A CEO Doing What’s In The Best Interest of Shareholders

Love or hate Jim Cramer, he’s not shy about the what he feels.

 

Last night, Cramer announced on CNBC:  "If Terry Semel (CEO of Yahoo) quit right now, YHOO would pop $5."  (About $7 billion in shareholder value at last night’s prices.)

 

Love or hate Terry Semel, that’s a pretty damning statement.

 

Certainly redefines the meaning of a CEO doing what’s in the best interest of shareholders.

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Google Will Be A $32 Billion Company in 2011

Interesting report from Piper Jaffray today (as reported by bizjournals.com) stating that online advertising will be $81 billion by 2011.

 

I think that’s conservative:  Overall ad market is $400-$600 billion, which says that the online piece will only be 14%-20%.  I think it will be closer to 30% in 2011, or $120-$180 billion, especially as ITV (Interactive TV) kicks in.

 

If we use the $81 billion — and Google is 25%-40% of the market (and they will be) — this means GOOG will be a $20-$32 billion company in 2011.

 

If my range is correct, however, GOOG will be a $30-$72 billion company… and that’s assuming the overall ad market doesn’t grow, which isn’t the case.

 

As I’m fond of saying, GOOG will be a $20 billion company before anyone knows it.

It’s Dangerous When The Press Tries To Think

I might consider renaming this blog, "How-Many-Ways-Can-The-Press-Misrepresent-A-Story" blog.

 

Everyone’s reporting how Steve Ballmer threw cold water on Microsoft’s Vista story.

 

Headlines have been ugly… both in print and on CNBC… essentially everyone’s expectations of Microsoft’s revenues are too high.

 

Consequently, the stock has been hit, trading down a couple % points.

 

I don’t get it.

 

Here’s a quote from a Reuters’ piece ("Vista revenue forecasts too aggressive"):

 

     When one analyst told Ballmer that he was forecasting for 6 percent growth in the Windows business for the 2008 fiscal year starting in July, the CEO laughed and said that was a "small but not tiny" number.

 

Hmmm.  That sounds like Steve was saying that forecast wasn’t aggressive enough.

 

But, try to find that in any MSFT headlines today.