Giving its biggest critics -- its shareholders -- a sneak peek at next month's quarterly report, IMAX
Shares of the big-screen cinematic enabler were trading 10% higher today, after IMAX expressed the possibility of topping earlier expectations of full-year 2005 earnings between $0.35 and $0.38 a share.
The company closed out the quarter with a record 14 new theater installations. Through 2005, IMAX received orders for 45 systems, a healthy improvement over the 36 orders it picked up a year earlier.
Why are entertainment centers, museums, and even multiplexes hitting up IMAX for its beefy signature sight and sound experiences? Dwindling box-office traffic over the past few years tells part of the story. Folks who are now spoiled by their home theaters need an upgraded reason to head out to a theater and overpay for nachos and popcorn.
Companies like IMAX and AccessIT
IMAX has been teaming up with Time Warner
Companies like IMAX and AccessIT may not come quickly to those rattling off promising growth stocks, but that's the point. The fact that they are percolating in an industry that many have left for dead may be the perfect reason to dig deeper. Are investors frustrated with the prospects for traditional theater operators like Regal
Perhaps that's why IMAX was recently recommended in the Motley Fool Rule Breakers growth-stock newsletter service, and why AccessIT has had some lively and insightful threads go up in the discussion board for Fool subscribers recently. If it's a sector worth saving -- and the movie houses most certainly are -- there are some neat investing ideas just waiting for companies looking to ride to the rescue.
Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz is a movie buff, but he does not own shares in any of the companies mentioned in this story. The Fool has a disclosure policy. Rick is also part of the Rule Breakers newsletter research team, seeking out tomorrow's ultimate growth stocks a day early.