Register for free to join our community of investors and share your ideas. You will also get access to streaming quotes, interactive charts, trades, portfolio, live options flow and more tools.
Register for free to join our community of investors and share your ideas. You will also get access to streaming quotes, interactive charts, trades, portfolio, live options flow and more tools.
Hi Dejgaard, Dick
IMO there are a few factors here at play that they do not jive.
One is the weak dollar and the other one is the price of oil.
The weak dollar is good in one way and that is "exports". Here is the conflict though, exports with expensive oil and weak dollar is contradictory. Industry (whatever is left of it) needs oil to produce in order to export, not only the oil is expensive as it is almost $29 per barrel but on top of that the dollar is weak which means that one dollar buys less oil now. That brings another fear into the picture and the fear is the possibility of selling for less $ than it takes to produce.
That is deflation and let's not get into this story (crash etc).
Let's not forget that the Nasdaq at 6000 was when the oil was $8.00 per barrel. So the question is what the bottom would be?
I was one of the pessimists if anybody remembers, but if somebody told me Nasdaq at 1300 I would laugh as loud as I could.
Let's get back to the weak dollar, which IMO is one of the biggest players right now although i have not heard any analyst making a strong case for it. When a country has a trade deficit of $450 b and that is growing exponentially there is a big problem at hand because that exponent now from squre goes into cube etc.
Weak dollar is good when you are on the plus side on the trade. Weak dollar also is good for the un/employment index,
weak dollar more production more jobs but here is another thing that does not jive, the unemloyment is on the rise.
My oppinion is that whatever is going to happen in the markets/economy can not possibly be predicted right now and for at least another year so be cautious.
Harry
I couldn't resist
Junior is a freakin' moron puppet whose strings are yanked by Cheney and Rumsfeld
I could not disagree more. On the contrary, I think junior knows exactly what he is doing and I don't know if "to his credit" is the right phrase but "to his credit" he does make it look like the others are the bad guys and they take advantage of him but he is the "good guy".
I am not defending him, I think what is happening is very sad and every day that an American soldier or anybody else for that matter is losing his or her life for the benefit of company x, y, z it says a lot about us the people of America that we see no wrong and the popularity numbers are still up there.
IMO the problem is that we have to wake up and smell the roses and in fact we have to accept that what we thought it was roses it was poison ivy.
A few words on the economic frontier. I agree with all the statements that were expressed on the board, the economic data does not support the current rise but ride the wave and jump as fast as you can. IMO the drop will be very sadden and rough, crash like.
You all have a nice day.
Harry
Hi dejgaard !!!
I hope you and your family had a great Christmas.
I share the shame thoughts as you do. The only difference would be that I would put a few more people in that Island,,,three names come to mind right away,,, "and the loser is the only survivor".
I also admire your faith in the market, there is an ancient Greek saying that says: "he who insists WINS".
I am sure you will win.
I wish you and everyone a Happy New Year.
Merry Christmas!!!!!!
I'd like to wish everybody this Holiday season to be the ONE that all the dreams come true.
Harry
Merry Christmas
I would like to wish everybody a merry Christmas.
2001 has not been my best of years as far as investing, and the spirit of this board reflects that it has not been the best year for many of us.
Fortunately the year ends with Christmas. May the positive spirit that is generated from it, to make up for a so and so yearOf course afew good presents from Santa might help the situation.
May Santa be great to all of you.
A few thoughts.
That's BS (ask e.g. JDSU, GLW, NOK or LU if they can predict exactly where they are by the second half of 2002 and then ask if an analyst is able to predict the field better than those companies) of a magnitude that has me suspecting that a desparate analyst haven't gotten enough cheap shares yet and are trying to create one last frantic dip to fill up his portfolio...
KD do not underestimate the analysts, they make the rules WE DON'T.
Just like the bears hybornate in the winter, they hybornate anytime a new administration comes to power.
History repeats itself. It's the power of the sinewave.
Look back a little bit, the market had some of its best years during the Reagan administration but the first 2-3 years of the Reagan administration sucked. The last 1 1/2 of his first term and the first 3 years of his second term were great. Then there was a small decline during the father Bush years(one term president) and then the Clinton years almost identical to Reagan years (percentage wise). I will predict that the son Bush is going to be an one term president.
Here is another analogy, during the Reagan years the increase of the market was a bubble too but instead of the internet it was the pharmacuticals then. Gorillas are what the analysts define as gorillas and that is why they are powerfull.
IMO the Buffet strategy is the way to go.
To make matters a little more complicated about JDSU have a look at this article from Washington Post.
Goodwill Haunting
After Eye-Popping JDS Accounting Charge Comes a U.S. Deluge, Experts Warn
By Steven Pearlstein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, July 28, 2001; Page E01
By any standard, $50 billion is a big number.
It's roughly the gross domestic product of Hungary.
It's more than the total tax refunds being sent out this month by the U.S. Treasury.
It's four times what it would cost to buy Marriott International Corp. at today's market prices.
And, according to standard accounting principles, it's what one company, JDS Uniphase Corp., lost last year, the most by any company in the history of business.
You might think that with such a loss, JDS was about to shut its doors. Not even close. In fact, the company last year set a record for sales of its high-tech telecommunications components -- $3.2 billion. And at the end of the year, it wound up with about $365 million more than it shelled out for running its factories, offices and labs. It still has $1.8 billion in the bank, no debt and, by all accounts, good prospects as a going concern.
What JDS has a lot less of, however, is "goodwill" -- a somewhat arcane accounting concept that is supposed to reflect the intangible value a company gains when it buys another company for a price in excess of the value of its plants, equipment and patents. But when circumstances change and that intangible value vanishes -- as happened with the bursting of the bubble in high-tech stock prices -- accounting rules require companies to acknowledge that they may have overpaid for those acquisitions and take a one-time charge to reflect that new reality.
JDS is not the only company to be caught in a goodwill bind. Earlier this month, another hot telecom equipment company, Nortel Networks Corp., led off the parade by announcing it had written off $12.3 billion in goodwill. It also warned that further reductions may be likely. And this week, VeriSign Inc., a fast-growing seller of Web addresses and Internet software, and Corning Corp., a maker of optical fiber, also took big charges against goodwill. Experts predict that scores of other, mostly high-tech companies will follow suit by the end of the year, with write-offs that could reach a trillion dollars or more.
"The sheer size of it is staggering -- just mind-boggling," said Robert Willens, an accounting expert and managing director at Lehman Brothers Inc.
No company, however, is likely to take a bigger hit than JDS Uniphase. In a frantic effort to meet the booming Internet demand for servers and routers, JDS bought four companies in deals valued at more than $61 billion. To pay for them, it issued 700 million new shares of JDS stock, which at the height of the stock market boom in March 2000 had reached $153 per share. Because tech firms have very little in the way of tangible assets, nearly the entire value of each of the acquisitions was added to JDS's balance sheet as goodwill, driving the conservative "book" value of the company above $60 billion, or about 300 times its operating profit.
Unfortunately, as JDS's book value was climbing, the value of its stock was plunging on Wall Street -- the same stock it had used to make the acquisitions. The implication from Wall Street was that JDS was overvalued and that it had, in turn, overvalued the four companies it had acquired. The $44.8 billion reduction in goodwill wiped out most of what had been added to JDS's book value only months before and led to the $50 billion net loss for the year.
Anthony Muller, JDS's chief financial officer, questioned just how relevant all this is to investors. He acknowledged that, in hindsight, it may appear that JDS paid more for the four companies than could be justified by the profits they are likely to generate in the coming years. But at the same time, he noted, those "overvalued" companies were purchased not with cold cash but with similarly "overvalued" JDS stock. As a result, he argues, the hit to JDS shareholders from the deals was less disastrous than the $50 billion figure would imply.
Lehman Brothers' Willens agreed. "These charges have nothing to do with the realities of the underlying businesses, which in most cases remain quite strong," he said yesterday. "They merely reflect the incredible volatility of the stock market."
Willens also pointed out that the accounting rules that require write-downs of goodwill are also notoriously, and ridiculously, asymmetric: If JDS stock rebounds, as many expect it will before long, the company will not be allowed to reverse the losses unless it sells the acquired companies at a price higher than now carried on its books.
At the Financial Accounting Standards Board, the college of cardinals for U.S. accounting, Kim Petrone has been heading up a task force on goodwill. She notes that while $44.8 billion may seem like an absurd sum for one company to write off at one time, it's still less than the valuations that companies had been carrying on their books.
"The purpose of the rules is to make sure companies don't mislead investors by having overvalued balance sheets," she said.
And at the Securities and Exchange Commission, Chief Accountant Lynn Turner dismissed suggestions that these write-downs are merely accounting technicalities. He noted that by issuing large blocks of new shares to pay for acquisitions, companies have significantly diluted the value of the stock held by the original investors. And those investors, he said, should be demanding to know why the companies paid so much for the acquisitions and why they waited so long to acknowledge it.
"What's causing the write-downs now has nothing to do with accounting," he said. "The message investors should draw from all this is that companies went out and paid way too much for these businesses and now they have to settle up."
© 2001 The Washington Post Company
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62588-2001Jul27.html
Re: Tech wreck
the first rate cut came in January. Six months is up
Very interesting topic !!!!
Here is an article that could be beneficial:
http://aolpf5.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?guid=%7BF938D400%2DEB2C%2D488C%2DB14D%2D868CD21796F7%7D...
In case it does not work I will cut and paste some parts that I found very interesting.
The market reaction to the sixth rate cut this year by the Federal Reserve Board brings to mind a lot of tired old sayings, principal among them: don't fight the Fed.
When Alan Greenspan & Co. first cut rates in January, the stock market soared. With the most powerful central bank in the world behind them, investors hoped to resume the bull market party that was so rudely interrupted nine months before by the collapse of the Internet/technology bubble.
They were premature then, and the January rally quickly faded. Still, Chainsaw Al kept slashing rates - 50 basis points at a time - and there was plenty of reason to believe that at some point in the next few months the rate cuts would take hold.
So much for history
Market historians rolled out fact after fact showing that six months after the first rate cut in a cycle, the market would be higher by some cool-sounding percentage, followed by bigger gains nine months out and 12 months out.
Well, it's been almost six months. The Nasdaq is down about 20 percent from its close on the day of that first cut, Jan. 3. The Dow is down more than 5 percent, the S&P 500 about 8 percent. So much for history.
Now, six rate cuts into one of the most aggressive Fed easing cycles the economy has ever seen - with no reaction in stocks -- we have to ask whether the Fed has the power to save us anymore.
The sides on this question are evenly divided between those who think the Fed's rate cuts will soon kick in and start pumping up the economy, and those who think that other factors - such as the strong dollar and the corporate overspending that led to this downturn - may have taken away the Fed's superpowers.
The most severe declines in the stock market are over. But as long as investors believe things aren't going to get any better anytime soon, they'll just hang on the sidelines for the summer, leaving the markets bumping around and making everyone depressed.
Holding its fire
The Fed has done its part to stimulate this economy, which is why its monetary committee might have chosen to go for only 25 basis points this week instead of 50 basis points. Now, it's waiting to see when the effect will take place, holding its fire for another 25-basis-point cut if necessary a few weeks down the road.
Investors are waiting too. But in the last few days, a few rays of light have begun to emerge from the dark forest.
Oracle's Larry Ellison said things look better in the third quarter, sending his company's shares (ORCL: chart, news, alerts) higher by 4 percent on Tuesday. Hand-held device maker Palm (PALM: chart, news, alerts) reported a narrower-than-expected loss and said it's working off excess inventory, sending its shares 23 percent higher Wednesday.
Little by little, good news is starting to emerge anecdotally amid the general earnings warning slaughter. The next few days are going to be hard, as big fund managers wind down the quarter by selling this and buying that to dress up their portfolios.
But once we get into earnings season itself, the second quarter won't be so important anymore, and the market will start pointing toward outlooks for the third.
A better-than-expected performance here - which is obviously what Greenspan is counting on - could help prevent investors from sleeping away the whole summer and start to push things higher before the fourth quarter.
Good defensive plays
You won't see gold funds lead the way when that happens, or emerging markets funds or even value funds, the way they did in the second quarter. See our second quarter mutual fund report. These are defensive plays. They're good ones, but not the choices of the long-term growth investor.
The stock market isn't going to snap back like a slingshot. Neither is the economy. But at some point these aggressive rate cuts will begin to make an impact. It's closer than most people think. The Fed move yesterday underscores that.
So when it does happen, investors like you and I are going to start to slowly venture back into those woods where the bear now lurks. I already have.
Just be sure to wear your shoes.
David Callaway is executive editor of CBS.MarketWatch.com.
More DAVID CALLAWAY
RE:Anyone seen EXDS today?
Dej nice posts !!!
I would like to add my 5c :
1. The Internet is by no means dead. It was manipulated, humiliated but the Internet is the future. It is sad what has happened.
2. Broadband/communications is an excellent place to get into for the long term NOW. IMO the two gorillas are Global Crossings(GX) and TYCO(TYC), excellent opportunities.
3. I see the global economy being an issue in the months to come, I relate that to the new administration.
I hope our leader and chief to get it together and lead us to prosperity, not to the expense to others of courde.
I'll give him a year.
Dej IMO the easiest way is to get in touch with the business journal of Portland.
They will provide you with the info you are asking for.
It would also be beneficial for the community if you provided them with the info that you have because to me it sounds like a scam.
The market will go through rough rough rough waters in the near future,,,,,
Have you taken a look at the news lately?
"US for the first time since 1947 not having a seat for the UN human rights board".
"U.S. Loses Seat on UN Drug Policy Board".
"The Kioto issue".
"The China Issue"(the biggest future market of the world: see QCOM).
"The shield".
Oh and lets see the new proposal by Ramsfeld this Wednsday.
Got the message ?
Well the key word here is "ISOLATION".
Isolation in economic terms translates to death for NASDAQ and diabetes for DOW and some "HIGH HIGH HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE FOR GREENSPAN".
0.5 points drop in IR's on May 15???? Well do not be surprised if we see ZERO.....
Time to look up the names of the Congressman/woman and senator of your state.
It is painfull ,,,,plain and simple.
This morning I had a conversation with a major,long time Seek/Go/Dig shareholder and we reviewed some of the things that Disney did with Seek/Go/Dig.
The sale of starwave to Seek, Disney was a big time winner, they dumped a big time loser to seek and they got big time money.
The sale of major parts of SEEK for big time money/stocks.
The conversion of SEEK to a tracking stock.
The dilution of the 50mil shares of seek to 150mil shares of GO and they only gave the seek holders only 1.15 share of GO instead of 3 shares of GO for each Seek.
The promotion of their verticals through GO.
All the false promisses.
Anybody who says that Disney/Eisner does not know what they are doing is wrong.
It's painfull and it wil hurt for a long time but it's a dog eat dog world I guess, I just hope a bigger dog eats them.
Let that be an expensive lesson and move on to bigger and better things although I would like to hear that Eisner dies from a slow painfull death that no painkiller could help him.
RE: I second your venom..... may the Disney cobra bite them right on the ass!
Count me in too !!!
But
I have some other thoughts on the matter.
Disney did what's good for Disney and looking back at it now I can't blame them for what they did, although I hate them(Disney/Eisner).
I believe that a huge share of the blame goes to WALL STREET and the spin that they put in the biggest scam ever called Technology/Internet.
I can't even begin to describe how I feel about it
I have been watching CNBC and listen to the think tanks they bring every day saying how they have unloaded their positions in technology. What they don't say is that how they hyped technology and how they are shorting the hell out of it now and make more money and get away with it. Well they will do it again and again and again and again they will get away with it again. Not a secret.
It makes me sick seeing stocks going from $150-$200 to pennies and not a single inquiry , they just display the charts and put a face that I can't tell if they laugh or act serious.
I had seen it coming and I had warned the members of the old GO board, but still I found myself on the short end of the stick. I did take some measures like eliminating my margin and recovering most of my capital but I still feel violated and prayed upon I hope I learned something from it.
In a strange way I feel that GO held better than most of others but I will give no credit to Disney.
Hard drive manufactures are toying with the idea of making it impossible to download
previously stored material.
IMO maybe that would be possible to be achieved but it would be impossible to be implemented.
Every day 5-10 files are e-mailed to me and they are either .doc(microsoft word), gif,,jpg(pictures), or dwg(autocad ). These are previously saved files that I download in my computer , if I am not able to save them
the whole idea of e-mail/internet/intranet goes by the way side.
It would be much easier for microsoft to develop software code that gives the user the option to assign an attribute to a file in case he/she does not want a particular file to be saved in another machine instead of the hard-drive not to accept it.
Maybe that was another of Disneys ideas to protect its intellectual properties and another proof that they do not understand that technology runs in the speed of light and not the speed of the turtle.
Article from the fools.comThe whole story in a nutshell, with some details that made my thinning hair thinner.
http://www.fool.com/news/2001/dis010130.htm
A few thoughts
IMHO Disney's internet group is finally ready to produce for Disney (not for me and you).....
Questions
1, Why did they finally start all this promotion ????
2.Why do they start the lay offs now???
3, Why did they redisign their site???
4. Why did they fight AOL /TWX merger ???
5,Why did they invest so much money in the secret team of software developers for the creation of technology in order to transmit movies through the internet?
6. Why did they give Eisner so many DIG options?
All the above cost huge money , why did they do it then ???
Did they do it in order to abandon the Internet venture or they are just plain stupid and they don't know what
they are doing (there is a remote possibility that this is true, but I think that there is a methode in their madness)????
NO WAY
I am not sure right now for the reason . I can only say that they did it because of some evil reason that Eisner
probably came up with that has to do with sacrificing DIG and its investors for the benefit of Disney investors,
Finally DIG is ready to do the things that Eisner/Disney initially promissed for the Disney investors.