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Technology Stocks : Dell Technologies Inc. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sig who wrote (139238)	8/15/1999 9:32:00 AM
From: Mick Mørmøny	Respond to of 176388

If Miltie DELL is from Austin, where is his penny from? Freaking whisperers!!! You give them one bloody red cent and they want a roll of dimes. This is insane. Oops, did I say that? >g< The Magic Penny Another stock beat earnings by 1 cent. Surprise! Every 13 weeks -- four times a year -- we go through a song and dance called earnings season. And that means it's time for "surprises." One company after another announces earnings that, oddly enough, always seem to come in just a penny or so higher than analysts expected. This year by late July, an astonishing 129 companies, among them Disney, Alcoa and Sears had beaten Wall Street analysts' estimates by precisely 1c. Indeed, it seems that no matter how large a company is, a penny is the magic number, the compromise between analysts' need to be right and companies' need to put forth good news. Consider General Electric, a massive conglomerate with annual revenues over $100 billion. On July 8, GE announced that in its second quarter it earned 85c a share, just a penny more than what Wall Street had projected. Voila, an earnings surprise! It used to be that an earnings surprise really was unexpected. But now, beating analysts' projections seems to be the norm. Chuck Hill is director of research at First Call, which tracks and compiles analysts' earnings estimates. He figures, if only anecdotally, that these days at least three of every four companies beat their projected quarterly profits at least once a year. "The goal of the investor relations person should be to meet estimates most of the time and, once a year, to beat the number by a penny," says Hill matter-of-factly. Every company wants to beat estimates because an earnings surprise makes for happy headlines in tomorrow's financial pages and, just possibly, a nice pop in the stock. But earnings surprises don't just happen; they're as precisely executed as a magician's pulling a rabbit from a hat. Here's how the trick works. Each quarter, companies hold a conference call with investors and analysts. High on the list of topics is the current quarter -- mainly, how's it shaping up? The companies give a few clues; the analysts try to get more. Later, analysts call the company's head of investor relations, hoping for leads. If the IR rep is any good, he or she will dole out just enough data to keep projections realistic but surpassable. Of course, there's danger in this sleight of hand. If a company beats estimates too frequently, or by too much, the gimmick wears thin. Then the Street creates its own estimate, the so-called whisper number, and you have to start beating estimates by far more than 1c to have any impact. So, in essence, the penny is right on the money. Money, September 1999 by Pablo Galarza

To: Sig who wrote (139238)	8/15/1999 9:42:00 AM
From: Sly_	Respond to of 176388

To anyone, "IF" Dell beats the numbers by one cent (or more), how will the stock react? Sly_

To: Sig who wrote (139238)	8/15/1999 10:26:00 AM
From: OLDTRADER	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 176388

SIG:Thank you for your always pungent comments.I have been "off -the-air" so to speak for a week or so as it took my computer garu and my $ to figure out how to get back into "response" mode.Lost my user and pass words.Did you see where DELL is now #1 -ichiban-in the world as we have all predicted.Take that Merill and CPQ-ite's.wbm-Yes I am gloating-BIGTIME!

To: Sig who wrote (139238)	8/16/1999 2:43:00 AM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 176388

DELL has some serious plans for its Nashville Operations....FYI... amcity.com <<...Construction is slated to begin within the year on two buildings near the airport. One will be a 250,000-square-foot office building which will accommodate Dell's local base of operations, including technical support functions for the company's Home and Small Business Group. The other building will house Dell's service logistics operations. Sussman, Tisdale, Gayle, an architectural firm based near Dell in Austin, Texas, has been chosen to design the office building. Gresham Smith and Partners will be doing the civil engineering and Smith, Seckman and Reid will be doing the mechanical and electrical engineering, says Hickman of T. W. Frierson Contractor. Kip Thompson, Dell Computer's vice president for facilities management and corporate real estate, offered a less specific reply when asked about the design and construction process timetable. "An architect should be chosen in the next 30 days and a contractor will be chosen and will start construction in the next 60 days," says Thompson. T.W. Frierson is one of the contractors negotiating for the construction contract for the office building at the Nashville campus. At the moment, Dell is also negotiating with Ray Bell Construction, Hardaway Construction, Turner Construction Co., and R. C Mathews Contractor for construction services, says Hickman.. ..>>