HELLO, HELLO Any one with half a brain home?? It is indeed
sad to see the sorry present state of what I once remembered
as a thoughtful, informative and often insightful thread.
Like Gresham's law it seems the worthwhile contributors have been crowded out by those with less substance to offer.
I'm breaking my two year posting strike in an attempt to bring a different perspective to this thread. Some of you might be wondering why if this thread has degenerated to
such a sorry state would I even bother lurking within its
borders. Believe it or not, it's been a wonderful collective
contrary indicator. When the volume of naysayers, doubters,
and perpetual doomsayers reaches a deafening ring (now for example) it almost always marks a near term low point,
conversely when the chorus of cheerleading rings out in unison - look out below. I do find it somewhat comical
that now that we are here in 2002 that there is such a plethora of "technical" concerns a la 50, 250 or even 375
day moving averages, (by the way in my 30 plus years as an
investor twenty of witch were spent professionally on Wall St, I never once met or heard of any one getting rich as a "technician")or even fundamental concerns a la subscriber
uptake, declining ASP, etc. Moreover this profound caution seems to be the exclusive purview of QCOM. You almost wouldn't know by looking at the 218.51 day moving average
that QCOM and NOK were even in remotely the same business
as obviously one is now double its post Sept. low while the other according to one particularly dim bulb on this thread is surely rapidly heading toward a new post Sept.
low.
Let's look for a moment at these two erstwhile cousins
QCOM and NOK. One of these almost immediately rolls off
the lips of almost every professional investment manager when asked for his favorite play in wireless equipment. Indeed, as we all here fret about the "no-growth" results
from QCOM we can surely forgive the 25+% negative top line
from good ole NOK. Don't care for QCOM's flat bottom line
in the face of the worst telecom slowdown in anyone's memory, a worldwide recession, and quasi war and the attendant hysteria that accompanies such events - no problem, just sprinkle a little NOK on that thar portfolio
and quit whining - after all their bottom line was more than halved during the same period , and how many quarters
in a row did they warm or miss or both? Don't any longer
have the stomach for QCOM's future prospects? No problem, I'm sure NOK's got the future ticket for you. Afterall
I'm sure with a dominant 30+%global market share things
can only get better right? Who cares that 90+% of the ole product line is obseleted. Who cares that with a gross margin that's twice the industry average that it might
just might have a wee little risk of going down - a lot.
Who cares that their whole technological franchise, obsoleted is protected and built upon upon euro-political
barrier that is now teetering on quicksand. Afterall, I'm
sure NOK will be a quick study when it learns to compete in
OPEN-STANDARD-LAND (even a standard that they neither
own or control)as they go against the likes of the Chinese,
the Koreans and the Japanese.(Oh Mama-san please don't take away my margins!) And no one worry that the vast bulk of NOK's Euro and non-Euro customer base is either hobbled
with an outmoded legacy network (GSM, TDMA) that has to be virtually junked, or a balance sheet that's been hobbled by forced acquisition of expensive and unneeded spectrum - or
both. Never mind then that QCOM's global technological
market share is growing and it is adding markets while NOK
is giving up markets - including soon enough its largest
and up to now most protected market. Never mind also that
NOK only makes a profit on stuff that it has to make and
market while that pesky QCOM makes nothing but collects
from everybody else's stuff....
Yep, there you have it folks... SO STOP WHINING, SELL YOUR
DAMN QCOM AND BUY NOK!!!! You deserve whats coming to you! |
