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Technology Stocks : All About Sun Microsystems -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JDN who wrote (35139)	9/9/2000 9:04:35 PM
From: QwikSand	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 64865

JDN: you know how you're always saying you're not a technical guy and you need to rely on others here who are more technical to explain some of the chip and benchmark things? Well, I'm not an accountant, and I need you to explain the article in this week's Barron's about how companies are reporting their earnings and the GAAP vs. "Pro Forma" numbers. It made me uncomfortable to read it. Partly because I didn't completely understand it. But also partly because, from the part I did understand, it looks like earnings numbers and estimates are no longer being reported according to any generally accepted standard. People leave out or leave in whatever the hell they feel like, and everyone does it different. "What do you expect, we're not steel companies, we grow by acquisition and investing in the future for years when we start up, if you just did simple addition according to a set formula and included one-shot events it wouldn't represent the truth, you can only pay attention to earnings from our operations as WE choose to define them," this seems to be the rationale. The problem is that the article shows that everyone defines them however they want and Wall Street is 100% bought into that program. I can see some sense to it because these companies are in fact starting up. But because there's no uniformity, I can also see what looks like a lot of potential for some really serious deception and shennanigans. It seems like the recent "awakening to the need for profitability" had less effect than everyone seems to think. Anyway, JDN I won't reproduce it here because it's long but if you don't have the Barron's hard copy and can't follow this link, I will PM you with it. I'm not sure whether it takes a subscription or not. Anyway, I'd appreciate your thoughts. --QS interactive.wsj.com