International Flavors And Fragrances Puns

Hi all,

Can you please give me your thoughts on IFF?

(sorry for formatting, on mobile)

For me, the pros are: 1 - Completed merger with Dupont Nutrition and Biosciences. One of the big advantages of this merger is it allows IFF to offer full spectrum product development, with an excellent focus on Plant based nutrition. (without disclosing too much, plant based nutrition was the only segment to grow very well during the pandemic, and now tastes as good, or better than dairy based nutrition, so it is set to explode)

2 - Consistent dividend growth. IFF tripled their dividends over 10 years. See above for my expectations for further growth in income. And looking back, they have been increasing their dividend since the 90s.

3 - IFF has traded sideways for years, all the while increasing earnings / decreasing their multiples. They are an ignored, low volatility stock.

4 - There is excessive short interest, as far as I can tell (iborrowdesk.com and Ortex). To me, that means there is good short term upside potential.

5 - ~25% of the outstanding stock is owned by the TetraPak family holding company. They are insiders in this industry, and clearly know who their customers are using to flavor the drinks going into TetraPaks.

6 - The flavor industry is technically complex, and there is very limited competition. And IFF has something like 3000 patents (serious, it is crazy complex, scientist with crazy hair level of technical complexity.)

7 - Their dividend percent is about a percent above the industry standard (think 2.5% vs 1.5%).

Cons:

1 - I don't know how well the merger will work.

2 - There are alot of shares coming "soon", but should still trade around the same value.

I already own 100 shares, and bought 200 Feb 19 $150 calls (because, wow, there was something like 160,000 open interest at that time point. Somone must know something, right?)

Plaintiff Judith Sanderson filed this action in state court against defendant International Flavors and Fragrances, Inc. for personal injuries stemming from her exposure to various perfumes and colognes https://h2o.law.harvard.edu/cases/488

I have noticed smell and flavor are quite similar. The skill of detecting notes and identifying them and seeing which combinations work well in smells also works for flavors.

Just recently I was eating a desert and I recognized some subtle tastes only because I had smelled them before: I mentioned the cake had hints of almond/clove/star anise, my friend who made it was shocked since these were only minor touches to a pumpkin loaf.

I also did a similar thing on Christmas Eve dinner with wine. When they poured it I sniffed it and instantly smelled black currant- I said it- and my uncle who loves wine couldn’t believe it- he said it was black currant dominant wine.

Then last week I was eating Mango Habanero wings and it was so obvious that the mango flavor was a synthetic superficial flavor and definitely not real mango, again only something I could know from having experienced synthetics in fragrance.

The last semi-recent example was sometime in November I went to a local bar serving craft beers and other more “indie” drinks. I love gin so I ordered the gin taster set, we did a game identifying what was in it- certainly I wasn’t great at identifying the many aromatics in them but I would usually guess the main characteristic... better than my friends who rated them only on a good/bad scale with no descriptors

I definitely couldn’t be a chef just as I couldn’t be a perfumer but I think this hobby has given me a better appreciation for food. Has anybody else experienced this?