Here’s Why Riverwater Partners Micro Opportunities Strategy Exited National CineMedia (NCMI)

Riverwater Partners, an investment management company, released its “Micro Opportunities Strategy” Q4 2025 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. Both Q4 and the full year 2025 were challenging for the strategy, which struggled to match the benchmark performance in Q4 and FY2025. The underweight exposure in speculative areas of the market led to the underperformance in the second half of the year. Low-quality stocks with poor fundamentals outperformed the market in the year. The strategy’s emphasis on high-quality stocks lagged behind the broader market trends. Heading to 2026, the Strategy focuses on micro-cap companies with broader sales and growth trajectories and believes that the low-quality stock market rallies will be short-lived. In addition, you can check the fund’s top five holdings to determine its best picks for 2025.

 In its fourth-quarter 2025 investor letter, Riverwater Partners Micro Opportunities Strategy highlighted stocks such as National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI). National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) is a North American-based cinema advertising network operator. On January 16, 2026, National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) stock closed at $3.84 per share. One-month return of National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) was -0.26%, and its shares lost 43.53% of their value over the last 52 weeks. National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) has a market capitalization of $360.312 million.

Riverwater Partners Micro Opportunities Strategy stated the following regarding National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) in its fourth quarter 2025 investor letter:

“National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) was held on the thesis that a normalization in box office attendance would drive a recovery in cinema advertising volumes, operating leverage, and free cash flow following the company’s restructuring. We exited the position as fourth-quarter box office trends proved materially weaker than expected, limiting advertiser demand and delaying the anticipated rebound in national and local ad spend. Similar to theater operators, market speculation around increased vertical integration—such as Netflix reportedly exploring the acquisition of Warner Bros.—introduced a longer-term structural overhang by raising concerns around theatrical relevance and marketing budgets tied to cinemas. While NCMI remains the dominant cinema advertising platform with improved balance sheet flexibility post-bankruptcy, these factors reduced our confidence in the timing and durability of earnings recovery.”

In another article, we covered National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) and shared the list of hidden penny stocks to buy. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q4 2025 page for more investor letters from hedge funds and other leading investors.

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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.