When we upgraded Snapchat to Neutral from Sell on December 20, 2018, we noted that substantial concerns persisted (link). As we head into Snapchat’s Q4 2018 earnings call on February 5th, we believe there are five questions/issues management must address head-on (note: we are calling this “Act II” following our first Dear Evan Spiegel blog in October…
We have had a bullish stance on the video game industry since our initiation in December 2017 (link), with the thesis that video games would continue to take share of consumer time and that AAA publishers would continue to optimize the monetization of this time. We believed that ATVI was the best way to play this theme,…
By any account, Disney’s sale of the Fox RSNs has not been smooth (as discussed in our separate blog Fox/Disney blog today, link). The Yankees appear set to take back control of YES, with a group in place to help them finance the 80% of shares they do not own. There are several potential buyers looking at the other 21 assets,…
We were surprised when Comcast decided to stop bidding for Fox last year and shifted all their energy toward Sky, which they ultimately succeeded in acquiring. Once Disney committed to sell all the Fox RSNs to speed DoJ approval, Comcast determined topping Disney’s offer again was simply too expensive (as it was clear to Comcast that the DoJ…
The Pixel 3 could be the first smartphone enabled with CBRS spectrum. This is a critical milestone for mid-band spectrum that has attracted the attention of wireless and cable operators, alike. The Pixel 3 launched exclusively with Verizon three months ago. At launch, it included Band 42, which includes a portion of the spectrum used for CBRS.…
Happy New Year 2019! As we do every year, we are kicking off media blogging in the new year by discussing our top predictions and events to watch for as you invest in media and tech stocks in the coming year #Top19for19 (last year’s Top 18 list for 2018 can be found here). 2019 is going to be an exciting year,…
AT&T is adding 60 MHz of new spectrum to its wireless network this year, which should materially improve wireless data speeds and performance for its customers. AT&T plans to market the faster speeds as 5GE, a tag that will uniquely appear on smartphone screens of AT&T customers. While some may decry this as “Fake 5G”,…
We cut our Fiscal 2019 EPS estimates by $1.30 to $12.34 following Apple’s pre-announcement earlier this afternoon. Our new estimates imply 4% EPS growth in Fiscal 2019 despite an expected 5% decline in Net Income, thanks to the share repurchase program.
As we head into the holiday season, with so much anger directed toward the tech-driven media companies we cover, we wanted to focus everyone on just how hard it is to accept disruption.
With Snapchat having effectively reached the price target we set in our September 2018 downgrade (link), we are upgrading the stock to Neutral from SELL and removing our price target (was $5). While we no longer perceive a compelling risk/reward to shorting the stock at current levels, we remain concerned about the company’s future and do…
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