2000 sure is shaping up as an curious year for the analyst community, where confusion, conflict, and flip-flops are becoming the norm - especially among the internet and semi crowd. They're well on their way to becoming something of a commodity opinion machine...no more reliable or investable than a thoughtful post here or on Yahoo! In recognition of their increasingly useless mediocrity and obvious grandstanding, I've stopped posting their opinions and price targets. IMO, they've become "background noise" and should be treated accordingly.
Thankfully, for us (reasonably informed individual investors) with forums like SI to share info, access to Edgar, real time news, industry conference reports and webcasts, quarterly conference calls, pertinent trade journals, etc., etc., we can now, more than ever, draw our own conclusions about the health and prospects for a company like ADI. The trend is in place and getting stronger, e.g. after hours trading, changes to the laws governing selective disclosure, etc. It all adds up to good news for us...bad news for the "professional" analyst mob.
I welcome the day when individual analysts offer their opinions directly to their clients with no publicity or market influence. If the mainstream press (print, on-line, and broadcast) reported their opinions on a macro consensus basis, the market would be a better place!
BV |
