Founder at Stock Spin-off Investing, Stock Spin-Off Investing

Richard Howe

Founder at Stock Spin-off Investing

Stock Spin-Off Investing

Generate attractive returns by taking advantage of inefficiencies in the stock spin-off market.

Stock Spin-offs

Event-Driven

<ul>
<li>This week, Corteva and Vylor hosted their respective analyst days.</li>
<li>Corteva also set the distribution ratio (1:1) for the spin-off, announced a ticker (VYLR), and confirmed expected regular way trading (10/1/2026).</li>
<li>Meanwhile, Medtronic announced it would distribute its ~90% stake in its diabetes business, MiniMed (MMED), through an exchange offer (MDT shareholders get to decide which stock they want to own).</li>
</ul>


This week, Corteva and Vylor hosted their respective analyst days.
Corteva also set the distribution ratio (1:1) for the spin-off, announced a ticker (VYLR), and confirmed expected regular way trading (10/1/2026).
Meanwhile, Medtronic announced it would distribute its ~90% stake in its diabetes business, MiniMed (MMED), through an exchange offer (MDT shareholders get to decide which stock they want to own).


Director, Head of Research, Smartkarma

Pranav Rao

Director, Head of Research

Smartkarma

Smartkarma unites the fragmented investment industry, connecting institutional investors, independent research providers, and corporates within a single network.

Research Reinvented

Equity Bottom-Up

Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings / Equity Bottom-Up

<ul>
<li>Welcome to Curator’s Cut - a fortnightly roundup of standout themes from the 1,200+ insights shared on Smartkarma.</li>
<li>In this cut, we survey the consumer staples sector at historic positioning lows, follow the rotation into (Asian) financials, and assess the sometimes mixed track record of spin-offs. </li>
<li>Want to dig deeper? Comment or message with the themes you'd like to see highlighted next.</li>
</ul>


Welcome to Curator’s Cut - a fortnightly roundup of standout themes from the 1,200+ insights shared on Smartkarma.
In this cut, we survey the consumer staples sector at historic positioning lows, follow the rotation into (Asian) financials, and assess the sometimes mixed track record of spin-offs. 
Want to dig deeper? Comment or message with the themes you'd like to see highlighted next.


Curator's Cut: Few Want Consumer Staples, Many Want Financials, & Spin-Off Lessons

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)

<ul><li>Political policies could affect markets across the spectrum.</li><li>The incoming administration’s more hawkish attitude when it comes to potentially destabilizing implementation of tariffs as a political rather than economic tool could result in greater volatility when it comes to commodity and finished goods pricing and availability, while its greater focus on domestic energy production and onshoring of supply chains could provide opportunities and lead to lower energy and logistics costs.</li><li><p>Lower energy and feedstock costs could drive margin improvement. </p></li></ul>

Political policies could affect markets across the spectrum.The incoming administration’s more hawkish attitude when it comes to potentially destabilizing implementation of tariffs as a political rather than economic tool could result in greater volatility when it comes to commodity and finished goods pricing and availability, while its greater focus on domestic energy production and onshoring of supply chains could provide opportunities and lead to lower energy and logistics costs.Lower energy and feedstock costs could drive margin improvement. 

WTR Small-Cap Spotlight Recap - Trends That Could Shape Chemicals and Materials Industries in 2025

<ul><li>WTR-CMI in 2024. Last year was difficult for specialty chemicals and materials stocks, with our WTR-CMI Index posting a rather modest 5% gain for the year, affected by &gt;40% Y/Y declines in lithium stocks.</li><li>The index’s performance was well off the pace of the Russell 2000 and S&amp;P 500, which posted returns of 10.8% and 24%, respectively, driven by the extraordinary gains of the “magnificent seven” tech and media stocks.</li><li>On a positive note, RYAM’s stock price nearly doubled during the year, driven by an <span style="font-size: var(--content-font-size);">improving pricing environment, better sales mix, and cost </span>containment efforts, as well as the ramp-up of the company’s Biomaterials business. </li></ul>

WTR-CMI in 2024. Last year was difficult for specialty chemicals and materials stocks, with our WTR-CMI Index posting a rather modest 5% gain for the year, affected by &gt;40% Y/Y declines in lithium stocks.The index’s performance was well off the pace of the Russell 2000 and S&amp;P 500, which posted returns of 10.8% and 24%, respectively, driven by the extraordinary gains of the “magnificent seven” tech and media stocks.On a positive note, RYAM’s stock price nearly doubled during the year, driven by an improving pricing environment, better sales mix, and cost containment efforts, as well as the ramp-up of the company’s Biomaterials business. 

Mat-Chem Notes - Looking Ahead by Looking Back at 2024

<ul>
<li>On September 8, Liberty agreed to sell VodafoneZiggo’s passive mobile tower infrastructure to DigitalBridge, L&amp;G and TD Asset Management for €669MM ($777.2MM), with the assets folding into DigitalBridge’s existing Belgium Tower Partners platform and proceeds going to retire debt across Ziggo.</li>
<li>Closing is expected in early 2027.</li>
<li>That single transaction covers roughly half the €1.2-1.4BN of asset sales management has been pointing to, alongside the pending sale of about half of Telenet’s stake in Wyre, and it materially de-risks the path to 4.5x leverage.</li>
</ul>


On September 8, Liberty agreed to sell VodafoneZiggo’s passive mobile tower infrastructure to DigitalBridge, L&amp;G and TD Asset Management for €669MM ($777.2MM), with the assets folding into DigitalBridge’s existing Belgium Tower Partners platform and proceeds going to retire debt across Ziggo.
Closing is expected in early 2027.
That single transaction covers roughly half the €1.2-1.4BN of asset sales management has been pointing to, alongside the pending sale of about half of Telenet’s stake in Wyre, and it materially de-risks the path to 4.5x leverage.


United States

Corteva, Inc. provides agricultural products. The Company offers seeds and crop protection products, as well as software solutions and digital services. Corteva serves customers worldwide.

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Corteva (CTVA US)

Weekly Update (MMED, MDT, ZD)

This week, Corteva and Vylor hosted their respective analyst days. Corteva also set the distribution ratio (1:1) for the spin-off...

Richard Howe

Curator's Cut: Few Want Consumer Staples, Many Want Financials, & Spin-Off Lessons

In this Curator's Cut, we examine poor positioning in Consumer Staples, the (continued) rotation into (Asian) Financials and mixed views on spin...

Pranav Rao

WTR Small-Cap Spotlight Recap - Trends That Could Shape Chemicals and Materials Industries in 2025

On the latest WTR Small-Cap Spotlight, we discussed our high-level views of the specialty chemicals and materials technology industries heading...

Water Tower Research

Mat-Chem Notes - Looking Ahead by Looking Back at 2024

Last year was difficult for specialty chemicals and materials stocks, with our WTR-CMI Index posting a rather modest 5% gain for the year, affected...

Water Tower Research

Weekly Update (LBTYA, HOH.V, Vylor)

On September 8, Liberty agreed to sell VodafoneZiggo’s passive mobile tower infrastructure to DigitalBridge, L&G and TD Asset Management

Richard Howe

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