Where To Invest Summer 2014

Deutsche Bank downgraded Dollar General on margin concerns,but Goldman Sachs said the stock is too low,and we're gonna stand by it,CNBC host Jim Cramer said.Too many people downgraded it on what turned out to be a decent quarter.*
Target stores are looking a little dowdy.*
Teen apparel retailer Quiksilver,Inc's balance sheet's not that good there.They lost their surfer spokesman Kelly Slater.*
Union Pacific said autos are great.Once they start ramping up those factories so they can run more,it looks really good for the economy-sorry to be so cheerful.*
Salesforce.com is in that very challenged area.You saw that software as a service got hammered yesterday.It's not the place to be.*
Ford's May sales were up 3.0%,beating the Edmunds estimate of 0.9;GM's were up 12.6%.GM totally blew their numbers away.It's been a monster bad stock.My charitable trust owns it.It's been very low in relation to its sales.*
I went to the Ford F-150 plant,and that is a winner.They make a big margin on the F-150.*
I don't know golfer Phil Mickelson from Adam.FBI agents walked up to him at a tournament.Listen,when the FBI shows up like that,they're making a statement,a frightening statement.*
I like First Solar very much,but they've been eviscerated by Chinese dumping.We're in a bit of a war with China financially.*
One of the things that happens in a bull market is,a guy upgrades a stock and it goes higher.Every one of the health maintenance stocks is on fire.Wellpoint is higher,and I think it deserves to be.You have takeovers,you have analysts making big calls,and it's working.There was a lot of fear and a lot of pain about that stock.I think you'll see the analysts come out of their foxholes and their pillboxes.*
AT&T expects to save 1.6 billion dollars in content costs after year 3 of the DirectTV deal,a 20% cut,adds Cramer colleague David Faber.It is certainly front and center for many of these companies as they see the Comcast-Time Warner Cable and AT&T-DirectTV mergers come into effect.One day CBS and Viacom coul come back together,but I don't want to get too far ahead of myself.Disney is by itself.It's so much bigger than everybody else.They have so many different parts.They have the theme parks.*
Rite-Aid is back.It's no longer a turnaround;it's an earnings per share story.I buy my beer at Rite-Aid.I'm not kidding.When you go into your drugstore,they don't look like they used to,CNBC Wall Street expert Jim Cramer pointed out.*
AT&T(T),Rite Aid Corporation(RAD),Ford Motor Company(F),Dollar General(DG),General Motors(GM),Walt Disney(DIS)

Business in Brief:Tim Geithner;Best Business Schools

The majority of businessmen have learned to give and take,according to Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack.Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner had the world on his shoulders.He'll be respected.
He did an outstanding job with the Chinese executives that visited him.I thought he was superb in the way he handled that.He didn't preach.
I think there would be a position for him on Wall Street.
AT and T will invest 14 billion dollars in broadband networks.It is also raising its dividend.Tech is the best-positioned sector under President Barack Obama,BMO Capital Markets believes.
With regard to the fiscal cliff negotiations,Professor John Cochrane of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business said the chance of another one year extension seems high to me,given how far apart we are in the basics.It needs real political leadership.That's roughly what happened in the 1980s.
Let's hope they can do it,lowering tax rates while eliminating deductions.That is tremendously pro-growth.The whole trick is to get this chaos out of our tax code.To focus on starting a business rather than consulting a tax lawyer-that would be pro-growth.
The Booth School of Business is rated the best this year by Businessweek magazine.Harvard Business School came in second,while the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business got third.
Morgan Stanley(MS),AT and T(T)

Asia This Day:Can SoftBank Save Sprint

As early as today,Monday,Japan's SoftBank,a telecom titan,is expected to announce a deal to purchase American counterpart Sprint Nextel.SoftBank will reportedly offer about 20 billion dollars for a 70% stake in Sprint.
Some analysts are sceptical SoftBank can reverse Sprint's decline.It has lost 7.5 million customers over the past five years.
The deal is unlikely to face official opposition.Indeed,regulators will probably welcome increased competition in a space currently dominated by AT and T and Verizon.
Moody's has downgraded Sony's credit rating to Baa.The rating agency has also reduced the Japanese electronics and entertainment firm's outlook to negative.
China's inflation is well in hand.According to this morning's report,consumer prices rose 1.9%,in line with estimates and below the government target rate of about 4%.Wholesale prices dropped for the eight straight month,down 3.36%.
Australian home loan approvals were up in August more than forecast,rising 1.68%.They had fallen in July.
Asian shares fell slightly in early Monday trading.The MSCI Asia-Pacific index was down 1.27% on concern about the Euro debt crisis.
Sprint Nextel(S),SoftBank(SFTBF)

NCAA Basketball Championship:Eyeballs May Have Strayed

After The Fray's charming acoustic guitar and drum national anthem,the NCAA Championship basketball game was trending downhill,though with some blips of excitement.The Kentucky Wildcats seized control early and made it clear they likely wouldn't relinquish it to the Kansas Jayhawks.The game started too late to begin with-9:23 Eastern.Despite a football style crowd of 70,000 screamers in the New Orleans Superdome,the air was gradually being let out of the broadcast balloon.
Sponsors of the CBS telecast included SABMiller PLC;Capital One Financial;AT&T;Chrysler;General Motors;Daimler Benz;Liberty Mutual;Nissan Motor Company Ltd.;Coca-Cola;and TD Ameritrade.The initial audience was no doubt of exceptional size,but one can see how it may have trailed off considerably before too long,depriving these firms of many of their highly desired eyeballs.
Kansas made a late run,but number one-ranked Kentucky won 67-59 for the team's eighth national championship.

The Paring Knife,Part 2:Yahoo Cuts Cell Phones

While Wal-Mart is cutting jobs and closing stores,Yahoo is responding to its situation by no longer serving lower end cell phones.Yahoo Mobile,its cell phone hub,has posted an apology to some pay-as-you-go phone owners.When these customers try to access Yahoo email or other services,they are met by the frustrating message.Yahoo Mobile says that if you own a higher end phone that got swept up in the change,you should let them know.Some AT&T customers with Motorola GoPhones are being impacted by the abrupt move.Windows Live Hotmail is still available to them.
GoPhone owners might consider complaining to the Federal Communications Commission about Yahoo's action.In the course of the financial crisis,many consumers are turning to the pay-as-you go model from the more expensive plans.Lack of access to their Yahoo account will hardly be helpful to them as they themselves navigate the difficulties of a damaged economy.

Sun Shines On Mr.Softie

Sun Microsystems(JAVA) and Microsoft(MSFT) show how two firms can both challenge and support one another in their quest for progress.Google(GOOG) is now distributing a free version of Sun's Star Office software.It is part of the Google Pack.Star Office is Microsoft Office-compatible and is also sold by Sun in a version with technical support and free updates.Star Office provides the Open Document Format Alliance,which includes Google,Sun and IBM,with an important open product.The free Star Office has the same basic features as Microsoft Office,which goes for 150-400 dollars.Word-processing,database,graphics,spreadsheets,photo editing and Web publishing are all possible with Star Office.Sun acquired Star Office when it purchased its parent company in 1999.Sun refined the product and contributed to a free version called Open Office before the Google Pack was offered.More than 100 million copies of Open Office have been downloaded.Star Office supports the Open Document file format,which many governments have considered adopting for its free document storage.Star Office is available on Sun's Solaris Operating Environment,along with Microsoft Windows and Linux.At the same time that Sun's Star Office competes with Microsoft Office,Sun is allied with Microsoft on a number of other fronts.Sun now sells servers with factory-installed Microsoft Windows.In this connection,the two firms will even call on customers together.They are also collaborating on interactive television built on Microsoft's Mediaroom software and Sun systems.AT and T wants to use this blend for its U-verse offering.It is clear that Sun and Microsoft are fully implementing their 2004 alliance,while competing in the office software realm.Their complex relations will be of benefit to both of them into at least the next decade.Shares of both Sun Microsystems and Microsoft were up this morning.

Russo Faces Restless Board

When Patricia Russo left America for Paris to head Alcatel-Lucent(ALU),she knew it would be a challenge.Mergers and acquisitions,such as the combination of Alcatel and Lucent Technologies,are rarely if ever easy.Not only are there cultural issues,but financial pitfalls as well.Alcatel-Lucent is proving to be no exception to the rule;indeed,it is ailing to a frustrating degree.Its share price was over 15.00 in January.Today,it struggles to stay above 10.00.The board of ALU has demanded changes within a month,following the telecom colossus' third profit warning.They expect Ms. Russo to deliver a restructuring plan.There is no reason why this industry leader can't be turned around.It is number one in DSL,with a 39% market share;number one in optics,with a 23% market share in Terrestrial and Submarine;and number one in long-haul microwave transmission,among other areas.With a capital of more than 4.5 billion euros,ALU has the substance.It just needs to be shaped a little better.Ms. Russo,54,is a Georgetown University graduate.She served more than twenty years at AT and T(T) and Lucent Technologies,which she helped found.I wish her much success at this crucial moment in the life of her major firm.This morning,Alcatel-Lucent shares were trading up at 10.10.