If long-suffering shareholders thought the flow of dire news from Jefferson Smurfit had come to an end, they got yet another nasty shock this week with the Smurfit Stone profit warning and the resulting collapse in the Smurfit shares. Maybe we shouldn't have been surprised - nasty shocks from Smurfit are now commonplace.

The week for Smurfit started with a pretty gushing research note from Davy's Joe Burnell, which inferred that, based on what Dutch group Kappa is paying for AssiDoman, Smurfit was undervalued by about one-third. Kappa, a private group, is paying $1.5 billion (P1.6 billion) for AssiDoman, about 10 times earnings.

Assign the same multiple to Smurfit, and take in the market value of the Smurfit Stone and Munskjo stakes, and one has a sum-of-the-parts valuation for Smurfit between P3.12 and P3.21, according to Davys. If only the market had faith in sum-of-the-parts valuations. The share price stayed bogged down around P2, roughly where it was 10 years ago.

Then came the bombshell with the warning from Smurfit Stone president Ray Curran that it will go nowhere near meeting the $0.15 per share forecast from Wall Street analysts. Down goes the Smurfit share below P1.80, and more pain for Smurfit shareholders.

Maybe the problems in the US will be short term, maybe investors will value Smurfit at the same rating as its peers. Maybe, maybe, maybe . . . !