Today's stock is one of the biggest winners across the Stansberry Research universe of publications...
Every weekday, at the bottom of the Stansberry Digest, we publish the "Stansberry Research Hall of Fame"... These stocks are the top 10 all-time, highest-returning closed positions across all of Stansberry Research's portfolios.
You can also find the Top 10 open recommendations, which includes well-known long-term recommendations like Automatic Data Processing (ADP) and Hershey (HSY)... and today's stock, too.
Match Group (Nasdaq: MTCH) owns and operates the largest dating site in the world by sales – Match.com. Of course, Match.com isn't the only dating site out there...
One of the other most popular sites appears to be Plenty of Fish, which is free and supported by advertising. Plenty of Fish claims 150 million registered accounts and starts 2.5 million conversations between users every day. There's also Tinder, OurTime, OkCupid, and Meetic.
Those sites all count millions of registered accounts. But they aren't a threat to Match Group's business... You see, all those "competitors" are owned by Match Group.
Overall, Match Group has products available in 42 different languages across more than 190 countries. The company says hundreds of millions of singles have used one of its brands' products at some point. All told, Match Group has nearly 10.8 million average subscribers – up from 9.6 million in the same quarter in 2019.
Match Group completely dominates the market. The only dating site name you may have heard of that isn't under the Match umbrella is eHarmony. But Match doubles eHarmony's market share. Match Group has about 26% of the online dating market, while eHarmony "only" has about 12%. And no other competitor even comes close.
Back in the 1990s, online dating (if it was even available) was taboo. Today, it's just the norm. It dominates the industry. And it's only going to become more common moving forward.
According to a prediction by eHarmony, by 2040 70% of all relationships will start from online dating.
And the pandemic has provided a huge boost for Match Group's business by accelerating the online dating trend...
Social distancing has been intensifying demand for virtual dating. Even stuck at home, unable to go to bars and other social gatherings, people want to connect with other people. COVID-19 doesn't change the fact that people need love.
And that's evident in Match's latest earnings report...
Match said that user activity remains elevated across its entire portfolio of apps. This fueled growth in both subscriber numbers and average revenue per user, Match Group said. As a result, Match Group's third-quarter revenue growth was 18%, equaling the company's growth from the quarter before the pandemic hit.
Match Group forecast revenue growth of 17% to 19% for the fourth quarter. This would put the company on track to meet its full-year revenue targets from the beginning of the year, despite the pandemic.
Video dating has also taken off...
Match Group said that more than 5.5 million people have used its Plenty of Fish video dating feature. It also reported that Plenty of Fish hosted the largest-ever virtual speed-dating event in the quarter. Match Group said these offerings are providing an incremental source of revenue for the company, and should continue to do so.
And Match has been profiting with its Tinder video-dating products, as well. That has been great for Match shareholders.
We covered Match Group in March 2019. At the time, MTCH shares were up 275% from their initial public offering ("IPO") in November 2015.
Since then, shares have more than doubled. And since bottoming in March with the rest of the market, MTCH shares have soared. The stock is up 187% since its March 20 low. That's more than triple the S&P 500's return over the same period. Just take a look at this chart...
But the gains aren't done yet...
Match Group estimates that there are more than 600 million single people globally who lack Internet access. Most of these people are in the Asia-Pacific regions. That's going to change... Mobile-network company GSMA predicts that mobile Internet user penetration in the Asia-Pacific region will increase from 48% to 61% by 2025. It's an incredible opportunity for Match Group to grow its products.
Match Group also estimates that the total number of dating-app users worldwide will potentially rise to 300 million in 2023, up from today's 254 million.
This should continue to fuel Match Group's growth. And that should continue to push its stock price higher.
Sometimes, investing is simple.
Our colleague Dr. David "Doc" Eifrig recommended shares of Match Group in his Retirement Millionaire advisory in December 2017. Subscribers who followed his advice are currently up 371%. If you'd like to learn more about a subscription to Retirement Millionaire, click here.