Timminco Limited (TSE: TIM) shares fell sharply earlier this week after the company reported lower-than-expected sales and made some questionable statements to investors. Short-seller Asensio has been making a bear case on the stock for some time, and it now appears like many of their predictions are coming true. Shares fell sharply after the news hit the market.

Timminco's 221 million tons of solar silicon shipped fell short of expectations due to contamination issues previously brought up by Asensio's research and denied by CEO Heinz Schimmelbusch in a May 30th article that appeared in the Globe and Mail. Earlier this week, the company elected to hold back 70 tonnes of silicon due to higher-than-expected phosphorous levels.

Asensio's issues with Timminco deals with its accounting for returns in sales recognition. A report on July 22nd issued by the short-seller questioned statements made by company officials that Timminco's customers were declining to return even highly contaminated parts of ingots for "extra credit offered by Timminco".

The big question going forward is whether or not the average selling price would decline due to returned material. CFO Rober Dietrich reiterated that there were no returns in the quarter, but did not shed any light on statements made by other executives mentioned above. As a result, Asensio believes there exists a possiblity of fraud within the high-flying company.

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The internet has become the new operating system with many companies moving many of their operations online. Microsoft Corporation (NYSE: MSFT) holds the monopoly on desktops and had the lead on web browsers until recently when competitor Firefox took a large share of the web browser market. So, how much is Firefox worth and should Google Inc. (NDAQ: GOOG) consider looking at Firefox?

How much does Firefox make? SpreadFirefox.com indicates that 622,003,431 people have downloaded the Firefox web browser with experts estimating that the firm makes $1 per download from the Google search box in the corner. The numbers suggest that the company is making between $100 million and $200 million per year in gross revenues with solid growth rates.

Additional revenues could be easily realized through other browser add-ons, default homepage ads, and other techniques. Since the Mozilla Foundation is more of a non-profit organization, revenue-generating activities have been kept relatively simple and limited in scope. Moreover, changes may alienate some users. Regardless, there is ample opportunity for increases.

Next, expenses must be considered. Mozilla's employee count is estimated at around 90 with more hiring planned in the future. Assuming that the firm has 100 full-time employees at $100,000 per employee, plus $50 million a year in other equipment/service costs, total expenses are around $60 million per year. This pegs the annual gross profits at around $40 million to $140 million.

Public companies also face additional costs that must be included in the net profit calculation. Sarbanes Oxley compliance costs around $5 million a year with taxes taking out an additional chunk of change. This would leave the firm with around $40 to $90 million in net income after all is said and done.

Investors know that public companies all trade at earnings multiples based on growth rates. Given the market growth, investors could expect a minimum price-to-earnings ratio of 25x earnings, which implies a valuation of around $1 billion to $2.2 billion. This is relatively conservative given the recent valuation of Facebook by Microsoft and acquisitions by Google.

Of course, Mozilla has repeatedly insisted that it would not go public. However, growing pressure on Google to find new revenue growth streams may force them to take a look at the company (Microsoft wouldn't have a chance) while the increasing valuations may be too much for some to resist.

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Deere & Company (NYSE: DE) shares continued their declines after it announced disappointing results in the third-quarter. Sales managed to grow an impressive 18% year-over-year - helped by a 35% growth in agricultural equipment - to $7.07. However, the most wasn't enough to impress Wall Street analysts that were expecting $7.23 billion. Operating margins also decreased a full percentage point to 13.2%, which is always a bad sign despite higher revenues.

The big concern surrounding Deere & Company its costs would increase and put pressure on its margins. Agricultural commodity prices have moderated and put some pressure on revenues, but the real problem is the cost of raw materials. The company's financial services operations also saw operating profits fall 21 percent to $111 million because of higher expenses, an increase in leverage, and a higher provision for credit losses.

Deere & Company, through its subsidiaries, operates in four business segments. The agricultural equipment segment manufactures and distributes a line of farm equipment and related service parts, including tractors; combine, cotton and sugarcane harvesters; tillage, seeding and soil preparation machinery; sprayers; hay and forage equipment; integrated agricultural management systems technology, and precision agricultural irrigation equipment.

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LDK Solar Co., Ltd. (NYSE: LDK) shares surged higher after the solar-maker reported better-than-expected second-quarter results in a 6-K filing with the SEC. Revenues surged 89.2% to $441.7 million after total wafer shipments increased 60.8% during the quarter. Meanwhile, gross profit margins ended up at 25.4%, meaning it didn't sacrifice profits for revenues. LDK Solar also upwardly revised its outlook for the year as it retains a bullish sentiment on the industry.

"We experienced substantial revenue growth during the second quarter as our wafer capacity expansion exceeded our expectations," stated Xiaofeng Peng, Chairman and CEO of LDK Solar. "We are pleased with our continued success of executing our growth strategies. In addition to our wafer capacity expansion, tremendous progress has been made to date on the construction of our polysilicon plants and the project remains on schedule."

The Chinese solar maker now expects revenues between $486 million and $496 million on shipments of between 210 megawatts and 220 megawatts of wafers in the third quarter. The company also lifted its full year guidance to between $1.65 and $1.75 billion compared to between $1.08 and $1.18 billion earlier. Meanwhile, analysts expected only $1.16 billion, which is why we saw the dramatic jump in today's trading when shares soared more than 26% briefly.

Despite the dramatic move, LDK Solar remains well below its 52-week highs of $76.75 per share. This is because the primary driver downwards was a reduction in growth estimates for the industry, which forced down PE multiples. Currently, LDK Solar trades at just 26x earnings, which is far below its prior valuations of closer to 50x earnings. This mirrors much of the rest of the industry that has also seen multiple contraction.

In the end, if solar companies like LDK Solar can continue to outperform like they have yesterday, we may see an increase in the multiples that could justify a higher share price on two levels. Earnings per share will be greater and the multiple will grow larger. However, if the rest of the industry shows signs of weakness, then investors have have to count on only one part of this equation to profit.

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Pilgrim's Pride Corporation (NYSE: PPC) shares rose sharply after the company announced that it would stop production at two of its chicken-processing plants in a move to rein in losses. The painful actions are deemed necessary by the company in order to position it to emerge from the down cycle as a much stronger and more efficient competitor.

The news comes after Pilgrim's Pride announced a third-quarter loss of $52.8 million after posting a $62.6 million profit just a year earlier. The results come on the heels of higher feed and commodity costs that are quickly eating into profit margins. Meanwhile, the chicken industry is also facing pricing pressures as a result of over-supply.

Pilgrim's Pride stock is far below its 52-week high of $41 per share on such problems. Oil prices may have subsided in recent days, but it is the feed costs that has many concerned. Meanwhile, there are no signs that chicken prices will recover as consumers purchase less and supply continues to grow.

The hope is that today's job cuts will at least reduce costs in an effort to boost the bottom line. Whether or not this effort will be pay off remains to be seen, but at least it is a step in the right direction, and that's what shareholders were looking for today...

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Bronco Drilling Company (NDAQ: BRNC) shares continued their decline after ISS Governance Services recommended a vote against the proposed merger with Allis-Chalmers Energy. The shareholder advisory service concluded that given the relatively strict sales process, increase in EBITDA estimates for the peer group, and a valuation analysis of the company, shareholders should vote against the proposed transaction.

The announcement by ISS Governance is a welcome message for Third Avenue Management - an activist shareholder that has been fighting the merger since its announcement. The 23.4% shareholder expressed its belief that the offer was undervalued several times in Schedule 13D filings with the SEC and may now have enough support to prevent the merger. Supporters include 12.8% holder Wexford Capital and 6.1% holder Alpine Associates.

Bronco Drilling Company provides contract land drilling and workover services to oil and natural gas exploration and production companies. As of February 29, 2008, the Company owned a fleet of 56 land drilling rigs, of which 45 were marketed and 11 were held in inventory. Bronco also owned a fleet of 59 workover rigs, of which 49 were operating and 10 were in the process of being manufactured. The Company also owned a fleet of 70 trucks used to transport its rigs.

Shares of Bronco Drilling dropped $0.09, or 0.56%, to $15.86 per share.

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Time Warner Inc. (NYSE: TWX) sharesholders are growing increasingly impatient after the company announced yet another sharp drop in second quarter earnings. Net income at the media company fell 22 cents per share, while sales rose 5.2 percent to top analyst estimates.

AOL housed the majority of the problems this quarter. The internet service provider lost 604,000 web access subscribers while ad sales rose just 2 percent to $530 million. AOL shifted its focus on ad sales as the dialup ISP market began to shrink. Unfortunately, the move came just as online advertising peaked and now growth is hard to come by in the industry. Luckily, the unit's third-party ad network and revenue partnership with Google offset much of the losses.

AOL's publishing group also came up short this quarter. Time Inc. reported a 9 percent drop in advertising revenue as print advertising moves towards the online markets. In fact, the only bright spot in the quarter was the cable teleivion and film businesses that managed to drive growth in the quarter. All of this has investors wondering just when the company will be broken up so that true value can be unlocked.

CEO Jeff Bewkes recently announced his plans to get rid of Time Warner Cable and focus on TV and film instead. The executive merged the Warner Brothers and New Line studios to lower costs and said he was open to selling AOL back in May. Since then, parties like Microsoft have expressed interest, but there have been no late-stage conversations. The ability to sell off the cable division stake along with a sale of AOL should generate enough cash to satisfy shareholders.

Time Warner shares dropped sharply lower at open before recovering for a small profit.

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Cablevision Systems Corporation (NYSE: CVC) shares jumped sharply today after the media company announced that it is considering a range of strategic options to unlock shareholder value. Among other things, the Dolan-owned firm is considering a spin-off of its cable-television business, Madison Square Garden sports unit, or its Rainbow Media TV networks. The company also said that it plans to pay a quarterly dividend or buyback shares in an effort to boost the stock price.

Cablevision faced some harsh criticism this past year after it spent the earnings from its New York-area cable service by buy the Sundance Channel and Long Island's Newsday newspaper. Activist investors, including Gamco Investors, demanded that Dolan stop doing deals and share the proceeds with shareholders instead - advice that is finally being taken to heart. The move to spin-off certain segments may also make Cablevision cheaper for the Dolan family to acquire outright as they have attempted to in the past.

Cablevision operates cable programming networks, entertainment businesses and telecommunications companies. As of December 31, 2006, the Company served approximately 3.1 million basic video subscribers in and around the New York City metropolitan area. Through its wholly owned subsidiary, Rainbow Media, Cablevision owns interests in and manages numerous national and regional programming networks, the Madison Square Garden sports and entertainment businesses, and cable television advertising sales companies.

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