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Technology Stocks : Booking Holdings (formerly Priceline) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: PeterGx who wrote (2068)	12/14/1999 2:58:00 PM
From: Enam Luf	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 2743

Peter, Didn't mean to jump down your throat but all the new-age rhetoric being tossed around these days gets under my skin. I hate to be the doom and gloom type, but I have a knack for anticipating marketing psychology and the way it looks to me right now, i'm expecting a post y2k boom (euphoria following the absence of a y2k disaster), followed my a major letdown, which, combined with higher rates, could spell the end for the nasdaq gold rush. Nuthin lasts forever. And with 1Q:99 being the most likely candidate for being the first quarter in which many big growth net players with record their first sequentially lower revenue quarter, we may see a significant correction. Do I really need to supply numbers for u? I've done enough financial analysis in my time to know that a company that is, in my opinion, grossly overstating revenues by recording the total sale price rather than commission (net revenue) and is misleading investors. And there is no way that a 30 million a quarter (net rev) company with no margin is worth 8 billion dollars, no matter how fast it is growing. I defy u to come up with a reasonable financial model for PCLN cash flows that can justify it's price. I don't short internet stocks, period. I don't like the momentum players and the daytraders ability to manipulate and it isn't worth the risk to me, there are easier ways to make money. Also, Peter Lynch's strategy of buy what u know is, imo, a farce. He has been a contributing factor to the lack of understanding of fundamentals and valuation that plagues the market today. There is a time to play the momentum, and the most important trick to that strategy is to know when to pack your bags. All this new-era bs is basically a manufactured way to explain the fact that stock demand has exceeded stock supply, resulting in prices that show no correlation to value. Sooner or later (not that i am hoping for it) those two concepts have to come back into line, it is a law of free markets. It may be fast, it may be slow, but it will eventually happen. Unless, that is, you really think that all these companies can continue to grow 100% y-o-y for the next 100 years straight and yield net margins upwards of 20%? As for priceline, considering it's financials, it's shakey market position (competitors are starting to come in), and all the other points i made here, it looks to me as if the risks are waaaaaay too high here (read: discount rate) to justify an 8 billion market cap. That kind of number reflect the blind faith of investors that everything will go smoothely over the next 10 yrs and the company will continue to grow at astronomical rates. The current lack of momentum in the stock, the cancelled debt offering, the patent disputes, these are all warning signs, ignore them at your own peril. I have no problem with riding the wave, or trading, but if that is your take then don't lionize PCLN as the end all be all of e-commerce. I am simply stating the way I see it, I don't know for sure what will happen, but I think that my analysis is logical and reasonable. I don't make a habit out of ripping into stocks, but every once in a while, I see situations that are out of line and I think this is one of them (Ktel was another that I fought, so was HIFN). There are many people out there who have no idea how to anticpate markets or do real financial evaluation, there are also many people who are unaware of what goes on behind the scenes on wall st. I am just trying to provide some insight. -enam