Nokia Is a Wide-Ranging Company and The Stock is With Hidden Value Right Now  Nokia does not only make phones.  Nokia´s feature-phone division is doing well, because of Asha phones.  Nokia has not lost about 1 billion dollars a quarter like the media says, because Nokia has 5 business parts and 4 of them are profitable. Therefore, the exact number is much much smaller.  Nokia´s loss is only 17 million euros any more (compared to Reuters´s consensus 277 million and Nokia´s last two previous quarters about 290 million each), this was much better.  Nokia Siemens Networks is doing very strongly (over 300 million euros profit in 3Q. More business to come in the future: 3G in developing countries, 4G in developed and emerging countries)  NAVTEQ was also profitable, NAVTEQ´s number might be better in 4Q, because of the deals with Amazon, Yahoo, Oracle and many car-companies.  Nokia´s patent portfolio earns about 500 million euros a year, and the number is still increasing.  Nokia has cut expenses (which saves about 1 billion euros a year) and in the future Nokia does not have to spend so much in R&D either, because it has teamed up with Microsoft.  Nokia´s WP 8 devices will hit more markets, for example the Middle-East countries (Lumia phones have not been in these countries yet till now).  New Lumia generation looks promising.  For example Lumia 920 has features, such as:  Floating-lens PureView camera with optical image stabilization  Super sensitive and bright screen that can be used with gloves or finger nails  Premium GPS that can be used also offline  Free music with no advertisements  Lumia 920 does not only have a great low-light camera, but also has exceptional audio recording quality due to the 3 HAAC Rich-recording microphones.  Right now, there is no way to compare Nokia to Apple among most smart phone consumers, but there is hope in the future.  For example, Nokia just signed the contract with China Mobile (who has about 660 million subscribers, which is about 70% of all subscribers in this world´s biggest nation), and even though iPhone is very popular in the US and Europe, Windows Phone OS already surpasses iOS in the world´s biggest countries beside China, such as Brasil, India and Russia. Even though in these countries more low price point phones are sold, but these are the most important emerging giants in the world where Nokia´s position and brand are still quite strong. And it may be sooner than we think when more people in these countries are able to afford high end smart phones.  Nokia has not lost about 1 billion dollars a quarter as the media says, because its other parts of business are profitable (while 1Q´s and 2Q´s total loss 290 million each, 3Q´s total loss only 17 million euros any more). Therefore, 3.6 billion euros net cash should be enough for Nokia´s transition period before WP8 phones take off. There is still enough room for a third ecosystem in this world, beside emerging markets Europe has adopted WP phones in a very encouraging way (for example Italy has already over 10% market share for WP phones, considering the Lumia debut has not been a year yet, since last November only. WP OS has already grown a lot faster compared to iOS and Android in their first quarters). Lumias were sold 9,9 million units under a year. The number is small compared to Iphones and Androids sold today, but it is not a bad start. It is more fair to compare the numbers among the 3 in their first year.  Now when the DOWS and S&P have almost hit all time highs, investors start to think more about cheap and potential value stocks. NOK is now only about book value, and usually NYSE stocks are on an average about 2x book value (Apple about 6x book value). Therefore, I think NOK is cheap enough for its values. Another reason is NOK has been already shorted massively about 19% of its total shares.  Apart from Vertu and so on, Nokia still can sell its patents, since it still has about 30 000 patents in its own hands (in case Nokia needs more cash).  If the stock price still goes cheaper and cheaper, one day some rival would bid for Nokia, just for its patents ( Motorola was acquired by Google with 12 billion dollars, this is good to remind people who underestimate intellectual properties´ value).  Microsoft will bid for Nokia with higher premium if some company really bids for Nokia, because Nokia is in so close partnership with Microsoft that this also includes business strategies, business secrets and so on. Therefore, Microsoft won´t let any company acquire Nokia than itself. When it comes to Microsoft, it is still the net cash king in the world, after all its debts excluded, it still has a huge net cash about 50 billion dollars.  About Nokia´s buy out: Motorola´s patents were worth about 5.5 billion, if some company bids for Nokia´s patents and Microsoft still does not acquire Nokia, Nokia will be sold in parts. Nokia has 5 business parts, therefore patent portfolio is only 1 out of 5. Now, you can count yourself how much are Nokia Siemens Networks, NAVTEQ, and feature-phone division worth.  I know US is very important market, because Wall Street and US consumer trend give directions to market momentum around the world, still you can not neglect the power of BRIC and MIST these days.  You can calculate yourself how many people living in these 8 BRIC- and MIST-countries. In these countries, in Brazil, Russia, India, China, Mexico, Indonesia and Turkey, Nokia´s position and brand are still quite strong (except South-Korea, but you know it is Samsung´s home-country and the smallest country among those important 8 anyway).  Share price assumption at this moment: 2.40 euro  Best scenario (if WP8 phones go well): the stock price will go to about 7.70 euro per share)  Worst scenario: no bankruptcy, because Nokia would be sold in parts before that.  Estimated price for this: intellectual properties over 1 euro per share; other business parts (smartphones, featurephones, NSN) at least over 1.50 euro per share.  And NAVTEQ´s price not included (Nokia bought NAVTEQ with 5.7 billion euro). All in all, even in this case, Nokia share price would be at least over 2.50 euro, excluded NAVTEQ.  Nokia also announced it is hiring more employees to work in Chicago (where NAVTEQ is). Who says Nokia is going bankrupt? Think twice before saying that!  Nokia also bought Scaladon, the imaging technology firm in Sweden. Therefore, apart from NAVTEQ and NSN, Nokia is no doubt going big with PureView imaging technology. Some authors compare Nokia to Eastman-Kodak, I think it is almost the opposite.  Eastman-Kodak was the old era and Nokia is starting the new evolution with smart-phone imaging, when consumers won´t have to carry another gadget (camera), for example during traveling.  One of the reasons why Nokia is one of the most defensive stocks right now during bear markets is that Nokia has been already shorted massively about 19% of its total shares (while Apple only about 0.5%, Samsung over 2%, and other telecom companies about 4% in general).  By the way, NAVTEQ just reported it is making navigators into 4 out of 5 cars (80%).  And I hope Nokia will license City Lens to tablet makers like Amazon, Asus, Acer etc (at the same time it can turn Google maps users into using Nokia´s advanced mapping platform) soon.  When also Nokia´s Devices & Services division is profitable as well, will you ever have a chance to buy NOK stock this cheap again? The answer might be: NEVER.
The Powerball Jackpot, which is now at an estimated $550 million caused a bit of a ruckus yesterday between a friend and me. In fact, the discussion reached a level that I didn't think was possible. You might think, so what – friends argue all the time. True, except this time we [...]