Possibleidiot01 wrote: A month ago, I travelled to Vancouver to attend a conference. Two of my favourite organizations in the microcap space, Planet MicroCap and Smallcap Discoveries, joined forces to create what I think was one of the best conferences I ever attended.
The two-day event had everything you’d want: a super high-quality company lineup, educational keynotes, and great people to meet during the breaks and cocktails. It was fantastic to reconnect with old friends and meet new ones.
When I attend conferences, I tend to have many one-on-one meetings with companies. Most microcaps aren’t covered by analysts, and little information is available publicly. You can really gain a deeper understanding of a business when you spend time asking the CEO questions.
For this conference, I had 17 meetings. Typically, I expect at least half of the meetings to be mediocre or even totally useless. The problem is that you can’t tell which ones in advance. I’ve been surprised countless times by a company I wasn’t super excited to meet, only to come away rushing to do more research (there’s one example below). That’s why I try to turn over as many rocks as possible - you never know what you’ll find. And honestly, the batting average at this conference was much higher. Most meetings were actually excellent.
I won’t provide a recap of all the companies I met, but I’ll give you some of my main highlights: the standouts, the companies I’m keeping at the top of my watch list, and the one that surprised me the most.
Let’s dive in!.
Watch List candidates start @#4
I’ve been following TMG for a while. I like the CEO, William Crossland. He’s thoughtful, patient, and long-term focused.
The stock had a bit of a tough time during the last few months as the company started investing in future growth by increasing operating expenses (bigger sales team, new facility in the UK, new mobile app). Those investments led to a short-term decline in profitability, which the market didn’t like.
Fundamentally, the business and the industry seem to be in good shape. The company's investments are short-term pain for long-term pain (at least, that’s the plan). They should lead to increased revenue growth over the coming years and, ultimately, higher profitability.
Unfortunately, most investors don’t have a 2- to 3-year investment horizon, which creates opportunities for someone willing to look past these temporarily depressed earnings.