Brad, we are here for different reasons
You're here to make sure management gets the full benefit of the doubt and to see how your friendly wager on IDCC (5% of your net worth, 1%, less??) turns out. This is your little game to see if you can pick one to beat the experts, but you would only use speculative capital that you can afford to lose. I follow IDCC because I do absolutely make buy, hold and sell decisions based on the news and how I interpret it. It's not an academic discussion for me. You forget that some of us are here to learn about our investments so we can make decisions. We are our own money managers. So it does matter to us because we do trade. What's a waste of time and emotion is following IDCC so closely when you never act on any information. Why do you waste so much time and emotion on it is a better question.
I follow the expert opinions here and I greatly appreciate them. However just because one has experience does not mean that their opinion has worth. You ask Bill Clinton or George Bush Sr about who is best to lead the country and I can guarantee Clinton will pick the Democrat and make a good case, while Bush will choose the Republican and defend his position. Similarly, you will always defend management with the fall back of since they know more than we do, we can't judge. Insightful stuff. So while you may put out a good argument it will always omit any compelling counter arguments, although you do love to throw stawmen up.
Nothing was made up from whole cloth today. IDCC traded 900,000 shares and plummuted 10% in minutes. That is a real event. Yes, I want to understand why that happens and make sure that there was nothing beyond that seemingly innocuos statement to cause the drop. You can see my recent post about catylsts and causes. The Nokia statement was just a catalyst, so it does not affect my long term outlook.
You again ignore what I write and make up my positions from whole cloth. I am very happy to have gotten the color from the court room. I appreciate the efforts of all those that went and reported, and the lawyers that provided their thoughts. After seeing Olddogs post about how IDCC has posted FD in the past, I now believe I was wrong with my guess of why the negotiations were mentioned in the 8K. IF they had been FD, I would have no problem with it. My concern with the disclosure, as I posted Monday, was if the contract was not done then don't expose yourself to potential embarrassment. IDCC had some disappointing news Thursday, yet is up ~5% in the two trading days since then. I don't see a disaster here. Just based on the way IDCC has been publicly embarrassed in the past I was very surprised by the 8K, and I was trying to come up with a logical explanation for putting it out so I could trade accordingly. I put my theory out and I'm glad that Olddog posted his reply. It's information I can use to adjust my thinking.
I ask questions and put out my thoughts to get feedback. I am here to learn, not to preach. However you on the other hand, have a Pavlovian response when you see something that could be construed as criticism of management. You have to discredit the poster. Sorry, Brad, but if anyone takes the time to read my posts they will see I have no axe to grind. I have not criticized management, I just tried to understand why they did what they did so I could make an investment decision. I had picked up some stock on margin when the price was in the teens, and with the potential for big news, I sold the margin stock yesterday and bought some calls, eliminating the margin debt and positioning for the upside. You can go back and clip your coupons, I'm here to invest.
I'd be happy to read and respond to anything further via PM.
