“Great stocks [Google, Apple] are to be owned. Companies who dominate their space are to be kept and allowed to grow. Those who have built fantastic franchise names should be accumulated. Buy Google over Yahoo. Apple over Dell. And most importantly, the speculator should be willing to hold on, eschewing the quick buck in search of the really big gains that can be achieved through diligence and patience.”

I could not disagree more with this conclusion. In the long run, the performance of a stock in isolation (ignoring the external environment, i.e. interest rates, risk, inflation) is the product of fundamentals (i.e. earnings and cash flow growth) and valuation (i.e. P/E, P/CF).

Google (GOOG) and Apple (AAPL) may have great fundamentals: their innovation has led and may continue to lead to high earnings and cash flow growth. But are they good stocks? They may or may not be. But, more importantly, will they be good stocks at any price? No! If I were to follow the above conclusion, that since Google and Apple are great companies they are great stocks at any price, at any valuation – at 50, 500, 5000 times earnings, then I’d walk into an overvaluation trap.

Take a look at eBay (EBAY) in the late 90s: it was a great company (it still is), but it was grossly overvalued. So, if you bought it in the late 90s and held it until today, despite its earnings going up 100-fold, the stock is roughly at the same level it was then. I’d argue few would have the patience and conviction to hold it through the downturn the stock took in the early ’00s. Most investing in the stock in the late 90s lost money on it.

One of the biggest mistakes investors make in investing is failing to separate a good company and a good stock. A great company’s (fundamental) performance is wiped out by valuation compression. This is the battle of two winds: the tailwind of earnings growth and the headwind of P/E compression.

Also, with a high growth priced appropriately (even to perfection) there is no room for even a small mistake (no margin of safety) left in the valuation – a small disappointment (it doesn’t have to be much) will lead to a substantial decline in price. The latest performance of Starbucks (SBUX) and Whole Foods (WHMI) stocks is a great example of being priced for perfection and delivering slightly less-than-perfect results.

This myopia in differentiating between good companies and good stocks is not just limited to wonderful, exciting, larger-than-life (Google comes to mind here), fast-growing internet companies. The bluest of the blue chip stocks, like GE (GE), Coca Cola (KO), Home Depot (HD), Amgen (AMGN), Johnson and Johnson (JNJ) (and the list goes on) were all great companies that one “had to own” but were terrible (overvalued) stocks in the late 90s. Their earnings have doubled or tripled since but the stocks have not gone anywhere.

I think it was Benjamin Graham who said that “price is what you pay, value is what you get.”

Let’s say all these points are accurate and there is a dichotomy between the on-the-surface and under-the-surface operational performances.  But suppose Nardelli lost his job not because he didn’t manage the company well, but simply because the stock didn’t go anywhere during his tenure.  One can argue that if the company was run by a better CEO, HD would command a higher P/E multiple.  But take a look at Lowe’s, it is supposedly a much better run company, but it trades at similar P/E.

Milton Friedman said, “the stock market and economy are two different things.”  I say the stock and an underlying company are two different things too.

 The ousting of Bob Nardelli sent a wrong message to American CEOs: it taught them an incorrect lesson – manage the stock, not the company.

As Herb Greenberg mentioned in his column, if Home Depot’s (HD) stock went up while he was in charge he would still have a job, though he’d be $210 million poorer.

Bob Nardelli was a terrible stock promoter (not his job), but he did a terrific job managing the company (his job). As I mentioned in the past, from the time Nardelli took over Home Depot in 2000, Home Depot’s earnings have grown at an amazing clip of 20% a year, revenues over 15%, net margins have increased and return on capital went up every single year. The stock has not gone anywhere during his leadership because it was grossly overpriced in 2000.

Did he do a job worthy of $210 million? He came to manage an already successful company, an industry leader, a well oiled, money making machine, not a startup that lost its way.

Despite the stock prices not moving since he came on board, he created a lot of shareholder value (when measured in operating performance). But in many ways his main job was not to screw up (not to destroy corporate culture, or make dumb acquisitions, or over leverage the company etc…).

His $210 million compensation package is a disgrace – sorry Bob, but you were not worth that much. But the blame for overpaying Bob should not go to Bob, but should instead land on Home Depot’s board of directors. Bob is as greedy as any human being, and if I were him I’d ask for a billion dollars (why not?), but it is the board’s responsibility to decide how much to pay a CEO.

If you invite a plumber to your house to fix a sink and he asks for $10,000 – that is his right! His first responsibility is to feed his family, not to you. Your right is to find another plumber who’ll do the same job for $100. And if you decided to pay the plumber $10,000 for a job that somebody else would do for $100 – don’t blame the plumber, point the finger at yourself.

Unfortunately, the same board that just paid a “failed CEO” (he was fired after all) the equivalent of a GDP of several Caribbean islands, will do the same thing all over again. If you are unhappy with Bob’s going away present, blame Home Depot’s board, not Bob. There is a free market at work when it comes to 99.999% of the jobs out there, the free market-Messrs. Supply and Demand decide how much to pay a computer programmer, an accountant, a store clerk. But when it comes to top executive jobs, Mr. Supply takes a vacation and Mr. Demand (the soon to be hired CEO) decides with the board’s rubber stamp his/her own compensation.