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Technology Stocks : Ticketmaster-Citysearch (TMCS)

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To: jk28 who wrote (771)12/3/1999 10:32:00 PM
From: bundashus  Read Replies (1) of 803
 
USA Networks (Barry Diller) invest $40million in TMCS

TMCS SEES SUPPORT FROM USA
TMCS received an additional $40 million investment from USA Networks
through the purchase of 1.3 million class B common shares, increasing its
ownership to approximately 52% from 51%. The investment raises TMCS's
cash balance to $93 million from $68 million at the end of the third quarter,
which we believe should see the company through 2000 as it continues to
invest for the future. We have been surprised with the range of opinions on
the merits of having USA as a majority holder, with some investors viewing
Barry Diller's involvement negatively. We agree with the majority of voices on
this issue, namely that Mr. Diller's involvement is a significant positive,
possibly opening doors and offering insight otherwise unavailable. We believe
the development of TMCS as an independent local eCommerce powerhouse is
a strategic priority for Diller and USA. The USA Networks investment comes
on the heels of the re-launch of the ticketmaster.com Web site, which offers
users a friendlier user interface, more robust navigation, deeper content and
improved merchandising features, allowing users the ability to purchase
merchandise related to their browsing or ticket-purchasing behavior. We
believe that the timely re-launch of the ticketmaster.com Web site could help
TMCS capture a large share of the holiday ticketing dollars spent online with
even further long-term benefits. Traffic growth appears strong, with early
reports from turning on the Microsoft Network local channel yielding very
high growth in traffic on some peak days. We continue to believe the
company will change its name sometime soon, possibly back to CitySearch.
We believe TMCS stock can quickly move back to old highs near $80 as
investor perceptions shift from viewing the company as a local content site to
viewing it as a local eCommerce powerhouse. We put it at the top of our list
of small- to mid-cap stocks to buy.
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