10 Best Internet Stocks To Invest In 2014

LOS ANGELES -- Some people have had it with TV. They've had enough of the 100-plus channel universe. They don't like timing their lives around network show schedules. They're tired of $100-plus monthly bills.

A growing number of them have stopped paying for cable and satellite TV service, and don't even use an antenna to get free signals over the air. These people are watching shows and movies on the Internet, sometimes via cellphone connections. Last month, the Nielsen Co. started labeling people in this group "Zero TV" households, because they fall outside the traditional definition of a TV home. There are 5 million of these residences in the U.S., up from 2 million in 2007.

10 Best Internet Stocks To Invest In 2014: Amazon.com Inc.(AMZN)

Amazon.com, Inc. operates as an online retailer in North America and internationally. It operates retail Web sites, including amazon.com and amazon.ca. The company serves consumers through its retail Web sites and focuses on selection, price, and convenience. It also offers programs that enable sellers to sell their products on its Web sites, and their own branded Web sites. In addition, the company serves developer customers through Amazon Web Services, which provides access to technology infrastructure that developers can use to enable virtually various type of business. Further, it manufactures and sells the Kindle e-reader. Additionally, the company provides fulfillment; miscellaneous marketing and promotional agreements, such as online advertising; and co-branded credit cards. Amazon.com, Inc. was founded in 1994 and is headquartered in Seattle, Washington.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Michael]

  Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN): On 3/31/11 Viking Global Investors reported holding 416,100 shares with a market value of $74,952,095. This comprised 0.65% of the total portfolio. On 6/30/11, Viking Global Investors held 2,031,800 shares with a market value of $415,482,793. This comprised 3.48% of the total portfolio. The net change in shares for this position over the two quarters is 1,615,700. About the company: Amazon.com, Inc. is an online retailer that offers a wide range of products.? The Company’s products include books, music, videotapes, computers, electronics, home and garden, and numerous other products.? Amazon offers personalized shopping services, Web-based credit card payment, and direct shipping to customers.

• [By Robert Holmes]

   Analyst Scott Devitt says that Amazon is the best positioned to lead the continuing secular transition from traditional retail to online ecommerce.

  "On multiple occasions, at different points in the company's life-cycle, Amazon.com has chosen to innovate, oftentimes cannibalizing existing business platforms in order to better position itself to provide its customers the products they will want," Devitt writes.

  Devitt's most optimistic view of Amazon would see shares rise 71% by the end of 2012, while his bearish scenario for the Internet retailer would see shares fall about 21% over the next 12 months.

• [By James K. Glassman]

   Amazon.com is an example of a company that's investing heavily to good effect. Last year, the online retailer spent $1.8 billion -- or triple its net income -- on capital expenditures. With $9.6 billion in cash and short-term investments and at least $3 billion in cash flow per year over the past three years, Amazon is not in danger of running out of money. Still, CEO Jeff Bezos is boldly spending to solidify his company's dominant position as the place to buy stuff on the Internet. The stock trades at $237.42.

• [By Jeanine Poggi]

  Amazon's (AMZN_) sales and margins are in focus, as both measures fell short of expectations in the fourth quarter, triggering a massive sell-off in the stock.

  
  

  This marked the third consecutive quarter that Amazon's results were not on par with its tradition of outperformance.

  While some brokerage firms downgraded the stock on the news, for the most part, analysts sentiment remains bullish, urging investors to pick up shares on the downturn.

  During the quarter the e-commerce giant earned $416 million, or 91 cents a share, on revenue of $12.95 billion. Analysts were looking for a profit of 88 cents on revenue of $13.01 billion.

  Margins came in at 3.7%, below Wall Street's forecast of 4.2%, as Amazon amped up its investment in its infrastructure.

10 Best Internet Stocks To Invest In 2014: eBay Inc.(EBAY)

eBay Inc. provides online platforms, services, and tools to help individuals and merchants in online and mobile commerce and payments in the United States and internationally. Its Marketplaces segment operates ecommerce platform eBay.com; vertical shopping sites, such as StubHub, Fashion, Motors, and Half.com; and classifieds Websites, including Den Bl�Avis, BilBasen, Gumtree, Kijiji, LoQUo, Marktplaats.nl, mobile.de, Alamaula, Rent.com, eBay Anuncios, eBay Kleinanzeigen, and eBay Annunci, as well as provides advertising services. The company?s Payments segment offers payment and settlement services for consumers and merchants on and off eBay Websites and other merchant Websites. This segment operates PayPal, which enables individuals and businesses to send and receive payments online and through mobile devices; Bill Me Later that enables the United States merchants to offer, the United States consumers to obtain, credit at the point of sale for ecommerce and mobile tra nsactions; Zong, which allows users with mobile phones to purchase digital goods and have the transactions charged to their phone bill; and BillSAFE that enables customers pay for purchases upon receipt of an invoice. Its GSI segment offers an ecommerce services suite for enterprise clients that operate in general merchandise categories, including apparel, sporting goods, toys and baby, health and beauty, and home; and marketing services comprising full-service digital agency, enterprise email marketing, mobile advertising, affiliate marketing, advertisement retargeting, and in-depth analytics services. The company also offers X.commerce platform that provides software developers access to the company?s applications programming interfaces to develop functionality for various merchants; and Magento Connect, which allows developers to market and sell add-on functionality and solutions to merchants that use a Magento storefront. eBay Inc. was founded in 1995 and is headquarter ed in San Jose, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Sy_Harding]

  eBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) is starting out 2013 very close to its 52-week high. The company continues to dominate online auctions hands down, but the real value is in the PayPal and transactions unit. Investors have a hard time judging eBay now due to a perception that every person who will auction things already has signed up. Prior changes in customer and merchant service fees have also not been popular. Still, with the stock close to a 52-week high and not far from an all-time high, it is hard to say much bad about the company at all.

  eBay trades at $53.50, its 52-week trading range is $29.89 to $53.70 and its market cap is $69 billion. Our area of concern is that eBay’s consensus price target of $56.03 leaves an implied upside of less than 5%. eBay trades at about 19.5-times expected 2013 earnings.

• [By Chuck]

  Legg Mason had $259 Million of eBay shares. The stock gained 47.1% during the past year and outperformed the SPY, which returned 21.5% since then. Legg Mason reduced their eBay holdings by 26.4% during the 4th quarter of 2010. Stock returned 23.8% since then, outperforming the SPY by 18 percentage points.

• [By Tamara Rutter]

  Online marketplace eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY  ) has also soared this year thanks to strength from its PayPal business. The stock is up more than 66% year-to-date and shows no sign of slowing down. The company's third-quarter revenue spiked 15% to $3.4 billion, as eBay continued to generate significant growth in both its payments business as well as its online marketplace business.

  Looking to the future, eBay is heavily investing in mobile technology. In fact, the company's smartphone applications have been downloaded more than 100 million times worldwide. Meanwhile PayPal, which is eBay's fastest-growing business, "is now accepted by more than 60 of the top 100 retailers in the United States," according to research from Morningstar.

• [By Jeanine Poggi]

  eBay's biggest story continues to be its PayPal business.

  The payments business pushed eBay's fourth-quarter earnings ahead of expectations. During the quarter the e-commerce company earned $559 million, or 42 cents a share, compared with $1.36 billion, or 1.02 a share in the year-ago period. Excluding costs related to the sale of its Skype business, eBay actually earned 52 cents a share. Revenue climbed 5% to $2.5 billion. Analysts were calling for a profit of 47 cents a share on revenue of $2.48 billion.

  This marks the 18th consecutive quarter eBay surpassed EPS estimates.

5 Best Warren Buffett Stocks To Watch For 2014: IAC/InterActiveCorp (IACI)

IAC/InterActiveCorp engages in the Internet business in the United States and internationally. The company�s Search segment develops, markets, and distributes various downloadable toolbars; provides search, reference, and content services through its destination search and other Websites, including Ask.com and Dictionary.com; and aggregates and integrates local advertising and content for distribution to publishers on Web and mobile platforms, as well as markets and distributes mobile applications through which it provides search and additional services. Its Match segment offers subscription-based and advertiser-supported online personals services through its Websites comprising Match.com, Chemistry.com, OurTime.com, BlackPeopleMeet.com, and OkCupid.com, as well as through mobile applications and Meetic-branded Websites. The company�s ServiceMagic segment offers Market Match service that matches consumers with service professionals; Exact Match service, which enables con sumers to review service professional profiles and select the service professional that meets their specific needs; and 1800Contractor.com, an online directory of service professionals. This segment also offers Website design and hosting services. Its Media and Other segment operates CollegeHumor.com, an online entertainment Website that targets young males; Vimeo, a Website on which users can upload, share, and view video; and Pronto.com, a comparison search engine. This segment also engages in the creation of video content for various distribution platforms; and operates as an Internet retailer of footwear and related apparel and accessories, as well as focuses on multimedia business. The company was formerly known as InterActiveCorp and changed its name to IAC/InterActiveCorp in July 2004. IAC/InterActiveCorp was founded in 1986 and is headquartered in New York, New York.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Lisa Springer]

  IAC/InteractiveCorp. (NASDAQ: IACI) is perhaps the forgotten Internet company. This $4 billion Web property gets very little love and respect from Wall St. because it is such a smaller competitor and it is considered a hodge-podge of Web properties. It has media, shopping and the Ask.com search engine, and that search is said to be the glue that keeps it together. Its Ask.com is still one of the largest search engines running, at number four in most rankings, but it is incredibly small when compared to Google and even compared to Microsoft along with Yahoo! Its own efforts to become a content destination have been met with a mixed reception, and the stock chart shows no real read either way at the start of 2013. What is amazing is that the company has grown without many investors paying attention.

  IAC/InteractiveCorp shares trade at $46.00, and its 52-week range is $40.87 to $55.57. Analysts have a consensus value of just over $60.00, for an implied upside of close to 30%, and IAC trades at only about 12-times earnings. Is this a Web value stock in the making?

10 Best Internet Stocks To Invest In 2014: Yahoo! Inc.(YHOO)

Yahoo! Inc., together with its subsidiaries, operates as a digital media company that delivers personalized digital content and experiences through various devices worldwide. It offers online properties and services to users; and a range of marketing services to businesses. The company?s communications and communities offerings include Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! Messenger, Yahoo! Groups, Yahoo! Answers, Flickr, and Connected TV, which provide a range of communication and social services to users and small businesses enabling users to organize into groups and share knowledge, common interests, and photos. Its search products comprise Yahoo! Search and Yahoo! Local, available free to users to navigate the Internet and discover content. The company?s marketplaces offerings and services include Yahoo! Shopping, Yahoo! Travel, Yahoo! Real Estate, Yahoo! Autos, and Yahoo! Small Business, which allow users to research specific topics, products, services, or areas of interest by review ing and exchanging information, obtaining contact details, or considering offers from providers of goods, services, or parties with similar interests. Its media offerings comprise Yahoo! Homepage, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Sports, Yahoo! Finance, My Yahoo!, Yahoo! Toolbar, Yahoo! Entertainment & Lifestyles, Yahoo! Contributor Network, and Yahoo! Pulse, which are designed to engage users with online content and services on the Web. The company also offers marketing services, such as display and search advertising, listing-based services, and commerce-based transactions to advertisers. In addition, it provides software and platform offerings for third-party developers, advertisers, and publishers, such as Yahoo! Developer Network, Yahoo! Open Strategy, Yahoo! Application Platform, Yahoo! Updates, Yahoo! Query Language, and Yahoo! Search BOSS. The company has strategic alliances with Nokia and ABC News, Inc. Yahoo! Inc. was founded in 1994 and is headquartered in Sunnyvale, Californi a.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Jon C. Ogg]

  Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) had a full shareholder recovery under new CEO Marissa Mayer, but now the company has to begin to execute on its strategy. Mayer probably has another three months before Wall St. will demand to see increasingly better results. We only say this because the shares rose by more than one-third from the summer lows to the peak above $20. Mayer has delivered on her promise to monetize the stake in Alibaba in China, and there is hope that more monetization from that may be seen, or from the Yahoo! Japan stake. Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) may represent the biggest opportunity, but it also may represent the largest challenge. Yahoo! looks as though it will be a content destination rather than stepping backwards to become a search and aggregation destination.

  Yahoo! trades at $19.40, but it has lost some momentum after closing at $20.08 and peaking at $20.32 for its 52-week high on the first trading day of 2013. The company has a $23 billion market cap, and we would caution that analysts have a consensus price target of only $19.66 after a fresh downgrade by Bernstein on valuation. Yahoo! trades at about 17-times current and forward earnings expectations.

  As you might have expected, there is an ETF for that! The First Trust Dow Jones Internet Index (NYSEMKT: FDN) ETF trades at $40.60, but note that it hit a 52-week high, and that the 52-week is now $40.67. We would also note that the volume of almost 2.4 million shares seen this past Monday was basically twice as active as the three busiest trading days of 2012 in this ETF.

10 Best Internet Stocks To Invest In 2014: Symantec Corporation(SYMC)

Symantec Corporation provides security, storage, and systems management solutions internationally. The company?s Consumer segment delivers Internet security, PC tune-up, and online backup solutions and services to individual users and home offices. Its Security and Compliance segment provides solutions for endpoint security and management, compliance, messaging management, data loss prevention, encryption, and authentication services to large, medium, and small-sized businesses, as well as offers solutions through its software-as-a-service (SaaS) security offerings. This segment?s products enable customers to secure, provision, and remotely manage their laptops, PCs, mobile devices, and servers. The company?s Storage and Server Management segment provides storage and server management, backup, archiving, and data protection solutions across heterogeneous storage and server platforms, as well as solutions delivered through its SaaS offerings to large, medium, and small-s ized businesses. Symantec?s Services segment offers implementation services and solutions, including consulting, business critical services, education, and managed security services. The company also provides various enterprise support offerings, such as annual maintenance support contracts, including content, upgrades, and technical support. It sells its products through its eCommerce platform, as well as through distributors, direct marketers, Internet-based resellers, system builders, ISPs, and retail locations worldwide. Symantec markets and sells its products through distributors, retailers, direct marketers, Internet-based resellers, original equipment manufacturers, system builders, and Internet service providers; and its e-commerce channels, as well as direct sales force, value-added and large account resellers, and system integrators. The company was founded in 1982 and is headquartered in Mountain View, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Jonas Elmerraji]

   Symantec (SYMC) is having a better year in 2012. Shares of the $13 billion computer security firm have rallied around 18% year-to-date, besting the broad market's performance by a slight margin. Much of Symantec's performance came in the late Summer, when the stock gapped up and started moving higher extremely quickly.

  But that straight-up trajectory wasn't sustainable, so shares have spent the last couple of months consolidating sideways in a price channel. Sideways consolidation isn't a bad thing -- it just means that investors are trying to catch their breath after a big volatile run. With resistance coming in at $19.25, buyers have a pretty well defined signal that the rest is over for SYMC and another rally leg is beginning. I wouldn't recommend buying until then.

  Remember, these setups all come down to supply and demand from buyers and sellers. After the huge push higher at the end of the summer, sellers started coming in at $19.25 -- it was a price where sellers were more eager to sell and take gains than buyers were to keep buying. That's why the breakout above $19.25 is a buy signal; a breakout indicates that buyers have gained enough strength to absorb all of the excess supply above $19.25.

  Without that upside barrier, this stock should be able to keep running higher…

10 Best Internet Stocks To Invest In 2014: Internap Network Services Corporation(INAP)

Internap Network Services Corporation provides information technology (IT) infrastructure services. The company operates through two segments, Data Center Services and IP Services. The Data Center Services segment provides colocation services, which include physical space for hosting customers? IT infrastructure network and other equipment, as well as offers associated services, such as redundant power and network connectivity, environmental controls, and security. This segment also offers managed hosting services that enable its customers to own and manage the software applications and content, as well as provides and maintains the hardware, operating system, collocation, and bandwidth. The IP services segment provides patented performance Internet protocol (IP) service; XIP acceleration-as-a-service solution; and flow control platform, a premise-based intelligent routing hardware product for customers, who run their own multiple network architectures, known as multi-homi ng. In addition, this segment offers content delivery network services that enable its customers to stream and distribute media and content, such as video, audio software, and applications to audiences through points of presence, as well as offers capacity-on-demand services to handle events and unanticipated traffic spikes. Internap Network Services Corporation provides its services and products through 76 IP service points, which include 20 CDN POPs and 1 standalone CDN POP, as well as through 37 data centers across North America, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region. It serves the entertainment and media, financial services, business services, software, hosting and information technology infrastructure, and telecommunications industries. The company was founded in 1996 and is based in Atlanta, Georgia.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Harding]

  Internap Network Services Corporation is an Internet solutions and data Center Company providing a suite of network optimization and delivery services and products that manage deliver and distribute applications. Its EPS forecast for the current year is 0.12 and next year is 0.21. According to consensus estimates, its topline is expected to grow 2.85% current year and 9.34% next year. It is trading at a forward P/E of 34.33. Out of eight analysts covering the company, three are positive and have buy recommendations and five have hold ratings.

10 Best Internet Stocks To Invest In 2014: Google Inc.(GOOG)

Google Inc. maintains an index of Web sites and other online content for users, advertisers, and Google network members and other content providers. It offers AdWords, an auction-based advertising program; AdSense program, which enables Web sites that are part of the Google Network to deliver ads from its AdWords advertisers; Google Display, a display advertising network that comprises the videos, text, images, and other interactive ads; DoubleClick Ad Exchange, a real-time auction marketplace for the trading of display ad space; and YouTube that provides video, interactive, and other ad formats for advertisers. The company also provides Google Mobile that optimizes Google?s applications for mobile devices in browser and downloadable form; and enables advertisers to run search ad campaigns on mobile devices, as well as Google Local that provides local information on the Web; and Google Boost for small businesses to participate in the ads auction. In addition, it offers And roid, an open source mobile software platform; Google Chrome OS, an open source operating system; Google Chrome, a Web browser; Google TV, a platform for the consumers to use the television and the Internet on a single screen; and Google Books platform to discover, search, and consume content from printed books online. Further, the company provides Google Apps, a cloud computing suite of message and collaboration tools, which includes Gmail, Google Docs, Google Calendar, and Google Sites; Google Search Appliance that offers real-time search of business and intranet applications, and public Web sites; Google Site Search, a custom search engine; Google Commerce Search for online retail enterprises; Google Checkout to make online shopping and payments streamlined and secure; Google Maps Application Programming Interface; and Google Earth Enterprise, a firewall software solution for imagery and data visualization. Google Inc. was founded in 1998 and is headquartered in Mountain View, California.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Bill]

  Google Inc. (Nasdaq: GOOG : 527.41, 5.92) announced to have purchased technology patents from International Business Machine Corp. (NYSE: IBM) as the former stocks up on intellectual property to defend itself against lawsuits. Shares of IBM were down 0.33 percent or 60 cents to trade at $181.20 in the pre-market trading. Shares of Google had closed at $610.94 yesterday.

• [By Sy_Harding]  

  With a PEG ratio of 0.6 Google is trading at a big discount compared to its peers. With a recovering economy and growing technology sector I see GOOG poised to hit $700.

• [By Chuck]  

  The brokerage expect outperformance for Google, given continued strength in the paid search market driven by a modestly improving economy and online share gains and traction with non-search businesses, primarily display and mobile. The brokerage is modeling 18 percent and 19 percent revenue and EPS growth, respectively, in 2011.

• [By McWillams]

  This stock has been going up higher and higher for at least the last 10 years.  They don’t seem to be letting up.  On the fundamental side, their market share is growing as well as the market itself.  They are starting to get into the social networking space as well with the recent release of Google+.  The thing you want to watch for is their operational costs.  It’s been rising very quickly due mostly to hiring costs.  I don’t foresee that stabilizing at any point.  Just make sure the earnings are growing faster than rising costs.