donzelion

Barron's Big Money Poll: Bullish, But with Little Conviction

Just can't see US economy improving all that much for next few years. A consumer-driven economy without consumers? Unemployment will be "cured" by retirement, not job growth. Corporate expansion plans will focus on the biggest bang for the buck investments - which are generally outside the developed markets. Most US spending will be about maintenance and preservation, not new enterprises.

Not a recipe for growth, but not Armageddon either. Maybe some new technology miracle will bubble us out of stagnation, or maybe waves of inflation will wipe out equities - but to be honest, I'd expect sideways movement for years to come (just as we've had for 10 years now) - bubbles appeal to traders, but are lousy for investors.

Better days ahead for emerging markets - but not necessarily for equities in those markets.

Web 1.0 Redux: Buy, Sell or Hold?

"E-commerce is benefitting from maturity." I'd be cautious deriving market consequences from this - eBay, Amazon, and Wal-Mart are all benefiting from maturity, but that hardly says which is the best investment.

"Brand matters....This benefits Amazon directly." Not so fast...look through the vendors on Amazon, and you notice that most of the products for sale are by third parties using Amazon's interface - Amazon gets a cut of the money from facilitating the transaction, not from actually selling the product at a profit. In this, they operate sort of like Visa/Mastercard, making money by helping other vendors to make money despite brand identity - and they're not like a vendor at all. (Just let Wal-Mart try to pull that trick off...never gonna happen.)

My view: Visa/MasterCard + UPS/FedEx are plays on ecommerce that offer all the benefits of Amazon except the "brand identity" - and also offer better dividends and valuations.

Amazon Is Gobbling up Market Share

In 2000, they mocked the notion that dot-coms could threaten brick'n'mortar shops....and now? With every other consumer discretionary company looking grim, Amazon, with much lower costs, can evade all the liabilities of massive real estate - avoid most of the rounds of layoffs, utility costs, and all the rest.

Amazon and eBay are best regarded more like Visa/Mastercard rather than a digital equivalent to Wal-Mart or Sears. They are transaction facilitators, earning money from other vendors, rather than purely through their own devices.

Top Ten Tech Surprises in 2009: Low Probability, High Consequence Edition

Some more intriguing possibilities:

Yahoo merges with Ebay
Amazon buys New York Times
Taiwan Semiconductor Buys AMD