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Non-Tech : Philip Morris - A Stock For Wealth Or Poverty (MO) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ralph Bergmann who wrote (4107)	7/6/1999 9:14:00 AM
From: md1derful	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 6439

Ralph: Agreed..but from a trial atts pov,whose to say that once the bonds are sold, they won't go further after the tob cos. with the sole aim of shutting them down, by whatever legal means are available..the government be dammed!!! Idon't know about that jury..did you see their picture on the news...I think this jury will have to punt....waytoo much work for these harvard graduates...punt and convict or acquit, just to get the h*ll out of Dodge

To: Ralph Bergmann who wrote (4107)	7/6/1999 9:30:00 AM
From: Prophet	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 6439

Ralph, I agree with your comments. On the other hand, politician don't give a s**t about the future of the industry if the can gain something out of it now. You know how politicians work; take what you can now and run! Looking at it from the Trial Lawyers perspective is different. The quality of lawyers required to bankrupt the industry do not work for a few million dollars, when others are doing it for billions. The government certainly would not pay billions to the trial lawyers to get nothing in return. Therefore, there is no incentive for trial lawyers to pursue the industry unless they can benefit significantly from it. There is probably more go gain by becoming defendants of the industry than pursuers. There will be middle ground where people will realize it is counter productive to pursue additional litigation.

To: Ralph Bergmann who wrote (4107)	7/6/1999 9:30:00 AM
From: Ian@SI	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 6439

Ralph, If the "company" issuing the bonds is as secure as the Government, the rate is around 5-6%. If it's among the bluest of blue chips, like IBM, then there's a premium in the order of 1 to 1 1/2% depending upon a whole bunch of conditions. My point is that it will be interesting to see how big a premium the Tobacco payment securitization gets over the long bond. My other point is that Governments and Lawyers have a track record of unethical behaviour. Yes they want the money now to spend it now. But let's not forget that they're getting payments now, which by most wealthy people's standards would be regarded as obscenely huge. Once they've got all their expected tobacco payments in hand, I'd trust them as far as I could throw them. And there's a lot of degrees of pain that can be inflicted on a company without actually bankrupting it. There's no NRA looking out for Tobacco's interests. FWIW, Ian.