At the Money

Apple's Bipolar China Disorder

Some people here are suggesting that Apple has not control or the right to control what kind of music it sells on iTune. This is absurd.

Not only Apple has full control of what to sell, it also chose to place this particular album on the front page of iTune store on the day that the Beijing Olympic Games started.

Apple's Bipolar China Disorder

This is nothing more than a PR stunt by International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) and Art of Peace Foundation. The album was put on the front page of iTune store on the opening day of the Beijing Olympic Games. It would be interesting to find out how much copies have been sold so far. Unfortunately, the Chinese government took the bait and made it a headline.

Note that AP casually left out the fact that these 40 Olympians were offered to download the $11.99 album for free (technology.timesonline...). So not only “free Tibet” is trendy, it is now also free. What’s not to like?

So much for “an act of solidarity” as declared by the executive director of Art of Peace Foundation.

7 Reasons Why NRG’s Offer for Calpine is Laughable

Amit,

Intentionally or not, there is so much misleading information in your article. Let's just go through the 7 reasons.

Young and Modern Fleet - Calpine's assets were YOUNGER when it filed for bankruptcy. Similar to real estates, the age of a property has a low baring on valuation. Location matters. About 25% of Calpine's assets is in the Southeast where there is still significant excess power supply.

Green Power Generation – Geothermal only accounts for 11% of Calpine’s generation fleet. It’s right that natural-gas fired power plants emit fewer pollutants than coal plants. However, the uncertainty surrounding the upcoming carbon regulation means that it is difficult to assign a value on Calpine’s greenness.

Geographic concentration – The author makes it sound like NRG is buying Calpine for its exposure in TX and CA. The fact is that NRG has more than 40% of capacity in TX where it generates more than 50% of its EBITDA.

Peak Season Ahead of CPN – I thought summer comes around every year. Are you suggesting that power M&A is off-limits in spring? How about all these asset transactions (Int’l Power, GSC, Tenaska and Sierra Pacific) in the recent months?

NOLs – With Q1 net losses of more than $200M, it will take years for Calpine to utilize the full amount of the NOLs, even if we assume that power market continues to tighten from here. Time value of money, anyone?

Exiting Bankruptcy Dynamics – Are you saying that power companies out of Ch. 11 will always experience share price appreciation? That’s investment made easy.

Valuation – I don’t know where you got these multiples. If your internal power analyst were feeding you these numbers, you need to find a replacement quick. Calpine is trading at 11.2x of 2009E EBITDA whereas NRG is trading at 7.3x.

STOP FOOLING RETAIL INVESTORS!

Why Apple Will Enter - And Win - the Flat Panel TV Market

<blockquote cite="It has a chain of 161 stores that generate 67% of the revenue of Best Buy with 10% of the floor space.">

I'm not saying that Apple's store is not a success but the the data is a bit misleading. Averge item price at Apple store is much higher than Bestbuy. The comparison doesn't make much sense. Would you compare sales per square foot of Tiffany and Wal-Mart?