HEADY STOCK GAINS by three companies involved in interactive communications are masking an otherwise lackluster year for publicly traded DM service suppliers.
The 40 companies in the four supplier segments tracked by Gruppo, Levey & Capell Inc.’s GLC Portfolio saw their stock prices rise an average of 39.4% for the 12 months ended June 30, significantly ahead of the 28.1% improvement in the Standard & Poor’s 500 during the same period. The comparison, however, is clouded by the triple-digit hikes in share price of CMG Information Services, Broadvision Inc. and DoubleClick Inc.
CMG’s stock has increased nearly 1,000% in the past year thanks to its ownership in Internet search engine Lycos and other Net-related companies. Broadvision’s price per share jumped almost 240% in the July 1, 1997 through June 30, 1998 period as its electronic communication/commerce software caught on. And Internet media placement agency DoubleClick surged more than 320% since it went public earlier this year.
Without those three firms’ performance, service suppliers’ average stock price gain was only 1.9% for the year ended June 30. Minus the high flyers, results in the supplier segments ranged from a 40.2% dip in average share price to an improvement of 31.5%.
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