For the week of 4/20/20-4/24/20, we focus on the Earnings Distortion Scores for 129 companies.

Our proprietary measure of earnings distortion (as featured on CNBC Squawk Box) leverages cutting-edge ML technology featured in Core Earnings: New Data & Evidence. This paper empirically concludes that our adjusted core earnings are superior to:

  1. “Street Earnings” from Refinitiv’s IBES, owned by Blackstone (BX) and Thomson Reuters (TRI), and
  2. “Income Before Special Items” from Compustat, owned by S&P Global (SPGI)

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The paper also shows that investors with better earnings research have a clear advantage in predicting:

  1. Future earnings (Section 3.4)
  2. Future stock prices (Section 4.3)

Our Earnings Distortion Scores[1] empower investors to make smarter investments with superior data as well as defend against management efforts to obfuscate financial performance. Earnings distortion for the overall market recently reached levels not seen since right before the tech bubble and the financial crisis.

Weekly Earnings Distortion Insights

Figure 1 contains the 15 largest (by market cap) companies that earn a “Strong Beat” or “Strong Miss” Earnings Distortion Score and are expected to report the week of April 20, 2020.

Figure 1: Earnings Distortion Scorecard Highlights: Week of 4/20/20-4/24/20

Sources: New Constructs, LLC and company filings

The appendix shows the Earnings Distortion Scores for all the S&P 500 companies, plus those with market caps greater than $10 billion, that are expected to report the week of April 20, 2020.

Details: Entegris Inc. (ENTG) Earnings Distortion

We first featured Entegris at the beginning of Filing Season in our report “Danger Zone: Investors Who Ignore the Real Earnings Season.” While the stock has fallen less than the market since our report, its earnings remain overstated. In 2019, Entegris had $60 million in net earnings distortion that cause earnings to be overstated. Notable unusual income in ENTG’s 2019 10-K includes:

  • $122 million in other income related to the Versum termination fee

This unusual income was partially offset by notable unusual expenses, such as:

  • $9 million in severance and restructuring costs – Page 36
  • $4 million in costs associated with the acquisition of MPD – Page F-15 (Page 75 total)
  • $2 million in costs associated with the acquisition of DSC – Page F-16 (Page 76 total)
  • $2 million in severance and restructuring costs – Page 37

In total, we identified $0.44/share (24% of GAAP EPS) in net unusual income in ENTG’s 2019 GAAP results. After removing this earnings distortion, ENTG’s 2019 core earnings of $1.43/share are lower than GAAP EPS of $1.87, per Figure 2.

With overstated earnings, ENTG gets our “Strong Miss” Earnings Distortion Score and is likely to miss consensus expectations.

Figure 2: ENTG Core Earnings Vs. GAAP: 2015 – 2019

Sources: New Constructs, LLC and company filings

Figure 1 shows that ENTG is one of 13 companies that earn our “Strong Miss” score for this week.

How to Make Money with Earnings Distortion Data

“Trading strategies that exploit {adjustments provided by New Constructs} produce abnormal returns of 7-to-10% per year.” – Page 1 in Core Earnings: New Data & Evidence

In Section 4.3, professors from HBS & MIT Sloan present a long/short strategy that holds the stocks with the most understated EPS and shorts the stocks with the most overstated earnings.

This strategy produced abnormal returns of 7-to-10% a year. Click here for more details on our data offerings.

We Provide 100% Audit-ability & Transparency

Clients can audit all of the unusual items used in our calculations in the Marked-Up Filings section of each of our Company Valuation models. We are 100% transparent about what goes into our research because we want investors to trust our work and see how much goes into building the best earnings quality and valuation models.

This article originally published on April 13, 2020.

Disclosure: David Trainer, Kyle Guske II, and Matt Shuler receive no compensation to write about any specific stock, sector, style, or theme.

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Appendix: All Major Companies Expected to Report April 20 – April 24

Figure 3 shows all the S&P 500 companies, plus those with market caps greater than $10 billion, that are expected to report the week of April 20, 2020.

Figure 3: Earnings Distortion Scorecard: Week of 4/20/20-4/24/20

Sources: New Constructs, LLC and company filings

Figure 3: Earnings Distortion Scorecard: Week of 4/20/20-4/24/20 (continued)

Sources: New Constructs, LLC and company filings

Figure 3: Earnings Distortion Scorecard: Week of 4/20/20-4/24/20 (continued)

Sources: New Constructs, LLC and company filings

[1] Earnings Distortion scores on ~3,0000 stocks are also available to clients of our website.

Click here to download a PDF of this report.

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