The Afterpay Ltd (ASX: APT) share price will be on watch next week as the world holds its Black Friday sales this weekend.

Shoppers are cashed up and retailers are at the ready for a boom in sales this weekend. Data from the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (ASX: CBA) suggests the four-day period could present another windfall for businesses, with previous years resulting in a 14% boost to spending compared to the prior week.

With buy now, pay later (BNPL) companies now being a prominent method of payment for online shoppers, Afterpay will benefit from any increase in spending over the period.

But, what could it mean for the Afterpay share price?

How have Black Friday sales influenced the Afterpay share price historically?

In the past, Australia’s biggest provider of BNPL services has informed investors of its trading performance following Cyber Monday. In 2019 the company announced a record November sales performance. Afterpay achieved $1 billion in underlying sales for the month ending 30 November 2019.

However, between Black Friday and Afterpay releasing this update in 2019, the share price sank 5.8%. Perhaps investors were looking for a sale on the share market. The Afterpay share price proceeded to flounder around aimlessly for the remainder of the year.

In contrast, last year painted a vastly different picture. What was similar was the BNPL company setting a new monthly sales record with the inclusion of the Black Friday weekend. Afterpay notched up $2.1 billion in underlying sales in a single month — 112% more than the same month in the previous year.

Though, this time the Afterpay share price responded positively between the commencement of the sales weekend and the company’s trading update. Specifically, shares rose 4% in the space of a few days. More impressively, the share price went on to gain nearly 20% by the end of the year.

This year, the Australian Retailers Association and Roy Morgan are forecasting a record $5.4 billion in sales for Australia during the shopping frenzy. As such, Afterpay shareholders will be watching with anticipation to see how well the company does from the sale period.

The post Could the Afterpay (ASX:APT) share price be about to get a boost? appeared first on The Motley Fool Australia.

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Motley Fool contributor Mitchell Lawler owns shares of AFTERPAY T FPO and Commonwealth Bank of Australia. The Motley Fool Australia’s parent company Motley Fool Holdings Inc. owns shares of and has recommended AFTERPAY T FPO. The Motley Fool Australia owns shares of and has recommended AFTERPAY T FPO. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. This article contains general investment advice only (under AFSL 400691). Authorised by Bruce Jackson.

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If you’re looking for dividend shares to buy next week, then you might want to look at the shares listed below.

Here’s why these ASX dividend shares could be worth considering right now:

Accent Group Ltd (ASX: AX1)

The first dividend share to look at is Accent. It is a footwear-focused retailer which owns a collection of popular store brands. The popularity of its store brands and their growing footprints have underpinned strong sales, profit, and dividend growth over the last few years.

Unfortunately, FY 2022 looks set to be a difficult year due to lockdowns. For example, during the first 18 weeks of the financial year, store closures across ANZ impacted over 60% of Accent’s store portfolio. This resulted in ~$86 million in lost sales and weaker gross margins.

However, the team at Bell Potter think investors should look beyond this short term headwind and focus on its long term growth potential. As a result, the broker has recently put a buy rating and $3.05 price target on its shares.

As for dividends, Bell Potter is forecasting fully franked dividends per share of 9.1 cents in FY 2022 and 13.5 cents in FY 2023. Based on the latest Accent share price of $2.49, this represents yields of 3.65% and 5.4%, respectively.

South32 Ltd (ASX: S32)

Another ASX dividend share to look at is this mining giant. It could be a top option for income investors that are not averse to investing in the resources sector. This is due to its attractive valuation, strong free cash flow generation, and its extremely generous dividend yield forecast.

Thanks to its exposure to a number of in-demand commodities such as aluminium, the team at Goldman Sachs believe South32’s shares will provide investors with fully franked dividend yields of greater than 11% per annum for the next five years.

It will therefore come as no surprise to learn that Goldman has a conviction buy rating and $4.40 price target on its shares. This compares to the latest South32 share price of $3.56.

The post 2 excellent ASX dividend shares to buy next week appeared first on The Motley Fool Australia.

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Motley Fool contributor James Mickleboro has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool Australia’s parent company Motley Fool Holdings Inc. has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool Australia has recommended Accent Group. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. This article contains general investment advice only (under AFSL 400691). Authorised by Bruce Jackson.

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If you’re wanting to gain exposure to the energy sector, the good news is that there are plenty of options on the Australian share market. Though, given the very sharp decline in oil prices on Friday night, investors may want to wait for the dust to settle before making a move.

That aside, which ones should you buy ahead of others when the time comes? To help narrow things down, Morgans has revealed a couple of energy shares it believes have major upside potential. They are as follows:

Santos Ltd (ASX: STO)

The first energy share to look at is Santos. Morgans likes the company due to its resilient growth profile and the diversity of its earnings. It also believes the merger with Oil Search Ltd (ASX: OSH) is a big positive.

The broker currently has an add rating and $8.85 price target on Santos’ shares. 

It commented: “We expect the resilience of STO’s growth profile and diversified earnings base see it best placed to outperform against a backdrop of a continuing broader sector recovery. STO remains our top preference amongst our large-cap energy universe.”

“With early indications supportive of our view that material synergies and enhanced growth plans will result from the OSH merger. While in good shape, we expect STO to continue gaining investor support as it executes on the opportunistic OSH merger,” the broker added.

Woodside Petroleum Limited (ASX: WPL)

Another ASX energy share that the broker is a fan of is Woodside. This is partly due to its proposed transformative merger with the petroleum assets of BHP Group Ltd (ASX: BHP).

Morgans currently has an add rating and $29.95 price target on the company’s shares.

The broker commented: “We believe WPL has benefited from being in the right place, at the right time. With: 1) BHP/WPL having an existing relationship, 2) BHP eager to boost its ESG profile, and 3) WPL being a quality operator (safe hands which is important for BHP).”

“From an economic standpoint we think WPL is clearly getting the better of the deal, with synergies not baked into deal metrics and BHP willing to accept a discount. The deal is transformative, lifting WPL into being a top 10 global E&P with +2 billion barrels of 2P reserves, with EBITDA of US$4.7bnpa and growth options,” it concluded.

The post Leading broker names 2 ASX energy shares to buy appeared first on The Motley Fool Australia.

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Motley Fool contributor James Mickleboro has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool Australia’s parent company Motley Fool Holdings Inc. has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool Australia has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. This article contains general investment advice only (under AFSL 400691). Authorised by Bruce Jackson.

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There are some wonderful ASX growth shares that may be worth owning for the long-term.

These businesses are ones that are seeing double digit growth of their revenue and may be able to achieve long-term profit growth.

With that in mind, these are two ASX growth shares that are worth knowing about:

VanEck Video Gaming and Esports ETF (ASX: ESPO)

The is a leading exchange-traded fund (ETF) that provides exposure to the global video gaming and e-sports sector.

There is ongoing double digit growth for this industry as more people play video games and watch it for entertainment.

VanEck – the ETF provider – says that video gaming has achieved 12% average annual growth since 2015. E-sports is growing even faster, with revenue growth of 28% per annum since 2015.

The competitive video gaming audience is expected to reach 646 million people globally in 2023, driven in part by the rising population of digital natives. E-sports is considered the world’s fastest growing sport, with the top tournaments getting crowds similar to World Cup football and the Olympic Games.

E-sports has created new potential revenue streams for the companies involved including game publisher fees, media rights, merchandise, ticket sales and advertising.

Some of the businesses involved includes: Nvidia, Advanced Micro Devices, Tencent, Sea, Netease, Activision Blizzard, Nintendo, Take-Two Interactive Software, Unity Software and Roblox. It has a total of 26 names in the portfolio, but the 10 names I just mentioned make up more than 60% of the overall portfolio.

This ASX growth share comes with an annual management fee of 0.55%. The index that this ETF tracks has seen average returns per annum of 30.2% over the last five years.

ELMO Software Ltd (ASX: ELO)

ELMO Software is a technology business that offers services relating to HR, payroll and expense management.

It’s currently rated as a buy by the broker Morgan Stanley, with a price target of $7.80. That’s a potential upside of 50% over the next year, if the broker is right.

The business is growing revenue very quickly. In the first quarter of FY22, annualised recurring revenue (ARR) grew 61% to $88.5 million, with organic ARR growth of 35%. Revenue increased 52% to $20.7 million.

ELMO says that it has strong momentum with a positive macroeconomic backdrop and with small and medium sized businesses continuing to adopt cloud-based solutions to manage a flexible workforce.

The ASX growth share boasts of a number of positive factors with its software as a service (SaaS) model with a high level of recurring subscription revenue, high customer retention, a high level of organic growth and expansion strategies.

In FY22 it’s aiming to break through $100 million of ARR. Guidance for FY22 ARR is between $105 million to $111 million, which would be year on year growth of 25% to 33%. It’s also expecting to achieve positive earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of between $1 million to $6 million.

The company thinks that there is a $12.8 billion opportunity across small business and mid-market in the UK and ANZ.

The post 2 top ASX growth shares that could be worth buying appeared first on The Motley Fool Australia.

More reading

• 4 small cap ASX shares to watch in 2022
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Motley Fool contributor Tristan Harrison has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool Australia’s parent company Motley Fool Holdings Inc. owns shares of and has recommended Elmo Software. The Motley Fool Australia owns shares of and has recommended Elmo Software. The Motley Fool Australia has recommended VanEck Vectors ETF Trust – VanEck Vectors Video Gaming and eSports ETF. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. This article contains general investment advice only (under AFSL 400691). Authorised by Bruce Jackson.

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