- Part 13

Eye on China Internet Stocks

I have been watching Chinese internet stocks recently. The China stocks I am most interested in are: SOHU, SINA, and BIDU.

The growth of internet users in China is tremendous. Some estimates place the number of people online in China at just under the number of internet users in the US. Other estimates say China has now surpassed the US in online users, making China the country with the most online internet users.

So where are Chinese people browsing to? The answers are baidu.com, sina.com.cn, and sohu.com.

According to Alexa, all 3 of these websites are in the global Top 10 of all websites. This means each of these websites gets enormous amounts of traffic. For online businesses, this means they can show lots of ads and promote their own pay services and products.

Each of these websites gets more web visitors (or “hits”) than Amazon.com or Microsoft.com. Wow.

Here’s a breakdown of the web rankings, web traffic graphs, and stock charts for SOHU, SINA, and BIDU:

Symbol: SOHU, global web rank: #9

SOHU web traffic graph:
sohu.com web traffic graph
SOHU 1 month stock chart:

Symbol: SINA, global web rank: #6

SINA web traffic graph:
sina.com.cn web traffic graph
SINA 1 month stock chart:

Symbol: BIDU, global web rank: #4

BIDU web traffic graph:
baidu.com web traffic graph
BIDU 1 month stock chart:

Anyone else watching these stocks? I personally would like to get a good entry on SOHU and SINA. My opinion is that BIDU is bloated right now and should dip some more, then BIDU will also be in a price range I would buy at.

My trade for SOHU, SINA, and BIDU stocks would be a swing trade or longer term investment, not a quick daytrade.

Google Founders Keep $1 Salary

Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin have turned down a raise and instead decided to rely on the success of GOOG (Google) stock. Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin each have a $1 salary. In addition, Google CEO Eric Schmidt turned down a raise, also sticking to his $1 salary and stock options. Read the entire CNN article: Google leaders stick with $1 salary

I wish more CEOs and overpaid executives would take this approach. By keeping a $1 salary, the Google leaders are completely relying on the performance of GOOG stock prices to make them money. Shareholders love this because the Google execs have to think about their own fortunes – about $5 billion for Schmidt and over $12 billion each for Page and Brin – when running Google. If Google fails, they lose everything. Also, Google’s revenues and profits are not foolishly spent on over-abundant salaries, like some other publicly traded companies.

By keeping a $1 salary, the Google co-founders are letting shareholders know they are looking out for best interest of the shareholders. The $1 salary with options is also a way of telling shareholders Google has a profitable and successful future with steady leadership.

I’m a huge fan of Google as stock and as a company with innovative, useful, and efficient products and tools. Unfortunatley, I don’t currently own any GOOG shares. I am kicking myself for not buying in at the GOOG $340 price dip!

What are your thoughts on the $1 salary? Any Google shareholders out there?

Stock Market Clouds

I have combined stock market trading and tag clouds to create Market Clouds.

Market Clouds shows the popularity and activity of stock market companies.

The font size of the symbol is determined by the symbols market trading popularity or activity. A bigger font size means the stock is actively trading and popular. A smaller font size shows the stock is less active and less people are trading it.

I find tag clouds and market clouds fascinating. Clouds are a way to order and prioritize seemingly endless amounts of data and information flow.

Market Clouds allow you to quickly visualize the popular or active stocks of the day, by weeding out inactive or unpopular stocks by making them smaller, and showing us the juicy plays and most popular and active stocks with huge letters.

Check it out and let me know what you think about Market Clouds!

Google Introduces Google Finance

Google has introduced Google Finance pages for stock charts, news, and company data. The Google Finance pages aim to compete with the likes of Yahoo! Finance and Microsoft’s MSN Moneycentral.

I still prefer using Yahoo! Finance for most of my research, but the I do enjoy the crisp look and feel of the new Google Finance pages. Over the coming weeks I see myself utilizing Google Finance pages more and more for my stock market research.

The Google Finance main page for a stock ticker displays useful information, such as basic balance sheet information, company news, and an interesting chart application. The charts allow you to scroll left or right allowing you to seamlessly move forwards or backwards in the price and volume history of a company. Check out GOOG at Google Finance to browse Google’s stock price and company information.

Well, I like the new Google Finance pages. What do you think about them?

Rumor: Google Buying Sun Microsystems

I was reading a news aggregation website, reddit, and came across a blog article regarding Google buying Sun Microsystems.

Logically, I could see this rumor coming to fruition. I think part of me would like to see Sun, a company I respect, purchased by Google, another company I highly respect.

Google and Sun are (supposedly?) working together to create Google Office – an online suite of software to challenge Microsoft Office. Sun is known for it’s excellent server hardware and the Java environment. Google is constantly and perhaps exponentially growing in its need for data storage and processing power. Google needs more computing resources. Fast. Google may also need more human resources, another advantage it would gain from buying Sun. Sun Microsystems engineers and developers consistently produce high quality software and systems.

My question is: What could Google possibly gain from purchasing Sun Microsystems? True, Sun has the hardware and people that Google could use. But does Google really need Sun Microsystems?

The only possibility I can think of is based on another rumor: the GoogleOS.

Has anyone else heard this rumor of Google planning to buy Sun?

Read the original article: It looks like Google’s Buying Sun After All.

IMPORTANT UPDATE:

A stock trader friend linked me to an article stating the “Google Buying Sun Microsystems” rumor is completely false and the rumor is being used to manipulate Sun Microsystem’s (NASDAQ: SUNW) stock price. This article contains background information regarding the rumor’s author and the rumor history. Read the article: Digg is used for Sun stock manipulation.

It appears this rumor has been verified as being a completely false rumor.