Independent research on the U.S. markets, Baptista Research

Baptista Research

Independent research on the U.S. markets

Baptista Research is an independent financial research house focused on the U.S. markets. We provide equity research as well as credit research reports on the top-listed U.S. companies with most of our focus on technology, consumer goods and services, automobiles, industrials, oil and gas, pharma, and healthcare. Our research has served more than 3000 institutional investors including mutual funds, hedge funds, banks, family offices, and various buy-side firms. We operate a research subscription service where institutions, as well as retail investors, can have priority access to all our research. We also have a wide distribution of our research reports across some of the top global financial platforms. Apart from equity research and credit research, we also provide advisory services with respect to mergers & acquisitions (M&A), private equity/ venture capital fundraising, valuation reports, and investment management services for corporates.
Baptista Research is owned and managed by Ishan Majumdar, an ex-Venture Capitalist/ Investment Banker, a Chartered Accountant, and a Masters’ degree holder in Management from HEC Paris. Ishan has nearly a decade of experience in Mergers and Acquisitions, Leveraged Buyouts (LBOs), Venture Capital Investing, Corporate Strategy, and Valuation in front-office roles at the likes of BNP Paribas CIB, Credit Agricole CIB, Groupe Danone, and TIW Private Equity. He has worked on and closed multiple acquisition deals, leveraged buyouts, and start-up investment transactions.

Equity Capital Markets

<ul><li>Microsoft zoomed past the target price from our last report as the company delivered yet another stellar result driven by the strong adoption of Azure cloud offerings, excellent momentum in its Teams app and its Power Platform, the robust LinkedIn business and the gaming segment.</li><li>The company’s overall top-line was up 22% and the Microsoft cloud continues to be a major driver, contributing $20.7 billion to the top-line, up by a staggering 36% year over year.</li><li>We are optimistic about Microsoft and give it an ‘Outperform’ rating with a revised target price.</li></ul>

Microsoft zoomed past the target price from our last report as the company delivered yet another stellar result driven by the strong adoption of Azure cloud offerings, excellent momentum in its Teams app and its Power Platform, the robust LinkedIn business and the gaming segment.The company’s overall top-line was up 22% and the Microsoft cloud continues to be a major driver, contributing $20.7 billion to the top-line, up by a staggering 36% year over year.We are optimistic about Microsoft and give it an ‘Outperform’ rating with a revised target price.

Microsoft Corporation - Investment Thesis

Latest News from the World’s Leading Innovators

Granite Bay Capital

An innovation focussed investment company

Granite Bay Capital is an innovation focussed investment company with a deep focus on the companies at the leading edge of innovation across major themes such as AI, ubiquitous computing, sustainability, automation and longevity.

Thematic (Sector/Industry)

Headline Development A lot of momentum continues around the metaverse. A few people were close to the pin on Facebook’s new name…..MetaBook, Metanet, MetaRack...even MetaMark being amongst the favourites.  However, Meta came out on top - or Meta Platforms (MVRS) to be precise.

Headline Development A lot of momentum continues around the metaverse. A few people were close to the pin on Facebook’s new name…..MetaBook, Metanet, MetaRack...even MetaMark being amongst the favourites.  However, Meta came out on top - or Meta Platforms (MVRS) to be precise.

Pan-Asia Catalysts/Events, Quiddity Advisors

David Blennerhassett

Pan-Asia Catalysts/Events

Quiddity Advisors

Event-Driven

The sound bite in the last week was <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/microsoft-corp" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:15273:1" rel="noopener">Microsoft Corp (MSFT US)</a> surpassing <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/apple-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:666:1" rel="noopener">Apple Inc (AAPL US)</a> as the world's most valuable company. 
Yet 13 years ago, almost to the day, the world's largest company was <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/volkswagen-ag" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:21738:1" rel="noopener">Volkswagen (VOW GR)</a>. For one day at least. 
Volkswagen, like a number of large listed companies in Germany, has two classes of shares - ordinary shares, which are carry voting rights, and preference shares, which don't, but are income paying. Below is the ord premium over prefs for the last 18 years.
<figure class="editor-figure mceNonEditable"><img src="https://static-prod.smartkarma.com/images/media/000/239/499/original/image_23964649881635928119230.png?1635928120" class="editor-image img-responsive" data-smartkarma-image-id="239499"></figure>
That extraordinary spike occurred on the 28 October 2008. Just as global markets were imploding. 
Around this time <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/porsche-automobil-holding-se" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:21691:1" rel="noopener">Porsche Automobil Holding Se (PAH3 GR)</a> held ~35% in VW - the ords - having first taken a 20% stake in 2005, then to 30% in early 2007, triggering a mandatory offer. In March 2008, Porsche's supervisory board gave the green light to hold 50%. 
The ord premium oscillated between ~27%-55% in the early noughts until around 2006 when Porsche began building its stake.
<figure class="editor-figure mceNonEditable"><img src="https://static-prod.smartkarma.com/images/media/000/239/503/original/image_70873068291635928736842.png?1635928739" class="editor-image img-responsive" data-smartkarma-image-id="239503"></figure>
This escalating premium can also be illustrated by the bifurcation in the prices of the two share classes.
<figure class="editor-figure mceNonEditable"><img src="https://static-prod.smartkarma.com/images/media/000/239/520/original/image_637451579121635932198816.png?1635932199" class="editor-image img-responsive" data-smartkarma-image-id="239520"></figure>
The arbitrage  - short the ords, long the prefs - appeared a "riskless trade". And still, the ord premium expanded, closing at a 400+% on the 16 October, before showing some semblance of normalcy and retracing to 247% on the 21 October.
Porsche had made no public announcement about any further share acquisition since the 17 September when it held <a href="https://www.porsche-se.com/en/news/press-releases/details/news/detail/News/porsche-increases-its-vw-stake-to-3514-per-cent-1" target="_blank" rel="noopener">35.14%</a>.  On Sunday the 26 October, it <a href="https://www.porsche-se.com/en/news/press-releases/details/news/detail/News/porsche-heads-for-domination-agreement-1" target="_blank" rel="noopener">announced</a>:
<blockquote>
Due to the dramatic distortions on the financial markets Porsche Automobil Holding SE, Stuttgart, has decided over the weekend to disclose its holdings in shares and hedging positions related to the takeover of Volkswagen AG, Wolfsburg. At the end of last week Porsche SE held 42.6 per cent of the Volkswagen ordinary shares and in addition 31.5 per cent in so called cash settled options relating to Volkswagen ordinary shares to hedge against price risks, representing a total of 74.1 per cent.
</blockquote>
Then that sinking feeling: Porsche holds 74.1%, Lower Saxony 20%, leaving ~6% of ordinary shares in the market to buy. Yet an estimated 12% of the ord shares were short sold. It wasn't possible for all short-sellers to buy back shares and close their positions.
VW touched $999/share on the 28 October,  before finally coming back (ostensibly from the moon) to earth, belatedly helped by Porsche providing 5% to short-sellers (despite <a href="https://www.porsche-se.com/en/news/press-releases/details/news/detail/News/short-sellers-responsible-for-extreme-price-movements-in-volkswagen-ordinary-shares-1" target="_blank" rel="noopener">blaming</a> the shorts for the extreme price movements).
<figure class="editor-figure mceNonEditable"><img src="https://static-prod.smartkarma.com/images/media/000/239/516/original/image_468353378111635930921766.png?1635930922" class="editor-image img-responsive" data-smartkarma-image-id="239516"></figure>
Porsche subsequently cleared 50% in VW's ordinary shares, but not only lacked the funding to take its stake all the way to 75% - via the options - it had also borrowed heavily to build that 50% stake in VW, to the point the iconic car brand had to stave off possible bankruptcy.
Short-sellers lost around US$20bn which has largely fallen on deaf ears in the <a href="https://www.courthousenews.com/investors-lose-suit-over-porsches-short-squeeze/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">courts</a>. Porsche's CEO Wendelin Wiedeking was booted out. And Ferdinand Piëch, Ferdinand Porsche's grandson, former CEO, then chairman of VW, was sitting pretty as he and family held 50% of the voting rights in Porsche SE. 
The ords moved into negative territory following the carnage, then roughly hugged parity for a few years. The ord premium is on the run again. Time to get short?
<figure class="editor-figure mceNonEditable"><img src="https://static-prod.smartkarma.com/images/media/000/239/515/original/image_948776569101635930730635.png?1635930743" class="editor-image img-responsive" data-smartkarma-image-id="239515"></figure>

The sound bite in the last week was Microsoft Corp (MSFT US) surpassing Apple Inc (AAPL US) as the world's most valuable company. 
Yet 13 years ago, almost to the day, the world's largest company was Volkswagen (VOW GR). For one day at least. 
Volkswagen, like a number of large listed companies in Germany, has two classes of shares - ordinary shares, which are carry voting rights, and preference shares, which don't, but are income paying. Below is the ord premium over prefs for the last 18 years.

That extraordinary spike occurred on the 28 October 2008. Just as global markets were imploding. 
Around this time Porsche Automobil Holding Se (PAH3 GR) held ~35% in VW - the ords - having first taken a 20% stake in 2005, then to 30% in early 2007, triggering a mandatory offer. In March 2008, Porsche's supervisory board gave the green light to hold 50%. 
The ord premium oscillated between ~27%-55% in the early noughts until around 2006 when Porsche began building its stake.

This escalating premium can also be illustrated by the bifurcation in the prices of the two share classes.

The arbitrage  - short the ords, long the prefs - appeared a "riskless trade". And still, the ord premium expanded, closing at a 400+% on the 16 October, before showing some semblance of normalcy and retracing to 247% on the 21 October.
Porsche had made no public announcement about any further share acquisition since the 17 September when it held 35.14%.  On Sunday the 26 October, it announced:

Due to the dramatic distortions on the financial markets Porsche Automobil Holding SE, Stuttgart, has decided over the weekend to disclose its holdings in shares and hedging positions related to the takeover of Volkswagen AG, Wolfsburg. At the end of last week Porsche SE held 42.6 per cent of the Volkswagen ordinary shares and in addition 31.5 per cent in so called cash settled options relating to Volkswagen ordinary shares to hedge against price risks, representing a total of 74.1 per cent.

Then that sinking feeling: Porsche holds 74.1%, Lower Saxony 20%, leaving ~6% of ordinary shares in the market to buy. Yet an estimated 12% of the ord shares were short sold. It wasn't possible for all short-sellers to buy back shares and close their positions.
VW touched $999/share on the 28 October,  before finally coming back (ostensibly from the moon) to earth, belatedly helped by Porsche providing 5% to short-sellers (despite blaming the shorts for the extreme price movements).

Porsche subsequently cleared 50% in VW's ordinary shares, but not only lacked the funding to take its stake all the way to 75% - via the options - it had also borrowed heavily to build that 50% stake in VW, to the point the iconic car brand had to stave off possible bankruptcy.
Short-sellers lost around US$20bn which has largely fallen on deaf ears in the courts. Porsche's CEO Wendelin Wiedeking was booted out. And Ferdinand Piëch, Ferdinand Porsche's grandson, former CEO, then chairman of VW, was sitting pretty as he and family held 50% of the voting rights in Porsche SE. 
The ords moved into negative territory following the carnage, then roughly hugged parity for a few years. The ord premium is on the run again. Time to get short?


Value Investing

Vladimir Dimitrov, CFA

Equity Bottom-Up

<ul><li>The unprecedented amount of liquidity is having profound implications for high growth tech companies.</li><li>Expected topline growth rate has become the number one business valuation driver in the cloud space.</li><li>The hidden risk of rising interest rates and fading momentum trade is often left unaccounted for, which could soon create serious problems.</li></ul>

The unprecedented amount of liquidity is having profound implications for high growth tech companies.Expected topline growth rate has become the number one business valuation driver in the cloud space.The hidden risk of rising interest rates and fading momentum trade is often left unaccounted for, which could soon create serious problems.

The Cloud Space In Numbers: What Matters The Most

TMT & Consumer Independent Equity Research Analyst, Obex Capital Research

Aaron Gabin

TMT & Consumer Independent Equity Research Analyst

TMT & Consumer Independent Equity Research

Obex Capital Research

“Obex” is Latin for Barriers to Entry. Obex Capital Management’s investment philosophy is driven by an intense focus on which business model’s Barriers to Entry are able to withstand the ever increasing competitive disruption in the TMT and Consumer Sectors.

Supply constraints. Wage inflation. People shopping in stores. Fixed cost develeraging.In 4Q20, Amazon earned $3.3B in EBIT for its retail businesses (NA + International). Amazon guided for $0–$3B in EBIT in 4Q21. If we assume the midpoint of Amazon’s guidance of $1.5B and subtract out the ~$10.5B in profits we expect from AWS and Amazon’s Advertising in 4Q21, that implies Retail is going to lose $9B (!!) in 4Q21. Amazon counts its ads business’ profitability within retail. We presume the Ad business has ~50% EBIT margins…which means this quarter Ads generated $4B in profits, while overall retail was breakeven on GAAP EBIT, meaning core retail lost $4B. Meaning, Amazon will have lost $13B in retail over the 2nd half of 2021. That is a staggering number. That only Amazon can absorb. And only Amazon will walk into 2022 with its already fortress retail moat stacked $13B higher than competitors can match. While a good amount of the $13B in losses are structural (wage inflation for instance), A LOT are also transitory…which means 2022 should see some significant operating leverage. THIS is when you invest in Amazon. Amazon is our Top 2022 long idea. We think its worth $6,000.<div class="content-highlight">Obex’s fundamental research process is focused on secular change in the TMT and Consumer sectors. We seek to differentiate between fundamental business analysis and security analysis. Before deciding if a security’s pricing and positioning merit a long or short position, we analyze the four pillars of business fundamentals (Secular Factors, TAM, Competitive Advantage, Business Model) in order to determine if this is a “good” or “not so good” opportunity.</div>

Supply constraints. Wage inflation. People shopping in stores. Fixed cost develeraging.In 4Q20, Amazon earned $3.3B in EBIT for its retail businesses (NA + International). Amazon guided for $0–$3B in EBIT in 4Q21. If we assume the midpoint of Amazon’s guidance of $1.5B and subtract out the ~$10.5B in profits we expect from AWS and Amazon’s Advertising in 4Q21, that implies Retail is going to lose $9B (!!) in 4Q21. Amazon counts its ads business’ profitability within retail. We presume the Ad business has ~50% EBIT margins…which means this quarter Ads generated $4B in profits, while overall retail was breakeven on GAAP EBIT, meaning core retail lost $4B. Meaning, Amazon will have lost $13B in retail over the 2nd half of 2021. That is a staggering number. That only Amazon can absorb. And only Amazon will walk into 2022 with its already fortress retail moat stacked $13B higher than competitors can match. While a good amount of the $13B in losses are structural (wage inflation for instance), A LOT are also transitory…which means 2022 should see some significant operating leverage. THIS is when you invest in Amazon. Amazon is our Top 2022 long idea. We think its worth $6,000.Obex’s fundamental research process is focused on secular change in the TMT and Consumer sectors. We seek to differentiate between fundamental business analysis and security analysis. Before deciding if a security’s pricing and positioning merit a long or short position, we analyze the four pillars of business fundamentals (Secular Factors, TAM, Competitive Advantage, Business Model) in order to determine if this is a “good” or “not so good” opportunity.

Amazon 3Q21: 4Q’s $9 Billion Consumer Shock Absorber

United States

Microsoft Corporation operates as a software company. The Company offers applications, extra cloud storage, and advanced security solutions. Microsoft serves customers worldwide.

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Microsoft Corp (MSFT US)

Microsoft Corporation - Investment Thesis

Microsoft zoomed past the target price from our last report as the company delivered yet another stellar result driven by the strong adoption of...

Baptista Research

Weekly Innovation Review (WIRE) #56

Headline Development A lot of momentum continues around the metaverse. A few people were close to the pin on Facebook’s new name…..MetaBook,...

Granite Bay Capital

Volkswagen's Ords Are Acting Up - Again

Why the bifurcation? I see no apparent reason. And without the benefit of understanding why this recent move has occurred, I'd be reluctant to set...

David Blennerhassett

The Cloud Space In Numbers: What Matters The Most

The unprecedented amount of liquidity is having profound implications for high growth tech companies. Expected topline growth rate has become the...

Vladimir Dimitrov, CFA

Amazon 3Q21: 4Q’s $9 Billion Consumer Shock Absorber

Supply constraints. Wage inflation. People shopping in stores. Fixed cost develeraging. Amazon's retail business will lose $13B in 2H21. 2022...

Aaron Gabin

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