Bookings/billings game
In fact, silicon foundry giant Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (TSMC) has spent 47 percent of its capital expenditure target in the first quarter, he said.
That's completely the opposite to the claim that foundries "come back" once U-rates hiy 90 - 95% range;
according to McClean TSMC would have "blown" almost 50% of capex during the quater with the lowest u-rate but if you go back 6 months TSMC's u-rates indeed exceeded 100% in Q3
(will pull up the data from TSMC web site)
Semicap Equipment Bookings Seen Weaker In 2nd Half
06.17.05, 1:27 PM ET
Tear Sheet | Chart | News
Responding to semiconductor-equipment order data for May, Adams Harkness said, "We do not expect these numbers to be a surprise to investors, given that leading front-end equipment manufacturers such as KLA-Tencor (nasdaq: KLAC - news - people ), Lam Research (nasdaq: LRCX - news - people ) and Novellus Systems (nasdaq: NVLS - news - people ) have all guided for June quarter orders to be sequentially flat versus their March quarter." Bookings were up 3% month-to-month as billings dropped 3%, pushing book to bill higher. Front-end bookings sore marginally 1%. "Given our expectation of weaker capital spending in the second half of 2005, we do not recommend equipment stocks at this time. . .Based on industry data points and the fact that spending patterns at some of the largest capital-expenditure spenders such as Samsung, Intel (nasdaq: INTC - news - people ) and Taiwan Semiconductor have been first half loaded, we expect front-end bookings in the second half to be weaker than the first half. While it might be a bit early at this time, our industry channel checks indicate that order guidance for the September quarter would likely be flat at best (may be down some)." In contrast to capital spending, Adams Harkness sees global wafer starts stabilizing by the June quarter and favors "a quality driven unit-play," ATMI (nasdaq: ATMI - news - people ), which the research firm rates "strong buy." Other "buys" include Novellus and Ultratech (nasdaq: UTEK - news - people ). |
