My thoughts on FMC

I have done a brief review of the FMC business. I believe this business to be a viable one in generally good standing, but outside of my circle of competence.

It seems to be struggling recently in its financial performance due to its channel partners purchasing too much inventory in advance, leading to significant performance declines. It also faces challenges enforcing its patents in foreign countries like China and India, who do not tend to respect them to the benefit of local competitors.

My thoughts at the present; the price recently bottomed at 34.54, and has since climbed back up to 43.21 as of 3/19/2025.

My true personal analysis of this company is "Too Hard"; I lack a circle of competence relevant to this industry. I would only be guessing at its valuation based off my general instincts.

If I were forced to place an instinctual (not truly informed) bet on the basis of my brief overview, it would be that this business is undervalued. The business has been in decline for several years, leading to an erosion of 30-40% in its stock price over 5 years, peaking at nearly 4-5x its recent low.

I believe this business is struggling, but is not down for the count. It also pays a fairly generous dividend of nearly 5-6%. I would neither hate or love to own this business at its current price, but I am more optimistic than skeptical on their behalf.

Being at the very bottom of the S&P is quite a risky position though, it is quite possible they are delisted and drop further as a result.