Institutional Position Changes
CTO/Co-Founder Ryan Smith from the 2022 Sun Valley Forum
This video was just posted to YouTube this week, featuring Chief Technology Officer and company co-founder Ryan Smith speaking at the 2022 Sun Valley Forum. His discussion of Origin Materials begins at the 15 minute mark.
Revlon Deal & Q2 Earnings Date Announced
With no official news since June, investors were starved to hear something from the company. Wishes were granted, as the company issued two press releases on July 20th. First, they announced a partnership with beauty and cosmetic giant Revlon. According to the release, "Revlon has signed a memorandum of understanding to reserve commercial volumes of Origin PET."
It seems as though the "memorandum of understanding" was entered due to Revlon's current bankruptcy proceedings. It's possible that the company can't legally enter into an offtake agreement or capacity reservation at the current time.
“Revlon’s initiative with Origin Materials will allow consumers at all price points to access sustainable, plant-based packaging,” said Keyla Lazardi, Chief Scientific Officer, Revlon. “As a company that is focused on driving sustainability in the beauty industry, Revlon is thrilled to advance the use of Origin’s carbon-negative bio-PET in the mass beauty space.”
This is the second beauty company to partner with Origin for sustainable packaging. On April 19, 2022 it was announced that "LVMH Beauty, a division of LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, the global leader in luxury products, today announced a strategic partnership to develop sustainable low-carbon footprint packaging for the perfumes and cosmetics industry."
The Company will report Q2 earnings on August 3rd after the market close, with a conference call set for 5:00pm EST on that same day.
"Origin management will incorporate responses to a selection of shareholders’ frequently asked questions during the webcast. Shareholders are invited to submit questions via the investor relations email address: [email protected]. Please include the hashtag #askorigin in the subject line. Questions will be accepted beginning today through July 27, 2022."
Hiring Continues
My unofficial employee headcount is now at 134. This week, I've discovered a Government Fund Development Manager has been hired. This is fantastic news, as securing government funds is one of the known risk factors going forward.
Another recent hire stumbled upon this week was for a Product Development Analyst position. This person previous worked at Mobius, spending 4 years there as a Systems Engineer.
Perhaps the most intriguing is the recent hire of a Project Engineer, based in Baton Rouge, Louisiana - the area of the future Origin 2 facility. This is the eighth engineer, by my count, poached from ExxonMobil.
Weekly Chart
The stock closed the week below both the 50 and 200 day moving averages, which can be seen as a short-term bearish signal. Also the 50-day appears to be heading below the 200-day, also a bearish sign. The bounce that began on Tuesday pretty much tracked the major indexes, as did the selloff on Friday.
New Seeking Alpha Article
For what it's worth, a new Seeking Alpha article was published on Wednesday with a thorough case made to give ORGN a buy rating, with a price target of $12.33
