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

To: Cary Salsberg who wrote (58378)	1/3/2002 5:30:31 PM
From: Return to Sender	Respond to of 70976

From Briefing.com: Close Dow +98.74 at 10172.14, S&P +10.60 at 1165.27, Nasdaq +64.98 at 2044.23: Suffice it to say, it has been a good start to the new year if you are long the market... Today, investors/traders picked up where they left off yesterday, bidding stock prices higher on bargain hunting interest and a sense the U.S. economy should be showing meaningful signs of improvement by the middle of the year... The latter outlook overshadowed a worse than expected initial claims report for the week of Dec. 29 and served as a motivating factor throughout the session that kept selling efforts in check... In addition, investors were heartened by the healthy gains in the transportation, financial, auto, and cyclical shares... The real source of strength, though, was the tech sector, and specifically, the semiconductor group... Driven by J.P. Morgan's call to buy Intel (INTC +2.52) ahead of its earnings report, the encouraging break by the SOX Index above its 200-day simple moving average, and a general belief that business conditions will only improve from here, investors piled into the chip and chip equipment names... The strength of the move was clearly reflected in the 8.3% increase in the SOX Index... Other tech standouts included the telecom equipment, storage, contract manufacturing, PC, and software issues... Gains in the tech sector were exacerbated by typical, early-year bargain hunting by investors looking to capitalize on potential turnaround plays... It is also reasonable to think that short covering played a part in the advance... Whatever the reason, it was clear investors wanted to own some form of technology... The exception to that inclination was the biotech sector, which underperformed noticeably today along with the drug, beverage, consumer goods, insurance, and oil-related shares... Consistent with the overall bias, Intel (INTC +2.52), IBM (IBM +2.16), and Microsoft (MSFT +2.19) topped the list of winners in the Dow while Coca-Cola (KO -0.62), Procter & Gamble (PG -0.77), and Merck (MRK -0.73) brought up the rear... In a bullish development, today's advance occurred on heavy volume and the major indices closed at their best levels for the session... As a reminder, the December employment report is scheduled to be released at 08:30 ET tomorrow... Briefing.com expects nonfarm payrolls to be down 225K (consensus -155K) and the avg. workweek to be 34.0 (consensus is 34.1)... A bullish call by J. P. Morgan on Intel (INTC +1.93) today is flowing right to the chip equipment makers, which certainly stand to benefit from improving business at the world's biggest chip maker.. In fact, it is the chip equipment makers-- and specifically Novellus Systems (NVLS +3.75), Applied Materials (AMAT +3.43), and KLA-Tencor (KLAC +3.20)-- that are leading the SOX Index today... SOX +6.8%, NYSE Adv/Dec 1914/1207, Nasdaq Adv/Dec 2030/1465 3:52PM Intel (INTC) 35.43 +2.43 (+7.3%): -- Update -- -- Technical -- At its current price, shares of INTC are on track to close at a 10-month high. It is also just three points shy of its 52-week high. To the upside, look for subsequent resistance at its 200-week moving average of 35.7 with additional congestion in the 36.50/37.0 area. Look for downside support initially in the area of 34.80. 3:17PM Micron Tech (MU) 36.41 +3.17 (+9.5%): Salomon Smith Barney positive on MU, raises FY02 est to ($0.35) from ($0.60) and FY03 to $2.35 from $1.50; also raises price target to $45 from $40 and maintains Buy rating. 2:05PM Advanced Micro (AMD) 18.39 +2.00 (+12.2%): Robertson Stephens positive on AMD, believes co sold 8.4 mln units in Q4 with an avg selling price of $80; inventories are lean, co not stuffing the channel, new 2ghz Athlon due next week, and plans on launching a new mobile product in Q1 and a new desktop product in Q2; co is likely to split microprocessor and flash units into separate organizations. Firm thinks Street numbers are too low, raises FY01 est to $0.01 from ($0.08) and FY02 to $0.12 from ($0.31). Firm is warming to PC sector in general 10:33AM ATI Tech (ATYT) 14.05 +0.87 (+6.6%): Digitimes.com reports that Gigabyte Technology plans to spend one quarter clearing out its current inventories of Nvidia (NVDA +3.3%) graphics cards as it makes the shift to products based on chips from ATI Tech. According to the article, Gigabyte said that its decision was due to the product competitiveness and rebates ATI is able to provide. However, the company does not rule out producing both ATI and Nvidia cards at the same time, given the right prices for Nvidia chips. 9:29AM Simplex Solutions (SPLX) 15.93: Needham & Co upgrades to BUY from Hold and establishes a 12-month target of $20. SPLX is a provider of physical analysis software for integrated circuit designs. 8:43AM United Micro (UMC) 9.70: Bear Stearns Ripple Effect notes that UMC is off in Asia due to speculation that XLNX and SNDK may place test production orders with rival TSM; UMC defended itself this morning, saying that XLNX has no engineering activity at TSM for advanced products and has no plans to switch. finance.yahoo.com Just as we later found we were in an actual recession since last March we may indeed find that we are now in a Bull Market. We need a bit more upside to confirm it from here but it will come sooner or later. RtS

To: Cary Salsberg who wrote (58378)	1/3/2002 7:25:45 PM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 70976

re: $110-165 in 2004, best case timing, or, more likely in 2005-2007. I can live with that. Live well, in fact. I am not, yet, quite convinced that we are in a new Bull Market. It looks a lot more likely than in the January or May 2001 rallies. And even if it is a new Bull, there is still going to be a lot of volatility, a lot of chances to buy (or buy back) on 20-40% dips. And there are going to be entire sectors, where overleveraged companies face lingering overcapacity into 2003. Whether we are, or are not, in a new Bull Market, I won't be using margin, or buying LEAPs. At most, I'll add a bit to long positions on those 20%+ dips, buying stock with cash. As of today, with the Nas at 2000, my portfolio is about 10% below where it was when the Nas hit 5000. That's an accomplishment I'm prouder of, than the doublings I had during the Bubble. Holding onto capital during downturns is as important as gains during Bull markets. It's been a brutal 2 years for techs (and longer for a lot of non-techs, many of which peaked in early 1998). "Valuation will make a ceiling for stocks, and liquidity will make a floor", says it about right. I'm pretty sure we've seen the bottom in business conditions, but I haven't really seen the upturn. Or the slope of that upturn. And, in the back of my mind, there is this small worried voice that keeps nagging: "How many Enrons and Argentinas will we have in 2002? And we haven't found the thousands of people trained by Bin Laden and dispersed in hidden cells throughout the world, we haven't found the leadership of Al Queda or the Taliban, or the people who sent the Anthrax letters. Where will the Nas be, after a dirty suitcase bomb makes the center of a major American city uninhabitable?" That is one possible future, which is why I won't be going below 20% cash in 2002.