One year ago the price per share of Avast (LON:AVST) was around 600 pence and since then its popularity among users of it products has soared. At 570 pence today after its lift of 13% I think Norton is having a laugh but how do Stocko commentators see it? Berenberg thinks it's worth $10 billion for starters.
Silver
Male, born in 1944. A saver who abandoned high interest cash accounts for equities when the bottom fell out of the interest rate. My mother's investment plan was to turn over the silver coins in her purse at the full moon, hence my moniker. more »
The founders hold 35% of the shares between them.
They are late 50 early 60s, relatively young but if wanting to move on, then that's it.
Six pounds was the buying climax. I sold but then bought back too early, holding a loss until recently.
Totally optimistic/opportunistic at £6. Possibly a defensive move but one that gives Symantec too much of the AV market and given their highly aggressive pricing policies not much benefit for the consumer. Avast have launched their cloud business hub recently which makes remote management of client AV and Security much easier especially in this era of remote working.
The IT security market is wealthy and cash generative if Avast seriously tackles enterprise solutions and add high value services their business could easily move to the next level. I was hoping that Avast might do a couple of their own acquisitions in this space that would be a smart move. Then Avast should tackle the enterprise market especially as cybersecurity threats and data breaches can now result in serious legal challenges.
I am no fan at all of Norton, for years their focused has been on maximising revenues from their products particularly the domestic part. My business has supplied Avast as the preferred AV solution since around 2007 in part because we objected to the crazy high renewal fees people were charged by the likes of McAfee and Symantec, plus Avast is a European company that provided a great product and in practice with 00s of instances we deployed there were few problems.
Merger/takeover announced this morning. Recommended by both managements.
https://www.investegate.co.uk/....
Cash and shares offer valuing Avast (LON:AVST) at 608.9p per share although different combinations of shares/cash appear to offer different values. Probably requires a cold towel on the neck to work out the various options. I hold.
Gus.
