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But you can get them to the present. From full global headquarters, this is Motley Fool Money. It's the Motley Fool Money Radio show. Thanks for being here.
I'm Chris Hill, joining me in studio this week. From Motley Fool One, Jason Moser. From Motley Fool Supernova, Matt Arguessinger, and from Million Dollar Portfolio. Mr.
Ron Gross. Good to see you as always, Jens. Glad to be here. Earning's Beluzah rolls on.
We've got the latest results from Facebook, Apple, Visa, MasterCard, and more. It is Super Bowl weekend, so we will dig into the business of Pro Football with our guests this week. And as always, we will share a few stocks you can put on your watch list. But we begin this week.
Before we get to Earning's Beluzah Ron, let's start with the market in general. We're wrapping up the first month of 2014. We do take a long view. But increasingly, if you look at the coverage of the market and you hear the rumblings out there, there is genuine concern.
When people consider the Dow is down more than 4% in one month, the S&P 500 down about 3%. What do you say to someone who says, wait a minute, what's going on here? I would say things weren't great in 2013 either from many different perspectives, metrics-wise economics-wise. And we had a 32% increase in the S&P.
So go figure and go try to predict where the stock market will go based on the data you see. It's very tough to get it right. But listen, emerging markets is kind of the thing of the month. We're worried about emerging markets, whether it's Turkey, Argentina, India, what have you.
The taper is feeding into this, obviously. The stimulus will go away. I think looking for a reason to take some money off the table. After such a strong year like last year, remember we said the January effect?
I want that back. The stocks are supposed to go up in January. What do you think about it? Well, and Ron just mentioned the taper.
Speaking of the Fed, you know, Ben Bernanke had his last meeting this past week. And the Fed didn't do anything. They stuck to their plan to reduce their subsidy essentially by another $10 billion. And I just think that was the right move.
I think the Fed looked at the data for the US and overall looks pretty good. We do have these emerging market jitters, but I kind of applaud them for not doing anything. It's sickening me sort of the end of the week when I started to see a lot of pundits say, yeah, I can't believe the Fed didn't do anything. We got these problems emerging markets.
Certainly they want to help us out here. And that was just a team of takers. Yeah. What's interesting is that the vast majority of S&P 500 companies have beaten expectations this earnings season.
You would expect to see the market rally on that. So the weakness is interesting to me. I think people aren't buying it necessarily. There's been a lot of share buybacks.
Share counts have come down. That makes earnings per share go up. It makes it look like a beat when perhaps it's not revenue growth isn't where it should be probably. But yet, you know, the headline is that companies are beating.
Yeah, I think Ron Keaton on something that's pretty interesting. There were plenty of bad metrics last year. We still had a stellar year in the market. It makes me think of a question I took earlier this week on Ask a Fool.
Someone was asking, why don't we utilize stop losses in our recommendations and stop losses basically in order to broker to basically sell this stock if it gets down to this price. I kind of cat my losses and cut bait and move on. But the answer to that was that's just not the way we operate. As long-term investors, the way the world is getting smaller, the internet is bringing basically everybody together in the flow of information.
So fast now. Volatility plays a much bigger role today in the market than I think it probably ever has. And when you look at something like a stop loss, you're taking the chance of selling at a loss based on just some basic noise out there that is more or less meaningless where we're not giving ourselves a chance to hang on for three, five, even ten years and really recognize some substantial gains. I think it really shines a lot on why Foolish Investing works so well.
Yeah, I wonder all the people who had stop losses on Chipotle over the years are feeling right now. We will get to Chipotle in a little while. But let's start with Facebook. Share is hitting an all-time high this week after fourth quarter profits came in higher than expected.
And Jason, once again the story, mobile ad revenue, the story here virtually not existent when the company went public and now it's more than half their revenue. Our man behind the glass there, Steve Broido was loving that noise. This is literally jumping up and down. He's thrilled.
I mean, if you're investing in Facebook, you've got to be really happy. I think you have to be excited about what Future Holds is pointing. I'll count myself among the early skeptics really of Facebook. I've certainly changed my tune based on the work I've done on the company and really what I think they're capable of doing because the company turns ten years old next week.
And when you look at this next decade, I think that Mark Zuckerberg knows it is going to be a focus on engagement. They've got a user base of 1.3 billion plus people that are coming to that site on a constant basis. I mean, weekly active users were $757 million for the quarter and they now make fully more than half of their revenue from mobile, like you mentioned. So I think when you look at what Facebook is doing today, the market opportunity that's out there with mobile advertising alone poised to hit around $45 billion by 2017, Facebook is going to get their share of it.
And advertisers go where the eyeballs are and the eyeballs go to Facebook. Ron, pretty amazing when you consider as Jason said, next week Facebook turns ten years old as a company. And it is now as a result of the stock moving up this week. It is now the 20th largest public company.
Yeah, it's really interesting. It's actually now the largest company in a million dollar portfolio as well. Not the largest company, our largest allocation. It's almost 10% of our portfolio now as a result of the increase in the stock, which gets a guy like me a little nervous.
How do you sleep? But we still think it's undervalued. We still think it's got plenty of room to grow. The sizing is a different matter.
We all have to think that through. But we still think that plenty of room ahead. All right, that's not moving in the other direction. Shares of Apple down around 10% this week.
Matt, first quarter results. You sell 51 million iPhones and it's just not enough. It's not a new record there. And of course, they also sold 26 million iPads and 4.1, 8 million Macs, which were also a big year over year.
But again, he's sold about 10% fewer iPhones and analysts were expecting. The revenue for the current quarter looks a little bit light and that is enough to shave about 40 billion off the stock off the company's market value in the past week. The problem with Apple, obviously, is perception problem right now. It has nothing to do with how they're doing as a business.
How they're doing as a business is phenomenal. I mean, we're talking. The iPhone didn't exist in 2007. Now about 500 million people around the world have used the iPhone.
I mean, it's amazing. And so I think it's right now it's can Apple innovate. And I get antsy when I hear that because I think it's absurd. I mean, we're sitting here watching a movie on a three inch piece of glass, which we're capable of doing just a few years ago.
It's incredible. Tim Cook said some interesting things on the call. He talks about new product categories Apple might be getting into. The only problem there is that he said that a few times in the past.
Since he's actually been CEO, he's kept mentioning, hey, our pipeline stuffed. We're entering new product categories. I like the fact they're buying back stock. They bought $50 billion back in the last quarter.
They've gone through about 50% of their authorization. They're obviously seeing value in the stock, not as much as something like Carl Icahn. But until the perception changes with Apple and until Tim Cook can really deliver on his call of having more product categories, I think the stock is going to stack. Ron, Tim Cook really does need to deliver because he was specific this time.
He said by the end of 2014, we're going to have a new product. And people are speculating, well, it could be a smart watch. It could be some other form of wearable technology. It could be a new TV.
But they got to have something. They got to have something. And I know they've got to have something because I'm getting sick of hearing myself say this company's got to start growing again. They've got to introduce new products.
As an investor, if I keep hearing myself say the same thing, quarter after quarter, almost a year after year, things got to change. I have to move on to another investment. Imagine how are listeners feel? He's on a short leash with me, not too short.
I'll give him the rest of the year, but he's got to make good on that promise. Google's fourth quarter profit rose 17% on higher ad revenue. The stock hitting a new all-time high, Ron. I'm assuming this is also part of why the million dollar portfolio service you're running is having a pretty good week.
Yeah, it was a great week with Facebook and Google and a few others. 17% is the number for Google. 17% increase in revenue, 17% increase in profit, 17% growth in their core advertising business. It was a really strong quarter.
I don't think people were expecting it to be that good. They're jettisoning, finally, their Motorola business, selling it to Lenovo, which they've run about $2 billion of operating losses since 2012 by owning that business. They'll keep some of the important patents. They'll get rid of that hardware distraction and they'll focus on their core business.
But for all the praise we give Google and deservedly so, I think we should take just a moment and dwell on this because the Motorola acquisition was massive and they are selling it to Lenovo for a fraction of the price. Even if you factor in the patents, this is a pretty big swing in the midst. I would have to agree with that. You know, what are you going to do?
You get rid of it and you move on. But they burnt up a lot of cash there without a doubt. Coming up, forget stock market predictions. We have got Super Bowl predictions.
This is Motley Fool Money. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. Chris Hill here in studio with Jason Moser, Matt Argusinger and Ron Gross. Earning Spillow's a rolls on.
Guys, Chipotle, up more than 10% on Friday after a strong fourth quarter report. Jason, revenue was up. Do I have this right that same store sales were up more than 9%? Isn't that crazy to think about?
It was 9.3% for the quarter, which is, I mean, that's phenomenal. Even for a fast-growing company like Chipotle, and it just shows that really the traffic was going through the stores in what's not even really seasonally their busiest quarter. But I mean, the market likes to focus on that same store sales number, and because it was so robust, I think that's part of the reaction of the stock that they obviously, something I focus on in the call quarter and quarter, because they focus so much on throughput. They give us a lot of great insight as to their throughput statistics and how they're doing.
And they really are continuing to knock that ball out of the park. I mean, you look at your peak times during the day, during the lunch hour, they picked up an average of six transactions per hour. The peak dinner, they picked up an average of five transactions per hour. That just means when you see that big long line at Chipotle, you know that you're going to get through pretty quickly.
It's still got a great experience. But yeah, I mean, they just continue to really do everything well. The cost of food is rising a little bit. They've hinted at more than likely we'll see a price increase in the third quarter of this year.
Thankfully, they have a little bit of price in power to be able to do that. The balance sheet is creeping up on $1 billion in cash now, and this is just a self-funding business. And it's a little known fact that the word pizzeria was mentioned 13 times in that conference call yesterday. That's right.
They've got that little investment of the pizza place in Denver. Pizza Rio Locale. They're going to be opening a couple more this year. They already said so.
It's definitely something that they are having fun with. They're working with the founders of that of that pizzeria Locale. It's a minority investment today with really, I think, the opportunity to bring it under that Chipotle umbrella fully, sort of like the shop houses developing as well. Yeah, the numbers are just incredible for Chipotle.
My only concern, I guess, is that I feel like the more restaurant chains I'm going into now, I'm seeing the model play out. I mean, we have an NDC. We have a kind of small franchise called Sweet Green. I don't know if you guys have ever been to a start by, but it sounds way too healthy for me.
It's salads. It is mostly salads, but it's started by a couple of Georgetown University guys. But you go in there and it is essentially, I am in Chipotle, but they're making salads. Yes.
It's roti, roti, but it's right. Elevation burger is the same thing. I mean, they literally are running that same model. I have not been in a store that runs it as well.
Right. And it's beyond just the incredible efficiency. It's also just the idea of focusing on natural foods and healthy eating. And that's exactly the reason I sold the stock $250 a day.
Well, at least he takes all this in the fact that apparently David Einhorn is still actually short this stock. And I just read in November, the November, it's confirmed at least up to that point he was still short this stock. So I imagine he's not too happy to do that. You can put a stop gain on it.
A stop gain. In the other direction, Amazon down about 10% on Friday after fourth quarter profits came in lower than expected. But Mattie, the big story seems to be that Amazon is considering raising prices on the Amazon Prime membership service. It's $79 a year.
They're talking an increase of anywhere from $20 to $40 on top of that. Good move. I think that is a good move. If you think about it, they've had Prime for about nine years.
There's never been an increase. Yeah. We know shipping costs are higher now. We know a good thing is that the average Amazon customers ordering more per order, so they're getting more things shipped.
And also, we didn't have streaming movies nine years ago. Now we have now on Amazon Prime, you can watch 40,000 movies and TV episodes. So it's incredible. In my mind, it's an incredible bargain for $79 a year.
The idea of raising that $20 to $40. I don't think it's going to have a big impact. It'll do a lot for the business. We've seen Costco, which I know Ron's a big fan of.
I mean, they've been able to sort of raise their membership fee about 10% every five years or so. No problem at all there. I think it's a great move, Fran. But Jason, it's got to be communicated correctly because it's the sort of...
As we've seen with other companies, if you watch a price increase, you're going to pay for it. Interesting. I mean, I asked the question on Twitter earlier today just to mean people how they felt about that. And one of the responses there was that they felt like they were doing this to appease Wall Street's expectations.
Now, I don't think that's it at all. I mean, Jeff Bezos is making this position very clearly. He doesn't care what the street thinks. I do think that...
I think they will raise the price to $99. I think there's a big perception between the difference of $99 to $100. I think that $20 of incremental income for each prime subscriber would be tremendously beneficial and that $99 still makes it feel like they're going to get the deal. I wonder, you know, and one thing that wasn't addressed on the call or they haven't really talked about is the idea of...
And they mentioned it in the past by the idea of doing multiple different tiers. Yeah, like Costco does. Well, Netflix talked about the same thing too, right? A price-tearing structure.
And I think it opens their world up to more potential customers because it's not just a one-size-fits-all model maybe at this point. I'm not concerned about current prime members renewing. I think everybody, everyone I speak to really enjoys their prime membership. I'm concerned about new acquisitions.
When they're trying to get new people and they see that price approaching 100, that worries me a little bit. Visa and MasterCard, the two dominant players in the credit card space, both stocks down a little bit this week after their latest quarterly reports. Ron, I'm curious on your take. Look like Visa's quarter was a little bit better than MasterCard's but both stocks getting hit just a little.
Just a little bit. But I agree with that Visa, their numbers came in a bit better, especially the operating expense numbers. MasterCard was a bit heavy there. Some rebates came in higher than analysts were expecting.
And that hit the bottom line where they really were only able to grow about 3 percent. Whereas Visa had stronger profit growth of almost 9. Shares of under armor up around 30 percent this week, fourth quarter profit up 35 percent, Jason. It's the 15th straight quarter that revenue has increased at least 20 percent.
And they're just crushing it up in Baltimore. Yeah, I was coming through the release in the call to try to find something to like harp here about. It just all really looks good for under armor. I mean, 35 percent top line growth free sporting retailer.
I mean, that's pretty phenomenal in and of itself. But you sort of see what they're selling at accessories have done very well. But they made I think great strides in footwear. And 25 percent growth in footwear is significant because when they first got into that market, I don't think many people gave them a chance going up against Nike.
They've really been focusing hard on building out that running shoe department, the interesting it's a big market opportunity. And to top it all off, they demonstrated a little pricing power. I mean, Grossmarge was up a full percentage point there in inventory levels, keep in check and revenues outpacing. And so, yeah, a lot of great things here for under armor shareholders.
All right, we got just a couple minutes left in the way of talking about sports apparel. The Super Bowl is this weekend. Our man on the other side of the glass, Steve, he's actually going to the Super Bowl. Steve, how excited are you?
That is correct. I'm very excited. It's been a great time. You have some under armor.
What's the weather for a layer of games? And Wendy, probably, but I did buy some long underwear, so not under armor. Oh, Steve. I bought them from Amazon though.
Oh, there you go. One for two. That's good. All right, I want one prediction about the Super Bowl.
It doesn't have to be about who is going to win the game. It could be about the game itself. It could be about one of the prop bets, the commercials. Give me something.
One prediction for the Super Bowl. The over-under, I think, is about 47. Take the under. Take the under.
You think the weather's trouble? Yeah. The weather's out towards it. Okay, Maddie, one prediction.
Okay, I say this as a somewhat frustrated New England Patriots fan. Mark my words, Denver fans. I think we got to talk about the Super Bowl within the Super Bowl. A lot of talk here about the second screen phenomenon on Facebook and Twitter going at it this year.
I think Twitter comes out on top as the winner of the Super Bowl. Interesting. Steve, one prediction. I know you're a big sports fan.
I think it's going to be a pretty tight game, but I think the Cowboys are going to pull it here. Right on. Drop us an email, radio at full.com. Send us your prediction for the Super Bowl.
And just send some words of encouragement that Steve stays warm and 10 doesn't freeze his butt off out there. We are the best, something crew, stepping on down, doing a big deal. All right, guys. We'll see you later.
Up next, we're actually going to head to New York City to talk about the business of Pro Football with sports agent, Lee Steinberg. Stay right here. This is Motley Fool Money. You know, we're just trying to find out stuff for everyone.
We're just switching to the Super Bowl. The second man's coming. I'm your man, Ben. If the quarterback's soul, he's going to get Ben.
He stopped the run. He stopped the pass. I like to come guys on the end. We're going to rock this town.
Rock this town. Rock this town. Rock this town. Rock this town.
Rock this town. Rock this town. Rock this town. Rock this town.
Rock this town. Rock this town. Over his 30-year run as a sports agent, Lee Steinberg represented over 150 professional athletes, including the number one overall pick in the NFL Draft eight times. His clients included Hall of Famers, Troy Aikman, Steve Young, and Warren Moon.
He talks about the ups and downs of his career in his new book, The Agent, My 40-Year Career Making Deals and Changing the Game. He joins me now from the Super Bowl Radio Row Lee. Thanks so much for making the time. Oh, it's my pleasure.
It is the Brock Zoo here. I'm sure it is. I appreciate your spending a few minutes with us here at the Motley Fool. I want to start in terms of your book with your career.
You had such a successful career in a business where many people fail. What do you think led to your success during your run? Well, first of all, I had a good fortune of being a dorm counselor in an undergrad dorm. The freshman football team lived in in 1975.
Steve Arkowski was the very first pick in the first round of the NFL Draft, and he asked me to represent him. And we ended up getting the largest rookie contract in NFL history. But the approach has been athletes' role models, retracing their roots to the high school, a community where 120 of them have set up Starship Funds. Then at the college level, people like Eric Carros and Trey Eggman, CBN, Group Let's All Endowed, have all endowed Starship Funds.
And then at the pro level, it's foundations like work done where he has 131 single mothers. He's moved into homes for the first time to have a home by making the down payment. So athletes can be role models, and that's what I profile. Athletes that would be willing to do things like, well, I have Linux loose, a heavyweight boxing champion.
Kind of public service announcement that said, real men don't hit women. How has the business of sports agency changed during the 40 years that you've been around it? I have to believe there have been some significant changes. When I started back in 1976, the 15 got $2 million as a chair of the national television contract.
That figure is now $130 million. So if Rick Van Winkle had gone to sleep back in 1975, he would not recognize this world. $130 million is what it cost for Jacksonville and Carolina to come into the lead. So they're making as much TV money as it actually cost about a franchise, at least 20 years ago.
And we have the explosion of big stadium revenue flow from that. We have the explosion of fantasy football. The estimates are 20% of the business computers which are on during the football season and businesses are being used for fantasy football. So we're in a massive, massive occasion by television.
Even baseball, which always complained about the owners, about losing money, have quadrupled their gross receipts since 1994. And so the sports are all rolling in money. And now the rookies in football and in basketball have a salary kit. So it really guarantees that the money goes to prove in productive starters, but also that teams will make a huge profit.
Now to the extent that the average person thinks about sports agents, the person who comes to mind is probably not an actual sports agent. It's probably Jerry Maguire. And you were involved in that. You know Cameron Crow, the director, you were a consultant on the film.
How did all of that evolve? So Cameron Crow called me in 1993. He was a writer director. I'd seen Fast Times and Rich Mokai, which I liked.
And he started following me around. So he went to the league meetings in 1993. He went to the draft where Drew Bledsall was the first pick in 1993 and then he flew up to the press conference. He came to Crow Scouting day.
A number of games with me, Super Bowl parties, instead of my office forever. And I told him stories, lots and lots of stories. And then he went off and wrote the script. And I had to bet it to make sure the willingness to suspension of disbelief did not get broken.
And then they descended on my office and took my pictures and magically Jerry Maguire's head off my shoulders. And I actually took a good in junior who played the wide receiver in the film down to the Phoenix Super Bowl. And made him pretend all week that he was a client of mine to put him in role. I actually had to show Jerry O'Connell who played the quarterback how to throw a spiral because he had done the NYU and they did not have football.
You're listening to Motley Fool Money talking with Lee Steinberg. His book is The Agent, my 40-year career making deals and changing the game. I want to ask you about the business of the NFL because for the 30th year in a row, the Harris Poll was conducted about the most popular sport. And for the 30th year in a row, the NFL is the most popular sport in America.
But Lee, more and more, the more we learn about the effective concussions. First and foremost, I'm curious, what do you see as the greatest threat to the NFL's popularity right now? I think the greatest threat to the sport is the existential threat posed by concussion. I had a crisis of conscience back in the 1980s because I had half the certain quarterbacks in the NFL.
I had 61st round graphics and very first pick in the draft eight different years. And I watched Steve Young, Troy Aikman, Warren Moon, Drew Bled, so part of back after quarter back to concussion. And when we went to the doctors to ask them how many is too many and what's the magic number they couldn't tell us. So I started to hold concussion conferences.
And the first one series was in the 90s. And we listened to the neurologist and issued a set of recommendations of which the NFL adopted virtually none. So in 2007, Warren Moon and I did it again. And we had the neurologist who said at that point three seems to be the magic number.
And after three, there's an exponentially higher rate of Alzheimer's premature senility and chronic traumatic encephalopathy. So at that point, I called it chicken time ball in an undiagnosed epidemic. I now believe that every single time an offensive lineman hits a defensive lineman, it triggers a low-level, competitive event. So you could have an offensive lineman coming out of football for 10,000 suffering because of kids, none of which have been diagnosed, and the aggregate of which is much worse than getting knocked out three times.
And so let's suppose that 50% of mothers knowing this, tell their kids, in playing sport except tackle football. It won't ruin football. It will just change the socioeconomic. So the people who play will be very akin to the people who box knowing the problem they have.
So I've been pushing geometry that does more than skull fracture, changing, blocking and tackling techniques for kids and pop-orner, creating technological devices that are able to diagnose low-level, concussive hits. And finally, that we do research into new officials and pharmaceuticals that will either prophylactically protect the brain or will stop it from swelling at the time of the hit. So that's the way to make sure that the brain is able to see the magic pill that will actually help cure brain damage. One of the ways that some people manage pain is through medical marijuana, and it just so happens in the Super Bowl this year, we have two teams from two states where marijuana use is legal.
And I'm just curious where you think the NFL goes with this in terms of their drug policy? Oh, well, we'll go where the rest of the country is going, which is to say that there's no difference in harm between two intoxicants, and so the marijuana currently is an IQ test for a player. We don't really morally judge him, but the fact that he can't abstain from that at the time of the test shows that he's not that committed to football, but there's no real rationale for it. One drug alcohol causes people to get aggressive, causes fights, breaks up marriages, causes people to drink and drive, which causes accidents.
And the other one causes people to watch cartoons and eat munchies. You're listening to Motley Fool Money talking about Lee Steinberg, his book is The Agent, My 40 Year Career, Making Deals, and Changing the Game. You are very candid in this book, not just about your success, not just about your wins, but about how it all came crashing down, divorce, bankruptcy. When you look back and think about among the roles for an agent, it is to help clients keep control of their lives.
How did you end up losing control of yours? So there was a series of reverses in the 2000s. My father died a long death of cancer. My two sons were diagnosed with an incurable eye disease.
We lost a home due to flooding that had to be knocked to the ground, and then I got divorced. And I felt like I could not control or protect anything, and unfortunately just felt a desire to check out. I felt like all around the beach tethered down with little effusion sticking forks and so I spiraled down in 2017 and in 2010 and March, I decided that there is, that I had to make a change. So I gave my practice away.
I went into sober living. I worked at 12-step program and in a unique fellowship. And I said two things. Number one, I will be sober.
And number two, I will be good thought of. And that was four years ago. So now I've been refunded and rebacked to build a new company that does representation, that does representation and marketing and content supply. You're making a comeback in the business world, and I'm curious for anyone listening who is thinking about heading into this world as their life's work.
Just what's one piece of advice you give someone who's interested in becoming an agent? They need to understand the power that athletes have. They need to not simply focus on dollars in the bank book, but on second career where we have three players and now are minority owners and teams. You've got Bruce Smith, who retires and has ownership in a luxury hotel in Washington, D.C.
and has a consecutive position in a construction company. And second of all, they need to know that athletes can trigger imitated behavior. So when we had Lennox Lewis, public service announcement that said real men don't hit women, it did more to trigger behavioral changes in young rebellious adolescents than 1,000 authority figures ever could. All right, last question.
And then I'll let you go. We got Denver. We've got Seattle. You've been around pro football for the better part of the last 40 years.
Who's going to win the game? I think the game centers on whether or not the defensive secondary of Seattle can slow down, paid in Manning, which no one has done, and whether the front can put enough pressure. I mean ironically, Richard Sherman right back into the lineup. Everyone's thinking, Dan Rock, I'll pick Seattle.
I think they're young and aggressive and hungry, and they're probably the only team existing that could figure out the way to slow down that. The book is the agent, my 40 year career making deals and changing the game. If you are a fan of football, you got to pick this up. Lee Steinberg, thanks so much for being here.
Thank you. Coming up, we'll give an inside look at the stocks on our radar. This is Motley Fool Money. As always, people on the program may have interest in the stocks they talk about, and then Motley Fool may have formal recommendations for or against.
So I'll buy ourselves stocks based solely on what you hear. I'm Chris L. Joining me back in studio once again, Ron Gross, Matt Argusinger and Jason Moser. Guys, time once again for the stocks on our radar.
We'll bring in our man Steve Broido to hit you with a question about your stock. Ron Gross, what do you got? I got LinkedIn, L.N.K.D. reports next week.
Stock is off 16% from their September highs. Less quarter they issued some weak guidance, 37% sales growth, versus enough for some folks. Wow. So be very interested to see how they come in versus expectations.
We own a position in really, really like it. Thanks to great company. Steve, question about LinkedIn? First off, I'm a shareholder.
My question is, if LinkedIn does not come, become the dominant way that people communicate about jobs. If it's not, just send me your LinkedIn profile, don't send a resume, no cover letter, just send me your LinkedIn profile. That does not happen. What happens to this time?
It goes down Steve. It goes down sharply. It goes down sharply. Just to go away.
They're not just going to be that. They're going to be other things. They're gathering so much data and they're going to use it in many different ways. We don't really know where yet.
We have to think 10 or 15 years down the road. But for me, that is their core primary business. If that doesn't work, we'd be in trouble. But we've talked before about companies, Facebook, is the first one that comes to mind that have a big network of people, have the ability to build a platform to compete with LinkedIn.
It doesn't really seem like we're seeing that play out though. It doesn't need to be the only place to go. But it should really be the de facto standard, I think, and certainly be the market leader because it's certainly priced that way from a stock perspective. Matt Ark and Singer, what do you got?
I got Mercado Libre, M-E-L-I. I think they report either this coming week or the following week. But this is the sort of eBay slash Amazon of Latin America, the biggest e-commerce site in Latin America. Really been hit hard lately, merging market fears, of course, currency fears, just giving an idea.
They're reporting in local currencies about 45% revenue growth. In US dollar terms, it's about 26%. Stocks come down a lot because of that. One of my favorite ideas, we own it also in the Aussie one portfolio in Supernova.
Super psyched about it. Steve, a question about Mercado Libre? We seem to have an incredible shipping platform in our country. Does Latin America have that same ability to get packages back and forth as easily as we do?
Great question. Thank you. One out of every hundred, he just nails. No, so that isn't Adcosum because there's different sort of shipping regimes in each other country, savored between Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina, Mexico, etc.
So that is certainly a risk to the model. I bet there's someone who thinks he's the Steve Brittle of Latin America, but he's wrong. There is no comparison. Jason, we've got about a minute left.
What's your style? I know you'll approve of this. It's Dunkin' Donuts, ticker, D-N-K-N's. Guys, franchise pretty much everything.
They've got about 11,000 Dunkin' Stores today. So there is room to grow if you look at it just from the perspective that Starbucks has something like 20,000 Starbucksers around the world. But what really caught my attention this week though is their new DD Perks program in which they're basically recognizing the power that Starbucks has built with their app. Being able to use that app as tender and getting rewards for frequenting those establishments.
And I think Dunkin' Donuts has that same fierce customer loyalty. And I think they stand a benefit pretty nicely from this program. Steve, question about Dunkin' Brands? How do you ensure consistency with franchise?
Well Steve, I think that in all honesty it's just a donut. It's not rocket science. And so fortunately for them I think they have a pretty good hold on the recipe of those donuts. But by the same token, your quality control is at risk when you franchise everything.
Five seconds to do what do you like. We're kind of like, we've raised sounds pretty interesting. Oh yeah. That's going to do it really so happy with this question.
That's going to do it for this week's show. We will see you next week.