ESG Newsletter Portfolio Idea ASML Holding May Further Boost Longer Term Guidance

Image Shown: How ASML Holding Inc’s photolithography systems are used to produce semiconductor components, including the most cutting edge “chips” along with more mature semiconductor components. Image Source: ASML Holding Inc – Fiscal 2021 Annual Report By Callum Turcan The maker of advanced photolithography systems that are used to produce the most cutting edge semiconductor components or “chips” is the Dutch firm ASML Holding NV (ASML). It has a virtual monopoly at the high-end of this market due to its technological prowess in this space and focus on R&D. The firm also produces photolithography systems to make more mature chips and offers services that are primarily geared towards its installed systems base. ASML Holding reported first quarter earnings for fiscal … Read more

Best Idea Alphabet Growing Global Cloud Presence

Image Shown: Alphabet Inc Class C shares, a top-weighted idea in our Best Ideas Newsletter portfolio, are up ~65% over the past year. By Callum Turcan Alphabet Inc (GOOG) (GOOGL) has historically focused primarily on growing its digital advertising revenues since the company was founded under the Google name back in 1998. More recently, the technology giant has begun seriously seeking to broaden its revenue base, and we like what we see on this front. We include Alphabet Class C shares (ticker: GOOG) as an idea in the Best Ideas Newsletter portfolio given its immense capital appreciation upside potential as a net cash-rich, free cash flow generating powerhouse (topics that we have covered often in the past). Our fair value … Read more

Innovative Fuel Cell Company Ceres Power Has a Stellar Growth Outlook

Image Shown: Ceres Power Holdings plc is a pioneer in the fuel cell industry. If Ceres Power and its strategic partners are successful, Ceres Power could offer investors ample capital appreciation upside though we caution that this is a highly speculative name. Image Source: Ceres Power Holdings Plc – First Half of 2021 Interim Report IR Presentation By Callum Turcan We wrote about Ceres Power Holdings plc (CPWHF), a UK-based pioneer in the fuel cell industry focused on building up a commercially viable licensing and royalty business, back in February 2021 (link here). The company is an innovator in the solid oxide fuel cell (‘SOFC’) industry, led by its SteelCell technology, and more recently started pushing into the realm of … Read more

Oil Markets Get Decimated

Image Shown: Oil prices have been decimated year-to-date. By Callum Turcan We are following up on our ‘Oil Prices Collapse, Reiterating 2,350-2,750 S&P 500 Target Range; Credit Crunch Looming?’ note (link here) published Sunday, March 8, to provide additional commentary on what’s going on in the shale patch right now. As of this writing, oil prices (BNO, USO) continue to get hammered. Here’s what we had to say in that recent note: The independent upstream producer space (XOP) is careening off a cliff, and that was before the OPEC+ cartel was unable to reach an agreement during their joint meeting (OPEC and non-OPEC members) on March 6. Due to the inability for the oil cartel to reach a deal, largely because Russia … Read more

Oil Prices Collapse, Reiterating 2,350-2,750 S&P 500 Target Range; Credit Crunch Looming?

Image Source: Value Trap: Theory of Universal Valuation From Value Trap: “The banking sector was not the only sector that faced considerable selling pressure during the Financial Crisis of the late 2000s, of course. Other companies that required funding to maintain their business operations faced severe liquidity risk, or a situation where refinancing, or rolling over debt, might be difficult to do on fair terms, making such financing prohibitive in some cases. Those that faced outsize debt maturities during the most severe months of the credit crunch faced a real threat of Chapter 11 restructuring had the lending environment completely seized. In thinking about share prices as a range of probable fair value outcomes, equity prices tend to face pressure as … Read more

A ~0.1% Probability Since 1896

Image Source: Wikipedia Commons   By Brian Nelson, CFA It was mid-June 2015, and our team released our case on why the midstream MLP space would collapse. To us, it just made sense. We’ve been practicing enterprise valuation for a long time, and to this day, we’ve updated over 20,000+ discounted cash flow models. I used to head up the methodology and valuation infrastructure of a department of over 100 analysts across several continents and all sectors when I used to work at Morningstar. Baptism by fire as they say. This was about 10 years ago now. Since our call in mid-June 2015 through March 2, 2020, on a price basis, the S&P 500 (SPY) has advanced 46%, while the Alerian MLP … Read more

Covering Oil Markets Ahead of the Upcoming OPEC/OPEC+ Meetings

Image Source: Exxon Mobil Corporation – 2019 IR Presentation  By Callum Turcan On March 5, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (‘OPEC’) is holding an “extraordinary” meeting in Vienna, Austria (EWO), which will be followed up by a ministerial meeting between OPEC and non-OPEC members the next day. The group had already agreed to cut oil (USO, BNO) supplies by an additional 0.5 million barrels of per day (‘bpd’) back in December 2019 through an agreement that would last through March 2020 (that was on top of an existing deal to keep 1.2 million bpd off of the market which runs through the end of March 2020 as well). As part of that deal, Saudi Arabia (KSA) offered to “voluntarily” … Read more

Fed Cuts 50 Basis Points, Expect More Market Volatility Ahead

Image Source: FOMC  The emergency 50-basis point Fed rate cut announced March 3 was largely expected by the marketplace in light of growing economic concerns due to COVID-19, but it does nothing to immunize against COVID-19 and little to stabilize the situation. We continue to monitor the situation closely, and we expect ongoing volatility in the coming days and months as the situation with COVID-19 remains fluid. Having moved to defensive positions in both the Best Ideas Newsletter portfolio and Dividend Growth Newsletter portfolio in January and having capitalized on the “crash protection” put, we are preparing for our next move. For now, we’re watching and waiting, and we encourage readers that have not yet picked up their copy of … Read more

COVID-19 Crisis Intensifies

Image Source: CDC. Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19).  Our dearest members: — The world is being challenged today by what some including Bill Gates believe might be a “once-in-a-century pathogen.” We do not know the eventual outcome, whether the impact of this illness ends up being as profound as the Spanish Influenza of 1918-1919 (which inflicted a death toll in the tens of millions), but we maintain our view the markets have yet to come to grips with the impact of COVID-19 on economic activity and potential ramifications on the global economy and the banking system.  — What is currently a “biological” crisis may turn into an all-out global financial crisis, one that could end up worse than the 2008/2009 mortgage meltdown. Instead … Read more

Has the Stock Market Crash Begun?

Image: CDC. Transmission electron microscopic image of an isolate from the first U.S. case of COVID-19, formerly known as 2019-nCoV. The spherical viral particles, colorized blue, contain cross-section through the viral genome, seen as black dots. Dear members: This article is our fourth update on COVID-19. The previous three installments can be found here (Feb 22), here (Feb 7) and here (Jan 31). We trust you and yours are well during this global crisis. It’s hard to turn on the television these days without hearing about COVID-19, a novel coronavirus and respiratory illness that continues to spread from person to person around the world. COVID-19 is deadly, and particularly deadly among those 60 years of age and older and those … Read more