168 Archived Topics
Remove Filter  | In the alternative energy movement, the mantra is a simple one: go to where you want to be – not where you are now. Think of hockey great Wayne Gretzky, who once said “I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it is has been, or … |
| | Feast or famine (probably famine); 2009 should be another interesting year for the tech sector. After all, any industry that can provide sexual performance drugs (Viagra) for the CIA to give to Afghan warlords is always going to find room on the front pages of every news outlet in the … |
| | I want to get to the impact of the current economic crisis on tech workers, but first a word on U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulsen, who engineered the mammoth $700 federal bailout of Wall Street with your tax dollars. And your kids' future tax dollars, and their kids' future tax … |
| | Uh-oh. When Barack Obama promised change, this wasn't what Wall Street was hoping for. The market was down, big time, today as investor came to grips with an Obama administration and its taxing impact on the investor class. Today's Yahoo.com headline said it all: "Stocks fall as investors ponder Obama … |
| | Is today the worst day of the recession? A lot of people seem to think so. I’ll get into that in a moment, in an otherwise light trading day for technology stocks. I think we’re seeing a run out of tech this week and into more stable companies, especially in … |
| | A new normal? That’s what one financial services guru says America consumers can expect now that the housing market has collapsed and people are losing their jobs in droves. “The worst is yet to come," adds Howard Davidowitz, chairman of Davidowitz & Associates. He thinks that the once lofty American's … |
| | Intel is killing the tech sector this morning, down six percent in trading – to $14.40 per share – after a particularly dismal earnings outlook. I’ll get into the details in a moment, but it’s worth noting that we can’t just point the icy finger of guilt at Intel. I’m … |
| | Will the tech sector lead an economic turnaround? Forbes.com thinks so. This week, Peter C. Beller writes that Monday’s IBM revenues numbers and the fallout from the proposed Oracle and Sun Microsystems could lay the groundwork for an economic rebound. I’ll get to the IBM numbers in a moment, but … |
| | I want to get to GameStop and the overall video game market, which finally seems to be losing steam. But tech is going nowhere until we straighten the banking mess out and this week’s earnings report from perhaps the biggest bank out there - Citi – is being falsely touted … |
| | If you’re holding shares in Saleforce.com (StockQuote: CRM) it might be time to sell. So says Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Nemeroff. The analyst slashed his rating on Salesforce.com from “hold” to “sell” and says that the online sales giant’s current stock price of $36 is about $10 higher than his … |
| | Is it time to get back into the market? I don’t think so – if it walks like a sucker’s market, talks like a sucker’s market, and squawks like a sucker’s market, it’s a sucker’s market. Tech Ticker’s Aaron Task agrees. He says today that the U.S. still haven't dealt … |
| | The Nasdaq is down 43 points this morning, with Google (down $12) and RIMM (down $3) leading the charge down the hill, so to speak. I think we’re seeing the first symptoms of anther false bottom, which sounds incredible after hearing from so many experts on Wall Street that the … |
| | It didn’t take long for CA to pay the price for the lower earnings outlook that popped up among Wall Street analysts last week. The stock fell 3% today after Jefferies analyst Katherine Egbert downgraded CA to “hold” from “buy”, and lowered her target price for the computer giant’s stock … |
| | My first job on Wall Street was on the equity options floor of the Philadelphia Stock Exchange, running trades for Bear Stearns’ clients, mostly market maker and floor brokers trading on their own accounts or for affluent clients. Options are a tricky beast, and I don’t recommend that average investors … |
| | I’m back from a timely and tropical Florida break, and now I’m tanned, rested and ready to talk tech stocks. Issue #1 is Research in Motion, a stock on the upswing (at $44 per share) on news that it plans to roll out a new, full-service TV feature in the … |
| | Now that the news is out on IBM’s proposed $6.5 billion purchase of Sun Microsystems, analysts are in a lather over why Big Blue wants to make the deal. The Wall Street Journal originally broke the story, reporting that the merger “could help IBM in the finance and telecommunications markets … |
| | When you rush legislation through Washington, like Congress did with the two financial sector bailout bills, you lose the right to complain when the outcome blows up in your face That means you Senator Chris Dodd, who actually inserted the language in the $170 billion AIG bailout bill guaranteeing the … |
| | One more note on the solar energy piece I wrote about yesterday. Evidently, the bad news on solar energy has made its way across the country. According to Barclays Capital analyst Vishal Shah early today, two solar energy stocks have seen their ratings cut due to lousy demand for solar … |
| | Tech employees are starting to take matters into their own hands, with some apparently not above kidnapping. Our story begins in southwestern France, at a soon-to-be-closed Sony plant where employees had suffered numerous layoffs. Frustrated with the aggressive pace of the layoffs, and the seeming arrogance among Sony execs in … |
| | The stock market is up about 10 points, trying to find some buoyancy after yesterday’s big 400-point gain. Traders credit two events for the quick market turnaround: Citi coming out and saying it actually made a profit during the last quarter and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke announcing that the … |
| | Rumors are rampant over a proposed Verizon-Nokia deal on a 4G mobile device, as equity options traders snapped up calls (options to buy a given stock at lower prices) in anticipation of a big run-up in Nokia’s stock. Nokia is trading at: $8.76, up a tick or two from the … |
| | When Warren Buffett talks, Wall Street – and Main Street – listen. And now he’s talking about the future of the U.S. economy. In a wide-ranging, three-hour interview on CNBC yesterday, Buffett said, “the economy has fallen off a cliff.” Noting people have "changed their habits", Buffett seemed very frustrated … |
| | Charlie Payne, sounding a lot like Revolutionary War pamphleteer Thomas Paine, says that we're in the 2009 version of “these are the times that try men’s souls”. Of course, the historical Paine once also said that those who want to reap the benefits of this great nation must bear the … |
| | Two pieces of dispiriting information on the economy hit the big wire services today: The Associated Press -- The economy contracted at a staggering 6.2 percent pace at the end of 2008, the worst showing in a quarter-century, as consumers and businesses ratcheted back spending, plunging the country deeper into … |
| | Rumors were rampant all over Wall Street that Barack Obama trotted Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke out yesterday to calm the markets by declaring the recession could be over by the last half of 2009. It was a surprise to hear Bernanke, who’s been relatively quiet about the economy to … |
| | Is there hope for stocks in 2009? At all? A University of Iowa business professor things so, and he claims he has the data to prove it. It’s all about upside potential – and the fact that Wall Street has already baked a lot of the bad news into the … |
| | Are small company software stocks – especially medical technology companies -- a safe, even profitable, haven for investors these days? Could be – especially if you’re looking to forego higher-risk plays like oil and financials – that your focus should be on smaller med tech companies, one institutional investor advises. … |
| | The bearish global economic environment just keeps adding pressure to technology stocks. As gross domestic product (GDP) drops in bourses around the globe, tech traders are nervous, at least for the short term. Take Japan. The Land of the Rising Sun is seeing a decline in GDP, falling to the …  |
| | Earlier in the year I clipped out a few expert predictions on technology stocks for 2009. From time to time, I’ll check in and see how those stocks are doing. It’s only six weeks into the new year, and perhaps it’s not fair to check in so early. Still, conditions … |
| | I’m a big fan of satellite radio. I have XM Radio in my car, and right now, at my desk as I’m writing these words, I’m listening to Frank Caliendo on XM's Laugh USA on channel 151. So I was very excited to hear last year that Sirius Radio and … |
| | Boy. What does a tech outfit have to do to get some love on Wall Street? Intel announces a $7 billion effort to upgrade a pair of chip manufacturing centers in the U.S. and Intel’s stock price actually drops by over 3% in Tuesday trading (to $14..44 per share). I’ll … |
| | I really don’t write enough about the biopharmaceutical market, which in tough economic times, can be a good defensive play relative to the rest of the market – even when compared to uniform technology stocks. My reasoning is simple. We have illness, disease, and injury in good economic times and … |
| | Another sliver of sunshine in the economic clouds – two of them, actually – as the U.S. service sector shrank in January, but less severely than expected, according to a report released by The Institute for Supply Management. The ISM reported that its non-manufacturing index came in at 42.9 in … |
| | Topping the news this morning is an announcement by Citigroup that it will finally crack open its wallet, stuffed with over $45 billion tax-payer funded TARP cash, and start lending again. The financial giant had come under fire in recent months for taking the TARP money and sitting on it. … |
| | It’s a big bag, if a mixed one, for the financial markets and for technology companies today. Overall, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is up 42 points, buoyed somewhat by (finally) some good economic news. Check out Monday’s housing sales numbers, which unexpectedly rose off of record lows. Also, a … |
| | It’s earnings week in Silicon Valley, even as the world is focused on the historic events in Washington today. Some heavyweights are on the financial reporting docket, including Google Inc., eBay Inc., Apple Inc. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. Here is a quick run-down of what we can expect this … |
| | If your company CEO is walking around with bags under eyes, clutching a balance sheet in one hand and a bottle of Chivas in the other, it could be because she can’t get financing to keep the company going. Business Week has a great article on this topic, pointing out … |
| | Bloomberg is out with a story this week saying IBM will lay off 16,000 more employees, on top of the 15,000 the firm has already cut. Since economic recovery usually lags job losses, it’s another morbid sign that we’re still in the teeth of this economic hurricane. Note also that … |
| | Tech talk has more predictions for 2009, and the news continues to be grim. Economist Gary Shilling, president of A. Gary Shilling & Co., was on the show this morning with a laundry list of dark projections for the economy and the stock market. Specifically, Shilling says the recession will … |
| | CNN’s Rick Sanchez is the latest victim of the “Twitter” curse. Sanchez, a CNN on-air anchor, reportedly fell victim to a phishing scam that could undermine the investment rationale for Twitter by big investors, one of the most popular social networking sites on the internet. In a “tweet” on Monday, … |
| | After a year featuring tectonic shifts in the stock market and the economy, 2008 is set to go out with barely a tremor. A quiet Monday in the technology market, with the big news that palm looks like it’s going to get its own version of a bailout. That after … |
| | Oracle, Research and Motion and Palm are all releasing earnings statements today, and that should pick up momentum in what has been a fairly dormant technology trading week. The web site Tradingmarkts.com thinks the earnings news means opportunity in two technology-heavy exchange-traded funds (ETFs); Technology Select Sector (SPDR ETF XLK); … |
| | The stock market held its gains of earlier today, although doubts about how financial companies are going to raise capital when their balance sheets are in complete disarray are prevalent on the street. The Dow was up 70 points and the Nasdaq up 18 points - thus providing some relative … |
| | Investors were banking on a lousy jobs number, and the last two days of trading have reflected that point That’s what I’m hearing from the traders I know – shrewd peope I shared trading pits with back in the day – almost to a man (and woman) saying that next … |
| | It almost seems out of place – like a spritz of a lilly inching up through the crusted snow after a long winter – to report some good economic news these days. But there it is, in the form of an investment forecast by the investment bank UBS that says … |
| | Both the Dow and the Nasdaq are flirting with positive territory today, thanks in part to one biotechnology stalwart, Amgen, which is up three points in trading. Why? Well, the Street is getting excited about life sciences stocks again, as several research reports hit the street suggesting that the biopharm … |
| | It was the fourth-worst trading day in Wall Street history, with the Dow off 679 points (about 8% of the index's total value) and the Nasdaq falling almost 9%, to 1,398 for the session. There's a lot to point at here, but the main culprit seems to be the fact … |
| | An update on the report from the UK’s Financial Times and The Telegraph that Microsoft is all set to buy Yahoo’s search engine division for $20 billion: more media outlets are carrying the story on Sunday night, including Drudge and CNET. But CNBC found an inside source who claims the … |
| | Trying, ever so hard, to find some good news amidst the doom and gloom on Wall Street. At least the market went up for a second straight session, with the DJIA up 400 points on Monday trading; that after rising 500 points last Friday. Investors seemed cautiously optimistic about the … |
| | Barrons has a great article today on how tech industry chief information officers and chief financial officers can't keep up with the free-fall in consumer spending. That's why we're seeing so many downward adjustments in industry revenue estimates that, right now, seem to be spread way out into 2009. The … |
The End.