That’s Inspiring!
Not! Although tech bellwether Cisco
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views of a fraction of a cent, its assessment of any pick-up in its
networking-gear business was hardly inspiring. About the best that CEO John
Chambers could say in the conference call was orders from big businesses met
projections and that those orders might be a sign the skid in its revenue and
business may be “leveling off.”
Revenues at Cisco were down 25% and the company forecast
sales to continue sliding. Shares of the big-cap technology stock are down 4%,
and setting the tone for a down day on Wall Street.
The Nasdaq is down 14.71 at 2013.08, the Dow is down 27
at 10,431, and the S&P 500 is off 3.96 at 1200.58.
In the last quarterly earnings season, Cisco
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said its start-up telecom business had lost 3000 customers to just 150, a 95%
reduction. The North American Telecom index
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20% since its May swing highs and the washout from the burst Internet and
broadband bubble could have lasting effect. Notably, fiber optic network
and component stocks remain in the dumps and continue to go out of business.
One question to ask is how good is Cisco’s intelligence?
They should have had information about the demise of the “upstart
telecoms” far in advance of the previous quarter, given their superior
information available through sales and marketing channels. So caution about
their predictions on the turnaround in the economy and business in Europe in the
next six or so months should be taken.
In the sectors, retail
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products
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semiconductors
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each.
Even stocks that showed rather excellent earnings results
are not getting a warm reception. Barr Labs
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predictions by a penny, but that was a 130% jump on 25% greater sales, its best
performance in eight quarters. And Americredit
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expectations by two cents on 65% greater revenue. That was a 76% increase in
earnings. Both stocks are up less than 2%. Now that’s inspiring!