QCOM is the future undoubtedly, the technology is great and it has great potential albeit with a lot of volatility, it has a beta of 1 with the NDX, very co-related to NDX, however a great future stock to own..
Look at this I was reading I hope to research it more...
Global Internet Stocks: A Wonder Down Under
November 1, 1999 4:06 PM EST
By Michael Ward and Mido Shammaa By Michael Ward and Mido Shammaa
Columnists
Believe it or not, there's a company out there that has managed to create value at twice the pace of Microsoft (MSFT: Nasdaq) over the past five years. The company is Computershare Limited (US$3.63 as of 10/29/99), and it trades on Australia's Sydney exchange.
The company develops and markets software programs for share registry and financial market operations, and its own shares have delivered a blistering 2,380% return over the past five years, against Microsoft's 1,104%.
Computershare's strategy is similar to Microsoft's: offering superior products, identifying attractive market opportunities to expand its product offerings, and forging alliances and acquisitions to build its business. Initially, the company offered specialty software for financial services, but moved rapidly into the share-registry service by developing software technology considered to be the most advanced of its kind. It is a fully integrated, real-time system that has the capability to maintain several registers on the same database.
Like Microsoft, which began as a specialty provider of operating systems before expanding to conquer every aspect of computing, Computershare is interfacing its products with the Internet, giving rise to cost savings and the opportunity to bring its software to the retail brokerage market. The company already dominates Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa's financial registry industries, and is currently expanding into the UK. Now it has set its sights on the US, though it has yet to make a move.
The online investing revolution offers particularly big opportunities to Computershare, which developing software that's able to link directly to online brokerage systems.
There are many reasons to be optimistic about Computershare's future. First of all, its markets enjoy a strong equity-investing culture, demonstrated by a large percentage of the population owning stocks.
Secondly, Computershare has had excellent success in managing the registry for a number of major demutualisations. A demutualisation is the process of transforming a mutually owned company, such as a credit union, into a share company. This is a growing phenomenon as companies around the world opt for a share structure to improve their businesses. Thirdly, Computershare has a proven track record in executing its business plans and essentially reinventing the share-registry business.
Computershare recently entered into partnership with Telstra (TLS: NYSE), Australia's largest company, to develop e-commerce solutions, online service applications, and financial platforms. According to the deal, Telstra, agreed to acquire a 5% stake in Computershare with an option to increase it to 15%. Computershare, in turn, announced its intention to acquire 15% of E*Trade Australia, a licensee of the E*trade Group (EGRP: Nasdaq), and Australia's leading online broker. In addition, the company launched an Internet IPO share service, in cooperation with Salomon Smith Barney and Spike Networks, to allow investors to participate in IPO's through the Internet.
Computershare grew sales by a compounded annual growth rate of 172% during the past three years, and are expected to grow by 15% annually over the next three years, according to a consensus of analyst estimates. The stock is trading at a 90 P/E of 2000 estimates and a 63 P/E of 2001 estimates. It also boasts earnings-per-share growth rates of 44% and +104% over 1999 earnings, respectively.
Computershare can be purchased though retail brokerage firms specializing in International securities.
Michael Ward is Director of Research and Mido Shammaa is a Research Analyst at International Assets Advisory Corp. Both developed the International Assets NETDEX, the first global Internet stock index. Their Global Internet Stocks column appears every Monday. As of October 29th, 1999, the writers of this column did not own any interest in the companies mentioned above. |
