Price comparison website MoneySupermarket.com (MONY) - which in particular allows consumers to compare prices for travel, financial services and utilities - is used to competition. For years it has bumped up against the likes of Confused.com, Gocompare.com, Comparethemarket.com or uSwitch.com. But, with Google muscling in, this market looks set to become far tougher.
- Growing solidly so far
- Reasonable dividend yield
- Competitive threat from Google
- Travel and home service units look weak
- Directors have been selling shares
- Takeover rumours died out long ago
True, MoneySupermarket's bosses say there has been little impact on its business from Google so far; and Google made a fairly modest start in the sector through 2011's £38m acquisition of UK financial price comparison site beatthatquote.com. But, in May, Google launched a credit card, savings and current account comparison tool, which was followed last month by a car insurance tool. Those products now put Google in markets that generate as much as 70 per cent of MoneySupermarket's revenues. Google's march is unlikely to stop there, which leaves our recommendation to hold the shares in July at 138p looking optimistic.