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Technology Stocks : Cisco Systems, Inc. (CSCO) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ed Forrest who wrote (40829)	10/14/2000 3:05:39 PM
From: kvkkc1	Respond to of 77400

I've held for over 7 years, and I'm not looking to get rid of it anytime soon. I sold covered calls last January on Jan01 leaps that would have given me a 55% total return if they are exercised, on a quarter of my holdings. We'll see what happens.knc

To: Ed Forrest who wrote (40829)	10/17/2000 4:13:56 AM
From: Stock Farmer	Respond to of 77400

Hi Ed. Noted your post 4% up YTD vs NASD down 23% & view of CSCO as a relatively good investment therefore. Today's close brought it to 2% up versus 24% down for NASD. It is true that YTD investing in CSCO would beat a room full of chimpanzees mindlessly picking equities from the NASD in composite. Right next door we have NT with a 32% return YTD. Just a tad farther afield, you might note that 2% return over 9.5 months is worse than a T-bill... which is the baseline for pathetic against the growth investor's objectives. I suppose it's OK to be content with the biggest bonsai in the garden... but I have slightly larger ambitions. As I posted several times, my outlook on CSCO is a "great company, but a lousy investment, right now" - compared to alternatives that are out there. Someone posted that such a view was self contradictory. Not so. Stock in a "great company" can be a lousy investment merely by the virtue of the price one must pay, relative to the price one must pay for similar value elsewhere. I chose the words "price" and "value" very carefully. This does not speak against the company as having been a great investment in the past. For an equity which yeilds no dividend, an investment decision boils down to price versus price appreciation. Which is where the past and the future are divergent. It is one thing to grow market cap from 40 B$ to 400 B$, and yet another thing altogether to grow from 400 B$ to 4 T$. By itself, lack of spectacular up does not argue to 'dump a position'. The established investor with unrealized capital gains is looking at a leveraged position by remaining invested, versus facing the tax consequences of exit & establishing a new position at a lower base. Leverage works both ways however. It is distressing that many of the longer term investors express what appears to be a perilomatic bias in regards to market sentiment. For those who don't recall the "Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy", perilomatic sunglasses were designed to defend the wearer by becoming opaque at the slightest hint of danger. As I posted earlier, if one takes the view that stock price appreciation rates in excess of economic growth appreciation are a correction waiting to occur... then there is truly danger. Particularly for those who have the highest leverage. Only months ago I recall posts gloating over 1700% returns over 5 years. Today, looks more like 1200%... In absolute terms, who wouldn't be satisfied! But in relative terms? It is an unusual investor who would contemplate satisfaction with 500% "loss" of their original stake. But what are the extrinsic forces? It could very well be that a manic force has propelled the stock price forward and that it has been lofted to heights from which it could continue to settle. Or it could be that a despondency has settled over the market and dragged down good equities with it. The bubble-like shape of price curves lends more credence to a prior manic tendency... so I am concerned. Thank goodness the company is reporting flawless execution! I still have no position. But, as always, contemplating entry points. This to indicate positive view on long-term business prospects, but concern about the stock price. Would rather miss some up than partake of down at this point. With the view that unsavory opinions often taste better than crow, I invite comment from some of the more bearish. I am also more concerned with reasoning than conclusions. Each of us gets to make our own investing decisions. As such discussion is an unnatural act for the thread, I also beg that posts and responses deal with more substantive issues than spelling and grammar and whatnot. Comments? John.