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Strategies & Market Trends : Stock Watcher's Thread / Pix of the Week (POW) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Stock Watcher who wrote (18724)	11/13/1999 7:04:00 AM
From: flickerful	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 52051

sw........*IM. an Internet Stock By: Steven Patrick October 28, 1999 BUY: Ingram Micro $10 Have you recently shopped at Amazon.com? Or Buy.com, Shopping.com, Beyond.com, or a slew of other E-tailers for that matter? Well, if you did and you bought any electronic product, it most likely was distributed and shipped by Ingram Micro (NYSE: IM) of Santa Ana, California. Ingram Micro is the world?s largest wholesale distributor of technology products and services, and a leader of assembly and integration services with sales of $25.5 billion for the past four reporting quarters. The company and its subsidiaries operate in 34 countries and distribute more than 225,000 products to more than 140,000 resellers in 130 countries. Ingram?s stock has been in a free-fall for the past few quarters as competitive pricing and slimmer margins have hurt the company?s bottom line. In early September of this year, Ingram warned that its third quarter profits would come in between 10-14 cents a share. Yesterday, after the close, Ingram reported 12 cents (incl. restructuring charges) a share for the third quarter, in-line with Wall Street estimates. As a wholesaler, many investors have stayed away because of the razor thin margins that come along with the business. With Wall Street and Main Street investors all viewing Ingram as just a pure wholesaler, the stock has plummeted to the current price of $10, from a 52-week high of $50 3/8, or just 20% of the high that was reached back in January. Not only is the stock well below its 52-week high, Ingram is currently trading below its 1996 IPO price of $18 too. This valuation on stock is absolutely ridiculous with the company still highly profitable in comparison to the valuation that Wall Street is giving the company. With most of the institutional sellers out, the stock?s limited, especially with book value of Ingram at $12.56 in the latest quarter, in comparison to $11.58 in the second quarter. This is an extremely good sign that the company is still moving along in improving shareholder value, even though Wall Street has turned its back against it. You also have to remember that the book value was only $9.35 at the end of the 1998 fiscal year. For those of you who think that the book value is overblown due to assets such as goodwill, taking out goodwill would still leave the company with a book value of $9.78. New deals with CompUSA, Unisys, GE Capital and others should also help the bottom line as Ingram continues to grow, especially in Europe and Asia. As stated earlier, Ingram?s new focus on assisting the E-tailer?s has gone widely unnoticed. As the largest distributor in the world for computer products, Ingram is the hidden workhorse for Internet shopping sites. The packaging and shipping of products for the E-tailers are a much higher margin business than the current wholesale business as a whole. With the company currently running off a gross margin of just 4.80%, any major improvement would greatly help the bottom line of the company. Efficiency will also play a major part of the turnaround in profitability for the company. Signs of improvement are already beginning to show up in areas such as inventory turnover, which has increased from 2.26x?s in the second quarter to 2.34x?s in the third. As announced in the first quarter of this year, Ingram is also restructuring its work force by laying off approximately 10% of its employees. Although employee morale has fallen dramatically since then, we anticipate that management will have these issues resolved in the next few quarters. Ingram?s long-term debt to equity ratio continues to fall from 1.20, 0.82, and 0.79 for 1998 fiscal year, second quarter ?99 and third quarter ?99, respectively. The company?s main liabilities are its zero coupon convertible bonds and credit facilities. The interest rate of 5 3/8% that the company received for the bonds was extremely favorable in light of the current interest rate environment. So with Ingram trading at less than 10x?s ?99 est. EPS and less than 7x?s 00? EPS, Ingram is extremely undervalued. If Wall Street begins to see Ingram as an E-tailer sidekick, as they have with Federal Express, Ingram?s stock could return march on back up to the high teens. With that, I am setting a price target of $18 by the end of next year on Ingram Micro. The fundamentals of the business are still intact and if I were to purchase any stock in the computer distribution industry at this time, Ingram Micro would be the one. patientinvestor.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ techstocks.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ #reply-11754626 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ **note...$10 buy rec level. IM has shown considerable recent strength.

To: Stock Watcher who wrote (18724)	11/15/1999 6:03:00 PM
From: Stock Watcher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 52051

11/15; Mon. INDEX RESULTS / FBCE + 56% / WINNERS & LOSERS HERE: Winners: FBCE + 56% (CrayUSA & Tsiokawe) STRU + 53% (hoffy) INVT + 42% (Francois Goelo) SCKT + 37% (Elliot Winter) INPH + 30% (Elliot Winter & mph) ECCS + 29% (mph) ZICA + 28.5 (Mac) ARTM + 24% (Mac) PNLK + 24% (Witold) NOOF + 23% (TWICK) UPGD + 22.5% (zero69) LOCH + 20% (daddydo) XYBR + 17% (Thomas Langan) KNSC + 17% (Joe Copia) GNLB + 17% (Toni Wheeler) OPTX + 17% (StkProfits) RRRR + 15.5% (QuietWon) EDIG + 15.5% (Trippi) NPTK + 15% (Rollcast & CrayUSA) MSTG + 14% (flickerful) TTRE + 14% (Mr Metals) CORL + 14% (CrayUSA) WPNE + 13% (David W. Heibeck) IDTC + 12.5% (Andrew H.) VMAX + 12% (Joe Copia) HYPD + 12% (Mac) ESFT + 11% (CrayUSA) VLAB + 11% (Mac) APES + 11% (Joe Copia) MRVC + 10% (William Petersen & TWICK) TLTG + 10% (Ernest Hung) (4) Pix on Winner's List: CrayUSA & Mac (3) Pix: Joe Copia (2) Pix: TWICK, Elliot Winter & mph Losers: USTI - 25% MDMI - 15% ADCO, HTSF, NVXE & RTIN - 14% ABET & INTF - 13% SHAL - 12.5% VTCO - 12% KIDE - 11% JCDA - 10.5% --------------------------------------------eom; sw