硅谷绩优股为何成了“绩忧股”？

    美国诗人艾略特在那首著名的《荒原》中把四月称为最残忍的月份。不过对于那些把信心放在科技股上的投资者来说，刚刚过去的五月也令他们很不好过。一向仁慈的五月也成了一个残忍的月份。究竟为什么，还没有一个明确的原因。

    今年五月，科技板块发生了一些奇怪的事。在没有明确卖出信号的情况下，科技股似乎一下被股民弃之如敝履。首先是Facebook在上市头几日市值就蒸发了四分之一。Facebook的节节败退也影响到了其他新近IPO的网络股。自从Facebook上市后，Groupon的股票下跌了15%，收益相当依赖Facebook的社交游戏公司Zynga的股票更是下跌了29%。

    不过许多人都忽略了一点：股民们不仅对最近IPO的几支网络股反应冷淡，而且近来不少老牌蓝筹股也出现了暴跌。Facebook的走势虽惨，戴尔（Dell）、思科（Cisco）等历史悠久的科技股上个月的表现也很惨淡。与此同时，其他大牌科技股也出现了意想不到的下跌。对此没有什么单独的原因可以解释，可能只是股民们厌倦了科技板的增长。

    从五月初到上周二，纳斯达克综合指数已经下跌了7%，许多大盘股的表现更差。戴尔股价下跌23%，思科下跌19%，甲骨文（Oracle）下跌11%，惠普（HP）、微软（Microsoft）和英特尔（Intel）都下跌了8%。IBM是少数几个表现优于纳斯达克综指的科技公司之一，它只下跌了6%。

    当然，从一个月的交易表现很难推断出太多，尤其是这个月，几乎全球各地都面临着经济的不确定性。不过以往当股市其他板块出现下跌时，这些蓝筹科技股历来被投资者当成避风港。但是现在当广域市场面临不确定性时，投资者们却有了出售科技股的倾向。

    这究竟是怎么回事？罪魁祸首应该是全球IT支出的下降，欧洲金融危机和强势美元应对此负主要责任。据研究机构高德纳公司（Gartner）预计，今年全球企业和政府的IT支出有望达到3.75万亿美元。不过高德纳公司最近把今年全球IT支出增幅的预测由之前的3.7%调低到2.5%。去年由于全球企业开始走出经济危机的阴影，因而去年全球IT支出的增幅达到了6.8%。

    有些领域的表现很可能会超过其他板块。比如电信设备领域今年有望增长6.9%，接近2011年的速度。另外全球在企业软件和计算机硬件上的支出将分别增长5%和4.3%，增幅都远远小于去年。电信和IT服务有望增长1%左右，也远低于去年的6%。

    April, as T.S. Eliot famously said, is the cruelest month. But for investors who put their faith in tech stocks, it's hard to look back on the past month and feel good. No, the merry month of May has been cruel. And there's no clear reason why.

    Something strange happened in the tech sector in May. Without a clear sell signal, tech stocks seemed to slip into some kind of investor oblivion. Exhibit A, of course, is the Facebook (FB) IPO, which in its first trading days has lost a quarter of the value that Wall Street's supposedly smartest underwriters thought it was worth. Facebook has pulled down other recent web IPOs as well: Groupon (GRPN) is down 15% since Facebook listed and Zynga (ZNGA), which relies in good part on Facebook for revenue, is down 29%.

    But overlooked in all the coverage about the cold shoulder investors have given to recent web IPOs is the slump that good old-fashioned, blue-chip tech giants have faced. As bad as Facebook has fared since its IPO, old-line tech brands like Dell (DELL) and Cisco (CSCO) have fared just as poorly this month. Meanwhile, others big-name tech stalwarts have also declined unexpectedly. And there's no single piece of bad news to explain it. It's just that investors seem to be weary of tech as a growth sector.

    As of Tuesday, the Nasdaq Composite is down 7% so far in May. Many large-cap stocks have fared much worse. Dell is down 23%, Cisco is down 19%, and Oracle (ORCL) is down 11%. Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), Microsoft (MSFT) and Intel (INTC) have all dropped 8%. IBM (IBM) is among the few tech giants that has outperformed the Nasdaq, falling a mere 6%.

    Of course, there is always a risk in extrapolating too much from a single month of stock trading, especially one that faced economic uncertainty in nearly every part of the world. But it used to be these same blue-chip tech names were seen as safe havens when other sectors were declining. Now, investors are inclined to sell tech when the broader market faces uncertainty.

    What gives? The biggest culprit seems to be a broad-based slowdown in the pace of spending on information technology, thanks to financial turmoil in Europe and a stronger dollar. Global IT spending by companies and governments is expected to total $3.75 trillion this year, according to research firm Gartner. But Gartner recently lowered its forecast for the pace of spending. Instead of expecting a 3.7% growth this year, the firm now expects IT spending to rise by only 2.5%. Last year, IT spending grew by 6.8% as companies straightened themselves out after the 2008 crisis.

    Some sectors are likely to fare better than others. Telecom equipment spending is expected to rise by 6.9%, close to the 2011 rate. Spending will rise 5% for enterprise software and 4.3% for computing hardware, both down significantly from last year. Telecom and IT services, however, are expected to grow by about 1%, well below the 6% rate for 2011.