Wendell, my guess is that an ex-intelligence hand like Westergaard is not going to waste friendly assets on a mission that A) stands little chance of success and B) lacks any strategic imperative (then again, there's an obit in the NYT today about one of the South Vietnamese commandos the CIA turned its back on, and the whole tale of what happened to these men sadly gives illustration to the contrary).
I trade large-cap tech companies because I think for the most part they are a lot more "visible" when it comes to information in the sense that there are multiple sources of news, commentary, etc. from which to get your read. Whacky stuff in a post on SI isn't going to have much of an effect on my read.
The issue of "negative posts", "false statements", etc. is obviously a VERY important issue and to be fair to Westergaard, he does deserve some credit for at least causing the issue to be re-examined. "His methods are unsound" - but his parts of his message are valid.
One point I totally disagree with is the notion that a poster having a position in a company is prima facie evidence that any statements that poster makes on the company in question must be SOLELY motivated by financial gain and are posted with the pre-meditated intent and forethought that there will be some sort of causual effect between the post and the stock price.
Do you really think the money managers at FIDO are out there making decisions based on posts in SI? That's about as deuluded as you can get.
And as for deep, dark, "underlying motives", did you ever run into a person in your life who enjoys debating?
Take me for instance. I've been very bearish on MU and I've been critical of some of the analysts who cover it. I also from time to time hold a position. The overwhleming majority of the time when I post I'm flat (because for my trading style, being flat is usually the best position <g>) but obviously there are times when I've posted and held a position.
So does that means that offering my read some of the basic industry trends, MU's outlook in light of those trends, how right or wrong (or totally out to lunch) the analysts have been in nailing these trends, etc., which on the negative-positive spectrum is obviously much more negative, is an "actionable offense"?
For John Westergaard to suggest that he's capable of launch some sort of truth squad implies that John Westergaard knows "the truth".
If anyone is capable of "knowing the truth" - it ain't Captain Bounty.
Case in point - his web site is going to start covering the "semiconductor equipment manufacturing industry." Fine. But in describing his coverage, there's the following statement:
"This is a vibrant, large ($75B+ market cap) segment dominated by micro and mid cap companies."
heLLO!!!
Yeah, there are certain micro and mid-cap niche players which may have critical technology in certain areas but...
...anyone ever hear of AMAT or NVLS or LRCX or KLAC or TER or ASMLF?
Their combined market caps as of Friday's close amounted to approximately $34.6 billion.
Add in ETEC, ASTSF, CYMI, CMOS, UNPH and SVGI - and that's another $6.6 billion.
So that gives you 12 companies capped at about $41.2 billion, which is 54.93% of the lower end of the estimated $75+ billion.
Not to put words in anyone's mouth, but maybe, just maybe someone like Jim Morgan at AMAT (whom I greatly admire) would have a different take on identifying the dominant players in his industry.
Good trading,
Tom |
