UK-based automotive payment provider Auto Service Finance has secured a debt and...

Weather and environmental forecasts made several weeks to months in advance can someday be as widely used and essential as current predictions of tomorrow’s weather are, but first more research and sustained investment are needed, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

Higher education leaders, policymakers, and the private sector should take a range of actions to strengthen STEM programs and degree attainment in the nation’s Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs), says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

Along with participation in the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) project – a large, international burning plasma experiment – the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) should start a national program of accompanying research and technology to build a compact pilot plant that produces electricity from fusion at the lowest possible capital cost, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

NASA’s investment in new instruments to analyze extraterrestrial samples is insufficient to provide for replacement of existing instruments, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

Biotechnology has the potential to be a part of the solution in protecting forest trees against destructive pest and disease outbreaks

The nation’s highways and roads connect almost 330 million Americans and are important to both commerce and national security. Two-thirds of total passenger travel in the country moves along this vast network of roads, as does 60 percent of the weight and almost three-quarters of the value of total U.S. freight transported.

Rwanda’s Human Resources for Health (HRH) Program – funded in part by the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) from 2012 to 2017 – more than tripled the country’s physician specialist workforce and produced major increases in the numbers and qualifications of nurses and midwives, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

State and local leaders break ground at a Louisville, Ky., coal-burning power plant in November 2012.; Credit: Dylan Lovan/AP

Molly Peterson

California State Senator Kevin de Leon says he’ll introduce legislation next month to get the state’s public employees retirement system off of coal.

Just back from ho-hum international talks in Lima, where he was a member of California's delegation, de Leon spoke at a conference in Oakland. It was sponsored by NextGen Climate, a nonpartisan group founded by billionaire philanthropist Tom Steyer to raise the profile of climate change among issues in the U.S. political debate.

“With coal power in retreat, and the value of coal dropping, it’s time for us to lead again in moving our massive state portfolios to lower carbon investments,” De Leon said. “Divestment is about matching your values with your investment strategy — and still seeing positive financial returns… California has prohibited its energy companies from buying or importing coal power, and state funds should match that.”

De Leon proposes to divest the nation’s two largest public pension funds from coal. The California Public Employees Retirement System, or CALPERS, is the nation’s largest, controlling about $295 billion as of the end of September.  The California School Teachers Retirement System is a sister fund for pensions of nearly 850,000 California teachers. CALSTRS controls another $187.1 billion dollars in potential investments.

Burning coal for energy is a major source of greenhouse gases that are warming the planet. The move would lend momentum to a divestment movement already underway, largely targeted at investment funds belonging to colleges and universities nationwide.

Stanford and Pitzer College in Claremont are among a dozen universities that have pulled investments out of the coal industry. But others, including the University of California have refused. 

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Frank Romero with one of his French paintings, in his home in the South of France. But every year, he and his wife Sharon throw a big studio sale for Christmas, and you're invited.; Credit: John Rabe

John Rabe

"Live! Life's a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death!" - Auntie Mame.

Your calendar is filling up, but here are four holiday events you'll want to make room for:

Every year, pioneering Chicano artist Frank Romero and his wife Sharon throw a big studio sale that includes works by a wide group of artists, and a lot of food and drink. It's just as much a party as a sales event, and Frank and the other artists are always there to meet and greet. And now that the couple is spending more time at their home in France, it's a chance for their old friends to catch up with them, so who knows who you'll see from L.A.'s arts community.

RELATED: See Frank's new works - French scenes with an East LA flavor

The Romero Studio annual Christmas party and sale is Saturday, Dec. 6, 6-10pm; and Sunday, Dec. 7, 1-5pm, at Plaza de la Raza, Boathouse Gallery, 3540 North Mission Rd., LA CA 90031 (in Lincoln Park across from the DMV — which BTW is a very good DMV).

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Then, on Sunday, Dec. 14, at 4:30pm,  it's the Advent Procession of Lessons and Carols, at St. James Episcopal Church, which a friend describes as "one of the truly beautiful choral events of the season," and the highlight of the Choir of St. James' season. It's free and it's at St. James' Episcopal Church in Koreatown (3903 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles 90010).
 

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"Auntie Mame," the 1958 Rosalind Russell movie with more quotable quips than a weekend getaway with Oscar Wilde, has become something of a Christmas tradition. It's screening at the American Cinematheque's Egyptian Theatre on Wednesday, Dec. 17, at 7:30. As delightful as this movie is any day of the week on your TV at home, this is a film to be seen in 35mm with a theater full of people reacting to every bon mot and heart-touching moment.

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GO INSIDE: The Disney Hall organ, "Hurricane Mama," turns 10

Last year, my husband and I blindly went to Disney Hall for the Holiday Organ Spectacular. We expected some music and a little fun. But it really was spectacular. It's back this year, on Friday, Dec. 19, with organist David Higgs leading the evening from the console of Hurricane Mama.

If you've never seen or heard the organ in person, this is a great evening because Higgs — a teacher as well as master organist — gives you a guided tour of every stop, and every mood the organ can produce, from cathedral-loud to country-church-quiet. At the end of the night, he breaks the audience into parts to sing "The Twelve Days of Christmas," and you may sing as loud as you like.

These are just a few curated selections, but they're just the tip of the iceberg in Southern California; please make your own holiday event recommendations in the comments below. 

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

The Asian Garden Mall in Westminster, where voters will make a choice about whether to recall city leaders.; Credit: Dorian Merina/KPCC

Josie Huang

Voters in Westminster will decide this spring whether to recall its mayor and two city councilmembers. The Orange County Registrar of Voters has signed off on petitions for a recall election.  

 

 

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Source: Streetwise Reports   04/28/2020

As the coronavirus pandemic has accelerated the move to telemedicine, two investment professionals are following CloudMD, a small cap rapidly expanding in Canada.

News Flash: On May 7, CloudMD announced that it is partnering with IDYA4 Corp. for it to resell the health technology firm's Livecare technology in the U.S.. Read more here.

News Flash: On May 4, CloudMD announced that it is partnering with Save-On-Foods grocery stores and Pure Integrative Pharmacy to pilot on demand, integrated virtual patient care through telemedicine kiosks placed in pharmacies' existing consult rooms. Read more here.

As people are avoiding going to doctor's offices and hospitals during the coronavirus pandemic, telemedicine has taken off. Two investment professionals, Bruce Campbell and Keith Schaefer, have called CloudMD Software & Services Inc. (DOC:CSE; DOCRF:OTCQB; 6PH:FSE), a small-cap Canadian telemedicine firm, a top pick.

Bruce Campbell, founder and portfolio manager of Stonecastle Investment Management, spoke about CloudMD on April 27 on BNN:

"The first top pick is CloudMD Software, a technological medical play. We've tried to look at opportunities that are really going to be able to take advantage of Covid and this is one of the ones that we think is; what they do is telemedicine.

"The jumping off point for TeleHealth is here and I think CloudMD is the best pure-play TeleHealth stock right now." - Keith Schaefer

If you look back at a year ago, where everyone had to go to the doctor, and now all of the different provinces have opened up billing codes, so that now we don't have to go into a doctor's office. We can do a virtual doctor's visit and the doctor gets paid just like they do with an in-house appointment. Obviously with everything that has happened with this crisis, people really don't want to go into a doctor's office and they need a prescription renewal or something like that.

If you look at CloudMD's peers in the U.S., there is a company called Teladoc, which is a big U.S. company that does the same thing. Obviously, the size of the market is different, but the multiple it trades at is multiple times higher than where CloudMD is.

CloudMD is just starting to gain adoption. They started off here in BC, they have moved to Ontario, and they are going to be rolling out really across the country, so tons of opportunity for a company like this. They will probably change the way that we view our doctor and our healthcare visits going forward."

Keith Schaefer, editor and publisher of Oil & Gas Investments Bulletin, is also following CloudMD, and wrote:

"An entirely new—and highly profitable—industry is being borne out in 2020—TeleHealth. CloudMD Software & Services Inc. (DOC:CSE; DOCRF:OTCQB; 6PH:FSE) is my favorite way to play TeleHealth. It's growing quickly with over 100,000 patients registered on its app and over 3000 doctors in 8 provinces in its Electronic Medical Records—EMR—system. It has MULTIPLE revenue streams and it just moved into Canada's largest market—Ontario—setting up an even faster growth rate.

The recent spread of coronavirus is only accelerating this. Covid-19 has forever changed how we all will think about visiting a hospital or seeing our doctor. We really don't want to do that at all, if possible. It will have a very positive and long lasting impact on TeleHealth.

TeleHealth companies in Canada are getting paid more money for services than bricks-and-mortar clinics, and have a fraction of the costs. Doctors want more of it, patients want more of it, government wants more of it—and the Market REALLY wants more of it. Everybody wins here; there is no downside.

The rapid scale-up and profitability is key for investors.

CloudMD is established, growing quickly and trading at a fraction of its peers. The average multiple of competitors in the sector trade at 5-7x revenue, and CloudMD is trading way below that at 2.5x per revenue. But realize that the Canadian use of telemedicine is still just a fraction of where it is in the U.S—so the quick, early upside is even bigger.

The market desperately wants to own TeleHealth right now. I see CloudMD as the best way to do that in the junior sector (where the leverage is!).

For this stock to have a major run all that needs to happen is for institutional investors to wake-up to the fact that the company exists. That's happening now with the company entering the province of Ontario—which has 14.5 million people—over one-third of Canada's population.

CloudMD is a fully integrated health care company—kind of like a hospital-in-the-sky. They do have five bricks-and-mortar clinics, but they also own their own EMR—Electronic Medical Records—system that operates in eight provinces and is used by over 3,000 doctors and is supported by an in-house 25 person development team. They have their own CloudMD app—which has over 100,000 registered patients already.

The EMR gives CloudMD a recurring monthly revenue stream, which The Street loves. The app gives them high-margin fees from doctors, specialists and groups like massage therapists & counselors. These people are revenue, not costs. As I said, full hospital-in-the-sky. Multiple revenue sources with lower costs.

To schedule a virtual doctor's appointment all that a patient has to do is download the free CloudMD app and then arrange an appointment with one of the doctors. There is zero charge for the patient and they can see a doctor very quickly.

CloudMD can scale up the number of patients VERY quickly—and they are. Every aspect of healthcare that's very fractured and disjointed will now be in the one CloudMD ecosystem.
Everyone wins with this system. Patients, doctors, the medical system, society, even investors. Everyone.

Doctors who have signed up with CloudMD work remotely from home or wherever they are (like their winter home down south). The rapid scale-up potential excites me. CloudMD can add in unlimited number of doctors and patients—so it has a virtually unlimited ability to scale quickly with little incremental cost.

Profit margins are wide and there is no cap on the number of customers that can be handled.

After a patient has an appointment, CloudMD bills the government directly just like every bricks-and-mortar clinic in Canada does. CloudMD records 100% of the revenue and gets to keep 30% of the billing for every patient that is seen through telemedicine, which is actually 10% more than what a bricks-and-mortar clinic receives. That is because the governments are trying to push TeleHealth. The doctor gets the other 70% and doesn't have to deal with any headaches of commuting or running a business.

Without the overhead of a bricks-and-mortar clinic, AND more revenue, CloudMD will be much more profitable than traditional healthcare stocks. Faster scale, more cash flow. And they just entered Canada's largest market. This is the right stock in the right market at the right time. That's the great thing about this business model. It's very scalable, very easy, and it grows very quickly.

CloudMD has been growing its recurring SAAS (Software-as-a-Service) revenue by 30% YoY with its EMR system. But this year the company is expecting that doctor growth to be much much higher—with a new full time sales team and the coronavirus pandemic. SaaS revenue is highly lucrative!

The jumping off point for TeleHealth is here and I think CloudMD is the best pure-play TeleHealth stock right now."

Read Keith Schaefer's entire article here.

Watch Bruce Campbell of StoneCastle Investments share his top picks: CloudMD, Lightspeed and Viemed.

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Disclosure:
1) Keith Schaefer: I, or members of my immediate household or family, own shares of the following companies mentioned in this article: CloudMD. I personally am, or members of my immediate household or family are, paid by the following companies mentioned in this article: CloudMD. My company has a financial relationship with the following companies mentioned in this article: None. Additional disclosures are listed below.
2) The following companies mentioned in this article are billboard sponsors of Streetwise Reports: None. Click here for important disclosures about sponsor fees. As of the date of this article, an affiliate of Streetwise Reports has a consulting relationship with CloudMD. Please click here for more information. An affiliate of Streetwise Reports is conducting a digital media marketing campaign for this article on behalf of CloudMD. Please click here for more information.
3) Statements and opinions expressed are the opinions of the author and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. The author is wholly responsible for the validity of the statements. The author was not paid by Streetwise Reports for this article. Streetwise Reports was not paid by the author to publish or syndicate this article. The information provided above is for informational purposes only and is not a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports requires contributing authors to disclose any shareholdings in, or economic relationships with, companies that they write about. Streetwise Reports relies upon the authors to accurately provide this information and Streetwise Reports has no means of verifying its accuracy.
4) This article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports' terms of use and full legal disclaimer. This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports.
5) From time to time, Streetwise Reports LLC and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their immediate families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise from the time of the interview or the decision to write an article until three business days after the publication of the interview or article. The foregoing prohibition does not apply to articles that in substance only restate previously published company releases. As of the date of this article, officers and/or employees of Streetwise Reports LLC (including members of their household) own securities of CloudMD, a company mentioned in this article.

Additional Disclosures

Keith Schaefer Disclosures:
CloudMD has reviewed and sponsored this article. The information in this newsletter does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any securities of a corporation or entity, including U.S. Traded Securities or U.S. Quoted Securities, in the United States or to U.S. Persons. Securities may not be offered or sold in the United States except in compliance with the registration requirements of the Securities Act and applicable U.S. state securities laws or pursuant to an exemption therefrom. Any public offering of securities in the United States may only be made by means of a prospectus containing detailed information about the corporation or entity and its management as well as financial statements. No securities regulatory authority in the United States has either approved or disapproved of the contents of any newsletter.

Keith Schaefer is not registered with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC"): as a "broker-dealer" under the Exchange Act, as an "investment adviser" under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, or in any other capacity. He is also not registered with any state securities commission or authority as a broker-dealer or investment advisor or in any other capacity.

Bruce Campbell, Stonecastle Investment Management:
A guest firm/affiliate holds a position in CloudMD. There is no guest position held, members of his household do not hold positions and CloudMD is not an investment banking client.

( Companies Mentioned: DOC:CSE; DOCRF:OTCQB; 6PH:FSE, )

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