Hi mindmeld,
No wish to start arguments or stir the messy stuff. I actually agreed with Adam too, in that CSCO will be acquiring again. Where we may have implicitly disagreed is "at what rate?".
Message 15698989
Adam's pondering
<<just saying that Cisco had a market cap of $100B in 1998, and it did an awful lot of acquisitions that year>>
seems to be looking forward to the good old days where CSCO can simply ride on the R&D of others and bribe them with paper to part with the R&D. Well, that is over. CSCO's R&D to acquisition spend ratio will have to rise, like all maturing companies in maturing industries. For the same mature reason, once the dust settles, CSCO will hence forth sport a more tepid (not weak, but more tepid than before) P/E.
The magic of a few metal boxes packing a few circuits is finished, and now traditional valuation and financial laws will reclaim the runaways. On this, I take it we do not agree, but we need not argue, as the market will settle matters.
Chugs, Jay |
