My letter to Mr. Bezos and the SEC sent this AM:
Dear Mr. Bezos:
Your company, Amazon.com, released financial results on October 28, 1998 at about 4:30 PM Eastern Standard Time. It was brought to my attention that you held a conference call at approximately 5:00 PM Eastern Standard Time on the same date.
I was very interested in hearing what was said in your conference call and did everything I could to locate a number or at least, to locate a play back number after the call. I understand that not all investors may participate in the conference calls. However, I would like to evaluate your comments myself rather than reading them through the analysts that were present. I have two reasons for this. The first, is the sell side analysts are not independent. They all work for investment firms which may do business with your firm such as underwriting. Secondly, I do not have access to the reports written by many of these analysts.
I could only locate the following comment in a news item :
"Seattle, Oct. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Amazon.com Inc. excluded the media and the public from
its earnings conference call, held today after the company released its third-quarter results
following the close of U.S. trading.
The No. 1 online bookseller said its third-quarter conference call with top executives was
for investment analysts only and barred all media. The move means smaller investors
without access to Wall Street research aren't privy to the call's detailed discussions of the
Seattle-based company's results and outlook.
''We've always done it that way,'' said spokeswoman Kay Dangaard. ''We have nothing to
say about it.''
Amazon.com's loss excluding acquisition costs widened to $24.7 million, or 49 cents a
share, from $9.6 million, or 21 cents, in the year-earlier quarter.
19:03:52 10/28/1998"
I am asking that you please make the conference call available for playback or to email a transcript of the conference call. It is my money that you are using as working capital. I do not want to exit my position and miss a great opportunity for more gains. On the other hand, I would be very unhappy if I sustained large losses without having the necessary information to make an informed decision.
I thank you in advance and will be awaiting the transcript or phone number so that I may hear what was said to the analysts. As you can see, I cannot even read about this in the news media.
Very truly yours,
Glenn D. Rudolph
FAX 814 337-0754" |
