Kodak Moment

[BlueBee]

Any of you going to miss Kodak?  How did it come to this for such an American icon?  What went wrong?  It seemed pretty clear to the rest of us a LONG time ago that photo film was going to go extinct.  Why didn’t this fact of evolution dawn on them?

I will miss Kodak and the old days a little.  I can still remember using some big (and expensive) Kodak paper for developing photos in a photography class I took around 1992.  Photoshop is sure a lot simpler than the multiple iterations of exposure times and color filters it used to take to get the photos right.  I went through plenty of Kodak paper in that class.  All my screw ups certainly helped their bottom line back then.

[AllenF]

I thought Kodak was just in Chapter 11.   They still will make printers and paper and ink.

[SEEYA]

A little of topic:
Remember those flash bulbs?

[edward]

I think that back i the 80-90 s they got really burned and had to pay a world record patent theft fine and damages to the Polaroid company 

mvh edward 

[tefer2]

They put their money into Printers instead of digital camera's.

[tefer2]

More people out of work, great news!

[BlueBee]

A little of topic:
Remember those flash bulbs?

Oh yeah, I remember those cool flash bulbs.  I used to love to take them apart as a kid.

[BlueBee]

You’re right Allen, Chapter 11.  However they only come out alive if they have a business plan that the secured debt holders and banks believe in.  Without a viable business plan they may end up Chapter 7.  Either way they still seem on the road to extinction (or name buyout) to me.  Look at their record.

I read a crazy article the other day suggesting that you might be able to make a quick 30% gain in a few days by buying Kodak stock AFTER they announced bankruptcy.  That sounds nuts on the surface since the stock holders are the first to get wiped out in bankruptcy.  However the article suggested that the stock price in bankruptcy cases typically bounce up shortly after the announcement as all the people who were short before the announcement have to “buy” to cover those short positions.  All that “buying” action drives the price of the shares up.  The old supply vs demand thing. 

The logic seems plausible to me, but the risk vs reward doesn't strike me as attractive; besides you get killed in commissions trading penny stuff.  EK is at 55 cents right now, it will be interesting to see what it does in the next few days.  Obviously nothing you want to buy and hold!

[Keith13]

More people out of work, great news!

They make an inferior product. If an employee can't see that he either doesn't want to or is oblivious to the world. Maybe the government will step in and save those high dollar jobs

Keith

[BlueBee]

I thought it was the “job” of the CEO and execs to see these things?  No?

Government shouldn’t bail them out unless they’re the victim of Wall Street Fraud.  I don’t see that in this case.  However the Government or employee reps should definitely try to claw back compensation from the CEOs and execs.

[kathyp]

government shouldn't bail them out at all.
pretty sure Keith was joking about that, but i wonder how you think GM was a victim....of anything other than unions?

Kodak made some bad business decision and they are buried under legacy costs.  reorganization and new leadership might help them out.