By: Gino Lattarulo

With Sirius XM (NASDAQ:SIRI) set to release earnings in about one week , the question that seems to be on the minds of the masses is: Will the results be enough to drive the stock to the next level of support and resistance or will it remain in it’s current trading range because everything is already priced in? Let’s talk about that for a bit.

I think it’s fair to say that ever since the stock action pushed through the $ 1.00 mark it has been about as exciting as watching a fly crawl up a drape. Every time it looked like something was going to make the price pop to the next level it just fizzled right back to that one dollar hard deck. There just hasn’t been any thrilling catalyst.  As usual, the exciting has become the norm.

12 years ago when you watched Mark McGuire smash a home run 1 out of every 10 at bats, it was exciting. But after awhile the fans and critics simply got used to the idea. It was just a given that he would hit a tape measure homer every three to four games and when it didn’t happen there was disappointment. ” Wow I wonder what’s wrong with Mark today”.  Never mind the fact that the man owns the lowest At Bats Per Home Run ratio in baseball history. It was just expected that he would perform this way. If, however, some obscure player from the Montreal Expos started spitting out dingers once every ten at bats, there would be pandemonium in Canada.

Stock performance is really no different.  Once a company sets a standard for their performance they have to continually ( and excitingly) exceed that performance to garner any lavish attention from Wall Street. Take APPLE (NASDAQ:AAPL) for example. Their recent earnings was effectively doubled over last year, and yes the stock did move up a bit, but blowing out earnings is so normal for this company that it really wasn’t huge news to Wall Street. They always want a bigger number than what is expected.Sirius is no exception either. Better than expected subscriber growth? nah….   Forward guidance of over a million subscribers?  nah…  That was yesterday’s excitement. Today’s climate not only dictates the ” What have you done for me lately” mentality, but the ” What will you do for me in the future?” mentality as well.

 So again, where will the catalyst come from? Earnings? Some fabulously statistical news event? Just like the Gulf oil spill, it’s all a game of hurry up and wait, politics, and posturing. Hey BP, how’s the clean up and restitution coming? Nah…

Peace

By: Gino Lattarulo

I am saddened  by the news that Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) has purchased and is closing down the LALA.com website, which is an online music service that provided (free) the ability to upload your entire music library to their servers to have a cloud like iTunes experience.  That in itself is no big deal.  What really drew me to this web site was the cost structure to pay for music.  A person could sample music from whatever artist they wish and then have the choice of downloading the entire collection in mp3 form for around $ 7.00 ( .89 cents per song ) or purchase the entire collection exclusively for online use for about  $ 1.00  ( .10 cents per song).  For a geek like me who has strayed from the shackles of tangible hardware players (except for my XM radio (NASDAQ:SIRI) and almost exclusively listens to music on the web, this was a perfect arrangement.  I even have access to it in my car.  Take a Netbook , FM transmitter, and Satellite Internet card and you are done.  OK , so it isn’t CD quality stuff but it’s a small price to pay for an unlimited library of music.  How long do we think it is going to be before the touch screen PC is manufactured into vehicles for this exact reason?  Not very long once the networks have beefed up bandwidth to offset inconsistent buffering issues. In any case, I think we can all guess why Apple purchased this LALA company.  They are squashing any threat to iTunes.  Not that there is a huge contest of course.  iTunes is obviously the king of the digital download land but cloud formats are quickly becoming the new sheriff in town and they are here to stay.  If I had to hazard a guess, I think Apple wants to use this LALA cloud structure for the Itunes experience.   If they are smart, they will. And we all know they are.

Enter Grooveshark.com. (more…)

By: Gino Lattarulo

Do we have a hallelujah on Sirius XM Radio (NASDAQ:SIRI) staying above the $1.00 mark  yet?   I think it may be time.

There have been a lot of questions and speculation on why Sirius XM dropped after such a good earnings report.  I read articles that the report was not good enough, there was manipulation, etc.  Same old Same old.  I like to keep things simple.  In my humble reality (which is fairly dizzy)  the stock was simply overbought.  How many times have you seen a stock that was overbought  blow away earnings only to watch it plummet?  Conversely we have seen oversold stocks stink up the joint with their earnings report only to see the price action rise.   (more…)

By Relmor Demitrius -

By now product reviews, projected sales information based in some reality, and media input aplenty is out on Motorola Inc.’s new smart phone (NYSE:MOT), the Droid.  The Droid was the first smart phone to utilize Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) new Android 2.0 operating system, introduced as a direct competitor to the Blackberry and Iphone operating systems, as well as the Palm, which is reportedly not doing well.  With any technology that has fans that are loyal to other products, getting a real feel for consumer sentiment on any new technology is risky at first, and best left instead to time.  Enough time has now passed for a good feel on this phone to be achieved.  Sales numbers appear to be decent to good.  The reviews on the phone itself are mixed, but mostly positive.  It has been as boldly called the Iphone Killer (which is ridiculous) to a washed up attempt to catch up in the smart phone space that is going to fail miserably(even more ridiculous). What is that old saying?  Somewhere in the middle lies the truth?  I think that is exactly the case here.

I don’t think the phone will be a failure, but the Droid has much competition, even within the same Android 2.0 market it uses to run its phone.  Since HTC offers the same operating system (OS) at the same dealers as does the Droid, there is competition even amongst the OS users themselves.  Imagine two very similar phones called the Blackberry and the Redberry, each phone basically the same.  Of course it would affect sales of the Blackberry.  Not only does Motorola have to compete with other smart phones, it has to compete with other smart phones running the same OS as they are.  Was Motorola blindsided when Google released and marketed heavily its version, the Nexus One?  Maybe, maybe not.  Would Motorola had done anything differently anyway?  Probably not.  Regardless, they did the right thing partnering with Google.  (more…)

By Relmor Demitrius -

Sirius XM Radio (NASDAQ:SIRI), which is 40% owned by Liberty Media (NASDAQ:LCAPA), achieved something few companies in their industry, if any, did in 2009:

They came out of 2009 in better financial shape and returned to subscriber growth during one of the most difficult economic periods possible. 2009 was a troubling time for the newly merged radio companies.  Huge debt obligations were due, the economy was in shambles, and the auto industry wasn’t selling enough cars.

What a difference a few quarters can make.

The satellite radio company entered the year with 19 million subscribers.  After losing 500,000 subscribers in Q1 and Q2 combined, they regained 105,000 back during Q3, reversing the trend.  That leaves them with around 400,000 subs under what they started the year with as of Q3.

Let’s run the numbers and see what Q4 will probably look like:

October through December auto sales totaled around 2,593,000 for the United States.  Penetration rate of the company’s products in these vehicles was going to be in the high 50’s, according to Mel Karmazin, CEO of Sirius XM Satellite Radio. Im going to assume 58%.  By this figure they should be adding (from the OEM channel) around 1,503,940 new subscribers, while losing around 1,053,000 from deactivations (assuming a 1.9% churn rate, lower than last quarters, but higher than Q4 of 2008).  Im giving credence to improved economic conditions, but also still accounting for a supressed economy.  1.9% churn should work for this calculation.  During the last 3 quarters churn has been 2.2%, 2.0%, and 2.0% respectively.  Assuming 1.9% in a traditionally strong churn quarter is fully reasonable given the conditions. (more…)