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Summit 2016: Can High-Rated Adobe Systems Profit From Platforms?

High-rated Adobe Systems ( ADBE ) stock edged up Thursday but closed down slightly for the week of its Adobe Summit 2016 digital marketing conference. That’s a week after shares advanced almost 9% on the strength of Adobe’s first-quarter earnings report and outlook. The Adobe Summit in Las Vegas drew more than 10,000 people — the company’s largest live event to date. The theme centered around how brands are increasingly interacting with consumers in a wave of “digital experiences” online that leverage social networking. Actor George Clooney spoke at the Adobe Summit on Wednesday, but most presenters were from the tech and business worlds. Executives from major brands were among the featured speakers, from McDonald’s ( MCD ) and Mattel ( MAT ) to General Motors ( GM ) and General Electric ( GE ) to Comcast ( CMCSA ) and Charles Schwab ( SCHW ). That's right. It's George at #AdobeSummit talking experience and creativity. Watch live now: https://t.co/NTBQXucWEM pic.twitter.com/Q0HoYKOw3f — Adobe (@Adobe) March 23, 2016 “Adobe’s momentum in digital marketing was demonstrated in record attendance, including by CEOs, at its marketing summit,” Pacific Crest analyst Brendan Barnicle wrote in a research note as the conference kicked off Tuesday. “New products and partnerships increase its strategic value both to customers and the industry, and should drive continued growth and market-share gains.” Adobe Summit Sees World Gone Digital, From ‘Deadpool’ To Sea Of Data https://t.co/wT0S73h5it pic.twitter.com/Qz56otNOGn — Investors.com (@IBDinvestors) March 22, 2016 Adobe makes the Creative Cloud suite of content tools, such as Photoshop and Premiere Pro video editing software, along with the Adobe Marketing Cloud array of tools to track online content popularity and inform advertising decisions. This week, the company announced an audience measurement partnership with comScore ( SCOR ), among initiatives aimed at improving measurement of online video viewing and other forms of content consumption across platforms. Adobe Systems Analyst Briefing FBR & Co. analyst Samad Samana wrote Wednesday about an analyst briefing held in conjunction with the conference that “focused  almost  entirely  on  Adobe’s  technology  and  the  platform  pivot.” In recent years, Adobe has moved headlong to host its products in the Internet cloud, using the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model, with platforms that handle content’s entire life cycle from creation through tracking consumer interaction with it. Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen summed up a broad Adobe goal: being able to “make, monetize and measure” the digital experiences that people have. “Management highlighted that it is investing around the ‘experience business’ wave of disruption and innovating at the platform level, both of which will be important in driving long-term growth for the digital marketing business,” Samana wrote. “While it is in the early stages, we see the platform play as strategically smart, as it should enhance the value proposition for Adobe’s entire product suite, making it stickier with customers.” Adobe, which is on the IBD Big Cap 20 stock list, closed up 0.4% Thursday at 92.52, down 1% for the week. The stock market is closed on Good Friday, March 25. Adobe gets a high IBD Composite Rating of 96 out of a possible 99. Adobe stock is a few percentage points under a potential buy point, trading above both its 50-day and 200-day moving averages. RELATED: Adobe Summit Sees World Gone Digital, From ‘Deadpool’ To Sea Of Data Image provided by Shutterstock .

Pandora Stock Jumps On New Buyout Chatter As Board Member Named

Music streaming service Pandora Media ( P ) saw its stock soar after the company appointed a new member to its board and fresh buyout rumors bubbled up. Pandora stock jumped 11% in the stock market today , to 10.93. Pandora stock had slumped to a three-year low of 7.10 in mid-February over concerns about competition from Apple ( AAPL ) Music and other Internet music services, as well as the company’s slowing user growth and engagement. In the near term, Pandora will see higher content acquisition expenses, say analysts, following a ruling in December from the Copyright Royalty Board — the panel that determines the rate to be paid to music labels and artists each time one of their songs is played on the Internet, under a statutory license for the period stretching from Jan. 1, 2016, to Dec. 31, 2020. On Wednesday, Pandora said it was expanding the size of its board from nine seats to 10, with the addition of Anthony Vinciquerra, Since 2011, Vinciquerra has been a senior advisor to Texas Pacific Group, in its Technology, Media and Telecom group. According to Dealreporter, Pandora is attracting buyout interest  from such companies as  Amazon.com ( AMZN ), Alphabet ( GOOGL )-unit Google and Yahoo ( YHOO ). The New York Times reported in February that Pandora was “working with Morgan Stanley to meet potential buyers,” and has held talks about putting itself up for sale. Besides Apple Music and Spotify, Pandora rivals include Amazon.com’s Prime Music and Google Play Music. Apple and Alphabet shares both fell a fraction Thursday, but Amazon stock rose 2.3%.

Micron Expected To Unveil Q2 Loss Amid Samsung-Driven Memory Glut

Samsung and SK Hynix’s relentless mobile DRAM push is slamming American rival Micron Technology ( MU ), which is expected to report a fiscal-second-quarter loss Wednesday for the first time in three years. A Nomura analyst reiterated his reduce rating — equivalent to a sell rating — and 8 price target Thursday on Micron stock. Micron stock fell 1.4% Thursday, to 10.50. Shares crashed 60% over 2015, and they are down another 26% year to date. The consensus of 33 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters for Micron’s fiscal Q2 results, slated for Wednesday afternoon, models $3.05 billion in sales, down 27%, and an 8-cent per-share loss ex items vs. 81 cents earnings per share in the year-earlier quarter. Three months ago, Micron guided to $2.9 billion to $3.2 billion and a loss of 5-12 cents per share ex items. Nomura’s Romit Shah expects Micron to issue Q3 guidance below the consensus model for the sixth consecutive quarter. For Q3, the consensus projects $3.2 billion in sales and 5 cents EPS minus items, down 17% and 91%, respectively. The DRAM (dynamic random-access memory) market “hit a downturn in 2015” amid weakening PC sales and a Samsung-driven oversupply. DRAM sales contracted by 2.4% for the year vs. 32% growth in 2014, Gartner analyst Viveca Woods wrote in a January report. Micron leads the American DRAM market, rivaling South Korean competitors Samsung and SK Hynix. The waning PC market — also slugging No. 1 chipmaker Intel ( INTC ) — forced Micron to shift gears, taking a mobile-centric approach. But mobile might not be Micron’s saving grace. In Q1, Micron posted a 13% year-over-year decline in mobile sales to $834 million. So, even if the DRAM in smartphones is increasing, it doesn’t mean Micron will seize the biggest chunk of that market. As DRAM oversupplies the market, pricing will remain competitive for another one to two months, Shah wrote. Then, prices will likely topple as DRAM-makers try to undercut one another. “Until supply cuts transpire (with Samsung being the key), the market will remain vastly oversupplied as average sales-price erosion is setting up to be greater in 2016,” he wrote in a research report. Like Samsung and SK Hynix, Micron is prepping for better technology with its 20-nanometer ramp. But Micron’s pace of cost declines, dependent on that ramp, won’t be sufficient to offset the pricing plunge, Shah wrote.