You didn't miss it but let me get on a little tangent about Twitter Inc. (TWTR) , which everyone has left for dead after treading water in its most recent quarter.
What happens as soon as a big event happens? You go to Twitter. Where has our president been pontificating about his political musings? On Twitter. What company is planning to stream more live sporting events and other live content over the next few years? Well, there are a couple, but Twitter is certainly one of them.
Twitter owns the moment, the now, the immediate public reaction, the post-game conversation. So how can a company like that, that counts more than 328 million monthly active users, be dead? In a nutshell, it can't.
Sure, it hasn't grown like we thought it would and Jack Dorsey has had his fair share of setbacks during his tenure as CEO, but that shouldn't stop a would-be acquirer or an activist from getting involved. Plus, we all know there is interest out there, with everyone from Salesforce.com Inc. (CRM) to Walt Disney Co. (DIS) kicking the tires. With all that said, I'm not telling you to invest in the company, but what I am saying is that this entity with millions and millions of active users is not going away anytime soon, despite what you may hear.
Twitter fell about 16% to $16.57 per share on Friday morning. The stock is still up year to date, though slightly after Thursday's sell-off.
All that said, it didn't stop us from posing the question: "Who stands to benefit if Twitter disappears?" A thought-provoking exercise, but an unlikely scenario.
Coverage was dominated by earnings, sans the midday reversal in the Nasdaq led by some big tech names, where some interesting angles presented themselves.
In the telecom sector, for instance, AT&T Inc. (T) and Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) roared back with vengeance after fading recently in the face of increased competition from lower cost carriers such as T-Mobile US Inc. (TMUS) and Sprint Corp. (S) . According to our technical analyst Bruce Kamich, the strong earnings from Verizon will likely be enough to erase any declines of the last year and beyond. But just how high could it be headed?
And then there was Procter & Gamble Co. (PG) , the consumer products giant that reported earnings this morning amid pressure from Nelson Peltz and Trian Fund. While the company beat Wall Street estimates, our own Lindsay Rittenhouse writes that strong earnings will not be enough to appease Trian, who could still push for a break-up of the 180-year-old company...
