04 August 2026 Screener
Macro backdrop (context, not a trading signal)
Fed holding rates at 3.50-3.75%, with market pricing shifting from expecting cuts toward a nontrivial chance of a hike given inflation stickiness. Iran-US tensions flared again this week (Trump called talks “the last chance”), keeping oil volatile. A rare coordinated US-Japan yen-defense intervention continued from the prior week. July was the worst month for semiconductors since 2008 despite a strong first half, and some commentators flagged the S&P 500 earnings yield now sitting below the 10-year Treasury yield — a negative equity-risk-premium signal. The broad tape is still near record highs (Dow closed at a record August 3) but breadth has narrowed. This “expensive index, choppy internals” backdrop is the likely explanation for why this run’s 40%+ drawdowns cluster in software/semis/recent-IPO names rather than being broad-based.
High-conviction, actionable ideas (2+ appearances with fresh evidence — the only names presented as leads)
1. Broadridge Financial Solutions (BR)
Price: $157.34 (FMP quote, 2026-08-04); 42.1% off its 52-week high, market cap ~$18.2B.
Passes: Real, growing FCF (~$1.06B FY2025, up from $539M FY2021), deleveraging (net debt/EBITDA 1.71x, down from 3.86x FY2021), Altman Z 3.9, Piotroski 8/9. Moat: regulatory-mandated proxy/investor-communications infrastructure with high switching costs, deepened by the recent CQG acquisition and tokenization partnerships (Alpaca, Ondo Finance); 20+ recent patents in blockchain settlement and LLM/agent orchestration. Valuation corroborated two ways: DCF $218.08 (+39%) and analyst consensus $200.60 (+27%), both aligned. Insider/congressional: checked fresh — mostly routine vesting-driven selling, no one-directional congressional signal, nothing material either direction.
Biggest fact against the thesis / value-trap answer: Q3 FY26 (reported April) beat on EPS but the stock fell 5.3% on weaker closed-sales pipeline guidance, and full FY26 results were scheduled to release the same day as this diligence pull (not yet reflected). This looks like temporary sentiment (a beat overshadowed by cautious forward commentary) rather than a broken business — FCF, deleveraging, and bookings-adjacent M&A are all still moving the right direction — but the pipeline softness is real and should be checked against tomorrow’s full-year print.
Legal/political: none identified.
Conviction: 7.0/10 — core (valuation + quality + catalyst): 7.3; legal/political deduction: 0; bounded boost: -0.3 (elevated EV/EBITDA ~18.5x and heavy historical insider selling tempered rather than boosted the score). Final: 7.0.
Label: High-conviction, actionable (4th appearance, fresh evidence this run).
Entry framing: Worth re-confirming once BR’s full FY26 results (released today, 8/4) are digested — if the pipeline-softness concern doesn’t worsen, the valuation gap remains the case; if guidance disappoints further, reassess.
2. Tyler Technologies (TYL)
Price: $305.54 (FMP quote, 2026-08-04); 50.8% off its 52-week high, market cap ~$12.5B.
Passes: Steady, real FCF growth ($637.5M FY2025 vs $331.3M FY2022), net cash position, Altman Z 4.06, Piotroski 8/9. Moat: dominant US government-software vendor (courts, property tax, public safety, ERP) with very high switching costs from multi-year embedded implementations; recurring revenue 86.7% of total; widened further by the CODY Systems public-safety software acquisition (closed 7/31/26). Valuation corroborated two ways: DCF $422.04 (+38%) and consensus $432.33 (+41%), agreeing directionally. Catalysts already-confirmed: Q2 2026 results (revenue +8.2% YoY, record SaaS bookings +21.7% YoY, record Q2 FCF), completed CODY acquisition, new $1.5B buyback, and a well-managed $1.4375B convertible-notes refinancing with capped calls. Insider/congressional: checked fresh — mostly routine diversification selling, one small genuine open-market buy (CAO Diaz-Pedrosa), no one-directional congressional signal.
Biggest fact against the thesis / value-trap answer: This is TYL’s second sharp reversal in two runs — it scored 7.0 two runs ago, dropped to 4.0 last run on analyst target cuts and a framing of “revenue miss,” and is back to 7.0 today. That volatility is itself a caution flag, not resolved conviction. The underlying fact pattern is consistent across runs: the stock got “thrashed” on the Q2 print specifically because revenue narrowly missed and guidance wasn’t raised, even though EPS beat and bookings/FCF hit records. This reads as a temporary sentiment/expectations problem (the market wanted a guidance raise and didn’t get one) rather than a broken business, but the whipsaw scoring history means this should be treated as a genuinely contested thesis, not a settled one.
Legal/political: none identified.
Conviction: 7.0/10 — core: 7.4; legal/political deduction: 0; bounded boost: -0.4 (no insider-buying boost of note; scored down slightly for the volatility/whipsaw pattern itself). Final: 7.0.
Label: High-conviction, actionable (4th appearance, fresh evidence this run — flagged for score instability).
Entry framing: Given the two-run whipsaw, wait for one more data point (next quarter’s guidance cadence) before treating this as settled; the valuation gap and catalysts are real, but conviction here should stay provisional until the score stabilizes.
3. Tradeweb Markets (TW)
Price: $101.00 (FMP quote, 2026-08-04); 28.4% off its 52-week high, market cap ~$21.5B.
Passes: Exceptional balance sheet — net cash, Altman Z 15.4, Piotroski 8/9, current ratio 4.94x. FCF growing steadily ($1.127B FY2025 vs $684.3M FY2023), ROIC improving (9.3% vs 6.0% three years ago). Moat: dominant electronic fixed-income/rates trading platform, two-sided network effects, high API/workflow switching costs, structurally levered to rising government-deficit issuance and rate volatility. Valuation: DCF $141.14 implies ~40% undervaluation; the formal analyst consensus-target field returned incomplete data this pull (flagged for re-verification next run), but directional sell-side commentary (Seeking Alpha, 7/22/26) cites “at least 65% upside” — consistent with the DCF, not contradicting it. Catalyst confirmed: Q2 2026 EPS beat ($0.97 vs $0.96) with broad-based revenue growth (+9% YoY, reported 7/30/26).
Biggest fact against the thesis / value-trap answer: No fundamental red flag was found — the stock’s drawdown looks like sector-wide de-rating (this run’s diligence batch flagged the same pattern hitting several fintech/exchange names) rather than anything company-specific. The main risk is data-completeness, not business quality: the formal consensus-target figure didn’t return cleanly this pull and should be independently re-verified next run before leaning on it further.
Legal/political: none identified.
Conviction: 7.3/10 — core: 7.5; legal/political deduction: 0; bounded boost: -0.2 (no insider-buying boost — activity is routine, mostly vesting-driven selling). Final: 7.3.
Label: High-conviction, actionable (6th appearance, fresh evidence this run — promoted back from Watchlist).
Entry framing: Re-verify the formal analyst consensus target next run; if it confirms the directional bullish read, this is one of the cleaner balance-sheet stories in the current survivor set.
4. Verisk Analytics (VRSK)
Price: $193.11 (FMP quote, 2026-08-04); 30.1% off its 52-week high, market cap ~$25.1B.
Passes: Real, growing FCF ($1.19B FY2025, +30% YoY; Q2 2026 FCF alone +57.9% YoY), Altman Z 6.87, no leverage concern (net debt/EBITDA ~1.7x). Moat: quasi-oligopoly data/analytics provider to the US P&C insurance industry (ISO forms, cat models, claims data) with deeply embedded workflows and industry-standard status — subscription revenue is 83% of the total and grew 8% organic-constant-currency in Q2. Valuation corroborated two ways: DCF $285.53 (+48%) and consensus $228.55 (+18%), agreeing directionally (consensus more conservative but still bullish). Catalyst confirmed: Q2 2026 beat (EPS $1.98 vs $1.94, revenue +4.3%, reported 7/29/26) plus the completed acquisition of McKenzie Intelligence Services (geospatial cat/conflict analytics, closed the same week).
Biggest fact against the thesis / value-trap answer: Nothing found that points to real impairment — this looks like straightforward temporary-discount mispricing (a quasi-utility data business trading cheap relative to both its own history and analyst targets, with two consecutive quarters of confirmed operating strength). The consensus sell-side rating leans Hold despite the math, which is worth noting as a mild sentiment counterweight, but it isn’t a fundamental counter-argument.
Legal/political: none identified.
Conviction: 7.3/10 — core: 7.5; legal/political deduction: 0; bounded boost: -0.2 (director buying by Stevenson/Hendrick was modest, not a strong signal on its own). Final: 7.3.
Label: High-conviction, actionable (2nd appearance with fresh 7/10+ evidence — promoted from single-run Watchlist).
Entry framing: Two consecutive quarters of confirmed operating beats plus a completed bolt-on acquisition is a reasonably clean setup; the main thing to watch is whether the “Hold”-leaning consensus rating starts moving with the fundamentals.
New 1st-appearance 7.0+ names logged to Watchlist, not presented (presentation gate)
AR (Antero Resources) — 7.0. DCF and consensus both agree undervalued vs. price ($36.48); confirmed completed $2.8B HG Energy acquisition. Moat is weaker (commodity gas producer with cost-position/integration advantages, not pricing power) — awaiting a second appearance before this would be presented as a lead.
Continuing High-conviction rows with no fresh 7+ evidence this run (stale counter incremented, not yet demoted)
NOW (7.0→6.5) and FIS (7.0→6.5) both remain logged as High-conviction, actionable but did not repeat at 7+ this run — NOW’s DCF now reads roughly fair value rather than a discount, and FIS had no fresh confirmed catalyst this window. Neither is presented this run per the gate (requires fresh 7+ evidence, not just label carry-forward).
Demoted from High-conviction to Watchlist this run (2nd consecutive stale run)
CRM, DKNG, and LDOS all hit a second consecutive run without a confirmed catalyst or full valuation corroboration and were demoted per the stale-run rule. LDOS in particular keeps generating real, dateable government-contract wins but has never cleared the two-source valuation bar (DCF has errored on every pull) — a data-availability limitation, not a business-quality one.
Notable new finding: ZTS legal overhang
Zoetis (ZTS), a single-run 7.0 from the prior run, dropped to 5.3 this run after fresh diligence surfaced an active securities-fraud class action tied to Librela (canine arthritis drug) adverse-event reporting, spanning a Jan 2025–May 2026 class period with multiple law firms involved. Materiality read: (a) damages scale unclear relative to the $32B market cap; (b) case is still pre-merits/early stage; (c) the underlying allegation points to a real product-safety/disclosure question, not a routine opportunistic post-drop filing — this was weighted as a genuine deduction, not noise.
Hard disqualifiers / excluded this run
STRK (Strategy Inc preferred — Bitcoin-price proxy, not common equity; recommend adding to the exclude list alongside MSTR), SATS (EchoStar — Hughes Network Systems subsidiary filed Chapter 11 on 8/3/26), IT/Gartner (active securities-fraud class action plus a fresh fiduciary-duty investigation), PODD/Insulet (two 2026 Class I FDA recalls including DKA hospitalizations plus active fraud litigation), CRWV/CoreWeave (near-disqualifier: -$7.25B FCF, Altman Z 0.31, credit markets visibly pushing back on “neocloud” financing), RBLX/Roblox (active age-verification-related fraud litigation, negative EBITDA, distressed Altman Z), CBRS/Cerebras (under 3 months trading history, single-customer concentration). SPCX/SpaceX was confirmed as a real, legitimate Nasdaq listing (not a data error) but has only ~7 weeks of trading history and no filed multi-year financials — treated as a speculative special case outside the standard “cheap vs. history” framework, not scored.
This is research/screening output only, not a trade instruction. Nothing here should be read as personalized financial or legal advice — conviction scores reflect a systematic screening process, not a recommendation to buy or sell any security. </content>