by Byron Macleod
  Associate Director of Research, Gradient Analytics LLC (a Sabrient Systems company)

In any given quarter for almost every company, there is often a swirling vortex of different signals as to the long-term health and future opportunities for each particular firm. Within this conflux of signals, there are two that often cause investor stress and confusion when they contradict each other: the firm’s GAAP versus non-GAAP earnings.

The simple rubric that often comes to mind is that GAAP earnings are the more conservative figure for the firm [as these accounting standards are closely monitored and controlled by a governing board, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB)], while its non-GAAP earnings are the more optimistic view (after being heavily tweaked and adjusted by management). However, this assumption does not always hold true. Often, a firm’s non-GAAP results will be the more accurate representation of its historical earnings power.

Although Gradient Analytics specializes in forensic accounting research and consulting to identify weak earnings quality for short idea generation, our expertise is also valuable for identifying solid earnings quality for the vetting of long candidates, as we discussed in a previous article. And with the impacts of the coronavirus still working their way through both the US and global economies, it is a certainty that the next twelve months of corporate financial reports will be littered with a variety of non-GAAP adjustments that will need to be deciphered.

With this flood of adjusted earnings about to hit the market, we felt it would be a good time for some examples to illustrate that not all non-GAAP adjustments are created equal, and although investors need to carefully consider when and how they use non-GAAP results, often they may be better served by focusing on non-GAAP earnings.  Read on....

  by Ryan Frederick
  Equity Analyst, Gradient Analytics LLC (a Sabrient Systems company)

In 2003, the SEC first officially adopted rules (following Sarbanes-Oxley in 2002) related to the reporting of non-GAAP financial metrics. The new regulations called for a reconciliation of GAAP versus non-GAAP results to be included in various investor resources and to refrain from excluding non-recurring items from non-GAAP metrics if they are reasonably likely to reoccur, which is subject to wide interpretation. Since then, it seems the perceived importance among investors of non-GAAP financial performance has been elevated above traditional GAAP measures. Between 2015 and 2017, less than 10.0% of companies in the S&P 500 did not report a non-GAAP income calculation. However, the ability for management to subjectively decide what is or is not relevant to a company’s core business leaves plenty of room for earnings manipulation.

On the one hand, companies tend to justify their exclusion of various transactions as necessary for “comparability” to historical results, given that GAAP rules have changed over time. Fair enough. However, when an investor chooses to rely upon non-GAAP results when comparing a given company’s results to another’s, the comparisons can be deeply misleading as management has great leeway for subjective (and sometimes ad-hoc) adjustments in their exclusions – i.e., what one company concludes should be excluded in a non-GAAP calculation may not be consistent with what another company may exclude.

In fact, in 2010 former SEC chief accountant Howard Scheck identified non-GAAP performance metrics as a “fraud risk factor.” The SEC even created a taskforce to analyze non-GAAP earnings metrics that could be misleading. Then, in an effort to provide more clarity, the commission provided Compliance and Disclosure Interpretations (C&DIs) which detailed ways in which the SEC may find non-GAAP disclosures to be misleading, but more on that later.

Here at Gradient Analytics, our focus on earnings quality analysis (for both short idea generation and vetting of long candidates) regularly includes an examination of non-GAAP adjustments to determine whether they are appropriate in helping represent the true performance of the firm, or whether they are misleading. There is a plethora of unique adjustments a company could make to a non-GAAP income calculation; however, some are more common than others. One of the more frequent adjustments to GAAP income is the exclusion of restructuring costs. Read on….

By Scott Martindale
President, Sabrient Systems LLC

Investors continue to be sanguine about the economy and are reluctant to lighten up on stocks, even as we enter the New Year on the heels of a big post-election run-up, perhaps for fear of missing out on continued upside. Rather than fearing the uncertainty of a new (and maverick) administration, they instead have an expectation of a more business-friendly environment, fiscal stimulus, and a desirably higher level of inflation under Trump and a Republican-controlled congress. Stimulus likely would include lower corporate and personal taxes, immediate expensing of capital investment (rather than depreciating over time), incentives to repatriate offshore-held cash, reduced regulatory burdens, and infrastructure spending programs. Longer term, we also might see more favorable international trade deals and a freer market for healthcare coverage. Even the Fed is finally admitting that monetary stimulus alone can’t do the trick.

As the New Year gets underway, the technical picture remains strong, as the Dow is gathering strength to challenge ominous psychological round-number resistance at 20,000 and market breadth is impressive, led by small caps and value stocks. I believe we have a favorable environment for US equities going forward – especially fundamentals-based portfolios, like Sabrient’s annual Baker’s Dozen.

In this periodic update, I give my view of the current market environment, offer a technical analysis of the S&P 500 chart, review Sabrient’s weekly fundamentals-based SectorCast rankings of the ten U.S. business sectors, and then offer up some actionable ETF trading ideas. Overall, our sector rankings still look bullish, and the sector rotation model continues to suggest a bullish stance. Read on....

Technology led today’s robust rally as the dollar continued to weaken. Financials, especially banks, remained strong the first three days of last week then fell to profit-taking on the final two days, ending down a little more than -0.5% for the week.  Today, that sector regained all of that loss and advanced an extra 25 basis points to reach near multi-year highs, although it is still more than 50% off its early 2007 high.