Topic: How To Invest

What is Pat’s commentary for the week of August 8, 2018

Article Excerpt

Spinoffs are great way for companies with various, unrelated operations to unlock hidden value. That’s because “pure play” companies that focus on a single business are much easier to evaluate than entities inside a larger corporate structure. A good example of this is WestRock Co., and its spinoff. On May 16, 2016, the leading cardboard-packaging maker spun off its specialty chemical operations as Ingevity. WestRock shareholders received one Ingevity share for every six shares they held. Following the split, WestRock’s shares have jumped 53%, while Ingevity’s have soared over 300%. We recently featured those two firms in our Spinoffs, Takeovers and Special Situations newsletter. Below is our expanded analysis of WestRock and Ingevity. WESTROCK CO. $56.72 (New York symbol WRK; Shares outstanding: 256.5 million; Market cap: $14.4 billion; www.westrock.com) is a leading provider of packaging materials and systems. It operates through roughly 300 locations across North America, South America, Europe and Asia. The company took its current form on July 1, 2015, when it merged with…