Been a While

It's taken a couple months longer than expected, but I'm back! I'm going to resume posting, albeit perhaps less frequently than I did previously.

A lot has happened since I last posted here. First, M&A: On July 28th SSNC Technologies (SSNC) made an agreement to be acquired by the Carlyle Group for $982 MM. Though I would've liked to have held this one longer, I'm not going to turn down a 40% gain in six months!

Then in August PetroKazakhstan (PKZ) agreed to be acquired by the Chinese state-owned China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) for $4.18 B, or $55 per share. More acquisitions will surely come as China continues to seek oil to fuel its burgeoning demand.

In other news, eBay agreed to purchase Skype for "up to $4.1 B" (a bit much?) on September 15th. The purchase fits eBay's pattern of acquiring/creating services (rent.com, paypal, et al) that use community as a means of achieving user lock-in. However, despite Skype's purported 54 million members, I have doubts about the potential benefit/monetization of the service. eBay can cross-market the eBay marketplace and Skype, of course, but what else? Sell sponsored ads? Could someone help me out here?

As far as stocks to purchase, I remain a big proponent of Digital River (DRIV) and J2 Global Communications (JCOM) at current price levels. DR closed at $35.38 on Friday, down more than 10% from the high it reached after reporting stellar Q2 numbers, and J2 is trading at around $37.50. While both stocks may continue to experience near-term volatility due to the market, their fundamentals remain extremely compelling, in this author's opinion.

Full disclosure: I own shares of Digital River and J2 Global Communications. I do not own shares of eBay.

The opinions expressed in this blog are my personal opinions. I am in no way responsible for trades made or not made because of something read here. One should always do his or her own due diligence before buying a stock.