To: Sonki who wrote (38834 ) 12/9/2000 8:08:46 PM From: QwikSand Read Replies (2) | Respond to Part of Briefing.com's Friday disinformation concerned a mention of SUNW in a "short-selling letter" or some such thing. I wonder if they could have meant the following excerpt from an interview with two short-selling money managers, Buettner and Straus of Straus Asset Management, on page 50 of this week's Barron's.Q: Did our one-day rally last week change your thinking? Has the speculation been washed out?Straus: No. The Nasdaq short term is oversold and still due for some sort of bounce. We're in a seasonally strong period, we've had the election results almost affirmed, and the Fed effectively went to a neutral bias. Greenspan has an almost impeccable record he doesn't want to ruin. So he'll actually start to loosen in January or February when it becomes absolutely crystal clear the economy has weakened. But we haven't seen the technical bottom. Twice as many investment services are bullish than are bearish. It's usually the reverse at the bottom. Over 60% of individual investors are still bullish, versus 45% a month ago. Mutual funds are up to 6% cash. It used to be that 8% was the low end of the band and 15% the high end. I don't consider 6% a lot. Also, over $100 billion in the last year came into the market from foreigners. Historically, they invested $10-$20 billion into our market. With the dollar weakening, the foreigner could become a liquidator. But the final capitulation to make people really scared isn't here yet. We have a group of shorts we monitor, which even after the declines still sell for 125 times this year's earnings and 82 times next year's - Sun Microsystems, I2, Mercury Interactive . I'm not impugning their quality, just their multiples.
