Stock Analysis
Random Thoughts: China; Ebay; Intel vs AMD and HP vs Dell
Let's say the scenario that I described in this article plays out, the Chinese economy slows down, its massive operational and financial leverages create deflationary pressure on the companies forcing them to lower prices in an attempt to stimulate sales growth.
Random Thoughts: Lion’s Gates; Life Centence; Danger of Cheap Stocks; Large and in Charge
At MIM2 (Minyanville in the Mountains 2) Jeff Macke and I discussed how being a public company impacts management's decisions, where management may do things that are not necessarily good for the long run of the business to please the short-term, result hungry Wall Street.
Dividends on the Ride Down
Cedar Fair is known as a pure-play, profitable, well-managed company that has paid and raised dividends every year for the past 19 years.
Fall in love again with a bellwether friend
Love was in the air, birds were singing, price/earnings ratios were growing and the stock prices of large-cap, bellwether companies such as Microsoft, Wal-Mart and Johnson & Johnson were rising as if dotcom had become their middle name.
Being Contrarian With Jos. A. Bank
Jos. A. Bank (JOSB) is up close to 6% after reporting truly unbelievable sales numbers for July: same store sales were up 16% and total sales were up 28%. July's performance has validated my view on the stock that you are about to read.
Dell? Not Yet
Dell (Nasdaq: DELL) is hitting multi-year lows and, at 16 times trailing earnings, is attracting value investors that have coveted the stock from afar for years.
Telecom New Zealand: Bull or Bear?
I'll spend the next few paragraphs making both a bullish and a bearish case for Telecom New Zealand (NYSE: NZT - News), and I'll let the reader decide which argument is more convincing.
Don’t be downbeat about Wal-Mart
The greatest investment opportunities are seeded not by warm sunshine but by chilling rain. It has been freezing and pouring in Wal-Mart’s (WMT) neck of the woods.
Government Goes Medieval on Telecom New Zealand
A political risk is present in shares of any government-regulated company, but it came to fruition for Telecom New Zealand (NYSE: NZT) when the New Zealand government unbundled the local loop.
Nokia: Slim Phones, Fatter Margins
Nokia (NYSE: NOK) announced that its average selling price (ASP) has increased in the first quarter from a projected 98 euros to 103 euros.
Westwood One to Avoid
The value guy in me always awakens when I see a stock scratching at multi-year lows, and Westwood One (NYSE: WON) piqued my interest a couple weeks ago.
Chicken Run: Value Manager’s Dream?
Are chicken stocks the value manager's dream, or are they a value trap in the making? I think the answer is a little bit of both, depending on an investor's time horizon.
Lloyds: Prime for Takeover
Lloyds TSB (NYSE: LYG) is up more than 5% at Wednesday's open, on the speculation that it will be bought out by Spanish bank BBVA.
The Profit Margin Paradigm?
As profit margins rise, corporations get to keep more of their sales, leading to improved profitability.
Protection Against a Dangerous Enemy
Emotions are a large part of both parenting and investing. Unfortunately, emotions often cloud our judgment and steer us toward making erroneous and irrational decisions.
Why Are Bank P/Es So Low?
Larger banks have lower P/Es generally because they are perceived to have a slower or more limited growth potential.
The China Bubble
Why should we care about what happens to China? As New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman put it in his book, the world is now flat.
Natural disasters may herald a ‘hard’ market
Last year's natural disasters (Rita, Katrina and Wilma) on the Gulf coast caused destruction and sucked out capital from the property and casualty insurance industry.
Mailbag: The Trouble With Timocracies
Those inefficient, bureaucratic, timocracies are losing market share and closing stores due to competition from the more efficient meritocracies such as Wal-Mart, Target (TGT), Costco (COST), BJ's (BJ) and Whole Foods (WFMI).
National Grid’s Boring Little Secret
If you need words to describe National Grid, "stable," "predictable," and "unexciting" spring to mind. Reading its financials stirs so little excitement that if you can't sleep, you might want to leave a copy of its 20-F (a 10-K equivalent filed by ADRs) on the nightstand.
