Mr. F. (I have found your dog)>>>>
CFCnews
This could be a great boost for ICHG.
A MUST READ -- kudos to this big guy who 'made it' even bigger and
fulfilled a dream. I don't know him but it seems he started at Silicon
Investor and now he's making millions.. but excuse him for charging <ggg>.
He should be doing it for free and continue to sell vinyl coatings..
that's only fair. After all this is a socialist society and everyone
shares their wealth ... and of course if you were offered his position you
would politely refuse ....wouldn't you?
April 22, 1999
A 'Big Dog' in Chat Rooms
Takes a Wild Internet Ride
By JOHN R. EMSHWILLER
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
CLIFTON, N.J. -- Mike "Big Dog" Nichols has gone from textile-coatings
salesman to Internet-stock guru to online investor-relations specialist to
co-founder of a publicly traded cyberspace-shopping mall with a market
value of about $100 million. All in less than a year. [editor's comment,
absolutely amazing right on Mike]
The 42-year-old Mr. Nichols has seen his wealth, at least on paper, soar
by millions of dollars in recent weeks because of his holdings in the
Internet shopping mall, called iChargeit Inc., that trades on the OTC
Bulletin Board. "It's unbelievable," he says.
It is the Internet stock-trading world, where mindboggling tales are
almost mundane. However, even in an arena where companies with barely
enough revenue for a cup of coffee can have Himalayan market
capitalizations, few stories illustrate more graphically the crazy power
of the Net than Big Dog's ride.
The ride started in this town across the Hudson River from Manhattan,
where Mr. Nichols lives with his wife and one of his two daughters. For 12
years, he sold vinyl coatings for textiles.
Stock-Chat Rooms
In November 1997, he began exploring the Internet stock-chat world. There,
he found adventure, intrigue, camaraderie and combat. There were passwords
to private electronic "rooms" where strangers from around the world
discussed "mo-mo mamas," "scam dogs," "bashers" and "pump and dumps." Amid
all this Internet stock-trading lingo was the lure of making a fortune
without leaving the upstairs living room of his duplex. It was, Mr.
Nichols recalls, "a world you wouldn't believe."
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Like many Internet traders, he chose a new name for this new world. The
nearly 6-foot-5-inch, 370-pound Mr. Nichols became Big Dog.
He quickly became a big bark on the chat circuit. By last summer, over 500
people had bookmarked Big Dog on the Web site Silicon Investor, making him
one of the most-followed names on that popular stock-chat operation. In
June, he quit his sales job to trade full time.
He had a flair for the dramatic. "Move over TokyoMex BIG DOG is in town,"
was the message Mr. Nichols posted early last year on a Silicon Investor
chat site that had been started by another Internet stock-chat guru. Mr.
Nichols and his allies posted so many hostile messages that TokyoMex
turned the site over to Mr. Nichols, who promptly renamed it the Dog House.
In the fall, someone started a chat site called "The life and times of BIG
DOG, a historical perspective." Fans portrayed him as a savvy stock
trader. Critics focused on his poorer picks. "If you place his brain on
the edge of a razor blade ... it would look like a Tic Tac on a 4 lane
highway," one volunteered.
Online Consultant
Tiring of the turmoil, Mr. Nichols says he decided to use his Internet
fame to start an online investor-relations and media firm, called Capital
Financial Consultants. Mr. Nichols says his firm has signed up as clients
several little companies listed on the OTC Bulletin Board, which is
maintained by the National Association of Securities Dealers for stocks
that don't qualify for the Nasdaq Stock Market itself. The companies have
paid him in stock that he estimates has a current value of a few million
dollars, though given the volatility and difficulty in selling many
Bulletin Board issues any such paper wealth could have the shelf life of a
mirage. But even if he gets nothing from that stock, he says, "I'm not
afraid to lose money because I know I can make more."
Capital Financial Consultants' Web site carries a disclaimer saying it is
paid by some of the companies mentioned on the site. Whether the
disclosure efforts satisfy the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission,
which has been cracking down on what it views as inadequate disclosure in
this area, isn't clear. The agency doesn't comment on specific Internet
sites unless it files a case, an SEC spokesman says.
Cyberspace Mall
In an effort to further cash in on cyberspace, Mr. Nichols recently teamed
up with his Internet buddy Cavalry, also known as Jesse Cohen, a
Huntington Beach, Calif., man who was developing the iChargeit shopping
mall.
The pair brought iChargeit public last month by merging it with a shell
company that had no operations but was trading on the OTC Bulletin Board.
Mr. Cohen is iChargeit's chairman and chief executive. He initially said
Mr. Nichols was vice president, but later upgraded him to president. "Call
me bottle washer as long as I get the money," Mr. Nichols says.
In recent weeks, iChargeit's stock has gone from less than $4 to as high
as $29, and is currently trading at about $14. Mr. Cohen says he owns
about 32% of the company's 7.2 million shares. Mr. Nichols says he has a
stake of about 17%. Suppliers and shareholders of the shell company have
much of the rest, Mr. Cohen says.
So far, only about 200,000 iChargeit shares are free to trade under
federal securities law, though more will become available in coming
months. Messrs. Cohen and Nichols say their shares are still restricted.
Counting on Big Gains
With a small trading volume, iChargeit shares weren't hit by Monday's big
sell-off in Internet stocks, nor was Mr. Nichols, who says his holdings
don't include any of the big online names. "Every Internet stock out there
is overpriced," he says, adding "except mine" in response to a question.
In the first three months of this year, iChargeit had $30,000 in revenue,
Mr. Cohen says. The company doesn't yet have publicly available financial
statements, but hopes to have them soon.
Its 14 online-mall tenants include a florist, a coffee seller, a
consumer-loan broker and an art gallery. They pay iChargeit between 10%
and 20% of sales revenue and about $140 per month in rent, Mr. Cohen says.
The mall also recently began carrying banner ads from other sites.
Some tenants are clients of Mr. Nichols's investor-relations firm. Mr.
Cohen has big expansion plans and Mr. Nichols plays down the competitive
threat of bigger Internet-mall operations. "There are enough people to go
around," he says.
Naturally, iChargeit has already spawned Internet chat sites. Critics
howled when they discovered that the initial artist featured at the mall's
gallery was Mr. Cohen's mother. Mr. Cohen says his mother is a fine
painter and that other artists have been added.
Mr. Nichols shrugs off the criticisms as he focuses on the hoped-for
bottom line. He says he sees no reason why he can't eventually reap tens
of millions of dollars from his iChargeit stock. With the Internet, "I
feel like anything I want, I can get," he says.
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