eelfland
17 years ago
Sorry, I mis-spoke. It was three dollars, not four. Could have been four, though, if I'd done better on the edges. But I'll take it. Pretty good chunk out of the middle for an overnight trade. Ready to buy another break, and have an order in at 16.25, just in case.
Best wishes.
EZ2
17 years ago
OT: MELI ~~~ Mercado May Attract Investors and Rival
Monday August 6, 7:13 am ET
By Kristen A. Lee, AP Business Writer
MercadoLibre's Potential for Growth May Draw Rivals After Initial Public Offering
NEW YORK (AP) -- When MercadoLibre Inc. launches its initial public offering this week, the online marketplace will count on luring investors with the potential growth of the emerging Latin American market.
In its prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company said Latin America, which is home to almost 9 percent of the world's population, has one of the world's fastest growing Internet penetration rates.
The company cited statistics from InternetWorldStats.com that Latin America's Internet user base surged more than fivefold between the end of 2000 and May 7.
Scott Sweet, the managing director of advisory firm IPO Boutique, said MercadoLibre will be an attractive buy for investors. The company, he said, "is in highly emerging growth countries, and it has little competition in that region at this time."
The same potential that may draw investors, however, could make MercadoLibre an attractive target for rivals, like its own stockholder eBay.
EBay, which will own an 18.5 percent stake in MercadoLibre after the IPO, reported 50 percent second-quarter earnings growth on July 18. But analysts expressed concern that the number of items for sale on the site fell for the third consecutive quarter, forcing the company to squeeze more money from each transaction.
As of March 31, MercadoLibre had 19.7 million registered users and averaged 2.9 million total listings per month. During the three months ended March 31, the company increased its earnings to $1 million, from $100,000, in the prior year. During the same period, revenue grew 50 percent to $16.5 million, from $11 million.
For growth opportunities, eBay might look no farther than its own backyard.
In its prospectus, MercadoLibre warned investors that a non-competition agreement it had signed with eBay has expired. If eBay launches a competing platform in Latin America, MercadoLibre said it would have a "material adverse effect" on its business.
Francis Gaskins, president of research company IPODesktop.com, believes potential competition from eBay is a danger. He theorized that eBay would have acquired MercadoLibre if it was not interested in expanding into Latin America itself.
EBay would also be a formidable rival. "EBay is a well known brand around the world," Gaskins said. And, he noted, "eBay knows everything there is to know about this company."
In its prospectus, MercadoLibre confirmed it "had the advantage of working closely with eBay in exchanging industry best practices and developing and improving our services and strategy."
Sweet disagreed that eBay will enter MercadoLibre's turf and said he expects their partnership to continue, at least for now. "EBay really needs to concentrate on their U.S. and European market, rather than Latin America, first and foremost," he said.
Instead, Sweet said eBay's investment demonstrates that the company is optimistic about MercadoLibre's prospects, comparing the relationship to Google's past investment in Chinese search engine Baidu.com Inc. Google, which sold the stake in 2006, has since challenged Baidu by expanding its presence in China.
MercadoLibre expects the offering, which totals 16.1 million shares, to price between $16 and $18 per share.
The company will sell 2.6 million shares in the IPO. A group of selling stockholders, including JP Morgan Partners and Chief Executive Marcos Galperin, will offer the remaining 13.5 million shares.
MercadoLibre expects to raise about $40.6 million after expenses from the IPO. The company said the proceeds will be used to repay about $9.3 million outstanding on a loan from eBay and for general corporate purposes, including potential acquisitions or investments.
JP Morgan Securities and Merrill Lynch are serving as lead underwriters for the IPO. RBC Capital Markets and Pacific Crest Securities are also underwriting the offering. The company and its selling shareholders have granted the underwriters an option to buy up to 2.4 million additional shares to cover any overallotments.
MercadoLibre has been approved for listing on the Nasdaq Stock Market under the symbol "MELI."
EZ2
17 years ago
SPOT ON !!
=====================
http://global.gmarket.co.kr/challenge/neo_contents/company/01_company.asp
http://library.corporate-ir.net/library/19/193/193909/items/247913/Factsheet_1Q07.pdf
Gmarket Inc. (NASDAQ: GMKT) is Korea's leading e-commerce marketplace, offering buyers a fun, convenient and secure shopping experience and sellers a flexible and comprehensive sales solution. The product categories available on our website include fashion and apparel, computers and electronics, furniture and home products, just to name a few, and we are constantly adding new services and product categories. Gmarket currently has over 10 million registered users, and we are also Korea¡¯s leading e-commerce website in terms of gross merchandise value. We have received numerous awards for our innovative e-commerce business model in Korea. Gmarket strongly believes in social and corporate responsibility, and we strictly abide by these principles in the operation of our business.
Our Business Model
The key to achieving our leadership has been our unique business model and effective targeting of the broadest seller segment, resulting in a tremendous selection of products available to our buyers. Our business focus has always been somewhat different from existing players in the market. Instead of focusing on large businesses or occasional sellers, we have focused on the needs of small to medium sized businesses. In Korea, this group of sellers has been the most active in adopting the Internet for their business and they have been the driving force of e-commerce market growth. Having captured this middle ground and achieving the critical mass of both buyers and sellers, we are well positioned to expand our seller base to large businesses as well as occasional sellers.
Diverse Revenue Sources
We derive our revenues primarily from transaction fees on the sale of products on our website. At the same time, we have been diversifying our revenue sources by offering premium listings, keyword listings, seller advertising and non-seller advertising.
Rapid Growth
We believe our rapid growth is attributable to our ability to facilitate interaction among a growing critical mass of buyers and sellers. We believe sellers are attracted to our website for our cost effective, end-to-end sales and marketing channel and access to a broad audience of buyers. We believe buyers are attracted to our website as we provide an entertaining and secure shopping environment with more than 2.0 million products currently available for sale in 29 product categories at competitive prices.
EZ2
17 years ago
About GMARKET INC (NasdaqGM:GMKT)
Gmarket, Inc. operates a retail e-commerce marketplace in Korea. Its e-commerce marketplace offers buyers a selection of products, and sellers various sales solutions. The products listed for sale on its Web site include apparel, beauty products, computers, electronics, child care/food products, furniture, jewelry, sporting goods, automobile accessories, health/living products, and travel/leisure products. These products are coupled with product information, including pictures, product descriptions, and customer reviews and commentary. As of March 31, 2007, the company had approximately 11.7 million registered users. It also offers an online magazine, ‘Shopping Webzine’, where its users and other members of the Internet community could publish their reviews regarding sellers and products, and contribute general interest articles or other commentary regarding fashion and other topics. Gmarket, Inc. was founded in 2000 and is headquartered in Seoul, South Korea.
MOPAR10R/T
17 years ago
EZ, thanks! Yes, Amazon ROCKS! I've bought most of my new electronics stuff there, over many years.
Great prices!!!
PC, DC's, and just bought a Samsung P1200 Blu-ray DVD, CD DVD/-R...etc... and all formats player. It came yesterday.
It's FANTASTIC...IMO...
I bought the Blu-ray DVD of Pirate movie, Dead Mans Chest, to see how it works!
I love IT!!!
In a few weeks, I want to buy Samsung LNT4665F 46" 1080p LCD HDTV. I have a 6 year old Sony 36" HDTV flat screen. But is the old BIG tube one.
Weights 225 lbs! WHOAAA!!!...LOL...
EZ2
17 years ago
GMKT ~~~ Seeking Alpha
Expecting Upside in Gmarket Following Results
Thursday August 2, 8:43 am ET
http://notablecalls.blogspot.com/
Notable Calls submits: Couple of firms comment on Gmarket (NasdaqGM: GMKT - News) after the Korean internet auction company reported its Q2 results last night:
- Goldman Sachs believes that advertising revenue can grow substantially further given Gmarket collects less than 15% of what NHN achieves, with a user base approximately half as large as NHN's, composed of (they assume) visitors that are less frequent but with a higher propensity to spend, and given some other e-commerce websites generate all their revenue from advertising and listing fees. 3Q07 GMV growth should suffer from the earlier Chusok holiday in 2007, but 3Q07 margins may benefit from no TV advertising campaign and CJ Home Shopping's retreat. GSCO raises their 2007 EPS estimate by 5% to $0.76 and 2008 by 7% to $1.08, delaying the benefits of lower credit card and click-through fees to 2008-2011.
They raise their 12-month target price from $24 based on 24X 2008E GAAP EPS to $28 based on 26X 2008E GAAP EPS. Maintains Conviction Buy List status.
- RBC Capital notes that as expected, nontransaction (advertising) revenue pointed the way toward top and bottom-line upside as GMKT reported solid results for 2Q07. Restructuring of the seller banner advertising platform from a flat CPM to an auction-bidding environment looks to be a success. They believe estimates will continue to head higher as Gmarket executes on its many 2H07 initiatives and nonseller-advertising starts to ramp. Firm maintains Outperform rating and raise target from $26 to $27 as EBITDA/EPS estimates increase by 4%/3% for 2008 and 6%/6% 2009.
Notablecalls: Did you notice GMKT's operating margin going from 11% to 14% quarter over quarter? Or did you notice the high-margin ad revenue up 80% y/y vs GSCO's 50-60% estimate? Management noted on the conference call that GMKT's market share reached a all time high this quarter. Yet the thing is selling at a lower multiple than eBay.
As I have noted in the past, I think GMKT represents an interesting opportunity. I expect to see around 10% upside in the stock today (and much more over the next couple of years).
Disclosure: no position
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Seminole Red
17 years ago
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