Intel schmintel.. Retrenchment is not a big deal in the economy since there's only a few way company can increase profit to attract investors. Either raise their selling price (which would make their customer run away) or cut cost (one of them is retrenchment and forcing each worker to do 2 to 3 person's job).
To me it's no sign of economy downturn. Today's market is different from 97. In 97, people believed in rumors, what other people say because the lack of information. Today we have the internet and the internet commerce area has peaked. If any economy downturn comes, it'll still not be as bad as it was as businesses has globalised. Most business nowadays has activities in other countries which might not be as effected as it was when it was focused locally in the past. In the past, people rely on magazines, newspapers which focuses to influence the person's decision. Today we have thousands of resources, people do their own research. A certain industry may go up or down, but not the entire market.
All signs shows a strong economy except for the slow down in the IT industry because mostly "must haves" has already been implemented. Common sense.
. Intel is losing market share, thus losing profit and revenues. To increase back the profit, retrench it's worker, cut costs. Another common sense.
Invest in telecommunication companies operating in India, common sense. 1 Million mobile user signs up everyday and would go on at least for the next 6 month. Speculate on emerging technologies such as nano carbon tubes for water filtration as it'll be a cheap way to product clean, drinkable water. Commodities go for germanium, silicon valley ran out of silicon, researches already find ways to use germanium to enhance microprocessors and find silicon germanium runs more effectively compare to pure silicon wafers. There are so much more signs of future growing industry and sectors. Small business grow big.. big business get small. It's just the norm in business.
Nobody can predict tomorrow. Do your research because nobody can tell you when will the economy fall.
