MB: INTC numbers are out, and as expected, the company came in reasonably close to the "revised analysts' expectations". (What a surprise!)
Before the great warning of several weeks ago, the stock traded at just under $85. Today, it closed at just under $81. Tomorrow, given the positive spin, I suspect it will trade up.
Now let me see if I've got this right......
Revenues DOWN sequentially.....6%
Income DOWN sequentially .....20%
Income per share DOWN sequentially ....16%
While it has been so long that I can't accurately remember exactly how it worked back in the old days, I seem to recall that the word "DOWN" showing up anywhere in a sequential number set would have caused a sell-off......but of course that was before the new era began.
- Revenues down sequentially.....well it's the slow summer season, so not to worry.
- Income down a lot more than revenues......well its those silly expenses that just won't stop going up, and with the number of employees up 10% SEQUENTIALLY, what else might one expect.
(whiners should note that as a result of the company's brilliant expenditure of close to a billion dollars during the quarter to buy back its own stock (@$73 per share!), the per share earnings were not down as much sequentially as one might have expected!)
- Unit shipments down......not to worry, next quarter, things will improve for sure, although we really don't want to say how, given our expectation of flat revenues, rising expenses, and reduced margins......trust Uncle Andy!
- foolishly worried that income from interest and put option sales are rising as a percentage of overall income? (now 12% of earnings!)......and you thought that we were in the chip business.... heh, heh, heh.
- worried that cash increased only $85.0 million?.......ungrateful wretches.....we've got tons of cash.
- So you noticed that in spite of all the stock buybacks, that the stock outstanding was still UP...AGAIN.....well what do you expect....we have to keep issuing all those options to keep our expense line (wages and salaries) artificially reduced so we can artificially boost our bottom line. Also, don't forget the great tax boost we get through this process, which also pumps up our bottom line.
- Getting picky about our finished goods inventory being up sequentially (like 28%)......for heavens sake, what's a hundred million to a big outfit like ours.
- Concerned that upcoming price cuts might smack our margins more than we are suggesting.....not even possible (but if it does, we'll let you know about it in our next "pre-announcement")
Anyway, as noted above, the stock will trade up tomorrow, so all is still perfect in the perfect world. Thank goodness for CNBC and all those nice supportive analysts.
Earlie |
