Cramer---------
Ingram Micro Casts Pall Over PCs
By James J. Cramer
02/15/2002 12:27 PM EST
Something's not right in personal computer land.
Dell's (DELL:Nasdaq - news - commentary -
research - analysis) call was fine, nothing great,
nothing bad. But Ingram Micro's (IM:NYSE -
news - commentary - research - analysis) call
stank and Ingram Micro is the biggest reseller of personal computers in the world.
As I listened to the replay of IM's conference call this morning, I was struck by the
way many analysts kept goading the company to say something positive about
personal computers, but the company just wouldn't go there. To be succinct,
Ingram is saying there is no evidence of any pickup in the PC market and that if
there was a blip up at the end of last year, it was purely seasonal.
That gets me thinking about a couple of things.
First, that explains why Intel (INTC:Nasdaq - news
- commentary - research - analysis) has stalled
here after that upbeat last quarter. Nobody's going
to pay 80 times earnings if the earnings might not
be there.
Second, where are all of those personal computers
going that Compaq (CPQ:NYSE - news -
commentary - research - analysis) and
Hewlett-Packard (HWP:NYSE - news -
commentary - research - analysis) sold last
quarter? Are they still stuck in the warehouses of
middlemen and retailers? Why were those two
companies able to say things are going gangbusters if Ingram is so downbeat?
Personal computers was the one area of tech that had me feeling sanguine about
tech. With Ingram, I am just not so sure. Let me know if you feel similarly queasy
about PCs right now. They were strong in December.
They don't seem to be strong now. |
