Research from Water Tower Research, Water Tower Research

Water Tower Research

Research from Water Tower Research

Water Tower Research is a leading equity research firm that provides research on micro, small and mid cap companies.

Water Tower Research was founded by Wall Street veterans after witnessing a fundamental shift in the investment research industry with the result being a declining knowledge base among investors, a lack of awareness and a shrinking pool of fundamental research being conducted on companies across the small-cap and micro-cap spectrum. The same issues are now increasingly occurring in the mid-cap space. This sea change within the investment community is impacting not only the companies themselves but also current shareholders and potential investors. With significantly less active sell-side sponsorship by Wall Street, a substantial information gap has developed between companies and various constituents in the financial community. The net result is fewer channels for insight and information to flow between companies and investors.

Equity Research Firm

Thematic (Sector/Industry)

<div><div><div><div><ul style="list-style-type: disc;"><li><p>Monthly report on restaurant and retail companies. At Water Tower Research, we are introducing a new monthly report to focus exclusively on the Restaurant and Retail Industries.</p></li><li><p>Our report will focus on stock performance, short interest, an outlook for restaurant commodity costs, interesting themes, and company interviews.</p></li><li><p>In this note, we interviewed Gary Schnierow, Vice-President of Investor Relations, and Corporate Finance for Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc. (NASDAQ: BBW). </p></li></ul></div></div></div></div>

Monthly report on restaurant and retail companies. At Water Tower Research, we are introducing a new monthly report to focus exclusively on the Restaurant and Retail Industries.Our report will focus on stock performance, short interest, an outlook for restaurant commodity costs, interesting themes, and company interviews.In this note, we interviewed Gary Schnierow, Vice-President of Investor Relations, and Corporate Finance for Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc. (NASDAQ: BBW). 

Restaurant & Retail Roundup - Interview with Build-A-Bear Workshop (BBW)

High Quality Stock Setups, Weekly Stock Bull Finder

Weekly Stock Bull Finder

High Quality Stock Setups

Finding high potential stock setups on quality companies

<ul><li>With the upcoming first quarter earnings season taking center stage the next 3 weeks, there is yet again a well overdue reprieve from the back and forth focus on hiking, pausing, and cutting next steps of the Federal Reserve.</li><li>The focus now goes back to company earnings and forward guidance and whether slowdowns picked up on ISM, PMI, and regional Fed surveys are now making its way through earnings reports.</li><li>While still early, the first 22 S&amp;P 500 Index companies reveal a 20% drop in earnings QoQ.</li></ul>

With the upcoming first quarter earnings season taking center stage the next 3 weeks, there is yet again a well overdue reprieve from the back and forth focus on hiking, pausing, and cutting next steps of the Federal Reserve.The focus now goes back to company earnings and forward guidance and whether slowdowns picked up on ISM, PMI, and regional Fed surveys are now making its way through earnings reports.While still early, the first 22 S&amp;P 500 Index companies reveal a 20% drop in earnings QoQ.

Technical Analyst, Vermilion Research

Joe Jasper

Technical Analyst

Technical and Quantitative Research

Vermilion Research

Vermilion’s objective is to deliver timely, actionable, and unique technical research to professional investors through the application of our various technical indicators.

Our research strategists seek to highlight securities which we believe are at major inflection points, based on our various technical and quantitative indicators, and offer asymmetric risk/return profiles. Our unique research methodology, centered on relative strength, enables our strategists to deliver superior investment recommendations.

Our process begins by organizing the universe of actively traded stocks into discrete sectors, then into industry groups. We then apply our technical and quantitative tools to identify developing price trends. Once attractive trends are identified within a selected sector or group, we screen for individual stocks which we believe offer the best risk/reward profile. We provide a historical perspective that often reveals, through our long-term charts, how price patterns often repeat themselves over time.

Technical Analysis

<ul>
<li>Over the past two weeks, we have been steadfast in our belief that this current rally/short squeeze is likely to fizzle in the 4100-4165 area on the S&amp;P 500.</li>
<li>There has yet to be any meaningful deterioration and we cannot rule out the SPX reaching higher, potentially for 4300-4325 (August 2022 highs).</li>
<li>We continue to preach caution and believe upside is limited on the market indexes. Any combination of a continued strong labor market or hotter-than-expected inflation could upset the market.</li>
</ul>


Over the past two weeks, we have been steadfast in our belief that this current rally/short squeeze is likely to fizzle in the 4100-4165 area on the S&amp;P 500.
There has yet to be any meaningful deterioration and we cannot rule out the SPX reaching higher, potentially for 4300-4325 (August 2022 highs).
We continue to preach caution and believe upside is limited on the market indexes. Any combination of a continued strong labor market or hotter-than-expected inflation could upset the market.


Downgrading Energy; SPX Final Reach Up to 4300-4325?; Buys in Restaurants, Retailers, Industrials

Fundamental Short Selling Research

Eric Fernandez, CFA

TwoRiversAnalytics

Equity Bottom-Up

<ul>
<li>Our breaking growth model uncovers slowing growth, margin declines, sales and/or earnings disappointments, troubling working capital trends, poor estimate trends or lowered guidance.</li>
<li>These shorts tend to have moderate to higher betas, time horizons of three to twelve months, higher valuations due to historically strong growth and are often “market darlings”.  </li>
<li>The short response, when growth breaks, is based on a downward reassessment of future growth potential frequently aided by multiple compression that accelerates the decline.</li>
</ul>


Our breaking growth model uncovers slowing growth, margin declines, sales and/or earnings disappointments, troubling working capital trends, poor estimate trends or lowered guidance.
These shorts tend to have moderate to higher betas, time horizons of three to twelve months, higher valuations due to historically strong growth and are often “market darlings”.  
The short response, when growth breaks, is based on a downward reassessment of future growth potential frequently aided by multiple compression that accelerates the decline.


IPOs and Catalysts/Events, Global Equity Research Ltd

Arun George

IPOs and Catalysts/Events

Uncompromised, Independent, Conflict-Free Research

Global Equity Research Ltd

Global Equity Research was started in 2017 by a group of experienced research professionals. It was founded on a passionate belief in the importance and the need for uncompromised, independent, conflict-free research. We aim to provide differentiated and actionable primary and bottom up fundamental research.

Equity Capital Markets

<div>
<p><a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/nayuki-holdings" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:32149:1" rel="noopener">Nayuki Holdings (2150 HK)</a> is the second-largest premium teahouse chain in China accounting for 18.9% of China’s premium modern teahouse market as measured by total retail consumption value in 2020, according to CIC.</p>
<p>Nayuki will commence trading on Wednesday, 30 June. Nayuki priced its IPO at HK$19.80 and the shares <a href="https://inews.hket.com/article/2993858/%E3%80%90%E5%A5%88%E9%9B%AA%E7%9A%84%E8%8C%B6%E6%9A%97%E7%9B%A4%E3%80%91%E5%A5%88%E9%9B%AA%E7%9A%84%E8%8C%B62150%E5%A0%B4%E5%A4%96%E6%9A%97%E7%9B%A4%E5%8D%8711-%E3%80%80%E4%B8%80%E6%89%8B%E5%B8%B3%E9%9D%A2%E8%B3%BA1100%E5%85%83?mtc=40001&amp;srkw=IPO%E6%9C%80%E5%BF%AB%E6%9C%80%E9%BD%8A" target="_blank" rel="noopener">stood 11% higher</a> at HK$22.00 in the grey market.</p>
</div><div>
<p>In <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/insights/nayuki-holdings-ipo-initiation-a-new-leaf" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="insights:48532" rel="noopener">Nayuki Holdings IPO Initiation: A New Leaf</a>, we noted that premium teahouses have rapidly gained popularity in China as they bring new tea-drinking experiences and benefit from the structural trend of consumer’s consumption upgrades driven by higher disposable income. We opined that Nayuki has the right ingredients to offer investors an attractive play on this market. In <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/insights/nayuki-holdings-ipo-drinking-habits" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="insights:52873" rel="noopener">Nayuki Holdings IPO: Drinking Habits</a>, we noted that recent results (disclosed in the PHIP) show that Nayuki is well-positioned as a post-COVID-19 recovery play.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/insights/nayuki-holdings-ipo-valuation-insights" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="insights:53291" rel="noopener">Nayuki Holdings IPO: Valuation Insights</a>, we noted that Nayuki is attractively valued to its peer group for its forecasted earnings growth i.e. on a PEG basis. We recommended participating at the low end of the IPO price range due to the decent upside compared to our base-case DCF valuation.</p>
</div><div><div><div class="content-highlight"><p>Updating for the final IPO net raise and FX, our base-case DCF derived price target is HK$19.45 per share. Nevertheless, our DCF sensitivity and relative valuation analysis show that the grey market price is justifiable.  </p></div></div></div>


Nayuki Holdings (2150 HK) is the second-largest premium teahouse chain in China accounting for 18.9% of China’s premium modern teahouse market as measured by total retail consumption value in 2020, according to CIC.
Nayuki will commence trading on Wednesday, 30 June. Nayuki priced its IPO at HK$19.80 and the shares stood 11% higher at HK$22.00 in the grey market.

In Nayuki Holdings IPO Initiation: A New Leaf, we noted that premium teahouses have rapidly gained popularity in China as they bring new tea-drinking experiences and benefit from the structural trend of consumer’s consumption upgrades driven by higher disposable income. We opined that Nayuki has the right ingredients to offer investors an attractive play on this market. In Nayuki Holdings IPO: Drinking Habits, we noted that recent results (disclosed in the PHIP) show that Nayuki is well-positioned as a post-COVID-19 recovery play.
In Nayuki Holdings IPO: Valuation Insights, we noted that Nayuki is attractively valued to its peer group for its forecasted earnings growth i.e. on a PEG basis. We recommended participating at the low end of the IPO price range due to the decent upside compared to our base-case DCF valuation.
Updating for the final IPO net raise and FX, our base-case DCF derived price target is HK$19.45 per share. Nevertheless, our DCF sensitivity and relative valuation analysis show that the grey market price is justifiable.  

United States

Wingstop Inc. owns and operates restaurants. The Company specializes in cooked-to-order, hand-sauced, and tossed chicken wings. Wingstop serves customers worldwide.

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Wingstop Inc (WING US)

Restaurant & Retail Roundup - Interview with Build-A-Bear Workshop (BBW)

Monthly report on restaurant and retail companies. At Water Tower Research, we are introducing a new monthly report to focus exclusively on the...

Water Tower Research

Weekly Stock Bullfinder - Week of 4/17

The focus now goes back to company earnings and forward guidance and whether slowdowns picked up on ISM, PMI, and regional Fed surveys are now...

Weekly Stock Bull Finder

Downgrading Energy; SPX Final Reach Up to 4300-4325?; Buys in Restaurants, Retailers, Industrials

We have expected this squeeze to fizzle in the 4100-4165 $SPX area, but with no meaningful deterioration, we could see the $SPX reach for 4300-4325...

Vermilion Research

Breaking Growth Short Candidates

Get a glimpse into our short idea generation process through our Breaking Growth model update. This week: Insulet, Generac, Catalent and Wingstop...

Eric Fernandez, CFA

Nayuki Holdings IPO: Trading Debut

Nayuki priced its IPO at HK$19.80 and the shares stood 11% higher at HK$22.00 in the grey market. Our DCF sensitivity and relative valuation...

Arun George

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