Category: Business

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Business Stocks

Apple Leaves Table Smiling

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Apple and Cisco settled the dispute around the iPhone trademark, according to Mac News. One interesting comment I can not stop laughing is: 

“if Apple leaves the table smiling, you better check your wallet.”

Seriously, I agree with the author Cisco guys are smart too. “Consumers are so with Apple these days, it would have been bad for Cisco, because consumers don’t want to see a company that’s going against Apple.”

I want to note that Cisco is going after the consumer markets these days. As you may noticed from the TV ads and Scientific Atlanta (TV setbox) acquisition.

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Business China

Xinhua Finance Media Limited IPO

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Found this through my friend thesunsfinancialdiary. I briefly went through their F1 prospectus. I had to admit I’m not in best position to evaluate their business: they have 5 divisions providing services from creating adverstisement to customer research. I can think of a St. Louis based privately held company called Maritz which does something similar: they organized conferences for other companies, send promotional gifts for companies like Nissan, take care of the employee reward etc. One way to analyze Xinhua Finance (symbol: XFML) is comparing each division to a public company does something similar, then adding them up.  

On a related matter, the event marketing services in China is booming. About 2 years ago, during my Jiu Zhai Guo tour, I met a senior executive of a conference organizing company  based in Beijing, I learned about three most popular conference places in China: Shanya (Beach), Dali (Yun’nan), and Jiu Zhai Gou/Chengdu.  

By the way, the parent company of Xinhua Finance Media Limited is traded in Tokyo. Also, the CEO and co-founder of the company is Ms. Fredy Bush, not sure if she is related to the George Bush family…

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Business Stocks

Stocks for the V-Day

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Blue Nile, a leading diamond ring online retailer. I vaguely remember one of my friends bought the wedding ring from them a while ago (before the company went public in 2004). The company has an interesting story: the founder went to a tradtional jewery store to buy the ring for his financee, he felt he was not treated well by the associates. So he did some research and started his own venture.

The Knot, I heard this name from Jim Cramer, the host of CNBC’s “Mad Money”. One of the founders by a Chinese American (husband). He started the business with his wife. The reason they started is when they were gettting married, they found the whole thing is just too overwelming. So they started this web site to help people “to be married”.

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Business Stocks

Dancing with Wall Street

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There are many benifits for a company to go public, otherwise why so many Chinese companies came to the Wall Street in recent years. But on the other hand, if a company came to public just for the sake of “listed in NYSE or Nasdaq”, there may be something wrong here. There are many rising stars and fallen heros among Chinese Internet companies in past few years, after Sina, Sohu and Netease came in the dot com era. Some of the notable ones include JOBS, SNDA, and BIDU. In all these cases the CEO of the company seemed worked too hard for Wall Street, and then made big mis-step.

I think for the long term, companies will be better served if CEOs can step back from the impatient Wall Street for a while. Just like in the dance, they should be the leaders, rather than let the Wall Street lead them. That is of course assume they know what they are doing.  

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Business China

Chinese Solar Stocks are Hot

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First is the SunTech Power (STP), it came to NYSE a little more than a year ago. The stock almost doubled from its debut. The company is founded by Australian Haigui and based on Wuxi, Jiangsu province. This is the largest Chinese solar panel marker and it’s profitable.

Then comes the Canadian Solar (CSIQ). Don’t know why it’s called Canadian. Maybe founded by Canadian Haigui? Anyway the company is based in Suzhou, Jiangsu province.

Just before Xmas 2006 two new players joined the party. Solarfun (SOLF) is based in Qidong, Jiangsu province. The rumor is the founder came from SunTech Power. Trina Solar (TSL), is based in Changzhou, Jiangsu. TSL is hot in last few days (don’t know why, not my specialty).

Last but not least, here comes the JA Solar (JASO). From its prospectus it’s from Hebei. The CEO worked for SunTech Power before founding the company.

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Business Stocks

Ford Taurus is Back

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It’s interesting to hear they decided to bring back the old name, the family sedan saved Ford during its difficult times in 1990s. Ford is in trouble again lately, due to its unattractive products and sky high labor cost. Will this name change save the company? Maybe not. But I think it will help them in some ways.

A little backgound: Ford introduced Ford 500, its new family sedan a while ago, to replace the decade old Taurus. Taurus was a big hit in its early years (1990s), but was increasingly under pressure from CamCord (Toyota Camry and Honda Accord) as it ages. Its brand was more diluted when the rental fleet (Hertz) have all those Taurus.  

Now the key question is: are there any Taurus fans (hint: moms) left?

ford taurus pic

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Business China

Sohu Coming of Age

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When I first came to the US in 1997, there is no Chinese web portals. We read Chinese news primarily through BBS. The Chinese language support for the browser was not widely available either. I remember a friend told me something about installing the “Chinese version of DOS” on the PC so that he can read the Chinese. Then comes the RichWin (the Sina), the Sohu and Netease. And the Internet Explorer incorporated the Chinese language support so we don’t need to install NJStar for the PC.

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Business China

Another New Oriental?

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A few months ago I saw a statement from New Oriental about the “Oriental Standard”. I thought Oriental Standard was some “New Oriental” knockoffs, which also provide English education in China. I was wrong. After a little research, now I believe Mr. Yu Minghong owned the ancester of Oriental Standard (it’s called New Oriental Professional Education Center) before 2006. It’s an IT training and service subsidiary of New Oriental group. In order to prepare the New Oriental IPO in NYSE, that subsidiary was spun off. The Oriental Standard focused more on IT professional service and outsourcing, in addtion to IT training.

Separately, I read Chinese news and it says Oriental Standard raised fund from Doll Capital, the company took 51job to Nasdaq a few years ago. To make things more interesting, it seems Oriental Standard still uses the New Oriental domain name. Oh, well, just like Lenovo still uses the “thinkpad” after they bought the PC/laptop from IBM 🙂

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Business China

Jinjiang Inn Hook up with Expedia

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Zhao Huan Yan published his January report for China domestic hotels industry. I am interested to learn some update on the economy chain such as Jinjiang Inns. I noticed Expedia, the leading US online travel consolidator, is establishing partnership with Jinjiang Inn. It seems foreigners can use expedia to book the Jinjiang Inn soon.

(Update 04Feb07) I looked up expedia, it appears you can book many 2.5 stars (and up) hotels in Shanghai right now, some of them are belong to Jinjiang group (such as the famous Peace Hotel in Nanjing Rd Bund). Have not seen Jinjiang Inn (or Jinjiang Stars yet).

I vaguely remember the foreigners make up about 7 to 8% of guests for Jinjiang and Home Inns (Rujia). This includes the foreigners already in China. In other words, I don’t expect Expedia Jinjiang partnership to give Jinjiang Inn a huge leg up in this “foreigners market”.

jin jiang Inn

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Business Stocks

When to Sell Heelys HLYS

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We all know it’s a fad. But here is the one million dollar question: when shall we take profit (or loss) for the Heelys stocks (HLYS)? From the IBD article today, it seems Heelys still got room to grow. The following is quoted from IBD:

“For one thing, there’s still plenty of room to grow sales in parts of the country between the coasts, he says. And overseas sales offer lots of potential, especially in Europe.

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