Fisher Investments on Telecom

Foreword

I’m pleased to introduce the tenth in a series of investing guides from Fisher Investments Press. This imprint—the first ever from a money manager—was launched in partnership with John Wiley & Sons to bring the accumulated investing wisdom of my firm to you, whether you’re an investing enthusiast, student, or aspiring professional.

This isn’t meant as a technical guide on the nuts and bolts of telephony. Rather, it’s an investing guide. Like the other books in the Fisher Investments On series, it aims to help you make better, forward-looking forecasts on the sector, its industries, and its individual stocks. Each book in the series can stand alone—read one or just a few on topics that interest you. But together, they can be a comprehensive, do-it-yourself training program for capital markets analysis—done from the comfort of your couch. The series will eventually cover all the standard investing sectors (Energy, Materials, Consumer Staples, Health Care, Utilities, etc.—just Financials remains after this) as well as other investing regions and categories.

Telecom (official name: Telecommunication Services Sector) is currently about 5 percent of total world stocks (as measured by the MSCI All Country index). It’s a small sector—globally, only Utilities is smaller. In the US, it’s just 3 percent of the S&P 500—smaller than Utilities (as of 12/31/2010). But in capital markets, “small” never means “unimportant.” Telecom firms don’t manufacture the super cool, itty bitty but ...