Sanford C. Bernstein & Co.’s Craig Moffett leaps from third to finish in first place for the first time; he is also No. 1 in Cable & Satellite for a sixth consecutive year. “His detailed knowledge of the companies is impressive, but I think his greatest value is his big-picture thinking, notably his recent work on the influence of income demographics on telecom demand and his studies of capital allocation — or misallocation — within his industry,” says one appreciative reader. Highly skeptical about Sprint Nextel Corp.’s ability to finance the 4G wireless network it shares with Bellevue, Washington–based Clearwire Corp., Moffett downgraded the Overland Park, Kansas–based company from market perform to underperform in January 2010, at $3.82. Although the stock rallied to nearly $6 in late May and early June of this year, it gave up all those gains and then some, slumping to $3.76 by the end of August; the 1.6 percent life-of-call loss trailed the sector by 15.9 percentage points. Moffett, 49, joined Sanford C. Bernstein in 2002 after working as a telecommunications consultant at Boston Consulting Group for 11 years; he earned an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1989.
Craig MoffettSanford C. Bernstein & Co. The buy side says: “He provides unique and insightful research.”