guru bears come out to play

From AFR 15/3/07

Adam Mitchell(Foresight Securities)-'We had been bullish on the non residential conastruction sector since 2001,however in october last year we changed our view'.'although we were more optimistic in where we expected activity to be,we thought it was time to start taking profits.'

'It is hard to see why anyone is going to pay higher than market multiples for alot of those stocks given growth prospects are looking limited approaching the peak.'

Craig James(Commsec)-'The key challenge for companies will be to keep a tight leash on costs,closely monitor work flows on existing projects and prioritise order books.'

Ben Griffiths portfolio mgr(Eley Griffiths)-A strong pipeline of work could result in delays to projects which would serve to extend the cycle amplitude,naturally in such times bottlenecks emerge and the availability of labour and capital equipment means serious disruptions to project scheduling.'

BIS Shrapnel forecasts on non residential construction
+7% in 2008
-2% in 2009