Nicotine pouches might be the best new consumer category in decades: cheap to make, high margin, and sticky once someone gets hooked, the same traits that made Philip Morris a 16.5% a year compounder for close to a century. George Baxter of Saberpoint Capital has owned Turning Point Brands since his fund's first days, and he thinks the market is missing how well TPB is positioned as the third player behind ZYN and Velo, with FRE and the Tucker Carlson backed Alp now almost half of revenue.

We get into whether pouch users are really brand loyal or will hop around like energy drink buyers (my straw man, using Haypp and Europe), why C-stores want a third brand on the back bar, how the new PMTA rules shut the door on VC-backed upstarts, and the cost gap from making every can in India and air freighting it here. I push back on the part that worries most people: EBITDA is falling while TPB spends on slotting fees, UFC and influencers, Alp is a 50/50 JV with a celebrity, and the longtime CEO just left with a finance guy stepping in. We finish on valuation, from $35 to $45 a share for the legacy Zig-Zag and Stoker's business to George's path to a $1,000 stock by 2030.

This episode is sponsored by Trata. Trata has a lot of TPB transcripts, including two done in the past month, and you can read both for free here:

https://www.trata.com/tpbv1

https://www.trata.com/tpbv2

Trata is two buysiders who both know a stock well talking through the risks and opportunities they see, not just trading price targets. When I'm looking at a new company, one of the first things my AI does is go see what people are saying about it on Trata.

Chapters:

(00:00) Intro: George Baxter and Turning Point Brands

(00:29) Sponsor: Trata

(01:43) Welcome, and 11 years of following TPB

(02:35) TPB's history: Zig-Zag, Stoker's, vapor and Standard General

(06:26) The pouch launch: FRE and the Alp JV with Tucker Carlson

(07:57) Why nicotine pouches look like the new tobacco

(13:00) Brand loyal like cigarettes, or fickle like energy drinks?

(18:45) Why US pouch users buy at the C-store, not online

(22:57) How many brands can a C-store actually carry?

(26:25) ZYN, Velo, and where TPB fits

(28:11) Regulatory capture, Velo Plus, and ZYN losing share

(32:53) PMTA changes shut the door on the VC-backed brands

(36:36) Why C-stores want a third player on the back bar

(39:36) Financials: falling EBITDA, TKO deal and slotting fees

(41:14) Made in India and air freighted: the $1.40 can

(44:11) The PMTA path to US manufacturing and slotting fees rolling off

(51:31) Valuation: what the legacy business is worth

(53:43) FRE's marketing and the energy drink playbook

(55:02) Alp, Tucker Carlson, and building a brand

(59:56) Alp JV economics and the celebrity risk

(1:04:17) Alp and FRE are the same product

(1:05:17) CEO exit, insider ownership and the ATM

(1:06:48) Will TPB buy more of Alp?

(1:09:17) David Glazek takes over

(1:13:43) The 2030 math: a $1,000 stock?

(1:16:20) George's bias disclaimer and his book

(1:18:25) Wrap

George Baxter / Saberpoint Capital

Links:

Yet Another Value Blog - https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com

See our legal disclaimer here: https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com/p/legal-and-disclaimer

The 10 year has gone from 4.2% at the start of the year to 4.6% in late August to 5.1% today, and the S&P is still basically touching all time highs. Interest rates are financial gravity, but I wonder if gravity works on a lag. Consumers and allocators are slow to move money from stocks to bonds, and corporates termed out a lot of 3.5% debt in 2021 to 2023 that starts rolling in 2028 to 2031. Today's free cash flow is flattered by that spread. Underneath the index there is already real pain in housing, levered small caps and biotech, and my bottom line is the margin of safety in stocks keeps getting skinnier.

From there: why merger arb spreads that looked juicy to anyone who came of age in ZIRP are just the time value of money at 5%, and where the crashes and long bear markets went. We have gone from 1929, 1987 and 1972 to 1974 to a nine month GFC, a two month COVID drawdown and a tariff tantrum that lasted weeks. Is that a stronger market, or a more fragile one waiting for one big break?

Then a friend's line that every investor is either overconfident or has imposter syndrome. I am firmly in the imposter camp, which is a problem, because almost every great investor I can name reads as overconfident. Survivorship explains a lot of it: we don't see the overconfident coin flippers who zeroed out, and Archegos is the cautionary tale. I close on mentorship, sparked by Ian Cassel's book Stock Picker and his mentor Skip, and why everyone, Buffett included with Ben Graham, eventually outgrows their mentor.

Today's post on Muse and the inertia sell off: https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com/p/musings-on-muse-the-inertia-sell

My episode with Ian Cassel on Stock Picker: https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com/p/ian-cassel-on-stock-picker-the-book

Last month's rates piece: https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com/p/rates-are-screaming-and-stocks-arent

This episode is sponsored by Fiscal.ai: https://fiscal.ai/yav. I'm a paying customer and I connect to Fiscal through its API. Two things I use it for: a huge database of fund letters I can pull up on any name I'm researching, and audited financials where every number in the model links back to the source. Use my link for 15% off their AI connector.

Chapters:

(00:00) What I'm rambling about this month

(01:57) Sponsor: Fiscal.ai

(03:30) Two stories: Muse and rates

(04:24) Interest rates are financial gravity

(07:35) Does gravity work on a lag? The coming debt refi wave

(09:17) Index highs, pain underneath: housing, small caps, biotech

(11:23) Rates and special situations: merger arb isn't free money anymore

(14:22) Where did the crashes and long bear markets go?

(18:11) Fed put, fragility, and one big break

(19:55) Overconfident investors vs imposter syndrome

(23:20) Survivorship: Archegos and Situational Awareness

(25:32) Mentors: Ian Cassel's Stock Picker and Skip

(27:16) Even Buffett outgrew Ben Graham

(30:07) Journaling as a way to keep evolving

(30:51) Wrapping up

Links:

Yet Another Value Blog - https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com

See our legal disclaimer here: https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com/p/legal-and-disclaimer

Shift4 trades around six and a half times EBITDA while the company tells you organic growth is 11%. The stock was $120 eighteen months ago and it is $42 today. Andrew Carreon of Emeth Value Capital argues you are paying for zero growth or less, and he points at the piece almost nobody is tracking: the gross equipment under lease line buried in the footnotes, which has gone from a nominal $40 million before 2021 to a $400 million run rate today as Shift4 Dine gets deployed. More than 80% of those installs are net new merchants, not migrations off the legacy POS systems Shift4 already owns.

I push back on the two things that keep value investors out of this name. First, the growth wall: the easy share gains from mid-sized restaurants running 1999-era on-prem systems are supposedly gone, and once that funnel empties you are in a churn fight with Toast and Square. Second, and more common, the distrust of management: they pulled the billion dollar free cash flow guide, they paid 12 to 13 times for Global Blue, they cut the buyback in Q2 after retiring 10% of the shares in three quarters, and they still will not name the acquisition they signed. We also get into what it means that Jared Isaacman is running NASA while owning 28% of the company and buying stock in the 40s, why he might be a back pocket activist, and the $1 billion mandatory convert that explains a real chunk of the 25% short interest.

Andrew's write-up on Shift4: https://www.emethvaluecapital.com/letters-1

This episode is sponsored by Trata: https://www.trata.com/four. Trata is two buy side investors hopping on an anonymous call and talking about a stock they own or follow, and the real issues they see in it. Go to trata.com/four to see the sample transcripts I used to prep for this episode.

Chapters:

(0:00) Intro

(1:03) Sponsor: Trata

(1:53) Why Shift4 keeps attracting value investors

(3:12) What Shift4 is: restaurants, hotels, stadiums, luxury retail

(5:14) Payments has been a value investor graveyard

(9:23) Isaacman leaves for NASA. Is the magic gone?

(13:07) Card present, card not present, and what integrated payments means

(19:25) Restaurants: how Shift4 assembled the vertical

(24:07) Shift4 Dine: the balance sheet line nobody is watching

(27:00) PAR, Toast, and the competition pushback

(33:12) Credit card surcharging and the 0% processing pitch

(37:24) International: buy the sales team, do not build one

(41:31) Is organic growth about to hit a wall?

(47:34) Do you trust this management team?

(53:31) SaaSpocalypse, AI, and why payments has not bounced

(57:05) The M&A history, and the bids they turned down

(60:14) The 2029 catalyst if Isaacman leaves NASA

(61:19) How to build your own organic growth number

(63:17) 25% short interest and the $1bn mandatory convert

(66:30) Disclaimer

Andrew Carreon / Emeth Value Capital: https://www.emethvaluecapital.com/letters-1

Links:

Yet Another Value Blog - https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com

See our legal disclaimer here: https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com/p/legal-and-disclaimer