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Posted
Sep 03 2008, 07:08 AM
by
Douglas McIntyre
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The good thing about the Apple iPod is that the company has sold 160 million of them. That is the bad thing about the device as well. Apple ships about 10 million units a quarter, and that figure is no longer going up very fast.
It does not seem right to say that too many people have iPods but it is starting to look that way. Apple has to come up with a new reason for consumers to walk into store with iPods on their minds. Mac and iPhone sales have been good, but the little MP3 player is what makes Jobs run.
Apple is supposed to say something important about the iPod at a September 9th conference. That is a rumor, but it might be true.
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Posted
Jul 18 2008, 08:00 PM
by
Andrew Horowitz
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We are the heart of earnings season and this week's lineup is massive. As I write this, I'm looking at over 25 pages of earnings estimates on hundreds of companies presenting results in one of the toughest quarters we've seen in decades. It appears that many of the companies that have already reported have been doing a fine job of beating lowered expectations and providing a nice balance to a market that has been under siege.
This week will be no different in terms of volatility. But those companies which have been savvy enough to project estimates that they figure they can beat will have an easy time pleasing investors. Those that don't will pay a heavy price into the next cycle. Let's face it, it's a game. If played well it can provide wondrous rewards.
Here are a few companies that you may want to pay attention to.
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Posted
Jul 17 2008, 10:50 AM
by
Kim Peterson
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If you want to sell TV shows and movies online, you've got to keep it simple. Make it easy. Apple knows this. So does Netflix, which is expanding its subscription service online. But Amazon straight-out failed in this area with its clunky Unbox download service. So it went back to the drawing board and has a new effort out today. The new store, called Amazon Video on Demand, has 40,000 movies and TV shows and ups the ante in the online video business with two significant breakthroughs. First, Amazon has partnered with Sony Electronics to get the store directly into the TV -- Sony Bravia TVs, specifically. Second, Amazon holds the videos you buy on its end, and you can watch them by logging in to Amazon from different computers or devices. Amazon shares are up less than 1% to $72.13. Here are more details about the service, which Amazon chose to announce in today's New York Times.
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Posted
Jun 23 2008, 12:15 PM
by
Kim Peterson
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Four tech companies land on Seeking Alpha's "Six screaming stock buys with hidden gems" report: Amazon, Apple, Google and eBay. I agree that each company has its "hidden gem," but not sure that every gem makes its owner a screaming buy. YouTube is a gem within Google, but it doesn't collect much revenue and Google hasn't figured out how to monetize it. Amazon has never disclosed Kindle sales figures, so we don't know how the device is affecting the company's finances.
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Posted
Apr 03 2008, 12:32 PM
by
Kim Peterson
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Apple has become the top music seller in the U.S. The company made the announcement today after Ars Technica leaked an internal e-mail with details. Just a couple of months ago, Apple passed Best Buy to become the #2 music retailer. Now, the company is topping the charts.
Apple had 19% of the market in January, and Wal-Mart was in second place with 15%, according to the leaked e-mail. It's worth noting an obvious difference between the two: Apple is an all-digital music seller, while most of Wal-Mart's sales are physical CDs. Best Buy, Amazon and Target rounded out the top five spots. Some tech blogs thought that January's numbers were skewed due to people redeeming iTunes gift cards recieved over the holidays. But it looks like Apple stayed on top in February as well.
Shares of the company rose nearly 3% today to close at $151.61. Here's what others had to say about the news:
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Posted
Mar 20 2008, 12:05 PM
by
Kim Peterson
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I've been thinking about CEO apologies today after reading the Jeff Bezos note plastered on Amazon's front page. Bezos' contrition stems from the fact that the company sold out of the new Kindle electronic book reader in 5.5 hours, and it has been scrambling to increase production ever since. Some customers have waited six weeks to get one. Soon, Bezos said, Amazon will start shipping Kindles to people the same day they order them. "We had high hopes for Kindle before its launch," Bezos wrote, "but we didn't expect the demand that actually materialized." This wasn't exactly an apology -- Bezos never said he was sorry -- but it did have a "we screwed up" tone. And yet it smacked of product promotion -- it was another opportunity to advertise the Kindle to everyone who visits Amazon today. Amazon shares rose more than 4% today to $73.25.
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Posted
Jan 31 2008, 12:22 PM
by
Kim Peterson
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Amazon is buying audio book seller Audible.com for $300 million. That, and the release of the Kindle e-book reader, gives a pretty good picture of where the e-commerce giant wants to go in terms of online content. And it sets the stage for an interesting rivalry between Amazon and Apple. Amazon shares rose nearly 5% to close at $77.70 today, reversing a month-long trend. Shares are down about 20% from the first of the year. A few numbers about today's news: Amazon is paying $11.50 per share for Audible -- a 24% premium over yesterday's close. In buying the company Amazon will add at least another $110 million in annual revenue. Audible has strong revenue growth -- 2007 sales rose nearly 30% over 2006, due in part to strong distribution through Apple's iTunes store -- but the company wasnt profitable. (Though to be fair, its net loss in Q3 was only $200,000).
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Posted
Dec 27 2007, 07:23 AM
by
Kim Peterson
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Apple is finally going to offer digital movie rentals from its iTunes store, the FT reports. The company has hooked up with News Corp's Twentieth Century Fox to allow short-term rental downloads of Fox DVDs. Apple hasn't officially confirmed the news or said anything about potential pricing, which is rumored to be about $3 per rental. Apple sells movies for download, but to this point hasn't made anything available to rent. So far, the downloadable rental business has been pretty abysmal, with rivals like Movielink and CinemaNow unable to turn big numbers. But the opportunities are there, and Amazon and others have been working hard to come up with a groundbreaking rental service. Enter Apple and it's not-so-secret weapon: the iPod (and now the iPhone). I'm assuming Apple will make it easy to shoot movies from your computer to your iPod. If that's the case -- and if Apple shines its marketing megaspotlight on the feature -- iTunes rentals could be huge. The next step might be enabling the downloading directly to an iPod over WiFi, but that could take hours.
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Posted
Dec 16 2007, 02:30 PM
by
Douglas McIntyre
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It is hard to find stocks that could double in a fairly short period of time. It rarely happens with shares in really big companies. There are exceptions like Apple and Amazon. But, most stocks that make big moves are smaller, and, they are often shares that have had a big fall.
For a stock to double over a few quarters it needs a catalyst of amazing earnings, a big customer win, a break-up or a buy-out. At 24/7 Wall St. we went through hundreds of companies to find ones with shares that could double. Each firm had to be matched with one or more compelling reasons to create a significant spike.
We came up with the list, and if you want to get greater detail on the analysis you can see it here.
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Posted
Nov 09 2007, 12:12 PM
by
Robert Walberg
I'm sure you've heard the phrase the best offense is a good defense, well given the offensive nature of the market over the past month -- the DJIA, S&P 500 and Nasdaq indices are down by 8.4%, 6.7% and 7.0%, respectively -- it might just be time to adopt a more defensive posture with your portfolio. How do we reduce risk, while maintaining exposure to the market? Simple, we lower our portfolio's beta.
As defined on the Investopedia web site, beta measures a stock's volatility in relation to the market. By definition, the market (the S&P 500) has a beta of 1.0, and individual stocks are ranked according to how much they deviate from the market. A stock that swings more than the market over time has a beta above 1.0. If a stock moves less than the market, the stock's beta is less than 1.0. When the market is racing to new highs, we want stocks with high betas that will outperform, but when the opposite is true -- as is the case now -- we want stocks that either move down slower than the overall market or, better yet, move in the opposite direction.
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