4-Star Stocks Poised to Pop: Bridgepoint Education
Based on the aggregated intelligence of 180,000-plus investors participating in Motley Fool CAPS, the Fool's free investing community, for-profit educator Bridgepoint Education (NYS: BPI) has earned a respected four-star ranking.
With that in mind, let's take a closer look at Bridgepoint's business and see what CAPS investors are saying about the stock right now.
Bridgepoint facts
Headquarters (founded) | San Diego (1999) |
Market Cap | $515.8 million |
Industry | Education services |
Trailing-12-Month Revenue | $954.4 million |
Management | Co-Founder/CEO Andrew Clark |
Return on Equity (average, past 3 years) | 60.0% |
Cash/Debt | $326.7 million / $0 |
Competitors | Apollo Group |
Sources: S&P Capital IQ and Motley Fool CAPS.
On CAPS, 95% of the 512 members who have rated Bridgepoint believe the stock will outperform the S&P 500 going forward.
Just last week, one of those bulls, neozyklon, tapped the recent accreditation uncertainty surrounding Bridgepoint's Ashford University as a tempting bargain opportunity:
I come to the conclusion that it won't be difficult or expensive to comply with [Higher Learning Commission's] requests. They don't want to put Ashford out of business, they just want them to shape up a bit. Ashford may contribute a little less to [Bridgepoint's] profits but at this point [Bridgepoint] is trading at a PE of less than 4 with NO debt and $327 million in cash! With 50 million shares outstanding, [Bridgepoint] has a cash position equal to $6.25 per share. Remember too that they have a share repurchase program in place and are likely repurchasing shares as we speak. If they get a feeling that HLC will continue their accreditation, expect this share repurchase program to be accelerated.
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The article 4-Star Stocks Poised to Pop: Bridgepoint Education originally appeared on Fool.com.
Fool contributor Brian Pacampara owns no position in any of the companies mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of Bridgepoint. Motley Fool newsletter services have recommended writing puts on Bridgepoint. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Fool's disclosure policy always gets a perfect score.
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