In today’s briefing:
- Makus: A Textbook Case Study of How Improving Shareholder Value Leads to Surging Share Price
- STAR Chip Index Rebalance Preview: Forecast Changes for September
- Taiwan Tech Weekly: TSMC Preparing 5x 2nm Ramp into 2027; Altman ‘Jokes’ About Buying 100x More GPUs
- NXP 2Q25: Slowly Getting Out of the Hole
- WiseTech Global: Initiation of Coverage: Can The Ramp-Up of New Products & Innovations Up Their Game?
- McGraw Hill IPO: Legacy Publisher to an EdTech Play. Key Facts, Financials and Valuation
- Shift 3Q: OP Beat with Upgrade to Guidance; Share Price on a Recovery
- Pine Labs Pre-IPO – The Negatives – …some Segments Slowing, Lots Unexplained
Makus: A Textbook Case Study of How Improving Shareholder Value Leads to Surging Share Price
- Makus Inc (093520 KS) is a textbook case study in Korea of how improving shareholder value leads to surging share price. Its example is simple and beautiful.
- Makus announced that it will cancel a total of 6 million treasury shares (37% of outstanding shares) in the next three years until 2027 to increase shareholder value.
- Applying a 15x P/E on EPS of 2,788 won (2027E) results in implied target price of 41,820 won per share, which would be a 67% further upside from current levels.
STAR Chip Index Rebalance Preview: Forecast Changes for September
- There could be 2 constituent change for the STAR Chip Index at the September rebalance. There will also be a few capping changes.
- Estimated one-way turnover is 1.4% resulting in a round-trip trade of CNY 983m (US$137m). Passives need to trade between 0.4-1.9x ADV in the potential changes.
- Both forecast inclusions are newly eligible for index inclusion and the passive buying could provide some support following the drop in the stock price post listing.
Taiwan Tech Weekly: TSMC Preparing 5x 2nm Ramp into 2027; Altman ‘Jokes’ About Buying 100x More GPUs
- TSMC’s Most Advanced Node — 5x Growth to 200K Wafers a Month? Upcoming 2nm Node Capacity Ramp Could Be Much Bigger Than Many Think
- OpenAI’s Sam Altman ‘Jokes’ About Owning US$3 Trillion Worth of GPUs One Day…
- AI PC Delay — Nvidia-MediaTek Push AI PC Chip Launch to 2026
NXP 2Q25: Slowly Getting Out of the Hole
- Bold statement by Management: early stage of cyclical recovery, new upcycle beginning. 2Q result and 3Q guidance show a smaller pace of YoY decline, converging slowly to 0.
- Other than an increasing order book, Management not forthcoming on details. In Automotive NXP has outperformed its peers during this latest downcycle with a smaller pace of decline.
- Stock valuations at 20x 2025 EPS, 16.8x 2026 EPS, which are almost +1 standard deviation above average PEx. No room for error here.
WiseTech Global: Initiation of Coverage: Can The Ramp-Up of New Products & Innovations Up Their Game?
- WiseTech Global Limited, a developer of cloud-based software solutions for the international and domestic logistics industries, recently released its first half of 2025 financial results.
- The company reported revenue of $381 million, marking a 17% increase compared to the same period in 2024, with an organic revenue growth rate of 15%.
- CargoWise, their flagship logistics platform, exhibited strong performance with organic revenue growth of 20% and recurring revenue contributing 99% of total CargoWise revenue.
McGraw Hill IPO: Legacy Publisher to an EdTech Play. Key Facts, Financials and Valuation
- McGraw Hill (MH US) , a leading name in educational publishing, is offering 24.39 mn shares to raise up to USD537 mn targeting an equity valuation of USD4.2 billion.
- McGraw Hill is a global provider of educational content and digital learning solutions, serving the K-12, higher education, and professional learning markets. Digital segment accounted for 65% of its revenues.
- McGraw Hill’s transition from print to predominantly digital positions the company to benefit from several structural shifts in the education sector.
Shift 3Q: OP Beat with Upgrade to Guidance; Share Price on a Recovery
- Shift Inc (3697 JP) reported 3QFY08/2025 results last week, with solid top-line and earnings growth. 3Q revenue fell below consensus while OP beat consensus by a huge margin.
- The margin drop in 3Q was only due to seasonality and not due to operational inefficiencies. Shift also raised its full-year OP guidance which seems too conservative.
- The market overreacted to Shift’s 3Q earnings with a 10% drop; however, the share price has begun to move up as there is no reason to panic.
Pine Labs Pre-IPO – The Negatives – …some Segments Slowing, Lots Unexplained
- Pine Labs is looking to raise up to US$1bn in its upcoming India IPO.
- Pine Labs (PL) is a fintech firm focused on digitizing commerce through digital payments and issuing solutions for merchants, consumer brands and enterprises, and financial institutions.
- In this note, we talk about the not-so-positive aspects of the deal.
💡 Before it’s here, it’s on Smartkarma
Sign Up for Free
The Smartkarma Preview Pass is your entry to the Independent Investment Research Network
- ✓ Unlimited Research Summaries
- ✓ Personalised Alerts
- ✓ Custom Watchlists
- ✓ Company Data and News
- ✓ Events & Webinars
