Trading is a losing game if it is your chief strategy. You’ll win big sometimes and you’ll lose big other times, but taken together it will be a loss unless you are a time traveler. Chances are, you’re not, so long term investment is the only long term winning strategy. Warren Buffett demonstrated this long ago, and it still holds true for any industry. This is precisely why we only held 0.5% in Caesars puts before the big Davis Report release last week. Though correct on outcome, I was wrong on magnitude which led to a loss. We can try again in May with a smaller sum when the next big court decision is scheduled, but a 0.5% is easily recoverable.

Bottom line, Paddy Power Betfair and 888 are the best companies to hold long term. 888 is higher by 15.6% since January 19, and while Paddy Power is more of a math problem considering the merger, its growth is obvious and in the right places. Both companies represent two models of growth, so hedging between them makes sense. 888 is the model of go-it-alone growth, not intentionally, but that is what ended up happening. The advantages are less leverage, less internal politics, more control over itself, less contracts and more just doing business. The disadvantages are that going it alone makes it harder to command market share all else being equal. Given that both companies are good at what they do, both may end up growing nicely long term with both strategies. It’s just good to have a stake in both for diversification.

The politics are already evident with Paddy Power Betfair as former Paddy CEO Andy McCue has chosen to leave in order to pursue new opportunities. Perhaps this was planned, amicable, the ultimate goal and all the rest. But even if it was, it still shows the downsides of mergers. You can have talent coming from both sides, but one side will always be dominant over the other, and hopefully the gain will be greater than the loss. That’s just the nature of business reality.

Last week we dealt with the tax blow to 888, and that really is the ultimate factor here between Paddy Power Betfair and 888, which in itself is a sad thing. Both companies’ growth strategies seem to be working, so the difference between them is really who can scale up best to defend against new tax regimes. When tax questions become the ultimate competition between businesses, what you have is no longer business but defensive maneuvering around politicians. It’s a whole different and more arbitrary game.