Menu
The Expanding Pain Point Fueling Safety and Security Investment Theme

The Expanding Pain Point Fueling Safety and Security Investment Theme

Over the last few weeks, we’ve been reminded of the dark side of our increasingly Connected Society, given cyber attacks and hacks at Equifax (EFX) and more recently Amazon’s (AMZN) Whole Foods and Sonic Corp. (SONC). Those are but a handful of examples in what is an expanding pain point that is fueling our Safety & Security investing theme and the ETFMG Prime Cyber Security ETF (HACK)* shares on the Tematica Investing Select List.

Unsurprisingly to us, there is yet another new report that not only paints a gloomier picture but also forecasts a continued ramp in cyber attacks. We see this as confirming our $35 price target on HACK shares over the coming quarters. New research by Gemalto showed that almost 2 billion data records around the world were lost or stolen by cyber attacks in the first half of 2017. Worse yet, the number of breaches is slated to rise further. Per the latest Gemalto breach level index report, there were 918 breaches during the first six months of 2017, and of those breaches, 500 had an unknown number of compromised records. Meanwhile, the top 22 breaches involved more than one million compromised records.

With new regulations such as the U.K. data protection bill, the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation and Australia’s Privacy Amendment (Notifiable Data Breaches) Act set to come into force in the coming months and quarters, odds are we will see another step up in the number of reported security breaches. No wonder in its latest annual results, consulting firm Deloitte described cybersecurity as a “high growth area” for the firm.

A somewhat different view on this was had with FedEx’s (FDX) recent earnings report, in which it copped to the fact that cyberattack Petya cost the company around $300 million dollars. This should serve as a reminder the impact of a cyber attack can cost a company day to day, but it also has implications for its stock price when it misses earnings expectations.

We see all of the above as a reminder of the incremental spending to be had to fend and secure companies from prospective cyberattacks, a good thing for the companies contained inside the HACK ETF.

  • Our price target on Safety & Security investing position in the ETFMG Prime Cyber Security ETF (HACK) remains $35.

 

* One quick housekeeping item, there was a recent name change for HACK shares to ETFMG Prime Cyber Security ETF from PureFunds. The underlying strategy of the ETF and its focus on cybersecurity stocks remains intact.

May Data From ADP and Challenger Offer Confirmation for Several Tematica Select List Positions

May Data From ADP and Challenger Offer Confirmation for Several Tematica Select List Positions

This morning we received the Challenger Job Cuts Report as well as ADP’s view on May job creation for the private sector. While ADP’s take that 253,000 jobs were created during the month, a nice boost from April and more in line with 1Q 2017 levels, we were reminded that all is not peachy keen with Challenger’s May findings. That report showed just under 52,000 jobs were cut during the month, a large step up from 36,600 in April, with the bulk of the increase due unsurprisingly to retail and auto companies.

As Challenger noted in the report, nearly 40% of the May layoffs were due to Ford (F), but the balance was wide across the retail landscape with big cuts at Macy’s (M), The Limited, Sears (SHLD), JC Penney (JCP) and Lowe’s (LOW) as well as others like Hhgregg and Wet Seal that have announced bankruptcy. In total, retailers continued to announce the most job cuts this year with just under 56,000 for the first five months of 2017. With yesterday’s news that Michael Kors (KORS) will shut 100 full-price retail locations over the next two years, we continue to see more pain ahead at the mall and fewer retail jobs to be had.

Sticking with the Challenger report, one of the items that jumped out to us was the call out that,

“Grocery stores are no longer immune from online shopping. Meal delivery services and Amazon are competing with traditional grocers, and Amazon announced it is opening its first ever brick-and mortar store in Seattle. Amazon Go, which mixes online technology and the in-store experience, is something to keep an eye on since it may potentially change the grocery store shopping experience considerably, “

 

In our view, this means the creative destruction that has plagued print media and retail brought on by Amazon (AMZN) is set to disrupt yet another industry, and it’s one of the reasons we’ve opted out of both grocery and retail stocks. The likely question on subscriber minds is what does this mean for our Amplify Snack Brands (BETR) position? In our view, we see little threat to Amplify’s business; if anything we see it’s mix of shipments skewing more toward online over time. Not a bad thing from a cost perspective. We’d also note that United Natural Foods (UNFI) is a partner with Amazon as well.

  • Our price target on Amazon (AMZN) remains $1,100 and offers more than 10% upside from current levels.
  • Amplify Snack Brands (BETR) has an $11 price target and is a Buy at current levels.
  • Our target on United Natual Foods (UNFI) is $65, and the recent pullback over the last six weeks enhances the long-term upside to be had.

We’d also note comments from Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG) that its recent cybersecurity attack hit most Chipotle restaurants allowing hackers to steal credit card information from customers. In a recent blog post, Chipotle copped to the fact the malware that it was hit with infected cash registers, capturing information stored on the magnetic strip on credit cards. Chipotle said that “track data” sometimes includes the cardholder’s name, card number, expiration date and internal verification code. We see this as another reminder of the down side of what we call both our increasingly connected society and the shift toward cashless consumption. It also serves as a reminder of the long-tail demand associated with cyber security, and a nice confirmation point for the position PureFunds ISE Cyber Security ETF (HACK) shares on the Tematica Select List.

  • Our price target on PureFunds ISE Cyber Security ETF (HACK) shares remains $35.

 

With 2017 Poised to be the Year of Ransomware, More Cyber Spending is on the Way

With 2017 Poised to be the Year of Ransomware, More Cyber Spending is on the Way

With headlines swirling following the WannaCry attack that hit more than 230,000 computers across more than 150 countries in just 48 hours, on this episode of Cocktail investing we spoke with Yong-Gon Chon, CEO of cyber security company Focal Point to get his insights on that attack, and why ransomware will be the cyber threat in 2017. Before we get into that Safety & Security conversation, Tematica’s investing mixologists, Chris Versace and Lenore Hawkins broke down last week’s economic and market data as well as the latest relevant political events. With all the controversy in D.C., there was a lot to discuss concerning the likelihood that the Trump Bump, which was based on assumptions around tax reform, regulatory roll-back, and infrastructure spending is evolving into the Trump Slump as investors realize the anticipated timeline for such was decidedly too aggressive. With mid-term elections looming, we expect the Trump opposition will be emboldened by the controversy surrounding the administration and will put in best efforts to appeal to their constituents. For the market, it’s another reason to see the Trump agenda likely slipping into late 2017-early 2018, and that realization is likely to weigh on robust GDP and earnings expectations for the balance of 2017.

The markets on May 17th suffered their biggest losses in 2017, with the Nasdaq taking the biggest one-day hit since Brexit, as the turmoil in Washington dampens investors’ appetite for risk while raising questions over GDP and earnings growth. While some Fed banks are calling for 2Q 2017 GDP as high as 4.1 percent (quite a jump from 1Q 2017’s 0.7 percent!), the data we’re seeing suggests something far slower. We continue to think there is more downside risk to be had in GDP expectations for the balance of 2017, and the latest Trump snafu is only likely to push out team Trump’s reforms and other stimulative efforts into 2018. If 2Q growth is driven in large part by inventory build, which is what the data is telling us, expect the second half to be significantly weaker than the mainstream financial media would lead you to believe.

While the global financial impact of the WannaCry ransomware attack may have been lower than some other high profile attacks such as ILOVEYOU and MyDoom, the speed at which it moved was profound. We spoke with Yong-Gon Chon, CEO of Focal Point Data Risk about the incident to get some of the perspective and insight the company shares with its c-suite and Board level customers. While many are focusing on WannaCry, Yong-Gon shares that as evidenced by recent content hijackings of Disney (DIS) and Netflix (NFLX), ransomware is poised to be the cyber threat of 2017. Those most likely to be targeted are those organizations that prioritize uptime and whose businesses tend to operate around the clock, making backups and software updates extremely challenging.

While in the past IP addresses may have been scanned once every four to five hours, in today’s increasingly Connected Society, IP addresses are scanned one to ten times every second. As consumers and businesses in the developed and emerging economies increasingly adopt the cloud and other aspects of Connected Society investing theme, we are seeing an explosion in the amount of data as more and more of our lives are evolving into data-generating activities. From wearables to appliances to autos, our homes, offices, clothing and accessories are becoming sources of data that goes into the cloud. With the Rise of the New Middle Class in emerging markets, we are seeing the number of households participating in this datafication grow dramatically, exposing new vulnerabilities along the way. That increasingly global pain point is fodder particularly for cyber security companies, such as Fortinet (FTNT), Splunk (SPLK) and Cisco Systems (CSCO) that are a part of our Safety & Security investing theme.

During our conversation with Yong Gon we learned that companies need to understand that breaches must be viewed as inevitable in today’s Connected Society, network boundaries are essentially a thing of the past. Security can no longer about preventing nefarious actors from gaining entrance, but rather is now about managing what happens once a company’s network has been invaded. From a sector perspective, with all the regulation and reporting requirements in financial services, many of these firms are leading the way in how to best deal with such breached.Uber

For investors who want to understand the potential impact of cybercrime, Yong-Gon Chon suggests looking at how much data a company is generating and how the company is managing the growth of that data, with companies such as Facebook (NASDAQ:FB), Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and Uber examples of heavy generators. Investors need to look at a company’s cyber risk as a function of the magnitude of its data generation and the company’s level of maturity in addressing that risk. By comparison, companies not affected by attacks such as WannaCry need to be asking themselves why didn’t they get hit? Was it luck or did we do something right? If so, what did we do right and what is the scope of protection we have given what we’ve learned about the latest attack strategies?

We also learned about the new efforts underway globally to develop attribution of cyber threats so as to differentiate between those threats from professional cyber criminals versus the capricious tech savant engaging in ill-advised boundary exploration. Along with this shift is also a change in the boardroom, where cybersecurity is viewed in the context of its potential impact on the business, rather than as a function of a company’s IT department.

One thing we can be assured of is that hackers are watching each other and the good ones are learning what makes attacks fail and where organizations are weakest. As the Connected Society permeates more and more of our lives, these risks become more pernicious and their prevention more relevant to our everyday lives. The bottom line is we are likely to see greater cyber security spending in preventative measures as well cyber consulting as those responsibilities become a growing focus of both the c-suite and board room.

Companies mentioned on the Podcast

  • Amazon.com (AMZN)
  • Apple (AAPL)
  • CVS Health (CVS)
  • Disney (DIS)
  • Facebook (FB)
  • Focal Point
  • JC Penny Co (JCP)
  • Kohl’s (KSS)
  • Macy’s (M)
  • Microsoft (MSFT)
  • Netflix (NFLX)
  • Nordstrom (JWN)
  • TJX Companies (TJX)
  • Twitter (TWTR)
  • Uber
  • United Parcel Service (UPS)
  • Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA)

Resources for this podcast: