Ralph
11.01.2001, 23:33
Rambus Misses Estimates
By Caroline Humer
Senior Writer
1/11/01 5:06 PM ET
Chip designer Rambus (RMBS:Nasdaq - news) said Thursday that fiscal first-quarter earnings were 12 cents a share, slightly below analysts' expectations.
Rambus was expected to post earnings per share of 13 cents, up from 9 cents a share in the previous quarter and up from 2 cents a share in the year-ago quarter, based on a consensus of three analysts, according to First Call/Thomson Financial.
Rambus also said that revenue was $34.7 million, near the expected $35 million, based on one analyst estimate. That compares with revenue of $26.9 million in the fiscal fourth quarter and $11.9 million a year ago.
The company said an increasing part of its revenue is from royalties on SDRAM-compatible chips and that the price decrease for SDRAM in the December quarter makes it unlikely that royalty revenue in the March quarter will increase. And the company said it expects other cost increases. Rambus' shares, which gained $2.72 prior to the earnings release to close the day at $48.91, were down sharply in after-hours trading on Island to $41.35.
Rambus announced its results on a day when Wall Street sell-side analysts were becoming increasingly negative on the semiconductor sector, dropping their earnings estimates on companies from Texas Instruments (TI:NYSE - news) to Intel (INTC:Nasdaq - news) to Altera (ALTR:Nasdaq - news). Semiconductor stocks have already been beaten down during the past four months because of concerns about inventories building and slowing demand for personal computers. Now it's becoming clear that inventory will take at least six months to work off, and that a looming recession could hurt demand for the consumer products that use chips.
For instance, Lehman Brothers analyst Dan Niles said in a note that in the current environment of Fed rate cuts (the Fed eased the Federal Funds rate by half a percentage point last week), Lehman's advice remains to sell when chip stocks rally. "In fact, the recent data points we are picking up, such as end demand falling, inventory levels rising, and book-to-bills cratering make us more negative on the fundamentals than before," Niles wrote.
Rambus, a Mountain View, Calif., company, designs chips that are used by chipmakers like Intel to speed up software applications. The Sony PlayStation 2, for instance, uses Rambus-designed chips (called RDRAM), and Intel uses Rambus-designed chips in conjunction with its recently released Pentium 4 chips.
Rambus shares have fallen far from its high of $135 on June 22 as the industry has slowly warmed to its designs. During 2000, the stock fell 46% but so far this year is up 28%.
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Anmerk.: Dan Niles ist einer der Analysten, die auch mal die Linien verbinden, um ein Gesamtbild zu bekommen (etwas was viele heute bei den PC-Aktien nicht gemacht haben) ! .... er warnte schon vor langem vor Intel (wie das geendet hat wissen wir) ....Semiconductors sind im Moment NUR Trading-Werte .... eine wirtschaftliche Erholung des Sektors ist noch lange nicht in Sicht (ich persönlich erwarte da erst Mitte/Ende 2002 wiederbelebende Ereignisse) und es ist viel zu früh m.E. hier eine Erholung einzupreisen !
Ralph
<font size=1>[Dieser Beitrag wurde von Ralph am 11.01.2001 editiert.]</font>
By Caroline Humer
Senior Writer
1/11/01 5:06 PM ET
Chip designer Rambus (RMBS:Nasdaq - news) said Thursday that fiscal first-quarter earnings were 12 cents a share, slightly below analysts' expectations.
Rambus was expected to post earnings per share of 13 cents, up from 9 cents a share in the previous quarter and up from 2 cents a share in the year-ago quarter, based on a consensus of three analysts, according to First Call/Thomson Financial.
Rambus also said that revenue was $34.7 million, near the expected $35 million, based on one analyst estimate. That compares with revenue of $26.9 million in the fiscal fourth quarter and $11.9 million a year ago.
The company said an increasing part of its revenue is from royalties on SDRAM-compatible chips and that the price decrease for SDRAM in the December quarter makes it unlikely that royalty revenue in the March quarter will increase. And the company said it expects other cost increases. Rambus' shares, which gained $2.72 prior to the earnings release to close the day at $48.91, were down sharply in after-hours trading on Island to $41.35.
Rambus announced its results on a day when Wall Street sell-side analysts were becoming increasingly negative on the semiconductor sector, dropping their earnings estimates on companies from Texas Instruments (TI:NYSE - news) to Intel (INTC:Nasdaq - news) to Altera (ALTR:Nasdaq - news). Semiconductor stocks have already been beaten down during the past four months because of concerns about inventories building and slowing demand for personal computers. Now it's becoming clear that inventory will take at least six months to work off, and that a looming recession could hurt demand for the consumer products that use chips.
For instance, Lehman Brothers analyst Dan Niles said in a note that in the current environment of Fed rate cuts (the Fed eased the Federal Funds rate by half a percentage point last week), Lehman's advice remains to sell when chip stocks rally. "In fact, the recent data points we are picking up, such as end demand falling, inventory levels rising, and book-to-bills cratering make us more negative on the fundamentals than before," Niles wrote.
Rambus, a Mountain View, Calif., company, designs chips that are used by chipmakers like Intel to speed up software applications. The Sony PlayStation 2, for instance, uses Rambus-designed chips (called RDRAM), and Intel uses Rambus-designed chips in conjunction with its recently released Pentium 4 chips.
Rambus shares have fallen far from its high of $135 on June 22 as the industry has slowly warmed to its designs. During 2000, the stock fell 46% but so far this year is up 28%.
***********************************************************
Anmerk.: Dan Niles ist einer der Analysten, die auch mal die Linien verbinden, um ein Gesamtbild zu bekommen (etwas was viele heute bei den PC-Aktien nicht gemacht haben) ! .... er warnte schon vor langem vor Intel (wie das geendet hat wissen wir) ....Semiconductors sind im Moment NUR Trading-Werte .... eine wirtschaftliche Erholung des Sektors ist noch lange nicht in Sicht (ich persönlich erwarte da erst Mitte/Ende 2002 wiederbelebende Ereignisse) und es ist viel zu früh m.E. hier eine Erholung einzupreisen !
Ralph
<font size=1>[Dieser Beitrag wurde von Ralph am 11.01.2001 editiert.]</font>