This stock is more than $500, and it’s not Apple

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) � This year is not quite two months old, way too early to start calling the winners and losers in the tech sector. But numbers don�t lie.

So far, there is a company that has started 2012 on a tear and is showing few signs of slowing down. Its brand is ubiquitous within its particular industry, and if you come across one of the respective ads on TV, there�s no mistaking it for another. When the firm reported its most-recent quarterly results back in November, earnings had more than doubled from the previous year.

Oh, and as of Thursday, its stock was up almost 27% this year, with visions of soon reaching $600 a share.

/quotes/zigman/90481/quotes/nls/pcln PCLN 588.78, +1.99, +0.34%

Now pick your jaw up off the floor, because I am not talking about Apple Inc. AAPL I�m referring to online-travel service Priceline.com Inc. PCLN , which saw its shares give up 32 cents to close Thursday at $587.40. Over the last year, Priceline�s stock has surged more than 35%.

Let�s get something out of the way. Some would say that Priceline isn�t really a tech company. They have a decent argument to make, because at its core Priceline is an aggregator of deals and prices for airlines and other travel-related services.

But the company uses the Internet as its business platform, and to say it isn�t a tech play would be kind of like excising the likes of Amazon.com Inc. AMZN �from the universe of bellwether tech leaders. It is what it is.

To ignore Priceline�s market performance this year also would be like pretending that its nearly 81-year-old spokesman, William Shatner, doesn�t chew up the scenery every time he�s on camera.

The world will get more of an insight into Priceline�s business Monday, when the company reports fiscal fourth-quarter results. Analysts surveyed by FactSet Research estimate the firm will earn $5.06 a share, excluding one-time items, on revenue of $971.6 million, compared with earnings of $175 million, or $3.40 a share, on $731 million in sales in the same period a year ago.

�Based on our analysis of industry data, Priceline traffic data and results from Expedia, we expect another solid quarter from Priceline,� said Aaron Kessler, who covers the online-travel company for Raymond James & Associates.

(On Feb. 9, Expedia Inc. EXPE �reported what was considered to be mixed quarterly results, with earnings that were down from a year ago, yet still beat analysts� forecasts.) Read more about Expedia's report.

Kessler seems to expect more than a �solid quarter� from Priceline. This week, he raised his target price on the stock to $685, or 10.5% higher than his previous forecast of $620 a share.

Even this lofty outlook for Priceline isn�t as high as that of Stephen Ju of Credit Suisse, who has a target of $720 on Priceline�s stock.

Click to Play Divers find more shipwreck bodies

Recovery workers continue their search in the Costa Concordia, a day after removing eight corpses from the sunken wreck. (Video: Reuters/Photo: Getty Images)

The bullishness behind Priceline, Kessler said, is rather easy to understand. He�s looking for the company�s bookings � a key measure of all the online-travel sites� business health � to provide evidence that Priceline�s stock price isn�t just built on hot air. Kessler estimates that the company will report U.S. bookings of $1 billion and international bookings of $3.68 billion for its fourth quarter.

But there could be a dent in Priceline�s armor due to the business climate in Europe. Data reports suggest the European travel market slowed somewhat in the fourth quarter, according to Kessler, with an analysis of six discount European airline carriers showing passenger growth of just 1.9% in the fourth quarter, down from an increase of 7% in the third quarter of last year.

Brian Nowak of Nomura Securities said that growth by European ADRs � stocks listed in the United States for a company based in Europe � turned negative in the fourth quarter for the first time since the first quarter of 2010. Nowak said that when this happens, it usually remains negative for six to 14 months, and could impact bookings across the Atlantic.

�This raises a new risk to Priceline�s 2012 bookings as European hotels make up around 55% of Priceline�s total bookings,� the analyst added.

Priceline originally made its name by letting customers name their price for what they wanted. Now, whatever the company says with its fourth-quarter report will have a lot to do with how investors feel about naming Priceline�s stock price for the rest of the year.