I think all of us have been disappointed by the trading action in the high growth IT space thus far in August. Consolidations are uncomfortable, and this one is being compounded, I believe by the spike in long rates, whether or not justified. I will take a bit more look at the course of long…
Ticker Target is not a trading service. Many of these exist and write sensational, perhaps breathless commentary about how their service or picks are going to make subscribers 10X or 5X their investment in a week or a month. I do not do that, never have, never will and find it an unfortunate part of…
Affirm: Can it satisfy investors in a fraught environment Investing in the fintech space has not been good for the performance of a portfolio during the past 14+ months. Supreme understatement, I suppose. Depending on the definition of fintech, most of the group has imploded. In terms of winners, there has been Shift4 Payments (FOUR) and…
Shift4 reported its results before the market opened on Thursday. The results were a significant beat in terms of earnings, and a reasonable beat in terms of net revenues as well. The company didn’t change its full year guidance, an excess of so-called prudence on the part of the CFO in my judgement, and highly…
This has been a painful day in a painful week. Stocks are once again declining because the yield on the long bond has risen by about 8 bps to 2.91%. The yield is down a little from its high point, of 2.95%. While the market is down overall, tech stocks again are the focus of…
Summary Shares of High-Growth software companies have led the market down so far in 2022. The decline in valuations and absolute share prices has been at rates that rival anything in the recent past. This decline has occurred against a background of strong and growing demand in the Information Technology (IT) space. Ironically, software demand…
Summary Shift4 is a leading payment processor in some high growth verticals including restaurants, hospitality, stadiums, gaming and specialty retailing. The company has been growing its user base by about 25%/year, and it has made a dramatic pivot to acquiring much larger users than was the case recently. The company has several key points of…
Yes, we did send out our weekly commentary just a little while ago. But the action of the market today. November 22, has impelled us to write an update for subscribers. The pullback today transcended the fintech space, although some commentators focused attention on the performance of those shares which retreated significantly. This was a…
While the headline averages such as Nasdaq traded with gains today, for the most part software shares were weak, and the IGV fell by about 1% and the Cloud Computing index fell by 1.25%. The IGV and the CLOU computing index have both been relatively weak so far this month, with the Cloud index down…
After falling dramatically last Wednesday, many high-growth names have recovered subsequently and made up lost ground. Of these 3 portfolio constituents, Affirm have shone the most brightly, rising 14% in the wake of earnings and making up the loss it had suffered in the wake of the share price implosion at Upstart. Shift4’s quarter was…