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4-Star Stocks Poised to Pop: Ancestry.com

Based on the aggregated intelligence of 180,000-plus investors participating in Motley Fool CAPS, the Fool's free investing community, online family history resource Ancestry.com (Nasdaq: ACOM  ) has earned a respected four-star ranking.

With that in mind, let's take a closer look at Ancestry's business and see what CAPS investors are saying about the stock right now.

Ancestry facts

Headquarters (Founded) Provo, Utah (1983)
Market Cap $1.12 billion
Industry Internet software and services
Trailing-12-Month Revenue $354.4 million
Management

CEO Timothy Sullivan (since 2005)

CFO Howard Hochhauser (since 2009)

Return on Equity (Average, Past 2 Years) 12.2%
Cash/Debt $71 million / $0

Sources: Capital IQ (a division of Standard & Poor's) and Motley Fool CAPS.

On CAPS, 93.5% of the 336 members who have rated Ancestry believe the stock will outperform the S&P 500 going forward. These bulls include yragca and azspudking.

This past summer, yragca listed several of Ancestry's positives:

They have proprietary software; they have been in the business for years; the networking effect helps them build a very significant competitive advantage. In addition, as baby boomers age they gravitate to a study of their family roots. The CEO is heavily invested, as is the senior management team.

Over the next five years, in fact, Ancestry is expected to grow its bottom line at a brisk rate of 21% annually. That's faster than less-specialized Internet information giants like Google (Nasdaq: GOOG  ) (19%), Sohu.com (Nasdaq: SOHU  ) (17%), and Yahoo! (13%).

CAPS member azspudking listed several of the trends working in Ancestry's favor:

1. Since I started doing my genealogy back in the mid 90's, the number of people doing it has increased as data became available online.

2. Most genealogists are retired and the Baby Boomers are not getting any younger.

...

6. Continued Growth in getting records of interest to genealogists online and searchable.

7. Family Tree feature which allows you to connect with others researching the same families

Overall, I think ACOM has built a strong company with a great moat around them and it will be hard to take over their position without spending a lot of money. As for continued membership growth and maintaining that growth as customers, I think I am proof that they can and will since I've been a member since 2003.

What do you think about Ancestry, or any other stock for that matter? If you want to retire rich, you need to put together the best portfolio you can. Owning exceptional stocks is a surefire way to secure your financial future, and on Motley Fool CAPS, thousands of investors are working every day to find them. CAPS is 100% free, so get started!

Interested in another easy way to track Ancestry? Add it to your watchlist.

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Fool contributor Brian Pacampara owns no position in any of the companies mentioned. Motley Fool newsletter services have recommended buying shares of Ancestry, Google, Sohu, and Yahoo!. The Fool owns shares of Google and Yahoo!. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days.

We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Fool's disclosure policy always gets a perfect score.


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