A comparative look

It's fun sometimes to read these 'immediate expert' analyses that pop up within forty-five minutes of a quarterly announcement, and think about them in a little larger context.  The ones I particularly like are the headline writers, who seem to have an especially fun time with HP.

The gist of the HP story headlines on Thursday were: "HP misses forecasts, doom and gloom"   No comparison to Dell, Lenovo, Microsoft, Intel, IBM or Cisco, which might have given some context

The Merc story (printed) was great:  "HP Misses Forecasts, Earning in Line."  The forecasts were $27.3B, and 68 cents a share.  The results were $27.2B, and 68 cents a share.  So both for precision and accuracy, this was an amazing delivery.  Why the headline?   Compare that to IBM's headline last month when they had a 17% decline in earnings (HP's was 14%), and the NY Times said, "came in well ahead of forecast".

One pundit opined that Donatelli's demotion was "expected" while another bemoaned the move, saying he "was the bright face both internally and externally".    "Expected" in this case meant that the street had three hours advance notice, hardly enough for investors to digest and act.  And the "bright face?"  Google him vs. some others at HP -- not overly gracing the pages or the pulpit, we'd say.

Here's the story (ZD NET) mid-day Wednesday four hours before the earnings announcement:

Expect executive shakeup at HP amid Q3 earnings report

Summary: The game of musical chairs continues at the top leadership tier of Hewlett-Packard.

By Rachel King for Between the Lines | August 21, 2013 -- 18:38 GMT (11:38 PDT)

But over the week, the headline and the article I like best?

3 Reasons Not to Panic Over Hewlett-Packard's Earnings Report

by Anders Bylund, The Motley Fool Aug 22nd 2013 2:03PM

This report takes a look at the options open to HP, "given that they've shown no ability to innovate" and says, "hey, they're doing damn well, just about as well as under Hurd."  Now there's some great praise!

But in general it is a trenchant report.  I just wish HP could 're-jigger" the innovative side.