I’ve had a few questions on MA, thought I’d at least preview it. MA report Q4 tomo before the close.
One thing I will be very upfront about, is I generally stay away form stocks that I don’t know well and MA is certainly one of them. But taking a quick look here are a few things that are interesting to me….
-stock is down 3% ytd vs spx up 5.6% and AXP up close to 8%….i have no idea why under-performance (otherr than the valuation gap to AXP), but the stock has had a great trailing 52 weeks up nearly 50%.
-short interest is not high at about 1.5% and the wall street generally positive with 27 Buys and 10 Holds, no Sells.
-Valuation seems fairly reasonable at about 17x next years earnings with expected eps growth of about 16% for the next 2 yrs and sales expected to grow about 12% for the same period. in comparison, AXP trades at 12x next yr but eps and sales only expected to grow 3 and 7% respectively.
-technically the stock has been in an interesting trading range since early Nov and now trades at the exact mid point of that range….
-I get the implied move at about 4.5% vs the 4 qtr avg of about 6.375%
The Feb 3rd weekly 360 straddle is offered at about $16, which means you would need a 4.5% move either way to make money….
SO I guess after taking a quick look buying the move seems tough so u have to pick a direction and frankly I have no reason that puts me over the edge to do so. But will continue to look at it into the close and if i have any ideas i will post on site