Hold on to these high P/E tech stocks

Article Excerpt

SHOPIFY INC. $193.00 (Toronto symbol SHOP; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (613-241-2828; www.shopify.ca; Shares o/s: 99.9 million; Market cap: $20.3 billion; No dividend) offers merchants of all sizes Internet-based software to design, set up and manage stores across multiple sales channels. They include both permanent and temporary retail stores, but also web, mobile and social-media platforms. The company has now reported its second consecutive quarter of profits. For the three months ended December 31, 2017, and excluding one-time items, it made $14.7 million, or $0.15 a share. That’s compared to a loss of $0.4 million, or nil per share, a year earlier. The most-recent $0.15 profit was significantly better than the consensus estimate for a profit of $0.05. Shopify continues to attract more merchants to its platform. As a result, its revenue in the latest quarter gained 70.9%, to $222.8 million from $130.4 million a year earlier. (All figures except share price in U.S. dollars.) The company ended the quarter with cash of $938.0 million. It has no…