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Politics : Formerly About Applied Materials -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Proud_Infidel who wrote (53105)	9/25/2001 11:35:33 AM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 70976

Americans getting rid of second phone lines SAN JOSE--U.S. households are beginning to dump their second phone lines. But that isn't necessarily bad news for the telecom industry because they are replacing them with alternative, feature-rich, higher-priced communications equipment, according to Dataquest. Nearly 6% of all U.S. households replaced a traditional telephony access line with alternative communications equipment during the first half of this year, according to a Dataquest survey. "A significant segment of these additional residence lines were never used for voice communications but rather for dial-up Internet access and faxing, so they were a natural market for upward migration to newly available and affordable forms of data communications," reports analyst Peggy Schoener. The growing mobile nature of society coupled with competitively priced wireless offerings has reduced the need for multiple wired access lines for voice communications, she says. Some 55% of the residence access lines replaced since January migrated to high-speed broadband access, the Datquest survey shows. The migration of almost 4 million dial-up lines to higher-priced broadband Internet access has "significant revenue implications" for those service providers capturing the broadband customer. Most of these voice lines replaced by broadband migrated to local exchange carrier (ILEC) high-speed residential services. DSL is the most popular choice. The number of wireless phones in U.S. households has reached a critical mass and continues to grow, Dataquest says. Some 64.3 million households have at least one wireless phone available in the household, the survey shows. This represents nearly 61% of all households, increasing from 50% reported 16 months earlier. Those households replacing their residence access line, 2.3 million or 33% of the lines were replaced with a cellular/PCS phone. The bundled pricing plans, free minutes, and other promotions have made wireless calling prices competitive with, and in some cases better than, wireline calling rates, Schoener says.

To: Proud_Infidel who wrote (53105)	9/25/2001 1:56:54 PM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 70976

My guess is, that article is about right. I doubt semi-equip orders go much below the current plateau. This represents tech buys. The semi industry, IMO, is in good enough shape financially to afford these buys, even if we get a sharp falloff in consumer demand (and therefore demand for chips). The situation of the semi industry is in sharp contrast to the telecoms, which are in much worse shape financially. Therefore, I see the potential for further cutbacks in telecom equip. Yes, I know, demand for telecom equip affects demand for chips. But it's only a partial overlap. If the current rate of semi-equip orders persists till mid-2002, then we are setting up for a serious shortage once chip demand comes back (whenever that is; I'm 100% certain it will happen, and very uncertain about when). As always, the return of capacity orders will be sudden. Every chip company will do it at the same time. As individual investors, we will not be the first to hear when this happens. The stocks will start looking strong, for no apparent reason. Then they will take off. Then a BTB will come out saying orders have doubled. I think last week saw at least a medium-term low for AMAT and the market. The panic selling is over, we're numb rather than scared. So, the stocks will drift, flat, or up a bit. I doubt AMAT gets above 40. I bought in 2.5-point increments, from 35 to 27.5. I will sell my higher-cost lots, at 37.5, and 40, or lower if we stall before there. I think investors have from last week till mid-2002, to pick up the semi-equips at trough prices. I think, at the least, we retest last weeks lows sometime in the next few months. I think the upside is not good enough to justify LEAPs, unless we go to the teens (that's not a prediction, just a comment on valuation). Other than the semi-equips, I see storage and wireless (and chip companies who sell into wireless) as the sectors that come back first and strongest.