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Valens Research

Valens Equity Insights and Inflections - 2018 02 21

AKS is currently trading at valuations below UAFRS-based (Uniform) Assets, with a 0.6x Uniform P/B. At these levels, the market is pricing in expectations for Uniform ROA to remain at current 3%-4% levels through 2021, accompanied by 2% Uniform Asset growth going forward. However, analysts have slightly more bullish expectations, projecting Uniform ROA to fade to 2% in 2017, before recovering to 5% in 2018, accompanied by 5% Uniform Asset shrinkage. Moreover, Valens' qualitative analysis of the firm's Q4 2017 earnings call highlights that management is confident about their outlook and recent performance. At current prices, asset values likely offer a floor to valuations, limiting equity downside for AKS, while any positive catalyst could lead to material upside for the name, and given management optimism, this scenario may be likely.

CCI Q4 2017 Embedded Expectations Analysis – Market expectations are for record-high Uniform ROA, but management has concerns about their investments and industry trends

NYT Q3 2017 Embedded Expectations Analysis – Market expectations are for material improvements in Uniform ROA, but management has concerns about revenue, growth, and costs

X Q4 2017 Embedded Expectations Analysis – X is currently trading well below Uniform Asset levels, but management is confident in their safety programs, quality and reliability improvements, and working capital management

AMD, AMZN, BWA, CTXS, DLX, FCX, HUN, KBH, MTOR, TLRD, URI, WRK
Underlyings
Advanced Micro Devices Inc.

Advanced Micro Devices is a semiconductor company. The company primarily provides x86 microprocessors, as standalone devices or as incorporated into an accelerated processing unit, chipsets, graphics processing units (GPUs), data center and personnel GPUs, and development services; server and embedded processors, semi-custom System-on-Chip products, development services and technology for game consoles. The company also licenses portions of its intellectual property portfolio. The company's segments are: Computing and Graphics, which consists of desktop, notebooks, commercial, and chipsets products; and Enterprise, Embedded and Semi-Custom, which includes server processors, and embedded P\processors products.

AK Steel Holding Corporation

AK Steel Holding is a producer of flat-rolled carbon, stainless and electrical steels products primarily for the automotive, infrastructure and manufacturing, and distributors and converters markets through its wholly-owned subsidiary, AK Steel Corporation. The company's other subsidiaries also provide customer solutions with carbon and stainless steel tubing products, solutions, tool design, hot- and cold-stamped steel components and assemblies. The company sells its carbon steel products mainly to customers in North America, and it sells its electrical and stainless steel products primarily in North America and Europe. The company also produces metallurgical coal through its AK Coal Resources, Inc. subsidiary.

Amazon.com Inc.

Amazon.com serves consumers through its online and physical stores. The company also manufactures and sells electronic devices, including Kindle, Fire tablet, Fire TV, Echo, and Ring, and the company develops and produces media content. The company operates customer service centers and provides programs that enable sellers to grow their businesses, sell their products in its stores, and fulfill orders through the company The company serves developers and enterprises of various sizes, including start-ups, government agencies, and academic institutions, through its Amazon Web Services segment, which provides a set of global compute, storage, database, and other service offerings. The company also provides services, such as advertising.

BorgWarner Inc.

BorgWarner is a holding company. Through its subsidiaries, the company is a global product provider in technology solutions for combustion, hybrid and electric vehicles. The company manufactures and sells these products worldwide, primarily to original equipment manufacturers of light vehicles (passenger cars, sport-utility vehicles, vans and light trucks). The company's segments are: Engine, which provides turbochargers, eBoosters, timing systems, emissions systems, thermal systems, gasoline ignition technology, cabin heaters, battery heaters and battery charging; and Drivetrain, which provides rotating electrical components, power electronics, clutching systems, control modules and all-wheel drive systems.

Citrix Systems Inc.

Citrix Systems is an enterprise software company. The company markets and licenses its solutions through multiple channels worldwide, including selling through resellers, direct and over the Web. The company's partner community comprises thousands of value-added resellers known as Citrix Solution Advisors, value-added distributors, systems integrators, independent software vendors, original equipment manufacturers and Citrix Service Providers. The company provides solutions and services that it categorizes into three inter-related and complementary areas: Workspace, Networking and Professional Services.

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.

Deluxe Corporation

Deluxe is engaged in providing payment solutions. The company's marketing solutions and other services provides products and services designed to meet its customers' sales and marketing needs, as well as various other service offerings. The company's forms, accessories and other products provides printed business forms, including deposit tickets, billing forms, work orders, job proposals, purchase orders, invoices and personnel forms, as well as computer forms compatible with accounting software packages commonly used by small businesses. The company also provides other customized products, including envelopes, office supplies, ink stamps, labels, deposit tickets, check registers and checkbook covers.

Freeport-McMoRan Inc.

Freeport-McMoRan is a holding company. Through its subsidiaries, the company is a mining company. The company operates assets with proven and probable reserves of copper, gold and molybdenum, and the company is a publicly traded copper producer. The company's portfolio of assets includes the Grasberg minerals district in Indonesia, copper and gold deposits; and mining operations in North America and South America, including the Morenci minerals district in Arizona and the Cerro Verde operation in Peru. The company has organized its mining operations into four primary divisions: North America copper mines, South America mining, Indonesia mining and Molybdenum mines.

Huntsman Corporation

Huntsman is a manufacturer of organic chemical products. The company's products are used in a range of applications, including those in the adhesives, aerospace, automotive, construction products, personal care and hygiene, durable and non-durable consumer products, digital inks, electronics, insulation, medical, packaging, coatings and construction, power generation, refining, synthetic fiber, textile chemicals and dyes industries. The company's primary product lines include methyl diphenyl diisocyanate, amines, maleic anhydride, epoxy-based polymer formulations, textile chemicals and dyes. The company's segments are: Polyurethanes, Performance Products, Advanced Materials and Textile Effects.

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.

Meritor Inc.

Meritor is a global supplier of a range of integrated systems, modules and components to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and the aftermarket for the commercial vehicle, transportation and industrial sectors. The company serves commercial truck, trailer, military, bus and coach, construction, and other industrial OEMs and certain aftermarkets. The company's segments are: Commercial Truck, which supplies drivetrain systems and components, including axles, drivelines and braking and suspension systems; and Aftermarket, Industrial and Trailer, which supplies axles, brakes, drivelines, suspension parts and other replacement parts to commercial vehicle and industrial aftermarket customers.

New York Times Company Class A

New York Times is a global media organization focused on creating, collecting and distributing news and information. The company's principal business consists of distributing content generated by its newsroom through its digital and print platforms. In addition to subscriptions to its digital news product, the company provides standalone subscriptions to other digital products, namely the company's Crossword and Cooking products. Certain digital news subscription packages include access to the company's Crossword and Cooking products. The company's products also include news and opinion podcasts, which are distributed both on its digital platforms and on third-party platforms.

Tailored Brands Inc.

Tailored Brands is a retailer of men's tailored clothing and men's formalwear provider in the U.S. and Canada. The company's operations are conducted in two segments: retail, which provides the company's products and services primarily through the company's retail brands - Men's Wearhouse, Men's Wearhouse and Tux, Jos. A. Bank Clothiers, Moores, Joseph Abboud, and K&G - and the internet at www.menswearhouse.com, www.josbank.com, and www.josephabboud.com; and corporate apparel, which includes the activities from the company's corporate apparel and uniform operations conducted by Dimensions, Alexandra and Yaffy in the U.K. and Twin Hill in the U.S., which provide corporate apparel uniforms and workwear to workforces.

United Rentals Inc.

United Rentals is an equipment rental company that operates throughout the United States and Canada, and Europe. The company's general rentals segment includes the rental of construction, aerial and industrial equipment, general tools and light equipment, and related services and activities. This segment's customers include construction and industrial companies, manufacturers, utilities, municipalities and homeowners. The company's trench, power and fluid solutions segment includes the rental of construction products and related services. This segment consist of: Trench Safety region, Power and Heating, Ventilating and Air Conditioning region; and Fluid Solutions and Fluid Solutions Europe regions.

United States Steel Corporation

United States Steel is a steel producer of flat-rolled and tubular products with production operations in the United States and Europe. The company is also engaged in railroad services and real estate operations. The company's segments are: North American Flat-Rolled, which produces slabs, strip mill plates, sheets and tin mill products; U. S. Steel Europe, which produces and sells slabs, strip mill plate, sheet, tin mill products and spiral welded pipe, as well as heating radiators and refractory ceramic materials; and Tubular Products, which produces and sells electric resistance welded steel casing and tubing (known as oil country tubular goods), and standard and line pipe and mechanical tubing.

WestRock Company

WestRock is a provider of paper and packaging solutions for consumer and corrugated packaging markets. The company partners with its customers to provide paper and packaging solutions. The company's operating and business locations are in North America, South America, Europe, Asia and Australia. The company's segments include: Corrugated Packaging, which consists of the company's containerboard mills, corrugated packaging and distribution operations, as well as its merchandising displays and recycling procurement operations; Consumer Packaging, which consists of the company's consumer mills, food and beverage and partition operations; and Land and Development, which sells real estate primarily in the Charleston, SC region.

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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.

  • 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

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