Vote! BlackBerry vs. Nokia—Which Stock Wins From Here?
By: Struggling BlackBerry's 26 percent gain this year from depressed levels won't last, Mark McKechnie, wireless equipment analyst at Evercore Partners, told CNBC's "Squawk Box" on Tuesday.
In fact, McKechnie said he thinks the stock will be just about cut in half to $8 a share by year's end as the company's new BB10 smartphones come with a changed business model on top of strong competition from new Google Android devices and Apple iPhones.
Over at another one-time darling of the cellphone market, Nokia, it's been a tough year so far. But Stuart Jeffrey, telecommunications equipment analyst at Nomura, told CNBC he sees the stock rising about 30 percent to $4.40 a share by year end.
Jeffrey said those gains are likely to be driven by sequential growth of the company's new Microsoft Windows smartphones. But like BlackBerry, Nokia faces the same headwinds from Android devices and iPhones, he concluded.
With that preamble, it's now your turn to put on your analyst cap and vote on which stock—BlackBerry or Nokia—will perform the best from the start of the second quarter to the end of the year. Vote on our Facebook page in the second matchup of our "Squawk Box Money Madness."
(Vote on Facebook! BlackBerry vs. Nokia—Which Wins?)
In our stock tournament—much like in March Madness basketball—the best performers for the year play the worst.
Monday, in our opening contest, year-to-date loser Apple went up against 2013 winner Netflix. Despite its recent tough run, however, Apple ran away with it. In our poll, you put the iPhone maker through with 83 percent of the thousands of votes.
So remember to vote on Tuesday's matchup: BlackBerry vs. Nokia. We'll have new "Money Madness" match-up each day of the "Big Dance" and a new poll awaiting your vote on our Facebook page.
—By CNBC's Matthew J. Belvedere; Follow him on Twitter @Matt_SquawkCNBC
Disclosures: Evercore or an affiliate expects to receive or intends to seek compensation for investment banking services from BlackBerry within the next three months. The analyst has not received compensation. Stuart Jeffrey of Nomura said his firm owns Nokia stock and Nokia is an investment banking client Nomura.
