Lazard Asset Management: 3 undervalued global equities
Morningstar speaks to portfolio manager at Lazard Asset Management, Warryn Robertson about 3 undervalued global equities.
Mentioned: The Lottery Corp Ltd (TLC), Aristocrat Leisure Ltd (ALL), eBay Inc (EBAY), Lazard Global Equity Franchise (), Alphabet Inc (GOOGL), International Game Technology PLC (IGT), Intel Corp (INTC), Microsoft Corp (MSFT)
Warryn Robertson: Lazard's Global Equity Franchise strategy has been well known for the last couple of years for not being favorably disposed to the big tech sector. Back in 2013, we bought Microsoft (NAS:MSFT), held it till 2019, made eight times our money. But since that time, we've struggled to justify those valuations.
In recent times, though, we've seen two tech stocks that have come under our radar, eBay (NAS:EBAY) and Intel (NAS:INTC), both down 50% in the last 12 months. We think they're at attractive valuations now. The eBay business has refocused its attention largely away from just being all things to all people as a marketplace on the Internet and focusing on three or four key areas where they're driving retail sales in those particular areas, largely around—their gross merchandise value dominates that particular segment, and that business now is trading on multiples that we think are very attractive—8.5 times EBITDA is where we think fair value is, which is conservative relative to where it's traded, and as we measure it today, it's on less than 6. So, again, it's a stock that has fallen out of favor. It'd probably take a little while to turn around, and we're not looking at a quarter or two quarters sort of recovery story. But over three to five years, we think that business is now focused and providing good value.
Similar story for Intel. Again, down 50%. We've increased our weight there appreciably over the last couple of months in particular. The business has sort of lost a bit of traction to Taiwan Semiconductor. We think that the market share position that it has today in our models, we're just going to hold that flat. We think that there's some teething problems that they're having in terms of getting the chips essentially to work in the business. But we're confident that the $18 billion they spend on R&D, which is twice their competitors, puts them in good stead, and we think the business is on 5, 6 times EBIT as we see it. Our numbers are 25% below management target. So, good headroom there for value opportunities, we think.
So, still can't get excited about Microsoft and Google (Alphabet NAS:GOOGL) at the current prices. But if they fall another 30%, which is what they're down so far year-to-date, then they probably will go into territory that we'd be comfortable buying.
Third stock would be IGT—International Game Technology (NYS:IGT). The business is basically a lottery concession operator, similar to The Lottery Corp (ASX:TLC) that operates here in Australia. But unlike Lottery Corp, which trades on 13 times EBITDA, and unlike its a gaming machine competitor, Aristocrat (ASX:ALL), which also trades on 13 times EBITDA, IGT is only trading on 6. So, the business has had really good, and I think, underappreciated earnings growth over the last three to five years. It's beaten consensus estimates 24 out of the last 26 quarters. And so, the business is on a good footing, but doesn't get the attention that it truly deserves, and we think it's again giveaway multiples trading at half the comparables in the same space. So, they are three stocks that we've really disposed favorably to at the moment.