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 multiplecans together, but the price per share is only one multiplecand. 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 the 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, it's price tag, it's 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 9th, 2017. 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, 10 new stocks, three guest stars, Matt Argusinger, Yasser al-Shimi, and you only on this week's Rule Breaker Investing. (upbeat music) - It's the Rule Breaker Investing Podcast with Motleyful co-founder, 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 we'll be competing for a seat at the final four for our 2025 World Championships. Matt Argusinger helped initiate the market cap game show, having been there with me in 2017 as we debuted the show, he is the OG. Matt currently works in the Motleyful's dividend investor service. You can also catch him regularly on the Motleyful Money Podcast. He enjoys traveling, collecting vintage comic books, and most of all spending time with his wife and five year old son. Yasser al-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 2022 appearance was our final tie. Yasser is a senior investment analyst at the Motleyful 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 Des 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 stuck in here for hours, David, studying market caps, of course. - Did we give you any refreshments? - You know, 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 10. 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 would of fools. - Yes, it is. - No, of course, actually I should say this, most companies actually pay dividend nowadays. If you look at the broader indexes, which is kind of a remark from 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 industry concentrated are you mad in your own hunting for stocks? - With dividends, I've become a little more concentrated because you have to kind of be in the financials, industrials, those kinds of areas to get more dividends. Dividends aren't found in pretty much every sector. - Do you have any stocks in your portfolio in industries that you don't spend much time with? - I do, David, I don't spend a lot of time looking at banks, but I do recognize there are a few banks that have a wonderful inner earnings and dividend history, and 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 file sciences, makes medicines to help people with brain-related conditions that affect how they move, think and feel. And my question for you, Matt, Argusinger, stock number one is, what is your stated market cap range for neurocrine biosciences ticker symbol N-B-I-X? - Wow, all right, well, here you go, Yasser. Shot in the dark here. (laughing) - That's the way we like to grow. - All right, you'll hear stock. - Let's do this stock number one. - Sir, no, I'm struggling, David. - I'm gonna go with a, gosh, I'm gonna go with a range of, let's say five to 10 billion. - Five billion to 10 billion dollars. Players at home, Yasser Elshimi, the question is, do you agree or do you disagree? - Man, oh man. I like the positive, I suspect many a listener jogging or driving right now is also taking an extra breath and wondering five to 10 inside or outside. - Yeah, neurocrine biosciences, this is not your famous biotech company out there. I am actually going to agree with that range. (buzzer buzzes) - 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 12.34 billion dollars outside the range. Therefore, listeners at home, if you said I disagree, give yourself a plus one. Yasser, you had that opportunity, but Matt gets the point with his five to 10. 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 Tardiv 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 2019, so it's just about five years done. Stocks up 25%. Problem is, the S&P 500 is up 90%, and so it has been an underperformer, but still a company doing good things in this world. It is up, but just not as much as I'd hoped when I picked it five years ago. - You could have said 500 million market cap or 20 billion market cap, and I would have said, "Duck, it makes sense." - Five to 10 was not a bad call. I think, in a way, you did deserve that plus one for being knee-knee. - All right. - Let's move on. - I will need that. - Let's 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 Matt's. 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.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 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 Lab's 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 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 stock number two, ticker symbol RKLB. 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 $7 billion to nine and a half billion dollars. All right, seven to nine and a half billion dollars. Matt, you're looking down at the post-it note where you wrote some scratch stats and 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 1.5 billion to three billion. All right, 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 $3.64 billion. So if you agreed with Matt, give yourself a plus one, $3.64 billion now. Yasser, I see you laughing and I think I know why 'cause full disclosure, I think this is an active recommendation in a motley full service. And I was looking at the buy recommendation from March 8th of last year, so 2023. It was written by Yasser Elshimi. That is correct, yes. And I'm way off on the market cap, so apologies for that. I'm sorry, I don't memorize market cap for companies I follow. And yet you're still pretty good at this game. But here's the thing, learning that the market cap for Rocket Lab is 3.6 billion actually makes me feel good about the investment because I assumed it was a much bigger company that actually is. And I think that's a company with a pretty promising future ahead. And indeed, it is up 75% since your recommendation, Yasser, with the market up 40%. I will note, I haven't been following this actively, but it was first up 80% within just months of your recommendation by the summer of 2023. Then all of a sudden, it was down. It was underwater 15% months later. It's now back up 75% overall. And if it gets to a $7.5 billion market cap, Yasser, it's gonna double from here. That sounds good to me. That's correct. It's not a stock for the faint of heart. It has significant volatility, 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, right? Exactly. 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 0 and 2 here first. And I'm surprised to be too enough. Rocket Lab Space Systems Technology, by the way, has enabled more than 1,700 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 $3.64 billion as we speak. By the way, all market caps updated as of noon. Yesterday, that would be Tuesday, September 17. So that's the time frame that we're speaking to just minutes before we record it. All right, 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 mask wear or any kind of super, super fan like that. I'm the guy who shows up with a polo shirt and cheers and 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 Boston sports, where I'm from, we actually-- 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. Did he win? He did not win that game, but it was still exciting. My son loved it. So yeah, rivalries. Matt, what are some corporate rivalries that come to mind? Wow, OK. Well, I mean, probably famously, Coke and Pepsi is probably a big rivalry. Domino's Pizza Hut. Although I don't know Pizza Hut. Yeah, Pizza Hut's a publicly traded young. That counts. Let me think. Could you say Microsoft and Alphabet? Maybe to a certain 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 in Vidia. Matt, as you probably guessed by now, stock number three is advanced micro devices. The ticker symbol is AMD. Matthew Argusinger, 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'm going to go pretty big on this one. I'm going to say 250 to 300 billion. 250 billion to 300 billion dollars. Yasser, is this a company you've ever looked at? Yes, it is. And 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 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 giant of AI. Well said, Yasser. Matt said 250 billion to 300 billion dollars. Yasser, do you want to agree or disagree with that range? I want to agree with that range. I mean, you're almost right. 2.49. You're not right. It's actually 246. No. 3.9 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, it's amazing to follow AMD. Lisa Sue, the CEO, came to the company in 2014. So she's now in her 10th year leading Advanced Micro Devices. And it's a 40 bagger for those who bought when she took the range. Just phenomenal performance. In fact, it's now well-passed Intel. Intel bouncing up a little bit this week on a couple of positive announcements. But Intel is down to a $93 billion market cap. So AMD is almost triple the market cap of Intel Corporation these days. Shocker. That is a shocker. I don't know what I'm more shocked by. Intel's fall from grace, I guess, or AMD's rise. Probably Intel's fall. But what's still amazing to me is even at almost $250 billion market cap, AMD's a 10th the size of NVIDIA. It is amazing to think about that. And that's part of the beauty of market caps. 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 take a look at companies like Microsoft and AMD. They were left for debt as these like dinosaurs. They were kind of these big technology companies when we thought that, hey, the internet bubble burst in 2000. And here comes Lisa Sue with AMD. Here comes Satya Nadella with Microsoft. And they just unleash incredible potential within both of these companies. And investors have been amply or-- 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 really, across all of American business, I'm not sure there's been much better performance at that scale over the last 10 years. By the way, Matt, I do see Intel has been reducing its dividend. Intel does pay a dividend. AMD does not pay a dividend. But Intel, a 1.8% yield now over the-- expected over the next 52 weeks down a bit. You know what's amazing is we've done some work in dividend investor looking back decades 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 can look at it and say, well, a company's going to protect their balance sheet, conserve cash. That's smart, maybe. But almost always, I'd say nine out of 10 times a company cuts a dividend. It means it's a bumpy road ahead. And that's what's happened to Intel. All right, Argus singer of three, El Shimi zero. Yeah, sir, I think a lot of us are cheering you out. 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. Yassir, 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 the reason is because I feel like we don't have fresh pastries anywhere near our zip code. And 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 pit 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 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 Motleyful members, because it's been recommended by a bunch of our services, by me, by my brother, et cetera, 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 $90 to $100 billion. $90 billion to $100 billion. Matt, have you ever opened up your own business? No, I haven't. Like Yasser, I've asked my wife to do many, many things for me. I should have 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 crossed paths with Shopify yet. Yasser said $90 billion to $100 billion. Matt Argusinger, players at home, would you like to agree or disagree? I'm worried, it's just outside of that range, but I think I'm gonna agree with Yasser in that range. (bell dings) 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 $96.16 billion. So you pretty much put it right in the middle. Maybe you need to be a little cageier, Yasser, and give intentionally the wrong market cap range to trick Matt Argusinger 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 Yasser's range, give yourself a plus one. Yeah, Shopify making commerce better for everyone. A classic, I would say a classic rule breaker of the past decade, you know, is cut in half in the five months before my colleague, Carl Teal, picked it for Motley Fool Rule Breakers on February 24th, check it, 2016. And when I quoted it yesterday, Shopify was up exactly 3,400%. For us, that's a 35 bagger. But even better, this is my favorite thing looking back on Shopify. Obaying 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 25%. But rather than say, oh well, we missed it, I got even more bullish in my Rule Breaker-y way and picked it 25% higher. That one is a 28 bagger now. I already mentioned my brother, Tom, picked the stock too. Many, many fools on this one. Tom's done some great interviews with CEO Toby Lutkev. 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, TwitterX. 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 do own Shopify, and it's because based largely on your recommendation, David. But I will just say, what you described about buying the stock or re-upping the stock again, a month later after a 25% move, that is something that is so hard for your average investor to do. 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 reasons I got the market cap so, you know, correct, is because it is my most successful investor ever as personal investment, at least. Picked it in 2014 at what is now probably a cost basis of $2.71 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 Motleyful 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. Maybe here. I'm kind of rooting against even though I need to be neutral. - It's gonna happen. This is, this is, I think shooting four out of 10, which I'm at right now is already above my average. So I'm flying on cloud nine here. - Beautiful. Matthew Argusinger, what's a parenting tip that you've picked up in your first five years as a dad that maybe we all could learn something from. It doesn't even have to be your best. How about your third best tip? - I think letting your child, no matter how young they might be, have adult conversations, be in the room when other adults are talking. I think as parents, we tend to say, oh, go play in your room or go play in the yard or something like that. But I think my son has really benefited from, not only just listening to adult conversations, but actually engaging in adult conversations. - At the age of five. - At the age of five. And Yasser, you are a dad as well. I'm gonna ask you the same questions, 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 and 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's right. I mean, 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 and sit in the cafeterias and look at their phones. And I just remember growing up when I was in school, the lunch cafeteria was this cacophony of noise. I mean, it's just trays, bashing, people talking, people yelling and to see it, to hear that it's silent these days is kind of shocking. - It is, it is shocking. And maybe that's temporary. In fact, I think we might be moving back toward more boisterousness. Jonathan Hight, 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 all together, but just much reduced in ways you can control it. And that includes the home, guys. And I want to turn back to Matt. Do you guys have an iPad technology overall? How does it work with your five-year-old? - We do, we have an iPad. It's a family iPad, but you know, my son uses it to do piano lessons and math games and things like that. But I tell you, it is one of those, you kind of bite your lip and hope, you know, 'cause my son can figure out some amazing things. And no matter how many restrictions we put on that iPad, he always ends up in certain places where I'm not expecting him to be. So 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 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 as much of a safe internet as you can hopefully get. I know there is no such thing as 100% safe, but that's what we aim for at least. - All right, 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 chat TBT 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 can't not think of what 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. - All right, well, let's turn to you, Matt, Argosinger, because synaptics, the ticker symbol is S-Y-N-A, you now know a little bit about its business. You may not have known 90 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 al-Shimi 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, players at home. - Or delaying being F-table. - Yasser, you were right, players at home. You were right, if you disagreed with Matt, synaptics is a smaller company than that 3.12 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 2012 to 2015, this was on the Rule Breaker's internal watch list, as I oversaw the service, and I never picked it. In fact, I noted, 'cause I always wrote notes, I have all of my reactions that I kept over the years 'cause 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 2015, I ended with this, and I quote, I quote me, I mean, why else do we have podcasts 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 1.7 billion dollars, but the stock is down 5%. Gross margins lost 8 percentage points, though, and Simon, that would be former full Simon Erickson, Simon says lower still, so the market is worried about the profitability of this business. I obviously much prefer a 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 5th of 2015, check it, it's up exactly 0%. It is right where it was, with the same market cap, nine years later, the market by the way, up 150% 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 Motleyful Advisors are the ones 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 showed 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 advisor here at the Motleyful, 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 Argresinger 4, Yasser El-Shimi 1. 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 yeah, we get that. Violas are rarely, if ever, invited to be part of marching band halftime shows, and that is a shame. - It's a gravity. - So I do hope and believe that Des is about to bring us this unique and special halftime show for this, our September 2024 market cap game show, halftime. (upbeat music) (audience applauding) - All right, on to stock number six. Yasser 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 an 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 in these cases, it would be prudent to buy back 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 know you're the dividend king here, but yeah, so that's one reason I guess why companies 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 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 $60 billion buyback this week. It also announced Matt Argersinger a 10% 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 $60 billion of our stock. For a lot of our market caps like synaptics, that wouldn't be the company 20 times over. - I was just gonna say, $60 billion is probably more than 95% of the S&P 500 companies out there. So that's an amazing amount 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 3.17 billion, a trillion, sorry, to 3.27 trillion. - Wow, and yet in some ways, not that tight, $100 billion between 3.17 trillion and 3.27 trillion. 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, 3.17 to 3.27. - 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'm gonna agree. I think he's right in there. - Positive sound, Des, because it was right to agree with what was a very narrow range, based on one definition of narrow. The correct answer is 3.237 trillion dollars which was inside the 3.17 to 3.27 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 the grander scheme. So as a listener or Matt Argersinger, it's hard to agree with such a narrow range. Why did you? - I just, he looked very confident. He had a very confident look in his eye when he said that range. - Yeah, remind me not to play poker with you. (laughing) - You know, as I looked up the market caps yesterday in preparation for the show, I did update them at noon today. So we always have the freshest numbers. But even just from yesterday to today, the market cap for Microsoft was up $45 billion. I know, by the way, $60 billion buyback. The scale 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 1,000 billions in a trillion, let alone 3.237 trillion dollars. You know, I read a Motleyful article this week. It was talking about the five biggest public companies in the world on January 1st of 1999. And ranked in order, they were, any guesses? Microsoft was number one. Guys, wanna take a shot at any of the other four? - I would say probably General Electric is probably in there. - That was number two. Good job, Matt. - ExxonMobil. - Was number five. - IBM. - Good try, we'll end it right there. No, but not bad, Dosser. It seems like Matt's scoring the points today, but good calls. Microsoft, then General Electric, Intel, Walmart, ExxonMobil were the top five in 1999. Microsoft's market cap back then, $348 billion, and it dropped down to ExxonMobil at about half that, 178. So those were the five largest market caps as 1999 started. So here we are, 25 years later, the five today are Apple, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Alphabet, and Amazon, Amazon down around 1.8 trillion number five. - That's a small cap. - Just really interesting to watch. Well said. 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 7.30 a.m. 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 $60 billion buyback. Okay, the score. Argosinger 5, El Shimi 1. 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 Argosinger 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 research. That sounds awesome. But she has, yes, she has, because of her timing, because of her time during the day and everything. She has outsourced all the investment management to me. That largely describes my own. Yasser, how about you? Yeah, my wife has no interest whatsoever in the investing world. And so it's more than happy to delegate all of that to me. That sounds great. Matt, back to your wife. Does she keep her eye out for products and services? Is that what you're describing in the world that she finds promising and let you know? She tends to, yes, in terms of either buying stuff for my son, or she has interest, she has interest. She'll say, "You know, is this a company public?" Or, "I love what you asked me that," because that's always like, "Oh, no, I didn't know that." 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 clench if you get stock number seven, right? This is a throw down 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. All right, 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 it to be, but I'm going with 80 to 95 billion. - 80 billion to 95 billion. Yasser, what did you write down? - I wrote down 90 to 115 billion. - 90 to 115 billion. All right, player at home, do you agree with Matt, or do you agree with Yasser, three, two, one, answer? All right, 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 146.49 billion dollars, almost 150, so Yasser, you guys were both low, but Yasser, you had a 90 to 115, 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 the cards for today, I would go close right, but Matt would go rocket lab right. I would have told you, you're out of your mind. - I would agree with you. (laughing) - Well, I mentioned that there is a little bit of a tail there. I never did pick Lowe's for full services, but in January, 2013, 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 2013, I wish I'd picked it for the Motleyful, is a seven bagger. So more than doubling up the S&P 500, truly a reminder of what Lynch advocated for so well, which is buying what you know. Or in this case, what your spouse knows. All right, the score. Argosinger 5, L. Shimi 2, 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. - No, not on the cards, unfortunately. - Yeah, I hear you. So I have a related but different question, Yasser. How do you do music on the internet? Spotify? To whatever extent you'd like to share, 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 are also giving me YouTube music for free and it works just fine. - Yeah. - So that was kind of like my thinking process. 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 subscribed to YouTube and that came with it. - I'm so glad it's worth for you. Let's delve a little bit deeper here, Yasser. - What about the hardware that delivers you these tunes? - Mm. - Yeah, I usually do a lot of my listening in the car, actually. (laughs) - That's some important hardware. - And thankfully I got a car with a pretty good sound system. So that has been kind of, so technically the company that makes the speakers in the car is called JBL. - Ah, 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 covered the Fool, 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 $7 billion to $10.5 billion. - $7 billion to $10.5. Yasser, I noticed earlier you went with a flat number, and then the higher parameter you gave a .5. Is this sort of an El Shimi flourish? - Correct. - We'll call it the El Shimi flourish. So we've got an El Shimi flourish. Matt's seven to $10.5 billion. Players at home, Matt Argusinger, do you want to agree or disagree? - He looks confident again, but then he could be throwing 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 Matt. (laughing) - 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 if I sounded confident enough, he was gonna fall for it, and I gave him a wide range, right? So that it's like, oh, yeah. - David said something about it's being in the news for the wrong reasons. I thought maybe this is gonna be smaller than Yasser thinks. - I never want to 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 2025. I think you just secured your seat. - All right. - Briefly back to Sonos, though, company has endured 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 kind of rushed the software, and they've been backpedaling publicly ever since. So, oh, did I forget to mention the market cap? Sonos's market cap is $1.49 billion 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 disagree, 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 wife is definitely the handyman of the house, but I can certainly handle my own. It becomes a small thing. - Well, it sounds like you're both pretty handy. Matt, if you ever tried fixing something at home, only to realize you needed a part that you didn't have, or that may not even exist. - One comes to mind recently, we had a problem where our, one of our HVAC systems was over-freezing. 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 a part that had gone bad. The problem is the system was built in around 2000 and 2001, and they just didn't make that part anymore. So, unfortunately, we had to bring in a professional to replace the whole thing, which was pretty expensive. - All right, 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 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 Heiko. Matt, H-E-I is the ticker symbol. Is this a company you've ever looked at? - Very, very briefly a while ago, 'cause I know it's a consistent dividend pair for one, but my research didn't go very deep. - What's your state-of-market cap range for Heiko? - I'm gonna say Heiko is between five billion and seven and a half billion. - Five billion to seven and a half billion with the alshimi flourish, I noticed. - I wanted to add that at the end, 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 his take in Heiko. - Hmm, 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. - Do you want to 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 Heiko and I wouldn't have known what to do with this. I didn't know about the Buffett entrance and it's $36.26 billion, Heiko is a very substantial company, fun fact about this one. My brother, Tom, picked this stock for Motleyful Stock Advisor in April of 2012. Great call, Tom, it's a 15-bagger since April of 2012. So if it's 36 billion today, that means it was about $2.4 billion, 12 years ago, very substantial growth. I felt embarrassed that I didn't really know much about Tom's 15-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 Heiko and one thing I picked up is where they're based. 'Cause I thought 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's headquartered in Hollywood, Florida. And I wanted to look up a little bit more 'cause I love corporate histories and hearing how things started or in this case, how a town started. So here it is in 1920, 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 30 miles away in Hollywood, California, as the motion picture industry began to center itself there by 1912. 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 1920 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 1925. A year later, it was devastated by the 1926 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 HICO is based. All right, six to three is the score. Yasser, 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 10. Yasser, I'm gonna try out a corporate tagline on you. - That's right. - Now, this is dangerous 'cause 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. So I was really asking this if Bill Barker is kind of a joke, because to me anyway, that tagline is pretty generic, and therefore I might say a bit lame. Technology is our how, and people are our why. And in one of the 10 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, 'cause the podcast would be coming prior to that premium pick coming out, guys. As you well know, we have firewalls and other internal rules in place, 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 2024 Rule Breaker Investing Malabag. Endava, let it be said, is up about 20% over the past three months. So shout out to Bill Barker in every way. Okay, with the past as prologue then, Yasser. That's probably the last time I get to tell the story in this podcast, but it was absolutely hilarious. Are you ready for stock number 10'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 you think chat GPT came? I'm not gonna accuse this company of doing that. - Strength in unity, purpose in progress, innovation for your future. You wanna make a guess what company? Can you Endava it? - Oh my God. - Dan and her, 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, I'm I guess. - No, 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. - It's 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 K-Force, ticker symbol, K-F-R-C? And no, K-Force 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, two businesses in need of talent, that's the force. Well, one form of the force. Yasser, that was quite a windup. I'm curious what your stated market cap range is for K-Force, ticker symbol, K-F-R-C, not K-F-C. K-F-R-C. - May the force be with you. - Exactly. All right. My guess is that the market cap range of K-Force falls somewhere between two billion to five billion dollars. - Two billion to five billion dollars. Players at home, Matt Argusinger, agree or disagree. - It's a good range. I have no idea, I'm just gonna say disagree, 'cause it could be smaller than that or bigger than that. - It was correct to disagree. K-Force is an even smaller company than that stock number 10. We close out this market cap game show with a company whose market cap is just 1.22 billion dollars, right about the same size as then Dava Associates, by the way, and a funny one, therefore, to close on strength and unity, Yasser. Purpose in progress, innovation for your future. - Clichay.com. That's actually the outside that goes to K-Force. - I'm kidding. - Clichay with a K, the stock, by the way, is up 80% over the past five years. The market is up 80% as well over the last five years. - And with this 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 Argusinger, seven. Yasser Elshimi, 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 Argusinger and Yasser Elshimi, you both distinguished yourselves and helped make the world a bit smarter, happier, and richer. Next week is our September 2024 mailbag. This month, featured essays from yesterday to kick off on September 4th, and then last week I talked to my friend, Rand Stagan 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. RBI@fool.com is our mailbag email address. You can tweet us @RBIpodcast, okay. A last line from you, Yasser Elshimi. - 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 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 a lot of fun, and I just enjoy the show so much, 'cause there's always at least, at least two, if not three or four companies that I've never heard that I love learning about, so thank you, David. - Well, thank you again, Yasser and Matt. Matt, see you in March. Fool on. (upbeat music) - As always, people on this program may have interest in the stocks they talk about, and the Miley Fool may have formal recommendations for or against. So don't buy or sell stocks based solely on what you hear. Learn more about rollbreakerinvesting@rbi.fool.com. (upbeat music) [BLANK_AUDIO]
