3. Business – Page 43

Cognitive artificial intelligence for automated reservoir analysis and prediction of porosity, permeability, and fluid saturation
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Cancom’s (ETR:COK) Conservative Accounting Might Explain Soft Earnings

Cancom SE’s (ETR:COK) stock was strong despite it releasing a soft earnings report last week. However, we think the company is showing some signs that things are more promising than they seem.

Trump has pledged to “unleash” American oil and gas and these 15 US stocks have developments that are poised to benefit.

XTRA:COK Earnings and Revenue History April 4th 2026

In high finance, the key ratio used to measure how well a company converts reported profits into free cash flow (FCF) is the accrual ratio (from cashflow). The accrual ratio subtracts the FCF from the profit for a given period, and divides the result by the average operating assets of the company over that time. The ratio shows us how much a company’s profit exceeds its FCF.

That means a negative accrual ratio is a good thing, because it shows that the company is bringing in more free cash flow than its profit would suggest. While it’s not a problem to have a positive accrual ratio, indicating a certain level of non-cash profits, a high accrual ratio is arguably a bad thing, because it indicates paper profits are not matched by cash flow. That’s because some academic studies have suggested that high accruals ratios tend to lead to lower profit or less profit growth.

Cancom has an accrual ratio of -0.25 for the year to December 2025. Therefore, its statutory earnings were very significantly less than its free cashflow. Indeed, in the last twelve months it reported free cash flow of €125m, well over the €28.7m it reported in profit. Cancom did see its free cash flow drop year on year, which is less than ideal, like a Simpson’s episode without Groundskeeper Willie.

That might leave you wondering what analysts are forecasting in terms of future profitability. Luckily, you can click here to see an interactive graph depicting future profitability, based on their estimates.

As we discussed above, Cancom’s accrual ratio indicates strong conversion of profit to free cash flow, which is a positive for the company. Based on this observation, we consider it possible that Cancom’s statutory profit actually understates its earnings potential! And we are pleased to note that EPS is at least heading in the right direction over the last three years. Of course, we’ve only just scratched the surface when it comes to analysing its earnings; one could also consider margins, forecast growth, and return on investment, among other factors. In light of this, if you’d like to do more analysis on the company, it’s vital to be informed of the risks involved. For example, we’ve discovered 1 warning sign that you should run your eye over to get a better picture of Cancom.

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April 4, 2026

Is It Time To Reassess Luckin Coffee (OTCPK:LKNC.Y) After The Recent Share Price Pullback

Make better investment decisions with Simply Wall St’s easy, visual tools that give you a competitive edge.

If you are wondering whether Luckin Coffee’s share price still lines up with its underlying worth, this breakdown will help you weigh what you are really paying for.
The stock last closed at US$31.21, with returns of a 1.5% decline over 7 days, a 10.9% decline over 30 days, an 11.9% decline year to date, a 2.5% decline over 1 year, a 16.2% gain over 3 years, and a very large 5-year gain of around 3x.
Recent coverage has focused on how the company is rebuilding its brand and store footprint after past governance issues, while still competing aggressively on price and convenience in China’s crowded coffee market. Headlines have also highlighted ongoing expansion and product launches, which helps explain why investors are debating whether the current pullback is an opportunity or a warning sign.
On Simply Wall St’s 6 point value check, Luckin Coffee scores a full 6 out of 6. Next, you will see how different valuation approaches assess that score, along with a final section on a more complete way to think about value.

Find out why Luckin Coffee’s -2.5% return over the last year is lagging behind its peers.

A Discounted Cash Flow model estimates what a business could be worth by projecting its future cash flows and then discounting them back to today’s value. In this case, the model used is a 2 Stage Free Cash Flow to Equity approach based on cash flow projections.

Luckin Coffee’s latest twelve month free cash flow is CN¥2,544.98m. Analysts provide free cash flow estimates through 2028, and Simply Wall St then extends these out to 2035. For example, projected free cash flow for 2026 is CN¥3,390.15m and for 2035 is CN¥10,097.43m, both in CN¥ terms even though the share price trades in US$.

After discounting each of these projected cash flows back to today and adding them up, the model arrives at an estimated intrinsic value of US$52.08 per share. Compared to the recent share price of US$31.21, this implies the stock is about 40.1% below that DCF estimate, which indicates the shares are trading at a significant discount in this model.

Result: UNDERVALUED

Our Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) analysis suggests Luckin Coffee is undervalued by 40.1%. Track this in your watchlist or portfolio, or discover 59 more high quality undervalued stocks.

LKNC.Y Discounted Cash Flow as at Apr 2026

Head to the Valuation section of our Company Report for more details on how we arrive at this Fair Value for Luckin Coffee.

For profitable companies, the P/E ratio is a useful way to think about value because it links what you are paying directly to current earnings per share. The P/E that investors are usually comfortable with tends to reflect how quickly those earnings are expected to grow and how risky those earnings are, with higher growth and lower perceived risk often justifying a higher multiple.

Luckin Coffee currently trades on a P/E of 19.28x. That sits below both the Hospitality industry average P/E of 21.31x and the wider peer group average of 71.86x. Simply Wall St also calculates a “Fair Ratio” of 28.74x for Luckin Coffee. This is a proprietary estimate of what the P/E might be based on factors such as the company’s earnings growth profile, its industry, profit margins, market cap and specific risks. Because it adjusts for these company level traits, the Fair Ratio aims to be more tailored than a simple comparison with broad industry or peer averages.

Comparing the Fair Ratio of 28.74x with the current P/E of 19.28x suggests the shares are trading below that Fair Ratio estimate.

Result: UNDERVALUED

P/E ratios tell one story, but what if the real opportunity lies elsewhere? Start investing in legacies, not executives. Discover our 20 top founder-led companies.

Earlier it was mentioned that there is an even better way to understand valuation. Narratives are introduced as clear stories that you and other investors build on Simply Wall St’s Community page to connect your view of Luckin Coffee’s future revenue, earnings and margins to a forecast, a fair value, and then a simple Fair Value versus Price comparison that can guide when to buy or sell. All of this then automatically refreshes as new earnings or news arrive. One investor might back a higher fair value near US$54.68 based on confidence in store expansion, digital engagement and margins. Another might anchor closer to US$35.10 because of concerns about competition, delivery costs and brand risk. Both Narratives sit side by side so you can see how different assumptions lead to very different conclusions about the same stock.

Do you think there’s more to the story for Luckin Coffee? Head over to our Community to see what others are saying!

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.

Companies discussed in this article include LKNCY.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com

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April 4, 2026

Is NNN REIT (NNN) Offering Value After Recent Short Term Share Price Weakness

Make better investment decisions with Simply Wall St’s easy, visual tools that give you a competitive edge.

With NNN REIT trading at US$42.77, many investors are asking a simple question: is the current price giving you real value, or are you paying too much for stability and income potential?

Over the past week the stock returned 2.0%, while the 30 day return stands at a 5.0% decline, set against an 8.2% year-to-date gain and 11.7% over the last year.

Recent news flow has focused on NNN REIT in the context of ongoing coverage of listed real estate and investor interest in income-focused stocks. This has drawn additional attention to how its pricing compares with perceived quality. That backdrop helps put the recent mix of short-term weakness and longer-term gains into context for anyone weighing valuation today.

On Simply Wall St’s 6 point valuation checklist, NNN REIT records a 5 out of 6 value score. The rest of this article will unpack how different valuation methods arrive at that result, before finishing with a tool that can help you go one step further in judging whether the current price fits your own view of value.

Find out why NNN REIT’s 11.7% return over the last year is lagging behind its peers.

A Discounted Cash Flow model takes NNN REIT’s adjusted funds from operations, projects them into the future, then discounts those projected cash flows back to today to estimate what the business could be worth per share.

For NNN REIT, the latest twelve month free cash flow is about $647.6 million. Analysts provide estimates for several years ahead, and Simply Wall St extends these with its own assumptions to build a ten year cash flow path. On this basis, projected free cash flow for 2035 is about $1,002.8 million.

Feeding these projections into a two stage Free Cash Flow to Equity model results in an estimated intrinsic value of about $81.73 per share. Compared with the current share price of US$42.77, this implies the stock trades at a 47.7% discount to that DCF estimate. This indicates potential upside if those cash flow projections and discount rate inputs hold up for you as an investor.

Result: UNDERVALUED

Our Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) analysis suggests NNN REIT is undervalued by 47.7%. Track this in your watchlist or portfolio, or discover 59 more high quality undervalued stocks.

NNN Discounted Cash Flow as at Apr 2026

Head to the Valuation section of our Company Report for more details on how we arrive at this Fair Value for NNN REIT.

For profitable companies like NNN REIT, the P/E ratio is a straightforward way to relate what you pay per share to the earnings that support it. It helps you see how many dollars investors are willing to pay for each dollar of earnings.

What counts as a “normal” P/E often reflects how the market views a company’s growth potential and risk. Higher expected growth or lower perceived risk can support a higher P/E, while slower growth or higher risk usually points to a lower one.

NNN REIT currently trades on a P/E of 20.92x. This sits below both the Retail REITs industry average of 26.46x and the broader peer group average of 33.79x. Simply Wall St also provides a proprietary “Fair Ratio” of 31.98x, which is the P/E level suggested by factors such as NNN REIT’s earnings profile, industry, profit margins, market cap and specific risks.

The Fair Ratio can be more informative than a simple comparison with peers or industry averages because it adjusts for those company specific characteristics rather than assuming all REITs deserve the same multiple. With NNN REIT’s current 20.92x P/E sitting well below the 31.98x Fair Ratio, the shares screen as trading below that Fair Ratio benchmark.

Result: UNDERVALUED

P/E ratios tell one story, but what if the real opportunity lies elsewhere? Start investing in legacies, not executives. Discover our 20 top founder-led companies.

Earlier it was mentioned that there is an even better way to understand valuation, so this is where Narratives come in. They give you a simple story that ties your view of NNN REIT’s tenants, balance sheet and risks to explicit forecasts for future revenue, earnings and margins, and then to a fair value that you can compare with the current price to decide whether the stock looks attractive, fully priced or expensive for you personally.

Do you think there’s more to the story for NNN REIT? Head over to our Community to see what others are saying!

Companies discussed in this article include NNN.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com

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April 4, 2026

Noodles, kidney dialysis, condoms – the global oil crisis is turning into an everything crisis

Taipei, Taiwan —

One month into the war in Iran, a growing shortage of crude oil is threatening to morph into something worse: a shortage of nearly everything.

The conflict in the Middle East has crimped oil and natural gas flows through the Strait of Hormuz, reducing global supply by about one-fifth. The disruption has not only sent fuel prices soaring, but has squeezed supplies of petrochemicals needed to make everyday items like shoes, clothing and plastic bags.

That strain is now spreading into every corner of the consumer market as prices rise for materials like plastic, rubber and polyester. The impact is so far most evident in Asia, which accounts for more than half of the world’s manufacturing and is heavily reliant on imports for oil and other commodities.

In South Korea, where people have been panic-buying trash bags, the government has encouraged event organizers to minimize use of disposable items. Taiwan has started a hotline for manufacturers that have run out of plastic, while its rice farmers told local media they may hike prices because they can’t get vacuum-sealed bags.

In Japan, the oil crisis has sparked fears that patients with chronic kidney failure won’t be able to get treatment due to a lack of plastic medical tubes used in hemodialysis. Malaysian glove manufacturers say a dearth of a petroleum byproduct needed to make rubber latex is threatening global supplies of medical gloves.

“This spills into everything very, very quickly: beer, noodles, chips, toys, cosmetics,” said Dan Martin, co-head of business intelligence at Dezan Shira & Associates, an advisory firm that helps international businesses expand in Asia.

That’s because plastic caps, crates, snack bags and containers are becoming more difficult to procure. Petroleum derivatives are also needed to make adhesives for footwear and furniture, industrial lubricants for machinery and solvents for paints and cleaning processes, Martin added.

“It’s very fast transmission from oil and shipping disruption into petrochemicals and consumer goods,” he said.

The upheaval across commodities and manufacturing is putting upward pressure on global inflation and weighing on economic growth. Manufacturers are paying more for energy and raw materials, which is hitting profit margins and starting to push up prices for consumers. Rising fuel costs are upending travel and logistics, while tight supplies of other materials from the Middle East, such as fertilizer and helium, could lead to more expensive food and electronics.

“Such complex spillovers confront us at a time when many economies have limited room to absorb shocks,” the International Monetary Fund wrote in a blog post Monday. “Although the war could shape the global economy in different ways, all roads lead to higher prices and slower growth.”

Countries have begun releasing a historic amount of oil from emergency stockpiles to offset the war’s impact. But much of the broadening supply crunch stems from a shortage of naphtha, a petroleum by-product and critical feedstock for synthetic materials, of which producers have far fewer reserves and no substitute.

Some petrochemical companies in Asia, which gets more than half its naphtha from the Middle East, have cut output or declared force majeure in recent weeks due to limited raw materials. Force majeure is a legal term that refers to unforeseeable circumstances preventing a company from fulfilling a contract.

South Korea has taken advantage of a suspension of US sanctions on certain Russian oil and petroleum products to buy its first load of naphtha from Moscow since the start of the Ukraine war. Seoul has also imposed an export ban on naphtha to preserve domestic supply.

Martin at Dezan Shira & Associates, who works with manufacturers in Vietnam, said the scarcity of naphtha is leading to higher input costs for clients, particularly those that make products with strict specifications, such as semiconductors, automotive parts and medical or food-grade packaging.

“There’s not really a whole lot of recourse, except to go and cut assembly and use less power,” he said. “All companies are competing against each other. Everyone’s in the same exact position.”

Tourists watch marine life, with the MT Desert Kite oil tanker carrying Russian oil in the background, at Narara Marine National Park in the Arabian Sea, Gujarat, India, on March 11 , 2026.

As producers rush to secure materials, the costs of plastic and products that contain it are climbing. According to ICIS, a commodities market intelligence platform, prices for plastic resins in Asia have risen as much as 59% to record highs since late February, when the United States and Israel first launched airstrikes against Iran.

One of Thailand’s biggest plastic packaging wholesalers said it has increased prices by 10% for the clear cellophane bags widely used by restaurants, food stalls and for take-out deliveries. Indian media has reported that bottled water is getting more expensive, with prices for plastic bottle caps quadrupling since the war started. And an official at Nongshim, South Korea’s largest instant noodle manufacturer, said the company that supplies its plastic packaging currently has about one month’s worth of supply left.

Shariene Goh, a senior petrochemical analyst at ICIS, said consumer goods that rely heavily on plastic packaging, like cosmetics, may be even more prone to shortages than some products with plastic in them.

“The end-products segment might leverage their inventory levels, which might deplete over time,” she said. “I would think that they might start to run out pretty soon.”

As the first region to feel the impact of the fuel crisis, Asia’s new supply issues bode poorly for the rest of the world, if oil and other resources can’t be produced in or shipped from the Middle East.

Aside from producing about 17% of the world’s naphtha and 30% of its plastic resin, the Middle East also supplies 45% of its sulphur, used to make fertilizer, 33% of its helium, used in semiconductors, healthcare and aerospace, and 22% of its urea and ammonia, used as nutrients for crops, according to Morgan Stanley.

US farmers are already paying more for fertilizer as the price for imported urea has risen by about one-third since the war began. In India, condom manufacturers are reporting disruptions from shortages in not only packaging materials and silicon oil, which requires petrochemical feedstocks, but also ammonia.

“Much like during COVID, the shock unfolds sequentially rather than simultaneously – a rolling supply disruption moving westward,” J.P. Morgan analysts wrote in a research note last week.

For the past few weeks, Asian countries have been focused on mitigating oil price spikes, with measures such as releasing oil stockpiles, capping fuel prices and cutting work hours to save energy. But according to J.P. Morgan, the supply constraints will become more severe in April, with the last of the crude deliveries sent before the war due to arrive at the beginning of the month.

“The primary challenge has shifted from price to physical scarcity,” the bank’s analysts said. “Asia is no longer in a purely preventive phase.”

Analysts said some producers of consumer goods are delaying materials purchases in the hope that prices will fall if the conflict in the Middle East is resolved.

An employee works at the spinning workshop of a polyester fiber factory in Jiujiang, China, on January 16, 2024.

Qiu Jun, a 36-year-old polyester maker in the eastern Chinese city of Haining, said that, since the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the price of the polyester chips he needs to make his fabric has jumped about 50%, a hike his clients in home textiles, apparel and yarns industries aren’t willing to swallow.

His factory of one dozen employees is still running, but only to fulfill existing client orders. He said he is taking a wait-and-see approach to avoid overpaying for materials to produce unwanted stock.

“I’m anxious,” Qiu said. “The whole industry feels the same. No one knows how the war will play out.”

Others are trying to cut costs by minimizing the amount of plastic used in packaging. In Indonesia, where plastic prices have doubled in the past month, companies are reducing the thickness of packaging material, according to the Indonesian Packaging Federation. Some are even considering using different materials, such as paper, glass, aluminum or recycled plastics, though the organization said each would pose its own challenges in terms of ensuring durability, compliance with safety regulations and the time needed to rebuild production lines and source new supply – which could take six months to one year.

Turning to recycled plastics could also come at a high cost, said Stephen Moore, founder of MLT Analytics, a plastics trade data platform. He said global supply of recycled plastic material is already constrained, and it generally costs five to seven times more than plastic made from fossil fuels.

“If everything returns to normal in the Strait of Hormuz tomorrow, I think it’s still several months at least until there’s a semblance of normalcy for the plastic sector in Asia,” he said.

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April 4, 2026

Assessing Global Partners (GLP) Valuation After Recent Price Moves And Long Term Return Track Record

Track your investments for FREE with Simply Wall St, the portfolio command center trusted by over 7 million individual investors worldwide.

Global Partners (GLP) is drawing fresh attention after recent trading left the units at $45. For income focused investors, the long term total return profile and current value metrics are now back in focus.

See our latest analysis for Global Partners.

The recent 1 day share price return of 2.55% and 7 day share price return of 1.42% come after a 30 day share price return of a 7.22% decline, while longer term total shareholder returns of 83.08% over three years and 209.35% over five years indicate momentum built over time.

If this kind of move has you thinking about what else is out there, it could be a good moment to scan for other energy related ideas via the 28 power grid technology and infrastructure stocks

With units at $45, an intrinsic value estimate that implies a discount of about 38% and a small gap to the $45.50 analyst target, you have to ask: Is Global Partners undervalued, or is the market already pricing in future growth?

With Global Partners units at $45 and the most followed fair value estimate anchored at $45.50, the narrative frames the current pricing as very close to its calculated worth, with a small discount that hinges on a specific earnings and revenue path.

In order for you to agree with the analysts, you’d need to believe that by 2029, revenues will be $43.0 billion, earnings will come to $168.0 million, and it would be trading on a PE ratio of 11.4x, assuming you use a discount rate of 8.0%.

Read the complete narrative. Read the complete narrative.

Curious what underpins that $45.50 fair value when today’s earnings and margins look very different from those implied future numbers? The narrative highlights rapid top line expansion, steady profitability and a lower future earnings multiple as the factors used to make the valuation math work. The focus is on how these three elements are expected to interact over time, rather than any single headline figure.

Result: Fair Value of $45.50 (UNDERVALUED)

Have a read of the narrative in full and understand what’s behind the forecasts.

However, you also need to weigh risks, including long term fossil fuel demand pressure and potential asset strain if terminal and station utilization weakens.

Find out about the key risks to this Global Partners narrative.

The mix of long term returns, valuation views and future assumptions here may feel balanced but still incomplete. Treat this as your starting point, move quickly to weigh both sides, and review the 2 key rewards and 3 important warning signs in the 2 key rewards and 3 important warning signs

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April 4, 2026

ExlService Google Cloud AI Push Meets Undervalued Share Price Story

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ExlService Holdings (NasdaqGS:EXLS) announced a new collaboration with Google Cloud focused on AI led transformation.
The partnership aims to expand EXL’s portfolio of AI powered solutions for clients across sectors such as financial services, healthcare, and utilities.
The initiative centers on enterprise AI and cloud modernization for EXL’s global client base.

For investors tracking ExlService Holdings at a current share price of $30.94, this move comes after mixed recent returns, with a 1.9% gain over the past week and a 3.1% decline over the past month. Over longer periods, the stock shows a 24.9% decline year to date and a 32.9% decline over the past year, alongside a 67.7% gain over five years. This provides context for how new partnerships may factor into longer term assessments.

This new AI and cloud focused collaboration indicates where management is putting its energy and resources, particularly in data heavy sectors such as financial services and healthcare. Investors watching NasdaqGS:EXLS may want to track how quickly new AI powered offerings tied to Google Cloud correspond with client wins, contract expansions, or measurable adoption across key industries.

Stay updated on the most important news stories for ExlService Holdings by adding it to your watchlist or portfolio. Alternatively, explore our Community to discover new perspectives on ExlService Holdings.

NasdaqGS:EXLS Earnings & Revenue Growth as at Apr 2026

We’ve flagged 0 risks for ExlService Holdings. See which could impact your investment.

✅ Price vs Analyst Target: At US$30.94 against a US$41.71 analyst target, the price sits roughly 26% below consensus.
✅ Simply Wall St Valuation: Shares are flagged as undervalued, trading about 48.3% below the estimated fair value.
❌ Recent Momentum: The 30 day return of about 3.1% decline shows weak short term momentum.

There is only one way to know the right time to buy, sell or hold ExlService Holdings. Head to Simply Wall St’s company report for the latest analysis of ExlService Holdings’s Fair Value.

📊 The Google Cloud collaboration aligns directly with EXL’s focus on data and AI, so it could be important for how the business positions itself with large enterprise clients.
📊 Watch how AI led deals show up in revenue, margins and client wins, especially given the current P/E of 19.3 and analyst target of US$41.71.
⚠️ Execution risk around integrating new AI solutions at scale, alongside a recent 3.1% 30 day share price decline, is worth monitoring.

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April 4, 2026

A Look At Valeura Energy (TSX:VLE) Valuation After Major Shareholder Trims Its Stake

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Thoresen Thai Agencies Public Company Limited, a 10% holder in Valeura Energy (TSX:VLE), recently sold 100,000 common shares for about CA$1,521,000, trimming its stake by roughly 0.6%.

This insider transaction highlights changing positioning by a significant shareholder. This can be relevant if you track ownership concentration and how aligned large holders appear with Valeura Energy’s current valuation and outlook.

See our latest analysis for Valeura Energy.

At around CA$13.85, the stock has paired a 1 day share price return of 1.39% with a 30 day share price return of 22.57%, and multi year total shareholder returns above 7x, suggesting strong longer term momentum even as some holders trim positions.

If this kind of move has your attention, it can be useful to see what else is gaining traction in energy and infrastructure, including 28 power grid technology and infrastructure stocks

With the share price up 71.2% over 90 days and trading at about a 35.5% discount to one estimated intrinsic value and a 19.1% discount to one analyst target, is there still an opportunity here, or is the market already pricing in future growth?

At CA$13.85, the most followed narrative anchors fair value at CA$16.50, so the insider sale sits against a backdrop of implied upside based on that thesis.

The Wassana Field redevelopment, expected to reach FID in early Q2 2025, could significantly increase the 2P reserves and double production upon completion, enhancing revenue and cash flow in the coming years. Operational efficiencies have lowered OpEx, coming in at $22.8 per barrel in Q4, and capitalized on cost-effectiveness in drilling activities. This efficiency is expected to improve net margins by reducing production costs further.

Read the complete narrative.

Want to see what sits behind that CA$16.50 fair value? The core of this story is margin expansion, tax benefits and a future earnings multiple that assumes real staying power.

Result: Fair Value of CA$16.50 (UNDERVALUED)

Have a read of the narrative in full and understand what’s behind the forecasts.

However, this hinges on execution. Regulatory setbacks or cost overruns at projects like Wassana could quickly challenge the current margin and valuation narrative.

Find out about the key risks to this Valeura Energy narrative.

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April 4, 2026

_{Don’t miss the quick guides: “Discovery and demo talk tracks” and “30-60-90 day sales manager onboarding plan”}

Amanda Zhu is a force to be reckoned with. As co-founder and COO of Recall.ai she personally closed more than $7M in enterprise deals while building the sales organization that drove 4x year-over-year growth.

Her story is a reminder that the COO role done right isn’t a template—rather, it’s a response to a company’s evolving needs. In the beginning, some companies need to scale customer operations. Others need to build a sales machine. Recall.ai needed someone to own go-to-market end-to-end, and Amanda took the helm. In doing so, she not only helped bring in some of the company’s foundational customers, but also built a consistent enterprise inbound motion and team that ultimately supported a $250M valuation.

Recall.ai is the API for meeting recording. The API captures recordings, transcripts and metadata from Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Google Meet, in-person meetings, phone calls, and more. Recall.ai offers a Meeting Bot API to send meeting bots to calls and a Desktop Recording SDK to build a desktop app that can record meetings.

Many founders act as the company’s first sales rep. But the real challenge is what comes next: systematizing that intuition, scaling hard-won insights, and building an organization that can execute the GTM motion without the founder in the room. Amanda’s experience demonstrates how AI-native founders can close seven-figure deals through rigorous discovery, strategic personalization, and disciplined execution—and then successfully systematize their learnings into a playbook that can be handed off to an independently led sales team.Here, we collected nine of Amanda’s best strategies for AI business to achieve success throughout the sales cycle and the journey of scaling a sales organization.

Top takeaways from this enterprise sales guide

The most important moments in moving deals forward are often between checkpoints. Invest in back-channeling, warm intros, and in-person visits as much as the formal sales process.

Every discovery call needs four things: a clear sequence, incisive questions, an honest qualification moment, and a compelling narrative.

When a deal stalls and you don’t know why, fly out. The goal is to uncover the blocker, not pitch harder.

Design every event and dinner to optimize for the follow-up, not the night itself.

Treat every objection as a missing signal: technical objections hide underlying constraints, financial objections open a conversation about the cost of inaction, and risk objections dissolve fastest on a live call.

When hiring a VP of Sales, prioritize intellectual honesty and critical thinking over quota history—ask candidates to analyze their misses, not just their wins.

Onboard your VP of Sales through maximum exposure before maximum ownership: shadow first, then transfer 1:1s, deal judgment, and board materials around day 90.

Opening self-serve will temporarily tank your MRR. Expect a stall, and trust that higher-fit, higher-volume inbound follows.

Every new product, customer segment, or GTM motion rewires your operating model. Plan for upheaval, not just growth.

Discovery calls that lay the groundwork for seven-figure deals

1. There is no enterprise sales script—only a scaffold

Founders are often told that when it comes to sales, there is no real playbook. “It’s true, there’s no script, formula, or guaranteed sequencing for enterprise deals,” writes Amanda. “But there is a scaffold.”

While every deal eventually hits the same checkpoints—from discovery call to demo to final sign-off—the moments of real importance are harder to define. “It’s what you do when you’re stuck between checkpoints,” Amanda says.

Below is a list of tactics she’s used to move deals forward:

Back-channeling to learn which stakeholders are worried, which are confused, and which might be silently blocking the deal

Flying out when a senior stakeholder joins late and wants to “reassess”

Hosting a small dinner to align teams who weren’t looped in until mid-PoC

Getting warm intros from investors or any mutual connections

Running security and procurement in parallel so they don’t choke the timeline later

Showing up early to events stakeholders are speaking at

Going backwards a checkpoint when something collapses, instead of forcing the next step forward

While none of these moves look like “selling” and may not follow a prescribed sequence, these tactics all nurture relationships and cultivate trust within the process. Amanda emphasizes the importance of lateral thinking to problem solve is what’s necessary to get past thorny sales obstacles.

2. Successful discovery and demo calls have four main ingredients

In the early days of founder-led sales, Amanda tried to compress discovery and demo into a single 30-minute call, jumping straight into feature walkthroughs before knowing whether a prospect was even a fit. Needless to say, this approach didn’t work.

“I didn’t start with great talk tracks,” admits Amanda. “I started by doing everything wrong.”

After hundreds of calls, Amanda noticed that prospects didn’t need a slicker talk track or a more seamless demo. What they actually needed was structure so they wouldn’t get lost in the call and a powerful narrative arc that situated use cases in real-life workflows.

Amanda has now crystallized her approach into four main things prospects need from her:

1. A clear sequence so the conversation doesn’t jump around

2. Incisive questions that get to the heart of the prospect’s problem

3. A moment of honest qualification where you openly tell the prospect if they are a fit or not

4. A compelling narrative, not just a simple product tour

Amanda kept refining her talk tracks around those principles until they became codified.

“If you’re doing founder-led sales, use the structure until it becomes instinct,” says Amanda.

Creating deal momentum where it counts

3. Flying out is about uncovering the real blocker, not pitching harder

Sometimes in sales, it’s unclear why you’ve hit a roadblock. For Amanda, these moments are often a clear signal it’s worth hopping on a plane. Though she never point-blank asks prospects if she can fly out to meet them.

Instead, she says something like: “I’m going to be in Atlanta on Friday from 2–7pm. Could we connect for dinner?” Amands likes this approach because the clarity of the ask signals effort without desperation, while the tight time window reduces back-and-forth and makes it easier for a busy executive to agree.

Once she’s in a prospect’s city, Amanda focuses on uncovering hidden information, not pitching. In one stalled deal, she learned that a decision-maker was quietly leaning toward an internal solution—something that never surfaced on Zoom. Meeting in person created the space for candor, which let Amanda respond by walking the exec through the edge cases, ceilings, and tradeoffs the team would have to deal with. “By meeting the exec on their turf, you have their full attention and don’t have to simultaneously perform in front of their team,” she writes.

Amanda is also deliberate about where these conversations happen, depending on her desired outcome. She finds that offices are ideal for aligning multiple stakeholders, while meeting outside of a company’s HQ is best for eliciting honesty. As Amanda puts it, “The room shapes what people feel safe saying.”

In-person visits have been an incredibly effective way for Amanda to unblock deals, but she has one important caveat: “Flying out isn’t about pushing the deal forward,” says Amanda. “It’s about finding out what’s actually blocking it.”

4. A carefully-engineered prospect dinner can deliver 160x ROI

Last year, Amanda spent $25K on a dinner that brought in $4M in revenue. This was no accident—every single element of the evening was meticulously designed to generate quality conversations that would spur deals forward.

At large conferences, where dozens of sponsored dinners happen every night, the promise of delicious food alone isn’t enough to get the right people in the room. So Amanda booked notable speakers two months in advance, and intentionally name-dropped them in the invites. She was aiming to entice 40 attendees, but was pleasantly surprised with overwhelming demand—pushing the capacity to 90 attendees.

At the dinner, Amanda didn’t leave conversations to chance. A sales rep was assigned to every table with a single goal: get customers and prospects sitting together. That way, prospects heard answers directly from happy customers—not the sales team—and could see firsthand how much customers trusted the team and product.

Even the follow-up was designed with intention. Instead of a generic follow-up email, reps introduced prospects directly to customers in the email, referencing specific conversation topics from their chats at dinner. Reps still requested meetings, but the follow-up led with value instead of a pitch.

In Amanda’s words, “If you want meetings after a dinner, design the dinner for the follow-up.”

5. Enterprise objections are most often missed signals

When a deal stalls in the middle, Amanda doesn’t push harder. Instead, she rewinds the deal to the last checkpoint where everyone was aligned. “In enterprise sales, a ‘no’ isn’t necessarily a rejection,” she says. “It’s often a signal you’re missing context.” In her experience, being given a ‘no’ usually boils down to one of three factors that can each be systematically addressed:

1. Technical objection

For example, “We need X and you don’t have it.”

Amanda finds that this is almost never about the feature. Instead, she focuses on the question behind the question, and asks, “What is the reason you need X?” By understanding the true underlying constraint, it’s often possible to offer a better solution to solve the actual problem.

2. Financial objection

For example, “How much should something cost?”

It’s common for early stage startups to experience prospects pushing back on pricing. When exploring willingness-to-pay, it’s recommended that founders ask thoughtful questions such as what the prospect is using to anchor the comparison and where the budget is actually coming from. Perhaps most importantly, pricing can be an entry point to discuss the cost of doing nothing—which is often much higher than prospects realize. If the champion can’t answer these questions, there’s a clear discovery gap to address.

3. Risk objection

For example, “It doesn’t meet our security requirements.”

When hit with this type of objection, Amanda has had consistent success getting everyone who’s concerned on a live call. Live conversations surface missing context, incorrect assumptions, and what actually needs to change. “Vague risk objections don’t survive real-time discussion,” she says.

Scaling the sales organization by hiring dedicated leadership

6. Ask hard-hitting questions to secure the right VP of Sales

As the Recall.ai has grown, Amanda knew it was time to delegate the sales function to a dedicated leader. At the executive level, nearly every resume was tightly polished and most candidates could pull off an excellent interview, so Amanda needed an alternative way to suss out the VP of Sales right for the team.

Amanda cut to the chase in interviews, asking candidates to dissect and analyze their misses more than highlight their wins.

“I cared less about whether targets were hit and more curious about why they thought they missed their targets,” she explains. “Did they blame the product, the market, or other people? Or did they truly understand what broke and own their role in it?” Amanda was looking for three qualities she couldn’t do without— intellectual honesty, critical thinking, and a growth mindset.

She also relied heavily on backchannel references, specifically from a candidate’s direct reports. She would ask them about where the candidate needed to improve and how they would react when things didn’t go according to plan. One very revealing question she always asked: “Tell me about a time you disagreed with them.”

Amanda would also assess whether or not the candidate could still be an effective seller themselves versus just waxing poetic about sales. She’d use take-home assignments to clearly evaluate their sales capabilities. She had candidates sell to her and put together a sales plan as part of the hiring process. Finally, Amanda would weigh personality and a gut sense of trust heavily in her decision.

CTA: Want a template for evaluating VP of Sales candidates—including interview questions and take-home assignment examples? Download here.

7. Maximum exposure is the best way to onboard a new VP of Sales

When Justin joined as VP of Sales, Amanda’s goal wasn’t for him to ‘run sales.’ “The goal was to make sure deals didn’t slow down because every hard call still flowed through me,” she says.

For the first 60 days, Amanda made sure Justin got maximum exposure to the reasoning behind her decision-making. She had him shadow every sales call, daily standup, pipeline review, and deal debate. She even had Justin selling like an AE with the goal to understand the team’s thinking and non-negotiables. “Because that context matters once deals get complex,” says Amanda.

Around the 90-day mark, she started shifting ownership off her plate. Justin took over 1:1s with reps including coaching and feedback, deal judgement, and recruiting workflows. He also handled billing and collections conversations, materials for board meetings, investor updates on sales. “A lot of that work doesn’t look like ‘sales,’” says Amanda. “But it’s the work that keeps seven-figure deals moving without the founder in every loop.”

Through this rigorous onboarding process, Amanda could hand off her responsibilities to Justin—freeing her up to tackle the next priority areas as COO. “The moment I consider an exec fully onboarded is when I trust their decisions when I’m not in the room,” she says. “And that trust only comes from shared context.”

Scaling beyond the first GTM motion

8. Changes to your GTM motion aren’t without risk—but a calculated risk was how Amanda scaled MRR 5X

“Opening self-serve was one of the scariest decisions I’ve made as a co-founder,” recalls Amanda. “Our MRR stalled for a month after launching.” Before self-serve, every prospect had to speak with the team. These conversations provided crystal clear visibility into why people were buying and how they planned to use the product. If MRR slowed, Amanda usually knew why within a day.

But when the team opened self-serve, people could sign up, build, and use the product without ever talking to the team. Usage took off immediately, but for a month, MRR went flat. Amanda and her team had traded immediate visibility for scale.

Amanda was deeply relieved when, with time, the system caught up. Self-serve customers started raising their hands to talk to the team—not for initial discovery, but to get more out of the product. At the same time, larger companies started reaching out after they’d already seen the product work.

This led to more conversations—“just later, at higher volume, and with bigger customers,” says Amanda. This when growth really accelerated and her initial risk paid off beautifully. Since opening self-serve, the team’s MRR has grown 5x.

9. Upheaval is often a necessary part of hypergrowth

The year 2025 was an eventful one for the Recall.ai team. They tripled their revenue, raised a Series B, expanded beyond the meeting bots with the launch of a new product, and launched self-serve. And yet, from the inside, the year was full of change and growing pains. “This was a rewiring year,” reflects Amanda.

A combination of three inflection points in three major areas of the business were hit at once: the product, the GTM motion, and the sales motion. A new product meant major adjustments to how the team pitched the product, allocated engineering time, and elevator pitched the company. The self-serve motion forced the team to rebuild the funnel. Established work on everything from pricing to onboarding to support had to be rethought.

And as the team attracted upmarket customers, the sales motion had to be drastically altered. Typical deals went from single to multi-stakeholder deals. Simple technical validation became multi-threaded reviews and one product fit became cross-product conversations. Amanda’s team had to learn a new type of selling.

Amanda learned firsthand that every new product, every new customer segment, and every new GTM motion changes the operating model. While the team is much stronger for it, Amanda feels it’s worth acknowledging the importance of upheaval.

“It’s a good reminder that companies don’t grow in straight lines,” says Amanda.

GTM resources

Don’t miss our guides from Amanda Zhu:

Learn more from Amanda on LinkedIn:

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How emerging markets borrow: New evidence on sovereign bond issuance

As conflict in the Middle East pushes oil prices higher and unsettles global bond markets, emerging market sovereigns are watching two things closely: the path of global yields and the debt coming due on their own refinancing calendar. They cannot set the price of borrowing. But can they choose the timing? That question goes to the heart of sovereign debt management in volatile global markets.

Emerging market debt has surged since the pandemic, renewing concerns about rollover risk and fiscal vulnerability (Rogoff et al. 2021). More broadly, recent evidence suggests that dollar use in international debt issuance has returned in waves rather than followed a one-way trend (Pradhan et al. 2026). Yet most research on sovereign borrowing in emerging markets still focuses on debt stocks: how much governments owe, in what currency, and to whom (Bolton et al. 2023). Debt stocks matter, but they are the cumulative outcome of many individual issuance decisions about when to borrow, how much, at what maturity, and in which currency. These are the choices debt managers make, and they are much harder to study because the underlying issuance data remain limited (Presbitero et al. 2016).

In this column, we shift attention from debt stocks to debt issuance. Using a novel auction-level dataset covering more than 75,000 sovereign bond issuance events across 20 emerging market economies, we show that local-currency and foreign-currency issuance follow fundamentally different logics. Local-currency issuance is mostly driven by refinancing needs, as maturing debt often has to be rolled over. Foreign-currency issuance is more strategic, responding to global financial conditions, investor sentiment, and terms-of-trade shocks. Looking at issuance at the auction level also helps uncover a feature that standard bond databases often miss: governments frequently reopen existing bonds rather than issue entirely new ones, so the remaining tenor at the time of issuance matters more than original maturity for understanding how debt portfolios are actually managed.

A new auction-level dataset

To study these issuance decisions directly, in Wong et al. (2026) we assemble a comprehensive issuance event-level dataset that merges official national publications with commercial databases. The dataset covers 20 emerging market economies across Asia, Emerging Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America over the period 2000–2023. It comprises over 75,000 issuance events – including more than 20,000 inaugural issues and 55,000 reopenings – and captures detailed information on coupon structure, maturity, amounts issued, auction yields, and prices.

Total bond issuance on a flow basis grew from roughly $500 billion in 2000 to nearly $3.5 trillion by 2023. China accounts for a rapidly increasing share: less than 10% of the sample total in 2005, but more than 45% by 2023 (Figure 1). Other large issuers include Egypt ($456 billion in 2023), India ($366 billion), Brazil ($265 billion), and Mexico ($223 billion).

Figure 1 Total government bond issuance

Notes: This figure plots the evolution of total government bond issuance (in billion US dollars) over the period 2000-2023. The orange bars show Chinese central government bond issuance and the blue bars show central government bond issuance by the other 19 countries in our dataset.

The majority of issuance is in local currency and has a maturity at issuance of five years or less, though this varies considerably by region. Asian emerging markets rarely issue in foreign currency, and about half of their local-currency issuance is long-term. In Emerging Europe and Africa, by contrast, most local-currency debt has short initial maturities. Foreign-currency bonds, which ranged between 20% and 30% of total issuance in the early 2000s, fell below 10% around 2006–2008 before recovering to 20–30% after the Global Crisis (Figure 2).

Figure 2 Composition of bond issuance

Notes: This figure illustrates the evolution of the composition of central government bond issuance. The top left panel includes all bonds, the top right shows only foreign currency bonds, and the bottom left focuses on local currency bonds. The six panels in the bottom right corner present the same information disaggregated by region. Light orange bars indicate the share of foreign currency bonds with a maturity of less than five years; dark orange bars represent long-term foreign currency bonds; dark blue bars show medium-term local currency bonds; and light blue bars reflect long-term local currency bonds

Local-currency issuance is driven by refinancing needs

In any given year, a treasury must finance the budget deficit and roll over maturing debt by issuing new bonds, adjusting its stock of bank loans, or drawing down cash reserves. We estimate how bond issuance responds to these financing needs, distinguishing between local-currency (LC) and foreign-currency (FX) instruments.

For local-currency bonds, issuance tracks refinancing needs very closely. The model fits tightly, with an R-squared of 0.95. Maturing foreign-currency debt, by contrast, has essentially no effect on local-currency issuance. The budget balance has a negative but modest association with local-currency issuance volumes, consistent with deficits being temporarily financed through non-bonded debt and cash management.

When we decompose issuance further by maturity, we find that, on average, longer-term local-currency bond issuance responds not only to maturing bonds of the same type but also to maturing bills, consistent with a gradual lengthening of the local-currency debt portfolio.

The strategic nature of foreign-currency issuance

The picture for foreign-currency bonds is strikingly different. While maturing foreign-currency debt does predict new foreign-currency issuance, the relationship is weaker and the overall model fit is weaker. This suggests that foreign-currency issuance is not primarily about rolling over existing obligations but reflects more strategic considerations.

Several patterns support this interpretation. Countries with higher foreign investor participation in their domestic bond markets issue less in foreign currency, suggesting that the ability to attract international capital into local-currency markets reduces the need to borrow abroad. Higher US interest rates and increased global uncertainty (proxied by the VIX) are both associated with lower foreign-currency bond issuance, consistent with the idea that emerging market issuers pull back from international markets when financial conditions tighten.

The maturity structure of foreign-currency bonds also responds to terms-of-trade shocks. When commodity import prices rise, an adverse shock for many emerging markets, foreign-currency maturities shorten, precisely when rollover risks are most elevated. Rising export commodity prices, conversely, are associated with longer foreign-currency tenors.

Using quarterly data and a specification that interacts a foreign-currency dummy with measures of global conditions – the Global Financial Cycle index of Miranda-Agrippino and Rey (2020), the VIX, and expected US ten-year Treasury yields – we find a consistent pattern: favourable global conditions are associated with relatively more foreign-currency bond issuance. A one standard deviation improvement in global financial conditions is associated with an increase of about 0.6 percentage points of GDP in foreign-currency issuance, or roughly one-sixth of the average difference in issuance volumes between currencies when global conditions are at their mean.

When we decompose this effect, the results suggest that local-currency issuance decreases during good times while foreign-currency issuance remains roughly constant. In other words, favourable global conditions increase the foreign-currency share of issuance, but emerging markets do not appear to go on a borrowing spree. The shift is compositional rather than expansionary. The motivation to tap foreign markets during favourable conditions appears to dominate the potential effect of increased foreign investor participation in local-currency markets.

Policy implications

Our findings have several implications for debt management.

First, they underscore the importance of developing deep domestic bond markets as core infrastructure for macroeconomic resilience. Local-currency borrowing can be backstopped by the domestic central bank, eliminates currency-induced balance-sheet risk, and provides greater room for countercyclical fiscal policy (Eichengreen et al. 2023, Onen et al. 2025). The strong mechanical relationship between maturing local-currency debt and new issuance confirms that these markets function as reliable funding infrastructure.

Second, foreign-currency borrowing can serve a useful tactical purpose – allowing governments to lock in favourable terms during periods of low spreads and high risk appetite – but debt strategies should not presume permanent access to international markets. Medium-term plans need to incorporate contingency planning for sudden stops. Commodity exporters face particular vulnerabilities, as adverse terms-of-trade shocks are associated with shorter foreign-currency maturities, reinforcing the importance of using commodity windfalls to lengthen maturities and build liquidity buffers.

Third, our work highlights persistent gaps in public reporting of sovereign debt. Substantial inconsistencies remain in how countries disclose issuance details. Governments should prioritise publishing standardised, high-frequency data on debt composition, broken down by currency, maturity, and holder type, alongside clear refinancing calendars (Manger et al. 2025). International organisations can play a pivotal role by promoting harmonised reporting standards, enabling more rigorous evaluations of debt sustainability.

References

Bolton, P, M Gulati and U Panizza (2023), “Sovereign Debt Puzzles”, VoxEU.org, 30 March.

Eichengreen, B J, R Hausmann and U Panizza (2023), “Yet It Endures: The Persistence of Original Sin”, Open Economies Review 34(1): 1–42.

Manger, M S, D Mihalyi, U Panizza, N Rescia, C Trebesch and K L Wong (2025), “Africa’s Domestic Debt Boom: Evidence from the African Debt Database”, CEPR Discussion Paper No. 20747.

Miranda-Agrippino, S and H Rey (2020), “U.S. Monetary Policy and the Global Financial Cycle”, The Review of Economic Studies 87(6): 2754–76.

Onen, M, H S Shin and G von Peter (2025), “Overcoming Original Sin: Shedding New Light on Uneven Progress”, Economic Policy 40(122): 575–620.

Pradhan, S-K, E S Prasad, E Takáts and J Temesvary (2026), “Dollarization Waves: New Evidence from a Comprehensive International Bond Database”, NBER Working Paper 34942.

Presbitero, A F, D Ghura, O S Adedeji and L Njie (2016), “Sovereign Bonds in Developing Countries: Drivers of Issuance and Spreads”, Review of Development Finance 6(1): 1–15.

Rogoff, K, F Ohnsorge, C Reinhart and M A Kose (2021), “Developing Economy Debt after the Pandemic”, VoxEU.org, 3 November.

Wong, K L, M S Manger and U Panizza (2026), “Determinants of Sovereign Bond Issuance in Emerging Markets”, CEPR Discussion Paper No. 21251.

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April 3, 2026

Category: 3. Business

Top takeaways from this enterprise sales guide

Discovery calls that lay the groundwork for seven-figure deals

1. There is no enterprise sales script—only a scaffold

2. Successful discovery and demo calls have four main ingredients

Creating deal momentum where it counts

3. Flying out is about uncovering the real blocker, not pitching harder

4. A carefully-engineered prospect dinner can deliver 160x ROI

5. Enterprise objections are most often missed signals

Scaling the sales organization by hiring dedicated leadership

6. Ask hard-hitting questions to secure the right VP of Sales

7. Maximum exposure is the best way to onboard a new VP of Sales

Scaling beyond the first GTM motion

8. Changes to your GTM motion aren’t without risk—but a calculated risk was how Amanda scaled MRR 5X

9. Upheaval is often a necessary part of hypergrowth

GTM resources

A new auction-level dataset

Notes: This figure plots the evolution of total government bond issuance (in billion US dollars) over the period 2000-2023. The orange bars show Chinese central government bond issuance and the blue bars show central government bond issuance by the other 19 countries in our dataset.

Local-currency issuance is driven by refinancing needs

The strategic nature of foreign-currency issuance

Policy implications

References