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Strategies & Market Trends : Gorilla and King Portfolio Candidates -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: mtnlady who wrote (15984)	1/22/2000 8:00:00 PM
From: mtnlady	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

Add KING to every statement I mentioned Gorilla. Kings have a disadvantage in that they need to worry about competition as much as new tornadoes. They possibly have an ADVANTAGE (radical thought I am just tossing around now in my brain) in that they are not chained/shackled to the technologies as much as the gorillas (true???) in that no value chain has been built up around them holding them hostage in gold chains. For example the technology behind fiber optics could change - radically but JDSU could still, theoritically, pick up that new technology and sell it to! i.e. the ultimate arms merchant. The weapons change but the merchant carries them all...

To: mtnlady who wrote (15984)	1/22/2000 9:52:00 PM
From: Seeker of Truth	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 54805

Let me address your minor point, i.e. that you have done well with number 2. I think you were just plain lucky there. After all number 1 has more prominence; the media will write more about number1; it's sheer size generates free advertising. It draws good employees by its size and good customers by its size, and stock buyers ditto. Everybody wants to go with the biggest. To argue for buying number 2 would be deliberately avoiding the gorilla, surely heresy. I forget what the punishment is for that, something unpleasant no doubt, boiling oil, er.. let's not talk about it. I agree with your main idea; the lifetime of gorillas will be shorter in the future. So we have to watch for the emergence of a new paradigm, a new "game" in which the gorilla of some past game may be irrelevant, in other words the CAP will shorten. This is your guess and my guess but they are only our guesses. When a new game appears the gorilla from the last game may enter it and win because he(she) has the advantage of cash from the previous victorious game.

To: mtnlady who wrote (15984)	1/23/2000 12:11:00 AM
From: DownSouth	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

Someone mentioned here 100-300% increases are the 'norm' during a tornado. WE DO NOT SEE SUCH RETURNS FROM A GORILLA. Slow, steady, strong growth.. but not 100-300% returns. This statement causes me to wonder if you understand the Gorilla Game. We certainly do see these returns from Gorillas. We see even better returns from them during the tornado. I have owned INTC, MSFT, QCOM, and CISCO during years where 100% was a disappointment, year after year. And these returns were during the tornado after they were the gorillas. I do not believe that the life of gorillas will become shorter. I believe the length of time that a tornado lasts will become shorter, but more violent and profitable for investors. The Gorilla will get to main street faster, which is where INTC, MSFT and CSCO seem to be now. (CSCO is trying to start a new tornado in VOIP.) #2 in the market usually does pretty good too. All of my #2 companies that I've held have been bought out by someone else at a pretty penny. So owning #2 sometimes has been as lucrative as holding #1! Good point with plenty of antecdotal evidence, but one objective of the game is to reduce risk while maximizing profit. Holding number two increases risk, Are you willing to bet on #2 being purchased before its margins and market share cause its price to rapidly decline?