Tag: noah kiedrowski

Tug-of-War: Disney Streaming vs. COVID-19

Posted on by Noah Kiedrowski

Clearly, COVID-19 has been very damaging with an unquantifiable impact across Disney’s (DIS) business segments. Disney has had to shutter all of its worldwide Parks and Resorts. ESPN has been hit with the cancellation of virtually all sports worldwide. Advertising revenue coming through its media properties has been hit as companies scale back ad spending. All of its movie studio productions have been halted, and movie releases postponed. Despite these headwinds, Disney’s streaming initiatives have been major growth catalysts for the company. Disney+ has racked up over 50 million paid subscribers in just five months, Hulu has 30 million paid subscribers, and ESPN+ has 7.9 million paid subscribers. Disney+ has been wildly successful via unleashing all of its content (Marvel, Star Wars, Disney, and Pixar) in what has become a formidable competitor in the ever-expanding streaming wars domestically and internationally. Hence the tug-of-war on Wall Street between the COVID-19 induced negative impact and the success of its streaming initiatives in terms of valuation. The stock is selling at a steep discount of ~30% from its highs of $151 per share. At these reduced COVID-19 levels, Disney is a compelling buy as its legacy business segments get back on track in conjunction with these successful streaming initiatives.

COVID-19 Perspective

As economies around the world reopen and certainty washes over the COVID-19 landscape, Disney’s business segments will regain their health. Parks will reopen as seen with Disney Shanghai, movie productions will resume, movie theaters and resorts will reopen, and sports will inevitably play-on. The resumption of all of these activities will feed into Disney’s legacy businesses. Disney continues to dominate the box office year after year with a long pipeline of blockbusters in the queue. Parks and Resorts continue to be a growth avenue with tremendous pricing power. Disney is going all-in on the streaming front and acquired full ownership of Hulu, and the company is launched its Disney branded streaming service with great success. I feel Continue reading "Tug-of-War: Disney Streaming vs. COVID-19" →

COVID-19 Market Meltdown - Hysteria Presents Opportunities

Posted on by Noah Kiedrowski

The coronavirus (COVID-19) has wreaked havoc on worldwide supply chains, shipping routes, commerce customer demand, and travel. The broader market sold off in a historic downward move as the coronavirus has spread outside of China. During the last week of February, the Dow Jones and S&P 500 sank by 12% and 11% for the week, respectively. This marked the worst weekly performance since the financial crisis for the markets. The Dow posted its biggest one-day loss ever during the week and tumbled into correction territory, down more than 10% along with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq. This market-wide meltdown is in response to the negative impact that COVID-19 will likely have on the global economy and corporate earnings. A wide array of companies have already issued warnings about their upcoming quarterly earnings. This placed a damper on the outlook for the markets, especially with rising concerns over a potential outbreak occurring in the United States. The OPEC fiasco and plummeting oil prices are exacerbating this market weakness. These events are presenting buying opportunities across the board in high-quality names and the indices on the whole.

The Market Meltdown

The number of new cases in China continued to rise and spiked in South Korea and Italy during the final week of February and the first week of March. During this time, the Dow posted multiple declines of more than 1,000 points. One loss of 1,192 points was the Dow's biggest one-day point loss on record. The Dow was down 14% from a record high during this period. The S&P 500, posted declines of more than 2% multiple times during this two week period as well. The S&P 500 fell 13% below a record high, and this marks the average's fastest decline from a record high into a correction ever, outside of a one-day crash. It's noteworthy to highlight that 96% of the entire S&P 500 is in correction territory, and all 30 Dow stocks are down more than 10% from their respective 52-week highs. Furthermore, the COVID-19 market sell-off has wiped out over $3.5 trillion in market value from its high during the two weeks. Continue reading "COVID-19 Market Meltdown - Hysteria Presents Opportunities" →

Transformation Underway - CVS Health and Aetna Combination

Posted on by Noah Kiedrowski

The combination of CVS Health (CVS) and Aetna is proving to be a success after initial skepticism by investors. CVS has broken out recently due to a string of better than expected quarters, in part attributable to the Aetna acquisition. CVS is generating large amounts of free cash flow, paying down debt, and returning value to shareholders in a variety of ways. To further boost long-term growth prospects, restore growth, and fend off potential competition, CVS combined with Aetna. This combination creates the first through-in-through healthcare company, combining CVS's pharmacies and PBM platform with Aetna's insurance business. The new CVS combines its existing pharmacy benefits manager (PBM) and retail pharmacies with the second-largest diversified healthcare company.

This is a bold and hefty price tag to pay yet necessary to compete in the increasingly competitive healthcare space, changing marketplace conditions, and political backdrop with drug pricing pressures. CVS made a defensive yet acquisition required to enable the company to go back on the offensive. CVS had been beaten down for years, plummeting by over 50% ($113 to $52) from its multi-year highs. As of late, CVS has broken out to the mid $70s on the heels of its positive string of earnings. At current levels, CVS presents a compelling investment opportunity while the company is still in the early stages of its CVS-Aetna combination, which drives shareholder returns.

Challenging Backdrop

The pharmaceutical supply chain cohort, specifically CVS, has been unable to obtain a firm footing in the backdrop of consolidation within the sector, negative legislative undertones, drug pricing pressures, rising insurance costs, and a market that has lost patience with these stocks. All of these factors culminated into sub-par growth with a level of uncertainty as the sector continued to face headwinds from multiple directions. Many of the stocks that comprised this cohort presented compelling valuations in a very frothy market. This allure had been a value trap as these stocks continued to disappoint. It's no secret that these companies have been faced with several headwinds that have negatively impacted the growth and the changing marketplace conditions have plagued these stocks. Continue reading "Transformation Underway - CVS Health and Aetna Combination" →

Facebook Remains Compelling

Posted on by Noah Kiedrowski

Facebook (FB) tanked after announcing its recent quarterly earnings despite beating on both the top and bottom-line numbers. In addition to the strong revenue and income figures, user growth across its platform grew by a robust clip and the company authorized an additional $10 billion for its share repurchase program. The culprit was a sharp rise in spending and expenses to contend with a slew of regulatory, user and legal battles the company is waging on the privacy front. This minor sell-off provides investors with a buying opportunity in top tier large-cap company that continues to grow double digits with a long runway for further growth and monetization of its platforms.

Trillion Dollar Market Capitalization

Recently, Google (GOOGL), Microsoft (MSFT), Amazon (AMZN), and Apple (AAPL) have all crossed the psychological threshold of the $1 trillion market capitalization valuation. This is the exclusive Wall Street club of only the select few. Facebook is the next potential company to be crowned a 1 trillion-dollar company and join the prestigious Wall Street club (Figure 1). Facebook’s current market capitalization sits at $611 billion, implying a $389 billion market capitalization gap. Facebook needs to appreciate roughly 64% from these levels to joins the likes of Apple, Amazon, Google, and Microsoft.

Facebook
Figure 1 – The $1 trillion market cap landscape back in August 2019 with Facebook in close pursuit and even closer to achieving the mark

Facebook’s Unparalleled Growth

Facebook is now testing its all-time highs with a reasonable price-to-earnings multiple when compared to its tech cohort. Facebook continues to post unparalleled growth Continue reading "Facebook Remains Compelling" →