Wednesday, November 22, 2006

The (James) Bond Portfolio

We have taken in our Christmas movie early and been to see Casino Royale, the 21st official Bond entry.

The Bond Portfolio contains

Gambling. Baccarat, the game in the novel, has given way to the more contemporary pleasures of poker. A belated boost for PartyPoker (PRTY.L), Cryptologic (CRYP) and the rest of that benighted sector.

New Media. Sony (SNE) has the most egregious product placements, of computers, cellphones and other dinky toys. An early warning sign for Apple (AAPL), normally the king of movie technology?

Banking. The plot turns (uninteresting plot spoiler ahead) on a series of slimy Swiss and Albanian bankers who are variously financing terrorism, laundering money and - in an interesting twist - facilitating short sellers. We don't see much fall out for the Albanian financial services sector, but watch out Credit Suisse (CS) and UBS (UBS).

Foreign Exchange. Both the American and British governments lose $5 to $15 million in poker related shenanigans but this is unlikely to hurt their currencies.

Pharmaceuticals. Bond ingests an amazing array of drugs and this is bound to help the hard pressed drug majors in this cold Democratic season: Pfizer (PFE), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) and Merck (MRK).

Daniel Craig is a hard Bond. He has tucked away the feminine side he displayed in The Mother and which started to disintegrate in Sylvia. Even compared to the unfortunate Ted Hughes, this Bond sets a personal best in the evisceration of women he meets - murdered, suicided, loved and destroyed - he is clearly channeling Henry VIII.

Disclosure: We have a position in Cryptologic

1 comment:

Cal said...

Interesting portfolio. I liked the movie, and yes there were tons of walking/talking advertisements. What I could not get over for the life of me was James Bond driving a Ford Fusion! Not very bond-like, and it screamed "advertisement"! Cool, blog, check me out.
-CalTrader