To: NickSE who wrote (47982 ) 6/18/1999 11:21:00 AM From: John Pitera Respond to
tippet is in heaven with CLX -g-The decline in this stock, from 130 to 95 Thursday, is one of those vertical selloffs that just takes your breath away. Before our eyes, Clorox is going from the highest multiple in the group to potentially the lowest multiple (unless they pole-axe Gillette (G:NYSE) on its preannouncement after the close), and it is Clorox's fault. It got the Street hooked on high single-digit growth and then blew everybody away by intimating that after the First Brands acquisition closed, it would be doing low single-digit growth -- and that growth would be below historic trend for a full year. This news shocked people, especially because Clorox had just blitzed New York with a rah-rah high-growth presentation and a super-de-duper story in the New York Times. Nothing stings more than when one of these safety stocks turns out not be so safe -- and at any price. Clorox shocked both holders and its analyst fans on Wall Street, all of whom have stood behind the stock all the way down. look at is when a stock declines or advances so fast that the options professionals don't even have a chance to revise their highest or lowest strikes. You can tell how incredibly weak Clorox is by the simple fact that there are no June 95s, which go out today, because the stock collapsed too fast for the options folk to add a new lower strike.
