The price per share of a stock tells you almost nothing. It's the price to buy one share of the stock. But how many shares does the company have outstanding? In math, we multiply two multiplicands together, but the price per share is only one multiplicand. If you don't know the other, you can't do any meaningful math or figure out much of the world around you.
Fools with a capital f know that you need to know the shares outstanding and then multiply that by the price per share, and now you know the actual full value of the company, its price tag, its market capitalization, market cap. Well, to teach this lesson inexorably and unforgettably, we invented a game. That's what I do. The date was August ninth two thousand seventeen. The Market Cap Game Show was born. We've been playing every quarter since. Oh, and you're playing too.
I designed it that way so you can play along against my guest stars, against your spouse or partner, against your kids. Can you outscore my talented contestants? It's that time of the quarter again. Ten new stocks, three guest stars, Matt Argosinger, Yasser El Shemi, and you only on this week's Rule Breaker Investing. It's the Rule Breaker Investing podcast with Motley Fool cofounder David Gardner. Welcome back to Rule Breaker Investing.
This is the Market Cap Game Show, and my two guest contestants today are both past winners and will be competing for a seat at the final four for our twenty twenty five world championships. Matt Argersinger helped initiate the Market Cap Game Show. Having been there with me in two thousand seventeen as we debuted the show, he is the OG. Matt currently works in The Motley Fool's dividend investor service. You can also catch him regularly on The Motley Fool Money podcast.
He enjoys traveling, collecting vintage comic books, and most of all, spending time with his wife and five year old son. Yasser El Shimi has won one, lost one, and tied one market cap game show back back when we used to have ties. But just as I don't think any National Football League game should ever end in a tie, I felt the same way about our market cap game show. So that June twenty twenty two appearance was our final tie.
Yasser is a senior investment analyst at The Motley Fool working on Stock Advisor and Global Partners. He particularly enjoys studying global markets and small and mid cap cap growth stocks. Other than that, Yasser's a diehard AS Roma fan for those of you who follow, and I know you're out there, European soccer. And, of course, the third player, and to us, the most important, is you. That's right.
You, our dear fellow foolish listener, as Dez begins to crank up our market cap game show music, let me just briefly remind especially new listeners, new players, I'll be mentioning a stock. Neither Matt nor Yasser knows what stock is coming. They've been in soundproof chambers for Matt how long? I've been I've been stuck in here for hours, David, studying market caps, of course. Did we give you any refreshments? You know, I I I got one cup of coffee. Okay.
So I'll turn to one of my all star guests here talking about a stock he didn't know was coming, and he will do his best to state a numerical range within which the market cap falls. The other contestant and you playing at home will simply say, I agree, meaning it's accurate. The stock's value falls inside the stated range, or I disagree. I think it's outside that stated range. So you simply not a hard game to play. Agree or disagree? And if you get it right, give yourself a plus one.
That's the Market Cap Game Show. We're focused on the real market caps of real stocks. Nobody knows what's coming. A perfect score would be ten. Okay. Stock number one. Matt, let me turn to you first. If a stock doesn't pay a dividend, is it dead to you? Oh, it is. Look at it, Dave. Never. Never at all. Now I was actually being serious, but I think you're being sarcastic. I am being sarcastic. Sarcasm is the wood of fools.
Yes. It is. No. I I of course, there you know, most, well, actually, I I should say this. Most companies actually pay dividend nowadays. If you look at the broader index, it's which is is kind of remarkable. Now sometimes they tend to be small. But, no, there are many companies, many wonderful companies that I invest in that don't pay dividends. What if it's from an industry that you don't normally follow? Do you spend any time with these kinds of stocks dividend or not?
How how industry concentrated are you mad in your own hunting for stocks? You know, I with dividends, I've become a little more concentrated because you have to kinda be in the financials, industrials, those kinds of areas to get more dividends. Dividends are found in pretty much every sector. Do you have any stocks in your portfolio in in industries that you don't spend much time with?
I do, David. You know, I don't spend a lot of time looking at banks, but I do recognize there are a few banks that have some a wonderful his inner earnings and dividend history, and I've I've invested in a few of those. Well, I don't know if biotechnology sits on that list of things you like and follow or not, Matt. Maybe we're about to Fiosciences. Wow. Makes medicines to help people with brain related conditions that affect how they move, think, and feel.
And my question for you, Matt Argosinger, stock number one is, what is your stated market cap range for Neurocrine Biosciences, ticker symbol n b I x? Wow. Alright. Well, here you go, Yasser. Shot in the dark here. Hey. That's the way we like to roll. Alright. You'll hear me. Number one. Starting off strong right. I'm gonna go with a gosh. I'm gonna go with a range of, let's say, five to ten billion. Five billion to ten billion dollars.
Players at home, Yasser Al Shimi, the question is, do you agree or do you disagree? Man, oh, man. I like the pause that you guys I suspect I suspect many a listener jogging or driving right now is also taking an extra breath and wondering. Five to ten inside or outside? Yeah. Neurocrine Biosciences, this is not your, you know, famous biotech company out there. I am actually going to agree with that range. Unfortunately, it was a good range, and it sounded agreeable.
And to me as well, this is a stock I picked in Motley Fool Stock Advisor five years ago. I haven't checked in that much recently with it, but the market cap for Neurocrine Biosciences is twelve point three four billion dollars Wow. Outside the range. Therefore, listeners at home, if you said I disagree, give yourself a plus one. Yasu, you had that opportunity, but Matt gets the point with his five to ten.
One of the funny things about this scoring system is that Matt can be kind of wrong and get a plus one. That's what I love about this game. This company, by the way, based in San Diego, California, one of their well known treatments is for a condition called tardive dyskinesia, which causes people to make uncontrollable movements often as a side effect of other medications.
So Neurocrine works on creating drugs that help people manage these kinds of health problems and improve their quality of life. As I mentioned, I picked it from Motley Fool Stock Advisor in October two thousand nineteen, so it's just about five years done. Stock's up twenty five percent. Problem is the S and P five hundred's up ninety percent, and so it has been an underperformer.
But still a company doing good things in this world, it it is up, but just not as much as I'd hoped when I picked it five years ago. I I you could have said five hundred billion market cap or twenty billion market cap, and I said I would've said, oh, it makes sense. It probably makes sense. Five to ten was not a bad call. I think in a way you did deserve that plus one for being me. Alright. Let's move on to I will need that. I promise you.
Move on to stock number two. Stock number two. Oh my gosh. It's a throwdown. Players at home, both Yasser and Matt will shortly write down their market cap range for this company. Once they're ready, each will share their market cap range, and it's time for you to decide which seems more plausible to you, Yasser's or Matts? And if you guess right, give yourself a point. Let me turn back to Yasser. Yasser, do you use the Internet to book travel? I do all the time. Favorite sites?
Expedia dot com, Chase Travel, but I know that the question is probably going with booking. Close, but no cigar. However, I think you'll be interested in this one. Have you ever used a a travel site with a big button that says book my launch? No. I have never even heard of that. Rocket Lab USA is in its own words, quote, the end to end space company opening access to space to improve life on Earth. Now a reminder that this is a throwdown, so pencils out Yasser and Matt.
And as they choose their market cap ranges for Rocket Labs USA, ticker symbol RKLB, let me add that there's a chance they'll both be right. In which case, the tighter range wins the point. And if they're both wrong, if the market cap actually falls outside their two stated ranges, well, that would never happen. But but if it ever did, whoever's closer to the actual market cap gets plus one. Again, this is a throwdown. We do this twice.
Every show's stock number two, ticker symbol r k l b. And it's worth reminding our players at home, all you have to do is say, I agree with Yasser or I agree with Matt. And if you're right, give yourself a plus one. Gentlemen, let me turn to Yasser first. Yasser, what is your stated market cap range for Rocket Lab USA? My market cap range for Rocket Lab is seven billion dollars to nine and a half billion dollars. Alright. Seven to nine and a half billion dollars.
Matt, you're looking down at the post it note where you wrote some scratch out some numbers. You're laughing at yours. I'm shaking my because I know I'm gonna be way off on this one. My range is one point five billion to three billion. Alright. To summarize, Matt, you said one and a half to three. Yasser, you said seven to nine and a half players at home. Do you agree with Yasser, or did you agree with Matt? State it right now. Thank you.
The market cap for Rocket Lab USA is three point six four billion dollars. So if you agreed with Matt, give yourself a plus. One, three point six four billion dollars. Now, Yasser, I see you laughing, and I think I know why because full disclosure, I think this is an active recommendation in a Motley Fool service. And I was looking at the buy recommendation from March eighth of last year, so twenty twenty three. It was written by Yasser Elshimi.
That is correct. Yes. And I'm way off on the market cap, so apologies for that. I I'm sorry. I I don't memorize market cap for the companies I follow. And yet you're still pretty good at this game. But but here's the thing. Learning that the market cap for Rocket Lab is three point six billion actually makes me feel good about that investment, because I assumed it was a much bigger company than it actually is. And I think that's, a company with a pretty promising future ahead.
And indeed, it is up seventy five percent since your recommendation, Yasser, with the market up forty percent. I will note, I haven't been following this actively, but it was first up eighty percent within just months of your recommendation by the summer of twenty twenty three. Then all of a sudden, it was down. It was underwater fifteen percent months later. It's now back up seventy five percent overall.
And, you know, if it gets to a seven to nine and a half billion dollar market cap, Yasser, it's gonna double from here. That sounds good to me. That's correct. That's not a stock for the faint of heart. It has significant volatility, you know, price going up and down. But I think that the long term trajectory should hopefully, look similar to how their rockets actually launch into space. So you were being aspirational with your market cap rate. Exactly. I like that. I like that.
I do too. Now, Matt, you didn't feel confident, yet you got it. How are you feeling right now? I'm feeling surprisingly good. I mean, I really thought I was o and two here first, and now I'm surprised to be two and up. Rocket Lab Space Systems technology, by the way, has enabled more than seventeen hundred missions globally from complex interplanetary scientific spacecraft like the James Webb Space Telescope to critical communications constellations.
I think after SpaceX, they're the number two most frequently launched private company. So an interesting one certainly to follow and one with a market cap, as it turns out, friends, of just three point six four billion dollars as we speak. By the way, all market caps updated as of noon yesterday. That would be Tuesday, September seventeenth. So that's the time frame that we're speaking to just minutes before we recorded. Alright. Let's move on to stock number three.
Matt, I noticed that you're up to nothing. So let me turn back to you. Matt, I know you're a sports fan. Oh, yeah. And you're involved in some rivalries. Oh, yeah. For instance, Red Sox. For instance, New England Patriots. You just throw down those names in some circles. It's enough to excite some resentment. Oh, yeah. Especially among New York fans, for sure. But rivalries are fun. Right? Absolutely. Ever painted your face at a game?
I am not a face painter or a or a mask wearer or any kind of super, super fan like that. I'm the guy who shows up with a polo shirt and cheers and, you know, takes an intellectual approach to the game. And am I right? I think when you were around last year, you'd recently taken your young son to his first NFL football game. That's right. We actually went and saw speaking of, well, Boston sports where I'm from, we actually we we were in Tampa.
We were seeing the Buccaneers play, but we were seeing one of Tom Brady's last home games before he retired. So Did he win? He did not win that game, but it was still exciting. My my son loved it. So yeah. Rivalries. Matt, what are some corporate rivalries that come to mind? Wow. Okay. Well, I mean, probably, famously, Coke and Pepsi is a is probably a big rivalry. Domino's Pizza Hut, although I don't know pizza. Yeah. Pizza Hut's Sure. Publicly traded with Yum. That counts. Let me think.
Could you say Microsoft and Alphabet maybe to a certain point extent? Or certainly back in the day, Apple. I mean, I think about that PC versus Mac guy ads, that seemed pretty rivalry centric. Absolutely. Well, this company played second fiddle in the semiconductor industry for decades to Intel. But in recent years, the tide seems to have turned, and Advanced Micro Devices may have traded in Intel for a new rival, NVIDIA.
Matt, as you probably guessed by now, stock number three is Advanced Micro Devices. The ticker symbol is AMD. Matthew Argosinger, what is your stated market cap range for Advanced Micro Devices? Wow. I know it's had a nice run along with the other semiconductor companies, especially those involved in AI. I am going to go I'm gonna go pretty big on this one. I'm gonna say two hundred and fifty to three hundred billion. Two hundred fifty billion to three hundred billion dollars.
Yasser, is this a company you've ever looked at? Yes. It is. And, yeah. Yeah. I mean, you're absolutely right that there is a pretty strong rivalry going on between AMD and NVIDIA, especially when it comes to data center, chips. Of course, NVIDIA has a a a lead right now with the GPU system that they have developed, but AMD is also working on its next generation data center, chips that are hopefully going to enable this coming revolution of generative AI. Well said, Yasser.
And that said, two hundred fifty billion to three hundred billion dollars. Yasser, do you wanna agree or disagree with that range? I wanna agree with that range. I mean, you're almost right. Two forty nine. You're not right. It it it's actually two hundred forty six No. Three nine billion dollars. And so the correct answer was to disagree with Matt's range. Matt did a pretty good job putting a round number right near the actual market cap. That's hard to pick with.
I'm quite sure a lot of our players at home probably also agreed with Matt, and it wasn't a bad call, but it was technically the wrong call. We have to give Matt the point there. Again, players at home, give yourself a plus one if you disagreed. You know, it's amazing to follow AMD. Lisa Hsu, the CEO, came to the company in two thousand fourteen. So she's now in her tenth year leading Advanced Micro Devices, and it's a forty bagger for those who bought when she took the reins.
Just phenomenal performance. In fact, it's now well past Intel. Intel bouncing up a little bit this week on a couple positive announcements, but Intel is down to a ninety three billion dollar market cap. So AMD is almost triple the market cap of Intel Corporation these days. Shocker. That is a shocker. I don't yeah. I don't know what I'm more shocked by, Intel's fall from grace, I guess, or or or AMD's rise.
Probably Intel's fall, but what's still amazing to me is even at a we're almost two hundred and fifty billion dollar market cap. AMD's a tenth the size of NVIDIA. It is amazing to think about that, and that's part of the beauty of market caps. Right. And the market cap game show insights like that, an eye opener. And this also shows to me the importance of management. I mean, you talk a lot you take a look at companies like Microsoft and AMD, they were left for dead as these, like, dinosaurs.
They were kind of these big technology companies with the when we thought that, hey, the Internet bubble burst in two thousand. And, you know, here comes Lisa Hsu with AMD. Here comes Satya Nadella with Microsoft, and they just unleashed incredible potential within both of these companies, and, investors have been amply roar. It is so true. I've often said this in the past. I will always say it in the future.
The single greatest factor behind market app performance are the people running the company. And often, they're founders, but not always. Lisa Sue certainly wasn't a founder for AMD, but she has been by far its most spectacular CEO. And and, really, across all of American business, I'm not sure there's been much better performance at that scale over the last ten years. By the way, Matt Argersinger, I do see Intel has been reducing its dividend. Intel does pay a dividend.
AMD does not pay a dividend, but Intel, a one point eight percent yield now over the expected over the next fifty two weeks down a bit. You know what's amazing is we we've done some work in dividend investor looking back decades with with data, and what's remarkable is companies that cut their dividend, and Intel first cut their dividend a while ago. It's usually a bad sign. Sometimes you you can look at it and say, well, company's gonna protect their balance sheet, conserve cash.
That's smart maybe. But almost always, I'd say nine out of ten times the company cuts a dividend. It means it's it's a bumpy road ahead, and that's what's happened to Intel. Alright. Arga Singer, three. Elshimi, zero. Yasser, I think a lot of us are cheering you. I almost feel like you're winning this with a lot of your insights, but in fact, you've been shut out so far. Let's go to stock number four. Yasir, have you ever dreamed of starting your own business? And if so, what would you sell?
I did, actually. And, for a little while, I entertained the idea of opening a bakery. And and and the reason is because I feel like we don't have fresh pastries anywhere near our ZIP code, and that that really rubs me the wrong way. And I think every American is entitled to fresh pastry. I love that line. And a lot of people, me included, I'm enjoying their product right now, use Starbucks often in and around breakfast, other times of the day too.
But Starbucks often gets dinged for not really having great pastries. Some of those decisions are local. So for all I know, at your local Starbucks, dear listener, you might love the pastries. But in general, Starbucks has never gotten great ratings for its food. Yet still what a great company and what a great stock pick it's been over the years. So, Yasser, I love that. Did you actually incorporate? Did you open any are you just cooking it up at the oven and imagining?
Or how far did you take that? I think I've taken as far as asking my wife to bake me stuff every once in a while. That is very that is an inspiring entrepreneurial story. Well, this company is making commerce better for everyone, supporting the next generation of entrepreneurs, the world's biggest brands, and everyone in between. This stock is owned by a lot of Motley Fool members because it's been recommended by a bunch of our services, by me, by my brother, etcetera, over the years.
And I just bet you already realize it's Shopify, ticker symbol s h o p. Turning now to Yasser. Let's cut to the quick. Yasser, I think a lot of us already knew the ticker symbol, probably already knew the company name. What is your stated market cap range for Shopify? I would say the stated market cap for Shopify is between ninety to a hundred billion dollars. Ninety billion to one hundred billion dollars. Matt, have you ever opened up your own business? No. I haven't.
And like like Yasser, I've asked my wife to do many, many things for me, though. So I I should've I should've be I should've opened business. I mean, I definitely know that acquiring some real estate and managing as a landlord some properties, that's part of a game you're in. I don't think Shopify really tries to empower that. Not really. No. So I haven't I haven't crossed paths with Shopify yet. Yasser said ninety billion to one hundred billion. Matt Aergensinger, players at home.
Would you like to agree or disagree? I'm worried. It's just outside that range, but I think I'm gonna agree with Yasser in that range. You were right to do so. And, again, the game often feels wrong and yet so right. Somehow, Matt just acquired another point even though Yasser did a great job naming the market cap. In fact, Shopify is ninety six point one six billion. So nice range. You pretty much put it right in the middle.
Maybe you need to be a little cagier, Yasser, and give intentionally the wrong market cap range to trick Matt Argersinger and players at home. But you didn't do it that time. You did a nice job calling the market cap, and Matt simply agreed and gets a plus one. Again, players at home, if you agreed with Yasir's range, give yourself a plus one. Yeah. Shopify making commerce better for everyone, a classic, I would say, classic rule breaker of the past decade.
You know, it was cut in half in the five months before my colleague, Carl Teal, picked it for Motley Fool rule breakers on February twenty fourth. Check it two thousand sixteen. And when I quoted it yesterday, Shopify was up exactly three thousand four hundred percent for us. That's a that's a thirty five bagger. But even better, this is my favorite thing looking back on Shopify, obeying rule breaker investor habit number two, we added up the opposite of looking to double down.
So the month after Carl picked it, I re upped it for rule breakers. Get this. The stock had jumped in that month a full twenty five percent. But rather than say, oh, well, we missed it, I got even more bullish in my rule breaker y way and picked it twenty five percent higher. That one is a twenty eight bagger now. I already mentioned my brother Tom picked the stock too. Many, many fools own this one. Tom's done some great interviews with CEO Toby
Lutkeff. I don't know him, but I know this about Toby. He's a gamer, which I really appreciate. I do follow him on Twitter, Twitter x, and he'll sometimes talk about tabletop board games, the kind that I love. So huge Shopify fan. Guys, do you own any Shopify? Any thoughts before we move to stock number five? I I I do own Shopify, and and it's because based largely on your recommendations, David.
But I will just say what you described about buying the stock or reupping the stock again a month later after a twenty five percent move, that is something that is so hard for your average investor to do. And and yet, it is one of the most powerful things you can do as an investor, long term investor. I too do own Shopify. And perhaps one of the reason I got the market cap so, you know, so correct is because it is my most successful investor ever as personal investment, at least.
Picked it in twenty fourteen at, what is now probably cost basis of two dollars and seventy one cents per share. Well done. Absolutely phenomenal. Yasser, I'm so glad we hired you years later. And, yeah, you scooped us. And that's really what we want for all of our members. You were maybe a Motley Fool member or follower back then. We didn't have the advice for you yet. You got in ahead of us, which we absolutely love.
In fact, growing a community of people who see great things and say something, like, I'm buying this one. If you see something, say something. I like that a lot. But I especially love it when you can go against the grain and do things people don't expect, like add up rather than look to double down, which is what most of the world looks to do buying low. So, anyway, thank you for that, Matt. Let's move on to stock number five. Matt, it's time for you, I don't know, to give away a point.
I maybe here. I I'm kind of rooting against it even though I need to be neutral. It's gonna happen. This is this is what I I actually I actually think four out of ten, which I which I'm at right now, is is already above my average. So I'm so I'm flying on cloud nine here. Beautiful. Matthew Argersinger, what's a parenting tip that you've picked up in your your first five years as a dad that that maybe we all could learn something from? Is that it doesn't even have to be your best.
How about how about your third best tip? I think letting your child, no matter how young they might be, be have adult conversations, be in the room when other adults are talking. We tend I think as parents, we tend to say, oh, go play in your room or go play in, you know, in the yard or something like that. And but I think my son has really benefited from, you know, not only just listening to adult conversations, but actually engaging in adult conversations. At the age of five?
At the age of five. Love it. And, Yasir, you are a dad as well. I'm gonna ask you the same question, so be thinking. But let me turn back to Matt because before we came on air, you guys were having an offline conversation just about technology and how we kind of oversee our kids in technology. There is a growing movement to move smartphones out of the schools. Some states have even stepped up at this point to kind of ban them, not because they're evil or bad, but because they're distracting.
And I will at least say, I think I'm surrounded at this table by individuals who did not have a smartphone that they were looking at during cafeteria or recess growing up as kids, and yet that is not uncommon these days. That that's right. I mean, I I I was shocked to read an article recently about how lunchrooms you just mentioned lunchrooms are so quiet these days because kids go to lunch in the sit in the cafeterias and look at their phones.
And I I just remember growing up when I was in school, the the lunch cafeteria was this cacophony of noise. I mean, it's just, you know, trays bashing, people talking, people yelling. And to see it to hear that it's it's silent these days is kinda shocking to me. It is. It is shocking. And and maybe that's temporary. In fact, I think we might be moving back toward more boisterousness.
Jonathan Haidt, author of The Coddling of the American Mind and other books, an academic and a real big backer of taking social media and smartphones out of our students' lives, not altogether, but just much reduced in ways you can control it. And that includes the home, guys. And I I wanna turn back to Matt. Do you guys have an iPad technology overall? How how does it work with your five year old? We do. We have we have an iPad.
It's a it's a family iPad, but, you know, my son uses it to do piano lessons and and and math, games and things like that. But I tell you, it is it is one of those, you kinda bite your lip and hope, you know, because my son can figure out some amazing things. And no matter how many restrictions we put on an iPad, he always ends up in certain places where I'm I'm not expecting him to be. So it's it is a constant challenge. Yasser, how does it work in the El Shimi household?
I know your kids are a little bit older, but this is very relevant. Yeah. So we actually control the Internet from the source. We bought a router with parental control where we, my wife and I can, effectively monitor and control, the Internet browsing, the, everything that the kids can do, how many hours, online they can spend on each device, and so on. So this way, we're hopefully, providing our kids with a as much of a safe Internet as you can hopefully get.
I know there is no such thing as one hundred percent safe, but, that's what we aim for at least. Alright. Well, this company definitely is in the world of touch screens, but also voice control in other ways that humans interface. It's that human machine interface. The company is Synaptics. And when I asked ChatGPT to explain Synaptics to me as if I were five years old, which seems relevant to this conversation, here is the answer.
Synaptics is like a helper that makes things you touch work better. You know how on phones or tablets, when you tap the screen, it knows exactly where your finger is? Synaptics makes the special parts that help devices like phones, laptops, and even car touch screens understand your touch. And when I think of touch, I cannot think of one of my favorite names anybody's ever named their son, Matt, your son, Dutch. So I hope Dutch would understand the touch that we just shared. I think so.
And he might even understand this company better than I. Alright. Well, let's turn to you, Matt Argersinger, because Synaptics, the ticker symbol is s y n a. You now know a little bit about its business. You may not have known ninety seconds ago. Matt, what is your stated market cap range for Synaptics? I am gonna say it is between six and a half and eight and a half billion. Six and a half to eight and a half billion dollars. Yasser, is this a small to mid cap company you've ever looked at?
I, unfortunately, have not looked at it before. I have, and thereby hangs a tail, but I'm gonna hold off on that as I turn to you now, Yasser, and say, Matt said six and a half to eight and a half billion dollars, Yasser Alshimi, and players at home. Do you wanna agree or disagree? I'll disagree. And score one for the underdog right now who's making an epic comeback. Yasser, you were right. Or delaying the inevitable. Yassir, you were right. Players at home, you were right.
If you disagreed with Matt, Synaptics is a smaller company than that. Three point one two billion dollars is Synaptics. And here's my quick story about Synaptics. And it's entitled, we never get credit for the ones we don't pick. So from two thousand twelve to two thousand fifteen, this was on the Rule Breaker's internal watch list as I oversaw the service, and I never picked it. In fact, I noted because I always wrote notes.
I have all of my reactions that I kept over the years because I saved it all on Evernote, so I know what I was thinking at the time. And as I wrote my final note to myself about Synaptics in August two thousand fifteen, I ended with this, and I quote, I quote me. I mean, why else do we have podcast? To quote ourselves. Here we go. Amazing.
A market up year, so the market was up that year, in which the company's revenue doubled to one point seven billion dollars, but the stock is down five percent. Gross margins lost eight percentage points, though, and Simon, that would be former fool Simon Erickson, Simon says lower still. So the market is worried about the profitability of this business. I obviously much prefer strong top line growth with margin expansion.
So this mixed signal makes me no more than lukewarm on the stock, and I never went back and updated my notes nor did I ever recommend the stock. From that day, August fifth of two thousand fifteen, check it, it's up exactly zero percent. It is right where it was with the same market cap nine years later. The market, by the way, up a hundred fifty percent plus. So, guys we never get credit for the ones we don't pick. I know you both have done the same.
Something to appreciate about your Motley Fool advisors are the ones they they toss away. Now sometimes we make mistakes and toss away really good fish, but often, we toss away not so good fish. We do know studies show that a minority of stocks beat the market averages anyway. So you're definitely not shooting fish in a barrel when you pick stocks as an adviser here at The Motley Fool or in your own portfolio, dear listener, but give yourself credit sometimes for the ones you didn't pick.
Well, we're now at halftime. The score is Matt Argersinger, four. Yasser Elshimi, one. It's time for our halftime Follies. Three months ago, Des brought what I would describe as a pretty compelling viola solo for the halftime show. Des herself is an accomplished viola player. So so, yeah, we get that. Violas are rarely, if ever, invited to be part of marching band halftime shows, and that that is a shame. So travesty.
So I do hope and believe that Dez is about to bring us this unique and special halftime show for this, our September twenty twenty four market cap game show halftime. Alright. On to stock number six. Yasir El Shimi, why do companies buy back their own stock? It's often the most prudent use of capital, to buy back your shares.
If you deem your shares to be at at attractive valuation compared to what the market is pricing in, you ultimately, as management team, you should know better than anyone what the prospects are for your business, how your customers are reacting to, let's say, new products and so on. And, you know, in these cases, it would be prudent to to, buy buy shares.
And in fact, it's a more tax efficient way for shareholders if, the company buys back its own shares as opposed to handing out special dividend. Sorry, Matt. I I know you're the dividend, king here. But yeah. So the you know, that's that's one way one reason, I I guess, why companies some tend to buy back shares. Of course, it is not always prudent, and many companies tend to, unfortunately, buy back their shares At the wrong time. At the wrong time. Studies show that that often happens.
Warren Buffett's certainly a fan of buying back stock, over time. Some people don't like it. They think that companies should be doing better things in this world than just using their capital to repurchase their own stock. There's been some criticism in recent years of this practice, but that was well answered, Yasser. And this company announced a sixty billion dollar buyback this week. It also announced Matt Argersinger a ten percent lift in its dividend payout.
Stock number six is Microsoft. The ticker symbol is MSFT. There aren't that many companies that would just blithely throw out there. Yeah. We're gonna buy back sixty billion dollars of our stock. For a lot of our market caps like Synaptics, that would be the company twenty times over. Well, I was just gonna say sixty billion is probably more than ninety five percent of the S and P five hundred companies out there. So that's an amazing amount of of capital. It is.
And the even more compelling question, Yasser El Shibi, is what is your stated market cap range for Microsoft? No spoilers here. This is one of the larger companies in the world today. Yeah. Absolutely. It's in the trillion dollar market cap club for sure. My stated market cap would be three point one seven billion trillion, sorry, to three point two seven trillion. Wow. And yet, in some ways, not that tight.
A hundred billion dollars between three point one seven trillion and three point two seven trillion. Matt Argersinger, players at home, do you wanna agree with Yasser or disagree with his stated market cap range in the trillions? This time, three dot one seven to three dot two seven. It's such a tight specific range he gave. It feels like that. Not that tight. Well, not that tight, but I guess when you Extremely tight. Yeah. I would say I I'm gonna I'm gonna agree.
I think it I think he's right in there. Positive, Sandez, because it was right to agree with what was a very narrow range based on one definition of narrow. The correct answer is three point two three seven trillion dollars, which was inside the three point one seven to three point two seven range. Yasser, did you look this up shortly before the show? Yes. I did. Yeah. And that was an incredibly good call. It was a narrow range in in the grander scheme.
So as a listener or Matt Argersinger, it's hard to agree with such a narrow range. Why did you? I I just he just he looked very confident. He had a very confident look in his in his eye when he when he said that range. So I I Yeah. Remind me not to play poker with you. You know, as I looked up the market caps yesterday in preparation for the show, I did update them at noon today, so you we always have the freshest numbers.
But even just from yesterday to today, the market cap for Microsoft was up forty five billion dollars. And, oh, by the way, sixty billion dollar buyback. Yeah. The scale of of this company is it's hard to understand and wrap our minds. Many human beings aren't good at understanding trillions, that there are a thousand billions in a trillion, let alone three point two three seven trillion dollars. You know, I read a Motley Fool article this week.
It was talking about the five biggest public companies in the world on January first of nineteen ninety nine. And ranked in order, they were any guesses? Microsoft was number one. You guys wanna take a shot at any of the other four? I would say probably General Electric is probably in there. Number two. Good job, Matt. ExxonMobil was number five. IBM. Good try. We'll end it right there. No. But not bad, Nasser. It seems like Matt's scoring the points today. I did. But good calls.
Microsoft then General Electric, Intel, Walmart, ExxonMobil were the top five in nineteen nine nine. Microsoft's market cap back then, three hundred forty eight billion dollars, and it dropped down to ExxonMobil at about half that, one seventy eight. So those were the five largest market caps as nineteen ninety nine started. So here we are twenty five years later. The five today are Apple, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Alphabet, and Amazon. Amazon down around one point eight trillion number five.
So That's a small cap. Just really interesting to watch. Well said. And and by the way, quick plug here. The Motley Fool is a new feature, which is breakfast news. And if you're a premium member, if you're a member of The Motley Fool, you've probably been getting this in your inbox the last seven days or so. I just I think it's fantastic. I realize I'm praising the home team here, but I really am enjoying breakfast news.
So if you're a member, I totally recommend that you get each market weekday. Somewhere around seven thirty AM eastern, you'll get a quick recap of what happened yesterday and what's going to happen today. That's where this morning over breakfast, I read about Microsoft's sixty billion dollar buyback. Okay. The score, Argersinger five, El Shimi one. Let's go on to stock number seven, which is a throwdown.
So, again, both Yasser and Matt will shortly write down their market cap range for this company. Let me turn to Matt. Matt, when it comes to managing, we talked a little bit about this earlier, the Argersinger Folio. Are you a sole proprietor here, or do you partner in any way with your wife? She my wife is a phenomenal source of new ideas to to research. That sounds awesome. But she has yes.
She has because of her timing because of her time, during the day and everything, I she has outsourced all the investment management to me. Me. That that largely describes my own. Yasser, how about you? Yeah. My wife has no interest whatsoever in the investing world and so is more than happy to delegate all of that to me. That sounds great. Matt, back to back to your wife. Does she keep her eye out for for products and services? Is is that what you're describing?
Like, in in the world that she finds promising and let you know? She tends to yes. In in terms of either buying stuff for my son or just she's interest she has interest, she'll say, you know, have you is this company public? Or I I love when she asked me that because that's always, oh, no. I didn't know that. Yeah. It gives me something to look at. Well, I had an experience like that with this stock, which I'll relate in a second.
But first, let's talk about Lowe's Companies, ticker symbol l o w. Matt, you are up five to one. You could almost I think you could clinch if you if you get stock number seven right. This is a throwdown, though, so both of you guys are gonna give your ranges, but Lowe's Companies, ticker symbol l o w, is stock number seven. And as Matt and Yasser write down their ranges, a reminder, player at home, you're just gonna say I agree with Matt or I agree with
Yasser. You'll give yourself a plus one if you are right. Alright. Pencils are down. Let me turn to Matt. Matt, what is your stated market cap range for Lowe's Companies, ticker symbol l o w? This is way wider than I wanted this to be, but I'm going with eighty to ninety five billion. Eighty billion to ninety five billion. Yasser, what did you write down? I wrote down ninety to a hundred and fifteen billion. Ninety to a hundred fifteen billion. Alright.
Player at home, do you agree with Matt, or do you agree with Yasser? Three, two, one, answer. Alright. Lock it in. If you said I agree with Yasser, give yourself a plus one. Guys, you were both low. This company speaking of Lowe's, this company has grown quite a bit more than that. The market cap for Lowe's companies is one hundred forty six point four nine billion dollars, almost a hundred fifty.
So, Yasser, you guys were both low, but, Yasser, you had a ninety to a hundred fifteen, which was closer to the market cap. Therefore, we give you the point, which keeps the game interesting five to two. If you told me that on that on the cards for today, I would get Lowes right, but Matt would get rocket lap right, I would have told you you're out of your mind. I would I would agree with you. Well, I mentioned that there is a little bit of a tale there.
I never did pick Lowe's for for full services. But in January two thousand thirteen, my wife said, hey. Why not Lowe's? She's always admired the store. She uses the store. Remember how Peter Lynch used to credit his wife for watching for stores popping up in malls? Well, this was kind of analogous for us, and it sounds like you've had some similar experiences.
Matt, shout out to the distaff side of my family because Lowe's, since two thousand thirteen, I wish I'd picked it for The Motley Fool, is a seven bagger. So more than doubling up the S and P five hundred, truly a reminder of what Lynch advocated for so well, which is buying what you know, or in this case, what your spouse knows. Alright. The score, Arkasinger five, El Shimi two. Let's move on. Yasser, stock number eight. Earlier, you shared a bit about how you book travel on the Internet.
You haven't yet flown into space or booked a launch, though, you mean? No. Not on the carts, unfortunately. Yeah. I hear you. So I I have a related but different question, Yasir. How how do you do music on the Internet? Spotify? To what extent you'd like to share, how how do tunes come to you digitally, and are you paying? Right. I am a paid subscriber to YouTube Premium, which includes YouTube Music.
And I have found YouTube Music to be more than a sufficient replacement for Spotify, which I used to use. And was there a moment where you just dissatisfied, walked away from Spotify, or was it maybe you kept that for a while, but then you just found YouTube taking over? It was more that I wanted to subscribe to YouTube just for the videos, but then I found, well, oh, they're also giving me YouTube music for free, and it works just fine.
Yeah. So that that that was kind of, like, my thinking process. Sure. But I was never, I should say, I never meant to say, like, I wanna end Spotify in order to join another service. It was more that I just subscribe to YouTube and that came with it. I'm so glad it's worked for you. Let's let's delve a little bit deeper here. Yasser, what about the hardware that delivers you these tunes? Yeah. I usually do a lot of my listening in the car, actually. That's some important hardware.
And, thankfully, I got a car with a pretty good sound system. So that has been kind of, it so, technically, the company the the company that makes the the speakers, in the car is called JBL. Well, JBL is not stock number eight, but a lot of us, me included, have or use Sonos, ticker symbol s o n o, a company that's been in the headlines. I mean, it's a well known consumer brand. It's been in the headlines, some negative headlines in recent months.
This is a Motley Fool recommendation across a few different services. I don't think either of you has it as a ongoing recommendation. Of course, I'm always randomizing from hundreds of stocks we cover the full, so I'm never quite sure if one of you guys already owns this or knows it or not. It's all neutral and randomized. Yasser, what is your stated market cap for Sonos, ticker symbol s o n o?
Yeah. My stated market cap for Sonos is between seven billion dollars to ten point five billion dollars. Seven billion to ten point five. Yeah. So I noticed earlier, you went with a flat number and then the higher parameter you gave a dot five. Is this sort of an LSHMI Correct. Flourish? Very nice. We'll call it the LSHMI flourish. So we've got an LSHMI flourish. That's seven to ten and a half billion players at home. Matt Aregersinger, do you wanna agree or disagree?
He looks confident again, but then he could be throwing me off. So I'm gonna say disagree on this one. That is correct to disagree with Yasser's too high estimation. Again, never play poker with Maslow. Yasser, this is one of the few times you were actually kind of off. Every single call you made was pretty much on. I knew I was off, but it thought that if I sounded confident enough, he was gonna fall for it. And I gave him a wide range. Right? So that it's like, I'll you know?
David said something about it's being in the news for the wrong reasons. I thought maybe this is gonna be smaller than than than Yasser thinks. I never wanna tilt it too much, although both of you got to hear me say that along with our players at home. Speaking of which, player at home, if you said I disagree with Yasser, give yourself a plus one. Matt, I believe that technically means you may have won this market cap game show. We still have two more questions.
This isn't for us. It's for our players at home. But, Matt, I think I can already be inviting you to the March market cap madness for twenty twenty five. I think you just secured your seat. Alright. Briefly back to Sonos, though. Company has entered widespread criticism, I don't know if you're keeping up with this, from its own customers due to its recent Sonos app rollout, the most recent version. So it appears to have been released prematurely.
So some features bugged, therefore disabled things like alarm and sleep timer functions that a lot of people liked, but they were kind of bugged. A lot of it because its new Sonos Ace headphone line came out hardware, and they were trying to time up their software with that release, and they kinda rushed the software, And they've been backpedaling publicly, ever since. So, oh, did I forget to mention the market cap?
Sonos' market cap is one point four nine billion dollars down from where it once was, an interesting place, almost a micro cap for a well known consumer brand and one worth following. So, again, if you disagreed, give yourself a plus one. The game in some ways is over, and yet the game is not over. Let's move on to stock number nine. Matt, how much of a fix it guy are you? Pretty big.
My my wife is definitely the the handyman of the house, but, I I can certainly handle my own if it comes to small things. Well, it sounds like you're both pretty handy. Matt, have you ever tried fixing something at home only to realize you needed a part that that you didn't have or that may not even exist? There one one comes to mind recently. We had a a problem where our one of our HVAC systems was was over freezing.
It was it was running, but it would freeze over, and it would lock up, and it wouldn't cool. And so we actually looked it up, and it was it was a part that had gone bad. The problem is the system was built in in around two thousand, two thousand one, and it was they just don't didn't make that part anymore. So, unfortunately, we had to bring in a a professional to replace the whole thing, which was pretty expensive. Alright.
Well, now connecting that, Matt, into stock number nine, this company's tagline is your challenges, our engineered solutions. This company has a role in creating niche, high-tech replacement parts for airplanes and defense systems, things that you can't just buy at the local hardware store. Any guesses as to what company I'm talking about? Maybe TransTime? That's not it, but that's a good guess. Stock number nine is HEICO. Matt, h e I is the ticker symbol.
Is this a company you've ever looked at? Very, very briefly a while ago. And I because I know it's a consistent dividend payer for one, but, I didn't my research didn't go very deep. Mhmm. What's your state of market cap range for HEICO? I'm gonna say HEICO is between five billion and seven and a half billion. Five billion to seven and a half billion with the Elshimi flourish, I noticed. I I wanted to add that at the end. Just just for Yasser. Yasser, players at home.
Matt said five to seven and a half billion. Have you ever followed this company at all? I have not followed the company, although it has been in the news lately with, Warren Buffett or Berkshire Hathaway rather taking a stake in HEICO. Seems like Yasser might know this one a little bit better than you. And I'm thinking it might be a lot bigger than what I think it is. Do you wanna agree or disagree with five to seven and a half? Most certainly disagree.
And if you disagreed, along with Yasser, give yourself a plus one. Matt severely undershot this company. And let me just say, I don't follow HEICO, and I wouldn't have known what to do with this. I didn't know about the Buffett entrance, and it's thirty six point two six billion dollars. HEICO is a very substantial company. Mhmm. Fun fact about this one. My brother Tom picked the stock for Motley Fool Stock Advisor in April of two thousand twelve.
Great call, Tom. It's a fifteen bagger since April of two thousand twelve. So if it's thirty six billion today, that means it was about two point four billion dollars twelve years ago, very substantial growth. I felt embarrassed that I didn't really know much about Tom's fifteen bagger and a company that was worth tens of billions of dollars, so I went to Wikipedia, one of my favorite sites on the Internet. I assume everybody's heard of Wikipedia before.
I read about HEICO, and one thing I picked up is where they're based. Because I thought, you know, maybe Northern Virginia, Washington DC, a lot of big aerospace and defense companies are in our greater metropolitan area here in Washington DC. This company is headquartered in Hollywood, Florida. And I wanted to look up a little bit more because I love corporate histories and hearing how things started or in this case, how a town started. So here it is.
In nineteen twenty, Joseph Young arrived in South Florida to create his own dream city in Florida. Joe is from Long Beach, California, and he saw what was happening thirty miles away in Hollywood, California as the motion picture industry began to center itself there by nineteen twelve. So Joseph Young's vision for this Miami suburb was to make the beaches of the Atlantic Ocean stretch westward with man made lakes, infrastructure, roads, and the intracoastal waterway.
He wanted to include large parks, schools, churches, and golf courses, all industries and activities that were very important to him. Young bought up thousands of acres of land around nineteen twenty and named his new town Hollywood by the Sea. And that was to distinguish itself from his other real estate venture, which was Hollywood in the hills in the Adirondacks in New York state.
After Young had spent literally millions of dollars, and this is a century ago, so millions of dollars was a really big sum. Constructing his city, he was elected mayor in nineteen twenty five. A year later, it was devastated by the nineteen twenty six Miami hurricane, but over time, it became home to Northerners. They're known as snowbirds, I think that term is still used, who flee the North during the winter and then escape the South during the summer.
Hollywood, Florida, ladies, gentlemen, and fools everywhere, and that's where HEICO is based. Alright. Six to three is the score. Yassir, it's often pointed out on the Market Cap Game Show that people tend to only remember that last question and who got that last one right. So in some ways, you may have lost, but you have an opportunity to win. We'll see about that. Let's move to stock number ten. Yasser, I'm gonna try out a corporate tagline on you. Sure.
Now this is dangerous because the last time I did this, I unintentionally unearthed a soon to be published Motley Fool recommendation. And, indeed, this is the last story I'll tell because this is one of my favorite stories from this podcast over the years. The tagline for this company with Bill Barker and Bill Mann three months ago was this, technology is our how and people are our why.
The I was really asking this of Bill Barker as kind of a joke because to me anyway, that tagline is pretty generic and, therefore, I I might say a bit lame. Technology is our how and people are our why. And in one of the one of the ten most amazing moments in this podcast history, Bill, not skipping a beat, said, that's Endava. Endava Associates, ticker symbol d a v a, a small microcap company, and Bill was absolutely right. Hilarity ensued.
The reason he was right, by the way, is that that very week that our podcast was coming out in June of this year, Bill was recommending Endava as his next pick in one of our services, but we couldn't air that on this podcast because the podcast will be coming prior to that premium pick coming out, guys. As you well know, we have firewalls and other internal rules in place so so that we never give away new picks prior to them being received by members.
So we didn't air the Endava pick on last quarter's game show. I slotted in a different stock. That said, I told the hilarious story in full a week later on the June twenty twenty four Rule Breaker Investing mailbag. And Dava, let it be said, is up about twenty percent over the past three months. So shout out to Bill Barker in every way. Okay. With the past as prologue then, Yasir, that's probably the last time I'll get to tell the story in this podcast, but it was absolutely hilarious.
Are you ready for stock number ten's tagline from the homepage of its website? Sure. Strength in unity, purpose in progress, innovation for your future. Oh my god. That's a mouthful. Do Do you think ChatGPT came? I'm not gonna accuse this company of doing that. Strength and unity, purpose and progress, innovation for your future. You wanna make a guess what company? Can you Endava it? Oh my god. Danaher? I I have no idea. No one should have any idea.
Would it help, Yasser, if I let you know the text that is on the clickable button right below that text on their website. If I were to let you know that the text on that clickable button says, together, let's do great things, you could click that. Would you like to make another guess? I don't know. Matt, not my guess. No. I am I am totally stumped. I am totally stumped. Oh my god. That sounds awfully generic. It's like there's no giveaway here at all. Purposely trying to be generic. I know.
Together, let's do great things. Click. Intel? Well, the correct answer for you and for all of us playing at home, did anyone get this is Kforce, ticker symbol KFRC. And no Kforce is not a Korean boys band. K Force is a staffing and consulting company that helps businesses find skilled professionals, especially in areas like technology, finance, and accounting. Kind of acts as a bridge between companies that need specialized workers and then people looking for jobs.
The name k Force, by the way, is a blend of two concepts. They say knowledge, that's the k part, and then, of course, force. So it reflects the company's mission of providing highly skilled professionals, those with knowledge, to businesses in need of talent. That's the force. Well, one form of the force. Yasser, that was quite a wind up. I'm curious what your stated market cap range is for Kforce, ticker symbol KFRC. Not KFC. KFRC. May the force be with you. Exactly. Alright.
My guess is that the market cap range of Kforce falls somewhere between two billion to five billion dollars. Two billion to five billion dollars. Players at home, Matt Argersinger. Agree or disagree? It's a good range. I I have no idea. I'm just gonna say disagree because it could be smaller than that or bigger than that. It was correct to disagree. Kforce is an even smaller company than that.
Stock number ten, we close out this market cap game show with a company whose market cap is just one point two two Oh, wow. Billion dollars, right about the same size as Zendava Associates, by the way, and a funny one, therefore, to close on strength and unity, Yasser, purpose and progress, innovation for your future. Cliche dot com. That's actually the website that goes to k four some k. Cliche with a k. The staff, by the way, is up Yes. Eighty percent over the past five years.
The market is up eighty percent as well over the last five years. Score in the show, I might need their service very soon. You were a very good sport, Yasser, and also very expert considering the final score. But we do give this one to Matt seven to three. The final score then, Matt Argersinger seven, Yasir El Shimi three. Thank you both. But my two all star contestants and I know that we're not playing this game for each other. We're playing for you. How did you score?
Dear fool, dear listener at home, we hope that you outscored all of us. The purpose of the Market Cap Game Show is to make more popular I'm never gonna say as popular as Jeopardy, but to make more popular market caps, the real value of stocks on the market that most people don't understand. Except that you do understand because you just listened to us for about an hour, and I hope you scored at least a few points this week and maybe beat one or both of our competitors.
Matt Argersinger and Yasser El Shimi, you both distinguished yourselves and helped make the world a bit smarter, happier, and richer. Next week is our September twenty twenty four mailbag. This month featured essays from yesterday to kick off on September fourth. And then last week, I talked to my friend, Rand Stegen, on long term leadership business and life and, of course, the market cap game show today.
If you have any further thoughts about any of these topics, wanna be on next week's show, just email us. R b I at fool dot com is our mailbag email address. You can tweet us at r b I podcast. Okay. A last line from you, Yasser El Shimi. Yeah. I mean, despite the absolute thumping I received today, I wanna congratulate Matt for making it to the March Madness Qualification Championship, however you wanna call it. It it was fun. I loved it. And, thanks for inviting me, David.
You bet. It's always a pleasure, Yasser. Thank you. Matt, a last line from you. Thank you, Yasser. It was it was a lot of fun. And I just enjoy the show so much because I there's always at least at least two, if not three or four companies that I've never heard of that I love learning about. So thank you, David. Well, thank you again, Yasser and Matt. Matt, see you in March. Fool on.
As always, people on this program may have interest in the stocks they talk about, and The Motley Fool may have formal recommendations for or against. So don't buy or sell stocks based solely on what you hear. Learn more about Rule Breaker Investing at r b I dot fool dot com.