A Fool Looks Back

By Rick Aristotle Munarriz | More Articles
November 19, 2011 | Comments (1)

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Some beats bring on beatings.

Cloud-computing pioneer salesforce.com (NYSE: CRM ) came through with a better-than-expected adjusted quarterly profit on Thursday night, but that was quickly forgotten after the investors keyed in on uninspiring billings and fears of a near-term slowdown.

Enterprise software is obviously susceptible to the whims of corporate spending, but salesforce.com has been an all-weather grower in the past. Companies continue to switch to its more cost-effective sever-stored solutions over traditional enterprise programs.

Did the stock take a hit on Friday morning because one of the few recessionary heroes is proving mortal? It's certainly possible, but salesforce.com is in fact still growing at a heady clip. Its guidance also points to future growth. It seems that salesforce.com's hit on the earnings news is more related to the stock's lofty valuation than to material weakness.

That won't come as a relief to shareholders, but it will be welcome news to those who keep tabs on salesforce.com as a bellwether for corporate spending on tech.

Briefly in the news
And now let's take a quick look at some of the other stories that shaped our week.

Youku.com (NYSE: YOKU ) took a hit after the leading Chinese video-streaming website posted a wider-than-expected deficit. It's at this point where the director yells out "cut!"
French conglomerate Vivendi sold a chunk of its majority stake in Activision Blizzard (Nasdaq: ATVI ) , reducing its stake from 63% to 60%. Isn't this the same Vivendi that bought EMI's music label for $1.9 billion a week earlier? Get your priorities in order, Vivendi.
Lazard Capital upgraded shares of Sirius XM Radio (Nasdaq: SIRI ) to "buy" and set a price target of $2.25. I think a certain analyst wants a Sirius XM 2.0 receiver for Christmas.
Rambus (Nasdaq: RMBS ) shares were creamed after coming up short in the courtroom in a drawn-out legal battle. Sometimes, intellectual property really smarts.

Until next week, I remain,

Rick Munarriz

The Steve Jobs Betrayal
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The Motley Fool owns shares of and has written calls on Activision Blizzard. Motley Fool newsletter services have recommended buying shares of salesforce.com and Activision Blizzard, creating a synthetic long position in Activision Blizzard, and shorting Salesforce.com. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz calls them as he sees them. He owns no shares in any of the stocks in this story and is also part of the Rule Breakers newsletter research team, seeking out tomorrow's ultimate growth stocks a day early. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

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Report this Comment On November 19, 2011, at 11:01 AM, duze54 wrote:

Rick isn't a SIRI investor?, the upgrade analyst may want a 2.0 radio. I just signed on from a qtrly talk only to the all access 1 yr. (Internet,phone,auto radio) and loving the extra channels. Will never go back to reg. radio again!!
Prefer the talk over the music, but wife loves the music and no commercials (70's=#1 for her). She has marked 3 good channels-I even like.
# of outstanding shares and debt hold this one back. Since the merger FCF has grown dramatically and it will take care of those two issues over time! From here I predict this is a triple to a four-bagger within six years. Duze54
PS:Long since $1.16, ave=1.58 for all my shares.

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