Warning: This will be long and rambling.
I feel a kinship with Safeguard, because their timing is (has been) almost as bad as mine. It's only discipline that allows me to recover (such as selling the S&P500 at 1105 early last year, only to miss it coming back up and buying back at 1140 in the summer - of course, it went way down after that, but it's recovered nicely, and I've held through the turmoil, so I'm doing OK - lesson learned).
So, with Safeguard's announcement, they should have been able to get a very nice pop on any other day, but today, the Internet's are showing weakness, and this could easily be the beginning of the end. Or not yet. Their timing sucks.
Also, I question their sincerity and ability to deliver - at least in the short term. They sent their best out to start ICG - or more likely, Fox and Buckley wanted to do this and couldn't at Safeguard. I'm seeing a picture form, where again people at Safeguard may have wanted to get big into the Internet, but others, like Caldwell, said this was crazy and not a good long-term idea, plus they already had substantial exposure through ICG. Well, now Caldwell is gone. Hmmm.
In the long run, everything will be "Internet" just like every business is "telecomm" in the sense that they use the phone. How good of an investment has the phone company turned out to be? Utilities like electric? Hey, tulips are my favorite flower.
If Safeguard and whoever else sticks to good companies, and - here's the key, IMHO - adopts the best and most efficient business practices (e.g., the Internet), they will do well. The Internet makes a lot of transactions feasible that previously were not, just like the phone did. Who knows what will come next, but something will. Probably sooner than we all think, and then we'll all think of the 'net just like we now think of the phone - "never touch that old thing anymore."
--John |
