re: Where da stock go?
Minnesota used to be filled with computer companies -- I distinctly remember traipsing through a number of them when shopping for computers -- big ones, fast ones -- is there anybody there now? Did the polar bears get 'em? Dell has the advantage of access to vast numbers of Texans and Mexicans as workers. Good guys, but they insist on money for tortillas,beans, and beer and Michael understands that so he shares his company with them. Instead of diluting our ownership, he buys our stock back and pays us to go away (only the really stupid ones do, so that Dell is one those few companies whose average stockholders are so smart and happy that the run around chirping and flapping their little wings even when in a trading range. As he ties his workers closer and closer to him by sharing ownership with them, the workers get wiser and wiser. Only the stupid ones leave. I estimate that the average IQ of Dell stockholders and employees increases by 0.05 std dev/year. Now, back in Minnesota, the former computer workers are living by ice fishing and eating piles of lutefisk (if you don't know, don't ask -- you wouldn't like it, and it is one of those words that is by tradition always misspelled in every language).
Get with the program! Quit whining! Who gives a damn about accounting! The company is worth its capitalization to us, it stockholders. If you want "owners equity" per share or "book value" per share, sell Dell and buy a steel minimill (a whole one, they're cheap!). Nucor's the best. You need to play more Monopoly! I am sure there is a set out localized for Minnesota with defunct and formerly independent companies -- Control Data, Pillsbury, U.S. Steel, ERA (I cut my teeth on an ERA 1103 but can't get parts now - and besides it fills the local National Guard Armory -- remember that huge 16kb drum?), Cray Research, that never learned to motivate and share with their workers. |
