The tech sector has just finished its worst month since the Great Recession, and after glancing at the headlines you might be forgiven for thinking that the sky is falling. After all, Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, and Alphabet (parent company of Google) did lose $75 billion dollars at the end of last week. News network CNBC summarized the carnage among the big-name techies: “Tech stocks are coming off their worst month since 2008. The Nasdaq closed October down 9.2 percent, with Amazon and Alphabet leading the decline down 20 percent and 9.7 percent, respectively.”
The news, however, is not all glum for tech sector investors. While the big names lost money, and by their sheer size led the market’s Friday downturn, a number of smaller tech firms showed real strength that same day. We’ll use the TipRanks data to take a look at three of those and explore why they are gaining ground.
Amdocs Limited
Amdocs (DOX – Research Report) is a major global supplier of software and support services for digital communications systems. The greater part of the company’s business is with US customers, although it maintains development and support departments worldwide.
September marked the end of Q4 FY18 for Amdocs, and the results were solid. The company reported revenue of $1.003 million, just ahead of the consensus estimate. North American business accounted for nearly 70% of the total, with the remainder divided between Europe and the rest of the world. Amdocs projects continued success into next year, giving guidance of 1% to 5% revenue growth in FY19.
The result is a stock that shows plenty of promise to weather today’s market climate. DOX added 2% on Friday, on top of 5% since October 29.
Top analyst Shaul Eyal (Track Record & Ratings) of Oppenheimer agrees that Amdocs is primed for growth. After reviewing the Q4 results, he gives DOX a ‘Buy’ rating and comments, “We view DOX as the predominant global player in the billing and customer experience space, with a demonstrated ability to execute large-scale and complex projects. We expect escalating competitive rivalry in the telecom sector to drive demand for DOX’s offerings.” Eyal sets a 15% upside for DOX, with a $77 price target.