u/tomato232

I project 488% (5.9x) earnings growth in the upcoming report. My estimates are conservative: DAU growth in the high teens and revenue growth slowing to 50% over the next year.

RDDT's price could triple to $420 by next April without being overvalued (P/E 56).

Full investment thesis is in my Mar 29 post.

I love this sub's discussion quality, and it's clear many users are experienced investors. I'll add my two cents with an intro to stock basics for people newer to investing.

Stock and valuation

• People buy stocks to make money; otherwise, they would hold cash. Valuation is based on future earnings—the past is gone and the present is fleeting, so only the future matters.
• Historically, the most common valuation method (in Graham's era) was the P/E ratio, based on the past 12 months of earnings, as a proxy for the future. Since the 1980s, with better data and computing, investors increasingly use forward P/E (fP/E), which incorporates future estimates.
  • To see if a purchase is worthwhile, you need both price and quantity. If someone says, "I bought $5 of grapes", you need the quantity. If they say, "I bought 5 kg of grapes", you need the price. The P/E ratio incorporates both.
• However, neither P/E nor fP/E captures growth. P/E divided by fP/E gives the growth rate. The PEG ratio combines current valuation (P/E) with future growth, making it one of the most widely used metrics.
  • fP/E, PEG, and P/E are the primary valuation tools; others (P/S, P/B, FCF, etc) are supporting metrics.

Tables are necessary

• The human mind can only track 3-5 numbers at once, while stock valuation involves many current and projected variables. A spreadsheet is essential to organize inputs and let the computer handle calculations.
• Also, use a digital spreadsheet to track your finances and taxes.

Valuation method

• Accounting is flexible, and true expenses are not always transparent. A simple approach is:
  • Revenue - net income = total expenses (including operating costs, taxes, etc).
• RDDT has consistently grown revenue faster than expenses, and this is likely to continue given its capital-light model—usage-based cloud costs with limited fixed costs.
• I estimate conservatively
  • My fair price is based on a PEG of 1. The 30-year average PEG for the S&P 500 is 1.3.
  • DAU growth: mid-high teens, slowing to low teens by 2030 (it doesn't need to slow, as international growth—96% of the world's population—has just started, with 28% growth over the past year).
  • ARPU: $57 at the end FY2030 (vs Facebook at $59 in 2025—I split out Facebook ARPU from Meta; its other apps have their own ARPUs).

RDDT's current fair price and potential

• RDDT fair price: $409. 1-year price target: $463.
• EPS grew by 247% (3.5x) and 415% (5.2x) over the past 2 quarters. The next 2 quarters are expected to be 5.9x and 3x, followed by several more quarters of >2x growth. Any P/E compresses rapidly.
• Reddit has one of the strongest balance sheets in the market, with $954M in cash and minimal debt ($23M).
• Share count growth has stabilized (201M in 2025 Q1 → 203M in 2025 Q4). Stock-based compensation is around industry average; ideally, management remains disciplined. A benchmark for extreme shareholder alignment is Warren Buffett, who kept a $100k annual compensation for decades and built wealth through company performance driven by good management decisions.
• Value per share
  • RDDT has 203M shares outstanding vs 2.57B for Meta—13x fewer shares. Each RDDT share represents a much larger ownership stake. RDDT can grow to $1,000/share and then split to $7x.

Upcoming momentum

• Earnings reports every 3 months
• Iran conflict resolution (anytime)—ceasefire reached 2026-04-07, 9 days after this post.
• S&P 500 inclusion (likely within 2-3 quarters; only a few companies ahead now)
• AI development & deals
  • Anthropic settlement and likely data-licensing deal (~2026-11)
  • Google AI deal renewal (~2027-02)
  • OpenAI deal renewal (~2027-05)
  • Potential deals with other AI players (Perplexity, Meta, xAI, etc)—anytime
  • Reddit isn't required to build AI models, but top-tier models greatly benefit from Reddit data for real human voice, conversational tone, emerging trends, and hyperlocal information (such as someone spotting a promotion in a Chicago hair salon). Until AGI can fully imitate humans and access instant, worldwide information (which would require ubiquitous camera and microphone coverage—very difficult to approve and likely never achievable), Reddit remains necessary for top-tier AI.
  • Youtube’s data is largely visual and nonverbal, while chatbots rely on text—and require Reddit to learn textual communication. If the AI industry succeeds, there will be enough money to handsomely pay all sources.

Headwinds and tailwinds

• AI
  • Reddit usage
    • AI could reduce Reddit usage for some types of Q&A (such as technical assistance). However, most Q&A can't be replaced, such as people asking how others feel about a book or movie, or seeking human opinions.
    • Reddit's main uses are community discussion, entertainment/time-passing, opinions, and news and reactions—these can't be replaced by AI.
    • People want to share pictures of their cats with other people, not AI—sort r/cats by New and see how many posts there are. r/cats is exploding and could be worth $2B as a site in itself. Reddit has hundreds of thousands of growing communities.
  • Tailwind
    • Electricity reduced physical effort without reducing jobs (people simply got more work done). If AI succeeds, it will reduce mental effort without reducing jobs. Future workers will then train for roles such as software and hardware engineering, system admin, cybersecurity, and robotics maintenance. As work becomes easier, people will work less and earn more—leading to higher Reddit usage and ad revenue.
    • AI is a labor-saving tool, like a toaster or refrigerator. People use it to get things done or keep it running in the background, while using the time saved to interact with other humans.
  • AI is net positive for Reddit. Whether AI succeeds or remains niche, Reddit does well.
• Growing internet usage
  • As of 2026-02:
    • Global population: 8.3B
    • Internet users: 5.5B (66%)
    • Average use: 6.5 hours/day → 36B total hours/day
  • By 2035:
    • Global population: 8.9B
    • Internet users: 7.7B (87%)
    • Average use: 7.5 hours/day → 58B total hours/day
  • Reddit can capture a growing share of an expanding pool of attention.

Eye test

• There's a subreddit for everything, with users submitting engaging content for the community to enjoy.
• The website and mobile app run smoothly and feel sleek and modern.

Investing method

• If you believe in RDDT, buy and hold long-term.
• Don't trade in and out
  • No one can predict short-term market movements—if they could, there would be far more billionaires. A 25% gain compounded 50 times turns $100k into $7B (100,000*1.25^50). Millions have tried to trade or time the market and failed; we won't be different.
• Avoid leveraged funds (such as RDTL)
  • Leveraged ETFs rebalance daily, which creates drag. For example:
    • RDDT +10% then -10% = 1.2*0.8 = 0.96 (-4%)
  • They're mathematically set up to lose. The funds adjust leverage too slowly. If using leverage, either keep debt constant (don't adjust debt) or keep leverage constant (adjust debt every tick). A simple tabulation in a spreadsheet proves this (I can provide it in a later post).

Why markets misprice stocks

• Markets are not fully efficient. They often badly misprice stocks because the future is unpredictable and institutions are structurally risk-averse.
  • Apple released the iPhone in 2007-06. Anyone with eyes could see it was a world-changing device, yet Apple's stock fell 57% in 2008. Apple had nothing to do with the bank failures of that time. Since then, Apple's total return has been 101x.
  • The market also badly mispriced Amazon (2,215x since IPO), Google, and Meta.
  • It did the same with Reddit's IPO, valuing the 6th-largest website in the world at pocket change for $6.4B. The stock promptly rose 3.6x from $34 to $121, yet it is still significantly undervalued.
• Institutional risk aversion
  • Much of the world's money is in pension, sovereign, and endowment funds. Managers typically hold variations of a conservative 60% stock / 40% bond portfolio, earning 5-6% returns while keeping their jobs. Their goal is to keep funds stable for annual withdrawals by governments and retirees—not to maximize growth.
  • Decisions are reviewed by executives and boards. Achieving a 30% return while risking a 5% loss (12.5% expected return) may be better for the fund, but the former might earn the manager a 20% bonus, while the latter could cost them their job. As a result, they are incentivized to be risk-averse—selling stocks at the first sign of uncertainty and moving to bonds or cash to avoid negative returns.
  • This is why 10-baggers (which are often smaller and more volatile) are neglected by large institutions, leaving opportunities for sharp investors. Once they reach mega-cap status, institutions step in, as holding a top-10 stock is seen as "common sense", and they won't be judged if it declines.

Executive sales

• Diversification / Kelly criterion
  • It’s understandable that executives selling shares at $14x and $13x could cause anxiety, as it may suggest the stock isn’t worth that much. However, both their past and future income are tied to RDDT, and the Kelly criterion states that one should never overconcentrate.
• Kelly criterion
  • Example 1 (positive expected value (EV), partial loss; splitting reduces average wealth but maximizes typical wealth)
    • A coin flip that doubles or halves your bet has an expected value of +25% per round. Over many rounds (for example, 1,000), most paths will be close to 500 wins and 500 losses, leaving wealth near the starting point, while a few extreme paths dominate the average (such as 40 net wins → 2^520*.5^480 ≈ 1.1Tx; 40 net losses → near zero).
    • The optimal strategy is to bet 50% of your bankroll each round. For example, over 2 rounds: 1.5*0.75 = 1.125. This approach limits drawdowns and maximizes long-run (geometric) growth, producing steady compounding rather than a small chance of extreme wealth and a small chance of ruin. Betting everything repeatedly yields a higher average outcome (1.25x per round), but few would accept it due to the risk of total loss.
  • Example 2 (positive EV, total loss; splitting reduces average wealth but maximizes typical wealth)
    • If a bet either triples your stake or loses everything, the optimal fraction is 25%. Betting your entire bankroll guarantees ruin over repeated plays, while fractional betting avoids wiping out and improves expected growth.
  • No company is guaranteed to make money. If RDDT could 20x or 0.5x in 10 years (average ≈10.3x), an overconcentrated investor should trim, while an underexposed investor (low allocation, no employment ties) should add.
• Zuckerberg sold 30,000,000 shares of Facebook at its IPO (2012) at $38/share, and 41,000,000 shares at $55 the following year (2013). As one of the richest, he understands money.
• Executives may not formalize this mathematically, but diversification is deeply and correctly ingrained, and they follow it.
• Marginal utility of money
  • After $100M or $1B, a 10x gain doesn't meaningfully improve life for many, but losing half would reduce it (from a mansion, household staff, and comfort to none of those). They would rather protect $500M than chase another 10x.
  • Someone with a $500k net worth may prefer the chance of a 10x gain and accept the risk of losing half. They can rebuild $250k through work, while $500k growing to $5M would be life-changing.
  • Think of an S-curve: at low net worth, losses matter less and gains matter more; at high net worth, losses matter more and gains matter less.
  • This is why retirees sell stocks and buy bonds—they just need steady 4% withdrawals. It doesn't mean stocks are suddenly bad. Different people have different optimal deployments of money.
• If you don't work at Reddit, are young, and can tolerate volatility, a high RDDT allocation may make sense. Otherwise, diversify. Hold some index for steady growth.
• Reasons for executive sales: Diversification, preplanned sales, taxes, marginal utility, lifestyle, philanthropy.

Assorted

• DAU growth
  • The US is the global tech leader—people worldwide use Windows/Mac, Google, Amazon, and Reddit/Meta. Companies are built in the US, gain adoption there, then the world follows.
  • As of 2026-03, 50% of the US uses Facebook daily vs 26% globally. 15% of the US (53M of 343M) uses Reddit daily, vs 1.5% globally. There's a gap in global users that is currently being closed.
    • If 10% of the world's projected 8.6B population in 2030 uses Reddit daily, that implies 860M DAU and a RDDT price of $3,220. I conservatively estimate 246M DAU by 2030 (2.9% of the global population).
  • With the US representing only 4% of the global population (343M of 8.3B), international growth (+28% over the past year) carries the load.
  • International users communicate in English (r/brazil, r/norway), local languages (r/brasil, r/norge), or both.
• Don't stress about logged in or out
  • Reddit is in the early stages of growth and has just reached the critical mass needed for rapid user expansion. I've never seen what some sites do because they show a "log in" prompt when I visit, and I just leave. People can consume Reddit content freely, and many will create accounts because they find it interesting and want to participate.
  • Reddit could grow steadily toward 1-3B DAU, or, if discovery accelerates, scale much faster. If the entire world is exposed to Reddit, it could reach billions of DAU sooner than expected.
  • Logged-out users see ads too and generate revenue.
• Evergreen platform
  • All developments are bullish for Reddit—positive news brings discussion; negative news brings debate and venting.
  • Reddit is designed to win: a global forum for anything people care about.
• Search optimization
  • Google needs Reddit more than Reddit needs Google. People use search to find things that interest them. People search "world news" or "best phone" and expect Reddit to be among the top results (often the top). If Google doesn't provide this, people will switch to alternatives that do. Google understands this and keeps Reddit highly ranked.
• Trading volume
  • RDDT has high trading volume relative to its share count—trading is smooth with no issues.
  • Recent average daily volume:
    • RDDT: 4.3M of 191M shares outstanding (2.2% traded daily)
    • AAPL: 40M of 15B (0.27% traded daily)
    • NVDA: 165M of 24B (0.68% traded daily)
• Meme potential
  • RDDT is the obvious choice for any crowd-driven speculation. A billion weekly actives represent serious capital. Assume it won't happen, but there's a non-zero chance.
• Unicorn upside (top-3 market cap)
  • Reddit has the potential to become the final, unified form of media (traditional + social), given its scale of user-generated content and engagement—everyone is both a news source and a viewer.
  • Answers is already a developed AI model and could, if Reddit chooses, evolve into a full chatbot (like GPT or Gemini). It could be called Robo.
  • Reddit has many initiatives planned that will surprise people when the timing is right. Huffman is extremely smart.

Share with others

• Some people have doubts about RDDT—feel free to use this information, along with anything else you know, to address their concerns and explain Reddit's business.

I'll periodically update this post (sort of a library) with new information rather than creating multiple posts.

Disclaimer

• I hold 21,900 RDDT shares at an average cost of $164.
• Provincial math champion in a Canadian province in high school. Retired in my early 30s.