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Technology Stocks : Siebel Systems (SEBL) - strong buy? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Wizard who wrote (2901)	7/6/1999 10:55:00 PM
From: Mike Buckley	Respond to of 6974

When Ben Rose lowers the rating, it's in context of the stock valuation. I've been following Siebel for a couple of years (and owned it almost as long) and don't remember a PEG ratio as high as it is now. In that context, the stock might endure a 40% drop. Duh. That's already happened twice in the last twelve months when the PEG ratios were lower. Those 40% drops were not symptomatic of any deterioration of the business fundamentals. I don't have any significant problems with his analysis. He's just as likely to raise his ratings months from now. When and if he does, I'll have the same ho-hum reaction to that as I have to his negative views. The thing I object most to is his relatively short-term view of things. That's his style. Though I respect it, I don't use such short-term horizons. As an example, when he mentions the company hasn't generated cash in recent quarters, I only look to the 10K to see what the annual numbers are. Cash generated from operations in each of the last three years: $86 million in FY98, $21 million in FY97, and $12 million in FY96. That's a 167% average annual increase. The overall long-term trend of the receent past looks awfully good, so good that I won't be particularly alarmed if the company goes through some extensive periods where numbers don't look quite so good. --Mike Buckley

To: Wizard who wrote (2901)	7/6/1999 11:15:00 PM
From: Trader Dave	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 6974

<<Amsterdam, looked at Actuate's stuff? also, any opinions on the Ariba/Commerce One/Concur space?? TD??>> Like the space, valuations are a struggle. Mike, Ben's work is clearly the result of sloppy emotionally driven analysis, a strong buy on Vantive? Yes sebl's pe to estimated growth rate is high, but so are all of the market leaders in this environment and there's more room for execution upside than in the past. Amsterdam: You think there's more competition in the fo than in the erp/backoffice? And the market won't be as large as ERP? I'll take that bet. we should chat about that one. The market's bigger and the competitors are generally weaker than SAP ever faced. Clarify may just be the PSFT to SEBL's SAP though. The folks at Clarify are in the way of some MONSTER pieces of business. TD Perhaps VNTV will create some buying opportunities, but I doubt the fourth blow up in 4 quarters will do much of anything.