DISH Network Corporation (NASDAQ:DISH)

Best in the sat world, take over possibilities,

outperforming digital TV and less expensive.

This is a meaningless down poke, I'm thinking either

A) More people using the internet for streaming and less interested in cable.

B) A solar flare hits in 2012 and knocks out the Dish Network satellite grid

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2012/01/12/heres-dish-networks-audacious-plan-on-a-silver-pla.aspx

Putting together the puzzle pieces we have today, it looks like DISH is planning to reduce its reliance on expensive satellites over the next few years. Blockbuster provides content by hook or by crook. The FCC had better approve Ergen's wireless network plans or else suffer his scorn. If it all comes together as planned, it'll really be like a terrific Seinfeld episode where you couldn't see the punchline coming until it was delivered. And it's all powered by Ergen's blood, toil, tears, and sweat as each of the components is facing serious resistance along the way.

"We may be sure that the world will roll forward into broader destinies," Churchill said in his Russian musings in 1939. So, too, does the entertainment industry roll forward into a brave new digital era -- and Charlie Ergen is hell-bent on keeping his DISH Network relevant in the new age.

The riddle unravels, and I like what I see inside.

I've had DISH for about five years now and the only thing keeping me there is I don't feel like another two year contract with some other service. The customer service is downright evil. Customer service means you SERVE THE CUSTOMER, not tell them them half-truths to entice them to buy more from you then break out the fine print later. That's the job of salesmen!

The Blockbuster acquisition and the way it's been implemented is frightful. There is NO streaming video available unless you have HD receiver which makes ZERO sense. Thus without HD, you're out of luck. You can't stream Blockbuster because the standard boxes won't stream! LMAO! Good stuff.

Of course if you're a loyal customer you get no breaks, you have to sign another two year contract to upgrade or "buy" the receiver yourself for $500 and NO warranty that you'd ever be able to take advantage of. Only then can they stream Blockbuster.

The technicians are mildly retarded. One came out to my house and tore up my wire routes that I'd spent hours setting up just so he wouldn't tear up my wire routes and didn't even realize all he had to do was plug into the wall and then to the box. He wasn't smart enough to figure out I'd done all the routing work for him and proceeded to tear it all out and then re-route it in the same way I'd just routed it but instead left the wire pulled through the wall and not even secured to anything without even so much as a strain relief.

All in all, if this is the type of business you want to invest in, be my guest.

a play on excess spectrum.

a quick look at the numbers tells me that a DTV short, DISH long is guaranteed to produce a positive return.

I believe DISH Network Corp will bring in 105.82 points considering a 15% S&P performance.

Nice entry with low pe and a product people can't do without.

Magic Formula pick

the net grows daily & NFLX messed up bad
LT Debt/ Equity    0.00
Price Earnings    8.70
Price/Sales    0.90
Price/Book    0.00
Price/Cash Flow    5.10

Dish is unveiling a new streaming service using blockbuster and with the price hike at netflix. People will switch and not to mention the awesome satelittle tv service they provide.

I have been watching Dish very closely for several months. Dish mumbled vaguely that they had something in the works.Something big and unexplainable. They bought several other networking companies around this time. And the dying Blockbuster name. Now Netflix begins to suffer and for $100 less per share Dish network is looking pretty good.

It has grown earnings an average of 10% a year over the past five years and it is selling at 7 times this year’s expected earnings. Netflix trades at 45 times this year’s expected earnings. DISH looks like a much better buy here. It is selling near the bottom of its five-year valuation. has beat earnings estimates five of the last six quarters and consensus EPS estimates for 2011 and 2012 have been raised over the last 90 days. Its forward P/E based on FY 2012’s projections is 8.5 times earnings, a 35% discount to its five-year average.

This is my anti Netflix pick. It seems like every discussion about competition for Netflix assumes as an article of faith that it will be based on the same all you can eat subscription service. IMO the all you can eat model is fatally flawed in that Netflix can't bring in enough revenues to ever afford anything more than tv re-runs and ancient movies. To the contrary all significant moves into streaming by competition such as Google and Amazon have been based on an a la carte model. I could go into a long dissertation on why Netflix subscription streaming is doomed to implode but this is a DISH pitch. Let's just say 50% churn rate and quality of content are why Netflix subscription based streaming service will implode (once they saturate the U.S. market).

On the other hand the news the other day that Dish was experimenting with offering football packages on their streaming service has me intrigued. Thats a package that makes a lot of sense as does news they are experimenting with offering streaming service to areas their satellite service does not cover such as in cities. I could see them selling other streaming packages such as newer movies or international television for ex patriots. The advantage to this model is that they can match price to cost so that they don't get caught in the Netflix trap of needing rapid growth to afford content but devaluing the content by giving it out to ever more subs. DISH's cost per sub is fixed and the content providers revenues per sub is fixed in a win win for both sides.

At 8X earnings right now I think this is a fairly low risk way to play the emergence of the streaming trend. The market obviously isn't seeing the potential here and IMO is way over estimating Netflix model. If DISH's foray into streaming didn't pan out I don't think the market would care and there's a lot of upside if packaged streaming does work out. Particularly so if the momo's decide to anoint DISH the new "paradigm shifter" in the streaming video business.

ROIC is high and growing.

I got interested in DISH when I heard that they bought the festering pile of junk which is Blockbuster. What could they possibly be planning to do with it? Compete with Netflix? They are also bidding for a company which owns a big chunk of wireless spectrum. All this means one thing: they see the writing on the wall when it comes to the future of satellite TV. Indeed, won't all television be coming over the Internet in the not-too-distant future? Or even if it won't, will the satellite TV market still be big enough for both Direct TV and the low-cost player DISH?

The acquisition of Blockbuster will pay off through the contracts for content. Added plus: they control bandwidth, which will be a scarce resource in coming years.

DISH's balance sheet is a little messy right now, but I there are some mitigating factors. Recently DISH came to Purdue for recruitment and I got to take a look into their business. I spoke with two different VPs and let me tell you they mean business. There is a ton a transparency at DISH and from what I can tell they employees love working there. I was also selected to interview with them. This was the most demanding interview processes I have every been through. DISH is very serious about scooping up the best young talent around. Before making the final cut for their internship position I had to take very challenging aptitude tests dealing with logic, math, and problem solving skills. I really think that DISH is going to overtake comcast within the next couple of years.