Hello Friends! As you will note from the previous post, I have just purchased 200 shares of iPass (IPAS) at $16.55 just minutes ago and promised to post a note on the company. So here it is. You take a look at the numbers and the story and see if you agree with me that it looks interesting.
IPAS is having a nice day today, currently as I write trading at $16.47 up $1.22 or 8.00%. The stock is actually trading at its lower end of its trading range for the past 52 weeks which according to Morningstar.com, has been a high of $29.19 and a low of $15.08.
According to money.cnn.com, IPAS "...is a provider of software-enabled enterprise connectivity services for mobile workers." As I understand it, IPAS is involved in the rapidly growing area of WiFi connectivity. (Did I spell that right?)
If we look at the "5-Yr Restated" financials on Morningstar.com, we find that IPAS has been growing rapidly from $3.9 million in revenue in 1998 to $14.3 million in 1999, $35.3 million in 2000, $53.2 million in 2001, and $92.8 million in 2002.
Free cash flow which was a ($29) million in 2000, and ($22) million in 2001, turned positive at $7 million in 2002.
The balance sheet, as presented on Morningstar.com also looks nice with $27.9 million in cash reported, more than enough to pay off both the current liabilities of $24.1 million and the long-term liabilities of only $1.8 million combined. In addition, they have other current assets totalling $25.8 million.
The latest quarterly results were reported on October 16, 2003, as picked up by the NYTimes on the Web, revenue was $35.0 million, an increase of 46% from the 2002 results, operating income was $6.2 million representing a 149% increase over the $2.5 million reported in the same period last year and a 9% increase over the prior quarter for sequential growth. On a per share basis, net income was $.07/share vs $.04/share last year.
Looking at "Key Statistics" on Yahoo.com financial site, we find that the current market cap is $989.71 million, the trailing p/e is at 23.93, however the forward p/e is at 37.20 (?). The PEG ratio is reported at 1.43 with a Price/Sales at 7.32. So except for the current p/e, this doesn't look cheap.
There are 60.46 million shares outstanding, but only 7.00 million of them float. There are only 92,000 shares out short as of 11/10/03, representing 0.369 trading days. No dividend is reported and no stock split since this company came public during the 3rd quarter 2003.
I do like this stock a lot. In fact I bought 200 shares (which are a little underwater already!) earlier today. The stock has a reasonable p/e in the low 20's with explosive growth history and in a spot of the market that should continue to grow, in my humble opinion.
Please consult with your investment advisor before making any decisions based on information presented on this website as investments discussed may or may not be appropriate or profitable for you!
Thanks again for stopping by! Please email me at bobsadviceforstocks@lycos.com if you have any questions. Also, feel free to leave comments right HERE on the website. When will someone "break the ice" and open up this site for discussion...hmmmm.
Bob