Analysis

On Friday morning, we sold four stocks: AAR Corporation (NYSE: AIR), ChannelAdvisor (NYSE: ECOM), AngioDynamics (NASDAQ: ANGO) and Sotheby’s (NYSE: BID). All four stocks have exceeded our suggested buy-up-to price. Amidst the higher market volatility, we decided to take the gains. AAR Corp. has been a consistent performer for us… Read More

Even with the decline on Friday, the S&P 500 finished the week in the green and recovered last week’s lost ground as trade-war fears moderated. Xi Jinping, China’s paramount leader, gave a speech about lowering tariffs on auto imports and tightening regulations surrounding intellectual property as part of an effort… Read More

AngioDynamics (NASDAQ: ANGO), which we covered last week, received an upgrade from Raymond James, an analytic firm, this week. The stock soared to $19 at one point, its highest mark since 2015. It now trades at our suggested buy-up-to price of $18 and has gained about 9% this week. Read More

AngioDynamics (NASDAQ: ANGO) reported quarterly earnings on Thursday morning. In the third fiscal 2018 quarter (ended February 2018), the company had revenue of $83.9 million, slightly below expectations. On the plus side, gross margin improved 3 percentage points, and earnings (adjusted for unusual items) was $0.25 per share, above expectations. Read More

Yesterday, the S&P 500 dropped 2.5%, its worst day in six weeks. President Trump’s new announcement of about $50 billion in tariffs targeting Chinese imports has sparked new trade-war concerns. The U.S. will also restrict Chinese investment in the U.S. In response, China’s Ministry of Commerce… Read More

TAL Education (NYSE: TAL) has removed two rigorous courses from its syllabus due to new government regulation. China’s education ministry has banned off-campus training institutes (which includes after-school tutoring classes) from holding primary and secondary school-level exams or competitions. This is probably the ministry’s strictest mandate ever on the after-school… Read More

On Thursday, Despegar.com (NYSE: DESP) announced fourth-quarter results. The results were strong, easily beating both revenue and EPS expectations ($144 million and $0.167 vs. $136 million and $0.141, respectively). As of noon Friday, the stock has jumped 10% from Wednesday’s closing price. The underlying metrics indicate strong momentum. On a… Read More

On Thursday, President Trump announced he will sign an order to levy a 25% on imported steel and 10% on aluminum despite protests from Republican lawmakers and members of his cabinet. The announcement sparked market fears of a trade war because U.S. trade partners will likely retaliate against American exports. Read More

Last week, we followed the lead of Marcato Capital Management and added Itron Inc. (NASDAQ: ITRI) to our portfolio. Today we will provide an overview and analysis of the company to see why it makes sense as an investment. Itron is an advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) specialist. It sells hardware… Read More

Institutional managers have just released their latest 13Fs, which contain information on changes in their holdings during the preceding quarter. Here is a summary of what our reference funds did with their holdings of the Brain Trust Profits stocks in the fourth quarter. Net Increases: BlackRock, AngioDynamics (NASDAQ:… Read More

This has been a very rough week. Monday in particular saw the worst one-day percentage drop for the S&P 500 since 2011 when the euro zone debt crisis rattled markets. Compared to the general lack of volatility in recent times, the week feels especially jarring. Last Friday’s monthly jobs report… Read More

Despegar.com (NYSE: DESP), our latest portfolio addition, is a leading Spanish language online travel agency, headquartered in Argentina. It has been nicknamed as the “Expedia of Latin America.” Expedia also owns roughly 14% of Despegar and has been speculated as a potential buyer of the company. Although Despegar, whose name… Read More

Yesterday, TAL Education (NYSE: TAL) delivered an earnings beat and the share price took off. The stock gained 17.7% for the day. The share price had marched downward in the days leading up to the earnings release. Some investors worried about disappointment. However, TAL’s results showed the worries were overblown. Read More

Synchrony Financial (NYSE: SYF) reported fourth-quarter results on Friday morning and the stock gained about 3%. The share price had declined a little in recent days, probably due to investor concern that the company may announce some credit-deterioration news, which could lead to a sharp price drop after. They remember… Read More

Jazz Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: JAZZ) has finally caught some positive momentum, gaining about 10% during the week. CEO Bruce Cozadd gave a strong presentation at the annual J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference, which helped to awaken buying interest in the stock. Good Results Confirmed Jazz confirmed its 2017 revenue guidance, expected to… Read More

Yesterday AngioDynamics (NASDAQ: ANGO) reported earnings (adjusted for one-time gains and losses) of $0.16 per share for its second fiscal quarter ended on November 30, 2016. The result missed analysts’ consensus expectation of $0.17 per share. Revenue also missed expectation: $86.7 million versus the $87.8 million expected. Due to the… Read More

Share of AAR Corp. (NYSE: AIR) reached an all-time high yesterday. But after the company reported somewhat soft results in the early evening, the stock fell. AAR reported quarterly revenue of $449.7 million, in line with The Street’s expectation, but earnings per share was a little light. Adjusted EPS was… Read More

IQVIA (NYSE: IQV) has launched a new commercial technology called Orchestrated Customer Engagement (OCE). The new enterprise software is described as a “transformative technology for life sciences commercial operations” that “can result in increased productivity, better alignment and communication between former silos in pharmaceutical commercial operations, higher customer satisfaction among… Read More

Synchrony Financial (NYSE: SYF) has rallied above $37 a share thanks largely to progression of the tax bill in Congress. Both the House and the Senate have passed a tax bill, greatly raising the probability that we could have a new tax law perhaps as early as before the end… Read More