Thinking of taking your company public? Get our essential guide to a successful IPO. Download Now

Westicke Partners

Close

Posts by Mike Piccinino, CFA

Mike Piccinino

Mike Piccinino is a Managing Director on Westwicke's medical technology and diagnostics teams. He has extensive experience in the buy-side investment process. He has a BA from James Madison University.

Best Practices for Earnings Call Preparation

Posted on November 14th, 2022. Posted by

Best Practices for Earnings Call Preparation

While every quarter is different, the “playbook” for preparing senior management for a successful earnings conference call is largely the same. Specifically, the best prepared CEOs and CFOs follow a set of key strategic and tactical steps designed to bring them through a review of all the essential elements pertinent to the investment community’s analysis of quarterly earnings. In short, CEOs and CFOs that have allocated adequate time to understanding the results, in the context of both internal and external expectations, and are capable of addressing all possible topics with ease and transparency, will succeed. Drafting the conference call script is just one piece of this important process. Below, we walk you through these best practices of an effective earnings call.

Continue Reading

Tailor Your Investor Meetings to the Audience and Timeframe

Posted on November 10th, 2021. Posted by

You spend considerable time creating a professional investor presentation that tells a comprehensive story of your company. Yet aside from the analyst/investor due diligence meeting, few opportunities exist for you to deliver the entire presentation from start-to-finish. How, then, can you tailor your presentation to the time and opportunities at hand?

Continue Reading

Formal Financial Guidance for FY’ 21: Reinstate or Wait?

Posted on February 10th, 2021. Posted by

Formal Financial Guidance

Many public companies withdrew, or never introduced, formal financial guidance in spring 2020 as a result of severe and widespread business disruption and the high level of uncertainty surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic. We are now roughly two weeks into the fourth quarter and fiscal year 2020 earnings reporting season and wanted to share a few notable trends and key considerations that public company management teams should bear in mind as they evaluate whether to give formal financial guidance for 2021.

Continue Reading

4 Key Questions to Consider When Preparing for Q2 Earnings Season

Posted on July 16th, 2020. Posted by

Questions for Q2 Earnings

The continued uncertainty created by the COVID-19 pandemic will continue to present unique challenges for public company management teams as they report Q2 earnings and attempt to provide the investment community with an appropriate update on the business.

Continue Reading

Maximizing Industry Meetings While Tending to Investors

Posted on February 7th, 2018. Posted by

Medical meetings allow analysts and investors to explore an array of public and private healthcare companies in one place and gain deeper insight into the industry’s competitive dynamics as they meet with management teams and learn about new products and strategies.

These and other industry events play an important role in enhancing Wall Street professionals’ understanding of the quickly changing healthcare landscape – helping them reinforce and update their investment ideas, conduct due diligence, evaluate new prospects, and spot emerging competitive threats.

Continue Reading

Tax Reform Blues? How to Manage Investor Communication During Periods of Legislative Uncertainty

Posted on December 21st, 2017. Posted by

Tax Reform Blues? How to Manage Investor Communication During Periods of Legislative Uncertainty

While it seems as though legislative uncertainty is increasingly an issue that the investment community needs to deal with on a year-round basis, at this time of year, many public companies in the healthcare sector are navigating the challenges of a “legislative overhang.”

With tax reform a key focus of President Trump’s legislative agenda, investors are keenly focused on how potential changes in healthcare policy may affect public companies’ growth and profitability profiles going forward. As always, heightened focus from investors means more questions for executive management teams; with legislative uncertainty however, there are no clean answers to these questions. So, what should you do?

Continue Reading

What Public Company CEOs, CFOs Need to Know About After-Hours Trading

Posted on January 4th, 2017. Posted by

What Public Company CEOs, CFOs Need to Know About After-Hours Trading

As much as CEOs and CFOs know that they should focus on the long-term performance of their stocks, it’s impossible not to at least notice and wonder about day-to-day, hour-to-hour fluctuations, especially when they seem arbitrary and divorced from fundamentals.

Trading before the market opens and after it closes can be particularly confusing. For instance, outside of the regular market session, spreads can widen dramatically (see chart).

Continue Reading

Non-GAAP Financial Measures Getting More SEC Scrutiny

Posted on July 20th, 2016. Posted by and

Non-GAAP Financial Measures

Background:

The Division of Corporation Finance (the Division) is a branch of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that supports the SEC’s mission to “protect investors, maintain fair, orderly, and efficient markets, and facilitate capital formation.” Among its duties, the Division “provides interpretive assistance to companies with respect to SEC rules and forms and makes recommendations to the Commission regarding new rules and revisions to existing rules.” This duty is performed, in part, through the issuance of Compliance and Disclosure Interpretations (or “C&DIs”) on a variety of subjects.

Continue Reading

Buy-Side Perspectives: Should You Meet With Hedge Funds?

Posted on April 20th, 2016. Posted by

In the world of small-cap healthcare, we have observed that the class of asset managers who are collectively referred to as “hedge funds” are often viewed negatively by executive management teams, particularly those that are new to the public markets.

This tendency is understandable in light of the fact that hedge funds, as a whole, most often attract media attention when they’ve disclosed a sizable position in a company with activist intentions (“corporate raiders”), or when they’ve come under the scrutiny of regulators. These high-profile examples distort the public perception of hedge funds overall.

Continue Reading

Hosting an Investor Day: 7 Key Things to Consider

Posted on November 4th, 2015. Posted by

A well-run Investor Day can be an incredibly valuable part of your investor relations strategy. It’s a great way to cultivate relationships with existing investors and covering analysts, and to introduce/enhance prospective investors’ and analysts’ understanding of your story.

Timely and strategic planning are integral to hosting a successful event. Drawing on our many years of attending and participating in Investor Days, we can be a valuable resource as you prepare for yours.

Continue Reading

Have News to Release?

Find out whether you should file a Form 8-K, issue a press release, or do both by using our easy-to-reference chart, “Form 8K vs. Press Release: What’s the Difference?

Our Locations