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The Stock Investor Newsletter
January 9, 1999
January Buy Recommendation
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Once again we welcome you to The Stock Investor premium newsletter
list. Today The Stock Investor Newsletter will be releasing its January
stock recommendation. Remember that as a premium subscriber you will
receive The Stock Investor Newsletter 10 business days before the stock
is posted on the StockInvestor.com web site. The Stock Investor
Newsletter seeks out Buy Recommendations and Research Reports that have
recently been issued by Wall Street investment analysts. It is our
goal to bring you stocks that go up and stay up. Please review our
previous performance below.
Last week we discussed the price performance of the previous six stocks
that were posted on The Stock Investor web site. Again, it is our
pleasure to inform you that both U.S. Microbics (November profile)
(Ticker: BUGS) and Ascend Communications Inc. (Ticker: ASND) hit all
time new highs late this week. BUGS, profiled in November at $1.53,
reached $5.375 per share for a 251% gain and ASND, profiled at $30.81
reached $71.25 for a 131% gain.
Listing of the past 6 stocks that The Stock Investor Newsletter has
Profiled:
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December Featured Company: Bluefly Inc. (Ticker: BFLY) at $10.875 per
share. High since profiled: $24.50 (125% gain).
November Featured Company: U.S. Microbics Inc. (Ticker: BUGS) at $1.53
per share. High since profiled: $5.375 (251% gain).
All profiles previous 10 months: (Only 4 companies were profiled during
that period.)
InterJetnet (Ticker: IJNT) profiled at $3.50 per share. High since
profiled: $12.125 (246% gain).
Seventh Generation Inc. (Ticker: SVNG) profiled at $0.47 per share. High
since profiled: $2.25 (378% gain).
Ascend Communications Inc. (Ticker: ASND) profiled at $30.81 per share.
High since profiled: $71.25 (131% gain).
Gateway 2000 (Ticker: GTW) profiled at $30.00 per share. High since
profiled: $68.75 (129% gain).
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January Buy Recommendation: iSleuth.com Inc.
Ticker Symbol: SLEU
Current Price: $6.68
Target Price: $17.00 to $19.00 per share
52 Week High/Low: High: $9.625 Low: $1.18
Shares Outstanding: 2.7 million
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..iSleuth.coms web site contains what has long been considered by
Internet experts to be one of the webs premier and most powerful search
engines in existence.. Now this company has gone public.
To start off the new year The Stock Investor Newsletter feels that it
has identified a company that offers investors tremendous potential.
The Stock Investor feels that iSleuth.com Inc. (Ticker: SLEU) meets
several key parameters that make this an undervalued stock at these
levels. First: SLEU has not received attention from Wall Street
analysts and we expect that to change very soon. Second: SLEU will
derive the majority of its revenue from its search engine iSleuth.com.
Third: SLEU has been ranked as one of the top search engines on the
internet.
Simply put, iSleuth.com Inc. is a search engine that has been rated as
one of the top search engines by PC World, PC Week and the New York
Times. With iSleuth.com going public, an opportunity has been created
for investors to get involved with this company on the ground floor.
Please Note that over the past 5 trading days the volume on iSlueth.com
Inc. stock has increased significantly. We believe that we will see a
strong spike in the stock to the upside as investors accumulate shares
of iSlueth.com Inc. A target price of $17.00 to $19.00 per share has
been set.
Let us look at the stock performance of other search engines over the
past year. Yahoo Inc. stock has gone from $28.81 to $340.00 per share
for a 1000% gain. Infoseeks stock has gone from $8.44 to $56.00 per
share for a 563% gain. Lycos Inc. stock has gone from $15.00 per share
to $90.50 per share for a 512% gain and Excite Inc. stock has gone from
$14.00 to $62.25 per share for a $344% gain. What will the future hold
for iSleuth.com Inc. currently trading at $6.75 per share?
Today a Strong Buy Recommendation was issued on iSleuth.com Inc.
(Ticker: SLEU) and that is why we have chosen iSleuth.com Inc. for our
January profile. A price target was set at $17.00 to $19.00 per share.
If you recall on 12/16/98, less than one month ago, Oppenheimer reissued
their buy recommendation on Amazon.com with a price target of $400.00
per share. Since this recommendation (only 3 weeks ago), Amazons stock
has gone from $240.00 per share to $556.75 per share. (Adjusted for the
recent 3:1 split). Will these stocks continue up or will investors and
fund managers flock to the smaller, less well known internet stocks? If
you look iSlueth.com Inc. stock over the past 5 days you will notice
that Wall Street is finally starting to notice iSlueth.com and is
investing heavily in this company. If you have any question about
iSlueth.com Inc. please call their investor relations department at
1-561-483-7743.
We have enclosed todays Buy Recommendation on iSleuth.com Inc. below:
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STRONG BUY RECOMMENDATION ISSUED ON iSlueth.com Inc.
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January Buy Recommendation: iSleuth.com Inc.
Ticker Symbol: SLEU
Current Price: $6.75
Target Price: $17.00 to $19.00 per share
52 Week High/Low: High: $9.625 Low: $1.18
Shares Outstanding: 2.7 million
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It's gotten so that you can't go anywhere without hearing someone
mention the Internet. Let's face it, it seems like everyone's doing it
-- adults, kids, college students, retirees, grandparents, Generation
X'ers, Baby Boomers, etc. As for that shrinking minority of non-Web
surfers, you can bet that lots of them either just got a new computer as
a present for the holidays or they'll be getting one real soon. Hey,
you want to see astounding growth, check out some of the industry
estimates being tossed around. Some industry analysts predict the
number of Internet users will grow to over 300 million within the next
two years. Now that is phenomenal!
With all this user growth, not to mention all of those companies and
organizations developing their own Web sites so they can hawk their
goods and services, how the heck will people pick a starting point and
then find their way around the Internet. Easy. First you pick out an
Internet "portal" site as your home base and then make use of a really
good search engine. Now, what would be really great is if you can find
one site that does both.
Which brings us to our pick for this month, iSleuth.com (OTC: SLEU),
whose stock we feel is relatively undiscovered and undervalued.
iSleuth.com's web site (http://www.isleuth.com) contains what has long
been considered by Internet experts to be one of the web's premier and
most powerful search engines in existence, The Internet Sleuth. Since it
was first founded in 1995, the Sleuth has been consistently cited among
the web's top search engines by the likes of the New York Times, PC
World and PC Week. Better still, the site is being transformed into a
portal, with a whole host of user-friendly services that Internet users
want.
With their stock trading at around only $5.50, giving them a market cap
of about $17 million (with only approximately 2.7 million share
outstanding), this may be one of the best value plays in the Internet
industry. Just consider that in mid-1998 Walt Disney purchased a 43%
stake in InfoSeek in exchange for Disney's ownership position in
Starwave plus $70 million in cash (a deal that based on current stock
market prices could be valued in excess of $1 billion). That should
tell you something about valuable a good search engine and portal can be
- and Disney and Infoseek are launching a new portal service that
parallels what iSleuth.com is developing.
How can it be possible that the iSleuth.com is so powerful, yet so
relatively undiscovered by Wall Street? The answer lies in the Sleuth's
genesis back in 1995 as a non-commercial site that was developed
primarily for the use of university and institutional researchers.
Quite simply, it was designed to provide serious researchers with an
incomparable tool for finding specific information related directly
their queries, with far fewer of the extraneous search results than are
typically spewed by other search engines.
What makes the iSleuth.com web site different is that while other search
engines attempt to index the entire web, The Internet Sleuth maintains
an index of over 3,000 subject specific searchable databases in over 300
categories. Unlike other search engines, most of these databases can be
searched directly from the Internet Sleuth, simplifying the search for
information. The Sleuth also has a parallel search engine that enables
users to search multiple search engines like Yahoo!, Excite, and Alta
Vista, all simultaneously! This is the ultimate in one-stop searching.
Now, fast forward to July 1998 when the site began its full
transformation into a for-profit commercial project upon its acquisition
by iSleuth.com. By way of background, an option to purchase the search
engine and its site (owned privately at the time by its founder, Sally
Elliot - a highly respected Internet pioneer), was held by Maverick
Communications, an Internet services company that was the site's host
ISP. In July, iSleuth.com acquired Maverick and then immediately
exercised its option to acquire the search engine and its site.
In the seven months since July 1998 the changes at iSleuth.com have been
clear and unmistakable, and all with a goal of further developing the
iSleuth.com Web site into a one-stop searching, shopping and information
site that will serve as a gateway for Internet users. Immediately the
user interface was updated, provisions for e-commerce and links to other
sites were added and the stage was set for further developments.
One of the biggest of those developments was the announcement in
December of an agreement with major Internet player Inktomi Corporation
for the development of a new comparative e-commerce shopping service.
This new service, the iSleuth Marketplace, utilizes a new software
platform Inktomi currently has under development, and provides access to
over 200 on-line merchants and 500,000 products, encompassing 14 major
product categories. Inktomi just happens to be a company that develops
software designed for the world's largest Internet infrastructure and
media companies. Inktomi also just happens to work with leading
companies such as America Online, @Home Network, CNET, Intel, Microsoft,
Sun Microsystems, and Yahoo! So clearly, this is a major feather in
iSleuth.com's hat.
Last November, the company entered into an agreement with 24/7 Media,
Inc., one of the Internet's leading media companies, whereby the
iSleuth.com site will become part of The 24/7 Network. Under the terms
of the agreement, 24/7 Media will also act as the company's exclusive
representative for the sale of advertising on the iSleuth.com Web site.
Reaching more than one out of three on-line users, 24/7 Media, Inc.
provides Internet advertising and on-line direct marketing solutions for
advertisers and Web publishers. 24/7 Media's network includes more than
100 high-profile web sites, the CLIQNOW! networks comprising more than
85 medium to large web sites anchored by flagship sites, and Content
Zone, a network of over 2,000 small to medium sites. Chalk up another
major feather in the company hat.
As if all of this wasn't enough, the company also entered into an
agreement last October with MBNA America Bank, N.A., naming MBNA the
'Official Credit Card Issuer of the iSleuth.com Website'. The co-branded
iSleuth.com credit card is being offered direct on the Internet, as well
as via direct mail to site visitors who have registered to receive such
offers and shopping opportunities. As part of the program, MBNA has also
been named a lead sponsor of the iSleuth.com web site. iSleuth.com will
earn royalties based on new account openings and cardholder retail
purchases. By the way, MBNA, which trades over the NYSE and has $56.3
billion in managed loans, is the largest credit card lender in the
world. Make that three major feathers in only a few months time!
So, where does iSleuth.com go from here? We think a lot higher.
They've reported plans to add free e-mail, and the development of
several new services and site enhancements that are designed to add
greater functionality and user-friendliness to it's web site, including
expanded news, weather, and financial information. iSleuth.com has
average monthly site traffic now at approximately 350,000 "hits", and
they're still in their infancy stage, in my opinion. We think the deals
they are working on, coupled with those they've already announced, could
drive traffic up ten-fold over the next few months.
And that's a good thing, considering that the Federal Trade Commission
has projected that business on the Internet could explode from $2.6
billion in 1996 to $220 billion in 2001. Also, a recent U.S. Government
report by the Commerce Commission said that e-commerce could surpass
$300 billion by 2002. Fact is, even with all the growth so far, we
think the Internet is also in its infancy stage, with potential growth
that could dwarf even those seemingly optimistic estimates.
Put it together and you have what we think is a recipe for Internet
success. And, to show you that this company has its head on straight
and is clearly not a flash in the pan, they've just reported plans to
file their Form 10 with the SEC to become a fully reporting company once
they complete their year-end audit later this month. We view this as a
strong indication that they are in it for the long haul and don't intend
to be a bulletin board company forever. When you take everything into
consideration, like what has happened to the stock prices of companies
like Yahoo, and others in this industry, it certainly would not seem to
be unrealistic to look at a target price here of $17.00 - $19.00 down
the road.
I love "ground floor opportunities", and this is another one who's
bandwagon I'm jumping on!
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The information provided herein is based on sources which National
Investors Council, LLC (NIC) considers to be reliable, but is not
guaranteed by NIC, nor does this report represent a solicitation to buy
or sell the securities discussed herein. The information contained
herein is subject to change without notice, and NIC assumes no
responsibility to update the information in this report. Any sales
and/or earnings forecasts included herein were independently prepared by
NIC, unless otherwise stated, and are not endorsed by the management of
the company which is the subject of this report. Use of this report may
be subject to the applicable rules of certain self-regulatory
organizations and securities mentioned herein which are traded
over-the-counter may not be cleared for sale in certain states. National
Investors Council, LLC and/or its employees, officers, affiliates, or
members of their families may have long or short positions in the
securities discussed in this report. NIC has been compensated $5,000 for
the preparation of this report by the subject company of such report.
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All statements and expressions are the opinion of The Stock Investor
Inc. and are not an offer or solicitation to buy or sell any securities
mentioned. While we believe all sources of information to be factual
and reliable, we in no way represent or guarantee the accuracy thereof,
nor the statements made herein. All claims should be verified by the
reader. Investing in securities is speculative and carries a high
degree of risk. From time to time investors may lose all of their
investment. This document may be quoted, in context, provided that
proper credit is given. Any investor should use this report only as a
starting point. We strongly recommend that investors complete their own
independent research before investing. The Stock Investor has not been
compensated by any of the companies that it has featured but reserves
the right to change policy at a future date. Please do your own due
diligence before investing in any security mentioned.
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