Nikon Stock

Benji2505

that's exactly the issue, the bread and butter segment of P&S is substituted by mobile phones. The Japanese are also not the fastest to start a serious restructuring, so stay away. If your are a momentum player, go short.

Ade

Nikon is "doubling down" on the P&S market (in a way). They are betting that even though the segment will shrink, there will also be fewer players, so they'll be able keep or even increase marketshare. It's difficult to predict whether this bet will pay off -- or prove disastrous.

Ade

Nikon's fiscal year ends next week and unless they post solid results, it's seems certain that the stock will break under the psychological 1,600 yen support. If that happens we could be testing 3-year lows in the near future.

Well, it has happened, sooner than I expected. A few minutes ago (morning Tokyo time) Nikon opened at 1595 and is currently -2.40% intraday in a broad Nikkei selloff.

Nikon stock is now at a 3-year low, wiping out gains since March 2011.

Nikon's annual report won't come out for a few more weeks. Nikon stock is now relatively cheap compared to the industry plus they still have a solid DSLR business and excellent financials. But if the annual doesn't bring solid news then the stock will likely go down even more to find a new support level.

The biggest risk short term will be the Yen vs. Dollar rate.

Photobug

I don't like hearing this news. This makes them open to be purchased.

PB_PM

Or worse, have a mass exodus of investors leading to the company simply dying.

Symphotic

I once was involved in an acquisition of a Japanese company that had an exodus of investors. It made it cheap for us to buy 100% and make it into a company we wanted, but it meant we had to lose a lot of the products they originally sold and shutter half our production facility.

Like my company in Japan, Nikon has good core products, an excellent and massive customer base, and a great name. But they have a number of weak products that don't do anything for the company, consumers or shareholders.

I think they won't die. Investors abandoning the stock make it it more likely it will be privatized with the losing business units sold off by the new owners. Not everybody should be GE.

TaoTeJared

Nikon has tracked the Nikkei 225 and has followed it consistently. All companies took a major hit yesterday and it didn't have much activity on it. The dollar also took a good hit yesterday with the bank of Japan stating that they didn't need any stimulus. That indicates the drop (for the last few months) was due to the whole market dropping, nothing to do with Nikon specifically.

If you look at the volumes it is quite obvious that some entity or group has been moving the stock in enormous numbers here and there that does not track the financial releases, industry or daily market activity. There are multiple large mutual funds that have had large holdings in Nikon stock in the past and are known to dump their holdings once they make their gains. I know of one who went strong into Nikon Stock in June of last year and then added more in December. Interestingly that is when the really high volume spiked as well. That's when the stocked jumped. In the last month approximately the same volume occurred and the stock dropped. I'm guessing that fund will show they got out. Dumping that type of position would cause any stock to tank a good 5%, at the rest of the market dropping and that accounts for the rest of the loss in the last 3 months. The market segment on a whole has taking a huge beating. In comparison Canon is near it's 52wk lows as well even with being much more diversified.

On the books Nikon's stock is just above $17.50 or around 1,780 JYN. That is about a 14% discount and would be a very good deal for the right person if the financials line up with expectations. Every analyst I have seen has them on a "Hold" call. There isn't any real reason to believe something is outside of normal market fluctuations inside a market segment that is dropping due to having to reinvent itself.

Golf007sd

+1 TTJ

The current valuation on many stock are to bold. Stock market correction is way over due. Hence, a wild ride is on the horizon for many securities....Nikon is just but one that is seeing such a hit.

Ade

On the books Nikon's stock is just above $17.50 or around 1,780 JYN. That is about a 14% discount and would be a very good deal for the right person if the financials line up with expectations.

Not sure what you mean there? The book value is lower than the market value in normal circumstances. In Nikon's case about 20% lower, since on the books Nikon stock is worth only around 1330 Yen (USD $13.10), slightly less than the 12-month average since the stock has been going down.

While Canon stock has lost about 16% in the past year, Nikon stock has plunged 29% in the same period. In comparison, the Nikkei as a whole is still positive at +5.15% even with the big hit last week.

In fact while Nikon has hit a 3-year low, the Nikkei is up over 50% in the same 3-year period. Nikon stock seems to be on the cheap side now but I think most potential investors might remain on the sidelines for the time being.

TaoTeJared

If you don't know what it means why on earth would you assume to correct something? Oh that's right, you are the one who likes to attack my posts.

You quoted the "tangible book value." That removes "intangible assets" like the "goodwill," patents and liabilities. It's not the same as book value. The only real time you need that is if a company is looming on bankruptcy, which Nikon is not.

No one compares percentages like that between companies like that. Canon and Nikon are completely different companies. Nikon is a $6 billion dollar company and Canon is a $35 billion dollar company (almost 6 times larger) and is a major player in multiple markets where Nikon is in just a few. Canon is more insulated from the Photographic (and any other industry they play in) industry concerns. Pointing out both are near their 52 week lows (and I could have mentioned dozens if not hundreds of companies) illustrate that there is a market trend.

Why are you cheery picking data to show that somehow Nikon is a crappy company? Neither Nikon or investors don't give a damn that you are somehow personally disjointed with them. There are many, many things in their numbers that show they are doing well. If you want to cheery pick how about this - five years ago after the market crash it was trading at $9. That is a 67% increase. Their books are good, year over year numbers are good and track market segments, and returns are typical for a 97-year old company. Unless some huge gremlin is in their new numbers, (that will be out soon) it will be much the same. They are a solid company.

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The photography market as a whole is a minefield at the moment with consumers swaying towards many different products, trying them and moving again to something different. Sales for companies have shot up when they get lucky and release a hot product, and then tank between refresh cycles. Most companies have a 2-4 year refresh cycle for their individual higher end cameras that we chase after and a yearly refresh cycle on digi cams. With Digi cam sales falling like a rock, the industry numbers have moved to a longer business cycle. There are many companies with long cycles like this. Aircraft manufactures are one of the longest as the time to develop, build and contracts for new aircraft are multiple years. As higher end camera systems become more of a companies percent of all camera sales, this shifts and markets will adjust. With Nikon having cameras being such a dominate segment in their business, the effects of this change will be more visible. The key is not that this change is happening, but how they handle it during the change. And that change can only be observed with a wide lens following multiple years.

Ade

Um, no.

As of right now Nikon's "book value" is 1381 Yen per share (most recent quarter).

Nikon's "tangible book value" (TBVPS) is even lower, currently at 1296 Yen.

Either way it's not "above $17.50 or around 1,780 JYN (sic)" as you claim. That would imply an inverted price-to-book.

Go look it up, Reuters, Bloomberg, Morningstar, FT, WSJ, whatever, none will show a Price/Book under 1.00 for Nikon however "book value" is calculated. Don't make me post a bunch of market data screenshots.

spraynpray

Looks like Nikon management aren't so stoopid after all:

https://nikonrumors.com/2018/05/30/harvard-business-review-on-how-nikon-used-investors-to-their-advantage.aspx/

rmp

Imagine a smart phone with:

A small sensor, say 12 mp for low noise.

Now add in-phone, invisible-to-the user, automatic-on-every-shot, HDR processing.

Not hard to imagine is it. Now combined that with

in-phone, invisible-to-the user, automatic-on-every-shot, taking multiple images and stitching them together like a panorama.

So, a 12 mp sensor, with stitching of multiple-HDR images produces a 48 mp HDR image with low noise.


Nikon, and the resulting Nikon stock, better jump on the in-camera, computational-photography train because it is leaving the station as we chat.