Few of us can or will undertake the depth of research that Mike Buckley does. But luckily for us, Mike is kind enough to share his research, information derived from it, analysis and thoughts here and elsewhere on SI. This is one source that is of great value IMO.
Being an expert on the subject :), I'm going to outwardly agree with Cha2 about the online discussion being a great value. I remember Tom Gardner of Motley Fool fame saying years ago that the single greatest asset to individual investors is message folders. Absolutely true!
Most recent example: People are thanking me for posting the link to the article about Brocade not realizing I was merely passing it on from a Motley Fool folder discussing EMC.
Where I disagree with Cha2 despite his kindness toward me, is that there really are a number of people who delve deeply into their subjects. At the HUGE and guaranteed risk of leaving people out, I'll briefly, off the top of my head, mention some:
MikeM in the Citrix thread here at SI
NYStew anywhere and everywhere about Gemstar
A dozen people regarding Qualcomm, including an ER doctor named Ajit in the old AOL Qualcomm thread that was abandoned by the Motley Fool
TMF Max and TMF Edible in the Motley Fool Rainforest thread
Cha2 on anything and everything telecosmic
Who is it here telling us about Sandisk? (apologies for not remembering!)
Lots of industry insiders in the Siebel thread here at SI
Lots and lots of others here I hope won't feel bad that I forgot to include them on the list.
As our folder contiunes to evolve, I see more and more people picking an industry and researching it like crazy. For me, there is no folder I've seen in cyberspace that begins to compare with this one in terms of pure enjoyment and importance to my net worth. I'll be forever indebted to Frank, though I'm not sure being indebted to him is a safe position. :)
And if you get tired as I do of trying to figure out these complex products we discuss here, there's a little ($2 billion market cap) company whose model is so simple that we don't need any experts to helps us understand it. It's Fastenal, a growing company that sells nuts and bolts. Who can't understand nuts and bolts, a rock-solid balance sheet with plenty of cash, no debt tremendously more assets than liabilities, 35% average revenue growth in the last five years, and 11% net margins for a commodity! Not a gorilla, not a king, but outperforming many of the Internuts, Citrix, EMC, and nearly outperforming Cisco year-to-date.
Time to return back to the topic of gorillas and kings. Sorry 'bout that!
--Mike Buckley |
