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Non-Tech : Bill Wexler's Dog Pound -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: chojiro who wrote (9293)	3/7/2003 1:26:53 AM
From: Bill Wexler	Respond to of 10293

I've been covering. On the other hand, I tend to be early. I'm also fairly well diversified. I've never been in a situation where any one position could destroy my entire portfolio...however, I did get hurt shorting internet stocks during the bubble. The price rises were so extreme...and he floats so tight, that I was simply killed on buy-ins. For the most part, I've stood pat on the outright frauds...because I knew that - sooner or later - the truth would surface. I knew that Chromatics Color Science would fail in trying to pawn off a cheap cosmetics color-meter as a breakthrough medical device. I knew that Zonagen would fail in relabeling an ancient and dangerous vasodilator as an ED drug. I knew that Turbochef's "revolutionary" oven was nothing more than a combination Microwave and convection oven priced at 10x what a similar item would cost you from GE or Kenmore. I knew that MTXX/GUMM's promotion of an inert "Homeopathic" gel as a remedy for the common cold would fail. In every single case I was 100% certain that I would make a profit from shorting the stock...because ultimately, you can't fool mother nature...no matter how many hundreds of cheerleaders typing furious rants on message boards claim otherwise.

To: chojiro who wrote (9293)	3/7/2003 4:31:11 PM
From: Bill Wexler	Respond to of 10293

Oh...I should also point out one more thing... I made a lot of money shorting Gardenburger (formerly GBUR...now GBUR.OB): finance.yahoo.com I never had to spend one minute worrying about or watching this position after opening it...I simply shorted more and added to my position nearly every week for many months. In this case, I only asked one simple question: "Will Americans give up burgers and switch en-masse to (what I jokingly called the product...) compressed salad patties?" When the stock was flying, I studied the financials for about 15 minutes (they weren't hard). Bought a box of Gardenburgers at Costco (I was long Costco at the time!!) and made two phone calls to the company. They were actually very nice people. I didn't see any evidence of fraud or overzealous stock promotion. However, the pitch they gave to investors simply didn't make sense. It assumed that an enormous number of people would permanently change their eating habits. The stock price reflected an absurd amount of optimism. And I think it would be wonderful if everyone switched to a healthy vegetarian diet, but the honest answer to my one simple question was "no". It was a slam dunk short. The stock traded quietly...and it was very easy to borrow because the company didn't show up on anybody's radar - so it never got crowded. In fact, there were times when I alone accounted for nearly half the entire short interest!!! A perfect example of a short that doesn't need to be watched. They rarely come along. P.S. The Gardenburgers actually weren't bad, but I will never buy more.