Aaron Katsman
www.IsraelNewsletter.com

At IOI we are not in the business of making fun of analysts who actually take a stand before an earnings report and tell investors what they think, even if they are wrong. In fact we applaud the move. It’s not very helpful to upgrade or downgrade a stock after earnings when the stock has already moved one way or another. Was it helpful to know that Google (GOOG) was upgraded this past Friday morning after the company blew past earnings and was up $70 in pre-market trading. Investors want information that they can use, before a difference making event happens to a company.

Last night the Israeli  hi-tech company Zoran (ZRAN) ,which makes chips for DVD players and multimedia systems, came out with numbers and provided a much rosier outlook than analysts had predicted. Ten days ago a Jefferies and Co.analyst downgraded Zoran stock down to ‘undeperform’, and slashed his numbers for the rest of the year as well.

Zoran predicted revenue of between $130 million and $135 million in the 2nd quarter, ahead of the $127.1 million that was the consensus. The company also said that they expect that margins for DTV and mobile phones will improve for the rest of the year.

IOI recently laid out the case for Zoran. Our subscribers would have known what the catalysts are going forward. With that being said, I still want to commend the Jefferies analyst for taking a position. He may have been wrong, we all are from time to time I am told, but at least he was proactive.

Disclosure: Author’s fund has a position in ZRAN, fund has no position in any other stock mentioned as of 4/22/08.

Please see our Disclaimer HERE.

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Aaron Katsman is Managing Editor of the Israel Opportunity Investor newsletter. He is lead portfolio manager for the Israel Growth Portfolio and Managing Director of America Israel Investment Associates, LLC. For more information, go to www.israelnewsletter.com or call 1-888-327-6179, or email aaron@profile-financial.com.

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Stock of the Month: ZRAN

Zoran (Nasdaq: ZRAN), was January’s Stock of the Month as part of our new subscription newsletter, Israel Opportunity Investor. You can find out more about the product and the opportunities we cover at www.israelnewsletter.com

Background

Zoran develops and markets integrated circuits (ICs) that provide digital signal processing (DSP) capabilities to a variety of consumer electronic products. These products are used in DVD players, home theatre systems, and digital cameras. The company also develops products for digital video delivery via set-top box or television. The company sells through Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM) who package them into digital and audio products sold to consumers.
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Aaron Katsman
IsraelNewsletter.com

Zoran (ZRAN), a developer and marketer of integrated circuit cores (ICs) and embedded software for DVDs, digital cameras, and set-top boxes, announced that US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has notified the company by letter dated November 2, 2007, that the staff’s investigation of Zoran’s historical stock option granting practices has been terminated and that no enforcement action against Zoran has been recommended to the Commission. Zoran’s NASDAQ listing was in jeopardy, as they delayed publishing their financial reports while the SEC investigation was on-going.

This should help lift a cloud that was hanging over the company and allow them to focus solely on executing their business model.

My man, Zack “FACEBOOK” Miller had a great piece on Zoran, and he is really getting jiggy.

Take a good look at Zoran, as they continue to be an attractive long-term play.

Please see our Disclaimer HERE.

Disclosure: Author has a position in ZRAN as of 11/9/07.

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Aaron Katsman is the lead portfolio manager for the Israel Growth Portfolio and Managing Director of America Israel Investment Associates, LLC. For more information, go to www.israelnewsletter.com or call 1-888-327-6179, or email aaron@profile-financial.com.

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It’s been a wild and woolly week for stocks in general and even more so for Israeli companies. We’ve seen some disappointing earnings across a broad swath of stocks and even the mighty have felt some pressure.

Let’s start with Alvarion (ALVR). Even after the Cisco purchase of WiMax competitor, Navini, the stock has had a hard go of it and even received a downgrade by Merriman, Curhan, et al. IsraelNewsletter’s Katsman, though, is still very positive on the name. Read his recent post here. Before Cisco (CSCO) officially announced its takeover of Navini, I posited that it would be better served by buying ALVR. Read that article here.

Commtouch (CTCH) out with numbers.

Radvision (RVSN) stinks up the joint. Even my colleague, Aaron “Buy Everything” Katsman has lost faith in the firm. See his recent capitulation here.

Magal (MAGS) Systems gets an order.

RRSat (RRST) reported last week.

Partner (PTNR) sees a lift from rising revenues.

Answers.com (ANSW) reports really strong traffic growth in its new WikiAnswers product.

Laggard BigBand Networks (BBND) terminates its CMTS business. I wrote on BloggingStocks about the future of cable TV and how BBND plays into the thesis.

ClickSoftware (CKSW) traded down big after reporting OK earnings. Read why Katsman smells an opportunity in this name.

Microcap Cimatron (CIMT) out with earnings and some info about its plans for China.  Read some excerpts from the conference call.

012 Smile.Communications (SMLC) floated this week.  I posted on the offering here.

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