Ned Riley Companies Quotations

I think the story is going to be the same going forward. We're going to see the tech companies reporting well. But the high interest rates we've seen so far have undermined some of the financial stocks and drug stocks.

But after all the corporate governance issues, there's a tendency now of erring on the side of ultra-conservatism in terms of what companies say about future quarters and that's going to continue.

I also feel very strongly that Procter & Gamble's strategy is not going to be linked only to Procter & Gamble, ... We will see other Dow-type companies that either have some economic sensitivity or a slowing of revenue growth start to announce restructurings.

It really does reflect the focus of American businesses on profitability because this is now substantially into this economic recovery and companies are still producing results that are substantially above long-term averages.

These companies are boxed in by poor past forecasts and lack of visibility.

These companies are actually growing, ... The whole group is growing somewhere between 10 and 13 percent relative earnings growth and the price-earnings ratios are about 13 to 14 times. It's one of the few groups out there that are actually selling at their growth rate in terms of price-earnings ratio. And, right now, it's strange -- people don't like the group. It isn't a hot group.

It's something of an uplifting experience for us in the investing community to see that companies really are taking their accounting seriously. An exercise that CEOs seemed to treat as rote and automatic is viewed totally differently.

I think people are anxiously awaiting the earnings reports, and what these companies have to say about demand for their business in the second half of the year.

Be prepared for a continuation of negative commentary by companies as they warn about the second quarter.

Fundamentally, I think that many of the reports, from companies like Intel, Apple and IBM do portray a relatively sound tech environment. But people are anxious right now generally.

The Dow seems to be lifted because people are trying to resurrect the old growth stocks and giving them another try as a safe place to hide. The perception is that some of these companies are not currency- or energy-dependent enough for earnings to get hurt.

There is a serious shift going from the growth companies in the old economy to growth companies in the new economy that have been quite tarnished over the past nine months. The tech recession was the catalyst and we are genuinely seeing a slowdown in old economy sectors.

The differentiation between the biggest and the best companies with the most name recognition is a development that usually occurs during a market correction and when uncertainty starts to creep it, ... This trend will continue.

The hesitancy is still there for the simple reason that companies have another two weeks of warnings before results are actually announced.

Unfortunately, the market has taken a 'shoot now, analyze later' attitude. These companies are guilty until proven innocent, and they need to come up with confessions or disclosures that prove there's nothing questionable.

There's skepticism out there. Companies are extremely cautious about giving a decent outlook. They've set a much lower level of expectation for the public and the analysts out there.

It's equally distributed in Nasdaq. I haven't seen any particular catalysts. The front-line companies like Cisco, Intel, Microsoft, Oracle are still suffering from tax selling.