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To: Glenn D. Rudolph who wrote (72672)	8/8/1999 4:36:00 PM
From: Mark Fowler	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 164684

Glenn that story is true i've talk with serval people at different brokerages and asked if there are traders still using margin with net stocks to my surprise many are -- what fools! I want to see capitulation first then i'll buy in and hold again we might see this as we get closer to this months Fed meeting, go big Al-- squeeze the excesses out...

To: Glenn D. Rudolph who wrote (72672)	8/8/1999 4:40:00 PM
From: Skeeter Bug	Respond to of 164684

>>uBid Inc. <UBID.O> a bone-jarring 90 percent<< hello, reality! anybody buying nets in 1999 on margin have more cents than sense, though i do think equalibrium is a bit closer now ;-)

To: Glenn D. Rudolph who wrote (72672)	8/9/1999 1:54:00 AM
From: GST	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

Thanks Glenn -- I also noted that the two responses to your post dealt with the margin aspect of the story -- important now but not the reason the stocks fell in the first place. There continues to be a reluctance here to recognize the deeper causes of this move down which are due to international money flows -- and thank you for noticing that I tried hard to draw attention to this in time for people to act on the information before the market went down.

To: Glenn D. Rudolph who wrote (72672)	8/10/1999 2:51:00 AM
From: GST	Respond to of 164684

Glenn -- More footprints: Tuesday August 10, 1:58 am Eastern Time FOCUS-Japan funds veil waning foreign bond interest By Yoshiko Mori TOKYO, Aug 10 (Reuters) - Waning interest in foreign bonds by Japan's private sector in the past few months is likely to have been obscured by active purchases by public funds, analysts say. The Ministry of Finance (MOF) said on Tuesday that net foreign bond buying by Japanese investors in July totalled 1.2514 trillion yen ($10.88 billion) on a contract basis, down from net purchases of 1.5127 trillion yen a month earlier. But what puzzles market players is that net foreign bond buying in July by life insurers, private financial institutions and investment trusts amounted to only 520.1 billion yen in the ministry data, leaving over 730 billion yen worth of net foreign bond buying unaccounted for. Such unexplained foreign bond purchases also topped 1.2 trillion yen in June. A MOF official said the 730 billion yen in part represented foreign bond investment through brokerage firms, but declined to elaborate further. Mitsumaru Kumagai, a senior market analyst for Industrial Bank of Japan, said: ``Judging from the magnitude of purchases unaccounted for, it's likely that major public funds, such as the Postal Life Insurance Bureau (Kampo) and Postal Savings System (Yucho), bought U.S. bonds as a part of Japan's attempt to prop up the dollar against the yen.' A Kampo official told Reuters its investment could have represented only a limited part of the 730 billion yen. A Yucho official was not immediately available for comment. Analysts, however, remain doubtful that private institutions remained keen on foreign bonds throughout July. The ministry's data also shows that foreign bond investment peaked in the period of July 21-30, when the dollar's fall against the yen was most significant. Investors bought 855.3 billion yen of foreign bonds in the last 10 days of July, up sharply from 166.7 billion yen in the second 10 days and 229.4 billion yen in the first 10 days. The dollar fell to a month-long low of 115.00 yen on July 29, after drifting in a range of 120.00-122.87 yen earlier in the month. ``Few private investors would have found U.S. bonds a bargain when the dollar's downtrend came to the fore amid expectations of further U.S. credit tightening,' Kumagai of IBJ said. Yoshiichi Taguchi, general manager of the global fixed income group of Tokio Marine MC Asset Management Co, added: ``It's most likely that public funds were behind the large bond purchases in July.' He said that, in the June-July period, some insurers were unable to move portfolios as they were going through inspections by the Financial Supervisory Agency. Nippon Life Insurance, Japan's largest life insurer with a gigantic portfolio of 40 trillion yen under management, said it has made few net foreign bond purchases since the start of the fiscal year on April 1, except for such operations as buying European bonds with money made available by redemptions of U.S. Treasury securities. ``Risk assets, comprising Japanese stocks and foreign currency assets, account for about 30 percent of our portfolio. There's little incentive to reduce domestic stock holdings and even less incentive to boost foreign bonds,' said Kiyoshi Ujihara, general manager of Nippon Life Insurance's International Investment Department. Many private portfolio investors are wary of downside risks in U.S. asset markets and the dollar. Tokio Marine's Taguchi said: ``I expect the Fed to raise its key short-term rate twice to 5.5 percent by early next year, and the dollar's downside risk is apparently more prominent than that of the euro.' The Federal Reserve lifted its fed funds overnight bank lending rate to 5.0 percent in June from 4.75 percent. Longer-term data, which is less affected by moves by public funds, shows clearly receding interest in foreign bonds. In the January-June period, Japanese investors bought a net 3.5341 trillion yen worth of foreign bonds, down sharply from 7.0623 trillion yen in the preceding half year. Analysts said there is a marked change in destination of foreign bond investment or capital flows out of Japan. IBJ's Kumagai said most foreign bond purchases by Japanese were investments in euro bonds rather than dollar bonds. Japanese investors, including government institutions, are the world's largest holders of U.S. Treasury securities, with $286.5 billion or 22.93 percent of the total $1.2497 trillion in foreign holdings at the end of May.