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

To: DownSouth who wrote (42613)	1/8/1999 8:10:00 AM
From: Elwood P. Dowd	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 97611

I had some trouble accessing the Forbes article, so thought I'd post it for anyone else who may have the same problem. El Market Close January 07, 1999 Fourth-quarter PC sales may top 20% By Om Malik Indexes (Jan 7, 1999 5:00 PM) DJIA 9538.00 -7.00 -0.07% S&P 500 1269.73 -2.61 -0.21% NASDAQ 2326.09 +5.23 +0.23% EW YORK. 4:15PM EST—Technology investors should pay attention to the computer hardware stocks, which are likely to experience an upturn when the personal computer sales data for the fourth quarter of 1998 are made available after Jan. 15. Why? Because it looks increasingly likely that sales will blow away the most optimistic of PC estimates for the fourth quarter. While the industry is forecasting 18.2% growth in PC sales in the U.S., the number could be greater than 20% given the strength of a still relatively robust economy, low-cost PCs, more online buying and a continuing growth of interest in the Internet. "The final numbers will be a huge surprise and the unit volumes are going to be huge," says Stephen Baker, hardware analyst with PC Data, a Reston, Va. market research firm. He points out that the falling price of personal computers is the major reason why sales have been exceptionally strong. At the end of November, 1998, the average selling price of a PC was down to $990 from $1,066 in October. A year earlier, the average selling price of a PC was about $1,350. Those looking for proof should check out the number of microprocessors shipped in the fourth quarter--33 million processors: 26 million Intel chips, 5.5 million chips shipped by Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), 1.5 million chips shipped by National Semiconductors' Cyrix division and 700,000 by IDT Technology (IDTI). The 33 million processors translates into 33 million PCs. The unit volume in the worldwide PC market this quarter is expected to grow year-over-year by 12.2%, according to International Data Corp., a Framingham, Mass.-based market research firm. Total 1998 worldwide PC volume is now projected to be 89.2 million on growth of 11.1%. These estimates, too, should be blown away. "Asian nations, despite their economic problems are simply buying new personal computers wholesale, and I think countries like India and Bangladesh are the new big buyers of the PCs," says CB Lee, analyst at brokerage house Sutro & Co. in San Francisco. The strength of buying in Asia is one of the main reasons why Intel has sold out its Pentium II inventory for the first quarter of 1999. Intel, for the first time in many years will not shut down its Malaysian plants for the Chinese New Year celebrations. Add to this the ongoing strength of the Western European markets and what IDC indicates as a slight positive growth in Japanese PC sales, and the outlook for the PC business looks bright. For 1999, IDC now estimates worldwide PC market growth at 12.8% on unit volume of 100.6 million chips. Against such a positive backdrop, investors should keep an eye on the stocks of companies like Compaq Computer (CPQ), which is likely to be the biggest winner of the fourth-quarter PC madness. Other big winners are likely to include AMD, National (NSM), IDT Technology (IDTI) and Hewlett-Packard (HWP).