Reuters: International bank regulators are looking at Brazil as a model.
Reuters: John Mack will step down at Morgan Stanley’s (MS) CEO.
Reuters: The SEC vowed reforms after its report on Madoff revealed mistakes.
Reuters: GM will sell control of Opel to Magna. Read More
These are this morning’s top pre-market day trader alert stocks. We have more color and more detail on price and volume analysis linked through to each at VSInvestor.com:
Smith & Wesson Holding Corp. (NASDAQ: SWHC) is up over 10% and strong enough to make Dirty Harry proud. We are looking for a secondary trade in Sturm, Ruger & Co. Inc. (NYSE: RGR) on this one.
Monsanto Co. (NYSE: MON) is getting worse on higher volume after it gave an earnings warning bad enough that traders need to watch Market Vectors Agribusiness ETF (NYSE: MOO) and Archer-Daniels Midland (NYSE: ADM) for secondary trades.
Real Networks Inc. (NASDAQ: RNWK) is surging, maybe almost too much had this not still been way off 52-week highs, on a Apple iPhone and iTouch app approval.
Texas Instruments Inc. (NYSE: TXN) is not very exciting considering raised guidance.
Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) is running higher on an upgrade and on a CEO interview with shares up now over 3%.
You can join our open email distribution list which goes out several times per week if you wish to be notified by email when the top day trader alerts hit, along with news of IPO’s, key offerings, guru investor data on Buffett and others, mergers, and more.
JON C. OGG
SEPTEMBER 10, 2009
Reuters: GE’s (GE) water business may be too small to help earnings.
Reuters: Madoff’s CFO plead guilty.
Reuters: Auto inventories are tight but interest in the “clunkers” program is falling.
Reuters: China formally arrest Rio Tinto (RTP) employees. Read More
Today’s market looked more like an advanced yo-yo session rather than a regular stock market trading day. Since stocks gapped down so much, there were many new names on the list of 52-week lows. What is interesting is that many other stocks hit 52-week lows but bounced back to being positive on the day.
Jon C. Ogg
January 23, 2009
These are some of the top individual analyst downgrades we are seeing very early this Wednesday morning:
Jon C. Ogg
October 8, 2008
In the world of global anti-trust, Intel (INTC) has become the Microsoft (MSFT) of the early 21st century. It is being chased around the desk by authorities in places are far flung as South Korea, the US, and Europe. The EU has decided to racket up the pressure on Intel, charging that it induced PC retailers to sell computers with its chips over those with products from AMD (AMD).
According to The Wall Street Journal, "The European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm, has been scrutinizing Intel for nearly eight years in one of the most complex antitrust cases on its docket."
If the charges against Intel are true, it is a great example of how, in big business, stupidity often trumps all the critical advantages a company dominant in its industry has. Although AMD had a brief period three years ago when it was taking market share from Intel, the larger company crushed it like a roach with a price war and improved product line.
The core of all the charges against Intel is that the company won business by cheating. It gave PC companies like Dell (DELL) special incentives to use its chips. It put pressure on large retail outlets to favor machines containing its hardware. In essence, it was a global conspiracy to cripple any other firm that wanted to squat on its territory. It was the big cattle rancher driving off sheep herders.
Such a substantial and long-standing malfeasance rarely goes undetected. The irony of its all is that any government success in bringing Intel to the trial chambers may be the only thing that keeps AMD alive. The smaller company is saddled with over $5 billion of debt from its ill-conceived buy-out of graphics chip company ATI. It loses money almost every quarter. Its technology has fallen behind Intel’s.
Any judgment or settlement on antitrust charges is likely to involve reparations payments to AMD, just as Microsoft has to pay Time Warner (TWX) because of overzealous competition with Netscape and RealNetworks (RNWK) for wrecking its online media-player business. The EU still hangs onto it case against Redmond which could go on for several more years.
By trying to destroy AMD, Intel has almost certainly saved it
Douglas A. McIntyre
Also-ran multimedia company Real Networks (RNWK) and Viacom (VIA) are going to take another run at Apple (AAPL) iTunes. They have a music download service call Rhapsody. One of the reasons it has done poorly is that songs bought through Rhapsody would not play on the iPod. Depending on who is measuring, the iTunes service has 70% to 85% of the multimedia download market now. Rhapsody subscriber have not been able to play songs on iPods but the new program will change that.
According to Reuters, "Digital music seller Rhapsody is launching a $50 million marketing assault on Apple’s iTunes, offering songs online and via partners including Yahoo Inc and Verizon Wireless." Verizon has not had much success selling music on its phones and the Yahoo! music store has not been a hit. The new alliance as all the look and feel of losers trying to become winners by banding together.
ITunes is successful because it was married with a hardware device, the iPod, from the day it launched over five years ago. This "installed base" of over 150 million multimedia players gives it a position that is unlikely to be challenged.
Real Networks and Viacom should save their money.
Douglas A. McIntyre
According to Reuters, Rhapsody, a music service owned by Real Networks (RNWK) and Viacom (VIA) will make a push against Apple (AAPL) iTunes by embracing the iPod as its player.
Reuters writes that the presidential election could delay any Fed action until December.
Reuters reports that China will up jet fuel 15% for its local carriers.
The Wall Street Journal reports that large tech companies like Verizon (VZ) and Google (GOOG) are buying patents in their industries to prevent them from being owned by companies which could ask for license fees.
The Wall Street Journal reports that drug companies say that the FDA’s long approval process is hurting their businesses.
The Wall Street Journal writes that flooding in the Midwest could push some insurance companies to losses in Q2.
The Wall Street Journal writes that US airline may have to take foreign investments.
The Wall Street Journal writes that China’s export strength could be hurt by inflation in the country.
The New York Times writes that food hoarding by some countries is pushing food prices higher.
The New York Times reports that Qualcomm (QCOM) is launching a new chip which will compete with Intel (INTC)
The FT writes that Citigroup (C) will change its bonus structure to one which encourages executives to improve earnings for the whole company and not just their divisions.
The FT writes that a new study show that when companies bought auction rate securities they believed that the banks who marketed them would support their value if the market turned down.
Douglas A. McIntyre
According to Reuters, AIG (AIG) lost $7.8 billion in the last quarter and will have to raise money.
Reuters reports that Google says it will have revenue enhancing products for YouTube soon.
Reuters writes that the head of China’s new sovereign fund see opportunty due to global financial turmoil.
The Wall Street Journal says that the US may have to put trade sanctions on Venezuela, a huge oil producer, because of its ties to Columbian rebels.
The Wall Street Journal says oil and food prices are being driven by fundamentals of supply and not speculation.
The Wall Street Journal writes that United (UAUA) got waivers on some debt covenants.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Microsoft (MSFT) will not renew its bid for Yahoo! (YHOO)
The Wall Street Journal writes that Wachovia’s (WB) CEO will no longer also be chairman.
The Wall Street Journal writes that Nasdaq’s net income was up six-fold.
The Wall Street Journal reports that McDonald’s (MCD) reported strong same-store sales.
The Wall Street Journal writes that RealNetworks (RNWK) will spin-off its video game division.
The New York Times writes that Citigroup (C) has started selling weak assets.
The New York Times writes that GM (GM) will pay $200 million to settle a suppliers strike.
The FT writes that Citigroup may sell up to $400 million in assets.
The FT writes that the IMF says global inflation will be caused by rising food and fuel cost.
Bloomberg writes that Boeing (BA) unions may delay the 787 to get negotiating leverage.
Bloomberg reports that oil hit $124 on concerns about summer demand.
Douglas A. McIntyre
While most of the investment community goes out breaking down earnings for major stocks, there is a huge interest in many of the cult stocks reporting earnings. Among the cult stocks we have reporting this week, the following is a list of key stocks reporting: DivX, Inc. (NASDAQ: DIVX), ValueClick Inc. (NASDAQ: VCLK), CROCS Inc. (NASDAQ: CROX), Hansen Natural Corporation (NASDAQ: HANS), Local.com Corp. (NASDAQ: LOCM), RealNetworks Inc. (NASDAQ: RNWK), Rick’s Cabaret International Inc. (NASDAQ: RICK), True Religion Apparel Inc. (NASDAQ: TRLG), and Vonage Holdings Corporation (NYSE: VG).
Cult stocks are often fad stocks, but they tend to see explosive volume on news and often have high short interest. Many of these stocks have been covered in our weekly "10 Stocks Under $10" newsletter we send out too. Here is a breakdown of these individually:
Streaming Media Magazine and Streamingmediia.com have released their list of the twenty-five most important people in in the streaming media industry over the last decade.
“I suppose if you extend the baseball metaphor, these 25 people would really make up the streaming media hall of fame,” said Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen.
According to Streaming Media "We began the selection process by issuing a call for nominations on StreamingMedia.com and to our Streaming Media discussion lists. From a list of more than 75 nominees, we picked the 25 who most clearly fit the bill, either for the technology they’ve created and advanced or the ways in which they’ve implemented solutions as end users."
The list includes Rob Glaser, CEO of Real Networks (RNWK), Stephen Condon, head of marketing at Verisign (VRSN), Michael Gordon, founder of Limelight Networks (LLNW), George Kliavkoff, Chief Digital Officer of GE’s (GE) NBC Universal division, Tom Leighton, co-founder of Akamai Technologies (AKAM), Andrew Olson, SVP Comcast (CMCSA) Interactive Media, Ben Waggoner, Silverlight division of Microsoft (MSFT), and Douglas A. McIntyre, Editor of 24/7 Wall St.
The Consumer Electronics Show kicked off last night with a keynote from Bill Gates (supposedly his last) and there are many product announcements being shown from large and small tech companies alike. Here are some of the key product launch features being shown so far:
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) unveiled its ATI Mobility Radeon 3000 graphics processor for notebooks and its Xilleon panel processor for LCD TV image quality; AMD shares up 1%.
Himax (HIMX) is in a new strategic alliance with 3M (MMM) over ultra-mobile digital projectors; HIMX stock up almost 6%.
Logitech (LOGI) is demo’ing its new sleek line of computer peripherals and entertainment devices.
Mad Catz (MCZ) will have its recently acquired Saitek unit with new Cyborg line including keyboard, mouse, headset, and peripherals.
Microsoft (MSFT) said at "CES" it had 100 million licenses sold of Windows Vista; 17.7 million Xbox 360’s, 10 million Xbox live users; will have new content downloads with Disney, ABC, and more; showcasing new GPS; MSFT shares up 1%.
Pixelworks (PXLW) launched its Keystone Correction Post-processing IC for digital projectors.
RealNetworks’ (RNWK) is partnering with Philips for its Rhapsody player for in-home audio and GoGear portable devices.
Sony (SNE) is debuting a new digital camcorder with triple recording in a hard drive, memory stick, and disk for ultra-compatibility among digital platforms; shares up 3%.
Yahoo! (YHOO) announced a platform neutral mobile ecosystem for mobile web content at CES with a new redesigned Yahoo! mobile launch page; shares up 0.5%.
Please be advised that there will be hundreds of product launches and partnerships announced out of the Consumer Electronics Show this week. This is only a small snapshot of new devices we saw from various announcements and press releases.
Jon C. Ogg
January 7, 2008
These are not the only impacting analyst calls this morning, but these are most of the initial calls being focused on by 247WallSt.com:
Jon C. Ogg
January 3, 2008
RealNetworks (RNWK) today announced that for the third quarter of 2007, revenue grew 55% to $145.1 million compared to $93.7 million for the third quarter of 2006. Technology Products and Solutions revenue of $53.3 million, a 377% increase over the third quarter of 2006, due in large part to the acquisition of WiderThan during the fourth quarter of 2006. So, much of the improvement was not "organic" as Wall St. types like to say.
Net income for the third quarter of 2007 was $4.3 million or $0.03 per diluted share, compared to $42.2 million or $0.24 per diluted share in the third quarter of 2006. Results for the third quarter of 2006 included payments related to Real’s antitrust settlement and commercial agreements with Microsoft.
Gross margin was 61% in the third quarter of 2007 compared to 70% in the third quarter of 2006.
For the fourth quarter of 2007, Real expects revenue in the range of $152 million to $157 million, GAAP net income per diluted share of $0.00 to $0.01 and adjusted net income per diluted share of $0.06 to $0.07. For the full year 2007, Real expects revenue in the range of $563 million to $568 million. Real expects 2007 GAAP net income per diluted share of $0.28 to $0.29 and adjusted net income per diluted share of $0.23 to $0.24.
Analysts had looked for EPS of ($.01) on revenue of $143 million. And for Q4 guidance of $.02 on $168 million in revenue.
In the eyes of Wall St. the figures were close enough for government work. The shares were up a fraction to $6.60 after hours.
Douglas A. McIntyre
RealNetworks Inc. (NASDAQ:RNWK) is set to report earnings after today’s close. First Call has estimates at -$0.01 EPS on revenues of $143.4 million, but there are some estimates with a break-even to even a slight positive earnings for the quarter. Estimates for next quarter are $0.02 EPS on $158.1 million in revenues.
It looks like the average analyst target is still over $10, but there have not been any major calls on today’s expectations. Morgan Keegan started this with an Outperform rating back in September and J.P. Morgan just initiated coverage earlier in October with a "Neutral" rating. Options are hard to use for any real indicator ahead of earnings and the open interest is not even worth noting. The stock has spent most of the last three-months in a $6 to $7 trading band, and it has been in a $5.45 to $12.08 trading range over the last 52-weeks.
This company would have been easy to attack ahead based on the fact that recent earnings have been skewed by one-time payments that are not going out indefinitely into the future. This will make comparisons to past quarters quite difficult. The good news is that the company has become more and more prominent in digital music downloads via its Rhapsody joint venture with Viacom (NYSE:VIA) and its recent TiVo (NASDAQ:TIVO) pact. Another interesting push here for looking ahead is its recent casual gaming infrastructure company called Game Trust.
One key issue is this huge short interest of 7.729 million shares as of mid-October. Shares are flat mid-day ahead of earnings and RealNetworks carries roughly a $987 million market cap. As of last quarter the company had almost $615 million in cash and equivalents and its net tangible assets after removing goodwill and other items was listed as $489.6 million.
Jon C. Ogg
October 30, 2007
According to Reuters, Sallie Mae (SLM) sued the buyers who walked away from a deal to buy the company.
Reuters writes that Yahoo! (YHOO) will buy 10% of Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce company, when it has its IPO.
The Wall Street Journal writes that hedge funds may put flattering prices on infrequently traded securities to make their performances look better.
The Wall Street Journal reports that media companies are employing new technology to make web video look better.
The Wall Street Journal writes that a Chinese company has received approval to finished pills to the U.S opening the door for pharmaceutical makers from that country.
The New York Times writes that Google (GOOG) will begin to allow advertisers to use some of its content from YouTube.
The FT writes that, for the first time, a Chinese Bank is buying shares in a US bank, UCBH Holdings.
Barron’s writes that Sprint (S) cut guidance as its CEO stepped down.
CNN Money writes that Tivo (TIVO) will offer the RealNetworks (RNWK) music service.
Douglas A. McIntyre
24/7 Wall St. has obtained a copy of the Bernstein Research report on the break-up of Yahoo!.
The first model done by Bernstein assume that the company is broken into three parts.
The first piece is Display Advertising. Using comparable figures for valuations of companies including DoubleClick, the value of this unit is put at $25.5 billion.
The next piece is the Search Unit. Looking at the values of Google (GOOG) and Ask.com, the research firm values this piece at $15.6 billion.
The last piece is Subscriptions. To get a value for this Bernstein used Match.com and RealNetworks (RNWK) and came up with a value of $1.3 billion.
The values of Yahoo! Japan and China e-commerce company Alibaba was added to cash and net operating losses, bringing the total break-up value of Yahoo! to $54.3 billion, or $38.65 a share.
Bernstein offered a second analysis based on Yahoo! outsourcing its search business to Google. If this was done, search revenue would rise 28% in 2008, and total revenue by 16% over current projections. Yahoo! could cut 25% of its head count dropping operating expenses by 17%. The combined benefit of these actions would improve operating income by 205% over current Wall St. estimates.
Maybe Yahoo! could contract out management of the company to Bernstein.
Douglas A. McIntyre can be reached at douglasamcintyre@247wallst.com. He does not own securities in companies that he writes about.
The MTV unit of Viacom (VIA), which makes up most of the revenue in its Media Networks operation, is in trouble. And, it has been coming on for some time. For the first six months of 2007, operating income in Media Networks was flat at just over $1.3 billion.
The problem at MTV is that it is still a winner on cable TV, but it is a loser on the internet.
The last two days have pointed out that MTV can’t get its online act together. Today, News Corp’s (NWS) MySpace and MTV announced a partnership on a series of dialogs between the leading Presidential candidates and the young TV and online audiences of the two firms. The events will take place on college campuses nationwide. Viacom’s shares promptly fell almost 1.5% to $37.50.
Over the last year, Viacom’s stock has continued to under-perform those of other entertainment companies like CBS (CBS) and Disney (DIS).
The news that should be harder on Viacom’s shareholders is that MTV has abandoned its URGE music download business to use the RealNetwork’s (RNWK) Rhapsody download operation. The two companies were good enough to call it a merger of the two services. Rhapsody has been an also-ran trailing far behind Apple (AAPL) iTunes for some time.
As an analyst at Forrester stated "It is an attempt to create a powerhouse that’s going to be able to compete with iTunes. It’s going to be very tough to compete that way. Many other companies have tried to do that and failed, including the limited success that MTV and Rhapsody have had separately."
Perhaps the most troubling part of all this is that a global music brand as powerful as MTV has gone nowhere.
Viacom fired its CEO last September and put in a pal of controlling shareholder Sumner Redstone. But, the shares are right back where they were last September.
Douglas A. McIntyre
Earlier this morning, Wal-Mart (NYSE:WMT) announced the launch of its own "DRM-free" MP3 music downloads. Those wanting the service can download from Walmart.com at $0.94/song and $9.22/album. The new MP3 digital format allows the ability for customers to play music on nearly any device, including iPod®, iPhone® and Zune(TM).
Wal-Mart is one of the first major retailers to offer MP3 digital tracks with music content from major record labels such as Universal and EMI Music, and the launch is aimed to get into the space of Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Amazon.com (NASSDAQ:AMZN). Wal-Mart’s new MP3 music catalog includes hundreds of thousands of songs and albums, and will be continually expanded with additional mainstream and independent music content. Also, Wal-Mart is currently offering special MP3 album pricing on hundreds of album classics.
It used to be that once Wal-Mart went after your space that things became instantly worse for you and your other competitors. But after the Wal-Mart woes of late, they just don’t seem able to wrangle away customers at the same rate. In fact, many may now chuckle at new initiatives because its online presence is still too small to be a major factor.
Steve Jobs and Jeff Bezos probably didn’t call each other up in a panic this morning, and probably won’t be tomorrow either. These stocks are even higher on the heels of RealNetworks (NASDAQ:RNWK) launch of a new digital music company with MTV. We addressed this earlier today. If these were as threatening as they sound then Amazon.com (AMZN) shares might not be up 3.8% and Apple (AAPL) shares might not be up 4% today. Getting the huge established tech predators unseated from a dinner table at their favorite restaurants usually takes more than getting a two-top table in the corner.
Jon C. Ogg
August 21, 2007
Jon Ogg can be reached at jonogg@247wallst.com; he does not own securities in the companies he covers.
It must be humiliating for MTV and RealNetworks (RNWK) to say they will compete with Apple (AAPL) iTunes and watch the AAPL shares spike up almost 6% to $129. RNWK were up only slightly more, and they should be the big beneficiaries of the news.
What the market’s reaction says is simple. Even with Viacom (VIA), Verizon Wireless, a joint venture between Verizon (VZ) and Vodagone (VOD) , behind a deal to sell and distribute music over one of the largest cellphone networks in the world, AAPL can’t be touched. MTV is a global brand. It doesn’t matter. RealNetworks has outstanding technology.
The new music store initiative is being viewed as a loser before it is even launched. And, that is probably right. It is hard to see what someone with an iPod (almost everyone), using iTunes, would switch to the new platform. Using cellphones to play music may become a big business, but it is not today.
In addition, that market does not like four-way deals among big companies. Each one has a different goal, and no one runs the thing. The promise and the problems end up in a committee.
Douglas A. McIntyre
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