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Technology Stocks : Altera -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Kirk © who wrote (2338)	11/3/2005 4:01:19 PM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 2389

UPDATE 1-Reuters Summit-Altera sees holiday weakness Thu Nov 3, 2005 03:51 PM ET SAN FRANCISCO, Nov 3 (Reuters) - Altera Corp.(ALTR.O: Quote, Profile, Research) , a maker of programmable logic chips, is prepared for consumers to tighten their belts in the fourth quarter, Chief Executive John Daane said on Thursday. "I built into our forecast an assumption that consumer would be weak this quarter," Daane said at the Reuters Semiconductors Summit, held in San Francisco. As semiconductor industry watchers consider whether industry growth will surge next year, a key issue is the strength of consumer spending. Once seen simply as the brains of computers, semiconductors are now pervasive in all sorts of devices. Daane said Altera expected good growth in all its sectors next year; but he said while a warning by Dell Inc.(DELL.O: Quote, Profile, Research) , the world's largest computer maker, could be an isolated incident, it was something to watch. Dell said earlier this week that it expected to report quarterly results below Wall Street expectations, citing in part weaker U.S. consumer sales. Daane also said the company aimed to keep buying back shares with its stockpile of cash. "Our plan at this point is to continue to purchase shares," he said. "Our shareholder base is predominantly one that does not want a dividend." Yet Daane said that a rising number of institutional investors are asking for a dividend, including those who invest only in companies that pay a dividend. "We are hearing more and more companies saying they would be interested," Daane said. Daane also said that the company continues to roll out new products to server new and existing markets. Almost half of our business is in products that we introduced since 2002," Daane said.