GigaOM

A bounce in technology stocks, at this point, is inevitable. With the S&P’s tech sector down 10 percent so far this year — and a bearish-looking 20 percent since last summer — it’s just a matter of time before the sellers get tired and others step in to buy, if only for short-term gains.

That leaves two questions: The first is when will the bounce come? And more importantly, what happens then? Is it the proverbial dead cat? Or is it a chance to get in on a sure-fire recovery now that the worst is past? Without a doubt, there’s as much uncertainty now as there has been in a while, and an absence of indicators tends to make us read the worst into the vague gloom. Further, there’s plenty of gloom to read into. Continue »

Every holiday season, it’s the same thing: Numbers showing retail sales are disappointing, data showing retail sales are strong, analysts are chasing their tails trying to explain why, and through it all we consumers just keep on buying.

So the fact that this scenario is playing itself out again this year comes as no surprise. What is a little surprising, however, is how much the gap has widened between the haves and the have-nots of the retail sector. This is especially true for stores that cater to gadget fanatics, and the extent of that gap was revealed in recent weeks, when three major electronic retailers reported three very different sets of quarterly numbers: Circuit City, Best Buy and GameStop.

Below is a graph charting the performance of all three companies’ shares in 2007. As you’ll see, the most recent financial results reported by these companies only served to validate the values the market was willing to place on their respective stocks. Continue »

The good news for Palm is that it met its second-quarter numbers Tuesday afternoon. OK, it met the estimates it made only a couple of weeks ago, which were substantially lower than its earlier guidance. That revision sent Palm’s stock tumbling 19 percent in less than a day. So the good news is really just that things didn’t get worse.

Except for one thing: According to Palm, things are getting worse.

Continue »

It was starting to look like the merger that time forgot. For months, there had been chatter about a possible corporate coupling between XM Satellite Radio (XMSR) and Sirius Satellite Radio (SIRI). The discussion reached a fevered pitch in February, when it became clear that both companies were in favor of a deal — not technically a merger, per se, but the acquisition of XM by Sirius for some $5 billion: Would it be a monopoly? Would it force FM radio to be more tolerable? Would the FCC tolerate it? Continue »

When does stock research go from being a helpful insight to the irresponsible equivalent of shouting “Fire!” in a crowded theater? People owning shares in E-Trade are probably wondering that today.

E-Trade (ETFC) has not exactly been a darling of the stock market lately. Its shares had fallen to close below $9 at the end of last week from $23 just four months ago amid news that its mortgage business was getting battered by the subprime mess. (Ironically, E-Trade branched into that business, via its 2001 purchase of LoansDirect, as a hedge against a brutal bear market.)

After Friday’s market closed, E-Trade warned of steeper writedowns this quarter, said earnings wouldn’t meet its previous guidance (while refusing to offer new guidance) and disclosed an SEC investigation into the firm. Continue »

Maybe one of the smarter moves of the Terry Semel era was for Yahoo to give up on its China operations, settling instead for a substantial chunk of a native startup, Alibaba. That decision has powered Yahoo’s stock to a level that was barely imaginable a month ago - and it may send it even higher.

Yahoo’s shares suddenly surged Friday afternoon to its highest level in 20 months on news that everyone has known for some time: It own’s a 40% stake in Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, and Alibaba is going public in Hong Kong with a valuation of at least $8.8 billion. Continue »