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

To: EnricoPalazzo who wrote (47938)	10/15/2001 7:36:55 PM
From: Pirah Naman	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 54805

Ethan: Like most people of the ill-fated GK class of 2000, I haven't much faith left in my stock-picking abilities. So perhaps it's just pessimism I won't tell you not to be depressed or discouraged, because they are natural reactions. But this can be just part of the learning curve if you approach it right. Try to write down exactly what you think were your errors. Take a break, and come back and ask "were these my errors, or did things just go badly?" i.e., remember that a correct decision can still yield a negative result. If you invested according to your own rules and understanding, then you didn't make a mistake. If you made a mistake, you can decide how to avoid that mistake going forward. If you didn't make a true mistake, then you can think about how you can improve your rules in the future, so that you can play within a better strategy. If you enjoy the process of investing (as opposed to those who just dream of riches and are disappointed if they don't get them), then you will get better and your results will reflect that. But you will also make new errors along the way, and there will be periods of setback. While this doesn't make them "fun" it may make them easier to keep in perspective. - Pirah

To: EnricoPalazzo who wrote (47938)	10/15/2001 11:23:23 PM
From: techreports	Respond to of 54805

I do in fact have money in SEBL & QCOM (also a share in BRCD, but that's really just to remind me to watch out). But that's really more a matter of my temperament (unwillingness to sit out the market) than of any real certainty about the prospects of these two companies. From a broad perspective, I'm really uncertain whether and how 3G will be used by the masses. I can't be sure, but I don't think i would have been so cautious about, say, the PC in the late 1980's. I'm very concerned about the mortality of patents, as this exacerbates the downside when markets are slow to develop. In the late 80s, I'm sure there were still many questions of who would win. Whether Apple and their graphical user interface would dominate the market. Intel actually had some serious competition. AMD's 486 processor was actually better than Intel's. That's when they changed plans and launched the Pentium and started a massive branding campaign. No company is perfect. I rather invest in a company where I know the risks.. businessweek.com On the ojective level, I recognized that the companies or industries in which I invested were bound to be flawed and I preferred to know what the flaws were. This did not stop me from investing; on the contrary, I felt much safer when I knew the potential danger points because that told me what signs to look for to sell my investment. No investment can offer superior returns indefinitely. Even if a company has superior market position, oustanding management, and exceptional profit margins, the stock may become overvalued, management may become complacent, and the competitive or regulatory environment may change. It is wise to be constantly looking for the fly in the ointment. When you know what it is, you are ahead of the game. I certainly believe that Microsoft, for instance, has a strong future ahead of it, i.e. low chance of failure, but while .NET could prove extremely lucrative, it's unripe for serious individual investment at this stage. Besides, my financial future is substantially pegged to the stock anyway, so that's ruled out. Not so sure..many of Microsoft's dirt tactics don't work anymore. A OEM can probably offer another OS which wasn't possible a few years ago. Microsoft would practically triple the amount they charged an OEM if they offer computers with another OS, which basically deterred them from offering another OS. If Apple released MacOS X for the x86 architecture, we could see as much as 7% of the market switch. Linux is working on a program that allows linux OS to run Microsoft applications. Still, I've read reports that Microsoft has massed thousands of software patents. So if they wanted, they could start suing companies to keep their monopoly. EBay, which is appealing in ways reminiscent of Gorillas, stands a very high chance of continuing to grow cash flow rapidly, but the P/E is just very high (~ 200). I haven't checked out the P/CF. eBay isn't perfect either. I felt and still feel that if Aol wanted, they could force their users to use their auction service, which would hurt eBay. Aol has roughly 31+ million households. Right now, I think eBay and Aol have a partnership so competition from Aol isn't a serious concern, plus Aol is now part of TimeWarner and is focused on other things..but Aol controls their users see much like Microsoft. As for BRCD, i'd watch out for SoIP. Many Brocade investors shrug off SoIP, but I think IP is going to be everywhere. Everything eventually goes to IP standard that can reasonably do so. So any technology on the road-tracks of this IP standards theme could be crushed. Once gigabit range ethernet connections are cheaply and widely available to company offices, the existing conventional phone system is doomed. Because VoIP can be cheaply added and then voice transmission is free. So you dump all your existing expensive phone lines and equipment So SoIP makes similar sense. Why wouldn't a corporation want a common ethernet IP standard for all data in the enterprise? Lowers cost..Why should data in storage boxes be treated any different than data in any other type of box?

To: EnricoPalazzo who wrote (47938)	10/16/2001 2:11:54 AM
From: Stock Farmer	Respond to of 54805

Hi Ethan, The author's reasoning is well wrapped up in the logic of moods. Yes. Very often. Moreso than many people realize at the time and it is this very characteristic that exposes itself at a well orchestrated auction. Or a market bubble. Faith in stock picking? Yah, I hear you. You have Brocade, I have Laidlaw. But there's a silver lining to the cloud. I suggest you should have little faith in the methods of stock picking you USED to use. Or more accurately, in the methods of stock pricing you used to use. I do think that GGaming picks good companies. Where I think you should have more faith is in the things you are kicking yourself about now. Whatever they are. Falling down was a part of how we all learned to walk. My current focus on GGaming is a result of woulda-coulda-shoulda hindsight applied to some of the pre-bubble period :) As to applicability of learnings? I don't think that it's too useful to lie awake at night thinking about bail-out points in the event that a bubble or micro-bubble materializes. The risk of that is much lower now. But this isn't to say dismiss thoughts forever. Ponder, but not with urgency. But entry points are another matter. I am personally not committing any capital to the market. For a couple of reasons but one is that I fear my valuation methods are not well calibrated for the current climate. Another is that the current climate still holds vestiges of the recent past. The two are mixing at the moment and the landscape is not clear. Not at all. Your being in the market exposes you to more risk, but that's the only way one can capture rewards. I'm more worried about capturing the negative kind of rewards than I would be pleased by capturing the positive kind. If you aren't similarly biased, then your stance of being in the market is quite appropriate. It would be a boring place if we all had the same stance on risk! As to the value of patents? Well, there we seem to be aligned. As far as I am concerned two problems: first, they run out, and thus their terminal value is zero. Second; patents are dangerous when used actively as an offensive weapon (as opposed to defensively)... extortion is not something that builds a loyal customer base. John.