Netflix Stock Update By Sell-Side Firms

Despite mounting competitive threats from established and budding streaming rivals, the Street is considerably bullish on Netflix’s prospects.

Netflix Inc. stock has dropped nearly 17% since mid-August due to enormous pressure from streaming competitors. Regardless of shareholder concerns over the company’s leadership position, equity analysts at the Street’s remain bullish on the streaming giant’s stock.

The Service Video on Demand (SVOD) has now become a well-known household name in the United States, achieving substantial diffusion in the country. While, nearly two thirds of the households are not even subscribed to the service. Therefore, as the company increases in popularity, the overall addressable market might churn out number of subscriber’s for Netflix domestically.

Moreover, its global expansion strategy portend well for substantial growth in the long term. The streaming giant has plans to make its service available to an overall of 200 nations by the end of next year. Once the international rollout is done, the streaming giant might see substantial growth by the addition of subscribers in the global market. This will result in higher revenue growth.

The streaming giant recently disclosed its plan to introduce its service in four critical market in Asia, namely Hong Kong, South Korea, and Taiwan by the start of next year. Analysts are optimistic that these launches of new services will help the company in maintaining strong subscriber growth over the coming few years.

According to the data gathered by Bloomberg, out of 45 analysts having coverage to Netflix stock, over 50% are bullish of the company’s stock. 23 gave it a Buy, 16 recommend a Hold, while only six suggested a Sell rating to the stock. The average twelve month consensus price target stands at $117.38, reflecting 14.8% upside potential in the coming future.

Jeffery Wlodarczak, an analyst at Pivotal Research Group LLC holds a bullish target price on the stock. Mr. Wlodarczak suggests a rating of Buy on Netflix stock and expects stock to increase to $175 mark next year reflecting an upside potential of over 71% from the present price levels.

On the other hand, Michael Pachter of Wedbush Securities continues his bearish outlook on the stock. He recommends $40 price target with an Underperform rating.

However, majority of popular equity Investment Company’s hold a positive viewpoint for the company. Morgan Stanley assigns $127 of price target, JP Morgan suggests it at $127 while Credit Suisse and UBS place target price of $110 and $143, respectively.

The stock year-to-date performance also showed its growth and following appreciation in price. Netflix stock news reveals that the stock was down 1.46% to $102.24.

Washington Post's Stories To Be Published On Facebook

The Washington Post would soon disseminate its stories through Facebook's Instant Articles platform.

Facebook’s platform would soon be flooded with a publication’s articles. Most media companies are interested in posting a set of stories on social platform’s Instant Articles; the Washing post aims to act in a different manner. The paper stated on Tuesday that it would post 100% of its website’s articles to Instant Articles. That contributes to roughly 1200 articles per day encompassing wire stories.

“We want to reach current and future readers on all platforms, and we aren’t holding anything back”, its publisher, Fred Ryan, stated. Facebook News today revealed that the company’s Instant Articles features, which has been launched gradually since it was proclaimed in May, permits media agencies to post their content directly on Facebook networker’s feeds, instead of the conventional approach of linking back to their webpages. The social platform pledges that Instant Articles would be speeding up load time for stories and would play a significant role in reaching larger audiences.

Facebook News affirmed that various publications, including Buzz Feed, New York Times, and the Atlantic, have signed during the launch, and on Tuesday others, such as Huffington Post, Vox Media, Daily Mail, Mashable, and MoviePlot, have also followed them. The Post has proclaimed that output would be significantly higher than that explained so far by the organization’s other collaborators.

The NYT, for instance, has stated it was testing with posting around 30 articles each day directly to Facebook’s news feed but had not pledged to a company number. Similarly, NBC News has also been posting 30 or 40 articles each day.

The Atlantic has stated that it was ready to share its content available through Facebook’s program and the official at Buzz Feed, Jonah Peretti, stated that his webpage is interested in posting as much content as possible on its network.

Facebook Breaking news reported that Instant Articles is one of the various new networks available to publications. A photo messaging application SnapChat offers a news platform, known as Discover, which has already logged up 15 publishers, including National Geographic, the Daily Mail, and Vice Media. Many publications also have logged on to post content in Apple’s News application, which released last week.

Commercial sources reported that Wall Street Journal is negotiating with Facebook but has not agreed to join in. Washington Post’s decision would influence readers towards the social media platform.

Facebook should operate the media-friendly initiative properly to dominate the competitive market and stay ahead of its rivals.

Tesla Stock Drops Following WSJ's Report On Apple Car

The electric carmaker received a blow in the stock price followed by the news presented by WSJ that Apple is aiming to release its EV in 2019.

It was observed recently that Tesla stock went down on the index by a considerable number on Monday’s trading session, which was due to the news released by the Wall Street Journal about how Apple Inc. is planning to launch its electric car in the 2019. This is expected to turn the tables for the electric carmakers in the long run.

In the starting of the session, the stock of the luxury car maker did find its way up by 3 percent, but by the time the trade came to close off, the downfall was recorded to be at 0.82%. The share price was seen to come around at $262.96 before the stock market closed.

Even though the fact that Apple is working on an electric vehicle is not a new thing and the industry is already bracing itself for the high end car the classic smart phone makers could be preparing, Tesla has informed the press about how this does not bother the auto company’s position in the industry and that it is actually glad that so many huge companies in the industry are considering working on electric cars in the first place, as this is going to boost the idea of EVs in the industry.

When the first EV was released in the market, it was received well but many analysts were of the opinion that this could not work out for a longer period. However, the hybrid car makers turned things around by creating customers through production of high end EVs, which were not only highly satiable but also looked gorgeous on the road.

As for Apple, the software firm has been rumored to be working on an EV for quite some time now and this is the first time that it has decided to make things official. Following a meeting with government officials, the Californian tech company decided to break the news into the market and gave the year 2019 as the time it is aiming for the release of the car.

Rumors previously stated that Apple is working on a project, which has been named as Titan and had a couple of hundred people working under it, which included all kinds of executives including software designers and developers from all over the industry. Tesla is well aware of this as the software firm has taken away a number of its employees, offering them a higher pay scale with better facilities. Recent news also suggests that the project Titan now has the permission to work with a team of 600 workers in total to carry out the plans effectively. 

Here's Why Verizon Communication Stock Fell On Thursday

Verizon stock dropped 3% today following the comments by CEO at an investor conference.

Verizon Communications Inc. stock dropped more than 3% on Thursday September 17 after the comments by company’s CEO and Chairman Mr. Lowell C. McAdam. The telecommunication company provided its idea related to future growth, depending on its network leadership.

Verizon Inc. thinks that its opportunity for growth in Internet of Things (IoT) and video looks achievable, keeping in mind its leadership and consistent investment in broadband and wireless networks. During an investor conference on Thursday, Mr. McAdam explains the broader idea of the company, provided its latest announcements related to the positioning of 5G wireless, fresh wireless products, and customer pricing simplification.

He also added that the customer demand is not at all matching up with Verizon old business model, which increases the transformation need. He noted that the company is emphasizing on growth in future with a reason to get consumer satisfaction by offering them what they require in the advanced world.

Particularly, he also said that Verizon Communication’s earnings for fiscal year 2016 might be at the similar level as fiscal year 2015, provided that the near term transformation impact. He thinks that the earnings will return to growth path by the end of fiscal year 2017. While, the company forecasts cash flows to stay robust, this causes in repetition of capital allocation preferences of shareholder returns and network investment.

McAdam also said that Verizon FiOS profits will remain robust. He said that it is expected that the telecommunication company will participate in 600 MHz auction. He believes that the consumers need skinny bundles, which are profitable for Verizon.

CEO of Verizon Communication has also confirmed that the company isn’t looking to acquire DISH Network Corp. He said, DISH is a big company, but not consistent with company’s business at all. The company also looks at Apple upgrade plan to be helpful for its cash flow.

As reported by Investor Business Daily, Mr. McAdam said at the conference, "I don't see us going out and buying network TV, that sort of thing. Digital media, which are the direction we're headed with mobile-first (video), are much smaller companies and wouldn't register in a big way with investors when we purchase them."

Provided all the updates and details in shareholder conference on Thursday, Verizon stock went red initially because of the update of fiscal year 2016 earnings to stay flat and change in consumer demand.

Verizon Communication was up 0.54% to $44.81 at close of market on Monday September 21. The Verizon stock news revealed that it is trading with rare volume as 16.13 million shares have been traded relative to average volume of 15.5 million shares.

How Canadian Oil Sands Operations Will Impact BP plc?

BP plc believes cost of Canadian oil sand has fallen due to depreciating Loonie and deflation in the country.

Richard Herbert, Exploration Head at BP plc. said at a conference held in Banff, Alberta that developing cost of oil sands in Canada is dropping quickly, as per Bloomberg. Canada’s oil sands are mixture of sand, water, clay, and bitumen in Alberta.

Oil reserves of Alberta are the third biggest crude reserve all over the globe, after Saudia Arabia and Venezuela. It has approximately 170 billion barrels of oil. Mr. Herbert said that crude oil cost of production in Alberta has decreased by nearly 15% to 20% due to Canadian dollar depreciation and deflation. This happened very first time that the cost have dropped in the last 15 years during that time the costs had soared by threefold. Presently, Canadian currency stands at 76 cents in United States dollar terms, as affirmed by BP stock analysis.

The British oil giant expects that by the year 2035, energy consumption might increase by nearly 41% and oil sand reserve in Alberta can then be utilized to meet the energy demand of the world. Mr. Herbert thinks that however huge savings can be generated from falling costs; they have not reached a price that can boost BP’s oil sand project in Alberta. It looks like that the company is confident that cost will fall further.

Since last year summers, prices of crude oil have dropped by over 50%. Various oil giants including, Total SA, Royal Dutch Shell plc and Exxon Mobil Corp. are reducing their capital spending to maintain themselves failing market conditions. Over 150,000 jobs have been reduced in the last one year. This cut in costs of producing and developing crude oil is going to favor the London oil company.

Like other oil firms, BP was also bearish regarding the oil market. It thinks that prices are not going to recover their momentum in the near term. The falling Asian market chaos and Chinese economy is going to maintain crude at its low.

In BP stock news related to the company, the Azerbaijan Republic State Oil Company and BP plc will endure its job as field operator at Azeri Chirag Gunashli even after the expiration of contract in 2024. The London oil majors was made field operator in the year 1994, when 30 year-long production sharing deal contract was signed by the companies.

Earlier, there had been some issues between the Oil Company and government of Azerbaijan. Although, this deal renewal shows that they have solved the issues. ACG field, which is situated 120 km away from the Azerbaijan coast, contains approximately 5.4 billion barrels of oil. Numerous big oil firms including Exxon Mobil, Hess Corp. and Statoil ASA have taken ownership in the field.

Ford Motors Company: Technical Analysis

On Wednesday, Ford Motors stock took a start with the stock above $13, as stated in technical analysis by Bidness ETC and Bloomberg.

Ford Motor Company is one of the concerned stocks during the current international market block trade. The company holds a very strong position in the world’s biggest automotive market in China. Fall in the currency of China affected their position negatively.

After the weakening Yuan, last Thursday, the stock declined more than 11%, when U.S market started to fall. S&P 500 index dropped down around 7.6%. Similarly, 8% declined was observed in the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Both suffered from the fall at the same time. Recently, the automotive company’s stock price is trading currently at $13.02, which is 2.09% up.

The auto parts company’s downtrend has not started yet. The stock started above $15 this year and gradually declined to $13.20 in the past 8 months, representing the fall of 15% till now. Ford showed impressive promotion of their cars performance in the “North American International Auto Show” (NAIAS) in the beginning of the year, followed by the series of upgrades in the automobiles technology.

According to the brief outlook, the stock raised their target of $12.62 to reach $10.44 before registering a fast recovery. It is expected that the stock are currently placed at an average position, which will deviate backward from $12.49 to $11.86. Its current resistance around $13.60 is observed blocking any restoration attempt due to the daily oversold readings. Constant weekly closings of more than $14.33 are needed to recommend a revived bull trend for Ford Motor stock.

According to the recommendations by the sources, all those financial investors, who were willing to invest their money into the stock, should wait for it to slide before investment. It is observed that during the 14-day Relative Strength Index of 26.04, the stock is certainly oversold. This indicates that the stock might probably be undervalued.

As U.S. stock markets make a comeback, its stock are anticipated to show an early jump just like the Blue Oval performance has been impressive. A car seller, Dearborn, reported its 2^nd quarter turnover around $35.1 billion. However, the adjusted earnings per share positioned at $0.47, more than analysts’ estimation of $0.36.

With respect to the Bloomberg’s report, a figure around 92.8 million shares were shorted during the mid-August period. The evaluated percentage for the shorted shares is 2.4 out of all the floating shares. Analysts are observing the company’s financial due to their interest in its size. This places a small load on the company’s management as well.

Pacific Crest Reiterates Overweight Rating On Visa Inc Stock

Visa has a tremendous opportunity to replace the current practice of checks and cash with digital payments, as only about 15% of global payments currently take place digitally

Pacific Crest has reaffirmed its Overweight rating of Visa stock and assigned $76 of price target in a sell-side report. The report suggests that forex headwinds can continue to be an impeding factor with an increasing dollar. However, there is a hope of a secular shift to digital payments, which might help strengthen underlying growth, in spite of macroeconomic sloth.

The report suggests the sluggishness in Chinese economy growth, but restraints that it’s too timely to mention that there might be a large impact on outbound travel, which is an important volume contributor, particularly in emerging countries with increasing prosperous populations. The increase in mid class demographics in countries like Latin America, China, India, and some countries in Africa is providing a motivation to the payment digitalization and its growth, and in result impacting business of Visa Inc.

According to the reports, there is a great opportunity to substitute the current practice of cash and checks with digital payments. Around only 15% of worldwide payments currently happens digitally, with approximately $8 trillion transaction expected to be included to digital payment volume by the end of 2020.

The financial service company has an extended portfolio containing products such as Visa ready, Visa Checkouts, Visa offers, and many more. According to the report, on the regulatory front, the emphasize is expected to move to Europe from United States at present, where services of visa have comparatively less dispersion.

Pacific Crest’s stock target price of $76 is on the basis of 25x price to earnings multiple for the earnings per share estimate for fiscal year 2016. As per the report, the primary risk that might delay the hike towards the target price involve adverse regulatory results, particularly in the core United States, reputation damage of brand, and a macroeconomic slowdown across the globe.

According to the data available on Bloomberg terminal, the Visa stock analysis has been covered by almost 41 analysts, out of which 31 have given a Buy rating, 10 have recommended a rating of Buy, while no one assigned a Sell rating. The twelve month average price target stands at $81.12, which shows a 13.6% upside potential compared to current closing price of $72.44.

 The company has a great opportunity to replace its present practice to digital payments, as nearly 15% of international payments occur digitally.

Visa stock price was up 0.06% at $72.44 at market close on Friday August 28.

Facebook Attracts Journalists To Discover And Source Social Content

Facebook has introduced Signal to help Journalists

Facebook has attempted to lure journalists towards its platform. Facebook news revealed that the social network has continuously been enchanted on daily news cycle. The organization attempts to capture spotlight through introduction of features, such as Facebook Stories, to demonstrate its capacity to act as a truly active news-providing source, while other moves, such as Instant Articles and Trending Section have demonstrated that it is interested in attracting users to news articles without leaving the webpage.

Facebook news today affirmed that the company has launched a new network known as Signal to attract journalists to explore and share their content. The feature, which has the capacity to drag them from Instagram and Facebook, provides an opportunity to media “to make Facebook a more vital part of their news gathering with access to relevant trends, photos, videos, and posts on Facebook and Instagram for use in their storytelling and reporting”, as posted in a company blog by a Facebook employee, Andy Mitchell.

Facebook breaking news reported that part of the effectiveness of Signals is that it provides an opportunity to journalists to access a variety of multiple highly organized newsfeeds of content viewed by public. Currently, personal profile interests of a user, which encompasses the pages ‘liked’ by them and material that has attracted them, affect features, such as Trending Topics.

The new addition allows journalists to get a more widespread concept of what has really been trended across the board through Trending Now. The network also allows media to recognize products that have begun to go viral through an update known as Emerging Trends.

In terms of its appearance and operations, the media-friendly tool seems to have been inspired from applications, such as Tweetdeck. Journalists could now carry out a grouping of profiles and pages that view specific feeds, so if they demonstrate their interest in studying public responses of members of the U.S Senate, they can develop a dedicated news feed named a “collection”, just for those specific profiles. The same applies for material posted on Instagram, where users of Signals could enter specific Instagram handles and share with a curated news feed.

Experts believe that the new feature tends to represent the company's attempt to turn into a news-breaking platform. Its latest effort would be welcomed by the media industry.

Facebook’s executives should promote the innovation and operate to succeed in dominating the media market. The social media is now on the verge of building relationship with news enthusiasts.

Is Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. A Long Term Stock?

Alibaba’s management continues to reassure investors on the stock’s potential; however, analysts do not seem convinced

During this time when Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is witnessing serious growth issues, the management of the company is doing their best to provide assurances to shareholders. As reported by Reuters, Joseph C. Tsai, Executive Vice Chairman of the company has said that the management is aware of the low share price level, and added that Alibaba’s fundamentals are much stronger now compared to the time of its initial public offering last year.

Alibaba’s stock price performance shows an entirely different picture, according to recent Alibaba stock news. As the company is reaching one year of its IPO, the stock is declining reaching a price less than its IPO levels. Baba stock closed at $64.90 yesterday, with a 52-week high and low $120 and $58, respectively. The e-commerce giant has a market capitalization of nearly $153.20 billion. Performance of stock shows that the company shares faced the worst ham this year. The stock has shack over 38% this year, according to Alibaba stock analysis.

On Monday, the company established that as consumer spending pull back on a Chinese economy slowdown, the Chinese company’s GMV is expected to drop below estimations. This also applies to Alibaba’s second quarter projections for FY16; while, several experts have warned that the country’s economic slowdown might affect volumes further than the second quarter.

The forecast comes out to be true as experts moves on to reduce the target prices yesterday on baba stock. However, in spite of substantial cuts to price targets, analysts reiterated their Buy rating on stock.

Youssef Squali, an analyst at Cantor Fitzgerald reduced his price target on e-commerce giant’s stock to $88 from previous $95, while reiterated a Buy rating. Likewise, Cheng Cheng, analyst at Pacific Crest, rated it a Buy, but with reduced price target from $94 to $80.

Remarkably, both these downgrades show a short term view. Analysts are optimistic on long term prospects of the company, and expect it gaining substantial gains for shareholders having long positions. Mr. Cheng also stated in his research note: “Domestic macro and emerging market currency fluctuation prompt lower estimates. We still view Alibaba’s prospects positively long-term, but volatility and limited visibility in both China macro and emerging market currency negatively impact our confidence in the short-term.”

Most experts who measure Alibaba’s long term performance agree with the idea above and are still bullish on Alibaba stock. Almost 52 analysts at Bloomberg covered the stock, out of which 45 gave it a Buy, 5 recommend a Hold, while only 2 suggests a Sell. The twelve month average price target is $94.81, almost 50% of upside potential to closing price of $64.90.

Visa, Inc Rating Analysis

The financial services firm's shares appreciated by 0.93% in the last five trading days while during the last trading session the shares dropped by -1.32%.

The shares of Visa, Inc. dropped by -1.32% at a price of $69.6 per share. On Wednesday, the trading session began at $70.75; they were seen to reach a higher estimate of $71.375 and were observed to have a lower estimate of $69.43.

The session ended at $69.6 and by the end of the trading session the volume of shares was at 9,022,190 shares. Throughout the day, the price kept fluctuating between these price ranges. The market capital currently of the financial services company is at $135,817 million while the number of outstanding share in the company was calculated to be at 1,951,387,000 shares.

In the short term, the mean price target was estimated to be at $81.82 and at high level of the price was estimated to be at $90 while the lower estimate was at $76; this was suggested by 17 analysts, according to Visa stock news. The standard deviation was calculated at $3.75.

The 52-week high of Visa, Inc. is $76.92 and the 52-week low of the financial firm is $48.7975. In the last three months, the shares of Visa are up by 0.12% and in the last five trading days they appreciated by 0.93% but on a four week basis lost 6.27%. The performance of the shares is at 6.73%. During the session, the up/down ratio was of 11.73 while the final up/down ratio was at 2.32.

The financial firm reported earnings per share of 2.53 and a P/E ratio of 27.45 as of September 10, 2015. $0.48 per share is paid by the company to the shareholders as dividend, which yields 0.70%, according to Visa stock analysis.

Insider trading was seen, which was disclosed to SEC on a form 4 filing. The Vice Chairperson, Richey Ellen, sold 4,785 shares at a share price of $277 per share. This transaction that was carried on March 2, 2015 was worth $1,325,445. The company’s Insiders own 0.12% of the firm’s shares while Institutional Investors own 92.8%. During the last three months a change of -0.37% was observed in the total institutional ownership while a change of -0.16% was seen in the total insider ownership of the company.

23 Brokerage firms have commented on the shares of Visa giving it a ranking of 1.5 while analysts at Zack’s Research have suggested a ranking of 2. In the short run, the analysts have given the rating of Buy to the shares of the company. 4 stock analysts gave a rating of Hold to the shares while 15 have recommended a Strong Buy.

Jefferies Reiterate Buy Rating On CVS Health Stock

CVS reports strong quarterly results for 2QFY15, leading to a positive outlook on the stock from Jefferies

CVS Health Corp. announced its second quarter results for fiscal year 2015 earlier last week. However, the stock declined during the trading session, after the earnings release, it started to recover the next day. The earnings announcement resulted in many sell side firm to revise their viewpoint on the company’s stock. Here is what Jefferies think about the stock.

CVS Health Corp. was able to report adjusted earnings of $1.22 per share for the recent quarter, surpassing analysts’ estimates by almost 2.6 cents. The company beat analysts’ expectation for the fifth time in a row. The figure enhanced by $0.09 year over year, as adjusted earnings for the prior year quarter was $1.13 per share.

The revenue for the company came in at $37.17 billion, despite of strong growth, it fell short of consensus estimate by 0.01%, and this was the first revenue for the company in past 13 quarters. The revenue figure for the period reflected a year over year growth of over 7%.

Jefferies has given the stock a Buy rating, with a price target of $125. The firm’s analyst having coverage on CVS stock believes more than expected retail, strong growth in Rx, and a robust beginning to pharmacy benefit manager for the current year is the main reason for the bullish stance on the company’s stock. For pharmacy benefit manager, CVS has announced gross latest business wins of around $12 billion up till now, together with $11 billion in net wins. Adding to this, the specialty Rx growth of 28% has surpassed growth in the division.

Investors’ negative reaction after the earnings announcement was primarily because of the reduction in guidance by the company’s management for third quarter. However, according to analysts it should not bother investors, as CVS has much of its emphasis on acquisition this year. CVS Health has also cut $1 billion from the amount due for share buyback to support funding of its Omnicare and Target Pharmacy acquisition.

The $125 price target given by the sell side firm uses a 20.5x of multiple for price to earnings ratio, using the expected figures for FY16, according to CVS stock analysis.

The Street is still bullish on company’ stock. Almost 28 analysts at Bloomberg covered the stock, 25 gave it a Buy, 3 rate it a Hold, while none suggests it a Sell rating, as reported by CVS stock news. The consensus price target is $119.35, which shows a 7.5% of return potential compared to current closing price.

RBC Capital Markets analyst Fran G. Morgan is most bullish with an Outperform rating and target price of $132 on the stock, while Morgan Stanley analyst Ricky Goldwasser is the most bearish with $111 target price and Overweight rating.