Nokia (NOK) made a number of odd statements today, the net effect of which was to drive the firm’s stock down 10%. For starters, it said its global market share in the third quarter would be below where it was in the second quarter. For some reason, it held to its prediction about market share being strong for the full-year 2008. If the company was wrong about the current quarter, why would it be right about what will happen next?

Beyond that, the world largest handset company, which has about 40% of the global market last quarter, said it still believes that overall demand for cell phones will grow modestly this year.

According to MarketWatch, "Nokia expects industry mobile device volumes in 2008 to grow 10% or more from the approximately 1.14 billion units it estimated for 2007."

The great mystery is who will pick up the market share that Nokia is losing? It is unlikely to be Motorola (MOT) which has been bleeding for almost two years. That leave the probable list of suspects at Sony Ericsson and Samsung.

Some one will do well in the cell phone industry this quarter but it is anyone’s guess who that will be.

Douglas A. McIntyre

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