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Technology Stocks : Semi Equipment Analysis -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Gottfried who wrote (40285)	9/19/2008 1:06:45 AM
From: John Carragher	1 Recommendation Respond to of 95531

its not the short selling that is the major problem, its the large volumne of shorts who are able to drive the stocks down , even ruin companies for their own profit. The sec has ignored trying to find those who are making runs at a company shorting stock and spreading false rumors. i expect it is more a staffing problem and documentation. Penalties may not be severe enough to offset the rewards. Let's get our hands around the financial market for a time. Perhaps then shorting can resume. When we have companies like state street and others taken out in hours somethng has to be done. We are talking peoples jobs, the financial functions we all depend on to function daily. If these shorts are the problems, their greed and lack of morality needs to be checked.

To: Gottfried who wrote (40285)	9/19/2008 1:29:00 AM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 95531

KLIC 2009 stock price range: $6.00-$3.00 2000 hi stock price/2000 EPS = $43/$1.93 = 22.3 cycle peak PE 12-03 hi stock price/2004 EPS = 17.20/0.89 = 19.3 2-06 hi stock price/2006 EPS = 12.50/0.78 = 16.0 7-07 hi stock price/2007 EPS = 12.46/0.57 = 21.9 The EPS is for fiscal years, which end in September. Those 4 numbers, for cycle peak PE, seem to form a cluster. Their average is 19.9. So...... Today, the FY2009 EPS consensus estimate is $0.30. Multiply that by a PE of 20, and I calculate a stock price of $6.00. There are several caveats here: 1. if 2010, not 2009, is the cycle peak, then the stock won't peak till October 2009 at the earliest. Notice that, in all 4 examples above, the stock price peaked during (not before) the fiscal year the earnings peaked. 2. 2009 earnings estimates for KLIC have been getting slashed recently. It was $0.60 3 months ago. 3. The estimates for 2009, range from -0.11 to +0.63, among the 5 analysts. The standard deviation is 0.27, which means nobody knows. To reassure myself that the stock probably wouldn't go to $1.91, as it did in 2002, I reviewed the 10K filings going back to 1998. In the FY ending Sept2002, the company lost $5.57/share. From 2000 to 2002, cash went down from $317m to $111m, while long-term debt went from zero in 1999 to $300m in 2002. Management seems to have learned something from that traumatic experience. I'm fairly certain they won't repeat their 2002 performance. In spite of the last few days, the volatility of all the semi-equips has been declining, ever since the 2000 peak. AMAT, for instance, seems to be flat-lining at $17, with steadily lower peaks and higher troughs. I guess $3 for the low, because it's half the $6 high price guess, and KLIC is usually about that volatile. If others want to post their guesses, I'll collect and post them, and we can review the results at the end of 2009. We could also do this exercise for the SOX. Disclosure: In the last few days, I have started using KLIC as a medium-term trading vehicle, and have accumulated a position at an average cost of $4.70. I'm posting my trades in real-time at Subject 52720.