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Strategies & Market Trends : Galapagos Islands

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To: Jorj X Mckie who wrote (1742)9/19/2002 3:14:34 PM
From: Original Mad Dog  Read Replies (2) of 57110
 
Yes, and I haven't yet. I am waiting for that one to clang onto the floor first.

I have been working a lot the past month or two at work on issues relating to the new corporate ethics law (Sarbanes-Oxley) that was passed at the end of July. One of the nuggets in there is a requirement for "real time issuer disclosures" (an "issuer" is a publicly traded company):

Each issuer ..... shall disclose to the public on a rapid and current basis such additional information concerning material changes in the financial condition or operations of the issuer, in plain English, which may include trend and qualitative information and graphic presentations, as the [SEC] determines, by rule, is necessary or useful for the protection of investors and in the public interest.

If you think about EDS for a minute, they just made an announcement yesterday afternoon which for now has caused one half of their market cap (approximately $9 Billion) to evaporate in a day.

On August 15, in the midst of a road show by the EDS CEO and CFO (Dick Brown and James Daley--names I suspect will become familiar soon), it was reported that EDS expected free cash flow to increase next year to 1.5 Billion:

biz.yahoo.com

No mention was made last month of an evaporation in new business.

Yesterday, EDS announced that "spending on computer services had virtually stopped and that the slump would shave more than 62 cents a share off its earlier third-quarter earnings estimate of 74 cents."

story.news.yahoo.com

If estimates were 74 cents and they are going to make only 12 cents, you have to believe that last month's roadshow participants must have had some inkling of that.

Get out the toaster. We have a couple more slices of toast to make.
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