In this segment from the Motley Fool Money podcast, Chris Hill, Jason Moser, Matt Argersinger, and Simon Erickson talk about a couple of investments that are beginning to look riskier than you might think and then shift over to the stocks on their radar this week.
A full transcript follows the video.
This podcast was recorded on July 29, 2016.
Chris Hill: As always, people on the program may have interests in the stocks they talk about, and The Motley Fool may have formal recommendations for or against, so don't buy yourself stocks based solely on what you hear.
Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. Chris Hill here in the studio with Matt Argersinger, Jason Moser, and Simon Erickson. Our email address is [email protected]. From Cody Terrell, who writes, "Longtime fan and just wanted to get your opinion on the recent Netflix drop." Yeah, Netflix taking a little dip last week.
Matt Argersinger: Taking a little dip. Cody, we've taken a very long look at Netflix in Million Dollar Portfolio. It's on our watch list, and you know, it's a Fool favorite. It's a great company. and I can talk about the accolades, and I love the service.
But the thing with Netflix that's difficult to understand right now for an investor, difficult to see, is the amount they're going to have to spend. They are spending on content, but the amount they're going to have to spend going forward with not only just generating original content, but of course licensing content from elsewhere because unless the subscriber kind of grows exceptionally well, it's doubtful that they're ever going to be able to scale the business as well as we think they are, because they're going to have to spend so much on content. So, little bit of a risky play right now, I mean, the stock's come down, so you're getting a good price here, but gosh, the risks are certainly there for Netflix.
Jason Moser: I think that question was asked of Reed Hastings on the call -- basically, is there a point where you feel like you're going to be able to pull back on content spend. I think he may have said "infinite," or something to that effect, and they are going to have to always just spend a lot of money on it. The content just doesn't live forever anymore.
Hill: Question from David Goldberg: "When talking about the future of autonomous cars, you often speak of Uber, Tesla, and other car manufacturers, but what about Mobileye? They're a leading producer of the sensors used to create autonomous cars and have recently announced partnerships with Intel and BMW." What do you think, Simon? Mobileye?
Simon Erickson: Well, yeah, I don't know. I mean, this is a risky one right now because Tesla just phased out Mobileye's EyeQ system out of the future developments of the Tesla, which was one of their biggest wins early on, when they were getting a lot of wins with the new bids that they were getting with the automakers.
But I mean, let's hear it straight from what Elon Musk had to say about it. He says that their "ability to evolve their technology is negatively affected by having to support hundreds of models from legacy auto companies." So basically he's saying Tesla wants to take control of this all themselves, and he thinks that it's going to just be too hard and too expensive for Mobileye to try to make a self-driving version of every automaker's car out there. I do think that will be a challenge.
Hill: All right, let's get to the stocks on our radar. No Steve Broido this week; he is at the beach. But Matty, let me start with you. What are you looking at this week?
Argersinger: Sure. I like Proto Labs, ticker PRLB. I've liked the company for a long time. They had a bit of a rough quarter, like a lot of companies. This is a prototyping company, low-volume manufacturer, small cap, and subject to volatility. But there's been a bit of an industrial slowdown in North America and Europe, and that's kind of impacting them. But so many great things for this business. I like the niche they're in. I like the fact that, really, for companies that want to outsource a lot of their low-volume manufacturing, this is where they're going, to Proto Labs. And so I think it's got about $4 in earnings power within five years, so if that's true, and I could be very wrong, and I am often, this stock is pretty cheap today.
Hill: All right, Simon Erickson, what are you looking at this week?
Erickson: Chris, I'm going with Universal Display, ticker OLED, which is appropriate because they own the IP after decades of developing organic light-emitting diodes. These are the lighting elements that are thinner, flexible, and more energy efficient, that made them very popular for consumer electronic devices that want good lighting, but also battery performance, too. I just see stocks hitting an all-time highs again. But I just think there's a lot of opportunity, whether it be in the upcoming iPhone, which is rumored right now, or a lot of virtual-reality stuff, which is going to be a huge one for this stock.
Hill: All right, Jason Moser, we've got about a minute left. What are you looking at?
Moser: I think you need to isolate that "I am wrong often" sound by Matty. We'll give it to his wife for Christmas, all right? I'm looking at Zillow, ticker Z and also ZG because of the stock split. This is a holding in Million Dollar Portfolio. Their earnings are coming out next week. Marketplace is the key driver for the business, makes up about 90% of total revenue. Most of that is the premier agent count. It's an interesting strategy shift they've taken and really not trying to grow that premier agent count, but rather focus on just the high performers. We've been kicking this around at MDP a lot, trying to figure out if that doesn't put a cap on their market opportunity at some point. That's what we'll be focusing on with earnings coming out next week.
Hill: All right, guys, Jason Moser, Simon Erickson, Matt Argersinger, thanks for being here. Keep the emails coming to [email protected], and if you want to check out past episodes of Motley Fool Money and all of The Motley Fool's podcasts, you can go to podcast.fool.com. You can check us out on iTunes, Sirius, Spotify, anywhere you find podcasts you can find The Motley Fool. That's going to do it for this weeks edition of Motley Fool Money. Mixing the show this week is Dan Boyd. Our producer is Mac Greer. I'm Chris Hill. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next week.
