Research on companies that have come public in recent years is readily available from the investment banks that participated in their IPOs. This inevitably leads to a conflict of interest, as the investment bank seeks to satisfy its underwriting clients, while at the same time provide credible research to fund managers and analysts, who must determine whether the research has been slanted to favor the subject company.

This conflict of interest continues long after the IPO is complete, for once a company becomes public, investment bankers and analysts seek additional fees through the execution of follow on stock offerings, acquisitions, convertible debt, share repurchases, and customized plans for insiders to sell their stock—any one of which might well run contrary to the interests of fund managers and analysts.

As a research-only firm, Battle Road focuses on helping fund managers and analysts seek out stocks to buy and stocks to avoid, without the conflict presented by conducting business with the subject of its research. For Battle Road, this means no investment banking, no company-sponsored reports, and no personal investment in the stocks that we research. Since our founding in 2001, we have remained true to these principles by avoiding financial ties to any company that we research.

The idea for The Battle Road Alert originated when one of our long-time clients, a well-respected portfolio manager, sought our help in seeking out solid companies with sustainable competitive advantages –and reasonable valuations—from among the many companies that had come public at the time. Using quantitative and qualitative measures we developed an approach to screen for new buy ideas in a report entitled The Battle Road IPO Review.

Over the years, The Battle Road IPO Review grew to become a monthly research service in which we not only profiled newly-minted IPOs, but also screened for new Buy and Sell ideas from among a unique universe of over 250 stocks. Beginning in 2025, reflecting the fact that our clients use the report primarily as a screen for new investment ideas, we rebranded the report as The Battle Road Alert.

The Battle Road Alert coverage universe features Software, Internet, Hardware, Consumer, EV and Manufacturing, and Business Services stocks. Over time, we’ve added select spinoffs, direct listings, and SPACs in the above-mentioned sectors, to our coverage universe as market conditions warrant. The universe continues to grow on a regular basis with the addition of recently-minted IPOs and other new listings.

Each month, stocks are ranked by P/E attractiveness in each sector. We conduct a secondary sort by enterprise value-to-sales, which we believe is an important screen for value. We rank order the stocks in each group every month and call out names for further exploration, based on our assessment of the company’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as other measures which include our interpretation of the company’s current valuation, balance sheet, quality of earnings, and other metrics. We draw upon these metrics, as well as qualitative factors to determine our monthly Exploration List, which is a select sub-set of all stocks that we believe should out-perform the overall coverage universe. We strive to develop a list that features both growth and value-oriented stocks.

Our goal is for the median stock performance of the Exploration List to exceed the median stock performance of the coverage universe, which it has, well over half the time since inception. Separately, we include a list of Sell-rated stocks that we believe will underperform the coverage universe as a whole. Our goal is for the median decline of our Sell List to be below the performance of the overall coverage universe.

Research on companies that have come public in recent years is readily available from the investment banks that participated in their IPOs. This inevitably leads to a conflict of interest, as the investment bank seeks to satisfy its underwriting clients, while at the same time provide credible research to fund managers and analysts, who must determine whether the research has been slanted to favor the subject company.

This conflict of interest continues long after the IPO is complete, for once a company becomes public, investment bankers and analysts seek additional fees through the execution of follow on stock offerings, acquisitions, convertible debt, share repurchases, and customized plans for insiders to sell their stock—any one of which might well run contrary to the interests of fund managers and analysts.

As a research-only firm, Battle Road focuses on helping fund managers and analysts seek out stocks to buy and stocks to avoid, without the conflict presented by conducting business with the subject of its research. For Battle Road, this means no investment banking, no company-sponsored reports, and no personal investment in the stocks that we research. Since our founding in 2001, we have remained true to these principles by avoiding financial ties to any company that we research.

The idea for The Battle Road Alert originated when one of our long-time clients, a well-respected portfolio manager, sought our help in seeking out solid companies with sustainable competitive advantages –and reasonable valuations—from among the many companies that had come public at the time. Using quantitative and qualitative measures we developed an approach to screen for new buy ideas in a report entitled The Battle Road IPO Review.

Over the years, The Battle Road IPO Review grew to become a monthly research service in which we not only profiled newly-minted IPOs, but also screened for new Buy and Sell ideas from among a unique universe of over 250 stocks. Beginning in 2025, reflecting the fact that our clients use the report primarily as a screen for new investment ideas, we rebranded the report as The Battle Road Alert.

The Battle Road Alert coverage universe features Software, Internet, Hardware, Consumer, EV and Manufacturing, and Business Services stocks. Over time, we’ve added select spinoffs, direct listings, and SPACs in the above-mentioned sectors, to our coverage universe as market conditions warrant. The universe continues to grow on a regular basis with the addition of recently-minted IPOs and other new listings.

Each month, stocks are ranked by P/E attractiveness in each sector. We conduct a secondary sort by enterprise value-to-sales, which we believe is an important screen for value. We rank order the stocks in each group every month and call out names for further exploration, based on our assessment of the company’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as other measures which include our interpretation of the company’s current valuation, balance sheet, quality of earnings, and other metrics. We draw upon these metrics, as well as qualitative factors to determine our monthly Exploration List, which is a select sub-set of all stocks that we believe should out-perform the overall coverage universe. We strive to develop a list that features both growth and value-oriented stocks.

Our goal is for the median stock performance of the Exploration List to exceed the median stock performance of the coverage universe, which it has, well over half the time since inception. Separately, we include a list of Sell-rated stocks that we believe will underperform the coverage universe as a whole. Our goal is for the median decline of our Sell List to be below the performance of the overall coverage universe.