Research

Level Set – Strategy for Rotating Rotations

The first week of 2024 seemed to set up for one of the most obvious rotations in recent memory. Most investors have not been surprised to see some sizable moves out of the frothier technology and consumer stocks into more sober value names—even if they did not position for it– to start the year. This

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What Really Happened In Q4

At the start of each quarter, we provide a detailed summary of the just completed quarter with the goal of helping investors make better investment decisions, in addition to providing insights that will facilitate investor communications, client conversations, and quarterly letters. Furthermore, our quarterly report seeks to identify emerging risk management concerns and give investment

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Accelerated Share Repurchases Are Good

There are several reasons management teams might consider an accelerated share repurchase, or ASR.  From a stock they feel is cheap despite a market rally, or underperformance vs. industry peers, to something potentially more self-serving, like meeting certain variable compensation bogeys based on per share metrics.  Whatever the motivation, we have noticed that ASRs often

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Level Set – A Look at Three Growth Cyclicals

In the last year it has become apparent that the consensus view of revenue growth for some of the important cyclical businesses in the market has improved. Housing-related securities, semiconductors, and electrification-focused industrials are three such important cyclicals. Higher rates in homebuilders, high inventory in semiconductors, and slowing industrial activity in industrials would have all

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Banks: Risk-Reward Skewed To The Positive

While apathy was the predominant sentiment toward banks for much of the year, the recent strong rally has generated more interest in our recent meetings.  If there is no recession next year – which we think is a possibility, further multiple expansion seems likely.   We consider available alpha, macro conditions, fundamentals, shareholder return, HTM-adjusted valuation,

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VIDEO – IPOs: Advice for Corporates & Investors

After a SPAC-induced mania of new offerings in 2021, the last two years have seen the lowest number of initial public offerings in over two decades.  Recently, there has been some renewed optimism that new issue deal flow could improve, with the Moelis CEO stating this past week that there will be a “huge backlog”

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