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To: Graystone who wrote (91011)	11/10/2002 12:01:58 PM
From: long-gone	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116909

The Next Market Boom May Be A Lifetime Away By Vincent Boland The Financial Times 11-9-2 Here's a strange thing for the boss of a stock market to say: you won't have it so good again. Wick Simmons (pictured), chairman and chief executive of Nasdaq, is not given to hyperbole. But he is ready to predict that investors will probably not see again in their lifetimes a stock market like the one Nasdaq gave them in the second half of the 1990s. Perhaps it is a flippant observation. Yet it is not difficult to catch the note of relief in Mr Simmons's comment - and a message to Nasdaq's army of unhappy investors. His words are a way of drawing a line under Nasdaq's brash past. They also signal that some serious growing up is being attempted at the number two US stock market as it struggles to survive the ferocious bear market that has followed the most spectacular bull market in the history of Wall Street. The affable Mr Simmons can speak with authority. Unlike many of the bankers and traders who are losing their jobs in New York and London, he knows what a bear market feels like. The 2002 version most resembles that of the early 1970s, he says during an interview at Nasdaq's temporary home, across the street from its famous "market site" in Times Square: "I was in my 30s at that time and didn't have the institutional wisdom I hope I have now. That was the only time I can remember when we had this kind of gloom settle over the Street." Nasdaq has become a particular victim of the vertiginous fall in share prices but it has been hurt badly in other areas too. It has some 3,800 listed companies, the lowest number since 1982. The combined market value has fallen from about $6,700bn on March 10 2000, when the market peaked, to $2,000bn (£1,300bn) today, a decline of 70 per cent. (The New York Stock Exchange lists about 2,800 companies valued at $14,000bn.) More than 500 Nasdaq companies could be delisted in the next few months because their share prices have fallen below the minimum $1 level. In its core business of attracting new companies to list, the decline is equally graphic. Nasdaq has attracted 33 initial public offerings so far this year, compared with its record of 680 in 1996. It lists 219 foreign companies, the lowest number for a decade. Some of the most egregious cases of 1990s corporate excess - WorldCom, Qwest Communications - were Nasdaq companies. The current difficulties at the US Securities and Exchange Commission, which regulates the market, have not helped confidence in the sector. Then there is Nasdaq's awful sense of timing. It has been forced to write off a $20m investment in a venture in Japan that was launched at the peak of the market. An equally expensive foray into Europe has raised eyebrows. A flirtation with the London Stock Exchange went nowhere. Last, there is its new electronic market system, SuperMontage - a bull market idea launched in the depths of a bear market and a system that its critics say should have been built years ago. That is a lot to be gloomy about. Not surprisingly, some observers question whether Nasdaq can survive. In particular, there is growing concern that the brand has been devalued beyond(cont) rense.com