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Strategies & Market Trends : Gorilla and King Portfolio Candidates -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jacob Snyder who wrote (39486)	2/19/2001 4:29:37 PM
From: Seeker of Truth	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 54805

I think AMAT is a very strong king, not a gorilla because basically it is offering one stop shopping. In my understanding you can get a fab built without them. Strong king or not, their products take a lot of capital to buy, and the more expensive capital equipment is the more cyclical is the market for it. Have you ever looked at the shares of shipbuilders? Investors are upset by cyclicality so AMAT will always sell for a lower PE than the actual earnings return would suggest. That said there are respected long term holders of the stock, e.g. CREF.

To: Jacob Snyder who wrote (39486)	2/21/2001 12:53:13 PM
From: FLSTF97	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 54805

Jacob, yes I sold most of my AMAT holdings in very early 2000. I didn't exactly nail the top but close enough. I don't recall the actual numbers now but they we at or very near an all time high valuation relative to sales. Since capacity in this industry come online in big chunks, I think we will continue to see volatility until the foundries take a much larger share of the market. I'm not ready to jump back in frankly despite Intel's capex budget (budgets and actually spending are two different things). I do believe that AMAT will come out of any downturn a much stronger King and likely closer to becoming a Gorilla. The last time I looked they had about $4bil in cash. A downturn is the perfect time to pick up missing pieces of the puzzle. Nobody else seems to be catching up to them in offering a turnkey fab unless one considers Mattson as a serious threat (I don't by a long shot.) I will one day jump back in with both feet, but I don't think that now is the right time. People are merely cautious, not yet claiming that the sky is falling. FATBOY