The Trouble With Dell's Beat

Goldman Sachs makes a market in Dell shares and has received compensation from Dell for investment banking and non-investment banking services in the past 12 months.

Dell said in June that it planned to slash 10% of its workforce. Curiously though, the company's total headcount has actually increased by about 2,300 employees (including temporary workers) since then.

In some ways, the jumble of positive and negative nuggets in Dell's report underscores the uncertainty about the exact nature of its comeback plan. Is Dell a cost-cutting story, or is it striving to recapture its erstwhile sales growth and market share?

The ambiguity has been exacerbated by the company's lack of briefings with the Street, although Dell promised Thursday to finally host a conference call about its plans in November.

"Dell is still going through a multi-quarter if not multiyear transition to get back to a better growth rate," says AtlanticTrust SteinRoe's Chuck Jones, which has a position in Dell, though not as one of its core holdings.

"I don't think they're even close to declaring victory, and I wouldn't be either," says Jones.