The ASX share with 'unassailable' lead over rivals: expert

Ask A Fund Manager: Fidelity International's Kate Howitt reveals the 'undisruptable' and 'unsellable' stock that she'd be happy to hold for a decade.

| More on:
Fast businessman with a car wins against the competitors.

Image source: Getty Images

You’re reading a free article with opinions that may differ from The Motley Fool’s Premium Investing Services. Become a Motley Fool member today to get instant access to our top analyst recommendations, in-depth research, investing resources, and more. Learn More

Ask A Fund Manager

The Motley Fool chats with fund managers so that you can get an insight into how the professionals think. In this edition, Fidelity International portfolio manager Kate Howitt reckons she could hold one particular ASX share for 10 years without a worry.

The ASX share for a comfortable night's sleep

The Motley Fool: If the market closed tomorrow for 4 years, which stock would you want to hold?

Kate Howitt: Let's shut it down for 10 years. That'd be WiseTech Global Ltd (ASX: WTC).

WiseTech is a software business, and software is very asset-light. So the economics can be brilliant. There's a lot of businesses out there that are software-ish, WiseTech is pure software. All they sell is software. 

We spend a lot of time trying to understand things and it can help to have an analogy. I think the closest analogy for WiseTech is Bloomberg. It's the same thing, right? You've got logistics, and you've got finance. Both of them are global industries, both of them are incredibly data-driven, both of them have very disparate data sets. 

Mike Bloomberg went around hoovering up all of the finance data sets around the globe to put them into one platform. And it's now pretty hard to operate in global finance without at least one Bloomberg terminal sitting in the corner. Richard White is doing a similar play for all of the data sets in global logistics. Equally very, very disparate.

But I actually think it goes a bit further than that. I think WiseTech is more like Bloomberg plus the LSE, plus the NYSE, plus the SGX — because [WiseTech] is also becoming the platform on which business gets conducted. 

He [White] copped a lot of flack a couple of years ago for all the acquisitions, but what he's done is just kind of buy-in people and data. That means his lead is pretty much unassailable. It's hard to see how there could be a competitor to WiseTech that can build a kind of integrated data set and functionality that WiseTech now offers to its clients. And you can see that the largest logistics players are just kind of progressively adopting WiseTech.

Now, the caveat is it's on a triple-digit PE, right?

What I remind myself of this one is if you are at the dot-com peak — that frenzy back in '99 and early 2000 where the internet was changing the world — it turns out it was right. The internet was changing the world, but there were only a couple of companies that were the real winners out of that. So there were a lot of 'pets.com' that blew up. It all went to zero and everyone lost money. There were a couple like Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT), and Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOGL), and Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ: AMZN), who were around then and who did go on to change the world. But for some of them, it was about 16 years until they regained those highs.

So with WiseTech, [what] if we had a big tech meltdown?

Tech valuations are a stretch, and partly that's driven by the low capital intensity of the business model, partly that's driven by low-interest rates and the discount factor that you're applying… But if sentiment reversed, interest rates went up, all of those valuations collapsed, who's the stock that in a decade's time, will have the earnings growth come through to eventually regain those highs? I think WiseTech is going to be one of those stocks, especially out of our market. 

Tech has the risk of being disrupted. They come and then they disrupt others — Blackberry gets disrupted by the iPhone.

I think the really powerful ones are the tech companies that just get such broad network effects that they become unsellable and undisruptable. I think WiseTech has that kind of business model. 

Totally I could see it going backwards for years and years if the valuation mindset changed, but the earnings power will eventually bring that one back.

But it's the kind of stock you should either only hold as much as you are prepared to not worry about for 10 years, or if you know you've got the stomach to not sell at a loss. 

If you're saving up for something in a couple of years' time, or if you know that you tend to be a bit trigger-happy, then that's not a stock to own. Not now.

Read Kate Howitt's thoughts on getting more women involved in the finance world here.

John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. Teresa Kersten, an employee of LinkedIn, a Microsoft subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. Motley Fool contributor Tony Yoo owns shares of Alphabet (A shares), Amazon, and Microsoft. The Motley Fool Australia's parent company Motley Fool Holdings Inc. owns shares of and has recommended Alphabet (A shares), Microsoft, and WiseTech Global. The Motley Fool Australia owns shares of and has recommended WiseTech Global. The Motley Fool Australia has recommended Alphabet (A shares), Alphabet (C shares), and Amazon. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. This article contains general investment advice only (under AFSL 400691). Authorised by Bruce Jackson.

More on Ask a Fund Manager

A businessman wearing a dark suit points at the camera in a gesture to represent Soul Patts encouraging AGL to give more thought to the Brookfield Consortium's takeover bid
Investing Strategies

This ASX share's halved in 5 years, but I'm still sticking with it

Ask A Fund Manager: Chester Asset Management's Rob Tucker picks the stock he'd put away in the bottom drawer for…

Read more »

Three people walk in a line with their heads obscured by dark clouds.
Investing Strategies

Bargain or value trap? Fundie rates 3 ASX 200 shares going for cheap

Ask A Fund Manager: Chester Asset Management's Rob Tucker offers his thoughts on what to do with these troubled stocks.

Read more »

A boy stands firm on a rocky cliff holding a rocket in each hand and looking up toward the sky, anticipating flying into space.
Ask a Fund Manager

Fundie loves these 2 ASX 200 shares that are 'difficult to replicate'

Ask A Fund Manager: Chester Asset Management's Rob Tucker names a pair of stocks that are the best buys right…

Read more »

A headshot of Rob Tucker with a cityscape of high rise buildings in the background..
Investing Strategies

How we beat the stock market by 7% per year: fund manager

Ask A Fund Manager: Chester Asset Management's Rob Tucker reveals the secret sauce to running his successful portfolio.

Read more »

Three boxers, two men and a woman, stand in their training wear with fists raised in a fighting stance with serious looks on their faces against a background of a boxing gym.
Ask a Fund Manager

Here's one hot, one lukewarm and one cold ASX share: fundie

Ask A Fund Manager: Capital H Management's Harley Grosser decides whether he would buy three stocks that have plunged in…

Read more »

Capital H Management founder and chief executive Harley Grosser
Small Cap Shares

This $70 million ASX company just pulled off a $40 million deal: fundie

Ask A Fund Manager: Capital H Management's Harley Grosser reveals a pair of small-cap shares ready to take a massive…

Read more »

a climber scales a sheer rock cliff face reaching out for a handhold with foreboding grey clouds gathering in the sky above him.
Investing Strategies

The one ASX share we're holding onto for dear life: experts

Ask A Fund Manager: Discovery Fund's Chris Bainbridge and Mark Devcich also explain why PE ratios are absolute rubbish for…

Read more »

Three people run in a race through deep mud and puddles of water.
Broker Notes

These 3 ASX shares just halved. I would buy one of them: experts

Ask A Fund Manager: Discovery Fund's Chris Bainbridge and Mark Devcich examine whether this trio of stocks are bargain buys…

Read more »