News & Publications

Stone Street Advisors publishes investment research, commentary, white papers, and opinion here and in other outlets, including Seeking Alpha, ValueWalk, Harvest Exchange, and now TheStreet.com. We have also contributed articles to Forbes, The Atlantic, and Business Insider. We have been featured in and quoted by The Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, CNBC, Reuters, Forbes, The Globe & Mail, and The Deal. In keeping with our strategy of only focusing on the best opportunities, we do not publish with great frequency, but when we do, we hope to make a significant impact.

Town Sports International & the Sound of Inevitablity

HVST Exchange, 01.28.2016

UPDATED 2/4/2016 - Absent a series of minor miracles, New York Sports Club parent Town Sports International will run out of cash by mid 2017. Revenue will fall almost 30% from the combination of intense membership fee pressure, attrition, and membership type downgrades. Inability to escape high northeast U.S. metro rents means the firm can't cut costs enough. Restructuring may already be underway...

Playing the U.S. Housing Recovery the Wrong Way: Builders FirstSource & Credit 101

TheStreet.com, 10.10.2015

Equity focused traders/investors/analysts/pundits seldom pay enough (if any) attention to how funds firm their operations, amateurs and professionals alike. The lack of respect for credit fundamentals creates not only distortions in pricing & valuation, but opportunity as well. Builders FirstSource is valued only on the upside from the resurgent housing market, with little concern for the firm's massive leverage.

Town Sports’ ‘High-Value Low-Price’ Strategy Is Doomed To Fail. Horribly.

Seeking Alpha, 05.07.2015

New York Sports Club parent Town Sports (CLUB) is being squeezed from both the bottom and top of the market, stuck between the proverbial rock and a hard place. Ultimately, trying to compete on price in a competitive industry with little cost flexibility and levered balance sheet, years late to the party, is a recipe for disaster.

White Paper: "P/E Ratios - You're Doing it Wrong"

SSA Blog, 04.20.2015

All-too-often traders and investors who should know better throw around comparisons and analysis using P/E ratios, without much (if any) thought being paid to the fundamental determinants thereof. Here, we explain how analyzing these determinants - free cash flow to equity, equity cost of capital, and the long-term growth rate - provides analysts and investors much-needed context to render P/E comparisons and analysis useful and actionable.

On the Perils of Management Access & Straying From Process: Our Adventure With Jones Soda

ValueWalk, 02.09.2015

We were initially skeptical about Jones Soda, but after meeting with management, we were left with a decidedly different, opposite impression. A few weeks later, we realized we hadn't taken management's comments with the requisite grain of salt they deserve. Here, we discuss how we allowed ourselves to be misled, what we've learned, and what we think about the company today.