There's some awful truth to the old saying that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and you can see that in action by examining recent history. Just as the Nasdaq was peaking a year ago, interest rate hikes were beginning to test investors' reluctance to apply traditional valuation metrics to new stocks. While the effect lagged for a few quarters, eventually the demand for Intel chips and Cisco routers caught up to reality. Meanwhile, a weaker Wall Street did little to prop up consumer confidence. When people and the companies they work for are unsure about expenditures, so goes the economy.
Life is lonely at the top.
A year ago, Cisco was actually the country's largest company in terms of market capitalization. But that was yesteryear. Last month the company missed estimates and warned of flat sequential revenue growth for the next two quarters. And they will get better because pessimism, like optimism, doesn't last forever. Rick Aristotle Munarriz feels the pain of those who have been let go by their company over the past year.