Welcome to week 25 of my stock-picking throwdown with Mr. Market. Let's get right to the numbers:
Company |
Starting Price* |
Recent Price |
Total Return |
---|---|---|---|
Akamai |
$22.23 |
$13.48 |
(39.4%) |
Harris & Harris |
$6.22 |
$3.58 |
(42.4%) |
IBM |
$128.33** |
$92.51 |
(27.9%) |
Oracle |
$22.75 |
$17.59 |
(22.7%) |
Taiwan Semiconductor |
$10.34 |
$7.68 |
(25.7%) |
AVERAGE RETURN |
-- |
-- |
(31.62%) |
S&P 500 SPDR |
$125.26** |
$84.55 |
(32.5%) |
DIFFERENCE |
-- |
-- |
0.88% |
Source: Yahoo! Finance.
* Tracking began on Aug. 7, 2008.
** Adjusted for dividends and other returns of capital.
Once again, I'm back on top -- by 88 basis points this time. A nervous Mr. Market can't break these balance sheet bullies.
The week in tech
Several of the top techies are flush. Apple
Yet now isn't the time to become complacent. With netbooks on the march, COO Tim Cook needs to keep Apple's legendary innovation machine in perpetual motion. Most of you believe that he will. I hope you're right.
Netflix
Sun Microsystems
The only remedies for times like these are prudence in picking stocks -- stick with the very best -- and patience in waiting for gains. That's how Motley Fool co-founder David Gardner produced a decade of 20% returns in the real-money Rule Breaker portfolio. The "simpleton portfolio" of his brother and Fool co-founder, Tom Gardner, was also a 10-year winner. With these five tech stocks, I believe that I will achieve similar success.
Checkup time!
Now, let's move onto the rest of today's update:
- Apple has hired Limelight Networks to backstop Akamai for software downloads. The deal may not be as bad as investors think, but we won't know for sure until Akamai reports fourth-quarter and full-year earnings Wednesday.
- IBM finally settled its tete-a-tete with Apple over its hiring of Mark Papermaster to lead development of new iPod and iPhone hardware. Can a breakthrough mobile chip architecture be far behind?
- Oracle peer SAP this week cut 3,000 jobs, boosting the stock of the German software giant by more than 6%. CAPS investors still prefer the database king, however.
There's your checkup. See you back here next week for more tech stock talk.
Get your clicks with more techie Foolishness:
- Has the iPhone inoculated AT&T from recession fever?
- Seagate, in transition, insists that it'll get its innovation mojo back.
- Say goodbye to the bandwidth cheaters.