Yet Another Value Podcast - $HIMS: Paul Cerro wouldn't trust the CEO to walk his dog. He's still long. Why? | Cedar Grove

Episode Date: August 7, 2026

Paul Cerro was long Hims & Hers in 2024, short it through the compounded GLP-1 unwind, and covered when the stock broke $14 after Q1. He's long again, and his thesis has almost nothing to do with peptides, testosterone, or the international launches everyone else is excited about. Those, he says, are table stakes. Hims has never had a problem acquiring customers. It has a problem keeping them, and subscriber counts have barely moved in three quarters. His argument is that labs and patient data are what push retention and LTV up, and that is the part the market isn't paying for.I push back in three places. The data play doesn't look unique to me: Whoop and Oura own a wearable and a daily interaction, Hims owns commoditized blood work, and if Hims does unlock it, Apple or Amazon can walk in on top of them. The 2030 targets ask you to double trust management, once on 4x-ing EBITDA and again on a very heavily adjusted EBITDA number, from a CEO Paul says he wouldn't trust to walk his dog. And when peptides go legal, I think a hundred Instagram churn-and-burn startups compete away the customer acquisition edge. Paul's answers are worth the hour, especially the balance-sheet argument for a price war and the Ro story. We close on what to watch in the August 10 print.Paul's Hims & Hers write-up: https://www.cedargroveresearch.com/p/hims-whoever-controls-the-data-controls-the-industryThis episode is sponsored by Trata: https://trata.com/hims. Trata is two investors who hop on and talk about a stock they're both in, sometimes one long and one short, sometimes both on the same side, but always about what actually drives the stock up or down. Trata now has an MCP, so you can point your AI agent at a company and pull the transcript, which is one of the first things I do when I start looking at a name. They have four HIMS calls, all less than a year old and one about a month old, and if you follow the link you can get their most recent HIMS coverage as a free trial.Chapters:(00:00) Long it, shorted it, now long again(02:57) Paul on the setup right now(04:17) What he learned building Ro(05:19) How cash-pay healthcare actually works(11:54) The original 2024 Hims thesis(13:26) The compounding loophole and its expiration date(15:58) Covering the short and going long again(18:54) Acquisition was never the problem, retention is(20:35) Why the money in healthcare is chasing data(22:33) My pushback: what is unique about Hims' data?(26:32) Hims versus Whoop, Oura and the Apple Watch(29:21) Valuation: 30x 2026 EBITDA, 6x 2030(32:56) Why international makes the targets conservative(34:12) Double trusting a heavily adjusted number(36:16) Icarus, Napoleon and the Teflon Don(40:05) On putting too much faith in regulators(43:49) Peptides and the market nobody has priced(45:36) Chinese peptides and what is in the vial(50:12) Can a hundred Instagram startups undercut Hims?(54:40) Why the balance sheet decides a price war(56:13) What to watch in the August 10 print(57:40) CVS, Walgreens, Walmart and Amazon(1:00:49) Closing thoughtsPaul Cerro / Cedar Grove: https://www.cedargroveresearch.comLinks:Yet Another Value Blog - https://www.yetanothervalueblog.comSee our legal disclaimer here: https://www.yetanothervalueblog.com/p/legal-and-disclaimerProduction and editing by The Podcast Consultant - https://thepodcastconsultant.com/

You're about to listen to yet another value podcast with your host, me, Andrew Walker. Today I've got Paul Serra on for the second time. Paul runs Cedar Grove Capital and he has a thesis on Hymns. The ticker is Hymns. I'll include a link to the ticker in to his write-up in the show notes, but he's got a thesis on Hymns and he has, A, it's a really fascinating conversation. I just did it. I really enjoyed it.

I learned a lot. I think we had a really good banter. But he's got really deep expertise here. He used to work for a HIMS competitor. so he's got, you know, actual sector expertise. And this is like he's done a write-up on, this is his third time he's written up, traded kind of quote-unquote traded the stock.

He went long to stock to great success. He went short the stock to great success. Now he's long to stock. So we're going to dive into all of it. We're going to talk competitive outlook, valuation, all sorts of stuff. I've got a lot of questions. It's an exciting story, but I think you're going to hear like, and Paul share some of these skepticism.

I don't think I'm saying anything like questions on management, questions on ad back. because everything, but I think it's a really good conversation. I think you're going to enjoy it. So we're going to get there in one second. But first, a word from our sponsors. And I'll just dive into the sponsor advertisement right now. This podcast is sponsored by him.

This podcast is sponsored by Trada. If you've been listening to this podcast for a while, you know I'm always pitching Trotta. And there's a reason I love Trotta. Trotta is two bysiders who hop on and talk about a stock that they are both invested in. Sometimes you'll have someone who owns the stock and someone who's short the stock. Sometimes you'll have two people who own the stock. Sometimes you'll have two people who are short the stock.

But they'll actually be talking about what matters for their investment thesis on the stock. What drives the stock higher? What drives the stock lower? And hey, here's the great news. Well, there's two pieces of great news. Number one, Trada now has an MCP. So if you are working with your favorite AI agent and you say, hey, I'm researching this company. You can just say, go pull the Trotter transcript and tell me what other investors who are looking at this transcript are thinking about.

So it's one of the first things I do every time I'm looking at a company right now. But B, the other great news is. Trotta has, if I am going to count one, two, three, four different transcripts on Hams. All of them are less than a year old, including one that is roughly a month old. So they've got a lot of coverage on HIMS. If you're interested in HIMS, you should listen to this podcast. You should go read Paul's note. And then you should go on Trada, follow the link in the show notes, and go read Trotta's

coverage. And I think I'll be able to convince Trotta to give me the most recent Hymns coverage that they have as a kind of free trial if you follow the link to the show notes. but thanks again to trada for smash for this podcast if you like this podcast you will love trada trata trata trata go check it out and now to the podcast all right hello and welcome to the yet another value podcast i'm your host andrew walker and with me today for the second time i believe it is paul sarah from paul you're you're just a man of you've got as i was joking before the pod you've got an empire that resembles my own over at cedar grove you can tell everybody what you're into but how's everything

going, Paul. Yeah, I wouldn't say empire is quite the right word. Yeah, maybe ambition is the empire, but we'll see how that happens. But I don't know, things have been well. I'd say, like on the investing front, it's been a interesting year to say the least, but I don't think anyone would disagree with that statement. But just like all interesting years, it makes for opportunities. And I think we have one, they have one on deck right now. Well, speaking to that, let's just start this podcast the way I do with every podcast. Quick disclaimer to remind everyone on this podcast is investing advice. There's a full disclaimer at the end of the pod

and in the show notes if you want it. Paul, the company we're going to talk about today is Hymns. I'm going to include a link to your most recent write-up in the show notes. And I'm laughing because I say most recent write-up because I follow Cedar Grove. And I know you've got, you know, you've been long. You've been short.

Now you're long again. Not to spoil the plot or anything. But, you know, I think that history is really interesting when people think about that because, you know, there's the old sell side thing. When somebody does a double-up or double downgrade. Those are the analysts you really pay attention to. And that's the, those are the types of double upgrades and downgrades that move to stock a lot of time,

just because we were like, oh, this guy was bearish and something has inflected. Something's change. For you, you were bullish and right. And then you were bearish and right. And now you're bullishkin. So that's my overview. I'll just toss it over to you. What is Hymns? What is your history with it and why is it so interesting? Yeah, absolutely. So I think of my own little disclaimer on this, because it's a special situation, not trade wise, just for for myself, a special situation. But so full disclosure, yeah, we are long in stock. In a previous life, I did work for their competitor, Roe, R.O.

Had not been with the company since January of 2022. So I have no affiliation. I don't know anything that's going on over there. I saw outside of the headlines that we all see. So my knowledge comes from being able to build this business or help build this business and then translate that into an investment in M's. I just pause you right I mean look

I noticed that in your report I think that's super interesting background too right now it's not quite Leopold over at situational working for open AI and then marrying the wife marrying the chief of staff of anthropic but

you've got industry context industry background and probably still some friends in the industry which I'm not saying it's NNPI but you get some color and some background so I just think that like adds to a level of expertise so Paul I'm actually glad you said that because like you know obviously whenever you try to like

you hear anybody's thoughts about a company, right? Like, you always should understand like, okay, well, what's your credibility with your knowledge there? And I always try to tell, like, everybody, listen, I'm not saying I'm the perfect person for it, but like my experience has been, I have helped grow this business. I probably know it better than anybody on Twitter who is not building it themselves or our has built it themselves. So it's like I'm not just pulling this information out of thin air.

It's because I've done it. So when I speak, it comes from an experiential background, which is why, as you alluded to earlier, we did make our first investment into Hymns in 2024. And that whole premise was around just the future of what telehealth was going to be and who were going to be the biggest players in it. Hymns was being, Hems being one of them. And the thesis revolved around, you know, foregoing insurance, opting in for cash pay because the U.S. healthcare market is just bananas for how it's, how it's being run.

I don't think anyone's going to debate that at all. A cash pay system basically disrupts the entire thing, the entire modality of how you see providers, how you get billed, how you pay. Why don't you just quickly describe the cash pay system so that we're not talking out to people who are. Oh, right. Sorry. Yeah.

So most of the American healthcare system right now is insurance based, right? whether it's insurance through your employer, insurance through the government, or you pay out of pocket for the insurance that if you're just like, you know, a loan person or, you know, a single member LLC or like whatever, you pay for your own insurance. Otherwise, the unfortunate thing there is you're kind of shit out of luck. And then you have to pay out of pocket,

which is why people forgo even calling an ambulance to go to the hospital because that's like a $2,000 out-of-pocket cost. And it's like, I'd rather take a $50 Uber and roll the dice. You know, I was playing an intramural sport once and somebody hit their head and cut their head. And it wasn't like life-threatening, but they called an ambulance and they brought him. And everybody was joking after they were like, this is the most expensive intramural game of all time. That dude just racked up a $2,500 hospital bill playing a, you know, 30-year-old ref league game. Yeah, it's like so sad that that's the state of things.

But unfortunately, that is the state of things. Because so much is wrong with the American health care system, I guess on the insurance side, being able to disrupt it by paying cash only for things, arguably depending on who you talk to, arguably could be a better alternative, which players like hymns and Roe are effectively trying to prove out that, hey, with a cash pay model, meaning I don't have, forget insurance,

hold hard, open my wallet cash, I can get things for cheaper, whether it's drugs, whether it's services, et cetera. It could be cheaper if I did it that way than if I went through my insurance. And that's basically a whole entire disruption of cash pay telehealth. Okay. So let me apologize there. Why would that be the case, right?

Because I understand you go to him and you get $135, but my insurance, insurance is often paid for by your employer, right? And there's tax reasons for that and everything. And then the insurance thing, like, I go to a hospital. And every time I go to the hospital, you know, I had a peck's hair a couple years ago. And I had to get it repaired. And they hit me with the bill and it was like $20,000, you know. And then it said your health insurance negotiated the price from $20,000 down to $2,000. Now, I understand if I went to the doctor and I said, hey, I'm going to cash pay for

the surgery. I could probably negotiate the price down. But why wouldn't, you know, the health insurance, we're going to be talking GLP-1s in a second. Why wouldn't the health insurance that goes to Novo Nordisk and says, hey, I want to negotiate the price for, we go V for, you know, five million. and health insurance members, why wouldn't they get a better price than you or Kim's going to them and saying, hey, we want a cash price for, you know, we can't even tell you how many people

because we need to go market, get them on Instagram and pop them in here. So why would that create a discount? Yeah, because I think the way the system is set up right now, it's actually I don't think it is. So at least in the American market, it's almost rewarding inefficiency effectively. And again, there's like, I mean, that this would probably be a discussion for later, but there's a lot of points within the journey of coverage of health care servicing that, in my opinion, don't need to exist, but they do exist. And it's almost kind of like everybody needs to get fed. Everybody's beaks need to get wet. And when you have incentives that are aligned to how can I maximize my own profit, each one of those barriers are going to be like no pay to, you got to pay the, you got to pay the. a toll and then we can negotiate, we can negotiate quote unquote things. You know, like a very easy example to your question is that like, you know, you go to a hospital and you get sick or whatever, emergency room, you get the bill like you just said in the mail,

oh, your insurance negotiated it down from $40,000 to $30,000. You're like, oh, wow, my insurance is working for me. But the thing is, if you just, you know, talk to the hospital and actually like negotiate with them, then all of a sudden a cash pay alternative is like dramatically less. It's not even $30,000 anymore. It could be, you know, $5,000, could be like $2,000, et cetera, et cetera. And so this is wide disparity of like everybody trying to bilk insurance because they, one, know they can and two, you know that they can get just massive premiums on their services

and their drugs, et cetera in order to, you know, make a living or whatever. And that's why the cash pay alternative is like, you know what? screw all of that. It's almost like, I hate saying this, but it's like kind of the easiest analogy. It's almost like a Walmart everyday low price. We can just make it a cash-fail alternative. You don't have to worry about the insurance

or what insurance you have, what kind of insurance you have, what state you're operating in. This is going to be a flat price. It's the price is the price. And that's what I think is interesting because it's kind of just recognizing that whole thing. So let's go.

So hopefully listeners have a good review of the cash papers, insurance everything. Let's go back to him. hymns and talk about, you know, in 2024, you come into them long thinking, hey, cash pay, revolution. Let's go back a little bit from the history and then we can pull it to today and that opportunity right now.

Yeah. So like it's really before. I actually invested in it before all the compounded GOP ones even happened is because I was like, I know exactly what this business is. I know exactly what it's trying to accomplish. I know how it's going to accomplish it. And ever since they, you know, went public through through a D spec, you know, they've, they've shown that they can actually start generate cash, become profitable, and that I know

with scale and the union economics being better over time, that trend would continue. And then, of course, you get the benefit in 2024 when they launch compounded GLP-1s, and most people know that story. It is exploded and growth. So we were very happy in 2024, just because we knew what the end goal was and we knew the direct what the trajectory was going to be. our problem arose as early as August in 2024. And that was after the Q2 earnings call.

So Q2 2024. And I always knew that the compounded GOP ones had an expiration date. Because it's a loophole. You exploit the loophole for as long as you can. And then, you know, game over. It was a loophole just for people who don't know. If a drug is in shortage, if the FDA is a shortage, you can start compounding the drug.

kind of go around basically patent law, right? Yeah. And I believe what you're referred to is, sometime around 10, like the shortage was declared over, and the FDA kind of said, hey, all you compounders, time to stop compounding because there's patent protection here, and you can go anywhere you want with that, but just so people know the background.

No, yeah, it's exactly right. So, like, if you have a shortage, other pharmacies, that technically would it be allowed to make this drug, can circumvent those rules legally and fill the gap of demand by, you know, increasing the supply, that is obviously in shortage. So I do there's an expiration date. But then Andrew, the CEO, goes, yeah, I think, you know, even after the shortage ends, I think we're still going to keep keep making it. And I'm like, wait a second, back up. Because that's not allowed. You can't do that.

So, you know, to avoid having to go through that whole rabbit hole, you know, like come January of 2025, you know, through our own research, which we flagged to everybody that, they read our work, we're like, there is a massive problem brewing. And it's that one, the short, there is no more shortage anymore. Like we've talked, we did research where we talked to, I think it was like 18 different states in like 32 cities, like pharmacies in 32 cities. And for the drug, we could get it either the same day or the next day. The worst case scenario would be like a couple of days out.

We'd have to wait. That is not grounds for a shortage anymore. That means that the drug is readily accessible. So we put out our research like, oh, no, this is a problem. This shortage is imminently about to end. And once it ends, then the party's over for combat to GP once. So, again, long story short, FDA pulled the short, ended the shortage in the third week of February of 2025. That's everybody was trying to time that shortage end.

So the stock memed from like $25 to $72 a share. And then it just immediately crashed after that. And then throughout the year, kept saying, listen, they're over-indexing to GLP ones. This business is reliant on GLP1. The whole growth is basically coming from GLP ones. The core business is slowing down. It's decelerating. So either they need to pull some rabbits out of their hat or they have to keep doing this, quote, unquote, arguably, I want to say illegal, but not compliant prescribing of GLP ones. I mean, you would know better than me, but I think the, I think the, I think the

FTA wasn't to ended up not being too happy with them. So I think that's great background here. Why don't we kind of fast forward it to today and kind of the opportunity you're seeing as, again, people can read the report, but you, you are now long. And I think you kind of see the business inflecting to from the GLP1 reliance into a completely new model. So why don't we fast forward to that? Absolutely. So we actually covered our last short trade at the end of Q1 earnings this year. So once it broke 14, I was like, okay, victory lap took it. And then, uh, once the litigation risk effectively was subdued, so once Novo Nordisk sued him's for IP infringement, and then they worked out some deal, that kind of went away.

I'm not saying it's gone forever because they dismissed the suit, I believe, without prejudice, so they can bring it back up if Hymns steps have a line. But what I was still bullish on in 2024 is still happening now, just in a different way. And one of the Bing things, like, I know you read it, but so many bulls and analysts are focusing on him's ability to just market and dispense drugs efficiently and effectively. That's not wrong per se. The problem there is that the emphasis on that is wrong because the whole reason why this business exists is because they can market very, very well to you, to me, to some 50-year-old person sitting at home on Facebook, etc. That is the table stakes part of the business.

If they don't continue doing that, then there's no business to be had. So when they keep talking about, oh, the peptide launches, oh, they keep talking about testosterone, or they keep talking about the generic GOP ones in Canada in the UK. It's like, okay, great. That's all great. It's a net positive. But the thing is, they need to do that. It's not an if.

It's a must. My part is that everybody's missing what the actual play here is, which is the, which I believe started with them offering lab services, is that the company has not had an issue getting customers. They have had an issue keeping customers. And that is where they're bleeding is that if you look at the, if you look at the subscriber numbers, we last like reporters, they've barely grown, relatively speaking. And that's after having a blockbuster year. So my point was having data and having insights through various forms that they are actively

already working on. It's not like it's a pipe dream or hypothetical, they're already doing it. That's where the value is really going to be coming from because if they can improve patient outcomes, if they can improve the data points so that these customers retain better, right, or more active, more engaged, feel more heard, get a good, knowledge that they are a unique individual, they will stay on, that increases their LTV, dramatically reduces their payback period, and it's a scalable product, not just in the domestic market, but internationally. That is where I think everybody fails to realize what the value is,

and not necessarily just them launching new products, because that's a given. They need to do that. Perfect. So if I'm hearing you correctly, what you're saying is, look, the market is really excited and really focused on this basically GLQ1 dispenser, or whether it's peptides or whatever, whatever, like, you know, Hymns has in their deck. I think it was slide 28. Their payback period to acquire a customer when they online market or however they go is under, is about six months, right? Yeah. So the market is just really excited. They've got this like really fast, really short term payback period. We grab customers. We get them in the door and we're really profitable. And what you're saying is, yeah, that's great. Like payback period of six months. And if the

average customer lasts a year, you're basically doubling your money. That's awesome. But that's a, as you're saying, that's a really high churned business. And the problem, with that business is high churned businesses, you know, they run into a growth problem when they start churning on. You're saying, hey, the real play is they get that person in the door and they say, hey, we get the data, we get your lab, and all of a sudden that one year goes to two years, goes to three years, goes to a lifetime because they say, hey, we've got your your lab data from when you were 25, 30, 35. And by the way, that's also a great business too, because you come in and you get your labs and you say, hey, I want testosterone. And I think it's kind of

their third or fourth stool right now, I want testing for testosterone. And then three years later, they say, hey, how about cancer? How about cholesterol? They just start adding up. So is that kind of the transformation and the inflection that you're seeing that you think the market's missing? Yeah, absolutely. Because, I mean, if you look at even, okay, forget, actually forget him's for a second,

because it'll loop back into him's, but it's important to understand what the market landscape is. I know you do excellent work when you look at your markets. You can see, there you go on the video. This is the where I was going to drive the next question. So yes, you see where I'm going. Yeah, so self-punt to that. But see, yeah, so you look outside the market.

You can look at VC funding and where it's going, right? In 2020 and 2020 and 2021, it was all telehealth. Anybody was doing telehealth, they were doing anything online with a provider. VC money just threw money at you. However, if you fast forward to today, when people ask you like, what's the moat? Yeah, it's actually really hard because everybody can just start at,

the guy who was in the New York Times for men, Edvi, right? He's a one-man compounded GLP1 business who is making like, what, like a billion dollars in revenue and like 60 million in profit? Granted, that's completely fraud. But, you know, as soon as to show that literally anybody or any group of people could just start up a business, target a certain condition, and boom, is a new telehealth company. So what I was arguing for is look at the market, look where the money is going. Right now, it's all data. It is, I mean, there's still some conditions. investment, but data. So your whoop band, my aura ring, much about worrying right now, I should, but

like aura ring, other devices that can track your data and be able to not only give you insights, but then also potentially give you curated recommendations for what you could do and what you could prove on, and then also give you like a look back of like, oh, yeah, how did I feel, you know, six months ago? Like, how's my sleep progressed since then, right? And that's actually one before before you jump in is that there's one company that I was so shocked that I read about. They're creating a toilet seat so that when you have bowel movements, they contract. They contract that you're basically your your waist or your excrement that comes out and tells you like how healthy it is based on like your gut biome.

And I'm like, that's nuts, right? So data is actually one of the biggest areas of VC investment right now and for good reason. So let me give, there's two angles of pushback. I wouldn't go up there, right? Actually, there's three. There's valuation, there's transformation, and there's management. Let's start with transformation because I think it's the more interesting and fun one, right? So what you're saying is you've got this business that, let's just say they sell GLP1s.

And I think these guys are going to, when peptides are legalized, I think these guys are going to just crush it in peptides. So we can talk. There are there's questions there, right? You've got this business that does, you know, sells to customers for, year to 18 months makes a great money off them, all this sort of stuff selling branded drugs, off-branded drugs, compounding drugs, whatever it is. You're saying, hey, I think they can transform ladder up into this long-term data business that gets a lot stickier. And I hear that, but like, I worry that it's such a transformation. And we mentioned whoop and aura rings. Like,

whoop and aura rings are trying to do that, right? And you mentioned data is the key. Wootenora rings have the data, right? Like my Woop has literally every second of the day, I think they argue it's 100 times per second. They're tracking my heartbeat and they've got all this off. And they're always pushing me to do measurements, put my weight in and everything. And I hear you, I'm sure Hymns will probably try to do that,

but because I interact with the Woop and I need to record my workouts on it every day and all that sort of stuff, like Woop has that daily interaction with me and they have unique heart rate data that no one else has. So my two pushbacks in Hymn was to be, They don't have that like wearable, like Woop and ORA have the wearable and they have unique data from that. Whereas what Hymns is trying to do is they're transcated in through labs, right, blood work labs. And that's a lot more commoditized.

A lot of people can get that. I mean, Woop is always saying, hey, Andrew, send us your blood work. And I have not done that for a said. And then, you know, the other thing is on the wearables, like I would not invest. I love my Woop. I would not invest in the Woop round because I hear you on unique data. But on my other wrist for those who are on YouTube, I've got my Apple Watch. And you know, there is something too.

Apple Watch does take your help, it does take a lot of this data. And if your whoop, you're always betting that, hey, we'll be able to keep longer batter life or convenience or something that Apple will just never attack that. I don't know if that's a great bet for whoop. So my two pushbacks queue would be, hey, they're trying to go into this data play. And that's what you're kind of saying the inflection is. I don't see what's unique about their data play. Like a whoop, I at least see where the uniqueness is there. And be, aren't you?

always at risk of even if you say, hey, they can figure out a way, aren't you kind of always at risk at this guy and Google on the other end coming? And, you know, these guys aren't the only one like Amazon is clearly dabbling around in this place? They've got a lot of different telehealth plays. Aren't you at risk of, oh, you unlock it and oh, boom, a giant swoops in and kills them. So that would be my pushback on the transformation angle. So a lot to impact there. But so that's why it's the most interesting and the most fun piece of the story, right? No, it is because you are betting on what the future actually is going to be and who and who basically wins at that future. If you're right about the future, then who wins with that reality.

And so few things to unpack. One, so yeah, I would agree with you. Like the whooped device, like I think it was last value to like $10 billion. So they were down like that. I read that and I'm like, what? Like I was like, I just didn't make heads or tails of that. So either somebody knows something that I definitely built or people were just so willing to, you know, pay a premium for that company on just a wearable device and the data because they don't do

anything else. And it's actually really interesting. I don't know if you caught this when you said it. You said, I have a whoop. And it reminds me all the time to upload my lab results. No, no. They, they, so the whoop, if I open it, every, every time I open it, the first thing it says is, hey, go get labs. And they want you to pay for like the whoop lab and like get the blood test and send it. Oh, good. Okay. always tried to get them to get me to send it to him. And I'm like, I don't really want to pay 200 bucks for you guys to get my blood test right now. Yeah.

So here's, okay, so here's my pushback on that is that all the wearables with their data are moving. I don't know if that's upstream or downstream. Maybe it's upstream in order to get, get health care data and then being able to recycle it into their own system. Where my argument against your pushback is that if you're already with a platform, that already handles all of your medications, arguably, you would probably want to stick with that place for all of your prescriptions, for all your provider access, for all of your follow-ups, you know, et cetera, et cetera,

and then be able to, I don't know how it would work, somehow have some like API plug-in with, you know, a WIPP device or a, your order ring or something where it can sync, something we can manually update. The bare case on Woop is Hymns does that, and they just say, hey, well, just take the data off your Apple Watch and you don't need the the whoop subscription, right? So you just get that the Apple Watch data. We plug it on API and boom, you've just saved.

I think whoop is like 250 year. I think I remember what it is. It's decently priced. Yeah, we've just, we've just cut you out of 250 per year and we're giving you like, we're combining your medication and all this sort of stuff. So I think that's an interesting. But there's a caveat there too because I don't know if sure if you remember, but when Fitbit came out, everybody was going crazy with, I even had a Fitbit. Everybody was going crazy about Fitbit because You can track all that stuff on your on your wrist. And then I think it actually rose up to like, I think like a $9 billion or $10 billion valuation on the public markets.

And what ended up happening was Apple ended up releasing their Apple Watch. And everyone's like, oh, a smart watch is just going to kill this like health-centric fitness watch, which I end up doing. And then Google bought them for like $2 billion, I think like six years later or something. That's why the whoop is so. So, sorry, it's like, we didn't we see this with Fitbit? But this is kind of like more. Exactly. Yeah, there's more, there's more nuance there.

But it was actually interesting as you're saying like, oh, canceling just come in and like, they have kind of display somebody else. Very recently, I think two weeks ago, Apple lost a lawsuit to Massimo because they effectively, according to the lawsuit, infringed on Massimo's IP for a pulse oxymeter. And Massimo sued them saying, you can't use that. You didn't pay us. And then Apple's like, well, it's our own technology. But blah, blah, they lost.

So so many of these companies are, are. trying so hard to get you to buy their product with the intent of what value it can provide, and then go on to step number two, which is then like, how do we expand on that? Which is what they're already doing, right? Like for the wearables, like you said, Woop has labs, lab companies, function health is moving into supplement, supplement tracking and at home blood tests, et cetera. Everybody knows they need to expand out, which Hymns is doing, but just like in the reverse. So I do, I will put the mass moving side for saying because I do remember that,

and I think they stopped, they lost in 2023, I think, and they stopped the shipments for a while and then I think this was the people, but let me go to the net. Yeah, it was. Yeah. I think the future is unknowable. And it's interesting to think about that. But let's talk about, let's assume you're right. And they kind of win the future, right?

Let's talk about valuation here. So right now, as we're sitting here, I'm just kind of glancing. I think Hymns is about a seven and a half billion. Evie, you can correct me if I am slightly off or anything. And the stock is kind of $31 per share, about $7.5 billion EV. Even is a little bit higher now, but yeah. Okay. There are some converts and everything and there are the coverage.

Yeah, it's with the converts. Yeah, it's completely okay. We can amount to $8 billion, whatever you went. They have given out 20, 30 targets of at least $1.3 billion in EBDA. That compares to, I think their 2006 targets are a little over 300. million of EBDA. So you're talking on a 2026, the year we're in basis. You're talking approaching 30 times EBITDA. You're talking on a 2020, 30 basis, 6X EBITA. So how do you think about the valuation? And I'll just layer one more thing. And we were mentioning the competitors,

whoop and ORRING, which again, they do have unique data. They do have that wearable. They have that component to it. Woop just raised that 10 billion. So when I'm looking, I'm saying, hey, the future Paul seeing, Hymns is already kind of at $8 billion right now. If Moop raised that $10 billion, like, is there really that upside? And now maybe it's VC exponential upside. But that's kind of the other thing other than just the EBITDA number that was weighing on my valuation. So toss a lot there.

I'll just step back and let you talk to all that. Yeah, I have never been a fan of private market valuations ever. That's why like when it comes to IP. I let's why I love researching IPOs because most of the time I end up shorting them. It's just like this is grossly overvalued. Like, there's no way this makes any sense. So when it comes to private market evaluations, like, I told you, when I heard the who was raising it a $10 billion evaluation, I was like, in what world is a watch worth this

much, you know? As my wife reminds me, it's not a watch. It does not tell you the time. My wife lost the joke in the environment. That's very fair. It's very fair. I know it's one of their marketing points. But yeah, so I sit there and like, okay, that doesn't make any sense because, you know,

you have a business right now with him. And mind you, I am, I, you've seen this. I am hyper critical on Hymns. If they are wrong, management is the third coin. We will talk that in a second. Yeah. Yeah. And so when it comes to the valuation, right, I'm looking at like what the market is actually

willing to pay. And so there's either, so someone is wrong in that equation. Either whoop is being overvalued at $10 million, over a $10 billion valuation or the market is pricing Hymns wrong at an $8 billion valuation. One of those two has to be wrong. And my opinion is that the Woot valuation is stronger, so I don't use them. I think, Orra did something similar to. And I'm like, okay, that doesn't make any sense either.

So when it comes to the valuation, when management gave out long-term targets, 2030, 6.5 billion in revenue, at least $1.3 billion in EBITDA by 2030. They gave that out in, I think May of last year, 2025. And I read that. And I was like, what mythical numbers are these? And where is he getting them from? Because this doesn't seem realistic in the slightest. Mind you, this is before Zaba, and this is before you can lit this. So there was no, there's really no international business.

Yep. But then, you know, as time goes on, you're like, the only way he actually gets there is because of the international business, not because of the American market. It's because the American market tied with the international business. So now when you take a look at the lens of international and U.S., then I'm like, that's probably conservative, actually. That's probably a very conservative number. So when you're talking about paying like a six times 20, 30 EBITAM

that's still growing at like a mid-teens, high-teens clip, top line, then, you know, the things start changing. It doesn't actually look too crazy anymore. Obviously, there's a lot of execution risk in there because, you know, the rules, regulations, compliance, whether it's in the EU, Canada, Brazil, Australia, they're all very, very different. And so there's a lot of execution risk involved in there. But valuation-wise, you have to edit believe that he at least hits what he thinks he's going to hit, which is still, you know, not like dumb cheap.

But at the same time, if you believe that the thesis holds the data play is right, the retention improves, LTV goes up globally, then, you know, it's not extreme in the slightest, in our opinion, right? Which is why, you know, like we decided to go long stock again this year. So go to the management. So you mentioned management. I mean, I think it would be an understanding to say you don't trust them. You know, there's a Bloomberg local from 2025 where you're quoted. And your quote is says when you're disrupting health care, you have to push the boundaries a little bit. The emphasis is a little bit.

As soon as you cross a line, you end up going to jail talking kind of about some of the lines that they cross. And in your report, you said, would I trust the CEO to walk my dog or plant sit my cactus, no. So, you know, I think it's introducing, like, you've got this growth outlook that management is providing. And you're saying, you're basically saying, hey, I like everything about this company except the visionary CEO who started, founder CEO who started and everything. And my two pushbacks on that would be, number one, I mean, just in my experience, if every time I had had a management team lied to me or, like, been proven wrong, and I should have just sold the shares instantly. And I didn't, like, I'd always explain.

away, be like, oh, and every time I've had that, like, I've had my face worked off. That's just my personal experience. And then if I was applying that to him specifically, you know, when I look, I mentioned, I'm just looking at their 2025 numbers, 317 million in adjusted EBDA, right? But it's pretty heavily adjusted, you know, 130 million of the adjusted EBDA is stock comp. 135 million is depreciation and amortization. And they add back investments and websites. Like, they do have a lot of investments into intangible assets and stuff. So that DNA number is like kind of a real number. They add back legal settlements.

They add like it's a pretty adjusted number. So when I say, hey, we're modeling them on $1.3 billion. We're like almost double trusting management. We're double trusting, hey, they're saying they're going to 4x their EBITDA 3X their EBITDA over the next four years or so. B, they're saying that heavily adjusted EBITDA we're trusting them. And Paul's over here saying I wouldn't trust them to walk my. to walk my dog or grow my cactus,

but we're saying we're trusting their growth numbers. Does that make sense? Oh, yeah, fair, because the thing is, like you said, most of the time, like whenever we talk to management, I imagine you're the same way. My goal, whenever I talk to management is how much, how much are you bullshitting me right now? Because obviously their job is to, you know,

promote the company, talk it up, et cetera, et cetera, obviously without lying, but, you know, not telling the whole truth, not necessarily be the same thing as lying, right? So there's like, you know, emphasis here and or de emphasis there. So that's why I always, that's why I always spoke so I want to talk to management. Mind you, I've actually never spoken to Andrew. Andrew, this will be fun for your listeners. When Andrew, when the company went public in 2021, I was very critical of the valuation in 2021 and to the point where Andrew ended up blocking me because I was so vocal about the valuation and then it dropped 90%. So I feel like I earned my stripes back then, too. Anyway, but yes,

No, I don't trust Andrew. And I don't trust Andrew because everything stemming from the compounded GLP1 fiasco that happened last year. And in my mind, I'm saying, this guy is very talented. He is very bright. He is very future forward and in his thinking. The problem is, I think, is when a CEO is sitting on the top for so long that he thinks he can be untouched, he can do whatever he wants and nothing can touch him, which is why my

short report last year was titled, titled, the Teflon Don because nothing was sticking to this guy, because it wasn't. And I'm sitting on like, this guy, I think he actually thinks he's like some type of God right now because no one's going after him. And eventually that comes crashing down. So the reason why I made those comments is because, yeah, I don't trust him personally. But I do trust his business acumen when it is checked, which he got his reality checked in February of this year, when he got sued, when he got hit by the FDA, got hit by the FTC, got, I think the SEC

when it's still going on. And, and Novo Nort to suit him. I'm like, that was his reality check. And now he knows that you actually can't step out of line and not face consequences. So when it comes to, you know, our thesis, yes, I believe management can get it done, but management still needs to operate under the same rules, which is why I made that comment in Bloomberg that people go to jail when you don't. Can I just like, I don't, I actually don't even know if this is pushback or not, but a lot of what Andrew does, and I'm not an expert on the company, I don't know the guy.

He did start a donut shop, which is near and dear to my heart. Have you, have you tried the donuts? I have not, no. Maybe we'll, if they go on gold belly, maybe we'll get them shipped to New York and we'll try them at some point because I think you're out in Brooklyn, right? No, I was out of Brooklyn, but I actually moved, but I go there every year now. Okay. We still maybe we'll figure out a time to try some to figure it out. Let's figure it.

A lot of what you're saying. the Teflon Don, the reality shop, you know, it kind of reminds me of Elon Musk. And again, I don't know if that's a bull point or a bear point because I remember people after multiple, multiple things that happen with Elon, people were like, oh, he got his reality check, right? And Elon never had his reality check, but every stock has gone straight up. So when you say he got his reality check, he's going to be checked. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing because if he is Elon Musk, like he's not going to be checked.

But as you're saying, Elon, the one place, I guess he is the, the, the brain neuro wave or whatever. But there is a little bit of a difference between, hey, my reality check is I'm selling cars and I'm like pushing the envelope on autonomous driving. And if you start doing products and like one of the things with compounding is, you know,

compounding shortages was because people need drugs, but people like you miss compound or something. Like people die. You sell people infected drugs and stuff. So I don't even know if saying he got his reality check and I'm saying a lot of this reminds you on us. I don't know if it's a bull point or a bear point. Well, there's a thing.

I say he got a reality check because of what ended up happening. Not that he actually suffered any consequences from it. So you know them, but Hunter, Hunter Brook was very, was very vocal about how he basically Andrew got away with compounding and he paid no repercussions for it. I agree. That is true. However, he knows that if, so I called him Icarus in 2024. I was like, hey, Icarus is able to fly around.

He could fly around for as long as he could. But, you know, when you get too close to the sun, you know, your wings burn up and you fall to the speed, fall to the sea and you die. So I called him Icarus in 2024. I called him Napoleon in February of 2025. And I called him the Teflon dawn in October of 2025. So when his reality check is that,

and this is a two point, there's a two pointer here. One is that he got a reality check by effectively understanding where his, where he was able to push that, that gray area as far as he could, which was basically creating his own drug out of thin air before everyone was just like, okay, nope, that's it. You can't. The red line, you can't do that. So now he actually knows what the red line is. So we'll see if he tries to maybe push that again or if he knows, like, does not have to get too close to that anymore. And then secondly, is that, like I mentioned before, like you have to, most of this, I'm not saying it's the Wild West.

I mean, some parts are the Wild West, but. I think the Chinese peptides are. Oh, that's definitely the Wild West. Yeah. No, for sure. So now, you know, absent peptides. Yeah, the repercussions are real, right? So he has to also answer to them too.

If people get sick, people die, which have been published before. But the thing is, life continues to go. Like you said, with Elon, his company is still keep going on. Life goes on. Hymns will continue to go on. And my reality, my reality check was that I put too much emphasis on morality. And I thought that, you know, if you if you didn't do the right thing, then regulators, you know, quote unquote police that I call them, people who are supposed to be there for people would step in and write the wrong, which is why all 2025, I'm like, All of this shit that he's saying isn't even accurate.

Like I was pointing out every little details. And I just very quick analogy because I know you love reading. I'm very late to this game. David Einhorn's book, fooling people, fooling some of the people all the time. He had five years before his short worked and it was down like 90%. However, and one line they said, the excuse that nothing was happening was like, oh, if my stock price is still high, that it can't be fraud or I'm not crooked. And I'm like, oh my God, that was all of 2025.

Like, everyone was like, no, the stock purchase of $60. You're wrong. I'm like, that's not how it works, dude. So my reality check is that I can't put faith in regulators to do the right thing. So, hey, if they're basically sanctioning that this is the red line and not what the actual red line should be, then who am I to, who am I to tell them otherwise? It is so funny because everything you just said is like, it reminds me of a lot of the Tesla bears over the year, you know, where they'd be like, he said we'd have Robotaxis by 2018.

or he said there'd be $20 billion. Going private, going private, 420, you know, but Tesla is having a higher, higher death rates when, when they get in car accidents

because the doors don't open. It's like, you would think regularers should be all over that. But the thing is, regulars don't care enough to get all over that. Do you think it's because of this FDA?

Oh, 100%. 100%. 100%. Let me go to, you know, you want to go on a weird tangent with me for two minutes. I see.

We mentioned Chinese peptides a few times. Yeah. So for those you don't know, if you go to Instagram, and I have not ordered them, I haven't done peptides, but you can get, you know, people are obsessed with peptides and they're not really approved here. And you can go on and you can get from Chinese laboratories like any peptides you want. And, you know, there are some that are very popular with fitness influencers and stuff. You probably know it better than me.

And if this gets right, I think it's going to get approved by the FDA pretty soon. And it's a big, it's going to be a big bull case for Hems, in my opinion, because I think these guys are very well situated. to take over the Instagram marketing, actually start compound. So you can say anything on that piece you want, but I want it to go on a weird different tangent as well. Yeah, yeah, I know. So, I mean, like, I think like, I forget who put it out. I think they're valuing the illicit market, like just under $2 billion right now.

No, no chance. It's going to be so much bigger when it's regulated. And I would be sure. Yeah, it's only $2 billion. Oh, yeah. So elicit is, I think, $2 billion. But once it goes legit, I mean, it's like multiples of that, which is fine. Like, yeah, as I said, it's a net positive.

Great. Like, see, again, I've, I've had my reality check of, I can't be the morality police because number one, I'm not. And then number two, I can't rely on the morality police to actually come in and do their job. So my argument, too, was I tweeted about, I tweeted about threat a couple, like a month or two ago. And I was like, everybody thinks I'm bearish peptides, but I'm actually not. If GLP-1s proved anything, it's that people will want to get any drug that will help.

them if it's cheaper or you know like whatever right it's like kind of like people still buy those like for like a better word is those rhino powder dick pills at gas stations because you know whatever do you do one of so there's apparently a specialized insurance market for ensuring there's like you know the horny goat weeds and stuff that they sell up they because sometimes they accidentally put uh sometimes they accidentally put cardboard in them and sometimes they accidentally put other stuff that like so apparently there's like a specialized insurance market like they're so low quality who knows what's in there. But speaking to low quality, like the weird tangent, I go on with Chinese peptides. I'm like, look, I mean, people are literally going on Instagram and ordering from

these Chinese peptides, these Chinese peptides, and there's no quality control. And there's been some investigations and people order like, I don't know what the name of the drugs are, right? But like, 10 milligrams of retroed. And sometimes they'll be like, oh, yeah, it's actually 10 milligrams, but sometimes it'll be like, oh, when we thought we were drawing 10, it was 20 or 5, which is a disaster. And sometimes they'll be like, we thought it was 10 milligrams of retro and it was, you know, 20 milligrams of this other drug, right? So the weird tangent is, and it's made me been, I've been thinking a lot about like AI and, you know, as AI and we have these AI agents spin up and price shop or everything. And the world goes more and more frictionless. You know, there was the Satrini thing that almost brought down the stock market where they're like, hey, instead of ordering off door to Ash, you'll just tell your chat cheap ETT to order pad tie.

And it'll compare 15 different bad tie places and find the cheapest service to deliver you when it cuts out. DoorDash. I have been thinking about the world goes frictionless. Consumers are proving they just go to Chinese labs and they say, hey, give me $20 worth of the cheapest thing and they don't even they don't care about quality. They don't care of controls. I've been really worried about the world as it goes frictional with AI. If people will just inject anything into their body, like, you know, I go and say chat GPT, order me $5 of apples and like, am I going to get rotten apples and just stuff in my body? I don't know, but it's the weird thing I've been thinking about. Regulars are super slow to catch up to anything

and consumers have proven that they don't care where something comes from as long as it's cheap and they get access to people were buying GOP ones off of Groupon dude Groupon I know Like who does that? It's so good and I hear it's cheap but it's just like It's one thing I don't the Groupon ones were they getting the branded drug or were they getting like some weird Oh no they were getting some weird at

Okay it was like a old unquote quote, GLP1. Yeah. It's just like, I can't imagine, I can imagine getting cheap on a lot of things. And I'm a pretty frugal guy in general. I don't, but something you're injecting your body just being like, yeah, I'm just going to go and get it from like someone who is some random Chinese company that's not getting FD and sick.

And that's, that's what the issue is. You and me approach this with logic and rational, a rational mindset. A lot of people do not. That is why they'll take the research for a peptides from a guy that they trust or a guy that they know, right? And, you know, hope and pray that the guy that they know or the guy that they trust is actually getting it from another guy that they know or that they trust. But there's so many breaks in that system of trust be, bro.

And you'll roll the dice because, you know, if I take BPC 157 and, you know, my muscles, you know, are recovering nicely, I'm going to keep doing it until, again, something where I'm supposed to draw 10 milligrams is actually 20 milligrams or 50 milligrams. I get some weird twitch in my arm or my heart stops or something like that. And then you rush to the hospital and then you have to deal with it then. I mean, some of the investigations with people who were like, yeah, I was taken and doing nicely. And then I got a bad batch. And like, now I've got a tingling in my foot for the rest of my life.

Here's the thing, Andrew. There's a thing. There's a thing to this. We're talking about something that's not even legal yet, right? There's a problem, which I meant to jail comment is what happens when you're supposed to trust people who actually have a legal market and they still screw you over. which I always, I always bring up because it's a poster child, what happened were the companies of Dunn and Cerebral,

who had access to control substances. They were pushing ADHD medications. And they were effectively telling their nurse practitioners, their providers, like, listen, when people come in, basically do the bare minimum and push these drugs on people. Even if they didn't need them or whatever, because we're making so much money and, you know, we're quote unquote helping people that we're doing the public of service. and just rolling in cash.

And when it ended up happening, they, you know, the founders got arrested, charged. And I think the most recent one got sent to like six years in prison. So there's an aspect of trusting people who you're supposed to trust. And then they break and then breaking like their oath to protect you or whatever. So there's always a risk there, whether it's legal or not. This is why dentists and doctors, I mean, they've got such a sheen on them. And it is scary.

Like they, as one friend who's a dentist told me, like a dental license is a license to print money. you tell somebody, hey, I need to fill that cavity and they don't really ask. They say, okay, yeah, let's fill the cavity. Let me use the Chinese peptides thing to just push into competition in one other angle. And we'll use it on the low end and then I'll go to the high end. On the low end, you know, peptides get legalized. And that's a big bull case for Hems. But a lot of this peptides get legalized.

Like, Hymns is somewhat regulated. Like, again, we talked about the management team being willing to push boundaries. I do worry like, and this would apply to Hems, whoop, whoever you want. like I worry that you just because so much of it is going to be Instagram marketing and acquiring the customers, right? I worry that if you are a bigger player with some something of a reputation, you get out competed by a smaller startup player, like hundreds of smaller startup players, Instagram influence or whatever, are going to work with people and they're just going to try to churn and burn, right? They're just going to say, hey, we do a fuzzy Instagram ad. We get people watching. We sell them and we don't care what the F we do, right?

Like we'll ship them freaking placebo sugar water, right? Whatever it is. And we're trying to turn and burn. And that, you know, Hymns did that to beat a lot of the players who were like kind of playing by the rules when the compounding went away. As you and I know and discussed, like, but if Hymns is going to be this big player, are they actually going to get out competed by smaller, a hundred smaller startup by night players that say, hey, F it.

We'll sell them. We'll push the boundary as far as humanly possible on peptides, whatever it is. that kind of undercuts him's ability to acquire customers. So that's the low-end competition I worry about. That's a very fair point. And my pushback on that is, so when I worked at Roe, you know, I was working basically directed for the CEO at certain points. And one thing, and I'll tell you a very quick story.

So we were trying to see where we could go as a company. And my job was to figure out where that would be. one of them was actually ADHD medication. And I was like, listen, I looked at the numbers, we can make a lot of money with this. Mind you, I had just come from investment banking. So my whole job is how do I create value? My whole mindset is how do I create value? I was like, we can make a lot of money with this.

And without skipping a beat, you know, he tells me, he's like, we're not doing that. And I'm like, wait, what do you mean? I'm like, I have all the numbers. I have all the data. And he's like, because we're, because it opens up more doors to actually hurt people than help people. And he told me that as long as we do the right thing for patients, then we will win over the long term. The short term might get bumpy, but the long term we will still win. And now to you, and I respected that immensely, I was like, oh, wow, this guy actually cares.

So to your point about all these little brands popping up and shooting peptides, it's a placebo, real fake, mix, whatever. I mean, it's fentanyl in it. Who cares? Who cares? Who knows? they might win in the short term and that might disrupt some or add some volatility to

you know if you're talking about him him stock price because as long as they're doing the right thing over the long term it will it will net out for them because in the hopes that like regulators come in and then an unfortunate aspect of like oh if somebody dies with one of these companies then like everybody gets sued and blah blah blah

so it will create some short term volatility for the people who are okay with breaking the rules and the laws in order to make some cash, but those who are like, you know what, we should do the right thing, but it's the right thing to do. You know, I love that. And generally, I'm optimist,

but the tough thing is in the long term, like, if you've got a lot of short-term players who are kind of eating into your profit-load and destroying it, destroying your profitability, I do hear you in the long-term, like, hopefully the good players went out. But the issue with the long-term is, hey, if the short-term players eat it. And you mentioned, you remember,

like, sometimes you've got the great thing, and maybe the time's not right. Or maybe there's so much competition and so much competition is doing the wrong way. Your company isn't the one who actually survives and makes it there. And like for Hymns, if let's say the next few years, it's just a blood sport of low cost players. Like Hymns never starts inflecting. And maybe the low cost players in 2027, 2028 kind of get kicked off the market.

But then, you know, it's two years later. And maybe a new startup comes and kind of attacks it from new way. So that's my one word. I'll pause there if you've got anything. And then I have two more questions. I will say, I will. say, maybe you agree with this, is that then it again, I think it plays on who's, who's, who's better capitalized, whose balance sheet is better, because if it's a race of the bottom

on price, then arguably, and I'm not saying this is going to happen, I'm just, I'm speaking hypothetically here, is that if all these new startups are basically saying, like, yeah, if prices of the determining factor for these peptides, once, once they come online, then a well capitalized business who is arguably a leader in the business can take their prices down in order to grab share and still have. cross-selling opportunity, which plays into the whole data, which plays into the additional additional conditions that they can treat so, etc., they can play that short game. Mind you, it's still hurt their profitability, but because they're capitalized well enough,

they can endure that short-term pain for, I think, a long-term, long-term return. Very Amazon thinking, though, you know, the issue is like Amazon, there was a big infrastructure thing. And here, I'm worried it's going to be like people outsourcing to the Chinese labs and just running like Instagram things, but I want to go to two last questions. Um, yeah, first question. We are recording this. Gosh, what's the date? August 6th.

Hymns reports August 10th. And this podcast is generally not a what your earnings, bro, what your outlooks, bro. But we're going to try and post this the day of August 10th because they report after hours. It's kind of hard to talk about, you know, you can look at him's volatility. Him's ball is a hundred ball. Uh, this stock does move a lot on names. Earnings.

I hate to say something like if this releases August 10th, it looks stale or like, but how, how are you thinking about like kind of just the near-term earnings on a name with this much volatility? Yeah, I mean, think about what's publicly been announced already. So they're already given Guy from Q1. But the thing is they didn't incorporate eucalyptus. Eucalyptus is now closed as of June. So when you're talking about fiscal year 2020-6 guide, it will be updated, even all else being equal just for eucalyptus. So you're talking about a few hundred million dollars in revenue that they'll recognize in 2006. It's not profitable. So then they'll assuming all else being equal, they'll negatively revise epithetic guide.

down to compensate for that lack of profitability over at you can lift this and then then the then the game is okay how well has a full quarter of a novo nor novo nordus partnership uh materialized into their into their financials and then secondly how well has the a four mentioned labs business testosterone business menopause menopause business scaled since they launched in september and october of last year um and i i feel like a little bit of that a I feel like a little bit of that has already been baked into guidance, but then who knows if there's upside risk there? So it'll be very interesting to see, but that's kind of like the easy takeaway is that

guidance will be revised at least upwards for revenue because of you could lift this acquisition and folding into the financials. And then negatively on the adjusted EBITDA just because if they are indeed not profitable and nothing else has changed, then it arguably has to come down. So that's like my very quick takeaway there. And then we'll see what happens. but long term, I'm still very okay with it. Perfect.

And I have one last question I want to ask, just on competitors. CVS, Walgreens, and then you can also their Walmart and Amazon into it a little bit. But particularly CVS and Walgreens, just because they've got so many local stores, they've got so many patients who are already getting prescriptions there. I've been a little surprised. Like, there's been no effort to get in here. But as you think about CVS and Walgreens in the long term, I mean, do you think there's, these companies are damn cheap?

I mean, Walgreens got taken out at like kind of a melting ice cube valuation. Do you think there's any pivot there? Do you worry about them from a competition? Do you think they're a partner maybe? But how do you think about them? Because if I was in charge of Walgreens, which I'm glad I'm not. But if I was in charge of a Walgreens or CVS, I would be thinking, hey, the peptide maybe I don't want to actually compound peptides at my thing.

But I've got a great customer acquisition source. Can I take that? Can I start doing exactly what you're saying with these? And maybe I partner with him, maybe I partner with a dozen companies, but can I kind of own the customer and have people do the back end and kind of win the market that way? So have you even thought about them or are they just such dinosaurs? They don't even matter here. I would say it don't matter because I think they I think all special. I think pharmacies and specialty pharmacies, but it's like a pharmacy within like a croaker pharmacy within a Costco, Walmart,

then the pure place pharmacies like CVS, Walgreens, Dean, etc. I think they're all fighting each other in their own respective markets, which is mainly insurance companies. insurance-covered medications. That's where they're fighting each other. And while, yes, there is some overlap that's like GOP-1s, whether it's insurance covered or do cash pay, there's some overlap there. But I think because HEMS is focusing all its efforts on cash pay,

there's actually no insurance involved on the cash on the, on the HMS model, that for now, they're okay that they're not really bumping heads at the moment. Could they work in the future, whether it's like some type of like, If you said, acquisition tool or referral or referral system or whatever, yeah, it totally can happen. But I think at this moment, I don't think it's really a threat because I think each company, hymns and all the pharmacies are fighting their own battles and are on their own turfs that they're not even thinking about each other at the moment.

I suspect there's also a little bit of like kind of the old, not necessarily innovators dilemma, but like a Walmart, for example. I think Walmart says, hey, we're a trillion dollar company. If there's any gray line or anything when it comes to compounding, and everything. We just don't want to touch it, you know? And I think Walgreens and CBS, that are their ice cubes, they should think about something else. But like, I just don't think a Walmart wants to get involved with personalized testing. And maybe they, that extends you, hey, we don't even want the legal liability of being a partner with someone on this.

That's it. That's in prescription side. They even tried doing like their own telehealth offerings, right? And had to dial them back because they just couldn't, they couldn't get it to work. So that's just that's just in the embassy, right? They launched a shitty product. Yeah. Well, that too. But the thing is they have, look at their balance sheets. If they really wanted to figure it out, they have the money to do it, right? Amazon is trying to do it. And man, they have led, led money to try to make an actual threat. And I think there's going to be more of that before it remotely gets better for them. Paul, this has been a ton of fun. I'm going to include a link for those of you are interested. If you're listening to August 10th and you're getting excited

for any of this call or if you're listening to Post it, because I think a lot of this is maybe not time us because in 2035, I think this is, but if you're listening to us, I think a lot of this will at least hold up for the next six months to 18 months. I'll include a link to Paul's write-up in the show news for those who want to get ready for the earnings call and everything with that. But Paul, this has been awesome. Thanks so much for coming on.

I really enjoyed this conversation, and we will chat soon. Always enjoy talking to you, Andrew. Thanks for having me. A quick disclaimer. Nothing on this podcast should be considered investment advice. Guests or the hosts may have positions in any of the stocks mentioned during this podcast.

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