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Strategies & Market Trends : Value Investing -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: John Carragher who wrote (24121)	9/16/2006 9:31:23 PM
From: Paul Senior	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 79163

I'm revisiting VZ vs. CMCSA. This time it's more "I have the service, so I'll buy the stock" as opposed to which is the better bet (or neither or both) (VZ vs. CMCSA?). Got my VZ fiber Thursday. It will replace my Earthlink DSL. Fib. seems to be just as you say, John Carragher. Several hours to wire the house and computers. Install went smoothly though, with a battery backup and their wireless router installed (although we chose to be hardwired from the router to our desktops now). My upload speed has gone from 114k to 1808k, and my download from 610k to 5043k (according to Speakeasy website). Both stocks are near highs. Darn difficult to figure the difference in technologies, and which might be better or worse. Maybe it's not even that: These telecom/cable companies...Perhaps it's the company with the best access to politicians that wins. Some of the other people here like VZ better because of the dividend. I'm leaning that way too. Maybe neither company can get a significant sustainable advantage out of their business, and if they just muddle along, I'd rather have that 4.5% VZ div. yield on my side. OTOH, there are several possible positives for holding CMCSA, perhaps a prime one might be that CMCSA has spent a lot of money on upgrades, voip, etc. etc. and maybe there's a lot of free cash flow to be had now and in future. OTOH, gee, competition seems like it forces continuing huge capital investments for everybody. Here's a cross post from tech101 which highlights the competition between Verizon and Cablevision: Message 22759030 I'm going to drop CMCSA and up my few shares of VZ. It'll never be anything but a tiny position for me, but it does fit in a category of "if you will buy the product, consider buying the stock". For me, I go beyond Peter Lynch who I believe said (paraphrased) about such stocks: buy what you know, but only after you investigate the company. I've found if I just buy stocks of most the companies from whom I buy their product or service, that on average, that that works out satisfactorily for me. And when I don't buy, I have regretted it. Others may have a different experience.