RIM’s and Nokia’s Irrational Rallies

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By Trey Thoelcke Published
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Wall St.’s uncanny new love of battered handset companies Research In Motion Ltd. (NASDAQ: RIMM) and Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK) continues. The stocks in each firm are up more than 40% in the past month.

The improvements do not make sense. Each continues to lose ground to leaders Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Samsung. Optimists might argue that the stock prices were so low that they had nowhere to go but up. RIM has a tiny chance to improve its fortunes with a new BlackBerry 10 line. But there is no evidence that the product will have any features that would make it more attractive than the better selling smartphones. The same is true of new Lumia phones from Nokia, which run the new Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) Windows mobile OS. Windows continues to have a very small portion of the global OS market, which is controlled by Google Inc.’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) Android.

Another possible cause for the increase in the share prices of the two companies is that they have become attractive takeover targets. The problem with that reasoning is that, if they are targets, why wouldn’t buyers have made offers when the stocks were at their lows.

Douglas A. McIntyre

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About the Author Trey Thoelcke →

Trey has been an editor and author at 24/7 Wall St. for more than a decade, where he has published thousands of articles analyzing corporate earnings, dividend stocks, short interest, insider buying, private equity, and market trends. His comprehensive coverage spans the full spectrum of financial markets, from blue-chip stalwarts to emerging growth companies.

Beyond 24/7 Wall St., Trey has created and edited financial content for Benzinga and AOL's BloggingStocks, contributing additional hundreds of articles to the investment community. He previously oversaw the 24/7 Climate Insights site, managing editorial operations and content strategy, and currently oversees and creates content for My Investing News.

Trey's editorial expertise extends across multiple publishing environments. He served as production editor at Dearborn Financial Publishing and development editor at Kaplan, where he helped shape financial education materials. Earlier in his career, he worked as a writer-producer at SVE. His freelance editing portfolio includes work for prestigious clients such as Sage Publications, Rand McNally, the Institute for Supply Management, the American Library Association, Eggplant Literary Productions, and Spiegel.

Outside of financial journalism, Trey writes fiction and has been an active member of the writing community for years, overseeing a long-running critique group and moderating workshop sessions at regional conventions. He lives with his family in an old house in the Midwest.

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