Always be polite

I'm presently finding a distinct lack of enthusiasm for writing my contribution to our global monthly product. I decided to trawl the analyst ratings pages on Bloomberg in search of something to spur me into action. I think I might have found it. I compiled 418 analyst ratings on 15 stocks (SBC, Verizon, BellSouth, Nextel, Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom, France Telecom, BT Group, Telefonica, NTT, KDDI, DoCoMo, SK Telecom, China Mobile, Telstra), and here's the split I got:

Positive 50%
Neutral 38%
Negative 12%

The MSCI World Telecom Index has underperformed the MSCI by 5.3% year-to-date. The power of positive thinking may be impotent.