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Technology Stocks : Qualcomm Incorporated (QCOM) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Voltaire who wrote (56719)	12/25/1999 3:09:00 PM
From: Jimmyjohn	Respond to of 152472

Voltaire: Confessions of an ex-analyst. Ran across this article in American Medical News. Thought you might be interested. Confirms what you and many on this thread have said about the Big Houses. Apologize if this is already well understood by the thread but helped me put it all together. How Good is Analyst's Buy Recommendations- "When shares of Oxford Health Plans Inc. collapsed last year, many of the doctors who were members of the beleaguered HMO were not surprised. But investors who followed the stock picks of Wall Street sages were caught off guard. Analysts had been placing buy recommendations on Oxford's stock right up until the bitter end. This has lead some to wonder what these supposedly savvy stockpickers were doing while they labored at their desks all day.....Faced with growing pressure to help win new clients for their investment banks, analysts have grown increasingly cautious about sending distress signals, often until a company is struggling for survival." "For the 10 to 15 major Wall Street firms that own the lion's share of the equity markets business, a research department full of security analysts is critical to maintaining the firm's credibility with institutional clients that buy stocks and the companies that seek out a firm's investment banking expertise." "The problems facing Wall Street analysts have less to do with the manner in which they evaluate companies than their conflicted role inside many investment banks." "The firms compete fiercely for assignments to sell stock and bond issues for the same corporate clients. Negative comments from research analysts obviously don't win sales orders." "Research analysts make between 200K and 600K in annual salary and bonus; a few top $1 million. While part of their pay is tied to their stockpicking acumen, most contracts tie salary to how much investment banking business an analyst brings to a firm. This provides a powerful incentive for analysts to become cozy--frequently too cozy--with management at the companies that they are paid to evaluate." "It is commonly agreed that any negative research reports about any of the investment banking clients would be strongly discouraged." Citing an article in the WSJ 1992 the author went on with the following: "At Wall Street investment bank's research departments don't pay for themselves directly and, therefore, must be funded by the rest of the firm. Morgan Stanley's investment banking department paid about 30% of the research department's budget .....That funding can be a big stick." "Like most firms caught in the act of twisting an analyst's arm, Morgan Stanley denied that it did anything wrong. Still, an internal memo circulated at that firm by the head of it's capital markets desk spoke bluntly of a "policy" mandating "no negative or controversial comments about our clients." Happy Holidays

To: Voltaire who wrote (56719)	12/25/1999 3:59:00 PM
From: swisstrader	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 152472

Voltaire...love your rants...the whole value issue kinda makes me think thoughts of gee, what would you rather own, Caterpillar, in the business of moving dirt, or QWST, in the business of moving data??...also, wrt the fella who stated that the BullMarket Report now indicates that Q is fully valued at these levels should note that this is the same Todd Shaver who has massive losses in his portfolio on the likes of FBR, TDE, SWS, LHSP (sold b4 they raged), EFAX and many others too numerous to mention...also, has this creative accounting habit of simply purging losers off his portfolio when annualized losses start to bleed bright red...nice newsletter, LOUSY picker....oh, and almost forgot to mention, no intention of letting go of even a single share in 2K.

To: Voltaire who wrote (56719)	12/25/1999 4:14:00 PM
From: KyrosL	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 152472

Voltaire, Your post implies that most analysts, talking heads, etc. are recommending value companies and few are recommending QCOM and similar companies that represent the FUTURE. I think that exactly the opposite is true. The conventional wisdom right now BY FAR is that high tech companies that represent the future is where people should continue putting their money. In fact, if you look at analysts' views of the high fliers, including Q, you will invariably see mostly buy recommendations. For example, Q's current average analyst recommendations are way more favorable than they were in January (to say nothing of last year), when Q was selling at less than a tenth its current price. Therefore, your views represents conventional wisdom rather than being contrarian, as you seem to imply. Nothing wrong with that. Conventional wisdom usually works for a long time before stumbling. Kyros