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Technology Stocks : Applied Materials No-Politics Thread (AMAT) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Gottfried who wrote (10153)	6/5/2004 5:45:15 PM
From: Proud_Infidel	Respond to of 25522

DRAM Bulletin: Prices to climb, parts are scarce Silicon Strategies 06/04/2004, 7:00 PM ET Prices for DRAMs are expected to climb after a long slump, according to Smith & Associates, an independent distributor in Houston. "Micron and Infineon seem to be shifting their focus away from their core DRAM businesses to devote more resources to newer technologies such as flash memory," according to an e-mail newsletter from the distributor. "Smith's global trading team anticipates that SDRAM prices will climb during 2H 2004 until fabless producers can reach adequate production levels to offset the shortage." Some parts are on allocation--and even rising. "Samsung and Micron PC 133 chips in 4x16, 8x16 and 16x16 configurations have become scarce, and Nanya 4x16 EDO prices rose sharply due to increased demand," according to the newsletter. "Smith's traders have seen increased activity on Micron 256MB 333MHz SODIMMS, but availability of these units is also thinning. Original Samsung, Micron, and Infineon DDR SDRAM modules are hot, with lead times extending on 256 to 512MB originals in 266 to 400MHz speeds," according to the newsletter.

To: Gottfried who wrote (10153)	6/5/2004 5:58:43 PM
From: Donald Wennerstrom	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 25522

<<remember that SIA chip sales estimates can be revised dramatically>> Very true - trying to predict out 3+ years for semi revenue is pretty dicey, and as always, I am sure we are going to faced with new predictions. It is happening now, as well - every few days we get another prediction, from another source, and the predictions don't always agree. The CEO's, I think, have the right idea by predicting only 3 months out for the most part. The visibility over that period of time should be relatively good and allows for reasonable assessments going forward. But let's go back and look at your chart again of chip sales and semi-equip bookings home.comcast.net to look at the overall cycles. The first 2 cycles in the 95/96 and 97/98 time frames were quite similar - up and down and then start another cycle. The 3rd cycle in 99/00 was in some ways quite similar from a timing point of view, but obviously quite a bit broader at the base with a much higher peak. That "bubble" caused a big "hangover" from which we are still recovering. From early 01 to mid 03, a period of about 2 1/2 years, or 30 months, Bookings were "bouncing along the bottom" with a "mild hump" in the 1st half of 02. The first up tick of the current cycle began in Aug 03. With the most recent report being Apr 04, we are 9 months into the current Bookings upswing. On the other hand, chip sales bottomed in Jan 02, and have been in an "up cycle" ever since, with a couple of small ripples, for a period of 28 months. Put another way, chip sales were rising for 19 months prior to seeing an up tick in Bookings. For the past 9 months, both chip sales and semi-equip bookings have been increasing. Another way to look at the situation is to observe this cycle is clearly unlike the previous 3 cycles starting in 95. This cycle took a long time to get started, 2 1/2 years, whereas the previous 3 hit bottom and started back up immediately. Also, the 2 1/2 year period of low Bookings compared to chip sales showing growth, is probably the result of 2 things - one, the huge amount of semi-equip gear delivered in the 99/00 bubble, allowed chip sales to increase without buying more new equipment immediately(chip makers had excess capacity) - two, the chip makers didn't want to get caught with excess capacity again if the up swing in chip sales didn't continue. Based on the extended low level of bookings, IMO the upward bookings of the last 9 months should continue for awhile. Of course for this to be true, chip sales must continue to rise, or at least not fall, going forward. I believe Cary's statement in his post Message 20195558 <<I expect bookings growth to shadow semi revenue growth>> and his scenario, which he has stated for several YEARS now, ie, the growth in this coming cycle should extend to 2007 or so, looks very likely at this point. Don