly dallied around the mid 50’s since I sold out in May, leading me to believe that it has found its bottom.  Plus the P/E is now adjusted back to 20 after the last company quarterly statement revealed new income growth. 

Is it just helium and hospitals that are making this stock go up?  No, it’s inflation, and especially of a commodity in limited supply.  All gasses are limited, and the world is using up gasses on an industrial scale unlike time has ever seen.  Look at the gasses used in places like body shops, where body men use them for welding.  There are refrigerants and dry ice, all of which are either made by Airgas or by one of its subsidiaries, plus dozens more. 

I checked to see if insiders are buying, and it didn’t surprise me that they are not.  ARG is trading at an all time high, but I noticed that darned few insders were selling.  Clearly they expect the worth of their shares to still go up.

ARG’s numbers look good all around.  Income is up, and their net profit has skyrocketed.  They just completed another subsidiary buy and that means more profits on their balance sheet in the future. 

 Finally, few financial prognosticators are going to even notice ARG, but if any or several do, the stock should start to take off.  

 So I’m going to set my buy order at 57.75 and see if it can grab.  Then we’ll check back on it in another blog later to see how it is doing. 

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