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Non-Tech : Williams Companies, Inc. (WMB) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bernard Levy who wrote (201)	5/3/2000 6:11:00 PM
From: samoyed	Respond to of 271

Yes, very true, but WMB actually went up on T's warning. Good news today will hopefully be remembered when things stabilize. I'm in long term, so the wait will be worth it. Definitely not shorts: Month Shares (Mil) % Outs % Float Days 04/10/00 4.382 0.992 1.306 2.575 03/10/00 7.824 1.772 2.331 4.597

To: Bernard Levy who wrote (201)	5/7/2000 11:05:00 AM
From: samoyed	Respond to of 271

Princeton, New Jersey, May 3 (Bloomberg Data) -- Williams Cos Inc. (WMB US) was reiterated near-term ''buy'' by analyst Donato J. Eassey at Merrill Lynch. The 12-month target price is $63.00 per share. The long-term rating was also reiterated ''buy.''

To: Bernard Levy who wrote (201)	5/12/2000 7:33:00 AM
From: samoyed	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 271

Thursday May 11, 12:52 pm Eastern Time worldlyinvestor.com Sector of the Day Telecommunications Power Play By David H.M. Baker, Columnist Williams Co. offers the upside of broadband build-out and the security of a profitable energy business. We all love bargains, and this is especially true in the current nervous market environment. As I have previously stated, the focus has moved from what may be to what is. Revenue growth, business penetration and customer ramp up has given way to earnings, cash flow and current income. This is why it is so important to find companies that have current earnings that are well positioned to participate in many of the high-growth sectors. Williams Co. (NYSE:WMB - news) is a perfect example of a lower-risk growth play. The company has a well-established, profitable energy business whose earnings stream is being utilized to shield losses from the build out of its vast telecommunications unit. This allows investors to participate in the long-term growth offered by the company's establishment of a nationwide fiber-optic network without the liquidity risk that may face a number of its competitors. Cash Generator Williams is an energy and communications company with over $25 billion in assets, $9 billion in revenues and $16.6 billion market capitalization. The energy division is comprised of a pipeline and energy-service segment. Williams owns approximately 27,000 miles of a nationwide pipeline segment providing nearly 25% of the nations daily capacity. The energy service is a vast enterprise consisting of a number of refineries, natural gas gathering/distribution systems, convenience stores, ethanol facilities, exploration & production as well as energy marketing and trading company. This division is a strong cash flow generator and is just starting to benefit from the firming of energy prices this past year. The pipeline segment alone is expected to generate approximately $1 billion in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) in 2000, with the energy-service segment providing just under $1 billion EBITDA in the same period. In turn, the cash generated allows the company to invest in rapidly expanding business segments, without putting the company at risk by piling on an inordinate debt load or significantly increasing the shareholder risks by pursuing dilutive equity issuance transactions to fund the operations. Playing Telecom Wildcard The wildcard that Williams holds is its 85% ownership interest in Williams Communications Group (NYSE:WCG - news), an exclusive wholesale, full-service provider of end-to-end carrier services over a nationwide fiber network. This network is comprised of over 33,000 route miles of which 24,000 is lit and is projected to be connected to 125 cities planned by the end of 2000. The genius in the architecture of these networks is that much of it housed within Williams' pipelines. The company avoids many costly rights of way issues and has been able to ramp up the network much faster than many competitors. Also, the network is designed to allow the company to scale with the expected future growth opportunities. Low on Energy The current value of Williams' holdings in Williams Communications is $14.5 billion. On a per-share basis -- based on 448 million fully diluted shares -- that works out to be approximately 88% of Williams Communications' share price. This values Williams' energy business at just over $2 billion, or $6.15 per share. That's exceptionally cheap when analysts project earnings from the energy business of $1.15 to $1.20 a share in 2000. This correlates into a forward price/earnings valuation of just over 5 times on its energy unit -- a far cry from the industry average of 1 Go to www.worldlyinvestor.com to see all of our latest stories.