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Texas must hate successful internet giants. At least, that is what one must think after two sets of goofy, litigious lawsuits were brought against Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG), Yahoo!, Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) in the last two months. On top of the Polaris lawsuit from a few months ago that accused the internet giants of violating its email filtering patent, Performance Pricing, Inc. (from Austin, Texas) now says that the three internet giants, along with AOL, LLC (part of Time Warner, Inc. (NYSE: TWX)) have violated patents related to -- get this -- a "transaction system."
Apparently some smaller firms have made it a point to make money not with innovation and marketing, but from trying to patent basic business practices and processes. This time around, these four companies have been charged with using Performance Pricing's technology "in methods and systems that they make, use, sell and offer to sell."
Is having a website that transacts business with customers a process that is patentable? I'm waiting for Performance Pricing to sue the other hundred million website operators who transact business with customers. Excuse me while I twiddle my thumbs here.
Is this "technology" even patentable? My guess is that the U.S. patent in question, 6,978,253, described as "Systems and Methods for Transacting Business Over a Global Communications Network such as the Internet" will be laughed out of court once it reaches that stage. Performance Pricing has requested a jury trial.
Yum Brands (NYSE: YUM) reported 17% growth in third-quarter profit, despite a mere 1% growth in U.S. profits. Profits in its China division grew 28% and international division profits were up 21%. Overall, net income rose to $270 million, or 50 cents per share beating expected earnings of per share of 45 cents. Yum shares climbed $1.94, or 5.7%, to close at $36.29 yesterday ahead of the results and continued to gain in after-hours trading.
After crossing the $600 threshold in yesterday's session, Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) continue to climb in premarket trading. The search giant will likely continue doing what it does best and that is to monetize its assets. Google is scheduled to announce tomorrow that it will begin showing YouTube videos on thousands of other Web sites, hoping to profit from ads attached to the clips. The ads accompanying the YouTube clips will appear as a graphic straddling the video or as a link along the bottom.
Deutsche Bank downgradedCoca-Cola Co. (NYSE: KO) to Hold from Buy, citing valuation after shares have appreciated 22% since March. PepsiCo (NYSE: PEP) received a similar downgrade from Buy to Hold at the broker. KO shares are down half a percent in premarket trading.
Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) reported its sales in China for the first three quarters of the year and the growth has been considerable at 30%. Sales of Ford brand vehicles, grew 27%, sales of Changan Ford Mazda, the three-way tie-up among Ford, Japan's Mazda Motor Corp and Changan Automobile Co Ltd, were up 59% and sales of the hot-selling mid-sized Focus sedan, rose 69%. Premium brands sales were up 72%. Ford has also announced it and Mazda Motor Corp will build a second, $500 million plant in Thailand to produce 100,000 cars a year to meet the region's growing demand for small cars.
Yahoo Inc (NASDAQ: YHOO) will buy 10% of a share sale by Alibaba.com Ltd, China's biggest e-commerce firm, as it steps up a battle with Google and Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU) in the world's second-biggest Internet market. Yahoo already has a 40% stake in the Chinese firm's parent, Alibaba Group.
MarketWatch reports on continued speculation that Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) is eyeing the purchase of a stake in Sanofi-Aventis (NYSE: SNY) or even a full takeover. Sanofi-Aventis shares rose 1.8% in premarket action.
Well, that didn't take long. Hackers have cracked the new update Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) has implemented in the iPhone and iPod Touch. Third party applications access and other hacks have been reported. And the shares continue to climb, after another record close when AAPL shares gained 4% yesterday, they continue the gains this morning, up 1.2% in premarket action.
As they resigned from their executive positions in Skype, co-founders agreed that eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) had indeed overpaid for the internet telecom group.
Yahoo, Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) and eBay, Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) are partnering up this holiday season to try and keep all those nasty but legit-looking email messages out of your Yahoo! Mail inbox. Yahoo! is by far the world's most popular web-based email service and I can only imagine the effort it takes to sniff out fraudulent and phishing email messages from tens of millions of inboxes every day.
In many cases, Yahoo! Mail users will receive official-looking messages that appears to come from eBay or its online payment division, PayPal. Those who are fooled into divulging personal information like passwords and account sign-in information usually have a large headache cleaning up the identity theft mess later. But, what if those unofficial email messages never arrived in your inbox to begin with?
Last last week, the three companies (PayPal is a wholly-owned eBay subsidiary) announced that the DomainKeys e-mail authentication system would be used to block malicious email messages from the inboxes of Yahoo! Mail users. Yahoo! stated that the upgrade would occur over its global email network for the next few weeks, allowing it to verify the domain from which email messages arrive. In other words, those Russia-based fraud emails that look like real eBay communications may soon be blocked for good.
This is a great initiative between the largest email provider and one of the largest commerce sites on the entire internet, and it's perfectly timed for the holiday e-commerce season that's already underway. Now, Yahoo! needs to market this new partnership in every way possible to let customers know what it is and how it can help them. Something like this does no deserve to be just working behind the scenes.
Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) shares are trading higher today after a new Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. report suggested this morning that Yahoo would be worth more if it broke up its Internet businesses. The analyst said Yahoo's operations could be valued as high as $39 per share, compared with a current share price closer to $27. If you think that the company won't fall by too much in the coming months, then now could be a good time to look at a bullish hedged trade on YHOO.
After hitting a one year high of $33.61 in May, the stock slipped through the spring and early summer to set its 52 week low of 22.27 in August. Yahoo! opened this morning at $27.78. So far today the stock has hit a low of $27.75 and a high of $28.16. As of 11:30, YHOO is trading at $27.78, up $0.63 (2.2%). The chart for YHOO looks bullish and steady, while S&P gives the stock a neutral 3 STARS (out of 5) hold rating.
For a bullish hedged play on this stock, I would consider a January bull-put credit spread below the $22.50 range. A bull-put credit spread is an options position that combines the purchase and sale of put options to hedge risk in case the stock doesn't do what you think but still leverage nice returns. This particular trade will make a 9.2% return in just 4 months as long as YHOO is above $22.50 at January expiration. Yahoo! would have to fall by more than 19% before we would start to lose money.
YHOO hasn't been below $22.50 by more than a few cents in the past year and has shown support around $25 recently. This trade could be risky if the company's earnings (due out on 10/16) disappoint, but even if that happens, this position could be protected by strong support between $22.50 and $24, where the stock bottomed out in August and September.
Brent Archer is an options analyst and writer at Investors Observer. DISCLOSURE: At publication time, Brent neither owns nor controls positions in YHOO.
No one seems satisfied with the plans that Sue Decker and Jerry Yang, Yahoo!'s (NASDAQ: YHOO) new management, have made for the company. Concerns about slow growth of display ads and a mediocre launch of the Panama search product have caused more grumbling among investors. No one thinks Q3 numbers are going to be impressive.
Yahoo! is up 3.5% this morning. 24/7 Wall St.published a summary of a report from Bernstein Research which shows that if the portal were broken into three pieces, the company would be worth $39 a share. The stock has been trading below $27.
The break-up document shows that Yahoo! should be cut into three pieces. The first is the display ad business. The second is the search business. And, the third is Yahoo!'s subscription operation. Bernstein is convinced that the three operations would do better with new owners For example, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) would do a better job of getting money from the Yahoo! search operation.
Bernstein earlier offered another option for Yahoo!. Out-source search to Google and cut 25% of total staff. The research house says that operating income would rise 206% next year compared to consensus numbers.
It is unlikely that Yahoo! management will take any of this advice, but the analysis does make one thing clear. The company is worth more than it stock price says.
British bank Barclays PLC (NYSE: BCS) withdrew its takeover offer for ABN Amro Holding NV (NYSE: ABN) on Friday, saying not enough shareholders tendered their shares. This leaves a consortium led by Royal Bank of Scotland PLC in position to buy ABN Amro in a deal worth €70.5 billion (US$99.9 billion), the largest takeover in the history of the financial industry.
Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) shares are up over 2.2% in premarket trading after Alibaba.com Corp., a unit of China's Alibaba Group, which is partly owned by Yahoo! won approval from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange to sell up to $1 billion worth of shares in its long-anticipated IPO.
The U.S. attorney in Brooklyn is investigating the collapse of two mortgage-related Bear Stearns (NYSE: BSC) hedge funds whose failure this summer cost investors an estimated $1.6 billion, according to the Wall Street Journal. The criminal probe is in the early stages and has yet to generate subpoenas.
Spring Nextel Corp. (NYSE: S) shares are up over 2% in premarket trading after the Wall Street Journal reported it has quietly launched a hunt for a successor to CEO [subscription] Gary Forsee amid investor pressure. The board hopes to name a new leader by early December.
Alcoa Inc. (NYSE: AA) announced yesterday it would take charges of $845 million as it closes in on the sale of two businesses - packaging and consumer products, and automotive castings - enabling it to focus on new growth opportunities.
Rio Tinto (NYSE: RTP) shares are up nearly 1.5% in premarket trading despite being downgraded to Hold from Buy by ABN Amro, mostly on valuation. Wachovia Securities downgradedMonster Worldwide, Inc. (NASDAQ: MNST) to Market Perform from Outperform, citing recent evidence of a slowdown in its North America Careers division. Walgreen Co. (NYSE: WAG) was downgraded to Sell from Buy at Banc of America Securities.
"What's very interesting is that there hasn't been much innovation in online advertising over the past few years," said Frank Addante, who is the CEO and founder of the Rubicon Project. Keep in mind that he is one of the pioneers of online advertising. After all, he took L90 public and eventually sold it to DoubleClick.
Well, this week, the Rubicon Project raised $6 million from lead investor Clearstone. In other words, Addante now has a chance to see if he will be the one to bring innovation back to the space.
Yesterday he gave me a demo of the new platform, and so far it looks pretty slick.
"We believe there are about 300 advertising networks in the US," said Addante. "Of course, there are those from Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) and Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO). But there are also many niche networks."
Now that Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) is still in the fray with its Exchange corporate e-mail solution and Yahoo! has entered into the dance with the Zimbra buy, Google's timing here is impeccable. But, are the Microsoft and Yahoo! solutions better than Google just beefing up security and adding more storage to its existing online corporate e-mail offering? That's up to each customer to decide, although anytime, anywhere, secure and easy access to e-mail is probably at the forefront of each corporate user's mind these days.
Business software is an area relatively new to Google, but with the company having acquired email security firm Postini for over $600 million recently, it must market and tout that technology to every business customer it can, starting now. A simple explanation of "increased corporate security" is not enough, and if Google is serious about challenging both Microsoft and Yahoo! in the business e-mail space, it has to start making large waves. A doubling of e-mail inbox capacity is a great start, but it's just that -- the start.
Another part of former CEO Terry Semel's strategy at Yahoo, Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) is being readied for a sale, as Yahoo's Kelkoo online shopping comparison site will probably go up on the bidding block soon. Kelkoo was purchased by Yahoo! in 2004 for roughly $670 million and was to be the premier price comparison shopping resource for all of Europe. Alas, as Yahoo! streamlines its strategy and dumps off non-core pieces of its business, this one too may be gone soon.
Yahoo! has already shut down its own photos website and plans to close its podcast service later this year, so the company seems to be wasting no time unloading non-core assets as it tries to get back to making money in several core areas while maintaining a lean offered-services structure. A few years ago, Yahoo! offered so much to so many that it was hard not to think of it as having a strategy of "offering something for everybody." Problem is, many of those areas distracted it from core businesses and could not stand on their own right. With company co-founder Jerry Yang in charge now, some Yahoo! services are finally being scuttled, as they should have been long ago. Even Yahoo! Music is facing some cutbacks, although a complete shutdown is seen as unlikely.
Although a Yahoo! spokesperson stated that "one of the priorities we have identified is improving the performance of Kelkoo -- our online shopping business." By improving, perhaps he meant getting the service in shape to sell off to someone else. In terms of online comparison shopping, it's hard to see why Yahoo! needed to play in a crowded field dominated by larger players like eBay, Inc.'s (NASDAQ: EBAY) shopping.com and many others like it.
Sprint Nextel Corporation's (NYSE: S) investors are unhappy, and led by the activist investor Ralph Whitworth, are voicing their displeasure with chairman and CEO Gary Forsee and the company's board, reported the Wall Street Journal.
The Associated Press reported that members of the United Automobile Workers union at two General Motors Corporation (NYSE: GM) locals have approved the union's tentative contract agreement with GM, local union officials said Wednesday.
Countrywide Financial Corporation (NYSE: CFC) has been ordered by a Delaware court to provide confidential information about its stock-granting practices to a Louisiana-based police pension fund that has invested in Countrywide, reported the Los Angeles Times.
CNet.com reported that Yahoo Inc (NASDAQ: YHOO) is upgrading its e-mail system starting today with technology designed to block phishing, spam, and other fraudulent e-mails that look like they come from eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) and PayPal, but actually don't.
Where is Yahoo, Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) headed these days? CEO Jerry Yang and President Sue Decker are in the middle of turning the internet giant back into a revenue leader after years of losing so many races to competitor Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG). Yahoo! still has the assets and the audience, which are 10 years in the making. What is doesn't have is the execution.
That was the message last Friday when Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) CEO and current king-of-everything Steve Jobs showed up to give some insight to a gathering of Yahoo! execs. His message was clear: like Apple of the past, Yahoo! has a great product portfolio and a world-class following of customers. What needs work is listening to customers and giving them solutions efficiently.
Only one thing stood out from the meeting: it was attended by 300 Yahoo! vice presidents. Three hundred? That right there tells me quite a bit if the number is right. Why on earth would Yahoo! need so many upper-level managers?
Barron's Online's (subscription required) "Inside Scoop" section reported that on Friday, two days after the stock dipped to $12.07, a 6-year low, Borders Group Inc (NYSE: BGP) CEO George Jones bought 50K shares, his first open market purchase since joining the retailer.
The Financial Times (subscription required) reported that Citigroup Inc (NYSE: C) CEO Chuck Prince is waiting for a review of the company's $3.3B in losses and writedowns in its banking business for Q3 before deciding whether to fire executives as a result of the poor performance, according to senior Citigroup executives.
Yahoo Inc (NASDAQ: YHOO) said it was considering selling Kelkoo, the online shopping comparison service that it acquired in 2004, admitting the acquisition did not pan out as planned, reported the Financial Times.
WEBSITES:
Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA) is going to combine its storage and server product teams to create a new converged group called the Systems team, Sun Microsystems CEO Jonathan Schwartz wrote in his blog.
Every year or so, some old roommate or a close friend's fiancee or somebody drags me onto yet another social networking site like a kid pulled off the bleachers at a middle school dance. This year, it was the very popular Facebook, one of the web's hottest private properties, which Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) has appraised somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 billion clams.
From my charming, handsome Facebook profile, you can get a pretty solid idea of my consumer habits, or at least the habits of the consumer I want you to think I am (Do I secretly love Nicholas Sparks novels? Do I burn through fungal creams? I'll never te-- I mean NO! No. Of course not!). I spill all my beans -- what I do with my free time, what books I read, what CDs I dig on, what TV shows I'd TiVo ... if I had a TiVo ... or a television. And I've never been private about it. Through the MySpaces and the Friendsters -- even ten years ago on my HotWired.com member page (remember these?) -- all that choice information has always been there since the beginning.
And, lucky me, so has the University of Phoenix. Why, when I log on to Facebook in the year 2007, is glorious old UoP still hassling me to go get my GED or whatever learn-at-home hustle it's running, particularly when the actual, genuine university that graduated me way back when is right there on the page, pulsing in Carolina blue beneath my favorite hilarious and insightful quotes?
U.S. stock futures are indicating this morning that the markets may continue yesterday's rally and start the session higher. After the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at a record high yesterday, this morning investors will focus on housing and car and truck sales.
Yesterday, the start of the fourth quarter, U.S. stocks rallied with the Dow reaching record highs, on hopes of future rate cuts. Huge write downs announced by banks also helped sentiment as many were hoping these mean the credit crisis is coming under control and being dealt with. The Dow industrials gained nearly 192 points to close at a new record 14,0857, having hit an intraday high of 14,115. This 1.38% climb was matched by the Nasdaq Composite and the S&P 500 with 1.46% and 1.33% respective advances of their own.
Only August pending U.S. home sales will be released today at 10:00 a.m. and sales are expected to show a further decline. Car makers will report September car and truck sales with Honda the only manufacturer expected to show year-over-year gains, according to MarketWatch, but the overall industry is starting to stabilize after car makers experienced a tough summer in the showrooms due to the sluggish economic climate. According to the average estimates of seven analysts in a Bloomberg survey, however, Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) and Chrysler are expected to post 15% and 5.9% declines in September U.S. sales and GM (NYSE: GM) a 3% increase.
Overseas, Asian markets rose to record highs with Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index closing above 28,000 points for the first time, Australia, Singapore, and Indonesia also reaching records. European stocks continued their advance today for the second day in a row, boosted by gains from the banking sector and solid results from British supermarket giant Tesco.
Palm Inc. (NASDAQ: PALM) shares fell nearly 5% in after-hours trading yesterday after the company reported a a small loss in its fiscal first quarter and forecast lower-than-expected results for the current quarter. As Palm continues to struggle, rivals Apple and RIM's performance has been phenomenal. In the quarter Palm sold 689,000 Treos, up 21% from the year-ago period. It lost $841,000, or a penny per share, in the first quarter on revenue that rose to $360.8 million, 1% above the year-ago period. Excluding charges, Palm would have earned $9.7 million, or 9 cents per share, beating analysts expectations. But Palm also issued a weak outlook.
Yahoo Inc. (NYSE: YHOO), in yet another attempt to gain back some market share from rival Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) in internet search, has retooled its online search engine to make it more helpful and engaging.
Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO) is releasing a major upgrade to its search engine technology. The company calls the new version an improvement, but only time can tell whether that is accurate. According to the FT the product promises "more relevant answers to queries and integrates audio, video and photos into its results pages." Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) and Ask.com have also released similar upgrades to their search products.
Yahoo! almost certainly spent a huge sum of money and precious engineering resources to bring the new product to market, but the company is in the unenviable position of launching a new version of its technology that is not likely to get it any additional marketshare. In other words, the company is running hard to stay in place.
It may be notable that the Yahoo! search improvement comes after those from Microsoft and Ask.com. It is a sign that being first to market in the most profitable part of the internet business is no longer prized because of Google's (NASDAQ: GOOG) huge lead.
For beaten down Yahoo!, a better mouse trap is not terribly valuable if there are no mice to catch.
No one seems satisfied with the plans that Sue Decker and Jerry Yang, 
"What's very interesting is that there hasn't been much innovation in online advertising over the past few years," said Frank Addante, who is the CEO and founder of the 
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Every year or so, some old roommate or a close friend's fiancee or somebody drags me onto yet another social networking site like a kid pulled off the bleachers at a middle school dance. This year, it was the very popular 
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