Latest / Warren's Watchlist - english / Symrise - Update 09/04/2026 - ISIN DE000SYM9999
Transcript
- 0:07Speaker 0: SimRise can make wood taste a vanilla.
- 0:12Speaker 0: What it can't do, tastes its own year in advance.
- 0:15Speaker 1: Wood into vanilla?
- 0:17Speaker 1: You'll have to explain that because I have no idea what i just heard.
- 0:21Speaker 0: Spruce bark.
- 0:21Speaker 1: Eighteen
- 0:22Speaker 0: seventy-four A small town In lower Saxony.
- 0:25Speaker 0: Two chemists build the first Vanilla flavor in history That contains No vanilla.
- 0:30Speaker 0: Tastes of vanilla But It's wood!
- 0:34Speaker 0: And this company?
- 0:37Speaker 1: Would I know
- 0:38Speaker 0: it?
- 0:44Speaker 0: So on
- 0:49Speaker 1: demand, they hit almost any taste in the world.
- 1:06Speaker 0: and those promises it doesn't keep.
- 1:09Speaker 1: And what does it cost to miss your own numbers?
- 1:12Speaker 0: Last year, half the profit—the best margin in ten years —and profit
- 1:16Speaker 0: cut-in-half.".
- 1:17Speaker 0: Today, Corey I'll show you that Simrise knows the taste of the world.
- 1:21Speaker 0: It's just its own...it isn't hitting
- 1:23Speaker 1: right now.
- 1:24Speaker 1: For those hearing us for the first time…I'm talking with Warren Wise an AI technology that analyzes & rates equity stories The way a value investor would
- 1:33Speaker 0: Exactly.
- 1:34Speaker 0: I'm a synthetic stakeholder, my thinking and voice are
- 1:37Speaker 0: AI.".
- 1:38Speaker 0: Today's basis is My Report on SimRises' twenty-twenty five annual report.
- 1:43Speaker 0: The report was published on the fourth of March, Twenty-Twenty Six.
- 1:47Speaker 0: I reviewed it using the methodology of Benjamin Graham, Warren Buffett & Charlie Munger
- 1:52Speaker 1: And i am Corey Capitol also
- 1:53Speaker 1: A.I.,
- 1:54Speaker 1: the Voice Of The Private Investor.
- 1:56Speaker 1: Some of you hold this stock.
- 1:57Speaker 1: Most of you ate or smelled This Company today without knowing It.
- 2:01Speaker 0: And since we're often asked, every episode is selected reviewed and approved by an editorial team.
- 2:07Speaker 0: The analysis and the voices are AI –the responsibility-is
- 2:10Speaker 0: not.".
- 2:11Speaker 1: Before we take anything apart… Is this even a good company?
- 2:15Speaker 0: It is!
- 2:16Speaker 0: SimRise is number four in world in flavours & fragrances... ...The Four Largest Together hold more than half of the market.
- 2:24Speaker 0: New competitors almost never appear in business.
- 2:27Speaker 1: Why
- 2:27Speaker 1: Not?!
- 2:27Speaker 1: What keeps them out?
- 2:29Speaker 0: The recipe, SimRise supplies more than six thousand manufacturers and every recipe is developed together with the customer.
- 2:37Speaker 0: If a beverage giant wants to switch supplier it has to hand its own recipe into someone else's hands... ...and hope that taste survives!
- 2:45Speaker 0: Almost no one tries that…
- 2:47Speaker 1: And no single customer can dictate their prices?
- 2:50Speaker 0: Not one of those six-thousand accounts for even a tenth of revenue.
- 2:54Speaker 0: Tens of thousands of products sold in over hundred fifty countries a small field, locked in customers.
- 3:01Speaker 0: No concentration risk on any single buyer.
- 3:04Speaker 0: so Simrise doesn't depend on its customers but it does depend on weather and harvest And we'll get to that.
- 3:10Speaker 1: Now I want understand what they actually sell.
- 3:13Speaker 1: Flavors & fragrances is still abstract me.
- 3:16Speaker 0: Then take the one you already know Real vanilla.
- 3:20Speaker 0: Where do think most of world's vanilla comes from?
- 3:23Speaker 1: No idea Somewhere warm
- 3:24Speaker 0: From One Island.
- 3:26Speaker 0: Around eighty percent of the world's vanilla grows on Madagascar, most of it in one region in the northeast.
- 3:32Speaker 0: SimRise buys there directly from more than seven thousand smallholder farmers... ...in around a hundred villages.
- 3:38Speaker 1: Wait!
- 3:39Speaker 1: This is the company that invented Vanilla without Vanilla?
- 3:43Speaker 1: And at the same time….
- 3:44Speaker 1: …one of the big buyers of The Real
- 3:46Speaker 1: Thing?!
- 3:46Speaker 0: Both and thats' the whole business right there.
- 3:49Speaker 0: They sell the real pod to the customer who wants it, and they build flavor for one that can't afford.
- 3:55Speaker 0: And know exactly what each one
- 3:57Speaker 0: costs.".
- 3:58Speaker 1: Why is real vanilla so expensive?
- 4:00Speaker 1: It's a pod!
- 4:01Speaker 0: "...it' s a pod whose plant needs three years before even flowers... The bloom opens on single day.
- 4:08Speaker 0: On Madagascar there no insect that reliably pollinates it.
- 4:12Speaker 0: So its done by hand in morning flower-by-flower.
- 4:15Speaker 0: Then takes months more before the pod ripe
- 4:18Speaker 1: Three years before it even flowers.
- 4:20Speaker 1: Nobody plants that without patience.
- 4:23Speaker 0: Keep that thought, It comes back in this episode.
- 4:26Speaker 0: This whole industry lives on things That take years Before they pay off.
- 4:31Speaker 1: Good So strong position Real vanilla and built Vanilla side by Side And real money that actually Comes In.
- 4:37Speaker 1: Then the foundation stands.
- 4:39Speaker 1: Now Take it apart.
- 4:40Speaker 1: for me
- 4:41Speaker 0: The debt is manageable.
- 4:42Speaker 0: The dividend is covered several times over by cash flow, and the profit shows up as real money in the till.
- 4:48Speaker 0: That's not true of every company!
- 4:50Speaker 0: This is a genuinely good business.
- 4:52Speaker 0: that why this episode is a critique – NOT A WARNING.
- 4:56Speaker 0: Let start with something the one big number hides... ...the one thats'nt ever headline next morning.
- 5:01Speaker 0: SimRise grew by so-and-so much….
- 5:04Speaker 0: …that single number for whole group.
- 5:06Speaker 0: But inside his group there are two very different companies.
- 5:10Speaker 0: One is taste, nutrition and health.
- 5:12Speaker 0: Food drinks pet food around three billion euros in revenue.
- 5:17Speaker 0: The other is scent and care perfume cosmetic ingredients sun protection just under two billion
- 5:25Speaker 1: And one of them is the good one I assume.
- 5:27Speaker 1: let me guess.
- 5:28Speaker 0: go ahead
- 5:29Speaker 1: perfume.
- 5:30Speaker 1: perfume sounds like the fat margins
- 5:34Speaker 0: On the side.
- 5:34Speaker 0: with food and pet food, about twenty-four cents of every euro of revenue stays in the day to day business.
- 5:44Speaker 1: That really surprises me!
- 5:46Speaker 1: Why is the glamorous half the weaker one?
- 5:49Speaker 0: Because glamour isn't all that's in it.
- 5:51Speaker 0: This half also holds sun protection filters And industrial fragrance raw materials.
- 5:56Speaker 0: They had a hard year.
- 5:57Speaker 0: Fine perfume itself did well Strong growth With wins in North & Latin America
- 6:03Speaker 1: And on the food side?
- 6:04Speaker 0: Food and drinks grew nicely.
- 6:06Speaker 0: That's the engine, and it ran!
- 6:08Speaker 0: Pet food of all things—the part.
- 6:11Speaker 0: I'd have expected them most from—stood still.
- 6:14Speaker 1: Pet food.
- 6:15Speaker 1: Explain to me why.
- 6:16Speaker 1: that is an interesting thing for you.
- 6:18Speaker 1: To be honest this bag is dry kibble.
- 6:20Speaker 0: Someone has decided whether your dog eats what's in their bag.
- 6:23Speaker 0: Dry kibbles alone aren't appetizing to animals.
- 6:26Speaker 0: What makes a dog empty the bowl... ...is a coating… The Palatant SimRise is one of the world leaders in that, and in twenty nineteen it paid a three-digit million sum for an American company.
- 6:38Speaker 0: to go deeper still.
- 6:40Speaker 1: So The Taste Of Dog Food Is A Serious Industry.
- 6:43Speaker 0: It's a very good business.
- 6:44Speaker 0: Repeat purchases high switching costs And a market That Grows Through Recessions Because People Cut Back On Themselves Before Their Pet.
- 6:52Speaker 1: Then Why Did It Stand Still?
- 6:54Speaker 0: The year before, Simrise had raised prices.
- 6:57Speaker 0: Customers then bought less
- 6:58Speaker 1: for a while
- 6:59Speaker 0: and it took time Before they were taking as much As before.
- 7:02Speaker 0: That happens.
- 7:03Speaker 0: But keep in mind that pet food is actually One of this company's strengths... ...that explains A purchase will get too shortly.
- 7:10Speaker 1: And regionally?
- 7:11Speaker 1: Is growing everywhere?
- 7:13Speaker 0: No!
- 7:14Speaker 0: This the part a shareholder should know.
- 7:16Speaker 0: Latin America grew strongly by almost seven percent.
- 7:20Speaker 0: North America grew not at all
- 7:22Speaker 1: Almost not at all, in the world's largest consumer
- 7:26Speaker 0: market.
- 7:41Speaker 1: Then I'll ask the obvious question isn't that just an average?
- 7:45Speaker 1: Some up some down and The sum is what comes out
- 7:49Speaker 0: And that's exactly why it is the most meaningless number in an annual report.
- 7:53Speaker 0: Whoever buys this stock isn't buying the average, they're buying a food business that works and a perfume business thats currently being repaired.
- 8:01Speaker 1: One more thing on that growth number... Is not even three percent what actually came in?
- 8:06Speaker 1: No!
- 8:07Speaker 0: ...and The Difference Matters Just under Three Percent.
- 8:10Speaker 0: is the organic Growth In Euros.
- 8:12Speaker 0: Revenue Actually Fell Slightly Because The Dollar & Other Currencies Moved Against Simrise.
- 8:18Speaker 1: So they sold a bit more, converted at worse rates.
- 8:22Speaker 0: Right?
- 8:22Speaker 0: And management can't help that... But it's the reason there is plus organically and minus in euros!
- 8:28Speaker 0: Now the number that scares people – and deserves at least… Profit!
- 8:33Speaker 0: Almost five hundred million euros the year before around two-hundred and fifty last year.
- 8:39Speaker 1: Half of profit gone In one year with record margin.
- 8:42Speaker 1: What happened?
- 8:43Speaker 0: Two write downs both at year end One on a Swedish animal health company, Simrise had been buying into for few years.
- 8:51Speaker 0: One in raw materials business that come along the way.
- 8:55Speaker 0: each costs around one hundred and fifty million euros.
- 8:58Speaker 1: Animal Health That's strength.
- 9:00Speaker 1: I should remember
- 9:01Speaker 0: Exactly that one.
- 9:02Speaker 0: They're good at animals so they bought deeper into animals Supplements, dental care...that world.
- 9:08Speaker 0: The logic was right The price too
- 9:11Speaker 1: high.
- 9:11Speaker 1: Explain write down.
- 9:13Speaker 1: to me It sounds like money disappears.
- 9:15Speaker 0: It's the company saying in writing, what we bought is worth less than we paid.
- 9:20Speaker 0: The money itself flowed years ago.
- 9:23Speaker 0: on day of purchase.
- 9:24Speaker 0: Last winter they printed a difference where every shareholder can read it.
- 9:28Speaker 1: Then let me defend them for second.
- 9:30Speaker 1: That paper not money.
- 9:31Speaker 1: Why should a shareholder care about number when no money ever moved?
- 9:35Speaker 0: Because its price tag and old decision And tells you how well this management could buy.
- 9:41Speaker 0: But on the money yourself your right.
- 9:43Speaker 0: And that's exactly where this industry offers the perfect comparison.
- 9:47Speaker 1: Which is?
- 9:48Speaker 0: A vanilla flavor can come from a real pod, three years grown pollinated by hand or it's built molecule-by-molecule until it tastes exactly the same on The tongue.
- 9:58Speaker 0: you can't tell them apart.
- 9:59Speaker 0: with profits It's the same.
- 10:01Speaker 0: some are real Some are built to taste real.
- 10:05Speaker 1: and how do you tell if not on the tongue?
- 10:07Speaker 0: At the till, a real profit turns into money coming in.
- 10:11Speaker 0: A built one stays on paper.
- 10:13Speaker 0: so guess?
- 10:14Speaker 0: In the year profit halved.
- 10:16Speaker 0: what happened at the till?
- 10:18Speaker 1: with a profit drop like that I'd expect the money to have collapsed too.
- 10:22Speaker 0: it was One of The best cash years in the company's history.
- 10:25Speaker 0: Profit came in almost one-to-one as Real Money.
- 10:28Speaker 0: the dividend is covered several times over and two rating agencies gave the Company their seal Of approval for the first
- 10:34Speaker 1: time.
- 10:35Speaker 1: So the halved profit was real vanilla, smaller but real.
- 10:39Speaker 0: Smaller?
- 10:40Speaker 0: Real and also openly explained.
- 10:43Speaker 0: If you own this stock This number is not your problem.
- 10:46Speaker 0: Two bad purchases were publicly admitted And paid for out of a strong year.
- 10:50Speaker 0: That's how it should go.
- 10:52Speaker 1: Then where Is The Problem?
- 10:53Speaker 0: In what the record margin Was Paid?
- 10:55Speaker 0: With
- 10:55Speaker 1: A quick word on our own account Since It Fits What You're Hearing Here Is Short Version.
- 11:00Speaker 1: The full Warren-Wise report checks an equity story across eight dimensions, page by page against the annual report.
- 11:08Speaker 1: If you want that view for your own company in the board on the supervisory board or in investor relations warren dash wise dot com.
- 11:17Speaker 1: so and now back to Simrise.
- 11:19Speaker 1: And
- 11:23Speaker 0: Part of it was paid for out-of the plants.
- 11:25Speaker 0: SimRise prints a number, it promises itself Of every hundred euros of revenue about six should flow into its own sites and facilities.
- 11:34Speaker 0: Last year It was four
- 11:36Speaker 1: Two Euros out of one hundred.
- 11:38Speaker 1: That sounds like little
- 11:39Speaker 0: At this company's size...it isn't.
- 11:42Speaker 0: And remember The vanilla vine Three years Until it flowers.
- 11:46Speaker 0: A production line is same kind thing.
- 11:48Speaker 0: You skip a year of planting And you notice three years later Not this year.
- 11:53Speaker 1: So the saving shows up immediately, and the damage shows up late?
- 11:56Speaker 0: That's a whole danger of skimping on investment!
- 11:59Speaker 0: It always looks free in the year you do it Now.
- 12:02Speaker 0: second question to guess And what did management with that strong cashier?
- 12:07Speaker 1: pay down debt or next acquisition?
- 12:09Speaker 0: Around turn-of-the-year announced share buyback Up to four hundred million euros.
- 12:14Speaker 1: Tell me that in plain words.
- 12:16Speaker 1: They're not raising investments at their own ambition level.
- 12:19Speaker 1: But for a buy back there is money.
- 12:21Speaker 0: Yes thats'it
- 12:22Speaker 1: But wait, every company I read about is buying back shares right now.
- 12:26Speaker 1: i thought that was good for shareholders isn't it?
- 12:29Speaker 0: It IS in one specific case.
- 12:32Speaker 0: when a company really has more money than good uses for it then giving it back is fine.
- 12:37Speaker 0: but this company printed a use-in its own report and then didn't fund it.
- 12:41Speaker 0: That's something different.
- 12:43Speaker 1: So the shareholders got a portion of what should have gone into
- 12:48Speaker 0: the kitchen.
- 12:49Speaker 0: SimRise prints a second number about itself.
- 12:52Speaker 0: Every seventh euro of revenue should come from products younger than three years.
- 12:57Speaker 0: That's how a flavor house proves its labs are still inventing.
- 13:00Speaker 1: And what did they achieve?
- 13:02Speaker 0: Every eighth Euro
- 13:03Speaker 1: One place further back in the line, that sounds like almost nothing
- 13:07Speaker 0: At a company this size.
- 13:09Speaker 0: it is around one hundred million euros of revenue.
- 13:11Speaker 0: The lab was supposed to invent and didn't.
- 13:14Speaker 1: How many of these self set numbers therein total?
- 13:17Speaker 0: Three Grow at least five percent a year on its own steam.
- 13:21Speaker 0: It managed not even three percent, fill every seventh euro of sales with new products it reached every eighth.
- 13:28Speaker 0: put six of every hundred euros back into the plants...it spent four.
- 13:32Speaker 1: A company that sells recipes writes itself one and doesn't stick to it.
- 13:36Speaker 0: And there's further observation that belongs next them because is same habit in another form.
- 13:42Speaker 0: last years guidance was met after had been cut in summer and again in the fall.
- 13:48Speaker 1: Ah, so the guidance came down until it fit the year?
- 13:51Speaker 0: Twice...in twelve months!
- 13:54Speaker 0: And that's what a private investor actually feels—you plan with a number…and the number moves out from under you.
- 14:00Speaker 1: Is any of this against the rules?
- 14:02Speaker 0: None-of-it.
- 14:03Speaker 0: Cutting guidance Saving costs Buying back shares All legal All disclosed All common.
- 14:10Speaker 0: That is The point.
- 14:11Speaker 0: Nothing here is a scandal.
- 14:13Speaker 0: It's a company quietly taking more out of itself than it puts back.
- 14:17Speaker 0: Simrise knows the taste of the world, its just its own isn't hitting right now.
- 14:22Speaker 1: Is there anything you couldn't check?
- 14:24Speaker 0: One point and I handle it carefully Since twenty-twenty three competition authorities have been looking at this whole industry Not At A Single Company.
- 14:33Speaker 0: For Simrise The Proceeding In The US Is Closed.
- 14:36Speaker 0: in Europe And Two Other Countries The Reviews Are Still On Going.
- 14:40Speaker 0: There Is No Finding No charge against individuals, no penalty.
- 14:44Speaker 1: Then why mention it at all?
- 14:46Speaker 0: Because nowhere is it quantified what could cost?
- 14:49Speaker 0: if anything Every ingredient has to be declared This one in the report as a sentence not as number.
- 14:56Speaker 0: That's checkpoint Not an accusation.
- 14:58Speaker 0: But investor can't price-in What nobody disclosed.
- 15:02Speaker 1: Is someone fixing this?
- 15:04Speaker 1: or are we watching slow decline?
- 15:06Speaker 0: Someone trying and timing matters?
- 15:08Speaker 0: In March, a new CEO took over Jean-Yves Parisot.
- 15:13Speaker 0: He made none of the purchases we talked about and set None Of The Three Numbers.
- 15:17Speaker 0: he inherited them And he's the one measured against him.
- 15:21Speaker 1: He inherited the recipe!
- 15:23Speaker 0: ...and started cleaning up... The raw materials business that was written down has since been sold.
- 15:28Speaker 0: The agreement was signed on the first September admitted then closed out.
- 15:32Speaker 1: And current business?
- 15:34Speaker 0: First quarter this year is weak.
- 15:36Speaker 0: revenue slightly below the prior year.
- 15:38Speaker 0: In the second quarter, by contrast... ...the business grew by four and a half percent organically The best quarter in a year-and-a-half led by drinks & fragrances And buy a recovery in North America
- 15:50Speaker 1: From Stanstil to the Best Quarter in A Year-And-A-Half
- 15:53Speaker 0: in
- 15:54Speaker 1: three months.
- 15:55Speaker 1: Is that the turn?
- 15:56Speaker 0: One quarter is a taste.
- 15:58Speaker 0: Two are direction.
- 16:00Speaker 0: Notice what management made of it.
- 16:02Speaker 0: Full year guidance was confirmed Confirmed not raised.
- 16:06Speaker 1: What does that tell you?
- 16:07Speaker 0: That they don't yet trust?
- 16:08Speaker 0: the second quarter.
- 16:09Speaker 0: turn themselves, and I respect that more than a guidance raise in September.
- 16:14Speaker 1: So what do you want to see from the board?
- 16:16Speaker 0: Three things – first deliver this year's guidance without a cut—that would be positive signal.
- 16:22Speaker 0: Second bring investment back toward six out of one hundred you named yourselves or explain to shareholders why your own number no longer holds.
- 16:32Speaker 0: Third, show what the written-down animal health business earns today so we can judge the next purchase before it's made.
- 16:40Speaker 1: And if that doesn't come... What was last year then?
- 16:43Speaker 0: Not a transition year!
- 16:44Speaker 0: The new normal not bad just NOT WHAT IT ORIGINALLY SAID ON THE LABEL.
- 16:48Speaker 1: Watchlist.
- 16:49Speaker 1: is THAT A SELL
- 16:50Speaker 1: SIGNAL?!
- 16:50Speaker 0: No I don't give buy hold or sell recommendations.
- 16:54Speaker 0: watch list means i see company that keeps missing its own numbers.
- 16:59Speaker 0: So im waiting for the Year when both line up.
- 17:01Speaker 0: The next answer comes in the fall, with a third quarter figures.
- 17:05Speaker 0: And first thing I check whether money went into plants.
- 17:09Speaker 1: What do i take from this?
- 17:10Speaker 1: For the annual report that I open...
- 17:12Speaker 0: Four things.
- 17:13Speaker 0: First when profit collapses go to till before you panic.
- 17:18Speaker 0: If the money still came your may be just reading price of an old purchase not broken business.
- 17:24Speaker 0: Second When margin is record and growth isn't ask if company sold more or spent less.
- 17:30Speaker 0: Third Never trust the group number alone.
- 17:33Speaker 0: Break it apart.
- 17:35Speaker 0: The average is usually one that reveals very little.
- 17:38Speaker 0: And fourth, find numbers the company promised itself and measure against those No-one forced to print them.
- 17:45Speaker 1: A company that stops investing in its self tells you something about how much still trusts itself.
- 17:52Speaker 1: That's what I'll be listening for from now
- 17:58Speaker 0: on.
- 17:59Speaker 0: Since then, it has hit the taste of billions of people every morning in the toothpaste and coffee at The Dog's Bowl.
- 18:05Speaker 0: And its still hits it!
- 18:07Speaker 0: What had missed last year?
- 18:08Speaker 0: You can't taste... you read It In Its Own Annual Report Grow Faster Invent More.
- 18:14Speaker 0: That Is New.
- 18:15Speaker 0: Invest more in the Plants.
- 18:17Speaker 0: Three Promises SimRise Rights For Itself.
- 18:20Speaker 0: A Cook Who Makes Every Guest Their Favorite Meal Doesn't Keep His own Kitchen.
- 18:25Speaker 0: As An Investor You're Not Buying The Aroma You're buying what it's made of.
- 18:29Speaker 0: Simrise knows the taste.
- 18:32Speaker 0: It does
- 18:59Speaker 2: not constitute investment advice or an invitation to buy, hold and sell any financial instrument.
- 19:07Speaker 2: All assessments are based on a model-driven AI supported analytical approach.
- 19:13Speaker 2: Warren Wise is fictional synthetic character.
- 19:16Speaker 2: neither real person nor their estate nor company connected with such persons.
- 19:22Speaker 2: Any reference to Benjamin Graham?
- 19:25Speaker 2: Warren Buffett or Charlie Munger is purely descriptive of the investment philosophies attributed to them.
- 19:32Speaker 2: No endorsement, authorization representation or other connection including their estates or affiliated
- 19:39Speaker 1: companies exists.
- 19:42Speaker 2: All voices and audio content in this episode are synthetically produced and AI generated.