To: pat mudge who wrote (13537 ) 10/28/2000 12:42:14 AM From: tekboy Read Replies (2) | Respond to of 24042 This article has all the markings of someone in a highly-leveraged short position who stands to lose his hide in the buying panic that's already begun. Actually, pat, Greg Jones--the author--has regularly been an intelligent commentator on tech trends in general and the optical sector in particular. He's written their "Photonics Revolution" series, for example. He does technology and fundamental analysis, not TA or other stuff, and I doubt he's motivated here by anything other than his sincere opinions. Don't know if it's been posted yet, but here was his response today to comments like yours: 11:02 ET ****** Optical Lowdown : We received more than a few emails about yesterday's JDSU comments, accusing us of shorting optical stocks, thinking the sector is going to hell, and so on. It's time to set the record straight. If there is one lesson that every investor should have learned this year, it's this: valuations matter. The optical business is booming and will be booming for years to come. Telecommunications service providers must adopt optical technologies or they will not be able to compete. But strong growth in optical networking sales does not mean that optical stocks are a good buy at any price. The stock pages are littered with great businesses that have seen horrendous stock price declines this year. It's not enough to have a great business; the business has to be sufficiently great to justify the price. That's what we have questioned with the optical sector. As was the case early in the dot-com bubble, investors have been making the mistake of believing that the worst case scenario is the current consensus, and that no competition exists outside of the current crop of publicly traded companies. Both are false. Capital expenditure growth at service providers will almost certainly be less robust in 2001. While the numbers might still be strong and growth will quite likely be focussed on optical gear, this still represents a change on the margin. Growth in spending, even on optical gear, will probably not be as good as had been expected. And competition is much more intense than widely believed. That venture cap money that used to fund dot-coms is now flooding optical start-ups. The line of opticals-in-waiting grows larger as a quick look at the IPO backlog indicates. When you are dealing with a sector whose valuations are extraordinary -- P/E and even some P/S ratios in the hundreds, any unexpected change in demand and/or competition can have an outsized impact on valuation. That is what we have seen in recent weeks -- a valuation reassessment. Now, back to JDSU's report. Was it good? Absolutely. But does that change the fact that concerns about demand and competition are now out there? Absolutely not. The Pandora's box has been opened. The JDSU report was good, and that is better than being bad. But as we noted yesterday, the demand slowdown is not expected until next year, and component makers will be the last to see it, so JDSU's past is not necessarily the optical sector's future. These stocks offer great long-term potential, but only at the right price. We are much closer to that price than we were a few weeks ago, but we're probably not there yet. - Greg Jones, Briefing.com tekboy@notallskepticsareshorts.com