While I typically view myself as a long-term investor, I also try to read the tea leaves and understand how a company’s fundamentals are shaping up. That way, I won’t be totally surprised when the company reports earnings. Sometimes, it makes sense to take signals appropriately and reduce a position you think is shaping up for failure.

This is a tough decision to make, but I think it makes sense to reduce CorePoint ahead of earnings. I say that based on the following:

• Booking Issue Lingered: We know the booking “disruption” from Q2 has lingered in Q3. This literally means they are losing customers because they can’t book on the site. They said it on the call.
  • “On July 30, 2019, we gave notice to LQ Management that we believe there are several events of default under the management agreements relating to all of our wholly owned properties” – so they waited until one month into the quarter to serve a default notice…
  • “On our first quarter call, we noted we were seeing early indications of disruption, in particular, a decline in ADR from the transition and integration of our hotels to the Wyndham platform in April. Unfortunately, that has not yet abated, and July’s RevPAR on a comparable basis was down 5.2% with continued market share loss.” – so we know in July RevPar was down ~5% compared to -6% for Q2.
  • While this should be temporary, I think they clearly tried to signal that the impacts would linger.
• Oil price and rig count is down: We know that CPLG has heavy exposure to Texas and the oil producing regions, which is why some look at oil as a proxy. As shown below, this does not bode well for improving results or an increase in guidance compared to Q2’19.
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• Hurricane Imelda: There is a chance that Hurricane Imelda had a significant impact on results. While not discussed as much as Hurricane Florence and Irene, Imelda caused significant flooding in Texas. We already saw what Hurricane damage did to CPLG before, so I am thinking it likely pressured results in some way (e.g. took some rooms of the table).
• CPLG’s price has recovered: CPLG’s stock was at $10.9 before it reported its last atrocious quarter and now is at $9.7. While I think it is technically cheap, I also think the stock price will follow fundamentals. I think the chances are higher that I’ll be able to nab at a better price post-quarter.

How could I be wrong? Well, I am essentially trying to trade CPLG around earnings, which is usually a losers game. The company also could have resolved the booking issue much faster and that will improve their outlook. Lastly and more importantly, I think the story continues to be around the asset sales. With the stock at such a low p/BV, selling assets above book is very accretive. This is where I am the most concerned on reducing.

Unfortunately, I think this means guidance will have to be reduced from $155MM at mid-point. The company previously guided RevPar to be flat to up 2%, then revised it to down between 2.5% and 4.5%. That new guidance, while abysmal, banks on a recovery in the 2H that I just do not see happening.

Is management stepping in to buy stock? This could be a good signal of how the quarter was shaping up, how they view the prospects of the company, how fundamentals are moving etc.

Sadly, no. Only a director bought right after Q2 ($4,400 ain’t much) and I don’t see any other members of management stepping up.