{
  "@context": "https://frontierpicks.com/schemas/dossier.v1.json",
  "ticker": "EVER",
  "name": "EverQuote, Inc.",
  "url": "https://frontierpicks.com/dossiers/EVER/",
  "json_url": "https://frontierpicks.com/dossiers/EVER.json",
  "status": "DORMANT",
  "current_conviction": "MEDIUM",
  "graded_conviction": "MEDIUM",
  "archetype": {
    "code": "a7",
    "n": 7
  },
  "current_thesis": "The 2026-08-03 Q2 print resolved the plateau binary bullish: revenue $195.1M (+25% YoY) broke the three-quarter ~$190M band, adjusted EBITDA hit a record $30.1M, and Q3 was guided $198–208M above the $201.6M consensus. The leg is now fundamental rather than technical — but price ($25.71 on 2026-08-07) sits below its December 2025 $27.87 high and on top of the $25.83 average target.",
  "invalidation_trigger": "A weekly close below $23.82 gives back the reaction to the 2026-08-03 print and returns price under the June swing-high shelf. Thesis fully broken if Q3 revenue lands below the $198.0M guide floor, or adjusted EBITDA below $28.0M, at the ~early-November print.",
  "catalyst_date": "2026-09-10",
  "outcome": "INVALIDATED",
  "outcome_date": "2026-08-17",
  "invalidation_fired": true,
  "themes": [
    "managed-care-health-services",
    "precision-biotech-therapeutics",
    "ai-enterprise-software",
    "fintech-consumer-credit"
  ],
  "tags": [],
  "sources": [],
  "notes": [
    "EVER = EverQuote, Inc. (NASDAQ: EVER), online auto/home insurance lead-gen marketplace. Revenue driver is P&C carrier and agent acquisition budgets.",
    "Auto concentration: $172.1M of $195.1M Q2'26 revenue. Home & renters ($23.0M) grows faster but is too small to offset an auto ad-budget downturn.",
    "Dual-class structure since the 2018 IPO. Insider Form 4s report Class A common; Class A economics and voting weight are not the same thing.",
    "Recent officer sales run under Rule 10b5-1 plans (CFO plan adopted 2025-12-03), so they are scheduled rather than discretionary decisions.",
    "Historically thin tape (~328K-646K average daily shares). Up-gaps and down-gaps are both amplified and fills away from the last print are common.",
    "Waniwani partnership terms, investment size and launch timing were all undisclosed in the 2026-08-10 release."
  ],
  "body_markdown": "## Current Thesis\nThe post-print leg is holding without extending. The last completed daily close was $25.24 on 2026-08-21, 9.4% under the $27.87 December 2025 high, with RSI(14) at 58.7 and a three-month price change of +33.7%. That is roughly where the stock sat when the Q2 numbers landed on 2026-08-03 — revenue $195.1M (+25% YoY) against a $190.4M consensus, record adjusted EBITDA of $30.1M, and a Q3 revenue guide of $198.0–208.0M whose midpoint cleared the $201.6M consensus. Eighteen sessions later the beat has been absorbed and not yet paid for with a new high.\n\nTwo dated items have been added since the prior read. On 2026-08-10 EverQuote announced an exclusive commercial partnership with Waniwani plus a strategic minority equity investment, terms undisclosed; Waniwani is a San Francisco startup founded in 2026 with roughly 13 employees that builds product-discovery and conversion channels inside AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini. On 2026-08-13 Raymond James raised its target to $28 from $25 and kept Outperform, explicitly framing the number as 0.9x its 2027 EV/sales estimate.\n\nThe narrative leg on offer is the second act: that a marketplace whose revenue had flatlined near $190M for three quarters has re-entered a compounding phase toward the $1B revenue target management reiterated in the 2026-08-03 release, with an agentic-AI distribution option attached on top. The option has no disclosed economics, no revenue contribution and no stated product-availability date, so it is currently a positioning statement rather than a modelled line.\n\n**The narrative is maturing.** The 2026-08-03 beat produced target raises from firms already covering the name (B. Riley to $34 and Needham to $30 on 2026-08-04, Raymond James to $28 on 2026-08-13) rather than new initiations, and the 2026-08-10 Waniwani headline did not carry price through the December 2025 high. Well known, still working, flow moderating.\n\n## Bull Case\n- **The plateau broke and the tape kept it:** Q2'26 revenue $195.1M, +25% YoY, versus a $190.4M consensus and Q1'26's $190.9M — the first clean sequential step out of the ~$190M band. The 2026-08-21 close of $25.24 is above every close printed between the 2026-06-26 200-day reclaim and the print.\n- **Record profit dollars, not just volume:** adjusted EBITDA $30.1M on 2026-08-03, +37% from $22.0M in Q2'25; margin 15.4% versus 14.0%; diluted EPS $0.53 against a $0.51 estimate; GAAP net income $19.2M. Variable Marketing Dollars $56.9M versus $45.5M a year earlier.\n- **Guide-up after a beat:** Q3'26 revenue $198.0–208.0M, VMD $56.0–59.0M, adjusted EBITDA $28.0–31.0M, issued 2026-08-03.\n- **Sell-side marked to the new run-rate:** Raymond James to $28 on 2026-08-13 at 0.9x 2027 EV/sales, following B. Riley to $34 and Needham to $30 on 2026-08-04.\n- **Distribution-shift hedge dated 2026-08-10:** the Waniwani agreement is exclusive on the commercial side and pairs with an equity stake, which puts EverQuote's carrier and agent customers in front of the AI-assistant shopping channel rather than exposed to it.\n- **Both verticals contributing (Q2'26):** auto $172.1M, +23%; home & renters $23.0M, +35%.\n- **Self-funded:** $192.3M cash and no debt at 2026-06-30, up from $178.5M at 2026-03-31, after repurchasing 578,000 shares for $9.1M in Q2 and $19.9M in Q1.\n\n## Bear Case\n- **No new high on a 25% beat:** $25.24 on 2026-08-21 is 9.4% below the $27.87 December 2025 high, three weeks after the strongest quarter the company has printed. Price is doing the work of a name whose good news is in the estimates.\n- **Price is at the poll:** the S&P Global consensus average target of $25.83 across eight analysts, as of 2026-08-07, sits within 2.3% of the last close. That poll predates the 2026-08-13 raise, so the average may since have moved; the $28/$30/$34 marks are the high end of the range, not its centre.\n- **The Q3 guide brackets the record rather than beating it:** adjusted EBITDA guided $28.0–31.0M against the $30.1M just delivered. The midpoint implies no sequential profit growth, which is what a marketing-funded revenue step looks like a quarter later.\n- That is a scheduled sale, but it is scheduled distribution into the post-print bid.\n- **The Waniwani deal is unpriced in both directions:** no investment size, no revenue share, no launch date disclosed on 2026-08-10. A 13-person company founded in 2026 is an option on a channel, and the same channel shift is the thing most capable of disintermediating a consumer lead-generation funnel.\n- **Concentration unchanged:** auto contributed $172.1M of $195.1M Q2 revenue. Home & renters grows faster but is too small to offset a P&C ad-budget contraction.\n\n## Setup & Price Structure\n- Reference close $25.24 on 2026-08-21. RSI(14) 58.7 — mid-range, neither extended nor washed out. Three-month price change +33.7%.\n- Overhead: the $27.87 December 2025 high, 10.4% above the last close, is the only structural resistance left; between here and there sits the $25.83 average target from the 2026-08-07 poll.\n- Downside reference: the $23.82 shelf, which is the June swing-high area and the floor of the reaction to the 2026-08-03 print. Losing it on a weekly close returns price to the pre-print range.\n- Prior structure worth carrying forward: the 2026-06-26 session reclaimed the then-declining ~$20.30 200-day moving average, +6.91% to $23.20 on 2.64M shares against a ~646K average.\n- Liquidity: historically ~328K–646K average daily shares. Both gap directions are amplified and single-session moves on light turnover carry little information.\n- Crowding observables, stated as observables: three target raises inside ten days from covering firms; a uniformly Buy consensus rating; a 10b5-1 officer sale executed 2026-08-10 at $25.51; no earnings date inside the next 30 days; price roughly 24% above the ~$20.30 area the 200-day occupied in late June, which is a wide but not vertical extension.\n\n## Catalyst Calendar (next 30 days)\n- **2026-09-10** — B. Riley Securities 2026 Consumer & TMT Conference, New York (announced 2026-08-05). The only scheduled management appearance inside the window; first public commentary since the print on Q3 revenue pacing, the $28.0–31.0M EBITDA band and any Waniwani integration detail.\n- **~2026-09-16 (est.)** — Progressive monthly results for the August period; exact date unconfirmed. PGR is a primary buyer of marketplace inventory, so its policies-in-force growth and advertising stance are the nearest leading read on the budgets that fund EverQuote revenue.\n- **~2026-11-02 (est.)** — Q3 FY2026 print. Outside the 30-day window and the actual resolution point for the guide.\n\n## What Would Change Our Mind\nThe fundamental break is the guide floor: Q3 revenue landing below $198.0M, or adjusted EBITDA below $28.0M, at the ~2026-11-02 print would recast the Q2 step-up as one quarter of marketing-bought growth rather than a new run-rate. A second consecutive quarter guided below the prior quarter's EBITDA would do the same thing more slowly.\n\nOn price, a weekly close below $23.82 gives back the reaction to the 2026-08-03 print and puts the stock under the June swing-high shelf, at which point the fundamental leg is being disbelieved by the tape rather than confirmed by it.\n\nThe narrative would read saturated if the 2026-09-10 fireside comes and goes with no incremental Q3 pacing detail and no Waniwani economics, while sell-side targets continue to rise and price still has not closed above $27.87 by the Q3 print. Coverage that keeps raising numbers into a stock that will not make a high is thin new bid.\n\nWorking the other way: a weekly close above $27.87 on turnover meaningfully above the ~646K historical average would say new participation arrived and the label should move back toward accelerating.\n\n## Correlation Notes\n- The direct revenue input is P&C customer-acquisition spend, so the cleanest read-throughs are Progressive and Allstate disclosures, and MediaAlpha (MAX) as the closest listed marketplace comparable on the same transaction-value cycle. This is a mechanism, not a measured beta.\n- Despite the 2026-08-10 headline, the name does not trade off AI capex. Nothing in the Q2 release ties revenue to compute, data-centre or model spend; the agentic-AI angle is a distribution channel for existing insurance advertising dollars.\n- Personal-auto rate adequacy drives the cycle: when carriers are profitable they grow policies-in-force and buy shopping volume. That transmission is why carrier underwriting commentary matters more to this name than consumer-sentiment data.\n- Small-cap liquidity means index-level risk appetite shows up as gap risk here at multiples of its effect in large caps, given the ~328K–646K historical average daily share turnover.",
  "first_seen": "2026-05-06",
  "last_analyzed": "2026-08-22T08:35:25+00:00",
  "last_synthesized": "2026-08-22",
  "last_update_source": "watchlist_research",
  "license": "Content © FrontierPicks. Cite the canonical URL."
}