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Technology Stocks : Hutchinson Technology, Inc. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: All Mtn Ski who wrote (1268)	6/23/1999 9:30:00 AM
From: Mark Oliver	Respond to of 1487

Did Hutchinson Technology's skid mean 'buy'? By Cecily Fraser, CBS MarketWatch Last Update: 9:58 AM ET Jun 22, 1999 Personal Finance news cbs.marketwatch.com NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- When Hutchinson Technology warned of a disappointing third quarter Monday, investors quickly dropped the stock as jitters about demand for the company's disk drives took over. Hutchinson Technology (HTCH: news, msgs) said it expects a loss of about 18 cents to 23 cents a share, on sales of about $130 million in the the quarter. Analysts polled by First Call were looking for a profit of 16 cents a share. The company tied its woes to a drop in shipments on account of sluggish demand. See press release. On that news, shares fell as low as 23 3/4 in early trading Monday. But not for long. Surprisingly, shares closed up 1 7/8 to 28 1/2. Clinton Morrison, an analyst at John G. Kinnard, said that clueless investors should have been bidding up shares long before. "The reality is, you'd be better off buying last week," the analyst said. Last Monday, Hutchinson shares were at 26 7/8. "Investors felt like they missed it after seeing the potential, and were looking for any weakness to get the stock that they already hadn't accumulated," Morrison said, noting that Hutchinson's business is picking up. In a statement, Hutchinson said that while near-term demand visibility remains "limited," it was encouraged enough by recent improvements to call back employees that it laid off in March. "This stock surprises more people more often than any stock around," the analyst said. "The fact that it was well under estimates isn't atypical, and seeing the stock go up is in character." Like Hutchinson, other disk drive companies forged gains on Monday. Seagate Technology (SEG: news, msgs) rose 1 1/4 to 29 15/16 and Quantum (QNTM: news, msgs) went up 1 3/16 to 25 1/16. However, shares of Western Digital (WDC: news, msgs) fell 1/16 to 6 5/8 in the wake of its own fourth-quarter profit warning issued last Thursday. See Hardware Report. In early trading Tuesday, Hutchinson shares were down 1 1/4 to 27 1/4.