Intel (INTC)

Not a fan. Haven’t been able to make it clear exactly what they are trying to do. Some years their targets are gross margins, and other years it’s ROI. Thinks they are betwixt and between. Regardless of what guidance they give on capital expenditures, they are going to spend more.

He watches semiconductor stocks as a bellwether for the market. This consolidated between $38 and $33 from September until September. Then it broke out and went to $40, traded sideways for 8-9 days, and is breaking out again today. He is a big bull on the semiconductor cycle for the Internet of things. This is a really attractive company, and is talking about splitting itself sometime.

An old tech company, and hopefully they can get things together. This has huge value. It closed at $39.76, and his model price is $61.56, a 54% upside, just on their current earnings. Dividend yield of 2.7%. (Analysts’ price target is $41.)

A company in transition. They did very, very well on the back of the desktop. As desktops became more pervasive, the stock ran up, but the world moved to a more mobile environment, and their ability to take a portion of that revenue has slowed. Great balance sheet and great story, but it is going to go through a transition into an environment where its chips aren’t as expensive. The longer-term story is of much smaller growth. He is a net seller of the semi space at this point. He would suggest Analog Devices (ADI-Q), on a market pullback.

Pays a pretty attractive yield. Has a lot of cash. Transitioning from their PC related end markets to higher growth markets. Semiconductors generally have done quite well. With improving economies, it is probably a relatively safe holding. Dividend yield of about 2.7%.

It has strong seasonality from now until the first week in January. It has already established an upward trend. There is a very good chance it will break out.

They made an interesting announcement that they have a new chip coming out that will be not only faster than existing chips, but a quantum faster. He thought chips reached their limit. INTC-Q will no longer be viewed as a commodity manufacturer. They have surpassed their competitors. He expects them to gain increased market share. It has a cheap PE.

He has a model price of $57.88 representing an upside of 60%. Dividend yield of 3%. (Analysts price target is $40.)

Seasonally, technology stocks are a little soft over the summer, and this tends to be the time where they peak out. The chart shows a big lid at around $38. It needs to blow through that in order to be attractive, and at this point it hasn’t happened. Because we are in the worst part of the season for Tech stocks, he would delay on buying this.

This was very, very good when PCs were the main thing. There was a transition to mobile devices and the business turned down. They are about to move to the mobile environment. This is a story that is going through a transition. A solid balance sheet and there is a definite upside opportunity, but he struggles to see how we can gain significantly here. You are at risk of a cyclical decline in the semi market, so he would probably be selling.

The largest chip manufacturer. A good part of their business is declining from traditional PC chips. Their latest acquisition will be positive in the long run. It is a company that makes chips for the autonomous cars. The company uses a good deal of their cash hoard, but they remain in good shape financially and pay a good dividend. He wouldn’t want to bet against this company.

An indispensable company in the world technological echo system. They have chips everywhere. However, it is competing in a very, very competitive industry, in which chips have become commoditized. He prefers some of the broader software/hardware companies such as Apple, Alphabet and Microsoft.

It does not have a long term solid uptrend, so you have to trade this. Typically they are good until the spring. He would get out.

Just acquired Mobileye, which is all about autonomous vehicles. It’s a big gulp, but it is the only way they are going to survive. They can’t sell chips into laptops and standalone computers any more. This is really the direction they want to go. There is lots of competition. He doesn’t want to own this, because free cash flow has been falling. There is nothing wrong with the quality, it’s just way down on his list.

This is in a very awkward situation. They missed the boat on smart phones and those areas. ARM is a company that has done incredibly well. Even Microsoft recently announced that they may be using ARM in some of their products. Thinks this will continue. You are not going to see the growth that they had many, many years ago.