SaaS Valuation Table

Hi Fools,

I wanted to share a table that I put together that consists of data taken from a newsletter released by Jamin Ball today (https://cloudedjudgement.substack.com/p/clouded-judgement-31…).

I picked out some of the most popular company names on this board and ones that are less mentioned, but seemed promising based on their relative valuations and other metrics. All of the companies that I included have at least a 30% projected revenue growth for next year, which is his criteria for “high growth” companies (NTM = Next Twelve Months). I figured it would be best to filter his list to include only the companies we are most focused on (i.e., higher growth) because I think it’s interesting to examine how these companies stack up against each other on various metrics. Note, the first three columns after EV are EV/revenue multiples.

Also, for the “Rule of 40” column, here’s an explanation taken from a Motley Fool article by TMFSaintCroix (https://www.fool.com/investing/2019/09/25/introducing-the-ru…:slight_smile:

“You take the annual revenue growth of a company as a percentage (say, 50% revenue growth) and add that to the company’s profit margin (for instance, 10%). In this example, the hypothetical company would have a Rule of 40 score of 60, which is outstanding. A score of above 40 is considered a passing grade, while a score below 40 means the company fails the Rule of 40 test.”


`		        **[EV/Revenue Multiples]**  **[RevenueGrowth%]**				`
`**EV	TTM	NTM	2022	TTM	NTM 	GrossMgn%    FCFMgn%	Ruleof40(%)**`
`Snowflake	64B	108x	58x	36x	124	85	60	     -28	96`
`Crowdstrike	45B	59x	40x	28x	86	48	73	     33	        119`
`Cloudflare	23B	54x	39x	30x	50	37	77	     -17	33`
`Datadog	        26B	42x	31x	23x	66	38	78	     17	        84`
`ZScaler	        25B	47x	34x	26x	49	38	77	     17	        65`
`Twilio	        61B	35x	25x	19x	55	38	52	     -2	        54`
`Zoom	        99B	38x	26x	22x	326	42	70	     53	        379`
`Docusign	42B	33x	24x	17x	44	37	75	     14	        59`
`Okta	        31B	37x	28x	22x	43	30	74	     14	        56`
`Palantir	47B	43x	32x	25x	47	35	68	     -28	19`
`Fastly	        9B	29x	23x	18x	45	31	59	     -17	28`
`JFrog	        4B	26x	20x	15x	44	33	81	     17	        61`
`HubSpot	        22B	25x	19x	15x	31	32	81	     11	        42`

A few cursory observations…

** Fastly and Palantir’s Rule of 40 numbers do not meet the minimum standard percentage, which potentially makes them less appealing overall

** Cloudflare also does not meet the minimum Rule of 40 criteria, which was quite surprising since this is one of my highest conviction holdings

** The strength of the across-the-board metrics for Crowdstrike and Datadog relative to the other companies makes me more bullish, although their EV/revenue numbers are among the highest

** Datadog may become my highest conviction company if they outperform their NTM estimates

** ZScaler also looks very strong, though I’m not as familiar with this company because I do not own shares (would love to hear insights from ZScaler bulls/bears)

** Zoom’s numbers are very impressive, but I just don’t know what will happen with this company post-pandemic and their guidance is weak relative to their unbelievably explosive growth during the past year. This is a tricky one for me because they may continue to surprise and handily outperform expectations by becoming an integral part of our world.

** Docusign looks like a really good value relative to the other companies.

** I don’t know much about JFrog, but the metrics peaked my interest and I may start researching this company a bit more. Again, I would appreciate any insights about this company from fellow Fools.

I’d be interested to hear any feedback on this table and if you all agree or disagree with my preliminary observations. I am open to learning from this community because, despite my best efforts, I know I may have missed something. Any thoughts?

  • Ceez

P.S. I need some guidance on how to efficiently make/share tables on these discussion boards. It’s my first time doing this and there has to be a better way! LOL!

98 Likes

Ceez,
Nice valuation summary. Most of our emphasis is high margin/high revenue growth, because they are landing and expanding, but there comes a time when those margins can presumably be converted to profits.

Instead of the PEG ratio (which I used to love), I thought it would be fun to look at EVS/Rev Growth for stocks I hold.

CRWD = 0.7
MELI = 0.2
NET = 1.1
DDOG = 0.6
DOCU = 0.8
NARI = 0.2
Zs = 1.0
TWLO = 0.6

For those looking for a stocks with a potentially a long runway and lot’s of TAM, it’s hard to beat NARI and MELI. I don’t want to beat a dead horse here, but MELI is producing these numbers with currency headwinds, dominance of the Latin American e-commerce, and dominance of Latin American fintech. In spite of the currency situation (it’s bad), it’s been a 7 bagger for me over the last 4 years. NARI’s a newcomer medical device company, which makes me a little nervous, but it’s hard to argue with their valuation and growth.

On the opposite side of hyper-growth, we hope, is hyper-profits. With DOCU, maybe the profits will start to ramp up, even if the growth stays in the 40% range due to contolled marketing spend. Beats a poke in the eye, eh?

Best,
bulwnkl

Long MELI (19.3%) and long NARI (9.6%)

36 Likes

Instead of the PEG ratio (which I used to love), I thought it would be fun to look at EVS/Rev Growth for stocks I hold.

bullwinkle

Enterprise value per share and percent growth have different units. So its not clear to me what ratios you are computing. Could you clarify?

draj
(another ChE)

Hi Draj,
Cool another ChemE. I took the EV to sales ratio and divided it by the revenue growth rate.

Best,

bulwnkl

Of course PEG is Price to earnings / earnings growth rate, so that’s funky units too. In finance, I guess we can get as funky as we want :o)

bulwnl