JVA - got a great chuckle out of your post, thanks for lightening up my day. And should have been clear that this is a trade rather than anything longer. Their whole foray into the weed business made it even more of a joke.

JVA - earnings today or in next few days, hoping they can finally deliver results based on surging coffee prices, but it's been an ongoing disappointment.

TSRI - still holding 25% of initial position. waiting for a bigger volume/price surge, but I could be a fool.

PRGS - yes, I like the setup, unfortunately missed my bid in the 44s the other day

TSRI - I liked it, my main thoughts are:

1) Do they make a dumb acquisition? (the one they just did seems to have worked out fairly well)

2) SG&A may be able to go lower (based on line in PR), still hoping for 3 million per Q

3) management team seems to actually be dong something good

I think 0.20 EPS per Q is in the cards soon (only takes 400K falling to the bottom line). If they achieve that and then you ex out the cash, it starts to become a more palatable PE of ~ 10 (granted this math will go out the window with an acquisition)

I'm interested in buying back what I sold in the 9s as well.

All my opinion

TSRI - simple answer for missing 14s is away from computer and didn't have orders ready to go. Oops. And then always planned on keeping 20%.

Ended up selling 20% more at 11.50. Can't complain too much because I think I would have been selling starting in 10s yesterday if at the computer.

TSRI - on vacation, so missed yesterday's pop. Got lucky and was still able to sell 60% at 11.40 this morning. Like you said, crazy volume. Want to see a bit more trading today before I decide what to do with the rest.

RGP - sold at 19.70, didn't realize it was already up so much and thanks to you and gil for heads up on their forward guidance

RGP - I bought a bit AH at 18.26, Q was better than I was expecting

GVC.TO/GLMFF - turnaround play in Canadian digital media sector.

Masked within the company's print/journalism assets are valuable pieces (e.g. environmental information company) that I think are worth quite a bit.

Some key details:
-have to be comfortable with the liquidity (seems like GLMFF trades okay on the US markets, but I did notice horrible bid/ask spreads at times)

-company is profitable and seems to be turning the corner; balance sheet has been cleaned up

-very sizable insider buying last few weeks

-looks like Canadian government is going to implement a law this year like Australia's that makes Facebook, etc. cut deals with local digital media companies (e.g. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/25/australia-passes-its-news-media-bargaining-code.html)

Risks:
-lawsuit (see ceo.ca link below)
-journalism continues to struggle and doesn't stabilize as anticipated

I can't do a better job with in-depth DD than these sources (link provided from Stockhouse):

Wrote up Glacier Media ($GVC.TO) a couple of months ago, but I think the risk/reward has gotten even better at this price. Would love any feedback on the idea. Thoughts, comments, pushback welcome. Thanks in advance!https://t.co/D3D5vIq6HL pic.twitter.com/0SSrpPZhlu

— Clark Square Capital (@ClarkSquareCap) December 13, 2021

RTMNF/RET.V - missed my bid on Friday by a few cents on the CAD issue...oops, thanks for the great DD though

PRGS - nice, I'm tempted to add but am interested to see if the tech sector stumbles even more out of the gate this year. Some of the bigger names getting trashed, which could create an opportunity across the sector

Omicron - agree re pandemic timing/severity, etc. although Omicron may exacerbate supply chain issues when it arrives in China. Clearly, it's insanely contagious and China continues to pursue a zero COVID strategy. Will be interesting to see how they respond once it arrives in force.

If the pandemic does end in the United States/most countries in March/April, are we looking at the "best summer ever"?

If so, in addition to the good points you make about inflation and the economy, there could be other interesting effects that impact the markets like the Democrats doing better in the midterms than most currently think (betting markets currently believe the Democrats are complete toast, which seems likely).

TSRI - added more at 8.03 the other day.

If I had traded it better, may have been able to flip some between 8 and 9, but mainly interested in having a position for the quarterly release in January.

HSON - took some profits as well today around $27. The low float is certainly good for quick trades.

RTMNF - I've very casually glanced at it several times over the past year or so, but I didn't pull the trigger. For some reason, I thought they were receiving more government support (looks like the only got just of $1.5 million in the most recent quarter). That was part of the reason I avoided.

Lockdown may suck a bit, but wouldn't concern me too much if they can keep their costs at this level. Kind of stunned by how much they've reduced their costs relative to before pandemic. Will be interesting to see if they start to get hit more by labor costs, etc. going forward.

Will keep an eye on it.

HSON - I think most of that was in prior presentation, although I think the target EBITDA margin of ~20% is new, could be wrong.

RGP - re CC transcript:

If I recall correctly, there were a few questions about how they benefited from SPACs, etc. which implies some exposure to the crazy financing period that has finally slowed down over the past few months.

Any thoughts? RGP seems to be a bit different play on the labor shortage. Clearly, shareholder friendly, and there's a lot to like.

No position at the moment.

SLNH - got it, thanks for the clarity there

SLNH - any thoughts on them putting out PRs about the MTI business yesterday and the day before, and today it's sold?

Disclosure: haven't had a position here for a little while.

HSON - added more at 22.01 today

PRGS - nice, missed your post from May that this was already on your radar. Interesting to see that it was still only at ~$42 at that point.

PRGS - I've got a decent position, wondering if the NASDAQ selloff may bring it into the the $40 to $44 territory, where it would be even more attractive.

SCX - I may be reading the website wrong, but it sounds like they are making mainly granite bases for equipment? I'm assuming this is needed for the semiconductor labs, etc.

https://www.starrett.com/precision-granite/about-tru-stone

PRGS - 2morrow, have you looked at this one? I know you often track these small cap tech/software companies with decent financials

Caught my eye recently with the FCF, share count reduction over past 5 years or so, and recent return to revenue growth

HSON - missed my bid by a few cents today...

Wage inflation - this is the key question right?

I think we are underestimating how much leverage employees are going to have over the next 3 to 5 years, especially in developed countries where manufacturing is coming back.

In Canada where I work, my line of work is tied to O&G and while the market is improving, it isn't gangbusters. Even so, myself and others that I work with are asking for and getting 10% raises because there is nobody to hire (I'm a mid-level scientist who works alongside engineers). If you jump ship, you get 20% raises. The craziest part is that the guys in the plants, the operators, the field guys, shop level, etc. can command even larger raises/pay. I think it's even more pronounced in hotter parts of the economy.

My view is that there simply aren't enough workers that are trained properly. For many years now, companies have been spoiled and could demand a lot when hiring. They got used to it, and are ill-equipped.

With this said, stocks are the place to be. The rotation to different sectors in a rising rate environment (even if a modest rise) is going to be interesting, especially with tech, FANG, pandemic plays, etc. having increased their share of the market indices over time.

All my opinion.

TSRI - anyone looked recently? not for everyone because of liquidity. Somewhat more interesting than I remember, other than the continual low float pump every 3 to 6 months.

Positives:
-Finally tossed out old CEO Hughes, who used to collect a $1 million dollar annual salary ...it was awful
-Revenues up quite a bit YoY, decent QoQ
-SG&A unusually high past quarter (and likely one before) due to acquisition and settlement with Hughes. Thinking it can easily make it back down to $3.5 million/quarter and maybe even $3 million/quarter
-Potential tailwinds from labor market (they do IT professional contract work, granted, they don't appear to be anything special)
-Insider buying
-Acquisition looked okay

Negatives:
-Liquidity
-Dilution (at least Hughes held the share count constant...)
-They filed an S3 back in October ($5 million), but maybe it's just to capitalize on when it gets pumped again to raise money at a good price?

will look closer when I get a chance

disclosure: all my opinion. I've got a position at an average of 8.72. Would've liked a better price but there's an opportunity cost

HSON - bought back what I sold at $30 at $25, hoping to get more a bit lower.

Omicron - transmissibility vs. immune escape:

If you really want to get in the weeds, here's some more stuff I find interesting:

Omicron analysis

I find this guy to be excellent. Here's purely data driven.

BRLT/CTHR - just wanted to mention this stock for those who follow CTHR. Been trading BRLT (recent IPO) over the last two months and wife and I have some in our retirement accounts. Volatility is high, which is great.

It's a bigger and much better run version of CTHR. Additionally, a large ESG angle and moissanite angle too. Very popular with my cohort.

Like many specialty/internet retail plays, it trades at a high multiple, but I still think there's decent risk reward here over the next several years.

Some details:
~100 M shares outstanding (lots of errors with the market cap estimates on multiple sites because of the share structure)
~40 to 42 M in EBITDA this year
~15% adjusted EBITDA margin at this point (I think they can easily ramp this up over time, hell even CTHR does 15% margins quite often)
-Right now, it's 35 EV/EBITDA, but for 2022 it looks to be trading at somewhere around 20x EV/EBITDA, which isn't terrible.

Other context: online competitor Blue Nile was bought out for $500 million in 2015. It has less website traffic than BRLT (4.8 million vs. 6.8 million based on SimilarWeb) and is probably growing less quickly.

I'd say downside risk is 10 or 11 and would load up at that price (would take quite a market pullback to get there I think).

I'm also interested in CTHR in the 2.70s or so. Moissanite search traffic is trending well:

Moissanite Search Traffic

All is just my opinion.

Omicron and virulence/mildness: still a lot of uncertainty, and this graph demonstrates that the initial optimism on virulence may not be playing out as we'd hoped:

insert-text-here

I certainly hope it is less virulent though...

SYNL - took profits on the rest at 14.07. I just want to see how the ex-date of the rights offering plays out this week. Will look to rebuy.

SYNL - re rights offering: you planning on selling before this hits on the 29th or participating?

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/synalloy-announces-10-million-rights-130000501.html

Powell may not be re-nominated, which paves the way for Brainard who is even more dovish. I think the market would interpret this as bullish and it would further juice the market...even if medium-term will need to be addressed at some point (i.e. inflation)

HSON - sold 1/2 at 30.03, now trading at ~8x EBITDA or so going forward. They've also only put up 1 good Q, so a bit cautious there (even though in the CC they stated this Q will be just as good).

I still like it a lot, but the RSI is over 90. I just expect an abrupt 10% to 20% pullback when it's this overbought.

all my opinion

CWL.TO/CWLPF - earnings out yesterday, revenues had me excited as I began to read the PR, but profit was underwhelming, even accounting for acquisition expenses. Their gross profit margin was as low as it's been in a while.

Lack of consistency strikes again with these guys. I bailed out at 2.60 CAD , but will look to get back in before Q1, especially if price drifts lower.

insert-text-here

CWL.TO - thanks so much for the input SSK

CWL.TO/CWLPF - SSK, any thoughts here? I know you've owned it in the past. Staffing groups focused on professionals are really doing well. I've owned it as well, and they typically disappoint and it drifts back down, but I'm wondering if this time around may be different? (mainly based on tailwinds in the sector + acquisition).

The IQTP acquisition they made back in December 2020 seems to be performing well and it looks like they stole it (got it for ~11 million, so perhaps they acquired for 3x ttm EBITDA or so?) IQTP is more focused on professional staffing than the executive search stuff they've been tied up in forever. Granted, the executive search segment is performing really well also.

I also noticed IQTP isn't even contributing to the bottom line yet because of the acquisition one-times. Thinking it might this quarter.

I took a shot ahead of earnings here (any day now). Wish I would have checked CWL back in September, but slipped my mind.

All my opinion. Disclosure: own position at 2.61 CAD.

HSON - Still have my entire core position, haven't added trading shares back. Quite impressed with the strength, I was expecting a larger pullback.

I read through the cc transcript and was happy with what I saw. I'm hoping that the integration of the acquisitions goes well. Always a risk to the bottom line if there's unforeseen expenses, etc. Also sounds like they are planning on making additional acquisitions.

All my opinion.