OT - ALU I'm in the process of doubling my stake in ALU
@$3.67 when it finishes filling, and making it my largest position.
(Who is the guy that's buying 5 shares at a time of a $3.67 stock,
lol?) Not that my stake is that large, but certainly in
'accumulate' mode.) Ah- there we go - filled in full. I
believe lt cap's assessment (thanks) that it's a long term play,
and with inherent risk, and concommitant potential rewards, seems
right.
I'm hopeful that perhaps the results might stir up some positive
analyst comments. The number that have upped their rating in the
last month or so is encouraging. My guess is that the results were
not good enough to put pressure on NOK to sweeten the offer, but I
hope I'm wrong. Their North American weakness, their biggest market
is not welcome news.
I do have a 'beginner's' question: What is the synergy between
ALU and NOK. Perhaps I've misunderstood, but NOK is primarily a
cell phone maker, and ALU a network hardware/software network
equipment company. North Amercia is ALU's biggest market - while
admittedly their business is, if I understand it, network hardware
rather than phones, for cells NA is a saturated
market with the game now being stealing market share among telcos
rather than significant growth. And the telcos have been
consistently stingy with capex - altho with Google talking about
internet speeds of 1T/sec to be a future standard, build-out has to
happen eventually, I would think. Hand sets for developing
countries has a lot of growth, but the margins can't be too
lucrative. Seems to me that being a cell phone maker is a tought
sector, with lots of competition.
But the synergy of the partnership is unclear to me.
Although the Nokia/MSFT Windows phone partnership was based on a
different synergy (MSFT just announced a new line of Window's
phones - aka 'PRE-phones' (Phones Rejected by Ethiopians - don't
they ever learn?), that one doesn't seem to have worked out too
well.
If anyone can enlighten the topic, TIA. My understanding of a
NOK/ALU marriage may have missed something.