The following video is part of our "Motley Fool Conversations" series, in which senior technology analyst Eric Bleeker and consumer goods editor and analyst Austin Smith discuss topics across the investing world.
Having previously looked at three reasons each to buy and sell Hewlett-Packard, Eric makes the final call on whether the stock is a buy, sell, or hold. In the end, Eric feels that HP's cheap valuation -- four times operating profits! -- can't make up for challenges coming down the pike. Eric believes HP is a sell and that Meg Whitman's lofty ambitions of capturing more opportunities in the cloud, security, and information management are coming at too large of a disadvantage to peers. HP blew much of its financial firepower on a misplaced Autonomy bet and has few options for gaining the kind of traction to push its services into higher-value categories. In the end, Eric feels as if investors are still better served in the long term by buying actual leaders like IBM or EMC.
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