Nice recommendation of GSTRF and LOR in upcoming Fortune article
[The term "visionary" is looking better and better...]
pathfinder.com
Street Life:
Musings from a Big-Think
Analyst
Kiril Sokoloff: "We're looking at
the Internet in terms of creative
destruction."
Andrew Serwer
Kiril Sokoloff has always danced to the
beat of a different drum. Only problem was,
for years he couldn't hear the music. You
see, Sokoloff is a big-think, independent
investment analyst who sells his research
to the likes of Julian Robertson, Steve
Wynn, and Edgar Bronfman Sr. And
remarkably, for much of his career Sokoloff
has been deaf because of a genetic
condition that surfaced when he was a
teenager.
Sokoloff, now 51, started at Citicorp but
went out on his own in 1977. "I wanted to
study the strategies of the world's greatest
investors," he says from his Boca Raton
office. (He also has digs in Sun Valley.) "I
spent a lot of time looking at 13D filings, so
I called my company 13D Research."
Sokoloff correctly predicted there would be
a wave of takeovers in the 1980s. Then he
delved into distressed securities. Then the
boom and bust of emerging markets. And
today? Not surprisingly, Sokoloff is focusing
on digital technology and the Internet. But
unlike Wall Street's madding crowd, he isn't
slicing and dicing Amazon's latest numbers.
"We're looking at the Internet in terms of
creative destruction," he says. "Who are
the losers? What's going to happen to sales
tax, and how will that impact state tax
revenues and budgets? What will the
Internet do to commercial property values?
Will it destroy corporate profits?"
Okay, Kiril, but what about the winners?
"We like a broadband technology called
local multipoint distribution devices. It's the
lowest-cost, highest-bandwidth way to go
into office buildings. We like Nextlink,
which is 50% controlled by Craig McCaw.
Also Teligent--Alex Mandel's company--and
Winstar."
Satellite telecommunications is another
favorite venue. "There is no way fiber and
copper cable can cover the entire world" he
says. "Cellular is still a huge growth
business, and satellites are the most
cost-effective way for it to grow. We like
Global Star, which has Soros and Sid Bass
as investors." Loral and Hughes
Electronics are two more.
What else? Sokoloff sees opportunity in
drugs, particularly in outfits that help giant
pharmaceuticals companies bring drugs to
market more efficiently. "The top ten drug
companies introduce about five drugs a
year at $350 million each. Only one in ten
ever recoups its costs." Two names he
likes--both of which cut costs for big drug
companies by managing clinical trials--are
Quintiles Transnational and Covance.
One reason Sokoloff is so keen on medical
research is his deafness and--I'm happy to
say--his triumph over that handicap. Three
years ago he was fitted with breakthrough
implants that restored his hearing 50% to
70%. "After my operation, I was having
Thanksgiving dinner with Jack Hemingway
[the author's eldest son] in Sun Valley,"
says Sokoloff. "Jack kind of mumbles and
has a mustache, so I had never been able
to understand him, but now I could. It was
an emotional moment for us both."
Issue date: July 19, 1999
Vol. 140, No. 2 |
