Bear Stearns Thinks Yahoo Needs A Social Networking Strategy

Bear Stearns Internet analyst Robert Peck Wednesday wrote a lengthy piece which contends Yahoo (YHOO) urgently needs to figure out a social networking strategy, “or risk being marginalized in some of their businesses.” He thinks Yahoo is going to have to buy or partner with one of the primary players.

Peck says that Yahoo has held talks at various times with Facebook, Bebo, Friendster and MySpace, but that “when it comes down to it, we think the price tag is the ultimate factor for a transaction to materialize.”

Isn’t it always.

Peck goes on to to build a financial model for Facebook stretching out to the year 2016, then discounting it all back to the present to come up with a valuation. Peck sees the company generating $139.7 million in revenue this year, $357.6 million in 2008…and $6 billion in 2016, with $2.3 billion in EBITDA. He concludes that Facebook is worth “as much as $5-$6 billion.”

Sounds like a big number, except that it might not be enough to buy it; Facebook investor and director Peter Thiel recently asserted that for $10 billion, they would consider selling.

The risk to Yahoo, Peck contends, is doing nothing. He says there is evidence of something he calls “Ad Dollar Splintering” going on, which is a fancy, upper-case-abusing way of saying that some ad dollars that formerly went to Internet portals are now ending up in the hands of the social networks.

Comments

[Living OffDividends]

Isn't that like Yahoo telling Bear Stearns it needs new risk managers ;-P

[genechuang]

> Peck sees the company generating $139.7 million in revenue this year, $357.6 million in 2008…and $6 billion in 2016, with $2.3 billion in EBITDA. He concludes that Facebook is worth “as much as $5-$6 billion.”

How reliable is a 9-year forecast on a social networking site? With this kind of calculation, Friendster should be making $20B in 2016! Oh wait...