Report
Valens Research

MSCI - Embedded Expectations Analysis - 2021 01 06

MSCI Inc. (MSCI:USA) currently trades at a historical high relative to UAFRS-based (Uniform) earnings, with a 46.4x Uniform P/E. At these levels, the market has bullish expectations for the firm, but management may have concerns about the ESG business, indices growth, and their partnerships

Specifically, management may lack confidence in their ability to monetize ESG data, maintain their competitive advantages in ESG, and drive growth. Moreover, they may be concerned about their MSCI ESG ratings on Bloomberg terminals and their ability to make acquisitions. In addition, they may lack confidence in their ability to see significant segment growth in the MSCI indexes, maintain the partnership they have with Carbon Delta management, and acquire new data sets through partnerships. Finally, they may have concerns about their ability to sustain the performance of their equity investment in Burgiss and remain focused in supporting their clients
Underlying
MSCI Inc. Class A

MSCI is a provider of decision support tools and services for the global investment community. The company's segments are: Index, in which Clients use the company's indexes in various areas of the investment process, including index-linked product creation; Analytics, which provides risk management, performance attribution and portfolio management content, applications and services; Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG), which helps institutional investors understand how ESG considerations can impact the long-term risk and reward of their portfolio and individual security-level investments; and Real Estate, which includes research, reporting, market data and benchmarking offerings.

Provider
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.

  • Corporate credit ratings remain years behind the fundamental underpinnings of company performance
  • Stock analysts continue to make recommendations with deeply inherent biases
  • Research firms have failed to break down the walls between credit, equity, and macroeconomic research
  • The governing accounting bodies have created more leeway for mis-estimates and mis-classifications as financials have become unwieldy and overwhelming

The integrity of Valens Research is founded in our disciplined processes and analytics. No “star” analysts. No corporate advisory relationships. No-nonsense opinions and recommendations.

Analysts
Valens Research

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