Application & Systems Software
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WORK
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Shares of Slack Technologies have risen nearly 40% this week on a rumor that Salesforce may want to buy the firm
(27 Nov 2020) Slack Technologies (WORK $41) is a Software as a Services (SaaS) firm which provides electronic communications tools for employees at small- and medium-sized businesses. Think of messaging on your smartphone or laptop, but for secure collaboration between you and your fellow employees. It is quite like Microsoft (MSFT) Teams, which some argue came out as a direct competitor to the Slack platform. The company went public in April of 2019, immediately trading around $37 per share. Shares fell all the way to $15.10 this past March as tech stocks (and stocks in every other industry) were searching for a bottom. By June, shares had risen back to $40, only to drop back down to $24 on the 10th of this month. Then came the rumor, reported by The Wall Street Journal, that SaaS relationship management software giant Salesforce (CRM $247) was in talks to buy the firm. That was all it took for traders to drive the shares up 40% in a matter of days and 69% since the 10th of November. Here's a company, now worth $23 billion thanks to traders, which has never had a profitable quarter and probably won't until the middle of the decade. A company late to the party with respect to video conferencing—a segment now dominated by Zoom (ZM $472). A company relying on one simple product, facing a dominant competitor in the form of Microsoft Teams. Our advice to traders: sell on the rumor. Slack has a perfectly fine offering; one which we wouldn't mind using. But our Microsoft subscription comes with Teams built in, and we are just one of about 60 million monthly active users. This is an industry with few barriers to entry, and one dominated by the tech giants. Slack's best strategic plan is to pray the deal with Salesforce goes through. |
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SAP
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German software giant SAP has biggest drop since 1996 on slashed outlook
(26 Oct 2020) In the stock's worst day in nearly a quarter-century, shares of $150 billion German software giant SAP (SAP $118) dropped over 21% after the company slashed its outlook for 2020, blaming the pandemic for putting the brakes on new corporate spending. Bad news for the company, but here's what investors need to know: is this train wreck company-centric, or does it portend bad news for the industry? The company, which sells a broad range of enterprise software products and services to corporations, government agencies, and educational institutions, generates approximately 40% of its revenues from the Americas, 40% from Europe, and 20% from Asia. We know that Europe is still reeling from the pandemic, with much of the continent back in lockdown mode. The US has been ramping up its corporate engine at a faster clip, and many parts of Asia are clawing their way back to pre-pandemic business activity levels. Looking at comparable offerings from the competition, Amazon's Web Services, Microsoft's Azure, and Oracle's suite of cloud infrastructure offerings have all held up relatively well this year. Software as a service (SaaS) providers such as Workday and Salesforce have actually been increasing market share—to the detriment of SAP. So, as bad as the news was for the company, the damage doesn't seem to be bleeding over to the competition. Our favorite systems software company continues to be Microsoft (MSFT $212), and our favorite specialty applications firm is Adobe (ADBE $475). We own both in the Penn Global Leaders Club and, at their current prices, both offer a better value than SAP. We have no confidence in SAP's management team following Bill McDermott's departure for ServiceNow (NOW $504—another great industry player, but too rich with its 137 multiple). |
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MSFT
AMZN |
SpaceX selects Microsoft (not Amazon) to run its space-based cloud computing network
(20 Oct 2020) It is almost embarrassing to watch Jeff Bezos pretend to compete with Elon Musk for commercial space dominance. He's like a little kid donning an astronaut costume and proclaiming, "take that Neil Armstrong!" In his own mind, Bezos's Blue Origin is right up there with SpaceX; hell, maybe better. Of course, in reality Blue Origin continues to be the pet project of the world's richest man while SpaceX is busy launching astronauts into orbit and building out a massive fleet of satellites which will provide high-speed Internet service to even the most remote parts of the globe. (Right on cue, Bezos stated that Blue Origin is going to build an even better satellite system—despite the lack of even one satellite in orbit.) In a move that should come as no surprise, SpaceX just selected Microsoft's (MSFT $214) Azure service to operate and manage its cloud computing needs for the Starlink system, barely considering Amazon (AMZN $3,226) Web Services (AWS) as an option. Considering the scope of the project, which will consist of linking cloud, space, and ground capabilities, crunching almost unfathomable amounts of data, and helping to control the orbits of SpaceX satellites, this was a huge win for Microsoft. Beyond the Starlink project, Musk's SpaceX also landed a demo contract from the Pentagon for a new generation missile warning system. Assuming the demo leads to deployment, Microsoft would certainly get that contract as well. Recall that Amazon is currently suing the US government for the Pentagon's decision to go with Azure for its $10 billion JEDI program, snubbing AWS. We see very little chance of the lawsuit changing the outcome of the JEDI contract, though we wonder how it might have poisoned the well for Amazon's hopes of landing government contracts in the future. For its core business of online retailing, no other company can compete with Amazon—which is why we own it within the Penn Global Leaders Club. We just wish Bezos would shut up and let someone else run the company. Maybe he could run Blue Origin full time and work on landing one single contract. |
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FSLY
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Tech traders beware: What just happened to Fastly is a sign of things to come
(17 Oct 2020) 2020 has been a banner year for Internet-based tech companies which have yet to turn a profit—Robinhood traders can't scoop up their shares fast enough. Take cloud platform provider Fastly (FSLY $85), for example. Traders turned this $1 billion startup into a $10 billion player virtually overnight despite the company's lack of net income—ever. All of that changed after the firm's latest earnings report, however. After a slight revenue miss (the company's Q3 revenue came in around $70 million versus analyst expectations for $75 million), FSLY shares began their rapid 33% decline. Let's back up and think about this: Here we have a company generating a paltry $70 million per quarter, earning zero net income, and traders were still piling in when its market cap hit $10 billion. Insanity. This is precisely the type of plunge we witnessed—ad nauseam—in early 2000. Let this be a warning shot to traders piling into unprofitable companies with reckless abandon. We've seen this movie before, and it does not end well. Here's what bothers us the most about the Fastly case study: We are willing to bet that the majority of "investors" who jumped in to buy shares couldn't explain what the company actually does if their lives depended on it. Here's a really simple basic rule to follow: Don't invest in any company before understanding what they do and what their unique value proposition is for customers. Then, it sure wouldn't hurt to actually look at the financials. |
Viral opportunity: mobile payment use will ramp up dramatically
(17 Apr 2020) Let's face it: people don't want to touch anything while out in public any longer. All of the daily tactile actions we would once take without thinking twice about, we now consciously consider. Investors should constantly be asking themselves, "How might the situation before us affect our portfolio, and what needs to be done, if anything?" Take the rise in the use of smartphones to make payments. What was once a novelty at places like Starbucks (SBUX) is rapidly becoming the primary way we transact business. We take our goods to the register, hold our phones or smart watches by a scanner, and voilà, payment made—with zero touch outside of our own devices. Remember how the checkbooks at the grocery store counter suddenly gave way to a debit card swipe? The same migration from physical debit cards to payment apps in our phone is now taking place, and the pandemic is accelerating the movement. Investors could consider companies such as PayPal (PYPL $108, owns Venmo), Square (SQ $58, point-of-sale software), Amazon (AMZN $2,420, Amazon Pay), and Apple (AAPL $287, Apple Pay) as potential ways to take advantage of this movement. Better yet, why not hedge your bets with IPAY ($38.63), the ETFMG Prime Mobile Payments ETF. This fund invests in 38 companies engaged in the development and deployment of software, hardware, architecture, and infrastructure for the payment processing and services industry.
(17 Apr 2020) Let's face it: people don't want to touch anything while out in public any longer. All of the daily tactile actions we would once take without thinking twice about, we now consciously consider. Investors should constantly be asking themselves, "How might the situation before us affect our portfolio, and what needs to be done, if anything?" Take the rise in the use of smartphones to make payments. What was once a novelty at places like Starbucks (SBUX) is rapidly becoming the primary way we transact business. We take our goods to the register, hold our phones or smart watches by a scanner, and voilà, payment made—with zero touch outside of our own devices. Remember how the checkbooks at the grocery store counter suddenly gave way to a debit card swipe? The same migration from physical debit cards to payment apps in our phone is now taking place, and the pandemic is accelerating the movement. Investors could consider companies such as PayPal (PYPL $108, owns Venmo), Square (SQ $58, point-of-sale software), Amazon (AMZN $2,420, Amazon Pay), and Apple (AAPL $287, Apple Pay) as potential ways to take advantage of this movement. Better yet, why not hedge your bets with IPAY ($38.63), the ETFMG Prime Mobile Payments ETF. This fund invests in 38 companies engaged in the development and deployment of software, hardware, architecture, and infrastructure for the payment processing and services industry.
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INTU
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Intuit to buy Credit Karma for $7.1 billion. (27 Feb 2020) Many Americans may not recognize the name Intuit (INTU $236-$280-$307), but odds are pretty good they have used one of the company's online financial services, such as TurboTax, QuickBooks, or budgeting platform Mint. In its most recent move to shore up its fintech services, the company just announced that it will buy personal finance portal Credit Karma for $7.1 billion in cash and stock. News of the deal was music to the ears of Credit Karma's 700 employees, who will receive around $300 million worth of INTU restricted stock, to be paid out over four years. That company provides free credit scores to consumers, in addition to credit monitoring and tax preparation and filing services. The deal will close in the second half of the year. Intuit's P/E ratio of 45 may seem a bit rich, but it is in line with other firms in the software applications industry. For example, Adobe (ADBE), perhaps our favorite firm in the industry, has a P/E ratio of 59. Additionally, Intuit's financials look great: solidly growing revenues, an operating margin of 27%, and a relatively low debt load. Shares are down 9% on the market pullback, but will the coronavirus stop anyone from filing their taxes or balancing their books?
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MSFT
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Another quarter, another set of blowout numbers from Microsoft. (30 Jan 2020) When Satya Nadella took the helm from the "animated" (we are being kind) Steve Ballmer at Microsoft (MSFT $102-$168-$168) in 2014, shares of the pioneer software company were trading for around $36, and the company had a market cap of $300 billion. That is approximately when we added the company to the Penn Global Leaders Club. We were decidedly not fans of Ballmer, but we loved the strategic vision Nadella was laying out for the firm. Since he took over, Microsoft has risen 360% versus an 88% rise in the S&P 500. With its $1.3 trillion market cap, the company comes in just behind Apple (AAPL) as the world's largest publicly-traded company. Based on the firm's just-released earnings report, expect that trajectory to continue. Microsoft generated revenues of $36.9 billion versus expectations for $35.7 billion; earnings per share came in at $1.51, well ahead of the $1.32 the Street was expecting. Most impressive was the company's Azure cloud segment—the segment Amazon (AMZN) is suing the government over, which posted a remarkable 62% jump in year-over-year sales. Perhaps even more amazing, the company's seemingly archaic Windows division notched a 26% spike in Y/Y sales thanks to strong demand for Windows 10. Finally, the Office 365 software subscription service (we are one of 120 million monthly active users) continues to bring in an enormous monthly income stream to the company. We are as bullish on Microsoft now as we were when Nadella took over. After Bill Gates left as the company's first CEO, Microsoft could have easily rested on its laurels (as we would argue it did under the goofy Ballmer) and made a slow descent into irrelevance. Instead, true leadership took over in 2014 and re-imagined what the company could be and do for an ever-increasing number of customers. Leadership made the difference.
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NOW
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Analysts turn cautious on business software firm ServiceNow after CEO bolts for Nike; we disagree. (23 Oct 2019) ServiceNow (NOW $148-$212-$303) is a $40 billion enterprise software company which provides customized workflow digitization to companies. In other words, it will take a look at what a company does, and it will streamline and automate all aspects of workflow, from customer interaction to back office functions. To quote incoming CEO Bill McDermott, the company provides a "fully integrated platform to drive productivity." Speaking of the incoming CEO, the C-suite shuffle is the reason some analysts have turned negative on the firm. Athletic apparel company Nike (NIKE) hired away NOW CEO John Donahoe to take over for the invertebrate Mark Parker ("Yank the Betsy Ross shoes"), who will—sadly—remain at the firm as the executive chairman. (Parker: "I will lean-in to help Donahoe...." Gag.) Donohoe doesn't need Parker's help—before successfully leading ServiceNow, he was chairman of PayPal. As for the company he is leaving, we can't imagine a better leader than SAP's (SAP) Bill McDermott. Under his leadership, in fact, SAP grew from a $39 billion firm to a $160 billion applications software juggernaut. He is, in our opinion, one of the best CEOs in the industry. Ironically, NOW sits almost precisely at the size of SAP when McDermott took over that firm. We strongly disagree with the downgrades. ServiceNow offers benchmark enterprise solutions to the world's largest organizations. Its customer retention rate is a crazy-high 98%. We would place a fair value on NOW shares at $300, or about 42% higher than where they sit following the downgrades.
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SYMC
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Two weeks ago we sold Symantec on acquisition rumors, this week that deal fell apart. (15 Jul 2019) Talk about great timing. Two weeks ago, when Broadcom (AVGO) announced it would be purchasing software applications company Symantec (SYMC $17-$21-$26), the latter rocketed over 20% to a new one-year high. So we sold the position (at $25.34) in the Intrepid Trading Platform. Now, however, it appears the two sides could not come to terms with respect to price, and Symantec promptly fell by nearly the same amount. You've heard the old investment adage, "buy the rumor, sell the news," but sometimes it is smart to take profits on the rumor and eliminate the odds of the deal never coming to fruition. We remain ultra-bullish on the cybersecurity industry, but we are not ready to pick up SYMC again just yet. Too many other great companies in the space.
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ADBE
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Stellar software applications company Adobe reports record revenue. Adobe Systems (ADBE $134-$258-$259) is, in our humble opinion, one of the most dominant applications software companies in the world. Its Adobe Creative Cloud suite is the benchmark software for professionals in a number of different industries, and its subscription model (pay monthly as opposed to paying for each new upgrade) was a brilliant strategic move. Sticky revenue. Recurring income stream. Those are golden words to a CFO. And that subscription model just helped Adobe hit a new revenue record: for Q2 of 2018, the company brought in $2.2 billion, a 24% year-over-year increase. After the report, RBC Capital Markets raised their price target on shares of the San Jose firm from $268 to $288.
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PANW
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Palo Alto Networks blows past earnings estimates
(27 Feb 2018) Shares of cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks (PANW $107-$179-$170) punched through their 52-week high after the company reported a lights-out fiscal second quarter. Top-line revenue rose 28% from the same quarter last year, to $542.4 million, while earnings rose to $0.97 per share—a 54% pop from last year. In addition to a big tax reform windfall for the quarter, billings were up 20% on the year as the company rolled out new security solutions. Shares were trading up about 6% on the news. |
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BLCN
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Forget bitcoin ETFs, new Reality Shares ETF focuses on blockchain technology
(23 Jan 2018) If we have reiterated two themes time and time again, they are 1) bitcoin is in a giant bubble, and 2) the underlying blockchain technology used by cryptocurrencies is the real deal. To that end, Reality Shares has launched the very first exchange-traded fund focused around blockchain technology. The Reality Shares Nasdaq NexGen Economy ETF (BLCN $24-$25-$25) began trading last week around $24 per share, and is currently up 2.47% since its launch. We are not making a recommendation on the investment, but investors should be able to scour the ETF's holdings for some interesting possible picks. One aspect of the ETF's name made us twitch: it sounds an awful lot like the "New Economy" fund that was all the rage right before the great Tech Bubble Burst of 2000. |
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SQ
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Square tumbles double-digits after analyst issues “sell” rating
(28 Nov 2017) Application software company Square (SQ $12-$44-$50) dropped 12% following a downgrade from analyst house BTIG. The analyst believes the stock’s crazy rally has been greatly overdone in the midst of the bitcoin craze. Square recently began a trial letting some of its users buy and sell the digital currency on its app. Square has no P/E, as it has never turned a profit. In addition to the “sell” rating, BTIG updated its SQ price target to $30. |
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PANW
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Application & Systems Software. Cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks pops 15% on open. Network security equipment maker Palo Alto Networks (PANW $107-$136-$166) jumped 15% Thursday morning after investors digested the company's most recent earnings release. Revenue for the quarter grew from $346 million to $432 million, year over year—a 25% gain. On another good note, we suppose, the company only lost $49 million this past quarter, as opposed to $59 million in the same quarter last year. The growth story is there for PANW, but we prefer some other companies in the space. We hold one competitor in the Global Leaders Club and three others in the Penn New Frontier Fund.
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ADBE
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(20 Mar 2017) Adobe delivers another solid quarter. Perennial Penn strategies member Adobe Systems (ADBE $90-$127-$130) reported another stellar quarter, with revenue growing 22% from last year, to $1.68 billion, and net income growing 57%, to $398.45 million. An extremely well-run organization with a strategic plan that stresses a steady stream of annuitized income. Well done.
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