Yahoo!'s Direction Key For Shareholders
Eric Jackson, president and founder of Ironfire Capital, believes Thompson will give investors light on what his plan is to save the company. "Yahoo! has a low bar to jump over, in terms of earnings," he said, over the phone. "They've been able to meet expectations recently, but I suspect
Jackson is long Yahoo! and has been adding to his position in recent weeks.
Bernstein analyst Carlos Kirjner notes that the plan could be subject to execution risk, given "it is unclear how much 'surgery' will be required to dismember and redistribute the product development organization across the different groups within Consumer," he wrote, in a research report. "The fact that the company appointed an executive to program-manage the transition suggests some non-trivial unwinding lays ahead." Kirjner rates Yahoo! "market perform" with a $17 price target.
Ryan Jacob, portfolio manager of Jacob Internet Fund(JAMFX) noted that "investors will be looking for more specifics on where he
Jacob has not been adding to his Yahoo! stake recently, but said that the Internet giant remains one of his larger positions.
Bernstein's Kirjner also believes that investors will be keen to hear what is going on with Yahoo!'s Asian assets. Yahoo! owns 40% of Alibaba and 34.9% of Yahoo! Japan. He believes the two stakes are worth $18 per share, far higher than where Yahoo! is currently trading.
Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expect Yahoo! to earn 17 cents per share on $1.059 billion in revenue.
Shares of Yahoo! are higher in Tuesday trading, up 2% to $15.08.
Interested in more on Yahoo!? See TheStreet Ratings' report card for this stock.
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--Written by Chris Ciaccia in New York
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