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Strategies & Market Trends : Value Investing -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Paul Senior who wrote (21661)	7/12/2005 3:53:40 AM
From: itilis2003	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 78817

I have tended to dismiss 13D buyers such as this one has unless there is other insider buying on top of it. Why ? Because a beneficial owner isnt really an insider and as such doesnt have any insider knowledge. Sure, he is "deemed" one by his large position, but that brings us back to him and his track record. Without any reason to believe the guy has a fantastic track record, I dismiss these kind of filings. As for SPOR, I hold my position from years ago. To say I have lost confidence in the board is an understatement. Watching them spend millions defending the Tomlinsons and then letting the tomlimnsons parachute out with severences well above even what was stated in the proxy is hard to fathom. The fact that they hired a banker many months ago and we havent heard anything and the stock has gone down suggests to me they are going to try and screw us since the Tomlinsons showed them how its done. I fear they will go dark on us and pilfer whats left. I hope Im wrong, but none of the directors has a significant stake and not one has a backbone from what I can tell. Id say our upside might be $4-4.50 in a buyout...if anyone wants it. Our downside ? $2.00 bid, $2.50 offer on the pinksheets perhaps followed by a reverse split to force out small holders at unfavorable prices. As for BAMM, I sold half of my small remaining position at $9.99 the day they announced the tender. The fact that insiders werent selling was bullish. The fact that an insider sold a bunch in the open market a few days later was bearish. So its a split decision for me. But with my cost basis so low, I feel like I should hold a small position out of gratitude.

To: Paul Senior who wrote (21661)	7/14/2005 3:33:10 PM
From: Jurgis Bekepuris	Respond to of 78817

Partially OT. I bought a small position of OAKLX today. I want to evaluate this fund and see if I want to make it one of my core mutual fund holdings. Our 401(k) right now has Vanguard Windsor II in its offerings. I got their report some time ago. The positives of the fund are low cost, low turnover, great recent results. The negative is its size (I guess a lot of 401(k)s and similar are invested there), complex investment structure - they have 5!!!! teams who invest funds money with 58% going to one of them (James Barrow) and the rest to others. Also I am not sure I like what Barrow reports in their quarterly reports. Lots of top-down market-speak mumbo jumbo instead of bottom-up value investing. I am evaluating whether I will keep any money in Windsor II in the future. BTW, interesting that recently quite a few value funds closed to new investors: Tweedy Browne, some of Third Avenue funds, Dodge and Cox. Funded Jurgis