Business Description

We started in 1999 with the simple idea that, if we could publish intelligent, independent, insightful, and in-depth investment research and treat the subscriber the way we would want to be treated, then subscribers would renew their subscriptions and stay with us. That simple idea worked and has guided our decisions ever since. Today, we are a leading multi-brand platform of subscription businesses that provides premium financial research, software, education, and tools for self-directed investors. We provide our subscribers with the research, education, and tools that they need to navigate the financial markets. We have evolved significantly since our inception in 1999. Over the years, we have expanded our business into a comprehensive suite of investment research products and solutions. We now produce a diversified product portfolio from a variety of financial research brands such as Stansberry Research, Chaikin Analytics, Brownstone Research, InvestorPlace, and TradeSmith. Our entire investment research product portfolio is 100% digital and 5 channel agnostic. We offer our research across a variety of platforms, including desktop, laptop, and mobile devices, including tablets and mobile phones. As a result of the expansion of the business, we now have over 67 editors and analysts covering a broad spectrum of investments, ranging from commodities to equities, to distressed debt and cryptocurrencies. This diversity of content has allowed our business to succeed and our subscription base to grow through the many economic cycles in our over 25-year history. We have a subscriber base of approximately 374 thousand Paid Subscribers. We define Paid Subscribers as the total number of unique subscribers with at least one paid subscription at the end of a given period. Our Value Proposition We empower retail investors with institutional-quality research at a price point that is accessible. Experienced analysts, with their own unique investment strategies and philosophies, lead our brands. As a result, we do not promote a single, unified view of the markets, but instead we publish a mosaic of opinions, recommendations, and strategies. This multi-brand approach gives our work far greater breadth, creating more diverse opportunities for our subscribers. Our brands are linked, however, by a continuous commitment to risk management and a contrarian approach to identifying investment opportunities. Across all our brands, we focus on investments that are unloved, ignored, or unknown. Having an informed perspective in these situations gives our subscribers the best risk-to-reward opportunities. We recognize that self-directed investors do not typically have the same research budget and resources at their disposal as institutional investors do. So we strive to provide them with institutional quality research at affordable price points. Unlike traditional institutional research, our offerings are significantly less expensive and more accessible. They are designed to be less technical and therefore more easily understood by subscribers who may not be finance professionals. At the same time, our offerings include premium content that is highly actionable. We believe that if we publish research to help our subscribers succeed in the financial markets, they will progressively become better investors, renew their subscriptions, and become long-term customers. We have proven out this thesis throughout our over 25-year history. We have formed long-standing relationships with our subscribers by providing superior value through our offerings. We provide a comprehensive suite of research solutions. Through 9 primary customer facing brands, we currently have 22 free products and 112 paid products. We cover various investment strategies, such as value investing, income, growth, commodities, cryptocurrencies, venture, biotechnology, mutual funds, options, and trading. We find that our subscribers develop personal affinities for specific writers and certain investment styles, and specific brands. When we acquire brands or form joint ventures, which we engage in periodically, we typically maintain the existing brands because we want to avoid disrupting those relationships by interjecting a new company name or persona, since subscribers may not have any prior relationship with us. We typically publish our research reports on a monthly basis, although some of our products publish more frequently. We also offer financial software and analytical tools.…