3 best stocks I plan to buy in November

With October now in the books, 2021 is fast approaching and it’s time for investors to start thinking about November, another historically strong month for the stock market. Since 1950, the S&P 500 the index posted its best returns on average in November. To help you come up with some great action ideas for November, a trio of Motley Fool contributors have picked out some of their top names for the month. Their three choices are Free Mercado (NASDAQ: MELI), Activision Blizzard (NASDAQ: ATVI), and SVB Financial Group (NASDAQ: SIVB). Let’s see why these actions are winning.

Latin America’s # 1 Ecommerce Platform Still in High Growth Mode

Nicolas rossolillo (MercadoLibre): MercadoLibre hit one out of the park during the pandemic, and its follow-up performance for 2021 is also quite good. The company has helped launch e-commerce and fintech in Latin America, and with online shopping activity still a tiny fraction of overall retail in most of the countries in which it operates, the trail ahead of MercadoLibre is always wide and long.

The results of the last quarter are a good example. Even though it experienced a boom in business on its platform last year, revenue doubled year over year through the first half of 2021. Net profit is stable, but c This is largely by design as the company is investing heavily to expand its services in the upper- and future regions in which it operates.

His efforts are really paying off on this front. Unique active users of MercadoLibre totaled up to 75.9 million at the end of June, down from just 51.5 million during the same period in 2020. the traditional banking system – jumped 72% when measured in local currency, purchases have been made. The average Wall Street analyst expects revenue of $ 1.88 billion when the company reports its third quarter on November 4, implying an expected year of 68% – on more than one year.

With such epic numbers, one would expect the stock to be up so far in 2021. It is not. In fact, it’s down 9% year-to-date. Part of this is simply an unwinding of over-optimism after MercadoLibre stock rocketed 193% more in 2020. But this e-commerce and fintech platform is far from over. With stocks down 24% from historic highs, I plan to make a buy in November.

Worth playing the long game with this stock

Keith Noonan (Activision Blizzard): Despite strong recent performance and an attractive pipeline of upcoming stocks, Activision Blizzard’s stock price is down around 15% year-to-date. 2021 has been a tough time for year-over-year comparisons, and the game industry leader’s valuation has also been slowed by narrowing growth opportunities for in-games advertising. A sexual harassment lawsuit filed by the state of California in July also raised significant concerns about certain aspects of the company’s culture.

Without minimizing the stakes and challenges ahead, I believe the video game publisher remains a top player for investors looking to take advantage of its industry’s global growth, and I plan to strengthen my position in November. Activision Blizzard has scored huge wins with its free-to-play Call of Duty: Mobile for smartphones and tablets, and its Call of Duty: War Zone title for PC and console platforms. These games have proven to be hugely popular and have generated solid revenue without diluting the appeal of the main series, and there’s a good chance the company can replicate that dynamic with other franchise properties in its stable.

Investors may not have to wait long for its next big free-to-play hit. Activision Blizzard unveiled Diablo: Immortal for mobile platforms at its BlizzCon 2018 conference, and the game originally seemed on track for a 2019 release. However, the company has repeatedly extended the development cycle in order to improve quality of the title and add new content to better meet the expectations of fans. The publisher hasn’t announced a specific release date for the game, but it is set to debut in the first half of next year.

Yes Diablo: Immortal proves to be a success, it could boost the performance of Activision Blizzard. And, even if the game does not reach blockbuster status, the company’s long-term prospects remain bright. Activision Blizzard is a clear leader in its category with decades of gaming experience, and the title looks set to continue delivering earnings to shareholders.

This bank is a beast

Bram berkowitz (SVB Financial Group): I have yet to buy shares of SVB Financial Group, the parent company of Silicon Valley Bank, due to the bank’s high valuation and impressive share price appreciation over the past year. But after another impressive quarter and some great advice through 2022, I’m finally thinking about pulling the trigger in November.

SVB is a niche bank that caters to start-up, venture capital (VC) and private equity (PE) communities. The bank provides short-term loans to venture capital and private equity firms so that they can make investments quickly; banks in the start-up phase which could one day be taken over or become public; has a growing investment bank leveraging the bank’s relationships in technology, life sciences and healthcare; and also provides more traditional banking products to high net worth individuals. SVB’s recent acquisition of Boston Private Financial Holdings strengthened its wealth management and private banking offerings, while SVB also doubled the size of its investment banking division in 2021.

With a full line of products in place to serve and fully penetrate its customer base, which is growing every quarter, the bank has a ton of momentum. SVB has doubled its balance sheet in the past year and now has around $ 191 billion in total assets, as private market investment explodes. If SVB maintains this growth, it could become one of the top 10 banks in the country in terms of asset size over the next few years. It also complements this impressive growth with impressive profitability. In the first nine months of 2021, SVB generated a return of almost 1% on average assets, which is quite impressive considering the insane growth of the bank’s assets. SVB during the same period generated a return of 19.4% on average equity.

Management’s forecast for 2022 looks very promising, with average loan growth expected to be in the order of 20% and average deposits expected to grow by more than an additional 40%. Net interest income, the money the bank earns on loans and securities after covering its cost of financing, is expected to rise within the average range of 30%, while base commission income is expected to rise by 20%. %. Management has also provided compelling long-term guidance, saying that in a low interest rate environment, where the fed funds rate is between zero and 2.5%, they believe they can generate a consistent return on equity. by 15% and increase annual earnings per share. by 10%.