Neha Gupta

Facilitating payments isn’t enough At the Credit Suisse 21st Annual Technology, Media & Telecom Conference, PayPal (PYPL) chief financial officer John Rainey stated that the company aims to become an everyday part of customers’ financial lives. To insert itself into customers’ routines, PayPal acknowledges that it cannot limit itself to its roots of facilitating payments for […]

Alphabet (GOOGL) has several branches, and Google is the branch that looks after its smart speaker business.

Faced with stiff competition for online marketing budgets, slowing revenue and user growth, and a falling stock price, Twitter (TWTR) seems to be battling a huge storm.

Facebook’s net profit was $3.9 billion in 2Q17, up from $2.3 billion in the corresponding quarter a year earlier.

Alphabet’s (GOOGL) Google submitted to the European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union (EZU), a plan on how it will stop favoring its own shopping services in its Internet search results.

Amazon’s (AMZN) 2017 book value per share of $51.30 compares to the expected book value per share of $52.50 for 2018.

Google could use Redux’s technology to develop better smartphones to bolster its competition in the global smartphone market where it trails Apple and Samsung.

Alibaba’s (BABA) stock fell about 6.2% on February 1—the day the company released its fiscal 3Q18 (December quarter) earnings.

Amazon incurred $49.1 billion in operating expenses in the first quarter, including costs tied to its cloud computing business.

Deciphering Twitter’s comprehensive valuations Twitter (TWTR) has an EV (enterprise value) of ~$10.2 billion. Among its peers, PayPal (PYPL), Baidu (BIDU), Square (SQ), and Groupon (GRPN) have enterprise values of ~$68.1 billion, ~$73.9 billion, ~$9.2 billion, and ~$1.9 billion, respectively. Twitter’s EV-to-adjusted-EBITDA[1. enterprise value to earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization] multiple for the trailing 12 […]

Baidu (BIDU) and Google have a lot of similarities. It’s no wonder Baidu has earned itself the nickname of the “Google of China.”

PayPal (PYPL) could have bright prospects despite the competitive threat it faces from Square and Apple in the online payment market, according to equity research firm BTIG.

It comes as no surprise that Google is spending hundreds of millions of dollars every year to review content on its platforms such as YouTube.

Twitter (TWTR) is considering rolling out a feature that could empower its users to report misleading or deceitful news stories, according to a Washington Post report.

Alibaba (BABA) has returned -2.02% in the last month, 20.2% in the last 12 months, and 5.9% in the last five days.

Twitter (TWTR) announced in mid-February that it would be dismantling its app for Apple desktop computers.

Several Wall Street companies have weighed in on Groupon (GRPN) since the company released its 4Q17 results back in February.

Monthly active users Investors are on high alert as Twitter’s (TWTR) 3Q17 release approaches. Last quarter, Twitter failed to grow its audience base meaningfully, and going by how the market reacted to the report, investors were not impressed. Twitter went into 2Q17 with 328 million MAUs (monthly active users), and it came out of the quarter […]

Soaring traffic acquisition costs and rising product development and marketing expenditures have weighed on Alphabet’s operating margins in recent years.

Twitter reported earnings per share of -$0.70 in 2017, while its EPS for 2018 is forecast to be $0.40.

As Facebook (FB) reports its 4Q16 results, all eyes are on the company’s mobile revenue. FB has begun taking steps to monetize its other mobile properties such as Instagram.

Facebook (FB) has once again reiterated its ambitions to become the leading content supplier in the social media space.

The European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (or GDPR) came into force on May 25.

Amazon paid $13.7 billion to acquire Whole Foods in a move that was viewed as in sync with its expansion into the food business.

Findings of a recent small survey paint a disturbing picture for Snap’s (SNAP) Spectacles smart glasses business.

Amazon (AMZN) had expressed interest in acquiring Flipkart to try to keep Walmart (WMT) away from India’s fast-growing online retail sector.

Snap (SNAP) is poised to release its second-quarter results amid speculations of the company taking a deeper plunge into gaming.

With a book value per share of $219.60, Alphabet is trading at a price-to-book multiple of 4.8x.

With the exception of China (MCHI) and North Korea, Facebook’s (FB) social media services are available worldwide, giving the company a global subscriber base of ~2.0 billion users.

Twitter (TWTR) is gearing up to tighten rules to foster healthier conversations on its platform and curb toxic speech.

According to eMarketer, Facebook (FB) took 19.9% of total US digital advertising funds in 2017, and Google (GOOGL) took 38.6%.

Alphabet reported net profits of $3.5 billion in 2Q17, down from $4.9 billion in 3Q16 due to the fine.

In the third quarter, eBay accounted for 11.0% of PayPal’s total payment volume, which was down from 13.0% in the third quarter of 2017.

On May 12, 2017, Alphabet (GOOGL) generated investor returns of 30.1% on a trailing 12-month basis.

Baidu (BIDU) has formed an AI partnership with the city of Shanghai.

Snap, which went public in March 2017, looks focused on accelerating its path to profitability.

Du Xiaoman Financial, Baidu’s (BIDU) financial services subsidiary, has been cleared to enter the business of selling mutual funds in China.

While announcing its plans for three new undersea cable systems and five new cloud regions, Google also disclosed that it had invested $30 billion into expanding its cloud infrastructure over the last three years.

On May 22, 2017, 2.6 million shares of Amazon (AMZN) exchanged hands, and the stock rose 1.1% to close at ~$970.7.

Twitter’s EV-to-adjusted EBITDA (enterprise value to adjusted earnings before interested, tax, depreciation, and amortization) for the trailing 12 months is 68.1x.

Amid tightening competition for advertising dollars, there is growing pressure on Google to diversify its revenue sources.

As Zynga (ZNGA) prepares to report its 4Q17 results, Alibaba (BABA) and India (INDA) are in the minds of many investors who have followed recent developments.

On December 19, Alibaba (BABA) stock opened at $140.75 and closed at $137.14, posting an average volume of 27.24 million.

PayPal grows faster than its parent, eBay PayPal (PYPL) outperformed several of its main challengers in 2017. While the stock rose 86.5%, Square (SQ) rose 154.4%, Amazon (AMZN) rose 56%, and Apple (AAPL) rose 46.1%. Alternative loan peer LendingClub (LC) fell 21.3% in 2017. PayPal’s parent, eBay (EBAY), saw its stock rise 27.1%. Could investors expect […]

Alphabet’s EPS (earnings per share) of $9.36 in 4Q16 was $0.26 below consensus expectations despite increasing from $8.67 in 4Q15.

Google’s smart speaker unit shipments soared 420% year-over-year in the second quarter.

According to Reuters, Facebook (FB) is currently in discussions with banks about improving customer service through its apps.

In the wake of the Facebook (FB) privacy scandals earlier this year, Twitter (TWTR) had a bit of explaining to do.

Google could have a much easier time policing its platforms to keep false news, so-called “fake news,” and other inappropriate content at bay.

Snap (SNAP), the parent of photo-sharing app Snapchat, reported a significant improvement in revenue for 4Q17.

If hardware products appeal to social media users, then Snap as well as Facebook will both enter the business. It won’t be an easy road for Snap.

Alibaba (BABA) is scheduled to report its fiscal Q1 2019 results on August 23.

In 3Q17, Alphabet reported EMEA revenues of $9.1 billion, implying a growth of 23% YoY (year-over-year).

Alibaba’s (BABA) big news in early 2018 was that the Chinese e-commerce giant was swapping its profit share in Ant Financial for an equity stake in the business.

The Waymo litigation, the leadership crisis, and escalating competition appear to be scaring investors away from Uber.

Facebook (FB) is betting on video to drive its growth in the coming years.

As small- and medium-sized enterprises go online to bolster their customer exposure, the local advertising market is heating up with competition, and Twitter (TWTR) is one of the providers stoking the fire.

Baidu’s (BIDU) expenses have risen steadily in recent years with notable increases in the cost of revenue and R&D (research and development) spending.

Alibaba’s 14-day RSI (relative strength index) was 75 compared to 87, 67, 84, and 96 for peers Twitter, Amazon, Facebook, and Alphabet, respectively.

Yandex (YNDX) is on track to launch its Yandex.Music service in Israel in the coming weeks, the Times of Israel has reported.

Shrinking profit margins have raised concerns about Baidu’s (BIDU) long-term prospects. Baidu’s operating margins trended downward last year.

Google has long required its employees to settle their claims against the company through arbitration.

China has been struggling with an economic slowdown recently in the midst of trade frictions with the United States.

During Amazon’s 4Q16 earnings call, the management didn’t offer a detailed explanation about how it would create the additional 100,000 full-time jobs it promised last month.

What’s Snap’s economic value? Snap (SNAP) boasts an enterprise value (or EV) of $14.3 billion. Peers FireEye (FEYE), IBM (IBM), Symantec (SYMC), and Oracle (ORCL) have EVs of $2.5 billion, $176.8 billion, $22.1 billion, and $190.6 billion, respectively. Snap’s trailing-12-month EV-to-sales ratio is 20.3x, and its EV-to-projected-sales ratio for the next year is 11.0x. Snap’s price […]

Japan is Twitter’s (TWTR) second-largest market after the United States.

Amazon’s (AMZN) automated Amazon Go store concept could improve the experience of shoppers, but it might also raise job creation questions.

Back in May 2017, Alibaba (BABA) announced a plan to repurchase its own shares to the tune of $6.0 billion over two years.

Alipay for US taxis Alibaba (BABA), through its payments affiliate Ant Financial, recently inked a deal to expand its mobile payment business in the United States (SPY). Ant Financial announced that it was partnering with Verifone, a US-based payments technology provider, to enable thousands of taxis in the United States to accept payments through Alipay. […]

PayPal finished 3Q17 with 218 million active customer accounts globally, most of which are consumer accounts that could use Raisin’s savings deposit marketplace.

Amazon disclosed in April that its Prime program had attracted over 100 million members globally.

Amazon (AMZN) closed 3Q17 with 541,900 employees around the world.

In 3Q17, Twitter generated advertising revenues of $503.0 million. In that quarter, the company generated total revenues of $590.0 million.

As of June 9, Zynga’s (ZNGA) shares had risen 44.4% since the start of 2017, with the stock’s best month so far being May.

Alphabet (GOOGL) units Google and Verify have partnered on a program to tackle vision loss.

Zynga (ZNGA), like other game developers such as Electronic Arts (EA) and Glu Mobile (GLUU), has been making an aggressive mobile push.

While in 2017, Twitter was focused on driving profit margin improvements, in 2018, driving growth is going to take the center stage.

In June last year, Baidu (BIDU) launched a stock repurchase program under which it planned to return as much as $1.0 billion to its shareholders in a period of one year.

Of the 47 analysts covering Amazon (AMZN), 41 have given it “buy” recommendations, one has given it a “sell” recommendation, and five have given it “hold” recommendations.

In November 2017, PayPal announced that it decided to sell its US consumer loan business to Synchrony.

Amazon (AMZN) is expanding its cloud footprint in Latin America as it pursues growth overseas.

At its Worldwide Developer Conference event, Apple (AAPL) announced it would add a new peer-to-peer (or P2P) payment service to its iMessage chat app.

Airbus is flying out of Microsoft’s (MSFT) Office environment, and the destination is Google.

Yelp (YELP) is hoping that Yelp Wi-Fi and Nowait, the two businesses it acquired about a month apart in 2017, will drive long-term growth and profitability by enabling it to capture more local advertising budgets.

PayPal’s (PYPL) chief financial officer, John Rainey, mentioned partnering with Amazon (AMZN) during a recent Credit Suisse technology event. He didn’t clarify whether the companies were still in active talks.

When eBay (EBY) announced earlier this year that Dutch company Adyen was replacing PayPal (PYPL) as its primary payments processor, something was not discussed.

Beyond processing transactions for merchants, Square (SQ) also supplies business loans to its merchant customers through a service called Square Capital.

Groupon (GRPN) is pumping millions of dollars (UUP) into marketing and customer acquisition efforts as it seeks to conquer the North American daily deals market.

Amazon (AMZN) is looking to build a new distribution center in Atlanta, according to an Atlanta Business Chronicle report citing sources familiar with the plans.

Amazon (AMZN) recently opened several bookstores in strategic locations in the US, including New York City.

In 2016, Alphabet issued a ten-year bond to raise $2 billion to pay off some short-term debts.

PayPal (PYPL) is introducing a new cashback credit card. The digital payment company has teamed up with Synchrony Bank (SYF) to launch the PayPal Cashback Mastercard.

Investment research firm Zenith estimates that worldwide spending on online video ads rose 23.0% to $27.2 billion in 2017.

Zynga closed 3Q17 with 19 million daily active users (or DAUs) on mobile, indicating that its mobile audience grew 19% YoY year-over-year.

According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, the global book market could grow to $121.1 billion by 2020, up from $114.8 billion in 2016.

Square (SQ) is a corporate investor in online ticketing company Eventbrite (EB), which went public in September 2018.

Alphabet’s (GOOGL) Other Bets segment continues to feed off Google, which is the source of all the profits Alphabet reports.

PayPal (PYPL) has partnered with AliExpress, a marketplace owned by Alibaba (BABA). PayPal is helping merchants on AliExpress accept payment from international consumers.

According to China Daily, citing data compiled by McKinsey, China is poised to be the world’s largest market for driverless vehicles in the next decade.

PayPal Credit allows PayPal (PYPL) users to purchase products from PayPal merchants and pay later.