O.K. another stock to consider. Again, as always, please consult with your own investment advisor before making any decisions based on my posts on this site.
According to money.cnn.com, Altiris (ATRS) "...develops, markets and supports information technology (IT) lifestyle management software products that manage software and hardware in IT environments." They reported their earnings after the market close yesterday and the good news is driving this stock higher. Currently as I write, ATRS is trading at $31.93, a gain of $4.46 or 16.24% on the day.
As reported on Yahoo.com, from PRNewsire-First Call, on October 27, 2003, ALTRS reported their financial results for the third quarter ended September 30, 2003. Revenue reported was $25.4 million, an increase of 59% over the third quarter of 2002 and 11% over the second quarter or 2003. Net income was $3.8 million, or $.15/diluted share, compared to a net loss of ($359,000) or ($.02)/diluted share in the same period last year.
Morningstar.com shows a nice growth pattern from $2 million in revenue in 1998, $4 million in 1999, $10 million in 2000, $34 million in 2001 and $63 million in 2002. Extrapolating the current quarter would get us over $100 million for 2003.
Although losing money until the last few quarters, free cash flow improved a couple of years ago from ($4) million in 2000, $1 million in 2001 and $8 million in 2002.
Balance sheet on this one is beautiful! As reported on Morningstar.com, ATRS has $72.9 million in cash, way more than enough to cover both the $20.5 million in current liabilities and $3.4 million in long-term liabilities combined. In addition, they have $12.9 million in other current assets.
Looking again at Yahoo.com, we find that the company has a market cap of $690.62 million with a trailing p/e of 65.36 and a forward p/e (2004) of 39.24. The PEG ratio is 2.03, and price/sales is 6.81. Clearly, this is not a totally undiscovered stock that is still cheap!
ATRS has 21.61 million shares outstanding with only 8.90 million shares float. Again there are a LOT of shares out short. As of 10/8/03, 3.44 million shares are out short, representing 11.332 days of trading. Either bad news is forthcoming...does not appear likely...or there will be a scramble to cover these short sales resulting in a 'squeeze' of those sellers selling short. (in my humble opinion!) No dividend is paid.
I like this stock, but it isn't cheap. The financial results are quite fabulous and might be a good investment in here. But you know the old story, margin, margin, margin....so I have made my purchase today already...will need to wait for the existing stocks to hit some sell points so we can may be add another issue to our portfolio.
Thanks for stopping by. Please as always consult your investment advisor before making any decisions based on what is written here. If you have any questions, you can reach me at bobsadviceforstocks@lycos.com
Bob