Hayweed

Bailout Nation Mentality: Ford Workers Reject Further Concessions

Ford should just close on their plants in union states and move their factories to non union states (VA, NC, SC, etc.) They should advise the union that if they don't concede the current issue, that even if Ford does go into bankruptcy, they will leave Detroit forever.

Short Amazon: Risky Investment at Current Price

AMZN's current stock surge reminds of RIMM which surged to ridiculous levels before diving over 50%. Rimm's growth was unsustainable and a new competitor emerged. Same thing is going to happen to AMZN since how long does it take to comparison shop on the web.

Earnings Preview: Amazon.com

I predict down 10% thursday night

Apple (AAPL): FQ4 EPS of $1.82 beats by $0.40. Sales of $9.87B vs. $9.2B. Sees FQ1 EPS of $1.70-1.87 vs. consensus of $1.91 on sales of $11.3-11.6B, in line. Sold 3.05M Macs, 10.2M iPods, and 7.4M iPhones during quarter. Gross margin 36.6%. Shares +5.1% AH. (PR)

Earnings for the year NonGAAP are $9.66 which makes the NonGAAP PE about 21 at 201 a share

Verizon's Droid Is the Real Deal

I don't think Apple has that much to worry about. This is about Verizon needing a phone to compete with Apple but at the same time, it eliminates the one thing holding Verizon customers from leaving to go to AT&T, which is the bogus claim that Verizon is getting the iPhone. Now that this officially proves no iPhone for Verizon, the people leaving Verizon will be huge.

As for the phone, Motorola is old tech. Their moment in the sun is past, kind of like Palm. The real company that will hurt from this is Rimm which will see this phone be the number one pushed phone on Verizon instead of Rimm's blackberries. I would stay long AAPL while short Rimm as a good pair trade.

Research in Motion: Valuation Wall Street Cannot Deny

It amazes me how people do not understand that Apple reports earnings in GAAP and nonGAAP. The nonGAAP earnings is the full impact of the iPhone on earnings while GAAP is where iPhone sales are deferred over two years.

Apple's nonGaap earnings for the past 12 months is $9.23 per share which gives Apple a nonGaap PE of 20. Since Apple is growing faster than Rimm and has over $30 a share in cash comparing the Gaap PE to Rimm's PE is wrong.

The accounting rule change means that Apple no longer has to defer the iPhone revenues over 2 years thus Apple will most likely report close to $10 a share in earnings this year thus a PE of 19. If Apple which is on fire gets a PE of 19 it is too low or Rimm's is way too high. Thus long Apple and short Rimm is a great pair trade.

Can Amazon Kindle Long Term Returns?

At a 50 PE AMZN is a real bargain

Market Reaction: The RIM Lesson

Check page 8 of the Conference Call Transcript where Basille in response to a question from Gus Papageorgiou - Scotia Capital talks about devices containing all kinds of features and "how do you sort of harvest all that richness together?" Then he as usual rambles on while saying nothing then mentions apps but states he has something big coming but can't talk about it.

Clearly this ramble shows that Rimm has realized that the iPhone is the converged device and that Rimm needs to have all the same features. Also you need to provide a great consumer experience and that is all about apps, which is not Rimm's strong suit.

Problem Rimm is having is that 80% of new customers are consumers which is not Rimm's strong area. Here Rimm is like a fish out of water but the fact that Verizon has such a lame phone lineup means Rimm gets pushed and pushed hard by the non-iPhone selling carriers. With all the new android phones coming it will be interesting to see if Rimm can keep the consumer interested in their phones when the phones are really business focused. Slapping an mp3 player, a video player and a facebook app in a phone does not make it a consumer device. If it did then why do you see so many blackberry users carrying ipods on planes.

Finally Sold My Position in Dell

Dell is in slow growth mode and the deal to buy Perot today signals that. Question is how much longer will Dell make the hardware as they try to transition to a services company like IBM. Problem I see is that this appears to be a catch up play. HP gets EDS so Dell buys Perot. HP got a market leader and Dell got an also ran.

RIM Set to Storm Smartphone Market

So they toss out the old sure press for true press. How does this affect the development of apps. My guess is storm2 is one more phone in Rimm's growing phone inventory which divides developers and consumers from products based on which handset they get. Meanwhile apple has one form factor for the phone and the touch which results in one development that reaches almost 50 million devices.

RImm needs to get to one or 2 phone forms or the developers will never make anything good apps.

Dell Launching a Smartphone: Bad Idea from the Get-Go?

Staying short Dell as Mikey keeps floundering at the helm.

Market Remains Bullish, But at a Price

As someone who has been long apple for years, the stock is up 30 points in the last month without a pause. The news flow on Apple is all positive and the rumour mill is in full force (china, tablet, etc.) I sold all my apple last week but kept the calls I wrote to make a few dollars as it drifts lower. Long term apple is a great stock, just not really a good trade at $165. The China news may be a catalyst but this is so widespread on news sites and blogs that I would argue that China is kind of priced in right now.

I would pick Rimm and AMZN as better short canidates than Apple but all of these stocks have been too hot as of late. Heck even SBUX is up 80% recently. Is the coffee biz that good as of late. My wait or lack of wait at SBUX is unchanged so this move is not sustainable either.

AT&T, Apple Can't Win Fight Against VoIP

Steve Jobs has said that the telecoms are just dumb pipes. Apple should have no opposition to VOIP, but the telcos do. Google has a seat on Apple's board. I would think Apple knows what Google is doing and the rejection will start a firestorm and a possible ruling that VOIP is allowed. Then Google and Apple both win while the telcos lose. Never underestimate Jobs ability to negotiate with unconventional methods. Remember that Apple talked to Verizon about the iphone but they would have never done a deal with Verizon. This was needed to get AT&T to pay thru the nose.

The Mac vs. PC Debate Was Never Clearer

Think most of you all miss the point. Let us look at last quarters earnings.

Dell $290 million
Apple $1.23 billion

Which company would you rather own.

Throw in Rimm which made $643 million

If Apple counted the iphone sales like Rimm did then Apple earnings would be 1.94 billion in one quarter

Hp only made 1.7 billion

Four Reasons to Avoid Apple

Interesting but in the phone space wouldn't you be better off shorting Rimm which only does phones and is feeling the heat from Apple, Palm, Nokia and all the other wanna be phone makers putting a keyboard on a phone.

Apple at least has an ecosystem of music players, phones and computers which all work together. What does Rimm and Nokia have - phones?