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To: Nouveau_Riche who wrote (65318)	7/19/1999 9:47:00 PM
From: Nouveau_Riche	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 97611

Maine's (CFO of IBM) comments that "With each succeeding month, if there is an impact, it's going to be short-term in nature." Reinforces my opinion (previously unmentioned on this thread) that Y2K fears will be played out by the end of October. It is my belief that investors began punishing vulnerable techs in January over fears about Y2K spending. (In one of my previous posts I mentioned how investors react 6-12 months in advance of negative events.) As the year progresses, visibility of eanings improves, and, if nothing shows up by the end of Q3 the techs will get new legs. One caveat here is that some Y2K fears can only be dispelled until after the new year itself. But, I believe, that as corporations report about Y2K readiness, things will improve and investors will begin to look beyond Y2K. Also, large corporation's, which account for about 80% (?) of tech spending, IS budgets are forecast at least upto the end of the year by now, which means that their major IT suppliers have a good take on Q3 and Q4 revenues from these accounts. I'd like to poll those reading this message who have insight into IS spending (IS professionals, etc.) for the corporations they work for of their opinion about IT spending and lock downs for the rest of the year. Please, no speculations from knowledgeable readers . I would like to hear only from those who have specific knowledge about their corporation's intents. This could be very intersting if we get enough responses.

To: Nouveau_Riche who wrote (65318)	7/19/1999 10:04:00 PM
From: Nouveau_Riche	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 97611

Well, it appears I read too much into Microsoft's cautionary statements issued with their earnings release. It appears, by the comments following, that analysts are not concerned (good call, dav): In a statement and conference call with analysts Maffei warned the company's sales growth rate would slow to the ''high teens'' in fiscal 2000 from 29 percent in the year just ended. And he said profit margins had peaked for now as Microsoft squeezed all the costs it could out of its business model by shifting to sales of licenses instead of packaged software. ''The easy money has been made there,'' he said. ''It's hard to see how we're going to see significant margin enhancements in fiscal '00, and frankly I think we're going to be lucky to keep them constant.'' Maffei said in the interview he remained comfortable with the First Call consensus estimate that the company would earn $1.54 a share in fiscal 2000, up just 8.5 percent from the $1.42 posted for the year just ended. Analysts said they were not surprised by the company's cautionary stance. ''Their comments about next year's results were characteristically cautious, citing familiar caveats -- economic growth and PC demand,'' said analyst Rick Sherlund of Goldman Sachs. ''I did not hear any major stock-impacting news conveyed on the call.''