General

Re: Investing tip: the "landscaping" corporate-confidence index

E. R. Olovetto — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 19:08:29 GMT

Intel's stock is the same value as in '06 and basically moves with the market, so I wouldn't touch it anyway under most circumstances. If only my trading software has detailed photos of each company's lawns though, heh. (BTW, campi isn't a word, use "-es" I think.)

Re: Investing tip: the "landscaping" corporate-confidence index

Giant_Joe — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 18:43:07 GMT

Haha! It's a different site, not to be confused with the hardware retail store.

It was actually a website/forum from the mid 90's to the mid 2000's. They had some articles up there on CPUs and servers. They have a "lifeboat" forum now (http://aceshardware.freeforums.org/) and the community is way smaller than it used to be. The Intel-AMD wars around that time were my first foray into learning the basics about the market and corporate structure, and how everything related to research and production development and production. Those were the good old days. :p

Re: Investing tip: the "landscaping" corporate-confidence index

Clayton — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 18:38:25 GMT

Nope. Ace's H/W has forums??!??! ROFL

Clayton -

Re: Investing tip: the "landscaping" corporate-confidence index

Giant_Joe — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 18:37:28 GMT

a bit off topic...

Were you ever on the ace's hardware forums? I swear "ClaytonB" sounds familiar.

Investing tip: the "landscaping" corporate-confidence index

Clayton — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 18:11:49 GMT

I just noticed something very interesting this morning. Yesterday, our CEO (I work for Intel) announced that we had our best quarter ever. During most of '09 and all of '10 to this point, we have not been hiring and many of the corporate services were scaled back... most notably, there are weeds growing in all but the exterior portion of the campus lawns. This morning, the sprinklers are running and there is a phalanx of landscapers out, mowing the lawns.

So, it may be educational for the "skeptical investor" to visit corporate campuses (campi?) during a recession to see how they are keeping their lawns... call it the Landscaping Corporate Confidence Index. If they are talking up the market (which they always do), but not weeding their lawns, they're bluffing. If lots of corporations are doing this, then you know that there is widespread anxiety.

Just thought I'd pass on this idea for your consideration.

Clayton -