IBM!?

[Joey Batz]

(10-20-2014, 09:38 AM)Kerim Wrote: So anybody grabbing IBM on today's big decline?

I'm really torn. It is a great name with great history that scores well (very well) in my personal ranking system.

If it were a consumer staples company, I'd be buying with both hands right now. But I'm much more skittish about tech.

Thoughts?

I seem to have the opposite view of IBM than everyone else. But I'm not as educated on the company as others. I certainly invested in it on its decline, after watching it initially go from $183/share to the mid $190's. It was certainly a pleasant surprise.

I am quite confident in IBM. The reason I quoted your comment, Kerim, was your remark about if it was a consumer staples. Sometimes I refer to IBM as a "business staples" company. IBM's software is necessary for the day to day operation of so many businesses today that it's amazing. I work in banking, and our Lotus Notes and FileNET programs (two EXTREMELY important software programs that without which, we couldn't service customers) are IBM products. I've been to numerous businesses, including Starbucks, a pizzeria, and a Chinese restaurant, and saw the IBM logo right on their computers and other equipment. Unlike Microsoft and Apple, which makes non-necessary items like Xboxes and iPhones (don't get me wrong; as a consumer, I'm surgically attached to both), IBM makes products that a business needs on a day to day basis. Just as you and I wouldn't stop eating food or using shampoo in an economic downturn, businesses won't stop using IBM's products.

And as for whether they will turn themselves around, I have confidence in IBM more than any other tech company. I'm not say Apple is a bad company--a cursory glance at their stock will show that it's far from--but Apple doesn't have the decades of experience that shows me that they can adapt to a changing technological paradigm. Sure, they invented the smartphone, but they were practically nothing before that (they paled in comparison to Microsoft), and what happens in the future when the smartphone is as obsolete as the cassette player? Will Apple be able to adapt? I don't doubt their ability, but they are untested in that regard. But IBM was around since 1910. 1910! This is a computer company that predates computers! Not only has IBM adapted to technological paradigms changing around them, they've adapted to EVERY SINGLE ONE and stayed at the top the entire time. I'm finding it hard to believe that they are going to collapse now.

Of course, as someone who is NOT in the tech industry (like R2R is), take my comments with a grain of salt and take his with...........well, a much healthier food. I look at it from the point of view of an investor, not an insider or anything. But I feel that IBM is a strong company to invest in, and I followed that up by doing so.