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Valens Research

Valens Equity Insights and Inflections - 2019 12 03

F currently trades below corporate averages relative to UAFRS-based (Uniform) Earnings, with a 17.3x Uniform P/E. At these levels, the market is pricing in expectations for Uniform ROA to contract from 5% in 2018 to 3% in 2023, accompanied by 1% Uniform Asset growth going forward. However, analysts have more bullish expectations, projecting Uniform ROA to sustain 5% levels through 2020, accompanied by immaterial Uniform Asset growth. Meanwhile, management is confident about their business transformation and international expansion. Current valuations appear to be pricing in overly bearish expectations for F, and should they see profitability remain stable or expand, as positive management sentiment would suggest, material upside would be warranted.

GT Q3 2019 Embedded Expectations Analysis – Market expectations are for slight declines in Uniform ROA, but management is confident about their brand awareness, cost savings, and momentum

KBH Q3 2019 Embedded Expectations Analysis – Market expectations are for Uniform ROA compression, but management is confident about growth, margins, and their backlog

RRC Q3 2019 Embedded Expectations Analysis – Market expectations are for Uniform ROA to remain muted, but management is confident about their liquidity, costs, and capital allocation

F, GT, KBH, RRC, ASGN, CCI, EBAY, EMR, LRCX, OC, RAD, V, VZ
Underlyings
ASGN Inc

ASGN provides information technology (IT) and other services in the technology, digital, creative, engineering and life sciences fields across commercial and government sectors. The company's segments are: Apex, which provides technical, digital, creative, scientific and engineering personnel for contract, contract-to-hire, and permanent placement positions to clients across the United States and Canada; Oxford, which provides staffing and permanent placement services in select skill and geographic markets in the United States and Europe; and ECS, which delivers solutions in cloud, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, machine learning, application and IT modernization, science and engineering.

Crown Castle International Corp

Crown Castle International is a holding company. Through its subsidiaries, the company owns, operates and leases shared communications infrastructure that is geographically dispersed throughout the U.S., including towers and other structures, such as rooftops (collectively, towers), and fiber primarily supporting small cell networks (small cells) and fiber solutions. The company's towers, fiber and small cells assets are collectively referred to herein as communications infrastructure. The company's core business is providing access, including space or capacity, to its shared communications infrastructure via long-term contracts in various forms, including lease, license, sublease and service agreements.

EBay Inc.

eBay is a global commerce provider, which includes its Marketplace, StubHub and Classifieds platforms. The company's Marketplace platforms include its online marketplace located at www.ebay.com, its localized counterparts and the eBay suite of mobile apps. The company's StubHub platforms include its online ticket platform located at www.stubhub.com, its localized counterparts and the StubHub mobile apps. These platforms connect fans with their favorite sporting events, shows and artists and enable them to buy and sell tickets whenever and wherever they want. The company's Classifieds platforms include a collection of brands such as mobile.de, Kijiji, Gumtree, Marktplaats, eBay Kleinanzeigen and others.

Emerson Electric Co.

Emerson Electric is a company that brings technology and engineering together to provide solutions for customers in a range of industrial, commercial and consumer markets around the world. The company 's segments are: Automation Solutions, which provides measurement and analytical instrumentation, valves, actuators and regulators, industrial solutions, and process control systems and solutions; Climate Technologies, which provides products and services for residential heating and cooling, commercial air conditioning, commercial and industrial refrigeration, and cold chain management; and Tools and Home Products, which provides tools for personnel and homeowners and appliance solutions.

Ford Motor Company

Ford Motor designs, manufactures, markets, and services a line of Ford cars, trucks, sport utility vehicles, electrified vehicles, and Lincoln vehicles, as well as provides financial services through its subsidiary, Ford Motor Credit Company LLC. The company is engaged in electrification; mobility solutions, including self-driving services; and connected vehicle services. The company has three operating segments: Automotive, which includes the sale of Ford and Lincoln vehicles, service parts, and accessories; Mobility, which includes its autonomous vehicles and its investment in mobility through Ford Smart Mobility LLC; and Ford Credit, which includes vehicle-related financing and leasing activities.

Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company

Goodyear Tire & Rubber develops, manufactures, distributes and sells tires and related products and services worldwide. The company manufactures and markets various lines of rubber tires for: automobiles, trucks, buses, aircraft, motorcycles, earthmoving and mining equipment, farm implements, industrial equipment, and various other applications. The company manufactures and sells tires under the Goodyear, Dunlop, Kelly, Debica, Sava and Fulda brands and various other Goodyear owned house brands, and the private-label brands of certain customers. The company operates its business through three operating segments representing its regional tire businesses: Americas; Europe, Middle East and Africa; and Asia Pacific.

KB Home

KB Home is a homebuilding company. The company builds a variety of homes designed primarily for first-time and first move-up, as well as second move-up and active adult homebuyers, including attached and detached single-family residential homes, townhomes and condominiums. The company's financial services operations provide various insurance products to its homebuyers in the markets where it builds homes and provide title services in certain of those markets. The company's financial services operations also provide mortgage banking services, including residential consumer mortgage loan originations, to its homebuyers indirectly through KBHS Home Loans, LLC, a joint venture the company formed with Stearns Lending, LLC.

Lam Research Corporation

Lam Research is a supplier of wafer fabrication equipment and services to the semiconductor industry. The company designs, manufactures, markets, refurbishes, and services semiconductor processing equipment used in the fabrication of integrated circuits. The company's customer base includes semiconductor memory, foundry, and integrated device manufacturers that make products such as non-volatile memory, dynamic random-access memory, and logic devices. The company's services include customer service, spares, improvement, and refurbishment of its deposition, etch, and clean products. The company sells its products and services to companies in the United States, China, Europe, Japan, Korea, Southeast Asia, and Taiwan.

OWENS CORNING INC

Owens Corning is engaged in manufacturing and delivering a range of insulation, roofing, and fiberglass composite materials. The company's Composites segment includes vertically integrated downstream activities. The company manufactures, fabricates and sells glass reinforcements in the form of fiber. The company's Insulation segment includes a portfolio of high, mid and low-temperature products with a geographic mix of United States, Canada, Europe, Asia-Pacific and Latin America, a market mix of residential, commercial, industrial and other markets, and a channel mix of retail, contractor and distribution. The company's products in the Roofing segment are laminate and strip asphalt roofing shingles.

Range Resources Corporation

Range Resources is a holding company. Through its subsidiaries, the company is an independent natural gas, natural gas liquids and oil company, engaged in the exploration, development and acquisition of natural gas and oil properties, located in the Appalachian and North Louisiana regions of the United States, primarily in the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania and the Lower Cotton Valley formation in Louisiana.

Rite Aid Corporation

Rite Aid is a pharmacy retail healthcare company. The company's Retail Pharmacy segment sells brand and generic prescription drugs, as well as an assortment of front-end products including health and beauty aids, personal care products, seasonal merchandise, and a private brand product line. The company's Pharmacy Services segment provides pharmacy benefit management (PBM) options through its EnvisionRxOptions and MedTrak PBMs, respectively. EnvisionRxOptions also provides mail-order and specialty pharmacy services through EnvisionPharmacies; a claims adjudication software platform in Laker Software; and a national Medicare Part D prescription drug plan through its EnvisionRx Plus product offering.

Verizon Communications Inc.

Verizon Communications is a holding company. Through its subsidiaries, the company provides communications, information and entertainment products and services to consumers, businesses and governmental agencies. The company has two reportable segments, Verizon Consumer Group (Consumer) and Verizon Business Group (Business). The company's Consumer segment provides consumer-focused wireless and wireline communications services and products under the Verizon brand and through wholesale and other arrangements. The company's Business segment provides, among others, wireless and wireline communications services and products, video and data services, corporate networking solutions, security and managed network services.

Visa Inc. Class A

Visa is engaged in digital payments. The company facilitates payments between consumers and businesses. The company is focused on its proprietary network, VisaNet, to provide products and services. The company provides a portfolio of business payment solutions, including small business, corporate (travel) cards, purchasing cards, virtual cards/digital credentials, non-card cross-border business-to-business payment options and disbursement accounts, covering various main industry segments around the world. The company also provides several capabilities and services, including fraud prevention and security, processing, loyalty, merchant and digital solutions, consulting and data solutions.

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Valens Research
Valens Research

In 2009, just as the dust was settling from the last major equity and credit market crises, we launched a boutique research firm with the intention of breaking Wall Street’s biases and broken incentives:

  • GAAP and IFRS have failed to provide rules for reliable financial statement reporting
  • Stock analyst recommendations are not grounded in disciplined financial analysis
  • Credit agencies have been set up to grossly fail in their responsibilities to investors and the public markets
  • Utter lack of willingness of major research firms to employ the the most advanced forensic analysis available

We sought to provide investors and company analysts with a source of information that changed all that.
Many years later, our business model remains because little has changed on Wall Street.

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  • The governing accounting bodies have created more leeway for mis-estimates and mis-classifications as financials have become unwieldy and overwhelming

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