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Politics : Formerly About Applied Materials -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Robert O who wrote (32572)	9/23/1999 2:18:00 AM
From: Jacob Snyder	Respond to of 70976

hi, Robert: No yachts at the pier yet, but I have my eye on one. Actually, I've only been buying stocks since Feb. 1996, and LEAPs since Tito taught me about them in May of 1998. So I don't have a long enough track record to say my success is anything more than luck. But I've tripled my initial capital (my paycheck, direct-deposited into an E-Trade account from 2/96 through 6/99, while we lived on my wife's salary) in that time. It's not easy money. I have a notebook 4 inches thick, full of graphs and numbers. And all that does is improve the odds; it's still gambling. If I couldn't afford to lose every penny, I wouldn't use this strategy. I've come up with several methods to reduce my costs and risks. First, I buy options that are far enough in the future, so I'll probably sell them several months before they expire. The graph of loss of time premium over time, in options, gets steeper the closer you get to expiration. Second, I never pay the stated ask price, and I never accept a 10% spread. Example: the last batch of Nasdaq 100 index puts I bought was on 9/20/99. When I placed the order, QQQ (the underlying tracking stock) was at 126 13/16. That is within a point, I think, of its high for the day. The bid-ask on the CBOE site was 5 1/8-5 3/8 for the option I wanted. I placed a limit order to buy 50 contracts at 5 1/4, the midpoint between bid and ask. I got a fill within 10 minutes, 5 contracts at a time (I'm willing to wait days, if it takes that long). When my fill showed up on the CBOE site, the bid-ask changed to 5 1/8-5 1/4, but only for about 15 minutes. Then it changed back to 5 1/8-5 3/8. So, my spread was only 2.4% ( =0.125/5.25 ). I have to be willing to not buy, in order for this method to work. I calculate the spread before placing any order. Often, I get fills at the bid, if I'm patient. It is possible to predict stocks that will double over the life of the option. The option has to have at least a couple years to run. Buy companies that are: 1. the best in the world at what they do 2. have a franchise 3. growing EPS by 20% a year, (based on track record, not wishful thinking) 4. have pristine balance sheets 5. don't have any big liabilities Then, wait to buy till the company's industry is out of favor, so it's trading at the low end of it's historical range for P/E, P/S, P/CF. I'm willing to wait forever, if the stock never goes out of favor. I'm still waiting to buy MSFT. And my portfolio is often very concentrated. In early 1997, my entire portfolio was one stock: AMAT. I now hold LEAPs in 4 companies, the most diversified I've ever been. It takes me about a year of study before I think I know about an industry enough to invest (or gamble, if you prefer) in it.

To: Robert O who wrote (32572)	9/23/1999 10:20:00 AM
From: Proud_Infidel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 70976

Quake update: WSMC reports minor fire; TSMC expects reasonable production in one week Semiconductor Business News (09/23/99, 08:36:19 AM EDT) HSINCHU, Taiwan--Silicon foundries and other chip-making operations here continued racing the clock to restart production facilities and wafer fab equipment following Tuesday's powerful earthquake. While semiconductor officials say they are now making progress in evaluating manufacturing lines and work-in-progress, the recovery efforts have not all gone smoothly. On Wedenesday, a fire broke out at Worldwide Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp. (WSMC) after a backup power generator overheated. The pure-play silicon foundry company said the generator was separated from its wafer-processing cleanroom, and no damage was sustained by fab's production equipment. WSMC said the fire was extinguished within an hour. The loss from the fire was placed at $630,000. As of early today local time, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) has secured partial electrical power, and the foundry giant said it had begun assessing the condition of its fabs. U.S.-based officials for TSMC on Wednesday said company's facilities had restored 10-20% of its normal power, which was enough to allow it to begin evaluating wafers in process and to begin equipment recovery. TSMC said it believed it would not have to wait for repair and equipment recalibration to be completed before starting operations. A very preliminary estimate indicates that it will take approximately one week after power is fully restored to achieve a reasonable level of production. The foundry company said it has established an emergency customer response task force to analyze the condition of work-in-progress and account managers are updating TSMC customers on the status of their individual lots on at least a daily basis. Chip makers and suppliers are also pitching in with the general recovery efforts in Taiwan, where more than 2,000 people died as a result of the earthquake. TSMC said the company and its employees have contributed $8.25 million to earthquake relief efforts, with about a quarter of the amount coming from employees. Applied Materials Inc. in Santa Clara, Calif., said it will contribute $100,000 to assist earthquake victims. The donation was being made to the Red Cross on behalf of the company and its employees. "As a company with close ties to and a decade of customer service in Taiwan, we believe it is very important to help Taiwan's people get back on their feet as quickly as possible," said Dan Maydan, president of Applied, the world's largest fab equipment supplier. Applied Materials Taiwan employs 600 people at three sites, in Hsinchu, Nan-Kan, and Tainan. The company said there have been no reports of injuries to employees or significant damage to its facilities. semibiznews.com