Boeing: Blue Chip or Cow Chip?

When Blue Chips Go Bad: What Should Investors Do With Boeing?
Excerpt:

[Boeing] is in the universe of quality stocks they follow. While there is no way of knowing how long problems will plague this new plane, how quickly the cause can be identified or how costly repairs will be, Smith says so far this issue looks to be short-term in nature and not something that threatens long-term earnings growth or compromises its financial strength.

"You have to factor in if a company's balance sheet is getting compromised because of its difficulties," Smith says, adding that the 787 is only one of many products sold by Boeing, albeit an important one. "Right now we have put this in the category of a short-term problem not the beginning of a long term obstacle, but that could change."

To be fair, Boeing is not the only "blue chip turned cow chip," as Smith characterizes it. In fact, there are three members of the Dow Jones Industrials that are technically in their own private bear markets right now, having fallen more than 20% from their 52-week highs. They are Hewlett Packard (HPQ) -42%, Intel (INTC) -25%, and DuPont (DD) -20%, and Smith says only one of them is on his cow chip list, so to speak.

"We like both DuPont and Intel and see their problems more as short-term headwinds," Smith says, while calling Hewlett Packard's plight one of secular, long-term challenges, as well as management issues.

Comment: We bought it in June '11. Down $ .30 per share since then. Holding onto. I agree that HPQ is "cow chip". For those not familiar with farming: Cow Chip