Sunday, October 29, 2006

Barron's Summary

Barron’s cover story discusses technology sector outlook. When analysts do survey corporate computing buyers, the CIOs indicate they will increase spending at the same 6-8% rate of the past few years. But tech-spending growth has actually exceeded that pace in recent months. With SepQ results in for about a 1/3 of tech co’s, they have surpassed expectations. Paul Wick's team at Seligman and Info Fund has one of the best records among large tech funds over the past few years. Mr. Wick favors ASML, CYMI, KLAC, MFE, STX, SYMC and SNPS. Pans include APCC, AVCI, CCI, DELL, NTES, NYT, KNOT and WBMD. 10 most widely held tech stocks are MSFT, CSCO, IBM, INTC, VZ, T, HPQ, GOOG, BLS and ORCL.

Blair Levin, a Managing Director at Stifel Nicolaus suggests that AT&T (T) may buy EchoStar (DISH). Also, DirecTV (DTV) may be a loser, as there are questions about its long term growth prospects.

Canadian Natural Resource (CNQ) stock, now 53, looks enticing. The shares could hit the 60s in a year and go much higher in the long run. The company might be takevoer bait, too.

Despite the Tellabs (TLAB) disappointing revenue outlook for the fourth quarter, the next three years look bright. The shares could climb more than 40% over that span.

DaimlerChrysler (DCX) shares are likely to be dead money right now. And they're likely to stay that way until definitive signs emerge of a Chrysler comeback or a corporate divorce.

According to the “The Trader” column, Glass Lewis, in a study to be released this week, tracked the regulatory filings in which co’s disclose option grants. Sarbox mandated that co’s report option awards to the SEC within 2 days of the grants in so-called Form 4 filings. Lots of co’s routinely miss the deadline, with rare enforcement action by regulators. Glass Lewis makes the case that filing Form 4s late and dating an options grant in the past when the stock price was much lower in itself can be suspicious. Glass Lewis names 9 co’s whose grants seem suspicious under this light. PLCE, HANS, ORLY, DRIV, AHM, WBSN, SIMG, KERX and MDTL are on the list.

“Technology Trader” section compares Dell (DELL) and H-P (HPQ). Dell shares have fallen 23% this year, while H-P's have risen 34.4% as HP has dethroned Dell as top computer maker for the first time in nearly 3 years. Nevertheless, Dell stock has garnered the attention of some of the most respected institutional value investors, who believe the marketplace's deeply skeptical attitude toward Dell is too extreme to be accurate. Some have begun to sense a turnaround in the next year or two. In the 2Q, the respected long-term value managers at Southeastern Asset Mgmt added 39.2m shares. "We think they still have significant advantages as far as inventory and distribution costs," says Kevin Grant, of Oakmark Fund. "We think that, over time, this business model and this strong co will succeed."

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