Razor's Runts (04/14/00)
Well, boys and grrls, it was a pretty rough day for the Runts. Every one of them down, which is highly unusual...
Percentage
Company Name (Ticker) 12/17/99 04/14/00 Difference
------------------------------ -------- -------- ----------
Harken Energy (HEC) $0.75 $0.75 0.0%
Miller Exploration (MEXP) $1.06 $1.06 0.0% *
Canadian 88 Energy (EEE) $1.19 $1.31 10.3%
Hurricane Hydrocarbons (HHLFQ) $2.00 $2.50 25.0%
Range Resources (RRC) $2.81 $1.81 (35.5%)
McDermott International (MDR) $7.44 $7.69 3.3%
------------------------------ -------- -------- ----------
Average $2.54 $2.52 0.6%
-------- -------- ----------
* Sold at $1.81, 01/21/00
Damn! Sometimes I just hate the downside risk of these "oilpatch pennies". <VBG>
That's nothing, though, compared to one of my tech holdings, a particularly volatile penny that just bought back all of an outstanding toxic convertible... down a mere 21% today. Ouch! Fortunately it's the smallest single holding in my portfolio, so the <0.04%> impact didn't exactly rock my world.
Actually my sympathies really go out to some of my clients. Three of them are dot-coms. One firm's stock was down 13% today, another down 22%, and the third down 27%. The CEO of the first just bought $1.5 million of his firm's stock this week, just convinced that it was undervalued. Suffice to say that today was an ugly day for him. On the flip side, however, he's been known to drop more than that on a single weekend in Vegas, so sometimes it helps to keep things in perspective. LOL! Prototypical client. ;-)
On a more serious note, I've been growing more and more defensive recently, pouring new funds into my portfolio on three separate occasions in the last four weeks, with the sole exception being RRC. I almost pulled the trigger on CRK today, but decided to wait a little longer. I'm now over 50% cash for the first time in two years. Feels a little strange to have such a large amount of dry powder available, but obviously reassuring after days like today, and patience has definitely been a virtue in recent weeks. Nevertheless, the nose knows. Something in my gut tells me it's probably about time to begin deploying capital again.
While one can never predict the future, IMO capitulation appears to be close at hand. There's major blood in the streets right now, and I can smell the fear, not only in tech land, but right here on this thread, too. Heck, even ole Bullsky, the Great One, pulled in his horns. Not exactly an irrelevant little detail IMHO. :)
All in all, I'm still pretty comfortable here in the patch. So raise those chins, people. I honestly think most of the damage is behind us.
Now if I can just figure out a way to get Cliffie to start trashing a little Range. ;-)
Razor |
