Vitesse Joins Warning Parade

There's yet more bad news for communications chipmakers, which have been hit by (surprise, surprise) continued weakness in communications and data-storage business.

This time it's Vitesse Semiconductor(VTSS) that's issuing a warning. The company said it expects second-quarter earnings to come in at 21 cents to 22 cents a share, lower than its previous forecast of 26 cents to 27 cents a share. The consensus estimate of analysts polled by earnings tracker First Call/Thomson Financial is currently 26 cents a share.

Vitesse also said it was revising downward its second-quarter revenue to a range of $150 million to $160 million from its current projection of $180 million to $190 million. The First Call estimate was $177.6 million.

In the past couple of weeks, we've seen Broadcom(BRCM) get battered from negative analyst research notes due to news that its customer 3Com(COMS) was issuing a warning. On Friday, Advanced Micro Circuits(AMCC) got its earnings outlook cut by Goldman Sachs. And at the beginning of last week, PMC-Sierra(PMCS) fell to a 52-week low on a trim from Salomon Smith Barney.

Cypress Semiconductor(CY) also issued a warning this morning, saying revenue and earnings for the first quarter would be lower than estimated.

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