Zynga ....les "believers" disent

• Nevada's online poker bill has passed. It has a provision stating that companies who illegally participated in the online gaming market between 2006 and 2011 will be banned for five years. This bodes well for Zynga, as Pokerstars, as well as other current top poker sites will have to wait 5 years before entering the gambling space.
• New Jersey has passed their online gambling bill recently which will now be the second state besides Nevada to offer Online Gambling legally in the USA
• Massachusetts lawmakers are now looking to pass an online gambling bill.
• Delaware is moving forward with online gambling; tomorrow, applications are due for potential service providers. I see Delaware as being the 3rd state to get online gambling going behind Nevada and New Jersey.
• Illinois gambling bill is in the works as well. It will allow for games of skill and chance, so not just poker like in Nevada.
• Pennsylvania has announced it is working on a bill for online gambling.
• Zynga's Draw Something 2 sequel is in the works, as was leaked today. Zynga bought OMGPOP the creator of Draw Something for $180 million last year. It has since lost the huge hype it had when Zynga first bought it, when it topped the App Store's paid, free, and top grossing games chart in the first two months.
• Zynga still has a huge cash pile equivalent to $1.69 a share and with trading at $3.36 down over 75% from its 52 week highs it is a great growth and value play.
• Zynga's CEO Mark Pincus spoke at the Morgan Stanley Technology Conference. He said "I definitely think that making the real money gambling experience social will make a difference when you bring the social and the identity in, things like reputation and bragging rights get a lot more exciting than if you're in an anonymous poker room."
• Zynga CEO feels there social gambling experience will provide them an edge and with the company on track to release its online gambling products Zynga Poker & Zynga Casino in the next 1-2 months the future is starting to look bright.
• 
  

une réserve d'Or à l'abri de Washington

http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/texas-may-start-hoarding-gold-secession-next-192407075.html

Le "trip" et fini ?

It is very frequent that companies get a boost from a novel series or from a movie series. It can be huge business. It can also be a sword that cuts two ways, and that is what we are seeing this Thursday at Scholastic Corp. SCHL.nasdaq

The company reported that sales of The Hunger Games trilogy were significantly lower than expected in its most recent quarter. With another film coming up, investors have to wonder if there is a likely tie in here for Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.LGF.nyse as it is the production house behind the movies.

The company is now looking for its earnings to be only $1.10 to $1.30 per share, and for sales to be down to a range of $1.75 billion to $1.8 billion. Its prior earnings target was $1.40 to $1.60 per share on sales of $1.8 billion to $1.9 billion. While this doesn’t sound too bad this time around, earnings projections are now down by almost 50% from as recently as September.

It was going to be hard to compare to the strength from a year ago, but overall sales were down by 19% and Scholastic has now lowered its annual targets for the second time in the last four months or so. Scholastic investors have seen this before, with big swings higher from Harry Potter leading to big booms, only to be followed by big busts. One other issue affecting sales is that school districts have delayed purchases as they have turned more toward training and digital investments.

Scholastic’s share price is down almost 14% at $26.75 in early trading on Thursday, versus a 52-week trading range of $25.03 to $38.49.

We are not seeing any trading indications that would signal a major change in shares of Lions Gate Entertainment, but at $22.75 we would note that shares are up about 200% from when Carl Icahn got involved and then bailed out. The huge boost has been from The Hunger Games. With another film coming up, it is hard to not wonder if investors will look at the 52-week range of $11.26 to $23.45 and decide to take at least some profits here.

IPO de Vieux....riche$ et malade$

Un de mes sujets sur www.radiopirate.com vendredi dernier...

Aviv REIT, which specializes in post-acute and long-term care skilled nursing facilities, raised $264 million by offering 13.2 million shares at $20, the high end of the range of $18 to $20. Aviv REIT, which initially filed confidentially on 10/31/2012, plans to list on the NYSE under the symbol "AVIV". Morgan Stanley, BofA Merrill Lynch and Goldman Sachs acted as lead managers on the deal.

Sprott encore....

Eric Sprott of Sprott Asset Management has penned his latest commentary entitled "Do Western Central Banks Have Any Gold Left???"  In it, he examines the selling pressure in gold recently, arguing that it's a great time to buy the precious metal.

Sprott notes that the supply of gold has pretty much remained the same, and that demand has steadily increased (thanks to India and China).  He also points out how central banks have been net buyers (instead of net sellers) of the precious metal.

He writes,

"Much ado has been made about the recent sell-off in the yellow metal forcing certain  ETPs to liquidate, adding a supply of gold into the market in the process. Our work  reveals that the previous ETP sell-offs, (which occurred in January 2011, December 2011,  May 2012 and July 2012) have all coincided with gold finding strong price support and  rallying higher."

Sprott concludes that this sell-off in gold is an opportunity to buy it "at an artificially low value."  While he does make some prudent points, it is worth highlighting, however, that Sprott has been a gold bull for quite some time.

Embedded below is the latest commentary from Sprott Asset Management: Do Western Central Banks Have Any Gold Left?

2009 - 2013

J'écrivais ça en Septembre 2009

MB.to 0.51$ Bien sûr, tout le monde connaît les nombreux problèmes de l'entreprise qui ont précipité son titre vers le bas: baisse des ventes, niveau d'endettement élevé, acquisitions douteuses, démêlées avec ses fournisseurs chinois, jouets défectueux qui ont entraîné des rejets et des poursuites ( mort d'un enfant par étouffement), inventaires élevés etc....Les toupies peuvent-elles faire monter le titre? Oui !mais ça va prendre une folie ce Noël et pas de rupture de stock....

J'ai reçu un e-mail d'un boursicoteur ce matin qui possède toujours ses actions depuis.....

J'ai eu un coup au coeur 

pour ensuite me rendre compte que....

Jun 15, 2011 1: 20 reverse Stock Split

La terre brulée après leurs passage....

Le "papy boom", désastre pour les finances publiques ? En l'absence d'intervention des autorités en matière de dépenses liées au vieillissement, les dettes publiques des pays développés risquent de s'envoler dans les 40 prochaines années, selon une étude publiée par Standard & Poor's.

L'agence de notation précise qu'il ne s'agit pas de prédictions, mais d'une simulation de l'impact du vieillissement de la population, à partir de scénarios hypothétiques. Au total, les comptes de 50 Etats, représentant les deux tiers des habitants de la planète, sont passés à la loupe. Par ailleurs, l'étude ne tient pas compte des réformes engagées ou prévues après la fin 2011.

Le vieillissement de la population représente un vrai défi pour les finances publiques. Il risque notamment d'entraîner un bond du coût des pensions de retraite, qui devraient représenter 11% du Produit intérieur brut (PIB) à l'horizon 2050, contre 2% actuellement. Sans compter aussi une forte hausse des dépenses de santé et de celles liées à la dépendance, explique S&P.

Un jour, nos enfants auront 20 ans, 30 ans, 40 ans. Ils embrasseront l'âge où l'on commence à discerner, dans les épreuves que l'on subit, ce qui dépend de soi et ce qui vient d'autrui. L'âge où l'on dresse les premier bilan et où l'on s'emploie à construire sa vie. C'est alors, quand on est plein de sève et d'espoir, en pleine possession de ses moyens, affamé d'avenir, qu'on se heurte brutalement aux murs, aux impasses, aux crevasses sociales laissées par les générations précédentes et qu'on compte, désarmé, les outils qui nous manquent pour en triompher. Ce jour-là, nos enfants nous haïront. Et ils auront raison. Car nous, les baby-boomers, leur avons laissé une société molle, mitée, usée. Nous avons eu tous les atouts en mains, nous avons exercé sans pitié notre droit d'inventaire sur les valeurs que les générations précédentes nous avaient transmises, nous avons grandi dans une société en pleine croissance. Pourtant, nous sommes la première génération qui laissera moins à la suivante que ce qu'elle a reçu de la précédente. Et c'est le pire qu'on puisse faire à ses enfants : leur léguer des dettes.

Chypre

IMX.to

On Feb. 21, Imax, the Canadian company known best for its super-giant movie screens, revealed the final details of what had been, all in all, a pretty solid year. Adjusted earnings per share climbed 95% in 2012, to 80¢. Revenues were up 20%. And the company’s digital remastering business, which converts Hollywood blockbusters to the Imax format, posted solid returns.

Perhaps most important for Imax watchers, the company installed 125 new theatre system in 2012. It also signed contracts to build 142 more, helping quiet the whispers that surely everybody who wants a movie screen the size of two barns has bought one already.

But alas for Imax, a new year brings new challenges, and 2013 promises a few doozies. Chief among them: the fortunes of a heartthrob copper named Jai Dixit and his bumbling sidekick, Ali. As the heroes in the Dhoom movie series, Dixit and Ali have become possibly the most popular protagonists in Indian film.Dhoom was a massive hit when it was released in 2004. Dhoom 2 fared even better in 2006.Dhoom 3 is scheduled—after a series of delays—to hit theatres next December. And Imax is hoping to ride its coattails to success in the massive and notoriously difficult-to-crack Indian film market.

Until recently, Imax had barely a footprint in India. The company boasts more than 100 screens in China—with at least 150 more on the way soon—and more than 250 in the U.S., its largest market. In India, it had only three at the end of 2012. More Imax cinemas are on the way for the country, including several more before the end of this year. But getting Indian consumers to pony up for pricey Imax tickets could still be a tough sell.

That’s where Dhoom 3 comes in. The movie is scheduled to be the first Bollywood production ever remastered for Imax’s eye-stretching format. It will also boast the star power of Aamir Khan, an Indian film legend who signed on to play the villain, and could just be the jolt Imax needs to find its way into the Indian mainstream.

It’s easy to understand why the company wants to get there. By most measures, India is the world’s largest film market. The country produces more movies than any other in the world—more than 900 (in more than 20 different languages) in 2011, according to Ernst & Young. And it sells somewhere in the neighbourhood of three movie tickets for each of the more than 1 billion people living in India every year. The industry has such a dominant place in Indian society, in fact, that some 14 million Indians go to the movies on any given day, according to Deloitte. That figure becomes only slightly less staggering when you consider that it represents less than 1.5% of the country’s total population

ut for all its size, the Indian film market has never been terribly profitable. The pure volume of films coming out of Bollywood and other regional hubs is so large that no one company has an easy time making money from them. And ticket prices remain on average far below those in other parts of the world, a serious problem for a company like Imax, which depends on premium pricing to justify higher production costs. What’s more, if Indians have had a hard time earning a rupee from Indian film, Americans have done, on the whole, much worse. An Indian film executive told a U.S. diplomat in 2010 that American films represent just 3% to 6% of the Indian market, according to a cable released by Wikileaks. That’s another significant hurdle for Imax, which relies on Hollywood blockbusters—ginned up for the big, big screen—to drive much of its business.

There are signs, however, that Indians’ tastes are beginning to change. More and more luxury multiplexes, fertile ground for Imax screens, are opening in India every year. And western blockbusters like The Avengers and Skyfall, the most recent James Bond instalment, are doing big business, says Rajesh Mansukhani, a Bollywood watcher who until recently hosted a radio show on Indian film in Vancouver. Life of Pi, an effects-heavy Hollywood film with a mostly Indian cast, has been doing even better, dominating the Indian box office since its release late last year.

The path, then, for Imax is clear, if not exactly guaranteed: introduce the wider Indian market to its brand with Dhoom 3, then keep audiences hooked afterward with a steady diet of American action. The second movie in The Hobbit trilogy will be available in Imax just weeks before Dhoom 3. The Amazing Spider-Man 2, a potentially huge hit with Indian audiences, comes out in Imax the following May. Mansukhani, for one, thinks it’s a solid plan. “People will spend a few hundred more rupees to go and see an Imax movie,” he says, “provided there are more Imax cinemas.”

Pendant fort longtemps, en gros jusqu'au départ de Steve Jobs, Apple se refusait à verser des dividendes aux actionnaires, considérant qu'ils n'avaient qu'à se payer sur la hausse du cours de l'action. Depuis, les fonds de pension ont tout fait pour qu'Apple reverse une partie de son trésor de guerre. La société l'a fait timidement il y a un an. La baisse constante du cours de l'action a rendu les actionnaires plus revendicatifs et Apple plus encline à plus distribuer.
Selon Bloomberg, qui cite de nombreux analystes, Apple pourrait augmenter le dividende versé de 56%, ce qui représenterait en année pleine la somme de 15,7 milliards de dollars.

Il lui restera dans tous les cas de quoi continuer à augmenter son trésor de guerre de près de 130 milliards de dollars tout en contentant, enfin pour le moment, les actionnaires.
Etant clients et pas actionnaires, nous aurions préféré que la société investisse autrement cet argent, par exemple en passant la garantie contractuelle (partout dans le monde) de tous ses produits à deux ou trois ans, ce qui aurait été un argument de vente certain et un moyen de redonner confiance à pas mal de clients échaudés.

HPQ + AAPL= Katy en feu

Morgan Stanley’s Katy Huberty was on CNBC a short while ago on the “Fast Money Halftime Report,” talking with Michelle Caruso-Cabrera in what the anchor characterized as a rare TV appearance, about her upgrade today of Hewlett-Packard  as well as positive remarks about Apple .

Huberty, pressed on the lack of growth, still, at HP, told Caruso-Cabrera and the gang on Halftime that it doesn’t matter “for the next nine months” because improving free cash flow is the issue that investors will care about:

We think Meg [Whitman, HP's CEO] is healing the brand, healing morale, and the company will top its free cash flow guidance by 35% this year, which will contribute to accelerating cash returns to HP investors. What you saw in fiscal Q1 [ended in January] was the co reported free cash flow of $2.1 billion, versus their forecast for $5 billion for the year, so they’ve already executed on better free cash flow, we think they can hit $6.7 billion. We think Meg is focusing the team on better free cash flow rather than prior executives’ focus on revenue. Meg is taking a different tack. She’s focusing the team on rigorous process around capital investments. I don’t think they need to grow revenue in next nine months. At the analyst day in October, they will have to answer that question [of growth]. But you see already they are moving away from Wintel PCs, they are taking share in printers, they are offering new power-efficient servers selling into internet data centers. But I wouldn’t expect to see revenue growth in next 12 months.

Asked about Apple, Huberty, who has an Overweight rating on the stock and a $630 price target, predicted a big comeback for the company with software features for the iPhone, including a “killer feature“:

I do believe that AAPL is approaching a bottom. As you have heard, they are talking about returning more cash, and we think they will do that in coming weeks. But people don’t own AAPL for that, they own AAPL for innovation. You saw the Samsung Galaxy S4 come out last week, that shows you the innovation cards are up for grabs. What is lacking in that product [the S4] is a killer feature. We think that’s where Apple will surprise this year. This [iPhone] 5S cycle this year will be about a killer feature that drives consumers increasingly to the platform, and that increases the value of those 500 million accounts.