Like the others, Dell has depended on improving demand for computing equipment to climb out of the recession.
The consumer segment is expected to come in stronger than expected, Piper Jaffray said, in addition to improving demand for enterprise hardware.
So while the chip market outlook may be improving, demand for final products is really the key factor that will turn it around.
Arch Coal : Shares of the St . Louis Mo.-based coal producer are up 3.25% to $26.92 today after the firm raised its earnings outlook for 2010, citing improving demand for high-margin metallurgical coal used in the production of steel.
DuPont Photomasks, a maker of glass plates used to inscribe circuit patterns on microchips, reported a narrower quarterly loss on Wednesday due to slowly improving demand for electronic devices.
Improving demand for memory chips should benefit Micron Technology in the second half of the year, but a weak PC market will limit the chip maker's upside in the near term, according to a recent Bear Stearns report.
Four Seasons Hotels reported a third-quarter profit on Thursday and said that higher room rates and improving demand for its luxury hotels would help bolster profit and sales in coming quarters.
However, as the largest refiner in the U.S., with a capacity of nearly $2.2 billion barrels per day and a market share of about 13%, Conoco is well positioned to benefit from improving demand for energy and the dearth of new refining capacity.
Further, some bears hasten to point out, despite periodic signs that the debt-ridden consumer is by no means dead, the fact is many of those better than expected second-quarter earnings reports -- which helped push stock prices higher -- largely reflected sizable corporate cost reductions rather than improving demand for products and services.
The main approaches to improving demand for maternal and reproductive health are: conditional cash transfers; voucher schemes, and community-based and social health insurance.
