Price/PE charting

Investment Analysis Clubs Saul’s Investing Discussions
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I’m posting this here because the inspiration came from Saul’s description of his charts and a spreadsheet recently shared by Phoolio18. I have been working on a Windows application that can display a Price/PE chart loosely based on my understanding of how Saul charts price vs. earnings. I know my display is different but I hope it encapsulates the same idea. It is still a work in progress but the basic functionality is there. The link below is to a screen capture saved on Google Drive.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B40ZcniWzxoNWFdnMFdHd3FZdl…

The price chart is a two-year history and current price from Yahoo! Finance. The silver rectangles represent a PE range of 15-20 for each quarter for the earnings data available. That range can be easily adjusted up or down or expanded and contracted using the controls to the left of the chart. The earnings numbers are listed in the grid view on the lower left. Date and EPS values can be changed by simply typing over the values. All of the earnings information is stored in a simple text file. Options for linear or logarithmic scales for the Price axis are shown, but only linear is available so far. The current price, PE and the 1YPEG number that has been recently discussed on this board are displayed on the upper left, below the company selection box. (I need to add a Refresh button there.)

The small window to the left pops up when either Add button is clicked. This would be to add new earnings to an existing company or to add a new company. A single amount can be entered in the top section or a list of multiple date/amount values can be entered (or pasted) into the lower section. That’s intended to be handy in case someone were to share earnings values on a discussion board or something. :wink:

I still have work to do on it, like the ability to delete a company that was no longer interesting, although that shouldn’t be needed often.

I’d be interested in any comments or observations of flaws in the idea. Thanks Saul and Phoolio18 for the inspiration and the numbers.

Steve

10 Likes
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Wow! That is very impressive!!! Great work.

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Thank you! It’s been an interesting project.

What I didn’t say before because it’s premature is that I will be happy to give it away freely to anyone interested in using it (and brave enough to run something from a stranger on their PC) at some point. I’m not making any promises as to when that might be.

FYI…I started with earnings numbers from the spreadsheet that Phoolio18 shared, but since I’ve been getting them from cnbc.com. At least for SCNR they match exactly with the numbers that Saul posted. Just enter the symbol at the top of the home page, then on the next page click on “Earnings” below the price information. I still have to enter them manually but it only takes a couple of minutes to get about 3 years of earnings data.

Steve

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I will be happy to give it away freely to anyone interested in using it (and brave enough to run something from a stranger on their PC) at some point. I’m not making any promises as to when that might be.

Sagewren,

This is a project I have tried to do in the past with not nearly as much luck as you. I am wondering what Saul thinks of it? I imagine the main thing to figure out is the logarithmic scale? Anyway, I would love to have access to a copy of it when you are ready to release it.

Thank you for putting in the work to figure out how to chart it. I knew it could be done, but gave up because my skills are not great.

Tdonb

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That is very cool - Yes, I’d be interested if you plan to make this available. I’ll install on my machine, it’s not an airgap or one of those high security devices - just an HP with ss drive and i7 processor, but already getting to be old tech.