Stock World Weekly
by ilene - January 23rd, 2011 3:20 pm
Here’s the newest: Stock World Weekly Newsletter. Comments welcome! – Ilene
Archives here.
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Steve Jobs To Take Medical Leave Of Absence
by ilene - January 17th, 2011 5:51 pm
TIME, Techland, reports: Steve Jobs To Take Medical Leave Of Absence
JUSTIN SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES
Courtesy of Doug Aamoth
This is kind of an odd press release, but Businesswire has just put up something simply titled Apple Media Advisory that apparently contains the following e-mail from Apple CEO Steve Jobs to all Apple employees:
"Team,
At my request, the board of directors has granted me a medical leave of absence so I can focus on my health. I will continue as CEO and be involved in major strategic decisions for the company.
I have asked Tim Cook to be responsible for all of Apple’s day to day operations. I have great confidence that Tim and the rest of the executive management team will do a terrific job executing the exciting plans we have in place for 2011.
I love Apple so much and hope to be back as soon as I can. In the meantime, my family and I would deeply appreciate respect for our privacy.
Steve"
Jobs has been no stranger to medical ailments in the past. You may recall that he underwent a liver transplant back in 2009 as part of a six-month leave of absence to treat pancreatic cancer. We’ll keep an eye on this story and update it accordingly.
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Goldman’s $430 Target, Screaming Buy On Apple At Its All Time High Is In Direct Contravention To Reggie Middleton’s Logic – Who’s Right? Well, Who Has Been More Right In The Past?
by ilene - December 14th, 2010 1:14 pm
Courtesy of Reggie Middleton, posted at Zero Hedge and originally posted at Reggie’s BoomBustBlog
Goldman has recently issued a strong buy recommendation on Apple, offering a $430 price target. I have been on record many times stating that Apples will be facing the toughest competition of its existence since Microsoft nearly put them out of business. This, of course, appears to be in direct contravention to the Goldman Sachs call which just happened to come out the day Apple hits its all time high. Being that Apple has more than its fair share of fans who ignore common sense, this is enough to set the stock on fire. The question still remains though, “Is Goldman right?” Goldman very well could be right, but not for the reasons most retail investors believe. Despite overwhelming evidence plus plain old history to the contrary, many investors and mainstream media outlets still take the sell side of Wall Street at their word. Sell side analysts are marketing arms for the brokerage sales force, the investment banking sales force and the traders who move inventory in and out of their respective banks. What they are not are wealth and strategy advisers for retail and institutional investors. Their historical performance clearly illustrates this, thus their is not need to take this entrepreneurial investor and blogger’s word for it. Well, for those of you who either don’t know of me or don’t know of Goldman, here’s a quick recap of Reggie Middleton vs. Goldman Sachs:
Who was more accurate concerning Google? Google’s 3rd Quarter Operating Results: The Foregone Conclusion That Was Amazingly Unanticipated by the Street!!! Monday, November 8th, 2010
Who was more accurate concerning Lehman Brothers, the Ivy league, ivory tower boys doing God’s work or that blogger with the smart ass mouth from Brooklyn?
Please click the graph to enlarge to print quality size.
As a matter of fact, who was more accurate during the ENTIRE Asset Securitization and Credit Crisis of the last three years? We believe Reggie Middleton and his team at the BoomBust bests ALL of Wall Street’s sell side research:…
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ARe You ReaDY To ReMeMBeR…Today for the Rest of Your Life?
by ilene - November 16th, 2010 1:39 pm
ARe You ReaDY To ReMeMBeR…Today for the Rest of Your Life?
Courtesy of William Banzai7, Zero Hedge
Apple is apparently ready to make another big announcement today. This will supposedly be yet another day that we will never forget.
This got me thinking about how many days there have been in my life so far that I will really never forget.
I vaguely remember being born. Lots of bright lights. I remember getting my first bicycle. I can remember a particular summer vacation day in New Hampshire when I was about 5 years old. I remember exactly where I was when JFK was assassinated. I don’t remember the Martin Luther King or Bobby Kennedy assassinations very well. I remember seeing Jimi Hendrix live in NYC. I remember some other important days like my high school and college graduations, the days my kids were born, the day I was married…and divorced. I remember 9/11 very well, I remember the day AIG claimed they had absolutely no exposure to subprime risk and I remember the September day Lehman tanked. I remember the day Paulsen and Bernanke said we were all doomed and I remember the day Obama was elected…
What could Apple possibly be planning that we will never forget?
Can it be this?
or this?
How about this…
or maybe even this…
or this…
All of the above would probably excite me more than an Beatles/Apple music deal with iTunes or an announcement concerning live streaming iTunes. But I am not quite sure I would remember any of it for the rest of my life.
Here, however, is an event I am pretty sure I would remember at least until the next AAPL quarterly announcement…
AAPL Fight Club 2010
I remember the last time I heard this type of extraordinary claim coming from a Silicon Valley darling…
But I can’t remember what it was that they announced.
AAPL…10:00 AM EST today…
"The easiest way to attract a crowd is to let it be known that at a given time and a given place someone is going to attempt something that in the event of failure will mean sudden death."--Harry Houdini
UPDATE
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Here Is Your Economy: Everyone’s Slowing Down, But Apple Is Completely Going Nuts
by ilene - July 20th, 2010 7:27 pm
Here Is Your Economy: Everyone’s Slowing Down, But Apple Is Completely Going Nuts
Courtesy of Joe Weisenthal at Clusterstock
Well, the after-hours news paints a pretty-much perfect view of the economy. Most earnings continue to disappoint a little: Yahoo, VMWare, etc., all are basically ho-hum.
The exception: Apple, which is going completely bezerk, and is up 3.7% after hours, after killing it on revenues.
Apple’s strong performance is enough to bring the whole market up, but not because it represents anything other than the fact that the company is killing it.
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Apple Needs Some RF Design Engineers
by ilene - July 13th, 2010 8:09 pm
Apple Needs Some RF Design Engineers
Courtesy of Karl Denninger at The Market Ticker
It’s official. Consumer Reports’ engineers have just completed testing the iPhone 4, and have confirmed that there is a problem with its reception. When your finger or hand touches a spot on the phone’s lower left side—an easy thing, especially for lefties—the signal can significantly degrade enough to cause you to lose your connection altogether if you’re in an area with a weak signal. Due to this problem, we can’t recommend the iPhone 4.
That’s Consumer Reports, incidentally, which put the phone in an RF-isolated room to perform their tests along with a base-station emulator.
Oops – that’s about as close to proof as you’re going to find. In an RF-quiet environment it’s pretty easy to prove your case, and it appears that CR did so.
The tests also indicate that AT&T’s network might not be the primary suspect in the iPhone 4′s much-reported signal woes.
"Might" not? 
I have never been impressed with the iPhone (any generation) in terms of RF. Ever. It has always been a "form before function" device from my perspective, all the way back to the original units. Then again I’m spoiled – the best RF-performing GSM phone I’ve ever used was a Nokia 3395. I may still have one laying around here somewhere, and all of my old Nokias (including a 6610 which was nearly as good) still work just fine. Old, yes, but one thing Nokia does know how to do is design and build an RF section.
Incidentally, buying devices that work before selecting them for "sex appeal" may be why I’ve never had a material problem with the "can you hear me?" BS that so many suffer with when it comes to cellphones. I guess my view is that a cellphone is for communicating rather than trying to shag some hot chick at the local bar by flashing my "bling."
This is a common flaw for consumer devices – be sexy rather than be smart – or good. Of course sex sells, and so the more "sexy" you can make something look the better it sells, and as long as you remain within the "acceptable" functionality envelope you don’t get hurt – too badly. Witness Motorola, which had the "hot" phone for a long time…
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The Support Shelf and Trading Range to Watch in AAPL
by Chart School - July 13th, 2010 4:00 pm
The Support Shelf and Trading Range to Watch in AAPL
Courtesy of Corey Rosenbloom at Afraid to Trade
Apple Inc (AAPL) frequently receives a great deal of media attention on their recent iPhone and iPad gadgets.
However, their stock has been stagnating in a trading range between$240 and $270 since May.
There is a critical support area – particularly from the weekly chart – that traders should be keenly aware of, so let’s see these levels and the bigger picture with Apple’s stock.
First, the daily trading range:
As the daily chart shows, Apple has a clear overhead resistance boundary at the $265 per share level, despite the ‘bull trap’ spiking up to $275. .
Thus, Apple bulls have their alerts set at the $265 level as the upside breakout level to punch through.
The lower boundary actually is rising, as seen in the ascending trendline, which will make more sense as you view the weekly chart.
Volume has trailed lower during the consolidation phase, but given that it’s summer and stocks in general exhibit lower participation/volume during a trading range, this is nothing to be concerned with yet.
Remember that in a trading range, moving averages matter less, so look to the trendlines as more important indicators.
Now,…
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An iPhone 4 Recall Will Hurt Apple More By Opening Additional Oppurtunity for Android Devices Than Increased Expenses
by ilene - July 13th, 2010 3:26 pm
An iPhone 4 Recall Will Hurt Apple More By Opening Additional Opportunity for Android Devices Than Increased Expenses
Courtesy of Reggie Middleton writing at Zero Hedge
Apple has had a hell of a time with what is arguably its most important product release since the initial iPhone in 2007. The handsets have been plagued with spotty screens, combustible USB ports, signal strength measurement inconsistencies, and the most damaging of the issues – an ill-conceived antenna design that causes attenuation when held from the lower left had corner. Steve Jobs did the Blankfein (Goldman Sachs CEO, stating that the Wall Street bank was doing God’s work) imitation by opening his mouth when he shouldn’t have and said that users were “hold the phone the wrong way”. Not only that, but Consumer Reports just came out with a report stating that they can not recommend the buying of an iPhone until the antenna situation has been rectified, prompting speculation that Apple will be forced to recall millions of phones.
As a matter of fact, the review was rather poignant:
“If you want an iPhone that works well without a masking-tape fix, we continue to recommend an older model, the 3G S.”
As evidence of the danger of relying on “lifestyle” marketing (see An Introduction to How Apple Apple Will Compete With the Google/Android Onslaught)…
It is very easy to fall out of favor with the trendy crowd. While I doubt very seriously that Apple is in danger of doing this anytime soon, a massive recall will open the door for devices which are technically much more capable, flexible and open than the iPhone, ex. the Android powered HTC and Samsung devices. Basically, the danger to Apple here is not the expense of a recall, but the loss of mindshare and potential widening of the opening for some very capable competition – an opening that did not have to be there!
Don’t believe me, click the link to the consumer reports article and peruse the comment section…
Posted by: John |…
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Google Swings for the Fences and Tries to Knock Apple, Microsoft, IPhones and Office Apps Out of the Park!!!
by ilene - July 9th, 2010 5:00 pm
Google Swings for the Fences and Tries to Knock Apple, Microsoft, IPhones and Office Apps Out of the Park!!!
Courtesy of Reggie Middleton
This is an excerpt from part two of a multi-part series on the companies vying for dominance during the 3rd major paradigm shift in personal and enterprise technology over the last 30 years. This one will be a biggie (not smalls) and promises to create an investment behemoth out of the winner and relegate the losers to relatively niche markets. This is saying a lot considering the size of the companies participating in the battle for the pole position. I created this series to provide a truly objective, truly informed, and truly analytical (from an empirical perspective) knowledge source on this very important intersection in personal computing and distributed media. This series will end with a full BoomBustBlog style forensic report on the company we feel has the most to gain from these wars from an investor’s perspective.Those who are not familiar with my hard-edged, yet objective analytical work should reference past performance and media appearances for a quick background.
It is imperative that readers first review “There Is Another Paradigm Shift Coming in Technology and Media: Apple, Microsoft and Google Know its Winner Takes All” before moving on so as to get a thorough background as to what is at stake, who the players are, and what mobile technologies are being released into the consumer and enterprise realm. This is a lengthy, meaty, objective and information packed post that was initially intended to go out to subscribers only (click here to subscribe to our research services). I welcome you to compare it to the research you find available from technology, financial and strategic advisory firms, including and particularly Goldman Sachs (click here to see what I mean) and let me know whose analysis is more accurate, in depth and thorough (not to mention less expensive).
Google is Giant, Online Ad Agency Cum Enterprise Software Developer and consumer electronics and media giant! WTF! That’s right…
At the end of 2009, Google earned $22.9 billion or 96.8% of its total revenues through advertising, out of which $15.7 billion was related to its own websites, with the remaining $7.2 billion related to other network websites.
Licensing and other revenues accounted for only 3.2% (or…
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The Coming Apple iOS – Android Wars
by ilene - June 9th, 2010 6:55 pm
The Coming Apple iOS – Android Wars
Courtesy of Edward Harrison at Credit Writedowns
In my last technology post, I wrote that we are moving to an Internet-centric world where your computing device or operating system are less important because your data will live and breathe in the Internet cloud. Google, in particular, is preparing for this world because it has a dominant role in the Internet through search. But everyone is moving to an Internet-centric service and content delivery strategy.
The telecom providers understand that their networks make them gatekeepers who can extract rents from content providers. Having paid handsomely to build these networks, they are fighting to not become dumb pipes and resisting net neutrality in order to keep that gatekeeper role. This is one reason Google is trying to build its own network and circumvent the telcos. Eventually, I think the land-based telcos will lose and the battle will move to one between mobile operating systems like Apple’s iOS and Android. Although mobile phone operators may still be able to extract rents for a while longer than the fixed-line telcos.
The PC OS landscape
In the past, the operating system has been important in computing because it allowed the same software to be run on different computing devices, permitting users of those devices to transfer data easily as they were using the same software. But, the OS also benefitted as the more installed users one OS had, the more developers created software for the operating system. These network effects made achieving critical mass a defining factor. Going forward, network effects will also be important in monetizing OS-proprietary e-Commerce platforms like iTunes and Google’s new iTunes competitor.
One reason Apple was near bankruptcy before Steve Jobs re-appeared on the scene is because Apple’s Macintosh’s installed base had shrunk. I used a Macintosh from the mid-1980s but was forced to switch to a PC when I bought a laptop in the mid-1990s that I used both at home and for work. As the PC gained sway, millions of users like me were forced to give up the Mac. And, of course, that meant software developers gravitated to the PC platform and the Mac became a niche product.
The Move to the Internet-centric Model
As Internet bandwidth increased, more and more of what had to be done locally or over a local area network on…
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Philip R. Davis is a founder Phil's Stock World, a stock and options trading site that teaches the art of options trading to newcomers and devises advanced strategies for expert traders...
Ilene is editor and affiliate program
coordinator for PSW. She manages the Favorites backup site
(