M&T Bank

Wilmington Trust has been struggling quite a bit lately. They have reported 5 straight quarters of losses. They were about to report their 6th straight quarterly loss before the acquisition.

When asked about the acquisition, M&T Bank’s CEO Robert G. Wilmers said, “We are building an even more powerful franchise with strength and stability, scale and density and top-of-class products and services.”

At the time this article was written, M&T Bank Stock (NYSE MTB) was up 3.80% to $77.59 for the day.

Stock holders of Wilmington Trust (NYSE WL) look to lose approximately 46% of the money they had invested in the company, after the acquisition.

Citigroup (C) On The Mend?

The banking sector, although facing many unknowns, will likely, over the long run be a beneficiary of profits that could approach those seen before the massive economic collapse of ’08. Being that the company’s stock is still very volatile, a good way to establish a position in Citigroup stock is to use a dollar cost average method. Dividends will eventually pick back up, likely by 2012, and as long as we don’t see another major recession over the next two years, the market cap of the entire banking sector should rise as the housing market slowly brings itself out if the rut it has been in.

Steve Jobs Speaks After Apple's Earning Report

The earnings for Steve Job’s company were quite impressive, leaps and bounds better than Apple’s quarter four numbers last year. They reported $20.3 billion in revenue for the quarter and $4.64 per share in earnings. Compare that to just $12.2 billion in revenue last year at this time, and there is no doubt that Apple has seen tremendous growth over the last 12 months. Despite these rather impressive numbers, the stock is currently down about 5.7% in after hours trading. The profit margins for the company were not as great as many investors had hoped, falling to 36.9 percent from 41.8 percent.

So, is this little pull back in the stock price a time to buy for those who have been looking for a solid entry point? More than likely, yes, if you are a long term investor. The facts are that the PE ratio of Apple’s stock is fairly low, and with all the cash on the company’s balance sheet, the stock looks even more impressive.

After the earnings report, Steve Jobs spoke out about the iPhone, and smart phone market in general. He criticized Google’s Android operating system, saying “open is not always better”. Jobs went on to outline why the unfragmented iPhone market was a better business model than the very fragmented Android Model. Despite all the bickering, we feel that both Google and Apple have bright futures ahead, both in the smart phone industry, as well as their own respected niches.

Intel is Down, Google Stock Up

A technology company which isn’t fairing so well today, even after a great earnings report last Tuesday, is Intel. Intel is down about 30 cents on the day, or about 1.6%. With a PE ratio of just over 10, and a dividend that yields over 3.3%, the company which is still dominating the PC microchip market seems like a good buy. The possible causes of the weakness in Intel stock is that they are lagging behind in the fast growing market for smart phone and tablet micro processors. Despite this, recent acquisitions and development plans will likely help Intel get a stronger foothold in the market. There have also been reports this morning that Intel may be about to announce a major investment into a social gaming company. A move that would have many investors rather surprised.

There are still many great deals in this market, especially in the tech sector. As an investor you just need to look at the numbers, and decide where you want your money working for you.

Citigroup and Bank of America Stocks Took a Pounding

Citigroup will report their earnings on Monday, followed by Bank of America on Tuesday, and Wells Fargo Wednesday. Analysts think that even if earnings are better than expected, the banking sector will continue to under perform the market as many uncertainties remain. Jefferies Managing Director, Art Hogan, explained, “It’s the dark cloud that is going to hang over the sector until we get some clarity. Quite candidly, you may look at these banks, like Citigroup, and when they report they may have fine numbers, but you may not get any lift because you still have this great unknown”.

Bank of America’s stock didn’t fair much better this last week, closing on Friday at $11.98 per share. It actually hit a fresh 52 week low on continued uncertainties in the foreclosure markets. Foreclosure freezes, and the uncertain prospects regarding quantitative easing have put a damper on it’s share price, which went from $13.55 on Wednesday all the way down to a close of $11.98 Friday.

If you are considering a long term investment, the banking sector may be a good bet if you have a stomach for risk.

How Many iPads and iPhone Did Apple Sell Last Quarter

Analysts expect revenue of anywhere between $18-21 billion this quarter alone, however they are all over the place in terms of total iPads and iPhones that the company likely sold last quarter. Analysts expect the company to report anywhere from 9.35 million to 13.5 million iPhones sold, while they expect anywhere from 2.4 million to 6.2 million iPads sold. Either way the company certainly looks to be on their way to another remarkable quarter.

The stock price closed at $314.74 on Friday, a day in which Apple shares hit another all time high. Helped by the amazing results from Google on Thursday, investors seem very optimistic in the company. With sales of iPhones and iPads also driving the adoption rate of iMacs in the PC industry, Apple seems to be firing on all cylinders. Are they overpriced? Likely not. The company has billions of dollars in cash on their balance sheet and is riding a wave of strong sales all the way to the bank.

Sirius XM Satellite Radio

In early 2009, the stock which was trading as high as $51 a share in late 2000 had fallen all the way down to $0.10 a share. The company looked as though it might vanish and satellite radio looked as though it was a failure. Now a year and a half later, the tables have turned. Sirius XM Radio Inc. which was formed when Sirius & XM merged is now back on track, and starting to make a lot of progress.

On Wednesday, the company announce that it is planning on offering buyers close to $550 million in aggregate senior notes. These unsecured notes would be due in 2018, and the proceeds from them would be used to help the company repurchase their older 11.25 percent notes which come due in 2013.

Sirius XM announced that in the third quarter of 2010 they gained a net of 334,000 subscribers, which brings the total net increase in subscribers to 1 million for the year. Last year in the third quarter, Sirius XM only say a net increase of 102,000. The total subscribers of the satellite radio product now stands at 19.8 million. They are predicting this number to hit 20.1 million by January 2011.

So much for satellite radio being a failure. 19.8 million people are happily using the service.

New Gap Logo

Yesterday Gap released the following statement:

Since we rolled out an updated version of our logo last week on our website, we’ve seen an outpouring of comments from customers and the online community in support of the iconic blue box logo.

Last week, we moved to address the feedback and began exploring how we could tap into all of the passion. Ultimately, we’ve learned just how much energy there is around our brand. All roads were leading us back to the blue box, so we’ve made the decision not to use the new logo on gap.com any further.

At Gap brand, our customers have always come first. We’ve been listening to and watching all of the comments this past week. We heard them say over and over again they are passionate about our blue box logo, and they want it back. So we’ve made the decision to do just that – we will bring it back across all channels.

In the meantime, the website will go back to our iconic blue box logo and, for Holiday, we’ll turn our blue box red for our seasonal campaign.

We’ve learned a lot in this process. And we are clear that we did not go about this in the right way. We recognize that we missed the opportunity to engage with the online community. This wasn’t the right project at the right time for crowd sourcing.

There may be a time to evolve our logo, but if and when that time comes, we’ll handle it in a different way.

Now comes the question: “Has the reputation of Gap as a clothing company taken a hit because of the failed new logo?”

It really is hard to say. The people in charge of deciding on the logo, certainly should have some explaining to do. Fans of the clothing brand most likely don’t really care about the logo debacle. However, it is poor publicity that the company will have to deal with both internally and externally.

We asked, internet marketing executive Jason Brown (not affiliate with Gap) about any potential problems this brings up for the company as a whole. He said, “If anything, this extra publicity may bring more attention to a brand that has excelled in a crowded clothing market for forty years. Gap already has established itself as a quality clothing company. Their business isn’t in making logos. It is in making clothing.”

The logo may not hurt the clothing brand from a sales point of view, but how about the price of Gap’s Stock? Shareholders want to invest in a company that makes good decisions, and hires the best employees to make those decisions. Could the new Gap logo crisis cause the share price of Gap Stock (GPS) to fall?

Currently the stock is up close to 5% over its price 1 month ago. If the stock price was going to take a hit, it probably would have already done so.

It looks as though Gap has made the right decision in reverting back to the old logo. The company may lose some respect as far as business management and marketing goes, but it shouldn’t hurt the short or long term revenues of Gap, Inc.

Shares of MakeMyTrip (MMYT) Soar Today

The stock has traded as high as $41.47 per share in the past 52 weeks. The large increase comes on the same day as Oppenheimer & Co. gave it a “Perform Rating”. The reason for such a good outlook is because they are bullish on India’s travel industry. If India’s travel industry flourishes like expected, than MakeMyTrip will be sitting pretty, since they have such a large scale of the Online Travel Arena.

The website located at MakeMyTrip.com allows travelers to book flights, hotels, and ground transportation both nationally and internationally. It is ranked in the top 100 sites visited by people in India, according to Alexa.com.

Netflix Stock (NFLX) at alltime high

Shares of Netflix were trading as high as $163.72 each today during trading hours. Currently it sits at $160.09 which is a 2.01% increase over yesterdays price. Blockbuster is not totally out of the picture, but the Chapter 11 news, can provide more confidence for investors of Netflix.

The market capital of Netflix is 8.42 Billion, with 52.36 million shares outstanding. It should be interesting to see what happens in the coming weeks. Blockbuster (BLOKA) stock has already fallen almost 27% today.