Citigroup is one of the largest bank holding companies but also one of the most complicated ones and that have disappointed investors the most in the past few years.  Many investors have given up on the stock -- categorizing it as un-analyzable -- but here we are going to walk through a very simplified way to think about formulating a potential investment thesis on such a stock.

Syms Corp is a discount retailer of men's and women's clothes with 53 stores across the United States.  In July 2009 it acquired the bankrupt Filene's Basement, effectively doubling itself in size and hopefully improving profit margins from cost-savings.  The company has produced erratic financial results with very low margins and has yet to prove its profit potential on a pro forma basis.  As a result, the market is valuing the company somewhere between its tangible book value and its liquidation value, not giving it any credit for profits.  SYMS' considerable assets provide downside protection for a value investor, but one has to be careful to distinguish the company from a potential value trap.

During a mini-correction or periods of global systemic crisis, investors have to deal with extreme market fear.  This kind of fear can paralyze you, but there are certain strategies that can help you improve the quality of your portfolio and perhaps even help you get on the offensive in order to take advantage of rare opportunities.

F&C asset management is an orphan stock that has recently gone through a rotation of practically 75% of its shareholder base and is still facing some serious issues that we are going to address.  After going through a 3-year investment plan, it is now free to leverage that infrastructure and personnel investment in order to transform from a boring, low-fee asset manager to more "alpha" / high-margin investment assets.  So, it has significant upside potential, while the stock still trades close to its lows, which we argue has put a floor to the stock's price, and therefore there is limited downside.

Avis Budget Group is a well-known car rental company that appreciated by more than 1,000% in less than 1 year.  We are going to examine the situation that led to its near demise and how it returned from the dead, in case we can identify companies with similar appreciation potential in the future.  Obviously, a stock that loses more than 95% of its value in a short time span has serious issues and it may not be an investable situation regardless of how good it looks in hindsight.  However, similar situations can be appropriately sized in one's portfolio to take advantage of them.

GameStop is a stock that looks cheap on most valuation metrics due to a poor outlook for its business model.  As a result, a lot of investors have built a significant short position on the stock.  Our focus is to take advantage of recent poor guidance which drove the stock down meaningfully, which may be a good entry point for a trade.  We are looking to play the event of an expected announcement by the company regarding a shareholder-friendly plan to utilize the $700mm that it expects to have on hand at year end.  A large one-time dividend could cause a short-squeeze and lift the share price.