Continue reading Closing Bell: Sentiment shifts to 'show me!' (AMGN, BBY, MTXX, NWS, RIMM)

Closing Bell: Sentiment shifts to 'show me!' (AMGN, BBY, MTXX, NWS, RIMM) originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Analyst Douglas Harned of Sanford C. Bernstein chopped his price targets on several defense stocks today, including Lockheed Martin Corp. (NYSE: LMT). "Trends in the defense budget remain the most important driver of defense stocks, and the cash flow outlook is strong for the defense businesses," said Harned in a note to clients.

Harned cut LMT's price target from $104 to $96, but he reiterated an "outperform" rating on the stock. Lockheed Martin remains the analyst's top pick in the defense sector, thanks to its strong overall growth potential and support from its F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program. Despite his forecast for a reduction in supplemental defense budgets, Harned expects the F-35 program will remain fully funded.

Continue reading Lockheed Martin hit with price-target cut on defense budget concerns

Lockheed Martin hit with price-target cut on defense budget concerns originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 16 Mar 2009 11:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Time Warner's stock up thanks to two analyst upgrades originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 25 Sep 2006 10:17:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Yesterday I liveblogged the speech given by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer at the Sanford C. Bernstein Strategic Decisions Conference, and if you read that, you already know: Microsoft is planning to keep investing significant dollars in operating expense, despite the shock-and-awe felt by the Street.

But now that the transcript's available on Microsoft's web site, I'd like to point you to a couple of Ballmer's justifications for this expense. He says that it's important to be on the front end of innovation (not exactly the place Microsoft's been known to be these last several years) and that the hardest decision was, what to invest in? "   When I first talked to Bill Gates about this and some of our other senior technology guys, Ray Ozzie, they came back with a list of, I don't know, 70 things. I said, Bill, you can't have a list of 70 things. He said, but there's 70 things, Steve. And I said, you've got to pare it down. He said, no ... with an R&D budget that's going to come on $7 billion, we could probably afford to do 60 or 70 different things."

What are those 70 things, though? The one thing he talked about most: obliterating paper. You heard me right. Steve Ballmer told the investors gathered at his talk, "I look in this audience, and I see a lot of paper and pencil. Ten years from now, I won't see paper and pencil if we in the hardware industry do our jobs right. Pencil and paper will be replaced by superior technology that is digital." If he has anything to do with it, it will be Microsoft that profits from the death of paper and pencil.

MSFT says the heck with paper: Steve Ballmer Bernstein speech transcript originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 01 Jun 2006 13:26:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.