by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Netgear ratcheted higher after hours on a strong Q3 financial report.
The maker of consumer networking products posted revenue of $171.1 million and non-GAAP profits of 31 cents a share, trouncing the Street consensus of $156 million and 8 cents.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Broadcom shares are down sharply in late trading after the chip maker posted Q3 earnings. For the quarter, the company reported revenue of $1.254 billion, up 20.6 percent from the second quarter, down 3.4 percent from a year ago, and ahead of the Street at $1.16 billion.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
There was a telling bit of news on the continued travails of the U.S. consumer today from a small Texas retail chain called Conn’s. (In general, I would say calling a retailer “Conn’s” is not something I would recommend. But I digress.)
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Wow, this is pretty strange behavior for a company that is hemorrhaging access lines.
AT&T has unveiled plans to raise landline phone rates by more than 20 percent in California, according to both the San Jose Mercury News and the San Francisco Chronicle.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Corning this morning said it suffered a power disruption over the weekend at its LCD glass manufacturing facility in Taichung, Taiwan which affected some glass-making operations.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Comments by Advanced Micro Devices yesterday apparently have triggered worries on the Street that the PC manufacturers, in their zealous optimism about the prospects for Microsoft Windows 7, may have built too many PCs.
As I noted last night, AMD said on its post-earnings conference call with the Street that it expects a less-than-seasonal sequential increase in Q4 revenues, due in part to the “the big build we’ve seen of PCs in anticipation of the Win 7 launch.”
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
The already intensively competitive wireless sector today finds itself with a tough new player: Wal-Mart. The retailing giant has teamed up with American Movil to sell low-cost service under the Straight Talk brand. The company is offering unlimited voice and text minutes for $45 a month, or 1,000 minutes and 1,000 text messages for $30 a month.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Is corporate IT spending showing signs of life?
Jefferies enterprise software analyst Katherine Egbert thinks so. She issued about a flurry of research notes today, saying various nice things about the improving climate, lifting targets and estimates for an assortment of stocks.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Piper Jaffray analyst Michael Olson today launched coverage of Coinstar with an Overweight rating and $38 price target. The parent of the Redbox video kiosk chain closed yesterday at $31.96.
Olson sees several trends working in the company’s favor.
One of the tech sector’s great hopes is that sometime in 2010, there will be a major PC refresh cycle, driven in part by by the arrival of Microsoft Windows 7, new Intel processors but even more by the general perception that the installed base of PCs is rapidly aging. The conventional wisdom is that the average PC is about five years old.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech TraderDaily
So, the latest theory seems to be that Comcast is in talks to buy 20-50 percent of NBC Universal, the TV/movie studio/cable/theme park company owned 80 percent by General Electric and 20 percent by Vivendi.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Akamai is losing deals in an attempt to hold the line on content deliver network pricing, according to Merriman Curhan Ford analyst Richard Fetyko, who late yesterday cut his rating on the stock to Sell from Hold.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Barron's, Tech Trader Daily
Global chip revenues in the third quarter are getting a big boost from inventory restocking, according to the research firm iSuppli.
According to iSuppli, in the second quarter inventories dwindled to “lean, but appropriate levels,” in a reversal of the excess inventory levels reached in 2008.
by Eric Savitz, Blogger and Columnist, Tech Trader Daily, Barron's
Is Twitter running out of gas? The company, which just today acknowledged that is completed a new round of financing which reportedly consists of $100 million raised at a $1 billion valuation, appears to be seeing a significant deceleration in traffic, according to market research firm Hitwise.
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