Mad Hedge Technology Letter
September 15, 2021
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(TRY THIS RELIABLE DATA CENTER STOCK)
(EQIX)
One of the seismic outcomes from the current rollout of 5G is the plethora of generated data and data storage that will be needed from it.
In the land of tech stocks — more data means more money.
If one fashions themselves as a cloud purist and wants to bet the ranch on data being the new oil (and one would be daft not to realize it is) then look no further than Equinix (EQIX).
This is a tech firm that connects the world's leading businesses to their customers, employees, and partners inside the most interconnected data centers.
We are really talking about the backbone of the internet.
This is what the company represents and without this spine, the internet would be way more primitive and not as robust.
On this global platform for digital business, companies fuse together worldwide on five continents to reach everywhere, interconnect everyone and integrate everything they need to reap a digital windfall.
And whether we like it or not, the future will be more interconnected than ever because of the explosion of data and the 5G that harnesses the data.
This is precisely why the data will motivate businesses to extend their reach across the globe and expand their addressable audience.
It’s not me just talking up these bunch of overachievers; the numbers back me up fully.
This past quarter Q2 revenues were $1.658 billion, up 8% over the same quarter last year due to strong business performance across EQIXs platform, led by the Americas region.
And as expected, nonrecurring revenues increased quarter-over-quarter to 7% of revenues due to a meaningful step-up in joint venture fees in Asia and Europe and custom installation work across all three regions.
As we must grapple with, nonrecurring revenues are inherently lumpy and therefore, as a result, EQIX expects Q3 nonrecurring revenues to decrease by $8 million compared to Q2. Cloud and IT verticals also captured strong bookings led by SaaS as the cloud diversifies towards a hybrid multi-cloud architecture.
High single digits might not look so glossy at first, but this is not a $1 billion per year in revenue company.
It’s probably one of the most stable businesses around since, unlike software, they can go out of fashion quite quickly if the next version bombs, yet storage space is more about economies of scale.
Other won deals lately include a leading SaaS provider expanding to support growth in new markets and with the Federal Government as well as an AI-powered commerce platform upgrading to enhance user experience support a rapidly growing customer base.
As digital transformation accelerates, the enterprise vertical continues to be Equinix’s sweet spot led by healthcare, legal, and travel sub-segments this quarter and the main catalysts to why I keep recommending readers this data storage company.
Other expansions this quarter included Zoom, a leading video communications platform, expanding coverage and scale to support market demand, and a cloud-delivered enterprise network security provider deploying infrastructure to support offerings in new locations.
EQIX’s enterprise vertical achieved record bookings, with broad global strength punctuated by an exceptionally strong quarter in the Americas across several subsegments, including healthcare, consumer services, business and professional services, and retail. New wins and expansions included Red Bull, a major sports energy drink manufacturer, deploying infrastructure across all three regions to take advantage of EQIX's cloud ecosystem.
EQIX can boast 65 consecutive quarters of increasing revenues, which eclipses every other company in the S&P 500, and it anticipates 8%-10% in annual revenue growth through 2022.
But now they are rolling out upgraded 2021 guidance by $15 million, forecasting to grow 10% to 12% year over year.
This represents a company that cuts across every nook and cranny of the tech sector by taking advantage of the unifying demand and storage requirements of big data.
This company will only become more vital once 5G goes blooms and being the global wizards of the data center will mean the stock goes higher in the long-term.
The momentum behind digital transformation is as robust as ever and shows no signs of letting up.
As a world digital infrastructure company, Equinix plays a unique role in this evolving story and is positioned to be both a catalyst and a key beneficiary as they partner with customers to unlock the enormous promise of digital.
They will continue to scale, doubling down on the strength of their core business, investing to further scale a go-to-market machine to win new customers, putting capital to work to add capacity in existing markets, and executing on targeted operational improvements to standardize, simplify and automate, driving expanded operating margins and providing a better experience for customers and partners.
Delivering advanced features to sustain momentum in EQIXs market-leading interconnection franchise and driving adoption of digital infrastructure services to deepen our relevance to customers is still paramount for the firms’ prospects.
I recommended this stock at $491 and now it sits nicely at $840.
My premise of buying and holding long term still holds true and any dip should be bought to take advantage of dollar-cost averaging.
I expect Equinix to be a slow and steady climb because let’s face it, it’s not a 40% per year growth story, but the stock does the job and rarely declines while providing a stable dividend.
“Capitalism has worked very well. Anyone who wants to move to North Korea is welcome.” – Said Founder and Former CEO of Microsoft Bill Gates
Global Market Comments
September 15, 2021
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(IS USA, INC. A SHORT?)
(TESTIMONIAL)
What would happen if I recommended a stock that had no profits, was losing $3 trillion a year and had a net worth of negative $44 trillion?
Chances are, you would cancel your subscription to the Mad Hedge Fund Trader, demand a refund, unfriend me from your Facebook account, and delete me from your Twitter network.
Yet, that is precisely what my former colleague at Morgan Stanley did a few years ago, technology guru Mary Meeker.
Now a partner at venture capital giant Kleiner Perkins, Mary has brought her formidable analytical talents to bear on analyzing the United States of America as a stand-alone corporation.
The bottom line: the challenges are so great they would daunt the best turnaround expert. The good news is that our problems are not hopeless or unsolvable.
The US government was a miniscule affair until the Great Depression and WWII when it exploded in size. Since 1965 when Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society” began, GDP rose 2.7 times, while entitlement spending leaped 11.1 times.
If current trends continue, the Congressional Budget Office says that entitlements and interest payments will exceed all federal revenues by 2025.
Of course, the biggest problem is with healthcare spending, which will see no solution until healthcare costs are somehow capped. Despite spending more than any other nation, we get one of the worst results, with lagging quality of life, life spans, and infant mortality.
Some 28% of Medicare spending is devoted to a recipient’s final four months of life. Somewhere, there are emergency room cardiologists making a fortune off of this. A night in an American hospital costs 500% more than in any other country.
Social Security is an easier fix. Since it started in 1935, life expectancy has risen by 26% to 78, while the retirement age is up only 3% to 66. Any reforms have to involve raising the retirement age to at least 70 and means testing recipients. If you make $1 billion a year, you don’t need a monthly social security check.
The solutions to our other problems are simple but require political suicide for those making the case.
For example, you could eliminate all tax deductions, including those for home mortgage deductions, charitable contributions, IRA contributions, dependents, and medical expenses, and raise $1 trillion a year. That would only make a dent in our current $3 trillion a year budget deficit.
Mary reminds us that government spending on technology laid the foundations of our modern economy. If the old DARPANET had not been funded during the sixties, Google, Yahoo, eBay, Facebook, Cisco, and Oracle would be missing today. Tech generates about 50% of all the profits in the US today.
Global Positioning Systems (GPS) were also invented by and is still run by the government and has been another great wellspring of profits. (I got to use it during the 1980s while flying across Greenland when it was still top secret. The Air Force base that ran it was called “Sob Story”).
There are a few gaping holes in Mary’s “thought experiment”. I doubt she knows that the Treasury Department carries the value of America’s gold reserves, the world’s largest at 8,965 tons worth $832 billion, at only $34 an ounce, versus an actual current market price of $1,861. By the way, the stash has only been seen once in 50 years.
Nor is she aware that our ten aircraft carriers are valued at $1 each, against an actual cost of $10 billion each in today’s dollars. And what is Yosemite worth on the open market, or Yellowstone, or the Grand Canyon? These all render her net worth calculations meaningless.
No, the USA is not a short. In fact, it is a long term scream long. The arguments as to why show up in the Diary of a Mad Hedge Fund Trader every day of the year. During the publishing run of this letter, I have seen the Dow Average soar from 600 to 30,000.
How could I think otherwise?
Mary expounds at length on her analysis, which you can buy in a book entitled USA Inc. at Amazon by clicking here.
Worth More Than a Dollar?
Thanks to both of you for taking the time to answer me back. I am going to hang in there.
I like your newsletter because the unbiased perspectives you share and the way in which you look at market opportunities in a realistic, factual manner. I am just hoping to turn that advantage into profit and learn.
I don’t like financial advisors as they open your account, offer canned advice, and disappear after they take your money. I want to have the independent skills needed to manage my own wealth, as I grow old.
I don’t expect that to happen overnight or without advice, but I am hoping that your newsletter is something above par not just in appearance, but in results.
Time will tell.
Thank you again for returning my emails. That says a lot.
Best,
Ryan
Hammond, New York
Mad Hedge Biotech & Healthcare Letter
September 14, 2021
Fiat Lux
FEATURED TRADE:
(IS THIS THE BIGGEST WINNER IN A WINNER-TAKE-MOST MARKET?)
(NVTA), (ARKK), (ARKG), (SFTBY), (AMZN), (EXAS), (AAPL), (MSFT)
One of the most underappreciated names in the biotechnology sector might just be the biggest winner in a winner-take-most market today: Invitae (NVTA).
Despite being at the receiving end of a seemingly endless flogging since the year started, Invitae remains an attractive stock for the likes of Cathie Woods.
In fact, this San Francisco-based company is one of the Top 20 holdings of ARK Innovation (ARKK) and ARK Genomic Revolution (ARKG).
Described by Woods as "probably one of the most important companies in the genomic revolution," Invitae is the sixth-largest holding of the ARK Investment portfolio with more than $1 billion worth of exposure.
Aside from ARK, Invitae also recently attracted the attention of Japanese tech conglomerate SoftBank (SFTBY), which came in the form of $1.2 billion worth of convertible bond investment.
Amid all these, why is Invitae still under-appreciated?
First, it’s essential to understand that biotech companies opt to target particular niches where they aim to maintain high prices and maximize profitability for as long as possible.
That way, they can maintain and continue to boost their profits.
This results in highly prohibitive costs in the healthcare innovation section, which in turn cause rationing of cases because only a select group of patients can actually afford the exorbitant fees for the innovative drug or therapy.
While rationing care and maximizing profits are obviously great for investors, this makes the innovations inaccessible to people who could not shell out the cash to take the tests or treatments.
This is where Invitae comes in.
Basically, Invitae is taking a completely different approach compared to its peers in the biotechnology world.
According to the company, its mission is "to bring comprehensive genetic information into mainstream medicine to improve healthcare for billions of people."
How will Invitae achieve this?
Instead of choosing a single genetic variant to test, which costs over $1,000 each, the company is developing a testing platform that can identify thousands of genetic variants.
The clincher? This will only cost less than $250 for the entire test panel.
This nonconforming approach to biotechnological innovations is what has primarily led to Invitae’s under-appreciation.
However, Invitae’s mission holds incredible potential.
What it means in medical terms is that the company can help about 1 in 6 people suffering from a medical condition with an inherent genetic factor.
What it means in financial terms is that the company holds the possibility of generating several hundred dollars per year from over 2 billion people—a jaw-dropping market opportunity worth $4 trillion.
One of Invitae’s key ideas is to grant people access to their genetic information and then interpret it for them.
To me, this indicates the company’s goal of doing for genetics what Amazon (AMZN) has done for book buyers.
The next question is this: Can Invitae truly accomplish this?
Let’s consider the company’s growth trajectory along with the catalysts ahead.
So far, three catalysts can push the company towards its goals.
First is the steady growth in testing volume. As with most medical procedures, the volume of genetic testing went down during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, this is now rebounding gradually.
In the first quarter of 2021, the billable volume went up by 72% year over year, with roughly 259,000 tests in that quarter alone.
Traditionally, genetic testing is generally driven by orders from doctors and the cooperation of health plans to cover the tests.
Moving forward, we expect pharmaceutical firms to play more significant roles in promoting and even paying for these tests.
Approximately 90% of the pharma pipelines these days are based on genetic conditions.
As these new and innovative genetic treatments gain FDA approval, the pharma companies would have additional vested interest in ensuring eligible patients receive testing. That way, they can drive demand for the therapies they developed.
The second catalyst comprises the oncology sector.
Genetic testing has become the trend, particularly for cancer—an undoubtedly massive and financially lucrative market.
To leverage this growth, Invitae acquired ArcherDX in 2020 in an effort to expand its offerings.
With this purchase, the company can help major cancer centers implement their testing systems while also offering support to healthcare providers who opt not to do their own testing.
The availability of these comprehensive services will serve as critical drivers of income and profitability considering the historically proven high reimbursement rates in the oncology testing segment.
Apart from this, Invitae recently announced its decision to acquire Ciitizen, a consumer health tech firm, for $325 million.
This move will allow Invitae to expand its patient database through the genomic and clinical information gathered from Ciitizen’s platform.
Thus far, Invitae has announced 13 acquisitions over the past 5 years.
The third catalyst is the continuous global growth of Invitae.
Evidently, the mission of reaching 2 billion people requires worldwide expansion—something that the company has been working on.
In fact, roughly 18% of the total billable volume of Invitae in the first quarter came from international transactions, which have the potential to grow faster than their business in the US.
To date, Invitae has been expanding its operations in Japan, Israel, Europe, and Australia.
Meanwhile, Invitae’s incredible potential has attracted other companies as well. Exact Sciences (EXAS) has been linked to the company for a potential merger among the firms interested.
Admittedly, Invitae’s mission to offer affordable and accessible genetic testing to 2 billion people will require many more years before it comes to fruition.
When that day comes, the company will join Apple (APPL), Amazon, and Microsoft (MSFT) as part of an elite group with $1 trillion and over market cap.
The long wait for Invitae to achieve this ambitious goal would be worth it for patient buy-and-hold investors.
Mad Hedge Bitcoin Letter
September 14, 2021
Fiat Lux
Featured Trade:
(CRYPTO IS LEGIT)
(HOOD), (BTC), (FINRA), (SEC), (CFTC)
There was a fresh wave of optimism that swept across Washington when SEC Chair Paul Atkins spoke to Congress about making the United States a global hub for digital-asset innovation. Headlines painted him as the opposite of Gary Gensler - friendlier, more flexible, and eager to strike a “balanced” approach.
But anyone who has lived through a regulatory cycle knows better. The pendulum swings, but the incentives at the center never change.
Atkins now gestures to the Senate committee that overly harsh enforcement may have stifled innovation - and that perhaps it is time to bring crypto into a more cooperative regulatory framework. These developments suggest the industry has grown too large and systemically relevant to operate outside the official perimeter of federal oversight.
Don’t blame me for being cynical, but whether the rhetoric is friendly or hostile, boiling this down to money and power still cuts through many adjacent industries.
It’s just the way of life.
Crypto has become lucrative, and every administration - no matter how innovation-forward their branding - still wants a slice of this golden goose.
Why do I say that?
The SEC’s core revenue mechanics have not changed. Every movement on regulated exchanges, from buying to selling, generates the fees that fuel its operations. The language used to justify them may evolve, but the incentive remains untouched.
Investing with retail brokerages is marketed as commission-free, now and forever. They do not charge fees to open or maintain accounts. Yet the fee structure underneath always finds its way back to the same place.
Self-regulatory organizations (SROs) such as the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) impose small fees for sell orders. These fees apply across brokerages. Firms pass them to customers, who indirectly fund regulatory bodies. FINRA is required by law to forward certain fees to the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The numbers shift with time, but the mechanism stays the same: fees ultimately cover the government’s cost of supervising markets and securities professionals.
There are numerous layers of cost embedded into participating on exchanges regulated by the SEC. The result is a well-oiled system of fee collection and institutional reinforcement.
So when Atkins offers his stamp of legitimacy to the crypto sector, the underlying exchange is simple: innovation-friendly messaging in return for bringing digital assets into the fee-generating ecosystem.
For lack of a better word, these fees allow regulators like FINRA and the SEC to rake in the cash, and as we know in this business, money is power.
I only see it as a matter of time before the SEC, FINRA, and Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) expand their reach further into crypto infrastructure - not just through enforcement, but through officially sanctioned pathways that look friendly on paper yet consolidate control.
And I’m not blaming them. Everyone is in the business of adding to their nest eggs, and the SEC, FINRA, and CFTC are no different.
However, ultimately this is what it’s about: a cash grab dressed up in innovation-forward language. The legitimization of crypto is merely the collateral benefit - one any asset class would be ecstatic to receive.
Take sports as an example. Football leagues scramble for the NFL’s approval, but the NFL rarely offers its blessing. They don’t care if college football and startup leagues battle it out away from the confines of professional football. The cost of lacking an NFL stamp of approval has been devastating for newcomers.
If the SEC once again vouches for large elements of the crypto ecosystem - this time through cooperative rulemaking under Atkins - this will start a chain reaction. It offers an olive branch to wealthy investors who have waited for a friendlier regulator.
Consequently, they would come pouring in, guns blazing, with the heft of their capital and the strength of their financial connections.
Atkins announcing that cryptocurrency exchanges may receive a clearer path to registration, as opposed to the adversarial gridlock of the Gensler era, makes this one step closer to reality.
During his early remarks, Atkins stated that recent regulatory battles left both investors and innovators without adequate clarity. His angle appears the inverse of Gensler’s warnings, but the subtext is the same: the SEC cannot effectively shape a market from which it remains partially excluded.
I want to remind readers that any SEC chair has the choice to allow crypto to operate in a vacuum, but doing so risks letting it grow too big to regulate - and too large to fold into traditional fee structures. They all know that.
Atkins highlights crypto as an asset class with enormous potential, yet one that requires consistent regulatory engagement.
The moral high ground is still shaky.
The SEC continues to permit the listing of foreign firms under structures that allow significant opacity, yet remains eager to frame crypto as the primary risk vector in modern markets.
Atkins acknowledges that Congress must ultimately define jurisdiction, just as Gensler once did. He may sound more cooperative, but the underlying tension is the same.
Regulation would be a huge win for the crypto universe, but it invariably infringes on the decentralized ideals that first drew people to digital assets.
Regulators love to preach about safety, but they preside over a system that endlessly erodes the purchasing power of fiat currency through policy choices far outside the crypto world.
Thus, does anyone sitting in the SEC chair truly believe that preserving the dollar’s value - or crypto’s future - is something they can call safe?
