AMC Entertainment (AMC -3.25%) made headlines on March 15 when it announced it had bought a 22% stake in a gold mine company, Hycroft Mining (HYMC -3.11%). In this clip from "The M&A Show" on Motley Fool Live, recorded on March 18, Fool.com contributors Jason Hall and Travis Hoium try to figure out why the biggest movie chain in the world would make such a head-scratching decision.
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Jason Hall: If I buy a movie theater, I didn't buy a gold mining business. I think it's so far outside the company's core business that there's an argument to be made that is incredibly foolhardy. I did not buy your company to invest in this other thing. I know there's gray area there and I'm not saying investors have a legal case. I don't want to even come close to touching on that. But what does the thesis if you own McDonald's (MCD -0.05%) and McDonald's makes an investment in an electric car start-up?
Travis Hoium: Let's get to that because I had another quote that I wanted to read. This is from the CEO on the same release, "As I've been saying repeatedly since last June, investors should think creatively and boldly about AMC's future. Because within the company, we ourselves have been thinking creatively and boldly about our future. Of course, as the largest movie theater chain in the world, we're passionately committed to orchestrating a full recovery from COVID impacts on the cinema industry. But even with the enthusiasm that the public has for movie-going in our theaters, it is not enough for us to merely bring back the AMC of old."
Hall: So, we're buying a gold mine. [laughs]
Hoium: I don't know what to think about this company, but my question coming out of this was, is AMC trying to repeat the meme with Hycroft? Do they think that they did something brilliant there to make AMC a meme-stock and that is a repeatable thing that they can do or are they trying to be Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A -0.28%) (BRK.B -0.68%)?
If Warren Buffett was in 1965, he took control of Berkshire. If that would happen today, we would've been like this guy crazy. What do you talking about? I didn't buy Berkshire to be an insurance company. It's a textile company. Is that their argument? It kind of seems like it. That changes the thesis a lot. But which one of those is more real? Are they trying to repeat the meme or become Berkshire?
Hall: Yeah, I don't think they're trying to become Berkshire. I don't think that's the case at all. There's just a little about this to make sense. I think what it gets back to me as we're talking about a business that continues to struggle with operations and cash flows. Is this really the wisest use of capital?
