What happened
Shares of SS&C Technologies (SSNC 0.44%) climbed 10.6% in September, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence, rebounding from a steep drop between late July and early August after the investment technology software company predicted a rise in broader M&A activity and announced a number of its own strategic acquisitions.
So what
For perspective, SS&C stock plunged nearly 30% from July 29 to Aug. 5 after the company posted reasonably strong second-quarter 2019 results but still lowered its full-year outlook despite it. At the time, management blamed its tepid guidance on a combination of lower trading volumes affecting revenue at its Eze Software subsidiary, a slower environment for mergers and acquisitions hurting Intralinks revenue, and attrition at some recently acquired businesses.
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Shares began to gradually rebound in late August, however, and continued to rise through early September after the company issued its latest "Intralinks Deal Flow Predictor," including a forecast for a notable increase in M&A activity for the second half of 2019.
On Sept. 12, SS&C then announced it had agreed to acquire investment and portfolio-management platform Investrack from United Arab Emirates-based Globacom Technologies. Then, on Sept. 25, SS&C followed this up by announcing a separate agreement to acquire certain "Algorithmics" risk analytics products and services from IBM.
Now what
Of course, it remains to be seen how much these acquisitions will contribute to SS&C's top and bottom lines in the near future, so I'm content continuing to put my money to work in other top stocks while I watch from the sidelines for more tangible signs of sustained improvement. But after SS&C coupled its prediction for a resurgence in M&A (which is beneficial to Intralinks) with the latest extensions of its growth-by-acquisition strategy, it was hardly surprising to see the company's shares partially recoup their summer losses last month.
