Compound Income
  • Blog
  • Scores
    • Scores Presentation
  • Portfolio
    • Table of Returns
  • Resources
    • Check list
  • About
  • Contact
  • New Page



Appillionaires Party like it's 1999!

10/3/2014

0 Comments

 
Picture
Now I know it is weird that a value and income investor should be writing about technology stocks as they do not normally have a place in those type of portfolios - but bear with me. This is really a follow on from my recent piece about billionaires and an add on to my Rise of the machines and Best way to get rich posts. As I concluded before, owning and running your own business is the best way to get rich in the long run as evidenced by the billionaires list. But maybe technology offers a faster way?
This is because technology businesses seem to have a much shorter half life or much more rapid life cycle as technology seems to change so rapidly - think Palm, Nokia and Blackberry to name just three. So given this and the way Venture capitalists and other technology Companies seem to be prepared to finance and buy up fledgling enterprises and app based ventures, this seems a promising way for people with the relevant skill to get rich quick and maybe even become a billionaire.

Take for example the app Snapchat which is the logo featured above in case you are wondering what the hell that is. Snapchat, a two-year-old picture messaging company with no revenue, last year rejected a $3bn (£1.8bn) buyout bid from Facebook. The 23-year-old boss Evan Spiegel has turned down the all-cash offer from the social network, claimed the Wall Street Journal, citing people briefed on the matter. Snapchat has no sales and no business model — but it does have a smartphone app that delivers hundreds of millions of picture messages, mostly from teenagers and young adults. The bit I don't get is that these photos then vanish in 10 seconds or less, go figure. Hot on the heals of that near miss Facebook then decided to buy WhatsApp which Mark Zuckerberg apparently described as "incredibly valuable." He certainly paid a lot for it as the deal to buy it included $4 billion in cash and approximately $12 billion-worth of Facebook shares, plus an additional $3 billion in stock to WhatsApp’s founders and employees at a later date. So "only" $4bn of real money, but not bad nevertheless and hey what do I know maybe Facebook will be worth trillions soon although it is on 55 times this years forecast earnings with no yield of course.

Now I would query the "incredibly valuable" statement as the price was certainly very high but I'm not sure about the value. As Warren Buffet is fond of saying "price is what you pay and value is what you get." Now they certainly paid a high price to access all those users who send messages over internet connections, avoiding text messaging fees or as Facebook said it was to "speed up their ability to bring connectivity and utility to the world”. Call me old fashioned, but it is not yet clear to me or anyone else how it will bring profits and cash flow to shareholders when it only charges a few users $1 and carries no advertising (disclosure: I do not hold any Facebook shares). WhatsApp was founded in 2009 and apparently had one round of funding of $8 million, yes million in 2011 - hats off to Sequoia Capital, trees really do grow to the sky in Silicon Valley.

So if you are worried about your job being vulnerable to the rise of the machines, then get yourself on a coding course, come up with an app and maybe one day soon you'll be a billionaire too! That's all for now but it does make me wonder about markets and valuations as a lot of this activity is quite similar to what went on back in 1999, although its not quite as extreme yet. So I suppose we should let the good times roll and enjoy the current bull market, but I think I'll revisit market valuations and thoughts on that soon.


0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    RSS Feed

    Google+

    Archives

    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    August 2019
    June 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014

    Categories

    All
    32Red
    Aberdeen Am
    Admin
    A G Barr
    Alliance Pharma
    Alternative Telecoms
    AMEC
    Amino Technologies
    Amlin
    Anglo Pacific
    Asset Allocation
    Auto Trader Group
    BA Systems
    BATS
    Behavioural Finance
    Bellway
    Berendsen
    BHP Billiton
    Bloomsbury Publishing
    Bodycote
    Books
    Bovis Homes
    BREXIT
    Britvic
    Catlin-group
    Central Asia Metals
    Centrica
    Character Group
    Churchill China
    Cineworld
    City Of London Investment Group
    Clarkson
    Commercial Property
    Compound
    Computacenter
    Connect Group
    Croda
    Currencies
    Demographics
    Diageo
    Diploma
    Directors Dealings
    Dividends
    Easyjet
    Economics
    Emerging Markets
    Emis
    Empiric Student Property
    Etfs
    Fairpoint
    Ferguson
    Ferrexpo
    Finsbury Foods
    Food Retailers
    Forterra
    Games Workshop
    Gateley
    Go Compare
    Goid
    Greene King
    GSK
    Hargreaves Services
    Hays
    Headlam
    Hedge Funds
    Hill & Smith
    House Builders
    Howden
    HSBC
    IG Group
    Imperial Tobacco
    Indivor
    Inflation
    Insurance
    Intermediate Capital
    Interserve
    Investec
    Investment Trusts
    It
    ITV
    James Halstead
    Jarvis Investment Management
    JLT
    Jupiter Fund Management
    KCOM
    Kingfisher
    Legal & General
    Lloyds Bank
    Maintel
    Man Group
    Market Timing Indicator
    Market Valuation
    Marston's
    Matchtec
    Media
    Merlin Entertainment
    Micro Focus
    Mining
    Mitie
    Miton Group
    Moenysupermarket
    Mondi
    Moneysupermaket.com
    Music
    National Grid
    N.Brown
    News
    Next
    Nichols
    Norcros
    Oil
    Page Group
    Paypoint
    Pennon
    Persimmon
    Personal Finance
    Pharmaceuticals
    Phoenix Group
    Photo Me
    Photo-Me
    Plus500
    Podcasts
    Polar Capital
    Politics
    Portfolio
    Portmeirion
    Provident Financial
    PZC
    Qinetiq
    Ramsdens Holdings
    Rank Group
    Reckitt Benckiser
    Renewable Energy
    Renew Holdings
    Renishaw
    Research Papers
    Restaurant Group
    Retailers
    RIO
    RM Group
    Rolls Royce
    RPC
    RPS
    Safestore
    Sage
    Sainsburys
    Savills
    Schroders
    Scores
    SCS Group
    Sell Discipline
    Shareholder Yield
    Share Picks
    Short Interest
    Somero
    Spectris
    Sprue Aegis
    SSE
    Stock Spirits
    S & U Plc
    TalkTalk
    Taptica
    Tax
    Technology
    Telecoms
    Tobacco
    Trading Ideas
    TSB
    TUI
    UK Market Update
    Unilever
    Utilitywise
    Value
    Victrex
    Vodafone
    VP.
    Water Utilities
    WH Smiths
    William Hill
    Wynstay
    XL Media
    XP Power
    Yield
    Zytronic

    googleda4a17cac6d02bb9.html
    File Size: 0 kb
    File Type: html
    Download File

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
  • Blog
  • Scores
    • Scores Presentation
  • Portfolio
    • Table of Returns
  • Resources
    • Check list
  • About
  • Contact
  • New Page