Tag Archives: revenue growth

Chinese Web

In a previous post last December, I had a quick look at the valuations of a few Chinese internet stocks that are traded in the US, solely for curiosity’s sake. At that time, I mused that Google (GOOG) may be a better bet than any of the Chinese high growth/high risk plays given its valuation. The one maybe I highlighted amongst the Chinese internet stocks was Baidu (BIDU), the so called Chinese Google. It is somewhat ironic that BIDU today fell 15% after disappointing results from higher expenses and lower revenue projections whilst GOOG, which had a great quarter due to revenue growth and squeezed expenses, is up over 20% since its Q2 results. Just shows what I know!

Given the drama in the Chinese stock market, I had another quick look over the Chinese internet stocks to see how they are performing, as per the graph below.

click to enlargeChinese Internet Stocks July 2014 to 2015

It is far too early to tell what the impact of the current turmoil will have on the Chinese consumer and on the Chinese internet sector (if any, given the government’s current policy of propping up the market). At this stage, it is interesting to see that it’s NetEase, primarily in the online game services sector, which has stood up the best so far, up 40% this year. That just confirms to me how far these stocks are outside my comfort zone.

Level 3 Options

Following on from my post on Level3 and prior to their quarterly results tom0rrow, I thought it was opportune to have a look at the current option pricing for Level3. With data sourced from Yahoo (which generally needs to be treated with caution), the contrast with the liquid Apple options outlined in another post could not be greater. Liquidity is a major issue to consider when looking at options for a firm like Level3. Like the stock itself, illiquid options on a historically volatile stock is not for the faint hearted. That said, the recent stability of the underlying stock over the past 18 months does potentially offer value by way of option pricing formula if Level3 is finally about to deliver on its potential.

click to enlarge 

Level 3 options July 2013

I don’t expect anything major from Level3 tomorrow and would take the selections of Robert Powell at Telecom Ramblings as a reasonable expectation. The long term key for Level3 is sustainable revenue growth but I would be happy with continued marginal movement on costs and EBITDA margin for now.