BlackBerry Ltd (BBRY) Rises From The Ashes Of Research In Motion?

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When nearly every media outlet was singing the death knell of Research In Motion last year, they were on to something. What many forgot, following near nonexistent sales of RIM’s Z10, was that BlackBerry needed to only change its name to, well, BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB). With constant calls for BlackBerry’s demise dominating websites from the New York Times to Cnet, a number of things were overlooked.

Reports of BlackBerry’s demise greatly exaggerated

Firstly, the company may very well be dead. That doesn’t mean that BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB)’s share price hasn’t hit rock bottom and can picked up before an imminent(?) rebound. Shares of BlackBerry are down over 50% for the year, and having fallen an additional 4% today, it’s now trading at its all-time low.

But the company has already cut 4,500 jobs and taken its billion dollar write-down. It’s important that I point out that anything approaching opinion, and there will be quite a bit, does not reflect the views of ValueWalk – just myself and a few others who think BlackBerry may see a rise in its share price in the near future.

There’s little doubt that BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB) has had a horrible year BUT…

Solvency, tax refund, security, and Chen are all positives

They still have $2.6 billion of their own money lying around as of August. In addition, they’ve rid themselves of that muppet Thorsten Heins who ran the ship into the rocks. His move away from the QWERTY keyboard was never meant to work. Hell, even Ryan Seacrest knows that’s a bad idea having invested a large chunk of his own money developing an iPhone case that adds a QWERTY keyboard.

I jumped ahead a bit: BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB) is looking at a tax refund of nearly $1 billion in the early months of 2014 according to sources familiar with the matter. Additionally, it received $1 billion from Fairfax Financial just last month.

They have no debt and a new CEO in John Chen that has turned around companies in the past. Following the Snowden affair, BlackBerry has enjoyed a lot of great press for both its enterprise use and its security.

Did I mention that BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB) owns a lot of buildings and has no debt?

I understand that this is all convoluted but I’m not trying to sell you anything. It’s just a matter of me believing you should have a look. While the phoenix only rose from the ashes in mythology, I’ve seen stranger things.

Don’t look to BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB) to become a dominant player in the smartphone market…ever again. But I wouldn’t be surprised to see its stock make a strong rebound in the short term.

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