Billionaire Larry Robbins Dishes On McDonald’s Corporation (MCD), T-Mobile US Inc (TMUS), Flextronics International Ltd. (FLEX)

Although McDonald’s Corporation (NYSE:MCD) wasn’t part of the fund’s holdings in the latest 13F filing, and has no known position in the company at present, Robbins is very confident about the future prospects of the fast food retail chain. He deems most of the company’s troubles relating to a deceleration of its top line over the past two years to be rooted in inefficiencies surrounding operational execution. He believes that the new management in the form of new CEO Steve Easterbrook will change that. Robbins believed that a simplified menu, the reduction of about $500 million from its $2.5 billion in annual SG&A expenses, franchising the 19% of stores which McDonald’s Corporation (NYSE:MCD) continues to own itself, and optimizing the capital structure through the cheap debt available nowadays will kick the company’s same store sales in the right direction.

Another stakeholder of the fast food chain banking on the turn around is Mason Hawkins. His fund Southeastern Asset Management upped its stake in the company by 65% in the fourth quarter to 11.92 million shares valued at $1.12 billion. McDonald’s Corporation (NYSE:MCD) was also among hedge funds’ favorite dividend stocks for the fourth quarter.

During the fourth quarter, Robbins increased Glenview’s stake in T-Mobile US Inc (NYSE:TMUS) by 23% to 9.85 million shares worth $265.33 million. John Paulson’s Paulson & Co held the highest stake in the company among the hedge funds that we track, with 15.34 million shares valued at $413.20 million.

Robbins initiated a stake in T-Mobile US Inc (NYSE:TMUS) in 2013 after the company came out of a reverse merger with a renewed focus, which was marked by an aggressive deployment of LTE, securing iPhone (T-Mobile being the only carrier that didn’t offer the device at the time), a move to more competitive price plans, and last year’s purchase of low-band spectrum to extend the company’s coverage. These measures have led to an increase in EBIDTA estimates for 2015 and 2016 by 16% and 30% respectively, as compared to their level in 2013. Furthermore,  T-Mobile US Inc (NYSE:TMUS)  is set to generate free cash flow in 2015 for the first time in its history.

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