Iridium Communications: Best For Near-Term Capital Gain (NASDAQ:IRDM)

Investment Thesis

The trade-commission-free automation progress achieved by securities markets in serving a continuing flow of individual investor internet-order small trades makes it necessary for Market-Makers to have capital at risk while handling the irregular huge-value “institutional” transactions. They protect their at-risk capital endangerment by hedging actions which reflects the coming price range expectations of the stocks involved – virtually all of the actively-traded issues.

The pricing and structure of such hedges reveal the coming-price expectations of both the MM protection-buyers and that of the MM industry protection-sellers.

Our selection of Iridium Communications Inc. (NASDAQ:IRDM) is established by its currently-attractive stock pricing reinforced by other Seeking Alpha fundamental-analytical contributors.

Description of Subject Company

“Iridium Communications Inc. provides mobile voice and data communications services and products to businesses, the United States and international governments, non-governmental organizations, and consumers worldwide. The company offers postpaid mobile voice and data satellite communications; prepaid mobile voice satellite communications; push-to-talk; broadband data; and Internet of Things [IoT] services. It also provides data solutions comprising personnel tracking devices; asset tracking devices for equipment, vehicles, and aircrafts; beyond-line-of-sight aircraft communications applications; maritime communications applications; specialized communications solutions for high-value individuals; mobile communications and data devices for the military and intelligence agencies and maintenance services for the United States government’s dedicated gateway. Iridium Communications Inc. sells its products and services to commercial end users through a wholesale distribution network that include service providers, and value-added resellers and manufacturers. The company was formerly known as Iridium Holdings LLC and changed its name to Iridium Communications Inc. in September 2009. Iridium Communications Inc. was founded in 2000 and is headquartered in McLean, Virginia.”

Source: Yahoo Finance

Risk~Reward Comparisons of Portfolio Investment Candidates

Figure 1

(used with prior permission)

The tradeoffs here are between near-term upside price gains (green horizontal scale) seen worth protecting against by Market-makers with short positions in each of the stocks, and the prior actual price drawdowns experienced during holdings of those stocks (red vertical scale). Both scales are of percent change from zero to 25%.

The intersection of those coordinates by the numbered positions is identified by the stock symbols in the blue field to the right.

The dotted diagonal line marks the points of equal upside price change forecasts derived from Market-Maker [MM] hedging actions and the actual worst-case price drawdowns from positions that could have been taken following prior MM forecasts like today’s.

Our principal interest is in IRDM at location [8]. A “market index” norm of reward~risk tradeoffs is offered by SPDR S&P500 index ETF at [13].

Those forecasts are implied by the self-protective behaviors of MMs who must usually put firm capital at temporary risk to balance buyer and seller interests in helping big-money portfolio managers make volume adjustments to multi-billion-dollar portfolios. The protective actions taken with real-money bets define daily the extent of likely expected price changes for thousands of stocks and ETFs.

This map is a good starting point, but it can only cover some of the investment characteristics that often should influence an investor’s choice of where to put his/her capital to work. The table in Figure 2 covers the above considerations and several others.

Comparing Alternative Investments

Figure 2

(used with permission)

Column headers for Figure 2 define elements for each row stock whose symbol appears at the left in column [A]. The elements are derived or calculated separately for each stock, based on the specifics of its situation and current-day MM price-range forecasts. Data in red numerals are negative, usually undesirable to “long” holding positions. Table cells with yellow fills are of data for the stock of principal interest and of all issues at the ranking column, [R].

Readers familiar with our analysis methods may wish to skip to the next section viewing price range forecast trends for IRDM.

Figure 2’s purpose is to attempt universally comparable measures, stock by stock, of a) How BIG the price gain payoff may be, b) how LIKELY the payoff will be a profitable experience, c) how SOON it may happen, and d) what price drawdown RISK may be encountered during its holding period.

The price-range forecast limits of columns [B] and [C] get defined by MM hedging actions to protect firm capital required to be put at risk of price changes from volume trade orders placed by big-$ “institutional” clients.

[E] measures potential upside risks for MM short positions created to fill such orders, and reward potentials for the buy-side positions so created. Prior forecasts like the present provide a history of relevant price draw-down risks for buyers. An average of the most severe ones actually encountered are in [F], during holding periods in effort to reach [E] gains. Those are where buyers are most likely to accept losses.

[H] tells what proportion of the [L] sample of prior like forecasts have earned gains by either having price reach its [B] target or be above its [D] entry cost at the end of a 3-month max-patience holding period limit. [ I ] gives the net gains-losses of those [L] experiences and [N] suggests how credible [E] may be compared to [ I ].

Further Reward~Risk tradeoffs involve using the [H] odds for gains and the 100 – H loss odds as weights for N-conditioned [E] and for [F], for a combined-return score [Q]. The typical position holding period [J] on [Q] provides a figure of merit [fom] ranking measure [R] useful in portfolio position preferences. Figure 2 is row-ranked on [R] among candidate securities, with IRDM yellow-row identified. Pink highlighted cells are alerts of data deficient in its intended purpose.

Along with the candidate-specific stocks these selection considerations are provided for the averages of over 3,000 stocks for which MM price-range forecasts are available today, and 20 of the best-ranked (by fom) of those forecasts, as well as the forecast for S&P500 Index ETF (NYSEARCA:SPY) as an equity market proxy.

Recent Trends in IRDM MM Price-Range Forecasts

Figure 3

(used with prior permission)

This picture is not a “technical chart” of past prices for IRDM. Instead, its vertical lines show the past 6 months of daily price range forecasts of market actions yet to come in the next few months. The only past information there is the heavy dot of the closing stock price on the day of each forecast.

That data splits the price range’s opposite forecasts into upside and downside prospects. Their trends over time provide additional insights into coming potentials, and helps keep perspective on what may be coming.

The small picture at the bottom of Figure 3 is a frequency distribution of the Range Index’s appearance daily during the past 5 years of daily forecasts. The Range Index [RI] tells how much the downside of the forecast range occupies of that percentage of the entire range each day, and its frequency suggests what may seem “normal” for that stock, in the expectations of its evaluators’ eyes. A RI of 10, about 10% of the range leaves the other 90% of the price change potential to the upside.

The Win Odds of 75 tells that percentage of all prior forecasts in 5 years like today’s have seen the stock’s price advance above its entry cost, often to its Sell Target.

Conclusion

Among these alternative investments explicitly compared, Iridium Communications Inc. appears to be a logical buy preference now for investors seeking near-term capital gain.