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

To: BWAC who wrote (14678)	4/28/2005 8:22:29 AM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25522

Semiconductor equipment market to rebound 2007, 2008, says analyst Peter Clarke EE Times (04/28/2005 7:38 AM EDT) LONDON — The semiconductor equipment market will start to recover in the middle of 2006 but is still set to decline by 5.0 percent in that year following a fall of 9.6 percent in 2005, according to The Information Network (New Tripoli, Pa.). Thereafter the semiconductor equipment market is set to achieve double-digit percentage annual growth of 20.5 percent in 2007 and 27.0 percent in 2008, driven by the needs of novel transistor and gate-level processing, the company said. The market research company's short-term forecast was close to the one it gave Feb. 1, 2005, when it said the market would fall 9.4 percent to $30.7 billion in 2005 after a growth spurt of 52.7 percent took it to $33.9 billion in 2004, Whereas the past semiconductor cycle focused on the back-end of the line processing utilizing copper interconnects and low-k materials, the next cycle — as the industry moves to 65- and 45-nm manufacturing processes is set to be driven by front-end of the line processes used to create ultra-shallow junctions, strained sources and drain through the use of silicon-germanium and complex gate stacks, The Information Network said. "Significantly more equipment will be needed to process the transistor at 65-nm versus 130-nm," said Robert Castellano, president of The Information Network, in a statement. "For example, it will take 17 implant tools versus only seven for the ultra-shallow junctions. For the strained silicon-germanium source-drain, five epi reactors, two etch, and two clean tools will be required at 65-nm for a process that was not even implemented at 130-nm. For the gate stack, five integrated tools will be required versus only one oxidation furnace and one poly furnace." The combined needs for these processing tools would result in annual market growth rates of following market declines of 9.6 percent in 2005 and 5.0 percent in 2006, The Information Network said. For gate-stack processing, the equipment market was $843 million in 2004. Applied Materials led the market with a 54.8 percent market share, followed by Tokyo Electron Ltd. with a 19.5 percent share and ASM International with a 10.5 percent share, the market research company said.

To: BWAC who wrote (14678)	4/28/2005 8:48:21 AM
From: Proud_Infidel	Respond to of 25522

Economy Grows at Slowest Pace in Two Years Thursday April 28, 8:41 am ET By Jeannine Aversa, AP Economics Writer Economy Grows at 3.1 Percent Annual Rate in 1Q, Slowest Pace of Expansion in Two Years WASHINGTON (AP) -- The economy lost momentum in the opening quarter of 2005, growing at an annual rate of 3.1 percent. The slowest pace of expansion in two years, amid soaring gasoline prices and rising interest rates, offered new evidence the economy has hit another "soft patch." The latest reading on gross domestic product, released by the Commerce Department on Thursday, showed that consumers and businesses turned cautious in their spending in the January-to-March quarter, a key factor in the slower economic growth. High energy prices and rising borrowing costs are causing Americans to tighten their belts a bit. The first-quarter's GDP figure, down from a 3.8 percent pace logged in the final quarter of 2004, represents the economy's most sluggish showing since the first quarter of 2003, when economic activity expanded at an even more mediocre 1.9 percent rate. GDP, the broadest barometer of the economy's health, measures the value of all goods and services produced within the United States. The newest snapshot of the economy is likely to disappoint economists. Before the report's release, they were forecasting a 3.5 percent growth rate for the first quarter. That estimate marked a downgrade from just a few weeks ago when economists were predicting that business growth would clock in at a pace of 4 percent or better in the first quarter. But they scrambled to lower those forecasts in the wake of a spate of disappointing economic reports in recent weeks. Those disappointing reports -- including retail sales, industrial production and big-ticket orders to factories -- along with Thursday's GDP figure, add to evidence that the economy hit a "soft patch." That's the term Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan used last spring when economic growth slowed abruptly. Economists also are lowering their estimates for growth in the current April-to-June quarter -- to around a 3 percent rate -- or possibly less. For now, economists believe any soft patch will be temporary and don't believe that it would be a harbinger of recession. Although a 3.1 percent growth rate may disappoint economists, it is a decent pace of expansion, nevertheless. President Bush wants to see the economy on solid ground as he tries to sell Americans his vision of overhauling the Depression-era Social Security program. He is promoting the idea of letting workers set up individual investment accounts in stocks and bonds, using a big chunk of payroll taxes to do that. The signs of slowing economic growth are especially disconcerting because they raise new questions about the state of the labor market, whose recovery from the 2001 recession has been uneven. Payrolls expanded by just 110,000 in March, the fewest new jobs in eight months. The employment report for April will be released by the government next week.

To: BWAC who wrote (14678)	4/28/2005 1:10:43 PM
From: Proud_Infidel	Respond to of 25522

After the bubble's "pop," a new trend emerged. Stock analysts began to reverse themselves, advising investors to sell what was left of their stocks. And so the stocks began to rise. In fact, in every single year of the new millennium, stocks rated "sell" by Wall Street have outperformed stocks rated "buy" or "hold." Over the past four years, stocks that the Street has been telling you to sell have risen 19% per annum on average. Meanwhile, the "buys" and "holds" have risen just 7%. fool.com

To: BWAC who wrote (14678)	4/28/2005 6:28:17 PM
From: BelowTheCrowd	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25522

What shortage? Where is a gas station pump dry? What station is limiting the gallons to satisfy demand? The previous post seemed to presume that a 40% increase in price should only occur in the context of a 40% increase in demand. That's not the case. In the face of inflexible supply (which is the current situation), even a small change in demand can result in one of two things: A huge price spike that drives demand back down, or a shortage if somebody tries to control prices as they did in the 70s. You are correct that at present there is no shortage, and I shouldn't have implied otherwise. There's no shortage because prices rose to the point where someone, somewhere in the world, decided to limit use in a way that they wouldn't have with oil at $25 per barrel. -btc

To: BWAC who wrote (14678)	5/2/2005 2:45:46 PM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25522

Flat growth seen for semis in Q2, Q3, says analyst EE Times (05/02/2005 1:50 PM EDT) SAN JOSE, Calif. — The worldwide IC industry is projected to show relatively flat growth in the second and third quarters despite an uptick in the first period of this year, according to Advanced Forecasting Inc. on Monday (May 2). As reported, the three-month average of worldwide sales of semiconductors was $18.43 billion in March 2005, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), up 2.2 percent from the February level of $18.04 billion and up 13.2 percent from the same period in 2004 Unit sales for March were 3.6 percent above February's, while overall first-quarter unit shipments were 1.6 percent above that of the fourth quarter of 2004, according to Advanced Forecasting (Saratoga, Calif.). Revenues for March 2005 were 2.3 percent above February's, while overall first-quarter revenues were 14.7 percent above that of the previous period. Still there is some uncertainty in the market. "Our quantitative-based forecast for the IC cycle indicated that the second quarter will be generally flat with a slight increase in growth expected for the third quarter," said Rosa Luis, director of marketing for Advanced Forecasting, in a statement. "This growth will not be long lasting."