There’s always been an artificial divide between value stocks and growth stocks. In truth, value investors want companies that offer the potential to grow, and growth investors want stocks that offer a good value.
Below are two businesses that give investors all kinds of chances to pick up solid stocks that offer both expansion opportunities and a good price.
When opportunity knocks
Your house probably contains products from Masonite International (NYSE:DOOR), and you don’t even realize it. The stock of the leading manufacturer of interior and exterior doors has been on a tear this year, with shares up 62% as of this writing as rising sales and profits have opened up new opportunities for the company.
While sales were down 1% in the third quarter, that was largely due to Masonite divesting noncore European businesses. North American sales rose 2% year over year, and architectural sales were up 5%. Adjusted earnings rose almost 6% from the previous year, as the homebuilding market continues to expand, allowing Masonite to open a new interior door manufacturing plant in Tijuana, though it is closing three U.S. facilities as it focuses on profitability.
A consolidation and realignment of its business last year has given the company a strong financial footing, but the market has yet to fully recognize this. Masonite trades at just 16 times estimated earnings and at a fraction of its sales. But with analysts forecasting that the door maker will expand earnings at a fantastic 50% annually for the next three to five years, the stock looks undervalued. It also trades at only 15 times the free cash flow it produces, which means that although it’s not a bargain basement stock, investors may want to knock on the door of this opportunity.
A growth stock still sprouting leaves
Marijuana stocks were delivered a buzzkill by the Food and Drug Administration last month, when it promised stricter regulation of cannabidiol producers that violated marketing and selling regulations. Canadian pot stocks have also wilted under a government bureaucracy moving at a glacial pace to adopt clear regulations and an efficient process for legal weed, allowing black market marijuana to continue thriving.
That creates problems for major producers like OrganiGram Holdings (NASDAQ:OGI), which recently said it was halting the latest phase of construction at its Moncton, New Brunswick, facility that would have increased its output by 24,000 kilos at full capacity. The company’s full “phase 4” expansion would have increased capacity by 77,000 kilograms.
OrganiGram isn’t the only producer to cut production, as the Canadian government is moving at a slow pace to clear out regulatory and procedural logjams that have caused a backup in licensing and dispensary applications.
Yet OrganiGram is uniquely positioned among the plethora of pot producers — even among the biggest in the industry. It can more easily serve all of Canada’s provinces from its Moncton production site in the East, and it is one of only a handful that has secured supply agreements with all 10 provinces. Only Canopy Growth, Aphria, and CannTrust have similar agreements in place.
Perhaps as the legal marijuana industry grows and the regulatory bottlenecks clear out other producers may develop the infrastructure to supply the entire country, buy OrganiGram is currently part of a rarified group.
It is also prepared to enter the offshoot markets such as vaping and edibles, having partnered with PAX Labs, the company that created and spun off Juul Labs, the leading electronic cigarette manufacturer.
There will probably be a lag before OrganiGram turns out the kind of growth investors associate with pot stocks, but after losing a quarter of its value over the past year, this major marijuana producer looks set to weather the storm and eventually grow like a weed.
