Altaba Inc (AABA)

Doesn’t know if the multiple will be lowered because the Alibaba IPO is kind of servicing the value of their holdings. Believes they own about 20% of Alibaba. Wouldn’t Buy or chase this, but would wait and see what happens. If you own, it might be a nice time to lighten up a little.

Chart shows a long basing pattern followed by a slow rising trend. There is a little bit of resistance around $40. Until it breaks over $40 or down through the lower trendline of about $33, you are in no man’s land. Indicators are not necessarily telling us that we should be grabbing this one.

Does not know the lift that Alibaba will give them. If it were to come out of this range it will probably have a move higher. You could probably argue there is a catalyst coming. He prefers FB-O.

Alibaba is about to do an IPO and Yahoo owns about 40%, which is what has been driving the stock up. It is very difficult to predict what the valuation of the IPO is going to be. Share price is already factoring in what people are estimating the IPO price will be. Very speculative at this time.

It’s the Alibaba stake. You have 50% plus revenue growth. This is where she is seeing big valuations. But Yahoo is struggling with the core business. They were a lot higher a little while ago.

Doesn’t know this company well, but does know that they have a significant investment in Ali Baba, which is a fantastic asset, a one-of-a-kind type of company which will go public over the next 12 months or so. Because of this, Yahoo’s stake may make them worth quite a bit more than it is today.

Yahoo (YHOO-Q) versus Google (GOOG-Q)? Google has 60%-70% plus of market share in terms of Search and is clearly the dominant player in the space. On ad based revenue growth, they been able to grow and currently have a new “enhanced campaign” for targeted marketing. Yahoo is getting beaten out by Google. If you want to play search, growth in mobile and ad revenues, Google is the one to play.

Owns over 20% of Alibaba, which will be coming out with an IPO sometime next year. How will this company do regarding that? Bigger issue for Yahoo is that it has done incredibly well. Feels it has overextended and it is now a “show me the money” sort of thing. Kind of missed their last numbers, top line wasn’t as strong, advertising numbers weren’t too strong, etc. Have hired a lot of very high profile people so their cost structure is increasing a fair bit. Not a big fan at these levels.

Has done extremely well. Good management. Rumour has it that they are hiring Katie Couric to run their news desk. Has progressed very nicely over the past year. Still playing 2^nd fiddle to Google (GOOG-Q) who still derives most of their business from search/advertising. If you are looking for exposure in this industry, he would recommend Google.

A large portion of this company’s value is based on its 24% stake in Alibaba. Given Alibaba’s plans to IPO next year, is this a good time to buy this company? Feels that Google (GOOG-Q) is the better approach to this. Yahoo is still concentrated a fair bit in search. The Alibaba theme has been prevalent in the stock for a long time. Given that it has done so well of late, he feels a lot of this is already built into the stock. Google is a lot more diversified and is the biggest search engine.

Has really struggled and struggled for many years. Part of it is that search is not what it is, most people use Google (GOOG-Q). If you own, this is probably worth selling and moving on.

Going through a major growth spurt. Had owned it when it was trying to recover off of its bottom. He got frustrated and moved on.

This company can transform itself if they can add on some revenue from the acquisitions they are doing. Remember, this is a search engine with some nice filters but Google (GOOG-Q) still has 60% market share. This company will try to steal market share from Microsoft Bing. They get a lot of money from Ali Baba and are putting that money into buying shares of the stock, which is supporting their earnings. He would wait for a better entry point.

New CEO is making some changes and the stock has gone up 50% in the last year. Does seem like some positive stuff but it is a challenged way to make money on the web. You have some media products, that are reasonable categories to be in but it doesn’t necessarily generate traffic on a consistent basis. The tough part is convincing advertisers that they need to be there on an ongoing basis day in and day out. If you own, he would look for other places to go.

(A Top Pick Dec 6/11. Up 23.93%.)