In public markets, the FOCUS Telecom Business Services Index (TBSI) continued its upward march with a gain of 1.6% for our fall reporting period. However, unlike in the summer period, this gain underperformed both the 4.0% gain in the S&P 500 and the 5.8% gain in the NASDAQ over the corresponding time period. Even with this period’s underperformance, the sector continues to outperform the broader indices for the full 12-month period. The TBSI’s 12-month gain of 24.4% compares favorably to both the 16.2% gain in the S&P 500 and the 22.3% gain in the NASDAQ. It also is worth noting that the sector’s strong year-over-year increases are the result of improvements in financial performance rather than multiple expansion, and in fact multiples have remained fairly steady compared to this same time last year. The sector revenue multiple held steady at 0.4x, while the sector EBITDA multiple ticked up slightly from 8.5x to 8.8x.

Oops! We could not locate your form.