Motley Fool analyst Jason Moser talks about why the Microsoft-Activision Blizzard news signals a direct shot at Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:FB) and why Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) shareholders should be optimistic about the company’s gaming aspirations. He also examines shares of Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) and The Gap (NYSE:GPS), and why one of them represents a potential buying opportunity.

Plus, Motley Fool host Alison Southwick and Motley Fool personal finance expert Robert Brokamp discuss actionable ways to stay on track with your financial goals for 2022, including a rare triple-tax advantage to help prepare for future healthcare costs.

To catch full episodes of all The Motley Fool’s free podcasts, check out our podcast center. To get started investing, check out our quick-start guide to investing in stocks. A full transcript follows the video.

This video was recorded on Jan. 18, 2022.

Chris Hill: Today on Motley Fool Money, Microsoft’s biggest acquisition ever makes it clear the company is gearing up in the battle for metaverse supremacy. That and more coming up right now. I’m Chris Hill joined by Motley Fool’s senior analyst, Jason Moser. Thanks for being here.

Jason Moser: Hey, thanks for having me.

Chris Hill: We’ve also got the latest on retail, financials, and the team from Motley Fool Answers is going to help you keep your New Year’s resolutions on track. But let’s start with Microsoft’s biggest acquisition ever. The software giant is buying Activision Blizzard (NASDAQ:ATVI) for $68.7 billion in cash. The deal is expected to close in 2023, at which point, Microsoft will become the third largest gaming company by revenue. There are a few things to get to here, Jason, but first and foremost, this seems like a shot across the bow at Meta Platforms.

Jason Moser: It’s a shot, Chris. It’s a big shot. Yeah. This is an attention getter for sure. The year is just underway, and here we go, largest acquisition in Microsoft’s history, and frankly, I do get the allure. I think there’s plenty of potential for this to work given the market opportunity in gaming. We heard Nvidia recently here at CES 2022, they called it out as a $300 billion all-in market. You’ve got three billion people around the world actively playing games today, and Microsoft quoted in the call, they expect this number to reach 4.5 billion by 2030. So I think the neat thing about this deal, it really is something that plays into a strength of Microsoft’s. This is a very complementary deal that doesn’t really possess a lot of overlap. I think that’s something important to consider because obviously, Microsoft has a very big gaming business on its own. A lot of success there with Xbox. A lot of success with Game Pass now crossing 25 million subscribers. For Microsoft management, they see this deal, ultimately, it gives them that entryway into more gaming that’s going to span all platforms. So mobile PC, console, and Cloud, and, of course, Chris, they had to throw the M word in there. That’s right, the metaverse. This is going to provide the building blocks for that metaverse. But I think, honestly, as wide reaching as this deal is, I think it’s compelling from a mobile perspective. I think this is honestly, this may be the biggest mobile opportunity for Microsoft to-date, given its shortcomings to this point in regards to the hardware. They never were able to really make the phone thing work. This is going to give them a massive opportunity in mobile, which I think is something we shouldn’t overlook.

Chris Hill: Before we focus on Microsoft for a second here, when you zoom out and look at the gaming industry and some of the stats you just provided, is gaming now one of those industries that investors who have a portfolio of 20-30 stocks, do investors need to look at their portfolios and ask, where is the gaming in my portfolio? Because it seems like if the industry is not there, if it is not in the must-have category, it’s getting there pretty quickly, isn’t it?

Jason Moser: Yeah. I feel like we’ve had this conversation before in regard to travel, and I think it absolutely makes sense for investors to look at their portfolio and say, well, how am I getting that gaming exposure? You look at Activision Blizzard. Activision Blizzard, it’s a popular holding through the years with a lot of our listeners and subscribers. Obviously, a company that has witnessed some turmoil here lately that we can get into if we need. But ultimately, I feel like you’ve got Activision Blizzard coming at this with 400 million players of all of their games and platforms across the globe. You’ve got Microsoft here just reporting that their gaming revenue just exceeded $15 billion for the year. Last year, it grew 33 percent as they saw record engagement with nearly 33 billion hours played across their Xbox platform, that Game Pass platform. Everything that they’ve got combined there, to me, it absolutely makes a lot of sense for investors to look and see how they’re getting that exposure because it really feels like, again, given where management sees this going, it really does feel like a market opportunity. Even though it’s really big today, it feels like a market opportunity still with a lot of growth to be had.

Chris Hill: Let’s talk about the turmoil for a second because The Wall Street Journal had a story on Sunday about how Activision Blizzard, over the past six months, has fired nearly 40 employees, disciplined another 40 on top of that to address the charges inside the company of misconduct, sexual harassment. Bobby Kotick, the CEO, was on CNBC this morning along with Phil Spencer, who is the Head of Gaming at Microsoft. Kotick got the question, the correct and obvious question, is this deal at this time with Microsoft do in part to what’s been going on, the allegations at your company about sexual harassment, problems with the culture? Kotick gave the answer that I thought he would give, which is essentially, no, it has nothing to do with that, and we’re working hard on that. But I don’t know, Jason, I guess the polite way to put it is, I just don’t believe him because I think if shares of Activision Blizzard aren’t cut in half over the past 12 months, Bobby Kotick is not as receptive to a conversation about his company being acquired.

Jason Moser: I think you’re probably right. The numbers don’t really paint the picture of a company that’s been killing it over the last few years. The stock up 38 percent over the last three years, the market has doubled that output, $95 per share all cash, that puts the business at 28 times trailing earnings, around 25 times trailing free cash flow. When you look at Activision Blizzard’s growth over the last three years during that same stock performance, you’ve got eight percent annualized revenue growth over the last three years. That revenue growth has been lumpy at times, and I think part of that really does have to do with cultural issues that really came too ahead here over the last year plus. I’m with you. That’s the answer I would expect Mr. Kotick to give. Now, by the same token, I feel like it puts Activision Blizzard in a little bit of