Archive for the 'Digital Revolution' Category
July 2, 2008 11:08AM
By Cody Willard
One of the themes of this blog and of Happy Hour that we covered extensively with Mort Zuckerman on our Wall Street block party last week is that investors should often just focus on the individual stocks and not the broader market. And indeed, I still maintain that caution is king as we now clearly are seeing the down part of the economic cycle. But I still see a stock or three, especially in the technology sector, that I think look ripe to pop.
First off is Apple. To review, I maintain that Apple has been and remains a great long term investment, as I wrote here in 2003, and recently I’d recommended buying some puts ahead of the WWDC conference when the stock was in the 185 range and then I recommended taking the profits on that trade after the stock had fallen about 5% that day to open back up the long term investment exposure of the “core” Apple long position.
I’d get long some Apple calls, say $50 deep in the money and dated three months out right now. The 3G iPhone is going to sell off the shelves in Europe and around the world. It’s going to be even bigger than the hype currently surrounding it. Flip the “flip it” this time, eh?
I just spent the last five days running around Milan and the coast of Italy with a local. And everywhere I went, people had their iPod on. And I asked everyone, granted in a very non-scientific manner, what they thought of their soon-to-have-ability to buy the 3G iPhone…and everyone under the age of 30 was excited. Many have put off upgrading their phone for the last few months as they anticipated the new iPhone was soon to be rolled out in their country.
And Apple is indeed rolling this thing out all over the world. And the price point is so much cheaper than the comparable Nokia offering, which by the way, is awesome too — it’s just too expensive and not exactly “Apple”.
And that was another interesting point during these discussions about Apple. I asked everybody if most kids in Italy buy Windows or Apple…and most said “used to be Windows, but now only Apple.”
For years I was ridiculed when I used to write about the “halo effect” (here in 2005, for example) from the iPod when the iPod first rolled out by guys who said: Jobs was an idiot and could never turn Apple around or that MP3 players were too specialized to hit critical mass when phones have that ability anyway or that the iPod wasn’t a good product cuz it scratched too easily and so on. Guess what — the halo effect is still building. In Italy even.
The stock market and economy still likely have more downside to them as we unwind the credit bubble. But who cares? Find me some great stocks instead! I’ll mention another name or two on here in the next week or two (and you can also get some exclusive picks with more detailed fundamental analysis by signing up for The Cody Report newsletter).
June 23, 2008 4:40PM
By Cody Willard
1. C, GS, MS: Penny Stocks?
2. McCain’s $300 Million Battery Theft
3. Liars at Broadcom (and Apple) To Get Theirs
1. I used to wonder on this show all the time if the financials would eventually face the same fate the telecoms did after the tech bubble burst…Still wondering…
2. McCain says he wants to give $300 million in taxpayer money to anyone who creates a batter that leapfrogs current technology and $5000 to anybody who buys a car with no carbon emissions… I gotta tell you that a battery that saves people thousands of dollars a year on their gas bills is worth several orders of magnitude more than 300 million bucks.
3. Broadcom (BRCM) Co-Founder Henry Samueli pleaded guilty to lying to the SEC and therefore investors about option pay out packages for insiders and executives at Broadcom. People might thing that’s really bad news for former BroadCom CEO Henry Nicholas.. and it is… but it’s even worse news for those guys at Apple (AAPL) like Steve Jobs who still want to pretend that this backdating scam is already over. It’s Not.
PS. Click here to receive the latest edition of our monthly stock market newsletter, The Cody Report, and get exclusive access to this month’s four stock picks.
May 14, 2008 11:52PM
By Cody Willard
I just couldn’t get a post written today, as I brought Lobo into meet the team at Fox Business today. (I do think he was quite a hit, though I admit I am far less than objective about this new best friend of mine…)
After realizing we had a promo shoot before the show and then I agreed to do American Nightly Scoreboard (I stormed off the set in mock protest when the viewership voted 61% to sell my man Neil Diamond..David Asman does such an amazing job on all the shows he does, and, man, he does a lot of shows), I decided I couldn’t keep Lobo around all night while I was on set so I had to run him back home to Soho.
Back from an hour back Lobo-sprint, Cody-bikeride, a little bit of training, and I’m finally crashing from this day. But you guys seen this? You can keep track of the Big 3 here on The Cody Word in print now, on Happy Hour every day at 5 and 11pm on cable and also on YouTube. Here’s today’s Big 3, for example (don’t ask me why I can’t embed it here…I don’t have that ability despite all the advantages of now having this blog hosted by Fox). Like we’ve been talking about, the addressable audience for content is exploding as the costs of distributing that content collapse. Content is king indeed.
Here’s what I was doing when i was not being voted off Happy Hour Idol today:
1. They Can’t Stop the Downside
2. Bearish Signal: My Gut’s Bullish
3. Life Cycles Matter Too
1. Corporate spreads are at multi year highs meaning that capital remains and is getting ever more expensive out there. The government and Wall Street can try all the games they want but they can’t actually change the fact that the cycle has turned, and by the way, that cycle turning is okay, it’s called a cycle ’cause it turns. For crying out loud, you idiot bankers, politicians, and bureaucrats who keep trying to stop what you cannot. Let it be.
2. I don’t trade anymore, but looking at the blinking green lights on my quote screens today as stocks like Sandisk, Vm Ware, Akamai, danced 30, 40, or 50% above their recent highs, sure did make me miss it. My gut was turning. I’ve often noted how hard it is to measure sentiment, but I can guarantee you could measure that bullish sentiment in my own gut right now and that by the way makes me even more bearish. You gotta flip your own sentiment. Think about it, guys.
3. My dear friend, Steve MaKowski, the father of my high school sweet heart and dear friend Cecily and Candace Makowski, was laid to rest this week. I spent many a night for years with Steve and he was an important and positive influence on my life, which we all need. My prayers are with you and everyone in your family. I love you all.
Check it out on YouTube
May 5, 2008 2:47PM
By Cody Willard
Yahoo should just break itself up instead. This is a company that’s had no direction since Semel stupidly decided it wasn’t a tech company but should copy media company business models from last century.
And today Softee walks away from the Yahoo deal. I’d expected this deal to get done, as I figured Softee would raise its bid. Which they did. But Yang et al, the same geniuses who can’t seem to figure out what business they’re in want to keep the company going in its present direction. Uh, what direction again?. Media content ownership company? Search company? Ad network company? Whatever you say, Jerry.
I mean, remember when Yahoo, after missing like 72 quarters in a row or something a couple years ago promised a revolution with their Panama upgrade? What a joke that turned out that to be.
Now we read in the papers that Yang felt “emboldened” because some ad-serving technology tests with Google didn’t suck?
Throughout 2005 and 2006, as I held a large Google position in my fund, I often wrote about Yahoo as a short and sometimes paired that position with a Yahoo short position. It was usually a good trade as Yahoo fell consistently and Google rose consistently. I wouldn’t short Yahoo any more, as I do think there’s enough value in that brand and traffic and content that the stock can work higher from here.
Which brings us back to the idea of just breaking this company up. How about one split off is a media content company, with all the writers and video programs and other content ventures the company has stupidly hurt its credibility as a search engine with for all these years. See, if Yahoo Content sold out to News Corp (full disclosure: NWS owns my career and soul and all that), they could combine Yahoo Finance and tech and so much more under Dow Jones/WSJ and the music/social networking content could go to Myspace, etc.
Yahoo could spin off its ad-serving company, which about 20 different companies, from Microsoft to some old-school ad company might go after.
And then Yahoo could go back to being a search engine. One that doesn’t try to control your actions by keeping you surfing on their own property and reading their own content as much as they possibly can. One that respects the idea that its users want to find the most relevant, germane information/content/video/story etc when they type something into a search box. Not a search company that strives to get me to watch one of my old friend, Aaron Task’s, videos — much as he’s still my boy and I’ll always have his back as he had mine in a pick up game of hoops a few years ago when I got tackled on a breakaway dunk — simply because they own the rights to his content and they’ll get paid if I do watch him.
Conflicts of interest don’t work in the search world, as I’ve long argued as a reason to stick with Google since they do “get” this logic. (YouTube’s an issue and I think a strategic mistake for Google because they now have a vested interest in making me go to YouTube rather than some other video-site…)
At any rate, let’s summarize the trading ideas here. The MSFT calls I wrote about last week have mostly about doubled in price or more as the stock has run from $28 to nearly $30. I’d sell half which means you’re now playing with the house’s money (don’t let the term fool you, the house’s money matters every bit your P&L as any other money does, so don’t think it’s “free” money). I’d let the other half of the calls ride for now.
And I’d still stick with Google, but would want to have trimmed that position recently. And Yahoo? Eh, just stay away from those idiots.
Question: Do You Yahoo?
Answer: No.
April 29, 2008 12:35PM
By Cody Willard
Softee’s been getting killed of late as the weekend passed and everybody was shocked that Yahoo and Softee haven’t resolved anything yet.
MSFT’s down from almost 30% from its highs late last year, and down about 20% from its more recent highs. Meanwhile, earnings and revenues have been steadily growing faster than the street’s modeled and the report last week was another pretty darn good one. But it’s all about the Yahoo courtship right now. And that’s got the stock acting like punk.
You want to buy “punk”. Later you can sell “rock” if the stock does indeed rock. Vista’s been a disappoint in many ways and Apple’s going to continue to kill Microsoft among consumers. Eventually, Apple might finally break into some enterprise market share, but they’ll never have much more than 2 or 3% in business computer market share — at least for another decade or so. There’s also Zune of course — as if that matters to the stock or the company. Xbox is indeed an important franchise and it is Microsoft’s own Trojan Horse in the living room / to stay relevant to the consumer.
Xbox kids are going to be increasingly watching movies, shows, talking and playing on the XBox networks over the next few years. And it’ll be very profitable for Softee along the way. Content and content distribution models come with high margins, as evidenced by media companies and cable/telco models. Xbox is as important to the future of Softee as search is.
At any rate, I think Softee’s a good trade to the long side here around $28. I might use a little bit of common stock, but I’d also look at using some slightly-in or slightly-out of the money calls dated a couple months out. Say the August 27.50s or September 30s or something.
To be clear, I’m not saying MSFT’s a great stock to buy and load up on here…as for example I’d been saying when I’d pounded the table on Softee back in summer of 06 when it was in the low $20s, I used a lot of common and long-dated as well as short-dated calls and I even shorted some puts (which means I borrowed some MSFT put options and sold them for market price. As the stock went up, the puts became worthless and I pocketed the money from the sell as gains for the P&L, see?). I wouldn’t advocate that approach now at all.
I’d probably just put a little bit of capital into some calls.
April 25, 2008 11:59AM
By Cody Willard
I miss writing for the FT, and was happy when I knew I’d get to see some of the people there at the fifth annual “Meet the FT” party. It was a great set up — at the top of 30 Rock. As I walked in with my Jedi Master, James Altucher, we passed NBC Universal CEO, Jeffrey Zucker, coming out of the building. I got a kick out of telling James that Zucker had eyed me as we passed because he knew who I was. LOL
But the whole evening did feel rather surreal. I mean, I already do TV for a living, and I’ve been dealing with the idea that I now live in four realities in which I have to somewhat keep track of what I’ve done where, when, and how.
That is, I have my real life. My on TV life. My off-air, but still wired up and being heard by dozens of people whom I don’t know life. And my writing life.
Is that four? I’ve lost track. And I’ve lost track partly because taking a car service to go to a party for the FT at the top of 30 Rock, where I remember seeing my first NYC-celeb sighting as Billy Crystal came out of 30 Rock during my first week working at Oppenheimer back in 1996, was indeed rather surreal.
And I’m always still feeling a bit out of place in the city — any city — because I really did spend my whole life in the country, far far away from apartment buildings and subways and skyscrapers. Further, it’s a trip hanging with all these incredibly powerful, smart, and successful businesspeople and media people. I turned to a friend of mine who used to run PR at FT (that’s exactly my point, btw — How and when did I end up in a place of calling someone who runs PR at FT a “friend” of mine!) and said, “How the heck have I gotten here?”
And that’s just about the time one of me got asked, “How you doing on the show, Cody?”… and the writer/real-life Codies tried to answer for that TV life Cody in as honest a way as I could. And now I see one of (all of???) the Codies’ names in headlines all of the blogosphere. And this writing life Cody now asks, “How the heck have I gotten here?!”
Cody Willard: “I Don’t Have Any Idea What I’m Doing” Huffington Post | Rachel Sklar | April 24, 2008 02:32 PM
And I’m now Catholic? When did that happen:
Apr 24 2008 2:05PM EDT
Maybe I’ve been thinking this line of thinking about my life (lives) lately because UNM had asked me to come home and talk about what it took for a naive, native New Mexico kid to survive a dozen years in NYC. After the FT event, I’d been bumming that I’d forgotten my Flip Camera to record some of the night for the upcoming music video I’m making off the song I wrote as I wrote that speech for UNM about dreaming big and never letting go (name of song, coincidentally enough: Dream Big and Never Let It Go)…
But seeing this headline and layout…pretty much made my week. There’s even a picture of the Empire State Building in the background…I’m just gonna record some footage of the site itself and that Cody guy’s name in the headline.
You do gotta love it, no? Right, Cody? Cody? Any of you?
PS. Had more than one strangely competitive conversations with execs and producers from that competing biz network at the event too. Is this actually my life? I mean, these are actually my lives. How the heck did I get here?
April 15, 2008 11:56AM
By Cody Willard
The mass of men love to look at Intel as a bellwether for the broader tech economy. Certainly, as Intel and Microsoft have created the platform on which 97% of the world’s computers run on and the company has grown from nothing to doing nearly $40 billion at about 60% gross margins, it’s clear that as goes Intel, so goes the computing world.But the computing world’s importance in tech has waned as the Internet age and the iPod/Crackberry age have gained importance. It might be better in this day and age to look at other suppliers into the tech world, that have a broader customer base…
And one good one in that regard is little ol’ Avnet. This company, which ain’t so little given that it does almost $16 billion in sales a year, distributes electronic components and all the little things that go into all the little (and big) electronic gadgets around the world. (Btw, the company sells that $16 billion of stuff at only about 15% gross margins — proprietary technologies like Intel’s are key to margins and since there’s nothing proprietary in commodities, that’s why commodities are never a good long term investment…yes, including oil, wheat, contract manufacturing, bookkeeping, etc.)
Avnet’s report was ugly as the company missed the top and bottom line and says the distribution business is finding rather soft demand across most the world.
Not that anybody should be shocked that demand is soft in this economy right now, and again, these stocks and these markets have already been crushed. Avnet’s down big today, so you can’t say it’s ALL priced in…but certainly Avnet could have been down a lot bigger today than just the 10% it is down.
Stay bullish, but this certainly still isn’t the time to be thinking about being levered up or aggressively long as it sometimes was when stocks would get crushed during the last handful of years even as the fundamentals were steadily improving.
Avnet’s ugly fundies are certainly not “steadily improving” right now. And guessing what’s priced in is certainly not for the faint of heart. There’s a time and place for everything. This ain’t the time and place to be betting the farm, even if you are, like me, expecting higher highs over the next few weeks and perhaps months.
PS. I’ll be giving some real-time earnings and trading analysis on Intel and Seagate on Happy Hour tonight, and Gogo and I will be joined by Minyanville.com’s Kevin Depew to preview the rest of the week’s earnings too.
April 14, 2008 11:36PM
By Cody Willard
People tell us that we play too loud
But they don’t know what our music’s about
We never listen to the record company man
They try to change us and ruin our band.
That’s why we don’t wanna be good
That’s why we don’t wanna be good
We’re prisoners of rock and roll.
When were jammin’ in our old garage
The girls come over and it sure gets hot
We don’t wanna be watered down
Takin’ orders from record company clowns.
That’s why we don’t wanna be good
That’s why we don’t wanna be good
We’re prisoners of rock and roll.
We’re prisoners of rock and roll. - Neil Young
CodyWillard.com is, alas, becoming cody.blogs.foxbusiness.com.
Am I just a classic sell out at this point? I have to wonder exactly that if I can flatter myself for a minute, don’t I, as the move is made…
The whole of my blog, starting with TheCodyBlog.com to my Trading Diary on TheStreet.com or even the original TelEconomist.com days, is something which frankly I’ve come to associate my self-identity with, at least in some part. And it is now fully engulfed by a mainstream media outlet… The Man. Hmm.
At any rate, rest assured that there will be absolutely no change in the the thrust of the content and what I write and say around here. I’ll not pull any punches — none that I’d not pull on my own anyway at least, you know. I’ll still write in exactly the same voice, calling it exactly as I see it, Flipping It as best as I can (though I suppose being as fully part of a mainstream media company, a giant conglomerate makes my trying to Flip It [Flipping It - a term I’ve trademarked and defined as doing or thinking exactly opposite conventional wisdom] a bit more challenging by definition, doesn’t it?) and basically being exactly who I’ve always been as best as I can.
I’ll post lots of stock, economic, and societal analysis and commentary, lots of music, personal stories and home videos and photologs and whatever else I want, whenever I want, however I want…as long as the technology’s supported and all that, which, come to think of it, means one change to the blog will be that I won’t be able to embed videos any more until FoxBusiness.com chooses to greenlight that ability. Sigh, the control starts even as I say it won’t, doesn’t it?
Well, at least they can’t stop me from writing that the control starts, can they?
We’re Prisoners of Rock n Roll, but let’s keep on rockin’ in the free world, eh?
Yes, ironically, you’ll have to click on the link below since I can’t embed the video since I’ve sold out and now don’t have the control I did if you want to scream with the Godfather of Grunge himself.
All that said, as far as my media career is concerned, you guys do realize I started off with a telecom stock website called TelEconomist.com and got a break from Jim Cramer and TheStreet.com by responding to one of his columns back in 2000 and now, yes, my blog is moving to Fox? I am pretty proud of that too, you see!
See you on the other side then.
April 14, 2008 8:32PM
By Cody Willard
People tell us that we play too loud
But they don’t know what our music’s about
We never listen to the record company man
They try to change us and ruin our band.
That’s why we don’t wanna be good
That’s why we don’t wanna be good
We’re prisoners of rock and roll.
When were jammin’ in our old garage
The girls come over and it sure gets hot
We don’t wanna be watered down
Takin’ orders from record company clowns.
That’s why we don’t wanna be good
That’s why we don’t wanna be good
We’re prisoners of rock and roll.
We’re prisoners of rock and roll. - Neil Young
CodyWillard.com is, alas, becoming cody.blogs.foxbusiness.com.
Am I just a classic sell out at this point? I have to wonder exactly that if I can flatter myself for a minute, don’t I, as the move is made…
The whole of my blog, starting with TheCodyBlog.com or even the original TelEconomist.com days, is something which frankly I’ve come to associate my self-identity with, at least in some part. And it is now fully engulfed by a mainstream media outlet… The Man. Hmm.At any rate, rest assured that there will be absolutely no change in the the thrust of the content and what I write and say around here. I’ll not pull any punches — none that I’d not pull on my own anyway at least, you know. I’ll still write in exactly the same voice, calling it exactly as I see it, Flipping It as best as I can (though I suppose being as fully part of a mainstream media company, a giant conglomerate makes my trying to Flip It [Flipping It - a term I've trademarked and defined as doing or thinking exactly opposite conventional wisdom] a bit more challenging by definition, doesn’t it?) and basically being exactly who I’ve always been as best as I can.
I’ll post lots of stock, economic, and societal analysis and commentary, lots of music, personal stories and home videos and photologs and whatever else I want, whenever I want, however I want…as long as the technology’s supported and all that, which, come to think of it, means one change to the blog will be that I won’t be able to embed videos any more until FoxBusiness.com chooses to greenlight that ability. Sigh, the control starts even as I say it won’t, doesn’t it?
Well, at least they can’t stop me from writing that the control starts, can they?
We’re Prisoners of Rock n Roll, but let’s keep on rockin’ in the free world, eh?
Yes, ironically, you’ll have to click on the link below since I can’t embed the video since I’ve sold out and now don’t have the control I did if you want to scream with the Godfather of Grunge himself.
All that said, as far as my media career is concerned, you guys do realize I started off with a telecom stock website called TelEconomist.com and got a break from Jim Cramer and TheStreet.com by responding to one of his columns back in 2000 and now, yes, my blog is moving to Fox? I am pretty proud of that too, you see!
See you on the other side then.
April 7, 2008 2:16PM
By Cody Willard
We have the following guests booked for this evening:
-John Huddy
-Lama Pema, Monk
-Dan Mchugh, VP of Budweiser & Bud Light
-Don Peebles, Peebles Corp. Chairman & CEO
-Bruce Vincent, Swift Energy President
-Steve Grasso, Stuart Frankel
-Kirsten Haglund, Miss America
-Tiernan Ray,Barron’s
Join Cody and Rebecca Gomez for a live Happy Hour at the Bull and Bear at 5:00–or at 5:00 and 11:00pm on FB
Click HERE to find out where you can See Happy Hour where you live.
Or if you are some of the lucky few who hail from NYC
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Time Warner, Channel 28 |
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Time Warner, Channel 43 |
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Verizon, Channel 94 |
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Comcast, Channel 106 |
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RCN Corp, Channel 194 |
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AT&T, Channel 211 |
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