You have to give communications titan Comcast (CMCSA) credit; it is simply not sleeping on potential ways to draw in interested customers and advertise to them accordingly. In fact, not only is it offering up a new speed boost for its internet service, but it is also offering a new means to get advertisers on board with Comcast. The combination did not seem to help share prices, though, as Comcast shares slipped modestly in Tuesday afternoon’s trading.
Comcast, via its Universal Ads platform in a partnership with the Ramp financial platform, brought out a combined program that should make it a lot easier for customers to buy advertising on Comcast television stations. With 30,000 Ramp customers involved, that could be a nice bump of ad revenue at a time when linear television is in open decline.
Since Ramp customers commonly include a lot of brands that do not often advertise on television, it should have a positive impact for Comcast. Not only will this mean more revenue, but it will also mean exposing customers to ads they do not ordinarily see. As anyone who watches video these days knows: it is not so much advertising that is the problem, but when the same ads come up over and over.
A Speed Bump…Up
And, in a development that is generally welcome when it hits, Comcast is giving its customers a little extra shot of speed. Xfinity customers with multiple plans will be able to get in on a set of speed boosts. This is a reflection of Comcast’s ongoing plan to build out its capacity and improve access to hybrid fiber-coax (HFC) and fiber networks in general.
The boosts may be modest, but are there nonetheless. For instance, the budget NOW 100 plan will see download speeds remain the same at 100 Mbps, but upload speeds have doubled from their previous 10 Mbps to 20 Mbps. The Connect More plan gets a boost for Standard service, going from 300 / 10 to 400 / 35, and Enhanced Speed Areas will go from 300 / 100 to 400 / 150. And the king of Comcast’s speed offerings, Gigabitx2 in Enhanced Speed Areas will go from 2,000 / 300 to 2,100 / 300, which is almost scary fast.
Is Comcast Stock a Good Buy Right Now?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Moderate Buy consensus rating on CMCSA stock based on 10 Buys and nine Holds assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 14.62% loss in its share price over the past year, the average CMCSA price target of $41.58 per share implies 16.57% upside potential.
See more CMCSA analyst ratings
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