🎌 Stock Focus : Nintendo 任天堂 [7974]

 

At its Bubble Era peak of ¥34,300, Nintendo was trading at over 10x its projected following year revenue, compared to 1.6x in '76, 1.3x in '78, 2.1x in '96, 2.05x at its '03 low, 4.33x in '23 & just over 5x currently. It was 6.69x at the 2007 peak of ¥73,200, but plumbed to 1.4x at the 2012 nadir. Price to book has fluctuated wildly, as can be imagined, with the ratio dipping to below 1 briefly in 2012 despite being just under 2x at the '74 low &  just over 1.2x at the '82 & '03 lows. It was during the course of 1981, when its classic Game & Watch handheld devices were unleashed onto the world that the P/B ratio soared to 3.83x even at the 1982 low as the stock was re-rated [vs 3.33x now & 8.5x at the '07 pinnacle & 9.1x at the '89 one]. As the company transitioned from traditional 'hanafuda' playing cards to the electronic gaming era of the '80s, its revenue ballooned from under ¥10 billion in '77 to over ¥117 billion by '85 with the release of the 'Famicom' game console two years prior & 'Super Mario Bros' in that very year & then 'Tetris' & 'Donkey Kong' a little later. This was accompanied by a 42-fold rocketing of the stock in the decade spanning 1979-1989.

Dividend yield peaked at 5.8% in 2009, after dipping below 1% at the '07 blowoff top. At my maiden entry price of ¥8,455 today, it's 2.1%, with the March portion alone at 1.6%: Despite buying above its adjusted peak of 19 years ago of ¥7,320,  I'm predicting that the stock will at least  be courted for the latter dividend. The price peaked on 26/6/08, 3/4/09, 5/4/10, 22/3/12 & 24/7/13 after that generational summit price in November nineteen years ago.  In rare losing year 2012 [an adjusted (¥33.8)], its highest yield was 1.2% at its nadir 90% below today's close on Nikkei fresh record high 58,875.17 day.

Projected EPS is 29% below the gaming stock's record ¥421.4 EPS in '24, achieved 15 months before the stocks new record high just over double its old pinnacle price, which suggests that it has overcorrected after 3 forays above ¥14,000 in the last 7 months [ 18/8, 12/9 & 6/11 of '25]

A rare zero debt technology/gaming company whose price rebound looks likely to be sharp between now & March 30th, barring any adverse announcements.  Although this argument may be weak, it's lower than the 0.618 Fibronacci retracement of the rise from ¥4,789 in '21 to the all-time high of  ¥14,795 just last year. Projected revenue to be announced in May is an all-time high of ¥2.25 trillion, fully 22% above the old 2009 peak. The most recent Q3 saw a record quarterly revenue of  ¥806.318 billion, itself almost a third of the projected FY number & an 86% increase on the previous year's corresponding figure!

I am certainly counting on the rampantly ebullient Japanese stock index to court foreign funds to game this equity back to ¥10,000 at least sometime in '26! 

.

Profitable JPN stocks as of 25th Feb '26:

Mitsuboshi

Sansha E

Shinto

TKS

Kao

Kawai

Almetax

Aigan

Daiun

Molitec S

Nippon Shikizai

Fujix

Miracle Streak : #25/'26 MNRB TRIPLES the old '17-'18 Record ! {25th Feb '26}

 

The first time in 11 years just before the Lunar New Year & again today, MNRB delivers to TRIPLE the old '17-'18 marathon record, pared @ the best levels since Jul '26 2007! Another momentous day because's Nikkei hits a fresh all-time high 51% above its Bubble Era peak while fabled gaming stock Nintendo 任天堂 falls into my hands at a price that pays off the lofty commission by the close!

Miracle Streak : Leform returns EXACTLY two years after its contribution to 861 days in a row on 24th Feb '24 ! {24th Feb '26}

 

Booted OUT at the day's high, at day's end after a speculative knife-catching on 22nd Feb '24 proved prescient for a contra gain 2 days later !!!

🎌 Stock Focus : Olympus オリンパス [7733]

 

Although the maker of therapeutic & surgical instruments is trading 8.3% above its old high in the previous generation, the annual dividend is also 3.75x higher than its previous highest in 2008 & book value was 60% lower than currently, although projected '26 revenue is also 12% lower than the still-standing record of ¥1.128875 trillion back then. Total assets have increased 55% since seven years ago when the price was slightly lower & capital adequacy has advanced eight % points since then to 53%.

Olympus is also coming off a record ¥199.9 EPS in '24 [which was foreshadowed strangely 2 years in advance with a record ¥3,198 stock price 20 months before this concretized number was announced] & projected FY EPS to be announced in May is 80% lower than that figure. This still implies a PE of a tad over 29 which beats many overvalued tech stocks now pummeled by AI fears!

As evidenced by the snapshots above, this storied company has seen massive Bubble Era writedown losses of roughly ¥50 billion in each of the years 2009 & 2012 which was accompanied by a massive drop in NTA from a peak of ¥263.8 in '08 to ¥33.6 at its worst in '12 when the stock price cratered at ¥106 [ NTA is ¥666.54 currently ].

Today I was fortunate enough to finally bag the stock for my portfolio at a 7.4% discount to the low on the 1st day of the Lunar New Year when I first put in a buy order & also for M$35 cheaper than the volume-weighted average of ¥1,448.498 today & additionally, at a 2-tick discount to last year's Trumpanic low, at the close! Today is also the 7th day of falls in the last 8 days post- its 43% quarterly profit decline announcement on Feb 13th. 

I have a 95% conviction of earning by end-March at the very latest & will be a happy seller at its 3-month-ago high of ¥2,168 but can flee at its ¥1,605.5 Jun '25 low-turned resistance!

Miracle Streak : Takeover target Timberwell scores TWICE as #24/'26 ! {23rd Feb '26}

 

🎌 Stock Focus : Tensho Electric 天昇電気工業 [6776]

 

As can be seen from the above snapshots, the plastic molding & automotive component maker's financials have improved tremendously over the last 30 years [ a legacy of when the company suffered big losses in the early 1990s], with capital adequacy rising from the teen %s to 47.4% & book has soared from ¥19 to ¥618 while operating cashflow has been healthy in the mid +¥2 billion range. NTA has thus risen a third in the last 3 years after halving to the mid ¥100 range post-2008. 

The company is coming off a record ¥74.30 EPS last year, which is projected to fall 80% back to 2022 levels & revenue is 29% lower than the '08 record: this is another stock of which I don't have a thorough understanding of the business, but relying almost exclusively on technical analysis [ showing a base occurring every 2-3 years with the latest being in 2025 ], anticipate a rise sometime between this year & 2027, perhaps culminating in a peak sometime early next year!

Furthermore, the top two shareholders hold a combined 47.3% of its 17.014 million shares outstanding, the low free-float perhaps explaining why the stock multiplied nearly 7-fold between 2002 low & the 2006 peak & more than 11-fold between its 2016 low & its 2019 peak. Top holder Sanko Realty 三甲不動産 has actually acquired 10,000 shares since 30 months ago despite already holding 33.5% & there is thus a not insignificant chance of a TOB or buyout offer within the next 2-3 years.

Another stock [ coincidentally with a nearly identical NTA to Tensho ] that was bought rashly after the euphoria of my first ever takeover experience in Japan, Toshiba's buyout of Nishishiba on Nov 13th 2019, today marks its 2nd day in the black after commissions despite being firmly in the red virtually throughout the last 75 months since purchase, thanks to an incomplete averaging down last year at a 35% discount to the ill-conceived entry. The maiden entry was goaded by overconfidence in earning what was then my biggest single win of  over ¥86,000 barely 17 months after my debut in the country. On hindsight, I didn't realize fully that Aigan 愛眼 was plagued by losses for most of the previous 11 years, but was stung by my narrowly missing its ascent from  ¥214 in Aug '17 to a stratospheric ¥861 within a few months, that I was happy to buy in at a price lower than its 2012 bottom:

No dividends since then, yet the forecast improvement of a turnaround from losses in '24 to a ¥7.7 EPS this year may foreshadow a similar turnaround to a ¥9.3 EPS in '18 from a (¥20.4) EPS in '17.  

Miracle Streak : Daiun 大運 is the 5th🎌in '26 & 118th🎌 since '17 after just 9 weeks ! {20th Feb '26}

 

With a name that I believe will embody my journey in 2026, Osakaport operator Daiun 大運 sails the record to 1,383 days in a row while bagging#5 in '26 & #118 since '17 ! Also, I re-enter Saylor Advertising 　セーラー広告 months after it became my Japanese Centurion & the 83rd score on 28th August last year, for a price 19.3% cheaper or ¥22,216.46 compared to my maiden but too-early entry in '25. However, I believe this time it's a better entry because the '"saucer bottom" is nearing completion !

🎌 Diary : How I Entered Molitec モリテック Steel on the Ground Floor

Another stock I'm eyeing :

C/B ratio has improved from 0.422 in '19 to 0.500 in '23 & 0.586 now, while net current assets has jumped from 1,297 to 1,618 while net net has dipped from 822 in '19 to 766.

Miracle Streak : Land & General strikes TWICE as #15/'26 on the 1st Market day after the Lunar New Year ! {19th Feb '26}

 

Profitable Japanese stocks:

Molitec Steel

Daiun

Kao

Almetax

Shinto

Kawai

TKS

Sansha E

Aigan

Mitsuboshi

 

Maybulk may have bottomed out for good:

Miracle Streak : MNRB Achieves a small Miracle on Lunar Year's Eve ! {16th Feb '26}

 

On the eve of the Lunar New Year, a small miracle: insurer MNRB finally delivers after deep paper losses since the last contribution 11 years ago, popping to near 19-year highs on great quarterly results. In Japan, recently purchased Molitec モリテック Steel rises smartly 19% above cost while even more recently purchased Kawai Musical 河合旋料 inches to 7% higher!

Miracle Streak : Dark Horse Timberwell emerges to secure 1,380 for the Record ! {13th Feb '26}

 

Timberwell, which I didn't know was a takeover target until last night, thankfully, scores a hat-trick of takeovers since X'mas : after Sawafuji Electric 澤藤電機 & Guocoland M'sia...inching towards TRIPLING the old '17-'18 record run which lasted 46 months!