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Strategies & Market Trends : Trend Setters and Range Riders -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Susan G who wrote (4834)	5/5/2001 12:05:36 PM
From: SusieQ1065	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 5732

MFNX..one of Briefing's Laggers..now a Featured Stock Play on WallStreetCity.com Featured Stocks May 4 2001 12:43PM CST Metromedia Fiber: Laying the Roads for the Information Superhighway in Metro Areas by Chris Connor Senior Technology Analyst, WallStreetCity.com Bandwidth Bandwidth Bandwidth Metromedia Fiber Network {MFNX} is a leader in the deployment of optical IP Internet infrastructure within large metropolitan areas. In short, Metromedia provides the infrastructure that allows companies to connect to remote offices, Internet data centers, telecommunication central offices, and carrier hotels to access such services as local and long-distance voice, email, ultra-fast Internet browsing, and remote storage management. The company intends to deploy a mesmerizing 3.6 million fiber miles of fiber-optic infrastructure by 2004. Already, the company has about 1.7 million fiber miles deployed. In fact, the company's fiber capacity grew 19 percent on a quarter-to-quarter basis. What does Metromedia intend to do with all this bandwidth? Metromedia wants to breakdown all bandwidth barriers for metro areas by offering essentially unlimited bandwidth capacity at a fixed cost instead of going by the amount of capacity that is used. Recent Earnings Release Metromedia appears to be on the right track since nobody seems to get enough bandwidth, especially in metropolitan areas that are inundated with LANs (local area networks) and WANs (wide area networks), but let's see how the company is doing money-wise. According to the company's latest earnings release, revenues soared 141 percent over the same period one year ago to $77 million. In fact, that revenue number exceeded the company's guidance of $74 million. Metromedia was able to report a blow-out quarter from a revenue standpoint because of continued strength in both its Internet infrastructure (includes managed services from recent acquisition SiteSmith) and optical infrastructure businesses. However, the company continues to wallow in red ink as the company builds out its Internet and optical infrastructures. Bad Connections Although Metromedia has been quite adept at expanding its customer list to include such diverse major companies as Electronic Arts {ERTS}, Verizon {VZ}, America Online {AOL}, and Sun Microsystems {SUNW}, Metromedia also has strong ties with struggling telecommunications companies that are in trouble of going out of business. For example, Winstar Communications {WCIEQ} agreed to purchase $300 million worth of dark fiber from Metromedia over a 25 year period and supply Metromedia's AboveNet division with long-haul backbone services, but Winstar recently filed for bankruptcy on April 18. In other words, Winstar has left Metromedia completely in the lurch. That said, the biggest risk with Metromedia is that it will suffer as its weaker partners and customers begin to drop off like flies, so investors need to take a long look at the complete telecommunications industry when researching Metromedia for a possible investment. Metromedia may be generating excellent sales growth now, but it obviously does not live on an island by itself because the misfortunes of weaker companies could limit the upside potential of this Internet infrastructure powerhouse. Looking Forward An Internet infrastructure powerhouse trading around $6 should attract aggressive investors to the stock even though the stock is not cheap based on sales (Metromedia's price to sales ratio is about 15 while the price to sales ratio of the S&P 500 is 4) or earnings (losses only). Given the distinct possibility that more telecommunication companies will fail like Winstar, those valuation measurements only add risk to Metromedia's stock. However, investors should not ignore Metromedia for the long term because the company is funded well enough to meet its goal of deploying 3.6 million fiber miles of fiber-optic infrastructure by 2004 and the company should be one of the big kuhunas of Internet infrastructure in the explosive metro optical networking (MON) industry for years to come

To: Susan G who wrote (4834)	5/5/2001 12:59:03 PM
From: SusieQ1065	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 5732

AMRI came up on a scan for reasonable P/E and High Earnings Growth Rate...it made a nice move on Friday...and it isn't already too far gone... P/E Ratio: 47.3 Earnings Growth Rate: 103 AMRI Daily: home.earthlink.net

To: Susan G who wrote (4834)	5/5/2001 1:13:05 PM
From: SusieQ1065	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 5732

Updated: 07-May-01 General Commentary Friday morning's jobs data were much worse than expected; the market opened sharply lower in reaction to the data; and then the big money investors stepped in and did just what Briefing.com said they would - they bought the dip... The result, an eye-opening turnaround which has bears/shorts very, very nervous... Though end gain of 45 points was nothing too spectacular, the Nasdaq finished at its session high and more than 100 points off its opening low. While many on the street expressed surprise/shock at the market's resiliency it's largely because they've been too busy telling the market what it should do rather than listening to the message of the market... As odd as it may seem, just because the near-term economic/earnings picture is bleak doesn't mean stock prices must go lower... The Nasdaq tumbled 68% from its old high in anticipation of the current economic/earnings mess... By moving sharply higher over the past month amid steadily improving internals (a/d line, new highs/new lows, volume, etc), market has been telling us that the bad news is in and that it is safe to look past the abyss to the time when earnings/economy begin to improve. Market now sees that turn taking place in Q4... For this rally to loose steam, traders will have to be convinced that the recovery is further down the road - much further... We aren't likely to get a good sense of that until Q2 warnings season, which remains several weeks off... In the meantime, traders looking at the powerful tape, and at the prospect of another 50 to 100 basis points in rate cuts, and they want in... And the higher the market climbs, the more sidelined investors will feel the need to get in themselves and the more shorts will be squeezed... That's how momentum builds, and it is building - ugly economy or not. While the large-cap companies with proven earnings streams continue to dominate the action, we did see participation expand to the second and third tier players late last week... Another bullish signal... Look for more of this behavior in the week ahead, as investors search for those shares left behind during the first push higher. Though earnings slow to a trickle this week, market will be focusing a lot of attention on Cisco's (CSCO) numbers due after Tuesday's close... Global Crossing (GX) and Electronic Arts (ERTS) are among the other notables due to release results over the next few days... Even if these companies disappoint, we doubt that they would carry enough weight alone or together to knock the market off its current path. Robert Walberg