What happened
Shares of eXp World Holdings (EXPI -4.43%) climbed 13.3% in February, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence. The online real estate and education stock gained ground thanks to continued momentum and a new partnership.
eXp's Virbela education technology platform announced a new relationship with academic products and services provider the Douglas Stewart Company. As a result of the partnership, Douglas Stewart's software and services group will offer Virbela's virtual campus and immersive learnings environments to a network of resellers targeting roughly 5,000 U.S. colleges and universities and 132,000 K-12 schools.
Image source: Getty Images.
So what
In addition to recent wins for its education technology business, eXp's online real estate platform has been putting up strong results and spurring investor enthusiasm. The company's virtual real estate brokerage has been booming, with a 56% increase for agents and brokers on its platform helping to push the company's overall revenue up 100% year over year in the third quarter.
The announcement of new selling opportunities for its Virbela education software further brightened the company's outlook, and its stock gains have been so strong that the company recently completed a stock split. eXp's two-for-one split was carried out at market close on Feb. 16.
Even with a recent pullback, the company's share price is up roughly 830% over the last year.
Now what
eXp World stock has seen a steep sell-off in March in conjunction with the broader pullback for growth-dependent tech stocks. The company's share price is down roughly 33% in this month's trading so far.
eXp published preliminary fourth-quarter results on March 2. The company expects Q4 sales to reach approximately $609 million, up 122% compared to the prior-year period. Management is guiding for net income of roughly $7.7 million in the quarter, representing growth of 885% year over year. The team reports that total agents and brokers on the eXp Realty platform rose 63% annually in 2020 and that residential transactions closed rose 77%.
eXp has a market capitalization of roughly $6.2 billion and trades at approximately 2.7 times this year's expected sales and 155 times expected earnings.
