Important reports in recent days on Israel startups, but two in particular are worth a close read. IBEX Investors surveyed 83 investors to determine whether their criteria for investing in Israel has changed in the last 12 months. Start-Up Nation Central’s annual round-up
TL;DR as we see it: 2023 is going to be good for seed and early stage investments, less so for Series B and C. There will likely be a culling of the unicorn herd. Private equity could fill the capital needs of late stage companies.
Bloggers Weigh In
Ituran Location and Control (NASDAQ:ITRN), at 11.6x trailing earnings, is trading below the sector median of 16.6x, notes Josh Enomoto (TipRanks #1,664 out of 22,169 financial bloggers) on InvestorPlace. He has the stock on his January buy list, particularly for the risk-tolerant investor.
LivePerson (NASDAQ:NVCR) remains a hold, per Donovan Jones (TipRanks #1,720 out of 22,169). He writes on Seeking Alpha that that won’t change until “management can capture more industry growth and make a real move toward operating breakeven.”
Perion Network (NASDAQ:PERI, TLV:PERI) could be a contrarian play on ChatGPT, writes Tristan De Blick. As a real threat to Google Search, the AI engine is being integrated into Microsoft’s (NASDAQ:MSFT) Bing. “Perion is Bing's strategic partner for search advertising. Its earnings are strongly correlated with the number of users of Microsoft Bing. Hence, if Bing's popularity increases upon the integration of ChatGPT, Perion's earnings will skyrocket,” he writes.
SentinelOne (NYSE:S) shares are trading near all-time lows, writes SA blogger Alessio Pace, but absent consistent profitability, they expect the stock will largely trade on market sentiment. Meanwhile, UFD Capital doesn’t see much downside to waiting for the heavy losses to stem before jumping into the name, which investors punished in 2022 despite management's continued execution.
WalkMe’s (NASDAQ:WKME) “lackluster margins” and steep losses are a concern to Seeking Alpha blogger The Value Investor (TipRanks #745), though the losses aren’t an immediate threat given the long net cash position held by the business and the focus on improvement of margins.
ZIM Integrated Shipping (NYSE:ZIM) has the attention of On the Pulse, who writes that the stock is bottoming and is reaching “a very compelling valuation.” In particular, the blogger views ZIM’s low-debt balance sheet will be a key asset during a recession. Also on Seeking Alpha, blogger LD Investments (TipRanks #2,254) likes ZIM’s 176% dividend yield and low, 0.46 P/E. But “the dividend may not be sustainable and any reductions in dividend payments could affect their stock price resulting in a capital loss.”